Wiki language: en

<mediawiki xmlns="http://www.mediawiki.org/xml/export-0.10/" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" xsi:schemaLocation="http://www.mediawiki.org/xml/export-0.10/ http://www.mediawiki.org/xml/export-0.10.xsd" version="0.10" xml:lang="en">
  <siteinfo>
    <sitename>Hitchwiki</sitename>
    <dbname>hitchwiki_en</dbname>
    <base>http:///https:///en/Main_Page</base>
    <generator>MediaWiki 1.32.3</generator>
    <case>first-letter</case>
    <namespaces>
      <namespace key="-2" case="first-letter">Media</namespace>
      <namespace key="-1" case="first-letter">Special</namespace>
      <namespace key="0" case="first-letter" />
      <namespace key="1" case="first-letter">Talk</namespace>
      <namespace key="2" case="first-letter">User</namespace>
      <namespace key="3" case="first-letter">User talk</namespace>
      <namespace key="4" case="first-letter">Hitchwiki</namespace>
      <namespace key="5" case="first-letter">Hitchwiki talk</namespace>
      <namespace key="6" case="first-letter">File</namespace>
      <namespace key="7" case="first-letter">File talk</namespace>
      <namespace key="8" case="first-letter">MediaWiki</namespace>
      <namespace key="9" case="first-letter">MediaWiki talk</namespace>
      <namespace key="10" case="first-letter">Template</namespace>
      <namespace key="11" case="first-letter">Template talk</namespace>
      <namespace key="12" case="first-letter">Help</namespace>
      <namespace key="13" case="first-letter">Help talk</namespace>
      <namespace key="14" case="first-letter">Category</namespace>
      <namespace key="15" case="first-letter">Category talk</namespace>
    </namespaces>
  </siteinfo>
  <page>
    <title>Main Page</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1503</id>
      <parentid>2745</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-10-18T04:59:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="976">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-left}}

|align="left" width="34%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-right}}

|}

==Related wikis==
[[w:c:cycling|Cycling Wiki]] - [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel] - [[w:c:World|World Wikia]]

[[Category:Browse]]</text>
      <sha1>f9t68n1tzplqul342dyz3siuehetx8s</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1504</id>
      <parentid>1</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="444">&lt;big&gt;'''MediaWiki has been successfully installed.'''&lt;/big&gt;

Consult the [http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Help:Contents User's Guide] for information on using the wiki software.

== Getting started ==

* [http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Help:Configuration_settings Configuration settings list]
* [http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Help:FAQ MediaWiki FAQ]
* [http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/mediawiki-announce MediaWiki release mailing list]</text>
      <sha1>h4akxazhyrfca1cq9yil0pxsafmqdhb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2708</id>
      <timestamp>2004-12-22T17:16:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Jasonr</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="29">This wikicity does not exist.</text>
      <sha1>eksspuep4k6hqz67iesr6nykkkihcxk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2709</id>
      <parentid>2708</parentid>
      <timestamp>2004-12-22T18:02:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Angela</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="909">'''The URL you entered points to a Wikicity that does not exist.'''

Please choose a correct URL from the [http://www.wikicities.com/index.php/List_of_Wikicities list of Wikicities].

If you would like to start a new Wikicity, please [http://www.wikicities.com/index.php/Start_a_new_Wikicity read the instructions] and fill out the [http://www.wikicities.com/index.php/Special:CreateWiki wiki request form].

Some of the most visited Wikicities include:
*[http://www.wikicities.com The central Wikicity]
*[http://peace.wikicities.com Peace Elements]
*[http://mac.wikicities.com WikiMac]
*[http://calgary.wikicities.com Calgary Community]
*[http://gknowledge.wikicities.com Green Knowledge]
*[http://tokipona.wikicities.com Toki pona encyclopedia]
*[http://ukrailways.wikicities.com UK Railways]
*[http://religion-wiki.wikicities.com Religion-wiki]
*[http://germanpodcast.wikicities.com Podcasts und Podcaster]</text>
      <sha1>gera5nzeyd3qxbyljtb33g00d0d6fu0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2710</id>
      <parentid>2709</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-01-25T16:02:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Jasonr</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1003">'''The URL you entered points to a Wikicity that does not exist.'''

Please choose a correct URL from the [http://www.wikicities.com/index.php/List_of_Wikicities list of Wikicities].

If you would like to start a new Wikicity, please [http://www.wikicities.com/index.php/Start_a_new_Wikicity read the instructions] and fill out the [http://www.wikicities.com/index.php/Special:CreateWiki wiki request form].

Some of the most visited Wikicities include (for a more up-to-date list, see our [http://www.wikicities.com/wikistats/Sitemap.htm stats]):
*[http://www.wikicities.com The central Wikicity]
*[http://peace.wikicities.com Peace Elements]
*[http://mac.wikicities.com WikiMac]
*[http://calgary.wikicities.com Calgary Community]
*[http://gknowledge.wikicities.com Green Knowledge]
*[http://tokipona.wikicities.com Toki pona encyclopedia]
*[http://ukrailways.wikicities.com UK Railways]
*[http://religion-wiki.wikicities.com Religion-wiki]
*[http://germanpodcast.wikicities.com Podcasts und Podcaster]</text>
      <sha1>kshhxte2lej8mtmv2udkk6ueexi7fsk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2711</id>
      <parentid>2710</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-01-25T16:11:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Jasonr</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1083">'''The URL you entered points to a Wikicity that does not exist.'''

Please choose a correct URL from the [http://www.wikicities.com/index.php/List_of_Wikicities list of Wikicities].

If you would like to start a new Wikicity, please [http://www.wikicities.com/index.php/Start_a_new_Wikicity read the instructions] and fill out the [http://www.wikicities.com/index.php/Special:CreateWiki wiki request form].

Some of the most visited Wikicities include (for a more up-to-date list, see our [http://www.wikicities.com/wikistats/Sitemap.htm stats]):
*[http://www.wikicities.com The central Wikicity]
*[http://doom.wikicities.com Doom]
*[http://mac.wikicities.com WikiMac]
*[http://creatures.wikicities.com Creatures]
*[http://calgary.wikicities.com Calgary Community]
*[http://gknowledge.wikicities.com Green Knowledge]
*[http://tokipona.wikicities.com Toki pona encyclopedia]
*[http://ukrailways.wikicities.com UK Railways]
*[http://peace.wikicities.com Peace Elements]
*[http://religion-wiki.wikicities.com Religion-wiki]
*[http://germanpodcast.wikicities.com Podcasts und Podcaster]</text>
      <sha1>iosclmo9buutqwnpwal7ga8gsu7dtoi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2712</id>
      <parentid>2711</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-05-04T21:22:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Angela</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="354">'''The URL you entered points to a Wikicity that does not exist.'''

Please choose a correct URL from the [[Wikicities:List of Wikicities|List of Wikicities]].

If you want to create this wiki or start another Wikicity, please [[Wikicities:Start a new Wikicity|read the instructions]] and fill out the [[Wikicities:Special:CreateWiki|wiki request form]].</text>
      <sha1>2bxv1lxwhxpz16p327cksj2q2q4fabm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2713</id>
      <parentid>2712</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-05-04T21:33:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Angela</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="354">'''The URL you entered points to a Wikicity that does not exist.'''

Please choose a correct URL from the [[Wikicities:List of Wikicities|list of Wikicities]].

If you want to create this wiki or start another Wikicity, please [[Wikicities:Start a new Wikicity|read the instructions]] and fill out the [[Wikicities:Special:CreateWiki|wiki request form]].</text>
      <sha1>fxlq4ff2co5q9bui46pt92cacek9dnd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2714</id>
      <parentid>4076</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-01-26T07:32:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Angela</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1039">'''The URL you entered points to a Wikicity that does not exist.'''

Please choose a correct URL from the [[Wikicities:List of Wikicities|list of Wikicities]].

If you want to create this wiki or start another Wikicity, please [[Wikicities:Start a new Wikicity|read the instructions]] and fill out the [[Wikicities:Special:CreateWiki|wiki request form]].

Some active wikis include:
*[http://memory-alpha.org/ Star Trek]
*[http://starwars.wikicities.com Star Wars]
*[http://doom.wikicities.com Doom]
*[http://creatures.wikicities.com Creatures]
*[http://muppet.wikicities.com Muppets]
*[http://whitewolf.wikicities.com White Wolf]
*[http://furry.wikicities.com Furry]
*[http://dofus.wikicities.com Dofus]
*[http://althistory.wikicities.com Alternative History]
*Parody wikis: [http://uncyclopedia.org/ Uncyclopedia (English)] / [http://nonsensopedia.wikicities.com/ Nonsensopedia (Polish)] / [http://desencyclopedie.wikicities.com/ Désencyclopédie (French)]

For test wikis, see the [http://scratchpad.wikicities.com Scratchpad WikiLab].</text>
      <sha1>3fqzwh8jl0gmwdo45m2ttilmuw69yqe</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2715</id>
      <parentid>4084</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-04-18T01:04:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Angela</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="944">'''The URL you entered points to a Wikia that does not exist.'''

Please choose a correct URL from the [[Wikia:List of Wikia|list of Wikia]].

If you want to create this wiki or start another Wikia, please [[Wikia:Start a new Wikia|read the instructions]] and fill out the [[Wikia:Special:CreateWiki|wiki request form]].

Some active wikis include:
*[http://memory-alpha.org/ Star Trek]
*[http://starwars.wikia.com Star Wars]
*[http://doom.wikia.com Doom]
*[http://creatures.wikia.com Creatures]
*[http://muppet.wikia.com Muppets]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://furry.wikia.com Furry]
*[http://dofus.wikia.com Dofus]
*[http://althistory.wikia.com Alternative History]
*Parody wikis: [http://uncyclopedia.org/ Uncyclopedia (English)] / [http://nonsensopedia.wikia.com/ Nonsensopedia (Polish)] / [http://desencyclopedie.com/ Désencyclopédie (French)]

For test wikis, see the [http://scratchpad.wikia.com Scratchpad WikiLab].</text>
      <sha1>jtl82ekxea6jg1i0qsrpfr37m7jif6q</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2716</id>
      <parentid>2715</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-04-26T19:05:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sannse</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1000">'''The URL you entered points to a Wikia that does not exist.'''

Please choose a correct URL from the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Wikia list of Wikia].

If you want to create this wiki or start another Wikia, please [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Start_a_new_Wikia read the instructions] and fill out the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Special%3ACreateWiki wiki request form].

Some active wikis include:
*[http://memory-alpha.org/ Star Trek]
*[http://starwars.wikia.com Star Wars]
*[http://doom.wikia.com Doom]
*[http://creatures.wikia.com Creatures]
*[http://muppet.wikia.com Muppets]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://furry.wikia.com Furry]
*[http://dofus.wikia.com Dofus]
*[http://althistory.wikia.com Alternative History]
*Parody wikis: [http://uncyclopedia.org/ Uncyclopedia (English)] / [http://nonsensopedia.wikia.com/ Nonsensopedia (Polish)] / [http://desencyclopedie.com/ Désencyclopédie (French)]

For test wikis, see the [http://scratchpad.wikia.com Scratchpad WikiLab].</text>
      <sha1>lbae6erkrmc65hecqhzq8j33v93vy1j</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2717</id>
      <parentid>4142</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-06-29T07:48:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sannse</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1040">'''The URL you entered points to a Wikia that does not exist.'''

Please choose a correct URL from the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Wikia list of Wikia].

If you want to create this wiki or start another Wikia, please [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Start_a_new_Wikia read the instructions] and fill out the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Special%3ACreateWiki wiki request form].

Some active wikis include:
*[http://memory-alpha.org/ Star Trek] (Memory Alpha)
*[http://starwars.wikia.com Star Wars] (Wookieepedia)
*[http://doom.wikia.com Doom]
*[http://creatures.wikia.com Creatures]
*[http://muppet.wikia.com Muppets]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://furry.wikia.com Furry] (WikiFur)
*[http://dofus.wikia.com Dofus]
*[http://althistory.wikia.com Alternative History]
*Parody wikis: [http://uncyclopedia.org/ Uncyclopedia (English)] / [http://nonsensopedia.wikia.com/ Nonsensopedia (Polish)] / [http://desencyclopedie.com/ Désencyclopédie (French)]

For test wikis, see the [http://scratchpad.wikia.com Scratchpad WikiLab].</text>
      <sha1>rwbxjrhp72jylvc9o6bc0uyd880xlvm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2718</id>
      <parentid>2717</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-06-29T07:50:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GreenReaper</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1070">&lt;div class="plainlinks"&gt;'''The URL you entered points to a Wikia that does not exist.'''

Please choose a correct URL from the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Wikia list of Wikia].

If you want to create this wiki or start another Wikia, please [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Start_a_new_Wikia read the instructions] and fill out the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Special%3ACreateWiki wiki request form].

Some active wikis include:
*[http://memory-alpha.org/ Star Trek] (Memory Alpha)
*[http://starwars.wikia.com Star Wars] (Wookieepedia)
*[http://doom.wikia.com Doom]
*[http://creatures.wikia.com Creatures]
*[http://muppet.wikia.com Muppets]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://furry.wikia.com Furry] (WikiFur)
*[http://dofus.wikia.com Dofus]
*[http://althistory.wikia.com Alternative History]
*Parody wikis: [http://uncyclopedia.org/ Uncyclopedia (English)] / [http://nonsensopedia.wikia.com/ Nonsensopedia (Polish)] / [http://desencyclopedie.com/ Désencyclopédie (French)]

For test wikis, see the [http://scratchpad.wikia.com Scratchpad WikiLab].&lt;/div&gt;</text>
      <sha1>50tju90fsd0tdzw0hyvvr91gnwo0fdh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2719</id>
      <parentid>2718</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-08-30T10:07:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>62.21.79.27</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1111">&lt;div class="plainlinks"&gt;'''The URL you entered points to a Wikia that does not exist.'''

Please choose a correct URL from the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Wikia list of Wikia].

If you want to create this wiki or start another Wikia, please [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Start_a_new_Wikia read the instructions] and fill out the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Special%3ACreateWiki wiki request form].

Some active wikis include:
*[http://memory-alpha.org/ Star Trek] (Memory Alpha)
*[http://starwars.wikia.com Star Wars] (Wookieepedia)
*[http://doom.wikia.com Doom]
*[http://creatures.wikia.com Creatures]
*[http://muppet.wikia.com Muppets]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://furry.wikia.com Furry] (WikiFur)
*[http://dofus.wikia.com Dofus]
*[http://althistory.wikia.com Alternative History]
*Parody wikis: [http://uncyclopedia.org/ Uncyclopedia (English)] / [http://nonsensopedia.wikia.com/ Nonsensopedia (Polish)] / [http://desencyclopedie.com/ Désencyclopédie (French)]
*[http://campaigns.wikia.com Campaigns]


For test wikis, see the [http://scratchpad.wikia.com Scratchpad WikiLab].&lt;/div&gt;</text>
      <sha1>p4f4bybwj95loo3mmlfqsrh1mzkumo3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2720</id>
      <parentid>2719</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-01T21:52:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Gil</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2316">&lt;div class="plainlinks"&gt;'''The URL you entered points to a Wikia that does not exist.'''

Please choose a correct URL from the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Wikia list of Wikia].

If you want to create this wiki or start another Wikia, please [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Start_a_new_Wikia read the instructions] and fill out the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Special%3ACreateWiki wiki request form].

Some active wikis include:
*[http://memory-alpha.org/ Star Trek] (Memory Alpha), [http://de.memory-alpha.org Star Trek (German)]
*[http://starwars.wikia.com Star Wars] (Wookieepedia)
*[http://doom.wikia.com Doom]
*[http://creatures.wikia.com Creatures]
*[http://muppet.wikia.com Muppets]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://furry.wikia.com Furry] (WikiFur)
*[http://dofus.wikia.com Dofus]
*[http://althistory.wikia.com Alternative History]
*Parody wikis: [http://uncyclopedia.org/ Uncyclopedia (English)] / [http://nonsensopedia.wikia.com/ Nonsensopedia (Polish)] / [http://desencyclopedie.com/ Désencyclopédie (French)], [http://es.inciclopedia.wikia.com Inciclopedia (Spanish)], [http://he.eincyclopedia.wikia.com Eincyclopedia (Hebrew)] [http://de.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia )German)], [http://zh.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (Chinese)
*[http://campaigns.wikia.com Campaigns]
*[http://24.wikia.com 24]
*[http://campaigns.wikia.com campaigns]
*[http://censorship.wikia.com censorship]
*[http://cybernations.wikia.com cybernations]
*[http://zh.evchk.wikia.com EVCHK (Chinese)]
*[http://familyguy.wikia.com Family Guy]
*[http://finalfantasy.wikia.com ]
*[http://gaia.wikia.com ]
*[http://halo.wikia.com ]
*http://lost.wikia.com ]
*http://lotr.wikia.com ]
*http://megaman.wikia.com ]
*http://muppet.wikia.com ]
*http://naked.wikia.com ]
*http://nethack.wikia.com ]
*http://ogame.wikia.com ]
*http://pl.ogame.wikia.com ]
*http://pikmin.wikia.com ]
*http://ja.revival.wikia.com ]
*http://runescape.wikia.com ]
*http://smallville.wikia.com ]
*http://stexpanded.wikia.com ]
*http://sw1mush.wikia.com ]
*http://swfanon.wikia.com ]
*http://tovid.wikia.com ]
*http://transformers.wikia.com ]
*http://turtledove.wikia.com ]
*http://whitewolf.wikia.com ]
*http://x-files.wikia.com ]
*http://yugioh.wikia.com ]



For test wikis, see the [http://scratchpad.wikia.com Scratchpad WikiLab].&lt;/div&gt;</text>
      <sha1>09vb0r9l38d4xrjxqb1qgs4atm4dylo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2721</id>
      <parentid>2720</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-01T21:56:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Gil</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2569">&lt;div class="plainlinks"&gt;'''The URL you entered points to a Wikia that does not exist.'''

Please choose a correct URL from the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Wikia list of Wikia].

If you want to create this wiki or start another Wikia, please [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Start_a_new_Wikia read the instructions] and fill out the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Special%3ACreateWiki wiki request form].

Some active wikis include:
*[http://memory-alpha.org/ Star Trek] (Memory Alpha), [http://de.memory-alpha.org Star Trek (German)]
*[http://starwars.wikia.com Star Wars] (Wookieepedia)
*[http://doom.wikia.com Doom]
*[http://creatures.wikia.com Creatures]
*[http://muppet.wikia.com Muppets]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://furry.wikia.com Furry] (WikiFur)
*[http://dofus.wikia.com Dofus]
*[http://althistory.wikia.com Alternative History]
*Parody wikis: [http://uncyclopedia.org/ Uncyclopedia (English)] / [http://nonsensopedia.wikia.com/ Nonsensopedia (Polish)] / [http://desencyclopedie.com/ Désencyclopédie (French)], [http://es.inciclopedia.wikia.com Inciclopedia (Spanish)], [http://he.eincyclopedia.wikia.com Eincyclopedia (Hebrew)] [http://de.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia )German)], [http://zh.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (Chinese)]
*[http://campaigns.wikia.com Campaigns]
*[http://24.wikia.com 24]
*[http://campaigns.wikia.com campaigns]
*[http://censorship.wikia.com censorship]
*[http://cybernations.wikia.com cybernations]
*[http://zh.evchk.wikia.com EVCHK (Chinese)]
*[http://familyguy.wikia.com Family Guy]
*[http://finalfantasy.wikia.com Final Fantasy]
*[http://gaia.wikia.com Gaia]
*[http://halo.wikia.com Halo]
*[http://lost.wikia.com Lost]
*[http://lotr.wikia.com Lord of the Rings]
*[http://megaman.wikia.com Megaman]
*[http://muppet.wikia.com Muppets]
*[http://naked.wikia.com Naked Wiki]
*[http://nethack.wikia.com Nethack]
*[http://ogame.wikia.com OGame] [http://pl.ogame.wikia.com Ogame (Polish)]
*[http://pikmin.wikia.com Pikmin]
*[http://ja.revival.wikia.com Revial (Japanese]
*[http://runescape.wikia.com Runescape]
*[http://smallville.wikia.com Smallville]
*[http://stexpanded.wikia.com Star Trek Expanded]
*[http://sw1mush.wikia.com SW1Mush]
*[http://swfanon.wikia.com SWFanon] Star Wars Fanon
*[http://tovid.wikia.com Tovid]
*[http://transformers.wikia.com Transformers]
*[http://turtledove.wikia.com Turtle Dove]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://x-files.wikia.com X Files]
*[http://yugioh.wikia.com Yugioh]



For test wikis, see the [http://scratchpad.wikia.com Scratchpad WikiLab].&lt;/div&gt;</text>
      <sha1>c60hbhsm9cm09d3tfd1esefvvzfpmir</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2722</id>
      <parentid>2721</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-03T00:22:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Szoferka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2570">&lt;div class="plainlinks"&gt;'''The URL you entered points to a Wikia that does not exist.'''

Please choose a correct URL from the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Wikia list of Wikia].

If you want to create this wiki or start another Wikia, please [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Start_a_new_Wikia read the instructions] and fill out the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Special%3ACreateWiki wiki request form].

Some active wikis include:
*[http://memory-alpha.org/ Star Trek] (Memory Alpha), [http://de.memory-alpha.org Star Trek (German)]
* [http://starwars.wikia.com Star Wars] (Wookieepedia)
*[http://doom.wikia.com Doom]
*[http://creatures.wikia.com Creatures]
*[http://muppet.wikia.com Muppets]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://furry.wikia.com Furry] (WikiFur)
*[http://dofus.wikia.com Dofus]
*[http://althistory.wikia.com Alternative History]
*Parody wikis: [http://uncyclopedia.org/ Uncyclopedia (English)] / [http://nonsensopedia.wikia.com/ Nonsensopedia (Polish)] / [http://desencyclopedie.com/ Désencyclopédie (French)], [http://es.inciclopedia.wikia.com Inciclopedia (Spanish)], [http://he.eincyclopedia.wikia.com Eincyclopedia (Hebrew)] [http://de.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia )German)], [http://zh.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (Chinese)]
*[http://campaigns.wikia.com Campaigns]
*[http://24.wikia.com 24]
*[http://campaigns.wikia.com campaigns]
*[http://censorship.wikia.com censorship]
*[http://cybernations.wikia.com cybernations]
*[http://zh.evchk.wikia.com EVCHK (Chinese)]
*[http://familyguy.wikia.com Family Guy]
*[http://finalfantasy.wikia.com Final Fantasy]
*[http://gaia.wikia.com Gaia]
*[http://halo.wikia.com Halo]
*[http://lost.wikia.com Lost]
*[http://lotr.wikia.com Lord of the Rings]
*[http://megaman.wikia.com Megaman]
*[http://muppet.wikia.com Muppets]
*[http://naked.wikia.com Naked Wiki]
*[http://nethack.wikia.com Nethack]
*[http://ogame.wikia.com OGame] [http://pl.ogame.wikia.com Ogame (Polish)]
*[http://pikmin.wikia.com Pikmin]
*[http://ja.revival.wikia.com Revial (Japanese]
*[http://runescape.wikia.com Runescape]
*[http://smallville.wikia.com Smallville]
*[http://stexpanded.wikia.com Star Trek Expanded]
*[http://sw1mush.wikia.com SW1Mush]
*[http://swfanon.wikia.com SWFanon] Star Wars Fanon
*[http://tovid.wikia.com Tovid]
*[http://transformers.wikia.com Transformers]
*[http://turtledove.wikia.com Turtle Dove]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://x-files.wikia.com X Files]
*[http://yugioh.wikia.com Yugioh]



For test wikis, see the [http://scratchpad.wikia.com Scratchpad WikiLab].&lt;/div&gt;</text>
      <sha1>b8vr9zpu2i1s5y69gnuet7ox7akwm4b</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2723</id>
      <parentid>2722</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-04T07:24:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Emil</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2495">&lt;div class="plainlinks"&gt;'''The URL you entered points to a Wikia that does not exist.'''

Please choose a correct URL from the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Wikia list of Wikia].

If you want to create this wiki or start another Wikia, please [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Start_a_new_Wikia read the instructions] and fill out the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Special%3ACreateWiki wiki request form].

Some active wikis include:
*[http://memory-alpha.org/ Star Trek] (Memory Alpha), [http://de.memory-alpha.org Star Trek (German)]
* [http://starwars.wikia.com Star Wars] (Wookieepedia)
*[http://doom.wikia.com Doom]
*[http://creatures.wikia.com Creatures]
*[http://muppet.wikia.com Muppets]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://furry.wikia.com Furry] (WikiFur)
*[http://dofus.wikia.com Dofus]
*[http://althistory.wikia.com Alternative History]
*Parody wikis: [http://uncyclopedia.org/ Uncyclopedia (English)] / [http://nonsensopedia.wikia.com/ Nonsensopedia (Polish)] / [http://desencyclopedie.com/ Désencyclopédie (French)], [http://es.inciclopedia.wikia.com Inciclopedia (Spanish)], [http://he.eincyclopedia.wikia.com Eincyclopedia (Hebrew)] [http://de.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia )German)], [http://zh.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (Chinese)]
*[http://campaigns.wikia.com Campaigns]
*[http://24.wikia.com 24]
*[http://censorship.wikia.com censorship]
*[http://cybernations.wikia.com cybernations]
*[http://zh.evchk.wikia.com EVCHK (Chinese)]
*[http://familyguy.wikia.com Family Guy]
*[http://finalfantasy.wikia.com Final Fantasy]
*[http://gaia.wikia.com Gaia]
*[http://halo.wikia.com Halo]
*[http://lost.wikia.com Lost]
*[http://lotr.wikia.com Lord of the Rings]
*[http://megaman.wikia.com Megaman]
*[http://naked.wikia.com Naked Wiki]
*[http://nethack.wikia.com Nethack]
*[http://ogame.wikia.com OGame] [http://pl.ogame.wikia.com Ogame (Polish)]
*[http://pikmin.wikia.com Pikmin]
*[http://ja.revival.wikia.com Revial (Japanese]
*[http://runescape.wikia.com Runescape]
*[http://smallville.wikia.com Smallville]
*[http://stexpanded.wikia.com Star Trek Expanded]
*[http://sw1mush.wikia.com SW1Mush]
*[http://swfanon.wikia.com SWFanon] Star Wars Fanon
*[http://tovid.wikia.com Tovid]
*[http://transformers.wikia.com Transformers]
*[http://turtledove.wikia.com Turtle Dove]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://x-files.wikia.com X Files]
*[http://yugioh.wikia.com Yugioh]



For test wikis, see the [http://scratchpad.wikia.com Scratchpad WikiLab].&lt;/div&gt;</text>
      <sha1>gd9lrramwjfu6j8lm6de3tbhw0eyw6t</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2724</id>
      <parentid>2723</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-06T02:46:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Brettbass</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2">hi</text>
      <sha1>moiryvew7z1nh6cf1srex5j09y58bpe</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2725</id>
      <parentid>2724</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-06T05:59:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>82.41.0.57</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2495">&lt;div class="plainlinks"&gt;'''The URL you entered points to a Wikia that does not exist.'''

Please choose a correct URL from the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Wikia list of Wikia].

If you want to create this wiki or start another Wikia, please [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Start_a_new_Wikia read the instructions] and fill out the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Special%3ACreateWiki wiki request form].

Some active wikis include:
*[http://memory-alpha.org/ Star Trek] (Memory Alpha), [http://de.memory-alpha.org Star Trek (German)]
* [http://starwars.wikia.com Star Wars] (Wookieepedia)
*[http://doom.wikia.com Doom]
*[http://creatures.wikia.com Creatures]
*[http://muppet.wikia.com Muppets]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://furry.wikia.com Furry] (WikiFur)
*[http://dofus.wikia.com Dofus]
*[http://althistory.wikia.com Alternative History]
*Parody wikis: [http://uncyclopedia.org/ Uncyclopedia (English)] / [http://nonsensopedia.wikia.com/ Nonsensopedia (Polish)] / [http://desencyclopedie.com/ Désencyclopédie (French)], [http://es.inciclopedia.wikia.com Inciclopedia (Spanish)], [http://he.eincyclopedia.wikia.com Eincyclopedia (Hebrew)] [http://de.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia )German)], [http://zh.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (Chinese)]
*[http://campaigns.wikia.com Campaigns]
*[http://24.wikia.com 24]
*[http://censorship.wikia.com censorship]
*[http://cybernations.wikia.com cybernations]
*[http://zh.evchk.wikia.com EVCHK (Chinese)]
*[http://familyguy.wikia.com Family Guy]
*[http://finalfantasy.wikia.com Final Fantasy]
*[http://gaia.wikia.com Gaia]
*[http://halo.wikia.com Halo]
*[http://lost.wikia.com Lost]
*[http://lotr.wikia.com Lord of the Rings]
*[http://megaman.wikia.com Megaman]
*[http://naked.wikia.com Naked Wiki]
*[http://nethack.wikia.com Nethack]
*[http://ogame.wikia.com OGame] [http://pl.ogame.wikia.com Ogame (Polish)]
*[http://pikmin.wikia.com Pikmin]
*[http://ja.revival.wikia.com Revial (Japanese]
*[http://runescape.wikia.com Runescape]
*[http://smallville.wikia.com Smallville]
*[http://stexpanded.wikia.com Star Trek Expanded]
*[http://sw1mush.wikia.com SW1Mush]
*[http://swfanon.wikia.com SWFanon] Star Wars Fanon
*[http://tovid.wikia.com Tovid]
*[http://transformers.wikia.com Transformers]
*[http://turtledove.wikia.com Turtle Dove]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://x-files.wikia.com X Files]
*[http://yugioh.wikia.com Yugioh]



For test wikis, see the [http://scratchpad.wikia.com Scratchpad WikiLab].&lt;/div&gt;</text>
      <sha1>gd9lrramwjfu6j8lm6de3tbhw0eyw6t</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2726</id>
      <parentid>2725</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-10T18:22:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sebk</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="400">&lt;div class="plainlinks"&gt;'''The URL you entered points to a Wikia that does not exist.'''

Please choose a correct URL from the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Wikia list of Wikia].

If you want to create this wiki or start another Wikia, please [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Start_a_new_Wikia read the instructions] and fill out the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Special%3ACreateWiki wiki request form].</text>
      <sha1>otb0vgevvu6xyt3miii6fc2ptg8ybfc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2727</id>
      <parentid>2726</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-10T18:26:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sebk</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2495">&lt;div class="plainlinks"&gt;'''The URL you entered points to a Wikia that does not exist.'''

Please choose a correct URL from the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Wikia list of Wikia].

If you want to create this wiki or start another Wikia, please [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Start_a_new_Wikia read the instructions] and fill out the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Special%3ACreateWiki wiki request form].

Some active wikis include:
*[http://memory-alpha.org/ Star Trek] (Memory Alpha), [http://de.memory-alpha.org Star Trek (German)]
* [http://starwars.wikia.com Star Wars] (Wookieepedia)
*[http://doom.wikia.com Doom]
*[http://creatures.wikia.com Creatures]
*[http://muppet.wikia.com Muppets]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://furry.wikia.com Furry] (WikiFur)
*[http://dofus.wikia.com Dofus]
*[http://althistory.wikia.com Alternative History]
*Parody wikis: [http://uncyclopedia.org/ Uncyclopedia (English)] / [http://nonsensopedia.wikia.com/ Nonsensopedia (Polish)] / [http://desencyclopedie.com/ Désencyclopédie (French)], [http://es.inciclopedia.wikia.com Inciclopedia (Spanish)], [http://he.eincyclopedia.wikia.com Eincyclopedia (Hebrew)] [http://de.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia )German)], [http://zh.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (Chinese)]
*[http://campaigns.wikia.com Campaigns]
*[http://24.wikia.com 24]
*[http://censorship.wikia.com censorship]
*[http://cybernations.wikia.com cybernations]
*[http://zh.evchk.wikia.com EVCHK (Chinese)]
*[http://familyguy.wikia.com Family Guy]
*[http://finalfantasy.wikia.com Final Fantasy]
*[http://gaia.wikia.com Gaia]
*[http://halo.wikia.com Halo]
*[http://lost.wikia.com Lost]
*[http://lotr.wikia.com Lord of the Rings]
*[http://megaman.wikia.com Megaman]
*[http://naked.wikia.com Naked Wiki]
*[http://nethack.wikia.com Nethack]
*[http://ogame.wikia.com OGame] [http://pl.ogame.wikia.com Ogame (Polish)]
*[http://pikmin.wikia.com Pikmin]
*[http://ja.revival.wikia.com Revial (Japanese]
*[http://runescape.wikia.com Runescape]
*[http://smallville.wikia.com Smallville]
*[http://stexpanded.wikia.com Star Trek Expanded]
*[http://sw1mush.wikia.com SW1Mush]
*[http://swfanon.wikia.com SWFanon] Star Wars Fanon
*[http://tovid.wikia.com Tovid]
*[http://transformers.wikia.com Transformers]
*[http://turtledove.wikia.com Turtle Dove]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://x-files.wikia.com X Files]
*[http://yugioh.wikia.com Yugioh]



For test wikis, see the [http://scratchpad.wikia.com Scratchpad WikiLab].&lt;/div&gt;</text>
      <sha1>gd9lrramwjfu6j8lm6de3tbhw0eyw6t</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2728</id>
      <parentid>2727</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-12T20:13:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Yuval Y</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2492">&lt;div class="plainlinks"&gt;'''The URL you entered points to a Wikia that does not exist.'''

Please choose a correct URL from the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Wikia list of Wikia].

If you want to create this wiki or start another Wikia, please [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Start_a_new_Wikia read the instructions] and fill out the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Special%3ACreateWiki wiki request form].

Some active wikis include:
*[http://memory-alpha.org/ Star Trek] (Memory Alpha), [http://de.memory-alpha.org Star Trek (German)]
* [http://starwars.wikia.com Star Wars] (Wookieepedia)
*[http://doom.wikia.com Doom]
*[http://creatures.wikia.com Creatures]
*[http://muppet.wikia.com Muppets]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://furry.wikia.com Furry] (WikiFur)
*[http://dofus.wikia.com Dofus]
*[http://althistory.wikia.com Alternative History]
*Parody wikis: [http://uncyclopedia.org/ Uncyclopedia (English)] / [http://nonsensopedia.wikia.com/ Nonsensopedia (Polish)] / [http://desencyclopedie.com/ Désencyclopédie (French)], [http://es.inciclopedia.wikia.com Inciclopedia (Spanish)], [http://eincyclopedia.wikia.com Eincyclopedia (Hebrew)] [http://de.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia )German)], [http://zh.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (Chinese)]
*[http://campaigns.wikia.com Campaigns]
*[http://24.wikia.com 24]
*[http://censorship.wikia.com censorship]
*[http://cybernations.wikia.com cybernations]
*[http://zh.evchk.wikia.com EVCHK (Chinese)]
*[http://familyguy.wikia.com Family Guy]
*[http://finalfantasy.wikia.com Final Fantasy]
*[http://gaia.wikia.com Gaia]
*[http://halo.wikia.com Halo]
*[http://lost.wikia.com Lost]
*[http://lotr.wikia.com Lord of the Rings]
*[http://megaman.wikia.com Megaman]
*[http://naked.wikia.com Naked Wiki]
*[http://nethack.wikia.com Nethack]
*[http://ogame.wikia.com OGame] [http://pl.ogame.wikia.com Ogame (Polish)]
*[http://pikmin.wikia.com Pikmin]
*[http://ja.revival.wikia.com Revial (Japanese]
*[http://runescape.wikia.com Runescape]
*[http://smallville.wikia.com Smallville]
*[http://stexpanded.wikia.com Star Trek Expanded]
*[http://sw1mush.wikia.com SW1Mush]
*[http://swfanon.wikia.com SWFanon] Star Wars Fanon
*[http://tovid.wikia.com Tovid]
*[http://transformers.wikia.com Transformers]
*[http://turtledove.wikia.com Turtle Dove]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://x-files.wikia.com X Files]
*[http://yugioh.wikia.com Yugioh]



For test wikis, see the [http://scratchpad.wikia.com Scratchpad WikiLab].&lt;/div&gt;</text>
      <sha1>t0s9ydmfnvzki223f2goj2pg9qqtmsv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2729</id>
      <parentid>2728</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-14T05:15:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Szoferka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2493">&lt;div class="plainlinks"&gt;'''The URL you entered points to a Wikia that does not exist.'''

Please choose a correct URL from the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Wikia list of Wikia].

If you want to create this wiki or start another Wikia, please [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Start_a_new_Wikia read the instructions] and fill out the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Special%3ACreateWiki wiki request form].

Some active wikis include:
*[http://memory-alpha.org/ Star Trek] (Memory Alpha), [http://de.memory-alpha.org Star Trek (German)]
* [http://starwars.wikia.com Star Wars] (Wookieepedia)
*[http://doom.wikia.com Doom]
*[http://creatures.wikia.com Creatures]
*[http://muppet.wikia.com Muppets]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://furry.wikia.com Furry] (WikiFur)
*[http://dofus.wikia.com Dofus]
*[http://althistory.wikia.com Alternative History]
*Parody wikis: [http://uncyclopedia.org/ Uncyclopedia (English)] / [http://nonsensopedia.wikia.com/ Nonsensopedia (Polish)] / [http://desencyclopedie.com/ Désencyclopédie (French)], [http://es.inciclopedia.wikia.com Inciclopedia (Spanish)], [http://eincyclopedia.wikia.com Eincyclopedia (Hebrew)], [http://de.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (German)], [http://zh.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (Chinese)]
*[http://campaigns.wikia.com Campaigns]
*[http://24.wikia.com 24]
*[http://censorship.wikia.com censorship]
*[http://cybernations.wikia.com cybernations]
*[http://zh.evchk.wikia.com EVCHK (Chinese)]
*[http://familyguy.wikia.com Family Guy]
*[http://finalfantasy.wikia.com Final Fantasy]
*[http://gaia.wikia.com Gaia]
*[http://halo.wikia.com Halo]
*[http://lost.wikia.com Lost]
*[http://lotr.wikia.com Lord of the Rings]
*[http://megaman.wikia.com Megaman]
*[http://naked.wikia.com Naked Wiki]
*[http://nethack.wikia.com Nethack]
*[http://ogame.wikia.com OGame] [http://pl.ogame.wikia.com Ogame (Polish)]
*[http://pikmin.wikia.com Pikmin]
*[http://ja.revival.wikia.com Revial (Japanese]
*[http://runescape.wikia.com Runescape]
*[http://smallville.wikia.com Smallville]
*[http://stexpanded.wikia.com Star Trek Expanded]
*[http://sw1mush.wikia.com SW1Mush]
*[http://swfanon.wikia.com SWFanon] Star Wars Fanon
*[http://tovid.wikia.com Tovid]
*[http://transformers.wikia.com Transformers]
*[http://turtledove.wikia.com Turtle Dove]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://x-files.wikia.com X Files]
*[http://yugioh.wikia.com Yugioh]



For test wikis, see the [http://scratchpad.wikia.com Scratchpad WikiLab].&lt;/div&gt;</text>
      <sha1>30qu36dk6jpuueoajnuouv9154fv501</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2730</id>
      <parentid>2729</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-14T23:01:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>63.109.159.154</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2501">&lt;div class="plainlinks"&gt;'''The URL you entered points to a Wikia that does not exist.'''

Please choose a correct URL from the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Wikia list of Wikia].

&lt;b&gt;If you want to create this wiki or start another Wikia, please [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Start_a_new_Wikia read the instructions] and fill out the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Special%3ACreateWiki wiki request form]. &lt;/B&gt;

Some active wikis include:
*[http://memory-alpha.org/ Star Trek] (Memory Alpha), [http://de.memory-alpha.org Star Trek (German)]
* [http://starwars.wikia.com Star Wars] (Wookieepedia)
*[http://doom.wikia.com Doom]
*[http://creatures.wikia.com Creatures]
*[http://muppet.wikia.com Muppets]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://furry.wikia.com Furry] (WikiFur)
*[http://dofus.wikia.com Dofus]
*[http://althistory.wikia.com Alternative History]
*Parody wikis: [http://uncyclopedia.org/ Uncyclopedia (English)] / [http://nonsensopedia.wikia.com/ Nonsensopedia (Polish)] / [http://desencyclopedie.com/ Désencyclopédie (French)], [http://es.inciclopedia.wikia.com Inciclopedia (Spanish)], [http://eincyclopedia.wikia.com Eincyclopedia (Hebrew)], [http://de.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (German)], [http://zh.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (Chinese)]
*[http://campaigns.wikia.com Campaigns]
*[http://24.wikia.com 24]
*[http://censorship.wikia.com censorship]
*[http://cybernations.wikia.com cybernations]
*[http://zh.evchk.wikia.com EVCHK (Chinese)]
*[http://familyguy.wikia.com Family Guy]
*[http://finalfantasy.wikia.com Final Fantasy]
*[http://gaia.wikia.com Gaia]
*[http://halo.wikia.com Halo]
*[http://lost.wikia.com Lost]
*[http://lotr.wikia.com Lord of the Rings]
*[http://megaman.wikia.com Megaman]
*[http://naked.wikia.com Naked Wiki]
*[http://nethack.wikia.com Nethack]
*[http://ogame.wikia.com OGame] [http://pl.ogame.wikia.com Ogame (Polish)]
*[http://pikmin.wikia.com Pikmin]
*[http://ja.revival.wikia.com Revial (Japanese]
*[http://runescape.wikia.com Runescape]
*[http://smallville.wikia.com Smallville]
*[http://stexpanded.wikia.com Star Trek Expanded]
*[http://sw1mush.wikia.com SW1Mush]
*[http://swfanon.wikia.com SWFanon] Star Wars Fanon
*[http://tovid.wikia.com Tovid]
*[http://transformers.wikia.com Transformers]
*[http://turtledove.wikia.com Turtle Dove]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://x-files.wikia.com X Files]
*[http://yugioh.wikia.com Yugioh]



For test wikis, see the [http://scratchpad.wikia.com Scratchpad WikiLab].&lt;/div&gt;</text>
      <sha1>43860kgeq5z5am4l4nnbaqhsu1q8513</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2731</id>
      <parentid>2730</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-16T04:18:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>BillK</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2571">&lt;div class="plainlinks"&gt;'''The URL you entered points to a Wikia that does not exist.'''

Please choose a correct URL from the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Wikia list of Wikia].

&lt;b&gt;If you want to create this wiki or start another Wikia, please [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Start_a_new_Wikia read the instructions] and fill out the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Special%3ACreateWiki wiki request form]. &lt;/B&gt;

Some active wikis include:
*[http://world.wikia.com/wiki/World_Wikia World Wikia] (travel guides)
*[http://memory-alpha.org/ Star Trek] (Memory Alpha), [http://de.memory-alpha.org Star Trek (German)]
*[http://starwars.wikia.com Star Wars] (Wookieepedia)
*[http://doom.wikia.com Doom]
*[http://creatures.wikia.com Creatures]
*[http://muppet.wikia.com Muppets]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://furry.wikia.com Furry] (WikiFur)
*[http://dofus.wikia.com Dofus]
*[http://althistory.wikia.com Alternative History]
*Parody wikis: [http://uncyclopedia.org/ Uncyclopedia (English)] / [http://nonsensopedia.wikia.com/ Nonsensopedia (Polish)] / [http://desencyclopedie.com/ Désencyclopédie (French)], [http://es.inciclopedia.wikia.com Inciclopedia (Spanish)], [http://eincyclopedia.wikia.com Eincyclopedia (Hebrew)], [http://de.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (German)], [http://zh.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (Chinese)]
*[http://campaigns.wikia.com Campaigns]
*[http://24.wikia.com 24]
*[http://censorship.wikia.com censorship]
*[http://cybernations.wikia.com cybernations]
*[http://zh.evchk.wikia.com EVCHK (Chinese)]
*[http://familyguy.wikia.com Family Guy]
*[http://finalfantasy.wikia.com Final Fantasy]
*[http://gaia.wikia.com Gaia]
*[http://halo.wikia.com Halo]
*[http://lost.wikia.com Lost]
*[http://lotr.wikia.com Lord of the Rings]
*[http://megaman.wikia.com Megaman]
*[http://naked.wikia.com Naked Wiki]
*[http://nethack.wikia.com Nethack]
*[http://ogame.wikia.com OGame] [http://pl.ogame.wikia.com Ogame (Polish)]
*[http://pikmin.wikia.com Pikmin]
*[http://ja.revival.wikia.com Revial (Japanese]
*[http://runescape.wikia.com Runescape]
*[http://smallville.wikia.com Smallville]
*[http://stexpanded.wikia.com Star Trek Expanded]
*[http://sw1mush.wikia.com SW1Mush]
*[http://swfanon.wikia.com SWFanon] Star Wars Fanon
*[http://tovid.wikia.com Tovid]
*[http://transformers.wikia.com Transformers]
*[http://turtledove.wikia.com Turtle Dove]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://x-files.wikia.com X Files]
*[http://yugioh.wikia.com Yugioh]



For test wikis, see the [http://scratchpad.wikia.com Scratchpad WikiLab].&lt;/div&gt;</text>
      <sha1>0kt8tpk9oxufp4q0tkxlbimj1v9b97a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2732</id>
      <parentid>2731</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-16T09:42:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Splarka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2698">&lt;div class="plainlinks"&gt;
&lt;div style="text-align:center;margin:.5em;padding:.5em;"&gt;
&lt;div style="font-weight:bold;font-size:200%;color:#005500"&gt;The URL you entered points to a Wikia that does not exist&lt;/div&gt;
Please choose a correct URL from the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Wikia list of Wikia].

'''If you want to create this wiki or start another Wikia, &lt;br /&gt;please [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Start_a_new_Wikia read the instructions] and fill out the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Special%3ACreateWiki wiki request form].'''
&lt;/div&gt;

Some active wikis include:
*[http://world.wikia.com/wiki/World_Wikia World Wikia] (travel guides)
*[http://memory-alpha.org/ Star Trek] (Memory Alpha), [http://de.memory-alpha.org Star Trek (German)]
*[http://starwars.wikia.com Star Wars] (Wookieepedia)
*[http://doom.wikia.com Doom]
*[http://creatures.wikia.com Creatures]
*[http://muppet.wikia.com Muppets]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://furry.wikia.com Furry] (WikiFur)
*[http://dofus.wikia.com Dofus]
*[http://althistory.wikia.com Alternative History]
*Parody wikis: [http://uncyclopedia.org/ Uncyclopedia (English)] / [http://nonsensopedia.wikia.com/ Nonsensopedia (Polish)] / [http://desencyclopedie.com/ Désencyclopédie (French)], [http://es.inciclopedia.wikia.com Inciclopedia (Spanish)], [http://eincyclopedia.wikia.com Eincyclopedia (Hebrew)], [http://de.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (German)], [http://zh.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (Chinese)]
*[http://campaigns.wikia.com Campaigns]
*[http://24.wikia.com 24]
*[http://censorship.wikia.com censorship]
*[http://cybernations.wikia.com cybernations]
*[http://zh.evchk.wikia.com EVCHK (Chinese)]
*[http://familyguy.wikia.com Family Guy]
*[http://finalfantasy.wikia.com Final Fantasy]
*[http://gaia.wikia.com Gaia]
*[http://halo.wikia.com Halo]
*[http://lost.wikia.com Lost]
*[http://lotr.wikia.com Lord of the Rings]
*[http://megaman.wikia.com Megaman]
*[http://naked.wikia.com Naked Wiki]
*[http://nethack.wikia.com Nethack]
*[http://ogame.wikia.com OGame] [http://pl.ogame.wikia.com Ogame (Polish)]
*[http://pikmin.wikia.com Pikmin]
*[http://ja.revival.wikia.com Revial (Japanese]
*[http://runescape.wikia.com Runescape]
*[http://smallville.wikia.com Smallville]
*[http://stexpanded.wikia.com Star Trek Expanded]
*[http://sw1mush.wikia.com SW1Mush]
*[http://swfanon.wikia.com SWFanon] Star Wars Fanon
*[http://tovid.wikia.com Tovid]
*[http://transformers.wikia.com Transformers]
*[http://turtledove.wikia.com Turtle Dove]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://x-files.wikia.com X Files]
*[http://yugioh.wikia.com Yugioh]



For test wikis, see the [http://scratchpad.wikia.com Scratchpad WikiLab].&lt;/div&gt;</text>
      <sha1>8v4vv3lawkwxd7fheezys5sh2qq9guf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2733</id>
      <parentid>2732</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-16T09:48:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Splarka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2981">&lt;div class="plainlinks"&gt;
&lt;div style="text-align:center;margin:.5em;padding:.5em;"&gt;
&lt;div style="font-weight:bold;font-size:200%;color:#005500"&gt;The URL you entered points to a Wikia that does not exist&lt;/div&gt;
Please choose a correct URL from the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Wikia list of Wikia].

'''If you want to create this wiki or start another Wikia, &lt;br /&gt;please [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Start_a_new_Wikia read the instructions] and fill out the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Special%3ACreateWiki wiki request form].'''
&lt;/div&gt;

{| style="width:95%;margin:auto;border:1px outset #bbbbff" 
|-
! colspan="3" style="border:1px outset #bbbbff" | Some active wikis include:
|- valign="top"
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://world.wikia.com/wiki/World_Wikia World Wikia] (travel guides)
*[http://memory-alpha.org/ Star Trek] (Memory Alpha), [http://de.memory-alpha.org Star Trek (German)]
*[http://starwars.wikia.com Star Wars] (Wookieepedia)
*[http://doom.wikia.com Doom]
*[http://creatures.wikia.com Creatures]
*[http://muppet.wikia.com Muppets]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://furry.wikia.com Furry] (WikiFur)
*[http://dofus.wikia.com Dofus]
*[http://althistory.wikia.com Alternative History]
*[http://campaigns.wikia.com Campaigns]
*[http://24.wikia.com 24]
*[http://censorship.wikia.com censorship]
*[http://cybernations.wikia.com cybernations]
*[http://zh.evchk.wikia.com EVCHK (Chinese)]
*[http://familyguy.wikia.com Family Guy]
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://finalfantasy.wikia.com Final Fantasy]
*[http://gaia.wikia.com Gaia]
*[http://halo.wikia.com Halo]
*[http://lost.wikia.com Lost]
*[http://lotr.wikia.com Lord of the Rings]
*[http://megaman.wikia.com Megaman]
*[http://naked.wikia.com Naked Wiki]
*[http://nethack.wikia.com Nethack]
*[http://ogame.wikia.com OGame] [http://pl.ogame.wikia.com Ogame (Polish)]
*[http://pikmin.wikia.com Pikmin]
*[http://ja.revival.wikia.com Revial (Japanese]
*[http://runescape.wikia.com Runescape]
*[http://smallville.wikia.com Smallville]
*[http://stexpanded.wikia.com Star Trek Expanded]
*[http://sw1mush.wikia.com SW1Mush]
*[http://swfanon.wikia.com SWFanon] Star Wars Fanon
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://tovid.wikia.com Tovid]
*[http://transformers.wikia.com Transformers]
*[http://turtledove.wikia.com Turtle Dove]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://x-files.wikia.com X Files]
*[http://yugioh.wikia.com Yugioh]
*Parody wikis: 
**[http://uncyclopedia.org/ Uncyclopedia (English)]
**[http://nonsensopedia.wikia.com/ Nonsensopedia (Polish)]
**[http://desencyclopedie.com/ Désencyclopédie (French)] 
**[http://es.inciclopedia.wikia.com Inciclopedia (Spanish)]
**[http://eincyclopedia.wikia.com Eincyclopedia (Hebrew)]
**[http://de.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (German)]
**[http://zh.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (Chinese)]
|}


For test wikis, see the [http://scratchpad.wikia.com Scratchpad WikiLab].&lt;/div&gt;</text>
      <sha1>lgps51gyg35jq7icgd82ovlof6kweiq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2734</id>
      <parentid>2733</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-16T18:21:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Gil</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3070">&lt;div class="plainlinks"&gt;
&lt;div style="text-align:center;margin:.5em;padding:.5em;"&gt;
&lt;div style="font-weight:bold;font-size:200%;color:#005500"&gt;The URL you entered points to a Wikia that does not exist&lt;/div&gt;
Please choose a correct URL from the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Wikia list of Wikia].

'''If you want to create this wiki or start another Wikia, &lt;br /&gt;please [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Start_a_new_Wikia read the instructions] and fill out the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Special%3ACreateWiki wiki request form].'''
&lt;/div&gt;

{| style="width:95%;margin:auto;border:1px outset #bbbbff" 
|-
! colspan="3" style="border:1px outset #bbbbff" | Some active wikis include:
|- valign="top"
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://world.wikia.com/wiki/World_Wikia World Wikia] (travel guides)
*[http://memory-alpha.org/ Star Trek] (Memory Alpha), [http://de.memory-alpha.org Star Trek (German)]
*[http://starwars.wikia.com Star Wars] (Wookieepedia)
*[http://doom.wikia.com Doom]
*[http://creatures.wikia.com Creatures]
*[http://muppet.wikia.com Muppets]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://furry.wikia.com Furry] (WikiFur)
*[http://dofus.wikia.com Dofus]
*[http://althistory.wikia.com Alternative History]
*[http://campaigns.wikia.com Campaigns]
*[http://24.wikia.com 24]
*[http://censorship.wikia.com censorship]
*[http://cybernations.wikia.com cybernations]
*[http://zh.evchk.wikia.com EVCHK (Chinese)]
*[http://familyguy.wikia.com Family Guy]
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://finalfantasy.wikia.com Final Fantasy]
*[http://gaia.wikia.com Gaia]
*[http://halo.wikia.com Halo]
*[http://lost.wikia.com Lost]
*[http://lotr.wikia.com Lord of the Rings]
*[http://megaman.wikia.com Megaman]
*[http://naked.wikia.com Naked Wiki]
*[http://nethack.wikia.com Nethack]
*[http://ogame.wikia.com OGame] [http://pl.ogame.wikia.com Ogame (Polish)]
*[http://pikmin.wikia.com Pikmin]
*[http://ja.revival.wikia.com Revial (Japanese]
*[http://runescape.wikia.com Runescape]
*[http://smallville.wikia.com Smallville]
*[http://stexpanded.wikia.com Star Trek Expanded]
*[http://sw1mush.wikia.com SW1Mush]
*[http://swfanon.wikia.com SWFanon] Star Wars Fanon
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://tovid.wikia.com Tovid]
*[http://transformers.wikia.com Transformers]
*[http://turtledove.wikia.com Turtle Dove]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://x-files.wikia.com X Files]
*[http://yugioh.wikia.com Yugioh]
*Parody wikis: 
**[http://uncyclopedia.org/ Uncyclopedia (English)]
**[http://nonsensopedia.wikia.com/ Nonsensopedia (Polish)]
**[http://desencyclopedie.com/ Désencyclopédie (French)] 
**[http://es.inciclopedia.wikia.com Inciclopedia (Spanish)]
**[http://eincyclopedia.wikia.com Eincyclopedia (Hebrew)]
**[http://de.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (German)]
**[http://zh.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (Chinese)]
|}

For non-english wikis, go to [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Category:Languages All Languages]
For test wikis, see the [http://scratchpad.wikia.com Scratchpad WikiLab].&lt;/div&gt;</text>
      <sha1>rq6m97zrkbze0xtxvw58itlij2jqsky</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2735</id>
      <parentid>2734</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-17T05:04:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Gil</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3307">&lt;div class="plainlinks"&gt;
&lt;div style="text-align:center;margin:.5em;padding:.5em;"&gt;
&lt;div style="font-weight:bold;font-size:200%;color:#005500"&gt;The URL you entered points to a Wikia that does not exist&lt;/div&gt;
Please choose a correct URL from the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Wikia list of Wikia].

'''If you want to create this wiki or start another Wikia, &lt;br /&gt;please [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Start_a_new_Wikia read the instructions] and fill out the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Special%3ACreateWiki wiki request form].'''
&lt;/div&gt;

{| style="width:95%;margin:auto;border:1px outset #bbbbff" 
|-
! colspan="3" style="border:1px outset #bbbbff" | Some active wikis include:
|- valign="top"
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://world.wikia.com/wiki/World_Wikia World Wikia] (travel guides)
*[http://memory-alpha.org/ Star Trek] (Memory Alpha), [http://de.memory-alpha.org Star Trek (German)]
*[http://starwars.wikia.com Star Wars] (Wookieepedia)
*[http://doom.wikia.com Doom]
*[http://creatures.wikia.com Creatures]
*[http://muppet.wikia.com Muppets]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://furry.wikia.com Furry] (WikiFur)
*[http://dofus.wikia.com Dofus]
*[http://althistory.wikia.com Alternative History]
*[http://boxster.wikia.com Boxster]
*[http://campaigns.wikia.com Campaigns]
*[http://24.wikia.com 24]
*[http://censorship.wikia.com censorship]
*[http://christianity.wikia.com/wiki/Welcome Christianity]
*[http://computervision.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page Computer Vision]
*[http://cybernations.wikia.com cybernations]
*[http://zh.evchk.wikia.com EVCHK (Chinese)]
*[http://familyguy.wikia.com Family Guy]
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://finalfantasy.wikia.com Final Fantasy]
*[http://gaia.wikia.com Gaia]
*[http://halo.wikia.com Halo]
*[http://lost.wikia.com Lost]
*[http://lotr.wikia.com Lord of the Rings]
*[http://megaman.wikia.com Megaman]
*[http://naked.wikia.com Naked Wiki]
*[http://nascar.wikia.com Nascar]
*[http://nethack.wikia.com Nethack]
*[http://ogame.wikia.com OGame] [http://pl.ogame.wikia.com Ogame (Polish)]
*[http://pikmin.wikia.com Pikmin]
*[http://psychology.wikia.com Psychology]
*[http://ja.revival.wikia.com Revial (Japanese]
*[http://runescape.wikia.com Runescape]
*[http://smallville.wikia.com Smallville]
*[http://stexpanded.wikia.com Star Trek Expanded]
*[http://sw1mush.wikia.com SW1Mush]
*[http://swfanon.wikia.com SWFanon] Star Wars Fanon
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://tovid.wikia.com Tovid]
*[http://transformers.wikia.com Transformers]
*[http://turtledove.wikia.com Turtle Dove]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://x-files.wikia.com X Files]
*[http://yugioh.wikia.com Yugioh]
*Parody wikis: 
**[http://uncyclopedia.org/ Uncyclopedia (English)]
**[http://nonsensopedia.wikia.com/ Nonsensopedia (Polish)]
**[http://desencyclopedie.com/ Désencyclopédie (French)] 
**[http://es.inciclopedia.wikia.com Inciclopedia (Spanish)]
**[http://eincyclopedia.wikia.com Eincyclopedia (Hebrew)]
**[http://de.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (German)]
**[http://zh.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (Chinese)]
|}

For non-english wikis, go to [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Category:Languages All Languages]
For test wikis, see the [http://scratchpad.wikia.com Scratchpad WikiLab].&lt;/div&gt;</text>
      <sha1>o7bz48c3y9n6wajwn3biagjyldiqi3y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2736</id>
      <parentid>2735</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-17T05:08:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Gil</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3383">&lt;div class="plainlinks"&gt;
&lt;div style="text-align:center;margin:.5em;padding:.5em;"&gt;
&lt;div style="font-weight:bold;font-size:200%;color:#005500"&gt;The URL you entered points to a Wikia that does not exist&lt;/div&gt;
Please choose a correct URL from the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Wikia list of Wikia].

'''If you want to create this wiki or start another Wikia, &lt;br /&gt;please [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Start_a_new_Wikia read the instructions] and fill out the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Special%3ACreateWiki wiki request form].'''
&lt;/div&gt;

{| style="width:95%;margin:auto;border:1px outset #bbbbff" 
|-
! colspan="3" style="border:1px outset #bbbbff" | Some active wikis include:
|- valign="top"
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://world.wikia.com/wiki/World_Wikia World Wikia] (travel guides)
*[http://memory-alpha.org/ Star Trek] (Memory Alpha), [http://de.memory-alpha.org Star Trek (German)]
*[http://starwars.wikia.com Star Wars] (Wookieepedia)
*[http://doom.wikia.com Doom]
*[http://creatures.wikia.com Creatures]
*[http://muppet.wikia.com Muppets]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://furry.wikia.com Furry] (WikiFur)
*[http://dofus.wikia.com Dofus]
*[http://althistory.wikia.com Alternative History]
*[http://boxster.wikia.com Boxster]
*[http://campaigns.wikia.com Campaigns]
*[http://24.wikia.com 24]
*[http://censorship.wikia.com censorship]
*[http://christianity.wikia.com/wiki/Welcome Christianity]
*[http://computervision.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page Computer Vision]
*[http://cybernations.wikia.com cybernations]
*[http://zh.evchk.wikia.com EVCHK (Chinese)]
*[http://familyguy.wikia.com Family Guy]
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://finalfantasy.wikia.com Final Fantasy]
*[http://gaia.wikia.com Gaia]
*[http://halo.wikia.com Halo]
*[http://health.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page Health]
*[http://lost.wikia.com Lost]
*[http://lotr.wikia.com Lord of the Rings]
*[http://megaman.wikia.com Megaman]
*[http://naked.wikia.com Naked Wiki]
*[http://nascar.wikia.com Nascar]
*[http://nethack.wikia.com Nethack]
*[http://ogame.wikia.com OGame] [http://pl.ogame.wikia.com Ogame (Polish)]
*[http://pikmin.wikia.com Pikmin]
*[http://psychology.wikia.com Psychology]
*[http://quitsmoking.wikia.com/wiki/Quit_Smoking Quit Smoking]
*[http://ja.revival.wikia.com Revial (Japanese]
*[http://runescape.wikia.com Runescape]
*[http://smallville.wikia.com Smallville]
*[http://stexpanded.wikia.com Star Trek Expanded]
*[http://swfanon.wikia.com SWFanon] Star Wars Fanon
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://tovid.wikia.com Tovid]
*[http://transformers.wikia.com Transformers]
*[http://turtledove.wikia.com Turtle Dove]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://x-files.wikia.com X Files]
*[http://yugioh.wikia.com Yugioh]
*Parody wikis: 
**[http://uncyclopedia.org/ Uncyclopedia (English)]
**[http://nonsensopedia.wikia.com/ Nonsensopedia (Polish)]
**[http://desencyclopedie.com/ Désencyclopédie (French)] 
**[http://es.inciclopedia.wikia.com Inciclopedia (Spanish)]
**[http://eincyclopedia.wikia.com Eincyclopedia (Hebrew)]
**[http://de.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (German)]
**[http://zh.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (Chinese)]
|}

For non-english wikis, go to [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Category:Languages All Languages]
For test wikis, see the [http://scratchpad.wikia.com Scratchpad WikiLab].&lt;/div&gt;</text>
      <sha1>t0ggy1va8c2chp2tn4jbbvutenqm7m0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2737</id>
      <parentid>2736</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-19T06:29:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>M03r</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3440">&lt;div class="plainlinks"&gt;
&lt;div style="text-align:center;margin:.5em;padding:.5em;"&gt;
&lt;div style="font-weight:bold;font-size:200%;color:#005500"&gt;The URL you entered points to a Wikia that does not exist&lt;/div&gt;
Please choose a correct URL from the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Wikia list of Wikia].

'''If you want to create this wiki or start another Wikia, &lt;br /&gt;please [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Start_a_new_Wikia read the instructions] and fill out the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Special%3ACreateWiki wiki request form].'''
&lt;/div&gt;

{| style="width:95%;margin:auto;border:1px outset #bbbbff" 
|-
! colspan="3" style="border:1px outset #bbbbff" | Some active wikis include:
|- valign="top"
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://world.wikia.com/wiki/World_Wikia World Wikia] (travel guides)
*[http://memory-alpha.org/ Star Trek] (Memory Alpha), [http://de.memory-alpha.org Star Trek (German)]
*[http://starwars.wikia.com Star Wars] (Wookieepedia)
*[http://doom.wikia.com Doom]
*[http://creatures.wikia.com Creatures]
*[http://muppet.wikia.com Muppets]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://furry.wikia.com Furry] (WikiFur)
*[http://dofus.wikia.com Dofus]
*[http://althistory.wikia.com Alternative History]
*[http://boxster.wikia.com Boxster]
*[http://campaigns.wikia.com Campaigns]
*[http://24.wikia.com 24]
*[http://censorship.wikia.com censorship]
*[http://christianity.wikia.com/wiki/Welcome Christianity]
*[http://computervision.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page Computer Vision]
*[http://cybernations.wikia.com cybernations]
*[http://zh.evchk.wikia.com EVCHK (Chinese)]
*[http://familyguy.wikia.com Family Guy]
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://finalfantasy.wikia.com Final Fantasy]
*[http://gaia.wikia.com Gaia]
*[http://halo.wikia.com Halo]
*[http://health.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page Health]
*[http://lost.wikia.com Lost]
*[http://lotr.wikia.com Lord of the Rings]
*[http://megaman.wikia.com Megaman]
*[http://naked.wikia.com Naked Wiki]
*[http://nascar.wikia.com Nascar]
*[http://nethack.wikia.com Nethack]
*[http://ogame.wikia.com OGame] [http://pl.ogame.wikia.com Ogame (Polish)]
*[http://pikmin.wikia.com Pikmin]
*[http://psychology.wikia.com Psychology]
*[http://quitsmoking.wikia.com/wiki/Quit_Smoking Quit Smoking]
*[http://ja.revival.wikia.com Revial (Japanese]
*[http://runescape.wikia.com Runescape]
*[http://smallville.wikia.com Smallville]
*[http://stexpanded.wikia.com Star Trek Expanded]
*[http://swfanon.wikia.com SWFanon] Star Wars Fanon
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://tovid.wikia.com Tovid]
*[http://transformers.wikia.com Transformers]
*[http://turtledove.wikia.com Turtle Dove]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://x-files.wikia.com X Files]
*[http://yugioh.wikia.com Yugioh]
*Parody wikis: 
**[http://uncyclopedia.org/ Uncyclopedia (English)]
**[http://nonsensopedia.wikia.com/ Nonsensopedia (Polish)]
**[http://desencyclopedie.com/ Désencyclopédie (French)] 
**[http://es.inciclopedia.wikia.com Inciclopedia (Spanish)]
**[http://eincyclopedia.wikia.com Eincyclopedia (Hebrew)]
**[http://de.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (German)]
**[http://zh.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (Chinese)]
**[http://absurdopedia.wikia.com Absurdopedia (Russian)]
|}

For non-english wikis, go to [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Category:Languages All Languages]
For test wikis, see the [http://scratchpad.wikia.com Scratchpad WikiLab].&lt;/div&gt;</text>
      <sha1>5mp19i7ty5awasm8fi2z0q1dbuykhxt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2738</id>
      <parentid>2737</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-19T19:32:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kamil1993</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3449">&lt;div class="plainlinks"&gt;
&lt;div style="text-align:center;margin:.5em;padding:.5em;"&gt;
&lt;div style="font-weight:bold;font-size:200%;color:#005500"&gt;The URL you entered points to a Wikia that does not exist&lt;/div&gt;
Please choose a correct URL from the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Wikia list of Wikia].

'''If you want to create this wiki or start another Wikia, &lt;br /&gt;please [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Start_a_new_Wikia read the instructions] and fill out the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Special%3ACreateWiki wiki request form].'''
&lt;/div&gt;

{| style="width:95%;margin:auto;border:1px outset #bbbbff" 
|-
! colspan="3" style="border:1px outset #bbbbff" | Some active wikis include:
|- valign="top"
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://world.wikia.com/wiki/World_Wikia World Wikia] (travel guides)
*[http://memory-alpha.org/ Star Trek] (Memory Alpha), [http://de.memory-alpha.org Star Trek (German)]
*[http://starwars.wikia.com Star Wars] (Wookieepedia)
*[http://doom.wikia.com Doom]
*[http://creatures.wikia.com Creatures]
*[http://muppet.wikia.com Muppets]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://furry.wikia.com Furry] (WikiFur)
*[http://dofus.wikia.com Dofus]
*[http://althistory.wikia.com Alternative History]
*[http://boxster.wikia.com Boxster]
*[http://campaigns.wikia.com Campaigns]
*[http://24.wikia.com 24]
*[http://censorship.wikia.com censorship]
*[http://christianity.wikia.com/wiki/Welcome Christianity]
*[http://computervision.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page Computer Vision]
*[http://cybernations.wikia.com cybernations]
*[http://zh.evchk.wikia.com EVCHK (Chinese)]
*[http://familyguy.wikia.com Family Guy]
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://finalfantasy.wikia.com Final Fantasy]
*[http://gaia.wikia.com Gaia]
*[http://halo.wikia.com Halo]
*[http://health.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page Health]
*[http://lost.wikia.com Lost]
*[http://lotr.wikia.com Lord of the Rings]
*[http://megaman.wikia.com Megaman]
*[http://naked.wikia.com Naked Wiki]
*[http://nascar.wikia.com Nascar]
*[http://nethack.wikia.com Nethack]
*[http://ogame.wikia.com OGame] [http://pl.ogame.wikia.com Ogame (Polish)]
*[http://pikmin.wikia.com Pikmin]
*[http://psychology.wikia.com Psychology]
*[http://quitsmoking.wikia.com/wiki/Quit_Smoking Quit Smoking]
*[http://ja.revival.wikia.com Revial (Japanese]
*[http://runescape.wikia.com Runescape]
*[http://smallville.wikia.com Smallville]
*[http://stexpanded.wikia.com Star Trek Expanded]
*[http://swfanon.wikia.com SWFanon] Star Wars Fanon
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://tovid.wikia.com Tovid]
*[http://transformers.wikia.com Transformers]
*[http://turtledove.wikia.com Turtle Dove]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://x-files.wikia.com X Files]
*[http://yugioh.wikia.com Yugioh]
*Parody wikis: 
**[http://uncyclopedia.org/ Uncyclopedia (English)]
**[http://nonsensopedia.wikia.com/ Nonsensopedia (Polish)]
**[http://desencyclopedie.com/ Désencyclopédie (French)] 
**[http://es.inciclopedia.wikia.com Inciclopedia (Spanish)]
**[http://eincyclopedia.wikia.com Eincyclopedia (Hebrew)]
**[http://de.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (German)]
**[http://zh.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (Chinese)]
**[http://absurdopedia.wikia.com Absurdopedia (Russian)]
|}
www.wp.pl
For non-english wikis, go to [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Category:Languages All Languages]
For test wikis, see the [http://scratchpad.wikia.com Scratchpad WikiLab].&lt;/div&gt;</text>
      <sha1>siwf1fv72zkfi62zhsrmly5xzxxee7u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2739</id>
      <parentid>2738</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-19T19:33:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kamil1993</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3439">&lt;div class="plainlinks"&gt;
&lt;div style="text-align:center;margin:.5em;padding:.5em;"&gt;
&lt;div style="font-weight:bold;font-size:200%;color:#005500"&gt;The URL you entered points to a Wikia that does not exist&lt;/div&gt;
Please choose a correct URL from the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Wikia list of Wikia].

'''If you want to create this wiki or start another Wikia, &lt;br /&gt;please [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Start_a_new_Wikia read the instructions] and fill out the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Special%3ACreateWiki wiki request form].'''
&lt;/div&gt;

{| style="width:95%;margin:auto;border:1px outset #bbbbff" 
|-
! colspan="3" style="border:1px outset #bbbbff" | Some active wikis include:
|- valign="top"
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://world.wikia.com/wiki/World_Wikia World Wikia] (travel guides)
*[http://memory-alpha.org/ Star Trek] (Memory Alpha), [http://de.memory-alpha.org Star Trek (German)]
*[http://starwars.wikia.com Star Wars] (Wookieepedia)
*[http://doom.wikia.com Doom]
*[http://creatures.wikia.com Creatures]
*[http://muppet.wikia.com Muppets]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://furry.wikia.com Furry] (WikiFur)
*[http://dofus.wikia.com Dofus]
*[http://althistory.wikia.com Alternative History]
*[http://boxster.wikia.com Boxster]
*[http://campaigns.wikia.com Campaigns]
*[http://24.wikia.com 24]
*[http://censorship.wikia.com censorship]
*[http://christianity.wikia.com/wiki/Welcome Christianity]
*[http://computervision.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page Computer Vision]
*[http://cybernations.wikia.com cybernations]
*[http://zh.evchk.wikia.com EVCHK (Chinese)]
*[http://familyguy.wikia.com Family Guy]
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://finalfantasy.wikia.com Final Fantasy]
*[http://gaia.wikia.com Gaia]
*[http://halo.wikia.com Halo]
*[http://health.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page Health]
*[http://lost.wikia.com Lost]
*[http://lotr.wikia.com Lord of the Rings]
*[http://megaman.wikia.com Megaman]
*[http://naked.wikia.com Naked Wiki]
*[http://nascar.wikia.com Nascar]
*[http://nethack.wikia.com Nethack]
*[http://ogame.wikia.com OGame] [http://pl.ogame.wikia.com Ogame (Polish)]
*[http://pikmin.wikia.com Pikmin]
*[http://psychology.wikia.com Psychology]
*[http://quitsmoking.wikia.com/wiki/Quit_Smoking Quit Smoking]
*[http://ja.revival.wikia.com Revial (Japanese]
*[http://runescape.wikia.com Runescape]
*[http://smallville.wikia.com Smallville]
*[http://stexpanded.wikia.com Star Trek Expanded]
*[http://swfanon.wikia.com SWFanon] Star Wars Fanon
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://tovid.wikia.com Tovid]
*[http://transformers.wikia.com Transformers]
*[http://turtledove.wikia.com Turtle Dove]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://x-files.wikia.com X Files]
*[http://yugioh.wikia.com Yugioh]
*Parody wikis: 
**[http://uncyclopedia.org/ Uncyclopedia (English)]
**[http://nonsensopedia.wikia.com/ Nonsensopedia (Polish)]
**[http://desencyclopedie.com/ Désencyclopédie (French)] 
**[http://es.inciclopedia.wikia.com Inciclopedia (Spanish)]
**[http://eincyclopedia.wikia.com Eincyclopedia (Hebrew)]
**[http://de.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (German)]
**[http://zh.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (Chinese)]
**[http://absurdopedia.wikia.com Absurdopedia (Russian)]
|}
For non-english wikis, go to [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Category:Languages All Languages]
For test wikis, see the [http://scratchpad.wikia.com Scratchpad WikiLab].&lt;/div&gt;</text>
      <sha1>fgzc9k1btp8xq4zzp7op9s3ajfw1um4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2740</id>
      <parentid>4145</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-10-10T19:18:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>81.177.14.26</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3464">&lt;div class="plainlinks"&gt;
&lt;div style="text-align:center;margin:.5em;padding:.5em;"&gt;
&lt;div style="font-weight:bold;font-size:200%;color:#005500"&gt;The URL you entered points to a Wikia that does not exist&lt;/div&gt;
Please choose a correct URL from the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Wikia list of Wikia].

'''If you want to create this wiki or start another Wikia, &lt;br /&gt;please [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Start_a_new_Wikia read the instructions] and fill out the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Special%3ACreateWiki wiki request form].'''
&lt;/div&gt;

{| style="width:95%;margin:auto;border:1px outset #bbbbff" 
|-
! colspan="3" style="border:1px outset #bbbbff" | Some active wikis include:
|- valign="top"
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://world.wikia.com/wiki/World_Wikia World Wikia] (travel guides)
*[http://memory-alpha.org/ Star Trek] (Memory Alpha), [http://de.memory-alpha.org Star Trek (German)]
*[http://starwars.wikia.com Star Wars] (Wookieepedia)
*[http://doom.wikia.com Doom]
*[http://creatures.wikia.com Creatures]
*[http://muppet.wikia.com Muppets]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://furry.wikia.com Furry] (WikiFur)
*[http://dofus.wikia.com Dofus]
*[http://althistory.wikia.com Alternative History]
*[http://boxster.wikia.com Boxster]
*[http://campaigns.wikia.com Campaigns]
*[http://24.wikia.com 24]
*[http://censorship.wikia.com censorship]
*[http://christianity.wikia.com/wiki/Welcome Christianity]
*[http://computervision.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page Computer Vision]
*[http://cybernations.wikia.com cybernations]
*[http://zh.evchk.wikia.com EVCHK (Chinese)]
*[http://familyguy.wikia.com Family Guy]
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://finalfantasy.wikia.com Final Fantasy]
*[http://gaia.wikia.com Gaia]
*[http://halo.wikia.com Halo]
*[http://health.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page Health]
*[http://lost.wikia.com Lost]
*[http://lotr.wikia.com Lord of the Rings]
*[http://megaman.wikia.com Megaman]
*[http://naked.wikia.com Naked Wiki]
*[http://nascar.wikia.com Nascar]
*[http://nethack.wikia.com Nethack]
*[http://ogame.wikia.com OGame] [http://pl.ogame.wikia.com Ogame (Polish)]
*[http://pikmin.wikia.com Pikmin]
*[http://psychology.wikia.com Psychology]
*[http://quitsmoking.wikia.com/wiki/Quit_Smoking Quit Smoking]
*[http://ja.revival.wikia.com Revial (Japanese]
*[http://runescape.wikia.com Runescape]
*[http://smallville.wikia.com Smallville]
*[http://stexpanded.wikia.com Star Trek Expanded]
*[http://swfanon.wikia.com SWFanon] Star Wars Fanon
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://tovid.wikia.com Tovid]
*[http://transformers.wikia.com Transformers]
*[http://turtledove.wikia.com Turtle Dove]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://x-files.wikia.com X Files]
*[http://yugioh.wikia.com Yugioh]
*Parody wikis: 
**[http://uncyclopedia.org/ Uncyclopedia (English)]
**[http://nonsensopedia.wikia.com/ Nonsensopedia (Polish)]
**[http://desencyclopedie.com/ Désencyclopédie (French)] 
**[http://es.inciclopedia.wikia.com Inciclopedia (Spanish)]
**[http://eincyclopedia.wikia.com Eincyclopedia (Hebrew)]
**[http://de.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (German)]
**[http://zh.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (Chinese)]
**[http://absurdopedia.wikia.com Absurdopedia (Russian)]
|}
For non-english wikis, go to [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Category:Languages All Languages]
For test wikis, see the [http://scratchpad.wikia.com Scratchpad WikiLab].&lt;/div&gt;
494578189322448874638573</text>
      <sha1>i2sav5r2m2xxxns3yvci5yzk2e1qw0p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2741</id>
      <parentid>2740</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-10-12T02:36:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Angela</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3439">&lt;div class="plainlinks"&gt;
&lt;div style="text-align:center;margin:.5em;padding:.5em;"&gt;
&lt;div style="font-weight:bold;font-size:200%;color:#005500"&gt;The URL you entered points to a Wikia that does not exist&lt;/div&gt;
Please choose a correct URL from the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Wikia list of Wikia].

'''If you want to create this wiki or start another Wikia, &lt;br /&gt;please [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Start_a_new_Wikia read the instructions] and fill out the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Special%3ACreateWiki wiki request form].'''
&lt;/div&gt;

{| style="width:95%;margin:auto;border:1px outset #bbbbff" 
|-
! colspan="3" style="border:1px outset #bbbbff" | Some active wikis include:
|- valign="top"
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://world.wikia.com/wiki/World_Wikia World Wikia] (travel guides)
*[http://memory-alpha.org/ Star Trek] (Memory Alpha), [http://de.memory-alpha.org Star Trek (German)]
*[http://starwars.wikia.com Star Wars] (Wookieepedia)
*[http://doom.wikia.com Doom]
*[http://creatures.wikia.com Creatures]
*[http://muppet.wikia.com Muppets]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://furry.wikia.com Furry] (WikiFur)
*[http://dofus.wikia.com Dofus]
*[http://althistory.wikia.com Alternative History]
*[http://boxster.wikia.com Boxster]
*[http://campaigns.wikia.com Campaigns]
*[http://24.wikia.com 24]
*[http://censorship.wikia.com censorship]
*[http://christianity.wikia.com/wiki/Welcome Christianity]
*[http://computervision.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page Computer Vision]
*[http://cybernations.wikia.com cybernations]
*[http://zh.evchk.wikia.com EVCHK (Chinese)]
*[http://familyguy.wikia.com Family Guy]
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://finalfantasy.wikia.com Final Fantasy]
*[http://gaia.wikia.com Gaia]
*[http://halo.wikia.com Halo]
*[http://health.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page Health]
*[http://lost.wikia.com Lost]
*[http://lotr.wikia.com Lord of the Rings]
*[http://megaman.wikia.com Megaman]
*[http://naked.wikia.com Naked Wiki]
*[http://nascar.wikia.com Nascar]
*[http://nethack.wikia.com Nethack]
*[http://ogame.wikia.com OGame] [http://pl.ogame.wikia.com Ogame (Polish)]
*[http://pikmin.wikia.com Pikmin]
*[http://psychology.wikia.com Psychology]
*[http://quitsmoking.wikia.com/wiki/Quit_Smoking Quit Smoking]
*[http://ja.revival.wikia.com Revial (Japanese]
*[http://runescape.wikia.com Runescape]
*[http://smallville.wikia.com Smallville]
*[http://stexpanded.wikia.com Star Trek Expanded]
*[http://swfanon.wikia.com SWFanon] Star Wars Fanon
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://tovid.wikia.com Tovid]
*[http://transformers.wikia.com Transformers]
*[http://turtledove.wikia.com Turtle Dove]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://x-files.wikia.com X Files]
*[http://yugioh.wikia.com Yugioh]
*Parody wikis: 
**[http://uncyclopedia.org/ Uncyclopedia (English)]
**[http://nonsensopedia.wikia.com/ Nonsensopedia (Polish)]
**[http://desencyclopedie.com/ Désencyclopédie (French)] 
**[http://es.inciclopedia.wikia.com Inciclopedia (Spanish)]
**[http://eincyclopedia.wikia.com Eincyclopedia (Hebrew)]
**[http://de.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (German)]
**[http://zh.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (Chinese)]
**[http://absurdopedia.wikia.com Absurdopedia (Russian)]
|}
For non-english wikis, go to [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Category:Languages All Languages]
For test wikis, see the [http://scratchpad.wikia.com Scratchpad WikiLab].&lt;/div&gt;</text>
      <sha1>fgzc9k1btp8xq4zzp7op9s3ajfw1um4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2742</id>
      <parentid>2741</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-10-12T02:39:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Angela</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3439">&lt;div class="plainlinks"&gt;
&lt;div style="text-align:center;margin:.5em;padding:.5em;"&gt;
&lt;div style="font-weight:bold;font-size:200%;color:#005500"&gt;The URL you entered points to a Wikia that does not exist&lt;/div&gt;
Please choose a correct URL from the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Wikia list of Wikia].

'''If you want to create this wiki or start another Wikia, &lt;br /&gt;please [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Start_a_new_Wikia read the instructions] and fill out the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Special%3ACreateWiki wiki request form].'''
&lt;/div&gt;

{| style="width:95%;margin:auto;border:1px outset #bbbbff" 
|-
! colspan="3" style="border:1px outset #bbbbff" | Some active wikis include:
|- valign="top"
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://world.wikia.com/wiki/World_Wikia World Wikia] (travel guides)
*[http://memory-alpha.org/ Star Trek] (Memory Alpha), [http://de.memory-alpha.org Star Trek (German)]
*[http://starwars.wikia.com Star Wars] (Wookieepedia)
*[http://doom.wikia.com Doom]
*[http://creatures.wikia.com Creatures]
*[http://muppet.wikia.com Muppets]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://furry.wikia.com Furry] (WikiFur)
*[http://dofus.wikia.com Dofus]
*[http://althistory.wikia.com Alternative History]
*[http://boxster.wikia.com Boxster]
*[http://campaigns.wikia.com Campaigns]
*[http://24.wikia.com 24]
*[http://censorship.wikia.com censorship]
*[http://christianity.wikia.com/wiki/Welcome Christianity]
*[http://computervision.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page Computer Vision]
*[http://cybernations.wikia.com cybernations]
*[http://zh.evchk.wikia.com EVCHK (Chinese)]
*[http://familyguy.wikia.com Family Guy]
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://finalfantasy.wikia.com Final Fantasy]
*[http://gaia.wikia.com Gaia]
*[http://halo.wikia.com Halo]
*[http://health.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page Health]
*[http://lost.wikia.com Lost]
*[http://lotr.wikia.com Lord of the Rings]
*[http://megaman.wikia.com Megaman]
*[http://naked.wikia.com Naked Wiki]
*[http://nascar.wikia.com Nascar]
*[http://nethack.wikia.com Nethack]
*[http://ogame.wikia.com OGame] [http://pl.ogame.wikia.com Ogame (Polish)]
*[http://pikmin.wikia.com Pikmin]
*[http://psychology.wikia.com Psychology]
*[http://quitsmoking.wikia.com/wiki/Quit_Smoking Quit Smoking]
*[http://ja.revival.wikia.com Revial (Japanese]
*[http://runescape.wikia.com Runescape]
*[http://smallville.wikia.com Smallville]
*[http://stexpanded.wikia.com Star Trek Expanded]
*[http://swfanon.wikia.com SWFanon] Star Wars Fanon
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://tovid.wikia.com Tovid]
*[http://transformers.wikia.com Transformers]
*[http://turtledove.wikia.com Turtle Dove]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://x-files.wikia.com X Files]
*[http://yugioh.wikia.com Yugioh]
*Parody wikis: 
**[http://uncyclopedia.org/ Uncyclopedia (English)]
**[http://nonsensopedia.wikia.com/ Nonsensopedia (Polish)]
**[http://desencyclopedie.com/ Désencyclopédie (French)] 
**[http://es.inciclopedia.wikia.com Inciclopedia (Spanish)]
**[http://eincyclopedia.wikia.com Eincyclopedia (Hebrew)]
**[http://de.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (German)]
**[http://zh.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (Chinese)]
**[http://absurdopedia.wikia.com Absurdopedia (Russian)]
|}
For non-english wikis, go to [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Category:Languages All Languages]
For test wikis, see the [http://scratchpad.wikia.com Scratchpad WikiLab].&lt;/div&gt;</text>
      <sha1>fgzc9k1btp8xq4zzp7op9s3ajfw1um4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2743</id>
      <parentid>2742</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-10-13T04:32:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GHe</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3491">&lt;div class="plainlinks"&gt;
&lt;div style="text-align:center;margin:.5em;padding:.5em;"&gt;
&lt;div style="font-weight:bold;font-size:200%;color:#005500"&gt;The URL you entered points to a Wikia that does not exist&lt;/div&gt;
Please choose a correct URL from the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Wikia list of Wikia].

'''If you want to create this wiki or start another Wikia, &lt;br /&gt;please [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Start_a_new_Wikia read the instructions] and fill out the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Special%3ACreateWiki wiki request form].'''
&lt;/div&gt;

{| style="width:95%;margin:auto;border:1px outset #bbbbff" 
|-
! colspan="3" style="border:1px outset #bbbbff" | Some active wikis include:
|- valign="top"
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://world.wikia.com/wiki/World_Wikia World Wikia] (travel guides)
*[http://memory-alpha.org/ Star Trek] (Memory Alpha), [http://de.memory-alpha.org Star Trek (German)]
*[http://starwars.wikia.com Star Wars] (Wookieepedia)
*[http://doom.wikia.com Doom]
*[http://creatures.wikia.com Creatures]
*[http://muppet.wikia.com Muppets]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://furry.wikia.com Furry] (WikiFur)
*[http://dofus.wikia.com Dofus]
*[http://althistory.wikia.com Alternative History]
*[http://boxster.wikia.com Boxster]
*[http://campaigns.wikia.com Campaigns]
*[http://24.wikia.com 24]
*[http://censorship.wikia.com censorship]
*[http://christianity.wikia.com/wiki/Welcome Christianity]
*[http://computervision.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page Computer Vision]
*[http://cybernations.wikia.com cybernations]
*[http://zh.evchk.wikia.com EVCHK (Chinese)]
*[http://familyguy.wikia.com Family Guy]
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://finalfantasy.wikia.com Final Fantasy]
*[http://gaia.wikia.com Gaia]
*[http://halo.wikia.com Halo]
*[http://health.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page Health]
*[http://inheritance.wikia.com Inheritance trilogy]
*[http://lost.wikia.com Lost]
*[http://lotr.wikia.com Lord of the Rings]
*[http://megaman.wikia.com Megaman]
*[http://naked.wikia.com Naked Wiki]
*[http://nascar.wikia.com Nascar]
*[http://nethack.wikia.com Nethack]
*[http://ogame.wikia.com OGame] [http://pl.ogame.wikia.com Ogame (Polish)]
*[http://pikmin.wikia.com Pikmin]
*[http://psychology.wikia.com Psychology]
*[http://quitsmoking.wikia.com/wiki/Quit_Smoking Quit Smoking]
*[http://ja.revival.wikia.com Revial (Japanese]
*[http://runescape.wikia.com Runescape]
*[http://smallville.wikia.com Smallville]
*[http://stexpanded.wikia.com Star Trek Expanded]
*[http://swfanon.wikia.com SWFanon] Star Wars Fanon
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://tovid.wikia.com Tovid]
*[http://transformers.wikia.com Transformers]
*[http://turtledove.wikia.com Turtle Dove]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://x-files.wikia.com X Files]
*[http://yugioh.wikia.com Yugioh]
*Parody wikis: 
**[http://uncyclopedia.org/ Uncyclopedia (English)]
**[http://nonsensopedia.wikia.com/ Nonsensopedia (Polish)]
**[http://desencyclopedie.com/ Désencyclopédie (French)] 
**[http://es.inciclopedia.wikia.com Inciclopedia (Spanish)]
**[http://eincyclopedia.wikia.com Eincyclopedia (Hebrew)]
**[http://de.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (German)]
**[http://zh.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (Chinese)]
**[http://absurdopedia.wikia.com Absurdopedia (Russian)]
|}
For non-english wikis, go to [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Category:Languages All Languages]
For test wikis, see the [http://scratchpad.wikia.com Scratchpad WikiLab].&lt;/div&gt;</text>
      <sha1>dhbgjnizxyl0hvboxbdj12p64fbsguc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2744</id>
      <parentid>2743</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-10-16T13:34:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Andy0116</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="24">歡迎來到遊戲大典</text>
      <sha1>afk0mgyrshy2u7yrvcpdx8iyfczd84q</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2745</id>
      <parentid>2744</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-10-16T14:20:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Angela</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3491">&lt;div class="plainlinks"&gt;
&lt;div style="text-align:center;margin:.5em;padding:.5em;"&gt;
&lt;div style="font-weight:bold;font-size:200%;color:#005500"&gt;The URL you entered points to a Wikia that does not exist&lt;/div&gt;
Please choose a correct URL from the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Wikia list of Wikia].

'''If you want to create this wiki or start another Wikia, &lt;br /&gt;please [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Start_a_new_Wikia read the instructions] and fill out the [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Special%3ACreateWiki wiki request form].'''
&lt;/div&gt;

{| style="width:95%;margin:auto;border:1px outset #bbbbff" 
|-
! colspan="3" style="border:1px outset #bbbbff" | Some active wikis include:
|- valign="top"
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://world.wikia.com/wiki/World_Wikia World Wikia] (travel guides)
*[http://memory-alpha.org/ Star Trek] (Memory Alpha), [http://de.memory-alpha.org Star Trek (German)]
*[http://starwars.wikia.com Star Wars] (Wookieepedia)
*[http://doom.wikia.com Doom]
*[http://creatures.wikia.com Creatures]
*[http://muppet.wikia.com Muppets]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://furry.wikia.com Furry] (WikiFur)
*[http://dofus.wikia.com Dofus]
*[http://althistory.wikia.com Alternative History]
*[http://boxster.wikia.com Boxster]
*[http://campaigns.wikia.com Campaigns]
*[http://24.wikia.com 24]
*[http://censorship.wikia.com censorship]
*[http://christianity.wikia.com/wiki/Welcome Christianity]
*[http://computervision.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page Computer Vision]
*[http://cybernations.wikia.com cybernations]
*[http://zh.evchk.wikia.com EVCHK (Chinese)]
*[http://familyguy.wikia.com Family Guy]
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://finalfantasy.wikia.com Final Fantasy]
*[http://gaia.wikia.com Gaia]
*[http://halo.wikia.com Halo]
*[http://health.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page Health]
*[http://inheritance.wikia.com Inheritance trilogy]
*[http://lost.wikia.com Lost]
*[http://lotr.wikia.com Lord of the Rings]
*[http://megaman.wikia.com Megaman]
*[http://naked.wikia.com Naked Wiki]
*[http://nascar.wikia.com Nascar]
*[http://nethack.wikia.com Nethack]
*[http://ogame.wikia.com OGame] [http://pl.ogame.wikia.com Ogame (Polish)]
*[http://pikmin.wikia.com Pikmin]
*[http://psychology.wikia.com Psychology]
*[http://quitsmoking.wikia.com/wiki/Quit_Smoking Quit Smoking]
*[http://ja.revival.wikia.com Revial (Japanese]
*[http://runescape.wikia.com Runescape]
*[http://smallville.wikia.com Smallville]
*[http://stexpanded.wikia.com Star Trek Expanded]
*[http://swfanon.wikia.com SWFanon] Star Wars Fanon
| style="width:33%;border:1px outset #bbbbff" |
*[http://tovid.wikia.com Tovid]
*[http://transformers.wikia.com Transformers]
*[http://turtledove.wikia.com Turtle Dove]
*[http://whitewolf.wikia.com White Wolf]
*[http://x-files.wikia.com X Files]
*[http://yugioh.wikia.com Yugioh]
*Parody wikis: 
**[http://uncyclopedia.org/ Uncyclopedia (English)]
**[http://nonsensopedia.wikia.com/ Nonsensopedia (Polish)]
**[http://desencyclopedie.com/ Désencyclopédie (French)] 
**[http://es.inciclopedia.wikia.com Inciclopedia (Spanish)]
**[http://eincyclopedia.wikia.com Eincyclopedia (Hebrew)]
**[http://de.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (German)]
**[http://zh.uncyclopedia.wikia.com Uncyclopedia (Chinese)]
**[http://absurdopedia.wikia.com Absurdopedia (Russian)]
|}
For non-english wikis, go to [http://www.wikia.com/wiki/Category:Languages All Languages]
For test wikis, see the [http://scratchpad.wikia.com Scratchpad WikiLab].&lt;/div&gt;</text>
      <sha1>dhbgjnizxyl0hvboxbdj12p64fbsguc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2746</id>
      <parentid>1504</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T13:17:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="444">&lt;big&gt;'''MediaWiki has been successfully installed.'''&lt;/big&gt;

Consult the [http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Help:Contents User's Guide] for information on using the wiki software.

== Getting started ==

* [http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Help:Configuration_settings Configuration settings list]
* [http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Help:FAQ MediaWiki FAQ]
* [http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/mediawiki-announce MediaWiki release mailing list]</text>
      <sha1>h4akxazhyrfca1cq9yil0pxsafmqdhb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4026</id>
      <parentid>2713</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-17T12:30:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>82.240.34.161</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9233">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to pack and when to go, what to eat and how to stay safe. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top 10 Tips]],
[[Finding accommodation]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[Phrasebooks]]
[[Hitchhiking essentials|more...]]

===[[Europe]]===

[[Netherlands]],
[[France]],
[[Finland]] ([[Helsinki]]),
[[Spain]],
[[Europe|more...]]

===[[North America]]===
[[United States of America]],
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico City]],
[[Minot]], 
[[North America|more...]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Morocco]],
[[Mozambique]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Mali]],
[[Senegal]],
[[South Africa]],
[[Africa|more...]]

===New Topics===
To start a new page, just click "edit" beside the "new topics" headline. There is more advice in the editing page.

[[Template:Stub]]
&lt;!-- How to create a new page

To create a new page in wiki you have to first create a link to the page. Do this by adding the topic of your page inside doublebrackets, like this: [[the topic of your page]]. Save the page, and you see a new, red link appearing in the New topics -section. Click the red link and you get to edit the new page.

Some tips about editing:

=Headline= creates top-level heading
==Headline== creates second-level headline
===Headline=== creates third-level headline
''emphazised text'' creates text emphasized in cursive
'''strong text''' creates bolded texts
[[Topic of the page]] creates a link to a page in the Guide. If the page does not exist, it creates a link to a new page.
[http://www.domain.com domain.com] creates an external link to http://www.domain.com to the text domain.com.

Remember that due to the nature of this project your text can and will be edited by other editing hitchhikers of the guide. Do not feel offended by editing - the main goal in this project is to provide the best stuff possible, meaning co-operation and collaborately improving the content to serve the Guide.

--&gt;
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]],
[[Middle East|more...]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]],
[[Asia|more...]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]],
[[Central America|more...]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Chile]],
[[Peru]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Argentina]],
[[Uruguay]],
[[South America|more...]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Hobart]],
[[Oceania|more...]]

== Maintenance? ==

It seems that there is no real maintenance of this site. If I don't get any response I will start checking out the possibilities of hosting it at Wikicities, which is somewhat more related to Wikipedia, and hence spammers will be easier kept out.

|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-left:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers'_Guide_to_Hitchhiking:Welcome, newcomers|Welcome]]===

[[Wikitravel:Welcome, newcomers|Newcomers]],
[[Wikitravel:Welcome, Wikipedians|Wikipedians]],
[[Wikitravel:Plunge forward|Plunge forward]]

===[[Help:Contents|Help]]===

[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],
[[Help:Utilities|more...]]

&lt;!-- This will have to be edited 
===[[Wikitravel:Full text of the Attribution-ShareAlike 1.0 license|Small print]]===

[[Wikitravel:Full text of the Attribution-ShareAlike 1.0 license|Attribution-ShareAlike license]],
[[Wikitravel:Why Wikitravel isn't GFDL|Why Wikitravel isn't GFDL]],
[[Wikitravel:Copyleft|Copyleft]]
--&gt;

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|Project]]===

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
&lt;!---  [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Neutral point of view|Neutral point of view]], hitchhiker's point of view! --&gt;
&lt;br&gt;

===Tools===

[[Help:Manual of style|Manual of style]],
[[Help:Geographical hierarchy|Geographical hierarchy]],
[[Help:Article naming conventions|Article naming conventions]],
[[Help:Article templates|Article templates]]

|align="left" width="250px" valign="top" style="background-color:#FFFFF7; border:1px solid #AAAA88; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;"|

===Logbook===

&lt;div style="width:250px; height:250px; overflow:auto; border:thin grey solid; padding:5px;"&gt;

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] is a collaborate project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of hitchhikers. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to pack and when to go, what to eat and how to stay safe.

The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org wikipedia]-project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way  [http://www.wikipedia.org wikipedia] does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every Hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a worrk of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===

Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link. So, [[new entries | PRESS HERE]] to get  more info.

You can also check the [[Top 10 Tips]] -page to see if you have something to add.



=Tips ordered by geograhpy=

[[Europe]], [[Asia]], [[North America]], [[South America]], [[Africa]], [[Australia]]

=General backpack travelling tips=

[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Safety]], [[Looks]]

=Hitchhiking recources in the web=
* [[digihitch.com]] is a hitchhiking culture portal
* [[Suite101]] contains articles about hitchhiking by [[Bernd Wechner]]  
* [[Vilnius Hitchhiking Club]] is the leading Hitchhiking community in the [[European Union]]
* [[Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers]]
* [[Hike.ru]] is a [[Russia|Russian]] hitchhiking community website 
* [[Liftari.org]] is a [[Finland|Finnish]] hitchhiking community website
* [[Hitchhiker's guide to Europe]]

&lt;/div&gt;

[[Wikitravel:Logbook|Previous entries]] [[Wikitravel:{{CURRENTDAY}} {{CURRENTMONTHNAME}} {{CURRENTYEAR}}|Today]]
|}</text>
      <sha1>qsgpoa3bewgi9db8wdcdh33s2rlkz2l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4027</id>
      <parentid>4026</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-17T20:26:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8966">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to pack and when to go, what to eat and how to stay safe. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top 10 Tips]],
[[Finding accommodation]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[Phrasebooks]]
[[Hitchhiking essentials|more...]]

===[[Europe]]===

[[Netherlands]],
[[France]],
[[Finland]] ([[Helsinki]]),
[[Spain]],
[[Europe|more...]]

===[[North America]]===
[[United States of America]],
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico City]],
[[Minot]], 
[[North America|more...]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Morocco]],
[[Mozambique]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Mali]],
[[Senegal]],
[[South Africa]],
[[Africa|more...]]

===New Topics===
To start a new page, just click "edit" beside the "new topics" headline. There is more advice in the editing page.

[[Template:Stub]]
&lt;!-- How to create a new page

To create a new page in wiki you have to first create a link to the page. Do this by adding the topic of your page inside doublebrackets, like this: [[the topic of your page]]. Save the page, and you see a new, red link appearing in the New topics -section. Click the red link and you get to edit the new page.

Some tips about editing:

=Headline= creates top-level heading
==Headline== creates second-level headline
===Headline=== creates third-level headline
''emphazised text'' creates text emphasized in cursive
'''strong text''' creates bolded texts
[[Topic of the page]] creates a link to a page in the Guide. If the page does not exist, it creates a link to a new page.
[http://www.domain.com domain.com] creates an external link to http://www.domain.com to the text domain.com.

Remember that due to the nature of this project your text can and will be edited by other editing hitchhikers of the guide. Do not feel offended by editing - the main goal in this project is to provide the best stuff possible, meaning co-operation and collaborately improving the content to serve the Guide.

--&gt;
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]],
[[Middle East|more...]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]],
[[Asia|more...]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]],
[[Central America|more...]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Chile]],
[[Peru]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Argentina]],
[[Uruguay]],
[[South America|more...]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Hobart]],
[[Oceania|more...]]


|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-left:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers'_Guide_to_Hitchhiking:Welcome, newcomers|Welcome]]===

[[Wikitravel:Welcome, newcomers|Newcomers]],
[[Wikitravel:Welcome, Wikipedians|Wikipedians]],
[[Wikitravel:Plunge forward|Plunge forward]]

===[[Help:Contents|Help]]===

[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],
[[Help:Utilities|more...]]

&lt;!-- This will have to be edited 
===[[Wikitravel:Full text of the Attribution-ShareAlike 1.0 license|Small print]]===

[[Wikitravel:Full text of the Attribution-ShareAlike 1.0 license|Attribution-ShareAlike license]],
[[Wikitravel:Why Wikitravel isn't GFDL|Why Wikitravel isn't GFDL]],
[[Wikitravel:Copyleft|Copyleft]]
--&gt;

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|Project]]===

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
&lt;!---  [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Neutral point of view|Neutral point of view]], hitchhiker's point of view! --&gt;
&lt;br&gt;

===Tools===

[[Help:Manual of style|Manual of style]],
[[Help:Geographical hierarchy|Geographical hierarchy]],
[[Help:Article naming conventions|Article naming conventions]],
[[Help:Article templates|Article templates]]

|align="left" width="250px" valign="top" style="background-color:#FFFFF7; border:1px solid #AAAA88; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;"|

===Logbook===

&lt;div style="width:250px; height:250px; overflow:auto; border:thin grey solid; padding:5px;"&gt;

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] is a collaborate project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of hitchhikers. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to pack and when to go, what to eat and how to stay safe.

The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org wikipedia]-project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way  [http://www.wikipedia.org wikipedia] does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every Hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a worrk of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===

Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link. So, [[new entries | PRESS HERE]] to get  more info.

You can also check the [[Top 10 Tips]] -page to see if you have something to add.



=Tips ordered by geograhpy=

[[Europe]], [[Asia]], [[North America]], [[South America]], [[Africa]], [[Australia]]

=General backpack travelling tips=

[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Safety]], [[Looks]]

=Hitchhiking recources in the web=
* [[digihitch.com]] is a hitchhiking culture portal
* [[Suite101]] contains articles about hitchhiking by [[Bernd Wechner]]  
* [[Vilnius Hitchhiking Club]] is the leading Hitchhiking community in the [[European Union]]
* [[Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers]]
* [[Hike.ru]] is a [[Russia|Russian]] hitchhiking community website 
* [[Liftari.org]] is a [[Finland|Finnish]] hitchhiking community website
* [[Hitchhiker's guide to Europe]]

&lt;/div&gt;

[[Wikitravel:Logbook|Previous entries]] [[Wikitravel:{{CURRENTDAY}} {{CURRENTMONTHNAME}} {{CURRENTYEAR}}|Today]]
|}</text>
      <sha1>bhi4979f7molqyxs8ijs0jsphxzbllo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4028</id>
      <parentid>4027</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T21:14:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8993">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to pack and when to go, what to eat and how to stay safe. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top 10 Tips]],
[[Finding accommodation]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking essentials|more...]]

===[[Europe]]===

[[Netherlands]],
[[France]],
[[Finland]] ([[Helsinki]]),
[[Spain]],
[[Europe|more...]]

===[[North America]]===
[[United States of America]],
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico City]],
[[Minot]], 
[[North America|more...]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Morocco]],
[[Mozambique]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Mali]],
[[Senegal]],
[[South Africa]],
[[Africa|more...]]

===New Topics===
To start a new page, just click "edit" beside the "new topics" headline. There is more advice in the editing page.

[[Template:Stub]]
&lt;!-- How to create a new page

To create a new page in wiki you have to first create a link to the page. Do this by adding the topic of your page inside doublebrackets, like this: [[the topic of your page]]. Save the page, and you see a new, red link appearing in the New topics -section. Click the red link and you get to edit the new page.

Some tips about editing:

=Headline= creates top-level heading
==Headline== creates second-level headline
===Headline=== creates third-level headline
''emphazised text'' creates text emphasized in cursive
'''strong text''' creates bolded texts
[[Topic of the page]] creates a link to a page in the Guide. If the page does not exist, it creates a link to a new page.
[http://www.domain.com domain.com] creates an external link to http://www.domain.com to the text domain.com.

Remember that due to the nature of this project your text can and will be edited by other editing hitchhikers of the guide. Do not feel offended by editing - the main goal in this project is to provide the best stuff possible, meaning co-operation and collaborately improving the content to serve the Guide.

--&gt;
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]],
[[Middle East|more...]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]],
[[Asia|more...]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]],
[[Central America|more...]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Chile]],
[[Peru]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Argentina]],
[[Uruguay]],
[[South America|more...]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Hobart]],
[[Oceania|more...]]


|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-left:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers'_Guide_to_Hitchhiking:Welcome, newcomers|Welcome]]===

[[Wikitravel:Welcome, newcomers|Newcomers]],
[[Wikitravel:Welcome, Wikipedians|Wikipedians]],
[[Wikitravel:Plunge forward|Plunge forward]]

===[[Help:Contents|Help]]===

[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],
[[Help:Utilities|more...]]

&lt;!-- This will have to be edited 
===[[Wikitravel:Full text of the Attribution-ShareAlike 1.0 license|Small print]]===

[[Wikitravel:Full text of the Attribution-ShareAlike 1.0 license|Attribution-ShareAlike license]],
[[Wikitravel:Why Wikitravel isn't GFDL|Why Wikitravel isn't GFDL]],
[[Wikitravel:Copyleft|Copyleft]]
--&gt;

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|Project]]===

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
&lt;!---  [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Neutral point of view|Neutral point of view]], hitchhiker's point of view! --&gt;
&lt;br&gt;

===Tools===

[[Help:Manual of style|Manual of style]],
[[Help:Geographical hierarchy|Geographical hierarchy]],
[[Help:Article naming conventions|Article naming conventions]],
[[Help:Article templates|Article templates]]

|align="left" width="250px" valign="top" style="background-color:#FFFFF7; border:1px solid #AAAA88; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;"|

===Logbook===

&lt;div style="width:250px; height:250px; overflow:auto; border:thin grey solid; padding:5px;"&gt;

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] is a collaborate project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of hitchhikers. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to pack and when to go, what to eat and how to stay safe.

The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org wikipedia]-project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way  [http://www.wikipedia.org wikipedia] does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every Hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a worrk of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===

Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link. So, [[new entries | PRESS HERE]] to get  more info.

You can also check the [[Top 10 Tips]] -page to see if you have something to add.



=Tips ordered by geograhpy=

[[Europe]], [[Asia]], [[North America]], [[South America]], [[Africa]], [[Australia]]

=General backpack travelling tips=

[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Safety]], [[Looks]]

=Hitchhiking recources in the web=
* [[digihitch.com]] is a hitchhiking culture portal
* [[Suite101]] contains articles about hitchhiking by [[Bernd Wechner]]  
* [[Vilnius Hitchhiking Club]] is the leading Hitchhiking community in the [[European Union]]
* [[Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers]]
* [[Hike.ru]] is a [[Russia|Russian]] hitchhiking community website 
* [[Liftari.org]] is a [[Finland|Finnish]] hitchhiking community website
* [[Hitchhiker's guide to Europe]]

&lt;/div&gt;

[[Wikitravel:Logbook|Previous entries]] [[Wikitravel:{{CURRENTDAY}} {{CURRENTMONTHNAME}} {{CURRENTYEAR}}|Today]]
|}</text>
      <sha1>7s6s2ho5hmkuio2fr5dr1kjd8e1smes</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4029</id>
      <parentid>4028</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T21:36:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9028">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to pack and when to go, what to eat and how to stay safe. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top 10 Tips]],
[[Finding accommodation]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking essentials|more...]]

===Other===
[[Hitchhiking clubs]]

===[[Europe]]===

[[Netherlands]],
[[France]],
[[Finland]] ([[Helsinki]]),
[[Spain]],
[[Europe|more...]]

===[[North America]]===
[[United States of America]],
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico City]],
[[Minot]], 
[[North America|more...]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Morocco]],
[[Mozambique]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Mali]],
[[Senegal]],
[[South Africa]],
[[Africa|more...]]

===New Topics===
To start a new page, just click "edit" beside the "new topics" headline. There is more advice in the editing page.

[[Template:Stub]]
&lt;!-- How to create a new page

To create a new page in wiki you have to first create a link to the page. Do this by adding the topic of your page inside doublebrackets, like this: [[the topic of your page]]. Save the page, and you see a new, red link appearing in the New topics -section. Click the red link and you get to edit the new page.

Some tips about editing:

=Headline= creates top-level heading
==Headline== creates second-level headline
===Headline=== creates third-level headline
''emphazised text'' creates text emphasized in cursive
'''strong text''' creates bolded texts
[[Topic of the page]] creates a link to a page in the Guide. If the page does not exist, it creates a link to a new page.
[http://www.domain.com domain.com] creates an external link to http://www.domain.com to the text domain.com.

Remember that due to the nature of this project your text can and will be edited by other editing hitchhikers of the guide. Do not feel offended by editing - the main goal in this project is to provide the best stuff possible, meaning co-operation and collaborately improving the content to serve the Guide.

--&gt;
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]],
[[Middle East|more...]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]],
[[Asia|more...]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]],
[[Central America|more...]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Chile]],
[[Peru]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Argentina]],
[[Uruguay]],
[[South America|more...]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Hobart]],
[[Oceania|more...]]


|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-left:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers'_Guide_to_Hitchhiking:Welcome, newcomers|Welcome]]===

[[Wikitravel:Welcome, newcomers|Newcomers]],
[[Wikitravel:Welcome, Wikipedians|Wikipedians]],
[[Wikitravel:Plunge forward|Plunge forward]]

===[[Help:Contents|Help]]===

[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],
[[Help:Utilities|more...]]

&lt;!-- This will have to be edited 
===[[Wikitravel:Full text of the Attribution-ShareAlike 1.0 license|Small print]]===

[[Wikitravel:Full text of the Attribution-ShareAlike 1.0 license|Attribution-ShareAlike license]],
[[Wikitravel:Why Wikitravel isn't GFDL|Why Wikitravel isn't GFDL]],
[[Wikitravel:Copyleft|Copyleft]]
--&gt;

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|Project]]===

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
&lt;!---  [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Neutral point of view|Neutral point of view]], hitchhiker's point of view! --&gt;
&lt;br&gt;

===Tools===

[[Help:Manual of style|Manual of style]],
[[Help:Geographical hierarchy|Geographical hierarchy]],
[[Help:Article naming conventions|Article naming conventions]],
[[Help:Article templates|Article templates]]

|align="left" width="250px" valign="top" style="background-color:#FFFFF7; border:1px solid #AAAA88; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;"|

===Logbook===

&lt;div style="width:250px; height:250px; overflow:auto; border:thin grey solid; padding:5px;"&gt;

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] is a collaborate project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of hitchhikers. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to pack and when to go, what to eat and how to stay safe.

The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org wikipedia]-project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way  [http://www.wikipedia.org wikipedia] does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every Hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a worrk of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===

Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link. So, [[new entries | PRESS HERE]] to get  more info.

You can also check the [[Top 10 Tips]] -page to see if you have something to add.



=Tips ordered by geograhpy=

[[Europe]], [[Asia]], [[North America]], [[South America]], [[Africa]], [[Australia]]

=General backpack travelling tips=

[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Safety]], [[Looks]]

=Hitchhiking recources in the web=
* [[digihitch.com]] is a hitchhiking culture portal
* [[Suite101]] contains articles about hitchhiking by [[Bernd Wechner]]  
* [[Vilnius Hitchhiking Club]] is the leading Hitchhiking community in the [[European Union]]
* [[Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers]]
* [[Hike.ru]] is a [[Russia|Russian]] hitchhiking community website 
* [[Liftari.org]] is a [[Finland|Finnish]] hitchhiking community website
* [[Hitchhiker's guide to Europe]]

&lt;/div&gt;

[[Wikitravel:Logbook|Previous entries]] [[Wikitravel:{{CURRENTDAY}} {{CURRENTMONTHNAME}} {{CURRENTYEAR}}|Today]]
|}</text>
      <sha1>kg0mwnzcltyoe5zt6mnk5np6fn4uipn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4030</id>
      <parentid>4029</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T14:02:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9038">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to pack and when to go, what to eat and how to stay safe. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top 10 Tips]],
[[Finding accommodation]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking essentials|more...]]

===Other===
[[Hitchhiking clubs]]

===[[Europe]]===

[[Netherlands]],
[[France]],
[[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Spain]],
[[Europe|more...]]

===[[North America]]===
[[United States of America]],
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico City]],
[[Minot]], 
[[North America|more...]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Morocco]],
[[Mozambique]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Mali]],
[[Senegal]],
[[South Africa]],
[[Africa|more...]]

===New Topics===
To start a new page, just click "edit" beside the "new topics" headline. There is more advice in the editing page.

[[Template:Stub]]
&lt;!-- How to create a new page

To create a new page in wiki you have to first create a link to the page. Do this by adding the topic of your page inside doublebrackets, like this: [[the topic of your page]]. Save the page, and you see a new, red link appearing in the New topics -section. Click the red link and you get to edit the new page.

Some tips about editing:

=Headline= creates top-level heading
==Headline== creates second-level headline
===Headline=== creates third-level headline
''emphazised text'' creates text emphasized in cursive
'''strong text''' creates bolded texts
[[Topic of the page]] creates a link to a page in the Guide. If the page does not exist, it creates a link to a new page.
[http://www.domain.com domain.com] creates an external link to http://www.domain.com to the text domain.com.

Remember that due to the nature of this project your text can and will be edited by other editing hitchhikers of the guide. Do not feel offended by editing - the main goal in this project is to provide the best stuff possible, meaning co-operation and collaborately improving the content to serve the Guide.

--&gt;
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]],
[[Middle East|more...]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]],
[[Asia|more...]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]],
[[Central America|more...]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Chile]],
[[Peru]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Argentina]],
[[Uruguay]],
[[South America|more...]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Hobart]],
[[Oceania|more...]]


|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-left:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers'_Guide_to_Hitchhiking:Welcome, newcomers|Welcome]]===

[[Wikitravel:Welcome, newcomers|Newcomers]],
[[Wikitravel:Welcome, Wikipedians|Wikipedians]],
[[Wikitravel:Plunge forward|Plunge forward]]

===[[Help:Contents|Help]]===

[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],
[[Help:Utilities|more...]]

&lt;!-- This will have to be edited 
===[[Wikitravel:Full text of the Attribution-ShareAlike 1.0 license|Small print]]===

[[Wikitravel:Full text of the Attribution-ShareAlike 1.0 license|Attribution-ShareAlike license]],
[[Wikitravel:Why Wikitravel isn't GFDL|Why Wikitravel isn't GFDL]],
[[Wikitravel:Copyleft|Copyleft]]
--&gt;

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|Project]]===

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
&lt;!---  [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Neutral point of view|Neutral point of view]], hitchhiker's point of view! --&gt;
&lt;br&gt;

===Tools===

[[Help:Manual of style|Manual of style]],
[[Help:Geographical hierarchy|Geographical hierarchy]],
[[Help:Article naming conventions|Article naming conventions]],
[[Help:Article templates|Article templates]]

|align="left" width="250px" valign="top" style="background-color:#FFFFF7; border:1px solid #AAAA88; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;"|

===Logbook===

&lt;div style="width:250px; height:250px; overflow:auto; border:thin grey solid; padding:5px;"&gt;

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] is a collaborate project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of hitchhikers. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to pack and when to go, what to eat and how to stay safe.

The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org wikipedia]-project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way  [http://www.wikipedia.org wikipedia] does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every Hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a worrk of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===

Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link. So, [[new entries | PRESS HERE]] to get  more info.

You can also check the [[Top 10 Tips]] -page to see if you have something to add.



=Tips ordered by geograhpy=

[[Europe]], [[Asia]], [[North America]], [[South America]], [[Africa]], [[Australia]]

=General backpack travelling tips=

[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Safety]], [[Looks]]

=Hitchhiking recources in the web=
* [[digihitch.com]] is a hitchhiking culture portal
* [[Suite101]] contains articles about hitchhiking by [[Bernd Wechner]]  
* [[Vilnius Hitchhiking Club]] is the leading Hitchhiking community in the [[European Union]]
* [[Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers]]
* [[Hike.ru]] is a [[Russia|Russian]] hitchhiking community website 
* [[Liftari.org]] is a [[Finland|Finnish]] hitchhiking community website
* [[Hitchhiker's guide to Europe]]

&lt;/div&gt;

[[Wikitravel:Logbook|Previous entries]] [[Wikitravel:{{CURRENTDAY}} {{CURRENTMONTHNAME}} {{CURRENTYEAR}}|Today]]
|}</text>
      <sha1>72o8ms4iu89tm1xzsaa3dv83zy0xw5m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4031</id>
      <parentid>4030</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T14:17:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7755">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to pack and when to go, what to eat and how to stay safe. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top 10 Tips]],
[[Finding accommodation]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking essentials|more...]]

===Other===
[[Hitchhiking clubs]]

===[[Europe]]===

[[Netherlands]],
[[France]],
[[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Spain]],
[[Europe|more...]]

===[[North America]]===
[[United States of America]],
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico City]],
[[Minot]], 
[[North America|more...]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Morocco]],
[[Mozambique]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Mali]],
[[Senegal]],
[[South Africa]],
[[Africa|more...]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]],
[[Middle East|more...]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]],
[[Asia|more...]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]],
[[Central America|more...]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Chile]],
[[Peru]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Argentina]],
[[Uruguay]],
[[South America|more...]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Hobart]],
[[Oceania|more...]]


|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-left:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers'_Guide_to_Hitchhiking:Welcome, newcomers|Welcome]]===

[[Wikitravel:Welcome, newcomers|Newcomers]],
[[Wikitravel:Welcome, Wikipedians|Wikipedians]],
[[Wikitravel:Plunge forward|Plunge forward]]

===[[Help:Contents|Help]]===

[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],
[[Help:Utilities|more...]]

&lt;!-- This will have to be edited 
===[[Wikitravel:Full text of the Attribution-ShareAlike 1.0 license|Small print]]===

[[Wikitravel:Full text of the Attribution-ShareAlike 1.0 license|Attribution-ShareAlike license]],
[[Wikitravel:Why Wikitravel isn't GFDL|Why Wikitravel isn't GFDL]],
[[Wikitravel:Copyleft|Copyleft]]
--&gt;

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|Project]]===

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
&lt;!---  [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Neutral point of view|Neutral point of view]], hitchhiker's point of view! --&gt;
&lt;br&gt;

===Tools===

[[Help:Manual of style|Manual of style]],
[[Help:Geographical hierarchy|Geographical hierarchy]],
[[Help:Article naming conventions|Article naming conventions]],
[[Help:Article templates|Article templates]]

|align="left" width="250px" valign="top" style="background-color:#FFFFF7; border:1px solid #AAAA88; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;"|

===Logbook===

&lt;div style="width:250px; height:250px; overflow:auto; border:thin grey solid; padding:5px;"&gt;

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] is a collaborate project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of hitchhikers. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to pack and when to go, what to eat and how to stay safe.

The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org wikipedia]-project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way  [http://www.wikipedia.org wikipedia] does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every Hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a worrk of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===

Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link. So, [[new entries | PRESS HERE]] to get  more info.

You can also check the [[Top 10 Tips]] -page to see if you have something to add.



=Tips ordered by geograhpy=

[[Europe]], [[Asia]], [[North America]], [[South America]], [[Africa]], [[Australia]]

=General backpack travelling tips=

[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Safety]], [[Looks]]

=Hitchhiking recources in the web=
* [[digihitch.com]] is a hitchhiking culture portal
* [[Suite101]] contains articles about hitchhiking by [[Bernd Wechner]]  
* [[Vilnius Hitchhiking Club]] is the leading Hitchhiking community in the [[European Union]]
* [[Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers]]
* [[Hike.ru]] is a [[Russia|Russian]] hitchhiking community website 
* [[Liftari.org]] is a [[Finland|Finnish]] hitchhiking community website
* [[Hitchhiker's guide to Europe]]

&lt;/div&gt;

[[Wikitravel:Logbook|Previous entries]] [[Wikitravel:{{CURRENTDAY}} {{CURRENTMONTHNAME}} {{CURRENTYEAR}}|Today]]
|}</text>
      <sha1>hpsy9h364rlqmh3uqo0zqx6l7m21fpz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4032</id>
      <parentid>4031</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T14:30:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7758">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to pack and when to go, what to eat and how to stay safe. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking essentials|more...]]

===Other===
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], ...

===[[Europe]]===

[[Netherlands]],
[[France]],
[[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Spain]],
[[Europe|more...]]

===[[North America]]===
[[United States of America]],
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico City]],
[[Minot]], 
[[North America|more...]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Morocco]],
[[Mozambique]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Mali]],
[[Senegal]],
[[South Africa]],
[[Africa|more...]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]],
[[Middle East|more...]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]],
[[Asia|more...]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]],
[[Central America|more...]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Chile]],
[[Peru]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Argentina]],
[[Uruguay]],
[[South America|more...]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Hobart]],
[[Oceania|more...]]


|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-left:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers'_Guide_to_Hitchhiking:Welcome, newcomers|Welcome]]===

[[Wikitravel:Welcome, newcomers|Newcomers]],
[[Wikitravel:Welcome, Wikipedians|Wikipedians]],
[[Wikitravel:Plunge forward|Plunge forward]]

===[[Help:Contents|Help]]===

[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],
[[Help:Utilities|more...]]

&lt;!-- This will have to be edited 
===[[Wikitravel:Full text of the Attribution-ShareAlike 1.0 license|Small print]]===

[[Wikitravel:Full text of the Attribution-ShareAlike 1.0 license|Attribution-ShareAlike license]],
[[Wikitravel:Why Wikitravel isn't GFDL|Why Wikitravel isn't GFDL]],
[[Wikitravel:Copyleft|Copyleft]]
--&gt;

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|Project]]===

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
&lt;!---  [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Neutral point of view|Neutral point of view]], hitchhiker's point of view! --&gt;
&lt;br&gt;

===Tools===

[[Help:Manual of style|Manual of style]],
[[Help:Geographical hierarchy|Geographical hierarchy]],
[[Help:Article naming conventions|Article naming conventions]],
[[Help:Article templates|Article templates]]

|align="left" width="250px" valign="top" style="background-color:#FFFFF7; border:1px solid #AAAA88; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;"|

===Logbook===

&lt;div style="width:250px; height:250px; overflow:auto; border:thin grey solid; padding:5px;"&gt;

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] is a collaborate project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of hitchhikers. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to pack and when to go, what to eat and how to stay safe.

The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org wikipedia]-project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way  [http://www.wikipedia.org wikipedia] does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every Hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a worrk of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===

Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link. So, [[new entries | PRESS HERE]] to get  more info.

You can also check the [[Top 10 Tips]] -page to see if you have something to add.



=Tips ordered by geograhpy=

[[Europe]], [[Asia]], [[North America]], [[South America]], [[Africa]], [[Australia]]

=General backpack travelling tips=

[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Safety]], [[Looks]]

=Hitchhiking recources in the web=
* [[digihitch.com]] is a hitchhiking culture portal
* [[Suite101]] contains articles about hitchhiking by [[Bernd Wechner]]  
* [[Vilnius Hitchhiking Club]] is the leading Hitchhiking community in the [[European Union]]
* [[Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers]]
* [[Hike.ru]] is a [[Russia|Russian]] hitchhiking community website 
* [[Liftari.org]] is a [[Finland|Finnish]] hitchhiking community website
* [[Hitchhiker's guide to Europe]]

&lt;/div&gt;

[[Wikitravel:Logbook|Previous entries]] [[Wikitravel:{{CURRENTDAY}} {{CURRENTMONTHNAME}} {{CURRENTYEAR}}|Today]]
|}</text>
      <sha1>ijoj9qptmxy7i2pdusgqe723dpi1y2m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4033</id>
      <parentid>4032</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T14:45:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7158">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to pack and when to go, what to eat and how to stay safe. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking essentials|more...]]

===Other===
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], ...

===[[Europe]]===

[[Netherlands]],
[[France]],
[[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Spain]],
[[Europe|more...]]

===[[North America]]===
[[United States of America]],
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico City]],
[[Minot]], 
[[North America|more...]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Morocco]],
[[Mozambique]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Mali]],
[[Senegal]],
[[South Africa]],
[[Africa|more...]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]],
[[Middle East|more...]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]],
[[Asia|more...]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]],
[[Central America|more...]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Chile]],
[[Peru]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Argentina]],
[[Uruguay]],
[[South America|more...]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Hobart]],
[[Oceania|more...]]


|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-left:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers'_Guide_to_Hitchhiking:Welcome, newcomers|Welcome]]===

[[Wikitravel:Welcome, newcomers|Newcomers]],
[[Wikitravel:Welcome, Wikipedians|Wikipedians]],
[[Wikitravel:Plunge forward|Plunge forward]]

===[[Help:Contents|Help]]===

[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],
[[Help:Utilities|more...]]

&lt;!-- This will have to be edited 
===[[Wikitravel:Full text of the Attribution-ShareAlike 1.0 license|Small print]]===

[[Wikitravel:Full text of the Attribution-ShareAlike 1.0 license|Attribution-ShareAlike license]],
[[Wikitravel:Why Wikitravel isn't GFDL|Why Wikitravel isn't GFDL]],
[[Wikitravel:Copyleft|Copyleft]]
--&gt;

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|Project]]===

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
&lt;!---  [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Neutral point of view|Neutral point of view]], hitchhiker's point of view! --&gt;
&lt;br&gt;

===Tools===

[[Help:Manual of style|Manual of style]],
[[Help:Geographical hierarchy|Geographical hierarchy]],
[[Help:Article naming conventions|Article naming conventions]],
[[Help:Article templates|Article templates]]

|align="left" width="250px" valign="top" style="background-color:#FFFFF7; border:1px solid #AAAA88; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;"|

===Logbook===

&lt;div style="width:250px; height:250px; overflow:auto; border:thin grey solid; padding:5px;"&gt;

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] is a collaborate project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of hitchhikers. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to pack and when to go, what to eat and how to stay safe.

The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org wikipedia]-project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way  [http://www.wikipedia.org wikipedia] does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every Hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a worrk of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===

Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link. So, [[new entries | PRESS HERE]] to get  more info.

You can also check the [[Top 10 Tips]] -page to see if you have something to add.

=Tips ordered by geograhpy=

[[Europe]], [[Asia]], [[North America]], [[South America]], [[Africa]], [[Australia]]

=General backpack travelling tips=

[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Safety]], [[Looks]]

&lt;/div&gt;
|}</text>
      <sha1>ouqjti7h8wzx9gzch11amva4cmdvfv7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4034</id>
      <parentid>4033</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-21T19:56:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7172">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to pack and when to go, what to eat and how to stay safe. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking essentials|more...]]

===Other===
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], ...

===[[Europe]]===

[[Netherlands]],
[[France]],
[[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Spain]],
[[Europe|more...]]

===[[North America]]===
[[United States of America]],
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico City]],
[[Minot]], 
[[North America|more...]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Morocco]],
[[Mozambique]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Mali]],
[[Senegal]],
[[South Africa]],
[[Africa|more...]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]],
[[Middle East|more...]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]],
[[Asia|more...]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]],
[[Central America|more...]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Chile]],
[[Peru]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Argentina]],
[[Uruguay]],
[[South America|more...]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Hobart]],
[[Oceania|more...]]


|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-left:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers'_Guide_to_Hitchhiking:Welcome, newcomers|Welcome]]===

[[Wikitravel:Welcome, newcomers|Newcomers]],
[[Wikitravel:Welcome, Wikipedians|Wikipedians]],
[[Wikitravel:Plunge forward|Plunge forward]]

===[[Help:Contents|Help]]===

[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],
[[Help:Utilities|more...]]

&lt;!-- This will have to be edited 
===[[Wikitravel:Full text of the Attribution-ShareAlike 1.0 license|Small print]]===

[[Wikitravel:Full text of the Attribution-ShareAlike 1.0 license|Attribution-ShareAlike license]],
[[Wikitravel:Why Wikitravel isn't GFDL|Why Wikitravel isn't GFDL]],
[[Wikitravel:Copyleft|Copyleft]]
--&gt;

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|Project]]===

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
&lt;!---  [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Neutral point of view|Neutral point of view]], hitchhiker's point of view! --&gt;
&lt;br&gt;

===Tools===

[[Help:Manual of style|Manual of style]],
[[Help:Geographical hierarchy|Geographical hierarchy]],
[[Help:Article naming conventions|Article naming conventions]],
[[Help:Article templates|Article templates]]

|align="left" width="250px" valign="top" style="background-color:#FFFFF7; border:1px solid #AAAA88; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;"|

===Logbook===

&lt;div style="width:250px; height:250px; overflow:auto; border:thin grey solid; padding:5px;"&gt;

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] is a collaborate project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of hitchhikers. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to pack and when to go, what to eat and how to stay safe.

The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org wikipedia]-project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way  [http://www.wikipedia.org wikipedia] does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every Hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a worrk of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===

Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link. So, [[new entries | PRESS HERE]] to get  more info.

You can also check the [[Top 10 Tips]] -page to see if you have something to add.

=Tips ordered by geograhpy=

[[Europe]], [[Asia]], [[North America]], [[South America]], [[Africa]], [[Australia]]

=General backpack travelling tips=

[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Safety]], [[Looks]]

&lt;/div&gt;
|}</text>
      <sha1>qz1zdbjzdqjactmyzhb7q61130l16b0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4035</id>
      <parentid>4034</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-21T19:58:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7175">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to pack and when to go, what to eat and how to stay safe. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking essentials|more...]]

===Other===
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], ...

===[[Europe]]===

[[Netherlands]],
[[France]],
[[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Spain]],
[[Europe|more...]]

===[[North America]]===
[[United States of America]],
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico City]],
[[Minot]], 
[[North America|more...]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Guinea]],
[[Mali]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Senegal]],
[[South Africa]],
[[Western Sahara]],
[[Africa|more...]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]],
[[Middle East|more...]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]],
[[Asia|more...]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]],
[[Central America|more...]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Chile]],
[[Peru]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Argentina]],
[[Uruguay]],
[[South America|more...]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Hobart]],
[[Oceania|more...]]


|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-left:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers'_Guide_to_Hitchhiking:Welcome, newcomers|Welcome]]===

[[Wikitravel:Welcome, newcomers|Newcomers]],
[[Wikitravel:Welcome, Wikipedians|Wikipedians]],
[[Wikitravel:Plunge forward|Plunge forward]]

===[[Help:Contents|Help]]===

[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],
[[Help:Utilities|more...]]

&lt;!-- This will have to be edited 
===[[Wikitravel:Full text of the Attribution-ShareAlike 1.0 license|Small print]]===

[[Wikitravel:Full text of the Attribution-ShareAlike 1.0 license|Attribution-ShareAlike license]],
[[Wikitravel:Why Wikitravel isn't GFDL|Why Wikitravel isn't GFDL]],
[[Wikitravel:Copyleft|Copyleft]]
--&gt;

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|Project]]===

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
&lt;!---  [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Neutral point of view|Neutral point of view]], hitchhiker's point of view! --&gt;
&lt;br&gt;

===Tools===

[[Help:Manual of style|Manual of style]],
[[Help:Geographical hierarchy|Geographical hierarchy]],
[[Help:Article naming conventions|Article naming conventions]],
[[Help:Article templates|Article templates]]

|align="left" width="250px" valign="top" style="background-color:#FFFFF7; border:1px solid #AAAA88; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;"|

===Logbook===

&lt;div style="width:250px; height:250px; overflow:auto; border:thin grey solid; padding:5px;"&gt;

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] is a collaborate project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of hitchhikers. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to pack and when to go, what to eat and how to stay safe.

The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org wikipedia]-project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way  [http://www.wikipedia.org wikipedia] does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every Hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a worrk of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===

Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link. So, [[new entries | PRESS HERE]] to get  more info.

You can also check the [[Top 10 Tips]] -page to see if you have something to add.

=Tips ordered by geograhpy=

[[Europe]], [[Asia]], [[North America]], [[South America]], [[Africa]], [[Australia]]

=General backpack travelling tips=

[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Safety]], [[Looks]]

&lt;/div&gt;
|}</text>
      <sha1>cxxmyu3jitw6n5ycxh7wqvjtof6jau4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4036</id>
      <parentid>4035</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-21T20:00:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7174">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to pack and when to go, what to eat and how to stay safe. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking essentials|more...]]

===Other===
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], ...

===[[Europe]]===

[[Netherlands]],
[[France]],
[[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Spain]],
[[Europe|more...]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]],
[[California]],
[[North America|more...]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Guinea]],
[[Mali]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Senegal]],
[[South Africa]],
[[Western Sahara]],
[[Africa|more...]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]],
[[Middle East|more...]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]],
[[Asia|more...]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]],
[[Central America|more...]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Chile]],
[[Peru]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Argentina]],
[[Uruguay]],
[[South America|more...]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Hobart]],
[[Oceania|more...]]


|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-left:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers'_Guide_to_Hitchhiking:Welcome, newcomers|Welcome]]===

[[Wikitravel:Welcome, newcomers|Newcomers]],
[[Wikitravel:Welcome, Wikipedians|Wikipedians]],
[[Wikitravel:Plunge forward|Plunge forward]]

===[[Help:Contents|Help]]===

[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],
[[Help:Utilities|more...]]

&lt;!-- This will have to be edited 
===[[Wikitravel:Full text of the Attribution-ShareAlike 1.0 license|Small print]]===

[[Wikitravel:Full text of the Attribution-ShareAlike 1.0 license|Attribution-ShareAlike license]],
[[Wikitravel:Why Wikitravel isn't GFDL|Why Wikitravel isn't GFDL]],
[[Wikitravel:Copyleft|Copyleft]]
--&gt;

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|Project]]===

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
&lt;!---  [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Neutral point of view|Neutral point of view]], hitchhiker's point of view! --&gt;
&lt;br&gt;

===Tools===

[[Help:Manual of style|Manual of style]],
[[Help:Geographical hierarchy|Geographical hierarchy]],
[[Help:Article naming conventions|Article naming conventions]],
[[Help:Article templates|Article templates]]

|align="left" width="250px" valign="top" style="background-color:#FFFFF7; border:1px solid #AAAA88; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;"|

===Logbook===

&lt;div style="width:250px; height:250px; overflow:auto; border:thin grey solid; padding:5px;"&gt;

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] is a collaborate project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of hitchhikers. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to pack and when to go, what to eat and how to stay safe.

The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org wikipedia]-project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way  [http://www.wikipedia.org wikipedia] does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every Hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a worrk of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===

Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link. So, [[new entries | PRESS HERE]] to get  more info.

You can also check the [[Top 10 Tips]] -page to see if you have something to add.

=Tips ordered by geograhpy=

[[Europe]], [[Asia]], [[North America]], [[South America]], [[Africa]], [[Australia]]

=General backpack travelling tips=

[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Safety]], [[Looks]]

&lt;/div&gt;
|}</text>
      <sha1>nx13kc9gj8uq25df1juu696ym6t1e8f</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4037</id>
      <parentid>4036</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-21T20:03:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7190">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to pack and when to go, what to eat and how to stay safe. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking essentials|more...]]

===Other===
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], ...

===[[Europe]]===

[[Netherlands]],
[[France]],
[[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Spain]],
[[Europe|more...]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]],
[[California]],
[[North America|more...]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Guinea]],
[[Mali]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Senegal]],
[[South Africa]],
[[Western Sahara]],
[[Africa|more...]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]],
[[Middle East|more...]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]],
[[Asia|more...]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]],
[[Central America|more...]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Chile]],
[[Peru]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Argentina]],
[[Uruguay]],
[[South America|more...]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Hobart]],
[[Oceania|more...]]


|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-left:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers'_Guide_to_Hitchhiking:Welcome, newcomers|Welcome]]===

[[Wikitravel:Welcome, newcomers|Newcomers]],
[[Wikitravel:Welcome, Wikipedians|Wikipedians]],
[[Wikitravel:Plunge forward|Plunge forward]]

===[[Help:Contents|Help]]===

[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],
[[Help:Utilities|more...]]

&lt;!-- This will have to be edited 
===[[Wikitravel:Full text of the Attribution-ShareAlike 1.0 license|Small print]]===

[[Wikitravel:Full text of the Attribution-ShareAlike 1.0 license|Attribution-ShareAlike license]],
[[Wikitravel:Why Wikitravel isn't GFDL|Why Wikitravel isn't GFDL]],
[[Wikitravel:Copyleft|Copyleft]]
--&gt;

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|Project]]===

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
&lt;!---  [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Neutral point of view|Neutral point of view]], hitchhiker's point of view! --&gt;
&lt;br&gt;

===Tools===

[[Help:Manual of style|Manual of style]],
[[Help:Geographical hierarchy|Geographical hierarchy]],
[[Help:Article naming conventions|Article naming conventions]],
[[Help:Article templates|Article templates]]

|align="left" width="250px" valign="top" style="background-color:#FFFFF7; border:1px solid #AAAA88; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;"|

===Logbook===

&lt;div style="width:250px; height:250px; overflow:auto; border:thin grey solid; padding:5px;"&gt;

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] is a collaborate project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of hitchhikers. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to pack and when to go, what to eat and how to stay safe.

The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org wikipedia]-project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way  [http://www.wikipedia.org wikipedia] does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every Hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a worrk of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===

Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link. So, [[new entries | PRESS HERE]] to get  more info.

You can also check the [[Top 10 Tips]] -page to see if you have something to add.

=Tips ordered by geograhpy=

[[Europe]], [[Asia]], [[North America]], [[South America]], [[Africa]], [[Australia]]

=General backpack travelling tips=

[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Safety]], [[Looks]]

&lt;/div&gt;
|}</text>
      <sha1>ok2j5wuzjtk1y6ivzobuhc3g5xrikxg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4038</id>
      <parentid>4037</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-21T20:07:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7204">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to pack and when to go, what to eat and how to stay safe. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking essentials|more...]]

===Other===
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], ...

===[[Europe]]===

[[Netherlands]],
[[France]],
[[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Spain]],
[[Europe|more...]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]],
[[California]],
[[North America|more...]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Guinea]],
[[Mali]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Senegal]],
[[South Africa]],
[[Western Sahara]],
[[Africa|more...]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]],
[[Middle East|more...]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]],
[[Asia|more...]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]],
[[Central America|more...]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Chile]],
[[Peru]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Argentina]],
[[Uruguay]],
[[South America|more...]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Hobart]],
[[Oceania|more...]]


|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-left:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers'_Guide_to_Hitchhiking:Welcome, newcomers|Welcome]]===

[[Wikitravel:Welcome, newcomers|Newcomers]],
[[Wikitravel:Welcome, Wikipedians|Wikipedians]],
[[Wikitravel:Plunge forward|Plunge forward]]

===[[Help:Contents|Help]]===

[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],
[[Help:Utilities|more...]]

&lt;!-- This will have to be edited 
===[[Wikitravel:Full text of the Attribution-ShareAlike 1.0 license|Small print]]===

[[Wikitravel:Full text of the Attribution-ShareAlike 1.0 license|Attribution-ShareAlike license]],
[[Wikitravel:Why Wikitravel isn't GFDL|Why Wikitravel isn't GFDL]],
[[Wikitravel:Copyleft|Copyleft]]
--&gt;

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|Project]]===

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
&lt;!---  [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Neutral point of view|Neutral point of view]], hitchhiker's point of view! --&gt;
&lt;br&gt;

===Tools===

[[Help:Manual of style|Manual of style]],
[[Help:Geographical hierarchy|Geographical hierarchy]],
[[Help:Article naming conventions|Article naming conventions]],
[[Help:Article templates|Article templates]]

|align="left" width="250px" valign="top" style="background-color:#FFFFF7; border:1px solid #AAAA88; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;"|

===Logbook===

&lt;div style="width:250px; height:250px; overflow:auto; border:thin grey solid; padding:5px;"&gt;

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] is a collaborate project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of hitchhikers. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to pack and when to go, what to eat and how to stay safe.

The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org wikipedia]-project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way  [http://www.wikipedia.org wikipedia] does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every Hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a worrk of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===

Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link. So, [[new entries | PRESS HERE]] to get  more info.

You can also check the [[Top 10 Tips]] -page to see if you have something to add.

=Tips ordered by geograhpy=

[[Europe]], [[Asia]], [[North America]], [[South America]], [[Africa]], [[Australia]]

=General backpack travelling tips=

[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Safety]], [[Looks]]

&lt;/div&gt;
|}</text>
      <sha1>m314m1mby5kacp3exgra928n5hutcrn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4039</id>
      <parentid>4038</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-22T13:57:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6879">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to pack and when to go, what to eat and how to stay safe. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking essentials|more...]]

===Other===
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], ...

===[[Europe]]===

[[Netherlands]],
[[France]],
[[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Spain]],
[[Europe|more...]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]],
[[California]],
[[North America|more...]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Guinea]],
[[Mali]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Senegal]],
[[South Africa]],
[[Western Sahara]],
[[Africa|more...]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]],
[[Middle East|more...]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]],
[[Asia|more...]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]],
[[Central America|more...]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Chile]],
[[Peru]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Argentina]],
[[Uruguay]],
[[South America|more...]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Hobart]],
[[Oceania|more...]]
|}


{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-left:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers'_Guide_to_Hitchhiking:Welcome, newcomers|Welcome]]===

[[Wikitravel:Welcome, newcomers|Newcomers]],
[[Wikitravel:Welcome, Wikipedians|Wikipedians]],
[[Wikitravel:Plunge forward|Plunge forward]]

===[[Help:Contents|Help]]===

[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],
[[Help:Utilities|more...]]

&lt;!-- This will have to be edited 
===[[Wikitravel:Full text of the Attribution-ShareAlike 1.0 license|Small print]]===

[[Wikitravel:Full text of the Attribution-ShareAlike 1.0 license|Attribution-ShareAlike license]],
[[Wikitravel:Why Wikitravel isn't GFDL|Why Wikitravel isn't GFDL]],
[[Wikitravel:Copyleft|Copyleft]]
--&gt;

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|Project]]===

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
&lt;!---  [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Neutral point of view|Neutral point of view]], hitchhiker's point of view! --&gt;
&lt;br&gt;

===Tools===

[[Help:Manual of style|Manual of style]],
[[Help:Geographical hierarchy|Geographical hierarchy]],
[[Help:Article naming conventions|Article naming conventions]],
[[Help:Article templates|Article templates]]

|align="left" width="250px" valign="top" style="background-color:#FFFFF7; border:1px solid #AAAA88; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;"|

===Logbook===

&lt;div style="width:250px; height:250px; overflow:auto; border:thin grey solid; padding:5px;"&gt;

The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org wikipedia]-project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way  [http://www.wikipedia.org wikipedia] does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every Hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a worrk of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===

Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link. So, [[new entries | PRESS HERE]] to get  more info.

You can also check the [[Top 10 Tips]] -page to see if you have something to add.

=Tips ordered by geograhpy=

[[Europe]], [[Asia]], [[North America]], [[South America]], [[Africa]], [[Australia]]

=General backpack travelling tips=

[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Safety]], [[Looks]]

&lt;/div&gt;
|}</text>
      <sha1>87roz8pp1hdz4mtrr4fubpylb6vl0v9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4040</id>
      <parentid>4039</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-22T13:59:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6523">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to pack and when to go, what to eat and how to stay safe. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking essentials|more...]]

===Other===
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], ...

===[[Europe]]===

[[Netherlands]],
[[France]],
[[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Spain]],
[[Europe|more...]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]],
[[California]],
[[North America|more...]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Guinea]],
[[Mali]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Senegal]],
[[South Africa]],
[[Western Sahara]],
[[Africa|more...]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]],
[[Middle East|more...]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]],
[[Asia|more...]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]],
[[Central America|more...]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Chile]],
[[Peru]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Argentina]],
[[Uruguay]],
[[South America|more...]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Hobart]],
[[Oceania|more...]]
|}


{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-left:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers'_Guide_to_Hitchhiking:Welcome, newcomers|Welcome]]===

[[Wikitravel:Welcome, newcomers|Newcomers]],
[[Wikitravel:Welcome, Wikipedians|Wikipedians]],
[[Wikitravel:Plunge forward|Plunge forward]]

===[[Help:Contents|Help]]===

[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],
[[Help:Utilities|more...]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|Project]]===

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]
&lt;br&gt;

===Tools===
[[Help:Manual of style|Manual of style]],
[[Help:Geographical hierarchy|Geographical hierarchy]],
[[Help:Article naming conventions|Article naming conventions]],
[[Help:Article templates|Article templates]]

|align="left" width="250px" valign="top" style="background-color:#FFFFF7; border:1px solid #AAAA88; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;"|

===Logbook===

&lt;div style="width:250px; height:250px; overflow:auto; border:thin grey solid; padding:5px;"&gt;

The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org wikipedia]-project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way  [http://www.wikipedia.org wikipedia] does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every Hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a worrk of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===

Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link. So, [[new entries | PRESS HERE]] to get  more info.

You can also check the [[Top 10 Tips]] -page to see if you have something to add.

=Tips ordered by geograhpy=

[[Europe]], [[Asia]], [[North America]], [[South America]], [[Africa]], [[Australia]]

=General backpack travelling tips=

[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Safety]], [[Looks]]

&lt;/div&gt;
|}</text>
      <sha1>lpqoig1p79pquz3puotghtx36mvphqu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4041</id>
      <parentid>4040</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-22T14:02:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6494">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to pack and when to go, what to eat and how to stay safe. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking essentials|more...]]

===Other===
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], ...

===[[Europe]]===

[[Netherlands]],
[[France]],
[[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Spain]],
[[Europe|more...]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]],
[[California]],
[[North America|more...]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Guinea]],
[[Mali]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Senegal]],
[[South Africa]],
[[Western Sahara]],
[[Africa|more...]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]],
[[Middle East|more...]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]],
[[Asia|more...]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]],
[[Central America|more...]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Chile]],
[[Peru]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Argentina]],
[[Uruguay]],
[[South America|more...]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Hobart]],
[[Oceania|more...]]
|}


{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-left:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers'_Guide_to_Hitchhiking:Welcome, newcomers|Welcome]]===

[[Wikitravel:Welcome, newcomers|Newcomers]],
[[Wikitravel:Welcome, Wikipedians|Wikipedians]],
[[Wikitravel:Plunge forward|Plunge forward]]

===[[Help:Contents|Help]]===

[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],
[[Help:Utilities|more...]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|Project]]===

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]
&lt;br&gt;

===Tools===
[[Help:Manual of style|Manual of style]],
[[Help:Geographical hierarchy|Geographical hierarchy]],
[[Help:Article naming conventions|Article naming conventions]],
[[Help:Article templates|Article templates]]

|align="left" width="250px" valign="top" style="background-color:#FFFFF7; border:1px solid #AAAA88; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;"|

===Logbook===

&lt;div style="width:250px; height:250px; overflow:auto; border:thin grey solid; padding:5px;"&gt;

The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every Hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===

Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link. So, [[new entries | PRESS HERE]] to get  more info.

You can also check the [[Top 10 Tips]] -page to see if you have something to add.

=Tips ordered by geograhpy=

[[Europe]], [[Asia]], [[North America]], [[South America]], [[Africa]], [[Australia]]

=General backpack travelling tips=

[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Safety]], [[Looks]]

&lt;/div&gt;
|}</text>
      <sha1>mr9y2s73adds5x1njjn0ut3l5eumvk7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4042</id>
      <parentid>4041</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-22T14:08:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5738">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to pack and when to go, what to eat and how to stay safe. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[Hitchhiking essentials|more...]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]], ...

===[[Europe]]===
[[Netherlands]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]],
[[Spain]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Guinea]],
[[Mali]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Senegal]],
[[South Africa]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Chile]],
[[Peru]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Argentina]],
[[Uruguay]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Hobart]],
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-left:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers'_Guide_to_Hitchhiking:Welcome, newcomers|Welcome]]===

[[Wikitravel:Welcome, newcomers|Newcomers]],
[[Wikitravel:Welcome, Wikipedians|Wikipedians]],
[[Wikitravel:Plunge forward|Plunge forward]]

===[[Help:Contents|Help]]===

[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],
[[Help:Utilities|more...]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|Project]]===

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]
&lt;br&gt;

===Tools===
[[Help:Manual of style|Manual of style]],
[[Help:Geographical hierarchy|Geographical hierarchy]],
[[Help:Article naming conventions|Article naming conventions]],
[[Help:Article templates|Article templates]]

|}

===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>cbb8y5jyzfe9fuh1v3509w5c4ik7mve</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4043</id>
      <parentid>4042</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-22T14:14:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5769">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to pack and when to go, what to eat and how to stay safe. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[Hitchhiking essentials|more...]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]], ...

===[[Europe]]===
[[Netherlands]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]],
[[Spain]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[Colorado]], [[Connecticut]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Guinea]],
[[Mali]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Senegal]],
[[South Africa]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Chile]],
[[Peru]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Argentina]],
[[Uruguay]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Hobart]],
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-left:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers'_Guide_to_Hitchhiking:Welcome, newcomers|Welcome]]===

[[Wikitravel:Welcome, newcomers|Newcomers]],
[[Wikitravel:Welcome, Wikipedians|Wikipedians]],
[[Wikitravel:Plunge forward|Plunge forward]]

===[[Help:Contents|Help]]===

[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],
[[Help:Utilities|more...]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|Project]]===

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]
&lt;br&gt;

===Tools===
[[Help:Manual of style|Manual of style]],
[[Help:Geographical hierarchy|Geographical hierarchy]],
[[Help:Article naming conventions|Article naming conventions]],
[[Help:Article templates|Article templates]]

|}

===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>f28b3snnlzylgflb50bwr98qsk7tuzh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4044</id>
      <parentid>4043</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-22T14:18:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5833">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to pack and when to go, what to eat and how to stay safe. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[Hitchhiking essentials|more...]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]], ...

===[[Europe]]===
[[Netherlands]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]],
[[Spain]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[Colorado]], [[Connecticut]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Guinea]],
[[Mali]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Senegal]],
[[South Africa]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Chile]],
[[Peru]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Argentina]],
[[Uruguay]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Hobart]],
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-left:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers'_Guide_to_Hitchhiking:Welcome, newcomers|Welcome]]===

[[Wikitravel:Welcome, newcomers|Newcomers]],
[[Wikitravel:Welcome, Wikipedians|Wikipedians]],
[[Wikitravel:Plunge forward|Plunge forward]]

===[[Help:Contents|Help]]===

[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],
[[Help:Utilities|more...]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|Project]]===

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]
&lt;br&gt;

===Tools===
[[Help:Manual of style|Manual of style]],
[[Help:Geographical hierarchy|Geographical hierarchy]],
[[Help:Article naming conventions|Article naming conventions]],
[[Help:Article templates|Article templates]]

|}

===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>n6m6du8p4esslix7vx1l9jewusg82m6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4045</id>
      <parentid>4044</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-22T14:19:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5797">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to pack and when to go, what to eat and how to stay safe. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]], ...

===[[Europe]]===
[[Netherlands]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]],
[[Spain]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[Colorado]], [[Connecticut]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Guinea]],
[[Mali]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Senegal]],
[[South Africa]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Chile]],
[[Peru]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Argentina]],
[[Uruguay]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Hobart]],
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-left:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers'_Guide_to_Hitchhiking:Welcome, newcomers|Welcome]]===

[[Wikitravel:Welcome, newcomers|Newcomers]],
[[Wikitravel:Welcome, Wikipedians|Wikipedians]],
[[Wikitravel:Plunge forward|Plunge forward]]

===[[Help:Contents|Help]]===

[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],
[[Help:Utilities|more...]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|Project]]===

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]
&lt;br&gt;

===Tools===
[[Help:Manual of style|Manual of style]],
[[Help:Geographical hierarchy|Geographical hierarchy]],
[[Help:Article naming conventions|Article naming conventions]],
[[Help:Article templates|Article templates]]

|}

===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>crqv6ywddvdw63zxvm0xptdxps4uji3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4046</id>
      <parentid>4045</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-22T14:20:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5837">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Netherlands]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]],
[[Spain]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[Colorado]], [[Connecticut]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Guinea]],
[[Mali]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Senegal]],
[[South Africa]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Chile]],
[[Peru]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Argentina]],
[[Uruguay]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-left:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers'_Guide_to_Hitchhiking:Welcome, newcomers|Welcome]]===

[[Wikitravel:Welcome, newcomers|Newcomers]],
[[Wikitravel:Welcome, Wikipedians|Wikipedians]],
[[Wikitravel:Plunge forward|Plunge forward]]

===[[Help:Contents|Help]]===

[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],
[[Help:Utilities|more...]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|Project]]===

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]
&lt;br&gt;

===Tools===
[[Help:Manual of style|Manual of style]],
[[Help:Geographical hierarchy|Geographical hierarchy]],
[[Help:Article naming conventions|Article naming conventions]],
[[Help:Article templates|Article templates]]

|}

===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>pwqw0y1zi7zuy62lxn8e2s0nenpi77z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4047</id>
      <parentid>4046</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-22T16:57:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>62.214.227.246</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5849">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Netherlands]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]],
[[Spain]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[Colorado]], [[Connecticut]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Guinea]],
[[Mali]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Senegal]],
[[South Africa]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Chile]],
[[Peru]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Argentina]],
[[Uruguay]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-left:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers'_Guide_to_Hitchhiking:Welcome, newcomers|Welcome]]===

[[Wikitravel:Welcome, newcomers|Newcomers]],
[[Wikitravel:Welcome, Wikipedians|Wikipedians]],
[[Wikitravel:Plunge forward|Plunge forward]]

===[[Help:Contents|Help]]===

[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],
[[Help:Utilities|more...]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|Project]]===

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]
&lt;br&gt;

===Tools===
[[Help:Manual of style|Manual of style]],
[[Help:Geographical hierarchy|Geographical hierarchy]],
[[Help:Article naming conventions|Article naming conventions]],
[[Help:Article templates|Article templates]]

|}

===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>cmt9q8bj2q7fl82qt5gezk8h78wk719</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4048</id>
      <parentid>4047</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-23T19:45:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5875">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Netherlands]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]],
[[Spain]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[Colorado]], [[Connecticut]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Guinea]],
[[Mali]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Nigeria]],
[[Senegal]],
[[South Africa]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Chile]],
[[Peru]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Argentina]],
[[Uruguay]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-left:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers'_Guide_to_Hitchhiking:Welcome, newcomers|Welcome]]===

[[Wikitravel:Welcome, newcomers|Newcomers]],
[[Wikitravel:Welcome, Wikipedians|Wikipedians]],
[[Wikitravel:Plunge forward|Plunge forward]]

===[[Help:Contents|Help]]===

[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],
[[Help:Utilities|more...]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|Project]]===

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]
&lt;br&gt;

===Tools===
[[Help:Manual of style|Manual of style]],
[[Help:Geographical hierarchy|Geographical hierarchy]],
[[Help:Article naming conventions|Article naming conventions]],
[[Help:Article templates|Article templates]]

|}

===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>gwxbwt8dot8wkpl7gh119rhgwitsnoe</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4049</id>
      <parentid>4048</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-23T20:18:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5899">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Netherlands]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]], [[Baden-Württemberg]],
[[Spain]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[Colorado]], [[Connecticut]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Guinea]],
[[Mali]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Nigeria]],
[[Senegal]],
[[South Africa]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Chile]],
[[Peru]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Argentina]],
[[Uruguay]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-left:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers'_Guide_to_Hitchhiking:Welcome, newcomers|Welcome]]===

[[Wikitravel:Welcome, newcomers|Newcomers]],
[[Wikitravel:Welcome, Wikipedians|Wikipedians]],
[[Wikitravel:Plunge forward|Plunge forward]]

===[[Help:Contents|Help]]===

[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],
[[Help:Utilities|more...]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|Project]]===

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]
&lt;br&gt;

===Tools===
[[Help:Manual of style|Manual of style]],
[[Help:Geographical hierarchy|Geographical hierarchy]],
[[Help:Article naming conventions|Article naming conventions]],
[[Help:Article templates|Article templates]]

|}

===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>gnb7xc5jju184hsd4uq8zt2eqarzlck</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4050</id>
      <parentid>4049</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-23T20:21:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5928">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Netherlands]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]],
[[Spain]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[Colorado]], [[Connecticut]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Guinea]],
[[Mali]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Nigeria]],
[[Senegal]],
[[South Africa]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Chile]],
[[Peru]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Argentina]],
[[Uruguay]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-left:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers'_Guide_to_Hitchhiking:Welcome, newcomers|Welcome]]===

[[Wikitravel:Welcome, newcomers|Newcomers]],
[[Wikitravel:Welcome, Wikipedians|Wikipedians]],
[[Wikitravel:Plunge forward|Plunge forward]]

===[[Help:Contents|Help]]===

[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],
[[Help:Utilities|more...]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|Project]]===

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]
&lt;br&gt;

===Tools===
[[Help:Manual of style|Manual of style]],
[[Help:Geographical hierarchy|Geographical hierarchy]],
[[Help:Article naming conventions|Article naming conventions]],
[[Help:Article templates|Article templates]]

|}

===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>650ikt4tfh0u3bnvr4owowiwa3misa7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4051</id>
      <parentid>4050</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-23T20:24:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5982">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]],
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]],
[[Poland]],
[[Spain]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[Colorado]], [[Connecticut]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Guinea]],
[[Mali]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Nigeria]],
[[Senegal]],
[[South Africa]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Chile]],
[[Peru]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Argentina]],
[[Uruguay]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-left:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers'_Guide_to_Hitchhiking:Welcome, newcomers|Welcome]]===

[[Wikitravel:Welcome, newcomers|Newcomers]],
[[Wikitravel:Welcome, Wikipedians|Wikipedians]],
[[Wikitravel:Plunge forward|Plunge forward]]

===[[Help:Contents|Help]]===

[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],
[[Help:Utilities|more...]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|Project]]===

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]
&lt;br&gt;

===Tools===
[[Help:Manual of style|Manual of style]],
[[Help:Geographical hierarchy|Geographical hierarchy]],
[[Help:Article naming conventions|Article naming conventions]],
[[Help:Article templates|Article templates]]

|}

===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>k945xueef357yhsyi71i6ylcj7juim0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4052</id>
      <parentid>4051</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-23T20:25:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6008">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]],
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]],
[[Poland]],
[[Spain]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[Colorado]], [[Connecticut]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Guinea]],
[[Mali]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Nigeria]],
[[Senegal]],
[[South Africa]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]],
[[Bolivia]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Chile]],
[[Columbia],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-left:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers'_Guide_to_Hitchhiking:Welcome, newcomers|Welcome]]===

[[Wikitravel:Welcome, newcomers|Newcomers]],
[[Wikitravel:Welcome, Wikipedians|Wikipedians]],
[[Wikitravel:Plunge forward|Plunge forward]]

===[[Help:Contents|Help]]===

[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],
[[Help:Utilities|more...]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|Project]]===

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]
&lt;br&gt;

===Tools===
[[Help:Manual of style|Manual of style]],
[[Help:Geographical hierarchy|Geographical hierarchy]],
[[Help:Article naming conventions|Article naming conventions]],
[[Help:Article templates|Article templates]]

|}

===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>2lnxxbdd34u0qrcsg70evp7o0lgprv2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4053</id>
      <parentid>4052</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-23T20:26:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6023">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]],
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]],
[[Poland]],
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[Colorado]], [[Connecticut]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Guinea]],
[[Mali]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Nigeria]],
[[Senegal]],
[[South Africa]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]],
[[Bolivia]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Chile]],
[[Columbia],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-left:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers'_Guide_to_Hitchhiking:Welcome, newcomers|Welcome]]===

[[Wikitravel:Welcome, newcomers|Newcomers]],
[[Wikitravel:Welcome, Wikipedians|Wikipedians]],
[[Wikitravel:Plunge forward|Plunge forward]]

===[[Help:Contents|Help]]===

[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],
[[Help:Utilities|more...]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#FFF7F7; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-bottom:1px solid #AA8888; border-top:1px solid #AA8888; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|Project]]===

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]
&lt;br&gt;

===Tools===
[[Help:Manual of style|Manual of style]],
[[Help:Geographical hierarchy|Geographical hierarchy]],
[[Help:Article naming conventions|Article naming conventions]],
[[Help:Article templates|Article templates]]

|}

===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>firgv4uttspfpvklyibxp6ig8qqj32v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4054</id>
      <parentid>4053</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-23T21:05:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4943">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]],
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]],
[[Poland]],
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[Colorado]], [[Connecticut]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Guinea]],
[[Mali]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Nigeria]],
[[Senegal]],
[[South Africa]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]],
[[Bolivia]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Chile]],
[[Columbia],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>gv0aukkywz6a2ciuc26ahj0kmztk5cu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4055</id>
      <parentid>4054</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-23T22:51:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>84.60.132.122</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4944">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]],
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]],
[[Poland]],
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[Colorado]], [[Connecticut]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Guinea]],
[[Mali]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Nigeria]],
[[Senegal]],
[[South Africa]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]],
[[Bolivia]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Chile]],
[[Columbia]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>2uzgq47hl1pxr0fyotvpmy3npcme9r0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4056</id>
      <parentid>4055</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-24T10:13:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5011">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]],
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]],
[[Poland]],
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[Colorado]], [[Connecticut]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Guinea]],
[[Mali]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Nigeria]],
[[Senegal]],
[[South Africa]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]],
[[Bolivia]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Chile]],
[[Columbia]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>iip6a1fa3y9my8uug5qo269xwdtiw2p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4057</id>
      <parentid>4056</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-27T13:31:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5063">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]],
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]],
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]],
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]],
[[Lithuania]],
[[Latvia]],
[[Estonia]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[Colorado]], [[Connecticut]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Guinea]],
[[Mali]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Nigeria]],
[[Senegal]],
[[South Africa]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]],
[[Bolivia]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Chile]],
[[Columbia]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>k861uyepbob1hr7188tcvkzgujgamhd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4058</id>
      <parentid>4057</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-27T14:02:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5074">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]],
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]],
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]],
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]],
[[Lithuania]],
[[Latvia]],
[[Estonia]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[Colorado]], [[Connecticut]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Guinea]],
[[Mali]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Nigeria]],
[[Senegal]],
[[South Africa]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]],
[[Bolivia]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Chile]],
[[Columbia]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>q5bg6f63w8ogv8oa307pczlxzckatri</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4059</id>
      <parentid>4058</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-27T14:03:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5171">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]],
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]],
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]],
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]],
[[Lithuania]],
[[Latvia]],
[[Estonia]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[Colorado]], [[Connecticut]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]]
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]],
[[Bolivia]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Chile]],
[[Columbia]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>1g58lm214pksz6obkptg4wk8fmbx0gn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4060</id>
      <parentid>4059</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-27T14:04:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5259">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]],
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]],
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]],
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]],
[[Lithuania]],
[[Latvia]],
[[Estonia]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Vancouver]], [[Montreal]]
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[San Francisco]], [[Colorado]], [[Connecticut]], [[New York]], [[Portland]], [[Seattle]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]]
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]],
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]],
[[Bolivia]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Chile]],
[[Columbia]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>2ixkiincciuywz4mq7vz6dhtgfm8zb4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4061</id>
      <parentid>4060</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-27T14:05:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5269">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]],
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]],
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]],
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]],
[[Lithuania]],
[[Latvia]],
[[Estonia]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Vancouver]], [[Montreal]]
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[San Francisco]], [[Colorado]], [[Connecticut]], [[New York]], [[Portland]], [[Seattle]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]]
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]],
[[Bolivia]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Chile]],
[[Columbia]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>ekg8uv3ad4gi8a7iue4q9iqq1cyo1l2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4062</id>
      <parentid>4061</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-27T15:29:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5315">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]],
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]],
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]],
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]],
[[Lithuania]],
[[Latvia]],
[[Estonia]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Vancouver]], [[Montreal]]
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[San Francisco]], [[Colorado]], [[Connecticut]], [[New York]], [[Portland]], [[Seattle]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]]
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]],
[[Bolivia]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Chile]],
[[Columbia]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>ida67dnjjtsrtv7m8gdygeokk9fpd30</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4063</id>
      <parentid>4062</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-27T15:30:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5398">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]],
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]],
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]],
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]],
[[Lithuania]],
[[Latvia]],
[[Estonia]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Vancouver]], [[Montreal]]
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[San Francisco]], [[Colorado]], [[Connecticut]], [[New York]], [[Portland]], [[Seattle]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]]
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]],
[[Bolivia]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Chile]],
[[Columbia]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>7zklej35frzp1snum77prranafuvap4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4064</id>
      <parentid>4063</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-27T15:30:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5399">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]],
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]],
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]],
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]],
[[Lithuania]],
[[Latvia]],
[[Estonia]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Vancouver]], [[Montreal]]
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[San Francisco]], [[Colorado]], [[Connecticut]], [[New York]], [[Portland]], [[Seattle]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]],
[[Bolivia]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Chile]],
[[Columbia]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]]

===[[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>4lkijz0jw8mi3fk844c2zz4gemcjnca</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4065</id>
      <parentid>4064</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-28T01:23:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5415">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]],
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]],
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]],
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]],
[[Lithuania]],
[[Latvia]],
[[Estonia]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Vancouver]], [[Montreal]]
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[San Francisco]], [[Colorado]], [[Connecticut]], [[New York]], [[Portland]], [[Seattle]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]],
[[Bolivia]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Chile]],
[[Columbia]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]]

===[[Australasia and Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>6zgq4t2yeagky7bkrohk0up7tawyil4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4066</id>
      <parentid>4065</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-28T01:23:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5419">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]],
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]],
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]],
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]],
[[Lithuania]],
[[Latvia]],
[[Estonia]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Vancouver]], [[Montreal]]
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[San Francisco]], [[Colorado]], [[Connecticut]], [[New York]], [[Portland]], [[Seattle]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]],
[[Bolivia]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Chile]],
[[Columbia]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]],
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>dkxsy3k0jaw5dfnabp3unxwfc0dbx0u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4067</id>
      <parentid>4066</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-28T01:30:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5432">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]],
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]],
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]],
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]],
[[Lithuania]],
[[Latvia]],
[[Estonia]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Vancouver]], [[Montreal]]
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[San Francisco]], [[Colorado]], [[Connecticut]], [[New York]], [[Portland]], [[Seattle]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]],
[[Bolivia]],
[[Brazil]],
[[Chile]],
[[Columbia]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>lhpyllw2is6d4ampc02611pdjdu3efw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4068</id>
      <parentid>4067</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-28T01:32:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5545">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]],
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]],
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]],
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]],
[[Lithuania]],
[[Latvia]],
[[Estonia]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Vancouver]], [[Montreal]]
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[San Francisco]], [[Colorado]], [[Connecticut]], [[New York]], [[Portland]], [[Seattle]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], [[La Paz]],
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio da Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Columbia]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>47d721isutaivgzsacq8plx68pqjjca</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4069</id>
      <parentid>4068</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-28T01:33:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5546">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]],
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]],
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]],
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]],
[[Lithuania]],
[[Latvia]],
[[Estonia]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Vancouver]], [[Montreal]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[San Francisco]], [[Colorado]], [[Connecticut]], [[New York]], [[Portland]], [[Seattle]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], [[La Paz]],
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio da Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Columbia]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>bvbyevzjjwmypqc1cz28al89dfmpwhp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4070</id>
      <parentid>4069</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-28T01:34:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5568">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]],
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]],
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]],
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]],
[[Lithuania]], [[Kaunas]],
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]],
[[Estonia]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Vancouver]], [[Montreal]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[San Francisco]], [[Colorado]], [[Connecticut]], [[New York]], [[Portland]], [[Seattle]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]],
[[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], 
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], [[La Paz]],
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio da Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Columbia]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>470k0r7ietjz527o4hi2p3n5fqyuq8w</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4071</id>
      <parentid>4070</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-28T01:34:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5591">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]],
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]],
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]],
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]],
[[Lithuania]], [[Kaunas]],
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]],
[[Estonia]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Vancouver]], [[Montreal]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[San Francisco]], [[Colorado]], [[Connecticut]], [[New York]], [[Portland]], [[Seattle]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Syria]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], [[La Paz]],
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio da Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Columbia]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>6oowuxf58wt2p1e38xzve76j1y49dq2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4072</id>
      <parentid>4071</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-28T01:37:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5642">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]],
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]],
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]],
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]],
[[Lithuania]], [[Kaunas]],
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]],
[[Estonia]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Vancouver]], [[Montreal]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[San Francisco]], [[Colorado]], [[Connecticut]], [[New York]], [[Portland]], [[Seattle]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], [[La Paz]],
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio da Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Columbia]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>rz6b7jsdy73hyq6a6gp39k54ciap48o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4073</id>
      <parentid>4072</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-29T00:31:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5642">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]],
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]],
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]],
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]],
[[Lithuania]], [[Kaunas]],
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]],
[[Estonia]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Vancouver]], [[Montreal]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[San Francisco]], [[Colorado]], [[Connecticut]], [[New York]], [[Portland]], [[Seattle]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], [[La Paz]],
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio da Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Columbia]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>1j4r97y7pp2gvu9y9bt4wqn2e9oy5pt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4074</id>
      <parentid>4073</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-31T17:21:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5666">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[Virgin hitchhiking]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]],
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]],
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]],
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]],
[[Lithuania]], [[Kaunas]],
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]],
[[Estonia]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Vancouver]], [[Montreal]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[San Francisco]], [[Colorado]], [[Connecticut]], [[New York]], [[Portland]], [[Seattle]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], [[La Paz]],
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio da Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Columbia]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>6eh6hgpausgkjnsyy7x9os344lt0nkw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4075</id>
      <parentid>4074</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-01-01T23:42:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>70.109.171.51</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5531">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[Virgin hitchhiking]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]],
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]],
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]],
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]],
[[Lithuania]], [[Kaunas]],
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]],
[[Estonia]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]],

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], [[La Paz]],
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio da Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Columbia]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>p9livtl36q9ti6bxh94r264rew991g7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4076</id>
      <parentid>4075</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-01-11T15:41:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Jenseb</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5544">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[Virgin hitchhiking]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]],
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]],
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]],
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]],
[[Lithuania]], [[Kaunas]],
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]],
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]],

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], [[La Paz]],
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio da Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Columbia]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>k7twzxz75kunvn32bj1sqqs74fkypi9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4077</id>
      <parentid>2714</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-01-28T17:17:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>200.28.176.102</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5568">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[Virgin hitchhiking]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Hitchhiking a boat]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]],
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]],
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]],
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]],
[[Lithuania]], [[Kaunas]],
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]],
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]],

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="35%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], [[La Paz]],
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio da Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Columbia]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>ecvc7qy2hlb46kgk209fnuydoqsawgw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4078</id>
      <parentid>4077</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-01-28T17:49:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5568">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[Virgin hitchhiking]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Hitchhiking a boat]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]],
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]],
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]],
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]],
[[Lithuania]], [[Kaunas]],
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]],
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]],

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], [[La Paz]],
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio da Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Columbia]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>si2muyhmb50bdgc4iafqwnyzlfbg1ee</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4079</id>
      <parentid>4078</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-02-06T17:07:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5572">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time hitchhiking]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Hitchhiking a boat]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]],
[[France]], [[Paris]],
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]],
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]],
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]],
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]],
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]],
[[Lithuania]], [[Kaunas]],
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]],
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]],

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], [[La Paz]],
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio da Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Columbia]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>auc7k3a667wi4ug2ncy1kytqtm4qlx3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4080</id>
      <parentid>4079</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-02-21T07:01:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>67.190.27.40</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5572">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time hitchhiking]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Hitchhiking a boat]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Kaunas]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]],

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], [[La Paz]],
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio da Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Columbia]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>939pbax9pmcffwbnclrg4nx276pxh9j</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4081</id>
      <parentid>4080</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-03-03T18:40:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Pedro Aguiar</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5572">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time hitchhiking]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Hitchhiking a boat]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Kaunas]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]],

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], [[La Paz]],
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Columbia]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>jcmgm5mls2y3hi1py8mty4cnrogkhii</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4082</id>
      <parentid>4081</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-03-10T15:17:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>200.63.240.128</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5613">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time hitchhiking]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Hitchhiking a boat]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Kaunas]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]],

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], [[La Paz]],
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]]
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>9xxufu4dmle7mued79dthftcim96i11</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4083</id>
      <parentid>4082</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-03-27T17:40:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5632">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time hitchhiking]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Hitchhiking a boat]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Kaunas]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]],

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], [[La Paz]],
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]]
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>oobo74lptnhsgs38iwy0t3qb3s49nnq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4084</id>
      <parentid>4083</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-03-27T17:50:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5633">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time hitchhiking]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Hitchhiking a boat]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Kaunas]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]],

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]]

|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], [[La Paz]],
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>81pqktezyhdq0ijed2g0qevsvchh01d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4085</id>
      <parentid>2716</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-04-26T23:37:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>24.186.165.58</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5647">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time hitchhiking]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Hitchhiking a boat]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Kaunas]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]],

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],
[[Ethiopia]]

|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], [[La Paz]],
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>qz77r6pdraxlycc7po2sabap02m4i0v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4086</id>
      <parentid>4085</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-04-27T04:49:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5649">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time hitchhiking]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Hitchhiking a boat]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Kaunas]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]],

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],


|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], [[La Paz]],
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>5abu6156xk752z6xsxe9ry5hro4v9w9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4087</id>
      <parentid>4086</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-01T11:59:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lobsterboy</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5669">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time hitchhiking]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Hitchhiking a boat]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[:Category:Baden-Württemberg|Baden-Württemberg]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Barcelona]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Kaunas]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]],

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],


|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], [[La Paz]],
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>b26v16qzkotpy5xy274p0f2lqz85jm6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4088</id>
      <parentid>4087</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-04T20:26:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5638">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time hitchhiking]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Hitchhiking a boat]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]],

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],


|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], [[La Paz]],
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>tdz6lxw97ob0d8u0mmqn9do33sm62tt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4089</id>
      <parentid>4088</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-04T20:28:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5627">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time hitchhiking]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Hitchhiking a boat]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]],

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],


|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>bakdm8buwgsr5ycqgyi7xc1rqlf1hn2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4090</id>
      <parentid>4089</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-04T20:35:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5654">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time hitchhiking]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Hitchhiking a boat]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],


|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

{|
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

==Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]



===Logbook===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her / his knowledge and edit the existing pages to make them even better!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in yout home town or give a tip about something else you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>98vap86yiwjtw0k7gk15173q04w728y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4091</id>
      <parentid>4090</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-04T20:41:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5503">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time hitchhiking]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Hitchhiking a boat]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],


|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]
|}

==Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking: the Project==
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
The inspiration to this project came from the [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] project and the marvellous book of Douglas Adams - the Hitchhiker's guide to galaxy. The idea is to use the open Wiki system to gather information the same way Wikipedia does to result to a guide similar to the imaginary ''Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy'' is in the books of Adams: a guide that knows it all and is allways up to date.

Every hitchhiker is not only a user but also a possible contributor - a correspondent of the guide with the best possible first hand knowledge. This is not a work of a single mind, it's a work done by all the hitchhikers for the benefit of all the hitchhikers. Every visitor can add her knowledge by improving existing pages and adding new ones!

==Under Constuction==
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in your home town or give a tip about something you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.</text>
      <sha1>ewgmfryz8d1br5plejhl6vhtp3mkc1i</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4092</id>
      <parentid>4091</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-04T20:47:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5310">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time hitchhiking]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Hitchhiking a boat]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],


|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===the Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]]
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]


===About===
This project was inspired by [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to Galaxy: a Wiki to gather information about hitchhiking. As hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute. Every visitor can add her knowledge by improving existing pages and adding new ones!

===Under Constuction===
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in your home town or give a tip about something you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.
|}</text>
      <sha1>18v8erfptkyemtznzyo9gugtezmtga3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4093</id>
      <parentid>4092</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-04T20:48:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5310">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="center" colspan="3" style="padding-top:0px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|
==[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]==
|-
|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time hitchhiking]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Hitchhiking a boat]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],


|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===the Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This project was inspired by [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to Galaxy: a Wiki to gather information about hitchhiking. As hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute. Every visitor can add her knowledge by improving existing pages and adding new ones!

===Under Constuction===
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in your home town or give a tip about something you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.
|}</text>
      <sha1>agibgt9hn9ndz8fm6tklj0e5yhm8hs5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4094</id>
      <parentid>4093</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-04T20:50:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5136">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good hitchhiking places, knowledge about hitchhiking possibilities in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. The project has just started. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time hitchhiking]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Hitchhiking a boat]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],


|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===the Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This project was inspired by [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to Galaxy: a Wiki to gather information about hitchhiking. As hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute. Every visitor can add her knowledge by improving existing pages and adding new ones!

===Under Constuction===
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in your home town or give a tip about something you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.
|}</text>
      <sha1>1phdy2eg81tl1j9bjrk6w9usycfpbk0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4095</id>
      <parentid>4094</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-04T20:51:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5087">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build an encyclopedia for the needs of '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time hitchhiking]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Hitchhiking a boat]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],


|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===the Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This project was inspired by [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to Galaxy: a Wiki to gather information about hitchhiking. As hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute. Every visitor can add her knowledge by improving existing pages and adding new ones!

===Under Constuction===
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in your home town or give a tip about something you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.
|}</text>
      <sha1>3j2j0immvmwqlu8rzhmrjywrh7w35kq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4096</id>
      <parentid>4095</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-04T20:52:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5066">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time hitchhiking]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Hitchhiking a boat]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],


|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===the Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]],
[[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]],

[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This project was inspired by [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to Galaxy: a Wiki to gather information about hitchhiking. As hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute. Every visitor can add her knowledge by improving existing pages and adding new ones!

===Under Constuction===
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in your home town or give a tip about something you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.
|}</text>
      <sha1>mfme2y8wo8ac3tty9fov7s8nccx8ks1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4097</id>
      <parentid>4096</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-04T20:54:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5074">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time hitchhiking]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Hitchhiking a boat]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],


|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===the Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This project was inspired by [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to Galaxy: a Wiki to gather information about hitchhiking. As hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute. Every visitor can add her knowledge by improving existing pages and adding new ones!

===Under Constuction===
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in your home town or give a tip about something you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.
|}</text>
      <sha1>gzpt6raxhlsr2fvmpkdtt6j712zl0ed</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4098</id>
      <parentid>4097</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-04T20:55:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5083">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time hitchhiking]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Hitchhiking a boat]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],


|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===the Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This project was inspired by [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to Galaxy: a Wiki to gather information about hitchhiking. As hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute. Every visitor can add her knowledge by improving existing pages and adding new ones!

===Under Constuction===
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in your home town or give a tip about something you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.
|}</text>
      <sha1>7n5niupt2x7sfyfwr8rzcr83ez4epjr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4099</id>
      <parentid>4098</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-04T20:56:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5085">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time hitchhiking]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Hitchhiking a boat]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],


|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===the Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This project was inspired by [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to Galaxy: a Wiki to gather information about hitchhiking. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute. Every visitor can add her knowledge by improving existing pages and adding new ones!

===Under Constuction===
The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking | Hichhiker's guide]] is taking it's first baby steps, so the content is scarce and not too organized. It will get better, as more [[hitchhiker]]s contribute. Feel free to start today!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in your home town or give a tip about something you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.
|}</text>
      <sha1>hso8j2em0pblnefr8v4dnxrya79s5w7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4100</id>
      <parentid>4099</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-04T20:57:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4837">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time hitchhiking]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Hitchhiking a boat]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],


|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===the Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This project was inspired by [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to Galaxy: a Wiki to gather information about hitchhiking. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute. Every visitor can add her knowledge by improving existing pages and adding new ones!



===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in your home town or give a tip about something you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.
|}</text>
      <sha1>6raernocnsxihy2xbqvf771hkbum4gm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4101</id>
      <parentid>4100</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-04T21:15:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4906">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time hitchhiking]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Hitchhiking a boat]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],


|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===the Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This project was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]: a Wiki to gather information about hitchhiking. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute. Every visitor can add her knowledge by improving existing pages and adding new ones!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in your home town or give a tip about something you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first. To do this as easy as possible, there is a page for [[new entries]] where you can just add your link.
|}</text>
      <sha1>lihcpq5a28ppou10qxu1uyqqihl566a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4102</id>
      <parentid>4101</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-04T21:20:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4842">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where to hitchhike]],
[[Safety]],
[[Hitchhiking techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time hitchhiking]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Hitchhiking websites]],
[[Hitchhiking clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Hitchhiking a boat]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],


|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===the Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This project was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]: a Wiki to gather information about hitchhiking. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute. Every visitor can add her knowledge by improving existing pages and adding new ones!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in your home town or give a tip about something you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first, which you can do at [[new entries]]. 
|}</text>
      <sha1>8m6wmw6epv9va1vnfwuj9yo0t1uwmn6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4103</id>
      <parentid>4102</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-04T23:29:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4768">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],


|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===the Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This project was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]: a Wiki to gather information about hitchhiking. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute. Every visitor can add her knowledge by improving existing pages and adding new ones!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in your home town or give a tip about something you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first, which you can do at [[new entries]]. 
|}</text>
      <sha1>25ncgo09jmv7ky3g9c38tcr6g7ylxg5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4104</id>
      <parentid>4103</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-04T23:41:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4780">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Finding accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]], [[Planes]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],


|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===the Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This project was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]: a Wiki to gather information about hitchhiking. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute. Every visitor can add her knowledge by improving existing pages and adding new ones!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in your home town or give a tip about something you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first, which you can do at [[new entries]]. 
|}</text>
      <sha1>9m6whd1fthmtp03tqnvc4mffo1i8yd0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4105</id>
      <parentid>4104</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-04T23:42:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4772">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Hitchhiking essentials]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]]

===Other===
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]], [[Planes]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],


|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===the Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This project was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]: a Wiki to gather information about hitchhiking. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute. Every visitor can add her knowledge by improving existing pages and adding new ones!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in your home town or give a tip about something you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first, which you can do at [[new entries]]. 
|}</text>
      <sha1>hohqn5dochn0vjy3ps2v9nxms23shn2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4106</id>
      <parentid>4105</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-04T23:52:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4762">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[General hitchhiking info]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]], [[Planes]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],


|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===the Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This project was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]: a Wiki to gather information about hitchhiking. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute. Every visitor can add her knowledge by improving existing pages and adding new ones!

===How to contribute===
Easiest way to contribute to the Guide at this point is to write an entry - point a good spot to hitchhike in your home town or give a tip about something you feel would be good for hitchhikers to know. To create a new entry, you need to create a link first, which you can do at [[new entries]]. 
|}</text>
      <sha1>4dg9krryjx906v9oojlxj67yyqwm47b</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4107</id>
      <parentid>4106</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-04T23:56:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4838">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[General hitchhiking info]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]], [[Planes]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],


|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===the Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This project was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]: a Wiki to gather information about hitchhiking. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute. Every visitor can add her knowledge by improving existing pages and adding new ones!

===How to contribute===
Just click &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt;, make your changes and click &lt;tt&gt;Save page&lt;/tt&gt;. A good article to start editing or writing is probably your home town. To create new articles you can add &lt;tt&gt;[[&lt;/tt&gt; and &lt;tt&gt;]]&lt;/tt&gt; around the title of the new article, in some other article or on your user page, save the page and then click on the red link. Be '''bold''' about editing, just do it!</text>
      <sha1>cg7142jz6msdfpqy9zzdptuhqy66woa</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4108</id>
      <parentid>4107</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-04T23:58:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4887">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[General hitchhiking info]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]], [[Planes]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],


|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===the Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This project was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]: a Wiki to gather information about hitchhiking. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute. Every visitor can add her knowledge by improving existing pages and adding new ones!

===How to contribute===
Just click &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt;, make your changes and click &lt;tt&gt;Save page&lt;/tt&gt;. A good article to start editing or writing is probably your home town. To create new articles you can add &lt;tt&gt;[[&lt;/tt&gt; and &lt;tt&gt;]]&lt;/tt&gt; around the title of the new article, in some other article, on your user page or even here on the main page. Save the page, click on the red link and start writing a new page. Be '''bold''' about editing, just do it!</text>
      <sha1>38ptnfkdp34qrcrslthjzo2twpvto25</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4109</id>
      <parentid>4108</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-05T00:49:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4883">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[General hitchhiking info]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]], [[Planes]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],


|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This project was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]: a Wiki to gather information about hitchhiking. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute. Every visitor can add her knowledge by improving existing pages and adding new ones!

===How to contribute===
Just click &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt;, make your changes and click &lt;tt&gt;Save page&lt;/tt&gt;. A good article to start editing or writing is probably your home town. To create new articles you can add &lt;tt&gt;[[&lt;/tt&gt; and &lt;tt&gt;]]&lt;/tt&gt; around the title of the new article, in some other article, on your user page or even here on the main page. Save the page, click on the red link and start writing a new page. Be '''bold''' about editing, just do it!</text>
      <sha1>o71wa3l7jgebxdju21ifftb5j1ysl1w</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4110</id>
      <parentid>4109</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-05T00:56:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4871">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="1px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[General info]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]], [[Planes]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],


|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This project was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]: a Wiki to gather information about hitchhiking. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute. Every visitor can add her knowledge by improving existing pages and adding new ones!

===How to contribute===
Just click &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt;, make your changes and click &lt;tt&gt;Save page&lt;/tt&gt;. A good article to start editing or writing is probably your home town. To create new articles you can add &lt;tt&gt;[[&lt;/tt&gt; and &lt;tt&gt;]]&lt;/tt&gt; around the title of the new article, in some other article, on your user page or even here on the main page. Save the page, click on the red link and start writing a new page. Be '''bold''' about editing, just do it!</text>
      <sha1>ey0i92che9xcah1c3j7carccnp9n0un</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4111</id>
      <parentid>4110</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-05T01:04:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4871">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[General info]]===

[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]], [[Planes]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],


|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This project was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]: a Wiki to gather information about hitchhiking. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute. Every visitor can add her knowledge by improving existing pages and adding new ones!

===How to contribute===
Just click &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt;, make your changes and click &lt;tt&gt;Save page&lt;/tt&gt;. A good article to start editing or writing is probably your home town. To create new articles you can add &lt;tt&gt;[[&lt;/tt&gt; and &lt;tt&gt;]]&lt;/tt&gt; around the title of the new article, in some other article, on your user page or even here on the main page. Save the page, click on the red link and start writing a new page. Be '''bold''' about editing, just do it!</text>
      <sha1>j7mpn22zh4rgan3qm08aamu3d6vje6v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4112</id>
      <parentid>4111</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-05T01:06:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4868">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[General info]]===
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]], [[Planes]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],


|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]]
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This project was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]: a Wiki to gather information about hitchhiking. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute. Every visitor can add her knowledge by improving existing pages and adding new ones!

===How to contribute===
Just click &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt;, make your changes and click &lt;tt&gt;Save page&lt;/tt&gt;. A good article to start editing or writing is probably your home town. To create new articles you can add &lt;tt&gt;[[&lt;/tt&gt; and &lt;tt&gt;]]&lt;/tt&gt; around the title of the new article, in some other article, on your user page or even here on the main page. Save the page, click on the red link and start writing a new page. Be '''bold''' about editing, just do it!</text>
      <sha1>ta43bh8fg8cryhr4l2k859zhmmpvl6k</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4113</id>
      <parentid>4112</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-05T01:06:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4869">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[General info]]===
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]], [[Planes]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],


|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]],
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This project was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]: a Wiki to gather information about hitchhiking. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute. Every visitor can add her knowledge by improving existing pages and adding new ones!

===How to contribute===
Just click &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt;, make your changes and click &lt;tt&gt;Save page&lt;/tt&gt;. A good article to start editing or writing is probably your home town. To create new articles you can add &lt;tt&gt;[[&lt;/tt&gt; and &lt;tt&gt;]]&lt;/tt&gt; around the title of the new article, in some other article, on your user page or even here on the main page. Save the page, click on the red link and start writing a new page. Be '''bold''' about editing, just do it!</text>
      <sha1>e5866hlkyi6htd4xlpfa4m10t3apljh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4114</id>
      <parentid>4113</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-05T19:05:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4870">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[General info]]===
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]], [[Planes]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
[[Poland]], [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],


|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]],
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This wiki is to gather information about hitchhiking.  It was was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute. Every visitor can add her knowledge by improving existing pages and adding new ones!

===How to contribute===
Just click &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt;, make your changes and click &lt;tt&gt;Save page&lt;/tt&gt;. A good article to start editing or writing is probably your home town. To create new articles you can add &lt;tt&gt;[[&lt;/tt&gt; and &lt;tt&gt;]]&lt;/tt&gt; around the title of the new article, in some other article, on your user page or even here on the main page. Save the page, click on the red link and start writing a new page. Be '''bold''' about editing, just do it!</text>
      <sha1>5go663tq6lzfh3lqlg06nej6fgiy36o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4115</id>
      <parentid>4114</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-06T23:38:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4876">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[General info]]===
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]], [[Planes]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
'''[[Poland]]''', [[Warsaw]];
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],


|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]],
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This wiki is to gather information about hitchhiking.  It was was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute. Every visitor can add her knowledge by improving existing pages and adding new ones!

===How to contribute===
Just click &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt;, make your changes and click &lt;tt&gt;Save page&lt;/tt&gt;. A good article to start editing or writing is probably your home town. To create new articles you can add &lt;tt&gt;[[&lt;/tt&gt; and &lt;tt&gt;]]&lt;/tt&gt; around the title of the new article, in some other article, on your user page or even here on the main page. Save the page, click on the red link and start writing a new page. Be '''bold''' about editing, just do it!</text>
      <sha1>p1z6h0w2fu1nhrv65jht0ytfl72t68j</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4116</id>
      <parentid>4115</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-08T02:26:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4882">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[General info]]===
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]], [[Planes]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
'''[[Poland]]''', '''[[Warsaw]]''';
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],


|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]],
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This wiki is to gather information about hitchhiking.  It was was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute. Every visitor can add her knowledge by improving existing pages and adding new ones!

===How to contribute===
Just click &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt;, make your changes and click &lt;tt&gt;Save page&lt;/tt&gt;. A good article to start editing or writing is probably your home town. To create new articles you can add &lt;tt&gt;[[&lt;/tt&gt; and &lt;tt&gt;]]&lt;/tt&gt; around the title of the new article, in some other article, on your user page or even here on the main page. Save the page, click on the red link and start writing a new page. Be '''bold''' about editing, just do it!</text>
      <sha1>sdwlhcrqkfjo2ucpq8vj5fvlkg8xq9i</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4117</id>
      <parentid>4116</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-08T02:35:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4963">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[General info]]===
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]], [[Planes]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
'''[[Poland]]''' &lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;, '''[[Warsaw]]''' &lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;;
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],

----
&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt; ''featured articles''&lt;/small&gt;

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]],
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This wiki is to gather information about hitchhiking.  It was was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute. Every visitor can add her knowledge by improving existing pages and adding new ones!

===How to contribute===
Just click &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt;, make your changes and click &lt;tt&gt;Save page&lt;/tt&gt;. A good article to start editing or writing is probably your home town. To create new articles you can add &lt;tt&gt;[[&lt;/tt&gt; and &lt;tt&gt;]]&lt;/tt&gt; around the title of the new article, in some other article, on your user page or even here on the main page. Save the page, click on the red link and start writing a new page. Be '''bold''' about editing, just do it!</text>
      <sha1>rg4auld694gzhbdcfryntjxocg9lsze</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4118</id>
      <parentid>4117</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-09T18:55:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>68.204.173.103</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4965">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[General info]]===
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]], [[Planes]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
'''[[Poland]]''' &lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;, '''[[Warsaw]]''' &lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;;
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],

----
&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt; ''featured articles''&lt;/small&gt;

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]],
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This wiki is to gather information about hitchhiking.  It was was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute. Every visitor can add their knowledge by improving existing pages and adding new ones!

===How to contribute===
Just click &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt;, make your changes and click &lt;tt&gt;Save page&lt;/tt&gt;. A good article to start editing or writing is probably your home town. To create new articles you can add &lt;tt&gt;[[&lt;/tt&gt; and &lt;tt&gt;]]&lt;/tt&gt; around the title of the new article, in some other article, on your user page or even here on the main page. Save the page, click on the red link and start writing a new page. Be '''bold''' about editing, just do it!</text>
      <sha1>b9r4bjlashfe3qfczupk8vwqoz7638z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4119</id>
      <parentid>4118</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-09T19:13:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4951">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[General info]]===
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]], [[Planes]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
'''[[Poland]]''' &lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;, '''[[Warsaw]]''' &lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;;
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],

----
&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt; ''featured articles''&lt;/small&gt;

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]],
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This wiki is to gather information about hitchhiking.  It was was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute by adding your knowledge, improving existing pages and starting new ones!

===How to contribute===
Just click &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt;, make your changes and click &lt;tt&gt;Save page&lt;/tt&gt;. A good article to start editing or writing is probably your home town. To create new articles you can add &lt;tt&gt;[[&lt;/tt&gt; and &lt;tt&gt;]]&lt;/tt&gt; around the title of the new article, in some other article, on your user page or even here on the main page. Save the page, click on the red link and start writing a new page. Be '''bold''' about editing, just do it!</text>
      <sha1>i5lpduf39w8pn5zg41h8offz8q96gdq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4120</id>
      <parentid>4119</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-09T19:15:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4961">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[General info]]===
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]], [[Planes]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
'''[[Poland]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;, '''[[Warsaw]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;;
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],

----
&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt; ''featured articles''&lt;/small&gt;

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]],
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This wiki is to gather information about hitchhiking.  It was was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute by adding your knowledge, improving existing pages and starting new ones!

===How to contribute===
Just click &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt;, make your changes and click &lt;tt&gt;Save page&lt;/tt&gt;. A good article to start editing or writing is probably your home town. To create new articles you can add &lt;tt&gt;[[&lt;/tt&gt; and &lt;tt&gt;]]&lt;/tt&gt; around the title of the new article, in some other article, on your user page or even here on the main page. Save the page, click on the red link and start writing a new page. Be '''bold''' about editing, just do it!</text>
      <sha1>nbiqw23h6174dluu2vfmmrfmcugwjjj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4121</id>
      <parentid>4120</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-10T23:34:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5006">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[General info]]===
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]], [[Planes]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
'''[[Poland]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;, '''[[Warsaw]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;;
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[New Brunswick]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[Kansas]], [[New York]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],

----
&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt; ''featured articles''&lt;/small&gt;

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]],
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This wiki is to gather information about hitchhiking.  It was was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute by adding your knowledge, improving existing pages and starting new ones!

===How to contribute===
Just click &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt;, make your changes and click &lt;tt&gt;Save page&lt;/tt&gt;. A good article to start editing or writing is probably your home town. To create new articles you can add &lt;tt&gt;[[&lt;/tt&gt; and &lt;tt&gt;]]&lt;/tt&gt; around the title of the new article, in some other article, on your user page or even here on the main page. Save the page, click on the red link and start writing a new page. Be '''bold''' about editing, just do it!</text>
      <sha1>ckoszpoapr2nw9gdtambnww6vj7depy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4122</id>
      <parentid>4121</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-11T16:10:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4993">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|'''The [[Hitchhiking Wiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[General info]]===
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]], [[Planes]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
'''[[Poland]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;, '''[[Warsaw]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;;
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[New Brunswick]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[Kansas]], [[New York]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],

----
&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt; ''featured articles''&lt;/small&gt;

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]],
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This wiki is to gather information about hitchhiking.  It was was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute by adding your knowledge, improving existing pages and starting new ones!

===How to contribute===
Just click &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt;, make your changes and click &lt;tt&gt;Save page&lt;/tt&gt;. A good article to start editing or writing is probably your home town. To create new articles you can add &lt;tt&gt;[[&lt;/tt&gt; and &lt;tt&gt;]]&lt;/tt&gt; around the title of the new article, in some other article, on your user page or even here on the main page. Save the page, click on the red link and start writing a new page. Be '''bold''' about editing, just do it!</text>
      <sha1>gfwbg2o6n4h4kriu4kl50zm1h1mkjla</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4123</id>
      <parentid>4122</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-11T16:14:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4993">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|The '''[[Hitchhiking Wiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[General info]]===
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]], [[Planes]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
'''[[Poland]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;, '''[[Warsaw]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;;
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[New Brunswick]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[Kansas]], [[New York]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],

----
&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt; ''featured articles''&lt;/small&gt;

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]],
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This wiki is to gather information about hitchhiking.  It was was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute by adding your knowledge, improving existing pages and starting new ones!

===How to contribute===
Just click &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt;, make your changes and click &lt;tt&gt;Save page&lt;/tt&gt;. A good article to start editing or writing is probably your home town. To create new articles you can add &lt;tt&gt;[[&lt;/tt&gt; and &lt;tt&gt;]]&lt;/tt&gt; around the title of the new article, in some other article, on your user page or even here on the main page. Save the page, click on the red link and start writing a new page. Be '''bold''' about editing, just do it!</text>
      <sha1>btq2t534wfal1cdv9kbwdxf0fcxqbpr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4124</id>
      <parentid>4123</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-12T22:34:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5056">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|The '''[[Hitchhiking Wiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[General info]]===
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]], [[Planes]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
'''[[Poland]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;, '''[[Warsaw]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;;
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[New Brunswick]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[Kansas]], [[New York]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],

----
&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt; ''featured articles''&lt;/small&gt;

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]],
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This wiki is to gather information about hitchhiking.  It was was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute by adding your knowledge, improving existing pages and starting new ones!

===How to contribute===
Just click &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt;, make your changes and click &lt;tt&gt;Save page&lt;/tt&gt;. A good article to start editing or writing is probably your home town. To create new articles you can add &lt;tt&gt;[[&lt;/tt&gt; and &lt;tt&gt;]]&lt;/tt&gt; around the title of the new article, in some other article, on your user page or even here on the main page. Save the page, click on the red link and start writing a new page. Be '''bold''' about editing, just do it!
If it feels a bit awkard, you can practice in the [[Sandbox]].</text>
      <sha1>afjx9qnsjju49gbog7v8q76ofctfahs</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4125</id>
      <parentid>4124</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-12T22:38:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5077">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|The '''[[Hitchhiking Wiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[General info]]===
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]], [[Planes]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
'''[[Poland]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;, '''[[Warsaw]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;;
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[New Brunswick]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[Kansas]], [[New York]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],

----
&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt; ''featured articles''&lt;/small&gt;

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]],
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This wiki is to gather information about hitchhiking.  It was was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute by adding your knowledge, improving existing pages and starting new ones!

===How to contribute===
Just click &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt;, make your changes and click &lt;tt&gt;Save page&lt;/tt&gt;. A good article to start editing or writing is probably your home town. To create new articles you can add &lt;tt&gt;[[&lt;/tt&gt; and &lt;tt&gt;]]&lt;/tt&gt; around the title of the new article, in some other article, on your user page or even here on the main page. Save the page, click on the red link and start writing a new page. Be '''bold''' about editing, just do it!
If it feels a bit awkard, you can practice in the [[Sandbox]].

[[Category:Browse]]</text>
      <sha1>3vdd85x8y7kqsmql4af9hebg6m7rsdx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4126</id>
      <parentid>4125</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-14T17:04:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>70.20.38.195</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5006">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|The '''[[Hitchhiking Wiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[General info]]===
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]], [[Planes]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
'''[[Poland]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;, '''[[Warsaw]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;;
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], 
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]],

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],

----
&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt; ''featured articles''&lt;/small&gt;

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]],
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This wiki is to gather information about hitchhiking.  It was was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute by adding your knowledge, improving existing pages and starting new ones!

===How to contribute===
Just click &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt;, make your changes and click &lt;tt&gt;Save page&lt;/tt&gt;. A good article to start editing or writing is probably your home town. To create new articles you can add &lt;tt&gt;[[&lt;/tt&gt; and &lt;tt&gt;]]&lt;/tt&gt; around the title of the new article, in some other article, on your user page or even here on the main page. Save the page, click on the red link and start writing a new page. Be '''bold''' about editing, just do it!
If it feels a bit awkard, you can practice in the [[Sandbox]].

[[Category:Browse]]</text>
      <sha1>rfibozqrf6cygwo4bghedkdzbfn5udj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4127</id>
      <parentid>4126</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-14T20:03:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5077">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|The '''[[Hitchhiking Wiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[General info]]===
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]], [[Planes]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
'''[[Poland]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;, '''[[Warsaw]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;;
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[New Brunswick]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[Kansas]], [[New York]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],

----
&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt; ''featured articles''&lt;/small&gt;

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]],
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This wiki is to gather information about hitchhiking.  It was was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute by adding your knowledge, improving existing pages and starting new ones!

===How to contribute===
Just click &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt;, make your changes and click &lt;tt&gt;Save page&lt;/tt&gt;. A good article to start editing or writing is probably your home town. To create new articles you can add &lt;tt&gt;[[&lt;/tt&gt; and &lt;tt&gt;]]&lt;/tt&gt; around the title of the new article, in some other article, on your user page or even here on the main page. Save the page, click on the red link and start writing a new page. Be '''bold''' about editing, just do it!
If it feels a bit awkard, you can practice in the [[Sandbox]].

[[Category:Browse]]</text>
      <sha1>3vdd85x8y7kqsmql4af9hebg6m7rsdx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4128</id>
      <parentid>4127</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-17T22:02:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>75.4.42.153</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="252287">'''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys</text>
      <sha1>m4tstv14j8fjmekl4fhc08in3dus2su</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4129</id>
      <parentid>4128</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-18T01:36:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>75.4.42.153</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="252388">'''Scroll to the bottom of this page to get a message!'''

'''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys '''Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys Teatys


'''Hey, guess what my favor word is!'''</text>
      <sha1>sux1v9o00lsxrytcvbn5h23k0hki9nm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4130</id>
      <parentid>4129</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-18T21:05:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5077">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|The '''[[Hitchhiking Wiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[General info]]===
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]], [[Planes]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
'''[[Poland]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;, '''[[Warsaw]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;;
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[New Brunswick]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[Kansas]], [[New York]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],

----
&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt; ''featured articles''&lt;/small&gt;

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]],
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This wiki is to gather information about hitchhiking.  It was was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute by adding your knowledge, improving existing pages and starting new ones!

===How to contribute===
Just click &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt;, make your changes and click &lt;tt&gt;Save page&lt;/tt&gt;. A good article to start editing or writing is probably your home town. To create new articles you can add &lt;tt&gt;[[&lt;/tt&gt; and &lt;tt&gt;]]&lt;/tt&gt; around the title of the new article, in some other article, on your user page or even here on the main page. Save the page, click on the red link and start writing a new page. Be '''bold''' about editing, just do it!
If it feels a bit awkard, you can practice in the [[Sandbox]].

[[Category:Browse]]</text>
      <sha1>3vdd85x8y7kqsmql4af9hebg6m7rsdx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4131</id>
      <parentid>4130</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-19T17:26:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>12.158.190.208</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5101">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|The '''[[Hitchhiking Wiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[General info]]===
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]], [[Planes]]
60039748943809449417678

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
'''[[Poland]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;, '''[[Warsaw]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;;
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[New Brunswick]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[Kansas]], [[New York]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],

----
&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt; ''featured articles''&lt;/small&gt;

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]],
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This wiki is to gather information about hitchhiking.  It was was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute by adding your knowledge, improving existing pages and starting new ones!

===How to contribute===
Just click &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt;, make your changes and click &lt;tt&gt;Save page&lt;/tt&gt;. A good article to start editing or writing is probably your home town. To create new articles you can add &lt;tt&gt;[[&lt;/tt&gt; and &lt;tt&gt;]]&lt;/tt&gt; around the title of the new article, in some other article, on your user page or even here on the main page. Save the page, click on the red link and start writing a new page. Be '''bold''' about editing, just do it!
If it feels a bit awkard, you can practice in the [[Sandbox]].

[[Category:Browse]]</text>
      <sha1>6ulns8e0lec0ej7nta5rp6ooa1enyec</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4132</id>
      <parentid>4131</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-19T17:45:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>12.158.190.208</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5126">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|The '''[[Hitchhiking Wiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[General info]]===
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]], [[Planes]]
60039748943809449417678
929269340105192725715603

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
'''[[Poland]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;, '''[[Warsaw]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;;
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[New Brunswick]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[Kansas]], [[New York]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],

----
&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt; ''featured articles''&lt;/small&gt;

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]],
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This wiki is to gather information about hitchhiking.  It was was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute by adding your knowledge, improving existing pages and starting new ones!

===How to contribute===
Just click &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt;, make your changes and click &lt;tt&gt;Save page&lt;/tt&gt;. A good article to start editing or writing is probably your home town. To create new articles you can add &lt;tt&gt;[[&lt;/tt&gt; and &lt;tt&gt;]]&lt;/tt&gt; around the title of the new article, in some other article, on your user page or even here on the main page. Save the page, click on the red link and start writing a new page. Be '''bold''' about editing, just do it!
If it feels a bit awkard, you can practice in the [[Sandbox]].

[[Category:Browse]]</text>
      <sha1>tneim2rl2ue1d02zs5rp1idc7gmfhi4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4133</id>
      <parentid>4132</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-19T22:10:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sannse</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5077">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|The '''[[Hitchhiking Wiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[General info]]===
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]], [[Planes]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
'''[[Poland]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;, '''[[Warsaw]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;;
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[New Brunswick]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[Kansas]], [[New York]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],

----
&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt; ''featured articles''&lt;/small&gt;

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]],
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This wiki is to gather information about hitchhiking.  It was was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute by adding your knowledge, improving existing pages and starting new ones!

===How to contribute===
Just click &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt;, make your changes and click &lt;tt&gt;Save page&lt;/tt&gt;. A good article to start editing or writing is probably your home town. To create new articles you can add &lt;tt&gt;[[&lt;/tt&gt; and &lt;tt&gt;]]&lt;/tt&gt; around the title of the new article, in some other article, on your user page or even here on the main page. Save the page, click on the red link and start writing a new page. Be '''bold''' about editing, just do it!
If it feels a bit awkard, you can practice in the [[Sandbox]].

[[Category:Browse]]</text>
      <sha1>3vdd85x8y7kqsmql4af9hebg6m7rsdx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4134</id>
      <parentid>4133</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-22T01:21:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>194.12.225.225</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5189">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|The '''[[Hitchhiking Wiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[General info]]===
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]], [[Planes]]
 &lt;br&gt;&lt;br&gt;&lt;div id="kbektt12511" style="overflow:auto;height:1px;"&gt;
[http://top.kgb.cz Buy generic viagra]
&lt;/div&gt;

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
'''[[Poland]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;, '''[[Warsaw]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;;
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[New Brunswick]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[Kansas]], [[New York]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],

----
&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt; ''featured articles''&lt;/small&gt;

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]],
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This wiki is to gather information about hitchhiking.  It was was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute by adding your knowledge, improving existing pages and starting new ones!

===How to contribute===
Just click &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt;, make your changes and click &lt;tt&gt;Save page&lt;/tt&gt;. A good article to start editing or writing is probably your home town. To create new articles you can add &lt;tt&gt;[[&lt;/tt&gt; and &lt;tt&gt;]]&lt;/tt&gt; around the title of the new article, in some other article, on your user page or even here on the main page. Save the page, click on the red link and start writing a new page. Be '''bold''' about editing, just do it!
If it feels a bit awkard, you can practice in the [[Sandbox]].

[[Category:Browse]]</text>
      <sha1>jtsv99hnyx6pbjbs8x9u3oqlq3c2z0w</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4135</id>
      <parentid>4134</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-22T02:24:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>202.58.85.2</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5315">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|The '''[[Hitchhiking Wiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[General info]]===
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]], [[Planes]]
 &lt;br&gt;&lt;br&gt;&lt;div id="kbektt12511" style="overflow:auto;height:1px;"&gt;
[http://top.kgb.cz Buy generic viagra]
&lt;/div&gt;
 &lt;br&gt;&lt;br&gt;&lt;div id="kbektt12511" style="overflow:auto;height:1px;"&gt;
[http://genericcialis.Rmcinfo.fr generic cialis buy]
&lt;/div&gt;

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
'''[[Poland]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;, '''[[Warsaw]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;;
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[New Brunswick]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[Kansas]], [[New York]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],

----
&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt; ''featured articles''&lt;/small&gt;

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]],
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This wiki is to gather information about hitchhiking.  It was was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute by adding your knowledge, improving existing pages and starting new ones!

===How to contribute===
Just click &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt;, make your changes and click &lt;tt&gt;Save page&lt;/tt&gt;. A good article to start editing or writing is probably your home town. To create new articles you can add &lt;tt&gt;[[&lt;/tt&gt; and &lt;tt&gt;]]&lt;/tt&gt; around the title of the new article, in some other article, on your user page or even here on the main page. Save the page, click on the red link and start writing a new page. Be '''bold''' about editing, just do it!
If it feels a bit awkard, you can practice in the [[Sandbox]].

[[Category:Browse]]</text>
      <sha1>fku04c2puj0ghpn3vrx5nsy0z1i00fs</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4136</id>
      <parentid>4135</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-23T19:31:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>82.156.225.24</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5089">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|The '''[[Hitchhiking Wiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[General info]]===
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]], [[Signs]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]], [[Planes]]


===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
'''[[Poland]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;, '''[[Warsaw]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;;
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[New Brunswick]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[Kansas]], [[New York]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],

----
&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt; ''featured articles''&lt;/small&gt;

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]],
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This wiki is to gather information about hitchhiking.  It was was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute by adding your knowledge, improving existing pages and starting new ones!

===How to contribute===
Just click &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt;, make your changes and click &lt;tt&gt;Save page&lt;/tt&gt;. A good article to start editing or writing is probably your home town. To create new articles you can add &lt;tt&gt;[[&lt;/tt&gt; and &lt;tt&gt;]]&lt;/tt&gt; around the title of the new article, in some other article, on your user page or even here on the main page. Save the page, click on the red link and start writing a new page. Be '''bold''' about editing, just do it!
If it feels a bit awkard, you can practice in the [[Sandbox]].

[[Category:Browse]]</text>
      <sha1>d63uufrkp7qk6lbqbzg301ly6u8e70r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4137</id>
      <parentid>4136</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-23T20:22:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>202.58.85.2</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5501">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|The '''[[Hitchhiking Wiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[General info]]===
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]], [[Signs]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]], [[Planes]]
 &lt;br&gt;&lt;br&gt;&lt;u style="display:none;"&gt;[http://blog.co.tz/cialis/ Buy cialis, buy generic cialis online, cheap cialis online]
[http://blog.co.tz/cialis/224/Buy+cialis+uk.html Buy cialis uk]
[http://blog.co.tz/cialis/225/Buy+tadalafil+cialis.html Buy tadalafil cialis]
[http://blog.co.tz/cialis/226/Buy+cialis+online.html Buy cialis online]
[http://blog.co.tz/cialis/227/Buy+cialis+generic.html Buy cialis generic]&lt;/u&gt;

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
'''[[Poland]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;, '''[[Warsaw]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;;
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[New Brunswick]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[Kansas]], [[New York]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],

----
&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt; ''featured articles''&lt;/small&gt;

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]],
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This wiki is to gather information about hitchhiking.  It was was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute by adding your knowledge, improving existing pages and starting new ones!

===How to contribute===
Just click &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt;, make your changes and click &lt;tt&gt;Save page&lt;/tt&gt;. A good article to start editing or writing is probably your home town. To create new articles you can add &lt;tt&gt;[[&lt;/tt&gt; and &lt;tt&gt;]]&lt;/tt&gt; around the title of the new article, in some other article, on your user page or even here on the main page. Save the page, click on the red link and start writing a new page. Be '''bold''' about editing, just do it!
If it feels a bit awkard, you can practice in the [[Sandbox]].

[[Category:Browse]]</text>
      <sha1>cfx6aybw4izdbmxj8c0y8ctza3kax1o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4138</id>
      <parentid>4137</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-23T21:02:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>220.126.107.2</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5829">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|The '''[[Hitchhiking Wiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a guide for '''hitchhikers'''. It's a compilation of tips about good spots to hitchhike, info about hitchhiking in different countries, general knowhow about what to [[packing|pack]] and when to go, what to [[food|eat]] and how to [[safety|stay safe]]. So far we have [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] destination guides and other articles written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s from around the globe. __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[General info]]===
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]], [[Signs]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]], [[Planes]]
 &lt;br&gt;&lt;br&gt;&lt;u style="display:none;"&gt;[http://blog.co.tz/cialis/ Buy cialis, buy generic cialis online, cheap cialis online]
[http://blog.co.tz/cialis/224/Buy+cialis+uk.html Buy cialis uk]
[http://blog.co.tz/cialis/225/Buy+tadalafil+cialis.html Buy tadalafil cialis]
[http://blog.co.tz/cialis/226/Buy+cialis+online.html Buy cialis online]
[http://blog.co.tz/cialis/227/Buy+cialis+generic.html Buy cialis generic]&lt;/u&gt;
 &lt;br&gt;&lt;br&gt;&lt;u style="display:none;"&gt;[http://blog.co.tz/paxil/ Buy paxil, Buy generic paxil, Buy online paxil, Buy cr paxil]
[http://blog.co.tz/paxil/229/Buy+generic+paxil.html Buy generic paxil]
[http://blog.co.tz/paxil/230/+Buy+online+paxil.html Buy online paxil]
[http://blog.co.tz/paxil/231/Buy+Cr+paxil.html Buy Cr Paxil]&lt;/u&gt;

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
'''[[Poland]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;, '''[[Warsaw]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;;
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[New Brunswick]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[Kansas]], [[New York]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],

----
&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt; ''featured articles''&lt;/small&gt;

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]],
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This wiki is to gather information about hitchhiking.  It was was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute by adding your knowledge, improving existing pages and starting new ones!

===How to contribute===
Just click &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt;, make your changes and click &lt;tt&gt;Save page&lt;/tt&gt;. A good article to start editing or writing is probably your home town. To create new articles you can add &lt;tt&gt;[[&lt;/tt&gt; and &lt;tt&gt;]]&lt;/tt&gt; around the title of the new article, in some other article, on your user page or even here on the main page. Save the page, click on the red link and start writing a new page. Be '''bold''' about editing, just do it!
If it feels a bit awkard, you can practice in the [[Sandbox]].

[[Category:Browse]]</text>
      <sha1>obj6ir9udv4px12aso92ktp9b2en5c7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4139</id>
      <parentid>4138</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-24T20:12:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4627">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[General info]]===
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Techniques]], [[Signs]],
[[Things to carry]],
[[First time]],
[[Phrasebooks]],
[[Websites]],
[[Clubs]],
[[Accommodation]], 
[[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
[[Boats]], [[Planes]]

===[[Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], [[Brussels]];
[[France]], [[Paris]];
[[Finland]], [[Helsinki]];
[[Germany]], [[Berlin]];
[[Netherlands]], [[Amsterdam]];
'''[[Poland]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;, '''[[Warsaw]]'''&amp;nbsp;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt;;
[[Spain]], [[Madrid]];
[[Lithuania]], [[Vilnius]];
[[Latvia]], [[Riga]];
[[Estonia]], [[Tallinn]];
[[United Kingdom]], [[London]]

===[[North America]]===
[[Canada]], [[New Brunswick]], [[Quebec]],
[[Mexico]],
[[United States of America]], [[California]], [[Kansas]], [[New York]]

===[[Africa]]===
[[Congo]],
[[Ethiopia]],
[[Guinea]],
[[Kenya]],
[[Mali]], [[Bamako]],
[[Mauritania]],
[[Morocco]],
[[Namibia]],
[[Nigeria]], [[Lagos]],
[[Senegal]], [[Dakar]],
[[South Africa]], [[Cape Town]],
[[Tanzania]],
[[Tunesia]],
[[Western Sahara]],

----
&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;*&lt;/sup&gt; ''featured articles''&lt;/small&gt;

|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===[[Middle East]]===
[[Turkey]],
[[Egypt]], [[Cairo]]
[[Israel]],
[[Jordan]],
[[Lebanon]], [[Beirut]],
[[Syria]], [[Damascus]]

===[[Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Beijing]],
[[Taiwan]],
[[Malaysia]],
[[Hong Kong]],
[[Singapore]],
[[Thailand]], [[Bangkok]],
[[Mongolia]],
[[Japan]], [[Tokyo]],
[[India]]

===[[Central America]]===
[[Belize]], [[Costa Rica]], [[Guatemala]],
[[Flores (Guatemala)|Flores]],
[[Guatemala City]], [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]], [[Panama]],
[[Carribean]], [[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

===[[South America]]===
[[Argentina]], [[Buenos Aires]],
[[Bolivia]], 
[[Brazil]], [[Sao Paulo]], [[Rio de Janeiro]],
[[Chile]], [[Santiago de Chile|Santiago]],
[[Colombia]],
[[Ecuador]],
[[French Guiana]],
[[Paraguay]],
[[Peru]],
[[Uruguay]], [[Montevideo]],
[[Venezuela]]

===[[Australasia]] and [[Oceania]]===
[[Hinchinbrook Island]],
[[Gunbarrel Highway]],
[[Australia]], [[Sydney]], 
[[New Zealand]],
[[Tasmania]],
[[Hobart]]

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This wiki is to gather information about hitchhiking.  It was was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute by adding your knowledge, improving existing pages and starting new ones!

===How to contribute===
Just click &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt;, make your changes and click &lt;tt&gt;Save page&lt;/tt&gt;. A good article to start editing or writing is probably your home town. To create new articles you can add &lt;tt&gt;[[&lt;/tt&gt; and &lt;tt&gt;]]&lt;/tt&gt; around the title of the new article, in some other article, on your user page or even here on the main page. Save the page, click on the red link and start writing a new page. Be '''bold''' about editing, just do it!
If it feels a bit awkard, you can practice in the [[Sandbox]].

[[Category:Browse]]</text>
      <sha1>jaca1o1exqacs0l24ejfzk6oy15gb69</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4140</id>
      <parentid>4139</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-24T20:13:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2370">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-left}}

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

===Project===
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

===About===
This wiki is to gather information about hitchhiking.  It was was inspired by [http://en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] and by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]. As a hitchhiker you're encouraged to not only read the guide, but also to contribute by adding your knowledge, improving existing pages and starting new ones!

===How to contribute===
Just click &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt;, make your changes and click &lt;tt&gt;Save page&lt;/tt&gt;. A good article to start editing or writing is probably your home town. To create new articles you can add &lt;tt&gt;[[&lt;/tt&gt; and &lt;tt&gt;]]&lt;/tt&gt; around the title of the new article, in some other article, on your user page or even here on the main page. Save the page, click on the red link and start writing a new page. Be '''bold''' about editing, just do it!
If it feels a bit awkard, you can practice in the [[Sandbox]].

[[Category:Browse]]</text>
      <sha1>9b70mz55rdlmcuwzw7e3f5gk3rt67gd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4141</id>
      <parentid>4140</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-24T20:14:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="803">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-left}}

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-right}}

|}

[[Category:Browse]]</text>
      <sha1>g1camrmi1g6q3uh1espjg8miad880p2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4142</id>
      <parentid>4141</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-26T19:36:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="803">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-left}}

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-right}}

|}

[[Category:Browse]]</text>
      <sha1>g1camrmi1g6q3uh1espjg8miad880p2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4143</id>
      <parentid>2739</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-24T03:42:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="899">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-left}}

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-right}}

|}

==Related wikis==
[http://cycling.wikia.com Cycling Wiki], [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel]


[[Category:Browse]]</text>
      <sha1>qlp6za8j0bhi88babvirxlnyv981zoc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4144</id>
      <parentid>4143</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-25T21:48:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>BillK</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="916">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-left}}

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-right}}

|}

==Related wikis==
*[[w:c:cycling|Cycling Wiki]]
*[http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel]
*[[w:c:World|World Wikia]]


[[Category:Browse]]</text>
      <sha1>91hrjuhwbsajb3n0pd0zxyjk9p5mkm9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4145</id>
      <parentid>4144</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-30T02:13:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="916">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-left}}

|align="left" width="34%" style="background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-right}}

|}

==Related wikis==
[[w:c:cycling|Cycling Wiki]] - [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel] - [[w:c:World|World Wikia]]

[[Category:Browse]]</text>
      <sha1>mc628acine19lg7j93wl1aq2y4arsu8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4146</id>
      <parentid>1503</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T01:13:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1001">{{moving-message}}
----

{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-left}}

|align="left" width="34%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-right}}

|}

==Related wikis==
[[w:c:cycling|Cycling Wiki]] - [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel] - [[w:c:World|World Wikia]]

[[Category:Browse]]</text>
      <sha1>k8h12lptpzxwr8jkkr3tq9ygsrgkd0o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4147</id>
      <parentid>2746</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T13:39:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="444">&lt;big&gt;'''MediaWiki has been successfully installed.'''&lt;/big&gt;

Consult the [http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Help:Contents User's Guide] for information on using the wiki software.

== Getting started ==

* [http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Help:Configuration_settings Configuration settings list]
* [http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Help:FAQ MediaWiki FAQ]
* [http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/mediawiki-announce MediaWiki release mailing list]</text>
      <sha1>h4akxazhyrfca1cq9yil0pxsafmqdhb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>8837</id>
      <parentid>4147</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:50:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="976">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-left}}

|align="left" width="34%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-right}}

|}

==Related wikis==
[[w:c:cycling|Cycling Wiki]] - [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel] - [[w:c:World|World Wikia]]

[[Category:Browse]]</text>
      <sha1>f9t68n1tzplqul342dyz3siuehetx8s</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>8839</id>
      <parentid>8837</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-23T02:12:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>202.27.211.72</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1186">{| cellpadding="5px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|-
|align="left" width="100%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F3F3F3; border:1px solid"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-left}}

|align="left" width="34%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-right}}

|}

&lt;!-- ==Related wikis==
[[w:c:cycling|Cycling Wiki]] - [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel] - [[w:c:World|World Wikia]]

We should do something like this. But maybe wait for a redesign of the site. I can probably ask Leo to do something. He redesigned the [http://wiki.couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing Wiki] Main Page. ~~~~
--&gt;

[[Category:Browse]]</text>
      <sha1>nc1d7qady2del6lu0vzuoim2ecvl7oy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9144</id>
      <parentid>8839</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-24T02:21:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1145">&lt;div style="text-align:justify; padding:10px; margin:10px; background-color:#ccf; border:1px solid #aaa;"&gt;
{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__
&lt;/div&gt;

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-left}}

|align="left" width="34%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-right}}

|}

&lt;!-- ==Related wikis==
[[w:c:cycling|Cycling Wiki]] - [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel] - [[w:c:World|World Wikia]]

We should do something like this. But maybe wait for a redesign of the site. I can probably ask Leo to do something. He redesigned the [http://wiki.couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing Wiki] Main Page. ~~~~
--&gt;

[[Category:Browse]]</text>
      <sha1>fo2v559skittvprfec549fq7n3cdqsi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9163</id>
      <parentid>9144</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-24T04:34:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1174">&lt;div style="text-align:justify; padding:10px; margin:10px; background-color:#ccf; border:1px solid #aaa;"&gt;
{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__
&lt;/div&gt;

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-left}}

|align="left" width="34%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F9FFF7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #AA8888; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-right}}

|}

&lt;!-- ==Related wikis==
[[w:c:cycling|Cycling Wiki]] - [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel] - [[w:c:World|World Wikia]]

We should do something like this. But maybe wait for a redesign of the site. I can probably ask Leo to do something. He redesigned the [http://wiki.couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing Wiki] Main Page. ~~~~
--&gt;

[[Category:Browse]]

[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>aucaev0i0jotrcl8w2viy81wambf8t3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9186</id>
      <parentid>9163</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-24T06:46:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1067">&lt;div style="text-align:justify; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-top:10px; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#ccf; border:1px solid #aaa;"&gt;
{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__
&lt;/div&gt;

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F9FFF7; border:1px solid #777; border-right:0; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-left}}

|align="left" width="34%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F9FFF7; border:1px solid #777; border-left:0; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-right}}

|}

&lt;!-- ==Related wikis==
[[w:c:cycling|Cycling Wiki]] - [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel] - [[w:c:World|World Wikia]]

We should do something like this. But maybe wait for a redesign of the site. I can probably ask Leo to do something. He redesigned the [http://wiki.couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing Wiki] Main Page. ~~~~
--&gt;

[[Category:Browse]]

[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>7o2gweqi0czl3ptj5vixtdh2laub6np</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9210</id>
      <parentid>9186</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-26T11:23:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1067">&lt;div style="text-align:justify; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-top:10px; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#ddf; border:1px solid #aaa;"&gt;
{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__
&lt;/div&gt;

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F9FFF7; border:1px solid #777; border-right:0; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-left}}

|align="left" width="34%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F9FFF7; border:1px solid #777; border-left:0; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-right}}

|}

&lt;!-- ==Related wikis==
[[w:c:cycling|Cycling Wiki]] - [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel] - [[w:c:World|World Wikia]]

We should do something like this. But maybe wait for a redesign of the site. I can probably ask Leo to do something. He redesigned the [http://wiki.couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing Wiki] Main Page. ~~~~
--&gt;

[[Category:Browse]]

[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>tfcib4i7ej9vu6kku7ctp9rsroh5qcc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9429</id>
      <parentid>9210</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-03T11:46:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1077">&lt;div style="text-align:justify; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-top:10px; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#ddf; border:1px solid #aaa;"&gt;
{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__
&lt;/div&gt;

{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F9FFF7; border:1px solid #777; border-right:0; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-left}}

|align="left" width="34%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F9FFF7; border:1px solid #777; border-left:0; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-right}}

|}

&lt;!-- ==Related wikis==
[[w:c:cycling|Cycling Wiki]] - [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel] - [[w:c:World|World Wikia]]

We should do something like this. But maybe wait for a redesign of the site. I can probably ask Leo to do something. He redesigned the [http://wiki.couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing Wiki] Main Page. ~~~~
--&gt;

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>iuhprfmlhlh2n2hv37pce6eyyt0yhwi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9464</id>
      <parentid>9429</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-04T10:39:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1639">&lt;div style="padding:10px; margin:0; margin-top:10px; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#ddf; border:1px solid #aaa;"&gt;
{|style="width:100%; border:0px;background:none"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%;border:none;margin: 0;padding:.1em;color:#000"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em;font-size: 100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:30px; text-align:right;"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__
|}
&lt;/div&gt;
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F9FFF7; border:1px solid #777; border-right:0; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-left}}

|align="left" width="34%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F9FFF7; border:1px solid #777; border-left:0; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-right}}

|}

&lt;!-- ==Related wikis==
[[w:c:cycling|Cycling Wiki]] - [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel] - [[w:c:World|World Wikia]]

We should do something like this. But maybe wait for a redesign of the site. I can probably ask Leo to do something. He redesigned the [http://wiki.couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing Wiki] Main Page. ~~~~
--&gt;

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>cejgekoeo5irid5ork9zqgd31qvwawd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9467</id>
      <parentid>9464</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-04T10:50:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1594">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-top:10px; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#ddf; border:1px solid #aaa"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:30px; text-align:right;"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F9FFF7; border:1px solid #777; border-right:0; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-left}}

|align="left" width="34%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F9FFF7; border:1px solid #777; border-left:0; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-right}}

|}

&lt;!-- ==Related wikis==
[[w:c:cycling|Cycling Wiki]] - [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel] - [[w:c:World|World Wikia]]

We should do something like this. But maybe wait for a redesign of the site. I can probably ask Leo to do something. He redesigned the [http://wiki.couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing Wiki] Main Page. ~~~~
--&gt;

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>m74cj6a2c9fmxsdc7z17r06qbnbin1u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9479</id>
      <parentid>9467</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-04T11:08:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1597">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-top:10px; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#d8b893; border:1px solid #aaa"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:30px; text-align:right;"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F9FFF7; border:1px solid #777; border-right:0; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-left}}

|align="left" width="34%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F9FFF7; border:1px solid #777; border-left:0; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-right}}

|}

&lt;!-- ==Related wikis==
[[w:c:cycling|Cycling Wiki]] - [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel] - [[w:c:World|World Wikia]]

We should do something like this. But maybe wait for a redesign of the site. I can probably ask Leo to do something. He redesigned the [http://wiki.couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing Wiki] Main Page. ~~~~
--&gt;

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>13uwn7cpoy5whktyg95csfln914ndg6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9480</id>
      <parentid>9479</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-04T11:08:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1594">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-top:10px; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#eca; border:1px solid #aaa"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:30px; text-align:right;"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F9FFF7; border:1px solid #777; border-right:0; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-left}}

|align="left" width="34%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F9FFF7; border:1px solid #777; border-left:0; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-right}}

|}

&lt;!-- ==Related wikis==
[[w:c:cycling|Cycling Wiki]] - [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel] - [[w:c:World|World Wikia]]

We should do something like this. But maybe wait for a redesign of the site. I can probably ask Leo to do something. He redesigned the [http://wiki.couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing Wiki] Main Page. ~~~~
--&gt;

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>eb7qfv54fdels5ev6q4ago2r3dza8pr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9481</id>
      <parentid>9480</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-04T11:09:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1594">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-top:10px; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#edc; border:1px solid #aaa"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:30px; text-align:right;"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F9FFF7; border:1px solid #777; border-right:0; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-left}}

|align="left" width="34%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F9FFF7; border:1px solid #777; border-left:0; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-right}}

|}

&lt;!-- ==Related wikis==
[[w:c:cycling|Cycling Wiki]] - [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel] - [[w:c:World|World Wikia]]

We should do something like this. But maybe wait for a redesign of the site. I can probably ask Leo to do something. He redesigned the [http://wiki.couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing Wiki] Main Page. ~~~~
--&gt;

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>bfbaw5nj5kzog42lwgvxr9whn0ws43f</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9482</id>
      <parentid>9481</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-04T11:09:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1597">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-top:10px; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#e7d3a7; border:1px solid #aaa"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:30px; text-align:right;"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F9FFF7; border:1px solid #777; border-right:0; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-left}}

|align="left" width="34%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F9FFF7; border:1px solid #777; border-left:0; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-right}}

|}

&lt;!-- ==Related wikis==
[[w:c:cycling|Cycling Wiki]] - [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel] - [[w:c:World|World Wikia]]

We should do something like this. But maybe wait for a redesign of the site. I can probably ask Leo to do something. He redesigned the [http://wiki.couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing Wiki] Main Page. ~~~~
--&gt;

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>gi1su8xsxynpn3mcjogwpt20xbi8lbp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9595</id>
      <parentid>9482</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-07T03:18:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Amylin</username>
        <id>11</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1597">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-top:10px; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#D9DBE1; border:1px solid #aaa"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:30px; text-align:right;"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F9FFF7; border:1px solid #777; border-right:0; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-left}}

|align="left" width="34%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F9FFF7; border:1px solid #777; border-left:0; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-right}}

|}

&lt;!-- ==Related wikis==
[[w:c:cycling|Cycling Wiki]] - [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel] - [[w:c:World|World Wikia]]

We should do something like this. But maybe wait for a redesign of the site. I can probably ask Leo to do something. He redesigned the [http://wiki.couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing Wiki] Main Page. ~~~~
--&gt;

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>65b89xbq3nspfzp2fbcc7ism47qx0jq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9598</id>
      <parentid>9595</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-07T03:27:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Amylin</username>
        <id>11</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1597">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-top:10px; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:30px; text-align:right;"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__
|}
{| cellpadding="1px" cellspacing="0px" border="0px"
|align="left" width="33%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F9FFF7; border:1px solid #777; border-right:0; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-left}}

|align="left" width="34%" style="text-align:justify; background-color:#F9FFF7; border:1px solid #777; border-left:0; padding-top:5px; padding-right:10px; padding-left:10px; padding-bottom:10px;" valign="top"|

{{mainpage-right}}

|}

&lt;!-- ==Related wikis==
[[w:c:cycling|Cycling Wiki]] - [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel] - [[w:c:World|World Wikia]]

We should do something like this. But maybe wait for a redesign of the site. I can probably ask Leo to do something. He redesigned the [http://wiki.couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing Wiki] Main Page. ~~~~
--&gt;

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>cjyd7c16ibq01mzbosqngdap8kj9wac</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9748</id>
      <parentid>9598</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-13T05:01:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="801">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-top:10px; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:30px; text-align:right;"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__
|}
{{mainpage-locations}}
{{mainpage-right}}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>5o3g037do1z3s0sem354f8zzy3h8gys</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9760</id>
      <parentid>9748</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-13T05:34:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2479">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-top:10px; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:30px; text-align:right;"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='60%' valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers on this Wiki]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] • 
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

{{news}}
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>4ljptiw648uykirpljs95ht2yhfb1eg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9762</id>
      <parentid>9760</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-13T05:35:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2497">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-top:10px; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:30px; text-align:right;"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='60%' valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers on this Wiki]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] • 
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

{{news}}
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>9cjurw1b3er63u1fde4s0xeah8s3hqt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9766</id>
      <parentid>9762</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-13T05:41:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2828">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-top:10px; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:30px; text-align:right;"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='60%' valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
[[Image:IMG 5336.jpg|thumb|200px|[[Zac]] in [[Amsterdam]]]]
[[Image:IMG_7303.JPG|thumb|200px|[[Tiziano]] along E67 Via Baltica, [[Latvia]]]]
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|200px|[[amylin]] in Northern [[California]]]]
[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[Robino]] in [[Spain]]]]
|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers on this Wiki]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] • 
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>rphsvg2dpyyo9jqt74r8xij2j0vpbxx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9767</id>
      <parentid>9766</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-13T05:43:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2844">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-top:10px; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:30px; text-align:right;"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='60%' valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
[[Image:IMG 5336.jpg|thumb|250px|[[Zac]] in [[Amsterdam]]]]
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[amylin]] in Northern [[California]]]]
[[Image:IMG_7303.JPG|thumb|250px|[[Tiziano]] along E67 Via Baltica, [[Latvia]]]]
[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Robino]] in [[Spain]]]]
|valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers on this Wiki]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] • 
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>mptj6fq05b8bhg20ni79pungw4j3i4y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9770</id>
      <parentid>9767</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-13T05:47:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2687">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-top:10px; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:30px; text-align:right;"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='60%' valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Picture of the week===
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg|thumb|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]

|valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers on this Wiki]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] • 
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>om4gcztrxf4md7kcvivzl64y4pwz7nl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9773</id>
      <parentid>9770</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-13T05:50:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2719">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-top:10px; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:30px; text-align:right;"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='60%' valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Picture of the week===
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg|thumb|left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]

|valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers on this Wiki]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] • 
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>7bmfblnai20k750sxgykl2xaohj08e1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9783</id>
      <parentid>9773</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-14T00:49:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2718">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-top:10px; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:30px; text-align:right;"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers on this Wiki]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] • 
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Picture of the week===
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg|thumb|left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>j7ljbnsrgc1pn0mtogind152exuoieu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9785</id>
      <parentid>9783</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-14T00:58:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2791">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-top:10px; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers on this Wiki]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] • 
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Picture of the week===
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg|thumb|left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>rrxc79lu57wp8vp15pwbnrulwl8ohic</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9786</id>
      <parentid>9785</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-14T01:02:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2774">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers on this Wiki]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] • 
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Picture of the week===
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg|thumb|left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>sf29pj6n4mglmqlsxzah4goc57lbjfu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9802</id>
      <parentid>9786</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-15T02:25:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2862">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers on this Wiki]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] • 
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Picture of the week===
[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|Jim hitching at Auckland's airport]]
&lt;!--[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]--&gt;
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>nlq7k56ztemcz15h2ihs6ols48rgu4e</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9803</id>
      <parentid>9802</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-15T02:31:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2853">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers on this Wiki]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] • 
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Picture of the week===
[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
&lt;!--[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]--&gt;
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>mq5r416dna0rj3y3pjptc9zfijcqkik</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9804</id>
      <parentid>9803</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-15T05:13:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Luna1</username>
        <id>22</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2874">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers on this Wiki]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] • 
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]]
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Picture of the week===
[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
&lt;!--[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]--&gt;
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>osne5vo41x7ojpgdn19sy5l3xv14jwi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9850</id>
      <parentid>9804</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-17T23:15:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2861">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] • 
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]]
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Picture of the week===
[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
&lt;!--[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]--&gt;
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>911apy8lmje9himncbxchit0v9c1t1o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9851</id>
      <parentid>9850</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-17T23:16:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2862">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] • 
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] 
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Picture of the week===
[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
&lt;!--[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]--&gt;
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>8bq5mkai9v1choglhwo544aex3enze9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9877</id>
      <parentid>9851</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-19T12:31:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2899">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] • 
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] 
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Picture of the week===
[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
&lt;!--[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]--&gt;
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>nh28d92s5ou5yncf1d4ftec6zpypebo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9955</id>
      <parentid>9877</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-22T00:01:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2930">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] • 
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] 
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Picture of the week===
[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
&lt;!--[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]--&gt;
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>i6s8t9axxwwo9xzhd0o04j3520yqirv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10022</id>
      <parentid>9955</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-28T18:42:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zac Stewart</username>
        <id>5</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3040">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] • 
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] 
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Picture of the now===
&lt;!--We seem not to keep up wit this on a weekly basis...now at least gives us some cover with ambiguity :) --&gt;
[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
&lt;!--[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]--&gt;
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>224z8lmznj8xiz931ow4gdgojpu0cvi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10039</id>
      <parentid>10022</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-01-02T14:16:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>212.246.69.97</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3066">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:Markus|Markus]] •
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] 
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Picture of the now===
&lt;!--We seem not to keep up wit this on a weekly basis...now at least gives us some cover with ambiguity :) --&gt;
[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
&lt;!--[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]--&gt;
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>itvrht0xd5bwr9jpa20ka88jg445k1v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10041</id>
      <parentid>10039</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-01-02T14:42:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3066">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Markus|Markus]] •
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] 
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Picture of the now===
&lt;!--We seem not to keep up wit this on a weekly basis...now at least gives us some cover with ambiguity :) --&gt;
[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
&lt;!--[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]--&gt;
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>145v9wdgrt16vfvssahg0bdjuubos3x</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10199</id>
      <parentid>10041</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-01-26T01:00:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3185">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Markus|Markus]] •
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] 
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Picture of the now===
&lt;!--We seem not to keep up wit this on a weekly basis...now at least gives us some cover with ambiguity :) --&gt;
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
&lt;!--[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]--&gt;
&lt;!--[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]--&gt;
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>d7ejc83oq3r98i70j1btoctg9mcmt7t</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10200</id>
      <parentid>10199</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-01-26T01:01:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3202">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Markus|Markus]] •
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] 
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Picture of the now===
&lt;!--We seem not to keep up wit this on a weekly basis...now at least gives us some cover with ambiguity :) --&gt;
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|frame|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
&lt;!--[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]--&gt;
&lt;!--[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]--&gt;
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>1rocbgorexdfp4rj9lvmtb838x6ococ</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10201</id>
      <parentid>10200</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-01-26T01:02:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3237">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Markus|Markus]] •
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] 
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Picture of the now===
&lt;!--We seem not to keep up wit this on a weekly basis...now at least gives us some cover with ambiguity :) --&gt;
&lt;!--[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|frame|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]] hmm, seems to be blown up too much--&gt;
&lt;!--[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]--&gt;
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>ckpxrsb4k53yy0ohsr74ofzd2r7ntid</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10202</id>
      <parentid>10201</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-01-26T12:22:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3295">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Markus|Markus]] •
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] 
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Picture of the now===
&lt;!--We seem not to keep up wit this on a weekly basis...now at least gives us some cover with ambiguity :) --&gt;
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
&lt;!--
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.
[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>2ex7r05euolnhnnmmbkw68tsr1rt2sv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10346</id>
      <parentid>10202</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-02-17T11:52:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>203.206.248.226</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3318">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Dangaroo]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Markus|Markus]] •
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] 
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Picture of the now===
&lt;!--We seem not to keep up wit this on a weekly basis...now at least gives us some cover with ambiguity :) --&gt;
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
&lt;!--
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.
[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>2gy4zv5jhgb9g514ir49pzsqo9w2kqy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10347</id>
      <parentid>10346</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-02-17T11:53:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>203.206.248.226</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3327">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Dangaroo|Dangaroo]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Markus|Markus]] •
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] 
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Picture of the now===
&lt;!--We seem not to keep up wit this on a weekly basis...now at least gives us some cover with ambiguity :) --&gt;
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
&lt;!--
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.
[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>iwiznhclwrpgr15rluuildy025i90ip</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10451</id>
      <parentid>10347</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-07T14:30:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3447">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Dangaroo|Dangaroo]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Markus|Markus]] •
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] 
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Picture of the now===
&lt;!--We seem not to keep up wit this on a weekly basis...now at least gives us some cover with ambiguity :) --&gt;
[[Image:Salman-hitchhiking-alabama-usa.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Salman]] hitchhiking in [[Alabama]], [[United States]]]] 
&lt;!--
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.
[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>nsl0er8k8ncqkegz0f8z2ba5oop3o1o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10453</id>
      <parentid>10451</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-07T14:32:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3527">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Dangaroo|Dangaroo]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Markus|Markus]] •
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] 
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Picture of the now===
&lt;!--We seem not to keep up wit this on a weekly basis...now at least gives us some cover with ambiguity :) --&gt;
[[Image:Salman-hitchhiking-alabama-usa.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Salman]] hitchhiking in [[Alabama]], [[United States]]]] 
&lt;!--
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.
[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change!]

|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>qzi3pqht1ynn0chldomshppfi1hq7ez</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10454</id>
      <parentid>10453</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-07T14:32:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3434">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Dangaroo|Dangaroo]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Markus|Markus]] •
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] 
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Picture of the now===
[[Image:Salman-hitchhiking-alabama-usa.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Salman]] hitchhiking in [[Alabama]], [[United States]]]] 


&lt;!--
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now picture!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>40csrxs0gv64bd4kphtmg8ius9r1wgk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10466</id>
      <parentid>10454</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-08T03:04:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3460">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Blank|Blank]] • 
[[User:Dangaroo|Dangaroo]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Markus|Markus]] •
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] 
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Picture of the now===
[[Image:Salman-hitchhiking-alabama-usa.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Salman]] hitchhiking in [[Alabama]], [[United States]]]] 


&lt;!--
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now picture!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>higgymefe07pou7d53dwiz6iwz4tp8z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10471</id>
      <parentid>10466</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-08T09:29:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3544">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Blank|Blank]] • 
[[User:Dangaroo|Dangaroo]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Markus|Markus]] •
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] 
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Picture of the now===
[[Image:Salman-hitchhiking-alabama-usa.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Salman]] hitchhiking in [[Alabama]], [[United States]]]] 
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|250px|Peacehead hitching in [[California]]]]

&lt;!--
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>fhod1xigdw44hy5bwdxol2ny3gn18bv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10549</id>
      <parentid>10471</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-14T16:42:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3516">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Blank|Blank]] • 
[[User:Dangaroo|Dangaroo]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Markus|Markus]] •
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] 
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Picture of the now===
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|250px|Peacehead hitching in [[California]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 

&lt;!--
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>9gtctrpdodl689djj4tgnclri8flb69</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10550</id>
      <parentid>10549</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-14T16:42:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3517">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Blank|Blank]] • 
[[User:Dangaroo|Dangaroo]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Markus|Markus]] •
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] 
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|250px|Peacehead hitching in [[California]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 

&lt;!--
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>2wdyp25t2zco0m1sblw28r5u9ry9g2b</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10633</id>
      <parentid>10550</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-26T11:11:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3662">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Blank|Blank]] • 
[[User:Dangaroo|Dangaroo]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Markus|Markus]] •
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] 
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|250px|Peacehead hitching in [[California]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>957yqyeef6afeay3yn5k04rsj44d8fi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10645</id>
      <parentid>10633</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-28T17:19:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3696">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Blank|Blank]] • 
[[User:Dangaroo|Dangaroo]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Markus|Markus]] •
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] 
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|250px|Peacehead hitching in [[California]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>092hy9sutoz8epjygug07l6j2b6lj0z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10778</id>
      <parentid>10645</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-12T08:33:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3724">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Blank|Blank]] • 
[[User:Dangaroo|Dangaroo]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:fverhart|Fverhart]] 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Markus|Markus]] •
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] 
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|250px|Peacehead hitching in [[California]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>ky2e431ppf5i2fkgt1eaewi6nftgkt6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10779</id>
      <parentid>10778</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-12T08:33:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3724">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Blank|Blank]] • 
[[User:Dangaroo|Dangaroo]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:fverhart|fverhart]] 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Markus|Markus]] •
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] 
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|250px|Peacehead hitching in [[California]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>5hrixqt8oswxw11g3ntpvk6279wflxm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10780</id>
      <parentid>10779</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-12T08:34:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3728">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Blank|Blank]] • 
[[User:Dangaroo|Dangaroo]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:fverhart|fverhart]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Markus|Markus]] •
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] 
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|250px|Peacehead hitching in [[California]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>7xq5f8xhzox3q78im57cgjuermv3ftj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10894</id>
      <parentid>10780</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-21T23:53:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TruckThor</username>
        <id>82</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3761">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Blank|Blank]] • 
[[User:Dangaroo|Dangaroo]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:fverhart|fverhart]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Markus|Markus]] •
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:TruckThor|TruckThor]] •
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] 
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|250px|Peacehead hitching in [[California]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>8m4pmdlql6wsrqojh96hpzqnyr4hb6s</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11140</id>
      <parentid>10894</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-01T08:16:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Pite</username>
        <id>85</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3783">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Blank|Blank]] • 
[[User:Dangaroo|Dangaroo]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:fverhart|fverhart]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Markus|Markus]] •
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:TruckThor|TruckThor]] •
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] •
[[User:pite|pite]]
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|250px|Peacehead hitching in [[California]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>oaiizjpozut6uynn5659i1mpmwhziao</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11150</id>
      <parentid>11140</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-01T14:23:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3788">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Blank|Blank]] • 
[[User:Dangaroo|Dangaroo]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:fverhart|fverhart]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Markus|Markus]] •
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:pite|pite]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:TruckThor|TruckThor]] •
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] •
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|250px|Peacehead hitching in [[California]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>sqmrjtxzeshxbolmz81a41ihmnqvzts</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11181</id>
      <parentid>11150</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-07T07:23:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>SAn</username>
        <id>50</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3809">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Blank|Blank]] • 
[[User:Dangaroo|Dangaroo]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:fverhart|fverhart]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Markus|Markus]] •
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:pite|pite]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:SAn|SAn]] •
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:TruckThor|TruckThor]] •
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] •
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|250px|Peacehead hitching in [[California]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>0xle7tc6q83xktpdeoo7vbwqe7ci1i5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11217</id>
      <parentid>11181</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-11T03:32:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3995">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Blank|Blank]] • 
[[User:Dangaroo|Dangaroo]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:fverhart|fverhart]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Markus|Markus]] •
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:pite|pite]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:SAn|SAn]] •
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:TruckThor|TruckThor]] •
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] •
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|300px|right|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|250px|Peacehead hitching in [[California]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>s7tubyoayd15c8nu6jvts5l2s39wlrj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11309</id>
      <parentid>11217</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-15T22:30:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tmoon</username>
        <id>91</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4021">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Blank|Blank]] • 
[[User:Dangaroo|Dangaroo]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:fverhart|fverhart]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Markus|Markus]] •
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:pite|pite]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:SAn|SAn]] •
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:tmoon|tmoon]] • 
[[User:TruckThor|TruckThor]] •
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] •
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|300px|right|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|250px|Peacehead hitching in [[California]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>i2qvbamth35fassnsgzh0gaapv84blj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11377</id>
      <parentid>11309</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-20T19:34:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Diyforlife</username>
        <id>94</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4056">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Blank|Blank]] • 
[[User:Dangaroo|Dangaroo]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:diyforlife|diyforlife]] •
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:fverhart|fverhart]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Markus|Markus]] •
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:pite|pite]] • 
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:SAn|SAn]] •
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:tmoon|tmoon]] • 
[[User:TruckThor|TruckThor]] •
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] •
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|300px|right|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|250px|Peacehead hitching in [[California]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>5yxyeum3t8y9x2n61z2t0k903xd8sxh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11475</id>
      <parentid>11377</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-29T15:19:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Ry</username>
        <id>100</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4075">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Blank|Blank]] • 
[[User:Dangaroo|Dangaroo]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:diyforlife|diyforlife]] •
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:fverhart|fverhart]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Markus|Markus]] •
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:pite|pite]] • 
[[User:ry|ry]] •
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:SAn|SAn]] •
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:tmoon|tmoon]] • 
[[User:TruckThor|TruckThor]] •
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] •
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|300px|right|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|250px|Peacehead hitching in [[California]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>k9jtk1nr27jxtz4gp82r8s2wz3xezoz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11520</id>
      <parentid>11475</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-06-01T14:35:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Monodico</username>
        <id>103</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4106">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Blank|Blank]] • 
[[User:Dangaroo|Dangaroo]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:diyforlife|diyforlife]] •
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:fverhart|fverhart]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Markus|Markus]] •
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:pite|pite]] • 
[[User:ry|ry]] •
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:SAn|SAn]] •
[[User:Monodico|Stefano]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:tmoon|tmoon]] • 
[[User:TruckThor|TruckThor]] •
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] •
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|300px|right|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|250px|Peacehead hitching in [[California]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>smmn61hymbi3zh9jehnav4g62fj7vfs</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11570</id>
      <parentid>11520</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-06-06T20:27:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>87.3.129.5</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4105">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Blank|Blank]] • 
[[User:Dangaroo|Dangaroo]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:diyforlife|diyforlife]] •
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:fverhart|fverhart]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Markus|Markus]] •
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:pite|pite]] • 
[[User:ry|ry]] •
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:SAn|SAn]] •
[[User:Monodico|Stefano]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:tmoon|tmoon]] • 
[[User:TruckThor|TruckThor]] •
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] •
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|300px|right|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|250px|Peacehead hitching in [[California]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>ttz83lr6mkgwwxcbmzed7imqyf8mhnf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11934</id>
      <parentid>11570</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-06-29T07:37:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4113">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Blank|Blank]] • 
[[User:Dangaroo|Dangaroo]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:diyforlife|diyforlife]] •
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:fverhart|fverhart]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Markus|Markus]] •
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:pite|pite]] • 
[[User:ry|ry]] •
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:SAn|SAn]] •
[[User:Monodico|Stefano]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:tmoon|tmoon]] • 
[[User:TruckThor|TruckThor]] •
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] •
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|300px|right|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|250px|Peacehead hitching in [[California]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[es:]]
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>0xdmq08po3euz9g8mpwxymk29ltfx7f</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12284</id>
      <parentid>11934</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-14T19:37:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Latindane</username>
        <id>120</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4146">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Blank|Blank]] • 
[[User:Dangaroo|Dangaroo]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:diyforlife|diyforlife]] •
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:fverhart|fverhart]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Latindane|Latindane]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Markus|Markus]] •
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:pite|pite]] • 
[[User:ry|ry]] •
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:SAn|SAn]] •
[[User:Monodico|Stefano]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:tmoon|tmoon]] • 
[[User:TruckThor|TruckThor]] •
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] •
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|300px|right|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|250px|Peacehead hitching in [[California]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[es:]]
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>71aqnvtd7ghbbuib4tzu7mypocblrh2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12413</id>
      <parentid>12284</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-25T14:30:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4177">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Blank|Blank]] • 
[[User:Dangaroo|Dangaroo]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:diyforlife|diyforlife]] •
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:fverhart|fverhart]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Latindane|Latindane]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Markus|Markus]] •
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:pite|pite]] • 
[[User:ry|ry]] •
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:SAn|SAn]] •
[[User:Monodico|Stefano]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:tmoon|tmoon]] • 
[[User:TruckThor|TruckThor]] •
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] •
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|300px|right|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|250px|Peacehead hitching in [[California]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[es:]]
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>fnilksvmv97ed3dumxugfc5abm618u3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12503</id>
      <parentid>12413</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-30T17:07:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Carl</username>
        <id>132</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4201">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[First time]] • [[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Possible Logo Re-designs]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[User:amylin|amylin]] • 
[[User:Blank|Blank]] • 
[[User:Dangaroo|Dangaroo]] • 
[[User:Dante|Dante]] • 
[[User:Carl|Carl]] • 
[[User:diyforlife|diyforlife]] •
[[User:djdirect|djdirect]] • 
[[User:fverhart|fverhart]] • 
[[User:Guaka|Guaka]] • 
[[User:Irvthom|Irvthom]] •
[[User:KennethSime|KennethSime]] •
[[User:Latindane|Latindane]] •
[[User:Luna1|Luna1]] • 
[[User:Markus|Markus]] •
[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] • 
[[User:Meenzer|Meenzer]] •  
[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] • 
[[User:Mirto|Mirto]] • 
[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] • 
[[User:pite|pite]] • 
[[User:ry|ry]] •
[[User:Robino|Robino]] • 
[[User:Salman|Salman]] • 
[[User:SAn|SAn]] •
[[User:Monodico|Stefano]] • 
[[User:Tiziano|Tiziano]] •
[[User:tmoon|tmoon]] • 
[[User:TruckThor|TruckThor]] •
[[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]] •
''you?''

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|300px|right|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|250px|Peacehead hitching in [[California]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[es:]]
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>ajti352r8thtterhnp8inaka4qs55sa</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12578</id>
      <parentid>12503</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-03T19:20:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3349">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to the [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] • 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|300px|right|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|250px|Peacehead hitching in [[California]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[es:]]
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>l1gk3zkvslcusrcvhhtig3vzhuxud3u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12580</id>
      <parentid>12578</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-03T19:27:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3345">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] • 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|300px|right|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|250px|Peacehead hitching in [[California]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[es:]]
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>rt1rg2vpzlr1g02npse8wcrcxhwamh2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12955</id>
      <parentid>12580</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-16T21:23:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3444">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] • 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|300px|right|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|250px|Peacehead hitching in [[California]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures, now!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[es:]]
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>pbnv8ifyb6d7zyij7r0xa2jrxf1whsy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13043</id>
      <parentid>12955</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-18T21:52:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>80.180.176.94</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3450">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] • 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], &lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|300px|right|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|250px|Peacehead hitching in [[California]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures, now!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[es:]]
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>is8dmlb98d6xwjqcj3tzn2kj4phuros</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13101</id>
      <parentid>13043</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-20T12:40:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3482">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] • 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|300px|right|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|250px|Peacehead hitching in [[California]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures, now!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[es:]]
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>1t3k8wwboa673mptf4lw232tcmrfrc2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13208</id>
      <parentid>13101</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-26T08:34:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>68.173.217.219</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3398">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] • 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|300px|right|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures, now!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[es:]]
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>84garqetp9ms4w3s7n412rpj4xiqonr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13254</id>
      <parentid>13208</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-28T20:35:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3402">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] • 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|300px|left|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
|-
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
|-
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures, now!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[es:]]
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>tm8ge0li0aswkx24jr9q84vthm43lys</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13525</id>
      <parentid>13254</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-10T08:55:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3418">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] • 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|300px|left|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
|-
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
|-
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures, now!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[es:]]
[[de:]]
[[fr:]]
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]</text>
      <sha1>2o44ndq5h8r21ahnp3bed8qkznsps3m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13540</id>
      <parentid>13525</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-10T16:42:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3427">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] • 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|300px|left|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
|-
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
|-
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures, now!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[es:]]
[[de:]]
[[fr:]]
&lt;!--
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]
--&gt;</text>
      <sha1>tlbsyg1jns1bklf9j5s9pw17adtidq3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13610</id>
      <parentid>13540</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-12T12:16:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3452">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] • 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|300px|left|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
|-
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
|-
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures, now!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]


[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[es:Portada]]
&lt;!--
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]
--&gt;</text>
      <sha1>2dhmi1dd8qp6jk3k0h62b7e2mmxi0vl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13627</id>
      <parentid>13610</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-12T14:09:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3453">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] • 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|300px|left|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
|-
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
|-
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures, now!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]


&lt;!--
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]
--&gt;

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>ltqt41suse471hcxl1ypfknhf96jjet</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13831</id>
      <parentid>13627</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-14T13:51:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3481">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}

{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] • 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|300px|left|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
|-
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
|-
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures, now!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]


&lt;!--
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]
--&gt;

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>sv53sx05gy0rm9xmmekah23rmky5l7f</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14254</id>
      <parentid>13831</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-01T18:32:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3513">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}

{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]], [[Hitchhiking races|Contests]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] • 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|300px|left|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
|-
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
|-
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures, now!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]


&lt;!--
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]
--&gt;

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>76f0y47s6fpiwoertvue1foq078qjme</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14482</id>
      <parentid>14254</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-08T13:35:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3712">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}

{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]], [[Hitchhiking races|Contests]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] • 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]][[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|300px|left|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
|-
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures, now!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]


&lt;!--
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]
--&gt;

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>n6vd6qynn1rcvvvgbt48jfk1tmjhngd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14483</id>
      <parentid>14482</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-08T13:35:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3712">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}

{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]], [[Hitchhiking races|Contests]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] • 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|200px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]][[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|200px|left|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
|-
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures, now!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]


&lt;!--
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]
--&gt;

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>2p6gaagp2dza82gch7d8r1bviv0yi8f</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14490</id>
      <parentid>14483</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-08T14:29:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3639">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}

{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]], [[Hitchhiking races|Contests]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] • 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|200px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] hitching in [[New England]], taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
&lt;!--

[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|200px|left|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
|-
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures, now!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]


&lt;!--
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]
--&gt;

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>69868213jbsy5g9cxybp9e3o9gebamh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14491</id>
      <parentid>14490</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-08T14:31:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Puman</username>
        <id>223</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3752">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}

{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:30px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]], [[Hitchhiking races|Contests]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] • 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Netherlands.jpg|thumb|200px|[[User:puman|puman]] hitching from Belgium to the Netherlands, August 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|200px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] hitching in [[New England]], taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
&lt;!--

[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|200px|left|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
|-
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures, now!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]


&lt;!--
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]
--&gt;

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>78ozim0esrlqo6s90rt425gkf5k96hh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14492</id>
      <parentid>14491</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-08T14:39:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3752">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}

{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:29px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]], [[Hitchhiking races|Contests]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] • 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Netherlands.jpg|thumb|200px|[[User:puman|puman]] hitching from Belgium to the Netherlands, August 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|200px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] hitching in [[New England]], taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
&lt;!--

[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|200px|left|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
|-
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures, now!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]


&lt;!--
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]
--&gt;

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>15rtkm3jbupllvg9tk4p0ybsfi32cnm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14493</id>
      <parentid>14492</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-08T14:47:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3752">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}

{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:29px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]], [[Hitchhiking races|Contests]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] • 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
{|
[[Image:Netherlands.jpg|thumb|200px|[[User:puman|puman]] hitching from Belgium to the Netherlands, August 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|200px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] hitching in [[New England]], taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
&lt;!--

[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|200px|left|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;
|-
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change the now pictures, now!]
|}

[[Category:Browse]]


&lt;!--
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]
--&gt;

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>ssru4p2n1p5hzvqou4ur6lg1gnaraeb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14494</id>
      <parentid>14493</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-08T14:51:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3732">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}

{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; white-space:nowrap; color:black; padding-right:29px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:162%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div id="articlecount" style="width:100%;text-align:center;font-size:85%;"&gt;[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]] articles&lt;/div&gt;

|style="margin-left:10px; padding-left:10px; text-align:right; font-size:85%; border-left:1px dotted #ddd"|{{mainpage-welcome}} __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]], [[Hitchhiking races|Contests]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] • 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change them]
{|
[[Image:Netherlands.jpg|thumb|200px|[[User:puman|puman]] hitching from Belgium to the Netherlands, August 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|200px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] hitching in [[New England]], taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
&lt;!--

[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|200px|left|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;

|}

[[Category:Browse]]


&lt;!--
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]
--&gt;

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>3jlcngcyhe92e8fd4995lxdofne5hyc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14587</id>
      <parentid>14494</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-10T12:20:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3537">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
 __NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; color:black; padding-right:29px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:172%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:70%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:120%; text-align: left;"&gt;
{{mainpage-welcome}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|}

{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]], [[Hitchhiking races|Contests]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] • 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change them]
{|
[[Image:Netherlands.jpg|thumb|200px|[[User:puman|puman]] hitching from Belgium to the Netherlands, August 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|200px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] hitching in [[New England]], taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
&lt;!--

[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|200px|left|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;

|}

[[Category:Browse]]


&lt;!--
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]
--&gt;

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>5cxag51qkrd81zdb07r4s7920hzzf9s</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14604</id>
      <parentid>14587</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-10T15:55:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3534">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; color:black; padding-right:29px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:172%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:70%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:120%; text-align: left;"&gt;
{{mainpage-welcome}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|}
__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]], [[Hitchhiking races|Contests]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] • 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change them]
{|
[[Image:Netherlands.jpg|thumb|200px|[[User:puman|puman]] hitching from Belgium to the Netherlands, August 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|200px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] hitching in [[New England]], taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
&lt;!--

[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|200px|left|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;

|}

[[Category:Browse]]


&lt;!--
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]
--&gt;

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>ldiidqn9givpj33rf6wd6axnlqf4ehz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15238</id>
      <parentid>14604</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-30T23:28:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3658">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; color:black; padding-right:29px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:150%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:80%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%; text-align: left;"&gt;
{{mainpage-welcome}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|}
__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]], [[Hitchhiking races|Contests]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] • 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change them]
{|
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] hitching from [[Manchester]] to [[Edinburgh]].]]
[[Image:Netherlands.jpg|thumb|200px|right|[[User:puman|puman]] hitching from Belgium to the Netherlands, August 2007]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|200px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] hitching in [[New England]], taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|200px|left|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;

|}

[[Category:Browse]]


&lt;!--
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]
--&gt;

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>j4iapnqwgeyp26rby8ovw0hpztk69sv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15242</id>
      <parentid>15238</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-30T23:36:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3657">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; color:black; padding-right:29px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:150%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:80%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%; text-align: left;"&gt;
{{mainpage-welcome}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|}
__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]],
[[Websites]], [[Books]], [[Media]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]], [[Hitchhiking races|Contests]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] • 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change them]
{|
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] hitching from [[Manchester]] to [[Edinburgh]].]]
[[Image:Netherlands.jpg|thumb|200px|right|[[User:puman|puman]] hitching from Belgium to the Netherlands, August 2007]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|200px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] hitching in [[New England]], taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|200px|left|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;

|}

[[Category:Browse]]


&lt;!--
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]
--&gt;

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>56cqva3aparw5d2c4snvvtqkpdt5749</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15263</id>
      <parentid>15242</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-31T19:32:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3640">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|style="width:250px; text-align:center; color:black; padding-right:29px" valign=top |
&lt;div style="font-size:150%; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:80%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:100%; text-align: left;"&gt;
{{mainpage-welcome}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|}
__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]] •
[[Multimedia]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]], [[Hitchhiking races|Contests]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] • 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change them]
{|
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] hitching from [[Manchester]] to [[Edinburgh]].]]
[[Image:Netherlands.jpg|thumb|200px|right|[[User:puman|puman]] hitching from Belgium to the Netherlands, August 2007]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|200px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] hitching in [[New England]], taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|200px|left|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;

|}

[[Category:Browse]]


&lt;!--
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]
--&gt;

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>hjz4621feunr6agcitbq9xwaupwxkha</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15356</id>
      <parentid>15263</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-03T16:11:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>130.89.6.71</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3594">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|&lt;div style="font-size:150%; text-align:center; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; text-align:center; font-size:80%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:95%; text-align: center;"&gt;
{{mainpage-welcome}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|}
__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]] •
[[Multimedia]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]], [[Hitchhiking races|Contests]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] • 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change them]
{|
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] hitching from [[Manchester]] to [[Edinburgh]].]]
[[Image:Netherlands.jpg|thumb|200px|right|[[User:puman|puman]] hitching from Belgium to the Netherlands, August 2007]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|200px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] hitching in [[New England]], taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|200px|left|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;

|}

[[Category:Browse]]


&lt;!--
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]
--&gt;

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>duvejlrrnzl7if6qsbqt3exlgul6iy1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15781</id>
      <parentid>15356</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-09T00:30:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fabzgy</username>
        <id>165</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3713">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|&lt;div style="font-size:150%; text-align:center; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; text-align:center; font-size:80%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:95%; text-align: center;"&gt;
{{mainpage-welcome}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|}
__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]] •
[[Multimedia]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]], [[Hitchhiking races|Contests]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] • 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change them]
{|
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] hitching from [[Manchester]] to [[Edinburgh]].]]
[[Image:Fabzgy_costarica.JPG|thumb|200px|right|[[User:fabzgy|Fabzgy]] Hitchhiking on the pacific coast of Costa Rica]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Netherlands.jpg|thumb|200px|right|[[User:puman|puman]] hitching from Belgium to the Netherlands, August 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|200px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] hitching in [[New England]], taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|200px|left|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;

|}

[[Category:Browse]]


&lt;!--
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]
--&gt;

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>9bu9eudb8z28y0ggqvhjnyku6zndmmy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15782</id>
      <parentid>15781</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-09T00:31:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fabzgy</username>
        <id>165</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3717">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|&lt;div style="font-size:150%; text-align:center; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; text-align:center; font-size:80%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:95%; text-align: center;"&gt;
{{mainpage-welcome}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|}
__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]] •
[[Multimedia]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]], [[Hitchhiking races|Contests]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] • 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change them]
{|
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] hitching from [[Manchester]] to [[Edinburgh]].]]
[[Image:Fabzgy_costarica.JPG|thumb|200px|right|[[User:fabzgy|Fabzgy]] Hitchhiking on the pacific coast of [[Costa Rica]]]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Netherlands.jpg|thumb|200px|right|[[User:puman|puman]] hitching from Belgium to the Netherlands, August 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|200px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] hitching in [[New England]], taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|200px|left|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;

|}

[[Category:Browse]]


&lt;!--
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]
--&gt;

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>m7hozagrsv7nye1l1rkviw70orzz0zp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16614</id>
      <parentid>15782</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-23T16:33:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3861">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|&lt;div style="font-size:150%; text-align:center; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; text-align:center; font-size:80%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:95%; text-align: center;"&gt;
{{mainpage-welcome}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|}
__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]] •
[[Multimedia]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]], [[Hitchhiking races|Contests]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] • 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change them]
{|
[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|The creeks in the [[Netherlands]] can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] hitching from [[Manchester]] to [[Edinburgh]].]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Fabzgy_costarica.JPG|thumb|200px|right|[[User:fabzgy|Fabzgy]] Hitchhiking on the pacific coast of [[Costa Rica]]]]
[[Image:Netherlands.jpg|thumb|200px|right|[[User:puman|puman]] hitching from Belgium to the Netherlands, August 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|200px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] hitching in [[New England]], taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|200px|left|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;

|}

[[Category:Browse]]


&lt;!--
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]
--&gt;

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>32bhs6c4bjz2pxydimoff8cr1pavizz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16617</id>
      <parentid>16614</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-23T16:37:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3928">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|&lt;div style="font-size:150%; text-align:center; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; text-align:center; font-size:80%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:95%; text-align: center;"&gt;
{{mainpage-welcome}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|}
__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]] •
[[Multimedia]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]], [[Hitchhiking races|Contests]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] • 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change them]
{|
[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|250px|left]]
[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|The creeks in the [[Netherlands]] can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] hitching from [[Manchester]] to [[Edinburgh]].]]
[[Image:Fabzgy_costarica.JPG|thumb|200px|right|[[User:fabzgy|Fabzgy]] Hitchhiking on the pacific coast of [[Costa Rica]]]]
[[Image:Netherlands.jpg|thumb|200px|right|[[User:puman|puman]] hitching from Belgium to the Netherlands, August 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|200px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] hitching in [[New England]], taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|200px|left|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;

|}

[[Category:Browse]]


&lt;!--
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]
--&gt;

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>1hgkoxinebrsbdq92vzycec1vwc1v8r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16618</id>
      <parentid>16617</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-23T16:38:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4016">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|&lt;div style="font-size:150%; text-align:center; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; text-align:center; font-size:80%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:95%; text-align: center;"&gt;
{{mainpage-welcome}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|}
__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]] •
[[Multimedia]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]], [[Hitchhiking races|Contests]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] • 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change them]
{|
[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|250px|left|The police in [[China]] tends to friendly and confused when confronted with hitchhikers]]
[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|The creeks in the [[Netherlands]] can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] hitching from [[Manchester]] to [[Edinburgh]].]]
[[Image:Fabzgy_costarica.JPG|thumb|200px|right|[[User:fabzgy|Fabzgy]] Hitchhiking on the pacific coast of [[Costa Rica]]]]
[[Image:Netherlands.jpg|thumb|200px|right|[[User:puman|puman]] hitching from Belgium to the Netherlands, August 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|200px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] hitching in [[New England]], taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|200px|left|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;

|}

[[Category:Browse]]


&lt;!--
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]
--&gt;

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>c0h3pl3sw4tydexylrtyw9n5aq5ddsx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16693</id>
      <parentid>16618</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-26T05:32:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>217.172.56.174</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4044">orlitr
{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|&lt;div style="font-size:150%; text-align:center; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; text-align:center; font-size:80%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:95%; text-align: center;"&gt;
{{mainpage-welcome}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|}
__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]] â¢
[[Multimedia]] â¢
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]], [[Hitchhiking races|Contests]] â¢
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] â¢
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] â¢
[[First time]] â¢ 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] â¢
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change them]
{|
[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|250px|left|The police in [[China]] tends to friendly and confused when confronted with hitchhikers]]
[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|The creeks in the [[Netherlands]] can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] hitching from [[Manchester]] to [[Edinburgh]].]]
[[Image:Fabzgy_costarica.JPG|thumb|200px|right|[[User:fabzgy|Fabzgy]] Hitchhiking on the pacific coast of [[Costa Rica]]]]
[[Image:Netherlands.jpg|thumb|200px|right|[[User:puman|puman]] hitching from Belgium to the Netherlands, August 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|200px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] hitching in [[New England]], taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|200px|left|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;

|}

[[Category:Browse]]


&lt;!--
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]
--&gt;

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>1guhaoi0i7u1f2se9kq3h650pzn42y7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16697</id>
      <parentid>16693</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-26T10:24:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>84.182.151.29</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4016">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|&lt;div style="font-size:150%; text-align:center; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; text-align:center; font-size:80%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:95%; text-align: center;"&gt;
{{mainpage-welcome}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|}
__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]] •
[[Multimedia]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]], [[Hitchhiking races|Contests]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] • 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
===Pictures of the now===
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change them]
{|
[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|250px|left|The police in [[China]] tends to friendly and confused when confronted with hitchhikers]]
[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|The creeks in the [[Netherlands]] can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] hitching from [[Manchester]] to [[Edinburgh]].]]
[[Image:Fabzgy_costarica.JPG|thumb|200px|right|[[User:fabzgy|Fabzgy]] Hitchhiking on the pacific coast of [[Costa Rica]]]]
[[Image:Netherlands.jpg|thumb|200px|right|[[User:puman|puman]] hitching from Belgium to the Netherlands, August 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|200px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] hitching in [[New England]], taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|200px|left|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;

|}

[[Category:Browse]]


&lt;!--
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]
--&gt;

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>c0h3pl3sw4tydexylrtyw9n5aq5ddsx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16699</id>
      <parentid>16697</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-26T10:32:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4018">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|&lt;div style="font-size:150%; text-align:center; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; text-align:center; font-size:80%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:95%; text-align: center;"&gt;
{{mainpage-welcome}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|}
__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]] •
[[Multimedia]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]], [[Hitchhiking races|Contests]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] • 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
=== Pictures of the now ===
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change them]
{|
[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|250px|left|The police in [[China]] tends to friendly and confused when confronted with hitchhikers]]
[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|The creeks in the [[Netherlands]] can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] hitching from [[Manchester]] to [[Edinburgh]].]]
[[Image:Fabzgy_costarica.JPG|thumb|200px|right|[[User:fabzgy|Fabzgy]] Hitchhiking on the pacific coast of [[Costa Rica]]]]
[[Image:Netherlands.jpg|thumb|200px|right|[[User:puman|puman]] hitching from Belgium to the Netherlands, August 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|200px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] hitching in [[New England]], taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|200px|left|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;

|}

[[Category:Browse]]


&lt;!--
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]
--&gt;

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>lhwm5g9byfcxraa9sr3gajprm6hzl9d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16812</id>
      <parentid>16699</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-29T18:31:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fabzgy</username>
        <id>165</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4038">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|&lt;div style="font-size:150%; text-align:center; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; text-align:center; font-size:80%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:95%; text-align: center;"&gt;
{{mainpage-welcome}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|}
__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]] •
[[Multimedia]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]], [[Hitchhiking races|Contests]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] • 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]] • [[HitchBiking]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
=== Pictures of the now ===
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change them]
{|
[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|250px|left|The police in [[China]] tends to friendly and confused when confronted with hitchhikers]]
[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|The creeks in the [[Netherlands]] can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] hitching from [[Manchester]] to [[Edinburgh]].]]
[[Image:Fabzgy_costarica.JPG|thumb|200px|right|[[User:fabzgy|Fabzgy]] Hitchhiking on the pacific coast of [[Costa Rica]]]]
[[Image:Netherlands.jpg|thumb|200px|right|[[User:puman|puman]] hitching from Belgium to the Netherlands, August 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|200px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] hitching in [[New England]], taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|200px|left|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;

|}

[[Category:Browse]]


&lt;!--
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]
--&gt;

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>dlbqo5pdi7zi1umgv07wbm2jzumf82s</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17144</id>
      <parentid>16812</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-01T02:08:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>195.229.242.57</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4075">trocbasaltrt
{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|&lt;div style="font-size:150%; text-align:center; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; text-align:center; font-size:80%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:95%; text-align: center;"&gt;
{{mainpage-welcome}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|}
__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]] â¢
[[Multimedia]] â¢
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]], [[Hitchhiking races|Contests]] â¢
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] â¢
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] â¢
[[First time]] â¢ 
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] â¢
[[Picking up hitchhikers]] â¢ [[HitchBiking]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
=== Pictures of the now ===
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change them]
{|
[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|250px|left|The police in [[China]] tends to friendly and confused when confronted with hitchhikers]]
[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|The creeks in the [[Netherlands]] can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] hitching from [[Manchester]] to [[Edinburgh]].]]
[[Image:Fabzgy_costarica.JPG|thumb|200px|right|[[User:fabzgy|Fabzgy]] Hitchhiking on the pacific coast of [[Costa Rica]]]]
[[Image:Netherlands.jpg|thumb|200px|right|[[User:puman|puman]] hitching from Belgium to the Netherlands, August 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|200px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] hitching in [[New England]], taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|200px|left|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;

|}

[[Category:Browse]]


&lt;!--
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]
--&gt;

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>07cntixpv4o0bg6l34l5loskas9qyzd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17574</id>
      <parentid>17144</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-04T10:16:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zac Stewart</username>
        <id>5</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4051">trocbasaltrt
{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|&lt;div style="font-size:150%; text-align:center; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; text-align:center; font-size:80%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:95%; text-align: center;"&gt;
{{mainpage-welcome}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|}
__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]] • 
[[Multimedia]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]], [[Hitchhiking races|Contests]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]] • [[HitchBiking]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
=== Pictures of the now ===
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change them]
{|
[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|250px|left|The police in [[China]] tends to friendly and confused when confronted with hitchhikers]]
[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|The creeks in the [[Netherlands]] can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] hitching from [[Manchester]] to [[Edinburgh]].]]
[[Image:Fabzgy_costarica.JPG|thumb|200px|right|[[User:fabzgy|Fabzgy]] Hitchhiking on the pacific coast of [[Costa Rica]]]]
[[Image:Netherlands.jpg|thumb|200px|right|[[User:puman|puman]] hitching from Belgium to the Netherlands, August 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|200px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] hitching in [[New England]], taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|200px|left|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;

|}

[[Category:Browse]]


&lt;!--
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]
--&gt;

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>bwft19zearfotvsrw4fi43loos5vn4o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17576</id>
      <parentid>17574</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-04T10:41:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4038">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|&lt;div style="font-size:150%; text-align:center; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; text-align:center; font-size:80%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:95%; text-align: center;"&gt;
{{mainpage-welcome}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|}
__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]] • 
[[Multimedia]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]], [[Hitchhiking races|Contests]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]] • [[HitchBiking]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
=== Pictures of the now ===
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change them]
{|
[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|250px|left|The police in [[China]] tends to friendly and confused when confronted with hitchhikers]]
[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|The creeks in the [[Netherlands]] can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] hitching from [[Manchester]] to [[Edinburgh]].]]
[[Image:Fabzgy_costarica.JPG|thumb|200px|right|[[User:fabzgy|Fabzgy]] Hitchhiking on the pacific coast of [[Costa Rica]]]]
[[Image:Netherlands.jpg|thumb|200px|right|[[User:puman|puman]] hitching from Belgium to the Netherlands, August 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|200px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] hitching in [[New England]], taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|200px|left|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;

|}

[[Category:Browse]]


&lt;!--
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]
--&gt;

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>l76p7cp9vndahh7w7b9kpfjtexlhgab</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17940</id>
      <parentid>17576</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-15T16:20:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>190.3.28.120</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4075">trvarorcolin
{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|&lt;div style="font-size:150%; text-align:center; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; text-align:center; font-size:80%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:95%; text-align: center;"&gt;
{{mainpage-welcome}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|}
__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]] â¢ 
[[Multimedia]] â¢
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]], [[Hitchhiking races|Contests]] â¢
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] â¢
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] â¢
[[First time]] â¢
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] â¢
[[Picking up hitchhikers]] â¢ [[HitchBiking]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
=== Pictures of the now ===
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change them]
{|
[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|250px|left|The police in [[China]] tends to friendly and confused when confronted with hitchhikers]]
[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|The creeks in the [[Netherlands]] can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] hitching from [[Manchester]] to [[Edinburgh]].]]
[[Image:Fabzgy_costarica.JPG|thumb|200px|right|[[User:fabzgy|Fabzgy]] Hitchhiking on the pacific coast of [[Costa Rica]]]]
[[Image:Netherlands.jpg|thumb|200px|right|[[User:puman|puman]] hitching from Belgium to the Netherlands, August 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|200px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] hitching in [[New England]], taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|200px|left|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;

|}

[[Category:Browse]]


&lt;!--
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]
--&gt;

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>dgfdtyc4bzpbzw5dawlgohub6wgpw15</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17941</id>
      <parentid>17940</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-15T16:35:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4038">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|-
|&lt;div style="font-size:150%; text-align:center; border:none; margin:0; padding:.1em; color:black"&gt;Welcome to [[Hitchwiki.org]],&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; text-align:center; font-size:80%"&gt;the Wiki for and by [[Hitchhikers]] that [[project:Introduction|anyone&amp;nbsp;can&amp;nbsp;edit]].&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="top:+0.2em; font-size:95%; text-align: center;"&gt;
{{mainpage-welcome}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|}
__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
{|cellspacing=0 cellpadding=3px style='text-align:justify;'
|width='40%' valign=top|
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[General info]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Top Tips]],
[[Where]],
[[Safety]],
[[Signs]] • 
[[Multimedia]] •
[[Clubs]], [[Phrasebooks]], [[Hitchhiking races|Contests]] •
[[Accommodation]], [[Things to carry]], [[Food]], [[Looks]] •
[[Boats]], [[Planes]], [[Trains]] •
[[First time]] •
[[Blogging Hitchhikers]] •
[[Picking up hitchhikers]] • [[HitchBiking]]

&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[:Category:Hitchhikers|Hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}
&lt;span style='font-size:130%; font-weight:bold'&gt;[[project:About|Project]] &amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;
[[Help:Contents|Help]], [[How to create new articles]],
&lt;!-- [[Help:FAQ|FAQ]],
[[Help:Search help|Search help]],
[[Help:How to create a user account|User accounts]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:About|About]],
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Why this wiki|Why this wiki]], &lt;!-- [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Goals and non-goals|Goals and non-goals]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Policies and guidelines|Policies and guidelines]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhikers|The Guide's Hitchhikers]], [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Help wanted|Help wanted]], --&gt;
[[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking:Hitchhiker's point of view|Hitchhiker's point of view]]

&lt;div style='font-size:88%'&gt;
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;
|valign=top|
{{mainpage-locations}}
=== Pictures of the now ===
[http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page?title=Main_Page&amp;action=edit&amp;section=1 change them]
{|
[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|250px|left|The police in [[China]] tends to friendly and confused when confronted with hitchhikers]]
[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|The creeks in the [[Netherlands]] can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] hitching from [[Manchester]] to [[Edinburgh]].]]
[[Image:Fabzgy_costarica.JPG|thumb|200px|right|[[User:fabzgy|Fabzgy]] Hitchhiking on the pacific coast of [[Costa Rica]]]]
[[Image:Netherlands.jpg|thumb|200px|right|[[User:puman|puman]] hitching from Belgium to the Netherlands, August 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|200px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] hitching in [[New England]], taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Sheffieldbedroomwall.jpg|thumb|200px|left|[[User:Tmoon|Tmoon]]'s collection of [[signs]]]]
[[Image:Hitching-luoping-china.jpg|thumb|200px|left|Hitching out of [[Luoping]], [[China]]]]
[[Image:Amylin-luoping-china-2.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[amylin]] hitchhiking in [[China]]]]
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[Mdsmendes]] hitchhiking in the [[Netherlands]]]] 
[[Image:Guaka - angel hitchhiking in Wellington.JPG|thumb|left|250px|[[Guaka]] hitchhiking in [[Wellington]] with angel wings.]]
hmm, seems to be blown up too much
 - Use thumb instead of frame. I don't know why, but it works.

[[Image:Pooh hitching in nz.JPG|frame|left|250px|At [[Auckland]]'s airport]]
[[Image:Elsa amylin kiwi experience.jpg||left|400px|Elsa and [[amylin]]'s [[New Zealand|Kiwi hitching experience]]]]
--&gt;

|}

[[Category:Browse]]


&lt;!--
[[digi:]]
[[wikitravel:]]
[[cswiki:]]
--&gt;

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>l76p7cp9vndahh7w7b9kpfjtexlhgab</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17984</id>
      <parentid>17941</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-18T20:06:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2542">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%" |
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''. So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General Hitchhiking Information]]'''
* '''[[Phrasebooks]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}&lt;/div&gt;
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>97ml5vmjj39f1t3lsj9uzu2zcfer3n6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18207</id>
      <parentid>17984</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-21T13:18:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>202.84.17.42</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2550">bobasle
{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%" |
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''. So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General Hitchhiking Information]]'''
* '''[[Phrasebooks]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}&lt;/div&gt;
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>bg5h0gj2njp06ng3ifrivu4z6kdzter</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18214</id>
      <parentid>18207</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-21T13:40:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2542">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%" |
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''. So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General Hitchhiking Information]]'''
* '''[[Phrasebooks]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}&lt;/div&gt;
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>97ml5vmjj39f1t3lsj9uzu2zcfer3n6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18265</id>
      <parentid>18214</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-29T03:58:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>212.107.116.240</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2550">acacelb
{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%" |
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''. So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General Hitchhiking Information]]'''
* '''[[Phrasebooks]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}&lt;/div&gt;
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>gtaqw86yz46v9i4ng99bt29gyffnqam</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18269</id>
      <parentid>18265</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-29T09:38:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2542">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%" |
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''. So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General Hitchhiking Information]]'''
* '''[[Phrasebooks]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}&lt;/div&gt;
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]</text>
      <sha1>97ml5vmjj39f1t3lsj9uzu2zcfer3n6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18692</id>
      <parentid>18269</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-03T21:46:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lnx</username>
        <id>1303</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2585">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%" |
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''. So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General Hitchhiking Information]]'''
* '''[[Phrasebooks]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}&lt;/div&gt;
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>q2n4ci5vsy9mszu1p7syv9alqtelvsb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19432</id>
      <parentid>18692</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-04-08T21:28:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2597">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%" |
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''. So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General Hitchhiking Information]]'''
* '''[[Phrasebooks]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}&lt;/div&gt;
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>orzwdoh9l7f9zpw9a1eq20w0ild34kz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>20055</id>
      <parentid>19432</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-05-22T10:20:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2837">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%" |
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''. So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General Hitchhiking Information]]'''
* '''[[Phrasebooks]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}&lt;/div&gt;
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Events]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{events}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>dw05yl2aki91uiq54dhvbna9lzgq8sy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>20385</id>
      <parentid>20055</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-05T08:00:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2852">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%" |
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''. So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General Hitchhiking Information]]'''
* '''[[Phrasebooks]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}&lt;/div&gt;
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Events]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{events}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]</text>
      <sha1>3kajvhsttjpes0aezwv9ar7rorg4f1h</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>20426</id>
      <parentid>20385</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-06T08:16:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2853">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%" |
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''. So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General Hitchhiking Information]]'''
* '''[[Phrasebooks]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}&lt;/div&gt;
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Events]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{events}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[fi:Etusivu]]

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>j7grz5l1w89uxpbtrvt6na83r1v2yi5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>20498</id>
      <parentid>20426</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-08T20:39:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2852">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%" |
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''. So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General Hitchhiking Information]]'''
* '''[[Phrasebooks]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}&lt;/div&gt;
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Events]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{events}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>kdlizrxti5kiv3j91i6zi1qifsotpwm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>20536</id>
      <parentid>20498</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-09T09:02:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2853">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%" |
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''. So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General Hitchhiking Information]]'''
* '''[[Phrasebooks]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}&lt;/div&gt;
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Events]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{events}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[fi:Etusivu]]

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>j7grz5l1w89uxpbtrvt6na83r1v2yi5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21528</id>
      <parentid>20536</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-18T11:28:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3102">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%" |
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''. So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General Hitchhiking Information]]'''
* '''[[Phrasebooks]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}&lt;/div&gt;
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Help:todo|Help]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{participation}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Events]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{events}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>evwgcs1ejscva730dk9ink4u8p2fdh7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21532</id>
      <parentid>21528</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-18T11:35:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3101">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%" |
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''. So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General Hitchhiking Information]]'''
* '''[[Phrasebooks]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}&lt;/div&gt;
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Help:todo|Help]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{participation}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Events]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{events}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>9snb7nq8f6oth884g706amnrflehhuv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21920</id>
      <parentid>21532</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-21T22:09:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3102">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%" |
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''. So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General Hitchhiking Information]]'''
* '''[[Phrasebooks]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}&lt;/div&gt;
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Help:todo|Help]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{participation}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Events]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{events}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[fi:Etusivu]]

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>e278rlxqh0k6mcl987znklyq1p0terv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22772</id>
      <parentid>21920</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-23T17:15:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Alex</username>
        <id>89</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3107">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%" |
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''. So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General Hitchhiking Information]]'''
* '''[[Phrasebooks]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Wiki [[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}&lt;/div&gt;
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Help:todo|Help]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{participation}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Events]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{events}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;
|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[fi:Etusivu]]

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>im03atl3yaamoav2w7svucajrng0yp0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22777</id>
      <parentid>22772</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-23T17:32:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Alex</username>
        <id>89</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3110">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%" |
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''. So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General Hitchhiking Information]]'''
* '''[[Phrasebooks]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Wiki [[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Help:todo|Help]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{participation}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Events]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{events}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[fi:Etusivu]]

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>9u2pa4krl4ve0hz2jspdxtra0xvz141</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22785</id>
      <parentid>22777</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-23T17:58:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Alex</username>
        <id>89</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3145">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%" |
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''. So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General Hitchhiking Information]]'''
* '''[[Phrasebooks]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Wiki [[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}''(Read [[News|old news here]]...)''
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Help:todo|Help]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{participation}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Events]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{events}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[fi:Etusivu]]

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>4wry9ggcaa11cg6b2j90ipn9x8gbob3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23052</id>
      <parentid>22785</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-30T18:11:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3144">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%" |
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''. So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General Hitchhiking Information]]'''
* '''[[Phrasebooks]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Wiki [[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}''(Read [[News|old news here]]...)''
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Help:todo|Help]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{participation}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Events]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{events}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>myfmqfsvhntzto9tva21n8c7qy4557c</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23080</id>
      <parentid>23052</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-30T20:04:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3169">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Hitchwiki}}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%" |
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''. So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General Hitchhiking Information]]'''
* '''[[Phrasebooks]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Wiki [[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}''(Read [[News|old news here]]...)''
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Help:todo|Help]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{participation}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Events]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{events}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>p4kvx72qmu2rkqrsxm8arw4dsiwqymm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23190</id>
      <parentid>23080</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-08-01T15:08:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3376">__NOTOC__
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%;vertical-align:top;" |
==What's this?==
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''.&lt;br /&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:100%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
==Basics==
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General Hitchhiking Information]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time]]'''
* '''[[Safety]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px" |
==Places==
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
==&amp;nbsp;==
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Wiki [[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}''(Read [[News|old news here]]...)''
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Help:todo|Help]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{participation}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Events]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{events}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>50sva9aqb614w11fd2tudwk6i6v20w2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23279</id>
      <parentid>23190</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-08-06T13:51:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3357">__NOTOC__
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%;vertical-align:top;" |
==What's this?==
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''.&lt;br /&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:100%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
==Basics==
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time]]'''
* '''[[Safety]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px" |
==Places==
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
==&amp;nbsp;==
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Wiki [[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}''(Read [[News|old news here]]...)''
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Help:todo|Help]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{participation}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Events]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{events}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>e3vakeqw6f9e5bzaptpem3h51lx2exc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23417</id>
      <parentid>23279</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-08-12T19:42:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robino</username>
        <id>4</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3610">__NOTOC__
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%;vertical-align:top;" |
==What's this?==
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''.&lt;br /&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:100%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
==Basics==
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time]]'''
* '''[[Safety]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px" |
==Places==
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
==&amp;nbsp;==
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Wiki [[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}''(Read [[News|old news here]]...)''
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Help:todo|Help]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{participation}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Events]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{events}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt; [[News2|Hitchhiking News]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{news2}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

|}

[[Category:Browse]]

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>6ezf8v00909ftoriw3co5kmy1u4ev26</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24630</id>
      <parentid>23417</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-07T22:13:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3629">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%;vertical-align:top;" |
==What's this?==
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''.&lt;br /&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:100%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
==Basics==
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time]]'''
* '''[[Safety]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px" |
==Places==
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
==&amp;nbsp;==
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Wiki [[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}''(Read [[News|old news here]]...)''
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Help:todo|Help]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{participation}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Events]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{events}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt; [[News2|Hitchhiking News]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{news2}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[Category:Browse]]


[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>jheilyucfvdkgn0956qac3x9q4muu8i</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24631</id>
      <parentid>24630</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-07T22:24:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3628">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%;vertical-align:top;" |
==What's this?==
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''.&lt;br /&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:100%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
==Basics==
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time]]'''
* '''[[Safety]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px" |
==Places==
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
==&amp;nbsp;==
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Wiki [[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}''(Read [[News|old news here]]...)''
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Help:todo|Help]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{participation}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Events]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{events}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt; [[News2|Hitchhiking News]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{news2}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[Category:Browse]]

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>2y3ekol6bhy4zof5yj4fpwdvtg7tb2i</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>25230</id>
      <parentid>24631</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-21T15:44:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robino</username>
        <id>4</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3375">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%;vertical-align:top;" |
==What's this?==
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''.&lt;br /&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:100%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
==Basics==
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time]]'''
* '''[[Safety]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px" |
==Places==
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
==&amp;nbsp;==
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Wiki [[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}''(Read [[News|old news here]]...)''
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Help:todo|Help]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{participation}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Events]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{events}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[Category:Browse]]

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>klcxgnba09olpn0ff0794xpqbhnfxbn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26159</id>
      <parentid>25230</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-14T00:46:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3414">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%;vertical-align:top;" |
==What's this?==
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''.&lt;br /&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:100%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
==Basics==
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time]]'''
* '''[[Safety]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px" |
==[[Image:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|16px]] Places==
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
==&amp;nbsp;==
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Wiki [[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}''(Read [[News|old news here]]...)''
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Help:todo|Help]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{participation}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Events]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{events}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}

|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[Category:Browse]]

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>3yxwsuc5n2qzib5ezanfp3oxgj3phmg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26285</id>
      <parentid>26159</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-15T13:21:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3413">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%;vertical-align:top;" |
==What's this?==
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''.&lt;br /&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:100%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
==Basics==
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time]]'''
* '''[[Safety]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px" |
==[[Image:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|16px]] Places==
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
==&amp;nbsp;==
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Wiki [[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}''(Read [[News|old news here]]...)''
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Help:todo|Help]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{participation}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Events]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{events}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[Category:Browse]]

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>p3eh1pp3seixuermrxsf4lbxnqkdekn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26303</id>
      <parentid>26285</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-16T14:33:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3453">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%;vertical-align:top;" |
==What's this?==
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''.&lt;br /&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:100%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
==[[Image:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|16px]] Basics==
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time]]'''
* '''[[Safety]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px" |
==[[Image:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|16px]] Places==
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
==&amp;nbsp;==
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Wiki [[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}''(Read [[News|old news here]]...)''
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Help:todo|Help]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{participation}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Events]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{events}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[Category:Browse]]

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>9b33evds5vqic7kud2vmjwl45j6kfgl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26504</id>
      <parentid>26303</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-27T17:30:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3448">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%;vertical-align:top;" |
==What's this?==
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''.&lt;br /&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:100%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
==[[Image:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|16px]] Basics==
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time]]'''
* '''[[Safety]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px" |
==[[Image:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|16px]] Places==
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
==&amp;nbsp;==
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}''(Read [[News|old news here]]...)''
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Help:todo|Help]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{participation}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Events]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{events}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[Category:Browse]]

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>hz7ndzzo88ifs72z49cw0jmjgrxuk2r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26655</id>
      <parentid>26504</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-30T23:48:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3427">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%;vertical-align:top;" |
==What's this?==
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''.&lt;br /&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:100%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
==[[Image:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|16px]] Basics==
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time]]'''
* '''[[Safety]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px" |
==[[Image:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|16px]] Places==
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
==&amp;nbsp;==
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}''(Read [[News|old news here]]...)''
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Help:todo|Help]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{participation}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Events]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{events}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>0ganp1igc1ehdys221w3szd1cifaqkl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26739</id>
      <parentid>26655</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-31T10:45:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3428">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%;vertical-align:top;" |
==What's this?==
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''.&lt;br /&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:100%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
==[[Image:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|16px]] Basics==
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time]]'''
* '''[[Safety]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px" |
==[[Image:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|16px]] Places==
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
==&amp;nbsp;==
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}''(Read [[News|old news here]]...)''
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Help:todo|Help]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{participation}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Events]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{events}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>om5y47nxms557kxuf9b396o5dxracyc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27177</id>
      <parentid>26739</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-07T01:16:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3362">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%;vertical-align:top;" |
==What's this?==
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''.&lt;br /&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:100%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
==[[Image:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|16px]] Basics==
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time]]'''
* '''[[Safety]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px" |
==[[Image:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|16px]] Places==
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
==&amp;nbsp;==
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}''(Read [[News|old news here]]...)''
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Help:todo|Help]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{participation}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Events]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{events}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>mgrh9qjqxc2zim5ide92ccuks105zkg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27186</id>
      <parentid>27177</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-07T02:06:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3405">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%;vertical-align:top;" |
==What's this?==
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''.&lt;br /&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:100%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
==[[Image:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|16px]] Basics==
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time]]'''
* '''[[Safety]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px" |
==[[Image:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|16px]] Places==
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
==&amp;nbsp;==
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Image:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|20px]] [[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}''(Read [[News|old news here]]...)''
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Help:todo|Help]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{participation}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Events]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{events}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>j66hd1luqu1id6n2u0i0i04kpj8f0vj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29462</id>
      <parentid>27186</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-21T10:35:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3403">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="background-color:#F3F3F3;border:1px solid #808080"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 0px 7px 7px;font-size:110%;vertical-align:top;" |
==Hitchwiki?==
'''[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]]''' is a ''collaborative'' project to build a '''[[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers'''.&lt;br /&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
| style="width:5%;font-size:100%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 0px 7px 0px" |
==[[Image:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|16px]] Basics==
* '''[[General hitchhiking info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time]]'''
* '''[[Safety]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px" |
==[[Image:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|16px]] Places==
* '''[[Africa]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Australasia]]''' &amp; '''[[Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Europe]]'''
| style="width:5%;font-size:97%;color:#000;white-space: nowrap;vertical-align:top;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px" |
==&amp;nbsp;==
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
|}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Image:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|20px]] [[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}''(Read [[News|old news here]]...)''
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Help:todo|Help]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{participation}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Events]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{events}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>9eflctlr5bcqaqlfvlmsubfiv41r28w</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29752</id>
      <parentid>29462</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-07T10:44:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2049">{{mainpage-welcome}}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cc99cc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Image:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|20px]] [[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:right;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}''(Read [[News|old news here]]...)''
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the now&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;{{potn}}&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf1;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Help:todo|Help]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{participation}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Events]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{events}}

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#9999ff;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Hitchhikers]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{mainpage-hitchhikers}}
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>7r7nvzj8ptaises6dbh2p4kueuhobbw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29765</id>
      <parentid>29752</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-07T11:20:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1496">{{mainpage-welcome}}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#bae8bc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Image:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|18px]]  [[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}''(Read [[News|old news here]]...)''
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#bae8bc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Events]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{events}}&lt;/div&gt;

|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cedff2;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;Picture of the Moment&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;{{PotM}}&lt;/div&gt;
|}

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>pn8etcdui80q8to3m54182kwlr3xh9f</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29773</id>
      <parentid>29765</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-07T11:46:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1514">{{mainpage-welcome}}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#bae8bc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Image:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|18px]]  [[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}''(Read [[News|old news here]]...)''
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#bae8bc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Events]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{events}}&lt;/div&gt;

|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#edfcf7;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cedff2;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Template:PotM|Picture of the Moment]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;{{PotM}}&lt;/div&gt;
|}

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>jgmemb0m1youmez6stnfjewh80x4sni</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29831</id>
      <parentid>29773</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-10T14:59:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1508">{{mainpage-welcome}}
{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0"
|-
|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#fff; border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-right:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 0px;" valign="top"|
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#bae8bc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Image:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|18px]]  [[News]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;
{{news}}''(Read [[News|old news here]]...)''
&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#bae8bc;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Events]]&lt;/div&gt;
{{events}}&lt;/div&gt;

|align="left" width="50%" style="background-color:#fff;border-top:1px solid #8AAA88; border-left:1px solid #8AAA88; border-bottom:1px solid #8AAA88;padding:7px 7px 7px 7px;" valign="top"|

&lt;div style="margin:0;background:#cedff2;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:120%;font-weight:bold;border:1px solid #8597ab;text-align:left;color:#000;padding-left:0.4em;padding-top: 0.2em;padding-bottom:0.2em;"&gt;[[Template:PotM|Picture of the Moment]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div style="float:left;margin-left:0.5em;margin-top:0.5em"&gt;{{PotM}}&lt;/div&gt;
|}

[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>7r8r9utt5aqwokz1x9wmozsblou3r5y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30285</id>
      <parentid>29831</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-19T14:58:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3573">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;.
&lt;div style="clear:both"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
----
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border: 0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=forum Forum]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>jwymuif9gtgr5btceubuhegq7do01gf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30286</id>
      <parentid>30285</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-19T14:58:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3572">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
----
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border: 0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=forum Forum]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>5vcflq2szsrx2w6v5oa7zhk6jnsqynt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30315</id>
      <parentid>30286</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-19T20:08:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3606">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
----
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border: 0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=forum Forum]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>gi4tvkwj52f5dgin3ymehsay0zwvm6i</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30402</id>
      <parentid>30315</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-22T17:19:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3624">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
----
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border: 0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=forum Forum]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>kf9qx24ja2izd0168fxe36eygd6zarz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30433</id>
      <parentid>30402</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-24T15:01:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3624">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
----
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border: 0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 500px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=forum Forum]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>69nr551n9d1xvke8j1k81mc1dbsei2b</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30434</id>
      <parentid>30433</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-24T15:02:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3624">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
----
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border: 0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=forum Forum]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:100%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>kf9qx24ja2izd0168fxe36eygd6zarz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30466</id>
      <parentid>30434</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-25T11:39:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>83.150.124.242</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3641">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
----
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=forum Forum]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>2pcdvy7m01od7s5u20v1qsorlizoag1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30484</id>
      <parentid>30466</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-26T17:28:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3667">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=forum Forum]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]</text>
      <sha1>nocoegsa9vvh5u4lpopdf2asacjm7fp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31272</id>
      <parentid>30484</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-24T20:56:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3706">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=forum Forum]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална_страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]</text>
      <sha1>lqin7pglszyd8pziwmywe0xvdzi9zm5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>34482</id>
      <parentid>31272</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T14:53:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3743">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=forum Forum]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[Image:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална_страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[zh:首页]]</text>
      <sha1>hwzq5jqtf2nnmz6nqix1rpotd49bxwx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35142</id>
      <parentid>34482</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T18:00:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3738">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=forum Forum]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[fr:Accueil]]

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Portada]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]
[[zh:首页]]</text>
      <sha1>863v7ztapp7pb5jgd76rxw7e8afpt77</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35685</id>
      <parentid>35142</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T21:17:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3748">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=forum Forum]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[fr:Accueil]]

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]
[[zh:首页]]</text>
      <sha1>9y93z17t5uw9sjhqnu4we8kcwyq29rw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35751</id>
      <parentid>35685</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-13T10:31:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3750">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=forum Forum]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[fr:Accueil]]

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]
[[zh:首页]]</text>
      <sha1>3ss0v0gevuj3jf6ev44rxny0edt6wme</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35928</id>
      <parentid>35751</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-18T00:41:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Paluch</username>
        <id>1363</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3750">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=forum Forum]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]
[[zh:首页]]</text>
      <sha1>m9kgfdkx7ggag5t03trqf0axm47papn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35929</id>
      <parentid>35928</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-18T00:42:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Paluch</username>
        <id>1363</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3750">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=forum Forum]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[zh:首页]]</text>
      <sha1>2a1nlzkplqjh23goc3yjeflhirvpfwq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35944</id>
      <parentid>35929</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-18T22:37:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3751">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=forum Forum]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[fr:Accueil]]

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]
[[zh:首页]]</text>
      <sha1>sbkz1s9wng0i6o47nuwqvmqy4vgwzhh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36047</id>
      <parentid>35944</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-23T20:15:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3841">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=forum Forum]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[fr:Accueil]]

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]
[[zh:首页]]</text>
      <sha1>gftdd611mz13uuhda2jfdq7524t6o86</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36048</id>
      <parentid>36047</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-23T20:15:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3859">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=forum Forum]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[fr:Accueil]]

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]
[[zh:首页]]</text>
      <sha1>qzt3uz4bzv0lxq9n90dtuu46w235dcx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36444</id>
      <parentid>36048</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-08-10T08:07:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>78.129.94.10</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3862">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;is a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=forum Forum]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[fr:Accueil]]

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]
[[zh:首页]]</text>
      <sha1>lm77bbgwcmwvzi66dluesb4urtbo48i</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>37771</id>
      <parentid>36444</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-10-09T22:44:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3861">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;is a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=forum Forum]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]
[[zh:首页]]</text>
      <sha1>j7t3ptv9hx7o4xykg200aaiwnv2wlar</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38562</id>
      <parentid>37771</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-11-24T15:50:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3878">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;is a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=forum Forum]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[tr:Ana_sayfa]]</text>
      <sha1>qc16nvior0d69yhvmk1s3fbb5vcb0se</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40578</id>
      <parentid>38562</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-21T23:27:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3897">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;is a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=forum Forum]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[tr:Ana_sayfa]]</text>
      <sha1>abzd54gsuc8dqj4h4r5xonc33yk8071</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40854</id>
      <parentid>40578</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-30T20:56:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3897">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;is a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=forum Forum]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]</text>
      <sha1>t5pzkj92v5uut8rh3ewvkmb4e6390pk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41484</id>
      <parentid>40854</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-17T07:30:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Index</username>
        <id>56</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3923">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;is a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=forum Forum]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]</text>
      <sha1>fpnun4q3tkeakdsbxsnqkcw3b1ak7os</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41485</id>
      <parentid>41484</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-17T07:32:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Index</username>
        <id>56</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3897">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;is a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=forum Forum]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]</text>
      <sha1>t5pzkj92v5uut8rh3ewvkmb4e6390pk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41516</id>
      <parentid>41485</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-19T14:16:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Index</username>
        <id>56</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3923">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;is a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=forum Forum]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]</text>
      <sha1>fpnun4q3tkeakdsbxsnqkcw3b1ak7os</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>45850</id>
      <parentid>41516</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-14T05:42:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>SpamBucket</username>
        <id>24368</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4650">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;is a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=forum Forum]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]

People did not notice me because I was over weight. My family and my girlfriends were also upset with me. The perfect [http://www.acaiberryinformations.com/ weight loss] solution then came into my life and everything changed, The superfood [http://ezinearticles.com/?Acai-Berry---How-I-Lost-30-Pounds-in-Under-30-Days-Using-The-Acai-Berry&amp;id=1998407 Acai Berry] changed my life. And now after using [http://www.buzzle.com/articles/the-facts-and-half-truths-about-the-acai-berry-diet.html Acai Berry] I am the happiest person in the world. Try it and you will also be always thankful to [http://www.articlesbase.com/supplements-and-vitamins-articles/my-weight-loss-experience-with-the-acai-berry-diet-1726693.html Acai Berry].</text>
      <sha1>ouic5v2q337rvszfybyvquoxkep5ky0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>45860</id>
      <parentid>45850</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-14T12:04:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3923">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;is a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=forum Forum]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]</text>
      <sha1>fpnun4q3tkeakdsbxsnqkcw3b1ak7os</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>46271</id>
      <parentid>45860</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-29T11:54:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3948">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;is a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=forum Forum]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]</text>
      <sha1>2ar79ahn24fac0xtmi2ccf98u9p0azq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>46291</id>
      <parentid>46271</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-30T02:35:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>SpamBucket</username>
        <id>24368</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3998">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;is a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=forum Forum]'''
* '''[http://www.lightsensor.net Light Sensor]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]</text>
      <sha1>9wrmq3js89ykcbd9x9bec8mju6jwr4v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>46292</id>
      <parentid>46291</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-30T03:21:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3948">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;is a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=forum Forum]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]</text>
      <sha1>2ar79ahn24fac0xtmi2ccf98u9p0azq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>46515</id>
      <parentid>46292</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-11-04T14:26:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3892">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;is a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Заглавная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]</text>
      <sha1>bmf2tnys2ub3bjfv9psy21eriuxltik</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>47788</id>
      <parentid>46515</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-11-24T03:47:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3888">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;is a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]</text>
      <sha1>dh6fhsy3s79xbe5q46sy7ggz9z1mh9b</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48151</id>
      <parentid>47788</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-12T15:14:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3896">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;is a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>qhb1j371zjjiwod6y1ffpc6ep44wvqi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48384</id>
      <parentid>48151</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-22T12:39:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>72.93.88.131</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="49">a cross between a fart and poop is called a shart</text>
      <sha1>84bfy7v4toyb6picmpd1s77a1gugi0c</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48385</id>
      <parentid>48384</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-22T13:30:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3896">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;is a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>qhb1j371zjjiwod6y1ffpc6ep44wvqi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48386</id>
      <parentid>48385</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-22T13:30:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3896">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;is a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>qhb1j371zjjiwod6y1ffpc6ep44wvqi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48969</id>
      <parentid>48386</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-19T02:35:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>SpamBucket</username>
        <id>24368</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3853">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;is a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Vagina.jpg|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Vagina.jpg|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Vagina.jpg|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>cw0ku27a81ngo6yzu0zbgcc8luaqolh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48971</id>
      <parentid>48969</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-19T02:37:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>SpamBucket</username>
        <id>24368</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="53">[[File:Vagina.jpg|thumb|600px|Welcome to hitchwiki!]]</text>
      <sha1>3h11wv4tpf2esj1zbrofnrg38vu8z5o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48973</id>
      <parentid>48971</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-19T02:45:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Timmy tofu</username>
        <id>1643</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3896">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;is a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>qhb1j371zjjiwod6y1ffpc6ep44wvqi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48975</id>
      <parentid>48973</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-19T03:08:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>SpamBucket</username>
        <id>24368</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="53">[[File:Vagina.jpg|thumb|600px|Welcome to hitchwiki!]]</text>
      <sha1>3h11wv4tpf2esj1zbrofnrg38vu8z5o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48977</id>
      <parentid>48975</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-19T03:09:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Timmy tofu</username>
        <id>1643</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3896">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;is a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>qhb1j371zjjiwod6y1ffpc6ep44wvqi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48978</id>
      <parentid>48977</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-19T03:11:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>SpamBucket</username>
        <id>24368</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="53">[[File:Vagina.jpg|thumb|600px|Welcome to hitchwiki!]]</text>
      <sha1>3h11wv4tpf2esj1zbrofnrg38vu8z5o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48979</id>
      <parentid>48978</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-19T03:12:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Timmy tofu</username>
        <id>1643</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3896">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;is a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>qhb1j371zjjiwod6y1ffpc6ep44wvqi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48980</id>
      <parentid>48979</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-19T03:13:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>SpamBucket</username>
        <id>24368</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="53">[[File:Vagina.jpg|thumb|600px|Welcome to hitchwiki!]]</text>
      <sha1>3h11wv4tpf2esj1zbrofnrg38vu8z5o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48981</id>
      <parentid>48980</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-19T03:15:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Timmy tofu</username>
        <id>1643</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3896">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;is a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>qhb1j371zjjiwod6y1ffpc6ep44wvqi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48982</id>
      <parentid>48981</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-19T03:17:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>SpamBucket</username>
        <id>24368</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="53">[[File:Vagina.jpg|thumb|600px|Welcome to hitchwiki!]]</text>
      <sha1>3h11wv4tpf2esj1zbrofnrg38vu8z5o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48983</id>
      <parentid>48982</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-19T03:19:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Timmy tofu</username>
        <id>1643</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3896">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;is a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>qhb1j371zjjiwod6y1ffpc6ep44wvqi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48984</id>
      <parentid>48983</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-19T03:20:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>SpamBucket</username>
        <id>24368</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="53">[[File:Vagina.jpg|thumb|600px|Welcome to hitchwiki!]]</text>
      <sha1>3h11wv4tpf2esj1zbrofnrg38vu8z5o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48985</id>
      <parentid>48984</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-19T03:22:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Timmy tofu</username>
        <id>1643</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3896">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;is a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>qhb1j371zjjiwod6y1ffpc6ep44wvqi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48986</id>
      <parentid>48985</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-19T03:23:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>SpamBucket</username>
        <id>24368</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="53">[[File:Vagina.jpg|thumb|600px|Welcome to hitchwiki!]]</text>
      <sha1>3h11wv4tpf2esj1zbrofnrg38vu8z5o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48987</id>
      <parentid>48986</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-19T03:27:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Timmy tofu</username>
        <id>1643</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3896">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;is a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>qhb1j371zjjiwod6y1ffpc6ep44wvqi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48988</id>
      <parentid>48987</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-19T03:28:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>SpamBucket</username>
        <id>24368</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="53">[[File:Vagina.jpg|thumb|600px|Welcome to hitchwiki!]]</text>
      <sha1>3h11wv4tpf2esj1zbrofnrg38vu8z5o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48989</id>
      <parentid>48988</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-19T03:32:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Timmy tofu</username>
        <id>1643</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3896">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;is a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>qhb1j371zjjiwod6y1ffpc6ep44wvqi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48990</id>
      <parentid>48989</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-19T03:32:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>SpamBucket</username>
        <id>24368</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="53">[[File:Vagina.jpg|thumb|600px|Welcome to hitchwiki!]]</text>
      <sha1>3h11wv4tpf2esj1zbrofnrg38vu8z5o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48991</id>
      <parentid>48990</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-19T03:35:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Timmy tofu</username>
        <id>1643</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3896">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;is a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>qhb1j371zjjiwod6y1ffpc6ep44wvqi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48992</id>
      <parentid>48991</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-19T03:36:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>SpamBucket</username>
        <id>24368</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="53">[[File:Vagina.jpg|thumb|600px|Welcome to hitchwiki!]]</text>
      <sha1>3h11wv4tpf2esj1zbrofnrg38vu8z5o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48993</id>
      <parentid>48992</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-19T03:42:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Timmy tofu</username>
        <id>1643</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3896">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;is a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>qhb1j371zjjiwod6y1ffpc6ep44wvqi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48994</id>
      <parentid>48993</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-19T03:42:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>SpamBucket</username>
        <id>24368</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="53">[[File:Vagina.jpg|thumb|600px|Welcome to hitchwiki!]]</text>
      <sha1>3h11wv4tpf2esj1zbrofnrg38vu8z5o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48996</id>
      <parentid>48994</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-19T03:52:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Timmy tofu</username>
        <id>1643</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3896">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;is a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>qhb1j371zjjiwod6y1ffpc6ep44wvqi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48997</id>
      <parentid>48996</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-19T04:43:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>SpamBucket</username>
        <id>24368</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="53">[[File:Vagina.jpg|thumb|600px|Welcome to hitchwiki!]]</text>
      <sha1>3h11wv4tpf2esj1zbrofnrg38vu8z5o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48998</id>
      <parentid>48997</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-19T04:44:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Timmy tofu</username>
        <id>1643</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3896">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;is a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>qhb1j371zjjiwod6y1ffpc6ep44wvqi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48999</id>
      <parentid>48998</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-19T07:54:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3896">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;is a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us.
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>qhb1j371zjjiwod6y1ffpc6ep44wvqi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>54350</id>
      <parentid>48999</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-09-02T01:38:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3924">{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; margin: 0 0 7px 0; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada;"
|-
| align="left" width="100%" style="padding:7px 15px 15px 15px;font-size:120%;vertical-align:top;" |
&lt;h1 style="clear:both; display:block; border:0; font-size:28px; line-height:28px;"&gt;&lt;span style="display:block; float:left;"&gt;Hitchwiki&lt;/span&gt; &lt;strong style="font-size:15px; font-weight:bold; float:left; display:block; padding:0 0 4px 15px;"&gt;is a collaborative project to build a [[Hitchwiki:About|free]] guide for hitchhikers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div style="clear:both; border-bottom:1px solid #ccc;"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the [[Earth|globe]]. Feel free to share your knowledge with us. [[Help:Contents|Click here to find out how!]]
|-
|}

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width:100%; border:0; padding:0; margin:0;"
|-
| align="left" valign="top" width="25%" style="vertical-align:top; min-width: 200px;" |
&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fcf5f3; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.png|30px]] Basics ==
New to hitchhiking or do you need some random information?
* '''[[:Category:General info|General info]]'''
* '''[[Top Tips]]'''
* '''[[First time hitchhiking|First time]]'''
* '''[[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]'''
* '''[[Signs]]'''
* '''[[Where to hitchhike]]'''
* '''[[Picking up hitchhikers]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#fffff4; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_browser.png|30px]] Places ==
Use the [[Special:Search|search engine]] or browse starting from here:
* '''[[Europe]]'''
* '''[[North America]]'''
* '''[[South America]]'''
* '''[[Central America]]''' &amp; '''[[Caribbean]]'''
* '''[[Oceania|Australia &amp; Oceania]]'''
* '''[[Middle East]]'''
* '''[[Asia]]'''
* '''[[Africa]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:left; background-color:#e9ffe6; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Khangman.png|30px]] Also on Hitchwiki ==
* '''[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/ Blogs]'''
* '''[http://www.hitchwiki.org/planet/ Planet]'''
* '''[http://maps.hitchwiki.org/ Maps]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

| width="1%" |

| align="left" valign="top" width="74%" style="vertical-align:top;" |

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#eff8fb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_knewsticker.png|30px]] [[News]] ==
{{news}}

'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#f0effb; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_date.png|30px]] [[Events]] ==
{{events}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="clear:both; height: 10px;"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div style="float:right; background-color:#fafafa; border:1px solid #dadada; width:99%;" class="round-box"&gt;
    &lt;div style="padding:10px 15px 15px 15px;"&gt;
== [[File:Nuvola_apps_Camera.png|30px]] [[Template:PotM|Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
    &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
|-
|}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>bbvu2iikajkjuwo3kegxxolfyrwevoq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>64805</id>
      <parentid>54350</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-10-01T15:00:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1562">&lt;ul id="ticker"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;br/&gt;
Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="icon-bullhorn icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] ==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="icon-thumbs-up icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] ==
{{events}}
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="icon-camera-retro icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>044jcn0jnia04zonize1nd608herdg3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>64808</id>
      <parentid>64805</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-10-01T15:15:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1594">&lt;ul id="ticker"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;br/&gt;
Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="icon-bullhorn icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] ==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="icon-thumbs-up icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] ==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="icon-camera-retro icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Pictures of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>dw82tusyjqizlh88abijw7y251og9yu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68709</id>
      <parentid>64808</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-03-22T14:00:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1583">&lt;ul id="ticker"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;br/&gt;
Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="icon-bullhorn icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] ==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="icon-thumbs-up icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] ==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="icon-road icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__

[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>puc81xr6lv64xm9sgoe7ept15ilrpii</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68716</id>
      <parentid>68709</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-03-22T14:07:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1741">&lt;ul id="ticker"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;br/&gt;
Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="icon-bullhorn icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] ==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="icon-camera-retro icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="icon-thumbs-up icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] ==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="icon-road icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
{{wanted}}
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>e49o6qcmx5fplrfm6yhyw83cfgh15yw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68775</id>
      <parentid>68716</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-03-24T21:47:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1743">&lt;ul id="ticker"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;br/&gt;
Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="icon-road icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
{{wanted}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="icon-bullhorn icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] ==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="icon-camera-retro icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="icon-thumbs-up icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] ==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>5vjva96gifs1gi9zp9byd9v3oz56ucb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68776</id>
      <parentid>68775</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-03-24T21:48:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1745">&lt;ul id="ticker"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;br/&gt;
Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="icon-road icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
{{wanted}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="icon-bullhorn icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] ==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="icon-thumbs-up icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] ==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="icon-camera-retro icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>ivsu527xpq34hsantew8tbhlal4k3at</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69366</id>
      <parentid>68776</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-05-07T13:57:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robyt</username>
        <id>9747</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1765">&lt;ul id="ticker"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by '''[[Special:Listusers|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]''' [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;br/&gt;
Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="icon-road icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
{{wanted}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="icon-bullhorn icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] ==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="icon-thumbs-up icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] ==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="icon-camera-retro icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]
[[trash:Main Page]]</text>
      <sha1>2j6944clhnw0eb7756y437s53fcqtel</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69438</id>
      <parentid>69366</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-05-08T19:22:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1936">&lt;ul id="ticker"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about hitchhiking and other ways of extremely cheap ways of transport.&lt;br/&gt;
Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="icon-road icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
{{wanted}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="icon-bullhorn icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] ==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="icon-thumbs-up icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] ==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="icon-camera-retro icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:center;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]
[[trash:Main Page]]</text>
      <sha1>rbpya73e4sw3k1e61b3w4p4xjcrwco0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69439</id>
      <parentid>69438</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-05-08T19:23:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1940">&lt;ul id="ticker"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap ways of transport.&lt;br/&gt;
Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="icon-road icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
{{wanted}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="icon-bullhorn icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] ==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="icon-thumbs-up icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] ==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="icon-camera-retro icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:center;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]
[[trash:Main Page]]</text>
      <sha1>1lvm620jn78hgjdqxrta4k5sgh8jjkg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69480</id>
      <parentid>69439</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-05-10T12:58:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1929">&lt;ul id="ticker"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap ways of transport.&lt;br/&gt;
Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="icon-road icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="icon-bullhorn icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] ==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="icon-thumbs-up icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] ==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="icon-camera-retro icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:center;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]
[[trash:Main Page]]</text>
      <sha1>tntrbl1b9mvqif1ysmeqy83wr291xru</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70520</id>
      <parentid>69480</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-07-17T08:53:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1982">&lt;ul id="ticker"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap ways of transport.&lt;br/&gt;
Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="icon-road icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="icon-bullhorn icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] ==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="icon-thumbs-up icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] ==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="icon-camera-retro icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:center;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]
[[trash:Main Page]]</text>
      <sha1>sllnw5v66d79keokcqktiv8youa7rw9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72382</id>
      <parentid>70520</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-12T21:43:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robyt</username>
        <id>9747</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2002">&lt;ul id="ticker"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap ways of transport.&lt;br/&gt;
Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="icon-road icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="icon-bullhorn icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] ==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="icon-thumbs-up icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] ==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="icon-camera-retro icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:center;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]
[[trash:Main Page]]
[[nomad:Main Page]]</text>
      <sha1>c48q6iydxvvgdp7qfq1ksh9ts02y06a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72481</id>
      <parentid>72382</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-16T16:54:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1996">&lt;ul id="ticker"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap ways of transport.Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="icon-road icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="icon-bullhorn icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] ==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="icon-thumbs-up icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] ==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="icon-camera-retro icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:center;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]
[[trash:Main Page]]
[[nomad:Main Page]]</text>
      <sha1>54lofm8n9tr1m5md1uycr0g2dilote9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72520</id>
      <parentid>72481</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-18T13:48:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2148">&lt;ul id="ticker"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap ways of transport.Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="icon-road icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="icon-bullhorn icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] ==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="icon-thumbs-up icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="icon-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="icon-camera-retro icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:center;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]
[[trash:Main Page]]
[[nomad:Main Page]]</text>
      <sha1>iccywr3euk7f59jysu3nl4j699o9nd3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72521</id>
      <parentid>72520</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-18T13:51:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2299">&lt;ul id="ticker"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap ways of transport.Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="icon-road icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="icon-bullhorn icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] ==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="icon-thumbs-up icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="icon-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="icon-camera-retro icon-large"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:PotM|action=edit}} &lt;i class="icon-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt; ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:center;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]
[[trash:Main Page]]
[[nomad:Main Page]]</text>
      <sha1>iaf7euc7rdfhs70eqaxy8rxk1j2da00</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>73588</id>
      <parentid>72521</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-12-13T16:23:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2285">&lt;ul id="ticker"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap ways of transport.Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] ==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-camera-retro"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:PotM|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt; ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:center;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]
[[trash:Main Page]]
[[nomad:Main Page]]</text>
      <sha1>mv6sacmhh1h2ky1empcss75qb1z76hl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>75641</id>
      <parentid>73588</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-06-18T03:18:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2280">&lt;ul id="ticker"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap of transport.Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] ==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-camera-retro"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:PotM|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt; ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:center;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]
[[trash:Main Page]]
[[nomad:Main Page]]</text>
      <sha1>20gzjtper08lh9dm1w0dbwxwn8kwek6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>75642</id>
      <parentid>75641</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-06-18T03:18:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2277">&lt;ul id="ticker"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport.Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] ==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-camera-retro"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:PotM|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt; ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:center;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]
[[trash:Main Page]]
[[nomad:Main Page]]</text>
      <sha1>90rs837uk3ewkl799btqo1569tisg2w</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79494</id>
      <parentid>75642</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-05-25T13:01:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4377">&lt;ul id="ticker"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport.Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}} articles|Flag_of_the_United_Kingdom.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|&lt;article_count lang="de" /&gt; Artikel|Flag_of_Germany.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|&lt;article_count lang="fr" /&gt; articles|Flag_of_France.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|&lt;article_count lang="es" /&gt; artículos|Flag_of_Spain.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|&lt;article_count lang="ru" /&gt; статей|Flag_of_Russia.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|&lt;article_count lang="pl" /&gt; artykułów|Flag_of_Poland.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|&lt;article_count lang="tr" /&gt; makale|Flag_of_Turkey.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|&lt;article_count lang="fi" /&gt; artikkelia|Flag_of_Finland.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|&lt;article_count lang="zh" /&gt; 條目|Flag_of_China.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl|&lt;article_count lang="nl" /&gt; artikelen}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt|&lt;article_count lang="pt" /&gt; artigos}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he|&lt;article_count lang="he" /&gt; articles}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg|&lt;article_count lang="bg" /&gt; статии}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro|&lt;article_count lang="ro" /&gt; articole}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr|&lt;article_count lang="hr" /&gt; Članci}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it|&lt;article_count lang="it" /&gt; articolo}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt|&lt;article_count lang="lt" /&gt; straipsniai}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;!--
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-camera-retro"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:PotM|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt; ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;
--&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:center;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]
[[trash:Main Page]]
[[nomad:Main Page]]</text>
      <sha1>66cqnwq5tjpxs3tg9fcvie60bzwhlws</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>96894</id>
      <parentid>79494</parentid>
      <timestamp>2019-09-28T21:42:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4387">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport.Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}} articles|Flag_of_the_United_Kingdom.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|&lt;article_count lang="de" /&gt; Artikel|Flag_of_Germany.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|&lt;article_count lang="fr" /&gt; articles|Flag_of_France.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|&lt;article_count lang="es" /&gt; artículos|Flag_of_Spain.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|&lt;article_count lang="ru" /&gt; статей|Flag_of_Russia.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|&lt;article_count lang="pl" /&gt; artykułów|Flag_of_Poland.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|&lt;article_count lang="tr" /&gt; makale|Flag_of_Turkey.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|&lt;article_count lang="fi" /&gt; artikkelia|Flag_of_Finland.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|&lt;article_count lang="zh" /&gt; 條目|Flag_of_China.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl|&lt;article_count lang="nl" /&gt; artikelen}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt|&lt;article_count lang="pt" /&gt; artigos}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he|&lt;article_count lang="he" /&gt; articles}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg|&lt;article_count lang="bg" /&gt; статии}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro|&lt;article_count lang="ro" /&gt; articole}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr|&lt;article_count lang="hr" /&gt; Članci}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it|&lt;article_count lang="it" /&gt; articolo}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt|&lt;article_count lang="lt" /&gt; straipsniai}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;!--
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-camera-retro"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:PotM|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt; ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;
--&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:center;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]
[[trash:Main Page]]
[[nomad:Main Page]]</text>
      <sha1>ddgzgzbp29jzk4trdvsxzr33n0ydbvx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>98921</id>
      <parentid>96894</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-09-18T08:27:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4424">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport.Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}} articles|Flag_of_the_United_Kingdom.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|&lt;article_count lang="de" /&gt; Artikel|Flag_of_Germany.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|&lt;article_count lang="fr" /&gt; articles|Flag_of_France.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|&lt;article_count lang="es" /&gt; artículos|Flag_of_Spain.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|&lt;article_count lang="ru" /&gt; статей|Flag_of_Russia.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|&lt;article_count lang="pl" /&gt; artykułów|Flag_of_Poland.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|&lt;article_count lang="tr" /&gt; makale|Flag_of_Turkey.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|&lt;article_count lang="fi" /&gt; artikkelia|Flag_of_Finland.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|&lt;article_count lang="zh" /&gt; 條目|Flag_of_China.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl|&lt;article_count lang="nl" /&gt; artikelen}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt|&lt;article_count lang="pt" /&gt; artigos}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he|&lt;article_count lang="he" /&gt; articles}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg|&lt;article_count lang="bg" /&gt; статии}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro|&lt;article_count lang="ro" /&gt; articole}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr|&lt;article_count lang="hr" /&gt; Članci}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it|&lt;article_count lang="it" /&gt; articolo}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt|&lt;article_count lang="lt" /&gt; straipsniai}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;!--
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-camera-retro"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:PotM|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt; ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;
--&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:center;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



== Trashwiki &amp; Nomadwiki ==

[[trash:Main Page]] [[nomad:Main Page]]


.


__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>rulhy3pto9e4n63w4mp4meqe6onvh0h</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>98922</id>
      <parentid>98921</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-09-18T08:28:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4422">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport.Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}} articles|Flag_of_the_United_Kingdom.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|&lt;article_count lang="de" /&gt; Artikel|Flag_of_Germany.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|&lt;article_count lang="fr" /&gt; articles|Flag_of_France.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|&lt;article_count lang="es" /&gt; artículos|Flag_of_Spain.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|&lt;article_count lang="ru" /&gt; статей|Flag_of_Russia.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|&lt;article_count lang="pl" /&gt; artykułów|Flag_of_Poland.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|&lt;article_count lang="tr" /&gt; makale|Flag_of_Turkey.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|&lt;article_count lang="fi" /&gt; artikkelia|Flag_of_Finland.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|&lt;article_count lang="zh" /&gt; 條目|Flag_of_China.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl|&lt;article_count lang="nl" /&gt; artikelen}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt|&lt;article_count lang="pt" /&gt; artigos}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he|&lt;article_count lang="he" /&gt; articles}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg|&lt;article_count lang="bg" /&gt; статии}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro|&lt;article_count lang="ro" /&gt; articole}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr|&lt;article_count lang="hr" /&gt; Članci}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it|&lt;article_count lang="it" /&gt; articolo}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt|&lt;article_count lang="lt" /&gt; straipsniai}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;!--
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-camera-retro"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:PotM|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt; ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;
--&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



== Trashwiki &amp; Nomadwiki ==

[[trash:Main Page]] [[nomad:Main Page]]


.


__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>du9vf85sfgwbk7h4qpysekmcmbennfe</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>99446</id>
      <parentid>98922</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-10-06T06:28:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4422">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport.Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}} articles|Flag_of_the_United_Kingdom.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|&lt;article_count lang="de" /&gt; Artikel|Flag_of_Germany.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|&lt;article_count lang="fr" /&gt; articles|Flag_of_France.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|&lt;article_count lang="es" /&gt; artículos|Flag_of_Spain.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|&lt;article_count lang="ru" /&gt; статей|Flag_of_Russia.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|&lt;article_count lang="pl" /&gt; artykułów|Flag_of_Poland.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|&lt;article_count lang="tr" /&gt; makale|Flag_of_Turkey.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|&lt;article_count lang="fi" /&gt; artikkelia|Flag_of_Finland.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|&lt;article_count lang="zh" /&gt; 條目|Flag_of_China.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl|&lt;article_count lang="nl" /&gt; artikelen}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt|&lt;article_count lang="pt" /&gt; artigos}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he|&lt;article_count lang="he" /&gt; articles}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg|&lt;article_count lang="bg" /&gt; статии}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro|&lt;article_count lang="ro" /&gt; articole}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr|&lt;article_count lang="hr" /&gt; Članci}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it|&lt;article_count lang="it" /&gt; articolo}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt|&lt;article_count lang="lt" /&gt; straipsniai}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;!--
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-camera-retro"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:PotM|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt; ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;
--&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



== Nomadwiki&amp; Trashwiki ==

[[nomad:Main Page]] [[trash:Main Page]] 


.


__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>gehdnzhjf0u1srrtb6y4frpvwx2xhgb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>99571</id>
      <parentid>99446</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-10-09T08:25:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4397">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport.Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}} articles|Flag_of_the_United_Kingdom.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|&lt;article_count lang="de" /&gt; Artikel|Flag_of_Germany.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|&lt;article_count lang="fr" /&gt; articles|Flag_of_France.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|&lt;article_count lang="es" /&gt; artículos|Flag_of_Spain.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|&lt;article_count lang="ru" /&gt; статей|Flag_of_Russia.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|&lt;article_count lang="pl" /&gt; artykułów|Flag_of_Poland.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|&lt;article_count lang="tr" /&gt; makale|Flag_of_Turkey.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|&lt;article_count lang="fi" /&gt; artikkelia|Flag_of_Finland.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|&lt;article_count lang="zh" /&gt; 條目|Flag_of_China.svg}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl|&lt;article_count lang="nl" /&gt; artikelen}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt|&lt;article_count lang="pt" /&gt; artigos}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he|&lt;article_count lang="he" /&gt; articles}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg|&lt;article_count lang="bg" /&gt; статии}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro|&lt;article_count lang="ro" /&gt; articole}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr|&lt;article_count lang="hr" /&gt; Članci}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it|&lt;article_count lang="it" /&gt; articolo}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt|&lt;article_count lang="lt" /&gt; straipsniai}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;!--
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-camera-retro"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:PotM|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt; ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;
--&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==


{{nomadwiki}}


.


__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>dq75dr449c3oqlo4z4wf97rxmfhcjmh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>100811</id>
      <parentid>99571</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-01T21:41:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>clean up: remove broken flag image links and broken article counts until this gets fixed</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3581">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport.Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;!--
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-camera-retro"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:PotM|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt; ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;
--&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>53aqur3nt1t2g7p1nyz1i9mi8npzcq7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101039</id>
      <parentid>100811</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-04T20:01:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>add a more prominent link to community portal</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3632">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport.Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] •&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;!--
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-camera-retro"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:PotM|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt; ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;
--&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>6w1e4kkcp678rtx2did6z3s4sdmex4m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101845</id>
      <parentid>101039</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-04-27T13:00:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3682">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport.Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking and Corona]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;!--
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-camera-retro"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:PotM|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt; ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;
--&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>5umnvbpuhij75skck0wevbops0yi1zz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104314</id>
      <parentid>101845</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-23T19:15:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3751">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[https://hitchwiki.org/Maps/|Map for Hitchhiking]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking and Corona]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;!--
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-camera-retro"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:PotM|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt; ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;
--&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>4buucc3ym4o5fx53jh7fn1g2e2a2my1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104315</id>
      <parentid>104314</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-23T19:16:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3752">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[https://hitchwiki.org/Maps/]|Map for Hitchhiking]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking and Corona]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;!--
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-camera-retro"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:PotM|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt; ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;
--&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>qd687hh67rz4mfrkhajldavchy62xwu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104316</id>
      <parentid>104315</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-23T19:17:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3730">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[:Maps| Map for Hitchhiking]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking and Corona]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;!--
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-camera-retro"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:PotM|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt; ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;
--&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>js8mg8pjvgi38i7731dcmzi5x9s0s5p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104318</id>
      <parentid>104316</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-23T19:20:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3729">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Maps| Map for Hitchhiking]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking and Corona]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;!--
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-camera-retro"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:PotM|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt; ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;
--&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>j2c3oxevqw4b58dl6w208zlo0j57kxo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104319</id>
      <parentid>104318</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-23T19:21:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3748">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchwiki.org/maps Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking and Corona]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;!--
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-camera-retro"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:PotM|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt; ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;
--&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>pdpnoamjo9abhytoy1xtwnal8y4i72w</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104320</id>
      <parentid>104319</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-23T19:21:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3752">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[https://hitchwiki.org/maps | Map for Hitchhiking]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking and Corona]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;!--
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-camera-retro"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:PotM|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt; ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;
--&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>dc7l6ayd8wn570mutkiu4g7dhp3w76u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104321</id>
      <parentid>104320</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-23T19:30:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3733">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[../#Maps| Map for Hitchhiking]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking and Corona]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;!--
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-camera-retro"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:PotM|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt; ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;
--&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>kmd9cfgg4p544sau1rtvponuxstpmzs</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104322</id>
      <parentid>104321</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-23T19:32:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3707">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[../]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking and Corona]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;!--
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-camera-retro"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:PotM|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt; ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;
--&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>297kw8adnb4n7vgs9cyl5v4hluxwipx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104323</id>
      <parentid>104322</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-23T19:34:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3709">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[/Maps]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking and Corona]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;!--
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-camera-retro"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:PotM|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt; ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;
--&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>de0whougp22lou9v6s44btuyejzo9z9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104324</id>
      <parentid>104323</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-23T19:36:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3709">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[:Maps]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking and Corona]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;!--
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-camera-retro"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:PotM|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt; ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;
--&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>ho0q2x8b9lrpvxmt357aumzkc56nghp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104325</id>
      <parentid>104324</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-23T19:40:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3727">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[/First time hitchhiking]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking and Corona]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;!--
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-camera-retro"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:PotM|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt; ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;
--&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>nwle4vvrhzhdc7o6x0p8jpmhvw74425</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104326</id>
      <parentid>104325</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-23T19:40:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3714">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[../../Maps]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking and Corona]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;!--
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-camera-retro"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:PotM|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt; ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;
--&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>jg8608zc7hjj12jb9r5ujawco3i6eis</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104327</id>
      <parentid>104326</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-23T19:42:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3717">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[/hitchhiking/]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking and Corona]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;!--
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-camera-retro"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:PotM|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt; ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;
--&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>cbo7qx4m3bd6kl44qreryridar9uddc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104330</id>
      <parentid>104327</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-23T19:47:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3729">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Map | Map for Hitchhiking]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking and Corona]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;!--
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-camera-retro"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:PotM|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt; ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;
--&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>dxv60y92zl3u110h11gzculnkk5i17z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104340</id>
      <parentid>104330</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-23T19:54:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3728">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[en | Map for Hitchhiking]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking and Corona]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;!--
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-camera-retro"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:PotM|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt; ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;
--&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>d8emsr6rjgy8cq93696hpkor60wlj4y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104341</id>
      <parentid>104340</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-23T20:01:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3745">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[https://hitchmap.com/|Map for Hitchhiking]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking and Corona]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;!--
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-camera-retro"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:PotM|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt; ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;
--&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>188n0rgglikz50ve261pmmwzhi7qan6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104342</id>
      <parentid>104341</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-23T20:01:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3743">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking and Corona]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;!--
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-camera-retro"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:PotM|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt; ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;
--&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>g4ioeas8vkifno4oc398dj23jc7z8ex</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104343</id>
      <parentid>104342</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-24T11:53:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3693">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking and Corona]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;!--
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-camera-retro"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:PotM|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt; ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;
--&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>qje7k8b6zhwqkuqr4hcs7czns6flv1y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104344</id>
      <parentid>104343</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-24T11:53:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3629">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking and Corona]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;


&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;!--
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-camera-retro"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:PotM|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt; ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;
--&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>29xfrpbmc3euq5fano9dwu3tn0xymsf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104345</id>
      <parentid>104344</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-24T11:54:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3626">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking and Corona]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;


&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;!--
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-camera-retro"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:PotM|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt; ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;
--&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>7nh9by3j03n0uusd0su6tex4ao0x498</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104346</id>
      <parentid>104345</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-24T11:57:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3755">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking and Corona]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;!--
&lt;div class="frontpage_potm frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Template:PotM|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-camera-retro"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Picture of the Moment]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:PotM|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt; ==
{{PotM}}
&lt;/div&gt;
--&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>1nrgc1ag11fekmfsl62ry2e5gnqdq68</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104347</id>
      <parentid>104346</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-24T12:58:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3433">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking and Corona]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
{{places-to-go}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>q1rb9kagpzoxdtapoejxecw3ii76nuc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104348</id>
      <parentid>104347</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-24T13:01:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3419">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking and Corona]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>nhkk7o83f61mjn4v57y210weyjbuxv9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104349</id>
      <parentid>104348</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-24T13:02:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3419">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking and Corona]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>0d1i4u40yib0tk16q4xhs2ea3ltas0b</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104350</id>
      <parentid>104349</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-24T13:03:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3468">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking and Corona]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;
ssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss
&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>r5cus0bzfxn7b6w0r8jq2o8p0o8f9tu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104351</id>
      <parentid>104350</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-24T13:03:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3468">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking and Corona]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Places to go|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-road"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Places to go]] ==
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>qan7lygil0smw6fmeo5edx00xvqwo9y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104885</id>
      <parentid>104351</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-11-01T13:05:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>delete "places to go to"</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3351">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking and Corona]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_languages frontpage_box"&gt;
        &lt;ul class="primary_wikis"&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|de|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|es|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|ru|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|pl|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|tr|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|fi|}}&lt;/li&gt;
            &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|zh|}}&lt;/li&gt;
        &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;div class="secondary_wikis"&gt;'''Baby wikis'''
            &lt;ul class="babywikis"&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|nl}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|pt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|he}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|bg}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|ro}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|hr}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|it}}&lt;/li&gt;
                    &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-babylanguage|lt}}&lt;/li&gt;
                &lt;/ul&gt;
        &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;


&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>9b6m85jpl6ouy4crcf4r4i2v8uj3wiq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104886</id>
      <parentid>104885</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-11-01T13:11:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>delete links to other languages</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2216">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking and Corona]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;


&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>agwj71356jqm4vhq36ntimjk5sehk0k</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104887</id>
      <parentid>104886</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-11-01T13:11:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2213">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking and Corona]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==
{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:20px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>5lj86jjb3q2awzawm8ik01cje1eigti</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104888</id>
      <parentid>104887</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-11-01T13:12:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2212">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking and Corona]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
'''[[Events|Past events...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==
{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:5px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>6hc9znzamjqipll4cofrps51nd052xq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104889</id>
      <parentid>104888</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-11-01T13:13:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2180">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking and Corona]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
'''[[News|Old news...]]'''
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==
{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:5px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>j7recum62iu6vmnqfbn3oakro4darot</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104890</id>
      <parentid>104889</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-11-01T13:13:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2153">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking and Corona]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==
{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:5px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>k56vkdkh55u3cqjq6m9ocalyykzrbxo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104999</id>
      <parentid>104890</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-12-09T10:10:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>remove front page link to covid page</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2110">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==
{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:5px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>rf4gpk9bn0c0cg45shh1huxs3i9u392</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105042</id>
      <parentid>104999</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-12-11T15:22:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2111">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike?]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==
{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:5px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>gw076fan3d5evduqj3j03m8ayofi53r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105186</id>
      <parentid>105042</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-01-13T12:06:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2129">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike?|Where to hitchhike]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==
{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:5px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>17xzwha9fzx4n4bdt6t2kld82mp9tku</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105187</id>
      <parentid>105186</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-01-13T12:08:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2129">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike|Where to hitchhike?]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==
{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:5px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>48irhq3ap9vjuyw5k2nvhbvvvpfhtd6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105188</id>
      <parentid>105187</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-01-13T12:08:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2130">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike|Where to hitchhike?]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchwiki:Community_Portal|Community]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==
{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:5px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>9hki42tnl8h3r0de8urqn0wfu2ajqw6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105257</id>
      <parentid>105188</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-01-28T11:05:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2134">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World.]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:Community Portal|Join the Community!]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike|Where to hitchhike?]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==
{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:5px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>bmy71hyyha9c6kw3lg4lbq26l8ht598</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105258</id>
      <parentid>105257</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-01-28T11:07:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2143">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World.]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:Community Portal|&lt;u&gt; Join the Community! &lt;/u&gt;]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike|Where to hitchhike?]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt; 
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==
{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:5px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>39w6y8g3mqw6r7lits7sjhxz51g2yuk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105763</id>
      <parentid>105258</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-05-19T08:35:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2191">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World.]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:Community Portal|&lt;u&gt; Join the Community! &lt;/u&gt;]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike|Where to hitchhike?]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
[[File:Hitchhiking world.png|thumb|right|300px]]
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==
{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:5px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>nqxhmrq3hvw6z0q7wsfb4ox8sy7i3zx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105764</id>
      <parentid>105763</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-05-19T08:36:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2195">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World.]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:Community Portal|&lt;u&gt; Join the Community! &lt;/u&gt;]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike|Where to hitchhike?]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
[[File:Hitchhiking worldwide.png|thumb|right|300px]]
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==
{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:5px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>dagov0gakadmqdqk706oi3hgh873a23</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105765</id>
      <parentid>105764</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-05-19T08:38:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2195">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World.]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:Community Portal|&lt;u&gt; Join the Community! &lt;/u&gt;]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike|Where to hitchhike?]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
[[File:Hitchhiking worldwide.png|thumb|right|300px]]
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==
{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:5px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>h9bapib0g808sxfcxe9wuf543ps45w4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105766</id>
      <parentid>105765</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-05-19T08:38:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2194">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World.]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:Community Portal|&lt;u&gt; Join the Community! &lt;/u&gt;]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike|Where to hitchhike?]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]][[File:Hitchhiking worldwide.png|thumb|right|300px]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==
{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:5px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>rjgtob435v4n0tpsyyq1p2t9u8vsxp2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105767</id>
      <parentid>105766</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-05-19T08:39:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2194">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World.]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:Community Portal|&lt;u&gt; Join the Community! &lt;/u&gt;]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us![[File:Hitchhiking worldwide.png|thumb|right|300px]]&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike|Where to hitchhike?]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==
{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:5px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>m76d458e43v8qaov7kquqq036xw6pv3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105768</id>
      <parentid>105767</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-05-19T08:40:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2142">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World.]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:Community Portal|&lt;u&gt; Join the Community! &lt;/u&gt;]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike|Where to hitchhike?]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==
{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:5px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>jqj1cs3lzar47x6v4f4iinr3b519izk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105769</id>
      <parentid>105768</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-05-19T08:42:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2182">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World.]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:Community Portal|&lt;u&gt; Join the Community! &lt;/u&gt;]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike|Where to hitchhike?]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
[[File:Hitchhiking worldwide.png|900px]]
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==
{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:5px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>824wlxxpf9uhcptwcmtorbvshm3es55</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105771</id>
      <parentid>105769</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-05-19T08:45:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2187">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World.]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:Community Portal|&lt;u&gt; Join the Community! &lt;/u&gt;]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike|Where to hitchhike?]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
[[File:Hitchhiking world_highres.png|1100px]]
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==
{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:5px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>oo82egmo80rozi4b6vqcq1k8okp3ebt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105772</id>
      <parentid>105771</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-05-19T08:46:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2273">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World.]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:Community Portal|&lt;u&gt; Join the Community! &lt;/u&gt;]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike|Where to hitchhike?]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add new]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== On the state of hitchhiking ==
[[File:Hitchhiking world_highres.png|1100px]]
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==
{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:5px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>oqpmyu5u3skibgiyjmq8ue4576ozih0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105812</id>
      <parentid>105772</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-05-26T02:45:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tobias</username>
        <id>2938</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2286">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World.]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:Community Portal|&lt;u&gt; Join the Community! &lt;/u&gt;]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike|Where to hitchhike?]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add/edit event]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add/edit news]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== On the state of hitchhiking ==
[[File:Hitchhiking world_highres.png|1100px]]
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==
{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:5px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>61x0zjrv35svizv7x19mcbgcml7t6q1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105817</id>
      <parentid>105812</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-05-28T09:05:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2278">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World.]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:Community Portal|&lt;u&gt; Join the Community! &lt;/u&gt;]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike|Where to hitchhike?]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add/edit event]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add/edit news]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== On the state of hitchhiking ==
[[File:Hitchhiking world.jpg|1100px]]
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==
{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:5px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>luv5fiv7glmpiyabt3tc5j8sxtn028x</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106063</id>
      <parentid>105817</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-08-22T14:59:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2277">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World.]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:Community Portal|&lt;u&gt; Join the Community! &lt;/u&gt;]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike|Where to hitchhike?]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]]&lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add/edit event]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add/edit news]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== On the state of hitchhiking ==
[[File:Hitchhiking world.jpg|1100px]]
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==
{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:5px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>binxj67ue5aa7gwoi12prbn7nv6ca1m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106213</id>
      <parentid>106063</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-09-27T15:34:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2322">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World.]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:Community Portal|&lt;u&gt; Join the Community! &lt;/u&gt;]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike|Where to hitchhike?]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking races|Races]] &lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add/edit event]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add/edit news]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== On the state of hitchhiking ==
[[File:Hitchhiking world.jpg|1100px]]
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==
{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:5px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>re47d9z76kqh1pl97cz57vitq148s65</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>107584</id>
      <parentid>106213</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-11-23T21:02:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robyt</username>
        <id>9747</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>Added {{geo-missing}}</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2339">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World.]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:Community Portal|&lt;u&gt; Join the Community! &lt;/u&gt;]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike|Where to hitchhike?]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking races|Races]] &lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add/edit event]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add/edit news]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== On the state of hitchhiking ==
[[File:Hitchhiking world.jpg|1100px]]
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==
{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:5px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]

{{geo-missing}}</text>
      <sha1>qoeypgo4bv93ofuq8ogqoh5so1zvz1m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>108328</id>
      <parentid>107584</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-12-14T13:47:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>show hitchmap on main page</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2460">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World.]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:Community Portal|&lt;u&gt; Join the Community! &lt;/u&gt;]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike|Where to hitchhike?]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking races|Races]] &lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add/edit event]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add/edit news]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Hitchhiking Map ==
&lt;iframe src="https://hitchmap.com/" title="HitchMap" style="width: 100%; height: 700px"&gt;&lt;/iframe&gt;

== On the state of hitchhiking ==
[[File:Hitchhiking world.jpg|1100px]]
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==
{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:5px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]

{{geo-missing}}</text>
      <sha1>ggxgemgfokgzvoqt0mwwu3ckwefr9dg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>108329</id>
      <parentid>108328</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-12-14T14:29:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2340">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World.]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:Community Portal|&lt;u&gt; Join the Community! &lt;/u&gt;]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike|Where to hitchhike?]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking races|Races]] &lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add/edit event]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add/edit news]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;

== On the state of hitchhiking ==
[[File:Hitchhiking world.jpg|1100px]]
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==
{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:5px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]

{{geo-missing}}</text>
      <sha1>c2gcbvbq8xdayhdttf0bq4ad9vsvr7p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>109334</id>
      <parentid>108329</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-04-11T06:09:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2323">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World.]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:Community Portal|&lt;u&gt; Join the Community! &lt;/u&gt;]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with us!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike|Where to hitchhike?]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking races|Races]] &lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add/edit event]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add/edit news]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;

== On the state of hitchhiking ==
[[File:Hitchhiking world.jpg|1100px]]
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==
{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:5px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>lowtdtaetfthwmvub6wvj4dmswh9p62</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>112162</id>
      <parentid>109334</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-08-24T09:42:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2338">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World.]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:Community Portal|&lt;u&gt; Join the Community! &lt;/u&gt;]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with other hitchhikers!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike|Where to hitchhike?]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking races|Races]] &lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add/edit event]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add/edit news]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;

== On the state of hitchhiking ==
[[File:Hitchhiking world.jpg|1100px]]
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==
{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:5px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]
[[hr:]]</text>
      <sha1>p4c0ms9qujgly5e349g0o3l8d9ruim3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>112536</id>
      <parentid>112162</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-09-03T16:59:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>alphabetic sorting for interwiki links</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2338">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World.]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:Community Portal|&lt;u&gt; Join the Community! &lt;/u&gt;]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with other hitchhikers!&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike|Where to hitchhike?]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking races|Races]] &lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add/edit event]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add/edit news]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;

== On the state of hitchhiking ==
[[File:Hitchhiking world.jpg|1100px]]
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==
{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;small style="text-align:left;display:block;clear:both;margin:5px 0;"&gt;So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.&lt;/small&gt;



__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[hr:]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]</text>
      <sha1>dxuy80jtarnm5wh2kkl0xg8sbtwcebt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>114772</id>
      <parentid>112536</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-10-05T11:15:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2263">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World.]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:Community Portal|&lt;u&gt; Join the Community! &lt;/u&gt;]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with other hitchhikers!

So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike|Where to hitchhike?]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking races|Races]] &lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add/edit event]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add/edit news]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;

== On the state of hitchhiking ==
[[File:Hitchhiking world.jpg|1100px]]
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==
{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;





__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[hr:]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]</text>
      <sha1>5dyket8onn2n7dma0f4h1522ede669v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>114773</id>
      <parentid>114772</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-10-05T11:16:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2262">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World.]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:Community Portal|&lt;u&gt; Join the Community! &lt;/u&gt;]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with other hitchhikers! So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike|Where to hitchhike?]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking races|Races]] &lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add/edit event]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add/edit news]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;

== On the state of hitchhiking ==
[[File:Hitchhiking world.jpg|1100px]]
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==
{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;





__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[hr:]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]</text>
      <sha1>3c8s1ckydlrkqaykcxwh66zwca1k2p2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>114777</id>
      <parentid>114773</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-10-05T12:07:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2141">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World.]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:Community Portal|&lt;u&gt; Join the Community! &lt;/u&gt;]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with other hitchhikers! So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike|Where to hitchhike?]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking races|Races]] &lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add/edit event]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add/edit news]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;


&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==
{{nomadwiki}}
&lt;/div&gt;





__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[hr:]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]</text>
      <sha1>elj6friblema8epz4fl0e6w7h1coamu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>114778</id>
      <parentid>114777</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-10-05T12:15:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2264">&lt;ul id="frontpage-header"&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:About|The Guide to Hitchhiking the World.]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;h1&gt;[[Hitchwiki:Community Portal|&lt;u&gt; Join the Community! &lt;/u&gt;]]&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;div class="ingress"&gt;Hitchwiki is a collaborative website for gathering information about [[hitchhiking]] and other ways of extremely cheap transport. Feel free to [[Help:Contents|share your knowledge]] with other hitchhikers! So far we have '''[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}]]''' articles in English, written and edited by [[hitchhiker]]s around the globe.
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;span class="first_links"&gt;[[:Category:General info|General info]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [https://hitchmap.com/ Map for Hitchhiking] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Top Tips]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[First time hitchhiking|First time]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safety]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Where to hitchhike|Where to hitchhike?]]  &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Picking up hitchhikers]] &amp;nbsp;•&amp;nbsp; [[Hitchhiking races|Races]] &lt;/span&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_events frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[Events|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-thumbs-up"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; Events]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:Events|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add/edit event]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{events}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_col"&gt;&lt;div class="col_content"&gt;
&lt;div class="frontpage_news frontpage_box"&gt;
== [[News|&lt;i class="fa fa-lg fa-bullhorn"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; News]] &lt;small class="frontpage-meta-links plainlinks pull-right text-muted"&gt;[{{fullurl:Template:News|action=edit}} &lt;i class="fa fa-plus"&gt;&lt;/i&gt; add/edit news]&lt;/small&gt;==
{{news}}
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;/div&gt;


&lt;div class="frontpage_ptg frontpage_box"&gt;
== Related projects ==
* [[:nomad:|Nomadwiki]] low/no budget travel guide
* [[:trash:|Trashwiki]] dumpster diving
* [[:trustroots:|Trustroots]] hospitality exchange
&lt;/div&gt;





__NOTOC__ __NOEDITSECTION__
[[bg:Начална страница]]
[[de:Hauptseite]]
[[es:Página Principal]]
[[fi:Etusivu]]
[[fr:Accueil]]
[[he:עמוד ראשי]]
[[hr:]]
[[it:Pagina_principale]]
[[lt:Pagrindinis puslapis]]
[[nl:Hoofdpagina]]
[[pl:Strona główna]]
[[pt:Página principal]]
[[ro:Pagina principală]]
[[ru:Главная страница]]
[[tr:Ana sayfa]]
[[zh:首页]]</text>
      <sha1>huchqf7lbdx4q0wd1qotdgiyrmms638</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>MediaWiki:Monobook.css</title>
    <ns>8</ns>
    <id>5</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1894</id>
      <parentid>5</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="60">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin */</text>
      <sha1>nd9yzayikoayp11075r2mvla53d51n6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2747</id>
      <timestamp>2004-12-22T17:47:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Angela</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="102">/* Display subtitle */
#siteSub {
    display: inline;
    font-size: 120%;
    font-weight: normal;
}</text>
      <sha1>lrt6rgte3ygd4xbvvjmw0nlhlpq252p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2748</id>
      <parentid>2747</parentid>
      <timestamp>2004-12-22T17:49:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Angela</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="100">/* Display subtitle */
#siteSub {
    display: inline;
    font-size: 200%;
    font-weight: bold;
}</text>
      <sha1>33sxaweuppfmy4g02hul8uflqt0185u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2749</id>
      <parentid>2748</parentid>
      <timestamp>2004-12-22T18:03:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Angela</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="208">/* Display subtitle */
#siteSub {
    display: inline;
    font-size: 200%;
    font-weight: bold;
}

#siteNotice {
    margin-top:5px;
    padding-left: 4px;
    font-style: italic;
    text-align: center;
}</text>
      <sha1>tq5589ovkv83812x965ximasapbeddi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2750</id>
      <parentid>2749</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-05-04T21:27:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Angela</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="260">/* Display subtitle */
#siteSub {
    display: inline;
    font-size: 200%;
    font-weight: bold;
}

#siteNotice {
    margin-top:5px;
    padding-left: 4px;
    font-style: italic;
    text-align: center;
}

	#p-tb {display:none;}
	#p-search  {display:none;}</text>
      <sha1>cc29rhpp3e7m4idwbfv3b70nqgyhs0f</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2751</id>
      <parentid>2750</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-05-04T21:27:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Angela</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="259">/* Display subtitle */
#siteSub {
    display: inline;
    font-size: 200%;
    font-weight: bold;
}

#siteNotice {
    margin-top:5px;
    padding-left: 4px;
    font-style: italic;
    text-align: center;
}

#p-tb {display:none;}

#p-search  {display:none;}</text>
      <sha1>hxnhwt4npcqzng6clbyzp2rxnw2si1j</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2752</id>
      <parentid>1893</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-16T09:54:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Splarka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="208">/* Display subtitle */
#siteSub {
    display: inline;
    font-size: 150%;
    font-weight: bold;
}

#siteNotice {
    margin-top:5px;
    padding-left: 4px;
    font-style: italic;
    text-align: center;
}</text>
      <sha1>7a5y5pm9vunc0izcmp6hu4vism060jx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2753</id>
      <parentid>2752</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-16T09:56:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Splarka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="245">/* Display subtitle */
#siteSub {
    display: inline;
    font-size: 150%;
    font-weight: bold;
}

#siteNotice {
    margin-top:5px;
    padding-left: 4px;
    font-style: italic;
    text-align: center;
}

#p-tb { display: none !important; }</text>
      <sha1>dj1hjy2zc3vrfwg6995gmoo5m9ijdoy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2754</id>
      <parentid>1894</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T13:17:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="60">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin */</text>
      <sha1>nd9yzayikoayp11075r2mvla53d51n6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9152</id>
      <parentid>2754</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-24T02:47:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="261">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin */

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}</text>
      <sha1>jbys5ezwk3epjdjx89kbl2ro3ffcttq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9205</id>
      <parentid>9152</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-26T09:38:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="643">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin */

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }</text>
      <sha1>cl5946izng9tnc49ue44vn7zyh4fi3l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9470</id>
      <parentid>9205</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-04T10:54:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="665">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin */

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

h3 {
  color:#5c5;
}</text>
      <sha1>pe7dem3kex8j2hekfsubpn57zh8hj9b</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9472</id>
      <parentid>9470</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-04T10:57:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="667">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin */

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#02280d;
}</text>
      <sha1>t5rcxe0moz2esy1tq36169dwrqozvta</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9473</id>
      <parentid>9472</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-04T10:58:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="707">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#02280d;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>ol9i7zvuhwzd9plq6ngpr6f5o37f9rc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9477</id>
      <parentid>9473</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-04T11:04:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="790">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#462;
}

a:visited {
  color:#464;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new    (line 82)
{
  color:#741;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>ahh3ywfan7jc5o1n36c5mrqalermjbo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9478</id>
      <parentid>9477</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-04T11:05:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="777">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#462;
}

a:visited {
  color:#464;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>sxx6czn9qho9ymwah033yi4mjw2hhmp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9483</id>
      <parentid>9478</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-04T11:26:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="777">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#693;
}

a:visited {
  color:#697;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>8z40o5z9vbgwrpaxg3znvyp6km4l91d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9484</id>
      <parentid>9483</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-04T11:28:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="783">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#486828;
}

a:visited {
  color:#446424;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>oiaox39khynyq3pjudo20qcp2apnli4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9488</id>
      <parentid>9484</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-04T11:46:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="829">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#486828;
}

a:visited {
  color:#446424;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#4f6f2f;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>ja089jy395kynrr2n2qo2sumuyczlak</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9535</id>
      <parentid>9488</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-06T04:36:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="829">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#4f6f2f;
}

a:visited {
  color:#446424;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>93o5dfg6ud6n52hkc0zxogqs7ghmp29</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9538</id>
      <parentid>9535</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-06T06:13:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="908">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#4f6f2f;
}

a:visited {
  color:#446424;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#efe;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}


/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>56gykbi61l5s3crmixnnl6fcjzv5h47</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9539</id>
      <parentid>9538</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-06T06:33:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Amylin</username>
        <id>11</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="911">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#4f6f2f;
}

a:visited {
  color:#446424;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}


/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>ge94iot4dvjpveotby1g9v1x23a8gdd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9596</id>
      <parentid>9539</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-07T03:22:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Amylin</username>
        <id>11</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="911">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#7B6B97;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}


/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>609ixa9i2r71smpzzyb2cr36e6w4r20</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9597</id>
      <parentid>9596</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-07T03:25:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Amylin</username>
        <id>11</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="911">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#6A6DA8;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}


/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>7bmurwplkh8b7ag04w0kd336hyutz3d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9599</id>
      <parentid>9597</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-07T03:28:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Amylin</username>
        <id>11</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="911">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}


/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>oeqzme2cwbbznemrkmj6b85bxb10x5u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9735</id>
      <parentid>9599</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-13T04:47:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="942">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

.portlet H5 { display:none; }

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}


/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>hvor0lz29sduuqt3eg09ws633ryyf95</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14908</id>
      <parentid>9735</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-15T17:42:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="978">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

.portlet H5 { display:none; }

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 90%;
}


/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>ae84doq9ch64e6k2yqyqbrsrzfa8s9w</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14909</id>
      <parentid>14908</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-15T17:44:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="994">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

.portlet H5 { display:none; }

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>5t71uplcsq9yk48knrg8bt8qh26tr9z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15625</id>
      <parentid>14909</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-08T12:50:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1162">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

.portlet H5 { display:none; }

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 12px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>9clmpj5mwu4p5ratk4lhi3xgzbffcn9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15627</id>
      <parentid>15625</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-08T12:51:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1162">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

.portlet H5 { display:none; }

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 16px;
    left: 0;
    height: 140px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>9cj82olas7kbxxk9t455sdh04bi0sjn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15630</id>
      <parentid>15627</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-08T12:52:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1162">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

.portlet H5 { display:none; }

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 24px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>9d7q3wzpi0n8k9x79nxxfaqudr5c7jp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15631</id>
      <parentid>15630</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-08T12:54:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1459">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

.portlet H5 { display:none; }

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 24px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 4.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}


/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>obm3mtij66egaf87mpaejkg7cu4evu7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15632</id>
      <parentid>15631</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-08T12:54:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1457">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

.portlet H5 { display:none; }

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 24px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 4em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}


/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>bjgl73bizcfzki47fm86m1bb4ysppxz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15633</id>
      <parentid>15632</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-08T12:55:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1459">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

.portlet H5 { display:none; }

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 24px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.8em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}


/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>bgw4eq1uyvq19b9g3dv9r6gw5nygnke</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15634</id>
      <parentid>15633</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-08T12:56:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1459">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

.portlet H5 { display:none; }

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 24px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}


/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>sd5gir6asn7b28ja94i17nmjtdmv5zb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15635</id>
      <parentid>15634</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-08T12:57:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1665">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

.portlet H5 { display:none; }

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 24px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

#p-cactions li {
    display: inline;
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    border-bottom: none;
    padding: 0 0 .1em 0;
    margin: 0 .3em 0 0;
    overflow: visible;
    background: white;
    height: 20px;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>gpudowcumn55j3vpne2zuincsph499n</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15636</id>
      <parentid>15635</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-08T12:58:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1459">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

.portlet H5 { display:none; }

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 24px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}


/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>sd5gir6asn7b28ja94i17nmjtdmv5zb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15639</id>
      <parentid>15636</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-08T13:08:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1459">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

.portlet H5 { display:none; }

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 24px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.5em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}


/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>i2jma9eb7ze4rhs46pm54zplfojnerb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15640</id>
      <parentid>15639</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-08T13:10:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1459">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

.portlet H5 { display:none; }

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}


/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>2ten1qrozrxsj297ox5wyxip4qzokne</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16228</id>
      <parentid>15640</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-04T14:52:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2071">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

.portlet H5 { display:none; }

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}


/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>mji8yjz2xykr9ya9z4l9ywb6d5ifpzt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16528</id>
      <parentid>16228</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-16T14:45:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2070">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

.portlet H5 { display:none; }

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: left;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}


/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>g04g9kz6ppwaqeatfhzridtqjvvrflw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16529</id>
      <parentid>16528</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-16T14:45:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2069">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

.portlet H5 { display:none; }

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: left;
   clear: left;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}


/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>j3da1ugj18nkzkeel1iro2cp14044rk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16530</id>
      <parentid>16529</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-16T14:46:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2071">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

.portlet H5 { display:none; }

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}


/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>mji8yjz2xykr9ya9z4l9ywb6d5ifpzt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>20411</id>
      <parentid>16530</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-05T21:24:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2071">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

.portlet H5 { display:none; }

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.1em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}


/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>d33jmu2dz0pmgnmd2orxla30pyxt95m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>20420</id>
      <parentid>20411</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-05T22:11:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2071">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

.portlet H5 { display:none; }

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}


/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>mji8yjz2xykr9ya9z4l9ywb6d5ifpzt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22730</id>
      <parentid>20420</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-21T14:04:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2195">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

.portlet H5 { display:none; }

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}


/*

dd {
 border-top:solid 2px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>kvgb6p7bnkada70qnqscunogsghw6pm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22731</id>
      <parentid>22730</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-21T14:10:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2194">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

.portlet H5 { display:none; }

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 2px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>r52arojkg1epktoek8018x6bqtyamik</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22843</id>
      <parentid>22731</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-25T08:22:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2194">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
/* url(http://couchsurfing.com/images/bg6-100k.jpg) top no-repeat; */

/*
  background-attachment: scroll;
  background-repeat: repeat-x; 
*/

  background-color: #eed;
}

.portlet H5 { display:none; }

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>iz9mcbhznppxys3772nutaff0fr38rd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24779</id>
      <parentid>22843</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-12T19:19:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2051">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
  background-color: #ddc;
}

.portlet H5 { display:none; }

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>kfnfvr6n7u2913qlcox6w1r7y9nqvts</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26856</id>
      <parentid>24779</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-03T11:33:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2550">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
  background-color: #ddc;
}

.portlet H5 { display:none; }

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>sle5r2csjg11rud01s02uvgith0askj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29461</id>
      <parentid>26856</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-21T10:35:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2588">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY { 
  background: none; 
  background-color: #ddc;
}

.page-Main_Page h1 { display:none; }

.portlet H5 { display:none; }

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>adzuxkhdfevjkarphzu1zmr1hpfvjy7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32819</id>
      <parentid>29461</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-08T10:05:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2650">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY 
{ 
  background:#f9f9f9 url(http://slice1.guaka.org/stuff/hitchwiki-background-test2.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0;
}

.page-Main_Page h1 { display:none; }

.portlet H5 { display:none; }

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>d36yrnj9k3vl3xlbhnhhtb89yxqn9r2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32821</id>
      <parentid>32819</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-08T10:10:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2758">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY 
{ 
  background:#f9f9f9 url(http://slice1.guaka.org/stuff/hitchwiki-background-test2.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0;
}

.page-Main_Page h1 { display:none; }

.portlet H5 { display:none; }

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }
#content { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em; }
div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #F9EF80;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>4tow61qaykzjvnoh25xx6obj8w1syn2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32822</id>
      <parentid>32821</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-08T10:13:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2901">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

BODY 
{ 
  background:#f9f9f9 url(http://slice1.guaka.org/stuff/hitchwiki-background-test2.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0;
}

.page-Main_Page h1 { display:none; }

.portlet H5 { display:none; }

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 
#p-cactions ul li, #p-cactions ul li a { -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; }

#content 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em;
  border-color:#f9ef80 -moz-use-text-color #f9ef80 #f9ef80;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #F9EF80;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>ruhiihl79z9gwhd1urpfuzwdgj280fc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32823</id>
      <parentid>32822</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-08T10:16:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2984">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

body
{ 
  background:#f9f9f9 url(http://slice1.guaka.org/stuff/hitchwiki-background-test2.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0;
}

.page-Main_Page h1 { display:none; }

.portlet H5 { display:none; }

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em;
  border-width: 3px;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #b21516;
}

#content 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em;
  border-color:#f9ef80 -moz-use-text-color #f9ef80 #f9ef80;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #F9EF80;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>lq08rkfifi4479hynrr91idcq20vjyg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32824</id>
      <parentid>32823</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-08T10:17:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3009">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

body
{ 
  background:#f9f9f9 url(http://slice1.guaka.org/stuff/hitchwiki-background-test2.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0;
}

.page-Main_Page h1 { display:none; }

.portlet H5 { display:none; }

/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #f9ef80;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #b21516;
}

#content 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em;
  border-color:#f9ef80 -moz-use-text-color #f9ef80 #f9ef80;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #F9EF80;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>rzutul8rtr0pxm2a9wc1j2hhdvx8qcd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32825</id>
      <parentid>32824</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-08T10:22:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3042">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

body
{ 
  background:#f9f9f9 url(http://slice1.guaka.org/stuff/hitchwiki-background-test2.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0;
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}


.portlet
{
  border: 3px solid #f9ef80;
}


/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #f9ef80;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #b21516;
}

#content 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em;
  border-color:#f9ef80 -moz-use-text-color #f9ef80 #f9ef80;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody { -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; }

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #F9EF80;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>q4i3pkt6q80bgqqs7ms38gcepso743x</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32826</id>
      <parentid>32825</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-08T10:23:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3005">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

body
{ 
  background:#f9f9f9 url(http://slice1.guaka.org/stuff/hitchwiki-background-test2.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0;
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}


/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #f9ef80;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #b21516;
}

#content 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em;
  border-color:#f9ef80 -moz-use-text-color #f9ef80 #f9ef80;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; 
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #F9EF80;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>qclnbueramvu2pp64gotuwwqpmrz23b</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32827</id>
      <parentid>32826</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-08T10:25:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3036">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

body
{ 
  background:#f9f9f9 url(http://slice1.guaka.org/stuff/hitchwiki-background-test2.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0;
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}


/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #f9ef80;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #b21516;
}

#content 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em;
  border-color:#f9ef80 -moz-use-text-color #f9ef80 #f9ef80;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; 
  border-width: 3px 3px 3px 0;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #F9EF80;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>8cje3rfcie0s9fiu0znzrqgqz4ydfc7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32828</id>
      <parentid>32827</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-08T10:26:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3036">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

body
{ 
  background:#f9f9f9 url(http://slice1.guaka.org/stuff/hitchwiki-background-test2.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0;
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}


/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #f9ef80;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #b21516;
}

#content 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em;
  border-color:#f9ef80 -moz-use-text-color #f9ef80 #f9ef80;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; 
  border-width: 2px 2px 2px 0;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #F9EF80;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>7b3thoadjvu6xdavrhrz5n8nsyhh6uz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32833</id>
      <parentid>32828</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-08T10:32:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3045">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

body
{ 
  background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/1/1e/Hitchwiki-background-test2.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0;
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}


/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #f9ef80;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #b21516;
}

#content 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em;
  border-color:#f9ef80 -moz-use-text-color #f9ef80 #f9ef80;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; 
  border-width: 2px 2px 2px 0;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #F9EF80;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>p729cjz9t6nay3dilnlu7zxsydemmhu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32838</id>
      <parentid>32833</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-08T10:59:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3113">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

body
{ 
  background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/1/1e/Hitchwiki-background-test2.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0;
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #f9ef80;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #b21516;
}

#content 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em;
  border-color:#f9ef80 -moz-use-text-color #f9ef80 #f9ef80;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; 
  border-width: 2px 2px 2px 0;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #F9EF80;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>kvlsj1pqpq7jru4w7kgfxp9zx4uy31t</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32841</id>
      <parentid>32838</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-08T11:07:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3113">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

body
{ 
  background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0;
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #f9ef80;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #b21516;
}

#content 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em;
  border-color:#f9ef80 -moz-use-text-color #f9ef80 #f9ef80;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; 
  border-width: 2px 2px 2px 0;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #F9EF80;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>ktdjs6rm14srevpqtotntq3rynx23n5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32843</id>
      <parentid>32841</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-08T11:09:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3170">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

body
{ 
  background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0;
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.5em; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #f9ef80;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #b21516;
}

#content 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em;
  border-color:#f9ef80 -moz-use-text-color #f9ef80 #f9ef80;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; 
  border-width: 2px 2px 2px 0;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #F9EF80;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>1i95h0bkm7fgh5ksnk5zn1lwgjkyzz8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32846</id>
      <parentid>32843</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-08T22:45:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3215">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.4em;
}

body
{ 
  background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0;
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.5em; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #f9ef80;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #b21516;
}

#content 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em;
  border-color:#f9ef80 -moz-use-text-color #f9ef80 #f9ef80;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; 
  border-width: 2px 2px 2px 0;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #F9EF80;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>f6tlpfzoqx6qimbqt9e69nk38rcb9ow</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>33239</id>
      <parentid>32846</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-17T00:25:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3451">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.4em;
}

body
{ 
  background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0;
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.5em; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #f9ef80;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #b21516;
}

#content 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em;
  border-color:#f9ef80 -moz-use-text-color #f9ef80 #f9ef80;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; 
  border-width: 2px 2px 2px 0;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #F9EF80;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

#topline
{
  top: 0px; 
  left: 0px; 
  background-color: #f9ef80; 
  width: 100%; 
  text-align: left;
}

#topline ul
{
  display: inline;
}

#topline ul#parts
{
  font-size: 1.05em;
}

#topline ul#languages
{
  font-size: 0.85em;
}


/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>5ktx5hgu2kcv0obqbr7z2a3oik67rkp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>33242</id>
      <parentid>33239</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-17T00:27:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3454">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.4em;
}

body
{ 
  background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0;
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.5em; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #f9ef80;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #b21516;
}

#content 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em;
  border-color:#f9ef80 -moz-use-text-color #f9ef80 #f9ef80;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; 
  border-width: 2px 2px 2px 0;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #F9EF80;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

#topline
{
  top: 0px; 
  left: 0px; 
  background-color: #f9ef80; 
  width: 100%; 
  text-align: left;
}

#topline ul li
{
  display: inline;
}

#topline ul#parts
{
  font-size: 1.05em;
}

#topline ul#languages
{
  font-size: 0.85em;
}


/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>5mm0v4qjk6u8030rq4pxpu4l0wfal05</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>33244</id>
      <parentid>33242</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-17T00:27:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3490">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.4em;
}

body
{ 
  background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0;
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.5em; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #f9ef80;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #b21516;
}

#content 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em;
  border-color:#f9ef80 -moz-use-text-color #f9ef80 #f9ef80;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; 
  border-width: 2px 2px 2px 0;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #F9EF80;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

#topline
{
  top: 0px; 
  left: 0px; 
  background-color: #f9ef80; 
  width: 100%; 
  text-align: left;
}

#topline ul
{
  display: inline;
}

#topline ul li
{
  display: inline;
}

#topline ul#parts
{
  font-size: 1.05em;
}

#topline ul#languages
{
  font-size: 0.85em;
}


/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>3q5ksl0acqovfbfklnvbwb3lk2gcrff</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>33246</id>
      <parentid>33244</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-17T00:29:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3596">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.4em;
}

body
{ 
  background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0;
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.5em; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #f9ef80;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #b21516;
}

#content 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em;
  border-color:#f9ef80 -moz-use-text-color #f9ef80 #f9ef80;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; 
  border-width: 2px 2px 2px 0;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #F9EF80;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

#topline
{
  top: 0px; 
  left: 0px; 
  background-color: #f9ef80; 
  width: 100%; 
  text-align: left;
}

#topline ul
{
  display: inline;
}

#topline ul li
{
  display: inline;
}

#topline ul#parts
{
  font-size: 1.05em;
}

#topline ul#languages
{
  font-size: 0.85em;
}

#topline #hitchwiki
{
  font-size: 14pt; 
  font-weight: bold;
}

#topline #hitchwiki a
{
  color:#b00;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>3qhhwhit9xuvx3eym4qlze9227gid85</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>33247</id>
      <parentid>33246</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-17T00:31:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3653">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.4em;
}

body
{ 
  background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0;
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.5em; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #f9ef80;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #b21516;
}

#content 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em;
  border-color:#f9ef80 -moz-use-text-color #f9ef80 #f9ef80;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; 
  border-width: 2px 2px 2px 0;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #F9EF80;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

#topline
{
  top: 0px; 
  left: 0px; 
  background-color: #f9ef80; 
  width: 100%; 
  text-align: left;
}

#topline ul
{
  display: inline;
}

#topline ul li
{
  display: inline;
}

#topline ul#parts
{
  font-size: 1.05em;
}

#topline ul#languages
{
  font-size: 0.85em;
}

#topline #hitchwiki
{
  font-size: 14pt; 
  font-weight: bold;
}

#topline a
{
  color: #b00;
}

#topline a:hover
{
  color: #f9ef80; 
  background-color: #b00;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>5qp9ed084wmlzp5bpsdntfbp1456e57</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>33248</id>
      <parentid>33247</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-17T00:33:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3690">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.4em;
}

body
{ 
  background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0;
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.5em; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #f9ef80;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #b21516;
}

#content 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em;
  border-color:#f9ef80 -moz-use-text-color #f9ef80 #f9ef80;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; 
  border-width: 2px 2px 2px 0;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #F9EF80;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

#topline
{
  top: 0px; 
  left: 0px; 
  background-color: #f9ef80; 
  width: 100%; 
  text-align: left;
}

#topline ul
{
  display: inline;
}

#topline ul li
{
  display: inline;
}

#topline ul#parts
{
  font-size: 1.05em;
}

#topline ul#languages
{
  font-size: 0.85em;
}

#topline #hitchwiki
{
  font-size: 14pt; 
  font-weight: bold;
}

#topline a
{
  color: #b00;
  font-weight: bold;
  padding: 5px;
}

#topline a:hover
{
  color: #f9ef80; 
  background-color: #b00;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>01pcom6q4rjdgbdpxomh0ur75x8njbl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>33249</id>
      <parentid>33248</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-17T00:34:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3715">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.4em;
}

body
{ 
  background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0;
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.5em; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #f9ef80;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #b21516;
}

#content 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em;
  border-color:#f9ef80 -moz-use-text-color #f9ef80 #f9ef80;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; 
  border-width: 2px 2px 2px 0;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #F9EF80;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

#topline
{
  top: 0px; 
  left: 0px; 
  background-color: #f9ef80; 
  width: 100%; 
  text-align: left;
}

#topline ul
{
  display: inline;
}

#topline ul li
{
  display: inline;
}

#topline ul#parts
{
  font-size: 1.05em;
}

#topline ul#languages
{
  font-size: 0.85em;
}

#topline #hitchwiki
{
  font-size: 14pt; 
  font-weight: bold;
}

#topline a
{
  color: #b00;
  font-weight: bold;
  padding: 5px;
}

#topline a:hover
{
  color: #f9ef80; 
  background-color: #b00;
  text-decoration: none;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>4cd4527fwzrzfgbssbj5q8afu362spq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>33252</id>
      <parentid>33249</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-17T00:37:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3215">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.4em;
}

body
{ 
  background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0;
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.5em; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #f9ef80;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #b21516;
}

#content 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em;
  border-color:#f9ef80 -moz-use-text-color #f9ef80 #f9ef80;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; 
  border-width: 2px 2px 2px 0;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #F9EF80;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>f6tlpfzoqx6qimbqt9e69nk38rcb9ow</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36783</id>
      <parentid>33252</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-08-26T10:19:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3305">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.4em;
}

body
{ 
  /* background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0; */
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/design/hwpatt2.jpg) repeat scroll 0 0
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.5em; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #f9ef80;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #b21516;
}

#content 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em;
  border-color:#f9ef80 -moz-use-text-color #f9ef80 #f9ef80;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; 
  border-width: 2px 2px 2px 0;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #F9EF80;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>8r756h6vplu1s8eykanjvpjrt29pbpl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36786</id>
      <parentid>36783</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-08-26T10:26:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3383">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.4em;
}

body
{ 
  /* background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0; */
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/design/hwpatt2.jpg) repeat scroll 0 0
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.5em; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #f9ef80;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #b21516;
}

#content 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em;
  border-color:#f9ef80 -moz-use-text-color #f9ef80 #f9ef80;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; 
  border-width: 2px 2px 2px 0;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #F9EF80;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

#p-personal li a
{
  color: black;
  font-weight: bold;
  font-size: 10px;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>hhqh6tkkt1l02lt3raa4dl0l63gttf8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36787</id>
      <parentid>36786</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-08-26T10:31:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3451">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.4em;
}

body
{ 
  /* background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0; */
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/design/hwpatt2.jpg) repeat scroll 0 0
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.5em; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #f9ef80;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #b21516;
}

#content 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em;
  border-color:#f9ef80 -moz-use-text-color #f9ef80 #f9ef80;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; 
  border-width: 2px 2px 2px 0;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #F9EF80;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

#p-personal li a
{
  color: black;
  font-weight: bold;
  font-size: 10px;
}

#footer a { color: #bb0000; }
#footer #credits a { color: black; }

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>dew2x40wktni65b8e8rl3ekqn9tpvf2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36788</id>
      <parentid>36787</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-08-26T10:33:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3503">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.4em;
}

body
{ 
  /* background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0; */
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/design/hwpatt2.jpg) repeat scroll 0 0
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.5em; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #f9ef80;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #b21516;
}

#content 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em;
  border-color:#f9ef80 -moz-use-text-color #f9ef80 #f9ef80;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomright: 0.4em; 
  border-width: 2px 2px 2px 0;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #F9EF80;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

#p-personal li a
{
  color: black;
  font-weight: bold;
  font-size: 10px;
}

#footer a { color: #bb0000; }
#footer #credits a { color: black; }

.portlet a:visited,
.portlet a { color: #bb0000; }

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>j8iynnikqs4mgxps0jxff436chop86e</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36789</id>
      <parentid>36788</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-08-26T10:46:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3462">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.4em;
}

body
{ 
  /* background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0; */
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/design/hwpatt2.jpg) repeat scroll 0 0
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.5em; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #f9ef80;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #b21516;
}

#content 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em;
  border-color:#f9ef80 -moz-use-text-color #f9ef80 #f9ef80;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -moz-border-radius: 9px;
  border-width: 2px;
  margin: 2px 0 0 6px;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #F9EF80;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

#p-personal li a
{
  color: black;
  font-weight: bold;
  font-size: 10px;
}

#footer a { color: #bb0000; }
#footer #credits a { color: black; }

.portlet a:visited,
.portlet a { color: #bb0000; }

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>f18wrk5s31jar8erwg44c3vi0r4rass</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36790</id>
      <parentid>36789</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-08-26T10:48:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3540">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.4em;
}

body
{ 
  /* background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0; */
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/design/hwpatt2.jpg) repeat scroll 0 0
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.5em; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #f9ef80;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #b21516;
}

#content 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em;
  border-color:#f9ef80 -moz-use-text-color #f9ef80 #f9ef80;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -moz-border-radius: 9px;
  border-width: 2px;
  margin: 2px 0 0 6px;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #F9EF80;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

#p-personal li a
{
  color: black;
  font-weight: bold;
  font-size: 10px;
}

#footer a { color: #bb0000; }
#footer #credits a { color: black; }

.portlet a:visited,
.portlet a { 
  color: #bb0000; 
  border-bottom: 1px dotted #ccc;
}

.portlet ul li {
  list-style: none;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>dtrllou01nidvoiz6mbhaya67qgtp74</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36792</id>
      <parentid>36790</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-08-26T10:53:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3561">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.4em;
}

body
{ 
  /* background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0; */
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/design/hwpatt2.jpg) repeat scroll 0 0
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.5em; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #f9ef80;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #b21516;
}

#content 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em;
  border-color:#f9ef80 -moz-use-text-color #f9ef80 #f9ef80;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -moz-border-radius: 9px;
  border-width: 2px;
  margin: 2px 0 0 6px;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #F9EF80;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

#p-personal li a
{
  color: black;
  font-weight: bold;
  font-size: 10px;
}

#footer a { color: #bb0000; }
#footer #credits a { color: black; }

.portlet a:visited,
.portlet a { 
  color: #bb0000; 
  border-bottom: 1px dotted #ccc;
}

.portlet ul li {
  list-style: none;
  margin-left: -4px;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>jnkagprue9fg60aj9v2wy6ua8il9vv1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36793</id>
      <parentid>36792</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-08-26T10:53:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3561">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.4em;
}

body
{ 
  /* background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0; */
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/design/hwpatt2.jpg) repeat scroll 0 0
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.5em; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #f9ef80;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #b21516;
}

#content 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em;
  border-color:#f9ef80 -moz-use-text-color #f9ef80 #f9ef80;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -moz-border-radius: 9px;
  border-width: 2px;
  margin: 2px 0 0 6px;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #F9EF80;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

#p-personal li a
{
  color: black;
  font-weight: bold;
  font-size: 10px;
}

#footer a { color: #bb0000; }
#footer #credits a { color: black; }

.portlet a:visited,
.portlet a { 
  color: #bb0000; 
  border-bottom: 1px dotted #ccc;
}

.portlet ul li {
  list-style: none;
  margin-left: -6px;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>myipwedqbkmldkt59vos3cggm52huqi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36796</id>
      <parentid>36793</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-08-26T11:16:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3729">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.4em;
}

body
{ 
  /* background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0; */
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/design/hwpatt2.jpg) repeat scroll 0 0
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.5em; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #f9ef80;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #b21516;
}

#content 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em;
  border-color:#f9ef80 -moz-use-text-color #f9ef80 #f9ef80;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -moz-border-radius: 9px;
  border-width: 2px;
  margin: 2px 0 0 6px;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #F9EF80;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

#p-personal li a
{
  color: black;
  font-weight: bold;
  font-size: 10px;
}

#footer a { color: #bb0000; }
#footer #credits a { color: black; }

.portlet a:visited,
.portlet a { 
  color: #bb0000; 
  border-bottom: 1px dotted #ccc;
}

.portlet ul li {
  list-style: none;
  margin-left: -6px;
}

#footer ul li#copyright, 
#footer ul li#disclaimer, 
#footer ul li#privacy, 
#footer ul li#about 
{
  border-top:1px dotted #CCCCCC;
  display:block;
  float:right;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */</text>
      <sha1>ec5mtyx4eb8w26524okjtu0aqqlbekk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39670</id>
      <parentid>36796</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-02-10T23:30:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4186">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.4em;
}

body
{ 
  /* background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0; */
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/design/hwpatt2.jpg) repeat scroll 0 0
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.5em; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #f9ef80;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #b21516;
}

#content 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em;
  border-color:#f9ef80 -moz-use-text-color #f9ef80 #f9ef80;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -moz-border-radius: 9px;
  border-width: 2px;
  margin: 2px 0 0 6px;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #F9EF80;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

#p-personal li a
{
  color: black;
  font-weight: bold;
  font-size: 10px;
}

#footer a { color: #bb0000; }
#footer #credits a { color: black; }

.portlet a:visited,
.portlet a { 
  color: #bb0000; 
  border-bottom: 1px dotted #ccc;
}

.portlet ul li {
  list-style: none;
  margin-left: -6px;
}

#footer ul li#copyright, 
#footer ul li#disclaimer, 
#footer ul li#privacy, 
#footer ul li#about 
{
  border-top:1px dotted #CCCCCC;
  display:block;
  float:right;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */

.road_euro,
.road_highway,
.road_national {
	padding: 0 1ex; 
	border: 1px solid #ddd; 
	color: #fff;
	font-size:95%;

	-moz-border-radius: 3px;
	-khtml-border-radius: 3px;
	-webkit-border-radius: 3px;
	border-radius: 3px;
}
.road_euro {
	background-color:#479A38;
	border: 1px solid #2f740f;
}
.road_highway {
	background-color:#E9132F;
	border: 1px solid #b13e38;
}
.road_national {
	background-color:#FCD016;
	border: 1px solid #de9700;
	color: #000;
}</text>
      <sha1>05gurhtkljwud099bz497j51q8nd6yj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41182</id>
      <parentid>39670</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-09T14:09:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Xo</username>
        <id>1470</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4192">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.4em;
}

body
{ 
  /* background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0; */
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/3/3a/Bg.png) repeat scroll 0 0
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
  -moz-border-radius: 0.5em; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, only supported by moz/firefox/other gecko browsers for now */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.4em; 
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 0.4em;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #f9ef80;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #b21516;
}

#content 
{ 
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 0.6em; 
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 0.6em;
  border-color:#f9ef80 -moz-use-text-color #f9ef80 #f9ef80;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -moz-border-radius: 9px;
  border-width: 2px;
  margin: 2px 0 0 6px;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #F9EF80;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

#p-personal li a
{
  color: black;
  font-weight: bold;
  font-size: 10px;
}

#footer a { color: #bb0000; }
#footer #credits a { color: black; }

.portlet a:visited,
.portlet a { 
  color: #606399; 
  border-bottom: 1px dotted #ccc;
}

.portlet ul li {
  list-style: none;
  margin-left: -6px;
}

#footer ul li#copyright, 
#footer ul li#disclaimer, 
#footer ul li#privacy, 
#footer ul li#about 
{
  border-top:1px dotted #CCCCCC;
  display:block;
  float:right;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */

.road_euro,
.road_highway,
.road_national {
	padding: 0 1ex; 
	border: 1px solid #ddd; 
	color: #fff;
	font-size:95%;

	-moz-border-radius: 3px;
	-khtml-border-radius: 3px;
	-webkit-border-radius: 3px;
	border-radius: 3px;
}
.road_euro {
	background-color:#479A38;
	border: 1px solid #2f740f;
}
.road_highway {
	background-color:#E9132F;
	border: 1px solid #b13e38;
}
.road_national {
	background-color:#FCD016;
	border: 1px solid #de9700;
	color: #000;
}</text>
      <sha1>44dgkuqoxjapcs2o96rzgn1b1rqn71s</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41183</id>
      <parentid>41182</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-09T14:30:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Xo</username>
        <id>1470</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4527">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
-webkit-border-radius: 7px;
-moz-border-radius: 7px;
border-radius: 7px;
}

body
{ 
  /* background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0; */
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/3/3a/Bg.png) repeat scroll 0 0
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
-webkit-border-radius: 8px;
-moz-border-radius: 8px;
border-radius: 8px; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, css3 code plus support for moz/firefox/other gecko browsers and webkit good tool here http://bit.ly/blZlbb */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -webkit-border-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius: 7px;
  border-radius: 7px;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #AAAAAA;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #b21516;
}

#content 
{ 
  -webkit-border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  -webkit-border-bottom-left-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 7px;
  border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  border-bottom-left-radius: 7px;
  border-color:#AAAAAA -moz-use-text-color #f9ef80 #f9ef80;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 10px;
  -moz-border-radius: 10px;
  border-radius: 10px;
  border-width: 2px;
  margin: 2px 0 0 6px;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #AAAAAA;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

#p-personal li a
{
  color: black;
  font-weight: bold;
  font-size: 10px;
}

#footer a { color: #bb0000; }
#footer #credits a { color: black; }

.portlet a:visited,
.portlet a { 
  color: #606399; 
  border-bottom: 1px dotted #ccc;
}

.portlet ul li {
  list-style: none;
  margin-left: -6px;
}

#footer ul li#copyright, 
#footer ul li#disclaimer, 
#footer ul li#privacy, 
#footer ul li#about 
{
  border-top:1px dotted #CCCCCC;
  display:block;
  float:right;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */

.road_euro,
.road_highway,
.road_national {
	padding: 0 1ex; 
	border: 1px solid #ddd; 
	color: #fff;
	font-size:95%;

	-moz-border-radius: 3px;
	-khtml-border-radius: 3px;
	-webkit-border-radius: 3px;
	border-radius: 3px;
}
.road_euro {
	background-color:#479A38;
	border: 1px solid #2f740f;
}
.road_highway {
	background-color:#E9132F;
	border: 1px solid #b13e38;
}
.road_national {
	background-color:#FCD016;
	border: 1px solid #de9700;
	color: #000;
}</text>
      <sha1>q0i5o0syqhh29gh4bybkpk7mcaej539</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41184</id>
      <parentid>41183</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-09T14:35:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Xo</username>
        <id>1470</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4613">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
-webkit-border-radius: 7px;
-moz-border-radius: 7px;
border-radius: 7px;
}

body
{ 
  /* background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0; */
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/3/3a/Bg.png) repeat scroll 0 0
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
-webkit-border-radius: 8px;
-moz-border-radius: 8px;
border-radius: 8px; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, css3 code plus support for moz/firefox/other gecko browsers and webkit good tool here http://bit.ly/blZlbb */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
-webkit-border-top-left-radius: 7px;
-webkit-border-top-right-radius: 7px;
-moz-border-radius-topleft: 7px;
-moz-border-radius-topright: 7px;
border-top-left-radius: 7px;
border-top-right-radius: 7px;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #AAAAAA;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #b21516;
}

#content 
{ 
  -webkit-border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  -webkit-border-bottom-left-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 7px;
  border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  border-bottom-left-radius: 7px;
  border-color:#AAAAAA;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 10px;
  -moz-border-radius: 10px;
  border-radius: 10px;
  border-width: 2px;
  margin: 2px 0 0 6px;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #AAAAAA;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

#p-personal li a
{
  color: black;
  font-weight: bold;
  font-size: 10px;
}

#footer a { color: #bb0000; }
#footer #credits a { color: black; }

.portlet a:visited,
.portlet a { 
  color: #606399; 
  border-bottom: 1px dotted #ccc;
}

.portlet ul li {
  list-style: none;
  margin-left: -6px;
}

#footer ul li#copyright, 
#footer ul li#disclaimer, 
#footer ul li#privacy, 
#footer ul li#about 
{
  border-top:1px dotted #CCCCCC;
  display:block;
  float:right;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */

.road_euro,
.road_highway,
.road_national {
	padding: 0 1ex; 
	border: 1px solid #ddd; 
	color: #fff;
	font-size:95%;

	-moz-border-radius: 3px;
	-khtml-border-radius: 3px;
	-webkit-border-radius: 3px;
	border-radius: 3px;
}
.road_euro {
	background-color:#479A38;
	border: 1px solid #2f740f;
}
.road_highway {
	background-color:#E9132F;
	border: 1px solid #b13e38;
}
.road_national {
	background-color:#FCD016;
	border: 1px solid #de9700;
	color: #000;
}</text>
      <sha1>kcd0kn3h6gbv12by8wfwld7uizign67</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41187</id>
      <parentid>41184</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-09T16:41:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Xo</username>
        <id>1470</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4613">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
-webkit-border-radius: 7px;
-moz-border-radius: 7px;
border-radius: 7px;
}

body
{ 
  /* background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0; */
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/3/3a/Bg.png) repeat scroll 0 0
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
-webkit-border-radius: 8px;
-moz-border-radius: 8px;
border-radius: 8px; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, css3 code plus support for moz/firefox/other gecko browsers and webkit good tool here http://bit.ly/blZlbb */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
-webkit-border-top-left-radius: 7px;
-webkit-border-top-right-radius: 7px;
-moz-border-radius-topleft: 7px;
-moz-border-radius-topright: 7px;
border-top-left-radius: 7px;
border-top-right-radius: 7px;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #AAAAAA;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #606399;
}

#content 
{ 
  -webkit-border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  -webkit-border-bottom-left-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 7px;
  border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  border-bottom-left-radius: 7px;
  border-color:#AAAAAA;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 10px;
  -moz-border-radius: 10px;
  border-radius: 10px;
  border-width: 2px;
  margin: 2px 0 0 6px;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #AAAAAA;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

#p-personal li a
{
  color: black;
  font-weight: bold;
  font-size: 10px;
}

#footer a { color: #bb0000; }
#footer #credits a { color: black; }

.portlet a:visited,
.portlet a { 
  color: #606399; 
  border-bottom: 1px dotted #ccc;
}

.portlet ul li {
  list-style: none;
  margin-left: -6px;
}

#footer ul li#copyright, 
#footer ul li#disclaimer, 
#footer ul li#privacy, 
#footer ul li#about 
{
  border-top:1px dotted #CCCCCC;
  display:block;
  float:right;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */

.road_euro,
.road_highway,
.road_national {
	padding: 0 1ex; 
	border: 1px solid #ddd; 
	color: #fff;
	font-size:95%;

	-moz-border-radius: 3px;
	-khtml-border-radius: 3px;
	-webkit-border-radius: 3px;
	border-radius: 3px;
}
.road_euro {
	background-color:#479A38;
	border: 1px solid #2f740f;
}
.road_highway {
	background-color:#E9132F;
	border: 1px solid #b13e38;
}
.road_national {
	background-color:#FCD016;
	border: 1px solid #de9700;
	color: #000;
}</text>
      <sha1>7bl1drvrrxe71h67glj8zb4tm1o5qot</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41188</id>
      <parentid>41187</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-09T17:01:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Xo</username>
        <id>1470</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4676">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius: 7px;
  border-radius: 7px;
}

body
{ 
  /* background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0; */
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/3/3a/Bg.png) repeat scroll 0 0
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 8px;
  -moz-border-radius: 8px;
  border-radius: 8px; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, css3 code plus support for moz/firefox/other gecko browsers and webkit good tool here http://bit.ly/blZlbb */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -webkit-border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  -webkit-border-top-right-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 7px;
  border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  border-top-right-radius: 7px;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #AAAAAA;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #7273D5;
}

#p-cactions li a {
  color:#606399;
}

#content 
{ 
  -webkit-border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  -webkit-border-bottom-left-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 7px;
  border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  border-bottom-left-radius: 7px;
  border-color:#AAAAAA;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 10px;
  -moz-border-radius: 10px;
  border-radius: 10px;
  border-width: 2px;
  margin: 2px 0 0 6px;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #AAAAAA;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

#p-personal li a
{
  color: black;
  font-weight: bold;
  font-size: 10px;
}

#footer a { color: #bb0000; }
#footer #credits a { color: black; }

.portlet a:visited,
.portlet a { 
  color: #606399; 
  border-bottom: 1px dotted #ccc;
}

.portlet ul li {
  list-style: none;
  margin-left: -6px;
}

#footer ul li#copyright, 
#footer ul li#disclaimer, 
#footer ul li#privacy, 
#footer ul li#about 
{
  border-top:1px dotted #CCCCCC;
  display:block;
  float:right;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */

.road_euro,
.road_highway,
.road_national {
	padding: 0 1ex; 
	border: 1px solid #ddd; 
	color: #fff;
	font-size:95%;

	-moz-border-radius: 3px;
	-khtml-border-radius: 3px;
	-webkit-border-radius: 3px;
	border-radius: 3px;
}
.road_euro {
	background-color:#479A38;
	border: 1px solid #2f740f;
}
.road_highway {
	background-color:#E9132F;
	border: 1px solid #b13e38;
}
.road_national {
	background-color:#FCD016;
	border: 1px solid #de9700;
	color: #000;
}</text>
      <sha1>431rd5vu7vrtplhszzthxuagbqpjpia</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>42572</id>
      <parentid>41188</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-06-19T20:47:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4790">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius: 7px;
  border-radius: 7px;
}

body
{ 
  /* background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0; */
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/3/3a/Bg.png) repeat scroll 0 0
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 8px;
  -moz-border-radius: 8px;
  border-radius: 8px; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, css3 code plus support for moz/firefox/other gecko browsers and webkit good tool here http://bit.ly/blZlbb */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -webkit-border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  -webkit-border-top-right-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 7px;
  border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  border-top-right-radius: 7px;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #AAAAAA;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #7273D5;
}

#p-cactions li a {
  color:#606399;
}

#content 
{ 
  -webkit-border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  -webkit-border-bottom-left-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 7px;
  border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  border-bottom-left-radius: 7px;
  border-color:#AAAAAA;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 10px;
  -moz-border-radius: 10px;
  border-radius: 10px;
  border-width: 2px;
  margin: 2px 0 0 6px;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #AAAAAA;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

#p-personal li a
{
  color: black;
  font-weight: bold;
  font-size: 10px;
}

#footer a { color: #bb0000; }
#footer #credits a { color: black; }

.portlet a:visited,
.portlet a { 
  color: #606399; 
  border-bottom: 1px dotted #ccc;
}

.portlet ul li {
  list-style: none;
  margin-left: -6px;
}

#footer ul li#copyright, 
#footer ul li#disclaimer, 
#footer ul li#privacy, 
#footer ul li#about 
{
  border-top:1px dotted #CCCCCC;
  display:block;
  float:right;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */

.road_euro,
.road_highway,
.road_national {
	padding: 0 1ex; 
	border: 1px solid #ddd; 
	color: #fff;
	font-size:95%;

	-moz-border-radius: 3px;
	-khtml-border-radius: 3px;
	-webkit-border-radius: 3px;
	border-radius: 3px;
}
.road_euro {
	background-color:#479A38;
	border: 1px solid #2f740f;
}
.road_highway {
	background-color:#E9132F;
	border: 1px solid #b13e38;
}
.road_national {
	background-color:#FCD016;
	border: 1px solid #de9700;
	color: #000;
}

#front-page-bottom
{
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/3/3a/Bg.png) repeat scroll 0 0
}</text>
      <sha1>jlxunym86um9qc7ywsr3accdicfyi1y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>42573</id>
      <parentid>42572</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-06-19T20:49:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4811">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius: 7px;
  border-radius: 7px;
}

body
{ 
  /* background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0; */
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/3/3a/Bg.png) repeat scroll 0 0
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 8px;
  -moz-border-radius: 8px;
  border-radius: 8px; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, css3 code plus support for moz/firefox/other gecko browsers and webkit good tool here http://bit.ly/blZlbb */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -webkit-border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  -webkit-border-top-right-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 7px;
  border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  border-top-right-radius: 7px;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #AAAAAA;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #7273D5;
}

#p-cactions li a {
  color:#606399;
}

#content 
{ 
  -webkit-border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  -webkit-border-bottom-left-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 7px;
  border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  border-bottom-left-radius: 7px;
  border-color:#AAAAAA;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 10px;
  -moz-border-radius: 10px;
  border-radius: 10px;
  border-width: 2px;
  margin: 2px 0 0 6px;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #AAAAAA;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

#p-personal li a
{
  color: black;
  font-weight: bold;
  font-size: 10px;
}

#footer a { color: #bb0000; }
#footer #credits a { color: black; }

.portlet a:visited,
.portlet a { 
  color: #606399; 
  border-bottom: 1px dotted #ccc;
}

.portlet ul li {
  list-style: none;
  margin-left: -6px;
}

#footer ul li#copyright, 
#footer ul li#disclaimer, 
#footer ul li#privacy, 
#footer ul li#about 
{
  border-top:1px dotted #CCCCCC;
  display:block;
  float:right;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */

.road_euro,
.road_highway,
.road_national {
	padding: 0 1ex; 
	border: 1px solid #ddd; 
	color: #fff;
	font-size:95%;

	-moz-border-radius: 3px;
	-khtml-border-radius: 3px;
	-webkit-border-radius: 3px;
	border-radius: 3px;
}
.road_euro {
	background-color:#479A38;
	border: 1px solid #2f740f;
}
.road_highway {
	background-color:#E9132F;
	border: 1px solid #b13e38;
}
.road_national {
	background-color:#FCD016;
	border: 1px solid #de9700;
	color: #000;
}

#front-page-bottom
{
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/3/3a/Bg.png) repeat scroll 0 0
  min-height: 230px;
}</text>
      <sha1>p1qu14222ys2ujb6kkv15tmk4ksm1kv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>42575</id>
      <parentid>42573</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-06-19T20:51:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4812">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius: 7px;
  border-radius: 7px;
}

body
{ 
  /* background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0; */
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/3/3a/Bg.png) repeat scroll 0 0
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 8px;
  -moz-border-radius: 8px;
  border-radius: 8px; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, css3 code plus support for moz/firefox/other gecko browsers and webkit good tool here http://bit.ly/blZlbb */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -webkit-border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  -webkit-border-top-right-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 7px;
  border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  border-top-right-radius: 7px;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #AAAAAA;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #7273D5;
}

#p-cactions li a {
  color:#606399;
}

#content 
{ 
  -webkit-border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  -webkit-border-bottom-left-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 7px;
  border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  border-bottom-left-radius: 7px;
  border-color:#AAAAAA;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 10px;
  -moz-border-radius: 10px;
  border-radius: 10px;
  border-width: 2px;
  margin: 2px 0 0 6px;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #AAAAAA;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

#p-personal li a
{
  color: black;
  font-weight: bold;
  font-size: 10px;
}

#footer a { color: #bb0000; }
#footer #credits a { color: black; }

.portlet a:visited,
.portlet a { 
  color: #606399; 
  border-bottom: 1px dotted #ccc;
}

.portlet ul li {
  list-style: none;
  margin-left: -6px;
}

#footer ul li#copyright, 
#footer ul li#disclaimer, 
#footer ul li#privacy, 
#footer ul li#about 
{
  border-top:1px dotted #CCCCCC;
  display:block;
  float:right;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */

.road_euro,
.road_highway,
.road_national {
	padding: 0 1ex; 
	border: 1px solid #ddd; 
	color: #fff;
	font-size:95%;

	-moz-border-radius: 3px;
	-khtml-border-radius: 3px;
	-webkit-border-radius: 3px;
	border-radius: 3px;
}
.road_euro {
	background-color:#479A38;
	border: 1px solid #2f740f;
}
.road_highway {
	background-color:#E9132F;
	border: 1px solid #b13e38;
}
.road_national {
	background-color:#FCD016;
	border: 1px solid #de9700;
	color: #000;
}

#front-page-bottom
{
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/3/3a/Bg.png) repeat scroll 0 0;
  min-height: 230px;
}</text>
      <sha1>0k2coaeu8js9nsgo7tqh98zf4a2di8g</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>42576</id>
      <parentid>42575</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-06-19T20:52:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4784">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius: 7px;
  border-radius: 7px;
}

body
{ 
  /* background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0; */
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/3/3a/Bg.png) repeat scroll 0 0
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 8px;
  -moz-border-radius: 8px;
  border-radius: 8px; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, css3 code plus support for moz/firefox/other gecko browsers and webkit good tool here http://bit.ly/blZlbb */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -webkit-border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  -webkit-border-top-right-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 7px;
  border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  border-top-right-radius: 7px;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #AAAAAA;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #7273D5;
}

#p-cactions li a {
  color:#606399;
}

#content 
{ 
  -webkit-border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  -webkit-border-bottom-left-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 7px;
  border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  border-bottom-left-radius: 7px;
  border-color:#AAAAAA;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 10px;
  -moz-border-radius: 10px;
  border-radius: 10px;
  border-width: 2px;
  margin: 2px 0 0 6px;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #AAAAAA;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

#p-personal li a
{
  color: black;
  font-weight: bold;
  font-size: 10px;
}

#footer a { color: #bb0000; }
#footer #credits a { color: black; }

.portlet a:visited,
.portlet a { 
  color: #606399; 
  border-bottom: 1px dotted #ccc;
}

.portlet ul li {
  list-style: none;
  margin-left: -6px;
}

#footer ul li#copyright, 
#footer ul li#disclaimer, 
#footer ul li#privacy, 
#footer ul li#about 
{
  border-top:1px dotted #CCCCCC;
  display:block;
  float:right;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */

.road_euro,
.road_highway,
.road_national {
	padding: 0 1ex; 
	border: 1px solid #ddd; 
	color: #fff;
	font-size:95%;

	-moz-border-radius: 3px;
	-khtml-border-radius: 3px;
	-webkit-border-radius: 3px;
	border-radius: 3px;
}
.road_euro {
	background-color:#479A38;
	border: 1px solid #2f740f;
}
.road_highway {
	background-color:#E9132F;
	border: 1px solid #b13e38;
}
.road_national {
	background-color:#FCD016;
	border: 1px solid #de9700;
	color: #000;
}

#front-page
{
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/3/3a/Bg.png) repeat scroll 0 0;
}</text>
      <sha1>jak37p5e5y67fz7yc5zcv069jmq5z81</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>42577</id>
      <parentid>42576</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-06-19T20:55:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4825">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius: 7px;
  border-radius: 7px;
}

body
{ 
  /* background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0; */
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/3/3a/Bg.png) repeat scroll 0 0
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 8px;
  -moz-border-radius: 8px;
  border-radius: 8px; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, css3 code plus support for moz/firefox/other gecko browsers and webkit good tool here http://bit.ly/blZlbb */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -webkit-border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  -webkit-border-top-right-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 7px;
  border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  border-top-right-radius: 7px;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #AAAAAA;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #7273D5;
}

#p-cactions li a {
  color:#606399;
}

#content 
{ 
  -webkit-border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  -webkit-border-bottom-left-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 7px;
  border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  border-bottom-left-radius: 7px;
  border-color:#AAAAAA;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 10px;
  -moz-border-radius: 10px;
  border-radius: 10px;
  border-width: 2px;
  margin: 2px 0 0 6px;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #AAAAAA;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

#p-personal li a
{
  color: black;
  font-weight: bold;
  font-size: 10px;
}

#footer a { color: #bb0000; }
#footer #credits a { color: black; }

.portlet a:visited,
.portlet a { 
  color: #606399; 
  border-bottom: 1px dotted #ccc;
}

.portlet ul li {
  list-style: none;
  margin-left: -6px;
}

#footer ul li#copyright, 
#footer ul li#disclaimer, 
#footer ul li#privacy, 
#footer ul li#about 
{
  border-top:1px dotted #CCCCCC;
  display:block;
  float:right;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */

.road_euro,
.road_highway,
.road_national {
	padding: 0 1ex; 
	border: 1px solid #ddd; 
	color: #fff;
	font-size:95%;

	-moz-border-radius: 3px;
	-khtml-border-radius: 3px;
	-webkit-border-radius: 3px;
	border-radius: 3px;
}
.road_euro {
	background-color:#479A38;
	border: 1px solid #2f740f;
}
.road_highway {
	background-color:#E9132F;
	border: 1px solid #b13e38;
}
.road_national {
	background-color:#FCD016;
	border: 1px solid #de9700;
	color: #000;
}

#front-page
{
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/3/3a/Bg.png) repeat scroll 0 0;
}

#front-page h1
{
  padding: 5px 20px;
}</text>
      <sha1>07t2nnbvu6zyxep9bgi4mam7nb25hzw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>57060</id>
      <parentid>42577</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-28T22:27:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4925">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius: 7px;
  border-radius: 7px;
}

body
{ 
  /* background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0; */
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/3/3a/Bg.png) repeat scroll 0 0
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 8px;
  -moz-border-radius: 8px;
  border-radius: 8px; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, css3 code plus support for moz/firefox/other gecko browsers and webkit good tool here http://bit.ly/blZlbb */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -webkit-border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  -webkit-border-top-right-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 7px;
  border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  border-top-right-radius: 7px;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #AAAAAA;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #7273D5;
}

#p-cactions li a {
  color:#606399;
}

#content 
{ 
  -webkit-border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  -webkit-border-bottom-left-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 7px;
  border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  border-bottom-left-radius: 7px;
  border-color:#AAAAAA;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 10px;
  -moz-border-radius: 10px;
  border-radius: 10px;
  border-width: 2px;
  margin: 2px 0 0 6px;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #AAAAAA;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

/* making sure hitchwiki links in top left aren't masked */
#p-personal {
  margin-left: 254px;
}


#p-personal li a
{
  color: black;
  font-weight: bold;
  font-size: 10px;
}

#footer a { color: #bb0000; }
#footer #credits a { color: black; }

.portlet a:visited,
.portlet a { 
  color: #606399; 
  border-bottom: 1px dotted #ccc;
}

.portlet ul li {
  list-style: none;
  margin-left: -6px;
}

#footer ul li#copyright, 
#footer ul li#disclaimer, 
#footer ul li#privacy, 
#footer ul li#about 
{
  border-top:1px dotted #CCCCCC;
  display:block;
  float:right;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */

.road_euro,
.road_highway,
.road_national {
	padding: 0 1ex; 
	border: 1px solid #ddd; 
	color: #fff;
	font-size:95%;

	-moz-border-radius: 3px;
	-khtml-border-radius: 3px;
	-webkit-border-radius: 3px;
	border-radius: 3px;
}
.road_euro {
	background-color:#479A38;
	border: 1px solid #2f740f;
}
.road_highway {
	background-color:#E9132F;
	border: 1px solid #b13e38;
}
.road_national {
	background-color:#FCD016;
	border: 1px solid #de9700;
	color: #000;
}

#front-page
{
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/3/3a/Bg.png) repeat scroll 0 0;
}

#front-page h1
{
  padding: 5px 20px;
}</text>
      <sha1>gnnluqi4dj617vwbdtztxr9uscntrbl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>57061</id>
      <parentid>57060</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-28T22:29:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4941">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius: 7px;
  border-radius: 7px;
}

body
{ 
  /* background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0; */
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/3/3a/Bg.png) repeat scroll 0 0
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 8px;
  -moz-border-radius: 8px;
  border-radius: 8px; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, css3 code plus support for moz/firefox/other gecko browsers and webkit good tool here http://bit.ly/blZlbb */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -webkit-border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  -webkit-border-top-right-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 7px;
  border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  border-top-right-radius: 7px;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #AAAAAA;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #7273D5;
}

#p-cactions li a {
  color:#606399;
}

#content 
{ 
  -webkit-border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  -webkit-border-bottom-left-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 7px;
  border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  border-bottom-left-radius: 7px;
  border-color:#AAAAAA;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 10px;
  -moz-border-radius: 10px;
  border-radius: 10px;
  border-width: 2px;
  margin: 2px 0 0 6px;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #AAAAAA;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

/* making sure hitchwiki links in top left aren't masked */
#p-personal {
  margin-left: 244px;
  width: 454px;
}


#p-personal li a
{
  color: black;
  font-weight: bold;
  font-size: 10px;
}

#footer a { color: #bb0000; }
#footer #credits a { color: black; }

.portlet a:visited,
.portlet a { 
  color: #606399; 
  border-bottom: 1px dotted #ccc;
}

.portlet ul li {
  list-style: none;
  margin-left: -6px;
}

#footer ul li#copyright, 
#footer ul li#disclaimer, 
#footer ul li#privacy, 
#footer ul li#about 
{
  border-top:1px dotted #CCCCCC;
  display:block;
  float:right;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */

.road_euro,
.road_highway,
.road_national {
	padding: 0 1ex; 
	border: 1px solid #ddd; 
	color: #fff;
	font-size:95%;

	-moz-border-radius: 3px;
	-khtml-border-radius: 3px;
	-webkit-border-radius: 3px;
	border-radius: 3px;
}
.road_euro {
	background-color:#479A38;
	border: 1px solid #2f740f;
}
.road_highway {
	background-color:#E9132F;
	border: 1px solid #b13e38;
}
.road_national {
	background-color:#FCD016;
	border: 1px solid #de9700;
	color: #000;
}

#front-page
{
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/3/3a/Bg.png) repeat scroll 0 0;
}

#front-page h1
{
  padding: 5px 20px;
}</text>
      <sha1>ir5q5619m9vxek87ydvulfxi8bbho2q</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>57071</id>
      <parentid>57061</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-29T18:00:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kundrt</username>
        <id>2416</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4976">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius: 7px;
  border-radius: 7px;
}

body
{ 
  /* background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0; */
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/3/3a/Bg.png) repeat scroll 0 0
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 8px;
  -moz-border-radius: 8px;
  border-radius: 8px; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, css3 code plus support for moz/firefox/other gecko browsers and webkit good tool here http://bit.ly/blZlbb */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -webkit-border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  -webkit-border-top-right-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 7px;
  border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  border-top-right-radius: 7px;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #AAAAAA;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #7273D5;
}

#p-cactions li a {
  color:#606399;
}

#content 
{ 
  -webkit-border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  -webkit-border-bottom-left-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 7px;
  border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  border-bottom-left-radius: 7px;
  border-color:#AAAAAA;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 10px;
  -moz-border-radius: 10px;
  border-radius: 10px;
  border-width: 2px;
  margin: 2px 0 0 6px;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    top: 3.3em;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #AAAAAA;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

/* making sure hitchwiki links in top left aren't masked + personal menu is on right side */
#p-personal {
  width: 50%;
  left: auto;
  right: 0;
}


#p-personal li a
{
  color: black;
  font-weight: bold;
  font-size: 10px;
}

#footer a { color: #bb0000; }
#footer #credits a { color: black; }

.portlet a:visited,
.portlet a { 
  color: #606399; 
  border-bottom: 1px dotted #ccc;
}

.portlet ul li {
  list-style: none;
  margin-left: -6px;
}

#footer ul li#copyright, 
#footer ul li#disclaimer, 
#footer ul li#privacy, 
#footer ul li#about 
{
  border-top:1px dotted #CCCCCC;
  display:block;
  float:right;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */

.road_euro,
.road_highway,
.road_national {
	padding: 0 1ex; 
	border: 1px solid #ddd; 
	color: #fff;
	font-size:95%;

	-moz-border-radius: 3px;
	-khtml-border-radius: 3px;
	-webkit-border-radius: 3px;
	border-radius: 3px;
}
.road_euro {
	background-color:#479A38;
	border: 1px solid #2f740f;
}
.road_highway {
	background-color:#E9132F;
	border: 1px solid #b13e38;
}
.road_national {
	background-color:#FCD016;
	border: 1px solid #de9700;
	color: #000;
}

#front-page
{
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/3/3a/Bg.png) repeat scroll 0 0;
}

#front-page h1
{
  padding: 5px 20px;
}</text>
      <sha1>mz70jefl267ndc4oehzgiukay7ei1s2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>64851</id>
      <parentid>57071</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-10-02T10:18:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4960">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius: 7px;
  border-radius: 7px;
}

body
{ 
  /* background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0; */
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/3/3a/Bg.png) repeat scroll 0 0
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display:none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 8px;
  -moz-border-radius: 8px;
  border-radius: 8px; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, css3 code plus support for moz/firefox/other gecko browsers and webkit good tool here http://bit.ly/blZlbb */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -webkit-border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  -webkit-border-top-right-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 7px;
  border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  border-top-right-radius: 7px;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #AAAAAA;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #7273D5;
}

#p-cactions li a {
  color:#606399;
}

#content 
{ 
  -webkit-border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  -webkit-border-bottom-left-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 7px;
  border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  border-bottom-left-radius: 7px;
  border-color:#AAAAAA;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 10px;
  -moz-border-radius: 10px;
  border-radius: 10px;
  border-width: 2px;
  margin: 2px 0 0 6px;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #AAAAAA;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

/* making sure hitchwiki links in top left aren't masked + personal menu is on right side */
#p-personal {
  width: 50%;
  left: auto;
  right: 0;
}


#p-personal li a
{
  color: black;
  font-weight: bold;
  font-size: 10px;
}

#footer a { color: #bb0000; }
#footer #credits a { color: black; }

.portlet a:visited,
.portlet a { 
  color: #606399; 
  border-bottom: 1px dotted #ccc;
}

.portlet ul li {
  list-style: none;
  margin-left: -6px;
}

#footer ul li#copyright, 
#footer ul li#disclaimer, 
#footer ul li#privacy, 
#footer ul li#about 
{
  border-top:1px dotted #CCCCCC;
  display:block;
  float:right;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */

.road_euro,
.road_highway,
.road_national {
	padding: 0 1ex; 
	border: 1px solid #ddd; 
	color: #fff;
	font-size:95%;

	-moz-border-radius: 3px;
	-khtml-border-radius: 3px;
	-webkit-border-radius: 3px;
	border-radius: 3px;
}
.road_euro {
	background-color:#479A38;
	border: 1px solid #2f740f;
}
.road_highway {
	background-color:#E9132F;
	border: 1px solid #b13e38;
}
.road_national {
	background-color:#FCD016;
	border: 1px solid #de9700;
	color: #000;
}

#front-page
{
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/3/3a/Bg.png) repeat scroll 0 0;
}

#front-page h1
{
  padding: 5px 20px;
}</text>
      <sha1>hyvunptr9v54lnkle88a5u3c2f7g50w</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72230</id>
      <parentid>64851</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-05T08:21:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5023">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius: 7px;
  border-radius: 7px;
}

body
{ 
  /* background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0; */
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/3/3a/Bg.png) repeat scroll 0 0
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display: none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 8px;
  -moz-border-radius: 8px;
  border-radius: 8px; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, css3 code plus support for moz/firefox/other gecko browsers and webkit good tool here http://bit.ly/blZlbb */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -webkit-border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  -webkit-border-top-right-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 7px;
  border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  border-top-right-radius: 7px;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #AAAAAA;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #7273D5;
}

#p-cactions li a {
  color:#606399;
}

#content 
{ 
  -webkit-border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  -webkit-border-bottom-left-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 7px;
  border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  border-bottom-left-radius: 7px;
  border-color:#AAAAAA;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 10px;
  -moz-border-radius: 10px;
  border-radius: 10px;
  border-width: 2px;
  margin: 2px 0 0 6px;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #AAAAAA;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

/* making sure hitchwiki links in top left aren't masked + personal menu is on right side */
#p-personal {
  width: 50%;
  left: auto;
  right: 0;
}


#p-personal li a
{
  color: black;
  font-weight: bold;
  font-size: 10px;
}

#footer a { color: #bb0000; }
#footer #credits a { color: black; }

.portlet a:visited,
.portlet a { 
  color: #606399; 
  border-bottom: 1px dotted #ccc;
}

.portlet ul li {
  list-style: none;
  margin-left: -6px;
}

#footer ul li#copyright, 
#footer ul li#disclaimer, 
#footer ul li#privacy, 
#footer ul li#about 
{
  border-top:1px dotted #CCCCCC;
  display:block;
  float:right;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */

.road_euro,
.road_highway,
.road_national {
	padding: 0 1ex; 
	border: 1px solid #ddd; 
	color: #fff;
	font-size:95%;

	-moz-border-radius: 3px;
	-khtml-border-radius: 3px;
	-webkit-border-radius: 3px;
	border-radius: 3px;
}
.road_euro {
	background-color:#479A38;
	border: 1px solid #2f740f;
}
.road_highway {
	background-color:#E9132F;
	border: 1px solid #b13e38;
}
.road_national {
	background-color:#FCD016;
	border: 1px solid #de9700;
	color: #000;
}

#front-page
{
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/3/3a/Bg.png) repeat scroll 0 0;
}

#front-page h1
{
  padding: 5px 20px;
}

/* fixing monobook, #47 */
.portlet h3 {
   display: none;
}</text>
      <sha1>smmrma3lglgxzx0pk1u1pclvjxov305</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72231</id>
      <parentid>72230</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-05T08:23:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>css</model>
      <format>text/css</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5065">/* CSS placed here will affect users of the Monobook skin 


&lt;pre&gt;&lt;nowiki&gt;
*/

.round-box
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius: 7px;
  border-radius: 7px;
}

body
{ 
  /* background:#f9f9f9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/b/bb/Hitchwiki-background-test3.png) repeat-x scroll 0 0; */
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/3/3a/Bg.png) repeat scroll 0 0
}

.page-Main_Page h1,
.portlet h5 
{  
  display: none; 
}

.page-Main_Page table
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 8px;
  -moz-border-radius: 8px;
  border-radius: 8px; 
}

.portlet ul
{
  list-style-type: disc;
  list-style-image: none;
}


/* make a few corners round, css3 code plus support for moz/firefox/other gecko browsers and webkit good tool here http://bit.ly/blZlbb */ 

#p-cactions ul li, 
#p-cactions ul li a 
{ 
  -webkit-border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  -webkit-border-top-right-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topright: 7px;
  border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  border-top-right-radius: 7px;
  border-width: 3px;
  border-color: #AAAAAA;
}

#p-cactions li.selected
{
  border-color: #7273D5;
}

#p-cactions li a {
  color:#606399;
}

#content 
{ 
  -webkit-border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  -webkit-border-bottom-left-radius: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-topleft: 7px;
  -moz-border-radius-bottomleft: 7px;
  border-top-left-radius: 7px;
  border-bottom-left-radius: 7px;
  border-color:#AAAAAA;
  border-style:solid none solid solid;
  border-width:3px medium 3px 3px;
}

div.pBody 
{
  -webkit-border-radius: 10px;
  -moz-border-radius: 10px;
  border-radius: 10px;
  border-width: 2px;
  margin: 2px 0 0 6px;
}

a {
  color:#606399;
}

a:visited {
  color:#6B5E7F;
}

a.new, #p-personal a.new {
  color:#741;
}

#bodyContent a.external
{
  color:#5f7f3f;
}


#toc {
  background:#E6D7B5;
  float:right;
  margin:10px;
  margin-right:0;
}

.editsection {
  font-size: 70%;
  float: right;
}


#p-logo {
    z-index: 3;
    position: absolute; /*needed to use z-index */
    top: 26px;
    left: 0;
    height: 155px;
    width: 12em;
    overflow: visible;
}


#p-cactions {
    position: absolute;
    left: 11.5em;
    margin: 0;
    white-space: nowrap;
    width: 76%;
    line-height: 1.1em;
    overflow: visible;
    background: none;
    border-collapse: collapse;     padding-left: 1em;
    list-style: none;
    font-size: 95%;
}

/* Infobox template style */

.infobox {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
   background-color: #f9f9f9;
   color: black;
   margin-bottom: 0.5em;
   margin-left: 1em;
   padding: 0.2em;
   float: right;
   clear: right;
}
.infobox td,
.infobox th {
   vertical-align: top;
}
.infobox caption {
   font-size: larger;
   margin-left: inherit;
}
.infobox.bordered {
   border-collapse: collapse;
}
.infobox.bordered td,
.infobox.bordered th {
   border: 1px solid #aaa;
}
.infobox.bordered .borderless td,
.infobox.bordered .borderless th {
   border: 0;
}

.infobox.sisterproject {
   width: 20em;
   font-size: 90%;
}

/* Messagebox templates */
.messagebox {
    border: 1px solid #aaa;
    background-color: #f9f9f9;
    width: 80%;
    margin: 0 auto 1em auto;
    padding: .2em;
}
.messagebox.merge {
    border: 1px solid #c0b8cc;
    background-color: #f0e5ff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.cleanup {
    border: 1px solid #9f9fff;
    background-color: #efefff;
    text-align: center;
}
.messagebox.standard-talk {
    border: 1px solid #c0c090;
    background-color: #f8eaba;
    margin: 4px auto;
}

dd {
 border-top:solid 0px #CCC;
 border-left:solid 2px #CCC;
 padding-top: 1px;
 padding-left: 4px;
 margin-left: 15px;
}

#footer
{
  border-width: 3px 0;
  border-style: solid;
  border-color: #AAAAAA;
  padding: 1em 0 1.6em;
}

/* making sure hitchwiki links in top left aren't masked + personal menu is on right side */
#p-personal {
  width: 50%;
  left: auto;
  right: 0;
}


#p-personal li a
{
  color: black;
  font-weight: bold;
  font-size: 10px;
}

#footer a { color: #bb0000; }
#footer #credits a { color: black; }

.portlet a:visited,
.portlet a { 
  color: #606399; 
  border-bottom: 1px dotted #ccc;
}

.portlet ul li {
  list-style: none;
  margin-left: -6px;
}

#footer ul li#copyright, 
#footer ul li#disclaimer, 
#footer ul li#privacy, 
#footer ul li#about 
{
  border-top:1px dotted #CCCCCC;
  display:block;
  float:right;
}

/*
&lt;/nowiki&gt;&lt;/pre&gt; */

.road_euro,
.road_highway,
.road_national {
	padding: 0 1ex; 
	border: 1px solid #ddd; 
	color: #fff;
	font-size:95%;

	-moz-border-radius: 3px;
	-khtml-border-radius: 3px;
	-webkit-border-radius: 3px;
	border-radius: 3px;
}
.road_euro {
	background-color:#479A38;
	border: 1px solid #2f740f;
}
.road_highway {
	background-color:#E9132F;
	border: 1px solid #b13e38;
}
.road_national {
	background-color:#FCD016;
	border: 1px solid #de9700;
	color: #000;
}

#front-page
{
  background:#F9F9F9 url(http://hitchwiki.org/en/images/en/3/3a/Bg.png) repeat scroll 0 0;
}

#front-page h1
{
  padding: 5px 20px;
}

/* fixing monobook, #47 */
.portlet h3 {
   display: none;
}

#column-one h2 {
  visibility: hidden;
}</text>
      <sha1>b03uw2tworzwk1w39zylc9pqijkv558</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>MediaWiki:Monobook.js</title>
    <ns>8</ns>
    <id>6</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1896</id>
      <parentid>6</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>javascript</model>
      <format>text/javascript</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3362">/* tooltips and access keys */
var ta = new Object();
ta['pt-userpage'] = new Array('.','My user page');
ta['pt-anonuserpage'] = new Array('.','The user page for the ip you\'re editing as');
ta['pt-mytalk'] = new Array('n','My talk page');
ta['pt-anontalk'] = new Array('n','Discussion about edits from this ip address');
ta['pt-preferences'] = new Array('','My preferences');
ta['pt-watchlist'] = new Array('l','The list of pages you\'re monitoring for changes.');
ta['pt-mycontris'] = new Array('y','List of my contributions');
ta['pt-login'] = new Array('o','You are encouraged to log in, it is not mandatory however.');
ta['pt-anonlogin'] = new Array('o','You are encouraged to log in, it is not mandatory however.');
ta['pt-logout'] = new Array('o','Log out');
ta['ca-talk'] = new Array('t','Discussion about the content page');
ta['ca-edit'] = new Array('e','You can edit this page. Please use the preview button before saving.');
ta['ca-addsection'] = new Array('+','Add a comment to this discussion.');
ta['ca-viewsource'] = new Array('e','This page is protected. You can view its source.');
ta['ca-history'] = new Array('h','Past versions of this page.');
ta['ca-protect'] = new Array('=','Protect this page');
ta['ca-delete'] = new Array('d','Delete this page');
ta['ca-undelete'] = new Array('d','Restore the edits done to this page before it was deleted');
ta['ca-move'] = new Array('m','Move this page');
ta['ca-watch'] = new Array('w','Add this page to your watchlist');
ta['ca-unwatch'] = new Array('w','Remove this page from your watchlist');
ta['search'] = new Array('f','Search this wiki');
ta['p-logo'] = new Array('','Main Page');
ta['n-mainpage'] = new Array('z','Visit the Main Page');
ta['n-portal'] = new Array('','About the project, what you can do, where to find things');
ta['n-currentevents'] = new Array('','Find background information on current events');
ta['n-recentchanges'] = new Array('r','The list of recent changes in the wiki.');
ta['n-randompage'] = new Array('x','Load a random page');
ta['n-help'] = new Array('','The place to find out.');
ta['n-sitesupport'] = new Array('','Support us');
ta['t-whatlinkshere'] = new Array('j','List of all wiki pages that link here');
ta['t-recentchangeslinked'] = new Array('k','Recent changes in pages linked from this page');
ta['feed-rss'] = new Array('','RSS feed for this page');
ta['feed-atom'] = new Array('','Atom feed for this page');
ta['t-contributions'] = new Array('','View the list of contributions of this user');
ta['t-emailuser'] = new Array('','Send a mail to this user');
ta['t-upload'] = new Array('u','Upload images or media files');
ta['t-specialpages'] = new Array('q','List of all special pages');
ta['ca-nstab-main'] = new Array('c','View the content page');
ta['ca-nstab-user'] = new Array('c','View the user page');
ta['ca-nstab-media'] = new Array('c','View the media page');
ta['ca-nstab-special'] = new Array('','This is a special page, you can\'t edit the page itself.');
ta['ca-nstab-project'] = new Array('a','View the project page');
ta['ca-nstab-image'] = new Array('c','View the image page');
ta['ca-nstab-mediawiki'] = new Array('c','View the system message');
ta['ca-nstab-template'] = new Array('c','View the template');
ta['ca-nstab-help'] = new Array('c','View the help page');
ta['ca-nstab-category'] = new Array('c','View the category page');</text>
      <sha1>ksiuf0pkgjpipkwcq3eqzhkwrdtnn0k</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2803</id>
      <parentid>2802</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-16T09:37:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Splarka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>javascript</model>
      <format>text/javascript</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3579">/* tooltips and access keys */
ta = new Object();
ta['pt-userpage'] = new Array('.','My user page');
ta['pt-anonuserpage'] = new Array('.','The user page for the ip you\'re editing as');
ta['pt-mytalk'] = new Array('n','My talk page');
ta['pt-anontalk'] = new Array('n','Discussion about edits from this ip address');
ta['pt-preferences'] = new Array('','My preferences');
ta['pt-watchlist'] = new Array('l','The list of pages you\'re monitoring for changes.');
ta['pt-mycontris'] = new Array('y','List of my contributions');
ta['pt-login'] = new Array('o','You are encouraged to log in, it is not mandatory however.');
ta['pt-anonlogin'] = new Array('o','You are encouraged to log in, it is not mandatory however.');
ta['pt-logout'] = new Array('o','Log out');
ta['ca-talk'] = new Array('t','Discussion about the content page');
ta['ca-edit'] = new Array('e','You can edit this page. Please use the preview button before saving.');
ta['ca-addsection'] = new Array('+','Add a comment to this discussion.');
ta['ca-viewsource'] = new Array('e','This page is protected. You can view its source.');
ta['ca-history'] = new Array('h','Past versions of this page.');
ta['ca-protect'] = new Array('=','Protect this page');
ta['ca-delete'] = new Array('d','Delete this page');
ta['ca-undelete'] = new Array('d','Restore the edits done to this page before it was deleted');
ta['ca-move'] = new Array('m','Move this page');
ta['ca-watch'] = new Array('w','Add this page to your watchlist');
ta['ca-unwatch'] = new Array('w','Remove this page from your watchlist');
ta['search'] = new Array('f','Search this wiki');
ta['p-logo'] = new Array('','Main Page');
ta['n-mainpage'] = new Array('z','Visit the Main Page');
ta['n-portal'] = new Array('','About the project, what you can do, where to find things');
ta['n-currentevents'] = new Array('','Find background information on current events');
ta['n-recentchanges'] = new Array('r','The list of recent changes in the wiki.');
ta['n-randompage'] = new Array('x','Load a random page');
ta['n-help'] = new Array('','The place to find out.');
ta['n-sitesupport'] = new Array('','Support us');
ta['t-whatlinkshere'] = new Array('j','List of all wiki pages that link here');
ta['t-recentchangeslinked'] = new Array('k','Recent changes in pages linked from this page');
ta['feed-rss'] = new Array('','RSS feed for this page');
ta['feed-atom'] = new Array('','Atom feed for this page');
ta['t-contributions'] = new Array('','View the list of contributions of this user');
ta['t-emailuser'] = new Array('','Send a mail to this user');
ta['t-upload'] = new Array('u','Upload images or media files');
ta['t-specialpages'] = new Array('q','List of all special pages');
ta['ca-nstab-main'] = new Array('c','View the content page');
ta['ca-nstab-user'] = new Array('c','View the user page');
ta['ca-nstab-media'] = new Array('c','View the media page');
ta['ca-nstab-special'] = new Array('','This is a special page, you can\'t edit the page itself.');
ta['ca-nstab-project'] = new Array('a','View the project page');
ta['ca-nstab-image'] = new Array('c','View the image page');
ta['ca-nstab-mediawiki'] = new Array('c','View the system message');
ta['ca-nstab-template'] = new Array('c','View the template');
ta['ca-nstab-help'] = new Array('c','View the help page');
ta['ca-nstab-category'] = new Array('c','View the category page');

if(document.title.indexOf("Main Page - ") == 0) {
    document.write('&lt;style type="text/css"&gt;/*&lt;![CDATA[*/ #p-personal, #lastmod, #siteSub, #contentSub, h1.firstHeading { display: none !important; } /*]]&gt;*/&lt;/style&gt;');
}</text>
      <sha1>5u0w7qcifilweg7wuiohwwesvdh1otw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2804</id>
      <parentid>2803</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-16T10:03:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Splarka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>javascript</model>
      <format>text/javascript</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3606">/* tooltips and access keys */
ta = new Object();
ta['pt-userpage'] = new Array('.','My user page');
ta['pt-anonuserpage'] = new Array('.','The user page for the ip you\'re editing as');
ta['pt-mytalk'] = new Array('n','My talk page');
ta['pt-anontalk'] = new Array('n','Discussion about edits from this ip address');
ta['pt-preferences'] = new Array('','My preferences');
ta['pt-watchlist'] = new Array('l','The list of pages you\'re monitoring for changes.');
ta['pt-mycontris'] = new Array('y','List of my contributions');
ta['pt-login'] = new Array('o','You are encouraged to log in, it is not mandatory however.');
ta['pt-anonlogin'] = new Array('o','You are encouraged to log in, it is not mandatory however.');
ta['pt-logout'] = new Array('o','Log out');
ta['ca-talk'] = new Array('t','Discussion about the content page');
ta['ca-edit'] = new Array('e','You can edit this page. Please use the preview button before saving.');
ta['ca-addsection'] = new Array('+','Add a comment to this discussion.');
ta['ca-viewsource'] = new Array('e','This page is protected. You can view its source.');
ta['ca-history'] = new Array('h','Past versions of this page.');
ta['ca-protect'] = new Array('=','Protect this page');
ta['ca-delete'] = new Array('d','Delete this page');
ta['ca-undelete'] = new Array('d','Restore the edits done to this page before it was deleted');
ta['ca-move'] = new Array('m','Move this page');
ta['ca-watch'] = new Array('w','Add this page to your watchlist');
ta['ca-unwatch'] = new Array('w','Remove this page from your watchlist');
ta['search'] = new Array('f','Search this wiki');
ta['p-logo'] = new Array('','Main Page');
ta['n-mainpage'] = new Array('z','Visit the Main Page');
ta['n-portal'] = new Array('','About the project, what you can do, where to find things');
ta['n-currentevents'] = new Array('','Find background information on current events');
ta['n-recentchanges'] = new Array('r','The list of recent changes in the wiki.');
ta['n-randompage'] = new Array('x','Load a random page');
ta['n-help'] = new Array('','The place to find out.');
ta['n-sitesupport'] = new Array('','Support us');
ta['t-whatlinkshere'] = new Array('j','List of all wiki pages that link here');
ta['t-recentchangeslinked'] = new Array('k','Recent changes in pages linked from this page');
ta['feed-rss'] = new Array('','RSS feed for this page');
ta['feed-atom'] = new Array('','Atom feed for this page');
ta['t-contributions'] = new Array('','View the list of contributions of this user');
ta['t-emailuser'] = new Array('','Send a mail to this user');
ta['t-upload'] = new Array('u','Upload images or media files');
ta['t-specialpages'] = new Array('q','List of all special pages');
ta['ca-nstab-main'] = new Array('c','View the content page');
ta['ca-nstab-user'] = new Array('c','View the user page');
ta['ca-nstab-media'] = new Array('c','View the media page');
ta['ca-nstab-special'] = new Array('','This is a special page, you can\'t edit the page itself.');
ta['ca-nstab-project'] = new Array('a','View the project page');
ta['ca-nstab-image'] = new Array('c','View the image page');
ta['ca-nstab-mediawiki'] = new Array('c','View the system message');
ta['ca-nstab-template'] = new Array('c','View the template');
ta['ca-nstab-help'] = new Array('c','View the help page');
ta['ca-nstab-category'] = new Array('c','View the category page');

if(document.title.indexOf("Main Page - ") == 0) {
    document.write('&lt;style type="text/css"&gt;/*&lt;![CDATA[*/ #p-cactions, #p-personal, #lastmod, #siteSub, #contentSub, h1.firstHeading { display: none } \n #content {top: -2.5em} /*]]&gt;*/&lt;/style&gt;');
}</text>
      <sha1>o0kl47mc0igtpqnusm1m18pgmt2889g</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2805</id>
      <parentid>2804</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-16T10:04:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Splarka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>javascript</model>
      <format>text/javascript</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3617">/* tooltips and access keys */
ta = new Object();
ta['pt-userpage'] = new Array('.','My user page');
ta['pt-anonuserpage'] = new Array('.','The user page for the ip you\'re editing as');
ta['pt-mytalk'] = new Array('n','My talk page');
ta['pt-anontalk'] = new Array('n','Discussion about edits from this ip address');
ta['pt-preferences'] = new Array('','My preferences');
ta['pt-watchlist'] = new Array('l','The list of pages you\'re monitoring for changes.');
ta['pt-mycontris'] = new Array('y','List of my contributions');
ta['pt-login'] = new Array('o','You are encouraged to log in, it is not mandatory however.');
ta['pt-anonlogin'] = new Array('o','You are encouraged to log in, it is not mandatory however.');
ta['pt-logout'] = new Array('o','Log out');
ta['ca-talk'] = new Array('t','Discussion about the content page');
ta['ca-edit'] = new Array('e','You can edit this page. Please use the preview button before saving.');
ta['ca-addsection'] = new Array('+','Add a comment to this discussion.');
ta['ca-viewsource'] = new Array('e','This page is protected. You can view its source.');
ta['ca-history'] = new Array('h','Past versions of this page.');
ta['ca-protect'] = new Array('=','Protect this page');
ta['ca-delete'] = new Array('d','Delete this page');
ta['ca-undelete'] = new Array('d','Restore the edits done to this page before it was deleted');
ta['ca-move'] = new Array('m','Move this page');
ta['ca-watch'] = new Array('w','Add this page to your watchlist');
ta['ca-unwatch'] = new Array('w','Remove this page from your watchlist');
ta['search'] = new Array('f','Search this wiki');
ta['p-logo'] = new Array('','Main Page');
ta['n-mainpage'] = new Array('z','Visit the Main Page');
ta['n-portal'] = new Array('','About the project, what you can do, where to find things');
ta['n-currentevents'] = new Array('','Find background information on current events');
ta['n-recentchanges'] = new Array('r','The list of recent changes in the wiki.');
ta['n-randompage'] = new Array('x','Load a random page');
ta['n-help'] = new Array('','The place to find out.');
ta['n-sitesupport'] = new Array('','Support us');
ta['t-whatlinkshere'] = new Array('j','List of all wiki pages that link here');
ta['t-recentchangeslinked'] = new Array('k','Recent changes in pages linked from this page');
ta['feed-rss'] = new Array('','RSS feed for this page');
ta['feed-atom'] = new Array('','Atom feed for this page');
ta['t-contributions'] = new Array('','View the list of contributions of this user');
ta['t-emailuser'] = new Array('','Send a mail to this user');
ta['t-upload'] = new Array('u','Upload images or media files');
ta['t-specialpages'] = new Array('q','List of all special pages');
ta['ca-nstab-main'] = new Array('c','View the content page');
ta['ca-nstab-user'] = new Array('c','View the user page');
ta['ca-nstab-media'] = new Array('c','View the media page');
ta['ca-nstab-special'] = new Array('','This is a special page, you can\'t edit the page itself.');
ta['ca-nstab-project'] = new Array('a','View the project page');
ta['ca-nstab-image'] = new Array('c','View the image page');
ta['ca-nstab-mediawiki'] = new Array('c','View the system message');
ta['ca-nstab-template'] = new Array('c','View the template');
ta['ca-nstab-help'] = new Array('c','View the help page');
ta['ca-nstab-category'] = new Array('c','View the category page');

if(document.title.indexOf("Main Page - ") == 0) {
    document.write('&lt;style type="text/css"&gt;/*&lt;![CDATA[*/ #p-cactions, #p-personal, #lastmod, #siteSub, #contentSub, h1.firstHeading { display: none !important } \n #content {top: -2.5em} /*]]&gt;*/&lt;/style&gt;');
}</text>
      <sha1>quz8f60np2vd8w819hcyo5guknqsb4x</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2806</id>
      <parentid>1896</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T13:17:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>javascript</model>
      <format>text/javascript</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3362">/* tooltips and access keys */
var ta = new Object();
ta['pt-userpage'] = new Array('.','My user page');
ta['pt-anonuserpage'] = new Array('.','The user page for the ip you\'re editing as');
ta['pt-mytalk'] = new Array('n','My talk page');
ta['pt-anontalk'] = new Array('n','Discussion about edits from this ip address');
ta['pt-preferences'] = new Array('','My preferences');
ta['pt-watchlist'] = new Array('l','The list of pages you\'re monitoring for changes.');
ta['pt-mycontris'] = new Array('y','List of my contributions');
ta['pt-login'] = new Array('o','You are encouraged to log in, it is not mandatory however.');
ta['pt-anonlogin'] = new Array('o','You are encouraged to log in, it is not mandatory however.');
ta['pt-logout'] = new Array('o','Log out');
ta['ca-talk'] = new Array('t','Discussion about the content page');
ta['ca-edit'] = new Array('e','You can edit this page. Please use the preview button before saving.');
ta['ca-addsection'] = new Array('+','Add a comment to this discussion.');
ta['ca-viewsource'] = new Array('e','This page is protected. You can view its source.');
ta['ca-history'] = new Array('h','Past versions of this page.');
ta['ca-protect'] = new Array('=','Protect this page');
ta['ca-delete'] = new Array('d','Delete this page');
ta['ca-undelete'] = new Array('d','Restore the edits done to this page before it was deleted');
ta['ca-move'] = new Array('m','Move this page');
ta['ca-watch'] = new Array('w','Add this page to your watchlist');
ta['ca-unwatch'] = new Array('w','Remove this page from your watchlist');
ta['search'] = new Array('f','Search this wiki');
ta['p-logo'] = new Array('','Main Page');
ta['n-mainpage'] = new Array('z','Visit the Main Page');
ta['n-portal'] = new Array('','About the project, what you can do, where to find things');
ta['n-currentevents'] = new Array('','Find background information on current events');
ta['n-recentchanges'] = new Array('r','The list of recent changes in the wiki.');
ta['n-randompage'] = new Array('x','Load a random page');
ta['n-help'] = new Array('','The place to find out.');
ta['n-sitesupport'] = new Array('','Support us');
ta['t-whatlinkshere'] = new Array('j','List of all wiki pages that link here');
ta['t-recentchangeslinked'] = new Array('k','Recent changes in pages linked from this page');
ta['feed-rss'] = new Array('','RSS feed for this page');
ta['feed-atom'] = new Array('','Atom feed for this page');
ta['t-contributions'] = new Array('','View the list of contributions of this user');
ta['t-emailuser'] = new Array('','Send a mail to this user');
ta['t-upload'] = new Array('u','Upload images or media files');
ta['t-specialpages'] = new Array('q','List of all special pages');
ta['ca-nstab-main'] = new Array('c','View the content page');
ta['ca-nstab-user'] = new Array('c','View the user page');
ta['ca-nstab-media'] = new Array('c','View the media page');
ta['ca-nstab-special'] = new Array('','This is a special page, you can\'t edit the page itself.');
ta['ca-nstab-project'] = new Array('a','View the project page');
ta['ca-nstab-image'] = new Array('c','View the image page');
ta['ca-nstab-mediawiki'] = new Array('c','View the system message');
ta['ca-nstab-template'] = new Array('c','View the template');
ta['ca-nstab-help'] = new Array('c','View the help page');
ta['ca-nstab-category'] = new Array('c','View the category page');</text>
      <sha1>ksiuf0pkgjpipkwcq3eqzhkwrdtnn0k</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>5169</id>
      <parentid>2806</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:21:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>javascript</model>
      <format>text/javascript</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3362">/* tooltips and access keys */
var ta = new Object();
ta['pt-userpage'] = new Array('.','My user page');
ta['pt-anonuserpage'] = new Array('.','The user page for the ip you\'re editing as');
ta['pt-mytalk'] = new Array('n','My talk page');
ta['pt-anontalk'] = new Array('n','Discussion about edits from this ip address');
ta['pt-preferences'] = new Array('','My preferences');
ta['pt-watchlist'] = new Array('l','The list of pages you\'re monitoring for changes.');
ta['pt-mycontris'] = new Array('y','List of my contributions');
ta['pt-login'] = new Array('o','You are encouraged to log in, it is not mandatory however.');
ta['pt-anonlogin'] = new Array('o','You are encouraged to log in, it is not mandatory however.');
ta['pt-logout'] = new Array('o','Log out');
ta['ca-talk'] = new Array('t','Discussion about the content page');
ta['ca-edit'] = new Array('e','You can edit this page. Please use the preview button before saving.');
ta['ca-addsection'] = new Array('+','Add a comment to this discussion.');
ta['ca-viewsource'] = new Array('e','This page is protected. You can view its source.');
ta['ca-history'] = new Array('h','Past versions of this page.');
ta['ca-protect'] = new Array('=','Protect this page');
ta['ca-delete'] = new Array('d','Delete this page');
ta['ca-undelete'] = new Array('d','Restore the edits done to this page before it was deleted');
ta['ca-move'] = new Array('m','Move this page');
ta['ca-watch'] = new Array('w','Add this page to your watchlist');
ta['ca-unwatch'] = new Array('w','Remove this page from your watchlist');
ta['search'] = new Array('f','Search this wiki');
ta['p-logo'] = new Array('','Main Page');
ta['n-mainpage'] = new Array('z','Visit the Main Page');
ta['n-portal'] = new Array('','About the project, what you can do, where to find things');
ta['n-currentevents'] = new Array('','Find background information on current events');
ta['n-recentchanges'] = new Array('r','The list of recent changes in the wiki.');
ta['n-randompage'] = new Array('x','Load a random page');
ta['n-help'] = new Array('','The place to find out.');
ta['n-sitesupport'] = new Array('','Support us');
ta['t-whatlinkshere'] = new Array('j','List of all wiki pages that link here');
ta['t-recentchangeslinked'] = new Array('k','Recent changes in pages linked from this page');
ta['feed-rss'] = new Array('','RSS feed for this page');
ta['feed-atom'] = new Array('','Atom feed for this page');
ta['t-contributions'] = new Array('','View the list of contributions of this user');
ta['t-emailuser'] = new Array('','Send a mail to this user');
ta['t-upload'] = new Array('u','Upload images or media files');
ta['t-specialpages'] = new Array('q','List of all special pages');
ta['ca-nstab-main'] = new Array('c','View the content page');
ta['ca-nstab-user'] = new Array('c','View the user page');
ta['ca-nstab-media'] = new Array('c','View the media page');
ta['ca-nstab-special'] = new Array('','This is a special page, you can\'t edit the page itself.');
ta['ca-nstab-project'] = new Array('a','View the project page');
ta['ca-nstab-image'] = new Array('c','View the image page');
ta['ca-nstab-mediawiki'] = new Array('c','View the system message');
ta['ca-nstab-template'] = new Array('c','View the template');
ta['ca-nstab-help'] = new Array('c','View the help page');
ta['ca-nstab-category'] = new Array('c','View the category page');</text>
      <sha1>ksiuf0pkgjpipkwcq3eqzhkwrdtnn0k</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11582</id>
      <parentid>5169</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-06-09T21:07:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zac Stewart</username>
        <id>5</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>javascript</model>
      <format>text/javascript</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3470">/* tooltips and access keys */
var ta = new Object();
ta['pt-userpage'] = new Array('.','My user page');
ta['pt-anonuserpage'] = new Array('.','The user page for the ip you\'re editing as');
ta['pt-mytalk'] = new Array('n','My talk page');
ta['pt-anontalk'] = new Array('n','Discussion about edits from this ip address');
ta['pt-preferences'] = new Array('','My preferences');
ta['pt-watchlist'] = new Array('l','The list of pages you\'re monitoring for changes.');
ta['pt-mycontris'] = new Array('y','List of my contributions');
ta['pt-login'] = new Array('o','You are encouraged to log in, it is not mandatory however.');
ta['pt-anonlogin'] = new Array('o','You are encouraged to log in, it is not mandatory however.');
ta['pt-logout'] = new Array('o','Log out');
ta['ca-talk'] = new Array('t','Discussion about the content page');
ta['ca-edit'] = new Array('e','You can edit this page. Please use the preview button before saving.');
ta['ca-addsection'] = new Array('+','Add a comment to this discussion.');
ta['ca-viewsource'] = new Array('e','This page is protected. You can view its source.');
ta['ca-history'] = new Array('h','Past versions of this page.');
ta['ca-protect'] = new Array('=','Protect this page');
ta['ca-delete'] = new Array('d','Delete this page');
ta['ca-undelete'] = new Array('d','Restore the edits done to this page before it was deleted');
ta['ca-move'] = new Array('m','Move this page');
ta['ca-watch'] = new Array('w','Add this page to your watchlist');
ta['ca-unwatch'] = new Array('w','Remove this page from your watchlist');
ta['search'] = new Array('f','Search this wiki');
ta['p-logo'] = new Array('','Main Page');
ta['n-mainpage'] = new Array('z','Visit the Main Page');
ta['n-portal'] = new Array('','About the project, what you can do, where to find things');
ta['n-currentevents'] = new Array('','Find background information on current events');
ta['n-recentchanges'] = new Array('r','The list of recent changes in the wiki.');
ta['n-randompage'] = new Array('x','Load a random page');
ta['n-help'] = new Array('','The place to find out.');
ta['n-sitesupport'] = new Array('','Support us');
ta['t-whatlinkshere'] = new Array('j','List of all wiki pages that link here');
ta['t-recentchangeslinked'] = new Array('k','Recent changes in pages linked from this page');
ta['feed-rss'] = new Array('','RSS feed for this page');
ta['feed-atom'] = new Array('','Atom feed for this page');
ta['t-contributions'] = new Array('','View the list of contributions of this user');
ta['t-emailuser'] = new Array('','Send a mail to this user');
ta['t-upload'] = new Array('u','Upload images or media files');
ta['t-specialpages'] = new Array('q','List of all special pages');
ta['ca-nstab-main'] = new Array('c','View the content page');
ta['ca-nstab-user'] = new Array('c','View the user page');
ta['ca-nstab-media'] = new Array('c','View the media page');
ta['ca-nstab-special'] = new Array('','This is a special page, you can\'t edit the page itself.');
ta['ca-nstab-project'] = new Array('a','View the project page');
ta['ca-nstab-image'] = new Array('c','View the image page');
ta['ca-nstab-mediawiki'] = new Array('c','View the system message');
ta['ca-nstab-template'] = new Array('c','View the template');
ta['ca-nstab-help'] = new Array('c','View the help page');
ta['ca-nstab-category'] = new Array('c','View the category page');
addButton('imageurl','mouseover message','leftside','rightside','highlighted middle','mw-editbutton-bold');</text>
      <sha1>j6g7nqutdbnhbk8uthmx8py50hi80gv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11583</id>
      <parentid>11582</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-06-09T21:10:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zac Stewart</username>
        <id>5</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>javascript</model>
      <format>text/javascript</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3362">/* tooltips and access keys */
var ta = new Object();
ta['pt-userpage'] = new Array('.','My user page');
ta['pt-anonuserpage'] = new Array('.','The user page for the ip you\'re editing as');
ta['pt-mytalk'] = new Array('n','My talk page');
ta['pt-anontalk'] = new Array('n','Discussion about edits from this ip address');
ta['pt-preferences'] = new Array('','My preferences');
ta['pt-watchlist'] = new Array('l','The list of pages you\'re monitoring for changes.');
ta['pt-mycontris'] = new Array('y','List of my contributions');
ta['pt-login'] = new Array('o','You are encouraged to log in, it is not mandatory however.');
ta['pt-anonlogin'] = new Array('o','You are encouraged to log in, it is not mandatory however.');
ta['pt-logout'] = new Array('o','Log out');
ta['ca-talk'] = new Array('t','Discussion about the content page');
ta['ca-edit'] = new Array('e','You can edit this page. Please use the preview button before saving.');
ta['ca-addsection'] = new Array('+','Add a comment to this discussion.');
ta['ca-viewsource'] = new Array('e','This page is protected. You can view its source.');
ta['ca-history'] = new Array('h','Past versions of this page.');
ta['ca-protect'] = new Array('=','Protect this page');
ta['ca-delete'] = new Array('d','Delete this page');
ta['ca-undelete'] = new Array('d','Restore the edits done to this page before it was deleted');
ta['ca-move'] = new Array('m','Move this page');
ta['ca-watch'] = new Array('w','Add this page to your watchlist');
ta['ca-unwatch'] = new Array('w','Remove this page from your watchlist');
ta['search'] = new Array('f','Search this wiki');
ta['p-logo'] = new Array('','Main Page');
ta['n-mainpage'] = new Array('z','Visit the Main Page');
ta['n-portal'] = new Array('','About the project, what you can do, where to find things');
ta['n-currentevents'] = new Array('','Find background information on current events');
ta['n-recentchanges'] = new Array('r','The list of recent changes in the wiki.');
ta['n-randompage'] = new Array('x','Load a random page');
ta['n-help'] = new Array('','The place to find out.');
ta['n-sitesupport'] = new Array('','Support us');
ta['t-whatlinkshere'] = new Array('j','List of all wiki pages that link here');
ta['t-recentchangeslinked'] = new Array('k','Recent changes in pages linked from this page');
ta['feed-rss'] = new Array('','RSS feed for this page');
ta['feed-atom'] = new Array('','Atom feed for this page');
ta['t-contributions'] = new Array('','View the list of contributions of this user');
ta['t-emailuser'] = new Array('','Send a mail to this user');
ta['t-upload'] = new Array('u','Upload images or media files');
ta['t-specialpages'] = new Array('q','List of all special pages');
ta['ca-nstab-main'] = new Array('c','View the content page');
ta['ca-nstab-user'] = new Array('c','View the user page');
ta['ca-nstab-media'] = new Array('c','View the media page');
ta['ca-nstab-special'] = new Array('','This is a special page, you can\'t edit the page itself.');
ta['ca-nstab-project'] = new Array('a','View the project page');
ta['ca-nstab-image'] = new Array('c','View the image page');
ta['ca-nstab-mediawiki'] = new Array('c','View the system message');
ta['ca-nstab-template'] = new Array('c','View the template');
ta['ca-nstab-help'] = new Array('c','View the help page');
ta['ca-nstab-category'] = new Array('c','View the category page');</text>
      <sha1>ksiuf0pkgjpipkwcq3eqzhkwrdtnn0k</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>MediaWiki:Disambiguationspage</title>
    <ns>8</ns>
    <id>224</id>
    <revision>
      <id>2262</id>
      <parentid>224</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17">Template:disambig</text>
      <sha1>e8tfpcdyt9q4wd8ijpdj8i4kf552nvm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>3201</id>
      <parentid>2262</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T13:18:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17">Template:disambig</text>
      <sha1>e8tfpcdyt9q4wd8ijpdj8i4kf552nvm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12065</id>
      <parentid>3201</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-03T12:18:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="32">[[Frankfurt]]

Template:disambig</text>
      <sha1>j838s3e4e8h4pdb2z5udafs4a7hpp6k</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12067</id>
      <parentid>12065</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-03T12:28:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="94">[[Image:Disambig.png]]
This disambiguation page lists articles associated with the same title.</text>
      <sha1>08k18dlyph8pyhuzkabh4c4dtk4rs9m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13468</id>
      <parentid>12067</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-06T11:38:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="123">[[Frankfurt]]
[[A1]]
[[A2]]

[[Image:Disambig.png]]
This disambiguation page lists articles associated with the same title.</text>
      <sha1>kmcjeslpeaysefzo2vdjlo27j4rnic0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13878</id>
      <parentid>13468</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-16T19:36:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12">{{disambig}}</text>
      <sha1>aaaf2ox8pxglehv0fydqmgl1xpkqzsy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>49338</id>
      <parentid>13878</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-02-08T12:54:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12">{{Disambig}}</text>
      <sha1>dewt0x8xlsyfil5qsmq171dqzq92l8g</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>49339</id>
      <parentid>49338</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-02-08T12:55:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="36">{{Disambig}}
* [[Template:Disambig]]</text>
      <sha1>cvyk2i4cvvlkf7q9muex5tz3zo0k4o6</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>MediaWiki:Disclaimerpage</title>
    <ns>8</ns>
    <id>226</id>
    <revision>
      <id>2266</id>
      <parentid>226</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="26">Project:General_disclaimer</text>
      <sha1>g2mfmfe3zhnp2dp04op9m8z3otl5z95</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>3205</id>
      <parentid>2266</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T13:18:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="26">Project:General_disclaimer</text>
      <sha1>g2mfmfe3zhnp2dp04op9m8z3otl5z95</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>5247</id>
      <parentid>3205</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:21:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="26">Project:General_disclaimer</text>
      <sha1>g2mfmfe3zhnp2dp04op9m8z3otl5z95</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11835</id>
      <parentid>5247</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-06-21T12:59:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20">Project:Legal_Notice</text>
      <sha1>t7o2ecnph2ucb9ung93xzedp570loja</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>MediaWiki:Disclaimers</title>
    <ns>8</ns>
    <id>227</id>
    <revision>
      <id>2268</id>
      <parentid>227</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11">Disclaimers</text>
      <sha1>5842lzstlns63tdttvjcdtis2a9qovt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2761</id>
      <timestamp>2004-12-22T17:53:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Angela</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1">-</text>
      <sha1>6za6z27cqk2qatlebqsiz85czbjf3rd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>2762</id>
      <parentid>2268</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T13:17:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11">Disclaimers</text>
      <sha1>5842lzstlns63tdttvjcdtis2a9qovt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11834</id>
      <parentid>2762</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-06-21T12:58:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12">Legal Notice</text>
      <sha1>c65nv0fe9kpwwm097hbwkpihwy06edn</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>MediaWiki:Newarticletext</title>
    <ns>8</ns>
    <id>857</id>
    <revision>
      <id>5953</id>
      <parentid>857</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:37:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="239">You've followed a link to a page that doesn't exist yet.
To create the page, start typing in the box below
(see the [[{{ns:help}}:Contents|help page]] for more info).
If you are here by mistake, just click your browser's '''back''' button.</text>
      <sha1>c0y5amoy3dll57tkm62ostyk7mx6y4o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13074</id>
      <parentid>5953</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-19T20:06:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="409">You've followed a link to a page that doesn't exist yet.
To create the page, start typing in the box below
(see the [[{{ns:help}}:Contents|help page]] for more info).
If you are here by mistake, just click your browser's '''back''' button.

If you want to create an article about a city, you can use [http://www.hitchwiki.org/index.php?action=edit&amp;title={{FULLPAGENAMEE}}&amp;preload=Template:City This template].</text>
      <sha1>1yo3ulvoc0itn9gor2s0be2l5u4fwwy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15255</id>
      <parentid>13074</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-31T18:41:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="414">You've followed a link to a page that doesn't exist yet.
To create the page, start typing in the box below
(see the [[{{ns:help}}:Contents|help page]] for more info).
If you are here by mistake, just click your browser's '''back''' button.

'''If you want to create an article about a city, you can use [http://en.hitchwiki.org/index.php?action=edit&amp;title={{FULLPAGENAMEE}}&amp;preload=Template:City This template].'''</text>
      <sha1>e7fx7lbw51oqz43dr2e2efxt9yoptzj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>47991</id>
      <parentid>15255</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-02T18:44:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="414">You've followed a link to a page that doesn't exist yet.
To create the page, start typing in the box below
(see the [[{{ns:help}}:Contents|help page]] for more info).
If you are here by mistake, just click your browser's '''back''' button.

'''If you want to create an article about a city, you can use [http://hitchwiki.org/en/index.php?action=edit&amp;title={{FULLPAGENAMEE}}&amp;preload=Template:City This template].'''</text>
      <sha1>41n22u83300u87fy2gwvas0nds8k778</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>MediaWiki:Otherlanguages</title>
    <ns>8</ns>
    <id>957</id>
    <revision>
      <id>6133</id>
      <parentid>957</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:37:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="18">In other languages</text>
      <sha1>ig34ufiiy8rcbge96gb06li087araq5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9149</id>
      <parentid>6133</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-24T02:43:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10">Also check</text>
      <sha1>9itw7szjfbjqvttjqeybxfei043dkyc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104894</id>
      <parentid>9149</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-11-01T13:47:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="18">In other languages</text>
      <sha1>ig34ufiiy8rcbge96gb06li087araq5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104895</id>
      <parentid>104894</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-11-01T13:47:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15">Other languages</text>
      <sha1>f1rzgx3lz60vr2mtck4fc9xpga5h917</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>MediaWiki:Recentchangestext</title>
    <ns>8</ns>
    <id>1064</id>
    <revision>
      <id>6326</id>
      <parentid>6325</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-02-15T01:02:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="120">Track the most recent changes to the wiki on this page.

Currently there are {{NUMBEROFARTICLES}} articles in this wiki.</text>
      <sha1>hsjfaeyp2lhqjx9rzwktbnyo1yl4liz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>6327</id>
      <parentid>6326</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-02-15T01:02:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="122">Track the most recent changes to the wiki on this page.

Currently this wiki contains '''{{NUMBEROFARTICLES}}''' articles.</text>
      <sha1>jiefcqcgcxcphzc71bhwfgrkwhnby39</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>6328</id>
      <parentid>1064</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:37:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="55">Track the most recent changes to the wiki on this page.</text>
      <sha1>ts0qsodfz2oh5l5yd2tqxzuhtld6b13</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9181</id>
      <parentid>6328</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-24T04:41:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="115">Track the most recent changes to the wiki on this page.

Currently we are working on {{NUMBEROFARTICLES}} articles.</text>
      <sha1>joniywmptuoxks8uxc8tb07oji90pb0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13253</id>
      <parentid>9181</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-28T19:48:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="146">Track the most recent changes to the wiki on this page.

Currently we are working on {{NUMBEROFARTICLES}} articles.

[[es:Especial:Recentchanges]]</text>
      <sha1>35twtdsuya2u05dyrqxyx64u82fplgs</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13528</id>
      <parentid>13253</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-10T09:58:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="203">Track the most recent changes to the wiki on this page.

Currently we are working on {{NUMBEROFARTICLES}} articles.

[[es:Special:Recentchanges]]
[[fr:Special:Recentchanges]]
[[de:Special:Recentchanges]]</text>
      <sha1>d9ygejw1j9jjqalcdagz544785wwkte</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18727</id>
      <parentid>13528</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-04T10:33:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="232">Track the most recent changes to the wiki on this page.

Currently we are working on {{NUMBEROFARTICLES}} articles.

[[es:Special:Recentchanges]]
[[fr:Special:Recentchanges]]
[[de:Special:Recentchanges]]
[[ru:Special:Recentchanges]]</text>
      <sha1>kbtfmdnwaxn9zrcs94tlr8enrwhjvte</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>20571</id>
      <parentid>18727</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-11T13:59:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="267">Track the most recent changes to the wiki on this page.

Currently we are working on {{NUMBEROFARTICLES}} articles.

[[es:Special:Recentchanges]]
[[fr:Special:Recentchanges]]
[[de:Special:Recentchanges]]
[[ru:Special:Recentchanges]]
[[fi:Toiminnot:Tuoreet_muutokset]]</text>
      <sha1>omvgszzjkutnhaz6hn4xn6k4amz5fld</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23046</id>
      <parentid>20571</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-30T14:00:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="297">Track the most recent changes to the wiki on this page.

Currently we are working on {{NUMBEROFARTICLES}} articles.

[[es:Special:Recentchanges]]
[[fr:Special:Recentchanges]]
[[de:Special:Recentchanges]]
[[ru:Special:Recentchanges]]
[[fi:Toiminnot:Tuoreet_muutokset]]
[[pt:Especial:Recentchanges]]</text>
      <sha1>1z6zrnywaz2r1b7354ydnib7wtr6b3a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29785</id>
      <parentid>23046</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-08T10:01:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="355">Track the most recent changes to the wiki on this page.

Currently we are working on {{NUMBEROFARTICLES}} articles.

[[es:Special:Recentchanges]]
[[fr:Special:Recentchanges]]
[[de:Special:Recentchanges]]
[[ru:Special:Recentchanges]]
[[fi:Toiminnot:Tuoreet_muutokset]]
[[pt:Especial:Recentchanges]]
[[bg:Специални:Последни_промени]]</text>
      <sha1>ki480v5wt2owiazh1lf4ge4sbwfh0u3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>34444</id>
      <parentid>29785</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-09T09:38:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="326">Track the most recent changes to the wiki on this page.

Currently we are working on {{NUMBEROFARTICLES}} articles.

[[es:Special:Recentchanges]]
[[fr:Special:Recentchanges]]
[[de:Special:Recentchanges]]
[[ru:Special:Recentchanges]]
[[fi:Toiminnot:Tuoreet_muutokset]]
[[pt:Especial:Recentchanges]]
[[zh:Special:RecentChanges]]</text>
      <sha1>cyb5o8q5x259ej5hgq74zn3twsg4j1z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35761</id>
      <parentid>34444</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-13T13:00:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="417">Track the most recent changes to the wiki on this page.

Currently we are working on {{NUMBEROFARTICLES}} articles.

[[es:Special:Recentchanges]]
[[fr:Special:Recentchanges]]
[[de:Special:Recentchanges]]
[[ru:Special:Recentchanges]]
[[bg:Специални:Последни_промени]]
[[fi:Toiminnot:Tuoreet_muutokset]]
[[pt:Especial:Recentchanges]]
[[pl:Specjalna:Ostatnie_zmiany]]
[[zh:Special:RecentChanges]]</text>
      <sha1>s605a0akmk4qhauiencvw6qvf391wff</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>64023</id>
      <parentid>35761</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-09-23T15:58:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="564">Track the most recent changes to the wiki on this page.

Currently we are working on {{NUMBEROFARTICLES}} articles.

[[es:Special:Recentchanges]]
[[fr:Special:Recentchanges]]
[[de:Special:Recentchanges]]
[[ru:Special:Recentchanges]]
[[bg:Специални:Последни_промени]]
[[fi:Toiminnot:Tuoreet_muutokset]]
[[pt:Especial:Recentchanges]]
[[pl:Specjalna:Ostatnie_zmiany]]
[[zh:Special:RecentChanges]]
[[tr:Özel:SonDeğişiklikler]]
[[nl:Speciaal:RecenteWijzigingen]]
[[he:מיוחד:שינויים_אחרונים]]
[[hr:Posebno:Nedavne_promjene]]</text>
      <sha1>ajy7j9ndyvuri3hjypadmr6f47y83ym</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>MediaWiki:Sidebar</title>
    <ns>8</ns>
    <id>1175</id>
    <revision>
      <id>6500</id>
      <parentid>1175</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:37:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="202">
* navigation
** mainpage|mainpage
** portal-url|portal
** currentevents-url|currentevents
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges
** randompage-url|randompage
** helppage|help
** sitesupport-url|sitesupport</text>
      <sha1>kiff4i6ocr16dlm7r6dbpezdn3zaw6l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9234</id>
      <parentid>6500</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-26T12:30:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="198">* navigation
** mainpage|mainpage
** portal-url|portal
** Hitchnews|Hitchnews
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges
** randompage-url|randompage
** helppage|help
&lt;!-- ** sitesupport-url|sitesupport --&gt;</text>
      <sha1>0qz3y498vwuscl22fxf9m98uunmjla2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11761</id>
      <parentid>9234</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-06-19T17:13:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="189">* navigation
** mainpage|mainpage
** portal-url|portal
** Hitchnews|Hitchnews
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges
** randompage-url|randompage
** helppage|help
** sitesupport-url|sitesupport</text>
      <sha1>l03i1crvezmyb0ejmv9hwbullz5zni1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11829</id>
      <parentid>11761</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-06-21T09:13:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="218">* navigation
** mainpage|mainpage
** portal-url|portal
** Hitchnews|Hitchnews
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges
** randompage-url|randompage
** helppage|help
** sitesupport-url|sitesupport
** Legal Notice|Legal Notice</text>
      <sha1>80iaffx3dk9tylkkq2ngykl7r0ztfn6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11836</id>
      <parentid>11829</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-06-21T13:00:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="189">* navigation
** mainpage|mainpage
** portal-url|portal
** Hitchnews|Hitchnews
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges
** randompage-url|randompage
** helppage|help
** sitesupport-url|sitesupport</text>
      <sha1>l03i1crvezmyb0ejmv9hwbullz5zni1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11889</id>
      <parentid>11836</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-06-25T18:49:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="267">* navigation
** mainpage|mainpage
** portal-url|portal
** Hitchnews|Hitchnews
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges
** randompage-url|randompage
** helppage|help
** sitesupport-url|sitesupport

* test
** General info
** Top Tips
** Where
** Safety
** Signs
** First time</text>
      <sha1>703shml2ojpbcg6p27i8o3sjsjzzixn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11890</id>
      <parentid>11889</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-06-25T18:50:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="319">* navigation
** mainpage|mainpage
** portal-url|portal
** Hitchnews|Hitchnews
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges
** randompage-url|randompage
** helppage|help
** sitesupport-url|sitesupport

* test
** General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Where|Where
** Safety|Safety
** Signs|Signs
** First time|First time</text>
      <sha1>6b5bz1iz35sy3resspmq50m92ypgkao</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12407</id>
      <parentid>11890</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-25T11:32:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="368">* navigation
** mainpage|mainpage
** portal-url|portal
** Hitchnews|Hitchnews
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges
** randompage-url|randompage
** helppage|help
** sitesupport-url|sitesupport

* test
** General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Where|Where
** Safety|Safety
** Signs|Signs
** First time|First time
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers</text>
      <sha1>l94k8jor4b94upgg8pysktacl46g2hp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13261</id>
      <parentid>12407</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-29T12:54:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="286">* navigation
** mainpage|Home
** portal-url|Talk to us
** Hitchnews|News
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges

* test
** General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Where|Where
** Safety|Safety
** Signs|Signs
** First time|First time
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers</text>
      <sha1>l83oee8vdph9qthfa8yy8c38mogpe3m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13301</id>
      <parentid>13261</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-30T07:58:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="315">* navigation
** mainpage|Home
** portal-url|Talk to us
** Hitchnews|News
** randompage-url|randompage
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges

* test
** General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Where|Where
** Safety|Safety
** Signs|Signs
** First time|First time
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers</text>
      <sha1>9i5ll28zcc0ghj98brbmn8ane2qkk6t</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14488</id>
      <parentid>13301</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-08T13:55:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="328">* navigation
** mainpage|Home
** Hitchnews|News
** portal-url|Talk to us
** Chat|Chat
** randompage-url|randompage
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges

* info
** General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Where|Where
** Safety|Safety
** Signs|Signs
** First time|First time
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers</text>
      <sha1>qpd8m5ne0kycv9u0360cl6o17uti0p0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26199</id>
      <parentid>14488</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-14T11:28:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="334">* navigation
** mainpage|Home
** Hitchnews|News
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Chat|Chat
** randompage-url|randompage
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges

* info
** General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Where|Where
** Safety|Safety
** Signs|Signs
** First time|First time
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers</text>
      <sha1>fh3r6ws93vltz5jm3xd54gde64uosdh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>28169</id>
      <parentid>26199</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-26T23:45:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robino</username>
        <id>4</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="343">* navigation
** mainpage|Home
** Hitchnews|News
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Chat|Chat
** randompage-url|randompage
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges

* info
** Category:General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Where|Where
** Safety|Safety
** Signs|Signs
** First time|First time
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers</text>
      <sha1>o2pohwsoh74s1f7ebnt174ecu437s3h</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29002</id>
      <parentid>28169</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-09T23:42:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="365">* navigation
** mainpage|Home
** Hitchnews|News
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Chat|Chat
** Help:Contents|Help
** randompage-url|randompage
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges

* info
** Category:General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Where|Where
** Safety|Safety
** Signs|Signs
** First time|First time
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers</text>
      <sha1>c8r785pux60y3i5rpkb43lbkj5g8cy6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30290</id>
      <parentid>29002</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-19T16:22:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="157">* mainpage|Home
* Hitchnews|News
* portal-url|Community Portal
* Chat|Chat
* Help:Contents|Help
* randompage-url|randompage
* recentchanges-url|recentchanges</text>
      <sha1>cr0piuqfm7a5sz5e7eg1f5wmrj58pp3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30291</id>
      <parentid>30290</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-19T16:22:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="164">** mainpage|Home
** Hitchnews|News
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Chat|Chat
** Help:Contents|Help
** randompage-url|randompage
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges</text>
      <sha1>0k7vm4ctjjfyioi0ociydfd4o1euu7c</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31269</id>
      <parentid>30291</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-24T20:51:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="350">** mainpage|Home
** Hitchnews|News
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Chat|Chat
** Help:Contents|Help
** randompage-url|randompage
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges

** Category:General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips	
** Where|Where	
** Safety|Safety	
** Signs|Signs	
** First time|First time	
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers</text>
      <sha1>m3vnvjnjf8yi2wbdvu2xqtnsg310evq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31270</id>
      <parentid>31269</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-24T20:51:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="356">** mainpage|Home
** Hitchnews|News
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Chat|Chat
** Help:Contents|Help
** randompage-url|randompage
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges

*info
** Category:General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips	
** Where|Where	
** Safety|Safety	
** Signs|Signs	
** First time|First time	
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers</text>
      <sha1>ah2la2949iem5v571qsbm1n46qiqt2j</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39941</id>
      <parentid>31270</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-05T11:28:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="366">* SEARCH

** mainpage|Home
** Hitchnews|News
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Chat|Chat
** Help:Contents|Help
** randompage-url|randompage
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges

*info
** Category:General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips	
** Where|Where	
** Safety|Safety	
** Signs|Signs	
** First time|First time	
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers</text>
      <sha1>6k0wciy7ff5ysdy8h8o9ydhkrifjpxk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39945</id>
      <parentid>39941</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-05T12:35:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="379">* SEARCH

* navigation
** mainpage|Home
** Hitchnews|News
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Chat|Chat
** Help:Contents|Help
** randompage-url|randompage
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges

*info
** Category:General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips	
** Where|Where	
** Safety|Safety	
** Signs|Signs	
** First time|First time	
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers</text>
      <sha1>lqx27nocdfx9oz21hithmi1ikmpmstx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48219</id>
      <parentid>39945</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-16T09:58:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="389">* SEARCH

* navigation
** mainpage|Home
** Hitchnews|News
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Hitchwiki:Chat|Chat
** Help:Contents|Help
** randompage-url|randompage
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges

*info
** Category:General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips	
** Where|Where	
** Safety|Safety	
** Signs|Signs	
** First time|First time	
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers</text>
      <sha1>rtwjlg3g69z2kl28469dlr148esncga</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>60305</id>
      <parentid>48219</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-03-30T18:22:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="401">* SEARCH

* navigation
** mainpage|Home
** Hitchnews|News
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Hitchwiki:Chat|Chat
** Help:Contents|Help
** randompage-url|randompage
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges

*info
** Category:General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips	
** Where|Where	
** Safety|Safety	
** Signs|Signs	
** First time hitchhiking|First time	
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers</text>
      <sha1>4z39hwpz8ctxyxq6ctbiqjzrtehtwli</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>64812</id>
      <parentid>60305</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-10-01T15:56:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="789">*How to hitchhike
** Category:General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips	
** Where|Where	
** Safety|Safety	
** Signs|Signs	
** First time hitchhiking|First time	
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers

*Places to go
** Africa|Africa 
** Asia|Asia 
** Australasia &amp; Oceania|Australasia &amp; Oceania 
** Europe|Europe
** Middle East|Middle East 
** North America|North America 
** South America|South America 
** Central America &amp; Caribbean|Central America &amp; Caribbean
**http://hitchwiki.org/maps/|Browse places on map

*Hitchwiki
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
**http://hitchwiki.org/contact/|Contact us
**http://hitchwiki.org/developers/|Developers blog
** randompage-url|randompage
** currentevents-url|currentevents
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges</text>
      <sha1>alxyi1rj2e2mw17qo6akpekndy6d3iv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>89672</id>
      <parentid>64812</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-10-09T22:59:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Traumschule</username>
        <id>28627</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="771">*How to hitchhike
** Category:General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips	
** Where|Where	
** Safety|Safety	
** Signs|Signs	
** First time hitchhiking|First time	
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers

*Places to go
** Africa|Africa 
** Asia|Asia 
** Australasia &amp; Oceania|Australasia &amp; Oceania 
** Europe|Europe
** Middle East|Middle East 
** North America|North America 
** South America|South America 
** Central America &amp; Caribbean|Central America &amp; Caribbean
**http://hitchwiki.org/maps/|Browse places on map

*Hitchwiki
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
**http://hitchwiki.org/contact/|Contact us
**Category:Tech team|Development
** randompage-url|randompage
** currentevents-url|currentevents
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges</text>
      <sha1>34p5cw18b1mzeerkv6fj3k7o58azwf0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>96899</id>
      <parentid>89672</parentid>
      <timestamp>2019-09-28T22:07:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="532">* Main Page|Events &amp; News
* http://hitchwiki.org/maps/|Map
* https://www.hitchlog.com/|Hitchlog
* https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots
*How to hitchhike
** Category:General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips	
** Where|Where	
** Safety|Safety	
** Signs|Signs	
** First time hitchhiking|First time	
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers

*Hitchwiki
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
**http://hitchwiki.org/contact/|Contact us
** currentevents-url|currentevents
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges</text>
      <sha1>kuixde3zwwc6hbof7zn77cq6auvfs0v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>96900</id>
      <parentid>96899</parentid>
      <timestamp>2019-09-28T22:09:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="549">* Hitchwiki
** Main Page|Events &amp; News
** http://hitchwiki.org/maps/|Map
** https://www.hitchlog.com/|Hitchlog
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots

*How to hitchhike
** Category:General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips	
** Where|Where	
** Safety|Safety	
** Signs|Signs	
** First time hitchhiking|First time	
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers

*Hitchwiki
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
**http://hitchwiki.org/contact/|Contact us
** currentevents-url|currentevents
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges</text>
      <sha1>2j842q1t1flfb5ornc32qt498b9rjk5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>96901</id>
      <parentid>96900</parentid>
      <timestamp>2019-09-28T22:11:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="503">* Hitchwiki
** Main Page|Events &amp; News
** http://hitchwiki.org/maps/|Map
** https://www.hitchlog.com/|Hitchlog
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots

* How to hitchhike
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Category:General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Where|Where
** Safety|Safety
** Signs|Signs
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers

* Hitchwiki
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** currentevents-url|currentevents
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges</text>
      <sha1>fevw0ubj3lksf4y761tca107o4sibmd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>96902</id>
      <parentid>96901</parentid>
      <timestamp>2019-09-28T22:13:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="468">* Hitchwiki
** Main Page|Events &amp; News
** http://hitchwiki.org/maps/|Map
** https://www.hitchlog.com/|Hitchlog
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots

* How to hitchhike
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Category:General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Where|Where
** Safety|Safety
** Signs|Signs
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers

* Hitchwiki
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges</text>
      <sha1>noug1mbj9f3lvy6q0x0fgcjn4rktrek</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>96904</id>
      <parentid>96902</parentid>
      <timestamp>2019-09-28T22:22:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="446">* Hitchwiki
** Homepage|Events &amp; News
** :maps|Map
** https://www.hitchlog.com/|Hitchlog
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots

* How to hitchhike
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Category:General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Where|Where
** Safety|Safety
** Signs|Signs
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers

* Hitchwiki
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges</text>
      <sha1>o0y0zx5vhhurwngzapu3zhnvasvrdqi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>96905</id>
      <parentid>96904</parentid>
      <timestamp>2019-09-28T22:23:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="448">* Hitchwiki
** Main Page|Events &amp; News
** ::maps|Map
** https://www.hitchlog.com/|Hitchlog
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots

* How to hitchhike
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Category:General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Where|Where
** Safety|Safety
** Signs|Signs
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers

* Hitchwiki
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges</text>
      <sha1>6na2n7pcghk7xjguskol4ytskru8nvi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>96906</id>
      <parentid>96905</parentid>
      <timestamp>2019-09-28T22:24:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="505">* Hitchwiki
** Main Page|Events &amp; News
** https://hitchwiki.org/maps/|Map
** https://www.hitchlog.com/|Hitchlog
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots

* How to hitchhike
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Category:General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Where|Where
** Safety|Safety
** Signs|Signs
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers

* Hitchwiki
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges
** https://hitchwiki.org/chat/|Chat</text>
      <sha1>acepghxzvqdcneug6jimvgm5ew5wqju</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>97006</id>
      <parentid>96906</parentid>
      <timestamp>2019-10-09T14:03:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="538">* this wiki
** Main Page|Events &amp; News
** https://hitchwiki.org/maps/|Map
** https://www.hitchlog.com/|Hitchlog
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots

* Hitchwiki
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges
** https://hitchwiki.org/chat/|Chat
** Special:Random|Random page

* How to hitchhike
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Category:General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Where|Where
** Safety|Safety
** Signs|Signs
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers
**</text>
      <sha1>t5r2efa16nguc7w59qyxst3nmr656gn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>97007</id>
      <parentid>97006</parentid>
      <timestamp>2019-10-09T14:05:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="556">* this wiki
** Main Page|Events &amp; News
** https://hitchwiki.org/maps/|Map

* Hitchwiki
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges
** Special:Random|Random page

* Useful
** https://hitchwiki.org/chat/|Chat
** https://www.hitchlog.com/|Hitchlog.com
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots.me


* How to hitchhike
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Category:General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Where|Where
** Safety|Safety
** Signs|Signs
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers
**</text>
      <sha1>1ls8s9do2o6wbap3ikpozizo14r44xe</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>103774</id>
      <parentid>97007</parentid>
      <timestamp>2022-11-15T17:33:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>hitchmap</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="550">* this wiki
** Main Page|Events &amp; News
** https://hitchmap.com/|Map

* Hitchwiki
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges
** Special:Random|Random page

* Useful
** https://hitchwiki.org/chat/|Chat
** https://www.hitchlog.com/|Hitchlog.com
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots.me


* How to hitchhike
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Category:General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Where|Where
** Safety|Safety
** Signs|Signs
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers
**</text>
      <sha1>r5ye5age0zek6ywf0miyblaq5ow435q</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>103775</id>
      <parentid>103774</parentid>
      <timestamp>2022-11-15T17:34:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="528">* this wiki
** Main Page|Events &amp; News
** https://hitchmap.com/|Map

* Hitchwiki
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges
** Special:Random|Random page

* Useful
** https://matrix.to/#/#hitchhiking:chagai.website|Chat
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots.me


* How to hitchhike
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Category:General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Where|Where
** Safety|Safety
** Signs|Signs
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers
**</text>
      <sha1>h0ry1mx3oizc2jthywbo3g35wkm9wuw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>103776</id>
      <parentid>103775</parentid>
      <timestamp>2022-11-15T17:34:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="535">* this wiki
** Main Page|Events &amp; News
** https://hitchmap.com/|Map

* Hitchwiki
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges
** Special:Random|Random page

* Useful
** https://matrix.to/#/#hitchhiking:chagai.website|Matrix chat
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots.me


* How to hitchhike
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Category:General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Where|Where
** Safety|Safety
** Signs|Signs
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers
**</text>
      <sha1>olmi79fnqcpbcbhw2pw22a71j805heb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104313</id>
      <parentid>103776</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-23T19:08:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="536">* this wiki
** https://hitchmap.com/|Map
** Main Page|Events &amp; News


* Hitchwiki
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges
** Special:Random|Random page

* Useful
** https://matrix.to/#/#hitchhiking:chagai.website|Matrix chat
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots.me


* How to hitchhike
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Category:General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Where|Where
** Safety|Safety
** Signs|Signs
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers
**</text>
      <sha1>rbpynu2to4rqerdf5n10qgihq0qa0n6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104352</id>
      <parentid>104313</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-24T13:14:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="574">* this wiki
** https://hitchmap.com/|Map
** Main Page|Events &amp; News


* Hitchwiki
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges
** Special:Random|Random page

* Useful
** https://matrix.to/#/#hitchhiking:chagai.website|Matrix chat
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots.me


* How to hitchhike
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Category:General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Where|Where
** Safety|Safety
** Signs|Signs
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers

* Languages 
{{Startpage-language|en|}}</text>
      <sha1>eh2knwzhd2buu9w6urdb7ed5fxu32zk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104353</id>
      <parentid>104352</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-24T13:16:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="583">* this wiki
** https://hitchmap.com/|Map
** Main Page|Events &amp; News


* Hitchwiki
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges
** Special:Random|Random page

* Useful
** https://matrix.to/#/#hitchhiking:chagai.website|Matrix chat
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots.me


* How to hitchhike
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Category:General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Where|Where
** Safety|Safety
** Signs|Signs
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers

* Languages 
&lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|}}&lt;/li&gt;</text>
      <sha1>aw01kr4kwmxbam7jvoq5wrbvp10dign</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104354</id>
      <parentid>104353</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-24T13:16:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="577">* this wiki
** https://hitchmap.com/|Map
** Main Page|Events &amp; News


* Hitchwiki
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges
** Special:Random|Random page

* Useful
** https://matrix.to/#/#hitchhiking:chagai.website|Matrix chat
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots.me


* How to hitchhike
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Category:General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Where|Where
** Safety|Safety
** Signs|Signs
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers

* Languages 
** {{Startpage-language|en|}}</text>
      <sha1>22s6k4kn7otldqn6ax9dmhr772ob5oi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104355</id>
      <parentid>104354</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-24T13:17:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="586">* this wiki
** https://hitchmap.com/|Map
** Main Page|Events &amp; News


* Hitchwiki
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges
** Special:Random|Random page

* Useful
** https://matrix.to/#/#hitchhiking:chagai.website|Matrix chat
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots.me


* How to hitchhike
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Category:General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Where|Where
** Safety|Safety
** Signs|Signs
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers

* Languages 
** &lt;li&gt;{{Startpage-language|en|}}&lt;/li&gt;</text>
      <sha1>78oc1efvse8rrtg1p0czju29zqydi4g</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104356</id>
      <parentid>104355</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-24T13:18:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="585">* this wiki
** https://hitchmap.com/|Map
** Main Page|Events &amp; News


* Hitchwiki
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges
** Special:Random|Random page

* Useful
** https://matrix.to/#/#hitchhiking:chagai.website|Matrix chat
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots.me


* How to hitchhike
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Category:General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Where|Where
** Safety|Safety
** Signs|Signs
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers

* Languages 
** {{Startpage-language|en|}}|English</text>
      <sha1>f13aodckdsgwv8w0mpb3wxx8azucwyi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104357</id>
      <parentid>104356</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-24T13:19:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="566">* this wiki
** https://hitchmap.com/|Map
** Main Page|Events &amp; News


* Hitchwiki
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges
** Special:Random|Random page

* Useful
** https://matrix.to/#/#hitchhiking:chagai.website|Matrix chat
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots.me


* How to hitchhike
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Category:General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Where|Where
** Safety|Safety
** Signs|Signs
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers

* Languages 
** English|English</text>
      <sha1>ce9zuxlzagxds9ag1jsph9f3zynocjq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104358</id>
      <parentid>104357</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-24T13:19:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="561">* this wiki
** https://hitchmap.com/|Map
** Main Page|Events &amp; News


* Hitchwiki
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges
** Special:Random|Random page

* Useful
** https://matrix.to/#/#hitchhiking:chagai.website|Matrix chat
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots.me


* How to hitchhike
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Category:General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Where|Where
** Safety|Safety
** Signs|Signs
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers

* Languages 
** en|English</text>
      <sha1>bqrhmknsp8a6hxrzhiemeeqoe5r8vjr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104359</id>
      <parentid>104358</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-24T13:20:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="568">* this wiki
** https://hitchmap.com/|Map
** Main Page|Events &amp; News


* Hitchwiki
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges
** Special:Random|Random page

* Useful
** https://matrix.to/#/#hitchhiking:chagai.website|Matrix chat
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots.me


* How to hitchhike
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Category:General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Where|Where
** Safety|Safety
** Signs|Signs
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers

* Languages 
** Startpage|English</text>
      <sha1>jbjrqru3ennfpkf9cjuatkdx1170giz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104360</id>
      <parentid>104359</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-24T13:20:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="572">* this wiki
** https://hitchmap.com/|Map
** Main Page|Events &amp; News


* Hitchwiki
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges
** Special:Random|Random page

* Useful
** https://matrix.to/#/#hitchhiking:chagai.website|Matrix chat
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots.me


* How to hitchhike
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Category:General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Where|Where
** Safety|Safety
** Signs|Signs
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers

* Languages 
** {{Startpage}}|English</text>
      <sha1>dopsd61aay4e25a91qi0qx8eei5glma</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104893</id>
      <parentid>104360</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-11-01T13:41:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>delete languages should be there by default</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="533">* this wiki
** https://hitchmap.com/|Map
** Main Page|Events &amp; News


* Hitchwiki
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges
** Special:Random|Random page

* Useful
** https://matrix.to/#/#hitchhiking:chagai.website|Matrix chat
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots.me


* How to hitchhike
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Category:General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Where|Where
** Safety|Safety
** Signs|Signs
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers</text>
      <sha1>6uw3ifrvtqsws8p18vpqkmrgqvd2vw5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105014</id>
      <parentid>104893</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-12-10T17:03:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="575">* this wiki
** https://hitchmap.com/|Map
** Main Page|Events &amp; News


* Hitchwiki
** portal-url|Community Portal
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges
** Special:Random|Random page

* Useful
** https://matrix.to/#/#hitchhiking:chagai.website|Matrix chat
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots.me
** https://www.hitchlog.com/|Hitchlog.com


* How to hitchhike
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Category:General info|General info
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Where|Where
** Safety|Safety
** Signs|Signs
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers</text>
      <sha1>na290oxf6lrn2t45fs56hyvyqybcn6e</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105038</id>
      <parentid>105014</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-12-11T15:18:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="541">* this wiki
** https://hitchmap.com/|Map
** Main Page|Events &amp; News


* Hitchwiki
** portal-url|Community
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges

* How to hitchhike
** Category:General info|General info
** Where|Where to hitchhike
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Safety|Safety
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers

* Useful Links
** https://matrix.to/#/#hitchhiking:chagai.website|Matrix chat
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots.me
** https://www.hitchlog.com/|Hitchlog.com</text>
      <sha1>1y1uwf2yjbfk57pynisvow79ric551j</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105039</id>
      <parentid>105038</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-12-11T15:21:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="577">* this wiki
** https://hitchmap.com/|Map
** Main Page|Events &amp; News


* Hitchwiki|What is hitchhiking?
** Category:General info|General info
** portal-url|Community
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges

* How to hitchhike
** Hitchhiking
** Where|Where to hitchhike
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Safety|Safety
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers

* Useful Links
** https://matrix.to/#/#hitchhiking:chagai.website|Matrix chat
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots.me
** https://www.hitchlog.com/|Hitchlog.com</text>
      <sha1>nsfokb9yxhwvobqljvcutiyeg2kr176</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105040</id>
      <parentid>105039</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-12-11T15:21:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="577">* this wiki
** https://hitchmap.com/|Map
** Main Page|Events &amp; News


* Hitchwiki
** Category:General info|General info
** portal-url|Community
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges

* How to hitchhike
** Hitchhiking|What is hitchhiking?
** Where|Where to hitchhike
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Safety|Safety
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers

* Useful Links
** https://matrix.to/#/#hitchhiking:chagai.website|Matrix chat
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots.me
** https://www.hitchlog.com/|Hitchlog.com</text>
      <sha1>c36chxhd3mcjstmkorxgpxg82eqd3eh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105041</id>
      <parentid>105040</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-12-11T15:22:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="578">* this wiki
** https://hitchmap.com/|Map
** Main Page|Events &amp; News


* Hitchwiki
** Category:General info|General info
** portal-url|Community
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges

* How to hitchhike
** Hitchhiking|What is hitchhiking?
** Where|Where to hitchhike?
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Safety|Safety
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers

* Useful Links
** https://matrix.to/#/#hitchhiking:chagai.website|Matrix chat
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots.me
** https://www.hitchlog.com/|Hitchlog.com</text>
      <sha1>sp3oyjjvnzpd7hb24dzku8oyo7zdpee</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105043</id>
      <parentid>105041</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-12-11T15:23:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="579">* this wiki
** https://hitchmap.com/|Map
** Main Page|Events &amp; News


* Hitchwiki
** Category:General info|General info
** portal-url|Community
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges

* How to hitchhike?
** Hitchhiking|What is hitchhiking?
** Where|Where to hitchhike?
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Safety|Safety
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers

* Useful Links
** https://matrix.to/#/#hitchhiking:chagai.website|Matrix chat
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots.me
** https://www.hitchlog.com/|Hitchlog.com</text>
      <sha1>p3764e7bwauek2v0llexhw3te45lwop</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105893</id>
      <parentid>105043</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-06-20T06:38:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="692">* this wiki
** https://hitchmap.com/|Map
** https://signal.group/#CjQKIGgw5-FMZ1Sq67CL50LKCkZg-6i0KCDuS24S4uBDyb5IEhAmnOqOcim9eSMm-TJFozyg|Community Chat
** Main Page|Events &amp; News


* Hitchwiki
** Category:General info|General info
** portal-url|Community
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges

* How to hitchhike?
** Hitchhiking|What is hitchhiking?
** Where|Where to hitchhike?
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Safety|Safety
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers

* Useful Links
** https://matrix.to/#/#hitchhiking:chagai.website|Matrix chat
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots.me
** https://www.hitchlog.com/|Hitchlog.com</text>
      <sha1>ftcvy4x4k4cs4d3mb86a612q2dyk43z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>107154</id>
      <parentid>105893</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-11-22T17:19:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="722">* this wiki
** https://hitchmap.com/|Map
** https://signal.group/#CjQKIGgw5-FMZ1Sq67CL50LKCkZg-6i0KCDuS24S4uBDyb5IEhAmnOqOcim9eSMm-TJFozyg|Community Chat
** Main Page|Events &amp; News


* Hitchwiki
** Category:General info|General info
** portal-url|Community
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** Random page|Special:Random
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges

* How to hitchhike?
** Hitchhiking|What is hitchhiking?
** Where|Where to hitchhike?
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Safety|Safety
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers

* Useful Links
** https://matrix.to/#/#hitchhiking:chagai.website|Matrix chat
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots.me
** https://www.hitchlog.com/|Hitchlog.com</text>
      <sha1>8unqbsagdmyzivn4sfyokj31nf77jl1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>107155</id>
      <parentid>107154</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-11-22T17:19:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="722">* this wiki
** https://hitchmap.com/|Map
** https://signal.group/#CjQKIGgw5-FMZ1Sq67CL50LKCkZg-6i0KCDuS24S4uBDyb5IEhAmnOqOcim9eSMm-TJFozyg|Community Chat
** Main Page|Events &amp; News


* Hitchwiki
** Category:General info|General info
** portal-url|Community
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** Special:Random|Random page
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges

* How to hitchhike?
** Hitchhiking|What is hitchhiking?
** Where|Where to hitchhike?
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Safety|Safety
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers

* Useful Links
** https://matrix.to/#/#hitchhiking:chagai.website|Matrix chat
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots.me
** https://www.hitchlog.com/|Hitchlog.com</text>
      <sha1>ktmsh50nwc1g15e417ljm86vvh9q87a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>108741</id>
      <parentid>107155</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-01-18T12:26:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>add links</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="827">* this wiki
** https://hitchmap.com/|Map
** https://signal.group/#CjQKIGgw5-FMZ1Sq67CL50LKCkZg-6i0KCDuS24S4uBDyb5IEhAmnOqOcim9eSMm-TJFozyg|Community Chat
** Main Page|Events &amp; News
** https://github.com/Hitchwiki/hitchwiki/issues/new?template=Blank+issue | Report a Problem


* Hitchwiki
** Category:General info|General info
** portal-url|Community
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges

* How to hitchhike?
** Hitchhiking|What is hitchhiking?
** Where|Where to hitchhike?
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Safety|Safety
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers

* Useful Links
** https://matrix.to/#/#hitchhiking:chagai.website|Matrix chat
** https://www.hitchmap.com/|Hitchmap.com
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots.me
** https://www.hitchlog.com/|Hitchlog.com</text>
      <sha1>f67k5o82b5cgdhpk7ak89zj2sz0sme4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>111228</id>
      <parentid>108741</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-06-22T12:37:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="871">* this wiki
** https://hitchmap.com/|Map
** https://signal.group/#CjQKIGgw5-FMZ1Sq67CL50LKCkZg-6i0KCDuS24S4uBDyb5IEhAmnOqOcim9eSMm-TJFozyg|Community Chat
** Main Page|Events &amp; News
** https://github.com/Hitchwiki/hitchwiki/issues/new?template=Blank+issue | Report a Problem


* Hitchwiki
** Category:General info|General info
** portal-url|Community
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges

* How to hitchhike?
** Hitchhiking|What is hitchhiking?
** Where|Where to hitchhike?
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Safety|Safety
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers

* Useful Links
** https://matrix.to/#/#hitchhiking:chagai.website|Matrix chat
** https://www.hitchmap.com/|Hitchmap.com
** https://hitchhiking.org/|Hitchhiking.org
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots.me
** https://www.hitchlog.com/|Hitchlog.com</text>
      <sha1>f8pigamsrkozkbhuwi7i0orygaa9qv8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>112141</id>
      <parentid>111228</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-08-24T09:14:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="935">* this wiki
** https://hitchmap.com/|Map
** https://signal.group/#CjQKIGgw5-FMZ1Sq67CL50LKCkZg-6i0KCDuS24S4uBDyb5IEhAmnOqOcim9eSMm-TJFozyg|Community Chat
** Main Page|Events &amp; News
** https://github.com/Hitchwiki/hitchwiki/issues/new?template=Blank+issue | Report a Problem


* Hitchwiki
** Category:General info|General info
** portal-url|Community
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges

* How to hitchhike?
** Hitchhiking|What is hitchhiking?
** Where|Where to hitchhike?
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Safety|Safety
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers

* Useful Links
** https://matrix.to/#/#hitchhiking:chagai.website|Matrix chat
** https://www.hitchmap.com/|Hitchmap.com
** https://hitchhiking.org/|Hitchhiking.org
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots.me
** https://www.hitchlog.com/|Hitchlog.com

** https://hitchwiki.org/en/MediaWiki:Sidebar|Edit the Sidebar</text>
      <sha1>6ak2fm96o614dd8kbj0tbdoyrvm5s23</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>112142</id>
      <parentid>112141</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-08-24T09:14:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="937">* this wiki
** https://hitchmap.com/|Map
** https://signal.group/#CjQKIGgw5-FMZ1Sq67CL50LKCkZg-6i0KCDuS24S4uBDyb5IEhAmnOqOcim9eSMm-TJFozyg|Community Chat
** Main Page|Events &amp; News
** https://github.com/Hitchwiki/hitchwiki/issues/new?template=Blank+issue | Report a Problem


* Hitchwiki
** Category:General info|General info
** portal-url|Community
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges

* How to hitchhike?
** Hitchhiking|What is hitchhiking?
** Where|Where to hitchhike?
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Safety|Safety
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers

* Useful Links
** https://matrix.to/#/#hitchhiking:chagai.website|Matrix chat
** https://www.hitchmap.com/|Hitchhiking Map
** https://hitchhiking.org/|Hitchhiking.org
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots.me
** https://www.hitchlog.com/|Hitchlog.com
** https://hitchwiki.org/en/MediaWiki:Sidebar|Edit the Sidebar</text>
      <sha1>euy0h9h7slh0s4f5n1oaix8p2utyja3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>112628</id>
      <parentid>112142</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-09-08T06:34:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="949">* this wiki
** https://hitchmap.com/|Hitchhiking Map
** https://signal.group/#CjQKIGgw5-FMZ1Sq67CL50LKCkZg-6i0KCDuS24S4uBDyb5IEhAmnOqOcim9eSMm-TJFozyg|Community Chat
** Main Page|Events &amp; News
** https://github.com/Hitchwiki/hitchwiki/issues/new?template=Blank+issue | Report a Problem


* Hitchwiki
** Category:General info|General info
** portal-url|Community
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges

* How to hitchhike?
** Hitchhiking|What is hitchhiking?
** Where|Where to hitchhike?
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Safety|Safety
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers

* Useful Links
** https://matrix.to/#/#hitchhiking:chagai.website|Matrix chat
** https://www.hitchmap.com/|Hitchhiking Map
** https://hitchhiking.org/|Hitchhiking.org
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots.me
** https://www.hitchlog.com/|Hitchlog.com
** https://hitchwiki.org/en/MediaWiki:Sidebar|Edit the Sidebar</text>
      <sha1>lbvea0fwdlgxmsjbgb4e1ezwi6sjyj7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>112629</id>
      <parentid>112628</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-09-08T06:42:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="954">* this wiki
** https://maps.hitchwiki.org|Hitchhiking Map
** https://signal.group/#CjQKIGgw5-FMZ1Sq67CL50LKCkZg-6i0KCDuS24S4uBDyb5IEhAmnOqOcim9eSMm-TJFozyg|Community Chat
** Main Page|Events &amp; News
** https://github.com/Hitchwiki/hitchwiki/issues/new?template=Blank+issue | Report a Problem


* Hitchwiki
** Category:General info|General info
** portal-url|Community
** Help:Contents|Tutorial
** recentchanges-url|recentchanges

* How to hitchhike?
** Hitchhiking|What is hitchhiking?
** Where|Where to hitchhike?
** First time hitchhiking|First time
** Top Tips|Top Tips
** Safety|Safety
** Picking up hitchhikers|Picking up hitchhikers

* Useful Links
** https://matrix.to/#/#hitchhiking:chagai.website|Matrix chat
** https://www.hitchmap.com/|Hitchhiking Map
** https://hitchhiking.org/|Hitchhiking.org
** https://www.hitchspots.me/|Hitchspots.me
** https://www.hitchlog.com/|Hitchlog.com
** https://hitchwiki.org/en/MediaWiki:Sidebar|Edit the Sidebar</text>
      <sha1>sw64c2j6wuqqwwz1hnrrttxg5gerher</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>MediaWiki:Sitestatstext</title>
    <ns>8</ns>
    <id>1180</id>
    <revision>
      <id>6509</id>
      <parentid>1180</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:37:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="572">There are '''$1''' total pages in the database.
This includes "talk" pages, pages about {{SITENAME}}, minimal "stub"
pages, redirects, and others that probably don't qualify as content pages.
Excluding those, there are '''$2''' pages that are probably legitimate
content pages. 

'''$8''' files have been uploaded.

There have been a total of '''$3''' page views, and '''$4''' page edits
since the wiki was setup.
That comes to '''$5''' average edits per page, and '''$6''' views per edit.

The [http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Help:Job_queue job queue] length is '''$7'''.</text>
      <sha1>bjn65tmd81iu68lexqszkl95w4vk4ar</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12609</id>
      <parentid>6509</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-07T17:14:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="669">You can find more extensive statistics at http://www.hitchwiki.org/stats/reports/EN/Sitemap.htm

There are '''$1''' total pages in the database.
This includes "talk" pages, pages about {{SITENAME}}, minimal "stub"
pages, redirects, and others that probably don't qualify as content pages.
Excluding those, there are '''$2''' pages that are probably legitimate
content pages. 

'''$8''' files have been uploaded.

There have been a total of '''$3''' page views, and '''$4''' page edits
since the wiki was setup.
That comes to '''$5''' average edits per page, and '''$6''' views per edit.

The [http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Help:Job_queue job queue] length is '''$7'''.</text>
      <sha1>ibd6kitqx4lky8a3b2khxfrz1qkfv0t</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12610</id>
      <parentid>12609</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-07T17:14:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="701">:''You can find much more detailed statistics at [http://www.hitchwiki.org/stats/reports/EN/Sitemap.htm Hitchwiki Statistics]''

There are '''$1''' total pages in the database.
This includes "talk" pages, pages about {{SITENAME}}, minimal "stub"
pages, redirects, and others that probably don't qualify as content pages.
Excluding those, there are '''$2''' pages that are probably legitimate
content pages. 

'''$8''' files have been uploaded.

There have been a total of '''$3''' page views, and '''$4''' page edits
since the wiki was setup.
That comes to '''$5''' average edits per page, and '''$6''' views per edit.

The [http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Help:Job_queue job queue] length is '''$7'''.</text>
      <sha1>qnjva0m8ockd0xm2qtz22o8fmhlirz2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12617</id>
      <parentid>12610</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-07T17:33:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="796">:''You can find much more detailed statistics at [http://www.hitchwiki.org/stats/reports/EN/Sitemap.htm Hitchwiki Statistics]''

There are '''$1''' total pages in the database.
This includes "talk" pages, pages about {{SITENAME}}, minimal "stub"
pages, redirects, and others that probably don't qualify as content pages.
Excluding those, there are '''$2''' pages that are probably legitimate
content pages. ''(And for some reason there are 154 more pages, that are not counted properly by MediaWiki.)''

'''$8''' files have been uploaded.

There have been a total of '''$3''' page views, and '''$4''' page edits
since the wiki was setup.
That comes to '''$5''' average edits per page, and '''$6''' views per edit.

The [http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Help:Job_queue job queue] length is '''$7'''.</text>
      <sha1>ab8p98liblu37byszdhopisjes3qakb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13473</id>
      <parentid>12617</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-06T12:18:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="701">'''You can find much more detailed statistics at [http://www.hitchwiki.org/stats/reports/EN/Sitemap.htm Hitchwiki Statistics]'''

There are '''$1''' total pages in the database.
This includes "talk" pages, pages about {{SITENAME}}, minimal "stub"
pages, redirects, and others that probably don't qualify as content pages.
Excluding those, there are '''$2''' pages that are probably legitimate
content pages.

'''$8''' files have been uploaded.

There have been a total of '''$3''' page views, and '''$4''' page edits
since the wiki was setup.
That comes to '''$5''' average edits per page, and '''$6''' views per edit.

The [http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Help:Job_queue job queue] length is '''$7'''.</text>
      <sha1>6ktnk0251l6x8wni5kdxajgjhgkefkd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32518</id>
      <parentid>13473</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-01T10:14:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="697">'''You can find much more detailed statistics at [http://hitchwiki.org/stats/reports/EN/Sitemap.htm Hitchwiki Statistics]'''

There are '''$1''' total pages in the database.
This includes "talk" pages, pages about {{SITENAME}}, minimal "stub"
pages, redirects, and others that probably don't qualify as content pages.
Excluding those, there are '''$2''' pages that are probably legitimate
content pages.

'''$8''' files have been uploaded.

There have been a total of '''$3''' page views, and '''$4''' page edits
since the wiki was setup.
That comes to '''$5''' average edits per page, and '''$6''' views per edit.

The [http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Help:Job_queue job queue] length is '''$7'''.</text>
      <sha1>0mlkpr81eyshjufqcnxc3vwd4ar5d9b</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Middle East</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1500</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1505</id>
      <parentid>4162</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-21T20:03:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="258">'''Middle East'''

* [[Bahrain]]
* [[Egypt]]
* [[Iran]]
* [[Iraq]]
* [[Israel]]
* [[Jordan]]
* [[Kuwait]]
* [[Lebanon]]
* [[Oman]]
* [[Qatar]]
* [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[Sudan]]
* [[Syria]]
* [[Turkey]]
* [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[Yemen]]


[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>6p5x8r67yt1howzqvr095byg04swbup</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1506</id>
      <parentid>1505</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="258">'''Middle East'''

* [[Bahrain]]
* [[Egypt]]
* [[Iran]]
* [[Iraq]]
* [[Israel]]
* [[Jordan]]
* [[Kuwait]]
* [[Lebanon]]
* [[Oman]]
* [[Qatar]]
* [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[Sudan]]
* [[Syria]]
* [[Turkey]]
* [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[Yemen]]


[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>6p5x8r67yt1howzqvr095byg04swbup</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4162</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-17T12:33:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GuakaTest</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="237">'''Middle East'''

* [[Bahrain]]
* [[Egypt]]
* [[Iran]]
* [[Iraq]]
* [[Israel]]
* [[Jordan]]
* [[Kuwait]]
* [[Lebanon]]
* [[Oman]]
* [[Qatar]]
* [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[Sudan]]
* [[Syria]]
* [[Turkey]]
* [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[Yemen]]</text>
      <sha1>nsb5ujr824d37yp930m0i301sgf9npu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4163</id>
      <parentid>1506</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="258">'''Middle East'''

* [[Bahrain]]
* [[Egypt]]
* [[Iran]]
* [[Iraq]]
* [[Israel]]
* [[Jordan]]
* [[Kuwait]]
* [[Lebanon]]
* [[Oman]]
* [[Qatar]]
* [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[Sudan]]
* [[Syria]]
* [[Turkey]]
* [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[Yemen]]


[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>6p5x8r67yt1howzqvr095byg04swbup</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18009</id>
      <parentid>4163</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-18T20:37:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1084">'''Middle East'''

* [[Image:Flag of Armenia.png|20px]] [[Armenia]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Azerbaijan.png|20px]] [[Azerbaijan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Cyprus.png|20px]] [[Cyprus]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Georgia.png|20px]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]], 
* [[Image:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]],
* [[Image:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]], 
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]], 
* [[Image:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>fcb0k0qo9vox33vifkjoikmd04nmwrb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18017</id>
      <parentid>18009</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-18T21:02:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1171">The '''Middle East''' is a region in '''Western Asia'''. The following countries are considered to be located in the '''Middle East''':

* [[Image:Flag of Armenia.png|20px]] [[Armenia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Azerbaijan.png|20px]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cyprus.png|20px]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[Image:Flag of Georgia.png|20px]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]]
* [[Image:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]]
* [[Image:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]]
* [[Image:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[Image:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]]
* [[Image:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]]
* [[Image:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[Image:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>qn8yqigmmu7tzlg9s1wpysjlwqnk0zo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18524</id>
      <parentid>18017</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-02-25T15:47:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fran</username>
        <id>1326</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1214">The '''Middle East''' is a region in '''Western Asia'''. The following countries are considered to be located in the '''Middle East''':

* [[Image:Flag of Armenia.png|20px]] [[Armenia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Azerbaijan.png|20px]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cyprus.png|20px]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[Image:Flag of Georgia.png|20px]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iran.png|20px]] [[Iran]]
* [[Image:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]]
* [[Image:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]]
* [[Image:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[Image:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]]
* [[Image:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]]
* [[Image:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[Image:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>pfwnlkef4d13qira6f68t7jxrhmclgb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18570</id>
      <parentid>18524</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-02-28T11:04:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1317">The '''Middle East''' is a region in '''Western Asia'''. The following countries are considered to be located in the '''Middle East''':
&lt;map lat='35.24561909420681' lng='45.703125' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' height='400' width='400'/&gt;
* [[Image:Flag of Armenia.png|20px]] [[Armenia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Azerbaijan.png|20px]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cyprus.png|20px]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[Image:Flag of Georgia.png|20px]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iran.png|20px]] [[Iran]]
* [[Image:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]]
* [[Image:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]]
* [[Image:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[Image:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]]
* [[Image:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]]
* [[Image:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[Image:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>pa46arm2tyiqhya56tnif5ldsa8s4lp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21360</id>
      <parentid>18570</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-15T13:30:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1331">The '''Middle East''' is a region in '''Western Asia'''. The following countries are considered to be located in the '''Middle East''':
&lt;map lat='35.24561909420681' lng='45.703125' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' height='400' width='400'/&gt;
* [[Image:Flag of Armenia.png|20px]] [[Armenia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Azerbaijan.png|20px]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cyprus.png|20px]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[Image:Flag of Georgia.png|20px]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iran.png|20px]] [[Iran]]
* [[Image:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]]
* [[Image:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]]
* [[Image:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[Image:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]]
* [[Image:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]]
* [[Image:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[Image:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


[[Category:World]]
{{IsIn|Asia}}</text>
      <sha1>fiqn46334pjdpn9eo8coeth72j7c1d8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23883</id>
      <parentid>21360</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-08-23T15:17:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1339">The '''Middle East''' is a region in '''Western Asia'''. The following countries are considered to be located in the '''Middle East''':
&lt;map lat='35.24561909420681' lng='45.703125' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' height='400' width='400'/&gt;
* [[Image:Flag of Armenia.png|20px]] [[Armenia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Azerbaijan.png|20px]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cyprus.png|20px]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[Image:Flag of Georgia.png|20px]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iran.png|20px]] [[Iran]]
* [[Image:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]]
* [[Image:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]]
* [[Image:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[Image:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]]
* [[Image:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]]
* [[Image:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[Image:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


[[Category:World]]
{{IsIn|Western Asia}}</text>
      <sha1>q56al9uaywoes714qevl2jphkk53mq6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27374</id>
      <parentid>23883</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-08T04:00:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sigurdas</username>
        <id>1658</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1330">The '''Middle East''' is a region in '''Western Asia'''. The following countries are considered to be located in the '''Middle East''':
&lt;map lat='35.24561909420681' lng='45.703125' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' height='400' width='400'/&gt;
* [[Image:Flag of Armenia.png|20px]] [[Armenia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Azerbaijan.png|20px]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cyprus.png|20px]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[Image:Flag of Georgia.png|20px]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iran.png|20px]] [[Iran]]
* [[Image:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]]
* [[Image:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]]
* [[Image:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[Image:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]]
* [[Image:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]]
* [[Image:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[Image:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


[[Category:Asia]]
{{IsIn|Asia}}</text>
      <sha1>akg8afdeuo91ctc3r2u5bqxveden6et</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27578</id>
      <parentid>27374</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-10T00:58:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sigurdas</username>
        <id>1658</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1958">The '''Middle East''' is a region in '''Western Asia''' and '''Northeastern Africa'''. 

The following countries are considered to be located in the Middle East:
&lt;map lat='30.06909396443887' lng='33.837890625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' /&gt;

'''Middle East'''
* [[Image:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[Image:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iran.png|20px]] [[Iran]]
* [[Image:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]]
* [[Image:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]]
* [[Image:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[Image:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]]
* [[Image:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]]
* [[Image:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[Image:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

=====Autonomic regions=====
* [[Image:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]

'''Greater Middle East'''
* [[Image:Flag Afghanistan.png|20px]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[Image:Flag of Djibouti.png|20px]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[Image:Flag of Eritrea.png|20px]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[Image:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Libya]]
* [[Image:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[Image:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Somalia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sudan.png|20px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]

Middle East has no clear boundaries, and so the following countries are sometimes included in its concept (as part of the Greater Middle East):
* [[Image:Flag of Cyprus.png|20px]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[Image:Flag of Pakistan.png|20px]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[Image:Flag Western Sahara.png|20px]] [[Western Sahara]]


[[Category:Asia]]
[[Category:Africa]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}</text>
      <sha1>kpwp5d0jrkwfs0b7a3rxop1fk1e5o8x</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27702</id>
      <parentid>27578</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-12T21:03:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1965">The '''Middle East''' is a region in '''Western Asia''' and '''Northeastern Africa'''. 

The following countries are considered to be located in the Middle East:
&lt;map lat='30.06909396443887' lng='33.837890625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' /&gt;

'''Middle East'''
* [[Image:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[Image:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iran.png|20px]] [[Iran]]
* [[Image:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]]
* [[Image:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]]
* [[Image:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[Image:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]]
* [[Image:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]]
* [[Image:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[Image:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

=====Autonomic regions=====
* [[Image:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]

'''Greater Middle East'''
* [[Image:Flag Afghanistan.png|20px]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[Image:Flag of Djibouti.png|20px]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[Image:Flag of Eritrea.png|20px]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[Image:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Libya]]
* [[Image:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[Image:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Somalia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sudan.png|20px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]

Middle East has no clear boundaries, and so the following countries are sometimes included in its concept (as part of the Greater Middle East):
* [[Image:Flag of Cyprus.png|20px]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[Image:Flag of Pakistan.png|20px]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[Image:Flag Western Sahara.png|20px]] [[Western Sahara]]


[[Category:Asia]]
[[Category:Africa]]
{{IsIn|Western Asia}}</text>
      <sha1>mqs535hrt1i5wx9dmuz054kfxkdohci</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>28598</id>
      <parentid>27702</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-29T13:41:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sigurdas</username>
        <id>1658</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1969">The '''Middle East''' is a region in [[Western Asia]], [[Northern Africa]] and [[Eastern Africa]]. However, it has no clear boundaries, and so it might include countries from [[Southern Asia]] and [[Central Asia]], too.

The following countries are usually considered to be located in the Middle East:
&lt;map lat='30.06909396443887' lng='33.837890625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' /&gt;

* [[Image:Flag Afghanistan.png|20px]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[Image:Flag of Djibouti.png|20px]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[Image:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[Image:Flag of Eritrea.png|20px]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iran.png|20px]] [[Iran]]
* [[Image:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]]
* [[Image:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]]
* [[Image:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[Image:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Libya]]
* [[Image:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[Image:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]
* [[Image:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]]
* [[Image:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]]
* [[Image:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Somalia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sudan.png|20px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[Image:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

[[Cyprus]], [[Pakistan]], [[Western Sahara]] and some other countries are sometimes included within the Middle East region, too. See the map below for more details.

[[Image:MiddleEast map.png|left|thumb|800px|Middle East territories]]

[[Category:Asia]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[wikipedia:Middle East]]</text>
      <sha1>k5cvcxpl1bk7pyif1i1tk3aui8wddy4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31435</id>
      <parentid>28598</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-03T14:39:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Alex</username>
        <id>89</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4050">The '''Middle East''' is a region in [[Western Asia]], [[Northern Africa]] and [[Eastern Africa]]. However, it has no clear boundaries, and so it might include countries from [[Southern Asia]] and [[Central Asia]], too.

The following countries are usually considered to be located in the Middle East:
&lt;map lat='30.06909396443887' lng='33.837890625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' /&gt;

* [[Image:Flag Afghanistan.png|20px]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[Image:Flag of Djibouti.png|20px]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[Image:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[Image:Flag of Eritrea.png|20px]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iran.png|20px]] [[Iran]]
* [[Image:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]]
* [[Image:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]]
* [[Image:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[Image:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Libya]]
* [[Image:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[Image:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]
* [[Image:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]]
* [[Image:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]]
* [[Image:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Somalia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sudan.png|20px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[Image:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

[[Cyprus]], [[Pakistan]], [[Western Sahara]] and some other countries are sometimes included within the Middle East region, too. See the map below for more details.

== Female ==
[[User:Alex|alex]]: As the question and discussion comes up regularly, I would like to devote a couple of thoughts to the topic “Hitchhiking as female”, even though I can only give limited information regarding this as I am male and the experiences are only second hand and interpretative. I can say that the people that I, and when I was with a female companion, met during my [http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/blogs/alex/20090213/just-hitching-rides-a-journey-eid-christmas journey] (and the four months I stayed in Yemen before that) brought a lot of respect into the encounter we had in Yemen. This is also what was reported from many other female moving solo in bigger cities. Further, I felt that the social pressure towards adequate behaviour in public is very high in the Middle East, meaning that people usually will not behave inappropriately when other people are around and watch or when the attention is brought on a person (thus in awkward situations taking people out of the anonymity helps!). Arguable, males in Arabic societies do have less contact with females (and the other way around) and many prejudices exist (on both sides), about Western women and Arabic societies and men which does not make the issue easier. Nevertheless, the guys I met and talked to are males like in other places and their needs and jokes are not much different. Generally, there are risks in all societies, and I think one cannot argue whether they are higher in the one or in the other (unknown) society. From my experiences and perspective there is no discussion whether females that hitchhike in the West, and came to a understanding and handling of the risks, should or should not hitchhike in the East.

[[Image:MiddleEast map.png|left|thumb|800px|Middle East territories]]

== Links ==
* [http://youarealltourists.blogspot.com/2008/04/hitchhiking-guide-to-turkey-for-girls.html Hitchhiking Guide to Turkey for girls]
* [http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/blogs/alex/20090213/just-hitching-rides-a-journey-eid-christmas Just hitching rides: A journey from Eid to Christmas] (Hitchhiking from Yemen to Germany), abgefahren Blogs


[[Category:Asia]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[wikipedia:Middle East]]</text>
      <sha1>te6zlfgs2y45jdp0p8inozle9mlqx1j</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32351</id>
      <parentid>31435</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-04-21T07:13:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4065">The '''Middle East''' is a region in [[Western Asia]], [[Northern Africa]] and [[Eastern Africa]]. However, it has no clear boundaries, and so it might include countries from [[Southern Asia]] and [[Central Asia]], too.

The following countries are usually considered to be located in the Middle East:
&lt;map lat='30.06909396443887' lng='33.837890625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' /&gt;

* [[Image:Flag Afghanistan.png|20px]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[Image:Flag of Djibouti.png|20px]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[Image:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[Image:Flag of Eritrea.png|20px]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iran.png|20px]] [[Iran]]
* [[Image:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]]
* [[Image:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]]
* [[Image:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[Image:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Libya]]
* [[Image:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[Image:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]
* [[Image:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]]
* [[Image:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]]
* [[Image:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Somalia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sudan.png|20px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[Image:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

[[Cyprus]], [[Pakistan]], [[Western Sahara]] and some other countries are sometimes included within the Middle East region, too. See the map below for more details.

== Female ==
[[User:Alex|alex]]: As the question and discussion comes up regularly, I would like to devote a couple of thoughts to the topic “Hitchhiking as female”, even though I can only give limited information regarding this as I am male and the experiences are only second hand and interpretative. I can say that the people that I, and when I was with a female companion, met during my [http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/blogs/alex/20090213/just-hitching-rides-a-journey-eid-christmas journey] (and the four months I stayed in Yemen before that) brought a lot of respect into the encounter we had in Yemen. This is also what was reported from many other female moving solo in bigger cities. Further, I felt that the social pressure towards adequate behaviour in public is very high in the Middle East, meaning that people usually will not behave inappropriately when other people are around and watch or when the attention is brought on a person (thus in awkward situations taking people out of the anonymity helps!). Arguable, males in Arabic societies do have less contact with females (and the other way around) and many prejudices exist (on both sides), about Western women and Arabic societies and men which does not make the issue easier. Nevertheless, the guys I met and talked to are males like in other places and their needs and jokes are not much different. Generally, there are risks in all societies, and I think one cannot argue whether they are higher in the one or in the other (unknown) society. From my experiences and perspective there is no discussion whether females that hitchhike in the West, and came to a understanding and handling of the risks, should or should not hitchhike in the East.

[[Image:MiddleEast map.png|left|thumb|800px|Middle East territories]]

== Links ==
* [http://youarealltourists.blogspot.com/2008/04/hitchhiking-guide-to-turkey-for-girls.html Hitchhiking Guide to Turkey for girls]
* [http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/blogs/alex/20090213/just-hitching-rides-a-journey-eid-christmas Just hitching rides: A journey from Eid to Christmas] (Hitchhiking from Yemen to Germany), abgefahren Blogs


[[Category:Asia]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[wikipedia:Middle East]]
{{IsIn|World}}</text>
      <sha1>6h3jvqrep3ecn14oxuwr8986ce2yvno</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35178</id>
      <parentid>32351</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T18:06:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4037">The '''Middle East''' is a region in [[Western Asia]], [[Northern Africa]] and [[Eastern Africa]]. However, it has no clear boundaries, and so it might include countries from [[Southern Asia]] and [[Central Asia]], too.

The following countries are usually considered to be located in the Middle East:
&lt;map lat='30.06909396443887' lng='33.837890625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' /&gt;

* [[File:Flag Afghanistan.png|20px]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.png|20px]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.png|20px]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.png|20px]] [[Iran]]
* [[File:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Libya]]
* [[File:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.png|20px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

[[Cyprus]], [[Pakistan]], [[Western Sahara]] and some other countries are sometimes included within the Middle East region, too. See the map below for more details.

== Female ==
[[User:Alex|alex]]: As the question and discussion comes up regularly, I would like to devote a couple of thoughts to the topic “Hitchhiking as female”, even though I can only give limited information regarding this as I am male and the experiences are only second hand and interpretative. I can say that the people that I, and when I was with a female companion, met during my [http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/blogs/alex/20090213/just-hitching-rides-a-journey-eid-christmas journey] (and the four months I stayed in Yemen before that) brought a lot of respect into the encounter we had in Yemen. This is also what was reported from many other female moving solo in bigger cities. Further, I felt that the social pressure towards adequate behaviour in public is very high in the Middle East, meaning that people usually will not behave inappropriately when other people are around and watch or when the attention is brought on a person (thus in awkward situations taking people out of the anonymity helps!). Arguable, males in Arabic societies do have less contact with females (and the other way around) and many prejudices exist (on both sides), about Western women and Arabic societies and men which does not make the issue easier. Nevertheless, the guys I met and talked to are males like in other places and their needs and jokes are not much different. Generally, there are risks in all societies, and I think one cannot argue whether they are higher in the one or in the other (unknown) society. From my experiences and perspective there is no discussion whether females that hitchhike in the West, and came to a understanding and handling of the risks, should or should not hitchhike in the East.

[[File:MiddleEast map.png|left|thumb|800px|Middle East territories]]

== Links ==
* [http://youarealltourists.blogspot.com/2008/04/hitchhiking-guide-to-turkey-for-girls.html Hitchhiking Guide to Turkey for girls]
* [http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/blogs/alex/20090213/just-hitching-rides-a-journey-eid-christmas Just hitching rides: A journey from Eid to Christmas] (Hitchhiking from Yemen to Germany), abgefahren Blogs
[[wikipedia:Middle East]]
{{IsIn|World}}

[[Category:Asia]]
[[Category:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>r4dm20hvjehsbhves3q92q92av0g1gp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39128</id>
      <parentid>35178</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-12-31T20:58:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Vidimian</username>
        <id>1703</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4057">The '''Middle East''' is a region in [[Western Asia]], [[Northern Africa]] and [[Eastern Africa]]. However, it has no clear boundaries, and so it might include countries from [[Southern Asia]] and [[Central Asia]], too.

The following countries are usually considered to be located in the Middle East:
&lt;map lat='30.06909396443887' lng='33.837890625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' /&gt;

* [[File:Flag Afghanistan.png|20px]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.png|20px]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.png|20px]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.png|20px]] [[Iran]]
* [[File:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Libya]]
* [[File:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.png|20px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

[[Cyprus]], [[Pakistan]], [[Western Sahara]] and some other countries are sometimes included within the Middle East region, too. See the map below for more details.

== Female ==
[[User:Alex|alex]]: As the question and discussion comes up regularly, I would like to devote a couple of thoughts to the topic “Hitchhiking as female”, even though I can only give limited information regarding this as I am male and the experiences are only second hand and interpretative. I can say that the people that I, and when I was with a female companion, met during my [http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/blogs/alex/20090213/just-hitching-rides-a-journey-eid-christmas journey] (and the four months I stayed in Yemen before that) brought a lot of respect into the encounter we had in Yemen. This is also what was reported from many other female moving solo in bigger cities. Further, I felt that the social pressure towards adequate behaviour in public is very high in the Middle East, meaning that people usually will not behave inappropriately when other people are around and watch or when the attention is brought on a person (thus in awkward situations taking people out of the anonymity helps!). Arguable, males in Arabic societies do have less contact with females (and the other way around) and many prejudices exist (on both sides), about Western women and Arabic societies and men which does not make the issue easier. Nevertheless, the guys I met and talked to are males like in other places and their needs and jokes are not much different. Generally, there are risks in all societies, and I think one cannot argue whether they are higher in the one or in the other (unknown) society. From my experiences and perspective there is no discussion whether females that hitchhike in the West, and came to a understanding and handling of the risks, should or should not hitchhike in the East.

[[File:MiddleEast map.png|left|thumb|800px|Middle East territories]]

== Links ==
* [http://youarealltourists.blogspot.com/2008/04/hitchhiking-guide-to-turkey-for-girls.html Hitchhiking Guide to Turkey for girls]
* [http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/blogs/alex/20090213/just-hitching-rides-a-journey-eid-christmas Just hitching rides: A journey from Eid to Christmas] (Hitchhiking from Yemen to Germany), abgefahren Blogs

[[tr:Orta Doğu]]

[[wikipedia:Middle East]]
{{IsIn|World}}

[[Category:Asia]]
[[Category:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>p9cjta242k3yskaivxqive7minrsrt9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40856</id>
      <parentid>39128</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-30T20:56:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4057">The '''Middle East''' is a region in [[Western Asia]], [[Northern Africa]] and [[Eastern Africa]]. However, it has no clear boundaries, and so it might include countries from [[Southern Asia]] and [[Central Asia]], too.

The following countries are usually considered to be located in the Middle East:
&lt;map lat='30.06909396443887' lng='33.837890625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' /&gt;

* [[File:Flag Afghanistan.png|20px]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.png|20px]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.png|20px]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.png|20px]] [[Iran]]
* [[File:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Libya]]
* [[File:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.png|20px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

[[Cyprus]], [[Pakistan]], [[Western Sahara]] and some other countries are sometimes included within the Middle East region, too. See the map below for more details.

== Female ==
[[User:Alex|alex]]: As the question and discussion comes up regularly, I would like to devote a couple of thoughts to the topic “Hitchhiking as female”, even though I can only give limited information regarding this as I am male and the experiences are only second hand and interpretative. I can say that the people that I, and when I was with a female companion, met during my [http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/blogs/alex/20090213/just-hitching-rides-a-journey-eid-christmas journey] (and the four months I stayed in Yemen before that) brought a lot of respect into the encounter we had in Yemen. This is also what was reported from many other female moving solo in bigger cities. Further, I felt that the social pressure towards adequate behaviour in public is very high in the Middle East, meaning that people usually will not behave inappropriately when other people are around and watch or when the attention is brought on a person (thus in awkward situations taking people out of the anonymity helps!). Arguable, males in Arabic societies do have less contact with females (and the other way around) and many prejudices exist (on both sides), about Western women and Arabic societies and men which does not make the issue easier. Nevertheless, the guys I met and talked to are males like in other places and their needs and jokes are not much different. Generally, there are risks in all societies, and I think one cannot argue whether they are higher in the one or in the other (unknown) society. From my experiences and perspective there is no discussion whether females that hitchhike in the West, and came to a understanding and handling of the risks, should or should not hitchhike in the East.

[[File:MiddleEast map.png|left|thumb|800px|Middle East territories]]

== Links ==
* [http://youarealltourists.blogspot.com/2008/04/hitchhiking-guide-to-turkey-for-girls.html Hitchhiking Guide to Turkey for girls]
* [http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/blogs/alex/20090213/just-hitching-rides-a-journey-eid-christmas Just hitching rides: A journey from Eid to Christmas] (Hitchhiking from Yemen to Germany), abgefahren Blogs

[[wikipedia:Middle East]]
{{IsIn|World}}

[[Category:Asia]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[tr:Orta Doğu]]</text>
      <sha1>h1vx2udtjo9u7nmce6dlo29wwfykzn2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>64118</id>
      <parentid>40856</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-09-24T01:04:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4071">The '''Middle East''' is a region in [[Western Asia]], [[Northern Africa]] and [[Eastern Africa]]. However, it has no clear boundaries, and so it might include countries from [[Southern Asia]] and [[Central Asia]], too.

The following countries are usually considered to be located in the Middle East:
&lt;map lat='30.06909396443887' lng='33.837890625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' /&gt;

* [[File:Flag Afghanistan.png|20px]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.png|20px]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.png|20px]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.png|20px]] [[Iran]]
* [[File:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Libya]]
* [[File:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.png|20px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

[[Cyprus]], [[Pakistan]], [[Western Sahara]] and some other countries are sometimes included within the Middle East region, too. See the map below for more details.

== Female ==
[[User:Alex|alex]]: As the question and discussion comes up regularly, I would like to devote a couple of thoughts to the topic “Hitchhiking as female”, even though I can only give limited information regarding this as I am male and the experiences are only second hand and interpretative. I can say that the people that I, and when I was with a female companion, met during my [http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/blogs/alex/20090213/just-hitching-rides-a-journey-eid-christmas journey] (and the four months I stayed in Yemen before that) brought a lot of respect into the encounter we had in Yemen. This is also what was reported from many other female moving solo in bigger cities. Further, I felt that the social pressure towards adequate behaviour in public is very high in the Middle East, meaning that people usually will not behave inappropriately when other people are around and watch or when the attention is brought on a person (thus in awkward situations taking people out of the anonymity helps!). Arguable, males in Arabic societies do have less contact with females (and the other way around) and many prejudices exist (on both sides), about Western women and Arabic societies and men which does not make the issue easier. Nevertheless, the guys I met and talked to are males like in other places and their needs and jokes are not much different. Generally, there are risks in all societies, and I think one cannot argue whether they are higher in the one or in the other (unknown) society. From my experiences and perspective there is no discussion whether females that hitchhike in the West, and came to a understanding and handling of the risks, should or should not hitchhike in the East.

[[File:MiddleEast map.png|left|thumb|800px|Middle East territories]]

== Links ==
* [http://youarealltourists.blogspot.com/2008/04/hitchhiking-guide-to-turkey-for-girls.html Hitchhiking Guide to Turkey for girls]
* [http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/blogs/alex/20090213/just-hitching-rides-a-journey-eid-christmas Just hitching rides: A journey from Eid to Christmas] (Hitchhiking from Yemen to Germany), abgefahren Blogs

[[wikipedia:Middle East]]
{{IsIn|World}}

[[Category:Asia]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[tr:Orta Doğu]]
[[zh:中东]]</text>
      <sha1>rhqrtsw0nax12thrlcandhe0zrp4pme</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68399</id>
      <parentid>64118</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-02-28T22:17:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Irisn</username>
        <id>9377</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4185">The '''Middle East''' is a region in [[Western Asia]], [[Northern Africa]] and [[Eastern Africa]]. However, it has no clear boundaries, and so it might include countries from [[Southern Asia]] and [[Central Asia]], too.

The following countries are usually considered to be located in the Middle East:
&lt;map lat='30.06909396443887' lng='33.837890625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' /&gt;

* [[File:Flag Afghanistan.png|20px]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.png|20px]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.png|20px]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.png|20px]] [[Iran]]
* [[File:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Libya]]
* [[File:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.png|20px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

[[Cyprus]], [[Pakistan]], [[Western Sahara]] and some other countries are sometimes included within the Middle East region, too. See the map below for more details.

== Female ==
[[User:Alex|alex]]: As the question and discussion comes up regularly, I would like to devote a couple of thoughts to the topic “Hitchhiking as female”, even though I can only give limited information regarding this as I am male and the experiences are only second hand and interpretative. I can say that the people that I, and when I was with a female companion, met during my [http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/blogs/alex/20090213/just-hitching-rides-a-journey-eid-christmas journey] (and the four months I stayed in Yemen before that) brought a lot of respect into the encounter we had in Yemen. This is also what was reported from many other female moving solo in bigger cities. Further, I felt that the social pressure towards adequate behaviour in public is very high in the Middle East, meaning that people usually will not behave inappropriately when other people are around and watch or when the attention is brought on a person (thus in awkward situations taking people out of the anonymity helps!). Arguable, males in Arabic societies do have less contact with females (and the other way around) and many prejudices exist (on both sides), about Western women and Arabic societies and men which does not make the issue easier. Nevertheless, the guys I met and talked to are males like in other places and their needs and jokes are not much different. Generally, there are risks in all societies, and I think one cannot argue whether they are higher in the one or in the other (unknown) society. From my experiences and perspective there is no discussion whether females that hitchhike in the West, and came to a understanding and handling of the risks, should or should not hitchhike in the East.

[[File:MiddleEast map.png|left|thumb|800px|Middle East territories]]

== Links ==
* [http://youarealltourists.blogspot.com/2008/04/hitchhiking-guide-to-turkey-for-girls.html Hitchhiking Guide to Turkey for girls]
* [http://kurdistandiary.blogspot.nl/2007/10/blog-post_26.html Notes about Female Hitchhiking in the Middle East]
* [http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/blogs/alex/20090213/just-hitching-rides-a-journey-eid-christmas Just hitching rides: A journey from Eid to Christmas] (Hitchhiking from Yemen to Germany), abgefahren Blogs

[[wikipedia:Middle East]]
{{IsIn|World}}

[[Category:Asia]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[tr:Orta Doğu]]
[[zh:中东]]</text>
      <sha1>4quws7z8lr5pec5o273c0jmfl614ufa</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70472</id>
      <parentid>68399</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-07-15T01:06:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4207">The '''Middle East''' is a region in [[Western Asia]], [[Northern Africa]] and [[Eastern Africa]]. However, it has no clear boundaries, and so it might include countries from [[Southern Asia]] and [[Central Asia]], too.

The following countries are usually considered to be located in the Middle East:
&lt;map lat='30.06909396443887' lng='33.837890625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' /&gt;

* [[File:Flag Afghanistan.png|20px]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.png|20px]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.png|20px]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.png|20px]] [[Iran]]
* [[File:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Libya]]
* [[File:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.png|20px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

[[Cyprus]], [[Pakistan]], [[Western Sahara]] and some other countries are sometimes included within the Middle East region, too. See the map below for more details.

== Female ==
[[User:Alex|alex]]: As the question and discussion comes up regularly, I would like to devote a couple of thoughts to the topic “Hitchhiking as female”, even though I can only give limited information regarding this as I am male and the experiences are only second hand and interpretative. I can say that the people that I, and when I was with a female companion, met during my [http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/blogs/alex/20090213/just-hitching-rides-a-journey-eid-christmas journey] (and the four months I stayed in Yemen before that) brought a lot of respect into the encounter we had in Yemen. This is also what was reported from many other female moving solo in bigger cities. Further, I felt that the social pressure towards adequate behaviour in public is very high in the Middle East, meaning that people usually will not behave inappropriately when other people are around and watch or when the attention is brought on a person (thus in awkward situations taking people out of the anonymity helps!). Arguable, males in Arabic societies do have less contact with females (and the other way around) and many prejudices exist (on both sides), about Western women and Arabic societies and men which does not make the issue easier. Nevertheless, the guys I met and talked to are males like in other places and their needs and jokes are not much different. Generally, there are risks in all societies, and I think one cannot argue whether they are higher in the one or in the other (unknown) society. From my experiences and perspective there is no discussion whether females that hitchhike in the West, and came to a understanding and handling of the risks, should or should not hitchhike in the East.

[[File:MiddleEast map.png|left|thumb|800px|Middle East territories]]

== Links ==
* [http://youarealltourists.blogspot.com/2008/04/hitchhiking-guide-to-turkey-for-girls.html Hitchhiking Guide to Turkey for girls]
* [http://kurdistandiary.blogspot.nl/2007/10/blog-post_26.html Notes about Female Hitchhiking in the Middle East]
* [http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/blogs/alex/20090213/just-hitching-rides-a-journey-eid-christmas Just hitching rides: A journey from Eid to Christmas] (Hitchhiking from Yemen to Germany), abgefahren Blogs

[[wikipedia:Middle East]]
{{IsIn|World}}

[[Category:Asia]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[pl:Bliski Wschód]]
[[tr:Orta Doğu]]
[[zh:中东]]</text>
      <sha1>2qrs7o73pdiw5o3qz34zo9kvzyijkb6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70959</id>
      <parentid>70472</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-08-19T21:36:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4228">The '''Middle East''' is a region in [[Western Asia]], [[Northern Africa]] and [[Eastern Africa]]. However, it has no clear boundaries, and so it might include countries from [[Southern Asia]] and [[Central Asia]], too.

The following countries are usually considered to be located in the Middle East:
&lt;map lat='30.06909396443887' lng='33.837890625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' /&gt;

* [[File:Flag Afghanistan.png|20px]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.png|20px]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.png|20px]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.png|20px]] [[Iran]]
* [[File:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Libya]]
* [[File:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.png|20px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

[[Cyprus]], [[Pakistan]], [[Western Sahara]] and some other countries are sometimes included within the Middle East region, too. See the map below for more details.

== Female ==
[[User:Alex|alex]]: As the question and discussion comes up regularly, I would like to devote a couple of thoughts to the topic “Hitchhiking as female”, even though I can only give limited information regarding this as I am male and the experiences are only second hand and interpretative. I can say that the people that I, and when I was with a female companion, met during my [http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/blogs/alex/20090213/just-hitching-rides-a-journey-eid-christmas journey] (and the four months I stayed in Yemen before that) brought a lot of respect into the encounter we had in Yemen. This is also what was reported from many other female moving solo in bigger cities. Further, I felt that the social pressure towards adequate behaviour in public is very high in the Middle East, meaning that people usually will not behave inappropriately when other people are around and watch or when the attention is brought on a person (thus in awkward situations taking people out of the anonymity helps!). Arguable, males in Arabic societies do have less contact with females (and the other way around) and many prejudices exist (on both sides), about Western women and Arabic societies and men which does not make the issue easier. Nevertheless, the guys I met and talked to are males like in other places and their needs and jokes are not much different. Generally, there are risks in all societies, and I think one cannot argue whether they are higher in the one or in the other (unknown) society. From my experiences and perspective there is no discussion whether females that hitchhike in the West, and came to a understanding and handling of the risks, should or should not hitchhike in the East.

[[File:MiddleEast map.png|left|thumb|800px|Middle East territories]]

== Links ==
* [http://youarealltourists.blogspot.com/2008/04/hitchhiking-guide-to-turkey-for-girls.html Hitchhiking Guide to Turkey for girls]
* [http://kurdistandiary.blogspot.nl/2007/10/blog-post_26.html Notes about Female Hitchhiking in the Middle East]
* [http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/blogs/alex/20090213/just-hitching-rides-a-journey-eid-christmas Just hitching rides: A journey from Eid to Christmas] (Hitchhiking from Yemen to Germany), abgefahren Blogs

[[wikipedia:Middle East]]
{{IsIn|World}}

[[Category:Asia]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[pl:Bliski Wschód]]
[[tr:Orta Doğu]]
[[zh:中东]]
[[nl:Midden Oosten]]</text>
      <sha1>64zgxjnws2nsx5xnzc3vbqh26r93bj5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>82166</id>
      <parentid>70959</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-02-09T01:56:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Irisn</username>
        <id>9377</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4242">The '''Middle East''' is a region in [[Western Asia]], [[Northern Africa]] and [[Eastern Africa]]. However, it has no clear boundaries, and so it might include countries from [[Southern Asia]] and [[Central Asia]], too.

The following countries are usually considered to be located in the Middle East:
&lt;map lat='30.06909396443887' lng='33.837890625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' /&gt;

* [[File:Flag Afghanistan.png|20px]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.png|20px]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.png|20px]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.png|20px]] [[Iran]]
* [[File:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Libya]]
* [[File:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.png|20px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

[[Cyprus]], [[Pakistan]], [[Western Sahara]] and some other countries are sometimes included within the Middle East region, too. See the map below for more details.

== Female ==
[[User:Alex|alex]]: As the question and discussion comes up regularly, I would like to devote a couple of thoughts to the topic “Hitchhiking as female”, even though I can only give limited information regarding this as I am male and the experiences are only second hand and interpretative. I can say that the people that I, and when I was with a female companion, met during my [http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/blogs/alex/20090213/just-hitching-rides-a-journey-eid-christmas journey] (and the four months I stayed in Yemen before that) brought a lot of respect into the encounter we had in Yemen. This is also what was reported from many other female moving solo in bigger cities. Further, I felt that the social pressure towards adequate behaviour in public is very high in the Middle East, meaning that people usually will not behave inappropriately when other people are around and watch or when the attention is brought on a person (thus in awkward situations taking people out of the anonymity helps!). Arguable, males in Arabic societies do have less contact with females (and the other way around) and many prejudices exist (on both sides), about Western women and Arabic societies and men which does not make the issue easier. Nevertheless, the guys I met and talked to are males like in other places and their needs and jokes are not much different. Generally, there are risks in all societies, and I think one cannot argue whether they are higher in the one or in the other (unknown) society. From my experiences and perspective there is no discussion whether females that hitchhike in the West, and came to a understanding and handling of the risks, should or should not hitchhike in the East.

[[File:MiddleEast map.png|left|thumb|800px|Middle East territories]]

== Links ==
* [http://youarealltourists.blogspot.com/2008/04/hitchhiking-guide-to-turkey-for-girls.html Hitchhiking Guide to Turkey for girls]
* [http://youarealltourists.blogspot.nl/2008/08/hitching-in-middle-east.html Notes about Female Hitchhiking in the Middle East]
* [http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/blogs/alex/20090213/just-hitching-rides-a-journey-eid-christmas Just hitching rides: A journey from Eid to Christmas] (Hitchhiking from Yemen to Germany), abgefahren Blogs

[[wikipedia:Middle East]]
{{IsIn|World}}

[[Category:Asia]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[pl:Bliski Wschód]]
[[tr:Orta Doğu]]
[[zh:中东]]
[[nl:Midden Oosten]]</text>
      <sha1>afiv4lmd3081hd7ahlzgo62tph8wrr6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>110336</id>
      <parentid>82166</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-04-19T14:09:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>KnyttesBot</username>
        <id>47742</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>Added infobox to articles where map tag is already present programatically</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4331">{{infobox Location
|country = -
|state = -
|map = &lt;map lat='30.06909396443887' lng='33.837890625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' /&gt;
|pop = -
|plate = -
|motorways = -
}}
The '''Middle East''' is a region in [[Western Asia]], [[Northern Africa]] and [[Eastern Africa]]. However, it has no clear boundaries, and so it might include countries from [[Southern Asia]] and [[Central Asia]], too.

The following countries are usually considered to be located in the Middle East:


* [[File:Flag Afghanistan.png|20px]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.png|20px]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.png|20px]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.png|20px]] [[Iran]]
* [[File:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Libya]]
* [[File:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.png|20px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

[[Cyprus]], [[Pakistan]], [[Western Sahara]] and some other countries are sometimes included within the Middle East region, too. See the map below for more details.

== Female ==
[[User:Alex|alex]]: As the question and discussion comes up regularly, I would like to devote a couple of thoughts to the topic “Hitchhiking as female”, even though I can only give limited information regarding this as I am male and the experiences are only second hand and interpretative. I can say that the people that I, and when I was with a female companion, met during my [http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/blogs/alex/20090213/just-hitching-rides-a-journey-eid-christmas journey] (and the four months I stayed in Yemen before that) brought a lot of respect into the encounter we had in Yemen. This is also what was reported from many other female moving solo in bigger cities. Further, I felt that the social pressure towards adequate behaviour in public is very high in the Middle East, meaning that people usually will not behave inappropriately when other people are around and watch or when the attention is brought on a person (thus in awkward situations taking people out of the anonymity helps!). Arguable, males in Arabic societies do have less contact with females (and the other way around) and many prejudices exist (on both sides), about Western women and Arabic societies and men which does not make the issue easier. Nevertheless, the guys I met and talked to are males like in other places and their needs and jokes are not much different. Generally, there are risks in all societies, and I think one cannot argue whether they are higher in the one or in the other (unknown) society. From my experiences and perspective there is no discussion whether females that hitchhike in the West, and came to a understanding and handling of the risks, should or should not hitchhike in the East.

[[File:MiddleEast map.png|left|thumb|800px|Middle East territories]]

== Links ==
* [http://youarealltourists.blogspot.com/2008/04/hitchhiking-guide-to-turkey-for-girls.html Hitchhiking Guide to Turkey for girls]
* [http://youarealltourists.blogspot.nl/2008/08/hitching-in-middle-east.html Notes about Female Hitchhiking in the Middle East]
* [http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/blogs/alex/20090213/just-hitching-rides-a-journey-eid-christmas Just hitching rides: A journey from Eid to Christmas] (Hitchhiking from Yemen to Germany), abgefahren Blogs

[[wikipedia:Middle East]]
{{IsIn|World}}

[[Category:Asia]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[pl:Bliski Wschód]]
[[tr:Orta Doğu]]
[[zh:中东]]
[[nl:Midden Oosten]]</text>
      <sha1>s613jhtiztvpsusw3u04uh5tcuopkfh</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Asia</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1501</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1507</id>
      <parentid>4171</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-27T13:43:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="862">'''Asia'''

==Post-Soviet==
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], [[Georgia]], [[Kazakhstan]], [[Kyrgyzstan]], [[Russia]], [[Tajikistan]], [[Turkmenistan]], [[Uzbekistan]]

==[[Middle East]]==
[[Bahrain]], [[Iran]], [[Iraq]], [[Israel]], [[Jordan]], [[Palestinian Territories]], [[Qatar]], [[Saudi Arabia]], [[Syria]], [[Turkey]], [[United Arab Emirates]], [[Yemen]]

==Far east==
[[China]], [[Japan]], [[Mongolia]], [[North Korea]]

==South East Asia==
[[Cambodia]], [[Thailand]], [[Vietnam]],  [[Philippines]]

* [[East Timor]], [[Indonesia]]

* [[Afghanistan]], [[Bangladesh]], [[Bhutan]], [[India]], [[Nepal]], [[Pakistan]],  [[Sri Lanka]]

* [[Brunei]]

* [[Kuwait]]
* [[Laos]]
* [[Lebanon]]
* [[Malaysia]]
* [[Maldives]]
* [[Myanmar]]

* Oman

* Singapore
* South Korea
* Taiwan
* Tibet

* [[Hong Kong]]
* [[Macau]]

[[Category:World]]
[[Category:Asia|*]]

{{stub}}</text>
      <sha1>ckvdsb8nokcce61h0ziieiiteofcvrn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1508</id>
      <parentid>1507</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="862">'''Asia'''

==Post-Soviet==
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], [[Georgia]], [[Kazakhstan]], [[Kyrgyzstan]], [[Russia]], [[Tajikistan]], [[Turkmenistan]], [[Uzbekistan]]

==[[Middle East]]==
[[Bahrain]], [[Iran]], [[Iraq]], [[Israel]], [[Jordan]], [[Palestinian Territories]], [[Qatar]], [[Saudi Arabia]], [[Syria]], [[Turkey]], [[United Arab Emirates]], [[Yemen]]

==Far east==
[[China]], [[Japan]], [[Mongolia]], [[North Korea]]

==South East Asia==
[[Cambodia]], [[Thailand]], [[Vietnam]],  [[Philippines]]

* [[East Timor]], [[Indonesia]]

* [[Afghanistan]], [[Bangladesh]], [[Bhutan]], [[India]], [[Nepal]], [[Pakistan]],  [[Sri Lanka]]

* [[Brunei]]

* [[Kuwait]]
* [[Laos]]
* [[Lebanon]]
* [[Malaysia]]
* [[Maldives]]
* [[Myanmar]]

* Oman

* Singapore
* South Korea
* Taiwan
* Tibet

* [[Hong Kong]]
* [[Macau]]

[[Category:World]]
[[Category:Asia|*]]

{{stub}}</text>
      <sha1>ckvdsb8nokcce61h0ziieiiteofcvrn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4164</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-17T12:40:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GuakaTest</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="716">'''Asia'''
* [[Afghanistan]]
* Armenia
* Azerbaijan
* Bahrain
* Bangladesh
* Bhutan
* Brunei
* Cambodia
* China
* East Timor
* Georgia
* India
* Indonesia
* Iran
* Iraq
* Israel
* Japan
* Jordan
* Kazakhstan
* Kuwait
    * Kyrgyzstan
    * Laos
    * Lebanon
    * Malaysia
    * Maldives
    * Mongolia
    * Myanmar
    * Nepal
    * North Korea
    * Oman
    * Pakistan
    * Philippines
    * Russia
    * Qatar
    * Saudi Arabia
    * Singapore
    * South Korea
    * Sri Lanka
    * Syria
    * Taiwan
    * Tajikistan
    * Thailand
    * Tibet
    * Turkey
    * Turkmenistan
    * United Arab Emirates
    * Uzbekistan
    * Vietnam
    * Yemen 

* [[Hong Kong]]
* [[Macau]]
* [[Palestinian Territories]]</text>
      <sha1>qp9tdwwrw12tu4ak9dpqe5ruwirnwss</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4165</id>
      <parentid>4164</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T22:24:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>80.186.138.5</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1186">'''Asia'''
* [[Afghanistan]]
* Armenia
* Azerbaijan
* Bahrain
* Bangladesh
* Bhutan
* Brunei
* Cambodia
* China
* East Timor
* Georgia
* India
* Indonesia
* Iran
* Iraq
* Israel
* Japan
* Jordan
* Kazakhstan
* Kuwait
    * Kyrgyzstan
    * Laos
    * Lebanon
    * Malaysia
    * Maldives
    * Mongolia
If you plan to hitch in Mongolia, it´s good to know that drivers expect to be paid.
    * Myanmar
    * Nepal
    * North Korea
    * Oman
    * Pakistan
    * Philippines
    * Russia
    * Qatar
    * Saudi Arabia
    * Singapore
    * South Korea
    * Sri Lanka
    * Syria
    * Taiwan
    * Tajikistan
    * Thailand
Wonderful hitch-hiking country! In buses you have air conditioning way too cold and you have to watch B-class movies on the video screen. Hitching you don´t have to freeze and you can get acquainted with locals and some foreigners too. They don´t ask money for the rides but if a someone not so rich offers you a long ride, would be polite to offer him a lunch if you can afford it.
    * Tibet
    * Turkey
    * Turkmenistan
    * United Arab Emirates
    * Uzbekistan
    * Vietnam
    * Yemen 

* [[Hong Kong]]
* [[Macau]]
* [[Palestinian Territories]]</text>
      <sha1>lc0ni9wm574gx3eoavw4vi2okrnz37q</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4166</id>
      <parentid>4165</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T22:25:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>80.186.138.5</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1200">'''Asia'''
* [[Afghanistan]]
* Armenia
* Azerbaijan
* Bahrain
* Bangladesh
* Bhutan
* Brunei
* Cambodia
* China
* East Timor
* Georgia
* India
* Indonesia
* Iran
* Iraq
* Israel
* Japan
* Jordan
* Kazakhstan
* Kuwait
    * Kyrgyzstan
    * Laos
    * Lebanon
    * Malaysia
    * Maldives
    * Mongolia
If you plan to hitch in Mongolia, it´s good to know that drivers expect to be paid.
    * Myanmar
    * Nepal
    * North Korea
    * Oman
    * Pakistan
    * Philippines
    * Russia
    * Qatar
    * Saudi Arabia
    * Singapore
    * South Korea
    * Sri Lanka
    * Syria
    * Taiwan
    * Tajikistan
    * Thailand
Thailand is a wonderful hitch-hiking country! In buses you have air conditioning way too cold and you have to watch B-class movies on the video screen. Hitching you don´t have to freeze and you can get acquainted with locals and some foreigners too. They don´t ask money for the rides but if a someone not so rich offers you a long ride, would be polite to offer him a lunch if you can afford it.
    * Tibet
    * Turkey
    * Turkmenistan
    * United Arab Emirates
    * Uzbekistan
    * Vietnam
    * Yemen 

* [[Hong Kong]]
* [[Macau]]
* [[Palestinian Territories]]</text>
      <sha1>gbmzslnnwybkqe96pqx4m67sql2fk9m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4167</id>
      <parentid>4166</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-21T19:53:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1115">'''Asia'''
* [[Afghanistan]]
* Armenia
* Azerbaijan
* Bahrain
* Bangladesh
* Bhutan
* Brunei
* Cambodia
* China
* East Timor
* Georgia
* India
* Indonesia
* Iran
* Iraq
* Israel
* Japan
* Jordan
* Kazakhstan
* [[Kuwait]]
* [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[Laos]]
* [[Lebanon]]
* Malaysia
* Maldives
* Mongolia
*:If you plan to hitch in Mongolia, it´s good to know that drivers expect to be paid.
* Myanmar
* Nepal
* North Korea
* Oman
* Pakistan
* Philippines
* Russia
* Qatar
* Saudi Arabia
* Singapore
* South Korea
* Sri Lanka
* Syria
* Taiwan
* Tajikistan
* [[Thailand]]
*:Thailand is a wonderful hitch-hiking country! In buses you have air conditioning way too cold and you have to watch B-class movies on the video screen. Hitching you don´t have to freeze and you can get acquainted with locals and some foreigners too. They don´t ask money for the rides but if a someone not so rich offers you a long ride, would be polite to offer him a lunch if you can afford it.
* Tibet
* Turkey
* Turkmenistan
* United Arab Emirates
* Uzbekistan
* [[Vietnam]]
* [[Yemen]]

* [[Hong Kong]]
* [[Macau]]
* [[Palestinian Territories]]</text>
      <sha1>2nyjl7q0my3q391xkwcozvl1ccqhf1m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4168</id>
      <parentid>4167</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-21T19:57:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="631">'''Asia'''
* [[Afghanistan]]
* Armenia
* Azerbaijan
* Bahrain
* Bangladesh
* Bhutan
* Brunei
* Cambodia
* China
* East Timor
* Georgia
* India
* Indonesia
* Iran
* Iraq
* Israel
* Japan
* Jordan
* Kazakhstan
* [[Kuwait]]
* [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[Laos]]
* [[Lebanon]]
* Malaysia
* Maldives
* [[Mongolia]]
* Myanmar
* Nepal
* North Korea
* Oman
* Pakistan
* Philippines
* Russia
* Qatar
* Saudi Arabia
* Singapore
* South Korea
* Sri Lanka
* Syria
* Taiwan
* Tajikistan
* [[Thailand]]
* Tibet
* Turkey
* Turkmenistan
* United Arab Emirates
* Uzbekistan
* [[Vietnam]]
* [[Yemen]]

* [[Hong Kong]]
* [[Macau]]
* [[Palestinian Territories]]</text>
      <sha1>rvravptany057vbu8fy9554th78vt86</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4169</id>
      <parentid>4168</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-21T20:03:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="651">'''Asia'''
* [[Afghanistan]]
* Armenia
* Azerbaijan
* Bahrain
* Bangladesh
* Bhutan
* Brunei
* Cambodia
* China
* East Timor
* Georgia
* India
* Indonesia
* Iran
* Iraq
* Israel
* Japan
* Jordan
* Kazakhstan
* [[Kuwait]]
* [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[Laos]]
* [[Lebanon]]
* Malaysia
* Maldives
* [[Mongolia]]
* Myanmar
* Nepal
* North Korea
* Oman
* Pakistan
* Philippines
* Russia
* Qatar
* Saudi Arabia
* Singapore
* South Korea
* Sri Lanka
* Syria
* Taiwan
* Tajikistan
* [[Thailand]]
* Tibet
* Turkey
* Turkmenistan
* United Arab Emirates
* Uzbekistan
* [[Vietnam]]
* [[Yemen]]

* [[Hong Kong]]
* [[Macau]]
* [[Palestinian Territories]]

[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>lycdpbo2446q4enit32j95v74gw2p70</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4170</id>
      <parentid>4169</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-27T13:36:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="835">'''Asia'''

==Post-Soviet==
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], [[Georgia]], [[Kazakhstan]], [[Russia]], [[Tajikistan]], [[Turkmenistan]], [[Uzbekistan]]

==[[Middle East]]==
* [[Bahrain]]
* [[Iran]]
* [[Iraq]]
* [[Israel]]
* [[Jordan]]

* [[Afghanistan]]
* [[Bangladesh]]
* [[Bhutan]]
* [[India]]
* [[Nepal]]
* [[Pakistan]]
* [[Sri Lanka]]

* [[Brunei]]

* [[Cambodia]]
* [[China]]
* [[Japan]]


* [[East Timor]]
* [[Indonesia]]


* [[Kuwait]]
* [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[Laos]]
* [[Lebanon]]
* [[Malaysia]]
* [[Maldives]]
* [[Mongolia]]
* [[Myanmar]]
* [[North Korea]]

* Oman

* Philippines
* Qatar
* Saudi Arabia
* Singapore
* South Korea
* Syria
* Taiwan
* [[Thailand]]
* Tibet
* Turkey
* United Arab Emirates
* [[Vietnam]]
* [[Yemen]]

* [[Hong Kong]]
* [[Macau]]
* [[Palestinian Territories]]

[[Category:World]]
[[Category:Asia|*]]

{{stub}}</text>
      <sha1>2mnpxsxv6z6i8ftsiodprmyhpcx71bk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4171</id>
      <parentid>4170</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-27T13:40:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="856">'''Asia'''

==Post-Soviet==
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], [[Georgia]], [[Kazakhstan]], [[Russia]], [[Tajikistan]], [[Turkmenistan]], [[Uzbekistan]]

==[[Middle East]]==
[[Bahrain]], [[Iran]], [[Iraq]], [[Israel]], [[Jordan]]

* [[Afghanistan]]
* [[Bangladesh]]
* [[Bhutan]]
* [[India]]
* [[Nepal]]
* [[Pakistan]]
* [[Sri Lanka]]

* [[Brunei]]

==Far east==
[[China]], [[Japan]], [[Mongolia]], [[North Korea]]

==South East Asia==
[[Cambodia]], [[Thailand]], [[Vietnam]],  [[Philippines]]

* [[East Timor]]
* [[Indonesia]]

* [[Kuwait]]
* [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[Laos]]
* [[Lebanon]]
* [[Malaysia]]
* [[Maldives]]
* [[Myanmar]]

* Oman

* Qatar
* Saudi Arabia
* Singapore
* South Korea
* Syria
* Taiwan
* Tibet
* Turkey
* United Arab Emirates
* [[Yemen]]

* [[Hong Kong]]
* [[Macau]]
* [[Palestinian Territories]]

[[Category:World]]
[[Category:Asia|*]]

{{stub}}</text>
      <sha1>okjcwumr0px4nsvmnz9m0v18ph6cih9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4172</id>
      <parentid>1508</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="862">'''Asia'''

==Post-Soviet==
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], [[Georgia]], [[Kazakhstan]], [[Kyrgyzstan]], [[Russia]], [[Tajikistan]], [[Turkmenistan]], [[Uzbekistan]]

==[[Middle East]]==
[[Bahrain]], [[Iran]], [[Iraq]], [[Israel]], [[Jordan]], [[Palestinian Territories]], [[Qatar]], [[Saudi Arabia]], [[Syria]], [[Turkey]], [[United Arab Emirates]], [[Yemen]]

==Far east==
[[China]], [[Japan]], [[Mongolia]], [[North Korea]]

==South East Asia==
[[Cambodia]], [[Thailand]], [[Vietnam]],  [[Philippines]]

* [[East Timor]], [[Indonesia]]

* [[Afghanistan]], [[Bangladesh]], [[Bhutan]], [[India]], [[Nepal]], [[Pakistan]],  [[Sri Lanka]]

* [[Brunei]]

* [[Kuwait]]
* [[Laos]]
* [[Lebanon]]
* [[Malaysia]]
* [[Maldives]]
* [[Myanmar]]

* Oman

* Singapore
* South Korea
* Taiwan
* Tibet

* [[Hong Kong]]
* [[Macau]]

[[Category:World]]
[[Category:Asia|*]]

{{stub}}</text>
      <sha1>ckvdsb8nokcce61h0ziieiiteofcvrn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11505</id>
      <parentid>4172</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-31T22:15:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="877">'''Asia'''

==Post-Soviet==
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], [[Georgia]], [[Kazakhstan]], [[Kyrgyzstan]], [[Russia]], [[Tajikistan]], [[Turkmenistan]], [[Uzbekistan]]

==[[Middle East]]==
[[Bahrain]], [[Iran]], [[Iraq]], [[Israel]], [[Jordan]], [[Palestinian Territories]], [[Qatar]], [[Saudi Arabia]], [[Syria]], [[Turkey]], [[United Arab Emirates]], [[Yemen]]

==Far east==
[[China]], [[Japan]], [[Mongolia]], [[North Korea]]

==South East Asia==
[[Cambodia]], [[Thailand]], [[Vietnam]],  [[Philippines]]

* [[East Timor]], [[Indonesia]]

* [[Afghanistan]], [[Bangladesh]], [[Bhutan]], [[India]], [[Nepal]], [[Pakistan]],  [[Sri Lanka]]

* [[Brunei]]

* [[Kuwait]]
* [[Laos]]
* [[Lebanon]]
* [[Malaysia]]
* [[Maldives]]
* [[Myanmar]]

* Oman

* Singapore
* South Korea
* Taiwan
* [[Thailand]]
* Tibet

* [[Hong Kong]]
* [[Macau]]

[[Category:World]]
[[Category:Asia|*]]

{{stub}}</text>
      <sha1>mv7n9vu47qvqmvwy80b9ol7nqmyf680</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12796</id>
      <parentid>11505</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-14T12:20:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1386">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.

==Tips for each country==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

===[[Central Asia]]===
[[Kazakhstan]], [[Kyrgyzstan]], [[Tajikistan]], [[Turkmenistan]], [[Uzbekistan]]

===[[Eastern Asia]]===
[[China]], [[Hong Kong|Hong Kong Special Adm. Region of China]], [[Macao|Macao Special Adm. Region of China]], [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]], [[Japan]], [[Mongolia]], [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]

===[[Southern Asia]]===
[[Afghanistan]], [[Bangladesh]], [[Bhutan]], [[India]], [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]], [[Maldives]], [[Nepal]], [[Pakistan]], [[Sri Lanka]]

===[[South-Eastern Asia]]===
[[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]], [[Cambodia]], [[Indonesia]], [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]], [[Malaysia]], [[Myanmar]], [[Philippines]], [[Singapore]], [[Thailand]], [[Timor-Leste]], [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]

===[[Western Asia]]===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], [[Bahrain]], [[Cyprus]], [[Georgia]], [[Iraq]], [[Israel]], [[Jordan]], [[Kuwait]], [[Lebanon]], [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]], [[Oman]], [[Qatar]], [[Saudi Arabia]], [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]], [[Turkey]], [[United Arab Emirates]], [[Yemen]]

[[Category:World]]
[[Category:Asia|*]]</text>
      <sha1>nwrdsqrz98lrjund1ux8elk0ab2dzvd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14698</id>
      <parentid>12796</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-13T14:44:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1399">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
[[Kazakhstan]], [[Kyrgyzstan]], [[Tajikistan]], [[Turkmenistan]], [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
[[China]], [[Hong Kong|Hong Kong Special Adm. Region of China]], [[Macao|Macao Special Adm. Region of China]], [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]], [[Japan]], [[Mongolia]], [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[Afghanistan]], [[Bangladesh]], [[Bhutan]], [[India]], [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]], [[Maldives]], [[Nepal]], [[Pakistan]], [[Sri Lanka]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
[[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]], [[Cambodia]], [[Indonesia]], [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]], [[Malaysia]], [[Myanmar]], [[Philippines]], [[Singapore]], [[Thailand]], [[Timor-Leste]], [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], [[Bahrain]], [[Cyprus]], [[Georgia]], [[Iraq]], [[Israel]], [[Jordan]], [[Kuwait]], [[Lebanon]], [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]], [[Oman]], [[Qatar]], [[Saudi Arabia]], [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]], [[Turkey]], [[United Arab Emirates]], [[Yemen]]


[[Category:World]]
[[Category:Asia| ]]</text>
      <sha1>j21dj3cp8jhee2j95d22mp3r3mnhvj0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14869</id>
      <parentid>14698</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-14T16:48:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1417">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
[[Kazakhstan]], [[Kyrgyzstan]], [[Tajikistan]], [[Turkmenistan]], [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
[[China]], [[Hong Kong|Hong Kong Special Adm. Region of China]], [[Macao|Macao Special Adm. Region of China]], [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]], [[Japan]], [[Mongolia]], [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[Afghanistan]], [[Bangladesh]], [[Bhutan]], [[India]], [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]], [[Maldives]], [[Nepal]], [[Pakistan]], [[Sri Lanka]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
[[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]], [[Cambodia]], [[Indonesia]], [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]], [[Malaysia]], [[Myanmar]], [[Philippines]], [[Singapore]], [[Thailand]], [[Timor-Leste]], [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], [[Bahrain]], [[Cyprus]], [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]], [[Iraq]], [[Israel]], [[Jordan]], [[Kuwait]], [[Lebanon]], [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]], [[Oman]], [[Qatar]], [[Saudi Arabia]], [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]], [[Turkey]], [[United Arab Emirates]], [[Yemen]]


[[Category:World]]
[[Category:Asia| ]]</text>
      <sha1>j6x1z7uivvq7f5azwcy2qdxw0sw34h5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17714</id>
      <parentid>14869</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-06T04:42:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1430">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
[[Kazakhstan]], [[Kyrgyzstan]], [[Tajikistan]], [[Turkmenistan]], [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
[[China]], [[Hong Kong|Hong Kong Special Adm. Region of China]], [[Macao|Macao Special Adm. Region of China]], [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]], [[Japan]], [[Mongolia]], [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[Afghanistan]], [[Bangladesh]], [[Bhutan]], [[India]], [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]], [[Maldives]], [[Nepal]], [[Pakistan]], [[Sri Lanka]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
[[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]], [[Cambodia]], [[Indonesia]], [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]], [[Malaysia]], [[Myanmar]], [[Philippines]], [[Singapore]], [[Thailand]], [[Timor-Leste]], [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], [[Bahrain]], [[Cyprus]], [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]], [[Iraq]], [[Israel]], [[Jordan]], [[Kuwait]], [[Lebanon]], [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]], [[Oman]], [[Qatar]], [[Saudi Arabia]], [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]], [[Turkey]], [[United Arab Emirates]], [[Yemen]]


[[Category:World]]
[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[fr:Asie]]</text>
      <sha1>lvwjpqw1x2t5sia02ft4qwno4vdmsxl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18002</id>
      <parentid>17714</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-18T20:33:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1636">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Kazakhstan.png|20px]] [[Kazakhstan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.png|20px]] [[Kyrgyzstan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Tajikistan.png|20px]] [[Tajikistan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Turkmenistan.png|20px]] [[Turkmenistan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Uzbekistan.png|20px]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
[[China]], [[Hong Kong|Hong Kong Special Adm. Region of China]], [[Macao|Macao Special Adm. Region of China]], [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]], [[Japan]], [[Mongolia]], [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[Afghanistan]], [[Bangladesh]], [[Bhutan]], [[India]], [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]], [[Maldives]], [[Nepal]], [[Pakistan]], [[Sri Lanka]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
[[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]], [[Cambodia]], [[Indonesia]], [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]], [[Malaysia]], [[Myanmar]], [[Philippines]], [[Singapore]], [[Thailand]], [[Timor-Leste]], [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], [[Bahrain]], [[Cyprus]], [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]], [[Iraq]], [[Israel]], [[Jordan]], [[Kuwait]], [[Lebanon]], [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]], [[Oman]], [[Qatar]], [[Saudi Arabia]], [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]], [[Turkey]], [[United Arab Emirates]], [[Yemen]]


[[Category:World]]
[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[fr:Asie]]</text>
      <sha1>8w6ytzecfz5r3mj6l943d08o4hd15dj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18003</id>
      <parentid>18002</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-18T20:33:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2011">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Kazakhstan.png|20px]] [[Kazakhstan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.png|20px]] [[Kyrgyzstan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Tajikistan.png|20px]] [[Tajikistan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Turkmenistan.png|20px]] [[Turkmenistan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Uzbekistan.png|20px]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag China.png|20px]] [[China]], 
* [[Image:Flag of North Korea.png|20px]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Japan.png|20px]] [[Japan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Mongolia.png|20px]] [[Mongolia]], 
* [[Image:Flag South Korea.png|20px]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[Image:Flag Republic of China Taiwan.png|20px]] [[Taiwan]]
=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag of Hong Kong China.png|20px]] [[Hong Kong|Hong Kong Special Adm. Region of China]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Macau China.png|20px]] [[Macao|Macao Special Adm. Region of China]]

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[Afghanistan]], [[Bangladesh]], [[Bhutan]], [[India]], [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]], [[Maldives]], [[Nepal]], [[Pakistan]], [[Sri Lanka]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
[[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]], [[Cambodia]], [[Indonesia]], [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]], [[Malaysia]], [[Myanmar]], [[Philippines]], [[Singapore]], [[Thailand]], [[Timor-Leste]], [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], [[Bahrain]], [[Cyprus]], [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]], [[Iraq]], [[Israel]], [[Jordan]], [[Kuwait]], [[Lebanon]], [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]], [[Oman]], [[Qatar]], [[Saudi Arabia]], [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]], [[Turkey]], [[United Arab Emirates]], [[Yemen]]


[[Category:World]]
[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[fr:Asie]]</text>
      <sha1>ef0w7mmmoseyrn0g82zj1dvkrcykd65</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18005</id>
      <parentid>18003</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-18T20:35:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2734">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Kazakhstan.png|20px]] [[Kazakhstan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.png|20px]] [[Kyrgyzstan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Tajikistan.png|20px]] [[Tajikistan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Turkmenistan.png|20px]] [[Turkmenistan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Uzbekistan.png|20px]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag China.png|20px]] [[China]], 
* [[Image:Flag of North Korea.png|20px]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Japan.png|20px]] [[Japan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Mongolia.png|20px]] [[Mongolia]], 
* [[Image:Flag South Korea.png|20px]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[Image:Flag Republic of China Taiwan.png|20px]] [[Taiwan]]
=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag of Hong Kong China.png|20px]] [[Hong Kong|Hong Kong Special Adm. Region of China]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Macau China.png|20px]] [[Macao|Macao Special Adm. Region of China]]

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[Afghanistan]], [[Bangladesh]], [[Bhutan]], [[India]], [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]], [[Maldives]], [[Nepal]], [[Pakistan]], [[Sri Lanka]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
[[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]], [[Cambodia]], [[Indonesia]], [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]], [[Malaysia]], [[Myanmar]], [[Philippines]], [[Singapore]], [[Thailand]], [[Timor-Leste]], [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Armenia.png|20px]] [[Armenia]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Azerbaijan.png|20px]] [[Azerbaijan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Cyprus.png|20px]] [[Cyprus]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Georgia.png|20px]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]], 
* [[Image:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]],
* [[Image:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]], 
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]], 
* [[Image:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]

[[Category:World]]
[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[fr:Asie]]</text>
      <sha1>szfzq5hidknw64lw892bzupjg82n8md</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18007</id>
      <parentid>18005</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-18T20:35:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3171">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Kazakhstan.png|20px]] [[Kazakhstan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.png|20px]] [[Kyrgyzstan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Tajikistan.png|20px]] [[Tajikistan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Turkmenistan.png|20px]] [[Turkmenistan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Uzbekistan.png|20px]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag China.png|20px]] [[China]], 
* [[Image:Flag of North Korea.png|20px]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Japan.png|20px]] [[Japan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Mongolia.png|20px]] [[Mongolia]], 
* [[Image:Flag South Korea.png|20px]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[Image:Flag Republic of China Taiwan.png|20px]] [[Taiwan]]
=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag of Hong Kong China.png|20px]] [[Hong Kong|Hong Kong Special Adm. Region of China]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Macau China.png|20px]] [[Macao|Macao Special Adm. Region of China]]

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[Afghanistan]], [[Bangladesh]], [[Bhutan]], [[India]], [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]], [[Maldives]], [[Nepal]], [[Pakistan]], [[Sri Lanka]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Brunei.png|20px]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Cambodia.png|20px]] [[Cambodia]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Indonesia.png|20px]] [[Indonesia]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Laos.png|20px]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Malaysia.png|20px]] [[Malaysia]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Myanmar burma.png|20px]] [[Myanmar]], 
* [[Image:Flag of the Philippines.png|20px]] [[Philippines]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Singapore.png|20px]] [[Singapore]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Thailand.png|20px]] [[Thailand]], 
* [[Image:Flag of East Timor.png|20px]] [[Timor-Leste]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Vietnam.png|20px]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Armenia.png|20px]] [[Armenia]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Azerbaijan.png|20px]] [[Azerbaijan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Cyprus.png|20px]] [[Cyprus]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Georgia.png|20px]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]], 
* [[Image:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]],
* [[Image:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]], 
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]], 
* [[Image:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]

[[Category:World]]
[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[fr:Asie]]</text>
      <sha1>im9uc26ssma4lmkufoio8b4hqz6zydp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18008</id>
      <parentid>18007</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-18T20:36:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3643">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Kazakhstan.png|20px]] [[Kazakhstan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.png|20px]] [[Kyrgyzstan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Tajikistan.png|20px]] [[Tajikistan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Turkmenistan.png|20px]] [[Turkmenistan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Uzbekistan.png|20px]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag China.png|20px]] [[China]], 
* [[Image:Flag of North Korea.png|20px]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Japan.png|20px]] [[Japan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Mongolia.png|20px]] [[Mongolia]], 
* [[Image:Flag South Korea.png|20px]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[Image:Flag Republic of China Taiwan.png|20px]] [[Taiwan]]
=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag of Hong Kong China.png|20px]] [[Hong Kong|Hong Kong Special Adm. Region of China]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Macau China.png|20px]] [[Macao|Macao Special Adm. Region of China]]

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag Afghanistan.png|20px]] [[Afghanistan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Bangladesh.png|20px]] [[Bangladesh]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Bhutan.png|20px]] [[Bhutan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of India.png|20px]] [[India]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Iran.png|20px]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Maldives.png|20px]] [[Maldives]], 
* [[Image:Flag Nepal.png|20px]] [[Nepal]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Pakistan.png|20px]] [[Pakistan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Sri Lanka.png|20px]] [[Sri Lanka]]
=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag British Indian Ocean Territory UK.png|20px]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Brunei.png|20px]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Cambodia.png|20px]] [[Cambodia]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Indonesia.png|20px]] [[Indonesia]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Laos.png|20px]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Malaysia.png|20px]] [[Malaysia]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Myanmar burma.png|20px]] [[Myanmar]], 
* [[Image:Flag of the Philippines.png|20px]] [[Philippines]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Singapore.png|20px]] [[Singapore]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Thailand.png|20px]] [[Thailand]], 
* [[Image:Flag of East Timor.png|20px]] [[Timor-Leste]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Vietnam.png|20px]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Armenia.png|20px]] [[Armenia]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Azerbaijan.png|20px]] [[Azerbaijan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Cyprus.png|20px]] [[Cyprus]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Georgia.png|20px]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]], 
* [[Image:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]],
* [[Image:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]], 
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]], 
* [[Image:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]

[[Category:World]]
[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[fr:Asie]]</text>
      <sha1>0wbcjnoaynaixskj919byt6k2m8xl17</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18015</id>
      <parentid>18008</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-18T20:51:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3871">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[Image:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]
== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Kazakhstan.png|20px]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.png|20px]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tajikistan.png|20px]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Turkmenistan.png|20px]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Uzbekistan.png|20px]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag China.png|20px]] [[China]]
* [[Image:Flag of North Korea.png|20px]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[Image:Flag of Japan.png|20px]] [[Japan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mongolia.png|20px]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[Image:Flag South Korea.png|20px]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[Image:Flag Republic of China Taiwan.png|20px]] [[Taiwan]]
=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag of Hong Kong China.png|20px]] [[Hong Kong|Hong Kong Special Adm. Region of China]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macau China.png|20px]] [[Macao|Macao Special Adm. Region of China]]

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[Image:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|400px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[Image:Flag Afghanistan.png|20px]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bangladesh.png|20px]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bhutan.png|20px]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[Image:Flag of India.png|20px]] [[India]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iran.png|20px]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[Image:Flag of Maldives.png|20px]] [[Maldives]]
* [[Image:Flag Nepal.png|20px]] [[Nepal]]
* [[Image:Flag of Pakistan.png|20px]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sri Lanka.png|20px]] [[Sri Lanka]]
=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag British Indian Ocean Territory UK.png|20px]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Brunei.png|20px]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cambodia.png|20px]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Indonesia.png|20px]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Laos.png|20px]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malaysia.png|20px]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Myanmar burma.png|20px]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Philippines.png|20px]] [[Philippines]]
* [[Image:Flag of Singapore.png|20px]] [[Singapore]]
* [[Image:Flag of Thailand.png|20px]] [[Thailand]]
* [[Image:Flag of East Timor.png|20px]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[Image:Flag of Vietnam.png|20px]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[Image:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|400px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]
=== [[Middle East|Western Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Armenia.png|20px]] [[Armenia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Azerbaijan.png|20px]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cyprus.png|20px]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[Image:Flag of Georgia.png|20px]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]]
* [[Image:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]]
* [[Image:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]]
* [[Image:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[Image:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]]
* [[Image:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]]
* [[Image:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[Image:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]

[[Category:World]]
[[Category:Asia| ]]
__NOTOC__
[[fr:Asie]]</text>
      <sha1>9cab42fz5s53zco9cna7ye4ygxwifkn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21302</id>
      <parentid>18015</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-15T10:52:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3886">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[Image:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]
== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Kazakhstan.png|20px]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.png|20px]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tajikistan.png|20px]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Turkmenistan.png|20px]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Uzbekistan.png|20px]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag China.png|20px]] [[China]]
* [[Image:Flag of North Korea.png|20px]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[Image:Flag of Japan.png|20px]] [[Japan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mongolia.png|20px]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[Image:Flag South Korea.png|20px]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[Image:Flag Republic of China Taiwan.png|20px]] [[Taiwan]]
=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag of Hong Kong China.png|20px]] [[Hong Kong|Hong Kong Special Adm. Region of China]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macau China.png|20px]] [[Macao|Macao Special Adm. Region of China]]

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[Image:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|400px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[Image:Flag Afghanistan.png|20px]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bangladesh.png|20px]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bhutan.png|20px]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[Image:Flag of India.png|20px]] [[India]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iran.png|20px]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[Image:Flag of Maldives.png|20px]] [[Maldives]]
* [[Image:Flag Nepal.png|20px]] [[Nepal]]
* [[Image:Flag of Pakistan.png|20px]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sri Lanka.png|20px]] [[Sri Lanka]]
=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag British Indian Ocean Territory UK.png|20px]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Brunei.png|20px]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cambodia.png|20px]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Indonesia.png|20px]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Laos.png|20px]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malaysia.png|20px]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Myanmar burma.png|20px]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Philippines.png|20px]] [[Philippines]]
* [[Image:Flag of Singapore.png|20px]] [[Singapore]]
* [[Image:Flag of Thailand.png|20px]] [[Thailand]]
* [[Image:Flag of East Timor.png|20px]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[Image:Flag of Vietnam.png|20px]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[Image:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|400px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]
=== [[Middle East|Western Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Armenia.png|20px]] [[Armenia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Azerbaijan.png|20px]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cyprus.png|20px]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[Image:Flag of Georgia.png|20px]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]]
* [[Image:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]]
* [[Image:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]]
* [[Image:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[Image:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]]
* [[Image:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]]
* [[Image:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[Image:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]

[[Category:World]]
[[Category:Asia| ]]
__NOTOC__
[[fr:Asie]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}</text>
      <sha1>4ggg446jp4pff5q8escyavahrfv8925</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>25641</id>
      <parentid>21302</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-03T21:49:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3871">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[Image:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Kazakhstan.png|20px]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.png|20px]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tajikistan.png|20px]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Turkmenistan.png|20px]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Uzbekistan.png|20px]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag China.png|20px]] [[China]]
* [[Image:Flag of North Korea.png|20px]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[Image:Flag of Japan.png|20px]] [[Japan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mongolia.png|20px]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[Image:Flag South Korea.png|20px]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[Image:Flag Republic of China Taiwan.png|20px]] [[Taiwan]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag of Hong Kong China.png|20px]] [[Hong Kong]] Special Adm. Region of China
* [[Image:Flag of Macau China.png|20px]] [[Macao]] Special Adm. Region of China

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[Image:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|400px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[Image:Flag Afghanistan.png|20px]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bangladesh.png|20px]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bhutan.png|20px]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[Image:Flag of India.png|20px]] [[India]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iran.png|20px]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[Image:Flag of Maldives.png|20px]] [[Maldives]]
* [[Image:Flag Nepal.png|20px]] [[Nepal]]
* [[Image:Flag of Pakistan.png|20px]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sri Lanka.png|20px]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag British Indian Ocean Territory UK.png|20px]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Brunei.png|20px]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cambodia.png|20px]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Indonesia.png|20px]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Laos.png|20px]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malaysia.png|20px]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Myanmar burma.png|20px]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Philippines.png|20px]] [[Philippines]]
* [[Image:Flag of Singapore.png|20px]] [[Singapore]]
* [[Image:Flag of Thailand.png|20px]] [[Thailand]]
* [[Image:Flag of East Timor.png|20px]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[Image:Flag of Vietnam.png|20px]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[Image:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|400px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Middle East|Western Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Armenia.png|20px]] [[Armenia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Azerbaijan.png|20px]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cyprus.png|20px]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[Image:Flag of Georgia.png|20px]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]]
* [[Image:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]]
* [[Image:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]]
* [[Image:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[Image:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]]
* [[Image:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]]
* [[Image:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[Image:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[de:Asien]]
[[fr:Asie]]

__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>3htdxwl9cso8lxjbqstesbl40f4tpn1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27577</id>
      <parentid>25641</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-10T00:22:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sigurdas</username>
        <id>1658</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3859">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[Image:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Kazakhstan.png|20px]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.png|20px]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tajikistan.png|20px]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Turkmenistan.png|20px]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Uzbekistan.png|20px]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag China.png|20px]] [[China]]
* [[Image:Flag of North Korea.png|20px]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[Image:Flag of Japan.png|20px]] [[Japan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mongolia.png|20px]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[Image:Flag South Korea.png|20px]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[Image:Flag Republic of China Taiwan.png|20px]] [[Taiwan]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag of Hong Kong China.png|20px]] [[Hong Kong]] Special Adm. Region of China
* [[Image:Flag of Macau China.png|20px]] [[Macao]] Special Adm. Region of China

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[Image:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|400px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[Image:Flag Afghanistan.png|20px]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bangladesh.png|20px]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bhutan.png|20px]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[Image:Flag of India.png|20px]] [[India]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iran.png|20px]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[Image:Flag of Maldives.png|20px]] [[Maldives]]
* [[Image:Flag Nepal.png|20px]] [[Nepal]]
* [[Image:Flag of Pakistan.png|20px]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sri Lanka.png|20px]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag British Indian Ocean Territory UK.png|20px]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Brunei.png|20px]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cambodia.png|20px]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Indonesia.png|20px]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Laos.png|20px]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malaysia.png|20px]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Myanmar burma.png|20px]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Philippines.png|20px]] [[Philippines]]
* [[Image:Flag of Singapore.png|20px]] [[Singapore]]
* [[Image:Flag of Thailand.png|20px]] [[Thailand]]
* [[Image:Flag of East Timor.png|20px]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[Image:Flag of Vietnam.png|20px]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[Image:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|400px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Armenia.png|20px]] [[Armenia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Azerbaijan.png|20px]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cyprus.png|20px]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[Image:Flag of Georgia.png|20px]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]]
* [[Image:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]]
* [[Image:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]]
* [[Image:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[Image:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]]
* [[Image:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]]
* [[Image:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[Image:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[de:Asien]]
[[fr:Asie]]

__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>pju6gg4589gwhkxztyw9f37xblfeip1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31549</id>
      <parentid>27577</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-04T23:34:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sigurdas</username>
        <id>1658</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3873">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[Image:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Kazakhstan.png|20px]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.png|20px]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tajikistan.png|20px]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Turkmenistan.png|20px]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Uzbekistan.png|20px]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag China.png|20px]] [[China]]
* [[Image:Flag of North Korea.png|20px]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[Image:Flag of Japan.png|20px]] [[Japan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mongolia.png|20px]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[Image:Flag South Korea.png|20px]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[Image:Flag Republic of China Taiwan.png|20px]] [[Taiwan]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag of Hong Kong China.png|20px]] [[Hong Kong]] Special Adm. Region of China
* [[Image:Flag of Macau China.png|20px]] [[Macao]] Special Adm. Region of China

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[Image:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|400px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[Image:Flag Afghanistan.png|20px]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bangladesh.png|20px]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bhutan.png|20px]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[Image:Flag of India.png|20px]] [[India]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iran.png|20px]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[Image:Flag of Maldives.png|20px]] [[Maldives]]
* [[Image:Flag Nepal.png|20px]] [[Nepal]]
* [[Image:Flag of Pakistan.png|20px]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sri Lanka.png|20px]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag British Indian Ocean Territory UK.png|20px]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Brunei.png|20px]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cambodia.png|20px]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Indonesia.png|20px]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Laos.png|20px]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malaysia.png|20px]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Myanmar burma.png|20px]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Philippines.png|20px]] [[Philippines]]
* [[Image:Flag of Singapore.png|20px]] [[Singapore]]
* [[Image:Flag of Thailand.png|20px]] [[Thailand]]
* [[Image:Flag of East Timor.png|20px]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[Image:Flag of Vietnam.png|20px]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[Image:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|400px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Armenia.png|20px]] [[Armenia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Azerbaijan.png|20px]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cyprus.png|20px]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[Image:Flag of Georgia.png|20px]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]]
* [[Image:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]]
* [[Image:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]]
* [[Image:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[Image:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]]
* [[Image:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]]
* [[Image:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[Image:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[Category:Asia| ]]
[[trash:Asia]]
[[de:Asien]]
[[fr:Asie]]

__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>mvjwrp3hinh4wxzncieaplkbjllj0yw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>33698</id>
      <parentid>31549</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-28T11:38:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.156.213.38</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3886">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[Image:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Kazakhstan.png|20px]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.png|20px]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tajikistan.png|20px]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Turkmenistan.png|20px]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Uzbekistan.png|20px]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag China.png|20px]] [[China]]
* [[Image:Flag of North Korea.png|20px]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[Image:Flag of Japan.png|20px]] [[Japan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mongolia.png|20px]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[Image:Flag South Korea.png|20px]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[Image:Flag Republic of China Taiwan.png|20px]] [[Taiwan]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag of Hong Kong China.png|20px]] [[Hong Kong]] Special Adm. Region of China
* [[Image:Flag of Macau China.png|20px]] [[Macao]] Special Adm. Region of China

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[Image:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|400px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[Image:Flag Afghanistan.png|20px]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bangladesh.png|20px]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bhutan.png|20px]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[Image:Flag of India.png|20px]] [[India]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iran.png|20px]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[Image:Flag of Maldives.png|20px]] [[Maldives]]
* [[Image:Flag Nepal.png|20px]] [[Nepal]]
* [[Image:Flag of Pakistan.png|20px]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sri Lanka.png|20px]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag British Indian Ocean Territory UK.png|20px]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Brunei.png|20px]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cambodia.png|20px]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Indonesia.png|20px]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Laos.png|20px]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malaysia.png|20px]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Myanmar burma.png|20px]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Philippines.png|20px]] [[Philippines]]
* [[Image:Flag of Singapore.png|20px]] [[Singapore]]
* [[Image:Flag of Thailand.png|20px]] [[Thailand]]
* [[Image:Flag of East Timor.png|20px]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[Image:Flag of Vietnam.png|20px]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[Image:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|400px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Armenia.png|20px]] [[Armenia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Azerbaijan.png|20px]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cyprus.png|20px]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[Image:Flag of Georgia.png|20px]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]]
* [[Image:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]]
* [[Image:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]]
* [[Image:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[Image:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]]
* [[Image:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]]
* [[Image:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[Image:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[Category:Asia| ]]
[[trash:Asia]]
[[de:Asien]]
[[fi:Aasia]]
[[fr:Asie]]

__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>jp7xj3ks0r23bwqm4cu625s8npa2kou</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>34510</id>
      <parentid>33698</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T15:29:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3887">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[Image:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Kazakhstan.png|20px]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.png|20px]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tajikistan.png|20px]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Turkmenistan.png|20px]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Uzbekistan.png|20px]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag China.png|20px]] [[China]]
* [[Image:Flag of North Korea.png|20px]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[Image:Flag of Japan.png|20px]] [[Japan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mongolia.png|20px]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[Image:Flag South Korea.png|20px]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[Image:Flag Republic of China Taiwan.png|20px]] [[Taiwan]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag of Hong Kong China.png|20px]] [[Hong Kong]] Special Adm. Region of China
* [[Image:Flag of Macau China.png|20px]] [[Macao]] Special Adm. Region of China

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[Image:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|400px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[Image:Flag Afghanistan.png|20px]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bangladesh.png|20px]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bhutan.png|20px]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[Image:Flag of India.png|20px]] [[India]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iran.png|20px]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[Image:Flag of Maldives.png|20px]] [[Maldives]]
* [[Image:Flag Nepal.png|20px]] [[Nepal]]
* [[Image:Flag of Pakistan.png|20px]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sri Lanka.png|20px]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag British Indian Ocean Territory UK.png|20px]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Brunei.png|20px]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cambodia.png|20px]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Indonesia.png|20px]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Laos.png|20px]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malaysia.png|20px]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Myanmar burma.png|20px]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Philippines.png|20px]] [[Philippines]]
* [[Image:Flag of Singapore.png|20px]] [[Singapore]]
* [[Image:Flag of Thailand.png|20px]] [[Thailand]]
* [[Image:Flag of East Timor.png|20px]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[Image:Flag of Vietnam.png|20px]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[Image:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|400px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Armenia.png|20px]] [[Armenia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Azerbaijan.png|20px]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cyprus.png|20px]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[Image:Flag of Georgia.png|20px]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]]
* [[Image:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]]
* [[Image:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]]
* [[Image:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[Image:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]]
* [[Image:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]]
* [[Image:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[Image:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[Category:Asia| ]]
[[trash:Asia]]
[[fr:Asie]]

__NOTOC__

[[de:Asien]]
[[fi:Aasia]]</text>
      <sha1>gi5vrvkq1n1xr8b8pes6d5e17p9m7b5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>34637</id>
      <parentid>34510</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T16:08:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3833">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[File:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Kazakhstan.png|20px]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.png|20px]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tajikistan.png|20px]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkmenistan.png|20px]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Uzbekistan.png|20px]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag China.png|20px]] [[China]]
* [[File:Flag of North Korea.png|20px]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of Japan.png|20px]] [[Japan]]
* [[File:Flag of Mongolia.png|20px]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[File:Flag South Korea.png|20px]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag Republic of China Taiwan.png|20px]] [[Taiwan]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Hong Kong China.png|20px]] [[Hong Kong]] Special Adm. Region of China
* [[File:Flag of Macau China.png|20px]] [[Macao]] Special Adm. Region of China

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[File:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|400px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[File:Flag Afghanistan.png|20px]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bangladesh.png|20px]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[File:Flag of Bhutan.png|20px]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[File:Flag of India.png|20px]] [[India]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.png|20px]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[File:Flag of Maldives.png|20px]] [[Maldives]]
* [[File:Flag Nepal.png|20px]] [[Nepal]]
* [[File:Flag of Pakistan.png|20px]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sri Lanka.png|20px]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag British Indian Ocean Territory UK.png|20px]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Brunei.png|20px]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[File:Flag of Cambodia.png|20px]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[File:Flag of Indonesia.png|20px]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[File:Flag of Laos.png|20px]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Malaysia.png|20px]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[File:Flag of Myanmar burma.png|20px]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Philippines.png|20px]] [[Philippines]]
* [[File:Flag of Singapore.png|20px]] [[Singapore]]
* [[File:Flag of Thailand.png|20px]] [[Thailand]]
* [[File:Flag of East Timor.png|20px]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[File:Flag of Vietnam.png|20px]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[File:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|400px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Armenia.png|20px]] [[Armenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Azerbaijan.png|20px]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.png|20px]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[File:Flag of Georgia.png|20px]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]]
* [[File:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[trash:Asia]]
[[fr:Asie]]

__NOTOC__

[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[de:Asien]]
[[fi:Aasia]]</text>
      <sha1>6jw5kpoxb4gtk469i1n885wgtopx3q2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35864</id>
      <parentid>34637</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-17T00:03:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3847">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[File:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Kazakhstan.png|20px]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.png|20px]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tajikistan.png|20px]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkmenistan.png|20px]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Uzbekistan.png|20px]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag China.png|20px]] [[China]]
* [[File:Flag of North Korea.png|20px]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of Japan.png|20px]] [[Japan]]
* [[File:Flag of Mongolia.png|20px]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[File:Flag South Korea.png|20px]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag Republic of China Taiwan.png|20px]] [[Taiwan]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Hong Kong China.png|20px]] [[Hong Kong]] Special Adm. Region of China
* [[File:Flag of Macau China.png|20px]] [[Macao]] Special Adm. Region of China

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[File:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|400px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[File:Flag Afghanistan.png|20px]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bangladesh.png|20px]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[File:Flag of Bhutan.png|20px]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[File:Flag of India.png|20px]] [[India]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.png|20px]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[File:Flag of Maldives.png|20px]] [[Maldives]]
* [[File:Flag Nepal.png|20px]] [[Nepal]]
* [[File:Flag of Pakistan.png|20px]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sri Lanka.png|20px]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag British Indian Ocean Territory UK.png|20px]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Brunei.png|20px]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[File:Flag of Cambodia.png|20px]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[File:Flag of Indonesia.png|20px]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[File:Flag of Laos.png|20px]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Malaysia.png|20px]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[File:Flag of Myanmar burma.png|20px]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Philippines.png|20px]] [[Philippines]]
* [[File:Flag of Singapore.png|20px]] [[Singapore]]
* [[File:Flag of Thailand.png|20px]] [[Thailand]]
* [[File:Flag of East Timor.png|20px]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[File:Flag of Vietnam.png|20px]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[File:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|400px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Armenia.png|20px]] [[Armenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Azerbaijan.png|20px]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.png|20px]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[File:Flag of Georgia.png|20px]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]]
* [[File:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[trash:Asia]]
[[fr:Asie]]

__NOTOC__

[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[de:Asien]]
[[fi:Aasia]]
[[zh:亚洲]]</text>
      <sha1>pwbfhuw7pkw3ct2pr1z82vg4tudtelr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>37732</id>
      <parentid>35864</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-10-09T22:15:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3846">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[File:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Kazakhstan.png|20px]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.png|20px]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tajikistan.png|20px]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkmenistan.png|20px]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Uzbekistan.png|20px]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag China.png|20px]] [[China]]
* [[File:Flag of North Korea.png|20px]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of Japan.png|20px]] [[Japan]]
* [[File:Flag of Mongolia.png|20px]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[File:Flag South Korea.png|20px]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag Republic of China Taiwan.png|20px]] [[Taiwan]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Hong Kong China.png|20px]] [[Hong Kong]] Special Adm. Region of China
* [[File:Flag of Macau China.png|20px]] [[Macao]] Special Adm. Region of China

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[File:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|400px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[File:Flag Afghanistan.png|20px]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bangladesh.png|20px]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[File:Flag of Bhutan.png|20px]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[File:Flag of India.png|20px]] [[India]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.png|20px]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[File:Flag of Maldives.png|20px]] [[Maldives]]
* [[File:Flag Nepal.png|20px]] [[Nepal]]
* [[File:Flag of Pakistan.png|20px]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sri Lanka.png|20px]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag British Indian Ocean Territory UK.png|20px]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Brunei.png|20px]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[File:Flag of Cambodia.png|20px]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[File:Flag of Indonesia.png|20px]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[File:Flag of Laos.png|20px]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Malaysia.png|20px]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[File:Flag of Myanmar burma.png|20px]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Philippines.png|20px]] [[Philippines]]
* [[File:Flag of Singapore.png|20px]] [[Singapore]]
* [[File:Flag of Thailand.png|20px]] [[Thailand]]
* [[File:Flag of East Timor.png|20px]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[File:Flag of Vietnam.png|20px]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[File:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|400px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Armenia.png|20px]] [[Armenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Azerbaijan.png|20px]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.png|20px]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[File:Flag of Georgia.png|20px]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]]
* [[File:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[trash:Asia]]
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[de:Asien]]
[[fi:Aasia]]
[[fr:Asie]]
[[zh:亚洲]]</text>
      <sha1>obgktc7w1o8tus4231qi7gs5708qvsz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39127</id>
      <parentid>37732</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-12-31T20:53:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Vidimian</username>
        <id>1703</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3858">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[File:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Kazakhstan.png|20px]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.png|20px]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tajikistan.png|20px]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkmenistan.png|20px]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Uzbekistan.png|20px]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag China.png|20px]] [[China]]
* [[File:Flag of North Korea.png|20px]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of Japan.png|20px]] [[Japan]]
* [[File:Flag of Mongolia.png|20px]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[File:Flag South Korea.png|20px]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag Republic of China Taiwan.png|20px]] [[Taiwan]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Hong Kong China.png|20px]] [[Hong Kong]] Special Adm. Region of China
* [[File:Flag of Macau China.png|20px]] [[Macao]] Special Adm. Region of China

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[File:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|400px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[File:Flag Afghanistan.png|20px]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bangladesh.png|20px]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[File:Flag of Bhutan.png|20px]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[File:Flag of India.png|20px]] [[India]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.png|20px]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[File:Flag of Maldives.png|20px]] [[Maldives]]
* [[File:Flag Nepal.png|20px]] [[Nepal]]
* [[File:Flag of Pakistan.png|20px]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sri Lanka.png|20px]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag British Indian Ocean Territory UK.png|20px]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Brunei.png|20px]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[File:Flag of Cambodia.png|20px]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[File:Flag of Indonesia.png|20px]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[File:Flag of Laos.png|20px]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Malaysia.png|20px]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[File:Flag of Myanmar burma.png|20px]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Philippines.png|20px]] [[Philippines]]
* [[File:Flag of Singapore.png|20px]] [[Singapore]]
* [[File:Flag of Thailand.png|20px]] [[Thailand]]
* [[File:Flag of East Timor.png|20px]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[File:Flag of Vietnam.png|20px]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[File:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|400px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Armenia.png|20px]] [[Armenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Azerbaijan.png|20px]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.png|20px]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[File:Flag of Georgia.png|20px]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]]
* [[File:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[trash:Asia]]
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[de:Asien]]
[[fi:Aasia]]
[[fr:Asie]]
[[tr:Asya]]
[[zh:亚洲]]</text>
      <sha1>9rvfysmqco1lofstnk9s0h4v9wxuski</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40896</id>
      <parentid>39127</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-30T21:43:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3870">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[File:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Kazakhstan.png|20px]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.png|20px]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tajikistan.png|20px]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkmenistan.png|20px]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Uzbekistan.png|20px]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag China.png|20px]] [[China]]
* [[File:Flag of North Korea.png|20px]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of Japan.png|20px]] [[Japan]]
* [[File:Flag of Mongolia.png|20px]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[File:Flag South Korea.png|20px]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag Republic of China Taiwan.png|20px]] [[Taiwan]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Hong Kong China.png|20px]] [[Hong Kong]] Special Adm. Region of China
* [[File:Flag of Macau China.png|20px]] [[Macao]] Special Adm. Region of China

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[File:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|400px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[File:Flag Afghanistan.png|20px]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bangladesh.png|20px]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[File:Flag of Bhutan.png|20px]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[File:Flag of India.png|20px]] [[India]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.png|20px]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[File:Flag of Maldives.png|20px]] [[Maldives]]
* [[File:Flag Nepal.png|20px]] [[Nepal]]
* [[File:Flag of Pakistan.png|20px]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sri Lanka.png|20px]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag British Indian Ocean Territory UK.png|20px]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Brunei.png|20px]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[File:Flag of Cambodia.png|20px]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[File:Flag of Indonesia.png|20px]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[File:Flag of Laos.png|20px]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Malaysia.png|20px]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[File:Flag of Myanmar burma.png|20px]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Philippines.png|20px]] [[Philippines]]
* [[File:Flag of Singapore.png|20px]] [[Singapore]]
* [[File:Flag of Thailand.png|20px]] [[Thailand]]
* [[File:Flag of East Timor.png|20px]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[File:Flag of Vietnam.png|20px]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[File:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|400px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Armenia.png|20px]] [[Armenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Azerbaijan.png|20px]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.png|20px]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[File:Flag of Georgia.png|20px]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]]
* [[File:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[trash:Asia]]
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[de:Asien]]
[[es:Asia]]
[[fi:Aasia]]
[[fr:Asie]]
[[tr:Asya]]
[[zh:亚洲]]</text>
      <sha1>grwd57i0c6oon4ohe6qktosuexgsa1z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>42824</id>
      <parentid>40896</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-07-01T18:38:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>79.68.42.111</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3949">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[File:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Kazakhstan.png|20px]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.png|20px]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tajikistan.png|20px]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkmenistan.png|20px]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Uzbekistan.png|20px]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag China.png|20px]] [[China]]
* [[File:Flag of North Korea.png|20px]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of Japan.png|20px]] [[Japan]]
* [[File:Flag of Mongolia.png|20px]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[File:Flag South Korea.png|20px]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag Republic of China Taiwan.png|20px]] [[Taiwan]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Hong Kong China.png|20px]] [[Hong Kong]] Special Adm. Region of China
* [[File:Flag of Macau China.png|20px]] [[Macao]] Special Adm. Region of China
* [[File:Flag of Tibet China.png|20px]] [[Tibet]] Special Adm. Region of China

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[File:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|400px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[File:Flag Afghanistan.png|20px]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bangladesh.png|20px]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[File:Flag of Bhutan.png|20px]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[File:Flag of India.png|20px]] [[India]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.png|20px]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[File:Flag of Maldives.png|20px]] [[Maldives]]
* [[File:Flag Nepal.png|20px]] [[Nepal]]
* [[File:Flag of Pakistan.png|20px]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sri Lanka.png|20px]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag British Indian Ocean Territory UK.png|20px]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Brunei.png|20px]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[File:Flag of Cambodia.png|20px]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[File:Flag of Indonesia.png|20px]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[File:Flag of Laos.png|20px]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Malaysia.png|20px]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[File:Flag of Myanmar burma.png|20px]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Philippines.png|20px]] [[Philippines]]
* [[File:Flag of Singapore.png|20px]] [[Singapore]]
* [[File:Flag of Thailand.png|20px]] [[Thailand]]
* [[File:Flag of East Timor.png|20px]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[File:Flag of Vietnam.png|20px]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[File:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|400px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Armenia.png|20px]] [[Armenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Azerbaijan.png|20px]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.png|20px]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.png|20px]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[File:Flag of Georgia.png|20px]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]]
* [[File:Flag Iraq.png|20px]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.png|20px]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.png|20px]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.png|20px]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.png|20px]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.png|20px]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.png|20px]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.png|20px]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.png|20px]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag Turkey.png|20px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.png|20px]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.png|20px]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.png|20px]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[trash:Asia]]
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[de:Asien]]
[[es:Asia]]
[[fi:Aasia]]
[[fr:Asie]]
[[tr:Asya]]
[[zh:亚洲]]</text>
      <sha1>lspfkoforz64u534mujoy3qmoa8mxd2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>45960</id>
      <parentid>42824</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-17T12:16:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4343">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[File:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Kazakhstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tajikistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkmenistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Uzbekistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of the People's Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[China]]
* [[File:Flag of North Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of Japan.svg|30px|border]] [[Japan]]
* [[File:Flag of Mongolia.svg|30px|border]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[Taiwan]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Hong Kong.svg|30px|border]] [[Hong Kong]] Special Adm. Region of China
* [[File:Flag of Macau.svg|30px|border]] [[Macao]] Special Adm. Region of China
* [[File:Flag of Tibet.svg|30px|border]] [[Tibet]] Special Adm. Region of China

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[File:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|400px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[File:Flag of Afghanistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bangladesh.svg|30px|border]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[File:Flag of Bhutan.svg|30px|border]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[File:Flag of India.svg|30px|border]] [[India]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.svg|30px|border]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[File:Flag of Maldives.svg|30px|border]] [[Maldives]]
* [[File:Flag of Nepal.svg|30px|border]] [[Nepal]]
* [[File:Flag of Pakistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sri Lanka.svg|30px|border]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of the British Indian Ocean Territory.svg|30px|border]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Brunei.svg|30px|border]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[File:Flag of Cambodia.svg|30px|border]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[File:Flag of Indonesia.svg|30px|border]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[File:Flag of Laos.svg|30px|border]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Malaysia.svg|30px|border]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[File:Flag of Myanmar.svg|30px|border]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Philippines.svg|30px|border]] [[Philippines]]
* [[File:Flag of Singapore.svg|30px|border]] [[Singapore]]
* [[File:Flag of Thailand.svg|30px|border]] [[Thailand]]
* [[File:Flag of East Timor.svg|30px|border]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[File:Flag of Vietnam.svg|30px|border]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[File:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|400px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Armenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Armenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Azerbaijan.svg|30px|border]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.svg|30px|border]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[File:Flag of Georgia.svg|30px|border]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]]
* [[File:Flag of Iraq.svg|30px|border]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.svg|30px|border]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.svg|30px|border]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.svg|30px|border]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.svg|30px|border]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.svg|30px|border]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.svg|30px|border]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.svg|30px|border]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.svg|30px|border]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.svg|30px|border]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.svg|30px|border]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.svg|30px|border]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[trash:Asia]]
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[de:Asien]]
[[es:Asia]]
[[fi:Aasia]]
[[fr:Asie]]
[[tr:Asya]]
[[zh:亚洲]]</text>
      <sha1>isr8xcyt7yk16szrgyjn6mxm7dhufn7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>46269</id>
      <parentid>45960</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-29T01:02:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4359">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[File:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Kazakhstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tajikistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkmenistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Uzbekistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of the People's Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[China]]
* [[File:Flag of North Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of Japan.svg|30px|border]] [[Japan]]
* [[File:Flag of Mongolia.svg|30px|border]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[Taiwan]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Hong Kong.svg|30px|border]] [[Hong Kong]] Special Adm. Region of China
* [[File:Flag of Macau.svg|30px|border]] [[Macao]] Special Adm. Region of China
* [[File:Flag of Tibet.svg|30px|border]] [[Tibet]] Special Adm. Region of China

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[File:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|400px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[File:Flag of Afghanistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bangladesh.svg|30px|border]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[File:Flag of Bhutan.svg|30px|border]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[File:Flag of India.svg|30px|border]] [[India]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.svg|30px|border]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[File:Flag of Maldives.svg|30px|border]] [[Maldives]]
* [[File:Flag of Nepal.svg|30px|border]] [[Nepal]]
* [[File:Flag of Pakistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sri Lanka.svg|30px|border]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of the British Indian Ocean Territory.svg|30px|border]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Brunei.svg|30px|border]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[File:Flag of Cambodia.svg|30px|border]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[File:Flag of Indonesia.svg|30px|border]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[File:Flag of Laos.svg|30px|border]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Malaysia.svg|30px|border]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[File:Flag of Myanmar.svg|30px|border]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Philippines.svg|30px|border]] [[Philippines]]
* [[File:Flag of Singapore.svg|30px|border]] [[Singapore]]
* [[File:Flag of Thailand.svg|30px|border]] [[Thailand]]
* [[File:Flag of East Timor.svg|30px|border]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[File:Flag of Vietnam.svg|30px|border]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[File:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|400px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Armenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Armenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Azerbaijan.svg|30px|border]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.svg|30px|border]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[File:Flag of Georgia.svg|30px|border]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]]
* [[File:Flag of Iraq.svg|30px|border]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.svg|30px|border]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.svg|30px|border]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.svg|30px|border]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.svg|30px|border]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.svg|30px|border]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.svg|30px|border]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.svg|30px|border]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.svg|30px|border]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.svg|30px|border]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.svg|30px|border]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.svg|30px|border]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[trash:Asia]]
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[de:Asien]]
[[es:Asia]]
[[fi:Aasia]]
[[fr:Asie]]
[[ru:Азия]]
[[tr:Asya]]
[[zh:亚洲]]</text>
      <sha1>96ue64kn3gd5uroobzgmfojqmh9owmc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48135</id>
      <parentid>46269</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-11T08:48:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mipplor</username>
        <id>1887</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4279">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[File:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Kazakhstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tajikistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkmenistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Uzbekistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of the People's Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[China]]
* [[File:Flag of North Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of Japan.svg|30px|border]] [[Japan]]
* [[File:Flag of Mongolia.svg|30px|border]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[Taiwan]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Hong Kong.svg|30px|border]] [[Hong Kong]] Special Adm. Region of China
* [[File:Flag of Macau.svg|30px|border]] [[Macao]] Special Adm. Region of China

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[File:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|400px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[File:Flag of Afghanistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bangladesh.svg|30px|border]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[File:Flag of Bhutan.svg|30px|border]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[File:Flag of India.svg|30px|border]] [[India]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.svg|30px|border]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[File:Flag of Maldives.svg|30px|border]] [[Maldives]]
* [[File:Flag of Nepal.svg|30px|border]] [[Nepal]]
* [[File:Flag of Pakistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sri Lanka.svg|30px|border]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of the British Indian Ocean Territory.svg|30px|border]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Brunei.svg|30px|border]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[File:Flag of Cambodia.svg|30px|border]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[File:Flag of Indonesia.svg|30px|border]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[File:Flag of Laos.svg|30px|border]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Malaysia.svg|30px|border]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[File:Flag of Myanmar.svg|30px|border]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Philippines.svg|30px|border]] [[Philippines]]
* [[File:Flag of Singapore.svg|30px|border]] [[Singapore]]
* [[File:Flag of Thailand.svg|30px|border]] [[Thailand]]
* [[File:Flag of East Timor.svg|30px|border]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[File:Flag of Vietnam.svg|30px|border]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[File:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|400px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Armenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Armenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Azerbaijan.svg|30px|border]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.svg|30px|border]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[File:Flag of Georgia.svg|30px|border]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]]
* [[File:Flag of Iraq.svg|30px|border]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.svg|30px|border]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.svg|30px|border]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.svg|30px|border]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.svg|30px|border]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.svg|30px|border]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.svg|30px|border]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.svg|30px|border]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.svg|30px|border]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.svg|30px|border]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.svg|30px|border]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.svg|30px|border]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[trash:Asia]]
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[de:Asien]]
[[es:Asia]]
[[fi:Aasia]]
[[fr:Asie]]
[[ru:Азия]]
[[tr:Asya]]
[[zh:亚洲]]</text>
      <sha1>6ywi6k3lhm1qxqtmh28g4qas69auap9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48136</id>
      <parentid>48135</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-11T08:49:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mipplor</username>
        <id>1887</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4281">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[File:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Kazakhstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tajikistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkmenistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Uzbekistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of the People's Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[China]]
* [[File:Flag of North Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of Japan.svg|30px|border]] [[Japan]]
* [[File:Flag of Mongolia.svg|30px|border]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[Taiwan]]

==== Special Administration Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Hong Kong.svg|30px|border]] [[Hong Kong]] Special Adm. Region of China
* [[File:Flag of Macau.svg|30px|border]] [[Macao]] Special Adm. Region of China

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[File:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|400px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[File:Flag of Afghanistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bangladesh.svg|30px|border]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[File:Flag of Bhutan.svg|30px|border]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[File:Flag of India.svg|30px|border]] [[India]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.svg|30px|border]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[File:Flag of Maldives.svg|30px|border]] [[Maldives]]
* [[File:Flag of Nepal.svg|30px|border]] [[Nepal]]
* [[File:Flag of Pakistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sri Lanka.svg|30px|border]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of the British Indian Ocean Territory.svg|30px|border]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Brunei.svg|30px|border]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[File:Flag of Cambodia.svg|30px|border]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[File:Flag of Indonesia.svg|30px|border]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[File:Flag of Laos.svg|30px|border]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Malaysia.svg|30px|border]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[File:Flag of Myanmar.svg|30px|border]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Philippines.svg|30px|border]] [[Philippines]]
* [[File:Flag of Singapore.svg|30px|border]] [[Singapore]]
* [[File:Flag of Thailand.svg|30px|border]] [[Thailand]]
* [[File:Flag of East Timor.svg|30px|border]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[File:Flag of Vietnam.svg|30px|border]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[File:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|400px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Armenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Armenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Azerbaijan.svg|30px|border]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.svg|30px|border]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[File:Flag of Georgia.svg|30px|border]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]]
* [[File:Flag of Iraq.svg|30px|border]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.svg|30px|border]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.svg|30px|border]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.svg|30px|border]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.svg|30px|border]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.svg|30px|border]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.svg|30px|border]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.svg|30px|border]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.svg|30px|border]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.svg|30px|border]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.svg|30px|border]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.svg|30px|border]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[trash:Asia]]
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[de:Asien]]
[[es:Asia]]
[[fi:Aasia]]
[[fr:Asie]]
[[ru:Азия]]
[[tr:Asya]]
[[zh:亚洲]]</text>
      <sha1>1mda4venk1wybez1jb44gsh5o3fdub1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48137</id>
      <parentid>48136</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-11T08:56:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mipplor</username>
        <id>1887</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4449">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[File:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Kazakhstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tajikistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkmenistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Uzbekistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of the People's Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[China]]
* [[File:Flag of Hong Kong.svg|30px|border]] [[Hong Kong]] Special Adm. Region of China
* [[File:Flag of Macau.svg|30px|border]] [[Macao]] Special Adm. Region of China
* [[File:Flag of North Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of Japan.svg|30px|border]] [[Japan]]
* [[File:Flag of Mongolia.svg|30px|border]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[Taiwan]]

==== Special Administration Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Hong Kong.svg|30px|border]] [[Hong Kong]] Special Adm. Region of China
* [[File:Flag of Macau.svg|30px|border]] [[Macao]] Special Adm. Region of China

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[File:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|400px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[File:Flag of Afghanistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bangladesh.svg|30px|border]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[File:Flag of Bhutan.svg|30px|border]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[File:Flag of India.svg|30px|border]] [[India]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.svg|30px|border]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[File:Flag of Maldives.svg|30px|border]] [[Maldives]]
* [[File:Flag of Nepal.svg|30px|border]] [[Nepal]]
* [[File:Flag of Pakistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sri Lanka.svg|30px|border]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of the British Indian Ocean Territory.svg|30px|border]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Brunei.svg|30px|border]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[File:Flag of Cambodia.svg|30px|border]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[File:Flag of Indonesia.svg|30px|border]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[File:Flag of Laos.svg|30px|border]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Malaysia.svg|30px|border]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[File:Flag of Myanmar.svg|30px|border]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Philippines.svg|30px|border]] [[Philippines]]
* [[File:Flag of Singapore.svg|30px|border]] [[Singapore]]
* [[File:Flag of Thailand.svg|30px|border]] [[Thailand]]
* [[File:Flag of East Timor.svg|30px|border]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[File:Flag of Vietnam.svg|30px|border]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[File:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|400px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Armenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Armenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Azerbaijan.svg|30px|border]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.svg|30px|border]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[File:Flag of Georgia.svg|30px|border]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]]
* [[File:Flag of Iraq.svg|30px|border]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.svg|30px|border]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.svg|30px|border]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.svg|30px|border]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.svg|30px|border]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.svg|30px|border]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.svg|30px|border]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.svg|30px|border]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.svg|30px|border]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.svg|30px|border]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.svg|30px|border]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.svg|30px|border]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[trash:Asia]]
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[de:Asien]]
[[es:Asia]]
[[fi:Aasia]]
[[fr:Asie]]
[[ru:Азия]]
[[tr:Asya]]
[[zh:亚洲]]</text>
      <sha1>nc9cjv32ictatd60z275l6mkd6yqdce</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48138</id>
      <parentid>48137</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-11T08:57:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mipplor</username>
        <id>1887</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4239">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[File:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Kazakhstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tajikistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkmenistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Uzbekistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of the People's Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[China]]
* [[File:Flag of Hong Kong.svg|30px|border]] [[Hong Kong]] Special Adm. Region of China
* [[File:Flag of Macau.svg|30px|border]] [[Macao]] Special Adm. Region of China
* [[File:Flag of North Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of Japan.svg|30px|border]] [[Japan]]
* [[File:Flag of Mongolia.svg|30px|border]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[Taiwan]]

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[File:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|400px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[File:Flag of Afghanistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bangladesh.svg|30px|border]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[File:Flag of Bhutan.svg|30px|border]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[File:Flag of India.svg|30px|border]] [[India]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.svg|30px|border]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[File:Flag of Maldives.svg|30px|border]] [[Maldives]]
* [[File:Flag of Nepal.svg|30px|border]] [[Nepal]]
* [[File:Flag of Pakistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sri Lanka.svg|30px|border]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of the British Indian Ocean Territory.svg|30px|border]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Brunei.svg|30px|border]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[File:Flag of Cambodia.svg|30px|border]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[File:Flag of Indonesia.svg|30px|border]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[File:Flag of Laos.svg|30px|border]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Malaysia.svg|30px|border]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[File:Flag of Myanmar.svg|30px|border]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Philippines.svg|30px|border]] [[Philippines]]
* [[File:Flag of Singapore.svg|30px|border]] [[Singapore]]
* [[File:Flag of Thailand.svg|30px|border]] [[Thailand]]
* [[File:Flag of East Timor.svg|30px|border]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[File:Flag of Vietnam.svg|30px|border]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[File:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|400px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Armenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Armenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Azerbaijan.svg|30px|border]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.svg|30px|border]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[File:Flag of Georgia.svg|30px|border]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]]
* [[File:Flag of Iraq.svg|30px|border]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.svg|30px|border]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.svg|30px|border]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.svg|30px|border]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.svg|30px|border]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.svg|30px|border]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.svg|30px|border]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.svg|30px|border]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.svg|30px|border]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.svg|30px|border]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.svg|30px|border]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.svg|30px|border]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[trash:Asia]]
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[de:Asien]]
[[es:Asia]]
[[fi:Aasia]]
[[fr:Asie]]
[[ru:Азия]]
[[tr:Asya]]
[[zh:亚洲]]</text>
      <sha1>ti8cnie3e5axacfkr9llbbtnl5dlyqi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48139</id>
      <parentid>48138</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-11T14:17:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>78.22.225.210</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4319">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[File:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Kazakhstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tajikistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkmenistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Uzbekistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of the People's Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[China]]
* [[File:Flag of Hong Kong.svg|30px|border]] [[Hong Kong]] Special Adm. Region of China
* [[File:Flag of Macau.svg|30px|border]] [[Macao]] Special Adm. Region of China
* [[File:Flag of Tibet.svg|30px|border]] [[Tibet]] Special Adm. Region of China
* [[File:Flag of North Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of Japan.svg|30px|border]] [[Japan]]
* [[File:Flag of Mongolia.svg|30px|border]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[Taiwan]]

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[File:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|400px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[File:Flag of Afghanistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bangladesh.svg|30px|border]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[File:Flag of Bhutan.svg|30px|border]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[File:Flag of India.svg|30px|border]] [[India]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.svg|30px|border]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[File:Flag of Maldives.svg|30px|border]] [[Maldives]]
* [[File:Flag of Nepal.svg|30px|border]] [[Nepal]]
* [[File:Flag of Pakistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sri Lanka.svg|30px|border]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of the British Indian Ocean Territory.svg|30px|border]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Brunei.svg|30px|border]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[File:Flag of Cambodia.svg|30px|border]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[File:Flag of Indonesia.svg|30px|border]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[File:Flag of Laos.svg|30px|border]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Malaysia.svg|30px|border]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[File:Flag of Myanmar.svg|30px|border]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Philippines.svg|30px|border]] [[Philippines]]
* [[File:Flag of Singapore.svg|30px|border]] [[Singapore]]
* [[File:Flag of Thailand.svg|30px|border]] [[Thailand]]
* [[File:Flag of East Timor.svg|30px|border]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[File:Flag of Vietnam.svg|30px|border]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[File:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|400px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Armenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Armenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Azerbaijan.svg|30px|border]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.svg|30px|border]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[File:Flag of Georgia.svg|30px|border]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]]
* [[File:Flag of Iraq.svg|30px|border]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.svg|30px|border]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.svg|30px|border]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.svg|30px|border]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.svg|30px|border]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.svg|30px|border]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.svg|30px|border]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.svg|30px|border]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.svg|30px|border]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.svg|30px|border]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.svg|30px|border]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.svg|30px|border]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[trash:Asia]]
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[de:Asien]]
[[es:Asia]]
[[fi:Aasia]]
[[fr:Asie]]
[[ru:Азия]]
[[tr:Asya]]
[[zh:亚洲]]</text>
      <sha1>25dwniuvz9hc0ui4eixrkoqw1emm6va</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48140</id>
      <parentid>48139</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-11T14:21:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>78.22.225.210</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4322">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[File:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Kazakhstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tajikistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkmenistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Uzbekistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of the People's Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[China]]
** [[File:Flag of Hong Kong.svg|30px|border]] [[Hong Kong]] Special Adm. Region of China
** [[File:Flag of Macau.svg|30px|border]] [[Macao]] Special Adm. Region of China
** [[File:Flag of Tibet.svg|30px|border]] [[Tibet]] Special Adm. Region of China
* [[File:Flag of North Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of Japan.svg|30px|border]] [[Japan]]
* [[File:Flag of Mongolia.svg|30px|border]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[Taiwan]]

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[File:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|400px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[File:Flag of Afghanistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bangladesh.svg|30px|border]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[File:Flag of Bhutan.svg|30px|border]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[File:Flag of India.svg|30px|border]] [[India]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.svg|30px|border]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[File:Flag of Maldives.svg|30px|border]] [[Maldives]]
* [[File:Flag of Nepal.svg|30px|border]] [[Nepal]]
* [[File:Flag of Pakistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sri Lanka.svg|30px|border]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of the British Indian Ocean Territory.svg|30px|border]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Brunei.svg|30px|border]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[File:Flag of Cambodia.svg|30px|border]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[File:Flag of Indonesia.svg|30px|border]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[File:Flag of Laos.svg|30px|border]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Malaysia.svg|30px|border]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[File:Flag of Myanmar.svg|30px|border]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Philippines.svg|30px|border]] [[Philippines]]
* [[File:Flag of Singapore.svg|30px|border]] [[Singapore]]
* [[File:Flag of Thailand.svg|30px|border]] [[Thailand]]
* [[File:Flag of East Timor.svg|30px|border]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[File:Flag of Vietnam.svg|30px|border]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[File:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|400px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Armenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Armenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Azerbaijan.svg|30px|border]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.svg|30px|border]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[File:Flag of Georgia.svg|30px|border]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]]
* [[File:Flag of Iraq.svg|30px|border]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.svg|30px|border]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.svg|30px|border]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.svg|30px|border]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.svg|30px|border]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.svg|30px|border]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.svg|30px|border]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.svg|30px|border]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.svg|30px|border]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.svg|30px|border]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.svg|30px|border]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.svg|30px|border]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[trash:Asia]]
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[de:Asien]]
[[es:Asia]]
[[fi:Aasia]]
[[fr:Asie]]
[[ru:Азия]]
[[tr:Asya]]
[[zh:亚洲]]</text>
      <sha1>s3j2qip7fpz1s2z2vyxskqf7rs0mleg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48142</id>
      <parentid>48140</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-11T16:24:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mipplor</username>
        <id>1887</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4241">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[File:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Kazakhstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tajikistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkmenistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Uzbekistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of the People's Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[China]]
** [[File:Flag of Hong Kong.svg|30px|border]] [[Hong Kong]] Special Adm. Region of China
** [[File:Flag of Macau.svg|30px|border]] [[Macao]] Special Adm. Region of China
* [[File:Flag of North Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of Japan.svg|30px|border]] [[Japan]]
* [[File:Flag of Mongolia.svg|30px|border]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[Taiwan]]

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[File:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|400px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[File:Flag of Afghanistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bangladesh.svg|30px|border]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[File:Flag of Bhutan.svg|30px|border]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[File:Flag of India.svg|30px|border]] [[India]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.svg|30px|border]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[File:Flag of Maldives.svg|30px|border]] [[Maldives]]
* [[File:Flag of Nepal.svg|30px|border]] [[Nepal]]
* [[File:Flag of Pakistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sri Lanka.svg|30px|border]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of the British Indian Ocean Territory.svg|30px|border]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Brunei.svg|30px|border]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[File:Flag of Cambodia.svg|30px|border]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[File:Flag of Indonesia.svg|30px|border]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[File:Flag of Laos.svg|30px|border]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Malaysia.svg|30px|border]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[File:Flag of Myanmar.svg|30px|border]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Philippines.svg|30px|border]] [[Philippines]]
* [[File:Flag of Singapore.svg|30px|border]] [[Singapore]]
* [[File:Flag of Thailand.svg|30px|border]] [[Thailand]]
* [[File:Flag of East Timor.svg|30px|border]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[File:Flag of Vietnam.svg|30px|border]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[File:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|400px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Armenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Armenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Azerbaijan.svg|30px|border]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.svg|30px|border]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[File:Flag of Georgia.svg|30px|border]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]]
* [[File:Flag of Iraq.svg|30px|border]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.svg|30px|border]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.svg|30px|border]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.svg|30px|border]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.svg|30px|border]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.svg|30px|border]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.svg|30px|border]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.svg|30px|border]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.svg|30px|border]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.svg|30px|border]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.svg|30px|border]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.svg|30px|border]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[trash:Asia]]
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[de:Asien]]
[[es:Asia]]
[[fi:Aasia]]
[[fr:Asie]]
[[ru:Азия]]
[[tr:Asya]]
[[zh:亚洲]]</text>
      <sha1>h3rsymszywe6n5b8yogpcgabdpqec8p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48144</id>
      <parentid>48142</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-11T20:02:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4322">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[File:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Kazakhstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tajikistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkmenistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Uzbekistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of the People's Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[China]]
** [[File:Flag of Hong Kong.svg|30px|border]] [[Hong Kong]] Special Adm. Region of China
** [[File:Flag of Macau.svg|30px|border]] [[Macao]] Special Adm. Region of China
** [[File:Flag of Tibet.svg|30px|border]] [[Tibet]] Special Adm. Region of China
* [[File:Flag of North Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of Japan.svg|30px|border]] [[Japan]]
* [[File:Flag of Mongolia.svg|30px|border]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[Taiwan]]

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[File:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|400px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[File:Flag of Afghanistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bangladesh.svg|30px|border]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[File:Flag of Bhutan.svg|30px|border]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[File:Flag of India.svg|30px|border]] [[India]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.svg|30px|border]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[File:Flag of Maldives.svg|30px|border]] [[Maldives]]
* [[File:Flag of Nepal.svg|30px|border]] [[Nepal]]
* [[File:Flag of Pakistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sri Lanka.svg|30px|border]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of the British Indian Ocean Territory.svg|30px|border]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Brunei.svg|30px|border]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[File:Flag of Cambodia.svg|30px|border]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[File:Flag of Indonesia.svg|30px|border]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[File:Flag of Laos.svg|30px|border]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Malaysia.svg|30px|border]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[File:Flag of Myanmar.svg|30px|border]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Philippines.svg|30px|border]] [[Philippines]]
* [[File:Flag of Singapore.svg|30px|border]] [[Singapore]]
* [[File:Flag of Thailand.svg|30px|border]] [[Thailand]]
* [[File:Flag of East Timor.svg|30px|border]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[File:Flag of Vietnam.svg|30px|border]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[File:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|400px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Armenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Armenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Azerbaijan.svg|30px|border]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.svg|30px|border]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[File:Flag of Georgia.svg|30px|border]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]]
* [[File:Flag of Iraq.svg|30px|border]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.svg|30px|border]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.svg|30px|border]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.svg|30px|border]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.svg|30px|border]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.svg|30px|border]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.svg|30px|border]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.svg|30px|border]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.svg|30px|border]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.svg|30px|border]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.svg|30px|border]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.svg|30px|border]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[trash:Asia]]
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[de:Asien]]
[[es:Asia]]
[[fi:Aasia]]
[[fr:Asie]]
[[ru:Азия]]
[[tr:Asya]]
[[zh:亚洲]]</text>
      <sha1>s3j2qip7fpz1s2z2vyxskqf7rs0mleg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48156</id>
      <parentid>48144</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-12T17:34:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4071">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[File:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Kazakhstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tajikistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkmenistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Uzbekistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of the People's Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[China]]
* [[File:Flag of North Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of Japan.svg|30px|border]] [[Japan]]
* [[File:Flag of Mongolia.svg|30px|border]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[Taiwan]]

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[File:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|400px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[File:Flag of Afghanistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bangladesh.svg|30px|border]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[File:Flag of Bhutan.svg|30px|border]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[File:Flag of India.svg|30px|border]] [[India]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.svg|30px|border]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[File:Flag of Maldives.svg|30px|border]] [[Maldives]]
* [[File:Flag of Nepal.svg|30px|border]] [[Nepal]]
* [[File:Flag of Pakistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sri Lanka.svg|30px|border]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of the British Indian Ocean Territory.svg|30px|border]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Brunei.svg|30px|border]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[File:Flag of Cambodia.svg|30px|border]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[File:Flag of Indonesia.svg|30px|border]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[File:Flag of Laos.svg|30px|border]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Malaysia.svg|30px|border]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[File:Flag of Myanmar.svg|30px|border]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Philippines.svg|30px|border]] [[Philippines]]
* [[File:Flag of Singapore.svg|30px|border]] [[Singapore]]
* [[File:Flag of Thailand.svg|30px|border]] [[Thailand]]
* [[File:Flag of East Timor.svg|30px|border]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[File:Flag of Vietnam.svg|30px|border]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[File:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|400px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Armenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Armenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Azerbaijan.svg|30px|border]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.svg|30px|border]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[File:Flag of Georgia.svg|30px|border]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]]
* [[File:Flag of Iraq.svg|30px|border]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.svg|30px|border]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.svg|30px|border]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.svg|30px|border]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.svg|30px|border]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.svg|30px|border]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.svg|30px|border]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.svg|30px|border]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.svg|30px|border]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.svg|30px|border]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.svg|30px|border]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.svg|30px|border]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[trash:Asia]]
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[de:Asien]]
[[es:Asia]]
[[fi:Aasia]]
[[fr:Asie]]
[[ru:Азия]]
[[tr:Asya]]
[[zh:亚洲]]</text>
      <sha1>4lrrmfdxjms4gaepfyrsyyk7e6lae7z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48313</id>
      <parentid>48156</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-17T20:41:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4110">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[File:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Kazakhstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tajikistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkmenistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Uzbekistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of the People's Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[People's Republic of China]]
* [[File:Flag of North Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of Japan.svg|30px|border]] [[Japan]]
* [[File:Flag of Mongolia.svg|30px|border]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[Taiwan|Republic of China]]

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[File:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|400px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[File:Flag of Afghanistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bangladesh.svg|30px|border]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[File:Flag of Bhutan.svg|30px|border]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[File:Flag of India.svg|30px|border]] [[India]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.svg|30px|border]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[File:Flag of Maldives.svg|30px|border]] [[Maldives]]
* [[File:Flag of Nepal.svg|30px|border]] [[Nepal]]
* [[File:Flag of Pakistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sri Lanka.svg|30px|border]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of the British Indian Ocean Territory.svg|30px|border]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Brunei.svg|30px|border]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[File:Flag of Cambodia.svg|30px|border]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[File:Flag of Indonesia.svg|30px|border]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[File:Flag of Laos.svg|30px|border]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Malaysia.svg|30px|border]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[File:Flag of Myanmar.svg|30px|border]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Philippines.svg|30px|border]] [[Philippines]]
* [[File:Flag of Singapore.svg|30px|border]] [[Singapore]]
* [[File:Flag of Thailand.svg|30px|border]] [[Thailand]]
* [[File:Flag of East Timor.svg|30px|border]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[File:Flag of Vietnam.svg|30px|border]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[File:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|400px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Armenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Armenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Azerbaijan.svg|30px|border]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.svg|30px|border]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[File:Flag of Georgia.svg|30px|border]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]]
* [[File:Flag of Iraq.svg|30px|border]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.svg|30px|border]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.svg|30px|border]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.svg|30px|border]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.svg|30px|border]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.svg|30px|border]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.svg|30px|border]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.svg|30px|border]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.svg|30px|border]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.svg|30px|border]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.svg|30px|border]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.svg|30px|border]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[trash:Asia]]
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[de:Asien]]
[[es:Asia]]
[[fi:Aasia]]
[[fr:Asie]]
[[ru:Азия]]
[[tr:Asya]]
[[zh:亚洲]]</text>
      <sha1>sj8lm61zmkbscdx1m32nskb9uq6qx3w</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>49457</id>
      <parentid>48313</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-02-13T15:14:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>80.99.123.23</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4130">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[File:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Kazakhstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tajikistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkmenistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Uzbekistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of the People's Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[People's Republic of China]]
* [[File:Flag of North Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of Japan.svg|30px|border]] [[Japan]]
* [[File:Flag of Mongolia.svg|30px|border]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[People's_Republic_of_China|Republic of China]]

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[File:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|400px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[File:Flag of Afghanistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bangladesh.svg|30px|border]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[File:Flag of Bhutan.svg|30px|border]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[File:Flag of India.svg|30px|border]] [[India]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.svg|30px|border]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[File:Flag of Maldives.svg|30px|border]] [[Maldives]]
* [[File:Flag of Nepal.svg|30px|border]] [[Nepal]]
* [[File:Flag of Pakistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sri Lanka.svg|30px|border]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of the British Indian Ocean Territory.svg|30px|border]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Brunei.svg|30px|border]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[File:Flag of Cambodia.svg|30px|border]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[File:Flag of Indonesia.svg|30px|border]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[File:Flag of Laos.svg|30px|border]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Malaysia.svg|30px|border]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[File:Flag of Myanmar.svg|30px|border]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Philippines.svg|30px|border]] [[Philippines]]
* [[File:Flag of Singapore.svg|30px|border]] [[Singapore]]
* [[File:Flag of Thailand.svg|30px|border]] [[Thailand]]
* [[File:Flag of East Timor.svg|30px|border]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[File:Flag of Vietnam.svg|30px|border]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[File:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|400px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Armenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Armenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Azerbaijan.svg|30px|border]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.svg|30px|border]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[File:Flag of Georgia.svg|30px|border]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]]
* [[File:Flag of Iraq.svg|30px|border]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.svg|30px|border]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.svg|30px|border]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.svg|30px|border]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.svg|30px|border]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.svg|30px|border]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.svg|30px|border]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.svg|30px|border]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.svg|30px|border]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.svg|30px|border]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.svg|30px|border]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.svg|30px|border]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[trash:Asia]]
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[de:Asien]]
[[es:Asia]]
[[fi:Aasia]]
[[fr:Asie]]
[[ru:Азия]]
[[tr:Asya]]
[[zh:亚洲]]</text>
      <sha1>r4g28x8ka7eup5hczn4xixdzx4mzd99</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>50073</id>
      <parentid>49457</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-03-07T23:04:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Luka85</username>
        <id>2439</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4103">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[File:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Kazakhstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tajikistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkmenistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Uzbekistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of the People's Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[People's Republic of China]]
* [[File:Flag of North Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of Japan.svg|30px|border]] [[Japan]]
* [[File:Flag of Mongolia.svg|30px|border]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of China]]

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[File:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|400px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[File:Flag of Afghanistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bangladesh.svg|30px|border]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[File:Flag of Bhutan.svg|30px|border]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[File:Flag of India.svg|30px|border]] [[India]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.svg|30px|border]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[File:Flag of Maldives.svg|30px|border]] [[Maldives]]
* [[File:Flag of Nepal.svg|30px|border]] [[Nepal]]
* [[File:Flag of Pakistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sri Lanka.svg|30px|border]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of the British Indian Ocean Territory.svg|30px|border]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Brunei.svg|30px|border]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[File:Flag of Cambodia.svg|30px|border]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[File:Flag of Indonesia.svg|30px|border]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[File:Flag of Laos.svg|30px|border]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Malaysia.svg|30px|border]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[File:Flag of Myanmar.svg|30px|border]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Philippines.svg|30px|border]] [[Philippines]]
* [[File:Flag of Singapore.svg|30px|border]] [[Singapore]]
* [[File:Flag of Thailand.svg|30px|border]] [[Thailand]]
* [[File:Flag of East Timor.svg|30px|border]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[File:Flag of Vietnam.svg|30px|border]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[File:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|400px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Armenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Armenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Azerbaijan.svg|30px|border]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.svg|30px|border]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[File:Flag of Georgia.svg|30px|border]] [[Georgia (Country)|Georgia]]
* [[File:Flag of Iraq.svg|30px|border]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.svg|30px|border]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.svg|30px|border]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.svg|30px|border]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.svg|30px|border]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.svg|30px|border]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.svg|30px|border]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.svg|30px|border]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.svg|30px|border]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.svg|30px|border]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.svg|30px|border]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.svg|30px|border]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[trash:Asia]]
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[de:Asien]]
[[es:Asia]]
[[fi:Aasia]]
[[fr:Asie]]
[[ru:Азия]]
[[tr:Asya]]
[[zh:亚洲]]</text>
      <sha1>2b0e60s27k79g9lw322em8fqfbj9x60</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>55610</id>
      <parentid>50073</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-08T01:05:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4110">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[File:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Kazakhstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tajikistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkmenistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Uzbekistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of the People's Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[People's Republic of China]]
* [[File:Flag of North Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of Japan.svg|30px|border]] [[Japan]]
* [[File:Flag of Mongolia.svg|30px|border]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[Taiwan|Republic of China]]

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[File:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|400px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[File:Flag of Afghanistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bangladesh.svg|30px|border]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[File:Flag of Bhutan.svg|30px|border]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[File:Flag of India.svg|30px|border]] [[India]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.svg|30px|border]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[File:Flag of Maldives.svg|30px|border]] [[Maldives]]
* [[File:Flag of Nepal.svg|30px|border]] [[Nepal]]
* [[File:Flag of Pakistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sri Lanka.svg|30px|border]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of the British Indian Ocean Territory.svg|30px|border]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Brunei.svg|30px|border]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[File:Flag of Cambodia.svg|30px|border]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[File:Flag of Indonesia.svg|30px|border]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[File:Flag of Laos.svg|30px|border]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Malaysia.svg|30px|border]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[File:Flag of Myanmar.svg|30px|border]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Philippines.svg|30px|border]] [[Philippines]]
* [[File:Flag of Singapore.svg|30px|border]] [[Singapore]]
* [[File:Flag of Thailand.svg|30px|border]] [[Thailand]]
* [[File:Flag of East Timor.svg|30px|border]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[File:Flag of Vietnam.svg|30px|border]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[File:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|400px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Armenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Armenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Azerbaijan.svg|30px|border]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.svg|30px|border]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[File:Flag of Georgia.svg|30px|border]] [[Georgia (country)|Georgia]]
* [[File:Flag of Iraq.svg|30px|border]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.svg|30px|border]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.svg|30px|border]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.svg|30px|border]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.svg|30px|border]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.svg|30px|border]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.svg|30px|border]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.svg|30px|border]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.svg|30px|border]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.svg|30px|border]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.svg|30px|border]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.svg|30px|border]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[trash:Asia]]
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[de:Asien]]
[[es:Asia]]
[[fi:Aasia]]
[[fr:Asie]]
[[ru:Азия]]
[[tr:Asya]]
[[zh:亚洲]]</text>
      <sha1>r20kh1aaozd4vu64ob0uv1qk4cny5k7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>57983</id>
      <parentid>55610</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-12-18T22:12:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Halt, Stop! Reudnitz kommt.</username>
        <id>3344</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4317">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[File:CraigDarioIndianTractor.jpg|thumb|300px|right|Dario and [[User:Halt, Stop! Reudnitz kommt.|Craig]] on Indian Tractor while '''[http://thumbingasia.blogspot.com/ Thumbing Asia From West to East]'''.]]
[[File:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Kazakhstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tajikistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkmenistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Uzbekistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of the People's Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[People's Republic of China]]
* [[File:Flag of North Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of Japan.svg|30px|border]] [[Japan]]
* [[File:Flag of Mongolia.svg|30px|border]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[Taiwan|Republic of China]]

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[File:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[File:Flag of Afghanistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bangladesh.svg|30px|border]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[File:Flag of Bhutan.svg|30px|border]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[File:Flag of India.svg|30px|border]] [[India]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.svg|30px|border]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[File:Flag of Maldives.svg|30px|border]] [[Maldives]]
* [[File:Flag of Nepal.svg|30px|border]] [[Nepal]]
* [[File:Flag of Pakistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sri Lanka.svg|30px|border]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of the British Indian Ocean Territory.svg|30px|border]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Brunei.svg|30px|border]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[File:Flag of Cambodia.svg|30px|border]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[File:Flag of Indonesia.svg|30px|border]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[File:Flag of Laos.svg|30px|border]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Malaysia.svg|30px|border]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[File:Flag of Myanmar.svg|30px|border]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Philippines.svg|30px|border]] [[Philippines]]
* [[File:Flag of Singapore.svg|30px|border]] [[Singapore]]
* [[File:Flag of Thailand.svg|30px|border]] [[Thailand]]
* [[File:Flag of East Timor.svg|30px|border]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[File:Flag of Vietnam.svg|30px|border]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[File:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|300px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Armenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Armenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Azerbaijan.svg|30px|border]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.svg|30px|border]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[File:Flag of Georgia.svg|30px|border]] [[Georgia (country)|Georgia]]
* [[File:Flag of Iraq.svg|30px|border]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.svg|30px|border]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.svg|30px|border]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.svg|30px|border]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.svg|30px|border]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.svg|30px|border]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.svg|30px|border]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.svg|30px|border]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.svg|30px|border]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.svg|30px|border]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.svg|30px|border]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.svg|30px|border]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[trash:Asia]]
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[de:Asien]]
[[es:Asia]]
[[fi:Aasia]]
[[fr:Asie]]
[[ru:Азия]]
[[tr:Asya]]
[[zh:亚洲]]</text>
      <sha1>lcj5xfhhyocb989xfgrsaqfpfvgxp4q</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>67941</id>
      <parentid>57983</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-01-03T02:07:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4329">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[File:CraigDarioIndianTractor.jpg|thumb|300px|right|Dario and [[User:Halt, Stop! Reudnitz kommt.|Craig]] on Indian Tractor while '''[http://thumbingasia.blogspot.com/ Thumbing Asia From West to East]'''.]]
[[File:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Kazakhstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tajikistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkmenistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Uzbekistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of the People's Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[People's Republic of China]]
* [[File:Flag of North Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of Japan.svg|30px|border]] [[Japan]]
* [[File:Flag of Mongolia.svg|30px|border]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[Taiwan|Republic of China]]

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[File:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[File:Flag of Afghanistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bangladesh.svg|30px|border]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[File:Flag of Bhutan.svg|30px|border]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[File:Flag of India.svg|30px|border]] [[India]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.svg|30px|border]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[File:Flag of Maldives.svg|30px|border]] [[Maldives]]
* [[File:Flag of Nepal.svg|30px|border]] [[Nepal]]
* [[File:Flag of Pakistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sri Lanka.svg|30px|border]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of the British Indian Ocean Territory.svg|30px|border]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Brunei.svg|30px|border]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[File:Flag of Cambodia.svg|30px|border]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[File:Flag of Indonesia.svg|30px|border]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[File:Flag of Laos.svg|30px|border]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Malaysia.svg|30px|border]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[File:Flag of Myanmar.svg|30px|border]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Philippines.svg|30px|border]] [[Philippines]]
* [[File:Flag of Singapore.svg|30px|border]] [[Singapore]]
* [[File:Flag of Thailand.svg|30px|border]] [[Thailand]]
* [[File:Flag of East Timor.svg|30px|border]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[File:Flag of Vietnam.svg|30px|border]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[File:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|300px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Armenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Armenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Azerbaijan.svg|30px|border]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.svg|30px|border]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[File:Flag of Georgia.svg|30px|border]] [[Georgia (country)|Georgia]]
* [[File:Flag of Iraq.svg|30px|border]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.svg|30px|border]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.svg|30px|border]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.svg|30px|border]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.svg|30px|border]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.svg|30px|border]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.svg|30px|border]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.svg|30px|border]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.svg|30px|border]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.svg|30px|border]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.svg|30px|border]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.svg|30px|border]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[trash:Asia]]
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[de:Asien]]
[[es:Asia]]
[[fi:Aasia]]
[[fr:Asie]]
[[pl:Azja]]
[[ru:Азия]]
[[tr:Asya]]
[[zh:亚洲]]</text>
      <sha1>07il5w3fzzopyjyizw17qmuonciz0rc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69186</id>
      <parentid>67941</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-04-23T01:12:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4345">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[File:CraigDarioIndianTractor.jpg|thumb|300px|right|Dario and [[User:Halt, Stop! Reudnitz kommt.|Craig]] on Indian Tractor while '''[http://thumbingasia.blogspot.com/ Thumbing Asia From West to East]'''.]]
[[File:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Kazakhstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tajikistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkmenistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Uzbekistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of the People's Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[People's Republic of China]]
* [[File:Flag of North Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of Japan.svg|30px|border]] [[Japan]]
* [[File:Flag of Mongolia.svg|30px|border]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[Taiwan|Republic of China]]

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[File:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[File:Flag of Afghanistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bangladesh.svg|30px|border]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[File:Flag of Bhutan.svg|30px|border]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[File:Flag of India.svg|30px|border]] [[India]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.svg|30px|border]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[File:Flag of Maldives.svg|30px|border]] [[Maldives]]
* [[File:Flag of Nepal.svg|30px|border]] [[Nepal]]
* [[File:Flag of Pakistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sri Lanka.svg|30px|border]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of the British Indian Ocean Territory.svg|30px|border]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Brunei.svg|30px|border]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[File:Flag of Cambodia.svg|30px|border]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[File:Flag of Indonesia.svg|30px|border]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[File:Flag of Laos.svg|30px|border]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Malaysia.svg|30px|border]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[File:Flag of Myanmar.svg|30px|border]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Philippines.svg|30px|border]] [[Philippines]]
* [[File:Flag of Singapore.svg|30px|border]] [[Singapore]]
* [[File:Flag of Thailand.svg|30px|border]] [[Thailand]]
* [[File:Flag of East Timor.svg|30px|border]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[File:Flag of Vietnam.svg|30px|border]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[File:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|300px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Armenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Armenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Azerbaijan.svg|30px|border]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.svg|30px|border]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[File:Flag of Georgia.svg|30px|border]] [[Georgia (country)|Georgia]]
* [[File:Flag of Iraq.svg|30px|border]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.svg|30px|border]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.svg|30px|border]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.svg|30px|border]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.svg|30px|border]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.svg|30px|border]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.svg|30px|border]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.svg|30px|border]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.svg|30px|border]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.svg|30px|border]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.svg|30px|border]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.svg|30px|border]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[trash:Asia]]
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[de:Asien]]
[[es:Asia]]
[[fi:Aasia]]
[[fr:Asie]]
[[he:אסיה]]
[[pl:Azja]]
[[ru:Азия]]
[[tr:Asya]]
[[zh:亚洲]]</text>
      <sha1>b074trucbocxt63fnspzl0c1mgxjn7o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70960</id>
      <parentid>69186</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-08-19T21:57:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4358">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[File:CraigDarioIndianTractor.jpg|thumb|300px|right|Dario and [[User:Halt, Stop! Reudnitz kommt.|Craig]] on Indian Tractor while '''[http://thumbingasia.blogspot.com/ Thumbing Asia From West to East]'''.]]
[[File:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Kazakhstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tajikistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkmenistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Uzbekistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of the People's Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[People's Republic of China]]
* [[File:Flag of North Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of Japan.svg|30px|border]] [[Japan]]
* [[File:Flag of Mongolia.svg|30px|border]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[Taiwan|Republic of China]]

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[File:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[File:Flag of Afghanistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bangladesh.svg|30px|border]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[File:Flag of Bhutan.svg|30px|border]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[File:Flag of India.svg|30px|border]] [[India]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.svg|30px|border]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[File:Flag of Maldives.svg|30px|border]] [[Maldives]]
* [[File:Flag of Nepal.svg|30px|border]] [[Nepal]]
* [[File:Flag of Pakistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sri Lanka.svg|30px|border]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of the British Indian Ocean Territory.svg|30px|border]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Brunei.svg|30px|border]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[File:Flag of Cambodia.svg|30px|border]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[File:Flag of Indonesia.svg|30px|border]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[File:Flag of Laos.svg|30px|border]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Malaysia.svg|30px|border]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[File:Flag of Myanmar.svg|30px|border]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Philippines.svg|30px|border]] [[Philippines]]
* [[File:Flag of Singapore.svg|30px|border]] [[Singapore]]
* [[File:Flag of Thailand.svg|30px|border]] [[Thailand]]
* [[File:Flag of East Timor.svg|30px|border]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[File:Flag of Vietnam.svg|30px|border]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[File:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|300px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Armenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Armenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Azerbaijan.svg|30px|border]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.svg|30px|border]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[File:Flag of Georgia.svg|30px|border]] [[Georgia (country)|Georgia]]
* [[File:Flag of Iraq.svg|30px|border]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.svg|30px|border]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.svg|30px|border]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.svg|30px|border]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.svg|30px|border]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.svg|30px|border]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.svg|30px|border]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.svg|30px|border]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.svg|30px|border]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.svg|30px|border]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.svg|30px|border]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.svg|30px|border]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[trash:Asia]]
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[de:Asien]]
[[es:Asia]]
[[fi:Aasia]]
[[fr:Asie]]
[[he:אסיה]]
[[pl:Azja]]
[[ru:Азия]]
[[tr:Asya]]
[[zh:亚洲]]
[[nl:Azië]]</text>
      <sha1>2kig1o3vph5x1e7dzsuyy6r4ac1kpto</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>73902</id>
      <parentid>70960</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-01-05T00:31:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robyt</username>
        <id>9747</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4372">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[File:CraigDarioIndianTractor.jpg|thumb|300px|right|Dario and [[User:Halt, Stop! Reudnitz kommt.|Craig]] on Indian Tractor while '''[http://thumbingasia.blogspot.com/ Thumbing Asia From West to East]'''.]]
[[File:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Kazakhstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tajikistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkmenistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Uzbekistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of the People's Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[People's Republic of China]]
* [[File:Flag of North Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of Japan.svg|30px|border]] [[Japan]]
* [[File:Flag of Mongolia.svg|30px|border]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[Taiwan|Republic of China]]

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[File:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[File:Flag of Afghanistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bangladesh.svg|30px|border]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[File:Flag of Bhutan.svg|30px|border]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[File:Flag of India.svg|30px|border]] [[India]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.svg|30px|border]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[File:Flag of Maldives.svg|30px|border]] [[Maldives]]
* [[File:Flag of Nepal.svg|30px|border]] [[Nepal]]
* [[File:Flag of Pakistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sri Lanka.svg|30px|border]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of the British Indian Ocean Territory.svg|30px|border]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Brunei.svg|30px|border]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[File:Flag of Cambodia.svg|30px|border]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[File:Flag of Indonesia.svg|30px|border]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[File:Flag of Laos.svg|30px|border]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Malaysia.svg|30px|border]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[File:Flag of Myanmar.svg|30px|border]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Philippines.svg|30px|border]] [[Philippines]]
* [[File:Flag of Singapore.svg|30px|border]] [[Singapore]]
* [[File:Flag of Thailand.svg|30px|border]] [[Thailand]]
* [[File:Flag of East Timor.svg|30px|border]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[File:Flag of Vietnam.svg|30px|border]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[File:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|300px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Armenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Armenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Azerbaijan.svg|30px|border]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.svg|30px|border]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[File:Flag of Georgia.svg|30px|border]] [[Georgia (country)|Georgia]]
* [[File:Flag of Iraq.svg|30px|border]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.svg|30px|border]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.svg|30px|border]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.svg|30px|border]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.svg|30px|border]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.svg|30px|border]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.svg|30px|border]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.svg|30px|border]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.svg|30px|border]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.svg|30px|border]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.svg|30px|border]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.svg|30px|border]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[trash:Asia]]
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[de:Asien]]
[[es:Asia]]
[[fi:Aasia]]
[[fr:Asie]]
[[he:אסיה]]
[[pl:Azja]]
[[ru:Азия]]
[[tr:Asya]]
[[zh:亚洲]]
[[nl:Azië]]
[[visa:Asia]]</text>
      <sha1>mabpwd750wxhpfdthem4aol9idm5tkd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79931</id>
      <parentid>73902</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-07-22T00:13:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robyt</username>
        <id>9747</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4387">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[File:CraigDarioIndianTractor.jpg|thumb|300px|right|Dario and [[User:Halt, Stop! Reudnitz kommt.|Craig]] on Indian Tractor while '''[http://thumbingasia.blogspot.com/ Thumbing Asia From West to East]'''.]]
[[File:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Kazakhstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tajikistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkmenistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Uzbekistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of the People's Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[People's Republic of China]]
* [[File:Flag of North Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of Japan.svg|30px|border]] [[Japan]]
* [[File:Flag of Mongolia.svg|30px|border]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[Taiwan|Republic of China]]

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[File:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[File:Flag of Afghanistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bangladesh.svg|30px|border]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[File:Flag of Bhutan.svg|30px|border]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[File:Flag of India.svg|30px|border]] [[India]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.svg|30px|border]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[File:Flag of Maldives.svg|30px|border]] [[Maldives]]
* [[File:Flag of Nepal.svg|30px|border]] [[Nepal]]
* [[File:Flag of Pakistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sri Lanka.svg|30px|border]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of the British Indian Ocean Territory.svg|30px|border]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Brunei.svg|30px|border]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[File:Flag of Cambodia.svg|30px|border]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[File:Flag of Indonesia.svg|30px|border]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[File:Flag of Laos.svg|30px|border]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Malaysia.svg|30px|border]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[File:Flag of Myanmar.svg|30px|border]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Philippines.svg|30px|border]] [[Philippines]]
* [[File:Flag of Singapore.svg|30px|border]] [[Singapore]]
* [[File:Flag of Thailand.svg|30px|border]] [[Thailand]]
* [[File:Flag of East Timor.svg|30px|border]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[File:Flag of Vietnam.svg|30px|border]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[File:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|300px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Armenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Armenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Azerbaijan.svg|30px|border]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.svg|30px|border]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[File:Flag of Georgia.svg|30px|border]] [[Georgia (country)|Georgia]]
* [[File:Flag of Iraq.svg|30px|border]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.svg|30px|border]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.svg|30px|border]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.svg|30px|border]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.svg|30px|border]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.svg|30px|border]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.svg|30px|border]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.svg|30px|border]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.svg|30px|border]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.svg|30px|border]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.svg|30px|border]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.svg|30px|border]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[trash:Asia]]
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[de:Asien]]
[[es:Asia]]
[[fi:Aasia]]
[[fr:Asie]]
[[he:אסיה]]
[[pl:Azja]]
[[ru:Азия]]
[[tr:Asya]]
[[zh:亚洲]]
[[nl:Azië]]
[[visa:Asia]]
[[nomad:Asia]]</text>
      <sha1>qfxu36pgbm38wnxdr6u94bdxqs3z3yx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>81937</id>
      <parentid>79931</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-01-13T13:39:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4344">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[File:CraigDarioIndianTractor.jpg|thumb|300px|right|Dario and [[User:Halt, Stop! Reudnitz kommt.|Craig]] on Indian Tractor while '''[http://thumbingasia.blogspot.com/ Thumbing Asia From West to East]'''.]]
[[File:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Kazakhstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tajikistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkmenistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Uzbekistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of the People's Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[People's Republic of China]]
* [[File:Flag of North Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of Japan.svg|30px|border]] [[Japan]]
* [[File:Flag of Mongolia.svg|30px|border]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[Taiwan|Republic of China]]

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[File:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[File:Flag of Afghanistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bangladesh.svg|30px|border]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[File:Flag of Bhutan.svg|30px|border]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[File:Flag of India.svg|30px|border]] [[India]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.svg|30px|border]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[File:Flag of Maldives.svg|30px|border]] [[Maldives]]
* [[File:Flag of Nepal.svg|30px|border]] [[Nepal]]
* [[File:Flag of Pakistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sri Lanka.svg|30px|border]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of the British Indian Ocean Territory.svg|30px|border]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Brunei.svg|30px|border]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[File:Flag of Cambodia.svg|30px|border]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[File:Flag of Indonesia.svg|30px|border]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[File:Flag of Laos.svg|30px|border]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Malaysia.svg|30px|border]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[File:Flag of Myanmar.svg|30px|border]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Philippines.svg|30px|border]] [[Philippines]]
* [[File:Flag of Singapore.svg|30px|border]] [[Singapore]]
* [[File:Flag of Thailand.svg|30px|border]] [[Thailand]]
* [[File:Flag of East Timor.svg|30px|border]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[File:Flag of Vietnam.svg|30px|border]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[File:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|300px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Armenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Armenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Azerbaijan.svg|30px|border]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.svg|30px|border]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[File:Flag of Georgia.svg|30px|border]] [[Georgia (country)|Georgia]]
* [[File:Flag of Iraq.svg|30px|border]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.svg|30px|border]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.svg|30px|border]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.svg|30px|border]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.svg|30px|border]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.svg|30px|border]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.svg|30px|border]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.svg|30px|border]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.svg|30px|border]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.svg|30px|border]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.svg|30px|border]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Palestine.svg|30px|border]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[trash:Asia]]
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Asia| ]]

[[visa:Asia]]

[[de:Asien]]
[[es:Asia]]
[[fi:Aasia]]
[[fr:Asie]]
[[pl:Azja]]
[[ru:Азия]]
[[tr:Asya]]
[[zh:亚洲]]</text>
      <sha1>sm2pa96vaqhmlk8gkwbm6g2xb9ypy6v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>99766</id>
      <parentid>81937</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-10-15T15:06:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Autonomic Islands or Regions */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4360">In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[File:CraigDarioIndianTractor.jpg|thumb|300px|right|Dario and [[User:Halt, Stop! Reudnitz kommt.|Craig]] on Indian Tractor while '''[http://thumbingasia.blogspot.com/ Thumbing Asia From West to East]'''.]]
[[File:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Kazakhstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tajikistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkmenistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Uzbekistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of the People's Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[People's Republic of China]]
* [[File:Flag of North Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of Japan.svg|30px|border]] [[Japan]]
* [[File:Flag of Mongolia.svg|30px|border]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[Taiwan|Republic of China]]

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[File:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[File:Flag of Afghanistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bangladesh.svg|30px|border]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[File:Flag of Bhutan.svg|30px|border]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[File:Flag of India.svg|30px|border]] [[India]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.svg|30px|border]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[File:Flag of Maldives.svg|30px|border]] [[Maldives]]
* [[File:Flag of Nepal.svg|30px|border]] [[Nepal]]
* [[File:Flag of Pakistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sri Lanka.svg|30px|border]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of the British Indian Ocean Territory.svg|30px|border]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Brunei.svg|30px|border]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[File:Flag of Cambodia.svg|30px|border]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[File:Flag of Indonesia.svg|30px|border]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[File:Flag of Laos.svg|30px|border]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Malaysia.svg|30px|border]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[File:Flag of Myanmar.svg|30px|border]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Philippines.svg|30px|border]] [[Philippines]]
* [[File:Flag of Singapore.svg|30px|border]] [[Singapore]]
* [[File:Flag of Thailand.svg|30px|border]] [[Thailand]]
* [[File:Flag of East Timor.svg|30px|border]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[File:Flag of Vietnam.svg|30px|border]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[File:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|300px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Armenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Armenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Azerbaijan.svg|30px|border]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.svg|30px|border]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[File:Flag of Georgia.svg|30px|border]] [[Georgia (country)|Georgia]]
* [[File:Flag of Iraq.svg|30px|border]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.svg|30px|border]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.svg|30px|border]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.svg|30px|border]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.svg|30px|border]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.svg|30px|border]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.svg|30px|border]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.svg|30px|border]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.svg|30px|border]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.svg|30px|border]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.svg|30px|border]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====

* [[File:Flag of Palestine.svg|30px|border]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Asia| ]]


[[de:Asien]]
[[es:Asia]]
[[fi:Aasia]]
[[fr:Asie]]
[[pl:Azja]]
[[ru:Азия]]
[[tr:Asya]]
[[zh:亚洲]]</text>
      <sha1>btusz6da37smn3yd4y8503dp1aqtlme</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105759</id>
      <parentid>99766</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-05-19T08:26:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4201">[[File:Hitchhiking asia.png|thumb|right|400px]]
In '''Asia''' hitchhiking is different country by country. Choose a country for more specific information.
[[File:Amylin-thai-pickup.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in [[Thailand]]]]

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Asia as following:

=== [[Central Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Kazakhstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kazakhstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kyrgyzstan.svg|30px|border]] [[Kyrgyzstan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tajikistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Tajikistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkmenistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkmenistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Uzbekistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Uzbekistan]]

=== [[Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of the People's Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[People's Republic of China]]
* [[File:Flag of North Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[North Korea|Democratic People's Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of Japan.svg|30px|border]] [[Japan]]
* [[File:Flag of Mongolia.svg|30px|border]] [[Mongolia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Korea.svg|30px|border]] [[South Korea|Republic of Korea]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of China.svg|30px|border]] [[Taiwan|Republic of China]]

=== [[Southern Asia]] ===
[[File:Mikeeg555 hitching in Turkey.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:Mikeeg555|Mikeeg555]] hitching in [[Turkey]]]]
* [[File:Flag of Afghanistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Afghanistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bangladesh.svg|30px|border]] [[Bangladesh]]
* [[File:Flag of Bhutan.svg|30px|border]] [[Bhutan]]
* [[File:Flag of India.svg|30px|border]] [[India]]
* [[File:Flag of Iran.svg|30px|border]] [[Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]]
* [[File:Flag of Maldives.svg|30px|border]] [[Maldives]]
* [[File:Flag of Nepal.svg|30px|border]] [[Nepal]]
* [[File:Flag of Pakistan.svg|30px|border]] [[Pakistan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sri Lanka.svg|30px|border]] [[Sri Lanka]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of the British Indian Ocean Territory.svg|30px|border]] [[British Indian Ocean Territory]]

=== [[South-Eastern Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Brunei.svg|30px|border]] [[Brunei|Brunei Darussalam]]
* [[File:Flag of Cambodia.svg|30px|border]] [[Cambodia]]
* [[File:Flag of Indonesia.svg|30px|border]] [[Indonesia]]
* [[File:Flag of Laos.svg|30px|border]] [[Laos|Lao People's Democratic Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Malaysia.svg|30px|border]] [[Malaysia]]
* [[File:Flag of Myanmar.svg|30px|border]] [[Myanmar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Philippines.svg|30px|border]] [[Philippines]]
* [[File:Flag of Singapore.svg|30px|border]] [[Singapore]]
* [[File:Flag of Thailand.svg|30px|border]] [[Thailand]]
* [[File:Flag of East Timor.svg|30px|border]] [[Timor-Leste]]
* [[File:Flag of Vietnam.svg|30px|border]] [[Vietnam|Viet Nam]]
[[File:DSC01806.JPG|right|thumb|300px|[[User:platschi|Platschi]] hitchhiking in [[Turkey]]]]

=== [[Western Asia]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Armenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Armenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Azerbaijan.svg|30px|border]] [[Azerbaijan]]
* [[File:Flag of Bahrain.svg|30px|border]] [[Bahrain]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
* [[File:Flag of Georgia.svg|30px|border]] [[Georgia (country)|Georgia]]
* [[File:Flag of Iraq.svg|30px|border]] [[Iraq]]
* [[File:Flag of Israel.svg|30px|border]] [[Israel]]
* [[File:Flag of Jordan.svg|30px|border]] [[Jordan]]
* [[File:Flag of Kuwait.svg|30px|border]] [[Kuwait]]
* [[File:Flag of Lebanon.svg|30px|border]] [[Lebanon]]
* [[File:Flag of Oman.svg|30px|border]] [[Oman]]
* [[File:Flag of Qatar.svg|30px|border]] [[Qatar]]
* [[File:Flag of Saudi Arabia.svg|30px|border]] [[Saudi Arabia]]
* [[File:Flag of Syria.svg|30px|border]] [[Syria|Syrian Arab Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Arab Emirates.svg|30px|border]] [[United Arab Emirates]]
* [[File:Flag of Yemen.svg|30px|border]] [[Yemen]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====

* [[File:Flag of Palestine.svg|30px|border]] [[Palestinian Territory|Occupied Palestinian Territory]]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Asia| ]]


[[de:Asien]]
[[es:Asia]]
[[fi:Aasia]]
[[fr:Asie]]
[[pl:Azja]]
[[ru:Азия]]
[[tr:Asya]]
[[zh:亚洲]]</text>
      <sha1>q8w5vwtawzge6rhkfdrdsfz94r0vlrc</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Central America</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1502</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1509</id>
      <parentid>4179</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-25T20:49:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>200.55.178.35</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="265">'''Central America'''

* [[Belize]]
* [[Costa Rica]]
* [[El Salvador]]
* [[Guatemala]]
* [[Honduras]]
* [[Nicaragua]]
* [[Panama]]

==[[Carribean]]==

* [[Cuba]]
* [[Dominica]], 
* [[Saint Lucia]]
* [[Trinidad and Tobago]]

[[Category:America|*]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>e0se4rmmzlzk9htlyoi8kgozpbz6hgf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1510</id>
      <parentid>1509</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="265">'''Central America'''

* [[Belize]]
* [[Costa Rica]]
* [[El Salvador]]
* [[Guatemala]]
* [[Honduras]]
* [[Nicaragua]]
* [[Panama]]

==[[Carribean]]==

* [[Cuba]]
* [[Dominica]], 
* [[Saint Lucia]]
* [[Trinidad and Tobago]]

[[Category:America|*]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>e0se4rmmzlzk9htlyoi8kgozpbz6hgf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4173</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-17T12:41:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GuakaTest</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="130">'''Central America'''

* [[Belize]]
* [[Costa Rica]]
* [[El Salvador]]
* [[Guatemala]]
* [[Honduras]]
* [[Nicaragua]]
* [[Panama]]</text>
      <sha1>q403cg2o6hlf62f3irs76yqq3go01n0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4174</id>
      <parentid>4173</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T14:42:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="154">'''Central America'''

* [[Belize]]
* [[Costa Rica]]
* [[El Salvador]]
* [[Guatemala]]
* [[Honduras]]
* [[Nicaragua]]
* [[Panama]]

[[Category:America|*]]</text>
      <sha1>nygcd6xcyidpo3ealj6ywozxabjnv07</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4175</id>
      <parentid>4174</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T14:42:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="173">'''Central America'''

* [[Belize]]
* [[Costa Rica]]
* [[El Salvador]]
* [[Guatemala]]
* [[Honduras]]
* [[Nicaragua]]
* [[Panama]]

[[Category:America|*]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>qjewxqyhh8dnruywus564ppfxyciku1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4176</id>
      <parentid>4175</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T22:39:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>80.186.138.5</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1380">'''Central America'''

* [[Belize]]
* [[Costa Rica]]
* Dominica
  Small country but has surprisingly lot of highway too. And shares something with Germany - no speed limits. Hitching works and people are friendly. Watch out for the cars that have TX-plates. They´re taxis and might want money.
* [[El Salvador]]
* [[Guatemala]]
* [[Honduras]]
* [[Nicaragua]]
* [[Panama]]
* Saint Lucia
 Hitching in St Lucia can´t really be recommended. Such culture doesn´t really exist there. Local minibuses run frequently and people just don´t understand why someone wants to hitch. This can be a problem on Sundays when local minibuses don´t run on every route.
Border crossing: This truly is a country where you can´t get in without an onward ticket. However, if you´re coming by a ferry from Martinique, they´ll force you to buy an open return ticket. But if you then will fly somewhere from St Lucia, you can cash the ticket back when you show the air ticket. And as a matter of fact, you can even sell your open ferry ticket. Good to know is also that the catamaran from Martinique is not the only alternative. From the town of Marin in Martinique you´ll find a little water bus coming to Castries. Not remarkable difference in the price. No ship connection to St Vincent though the country can be seen from the southern tip of St Lucia.
[[Category:America|*]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>kvnepnnrtavy6yuh41ry25w8iufln36</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4177</id>
      <parentid>4176</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T22:40:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>80.186.138.5</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1395">'''Central America'''

* [[Belize]]
* [[Costa Rica]]
* Dominica
  Dominica is a small country but has surprisingly lot of highways too. And shares something with Germany - no speed limits. Hitching works and people are friendly. Watch out for the cars that have TX-plates. They´re taxis and might want money.
* [[El Salvador]]
* [[Guatemala]]
* [[Honduras]]
* [[Nicaragua]]
* [[Panama]]
* Saint Lucia
 Hitching in St Lucia can´t really be recommended. Such culture doesn´t really exist there. Local minibuses run frequently and people just don´t understand why someone wants to hitch. This can be a problem on Sundays when local minibuses don´t run on every route.
Border crossing: This truly is a country where you can´t get in without an onward ticket. However, if you´re coming by a ferry from Martinique, they´ll force you to buy an open return ticket. But if you then will fly somewhere from St Lucia, you can cash the ticket back when you show the air ticket. And as a matter of fact, you can even sell your open ferry ticket. Good to know is also that the catamaran from Martinique is not the only alternative. From the town of Marin in Martinique you´ll find a little water bus coming to Castries. Not remarkable difference in the price. No ship connection to St Vincent though the country can be seen from the southern tip of St Lucia.
[[Category:America|*]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>161mqnzqjn8nj9ymwfthp7kupt1x2fm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4178</id>
      <parentid>4177</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-21T16:02:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Deleea</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="206">'''Central America'''

* [[Belize]]
* [[Costa Rica]]
* [[Dominica]]
* [[El Salvador]]
* [[Guatemala]]
* [[Honduras]]
* [[Nicaragua]]
* [[Panama]]
* [[Saint Lucia]]

[[Category:America|*]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>oyl2wmh8e69rc19ulsraudhdxhtw06v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4179</id>
      <parentid>4178</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-27T15:28:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="222">'''Central America'''

* [[Belize]]
* [[Costa Rica]]
* [[El Salvador]]
* [[Guatemala]]
* [[Honduras]]
* [[Nicaragua]]
* [[Panama]]

==[[Carribean]]==
[[Dominica]], [[Saint Lucia]]

[[Category:America|*]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>rzhnotm4n6kyf2iv2hd2lza677xofcj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4180</id>
      <parentid>1510</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="265">'''Central America'''

* [[Belize]]
* [[Costa Rica]]
* [[El Salvador]]
* [[Guatemala]]
* [[Honduras]]
* [[Nicaragua]]
* [[Panama]]

==[[Carribean]]==

* [[Cuba]]
* [[Dominica]], 
* [[Saint Lucia]]
* [[Trinidad and Tobago]]

[[Category:America|*]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>e0se4rmmzlzk9htlyoi8kgozpbz6hgf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13297</id>
      <parentid>4180</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-30T07:30:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="186">'''Central America'''

* [[Belize]]
* [[Costa Rica]]
* [[El Salvador]]
* [[Guatemala]]
* [[Honduras]]
* [[Mexico]]
* [[Nicaragua]]
* [[Panama]]

[[Category:America|*]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>0nbuyuc8alpzi7vl7z8m7c745blt12n</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14074</id>
      <parentid>13297</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-23T15:54:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="185">'''Central America'''

* [[Belize]]
* [[Costa Rica]]
* [[El Salvador]]
* [[Guatemala]]
* [[Honduras]]
* [[Mexico]]
* [[Nicaragua]]
* [[Panama]]

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>ngfgv3v1gr3g2hlyerfk2ou9mr8a2z2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17446</id>
      <parentid>14074</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-02T18:28:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="219">'''Central America'''

* [[Belize]]
* [[Costa Rica]]
* [[El Salvador]]
* [[Guatemala]]
* [[Honduras]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mexico.png|20px]] [[Mexico]]
* [[Nicaragua]]
* [[Panama]]

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>d1bydptwnhpkg2e6lgorxv999fzxt7t</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17461</id>
      <parentid>17446</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-02T21:41:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="434">'''Central America'''

* [[Image:Flag of Belize.png|20px]] [[Belize]]
* [[Image:Flag of Costa Rica.png|20px]] [[Costa Rica]]
* [[El Salvador]]
* [[Image:Flag of Guatemala.png|20px]] [[Guatemala]]
* [[Image:Flag of Honduras.png|20px]] [[Honduras]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mexico.png|20px]] [[Mexico]]
* [[Image:Flag of Nicaragua.png|20px]] [[Nicaragua]]
* [[Image:Flag of Panama.png|20px]][[Panama]]

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>7yof0m4ux4eico1mvphjb5yv65df2v5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17479</id>
      <parentid>17461</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-02T22:52:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="473">'''Central America'''

* [[Image:Flag of Belize.png|20px]] [[Belize]]
* [[Image:Flag of Costa Rica.png|20px]] [[Costa Rica]]
* [[Image:Flag of El Salvador.png|20px]] [[El Salvador]]
* [[Image:Flag of Guatemala.png|20px]] [[Guatemala]]
* [[Image:Flag of Honduras.png|20px]] [[Honduras]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mexico.png|20px]] [[Mexico]]
* [[Image:Flag of Nicaragua.png|20px]] [[Nicaragua]]
* [[Image:Flag of Panama.png|20px]][[Panama]]

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>d6q6s3omefscbfmbux3n010hyd8picb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17889</id>
      <parentid>17479</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-12T14:06:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1988">&lt;map lat='12.254127737657367' lng='-85.2978515625' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
'''Central America'''  is a central geographic region of the [[Americas]].

=== Countries ===
* [[Image:Flag of Belize.png|20px]] [[Belize]]
* [[Image:Flag of Costa Rica.png|20px]] [[Costa Rica]]
* [[Image:Flag of El Salvador.png|20px]] [[El Salvador]]
* [[Image:Flag of Guatemala.png|20px]] [[Guatemala]]
* [[Image:Flag of Honduras.png|20px]] [[Honduras]]
* [[Image:Flag of Nicaragua.png|20px]] [[Nicaragua]]
* [[Image:Flag of Panama.png|20px]] [[Panama]]

=== Usage ===
'''Central America''' may mean different things to different people in the world according to the context:

* In English, Central America is considered a region of the [[North America|North American]] continent. Geopolitically, it usually comprises seven countries – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama. [[Mexico]], in whole or in part, is occasionally included. Some geographers include the {{wiki|Political_divisions_of_Mexico|five states}} of [[Campeche]], [[Chiapas]], [[Tabasco]], [[Quintana Roo]], and [[Yucatán]], together representing 12.1% of the country's total area.
* In {{wiki|Latin America|Latin America}}, {{wiki|Iberian Peninsula|Iberia}}, and some other parts of [[Europe]], the Americas are considered to be a single continent, and '''Central America''' is considered a region of this continent.  In {{wiki|Ibero-America|Ibero-America}}, the region is defined as seven nations – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama – and may occasionally include Mexico's southernmost region. Geopolitically, Mexico is not considered part of the region. 
* The {{wiki|United Nations geoscheme|UN geoscheme}} defines the region as all states of North America south of the [[United States]]; conversely, the [[European Union]] excludes Belize and Mexico from its definition of the region.

{{wikipedia}}

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>h7pd98xj04pzkenv0zqru9je29yvvkg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21417</id>
      <parentid>17889</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-16T11:19:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2006">&lt;map lat='12.254127737657367' lng='-85.2978515625' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
'''Central America'''  is a central geographic region of the [[Americas]].

=== Countries ===
* [[Image:Flag of Belize.png|20px]] [[Belize]]
* [[Image:Flag of Costa Rica.png|20px]] [[Costa Rica]]
* [[Image:Flag of El Salvador.png|20px]] [[El Salvador]]
* [[Image:Flag of Guatemala.png|20px]] [[Guatemala]]
* [[Image:Flag of Honduras.png|20px]] [[Honduras]]
* [[Image:Flag of Nicaragua.png|20px]] [[Nicaragua]]
* [[Image:Flag of Panama.png|20px]] [[Panama]]

=== Usage ===
'''Central America''' may mean different things to different people in the world according to the context:

* In English, Central America is considered a region of the [[North America|North American]] continent. Geopolitically, it usually comprises seven countries – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama. [[Mexico]], in whole or in part, is occasionally included. Some geographers include the {{wiki|Political_divisions_of_Mexico|five states}} of [[Campeche]], [[Chiapas]], [[Tabasco]], [[Quintana Roo]], and [[Yucatán]], together representing 12.1% of the country's total area.
* In {{wiki|Latin America|Latin America}}, {{wiki|Iberian Peninsula|Iberia}}, and some other parts of [[Europe]], the Americas are considered to be a single continent, and '''Central America''' is considered a region of this continent.  In {{wiki|Ibero-America|Ibero-America}}, the region is defined as seven nations – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama – and may occasionally include Mexico's southernmost region. Geopolitically, Mexico is not considered part of the region. 
* The {{wiki|United Nations geoscheme|UN geoscheme}} defines the region as all states of North America south of the [[United States]]; conversely, the [[European Union]] excludes Belize and Mexico from its definition of the region.

{{wikipedia}}

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]
{{IsIn|Americas}}</text>
      <sha1>2y4q9fhz3de2p5spzitv931c0vbhbuw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26136</id>
      <parentid>21417</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-13T16:06:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2028">&lt;map lat='12.254127737657367' lng='-85.2978515625' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
'''Central America'''  is a central geographic region of the [[Americas]].

=== Countries ===
* [[Image:Flag of Belize.png|20px]] [[Belize]]
* [[Image:Flag of Costa Rica.png|20px]] [[Costa Rica]]
* [[Image:Flag of El Salvador.png|20px]] [[El Salvador]]
* [[Image:Flag of Guatemala.png|20px]] [[Guatemala]]
* [[Image:Flag of Honduras.png|20px]] [[Honduras]]
* [[Image:Flag of Nicaragua.png|20px]] [[Nicaragua]]
* [[Image:Flag of Panama.png|20px]] [[Panama]]

=== Usage ===
'''Central America''' may mean different things to different people in the world according to the context:

* In English, Central America is considered a region of the [[North America|North American]] continent. Geopolitically, it usually comprises seven countries – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama. [[Mexico]], in whole or in part, is occasionally included. Some geographers include the {{wiki|Political_divisions_of_Mexico|five states}} of [[Campeche]], [[Chiapas]], [[Tabasco]], [[Quintana Roo]], and [[Yucatán]], together representing 12.1% of the country's total area.
* In {{wiki|Latin America|Latin America}}, {{wiki|Iberian Peninsula|Iberia}}, and some other parts of [[Europe]], the Americas are considered to be a single continent, and '''Central America''' is considered a region of this continent.  In {{wiki|Ibero-America|Ibero-America}}, the region is defined as seven nations – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama – and may occasionally include Mexico's southernmost region. Geopolitically, Mexico is not considered part of the region. 
* The {{wiki|United Nations geoscheme|UN geoscheme}} defines the region as all states of North America south of the [[United States]]; conversely, the [[European Union]] excludes Belize and Mexico from its definition of the region.

{{wikipedia}}

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]
{{IsIn|Americas}}

[[de:Mittelamerika]]</text>
      <sha1>3k9d5qjwq0ymq1nrn62sovz93ronhh0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30152</id>
      <parentid>26136</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-18T09:42:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>63.249.23.67</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2073">&lt;map lat='12.254127737657367' lng='-85.2978515625' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
'''Central America'''  is a central geographic region of the [[Americas]], which you can hitchhike all the way through.

=== Countries ===
* [[Image:Flag of Belize.png|20px]] [[Belize]]
* [[Image:Flag of Costa Rica.png|20px]] [[Costa Rica]]
* [[Image:Flag of El Salvador.png|20px]] [[El Salvador]]
* [[Image:Flag of Guatemala.png|20px]] [[Guatemala]]
* [[Image:Flag of Honduras.png|20px]] [[Honduras]]
* [[Image:Flag of Nicaragua.png|20px]] [[Nicaragua]]
* [[Image:Flag of Panama.png|20px]] [[Panama]]

=== Usage ===
'''Central America''' may mean different things to different people in the world according to the context:

* In English, Central America is considered a region of the [[North America|North American]] continent. Geopolitically, it usually comprises seven countries – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama. [[Mexico]], in whole or in part, is occasionally included. Some geographers include the {{wiki|Political_divisions_of_Mexico|five states}} of [[Campeche]], [[Chiapas]], [[Tabasco]], [[Quintana Roo]], and [[Yucatán]], together representing 12.1% of the country's total area.
* In {{wiki|Latin America|Latin America}}, {{wiki|Iberian Peninsula|Iberia}}, and some other parts of [[Europe]], the Americas are considered to be a single continent, and '''Central America''' is considered a region of this continent.  In {{wiki|Ibero-America|Ibero-America}}, the region is defined as seven nations – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama – and may occasionally include Mexico's southernmost region. Geopolitically, Mexico is not considered part of the region. 
* The {{wiki|United Nations geoscheme|UN geoscheme}} defines the region as all states of North America south of the [[United States]]; conversely, the [[European Union]] excludes Belize and Mexico from its definition of the region.

{{wikipedia}}

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]
{{IsIn|Americas}}

[[de:Mittelamerika]]</text>
      <sha1>ik9xabslqeoc2rhqygcp6oy4yo83yy7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31565</id>
      <parentid>30152</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-05T00:09:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sigurdas</username>
        <id>1658</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2098">&lt;map lat='12.254127737657367' lng='-85.2978515625' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
'''Central America'''  is a central geographic region of the [[Americas]], which you can hitchhike all the way through.

=== Countries ===
* [[Image:Flag of Belize.png|20px]] [[Belize]]
* [[Image:Flag of Costa Rica.png|20px]] [[Costa Rica]]
* [[Image:Flag of El Salvador.png|20px]] [[El Salvador]]
* [[Image:Flag of Guatemala.png|20px]] [[Guatemala]]
* [[Image:Flag of Honduras.png|20px]] [[Honduras]]
* [[Image:Flag of Nicaragua.png|20px]] [[Nicaragua]]
* [[Image:Flag of Panama.png|20px]] [[Panama]]

=== Usage ===
'''Central America''' may mean different things to different people in the world according to the context:

* In English, Central America is considered a region of the [[North America|North American]] continent. Geopolitically, it usually comprises seven countries – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama. [[Mexico]], in whole or in part, is occasionally included. Some geographers include the {{wiki|Political_divisions_of_Mexico|five states}} of [[Campeche]], [[Chiapas]], [[Tabasco]], [[Quintana Roo]], and [[Yucatán]], together representing 12.1% of the country's total area.
* In {{wiki|Latin America|Latin America}}, {{wiki|Iberian Peninsula|Iberia}}, and some other parts of [[Europe]], the Americas are considered to be a single continent, and '''Central America''' is considered a region of this continent.  In {{wiki|Ibero-America|Ibero-America}}, the region is defined as seven nations – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama – and may occasionally include Mexico's southernmost region. Geopolitically, Mexico is not considered part of the region. 
* The {{wiki|United Nations geoscheme|UN geoscheme}} defines the region as all states of North America south of the [[United States]]; conversely, the [[European Union]] excludes Belize and Mexico from its definition of the region.

{{wikipedia}}

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]
{{IsIn|Americas}}
[[trash:Central America]]
[[de:Mittelamerika]]</text>
      <sha1>auzoewu2qc5wvd0fi1jex7t9cq2w4qz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>34771</id>
      <parentid>31565</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T16:58:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2077">&lt;map lat='12.254127737657367' lng='-85.2978515625' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
'''Central America''' is a central geographic region of the [[Americas]], which you can hitchhike all the way through.

=== Countries ===
* [[File:Flag of Belize.png|20px]] [[Belize]]
* [[File:Flag of Costa Rica.png|20px]] [[Costa Rica]]
* [[File:Flag of El Salvador.png|20px]] [[El Salvador]]
* [[File:Flag of Guatemala.png|20px]] [[Guatemala]]
* [[File:Flag of Honduras.png|20px]] [[Honduras]]
* [[File:Flag of Nicaragua.png|20px]] [[Nicaragua]]
* [[File:Flag of Panama.png|20px]] [[Panama]]

=== Usage ===
'''Central America''' may mean different things to different people in the world according to the context:

* In English, Central America is considered a region of the [[North America]]n continent. Geopolitically, it usually comprises seven countries – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama. [[Mexico]], in whole or in part, is occasionally included. Some geographers include the {{wiki|Political_divisions_of_Mexico|five states}} of [[Campeche]], [[Chiapas]], [[Tabasco]], [[Quintana Roo]], and [[Yucatán]], together representing 12.1% of the country's total area.
* In {{wiki|Latin America|Latin America}}, {{wiki|Iberian Peninsula|Iberia}}, and some other parts of [[Europe]], the Americas are considered to be a single continent, and '''Central America''' is considered a region of this continent.  In {{wiki|Ibero-America|Ibero-America}}, the region is defined as seven nations – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama – and may occasionally include Mexico's southernmost region. Geopolitically, Mexico is not considered part of the region. 
* The {{wiki|United Nations geoscheme|UN geoscheme}} defines the region as all states of North America south of the [[United States]]; conversely, the [[European Union]] excludes Belize and Mexico from its definition of the region.

{{wikipedia}}
{{IsIn|Americas}}
[[trash:Central America]]

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]

[[de:Mittelamerika]]</text>
      <sha1>m4elt1a28nf0xgu0w0ao3h5lonlnukf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35860</id>
      <parentid>34771</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-17T00:00:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2094">&lt;map lat='12.254127737657367' lng='-85.2978515625' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
'''Central America''' is a central geographic region of the [[Americas]], which you can hitchhike all the way through.

=== Countries ===
* [[File:Flag of Belize.png|20px]] [[Belize]]
* [[File:Flag of Costa Rica.png|20px]] [[Costa Rica]]
* [[File:Flag of El Salvador.png|20px]] [[El Salvador]]
* [[File:Flag of Guatemala.png|20px]] [[Guatemala]]
* [[File:Flag of Honduras.png|20px]] [[Honduras]]
* [[File:Flag of Nicaragua.png|20px]] [[Nicaragua]]
* [[File:Flag of Panama.png|20px]] [[Panama]]

=== Usage ===
'''Central America''' may mean different things to different people in the world according to the context:

* In English, Central America is considered a region of the [[North America]]n continent. Geopolitically, it usually comprises seven countries – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama. [[Mexico]], in whole or in part, is occasionally included. Some geographers include the {{wiki|Political_divisions_of_Mexico|five states}} of [[Campeche]], [[Chiapas]], [[Tabasco]], [[Quintana Roo]], and [[Yucatán]], together representing 12.1% of the country's total area.
* In {{wiki|Latin America|Latin America}}, {{wiki|Iberian Peninsula|Iberia}}, and some other parts of [[Europe]], the Americas are considered to be a single continent, and '''Central America''' is considered a region of this continent.  In {{wiki|Ibero-America|Ibero-America}}, the region is defined as seven nations – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama – and may occasionally include Mexico's southernmost region. Geopolitically, Mexico is not considered part of the region. 
* The {{wiki|United Nations geoscheme|UN geoscheme}} defines the region as all states of North America south of the [[United States]]; conversely, the [[European Union]] excludes Belize and Mexico from its definition of the region.

{{wikipedia}}
{{IsIn|Americas}}
[[trash:Central America]]

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]

[[de:Mittelamerika]]
[[zh:中美洲]]</text>
      <sha1>p6kg1ibmf0r77pzu34eoe576onobpu8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>45969</id>
      <parentid>35860</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-17T13:23:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2143">&lt;map lat='12.254127737657367' lng='-85.2978515625' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
'''Central America''' is a central geographic region of the [[Americas]], which you can hitchhike all the way through.

=== Countries ===
* [[File:Flag of Belize.svg|30px|border]] [[Belize]]
* [[File:Flag of Costa Rica.svg|30px|border]] [[Costa Rica]]
* [[File:Flag of El Salvador.svg|30px|border]] [[El Salvador]]
* [[File:Flag of Guatemala.svg|30px|border]] [[Guatemala]]
* [[File:Flag of Honduras.svg|30px|border]] [[Honduras]]
* [[File:Flag of Nicaragua.svg|30px|border]] [[Nicaragua]]
* [[File:Flag of Panama.svg|30px|border]] [[Panama]]

=== Usage ===
'''Central America''' may mean different things to different people in the world according to the context:

* In English, Central America is considered a region of the [[North America]]n continent. Geopolitically, it usually comprises seven countries – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama. [[Mexico]], in whole or in part, is occasionally included. Some geographers include the {{wiki|Political_divisions_of_Mexico|five states}} of [[Campeche]], [[Chiapas]], [[Tabasco]], [[Quintana Roo]], and [[Yucatán]], together representing 12.1% of the country's total area.
* In {{wiki|Latin America|Latin America}}, {{wiki|Iberian Peninsula|Iberia}}, and some other parts of [[Europe]], the Americas are considered to be a single continent, and '''Central America''' is considered a region of this continent.  In {{wiki|Ibero-America|Ibero-America}}, the region is defined as seven nations – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama – and may occasionally include Mexico's southernmost region. Geopolitically, Mexico is not considered part of the region. 
* The {{wiki|United Nations geoscheme|UN geoscheme}} defines the region as all states of North America south of the [[United States]]; conversely, the [[European Union]] excludes Belize and Mexico from its definition of the region.

{{wikipedia}}
{{IsIn|Americas}}
[[trash:Central America]]

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]

[[de:Mittelamerika]]
[[zh:中美洲]]</text>
      <sha1>17ycactywf7nka19ds497b9ci1bfwjj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>53281</id>
      <parentid>45969</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-07-11T18:38:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Marcool</username>
        <id>3407</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3474">&lt;map lat='12.254127737657367' lng='-85.2978515625' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
'''Central America''' is a central geographic region of the [[Americas]], which you can hitchhike all the way through.

=== Countries ===
* [[File:Flag of Belize.svg|30px|border]] [[Belize]]
* [[File:Flag of Costa Rica.svg|30px|border]] [[Costa Rica]]
* [[File:Flag of El Salvador.svg|30px|border]] [[El Salvador]]
* [[File:Flag of Guatemala.svg|30px|border]] [[Guatemala]]
* [[File:Flag of Honduras.svg|30px|border]] [[Honduras]]
* [[File:Flag of Nicaragua.svg|30px|border]] [[Nicaragua]]
* [[File:Flag of Panama.svg|30px|border]] [[Panama]]

=== Usage ===
'''Central America''' may mean different things to different people in the world according to the context:

* In English, Central America is considered a region of the [[North America]]n continent. Geopolitically, it usually comprises seven countries – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama. [[Mexico]], in whole or in part, is occasionally included. Some geographers include the {{wiki|Political_divisions_of_Mexico|five states}} of [[Campeche]], [[Chiapas]], [[Tabasco]], [[Quintana Roo]], and [[Yucatán]], together representing 12.1% of the country's total area.
* In {{wiki|Latin America|Latin America}}, {{wiki|Iberian Peninsula|Iberia}}, and some other parts of [[Europe]], the Americas are considered to be a single continent, and '''Central America''' is considered a region of this continent.  In {{wiki|Ibero-America|Ibero-America}}, the region is defined as seven nations – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama – and may occasionally include Mexico's southernmost region. Geopolitically, Mexico is not considered part of the region. 
* The {{wiki|United Nations geoscheme|UN geoscheme}} defines the region as all states of North America south of the [[United States]]; conversely, the [[European Union]] excludes Belize and Mexico from its definition of the region.

=== Hitch Hiking ===
The readiness of hitch-hiking in central america varies from country to country but generally it is rather good. One good point for hitch-hikers in this sub-continent is the large number of trucks that travel up and down the Panamerican highway, and between all major cities. Truck drivers, although they might tell you that their boss doesn't allow them to carry passengers (which might be true, but unless you drive up to the boss' door he isn't about to find out is he...), are very free people in their jobs : they can drive for as long as they want (and they do, sometimes more than 24 hours with no sleep!), they can stop when and where they want, they have cash from the boss to put diesel in the trucks, and apart from long waits at certain borders for paperwork (which they don't do themselves, letting specialized agencies do it for them!!), have almost not a worry on their mind! If you do get to travel any significant distance with them, and some drive all the way from Nicaragua up to the Mexican border, you'll probably have a great time, get loads of food bought for you (with the boss' cash!) and be really comfortable.
Other forms of hitch-hiking can be harder to pull-off as bus transportation is usually very cheep and conditions of roads and amounts of private cars are erratic in parts.

{{wikipedia}}
{{IsIn|Americas}}
[[trash:Central America]]

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]

[[de:Mittelamerika]]
[[zh:中美洲]]</text>
      <sha1>n8tp58lgvgngl92n7h1k7r60rh1voer</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>53301</id>
      <parentid>53281</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-07-11T19:47:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3459">&lt;map lat='12.254127737657367' lng='-85.2978515625' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
'''Central America''' is a central geographic region of the [[Americas]], which you can hitchhike all the way through.

=== Countries ===
* [[File:Flag of Belize.svg|30px|border]] [[Belize]]
* [[File:Flag of Costa Rica.svg|30px|border]] [[Costa Rica]]
* [[File:Flag of El Salvador.svg|30px|border]] [[El Salvador]]
* [[File:Flag of Guatemala.svg|30px|border]] [[Guatemala]]
* [[File:Flag of Honduras.svg|30px|border]] [[Honduras]]
* [[File:Flag of Nicaragua.svg|30px|border]] [[Nicaragua]]
* [[File:Flag of Panama.svg|30px|border]] [[Panama]]

=== Usage ===
'''Central America''' may mean different things to different people in the world according to the context:

* In English, Central America is considered a region of the [[North America]]n continent. Geopolitically, it usually comprises seven countries – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama. [[Mexico]], in whole or in part, is occasionally included. Some geographers include the {{wiki|Political_divisions_of_Mexico|five states}} of [[Campeche]], [[Chiapas]], [[Tabasco]], [[Quintana Roo]], and [[Yucatán]], together representing 12.1% of the country's total area.
* In {{wiki|Latin America|Latin America}}, {{wiki|Iberian Peninsula|Iberia}}, and some other parts of [[Europe]], the Americas are considered to be a single continent, and '''Central America''' is considered a region of this continent.  In {{wiki|Ibero-America|Ibero-America}}, the region is defined as seven nations – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama – and may occasionally include Mexico's southernmost region. Geopolitically, Mexico is not considered part of the region. 
* The {{wiki|United Nations geoscheme|UN geoscheme}} defines the region as all states of North America south of the [[United States]]; conversely, the [[European Union]] excludes Belize and Mexico from its definition of the region.

=== Hitch-Hiking ===
The hitchability in Central America varies from country to country but generally it is rather good. One good point for hitch-hikers in this sub-continent is the large number of trucks that travel up and down the Panamerican highway, and between all major cities. Truck drivers, although they might tell you that their boss doesn't allow them to carry passengers (which might be true, but unless you drive up to the boss' door he isn't about to find out is he...), are very free people in their jobs: they can drive for as long as they want (and they do, sometimes more than 24 hours with no sleep!), they can stop when and where they want, they have cash from the boss to put diesel in the trucks, and apart from long waits at certain borders for paperwork (which they don't do themselves, letting specialized agencies do it for them), have almost not a worry on their mind! If you do get to travel any significant distance with them, and some drive all the way from Nicaragua up to the Mexican border, you'll probably have a great time, get loads of food bought for you (with the boss' cash!) and be really comfortable.

Other forms of hitch-hiking can be harder to pull-off as bus transportation is usually very cheep and conditions of roads and amounts of private cars are erratic in parts.

{{wikipedia}}
{{IsIn|Americas}}
[[trash:Central America]]

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]

[[de:Mittelamerika]]
[[zh:中美洲]]</text>
      <sha1>t79nevb3lo9wgesqvrblo02m2pumo47</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>55688</id>
      <parentid>53301</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-08T01:08:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3484">&lt;map lat='12.254127737657367' lng='-85.2978515625' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
'''Central America''' is a central geographic region of the [[Americas]], which you can hitchhike all the way through.

=== Countries ===
* [[File:Flag of Belize.svg|30px|border]] [[Belize]]
* [[File:Flag of Costa Rica.svg|30px|border]] [[Costa Rica]]
* [[File:Flag of El Salvador.svg|30px|border]] [[El Salvador]]
* [[File:Flag of Guatemala.svg|30px|border]] [[Guatemala]]
* [[File:Flag of Honduras.svg|30px|border]] [[Honduras]]
* [[File:Flag of Nicaragua.svg|30px|border]] [[Nicaragua]]
* [[File:Flag of Panama.svg|30px|border]] [[Panama]]

=== Usage ===
'''Central America''' may mean different things to different people in the world according to the context:

* In English, Central America is considered a region of the [[North America]]n continent. Geopolitically, it usually comprises seven countries – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama. [[Mexico]], in whole or in part, is occasionally included. Some geographers include the {{wiki|Political_divisions_of_Mexico|five states}} of [[Campeche]], [[Chiapas]], [[Tabasco]], [[Quintana Roo]], and [[Yucatán]], together representing 12.1% of the country's total area.
* In {{wiki|Latin America|Latin America}}, {{wiki|Iberian Peninsula|Iberia}}, and some other parts of [[Europe]], the Americas are considered to be a single continent, and '''Central America''' is considered a region of this continent.  In {{wiki|Ibero-America|Ibero-America}}, the region is defined as seven nations – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama – and may occasionally include Mexico's southernmost region. Geopolitically, Mexico is not considered part of the region. 
* The {{wiki|United Nations geoscheme|UN geoscheme}} defines the region as all states of North America south of the [[United States of America|United States]]; conversely, the [[European Union]] excludes Belize and Mexico from its definition of the region.

=== Hitch-Hiking ===
The hitchability in Central America varies from country to country but generally it is rather good. One good point for hitch-hikers in this sub-continent is the large number of trucks that travel up and down the Panamerican highway, and between all major cities. Truck drivers, although they might tell you that their boss doesn't allow them to carry passengers (which might be true, but unless you drive up to the boss' door he isn't about to find out is he...), are very free people in their jobs: they can drive for as long as they want (and they do, sometimes more than 24 hours with no sleep!), they can stop when and where they want, they have cash from the boss to put diesel in the trucks, and apart from long waits at certain borders for paperwork (which they don't do themselves, letting specialized agencies do it for them), have almost not a worry on their mind! If you do get to travel any significant distance with them, and some drive all the way from Nicaragua up to the Mexican border, you'll probably have a great time, get loads of food bought for you (with the boss' cash!) and be really comfortable.

Other forms of hitch-hiking can be harder to pull-off as bus transportation is usually very cheep and conditions of roads and amounts of private cars are erratic in parts.

{{wikipedia}}
{{IsIn|Americas}}
[[trash:Central America]]

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]

[[de:Mittelamerika]]
[[zh:中美洲]]</text>
      <sha1>p124ilwz4b2nqi1qklo6nsy7hesf9a4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>64900</id>
      <parentid>55688</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-10-07T23:53:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3484">&lt;map lat='12.254127737657367' lng='-85.2978515625' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
'''Central America''' is a central geographic region of the [[Americas]], which you can hitchhike all the way through.

=== Countries ===
* [[File:Flag of Belize.svg|30px|border]] [[Belize]]
* [[File:Flag of Costa Rica.svg|30px|border]] [[Costa Rica]]
* [[File:Flag of El Salvador.svg|30px|border]] [[El Salvador]]
* [[File:Flag of Guatemala.svg|30px|border]] [[Guatemala]]
* [[File:Flag of Honduras.svg|30px|border]] [[Honduras]]
* [[File:Flag of Nicaragua.svg|30px|border]] [[Nicaragua]]
* [[File:Flag of Panama.svg|30px|border]] [[Panama]]

=== Usage ===
'''Central America''' may mean different things to different people in the world according to the context:

* In English, Central America is considered a region of the [[North America]]n continent. Geopolitically, it usually comprises seven countries – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama. [[Mexico]], in whole or in part, is occasionally included. Some geographers include the {{wiki|Political_divisions_of_Mexico|five states}} of [[Campeche]], [[Chiapas]], [[Tabasco]], [[Quintana Roo]], and [[Yucatán]], together representing 12.1% of the country's total area.
* In {{wiki|Latin_America|Latin America}}, {{wiki|Iberian_Peninsula|Iberia}}, and some other parts of [[Europe]], the Americas are considered to be a single continent, and '''Central America''' is considered a region of this continent.  In {{wiki|Ibero-America|Ibero-America}}, the region is defined as seven nations – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama – and may occasionally include Mexico's southernmost region. Geopolitically, Mexico is not considered part of the region. 
* The {{wiki|United_Nations_geoscheme|UN geoscheme}} defines the region as all states of North America south of the [[United States of America|United States]]; conversely, the [[European Union]] excludes Belize and Mexico from its definition of the region.

=== Hitch-Hiking ===
The hitchability in Central America varies from country to country but generally it is rather good. One good point for hitch-hikers in this sub-continent is the large number of trucks that travel up and down the Panamerican highway, and between all major cities. Truck drivers, although they might tell you that their boss doesn't allow them to carry passengers (which might be true, but unless you drive up to the boss' door he isn't about to find out is he...), are very free people in their jobs: they can drive for as long as they want (and they do, sometimes more than 24 hours with no sleep!), they can stop when and where they want, they have cash from the boss to put diesel in the trucks, and apart from long waits at certain borders for paperwork (which they don't do themselves, letting specialized agencies do it for them), have almost not a worry on their mind! If you do get to travel any significant distance with them, and some drive all the way from Nicaragua up to the Mexican border, you'll probably have a great time, get loads of food bought for you (with the boss' cash!) and be really comfortable.

Other forms of hitch-hiking can be harder to pull-off as bus transportation is usually very cheep and conditions of roads and amounts of private cars are erratic in parts.

{{wikipedia}}
{{IsIn|Americas}}
[[trash:Central America]]

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]

[[de:Mittelamerika]]
[[zh:中美洲]]</text>
      <sha1>lm4f8mbjwvqj3iv91e4n7unynry10cl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70518</id>
      <parentid>64900</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-07-17T01:05:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3509">&lt;map lat='12.254127737657367' lng='-85.2978515625' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
'''Central America''' is a central geographic region of the [[Americas]], which you can hitchhike all the way through.

=== Countries ===
* [[File:Flag of Belize.svg|30px|border]] [[Belize]]
* [[File:Flag of Costa Rica.svg|30px|border]] [[Costa Rica]]
* [[File:Flag of El Salvador.svg|30px|border]] [[El Salvador]]
* [[File:Flag of Guatemala.svg|30px|border]] [[Guatemala]]
* [[File:Flag of Honduras.svg|30px|border]] [[Honduras]]
* [[File:Flag of Nicaragua.svg|30px|border]] [[Nicaragua]]
* [[File:Flag of Panama.svg|30px|border]] [[Panama]]

=== Usage ===
'''Central America''' may mean different things to different people in the world according to the context:

* In English, Central America is considered a region of the [[North America]]n continent. Geopolitically, it usually comprises seven countries – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama. [[Mexico]], in whole or in part, is occasionally included. Some geographers include the {{wiki|Political_divisions_of_Mexico|five states}} of [[Campeche]], [[Chiapas]], [[Tabasco]], [[Quintana Roo]], and [[Yucatán]], together representing 12.1% of the country's total area.
* In {{wiki|Latin_America|Latin America}}, {{wiki|Iberian_Peninsula|Iberia}}, and some other parts of [[Europe]], the Americas are considered to be a single continent, and '''Central America''' is considered a region of this continent.  In {{wiki|Ibero-America|Ibero-America}}, the region is defined as seven nations – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama – and may occasionally include Mexico's southernmost region. Geopolitically, Mexico is not considered part of the region. 
* The {{wiki|United_Nations_geoscheme|UN geoscheme}} defines the region as all states of North America south of the [[United States of America|United States]]; conversely, the [[European Union]] excludes Belize and Mexico from its definition of the region.

=== Hitch-Hiking ===
The hitchability in Central America varies from country to country but generally it is rather good. One good point for hitch-hikers in this sub-continent is the large number of trucks that travel up and down the Panamerican highway, and between all major cities. Truck drivers, although they might tell you that their boss doesn't allow them to carry passengers (which might be true, but unless you drive up to the boss' door he isn't about to find out is he...), are very free people in their jobs: they can drive for as long as they want (and they do, sometimes more than 24 hours with no sleep!), they can stop when and where they want, they have cash from the boss to put diesel in the trucks, and apart from long waits at certain borders for paperwork (which they don't do themselves, letting specialized agencies do it for them), have almost not a worry on their mind! If you do get to travel any significant distance with them, and some drive all the way from Nicaragua up to the Mexican border, you'll probably have a great time, get loads of food bought for you (with the boss' cash!) and be really comfortable.

Other forms of hitch-hiking can be harder to pull-off as bus transportation is usually very cheep and conditions of roads and amounts of private cars are erratic in parts.

{{wikipedia}}
{{IsIn|Americas}}
[[trash:Central America]]

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]

[[de:Mittelamerika]]
[[pl:Ameryka Środkowa]]
[[zh:中美洲]]</text>
      <sha1>jktughq2qnsv30uszkru82e9l5z0h84</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>74219</id>
      <parentid>70518</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-02-14T21:34:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dr.Keith</username>
        <id>3060</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3601">&lt;map lat='12.254127737657367' lng='-85.2978515625' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
'''Central America''' is a central geographic region of the [[Americas]], which you can hitchhike all the way through.

=== Countries ===
* [[File:Flag of Belize.svg|30px|border]] [[Belize]]
* [[File:Flag of Costa Rica.svg|30px|border]] [[Costa Rica]]
* [[File:Flag of El Salvador.svg|30px|border]] [[El Salvador]]
* [[File:Flag of Guatemala.svg|30px|border]] [[Guatemala]]
* [[File:Flag of Honduras.svg|30px|border]] [[Honduras]]
* [[File:Flag of Nicaragua.svg|30px|border]] [[Nicaragua]]
* [[File:Flag of Panama.svg|30px|border]] [[Panama]]

=== Usage ===
'''Central America''' may mean different things to different people in the world according to the context:

* In English, Central America is considered a region of the [[North America]]n continent. Geopolitically, it usually comprises seven countries – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama. [[Mexico]], in whole or in part, is occasionally included. Some geographers include the {{wiki|Political_divisions_of_Mexico|five states}} of [[Campeche]], [[Chiapas]], [[Tabasco]], [[Quintana Roo]], and [[Yucatán]], together representing 12.1% of the country's total area.
* In {{wiki|Latin_America|Latin America}}, {{wiki|Iberian_Peninsula|Iberia}}, and some other parts of [[Europe]], the Americas are considered to be a single continent, and '''Central America''' is considered a region of this continent.  In {{wiki|Ibero-America|Ibero-America}}, the region is defined as seven nations – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama – and may occasionally include Mexico's southernmost region. Geopolitically, Mexico is not considered part of the region. 
* The {{wiki|United_Nations_geoscheme|UN geoscheme}} defines the region as all states of North America south of the [[United States of America|United States]]; conversely, the [[European Union]] excludes Belize and Mexico from its definition of the region.

=== Hitch-Hiking ===
The hitchability in Central America varies from country to country but generally it is rather good.  Hitchhiking is not very common because of the cheap bus transportation, but drivers understand what the thumb means.  Waiting times vary but are not usually longer than 20 minutes.  In many places, the first or second car will stop for a Gringo.  

== Trucks ==
One good point for hitch-hikers in this sub-continent is the large number of trucks that travel up and down the Panamerican highway, and between all major cities. Truck drivers, although they might tell you that their boss doesn't allow them to carry passengers (which might be true, but unless you drive up to the boss' door he isn't about to find out is he...), are very free people in their jobs: they can drive for as long as they want (and they do, sometimes more than 24 hours with no sleep!), they can stop when and where they want, they have cash from the boss to put diesel in the trucks, and apart from long waits at certain borders for paperwork (which they don't do themselves, letting specialized agencies do it for them), have almost not a worry on their mind! If you do get to travel any significant distance with them, and some drive all the way from Nicaragua up to the Mexican border, you'll probably have a great time, get loads of food bought for you (with the boss' cash!) and be really comfortable.  

{{wikipedia}}
{{IsIn|Americas}}
[[trash:Central America]]

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]

[[de:Mittelamerika]]
[[pl:Ameryka Środkowa]]
[[zh:中美洲]]</text>
      <sha1>3cumfop12bpyznpjuds26ow93w16qgg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>74220</id>
      <parentid>74219</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-02-14T21:47:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dr.Keith</username>
        <id>3060</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3597">&lt;map lat='12.254127737657367' lng='-85.2978515625' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
'''Central America''' is a central geographic region of the [[Americas]], which you can hitchhike all the way through.

== Countries ==
* [[File:Flag of Belize.svg|30px|border]] [[Belize]]
* [[File:Flag of Costa Rica.svg|30px|border]] [[Costa Rica]]
* [[File:Flag of El Salvador.svg|30px|border]] [[El Salvador]]
* [[File:Flag of Guatemala.svg|30px|border]] [[Guatemala]]
* [[File:Flag of Honduras.svg|30px|border]] [[Honduras]]
* [[File:Flag of Nicaragua.svg|30px|border]] [[Nicaragua]]
* [[File:Flag of Panama.svg|30px|border]] [[Panama]]

== Usage ==
'''Central America''' may mean different things to different people in the world according to the context:

* In English, Central America is considered a region of the [[North America]]n continent. Geopolitically, it usually comprises seven countries – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama. [[Mexico]], in whole or in part, is occasionally included. Some geographers include the {{wiki|Political_divisions_of_Mexico|five states}} of [[Campeche]], [[Chiapas]], [[Tabasco]], [[Quintana Roo]], and [[Yucatán]], together representing 12.1% of the country's total area.
* In {{wiki|Latin_America|Latin America}}, {{wiki|Iberian_Peninsula|Iberia}}, and some other parts of [[Europe]], the Americas are considered to be a single continent, and '''Central America''' is considered a region of this continent.  In {{wiki|Ibero-America|Ibero-America}}, the region is defined as seven nations – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama – and may occasionally include Mexico's southernmost region. Geopolitically, Mexico is not considered part of the region. 
* The {{wiki|United_Nations_geoscheme|UN geoscheme}} defines the region as all states of North America south of the [[United States of America|United States]]; conversely, the [[European Union]] excludes Belize and Mexico from its definition of the region.

== Hitch-Hiking ==
The hitchability in Central America varies from country to country but generally it is rather good.  Hitchhiking is not very common because of the cheap bus transportation, but drivers understand what the thumb means.  Waiting times vary but are not usually longer than 20 minutes.  In many places, the first or second car will stop for a Gringo.  

=== Trucks ===
One good point for hitch-hikers in this sub-continent is the large number of trucks that travel up and down the Panamerican highway, and between all major cities. Truck drivers, although they might tell you that their boss doesn't allow them to carry passengers (which might be true, but unless you drive up to the boss' door he isn't about to find out is he...), are very free people in their jobs: they can drive for as long as they want (and they do, sometimes more than 24 hours with no sleep!), they can stop when and where they want, they have cash from the boss to put diesel in the trucks, and apart from long waits at certain borders for paperwork (which they don't do themselves, letting specialized agencies do it for them), have almost not a worry on their mind! If you do get to travel any significant distance with them, and some drive all the way from Nicaragua up to the Mexican border, you'll probably have a great time, get loads of food bought for you (with the boss' cash!) and be really comfortable.  

{{wikipedia}}
{{IsIn|Americas}}
[[trash:Central America]]

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]

[[de:Mittelamerika]]
[[pl:Ameryka Środkowa]]
[[zh:中美洲]]</text>
      <sha1>pqknrfdd6z56ejk8waz0axw20eapdjn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>76953</id>
      <parentid>74220</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-09-05T17:01:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dr.Keith</username>
        <id>3060</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4030">&lt;map lat='12.254127737657367' lng='-85.2978515625' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
'''Central America''' is a central geographic region of the [[Americas]], which you can hitchhike all the way through.

== Countries ==
* [[File:Flag of Belize.svg|30px|border]] [[Belize]]
* [[File:Flag of Costa Rica.svg|30px|border]] [[Costa Rica]]
* [[File:Flag of El Salvador.svg|30px|border]] [[El Salvador]]
* [[File:Flag of Guatemala.svg|30px|border]] [[Guatemala]]
* [[File:Flag of Honduras.svg|30px|border]] [[Honduras]]
* [[File:Flag of Nicaragua.svg|30px|border]] [[Nicaragua]]
* [[File:Flag of Panama.svg|30px|border]] [[Panama]]

== Usage ==
'''Central America''' may mean different things to different people in the world according to the context:

* In English, Central America is considered a region of the [[North America]]n continent. Geopolitically, it usually comprises seven countries – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama. [[Mexico]], in whole or in part, is occasionally included. Some geographers include the {{wiki|Political_divisions_of_Mexico|five states}} of [[Campeche]], [[Chiapas]], [[Tabasco]], [[Quintana Roo]], and [[Yucatán]], together representing 12.1% of the country's total area.
* In {{wiki|Latin_America|Latin America}}, {{wiki|Iberian_Peninsula|Iberia}}, and some other parts of [[Europe]], the Americas are considered to be a single continent, and '''Central America''' is considered a region of this continent.  In {{wiki|Ibero-America|Ibero-America}}, the region is defined as seven nations – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama – and may occasionally include Mexico's southernmost region. Geopolitically, Mexico is not considered part of the region. 
* The {{wiki|United_Nations_geoscheme|UN geoscheme}} defines the region as all states of North America south of the [[United States of America|United States]]; conversely, the [[European Union]] excludes Belize and Mexico from its definition of the region.

== Hitch-Hiking ==
The hitchability in Central America varies from country to country but generally it is rather good.  Hitchhiking is not very common because of the cheap bus transportation, but drivers understand what the thumb means.  Waiting times vary but are not usually longer than 20 minutes.  In many places, the first or second car will stop for a Gringo.  

=== Trucks ===
One good point for hitch-hikers in this sub-continent is the large number of trucks that travel up and down the Panamerican highway, and between all major cities. Truck drivers, although they might tell you that their boss doesn't allow them to carry passengers (which might be true, but unless you drive up to the boss' door he isn't about to find out is he...), are very free people in their jobs: they can drive for as long as they want (and they do, sometimes more than 24 hours with no sleep!), they can stop when and where they want, they have cash from the boss to put diesel in the trucks, and apart from long waits at certain borders for paperwork (which they don't do themselves, letting specialized agencies do it for them), have almost not a worry on their mind! If you do get to travel any significant distance with them, and some drive all the way from Nicaragua up to the Mexican border, you'll probably have a great time, get loads of food bought for you (with the boss' cash!) and be really comfortable.  

== Accomodation and sleep ==
In many cities and towns in Central America, you can usually ask the '''bomberos''' (firemen) if they have a place for you to crash for a night.  Often they will give you a bunk or matress or couch to sleep on.  Sometimes they give you a place to put up your tent.  Sometimes they say no or make excuses.  It's worth a try to ask though!  They have bathrooms and usually a kitchen where you can cook.  

{{wikipedia}}
{{IsIn|Americas}}
[[trash:Central America]]

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]

[[de:Mittelamerika]]
[[pl:Ameryka Środkowa]]
[[zh:中美洲]]</text>
      <sha1>dkmjvdeor6kqowcgnx41cp8w7a4aowi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>81939</id>
      <parentid>76953</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-01-13T13:40:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4005">&lt;map lat='12.254127737657367' lng='-85.2978515625' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
'''Central America''' is a central geographic region of the [[Americas]], which you can hitchhike all the way through.

== Countries ==
* [[File:Flag of Belize.svg|30px|border]] [[Belize]]
* [[File:Flag of Costa Rica.svg|30px|border]] [[Costa Rica]]
* [[File:Flag of El Salvador.svg|30px|border]] [[El Salvador]]
* [[File:Flag of Guatemala.svg|30px|border]] [[Guatemala]]
* [[File:Flag of Honduras.svg|30px|border]] [[Honduras]]
* [[File:Flag of Nicaragua.svg|30px|border]] [[Nicaragua]]
* [[File:Flag of Panama.svg|30px|border]] [[Panama]]

== Usage ==
'''Central America''' may mean different things to different people in the world according to the context:

* In English, Central America is considered a region of the [[North America]]n continent. Geopolitically, it usually comprises seven countries – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama. [[Mexico]], in whole or in part, is occasionally included. Some geographers include the {{wiki|Political_divisions_of_Mexico|five states}} of [[Campeche]], [[Chiapas]], [[Tabasco]], [[Quintana Roo]], and [[Yucatán]], together representing 12.1% of the country's total area.
* In {{wiki|Latin_America|Latin America}}, {{wiki|Iberian_Peninsula|Iberia}}, and some other parts of [[Europe]], the Americas are considered to be a single continent, and '''Central America''' is considered a region of this continent.  In {{wiki|Ibero-America|Ibero-America}}, the region is defined as seven nations – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama – and may occasionally include Mexico's southernmost region. Geopolitically, Mexico is not considered part of the region. 
* The {{wiki|United_Nations_geoscheme|UN geoscheme}} defines the region as all states of North America south of the [[United States of America|United States]]; conversely, the [[European Union]] excludes Belize and Mexico from its definition of the region.

== Hitch-Hiking ==
The hitchability in Central America varies from country to country but generally it is rather good.  Hitchhiking is not very common because of the cheap bus transportation, but drivers understand what the thumb means.  Waiting times vary but are not usually longer than 20 minutes.  In many places, the first or second car will stop for a Gringo.  

=== Trucks ===
One good point for hitch-hikers in this sub-continent is the large number of trucks that travel up and down the Panamerican highway, and between all major cities. Truck drivers, although they might tell you that their boss doesn't allow them to carry passengers (which might be true, but unless you drive up to the boss' door he isn't about to find out is he...), are very free people in their jobs: they can drive for as long as they want (and they do, sometimes more than 24 hours with no sleep!), they can stop when and where they want, they have cash from the boss to put diesel in the trucks, and apart from long waits at certain borders for paperwork (which they don't do themselves, letting specialized agencies do it for them), have almost not a worry on their mind! If you do get to travel any significant distance with them, and some drive all the way from Nicaragua up to the Mexican border, you'll probably have a great time, get loads of food bought for you (with the boss' cash!) and be really comfortable.  

== Accomodation and sleep ==
In many cities and towns in Central America, you can usually ask the '''bomberos''' (firemen) if they have a place for you to crash for a night.  Often they will give you a bunk or matress or couch to sleep on.  Sometimes they give you a place to put up your tent.  Sometimes they say no or make excuses.  It's worth a try to ask though!  They have bathrooms and usually a kitchen where you can cook.  

{{wikipedia}}
{{IsIn|Americas}}
[[trash:Central America]]

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]

[[de:Mittelamerika]]
[[zh:中美洲]]</text>
      <sha1>hhf1osvialn13lzo6ak38blvxgtofyb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>100925</id>
      <parentid>81939</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-04T15:16:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4024">&lt;map lat='12.254127737657367' lng='-85.2978515625' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
'''Central America''' is a central geographic region of the [[Americas]], which you can hitchhike all the way through.

== Countries ==
* [[File:Flag of Belize.svg|30px|border]] [[Belize]]
* [[File:Flag of Costa Rica.svg|30px|border]] [[Costa Rica]]
* [[File:Flag of El Salvador.svg|30px|border]] [[El Salvador]]
* [[File:Flag of Guatemala.svg|30px|border]] [[Guatemala]]
* [[File:Flag of Honduras.svg|30px|border]] [[Honduras]]
* [[File:Flag of Nicaragua.svg|30px|border]] [[Nicaragua]]
* [[File:Flag of Panama.svg|30px|border]] [[Panama]]

== Usage ==
'''Central America''' may mean different things to different people in the world according to the context:

* In English, Central America is considered a region of the [[North America]]n continent. Geopolitically, it usually comprises seven countries – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama. [[Mexico]], in whole or in part, is occasionally included. Some geographers include the {{wiki|Political_divisions_of_Mexico|five states}} of [[Campeche]], [[Chiapas]], [[Tabasco]], [[Quintana Roo]], and [[Yucatán]], together representing 12.1% of the country's total area.
* In {{wiki|Latin_America|Latin America}}, {{wiki|Iberian_Peninsula|Iberia}}, and some other parts of [[Europe]], the Americas are considered to be a single continent, and '''Central America''' is considered a region of this continent.  In {{wiki|Ibero-America|Ibero-America}}, the region is defined as seven nations – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama – and may occasionally include Mexico's southernmost region. Geopolitically, Mexico is not considered part of the region. 
* The {{wiki|United_Nations_geoscheme|UN geoscheme}} defines the region as all states of North America south of the [[United States of America|United States]]; conversely, the [[European Union]] excludes Belize and Mexico from its definition of the region.

== Hitch-Hiking ==
The hitchability in Central America varies from country to country but generally it is rather good.  Hitchhiking is not very common because of the cheap bus transportation, but drivers understand what the thumb means.  Waiting times vary but are not usually longer than 20 minutes.  In many places, the first or second car will stop for a Gringo.  

=== Trucks ===
One good point for hitch-hikers in this sub-continent is the large number of trucks that travel up and down the Panamerican highway, and between all major cities. Truck drivers, although they might tell you that their boss doesn't allow them to carry passengers (which might be true, but unless you drive up to the boss' door he isn't about to find out is he...), are very free people in their jobs: they can drive for as long as they want (and they do, sometimes more than 24 hours with no sleep!), they can stop when and where they want, they have cash from the boss to put diesel in the trucks, and apart from long waits at certain borders for paperwork (which they don't do themselves, letting specialized agencies do it for them), have almost not a worry on their mind! If you do get to travel any significant distance with them, and some drive all the way from Nicaragua up to the Mexican border, you'll probably have a great time, get loads of food bought for you (with the boss' cash!) and be really comfortable.  

== Accomodation and sleep ==
In many cities and towns in Central America, you can usually ask the '''bomberos''' (firemen) if they have a place for you to crash for a night.  Often they will give you a bunk or matress or couch to sleep on.  Sometimes they give you a place to put up your tent.  Sometimes they say no or make excuses.  It's worth a try to ask though!  They have bathrooms and usually a kitchen where you can cook.  

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{wikipedia}}
{{IsIn|Americas}}


[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]

[[de:Mittelamerika]]
[[zh:中美洲]]</text>
      <sha1>jcjhu2imbnpr60q9cz30m8gwsahb6z4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>110137</id>
      <parentid>100925</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-04-19T13:36:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>KnyttesBot</username>
        <id>47742</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>Added infobox to articles where map tag is already present programatically</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4113">{{infobox Location
|country = -
|state = -
|map = &lt;map lat='12.254127737657367' lng='-85.2978515625' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
|pop = -
|plate = -
|motorways = -
}}

'''Central America''' is a central geographic region of the [[Americas]], which you can hitchhike all the way through.

== Countries ==
* [[File:Flag of Belize.svg|30px|border]] [[Belize]]
* [[File:Flag of Costa Rica.svg|30px|border]] [[Costa Rica]]
* [[File:Flag of El Salvador.svg|30px|border]] [[El Salvador]]
* [[File:Flag of Guatemala.svg|30px|border]] [[Guatemala]]
* [[File:Flag of Honduras.svg|30px|border]] [[Honduras]]
* [[File:Flag of Nicaragua.svg|30px|border]] [[Nicaragua]]
* [[File:Flag of Panama.svg|30px|border]] [[Panama]]

== Usage ==
'''Central America''' may mean different things to different people in the world according to the context:

* In English, Central America is considered a region of the [[North America]]n continent. Geopolitically, it usually comprises seven countries – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama. [[Mexico]], in whole or in part, is occasionally included. Some geographers include the {{wiki|Political_divisions_of_Mexico|five states}} of [[Campeche]], [[Chiapas]], [[Tabasco]], [[Quintana Roo]], and [[Yucatán]], together representing 12.1% of the country's total area.
* In {{wiki|Latin_America|Latin America}}, {{wiki|Iberian_Peninsula|Iberia}}, and some other parts of [[Europe]], the Americas are considered to be a single continent, and '''Central America''' is considered a region of this continent.  In {{wiki|Ibero-America|Ibero-America}}, the region is defined as seven nations – Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama – and may occasionally include Mexico's southernmost region. Geopolitically, Mexico is not considered part of the region. 
* The {{wiki|United_Nations_geoscheme|UN geoscheme}} defines the region as all states of North America south of the [[United States of America|United States]]; conversely, the [[European Union]] excludes Belize and Mexico from its definition of the region.

== Hitch-Hiking ==
The hitchability in Central America varies from country to country but generally it is rather good.  Hitchhiking is not very common because of the cheap bus transportation, but drivers understand what the thumb means.  Waiting times vary but are not usually longer than 20 minutes.  In many places, the first or second car will stop for a Gringo.  

=== Trucks ===
One good point for hitch-hikers in this sub-continent is the large number of trucks that travel up and down the Panamerican highway, and between all major cities. Truck drivers, although they might tell you that their boss doesn't allow them to carry passengers (which might be true, but unless you drive up to the boss' door he isn't about to find out is he...), are very free people in their jobs: they can drive for as long as they want (and they do, sometimes more than 24 hours with no sleep!), they can stop when and where they want, they have cash from the boss to put diesel in the trucks, and apart from long waits at certain borders for paperwork (which they don't do themselves, letting specialized agencies do it for them), have almost not a worry on their mind! If you do get to travel any significant distance with them, and some drive all the way from Nicaragua up to the Mexican border, you'll probably have a great time, get loads of food bought for you (with the boss' cash!) and be really comfortable.  

== Accomodation and sleep ==
In many cities and towns in Central America, you can usually ask the '''bomberos''' (firemen) if they have a place for you to crash for a night.  Often they will give you a bunk or matress or couch to sleep on.  Sometimes they give you a place to put up your tent.  Sometimes they say no or make excuses.  It's worth a try to ask though!  They have bathrooms and usually a kitchen where you can cook.  

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{wikipedia}}
{{IsIn|Americas}}


[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]

[[de:Mittelamerika]]
[[zh:中美洲]]</text>
      <sha1>s13fphff6td5xsiy2o9x4412cl08aq4</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>South America</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1503</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1511</id>
      <parentid>4186</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-08-07T18:47:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1032">Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous, and on top of that, if you do try, you will find it extremely hard to actually get a ride.

[http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese but has information about the whole of South America.

==Countries==
* [[Argentina]]
* [[Bolivia]]
* [[Brazil]]
* [[Chile]]
* [[Colombia]]
* [[Ecuador]]
* [[French Guiana]]
* [[Guyana]]
* [[Paraguay]]
* [[Peru]]
* [[Suriname]]
* [[Uruguay]]
* [[Venezuela]]

==More info==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at roadjunky.com

[[Category:World]]
[[Category:America|*]]</text>
      <sha1>a1kqmr84ttnk5w4l425on6bxfj1az2a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1512</id>
      <parentid>1511</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1032">Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous, and on top of that, if you do try, you will find it extremely hard to actually get a ride.

[http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese but has information about the whole of South America.

==Countries==
* [[Argentina]]
* [[Bolivia]]
* [[Brazil]]
* [[Chile]]
* [[Colombia]]
* [[Ecuador]]
* [[French Guiana]]
* [[Guyana]]
* [[Paraguay]]
* [[Peru]]
* [[Suriname]]
* [[Uruguay]]
* [[Venezuela]]

==More info==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at roadjunky.com

[[Category:World]]
[[Category:America|*]]</text>
      <sha1>a1kqmr84ttnk5w4l425on6bxfj1az2a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4181</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-17T12:41:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GuakaTest</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="360">'''South America'''
* [[Argentina]]
* [[Bolivia]]
* [[Brazil]]
* [[Chile]]
* [[Colombia]]
* [[Ecuador]]
* [[French Guiana]]
* [[Guyana]]
* [[Paraguay]]
* [[Peru]]
* [[Suriname]]
* [[Trinidad and Tobago]]
* [[Uruguay]]
* [[Venezuela]]

==More info==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at roadjunky.com</text>
      <sha1>30h7p4sja7fgqoggbfvkrzy5t6adfsa</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4182</id>
      <parentid>4181</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T14:10:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="380">'''South America'''
* [[Argentina]]
* [[Bolivia]]
* [[Brazil]]
* [[Chile]]
* [[Colombia]]
* [[Ecuador]]
* [[French Guiana]]
* [[Guyana]]
* [[Paraguay]]
* [[Peru]]
* [[Suriname]]
* [[Trinidad and Tobago]]
* [[Uruguay]]
* [[Venezuela]]

==More info==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at roadjunky.com

[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>gc8b3hhzp79vinz9ul700n0y31zc21k</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4183</id>
      <parentid>4182</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T14:42:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="403">'''South America'''
* [[Argentina]]
* [[Bolivia]]
* [[Brazil]]
* [[Chile]]
* [[Colombia]]
* [[Ecuador]]
* [[French Guiana]]
* [[Guyana]]
* [[Paraguay]]
* [[Peru]]
* [[Suriname]]
* [[Trinidad and Tobago]]
* [[Uruguay]]
* [[Venezuela]]

==More info==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at roadjunky.com

[[Category:World]]
[[Category:America|*]]</text>
      <sha1>26ecixzsrpo3b1yx4zrcc3zadvrsa40</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4184</id>
      <parentid>4183</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-27T00:38:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="491">'''South America'''

[http://www.uk.map24.com/ map24] has a route planner for South America.

==Countries==
* [[Argentina]]
* [[Bolivia]]
* [[Brazil]]
* [[Chile]]
* [[Colombia]]
* [[Ecuador]]
* [[French Guiana]]
* [[Guyana]]
* [[Paraguay]]
* [[Peru]]
* [[Suriname]]
* [[Trinidad and Tobago]]
* [[Uruguay]]
* [[Venezuela]]

==More info==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at roadjunky.com

[[Category:World]]
[[Category:America|*]]</text>
      <sha1>kwqdowziw3vef2iqppcaapbwglboac8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4185</id>
      <parentid>4184</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-01-10T03:38:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="523">'''South America'''

[http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese but has information about the whole of South America.

==Countries==
* [[Argentina]]
* [[Bolivia]]
* [[Brazil]]
* [[Chile]]
* [[Colombia]]
* [[Ecuador]]
* [[French Guiana]]
* [[Guyana]]
* [[Paraguay]]
* [[Peru]]
* [[Suriname]]
* [[Trinidad and Tobago]]
* [[Uruguay]]
* [[Venezuela]]

==More info==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at roadjunky.com

[[Category:World]]
[[Category:America|*]]</text>
      <sha1>mjq8t6qa94h6b5uv3a8mmbo3kf4shkm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4186</id>
      <parentid>4185</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-25T21:02:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>200.55.178.35</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="497">'''South America'''

[http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese but has information about the whole of South America.

==Countries==
* [[Argentina]]
* [[Bolivia]]
* [[Brazil]]
* [[Chile]]
* [[Colombia]]
* [[Ecuador]]
* [[French Guiana]]
* [[Guyana]]
* [[Paraguay]]
* [[Peru]]
* [[Suriname]]
* [[Uruguay]]
* [[Venezuela]]

==More info==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at roadjunky.com

[[Category:World]]
[[Category:America|*]]</text>
      <sha1>d35zb02x5zii30j6i6kmu224qn71vbv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4187</id>
      <parentid>1512</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1032">Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous, and on top of that, if you do try, you will find it extremely hard to actually get a ride.

[http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese but has information about the whole of South America.

==Countries==
* [[Argentina]]
* [[Bolivia]]
* [[Brazil]]
* [[Chile]]
* [[Colombia]]
* [[Ecuador]]
* [[French Guiana]]
* [[Guyana]]
* [[Paraguay]]
* [[Peru]]
* [[Suriname]]
* [[Uruguay]]
* [[Venezuela]]

==More info==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at roadjunky.com

[[Category:World]]
[[Category:America|*]]</text>
      <sha1>a1kqmr84ttnk5w4l425on6bxfj1az2a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9507</id>
      <parentid>4187</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-05T03:54:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>200.118.121.2</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1093">Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous by foreigners, but if you try it you´ll figure that main roads are absolutely safe and is extremely hard to get a ride since people is very cautious ..

[http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese but has information about the whole of South America.

==Countries==
* [[Argentina]]
* [[Bolivia]]
* [[Brazil]]
* [[Chile]]
* [[Colombia]]
* [[Ecuador]]
* [[French Guiana]]
* [[Guyana]]
* [[Paraguay]]
* [[Peru]]
* [[Suriname]]
* [[Uruguay]]
* [[Venezuela]]

==More info==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at roadjunky.com

[[Category:World]]
[[Category:America|*]]</text>
      <sha1>nwqg5au9920ehpcyk9d643uhskq1e89</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13299</id>
      <parentid>9507</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-30T07:35:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1177">Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous by foreigners, but if you try it you´ll figure that main roads are absolutely safe and is extremely hard to get a ride since people is very cautious ..

[http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese but has information about the whole of South America.

==Countries==
* [[Argentina]]
* [[Bolivia]]
* [[Brazil]]
* [[Chile]]
* [[Colombia]]
* [[Ecuador]]
* [[Falkland Islands|Falkland Islands (Malvinas)]]
* [[French Guiana]]
* [[Guyana]]
* [[Paraguay]]
* [[Peru]]
* [[Suriname]]
* [[Uruguay]]
* [[Venezuela|Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela]]

==More info==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at roadjunky.com

[[Category:World]]
[[Category:America|*]]</text>
      <sha1>7g32glteznrq1e3n42bor6fxxyew3xe</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13667</id>
      <parentid>13299</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-12T15:53:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1201">Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous by foreigners, but if you try it you´ll figure that main roads are absolutely safe and is extremely hard to get a ride since people is very cautious ..

[http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese but has information about the whole of South America.

==Countries==
* [[Argentina]]
* [[Bolivia]]
* [[Brazil]]
* [[Chile]]
* [[Colombia]]
* [[Ecuador]]
* [[Falkland Islands|Falkland Islands (Malvinas)]]
* [[French Guiana]]
* [[Guyana]]
* [[Paraguay]]
* [[Peru]]
* [[Suriname]]
* [[Uruguay]]
* [[Venezuela|Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela]]

==More info==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at roadjunky.com

[[Category:World]]
[[Category:America|*]]

[[es:America del Sur]]</text>
      <sha1>ahegafibhqgaz0oar6wpzu7hjkv9zfm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14075</id>
      <parentid>13667</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-23T15:55:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1205">Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous by foreigners, but if you try it you´ll figure that main roads are absolutely safe and is extremely hard to get a ride since people is very cautious ..

[http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese but has information about the whole of South America.

==Countries==
* [[Argentina]]
* [[Bolivia]]
* [[Brazil]]
* [[Chile]]
* [[Colombia]]
* [[Ecuador]]
* [[Falkland Islands|Falkland Islands (Malvinas)]]
* [[French Guiana]]
* [[Guyana]]
* [[Paraguay]]
* [[Peru]]
* [[Suriname]]
* [[Uruguay]]
* [[Venezuela|Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela]]

==More info==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at ''roadjunky.com''

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]


[[es:America del Sur]]</text>
      <sha1>18cwrpvbhe1u7f3veynhag2opb3hyfe</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14225</id>
      <parentid>14075</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-29T22:08:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1204">Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous by foreigners, but if you try it you´ll figure that main roads are absolutely safe and is extremely hard to get a ride since people is very cautious ..

[http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese but has information about the whole of South America.

==Countries==
* [[Argentina]]
* [[Bolivia]]
* [[Brazil]]
* [[Chile]]
* [[Colombia]]
* [[Ecuador]]
* [[Falkland Islands|Falkland Islands (Malvinas)]]
* [[French Guiana]]
* [[Guyana]]
* [[Paraguay]]
* [[Peru]]
* [[Suriname]]
* [[Uruguay]]
* [[Venezuela|Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela]]

==More info==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at ''roadjunky.com''

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]

[[es:America del Sur]]</text>
      <sha1>k4lobv4xdwio02kq76i35xk2up88m2y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16362</id>
      <parentid>14225</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-09T04:38:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1228">Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous by foreigners, but if you try it you´ll figure that main roads are absolutely safe and is extremely hard to get a ride since people is very cautious ..

[http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese but has information about the whole of South America.

==Countries==
* [[Argentina]]
* [[Bolivia]]
* [[Brazil]]
* [[Chile]]
* [[Colombia]]
* [[Ecuador]]
* [[Falkland Islands|Falkland Islands (Malvinas)]]
* [[French Guiana]]
* [[Guyana]]
* [[Paraguay]]
* [[Peru]]
* [[Suriname]]
* [[Uruguay]]
* [[Venezuela|Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela]]

==More info==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at ''roadjunky.com''

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]

[[es:America del Sur]]
[[fr:Amérique du Sud]]</text>
      <sha1>1anguwxytctoalajqc6txjx3u5982tl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17128</id>
      <parentid>16362</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-31T02:15:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1264">Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous by foreigners, but if you try it you´ll figure that main roads are absolutely safe and is extremely hard to get a ride since people is very cautious ..

[http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese but has information about the whole of South America.

==Countries==
* [[Argentina]]
* [[Bolivia]]
* [[Brazil]]
* [[Chile]]
* [[Colombia]]
* [[Ecuador]]
* [[Guyana]]
* [[Paraguay]]
* [[Peru]]
* [[Suriname]]
* [[Uruguay]]
* [[Venezuela|Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela]]

===Autonomic Islands or Regions===
* [[Falkland Islands|Falkland Islands (Malvinas)]]
* [[French Guiana]]

==More info==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at ''roadjunky.com''

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]

[[es:America del Sur]]
[[fr:Amérique du Sud]]</text>
      <sha1>tfqn4heqieq3e761euicxbt6rlhvqjn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17477</id>
      <parentid>17128</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-02T22:51:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1773">Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous by foreigners, but if you try it you´ll figure that main roads are absolutely safe and is extremely hard to get a ride since people is very cautious ..

[http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese but has information about the whole of South America.

==Countries==
* [[Image:Flag of Argentina.png|20px]] [[Argentina]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bolivia.png|20px]] [[Bolivia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Brazil.png|20px]] [[Brazil]]
* [[Image:Flag of Chile.png|20px]] [[Chile]]
* [[Image:Flag of Colombia.png|20px]] [[Colombia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ecuador.png|20px]] [[Ecuador]]
* [[Image:Flag of Guyana.gif|20px]] [[Guyana]]
* [[Image:Flag of Paraguay.png|20px]] [[Paraguay]]
* [[Image:Flag of Peru.png|20px]] [[Peru]]
* [[Image:Flag of Suriname.png|20px]] [[Suriname]]
* [[Image:Flag of Uruguay.png|20px]] [[Uruguay]]
* [[Image:Flag of Venezuela.png|20px]] [[Venezuela|Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela]]

===Autonomic Islands or Regions===
* [[Image:Flag of the Falkland Islands UK.png|20px]] [[Falkland Islands|Falkland Islands (Malvinas)]]
* [[Image:Flag French Guyana.jpg|20px]] [[French Guiana]]

==More info==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at ''roadjunky.com''

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]

[[es:America del Sur]]
[[fr:Amérique du Sud]]</text>
      <sha1>qsrb7gvl86cgz0g38ijeh66k40i8wzx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17883</id>
      <parentid>17477</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-11T22:17:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1900">Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. 

In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous by foreigners, but if you try it you'll figure out that main roads are absolutely safe and it's extremely hard to get a ride since people are very cautious. 

:'''For more specific information, have a look to the nation articles listed below:'''

== Countries ==
* [[Image:Flag of Argentina.png|20px]] [[Argentina]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bolivia.png|20px]] [[Bolivia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Brazil.png|20px]] [[Brazil]]
* [[Image:Flag of Chile.png|20px]] [[Chile]]
* [[Image:Flag of Colombia.png|20px]] [[Colombia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ecuador.png|20px]] [[Ecuador]]
* [[Image:Flag of Guyana.gif|20px]] [[Guyana]]
* [[Image:Flag of Paraguay.png|20px]] [[Paraguay]]
* [[Image:Flag of Peru.png|20px]] [[Peru]]
* [[Image:Flag of Suriname.png|20px]] [[Suriname]]
* [[Image:Flag of Uruguay.png|20px]] [[Uruguay]]
* [[Image:Flag of Venezuela.png|20px]] [[Venezuela|Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela]]

===Autonomic Islands or Regions===
* [[Image:Flag of the Falkland Islands UK.png|20px]] [[Falkland Islands|Falkland Islands (Malvinas)]]
* [[Image:Flag French Guyana.jpg|20px]] [[French Guiana]]

==More info==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at ''roadjunky.com''
* [http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese but has information about the whole of South America.


[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]
__NOTOC__
[[es:America del Sur]]
[[fr:Amérique du Sud]]
[[de:Südamerika]]</text>
      <sha1>4lv8zo2d6w5t25ffb750a4pel4am8w6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17899</id>
      <parentid>17883</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-12T14:42:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1997">Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. 

In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous by foreigners, but if you try it you'll figure out that main roads are absolutely safe and it's extremely hard to get a ride since people are very cautious. 
&lt;map lat='-25.641526373065755' lng='-60.64453125' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' height='500'/&gt;

:'''For more specific information, have a look to the nation articles listed below:'''

== Countries ==
* [[Image:Flag of Argentina.png|20px]] [[Argentina]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bolivia.png|20px]] [[Bolivia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Brazil.png|20px]] [[Brazil]]
* [[Image:Flag of Chile.png|20px]] [[Chile]]
* [[Image:Flag of Colombia.png|20px]] [[Colombia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ecuador.png|20px]] [[Ecuador]]
* [[Image:Flag of Guyana.gif|20px]] [[Guyana]]
* [[Image:Flag of Paraguay.png|20px]] [[Paraguay]]
* [[Image:Flag of Peru.png|20px]] [[Peru]]
* [[Image:Flag of Suriname.png|20px]] [[Suriname]]
* [[Image:Flag of Uruguay.png|20px]] [[Uruguay]]
* [[Image:Flag of Venezuela.png|20px]] [[Venezuela|Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela]]

===Autonomic Islands or Regions===
* [[Image:Flag of the Falkland Islands UK.png|20px]] [[Falkland Islands|Falkland Islands (Malvinas)]]
* [[Image:Flag French Guyana.jpg|20px]] [[French Guiana]]

==More info==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at ''roadjunky.com''
* [http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese but has information about the whole of South America.


[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]
__NOTOC__
[[es:America del Sur]]
[[fr:Amérique du Sud]]
[[de:Südamerika]]</text>
      <sha1>882ex5fecpsycwyh7yemlma2ec0f0xp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17903</id>
      <parentid>17899</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-13T01:40:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1998">Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. 

In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous by foreigners, but if you try it you'll figure out that main roads are absolutely safe and it's extremely hard to get a ride since people are very cautious. 
&lt;map lat='-25.641526373065755' lng='-60.64453125' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' height='500'/&gt;

:'''For more specific information, have a look to the nation articles listed below:'''

== Countries ==
* [[Image:Flag of Argentina.png|20px]] [[Argentina]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bolivia.png|20px]] [[Bolivia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Brazil.png|20px]] [[Brazil]]
* [[Image:Flag of Chile.png|20px]] [[Chile]]
* [[Image:Flag of Colombia.png|20px]] [[Colombia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ecuador.png|20px]] [[Ecuador]]
* [[Image:Flag of Guyana.gif|20px]] [[Guyana]]
* [[Image:Flag of Paraguay.png|20px]] [[Paraguay]]
* [[Image:Flag of Peru.png|20px]] [[Peru]]
* [[Image:Flag of Suriname.png|20px]] [[Suriname]]
* [[Image:Flag of Uruguay.png|20px]] [[Uruguay]]
* [[Image:Flag of Venezuela.png|20px]] [[Venezuela|Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela]]

===Autonomic Islands or Regions===
* [[Image:Flag of the Falkland Islands UK.png|20px]] [[Falkland Islands|Falkland Islands (Malvinas)]]
* [[Image:Flag French Guyana.jpg|20px]] [[French Guiana]]

==More info==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at ''roadjunky.com''
* [http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese but has information about the whole of South America.


[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]
__NOTOC__

[[de:Südamerika]]
[[es:America del Sur]]
[[fr:Amérique du Sud]]</text>
      <sha1>53t7dnls4ge23v0i15q7qjhyw8me396</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21521</id>
      <parentid>17903</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-18T10:44:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2015">Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. 

In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous by foreigners, but if you try it you'll figure out that main roads are absolutely safe and it's extremely hard to get a ride since people are very cautious. 
&lt;map lat='-25.641526373065755' lng='-60.64453125' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' height='500'/&gt;

:'''For more specific information, have a look to the nation articles listed below:'''

== Countries ==
* [[Image:Flag of Argentina.png|20px]] [[Argentina]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bolivia.png|20px]] [[Bolivia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Brazil.png|20px]] [[Brazil]]
* [[Image:Flag of Chile.png|20px]] [[Chile]]
* [[Image:Flag of Colombia.png|20px]] [[Colombia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ecuador.png|20px]] [[Ecuador]]
* [[Image:Flag of Guyana.gif|20px]] [[Guyana]]
* [[Image:Flag of Paraguay.png|20px]] [[Paraguay]]
* [[Image:Flag of Peru.png|20px]] [[Peru]]
* [[Image:Flag of Suriname.png|20px]] [[Suriname]]
* [[Image:Flag of Uruguay.png|20px]] [[Uruguay]]
* [[Image:Flag of Venezuela.png|20px]] [[Venezuela|Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela]]

===Autonomic Islands or Regions===
* [[Image:Flag of the Falkland Islands UK.png|20px]] [[Falkland Islands|Falkland Islands (Malvinas)]]
* [[Image:Flag French Guyana.jpg|20px]] [[French Guiana]]

==More info==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at ''roadjunky.com''
* [http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese but has information about the whole of South America.


[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Americas}}
[[de:Südamerika]]
[[es:America del Sur]]
[[fr:Amérique du Sud]]</text>
      <sha1>go0iy89v8cu6kw5vhrrgmwel7z11hzt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21935</id>
      <parentid>21521</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-21T22:19:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2016">Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. 

In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous by foreigners, but if you try it you'll figure out that main roads are absolutely safe and it's extremely hard to get a ride since people are very cautious. 
&lt;map lat='-25.641526373065755' lng='-60.64453125' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' height='500'/&gt;

:'''For more specific information, have a look to the nation articles listed below:'''

== Countries ==
* [[Image:Flag of Argentina.png|20px]] [[Argentina]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bolivia.png|20px]] [[Bolivia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Brazil.png|20px]] [[Brazil]]
* [[Image:Flag of Chile.png|20px]] [[Chile]]
* [[Image:Flag of Colombia.png|20px]] [[Colombia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ecuador.png|20px]] [[Ecuador]]
* [[Image:Flag of Guyana.gif|20px]] [[Guyana]]
* [[Image:Flag of Paraguay.png|20px]] [[Paraguay]]
* [[Image:Flag of Peru.png|20px]] [[Peru]]
* [[Image:Flag of Suriname.png|20px]] [[Suriname]]
* [[Image:Flag of Uruguay.png|20px]] [[Uruguay]]
* [[Image:Flag of Venezuela.png|20px]] [[Venezuela|Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela]]

===Autonomic Islands or Regions===
* [[Image:Flag of the Falkland Islands UK.png|20px]] [[Falkland Islands|Falkland Islands (Malvinas)]]
* [[Image:Flag French Guyana.jpg|20px]] [[French Guiana]]

==More info==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at ''roadjunky.com''
* [http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese but has information about the whole of South America.


[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Americas}}

[[de:Südamerika]]
[[es:America del Sur]]
[[fr:Amérique du Sud]]</text>
      <sha1>ql9326ryp9cvqfr6dtkwp4nx8n8k5jl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22155</id>
      <parentid>21935</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-30T19:10:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2039">Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. 

In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous by foreigners, but if you try it you'll figure out that main roads are absolutely safe and it's extremely hard to get a ride since people are very cautious. 
&lt;map lat='-25.641526373065755' lng='-60.64453125' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' height='500'/&gt;

:'''For more specific information, have a look to the nation articles listed below:'''

== Countries ==
* [[Image:Flag of Argentina.png|20px]] [[Argentina]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bolivia.png|20px]] [[Bolivia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Brazil.png|20px]] [[Brazil]]
* [[Image:Flag of Chile.png|20px]] [[Chile]]
* [[Image:Flag of Colombia.png|20px]] [[Colombia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ecuador.png|20px]] [[Ecuador]]
* [[Image:Flag of Guyana.gif|20px]] [[Guyana]]
* [[Image:Flag of Paraguay.png|20px]] [[Paraguay]]
* [[Image:Flag of Peru.png|20px]] [[Peru]]
* [[Image:Flag of Suriname.png|20px]] [[Suriname]]
* [[Image:Flag of Uruguay.png|20px]] [[Uruguay]]
* [[Image:Flag of Venezuela.png|20px]] [[Venezuela|Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela]]

===Autonomic Islands or Regions===
* [[Image:Flag of the Falkland Islands UK.png|20px]] [[Falkland Islands|Falkland Islands (Malvinas)]]
* [[Image:Flag French Guyana.jpg|20px]] [[French Guiana]]

==More info==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at ''roadjunky.com''
* [http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese but has information about the whole of South America.


[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Americas}}

[[de:Südamerika]]
[[es:America del Sur]]
[[fr:Amérique du Sud]]
[[fi:Etelä-Amerikka]]</text>
      <sha1>44tamuujaf5l908co51c8a5cjdvmzyn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23059</id>
      <parentid>22155</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-30T18:22:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2039">Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. 

In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous by foreigners, but if you try it you'll figure out that main roads are absolutely safe and it's extremely hard to get a ride since people are very cautious. 
&lt;map lat='-25.641526373065755' lng='-60.64453125' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' height='500'/&gt;

:'''For more specific information, have a look to the nation articles listed below:'''

== Countries ==
* [[Image:Flag of Argentina.png|20px]] [[Argentina]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bolivia.png|20px]] [[Bolivia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Brazil.png|20px]] [[Brazil]]
* [[Image:Flag of Chile.png|20px]] [[Chile]]
* [[Image:Flag of Colombia.png|20px]] [[Colombia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ecuador.png|20px]] [[Ecuador]]
* [[Image:Flag of Guyana.gif|20px]] [[Guyana]]
* [[Image:Flag of Paraguay.png|20px]] [[Paraguay]]
* [[Image:Flag of Peru.png|20px]] [[Peru]]
* [[Image:Flag of Suriname.png|20px]] [[Suriname]]
* [[Image:Flag of Uruguay.png|20px]] [[Uruguay]]
* [[Image:Flag of Venezuela.png|20px]] [[Venezuela|Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela]]

===Autonomic Islands or Regions===
* [[Image:Flag of the Falkland Islands UK.png|20px]] [[Falkland Islands|Falkland Islands (Malvinas)]]
* [[Image:Flag French Guyana.jpg|20px]] [[French Guiana]]

==More info==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at ''roadjunky.com''
* [http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese but has information about the whole of South America.


[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Americas}}

[[de:Südamerika]]
[[es:America del Sur]]
[[fi:Etelä-Amerikka]]
[[fr:Amérique du Sud]]</text>
      <sha1>fzg41amfi1z5aodmcx410crdl2c160u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23079</id>
      <parentid>23059</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-30T20:03:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2062">Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. 

In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous by foreigners, but if you try it you'll figure out that main roads are absolutely safe and it's extremely hard to get a ride since people are very cautious. 
&lt;map lat='-25.641526373065755' lng='-60.64453125' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' height='500'/&gt;

:'''For more specific information, have a look to the nation articles listed below:'''

== Countries ==
* [[Image:Flag of Argentina.png|20px]] [[Argentina]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bolivia.png|20px]] [[Bolivia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Brazil.png|20px]] [[Brazil]]
* [[Image:Flag of Chile.png|20px]] [[Chile]]
* [[Image:Flag of Colombia.png|20px]] [[Colombia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ecuador.png|20px]] [[Ecuador]]
* [[Image:Flag of Guyana.gif|20px]] [[Guyana]]
* [[Image:Flag of Paraguay.png|20px]] [[Paraguay]]
* [[Image:Flag of Peru.png|20px]] [[Peru]]
* [[Image:Flag of Suriname.png|20px]] [[Suriname]]
* [[Image:Flag of Uruguay.png|20px]] [[Uruguay]]
* [[Image:Flag of Venezuela.png|20px]] [[Venezuela|Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela]]

===Autonomic Islands or Regions===
* [[Image:Flag of the Falkland Islands UK.png|20px]] [[Falkland Islands|Falkland Islands (Malvinas)]]
* [[Image:Flag French Guyana.jpg|20px]] [[French Guiana]]

==More info==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at ''roadjunky.com''
* [http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese but has information about the whole of South America.


[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Americas}}

[[de:Südamerika]]
[[es:America del Sur]]
[[fi:Etelä-Amerikka]]
[[fr:Amérique du Sud]]
[[pt:América do Sul]]</text>
      <sha1>77dsxs69r5hwh0aszb3uzs2fsk9yhna</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29710</id>
      <parentid>23079</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-04T22:02:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>190.31.240.86</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2029">Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. 

In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous by foreigners, but if you try it you'll figure out that main roads are absolutely safe and it's extremely hard to get a ride since people are very cautious. 
&lt;map lat='-25.641526373065755' lng='-60.64453125' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' height='500'/&gt;

:'''For more specific information, have a look to the nation articles listed below:'''

== Countries ==
* [[Image:Flag of Argentina.png|20px]] [[Argentina]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bolivia.png|20px]] [[Bolivia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Brazil.png|20px]] [[Brazil]]
* [[Image:Flag of Chile.png|20px]] [[Chile]]
* [[Image:Flag of Colombia.png|20px]] [[Colombia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ecuador.png|20px]] [[Ecuador]]
* [[Image:Flag of Guyana.gif|20px]] [[Guyana]]
* [[Image:Flag of Paraguay.png|20px]] [[Paraguay]]
* [[Image:Flag of Peru.png|20px]] [[Peru]]
* [[Image:Flag of Suriname.png|20px]] [[Suriname]]
* [[Image:Flag of Uruguay.png|20px]] [[Uruguay]]
* [[Image:Flag of Venezuela.png|20px]] [[Venezuela]]

===Autonomic Islands or Regions===
* [[Image:Flag of the Falkland Islands UK.png|20px]] [[Falkland Islands|Falkland Islands (Malvinas)]]
* [[Image:Flag French Guyana.jpg|20px]] [[French Guiana]]

==More info==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at ''roadjunky.com''
* [http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese but has information about the whole of South America.


[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Americas}}

[[de:Südamerika]]
[[es:America del Sur]]
[[fi:Etelä-Amerikka]]
[[fr:Amérique du Sud]]
[[pt:América do Sul]]</text>
      <sha1>fuk428lkl2nm4nevfyg51fi8rrsqwsa</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30775</id>
      <parentid>29710</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-04T03:40:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kb</username>
        <id>1332</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2029">Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. 

In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous by foreigners, but if you try it you'll figure out that main roads are absolutely safe and it's extremely hard to get a ride since people are very cautious. 
&lt;map lat='-25.641526373065755' lng='-60.64453125' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' height='500'/&gt;

:'''For more specific information, have a look to the nation articles listed below:'''

== Countries ==
* [[Image:Flag of Argentina.png|20px]] [[Argentina]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bolivia.png|20px]] [[Bolivia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Brazil.png|20px]] [[Brazil]]
* [[Image:Flag of Chile.png|20px]] [[Chile]]
* [[Image:Flag of Colombia.png|20px]] [[Colombia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ecuador.png|20px]] [[Ecuador]]
* [[Image:Flag of Guyana.png|20px]] [[Guyana]]
* [[Image:Flag of Paraguay.png|20px]] [[Paraguay]]
* [[Image:Flag of Peru.png|20px]] [[Peru]]
* [[Image:Flag of Suriname.png|20px]] [[Suriname]]
* [[Image:Flag of Uruguay.png|20px]] [[Uruguay]]
* [[Image:Flag of Venezuela.png|20px]] [[Venezuela]]

===Autonomic Islands or Regions===
* [[Image:Flag of the Falkland Islands UK.png|20px]] [[Falkland Islands|Falkland Islands (Malvinas)]]
* [[Image:Flag French Guyana.jpg|20px]] [[French Guiana]]

==More info==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at ''roadjunky.com''
* [http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese but has information about the whole of South America.


[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Americas}}

[[de:Südamerika]]
[[es:America del Sur]]
[[fi:Etelä-Amerikka]]
[[fr:Amérique du Sud]]
[[pt:América do Sul]]</text>
      <sha1>0z8eghb0f7lglbkxysjkrgm3kg94wig</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31564</id>
      <parentid>30775</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-05T00:07:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sigurdas</username>
        <id>1658</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2054">Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. 

In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous by foreigners, but if you try it you'll figure out that main roads are absolutely safe and it's extremely hard to get a ride since people are very cautious. 
&lt;map lat='-25.641526373065755' lng='-60.64453125' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' height='500'/&gt;

:'''For more specific information, have a look to the nation articles listed below:'''

== Countries ==
* [[Image:Flag of Argentina.png|20px]] [[Argentina]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bolivia.png|20px]] [[Bolivia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Brazil.png|20px]] [[Brazil]]
* [[Image:Flag of Chile.png|20px]] [[Chile]]
* [[Image:Flag of Colombia.png|20px]] [[Colombia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ecuador.png|20px]] [[Ecuador]]
* [[Image:Flag of Guyana.png|20px]] [[Guyana]]
* [[Image:Flag of Paraguay.png|20px]] [[Paraguay]]
* [[Image:Flag of Peru.png|20px]] [[Peru]]
* [[Image:Flag of Suriname.png|20px]] [[Suriname]]
* [[Image:Flag of Uruguay.png|20px]] [[Uruguay]]
* [[Image:Flag of Venezuela.png|20px]] [[Venezuela]]

===Autonomic Islands or Regions===
* [[Image:Flag of the Falkland Islands UK.png|20px]] [[Falkland Islands|Falkland Islands (Malvinas)]]
* [[Image:Flag French Guyana.jpg|20px]] [[French Guiana]]

==More info==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at ''roadjunky.com''
* [http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese but has information about the whole of South America.


[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]

[[trash:South America]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Americas}}

[[de:Südamerika]]
[[es:America del Sur]]
[[fi:Etelä-Amerikka]]
[[fr:Amérique du Sud]]
[[pt:América do Sul]]</text>
      <sha1>s2gk7ip59y0yns0tvrg4bd6ogdca0d2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32265</id>
      <parentid>31564</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-04-16T10:05:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>190.27.96.119</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2053">Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. 

In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous by foreigners, but if you try it you'll figure out that main roads are absolutely safe and it's extremely hard to get a ride since people are very cautious. 
&lt;map lat='-25.641526373065755' lng='-60.64453125' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' height='500'/&gt;

:'''For more specific information, have a look to the nation articles listed below:'''

== Countries ==
* [[Image:Flag of Argentina.png|20px]] [[Argentina]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bolivia.png|20px]] [[Bolivia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Brazil.png|20px]] [[Brazil]]
* [[Image:Flag of Chile.png|20px]] [[Chile]]
* [[Image:Flag of Colombia.png|20px]] [[Colombia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ecuador.png|20px]] [[Ecuador]]
* [[Image:Flag of Guyana.png|20px]] [[Guyana]]
* [[Image:Flag of Paraguay.png|20px]] [[Paraguay]]
* [[Image:Flag of Peru.png|20px]] [[Peru]]
* [[Image:Flag of Suriname.png|20px]] [[Suriname]]
* [[Image:Flag of Uruguay.png|20px]] [[Uruguay]]
* [[Image:Flag of Venezuela.png|20px]] [[Venezuela]]

===Autonomic Islands or Regions===
* [[Image:Flag of the Falkland Islands UK.png|20px]] [[Falkland Islands|Falkland Islands (Malvinas)]]
* [[Image:Flag French Guyana.jpg|20px]] [[French Guiana]]

==More info==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at ''roadjunky.com''
* [http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese having information about the whole of South America.


[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]

[[trash:South America]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Americas}}

[[de:Südamerika]]
[[es:America del Sur]]
[[fi:Etelä-Amerikka]]
[[fr:Amérique du Sud]]
[[pt:América do Sul]]</text>
      <sha1>sk7kft0r8qftkhklgexunhr3i0eqj0e</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35469</id>
      <parentid>32265</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T18:54:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2042">Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. 

In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous by foreigners, but if you try it you'll figure out that main roads are absolutely safe and it's extremely hard to get a ride since people are very cautious. 
&lt;map lat='-25.641526373065755' lng='-60.64453125' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' height='500'/&gt;

:'''For more specific information, have a look to the nation articles listed below:'''

== Countries ==
* [[File:Flag of Argentina.png|20px]] [[Argentina]]
* [[File:Flag of Bolivia.png|20px]] [[Bolivia]]
* [[File:Flag of Brazil.png|20px]] [[Brazil]]
* [[File:Flag of Chile.png|20px]] [[Chile]]
* [[File:Flag of Colombia.png|20px]] [[Colombia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ecuador.png|20px]] [[Ecuador]]
* [[File:Flag of Guyana.png|20px]] [[Guyana]]
* [[File:Flag of Paraguay.png|20px]] [[Paraguay]]
* [[File:Flag of Peru.png|20px]] [[Peru]]
* [[File:Flag of Suriname.png|20px]] [[Suriname]]
* [[File:Flag of Uruguay.png|20px]] [[Uruguay]]
* [[File:Flag of Venezuela.png|20px]] [[Venezuela]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Falkland Islands UK.png|20px]] [[Falkland Islands|Falkland Islands (Malvinas)]]
* [[File:Flag French Guyana.jpg|20px]] [[French Guiana]]

== More info ==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at ''roadjunky.com''
* [http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese having information about the whole of South America.
[[trash:South America]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Americas}}

[[fr:Amérique du Sud]]

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]

[[de:Südamerika]]
[[es:America del Sur]]
[[fi:Etelä-Amerikka]]
[[pt:América do Sul]]</text>
      <sha1>n2dqnp0bei91d4pfjsgklwc68ju79az</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35865</id>
      <parentid>35469</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-17T00:04:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2056">Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. 

In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous by foreigners, but if you try it you'll figure out that main roads are absolutely safe and it's extremely hard to get a ride since people are very cautious. 
&lt;map lat='-25.641526373065755' lng='-60.64453125' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' height='500'/&gt;

:'''For more specific information, have a look to the nation articles listed below:'''

== Countries ==
* [[File:Flag of Argentina.png|20px]] [[Argentina]]
* [[File:Flag of Bolivia.png|20px]] [[Bolivia]]
* [[File:Flag of Brazil.png|20px]] [[Brazil]]
* [[File:Flag of Chile.png|20px]] [[Chile]]
* [[File:Flag of Colombia.png|20px]] [[Colombia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ecuador.png|20px]] [[Ecuador]]
* [[File:Flag of Guyana.png|20px]] [[Guyana]]
* [[File:Flag of Paraguay.png|20px]] [[Paraguay]]
* [[File:Flag of Peru.png|20px]] [[Peru]]
* [[File:Flag of Suriname.png|20px]] [[Suriname]]
* [[File:Flag of Uruguay.png|20px]] [[Uruguay]]
* [[File:Flag of Venezuela.png|20px]] [[Venezuela]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Falkland Islands UK.png|20px]] [[Falkland Islands|Falkland Islands (Malvinas)]]
* [[File:Flag French Guyana.jpg|20px]] [[French Guiana]]

== More info ==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at ''roadjunky.com''
* [http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese having information about the whole of South America.
[[trash:South America]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Americas}}

[[fr:Amérique du Sud]]

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]

[[de:Südamerika]]
[[es:America del Sur]]
[[fi:Etelä-Amerikka]]
[[pt:América do Sul]]
[[zh:南美]]</text>
      <sha1>cmyft4w86pirqap3ss9mtz9m22w7zca</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>37794</id>
      <parentid>35865</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-10-09T23:02:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2055">Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. 

In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous by foreigners, but if you try it you'll figure out that main roads are absolutely safe and it's extremely hard to get a ride since people are very cautious. 
&lt;map lat='-25.641526373065755' lng='-60.64453125' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' height='500'/&gt;

:'''For more specific information, have a look to the nation articles listed below:'''

== Countries ==
* [[File:Flag of Argentina.png|20px]] [[Argentina]]
* [[File:Flag of Bolivia.png|20px]] [[Bolivia]]
* [[File:Flag of Brazil.png|20px]] [[Brazil]]
* [[File:Flag of Chile.png|20px]] [[Chile]]
* [[File:Flag of Colombia.png|20px]] [[Colombia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ecuador.png|20px]] [[Ecuador]]
* [[File:Flag of Guyana.png|20px]] [[Guyana]]
* [[File:Flag of Paraguay.png|20px]] [[Paraguay]]
* [[File:Flag of Peru.png|20px]] [[Peru]]
* [[File:Flag of Suriname.png|20px]] [[Suriname]]
* [[File:Flag of Uruguay.png|20px]] [[Uruguay]]
* [[File:Flag of Venezuela.png|20px]] [[Venezuela]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Falkland Islands UK.png|20px]] [[Falkland Islands|Falkland Islands (Malvinas)]]
* [[File:Flag French Guyana.jpg|20px]] [[French Guiana]]

== More info ==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at ''roadjunky.com''
* [http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese having information about the whole of South America.
[[trash:South America]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Americas}}

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]

[[de:Südamerika]]
[[es:America del Sur]]
[[fi:Etelä-Amerikka]]
[[fr:Amérique du Sud]]
[[pt:América do Sul]]
[[zh:南美]]</text>
      <sha1>0m6t47emcbz1dtyk0svhglhha93z4e4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>45967</id>
      <parentid>37794</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-17T12:57:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2143">Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. 

In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous by foreigners, but if you try it you'll figure out that main roads are absolutely safe and it's extremely hard to get a ride since people are very cautious. 
&lt;map lat='-25.641526373065755' lng='-60.64453125' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' height='500'/&gt;

:'''For more specific information, have a look to the nation articles listed below:'''

== Countries ==
* [[File:Flag of Argentina.svg|30px|border]] [[Argentina]]
* [[File:Flag of Bolivia.svg|30px|border]] [[Bolivia]]
* [[File:Flag of Brazil.svg|30px|border]] [[Brazil]]
* [[File:Flag of Chile.svg|30px|border]] [[Chile]]
* [[File:Flag of Colombia.svg|30px|border]] [[Colombia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ecuador.svg|30px|border]] [[Ecuador]]
* [[File:Flag of Guyana.svg|30px|border]] [[Guyana]]
* [[File:Flag of Paraguay.svg|30px|border]] [[Paraguay]]
* [[File:Flag of Peru.svg|30px|border]] [[Peru]]
* [[File:Flag of Suriname.svg|30px|border]] [[Suriname]]
* [[File:Flag of Uruguay.svg|30px|border]] [[Uruguay]]
* [[File:Flag of Venezuela.svg|30px|border]] [[Venezuela]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Falkland Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Falkland Islands|Falkland Islands (Malvinas)]]
* [[File:Flag French Guyana.jpg|20px]] [[French Guiana]]

== More info ==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at ''roadjunky.com''
* [http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese having information about the whole of South America.
[[trash:South America]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Americas}}

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]

[[de:Südamerika]]
[[es:America del Sur]]
[[fi:Etelä-Amerikka]]
[[fr:Amérique du Sud]]
[[pt:América do Sul]]
[[zh:南美]]</text>
      <sha1>axuwf5nxk4a3glasd8gum6f61t7xmjj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>71012</id>
      <parentid>45967</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-08-20T01:13:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2163">Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. 

In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous by foreigners, but if you try it you'll figure out that main roads are absolutely safe and it's extremely hard to get a ride since people are very cautious. 
&lt;map lat='-25.641526373065755' lng='-60.64453125' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' height='500'/&gt;

:'''For more specific information, have a look to the nation articles listed below:'''

== Countries ==
* [[File:Flag of Argentina.svg|30px|border]] [[Argentina]]
* [[File:Flag of Bolivia.svg|30px|border]] [[Bolivia]]
* [[File:Flag of Brazil.svg|30px|border]] [[Brazil]]
* [[File:Flag of Chile.svg|30px|border]] [[Chile]]
* [[File:Flag of Colombia.svg|30px|border]] [[Colombia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ecuador.svg|30px|border]] [[Ecuador]]
* [[File:Flag of Guyana.svg|30px|border]] [[Guyana]]
* [[File:Flag of Paraguay.svg|30px|border]] [[Paraguay]]
* [[File:Flag of Peru.svg|30px|border]] [[Peru]]
* [[File:Flag of Suriname.svg|30px|border]] [[Suriname]]
* [[File:Flag of Uruguay.svg|30px|border]] [[Uruguay]]
* [[File:Flag of Venezuela.svg|30px|border]] [[Venezuela]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Falkland Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Falkland Islands|Falkland Islands (Malvinas)]]
* [[File:Flag French Guyana.jpg|20px]] [[French Guiana]]

== More info ==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at ''roadjunky.com''
* [http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese having information about the whole of South America.
[[trash:South America]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Americas}}

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]

[[de:Südamerika]]
[[es:America del Sur]]
[[fi:Etelä-Amerikka]]
[[fr:Amérique du Sud]]
[[nl:Zuid-Amerika]]
[[pt:América do Sul]]
[[zh:南美]]</text>
      <sha1>f0eq4ssj2p39bwdls81f5b90ynqj83c</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>76026</id>
      <parentid>71012</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-07-08T18:27:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dr.Keith</username>
        <id>3060</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2584">Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. 

In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous by foreigners, but if you try it you'll figure out that main roads are absolutely safe and it's extremely hard to get a ride since people are very cautious. 
&lt;map lat='-25.641526373065755' lng='-60.64453125' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' height='500'/&gt;

:'''For more specific information, have a look to the nation articles listed below:'''

== Food ==
If you are not vegetarian, '''empanadas''' are probably the fastest and easiest streer food.  You can buy them at many kiosks and walk with them.  They are quite greasy and have lots of energy, but you will feel sick from eating them too much.  They usually contain chicken or meat but can also contain cheese, eggs, or potatoes.  They are widely available across the continent and differ in every country.  

== Countries ==
* [[File:Flag of Argentina.svg|30px|border]] [[Argentina]]
* [[File:Flag of Bolivia.svg|30px|border]] [[Bolivia]]
* [[File:Flag of Brazil.svg|30px|border]] [[Brazil]]
* [[File:Flag of Chile.svg|30px|border]] [[Chile]]
* [[File:Flag of Colombia.svg|30px|border]] [[Colombia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ecuador.svg|30px|border]] [[Ecuador]]
* [[File:Flag of Guyana.svg|30px|border]] [[Guyana]]
* [[File:Flag of Paraguay.svg|30px|border]] [[Paraguay]]
* [[File:Flag of Peru.svg|30px|border]] [[Peru]]
* [[File:Flag of Suriname.svg|30px|border]] [[Suriname]]
* [[File:Flag of Uruguay.svg|30px|border]] [[Uruguay]]
* [[File:Flag of Venezuela.svg|30px|border]] [[Venezuela]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Falkland Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Falkland Islands|Falkland Islands (Malvinas)]]
* [[File:Flag French Guyana.jpg|20px]] [[French Guiana]]

== More info ==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at ''roadjunky.com''
* [http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese having information about the whole of South America.
[[trash:South America]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Americas}}

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]

[[de:Südamerika]]
[[es:America del Sur]]
[[fi:Etelä-Amerikka]]
[[fr:Amérique du Sud]]
[[nl:Zuid-Amerika]]
[[pt:América do Sul]]
[[zh:南美]]</text>
      <sha1>b11r7xke1zi50litv6vmcktotseinmb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>76027</id>
      <parentid>76026</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-07-08T18:28:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dr.Keith</username>
        <id>3060</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2582">Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. 

In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous by foreigners, but if you try it you'll figure out that main roads are absolutely safe and it's extremely hard to get a ride since people are very cautious. 
&lt;map lat='-25.641526373065755' lng='-60.64453125' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' height='500'/&gt;

:'''For more specific information, have a look to the nation articles listed below:'''

== Food ==
If you are not vegetarian, '''empanadas''' are probably the fastest and easiest street food.  You can buy them at many kiosks and walk with them.  They are quite greasy and have lots of energy, but you will feel sick from eating them too much.  They usually contain chicken or meat but can also contain cheese, eggs, or potatoes.  They are widely available across the continent and differ in every country.

== Countries ==
* [[File:Flag of Argentina.svg|30px|border]] [[Argentina]]
* [[File:Flag of Bolivia.svg|30px|border]] [[Bolivia]]
* [[File:Flag of Brazil.svg|30px|border]] [[Brazil]]
* [[File:Flag of Chile.svg|30px|border]] [[Chile]]
* [[File:Flag of Colombia.svg|30px|border]] [[Colombia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ecuador.svg|30px|border]] [[Ecuador]]
* [[File:Flag of Guyana.svg|30px|border]] [[Guyana]]
* [[File:Flag of Paraguay.svg|30px|border]] [[Paraguay]]
* [[File:Flag of Peru.svg|30px|border]] [[Peru]]
* [[File:Flag of Suriname.svg|30px|border]] [[Suriname]]
* [[File:Flag of Uruguay.svg|30px|border]] [[Uruguay]]
* [[File:Flag of Venezuela.svg|30px|border]] [[Venezuela]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Falkland Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Falkland Islands|Falkland Islands (Malvinas)]]
* [[File:Flag French Guyana.jpg|20px]] [[French Guiana]]

== More info ==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at ''roadjunky.com''
* [http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese having information about the whole of South America.
[[trash:South America]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Americas}}

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]

[[de:Südamerika]]
[[es:America del Sur]]
[[fi:Etelä-Amerikka]]
[[fr:Amérique du Sud]]
[[nl:Zuid-Amerika]]
[[pt:América do Sul]]
[[zh:南美]]</text>
      <sha1>4l0fqqf8qpza6uxw0lqmbnvq0v4z0ol</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>76955</id>
      <parentid>76027</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-09-05T17:12:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dr.Keith</username>
        <id>3060</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3030">Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. 

In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous by foreigners, but if you try it you'll figure out that main roads are absolutely safe and it's extremely hard to get a ride since people are very cautious. 
&lt;map lat='-25.641526373065755' lng='-60.64453125' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' height='500'/&gt;

:'''For more specific information, have a look to the nation articles listed below:'''

== Food ==
If you are not vegetarian, '''empanadas''' are probably the fastest and easiest street food.  You can buy them at many kiosks and walk with them.  They are quite greasy and have lots of energy, but you will feel sick from eating them too much.  They usually contain chicken or meat but can also contain cheese, eggs, or potatoes.  They are widely available across the continent and differ in every country.

== Accomodation and sleep ==
In many cities and towns in South America, you can usually ask the '''firemen''' (es:bomberos, pt:bombieros) if they have a place for you to crash for a night.  Often they will give you a bunk or matress or couch to sleep on.  Sometimes they give you a place to put up your tent.  Sometimes they say no or make excuses.  It's worth a try to ask though!  They have bathrooms and usually a kitchen where you can cook.  

== Countries ==
* [[File:Flag of Argentina.svg|30px|border]] [[Argentina]]
* [[File:Flag of Bolivia.svg|30px|border]] [[Bolivia]]
* [[File:Flag of Brazil.svg|30px|border]] [[Brazil]]
* [[File:Flag of Chile.svg|30px|border]] [[Chile]]
* [[File:Flag of Colombia.svg|30px|border]] [[Colombia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ecuador.svg|30px|border]] [[Ecuador]]
* [[File:Flag of Guyana.svg|30px|border]] [[Guyana]]
* [[File:Flag of Paraguay.svg|30px|border]] [[Paraguay]]
* [[File:Flag of Peru.svg|30px|border]] [[Peru]]
* [[File:Flag of Suriname.svg|30px|border]] [[Suriname]]
* [[File:Flag of Uruguay.svg|30px|border]] [[Uruguay]]
* [[File:Flag of Venezuela.svg|30px|border]] [[Venezuela]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Falkland Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Falkland Islands|Falkland Islands (Malvinas)]]
* [[File:Flag French Guyana.jpg|20px]] [[French Guiana]]

== More info ==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at ''roadjunky.com''
* [http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese having information about the whole of South America.
[[trash:South America]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Americas}}

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]

[[de:Südamerika]]
[[es:America del Sur]]
[[fi:Etelä-Amerikka]]
[[fr:Amérique du Sud]]
[[nl:Zuid-Amerika]]
[[pt:América do Sul]]
[[zh:南美]]</text>
      <sha1>755wupi4locpocyl8do5vz1neil8e5u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>92679</id>
      <parentid>76955</parentid>
      <timestamp>2019-02-12T18:17:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zrth</username>
        <id>32538</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3028">Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. 

In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous by foreigners, but if you try it you'll figure out that main roads are absolutely safe and it's extremely hard to get a ride since people are very cautious. 
&lt;map lat='-25.641526373065755' lng='-60.64453125' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' height='500'/&gt;

:'''For more specific information, have a look to the nation articles listed below:'''

== Food ==
If you are not vegetarian, '''empanadas''' are probably the fastest and easiest street food.  You can buy them at many kiosks and walk with them.  They are quite greasy and have lots of energy, but you will feel sick from eating them too much.  They usually contain chicken or meat but can also contain cheese, eggs, or potatoes.  They are widely available across the continent and differ in every country.

== Accomodation and sleep ==
In many cities and towns in South America, you can usually ask the '''firemen''' (es:bomberos, pt:bombieros) if they have a place for you to crash for a night.  Often they will give you a bunk, matress or couch to sleep on.  Sometimes they give you a place to put up your tent.  Sometimes they say no or make excuses.  It's worth a try to ask though!  They have bathrooms and usually a kitchen where you can cook.  

== Countries ==
* [[File:Flag of Argentina.svg|30px|border]] [[Argentina]]
* [[File:Flag of Bolivia.svg|30px|border]] [[Bolivia]]
* [[File:Flag of Brazil.svg|30px|border]] [[Brazil]]
* [[File:Flag of Chile.svg|30px|border]] [[Chile]]
* [[File:Flag of Colombia.svg|30px|border]] [[Colombia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ecuador.svg|30px|border]] [[Ecuador]]
* [[File:Flag of Guyana.svg|30px|border]] [[Guyana]]
* [[File:Flag of Paraguay.svg|30px|border]] [[Paraguay]]
* [[File:Flag of Peru.svg|30px|border]] [[Peru]]
* [[File:Flag of Suriname.svg|30px|border]] [[Suriname]]
* [[File:Flag of Uruguay.svg|30px|border]] [[Uruguay]]
* [[File:Flag of Venezuela.svg|30px|border]] [[Venezuela]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Falkland Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Falkland Islands|Falkland Islands (Malvinas)]]
* [[File:Flag French Guyana.jpg|20px]] [[French Guiana]]

== More info ==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at ''roadjunky.com''
* [http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese having information about the whole of South America.
[[trash:South America]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Americas}}

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]

[[de:Südamerika]]
[[es:America del Sur]]
[[fi:Etelä-Amerikka]]
[[fr:Amérique du Sud]]
[[nl:Zuid-Amerika]]
[[pt:América do Sul]]
[[zh:南美]]</text>
      <sha1>1kldyuzveouo88xagpf010p4wzrqmgh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>100927</id>
      <parentid>92679</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-04T15:17:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* More info */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3049">Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. 

In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous by foreigners, but if you try it you'll figure out that main roads are absolutely safe and it's extremely hard to get a ride since people are very cautious. 
&lt;map lat='-25.641526373065755' lng='-60.64453125' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' height='500'/&gt;

:'''For more specific information, have a look to the nation articles listed below:'''

== Food ==
If you are not vegetarian, '''empanadas''' are probably the fastest and easiest street food.  You can buy them at many kiosks and walk with them.  They are quite greasy and have lots of energy, but you will feel sick from eating them too much.  They usually contain chicken or meat but can also contain cheese, eggs, or potatoes.  They are widely available across the continent and differ in every country.

== Accomodation and sleep ==
In many cities and towns in South America, you can usually ask the '''firemen''' (es:bomberos, pt:bombieros) if they have a place for you to crash for a night.  Often they will give you a bunk, matress or couch to sleep on.  Sometimes they give you a place to put up your tent.  Sometimes they say no or make excuses.  It's worth a try to ask though!  They have bathrooms and usually a kitchen where you can cook.  

== Countries ==
* [[File:Flag of Argentina.svg|30px|border]] [[Argentina]]
* [[File:Flag of Bolivia.svg|30px|border]] [[Bolivia]]
* [[File:Flag of Brazil.svg|30px|border]] [[Brazil]]
* [[File:Flag of Chile.svg|30px|border]] [[Chile]]
* [[File:Flag of Colombia.svg|30px|border]] [[Colombia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ecuador.svg|30px|border]] [[Ecuador]]
* [[File:Flag of Guyana.svg|30px|border]] [[Guyana]]
* [[File:Flag of Paraguay.svg|30px|border]] [[Paraguay]]
* [[File:Flag of Peru.svg|30px|border]] [[Peru]]
* [[File:Flag of Suriname.svg|30px|border]] [[Suriname]]
* [[File:Flag of Uruguay.svg|30px|border]] [[Uruguay]]
* [[File:Flag of Venezuela.svg|30px|border]] [[Venezuela]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Falkland Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Falkland Islands|Falkland Islands (Malvinas)]]
* [[File:Flag French Guyana.jpg|20px]] [[French Guiana]]

== More info ==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at ''roadjunky.com''
* [http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese having information about the whole of South America.

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Americas}}

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]

[[de:Südamerika]]
[[es:America del Sur]]
[[fi:Etelä-Amerikka]]
[[fr:Amérique du Sud]]
[[nl:Zuid-Amerika]]
[[pt:América do Sul]]
[[zh:南美]]</text>
      <sha1>2c8utcgq0xnk8w36mznty0iilsk3zme</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105754</id>
      <parentid>100927</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-05-19T08:21:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3011">[[File:Hitchhiking south_america.png|thumb|right|300px]]
Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. 

In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous by foreigners, but if you try it you'll figure out that main roads are absolutely safe and it's extremely hard to get a ride since people are very cautious. 

:'''For more specific information, have a look to the nation articles listed below:'''

== Food ==
If you are not vegetarian, '''empanadas''' are probably the fastest and easiest street food.  You can buy them at many kiosks and walk with them.  They are quite greasy and have lots of energy, but you will feel sick from eating them too much.  They usually contain chicken or meat but can also contain cheese, eggs, or potatoes.  They are widely available across the continent and differ in every country.

== Accommodation and sleep ==
In many cities and towns in South America, you can usually ask the '''firemen''' (es:bomberos, pt:bombieros) if they have a place for you to crash for a night.  Often they will give you a bunk, mattress or couch to sleep on.  Sometimes they give you a place to put up your tent.  Sometimes they say no or make excuses.  It's worth a try to ask though!  They have bathrooms and usually a kitchen where you can cook.  

== Countries ==
* [[File:Flag of Argentina.svg|30px|border]] [[Argentina]]
* [[File:Flag of Bolivia.svg|30px|border]] [[Bolivia]]
* [[File:Flag of Brazil.svg|30px|border]] [[Brazil]]
* [[File:Flag of Chile.svg|30px|border]] [[Chile]]
* [[File:Flag of Colombia.svg|30px|border]] [[Colombia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ecuador.svg|30px|border]] [[Ecuador]]
* [[File:Flag of Guyana.svg|30px|border]] [[Guyana]]
* [[File:Flag of Paraguay.svg|30px|border]] [[Paraguay]]
* [[File:Flag of Peru.svg|30px|border]] [[Peru]]
* [[File:Flag of Suriname.svg|30px|border]] [[Suriname]]
* [[File:Flag of Uruguay.svg|30px|border]] [[Uruguay]]
* [[File:Flag of Venezuela.svg|30px|border]] [[Venezuela]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Falkland Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Falkland Islands|Falkland Islands (Malvinas)]]
* [[File:Flag French Guyana.jpg|20px]] [[French Guiana]]

== More info ==
* [http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchsouthamericas.shtml Hitchhiking in South America] at ''roadjunky.com''
* [http://www.br.map24.com/ map24] is in Portuguese having information about the whole of South America.

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Americas}}

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]

[[de:Südamerika]]
[[es:America del Sur]]
[[fi:Etelä-Amerikka]]
[[fr:Amérique du Sud]]
[[nl:Zuid-Amerika]]
[[pt:América do Sul]]
[[zh:南美]]</text>
      <sha1>e4px2t4idou2fnqu1hejs70tlory6kr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>108939</id>
      <parentid>105754</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-02-27T07:21:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2773">[[File:Hitchhiking south_america.png|thumb|right|300px]]
Hitchhiking in '''South America''' varies a lot. 

In some countries, such as [[Ecuador]], it is really easy to get rides, especially when you look like a foreigner, though there are also some more dangers involved. [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]] and [[Chile]] are considered the safest countries to hitchhike. In [[Brazil]] it's a bit less secure, but the buses are much more expensive than in other countries. Hitchhiking in [[Colombia]] is considered very dangerous by foreigners, but if you try it you'll figure out that main roads are absolutely safe and it's extremely hard to get a ride since people are very cautious. 

:'''For more specific information, have a look to the nation articles listed below:'''

== Food ==
If you are not vegetarian, '''empanadas''' are probably the fastest and easiest street food.  You can buy them at many kiosks and walk with them.  They are quite greasy and have lots of energy, but you will feel sick from eating them too much.  They usually contain chicken or meat but can also contain cheese, eggs, or potatoes.  They are widely available across the continent and differ in every country.

== Accommodation and sleep ==
In many cities and towns in South America, you can usually ask the '''firemen''' (es:bomberos, pt:bombieros) if they have a place for you to crash for a night.  Often they will give you a bunk, mattress or couch to sleep on.  Sometimes they give you a place to put up your tent.  Sometimes they say no or make excuses.  It's worth a try to ask though!  They have bathrooms and usually a kitchen where you can cook.  

== Countries ==
* [[File:Flag of Argentina.svg|30px|border]] [[Argentina]]
* [[File:Flag of Bolivia.svg|30px|border]] [[Bolivia]]
* [[File:Flag of Brazil.svg|30px|border]] [[Brazil]]
* [[File:Flag of Chile.svg|30px|border]] [[Chile]]
* [[File:Flag of Colombia.svg|30px|border]] [[Colombia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ecuador.svg|30px|border]] [[Ecuador]]
* [[File:Flag of Guyana.svg|30px|border]] [[Guyana]]
* [[File:Flag of Paraguay.svg|30px|border]] [[Paraguay]]
* [[File:Flag of Peru.svg|30px|border]] [[Peru]]
* [[File:Flag of Suriname.svg|30px|border]] [[Suriname]]
* [[File:Flag of Uruguay.svg|30px|border]] [[Uruguay]]
* [[File:Flag of Venezuela.svg|30px|border]] [[Venezuela]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Falkland Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Falkland Islands|Falkland Islands (Malvinas)]]
* [[File:Flag French Guyana.jpg|20px]] [[French Guiana]]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Americas}}

[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:World]]

[[de:Südamerika]]
[[es:America del Sur]]
[[fi:Etelä-Amerikka]]
[[fr:Amérique du Sud]]
[[nl:Zuid-Amerika]]
[[pt:América do Sul]]
[[zh:南美]]</text>
      <sha1>15nark8c9lirtafjlzf8eua27u58mmw</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>General hitchhiking info</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1504</id>
    <redirect title="Category:General info" />
    <revision>
      <id>1513</id>
      <parentid>4190</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-04T23:53:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="303">General '''information about hitchhiking''':

* [[Top Tips]],
* [[Where]],
* [[Safety]],
* [[Techniques]],
* [[Things to carry]],
* [[First time]],
* [[Phrasebooks]],
* [[Websites]], [[Clubs]],
* [[Accommodation]], 
* [[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
* [[Boats]], [[Planes]]


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>1rtymaf5g0jnvfm2sycjn6bsmdrgo04</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1514</id>
      <parentid>1513</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="303">General '''information about hitchhiking''':

* [[Top Tips]],
* [[Where]],
* [[Safety]],
* [[Techniques]],
* [[Things to carry]],
* [[First time]],
* [[Phrasebooks]],
* [[Websites]], [[Clubs]],
* [[Accommodation]], 
* [[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
* [[Boats]], [[Planes]]


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>1rtymaf5g0jnvfm2sycjn6bsmdrgo04</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4188</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-17T12:43:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GuakaTest</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="197">'''Hitchhiking''' essentials:
* time


* [[Top 10 Tips]],
* [[Finding accommodation]],
* [[Where to hitchhike]],
* [[Safety]],
* [[Hitchhiking techniques]],
* [[Things to carry]],
* [[Phrasebooks]]</text>
      <sha1>94y7hfh8o0wbzfxjjjp19u6j0nclhbm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4189</id>
      <parentid>4188</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-03-29T17:43:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="224">'''Hitchhiking''' essentials:
* time


* [[Top 10 Tips]],
* [[Finding accommodation]],
* [[Where to hitchhike]],
* [[Safety]],
* [[Hitchhiking techniques]],
* [[Things to carry]],
* [[Phrasebooks]]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>2x3crkzo941a600ue4j8suauoqr5qp7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4190</id>
      <parentid>4189</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-04T23:52:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="224">'''Hitchhiking''' essentials:
* time


* [[Top 10 Tips]],
* [[Finding accommodation]],
* [[Where to hitchhike]],
* [[Safety]],
* [[Hitchhiking techniques]],
* [[Things to carry]],
* [[Phrasebooks]]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>2x3crkzo941a600ue4j8suauoqr5qp7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4191</id>
      <parentid>1514</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="303">General '''information about hitchhiking''':

* [[Top Tips]],
* [[Where]],
* [[Safety]],
* [[Techniques]],
* [[Things to carry]],
* [[First time]],
* [[Phrasebooks]],
* [[Websites]], [[Clubs]],
* [[Accommodation]], 
* [[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
* [[Boats]], [[Planes]]


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>1rtymaf5g0jnvfm2sycjn6bsmdrgo04</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15015</id>
      <parentid>4191</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-21T03:37:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="332">General '''information about hitchhiking''':

* [[Top Tips]],
* [[Where]],
* [[Safety]],
* [[Techniques]],
* [[Things to carry]],
* [[First time]],
* [[Phrasebooks]],
* [[Websites]], [[Clubs]],
* [[Accommodation]], 
* [[Packing]], [[Food]], [[Looks]],
* [[Boats]], [[Planes]]


[[Category:General info]]

[[fr:Information generale]]</text>
      <sha1>ns6gcdsvt88a7jpeiphvtb49wfa2khk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15264</id>
      <parentid>15015</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-31T19:52:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1751">In this section you can find a lot of '''general information''' about hitchhiking:

Have a look at the '''[[Top Tips]]''', '''[[First time]]''' and '''[[Safety]]''' articles to get a first impression if you're new to hitchhiking or if you need random information. To get deeper into the topic, concentrate your attention on articles about '''[[Where|Where to hitchhike]]''', different '''[[Techniques]]''' and which important '''[[things to carry]]''' while hitchhiking. If you want to avoid waiting for hours, also have a look about your '''[[Looks|appearance]]''' along the road.

If you're planning to go abroad, some '''[[phrasebooks]]''' may be important for you if you want to communicate with your drivers. After hitching some hundreds of kilometers, all big hitchhikers at some point need some '''[[food]]''', or maybe some nice '''[[accommodation]]''' along the road. All this information you can find on the hitchwiki! 

If you need information about specific cities or countries, just search for them by typing in their names into the search box in the navigation bar on the left side.

If you're fed up with hitchhiking on your own, you can find other hitchhikers in different '''[[clubs]]''' all around the world. They even organize [[hitchhiking races|contests]] sometimes! Many of them write articles on different '''[[multimedia|websites]]''' or '''[[Blogging_Hitchhikers|blogs]]''', you can even find them in the [[Multimedia#News_Media news]]! 

At the end, if you want to try out new vehicles, check out how to hitchhike '''[[boats]]''', '''[[trains]]''' or even '''[[planes]]'''!

We hope that we could help you navigating through your first steps in the world of hitchhiking!

[[Category:General info]]
[[fr:Information generale]]</text>
      <sha1>dxq92ozs0zdydh5aojtaf8tgnwpyzja</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15265</id>
      <parentid>15264</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-31T19:54:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1763">In this section you can find a lot of '''general information''' about hitchhiking:

Have a look at the '''[[Top Tips]]''', '''[[First time]]''' and '''[[Safety]]''' articles to get a first impression if you're new to hitchhiking or if you need random information. To get deeper into the topic, concentrate your attention on articles about '''[[Where|Where to hitchhike]]''', different '''[[Techniques]]''' and which important '''[[things to carry]]''' while hitchhiking. If you want to avoid waiting for hours, also have a look about your '''[[Looks|appearance]]''' along the road.

If you're planning to go abroad, some '''[[phrasebooks]]''' may be important for you if you want to communicate with your drivers. After hitching some hundreds of kilometers, all big hitchhikers at some point need some '''[[food]]''', or maybe some nice '''[[accommodation]]''' along the road. All this information you can find on the hitchwiki! 

If you need information about specific cities or countries, just search for them by typing in their names into the search box in the navigation bar on the left side.

If you're fed up with hitchhiking on your own, you can find other hitchhikers in different '''[[clubs]]''' all around the world. They even organize '''[[hitchhiking races|contests]]''' sometimes! Many of them write articles on different '''[[multimedia|websites]]''' or '''[[Blogging_Hitchhikers|blogs]]''', you can even find them in the '''[[Multimedia#News_Media|news]]'''! 

At the end, if you want to try out new vehicles, check out how to hitchhike '''[[boats]]''', '''[[trains]]''' or even '''[[planes]]'''!

We hope that we could help you navigating through your first steps in the world of hitchhiking!

[[Category:General info]]
[[fr:Information generale]]</text>
      <sha1>ov37frxwcoihh3cze6c3c9atosxula0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16771</id>
      <parentid>15265</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-27T19:31:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mxnnz</username>
        <id>1298</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2029">In this section you can find a lot of '''general information''' about hitchhiking:

A definition for hitchhiking: 
== " the hitchhiker is there so someone can do their good deed for the day". ==
 By Max. reference: www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnz. "the overland traveler goes around the corner to see who there is to meet around the next corner...


Have a look at the '''[[Top Tips]]''', '''[[First time]]''' and '''[[Safety]]''' articles to get a first impression if you're new to hitchhiking or if you need random information. To get deeper into the topic, concentrate your attention on articles about '''[[Where|Where to hitchhike]]''', different '''[[Techniques]]''' and which important '''[[things to carry]]''' while hitchhiking. If you want to avoid waiting for hours, also have a look about your '''[[Looks|appearance]]''' along the road.

If you're planning to go abroad, some '''[[phrasebooks]]''' may be important for you if you want to communicate with your drivers. After hitching some hundreds of kilometers, all big hitchhikers at some point need some '''[[food]]''', or maybe some nice '''[[accommodation]]''' along the road. All this information you can find on the hitchwiki! 

If you need information about specific cities or countries, just search for them by typing in their names into the search box in the navigation bar on the left side.

If you're fed up with hitchhiking on your own, you can find other hitchhikers in different '''[[clubs]]''' all around the world. They even organize '''[[hitchhiking races|contests]]''' sometimes! Many of them write articles on different '''[[multimedia|websites]]''' or '''[[Blogging_Hitchhikers|blogs]]''', you can even find them in the '''[[Multimedia#News_Media|news]]'''! 

At the end, if you want to try out new vehicles, check out how to hitchhike '''[[boats]]''', '''[[trains]]''' or even '''[[planes]]'''!

We hope that we could help you navigating through your first steps in the world of hitchhiking!

[[Category:General info]]
[[fr:Information generale]]</text>
      <sha1>hmbz2ey1xq80by0tyrfuepxh3ba4ff5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16777</id>
      <parentid>16771</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-27T20:46:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mxnnz</username>
        <id>1298</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2045">In this section you can find a lot of '''general information''' about hitchhiking:

A definition for hitchhiking: 
&lt;nowiki&gt;== " the hitchhiker is there so someone can do their good deed for the day". ==&lt;/nowiki&gt; By Max. reference: www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnz. "the overland traveler goes around the corner to see who there is to meet around the next corner...


Have a look at the '''[[Top Tips]]''', '''[[First time]]''' and '''[[Safety]]''' articles to get a first impression if you're new to hitchhiking or if you need random information. To get deeper into the topic, concentrate your attention on articles about '''[[Where|Where to hitchhike]]''', different '''[[Techniques]]''' and which important '''[[things to carry]]''' while hitchhiking. If you want to avoid waiting for hours, also have a look about your '''[[Looks|appearance]]''' along the road.

If you're planning to go abroad, some '''[[phrasebooks]]''' may be important for you if you want to communicate with your drivers. After hitching some hundreds of kilometers, all big hitchhikers at some point need some '''[[food]]''', or maybe some nice '''[[accommodation]]''' along the road. All this information you can find on the hitchwiki! 

If you need information about specific cities or countries, just search for them by typing in their names into the search box in the navigation bar on the left side.

If you're fed up with hitchhiking on your own, you can find other hitchhikers in different '''[[clubs]]''' all around the world. They even organize '''[[hitchhiking races|contests]]''' sometimes! Many of them write articles on different '''[[multimedia|websites]]''' or '''[[Blogging_Hitchhikers|blogs]]''', you can even find them in the '''[[Multimedia#News_Media|news]]'''! 

At the end, if you want to try out new vehicles, check out how to hitchhike '''[[boats]]''', '''[[trains]]''' or even '''[[planes]]'''!

We hope that we could help you navigating through your first steps in the world of hitchhiking!

[[Category:General info]]
[[fr:Information generale]]</text>
      <sha1>31zj4sxs3o92ten029rbfcemga2nlvi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17878</id>
      <parentid>16777</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-11T21:36:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2206">[[Image:Ott2.jpg|thumb|[[User:Aili|Aili]] preparing for hitchhiking.]]
In this section you can find a lot of '''general information''' about hitchhiking:

===General Information===
Have a look at the '''[[Top Tips]]''', '''[[First time]]''' and '''[[Safety]]''' articles to get a first impression if you're new to hitchhiking or if you need random information. To get deeper into the topic, concentrate your attention on articles about '''[[Where|Where to hitchhike]]''', different '''[[Techniques]]''' and which important '''[[things to carry]]''' while hitchhiking. If you want to avoid waiting for hours, also have a look about your '''[[Looks|appearance]]''' along the road.

If you're planning to go abroad, some '''[[phrasebooks]]''' may be important for you if you want to communicate with your drivers. After hitching some hundreds of kilometers, all big hitchhikers at some point need some '''[[food]]''', or maybe some nice '''[[accommodation]]''' along the road. All this information you can find on the hitchwiki![[Image:Img l 580536.jpg|thumb|270px|left|[[User:General.manifest|General.manifest]] waiting for a ride.]]
 
If you need information about specific cities or countries, just search for them by typing in their names into the search box in the navigation bar on the left side.

If you're fed up with hitchhiking on your own, you can find other hitchhikers in different '''[[clubs]]''' all around the world. They even organize '''[[hitchhiking races|contests]]''' sometimes! Many of them write articles on different '''[[multimedia|websites]]''' or '''[[Blogging_Hitchhikers|blogs]]''', you can even find them in the '''[[Multimedia#News_Media|news]]'''! 

At the end, if you want to try out new vehicles, check out how to hitchhike '''[[boats]]''', '''[[trains]]''' or even '''[[planes]]'''!

We hope that we could help you navigating through your first steps in the world of hitchhiking!

===Quotes===
:''The hitchhiker is there so someone can do their good deed for the day.'' 
:''The overland traveler goes around the corner to see who there is to meet around the next corner.'' [http://www.couchsurfing.com/people/mxnnz Max]

[[Category:General info]]
[[fr:Information generale]]</text>
      <sha1>l6xompt8hzxhxndkenwc8z3039qucsm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19500</id>
      <parentid>17878</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-04-12T07:48:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>58.174.4.23</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2279">[[Image:Ott2.jpg|thumb|[[User:Aili|Aili]] preparing for hitchhiking.]]
In this section you can find a lot of '''general information''' about hitchhiking:

===General Information===
Have a look at the '''[[Top Tips]]''', '''[[First time]]''' and '''[[Safety]]''' articles to get a first impression if you're new to hitchhiking or if you need random information. To get deeper into the topic, concentrate your attention on articles about '''[[Where|Where to hitchhike]]''', different '''[[Techniques]]''' and which important '''[[things to carry]]''' while hitchhiking. If you want to avoid waiting for hours, also have a look about your '''[[Looks|appearance]]''' along the road.

If you're planning to go abroad, some '''[[phrasebooks]]''' may be important for you if you want to communicate with your drivers. After hitching some hundreds of kilometers, all big hitchhikers at some point need some '''[[food]]''', or maybe some nice '''[[accommodation]]''' along the road. All this information you can find on the hitchwiki![[Image:Img l 580536.jpg|thumb|270px|left|[[User:General.manifest|General.manifest]] waiting for a ride.]]
 
If you need information about specific cities or countries, just search for them by typing in their names into the search box in the navigation bar on the left side.

If you're fed up with hitchhiking on your own, you can find other hitchhikers in different '''[[clubs]]''' all around the world. They even organize '''[[hitchhiking races|contests]]''' sometimes! Many of them write articles on different '''[[multimedia|websites]]''' or '''[[Blogging_Hitchhikers|blogs]]''', you can even find them in the '''[[Multimedia#News_Media|news]]'''! 

At the end, if you want to try out new vehicles, check out how to hitchhike '''[[boats]]''', '''[[trains]]''' or even '''[[planes]]'''!

We hope that we could help you navigating through your first steps in the world of hitchhiking!

===Quotes===
:''The hitchhiker is there so someone can do their good deed for the day.'' 
:''The overland traveler goes around the corner to see who there is to meet around the next corner.'' [http://www.couchsurfing.com/people/mxnnz Max]
"The good thing about hitchhiking is that the assholes drive right on by"
[[Category:General info]]
[[fr:Information generale]]</text>
      <sha1>julvfzqihy8yqenrb4jd9wlvgnmq1n8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19504</id>
      <parentid>19500</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-04-12T10:30:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2282">[[Image:Ott2.jpg|thumb|[[User:Aili|Aili]] preparing for hitchhiking.]]
In this section you can find a lot of '''general information''' about hitchhiking:

===General Information===
Have a look at the '''[[Top Tips]]''', '''[[First time]]''' and '''[[Safety]]''' articles to get a first impression if you're new to hitchhiking or if you need random information. To get deeper into the topic, concentrate your attention on articles about '''[[Where|Where to hitchhike]]''', different '''[[Techniques]]''' and which important '''[[things to carry]]''' while hitchhiking. If you want to avoid waiting for hours, also have a look about your '''[[Looks|appearance]]''' along the road.

If you're planning to go abroad, some '''[[phrasebooks]]''' may be important for you if you want to communicate with your drivers. After hitching some hundreds of kilometers, all big hitchhikers at some point need some '''[[food]]''', or maybe some nice '''[[accommodation]]''' along the road. All this information you can find on the hitchwiki![[Image:Img l 580536.jpg|thumb|270px|left|[[User:General.manifest|General.manifest]] waiting for a ride.]]
 
If you need information about specific cities or countries, just search for them by typing in their names into the search box in the navigation bar on the left side.

If you're fed up with hitchhiking on your own, you can find other hitchhikers in different '''[[clubs]]''' all around the world. They even organize '''[[hitchhiking races|contests]]''' sometimes! Many of them write articles on different '''[[multimedia|websites]]''' or '''[[Blogging_Hitchhikers|blogs]]''', you can even find them in the '''[[Multimedia#News_Media|news]]'''! 

At the end, if you want to try out new vehicles, check out how to hitchhike '''[[boats]]''', '''[[trains]]''' or even '''[[planes]]'''!

We hope that we could help you navigating through your first steps in the world of hitchhiking!

===Quotes===
:''The hitchhiker is there so someone can do their good deed for the day.'' 
:''The overland traveler goes around the corner to see who there is to meet around the next corner.'' [http://www.couchsurfing.com/people/mxnnz Max]
:''The good thing about hitchhiking is that the assholes drive right on by''
[[Category:General info]]
[[fr:Information generale]]</text>
      <sha1>0qqz4glf49thwobpw4ur1h60ny8mhll</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21620</id>
      <parentid>19504</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-18T22:26:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2327">[[Image:Ott2.jpg|thumb|[[User:Aili|Aili]] preparing for hitchhiking.]]
In this section you can find a lot of '''general information''' about hitchhiking:

===General Information===
Have a look at the '''[[Top Tips]]''', '''[[First time]]''' and '''[[Safety]]''' articles to get a first impression if you're new to hitchhiking or if you need random information. To get deeper into the topic, concentrate your attention on articles about '''[[Where|Where to hitchhike]]''', different '''[[Techniques]]''' and which important '''[[things to carry]]''' while hitchhiking. If you want to avoid waiting for hours, also have a look about your '''[[Looks|appearance]]''' along the road.

If you're planning to go abroad, some '''[[phrasebooks]]''' may be important for you if you want to communicate with your drivers. After hitching some hundreds of kilometers, all big hitchhikers at some point need some '''[[food]]''', or maybe some nice '''[[accommodation]]''' along the road. All this information you can find on the hitchwiki![[Image:Img l 580536.jpg|thumb|270px|left|[[User:General.manifest|General.manifest]] waiting for a ride.]]
 
If you need information about specific cities or countries, just search for them by typing in their names into the search box in the navigation bar on the left side.

If you're fed up with hitchhiking on your own, you can find other hitchhikers in different '''[[clubs]]''' all around the world. They even organize '''[[hitchhiking races|contests]]''' sometimes! Many of them write articles on different '''[[multimedia|websites]]''' or '''[[Blogging_Hitchhikers|blogs]]''', you can even find them in the '''[[Multimedia#News_Media|news]]'''! 

At the end, if you want to try out new vehicles, check out how to hitchhike '''[[boats]]''', '''[[trains]]''' or even '''[[planes]]''' or simply '''[[HitchBiking|with your bike'''!

We hope that we could help you navigating through your first steps in the world of hitchhiking!

===Quotes===
:''The hitchhiker is there so someone can do their good deed for the day.'' 
:''The overland traveler goes around the corner to see who there is to meet around the next corner.'' [http://www.couchsurfing.com/people/mxnnz Max]
:''The good thing about hitchhiking is that the assholes drive right on by''
[[Category:General info]]
[[fr:Information generale]]</text>
      <sha1>kocmj1i0p0s3l254usx5t5jtw8f73fg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21747</id>
      <parentid>21620</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-19T02:25:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2329">[[Image:Ott2.jpg|thumb|[[User:Aili|Aili]] preparing for hitchhiking.]]
In this section you can find a lot of '''general information''' about hitchhiking:

===General Information===
Have a look at the '''[[Top Tips]]''', '''[[First time]]''' and '''[[Safety]]''' articles to get a first impression if you're new to hitchhiking or if you need random information. To get deeper into the topic, concentrate your attention on articles about '''[[Where|Where to hitchhike]]''', different '''[[Techniques]]''' and which important '''[[things to carry]]''' while hitchhiking. If you want to avoid waiting for hours, also have a look about your '''[[Looks|appearance]]''' along the road.

If you're planning to go abroad, some '''[[phrasebooks]]''' may be important for you if you want to communicate with your drivers. After hitching some hundreds of kilometers, all big hitchhikers at some point need some '''[[food]]''', or maybe some nice '''[[accommodation]]''' along the road. All this information you can find on the hitchwiki![[Image:Img l 580536.jpg|thumb|270px|left|[[User:General.manifest|General.manifest]] waiting for a ride.]]
 
If you need information about specific cities or countries, just search for them by typing in their names into the search box in the navigation bar on the left side.

If you're fed up with hitchhiking on your own, you can find other hitchhikers in different '''[[clubs]]''' all around the world. They even organize '''[[hitchhiking races|contests]]''' sometimes! Many of them write articles on different '''[[multimedia|websites]]''' or '''[[Blogging_Hitchhikers|blogs]]''', you can even find them in the '''[[Multimedia#News_Media|news]]'''! 

At the end, if you want to try out new vehicles, check out how to hitchhike '''[[boats]]''', '''[[trains]]''' or even '''[[planes]]''' or simply '''[[HitchBiking|with your bike]]'''!

We hope that we could help you navigating through your first steps in the world of hitchhiking!

===Quotes===
:''The hitchhiker is there so someone can do their good deed for the day.'' 
:''The overland traveler goes around the corner to see who there is to meet around the next corner.'' [http://www.couchsurfing.com/people/mxnnz Max]
:''The good thing about hitchhiking is that the assholes drive right on by''
[[Category:General info]]
[[fr:Information generale]]</text>
      <sha1>d2qy1bap7c85nik9gwjeivvvmcxbxwl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22449</id>
      <parentid>21747</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-14T06:46:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2341">[[Image:Ott2.jpg|thumb|[[User:Aili|Aili]] preparing for hitchhiking.]]
In this section you can find a lot of '''general information''' about hitchhiking:

===General Information===
Have a look at the '''[[Top Tips]]''', '''[[First time]]''' and '''[[Safety]]''' articles to get a first impression if you're new to hitchhiking or if you need random information. To get deeper into the topic, concentrate your attention on articles about '''[[Where|Where to hitchhike]]''', different '''[[Techniques]]''' and which important '''[[things to carry]]''' while hitchhiking. If you want to avoid waiting for hours, also have a look about your '''[[Looks|appearance]]''' along the road.

If you're planning to go abroad, some '''[[phrasebooks]]''' may be important for you if you want to communicate with your drivers. After hitching some hundreds of kilometers, all big hitchhikers at some point need some '''[[food]]''', or maybe some nice '''[[accommodation]]''' along the road. All this information you can find on the hitchwiki![[Image:Img l 580536.jpg|thumb|270px|left|[[User:General.manifest|General.manifest]] waiting for a ride.]]
 
If you need information about specific cities or countries, just search for them by typing in their names into the search box in the navigation bar on the left side.

If you're fed up with hitchhiking on your own, you can find other hitchhikers in different '''[[clubs]]''' all around the world. They even organize '''[[hitchhiking races|contests]]''' sometimes! Many of them write articles on different '''[[multimedia|websites]]''' or '''[[Blogging_Hitchhikers|blogs]]''', you can even find them in the '''[[Multimedia#News_Media|news]]'''! 

At the end, if you want to try out new vehicles, check out how to hitchhike '''[[boats]]''', '''[[trains]]''' or even '''[[planes]]''' or simply '''[[HitchBiking|with your bike]]'''!

We hope that we could help you navigating through your first steps in the world of hitchhiking!

===Quotes===
:''The hitchhiker is there so someone can do their good deed for the day.'' 
:''The overland traveler goes around the corner to see who there is to meet around the next corner.'' [http://www.couchsurfing.com/people/mxnnz Max]
:''The good thing about hitchhiking is that the assholes drive right on by''
[[Category:General info]]
[[fr:Information generale]]
[[fi:Opas]]</text>
      <sha1>8sm0p1yt2kgxkngx4jivzmil0c7nsmp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>28167</id>
      <parentid>22449</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-26T23:40:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kardan</username>
        <id>1635</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="36">#REDIRECT [[:Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>mjyvz3ci0e84q4n3inoqzti8c2gjgxy</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Top 10 Tips</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1505</id>
    <redirect title="Top tips" />
    <revision>
      <id>1515</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-17T12:43:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GuakaTest</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="22">#redirect [[Top Tips]]</text>
      <sha1>8xj0vtp9lupjwy53snm37l3r0h70yr5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1516</id>
      <parentid>1515</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="22">#redirect [[Top Tips]]</text>
      <sha1>8xj0vtp9lupjwy53snm37l3r0h70yr5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32863</id>
      <parentid>1515</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-09T17:43:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Redirect fixer</username>
        <id>1653</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="22">#redirect [[Top tips]]</text>
      <sha1>f62n30gvb4alh3bx3fs23dgs4embrsz</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Top tips</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1506</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1517</id>
      <parentid>4205</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-17T09:44:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Wisdomseeker</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5862">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your carreer as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from distance and  stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder an his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers stright in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.

In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writting "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== Say no, if you don't feel safe ==
Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being pussy, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accomodation. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>9hnsdwyu6eipvlhnsd8mcu60pix6hrq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1518</id>
      <parentid>1517</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5862">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your carreer as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from distance and  stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder an his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers stright in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.

In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writting "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== Say no, if you don't feel safe ==
Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being pussy, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accomodation. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>9hnsdwyu6eipvlhnsd8mcu60pix6hrq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4192</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-17T12:43:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GuakaTest</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4017">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggest you keep these in mind when strating your carreer as an enthusiastic thumber:

= Take the most used route = 
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

= Carry a good map =
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is quite good for Europe, but not easy to find.

= Be in a good, safe spot =
Be in a place where the cars can see you from distance and  stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

=Stay positive, smile and laugh =
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

=Make eye contact with drivers =
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder an his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers stright in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

=When in doubt, use a sign =
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region), but if your destination is not apparent or drivers will be turning in multiple directions up ahead use a sign to announce where you want to go. Use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters.

=Say no, if you don't feel safe =
Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being pussy, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars.

=Be prepared to camp =
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [[Hospitality Club]]. There are many hitchhikers and it's easy to find a couple of places to stay on a long trip.

=Use buses and trains =
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

[http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
[http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
[http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]</text>
      <sha1>2zwtl1z52z2ti4ih63flu53831pc0f7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4193</id>
      <parentid>4192</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-31T17:30:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4023">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggest you keep these in mind when strating your carreer as an enthusiastic thumber:

= Take the most used route = 
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

= Carry a good map =
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is quite good for Europe, but not easy to find.

= Be in a good, safe spot =
Be in a place where the cars can see you from distance and  stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

=Stay positive, smile and laugh =
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

=Make eye contact with drivers =
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder an his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers stright in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

=When in doubt, use a sign =
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region), but if your destination is not apparent or drivers will be turning in multiple directions up ahead use a sign to announce where you want to go. Use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters.

=Say no, if you don't feel safe =
Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being pussy, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars.

=Be prepared to camp =
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [[Hospitality Club]]. There are many hitchhikers and it's easy to find a couple of places to stay on a long trip.

=Use buses and trains =
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]</text>
      <sha1>1odxtrwoqyb0k9m9x8e3ep9ehbj70ae</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4194</id>
      <parentid>4193</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-31T17:38:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4050">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggest you keep these in mind when strating your carreer as an enthusiastic thumber:

= Take the most used route = 
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

= Carry a good map =
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is quite good for Europe, but not easy to find.

= Be in a good, safe spot =
Be in a place where the cars can see you from distance and  stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

=Stay positive, smile and laugh =
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

=Make eye contact with drivers =
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder an his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers stright in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

=When in doubt, use a sign =
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region), but if your destination is not apparent or drivers will be turning in multiple directions up ahead use a sign to announce where you want to go. Use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters.

=Say no, if you don't feel safe =
Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being pussy, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars.

=Be prepared to camp =
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [[Hospitality Club]]. There are many hitchhikers and it's easy to find a couple of places to stay on a long trip.

=Use buses and trains =
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>qulyp26pf8921wjilz29krx51obcu32</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4195</id>
      <parentid>4194</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-01-11T18:53:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>201.252.150.221</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4079">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggest you keep these in mind when strating your carreer as an enthusiastic thumber:

= Take the most used route = 
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

= Carry a good map =
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is quite good for Europe, but not easy to find.

= Be in a good, safe spot =
Be in a place where the cars can see you from distance and  stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

=Stay positive, smile and laugh =
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

=Make eye contact with drivers =
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder an his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers stright in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

=When in doubt, use a sign =
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region), but if your destination is not apparent or drivers will be turning in multiple directions up ahead use a sign to announce where you want to go. Use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters.

=Say no, if you don't feel safe =
Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being pussy, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars.

=Be prepared to camp =
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club]. There are many hitchhikers and it's easy to find a couple of places to stay on a long trip.

=Use buses and trains =
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>e9yqyfqat23foeuts1v0yknfll7qxih</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4196</id>
      <parentid>4195</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-01-15T22:40:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4153">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggest you keep these in mind when strating your carreer as an enthusiastic thumber:

= Take the most used route = 
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

= Carry a good map =
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is quite good for Europe, but not easy to find.

= Be in a good, safe spot =
Be in a place where the cars can see you from distance and  stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

=Stay positive, smile and laugh =
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

=Make eye contact with drivers =
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder an his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers stright in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

=When in doubt, use a sign =
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region), but if your destination is not apparent or drivers will be turning in multiple directions up ahead use a sign to announce where you want to go. Use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters.

=Say no, if you don't feel safe =
Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being pussy, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars.

=Be prepared to camp =
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] and [http://couchsurfing.com]. There are many hitchhikers and it's easy to find a couple of places to stay on a long trip, and of course in your place of destination.

=Use buses and trains =
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>em2ho7zclsqahz258oe573253kklfcp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4197</id>
      <parentid>4196</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-02-07T05:48:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>130.126.67.39</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4170">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggest you keep these in mind when strating your carreer as an enthusiastic thumber:

= Take the most used route = 
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

= Carry a good map =
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is quite good for Europe, but not easy to find.

= Be in a good, safe spot =
Be in a place where the cars can see you from distance and  stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

=Stay positive, smile and laugh =
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

=Make eye contact with drivers =
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder an his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers stright in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

=When in doubt, use a sign =
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region), but if your destination is not apparent or drivers will be turning in multiple directions up ahead use a sign to announce where you want to go. Use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters.

=Say no, if you don't feel safe =
Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being pussy, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars.

=Be prepared to camp =
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] and [http://couchsurfing.com Couchsurfing.com]. There are many hitchhikers and it's easy to find a couple of places to stay on a long trip, and of course in your place of destination.

=Use buses and trains =
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>1ye0fy3pug61p6ib4tq92jido7zglpf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4198</id>
      <parentid>4197</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-04-07T17:51:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>24.9.125.18</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4203">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggest you keep these in mind when strating your carreer as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is quite good for Europe, but not easy to find.

== Be in a good, safe spot ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from distance and  stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== Make eye contact with drivers ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder an his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers stright in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== When in doubt, use a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region), but if your destination is not apparent or drivers will be turning in multiple directions up ahead use a sign to announce where you want to go. Use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters.

== Say no, if you don't feel safe ==
Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being pussy, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars.

== Be prepared to camp ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] and [http://couchsurfing.com Couchsurfing.com] for free accomodation. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>obwjlyagz3qvb8cszcrcerew00xqgf7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4199</id>
      <parentid>4198</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-07-04T17:14:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Rev 22</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4204">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your carreer as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is quite good for Europe, but not easy to find.

== Be in a good, safe spot ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from distance and  stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== Make eye contact with drivers ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder an his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers stright in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== When in doubt, use a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region), but if your destination is not apparent or drivers will be turning in multiple directions up ahead use a sign to announce where you want to go. Use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters.

== Say no, if you don't feel safe ==
Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being pussy, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars.

== Be prepared to camp ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] and [http://couchsurfing.com Couchsurfing.com] for free accomodation. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>k8kjqp69ps96pc0jzi5nr8fy4ckc9r8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4200</id>
      <parentid>4199</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-28T12:32:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>213.123.171.195</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5101">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your carreer as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is quite good for Europe, but not easy to find.

== Be in a good, safe spot ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from distance and  stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== Make eye contact with drivers ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder an his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers stright in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.

In the same spirit. If you're doing Barcelona - Amsterdam. Consider writting "Paris" on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== Say no, if you don't feel safe ==
Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being pussy, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars.

== Be prepared to camp ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] and [http://couchsurfing.com Couchsurfing.com] for free accomodation. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>pz20lrc1portpgxjjk7qcuovzrssxl6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4201</id>
      <parentid>4200</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-28T21:21:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5158">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your carreer as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is quite good for Europe, but not easy to find.

== Be in a good, safe spot ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from distance and  stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== Make eye contact with drivers ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder an his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers stright in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.

In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writting "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== Say no, if you don't feel safe ==
Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being pussy, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars.

== Be prepared to camp ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] and [http://couchsurfing.com Couchsurfing.com] for free accomodation. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>94o1b00re007o6hb0wbk1uknyyylf8j</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4202</id>
      <parentid>4201</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-10-09T19:06:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5321">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your carreer as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is quite good for Europe, but not easy to find.

== Be in a good, safe spot ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from distance and  stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== Make eye contact with drivers ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder an his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers stright in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.

In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writting "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== Say no, if you don't feel safe ==
Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being pussy, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accomodation. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>mfqn93do3pxlrc6jfklyk2451tt61qi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4203</id>
      <parentid>4202</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-10-09T19:07:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5344">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your carreer as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is quite good for Europe, but not easy to find.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from distance and  stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== Make eye contact with drivers ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder an his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers stright in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.

In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writting "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== Say no, if you don't feel safe ==
Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being pussy, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accomodation. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>c45sl8no6vmmjorzjix49o3qz9jafnk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4204</id>
      <parentid>4203</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-10-09T19:07:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5368">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your carreer as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is quite good for Europe, but not easy to find.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from distance and  stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder an his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers stright in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.

In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writting "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== Say no, if you don't feel safe ==
Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being pussy, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accomodation. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>5g10udq7b0x8nbplcyw0casj772imlj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4205</id>
      <parentid>4204</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-12T00:21:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Djdirect</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5623">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your carreer as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from distance and  stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder an his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers stright in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.

In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writting "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== Say no, if you don't feel safe ==
Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being pussy, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accomodation. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>h13d7veahr0t5yzl6md2gahk9aplrch</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4206</id>
      <parentid>1518</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5862">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your carreer as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from distance and  stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder an his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers stright in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.

In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writting "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== Say no, if you don't feel safe ==
Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being pussy, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accomodation. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>9hnsdwyu6eipvlhnsd8mcu60pix6hrq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9707</id>
      <parentid>4206</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-11T18:33:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>70.55.82.166</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6319">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your carreer as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from distance and  stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder an his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers stright in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== [[ Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small mather, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light coloured clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something.

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.

In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writting "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== Say no, if you don't feel safe ==
Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being pussy, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accomodation. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>imen9u0k69jqn9rz92nk4ci50dicar0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9708</id>
      <parentid>9707</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-11T18:33:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>70.55.82.166</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6328">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your carreer as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from distance and  stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder an his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers stright in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== [[ Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light coloured clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something.

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.

In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writting "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== Say no, if you don't feel safe ==
Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being pussy, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accomodation. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>rfrwxdl0ikn5gw0fbr113to1h4unb7q</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10435</id>
      <parentid>9708</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-04T22:54:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6331">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your carreer as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from distance and  stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder an his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers stright in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== [[ Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light coloured clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something.

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.

In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writting "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== Say no, if you don't feel safe ==
Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accomodation. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>qvolxy1arqh3bpbh5izbun1pha0wg6j</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10443</id>
      <parentid>10435</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-06T05:17:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Blank</username>
        <id>61</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7545">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your carreer as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from distance and  stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder an his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers stright in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== [[ Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light coloured clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something.

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.

In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writting "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== Say no, if you don't feel safe ==
Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a manner of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). Keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, so if they mention something that your political views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accomodation. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>ldfvji00n27yk5jl3pw0ldogt55ja7q</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10447</id>
      <parentid>10443</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-07T14:16:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7672">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your carreer as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from distance and  stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder an his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers stright in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== [[ Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light coloured clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something.

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.

In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writting "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== Say no, if you don't feel safe ==
Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a manner of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can fall asleep or read your book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accomodation. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>otk987uj3l0kkke6x8puqxyk61dar0n</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10456</id>
      <parentid>10447</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-07T16:53:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Blank</username>
        <id>61</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7669">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your carreer as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from distance and  stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder an his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers stright in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== [[ Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light coloured clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something.

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.

In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writting "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== Say no, if you don't feel safe ==
Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a manner of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can fall asleep or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accomodation. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>ofeiimp07k85pwkdga7uphjb3bykpa2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10457</id>
      <parentid>10456</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-07T16:54:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Blank</username>
        <id>61</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7742">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your carreer as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from distance and  stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder an his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers stright in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== [[ Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light coloured clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something.

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.

In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writting "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== Say no, if you don't feel safe ==
Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a manner of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can fall asleep or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accomodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>p4s58sw1zs45erc3brxh0mlej480dmi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10459</id>
      <parentid>10457</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-07T19:53:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>66.189.9.198</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7736">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your carreer as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from distance and  stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder an his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers stright in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== [[ Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light coloured clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something.

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.

In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writting "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== Say no, if you don't feel safe ==
Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a manner of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accomodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>nk4wt7smgpm3pnbd99eboh8a31qbhb9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10468</id>
      <parentid>10459</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-08T03:10:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Peacehead</username>
        <id>62</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7834">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your carreer as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from distance and  stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder an his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers stright in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== [[ Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.

In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writting "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== Say no, if you don't feel safe ==
Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a manner of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accomodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>kw8kguqmddfuurv82vpz1y6xmu3tta0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10469</id>
      <parentid>10468</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-08T03:11:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Peacehead</username>
        <id>62</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7904">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your carreer as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from distance and  stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder an his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers stright in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== [[ Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.

In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writting "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== Say no, if you don't feel safe ==
Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a manner of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accomodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>9tt2mcrm2zhv9wzmbggg4qikf5t4i33</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10587</id>
      <parentid>10469</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-17T18:33:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>142.68.99.93</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7905">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your carreer as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from distance and  stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers stright in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== [[ Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.

In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writting "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== Say no, if you don't feel safe ==
Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a manner of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accomodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>rtwgwjarl2q85zeuqv6sb6ov0k6aaix</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10622</id>
      <parentid>10587</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-21T20:10:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>86.129.14.99</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7905">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from distance and  stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== [[ Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.

In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== Say no, if you don't feel safe ==
Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a manner of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>m7nlah5e2se45j9mwlavzgppnusbqyn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10623</id>
      <parentid>10622</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-21T20:11:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>86.129.14.99</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7906">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== [[ Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.

In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== Say no, if you don't feel safe ==
Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a manner of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>gk77fiia5qes48e0i5p9rvrufq33cz1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10624</id>
      <parentid>10623</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-21T20:14:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>86.129.14.99</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7906">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== [[ Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.

In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== Say no, if you don't feel safe ==
Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>9pm6xznyrh2ere8aj2wawn3taxf6b9l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10712</id>
      <parentid>10624</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-04T15:13:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>85.178.90.37</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8182">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== [[ Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!
If you can…don’t wear your old cloth or cloth witch can frighten a driver (t-shirt with a skull for example). Conservative people just take you with proper cloth. Open-minded people always take you...but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.

In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== Say no, if you don't feel safe ==
Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>5wa3urovdw444un5ciqsasmvc72mioo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10713</id>
      <parentid>10712</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-04T15:28:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>85.178.90.37</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8782">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== [[ Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!
If you can…don’t wear your old cloth or cloth witch can frighten a driver (t-shirt with a skull for example). Conservative people just take you with proper cloth. Open-minded people always take you...but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.
The driver also has to read it, than he must think about if goes the same direction and than he wants to know if he likes your face...but than he notice that he passed …he is now 500m away from you ...so he will deicide to drive on!
So if you just use your thump the driver only has to decide if he likes you and if he can stop his car in this place. If he is on the  right way you can find out when he stops.
Another bad idea is the use shortcuts, because only locals know them (like HH for Hamburg).
On the other hand you need a really big sign if you want you aimed city be seen on your sign. 


In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== Say no, if you don't feel safe ==
Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>5lri2ncvgeoufx3v54stp4tsg7s0s3b</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10714</id>
      <parentid>10713</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-04T15:35:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>85.178.90.37</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8886">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== [[ Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!
If you can…don’t wear your old cloth or cloth witch can frighten a driver (t-shirt with a skull for example). Conservative people just take you with proper cloth. Open-minded people always take you...but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.
The driver also has to read it, than he must think about if goes the same direction and than he wants to know if he likes your face...but than he notice that he passed …he is now 500m away from you ...so he will deicide to drive on!
So if you just use your thump the driver only has to decide if he likes you and if he can stop his car in this place. If he is on the  right way you can find out when he stops.
Another bad idea is the use shortcuts, because only locals know them (like HH for Hamburg).
On the other hand you need a really big sign if you want you aimed city be seen on your sign. 


In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== safe hitchhiking ==
Say no, if you don't feel safe!Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send a SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>lslkw7x0a635ia0yn33wyudq8px3yjs</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10723</id>
      <parentid>10714</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-04T16:37:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>85.178.90.37</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8900">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== [[ Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!
If you can…don’t wear your old cloth or cloth witch can frighten a driver (t-shirt with a skull for example). Conservative people just take well shaved guys with proper cloth . Open-minded people always take you...but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.
The driver also has to read it, than he must think about if goes the same direction and than he wants to know if he likes your face...but than he notice that he passed …he is now 500m away from you ...so he will deicide to drive on!
So if you just use your thump the driver only has to decide if he likes you and if he can stop his car in this place. If he is on the  right way you can find out when he stops.
Another bad idea is the use shortcuts, because only locals know them (like HH for Hamburg).
On the other hand you need a really big sign if you want you aimed city be seen on your sign. 


In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== safe hitchhiking ==
Say no, if you don't feel safe!Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send a SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>svtqw7z44xgbdr78lhssqfezj2i861f</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10730</id>
      <parentid>10723</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-05T03:16:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8901">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== [[ Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!
If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people just take well shaved guys with proper cloth . Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.
The driver also has to read it, than he must think about if goes the same direction and than he wants to know if he likes your face...but than he notice that he passed …he is now 500m away from you ...so he will deicide to drive on!
So if you just use your thump the driver only has to decide if he likes you and if he can stop his car in this place. If he is on the  right way you can find out when he stops.
Another bad idea is the use shortcuts, because only locals know them (like HH for Hamburg).
On the other hand you need a really big sign if you want you aimed city be seen on your sign. 


In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== safe hitchhiking ==
Say no, if you don't feel safe!Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send a SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>jpcnticc6558hlymi7p9oug010emb6q</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10827</id>
      <parentid>10730</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-17T12:38:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Abstorz</username>
        <id>73</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8999">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!
If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people just take well shaved guys with proper cloth . Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.
The driver also has to read it, than he must think about if goes the same direction and than he wants to know if he likes your face...but than he notice that he passed …he is now 500m away from you ...so he will deicide to drive on!
So if you just use your thump the driver only has to decide if he likes you and if he can stop his car in this place. If he is on the  right way you can find out when he stops.
Another bad idea is the use shortcuts, because only locals know them (like HH for Hamburg).
On the other hand you need a really big sign if you want you aimed city be seen on your sign. 


In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== safe hitchhiking ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe!Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send a SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>j3lsptiosin38lczjvd7r6fgrd37dew</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11015</id>
      <parentid>10827</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-27T11:22:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>86.211.1.4</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8998">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!
If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people just take well shaved guys with proper cloth . Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.
The driver also has to read it, than he must think about if goes the same direction and than he wants to know if he likes your face...but than he notice that he passed …he is now 500m away from you ...so he will decide to drive on!
So if you just use your thump the driver only has to decide if he likes you and if he can stop his car in this place. If he is on the  right way you can find out when he stops.
Another bad idea is the use shortcuts, because only locals know them (like HH for Hamburg).
On the other hand you need a really big sign if you want you aimed city be seen on your sign. 


In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== safe hitchhiking ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe!Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send a SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>oceod9uc9rt5ady0a1j1hqpp8t5lnif</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11016</id>
      <parentid>11015</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-27T11:22:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>86.211.1.4</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8998">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!
If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people just take well shaved guys with proper cloth . Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.
The driver also has to read it, than he must think about if goes the same direction and than he wants to know if he likes your face...but than he notice that he passed …he is now 500m away from you ...so he will decide to drive on!
So if you just use your thump the driver only has to decide if he likes you and if he can stop his car in this place. If he is on the  right way you can find out when he stops.
Another bad idea is the use shortcuts, because only locals know them (like HH for Hamburg).
On the other hand you need a really big sign if you want you aimed city be seen on your sign. 


In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== Safe hitchhiking ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe!Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send a SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>0uef21affyapgezusu2eai38smilqau</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11143</id>
      <parentid>11016</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-01T10:39:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.129.167.233</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9068">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!
If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people just take well shaved guys with proper cloth . Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers.

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.
The driver also has to read it, than he must think about if goes the same direction and than he wants to know if he likes your face...but than he notice that he passed …he is now 500m away from you ...so he will decide to drive on!
So if you just use your thump the driver only has to decide if he likes you and if he can stop his car in this place. If he is on the  right way you can find out when he stops.
Another bad idea is the use shortcuts, because only locals know them (like HH for Hamburg).
On the other hand you need a really big sign if you want you aimed city be seen on your sign. 


In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== Safe hitchhiking ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe!Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send a SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>qt3tu22m1apgttp2702k6g3aftog3qo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11144</id>
      <parentid>11143</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-01T10:40:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.129.167.233</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8998">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!
If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people just take well shaved guys with proper cloth . Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.
The driver also has to read it, than he must think about if goes the same direction and than he wants to know if he likes your face...but than he notice that he passed …he is now 500m away from you ...so he will decide to drive on!
So if you just use your thump the driver only has to decide if he likes you and if he can stop his car in this place. If he is on the  right way you can find out when he stops.
Another bad idea is the use shortcuts, because only locals know them (like HH for Hamburg).
On the other hand you need a really big sign if you want you aimed city be seen on your sign. 


In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== Safe hitchhiking ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe!Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send a SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>0uef21affyapgezusu2eai38smilqau</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11145</id>
      <parentid>11144</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-01T10:41:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.129.167.233</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9093">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seems to work quite well.

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!
If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people just take well shaved guys with proper cloth . Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.
The driver also has to read it, than he must think about if goes the same direction and than he wants to know if he likes your face...but than he notice that he passed …he is now 500m away from you ...so he will decide to drive on!
So if you just use your thump the driver only has to decide if he likes you and if he can stop his car in this place. If he is on the  right way you can find out when he stops.
Another bad idea is the use shortcuts, because only locals know them (like HH for Hamburg).
On the other hand you need a really big sign if you want you aimed city be seen on your sign. 


In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== Safe hitchhiking ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe!Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send a SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>9oxx7v8qtqpegtjx924f6g91qc3v0ah</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11146</id>
      <parentid>11145</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-01T10:47:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.129.167.233</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9553">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seems to work quite well.

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!
If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people just take well shaved guys with proper cloth . Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Never wear black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. I have also found that caps and black or blue wolly hats are awfull too. If the weather permits, wear light couloured shorts and a bright colourful tshirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether or not you have luggage, I have found that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows your not conceling anything.

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.
The driver also has to read it, than he must think about if goes the same direction and than he wants to know if he likes your face...but than he notice that he passed …he is now 500m away from you ...so he will decide to drive on!
So if you just use your thump the driver only has to decide if he likes you and if he can stop his car in this place. If he is on the  right way you can find out when he stops.
Another bad idea is the use shortcuts, because only locals know them (like HH for Hamburg).
On the other hand you need a really big sign if you want you aimed city be seen on your sign. 


In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

== Safe hitchhiking ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe!Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send a SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>jynzc7ueiv3pakkfezijzhck5daz8s9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11147</id>
      <parentid>11146</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-01T10:54:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.129.167.233</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10035">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seems to work quite well.

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!
If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people just take well shaved guys with proper cloth . Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Never wear black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. I have also found that caps and black or blue wolly hats are awfull too. If the weather permits, wear light couloured shorts and a bright colourful tshirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether or not you have luggage, I have found that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows your not conceling anything.

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.
The driver also has to read it, than he must think about if goes the same direction and than he wants to know if he likes your face...but than he notice that he passed …he is now 500m away from you ...so he will decide to drive on!
So if you just use your thump the driver only has to decide if he likes you and if he can stop his car in this place. If he is on the  right way you can find out when he stops.
Another bad idea is the use shortcuts, because only locals know them (like HH for Hamburg).
On the other hand you need a really big sign if you want you aimed city be seen on your sign. 


In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example Amsterdam could be A'DAM and Hamburg could be HAMB.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

== Safe hitchhiking ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe!Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send a SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>db2kqoitjlhrv5v55nn7md655b66g5z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11148</id>
      <parentid>11147</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-01T11:02:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.129.167.233</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10762">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seems to work quite well.

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!
If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people just take well shaved guys with proper cloth . Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Never wear black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. I have also found that caps and black or blue wolly hats are awfull too. If the weather permits, wear light couloured shorts and a bright colourful tshirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether or not you have luggage, I have found that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows your not conceling anything.

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.
The driver also has to read it, than he must think about if goes the same direction and than he wants to know if he likes your face...but than he notice that he passed …he is now 500m away from you ...so he will decide to drive on!
So if you just use your thump the driver only has to decide if he likes you and if he can stop his car in this place. If he is on the  right way you can find out when he stops.
Another bad idea is the use shortcuts, because only locals know them (like HH for Hamburg).
On the other hand you need a really big sign if you want you aimed city be seen on your sign. 


In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example Amsterdam could be A'DAM and Hamburg could be HAMB.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

== Safe hitchhiking ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe!Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send a SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night dont bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quite between 2-5am even at a busy autobahn rasthoff. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>jsit1j92syay528ujd45htwokukaamc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11151</id>
      <parentid>11148</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-01T14:28:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10782">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seems to work quite well.

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!
If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people just take well shaved guys with proper cloth . Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Never wear black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. I have also found that caps and black or blue wolly hats are awfull too. If the weather permits, wear light couloured shorts and a bright colourful tshirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether or not you have luggage, I have found that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows your not conceling anything.

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.
The driver also has to read it, than he must think about if goes the same direction and than he wants to know if he likes your face...but than he notice that he passed …he is now 500m away from you ...so he will decide to drive on!
So if you just use your thump the driver only has to decide if he likes you and if he can stop his car in this place. If he is on the  right way you can find out when he stops.
Another bad idea is the use shortcuts, because only locals know them (like HH for Hamburg).
On the other hand you need a really big sign if you want you aimed city be seen on your sign. 


In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

== Safe hitchhiking ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe!Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quite between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>69aemxpcqbyljg04r2sz1r5f5twkgt9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11242</id>
      <parentid>11151</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-13T06:22:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>24.131.1.212</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11620">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seems to work quite well.

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!
If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people just take well shaved guys with proper cloth . Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Never wear black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. I have also found that caps and black or blue wolly hats are awfull too. If the weather permits, wear light couloured shorts and a bright colourful tshirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether or not you have luggage, I have found that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows your not conceling anything.

== About the use of a sign ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.
The driver also has to read it, than he must think about if goes the same direction and than he wants to know if he likes your face...but than he notice that he passed …he is now 500m away from you ...so he will decide to drive on!
So if you just use your thump the driver only has to decide if he likes you and if he can stop his car in this place. If he is on the  right way you can find out when he stops.
Another bad idea is the use shortcuts, because only locals know them (like HH for Hamburg).
On the other hand you need a really big sign if you want you aimed city be seen on your sign. 


In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

Always, always if you have the chance, add "Please" onto your signs.

== Safe hitchhiking ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe!Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quite between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>dfd2q3byo34v9aiyb72ooi8s4j49ly5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11860</id>
      <parentid>11242</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-06-22T14:55:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>129.125.177.31</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11625">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seems to work quite well.

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!
If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people just take well shaved guys with proper cloth . Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Never wear black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. I have also found that caps and black or blue wolly hats are awfull too. If the weather permits, wear light couloured shorts and a bright colourful tshirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether or not you have luggage, I have found that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows your not conceling anything.

== About the use of a [[signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.
The driver also has to read it, than he must think about if goes the same direction and than he wants to know if he likes your face...but than he notice that he passed …he is now 500m away from you ...so he will decide to drive on!
So if you just use your thump the driver only has to decide if he likes you and if he can stop his car in this place. If he is on the  right way you can find out when he stops.
Another bad idea is the use shortcuts, because only locals know them (like HH for Hamburg).
On the other hand you need a really big sign if you want you aimed city be seen on your sign. 


In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

Always, always if you have the chance, add "Please" onto your signs.

== Safe hitchhiking ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe!Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quite between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>fcs4dzkjm3mx182k9xquof0uqimkqxb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11862</id>
      <parentid>11860</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-06-22T16:29:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11630">There are some essential things you should remember whenever you are going hitchhiking. The [[Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. 

For example, the ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for Europe, however, it's not so easy to find.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

It's recommended you have a map thats at least to 1 to 1,000,000 ratio, however, 1 to 750,000 is perfect.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is actually the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seems to work quite well.

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!
If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people just take well shaved guys with proper cloth . Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Never wear black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. I have also found that caps and black or blue wolly hats are awfull too. If the weather permits, wear light couloured shorts and a bright colourful tshirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether or not you have luggage, I have found that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows your not conceling anything.

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.


On another hand, the use of a sign on a road where everyone goes the same way (for example: a highway service station) can decrease your odds, since someone that would be going halfway to your destination is less likely to stop if he sees how far you're going. And halfway is still good on more than a 200 km trip.
The driver also has to read it, than he must think about if goes the same direction and than he wants to know if he likes your face...but than he notice that he passed …he is now 500m away from you ...so he will decide to drive on!
So if you just use your thump the driver only has to decide if he likes you and if he can stop his car in this place. If he is on the  right way you can find out when he stops.
Another bad idea is the use shortcuts, because only locals know them (like HH for Hamburg).
On the other hand you need a really big sign if you want you aimed city be seen on your sign. 


In the same spirit. If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

Always, always if you have the chance, add "Please" onto your signs.

== Safe hitchhiking ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe!Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quite between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>bnvaiu0a55aksf0q7z9mr9exeq9nyty</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11923</id>
      <parentid>11862</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-06-28T01:15:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tmoon</username>
        <id>91</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12451">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often.

The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.

The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.

The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in Germany but is available across the continent.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

For the United Kingdom, AA maps are good but can get a bit large.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio, however, 1:750,000 is fine.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seems to work quite well.

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Never wear black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. I have also found that caps and black or blue wolly hats are awfull too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, I have found that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything.

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== Safe hitchhiking ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quite between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>5m49zgs3byn1b2f8dkqdnrypx0qvcg3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11924</id>
      <parentid>11923</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-06-28T01:18:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tmoon</username>
        <id>91</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12461">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often.

The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.

The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.

The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in Germany but is available across the continent.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

For the United Kingdom, AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seems to work quite well.

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Never wear black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. I have also found that caps and black or blue wolly hats are awfull too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, I have found that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything.

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== Safe hitchhiking ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quite between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>b75w9l4tqzdx8waqxw6or8ma7p4wyew</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11995</id>
      <parentid>11924</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-02T15:49:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12660">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often.

The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.

The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.

The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in Germany but is available across the continent.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

For the United Kingdom, AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seems to work quite well.

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== Safe hitchhiking ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quite between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>oqyugix94ifyw36apzb0ytnstonffu5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11996</id>
      <parentid>11995</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-02T15:50:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12672">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often.

The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.

The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.

The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in Germany but is available across the continent.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

For the United Kingdom, AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seems to work quite well.

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== Safe hitchhiking ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quite between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>qtoxhppz459rqwsvv3gtm875ocja1bs</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12686</id>
      <parentid>11996</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-10T22:48:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>81.74.236.38</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="28661">[[http://www.freewebtown.com/starbriteyellow/resources/articles/il-cambiamento.htm il cambiamento del clima]] [[http://www.freewebtown.com/starbriteyellow/resources/articles/polpette-romane.htm polpette romane]] [[http://greensticky.freehostia.com/library/html/scarpa-da/ scarpa da ballo]] [[http://www.freewebtown.com/boogiejames/topic/fun-factory.htm fun factory]] [[http://benevolently.freehostia.com/content/view/nikon-enel/ nikon en-el1]] [[http://www.freewebtown.com/prncessprncipe/library/html/lignano-appartamento.htm lignano appartamento]] [[http://selemku.t35.com/text/directory/abbigliamento-di.htm abbigliamento di marca]] [[http://benevolently.freehostia.com/content/view/sito-ufficiale/ sito ufficiale dei free]] [[http://benevolently.freehostia.com/content/view/capo-d/ capo d orlando messina]] [[http://kopapguw.homeblock.com/topic/passione-e/ passione e sangue]] [[http://grahrens.125mb.com/view/new/testi-canzoni/ testi canzoni avril lavigne]] [[http://greensticky.freehostia.com/library/html/cucina-scavolini/ cucina scavolini]] [[http://lorcaxon.homeblock.com/data/kuhn-hugo/ kuhn, hugo]] [[http://boreldar.t35.com/text/directory/una-ragazza.htm una ragazza di periferia cd musicali]] [[http://greensticky.freehostia.com/library/html/chicco-sahara/ chicco sahara]] [[http://gawelzba.t35.com/library/html/dragostei-din.htm dragostei din tei remix]] [[http://greensticky.freehostia.com/library/html/agriturismo-chivasso/ agriturismo chivasso]] [[http://saline-joy.freehostia.com/web/lavamat-clara.htm lavamat clara]] [[http://licohwar.homeblock.com/library/html/monkey-madness/ monkey madness]] [[http://getraylo.freeweb7.com/img/styles/daniele-casati.htm daniele casati]] [[http://wainfan.t35.com/view/new/digital-ixus.htm digital ixus 700 -new]] [[http://licohwar.homeblock.com/library/html/ammi/ ammi]] [[http://lorcaxon.homeblock.com/data/video-asiatiche/ video asiatiche]] [[http://gawelzba.t35.com/library/html/edream-it.htm edream it]] [[http://gawelzba.t35.com/library/html/mimi-macpherson.htm mimi macpherson video]] [[http://zoelverd.freeweb7.com/description/lib/morenas/ morenas]] [[http://zoelverd.freeweb7.com/description/lib/cirano-di/ cirano di guccini]] [[http://benevolently.freehostia.com/content/view/risposte/ risposte]] [[http://mcwardlo.t35.com/library/html/nike-shox/ nike shox andalucia]] [[http://scaleslea.freewebpage.org/text/directory/nvidia-geforce/ nvidia geforce 7800]] [[http://www.freewebtown.com/prncessprncipe/library/html/yatzhee.htm yatzhee]] [[http://gawelzba.t35.com/library/html/party-mix.htm party mix estate 2004]] [[http://huruple.125mb.com/text/directory/batman-the/ batman. the complete collection]] [[http://flheddin.125mb.com/content/view/europa-cartina.htm europa cartina geografica]] [[http://benevolently.freehostia.com/content/view/williams-angel/ williams angel]] [[http://www.freewebtown.com/boogiejames/topic/giochi-tavolo.htm giochi tavolo bambino]] [[http://www.freewebtown.com/starbriteyellow/resources/articles/millennium-pronto.htm millennium pronto anche per il mercato inglese]] [[http://kopapguw.homeblock.com/topic/dze-chu/ dze chu]] [[http://www.freewebtown.com/prncessprncipe/library/html/ati-.htm ati 9250 128mb]] [[http://benevolently.freehostia.com/content/view/monitor-philips/ monitor philips 19 pollici]] [[http://selemku.t35.com/text/directory/cerco-sesso.htm cerco sesso]] [[http://coarmago.t35.com/content/view/opel-astra/ opel astra sw 2002]] [[http://saline-joy.freehostia.com/web/hotel-regente.htm hotel regente]] [[http://www.freewebtown.com/boogiejames/topic/thuaj-mamit.htm thuaj mamit]] [[http://boreldar.t35.com/text/directory/tanc.htm tanc]] [[http://www.freewebtown.com/starbriteyellow/resources/articles/tdz.htm tdz]] [[http://boreldar.t35.com/text/directory/classificatori-per.htm classificatori per cartelle sospese]] [[http://www.freewebtown.com/prncessprncipe/library/html/lesbo-e.htm lesbo e video sex gratis]] [[http://www.freewebtown.com/boogiejames/topic/euroflex.htm euroflex]] [[http://kopapguw.homeblock.com/topic/miss-playboy/ miss playboy di giugno]] [[http://flheddin.125mb.com/content/view/para-vivir.htm para vivir]] [[http://coarmago.t35.com/content/view/hotel-lucerna/ hotel lucerna]] [[http://licohwar.homeblock.com/library/html/sony-cybershot/ sony cyber-shot dsc-f828 8 megapixel 7x]] [[http://oedi.freehostia.com/text/directory/hotel-arabba/ hotel arabba]] [[http://gawelzba.t35.com/library/html/foto-sesso.htm foto sesso gratis bizzarre]] [[http://huruple.125mb.com/text/directory/helene-sweden/ helene sweden]] [[http://www.freewebtown.com/boogiejames/topic/navel.htm navel]] [[http://wainfan.t35.com/view/new/non-succedera.htm non succedera piu]] [[http://coarmago.t35.com/content/view/wenning-eleven/ wenning eleven 8]] [[http://boreldar.t35.com/text/directory/les-enfants.htm les enfants srl]] [[http://zoelverd.freeweb7.com/description/lib/hotel-mediterraneo/ hotel mediterraneo]] [[http://flheddin.125mb.com/content/view/culle-italbaby.htm culle italbaby]] [[http://saline-joy.freehostia.com/web/nikon-.htm nikon 4600 fotocamera digitale]] [[http://zoelverd.freeweb7.com/description/lib/nude-teens/ nude teens]] [[http://getraylo.freeweb7.com/img/styles/confession-usher.htm confession usher]] [[http://saline-joy.freehostia.com/web/datel-action.htm datel action replay xbox]] [[http://greensticky.freehostia.com/library/html/costiera-amalfitana/ costiera amalfitana]] [[http://beshennayabelka.freehostia.com/content/view/jack-folla.htm jack folla]] [[http://www.freewebtown.com/boogiejames/topic/asus-kvx.htm asus k8v-x via k8t800 socket 754]] [[http://zoelverd.freeweb7.com/description/lib/forno-elettrico/ forno elettrico microonde]] [[http://kopapguw.homeblock.com/topic/residence-mare/ residence mare abruzzo]] [[http://selemku.t35.com/text/directory/xgirls.htm xgirls]] [[http://beshennayabelka.freehostia.com/content/view/jaguar-s.htm jaguar s type 3.0]] [[http://greensticky.freehostia.com/library/html/www-team/ www team cristo]] [[http://zoelverd.freeweb7.com/description/lib/radetzky-march/ radetzky march video real player]] [[http://mauballe.125mb.com/web/stampante-laser/ stampante laser hp 1200]] [[http://mcwardlo.t35.com/library/html/goggles/ goggles]] [[http://www.freewebtown.com/prncessprncipe/library/html/www-anact.htm www anact it]] [[http://greensticky.freehostia.com/library/html/mp-/ mp3 256 mmc]] [[http://www.freewebtown.com/boogiejames/topic/noverasco.htm noverasco]] [[http://lorcaxon.homeblock.com/data/cavo-digitale/ cavo digitale ottico]] [[http://benevolently.freehostia.com/content/view/videoregistratore-dvd/ videoregistratore dvd vhs]] [[http://mauballe.125mb.com/web/tomtom-europa/ tomtom europa]] [[http://kopapguw.homeblock.com/topic/there/ there]] [[http://zoelverd.freeweb7.com/description/lib/madaba/ madaba]] [[http://scaleslea.freewebpage.org/text/directory/ventole-raffreddamento/ ventole raffreddamento socket 478]] [[http://www.freewebtown.com/boogiejames/topic/college-slam.htm college slam]] [[http://licohwar.homeblock.com/library/html/gibonni-arsen/ gibonni arsen dedic]] [[http://failtoexpress.freehostia.com/html/selettore-multiscart.htm selettore multiscart]] [[http://selemku.t35.com/text/directory/elite-auto.htm elite auto]] [[http://selemku.t35.com/text/directory/sony-ericcson.htm sony ericcson p800]] [[http://www.freewebtown.com/starbriteyellow/resources/articles/giustizia-per.htm giustizia per samuele]] [[http://failtoexpress.freehostia.com/html/codice-di.htm codice di procedura civile]] [[http://saline-joy.freehostia.com/web/john-lee.htm john lee hoker]] [[http://www.freewebtown.com/boogiejames/topic/master-ii.htm master ii livello scienziati motori]] [[http://benevolently.freehostia.com/content/view/lacrimosa-the/ lacrimosa. the live history]] [[http://coarmago.t35.com/content/view/modaonline/ modaonline]] [[http://zoelverd.freeweb7.com/description/lib/berretti/ berretti]] [[http://greensticky.freehostia.com/library/html/il-gattopardo/ il gattopardo valzer]] [[http://huruple.125mb.com/text/directory/ipertesto-dei/ ipertesto dei promessi sposi]] [[http://wainfan.t35.com/view/new/maco.htm maco]] [[http://zoelverd.freeweb7.com/description/lib/a-caccia/ a caccia di spie]] [[http://benevolently.freehostia.com/content/view/km-fiat/ km0 fiat auto km 0]] [[http://boreldar.t35.com/text/directory/lettore-divx.htm lettore divx waitec]] [[http://www.freewebtown.com/prncessprncipe/library/html/indesit-wat.htm indesit wat 10]] [[http://coarmago.t35.com/content/view/powerless/ powerless]] [[http://grahrens.125mb.com/view/new/fx/ fx 890]] [[http://www.freewebtown.com/prncessprncipe/library/html/fotocamera-.htm fotocamera 3 megapixel]] [[http://oedi.freehostia.com/text/directory/il-ponticello/ il ponticello sul fiume dei guai]] [[http://www.freewebtown.com/prncessprncipe/library/html/wi-sonyericsson.htm w800i sonyericsson]] [[http://kopapguw.homeblock.com/topic/misure-sostitutive/ misure sostitutive]] [[http://boreldar.t35.com/text/directory/georg-friedrich.htm georg friedrich handel. giulio cesare]] [[http://wainfan.t35.com/view/new/mappa-di.htm mappa di torino]] [[http://kopapguw.homeblock.com/topic/foto-di/ foto di zia]] [[http://oedi.freehostia.com/text/directory/militari-donne/ militari donne nude]] [[http://coarmago.t35.com/content/view/milano-delhi/ milano delhi alitalia]] [[http://kopapguw.homeblock.com/topic/si-me/ si me dejas no vale]] [[http://www.freewebtown.com/boogiejames/topic/elenco-abbonati.htm elenco abbonati telefonici]] [[http://beshennayabelka.freehostia.com/content/view/i-giovani.htm i giovani eroi]] [[http://getraylo.freeweb7.com/img/styles/oleo-mac.htm oleo mac]] [[http://flheddin.125mb.com/content/view/fghgg.htm fghgg]] [[http://www.freewebtown.com/boogiejames/topic/th-ereason.htm th ereason]] [[http://flheddin.125mb.com/content/view/covito-carmen.htm covito, carmen]] [[http://oedi.freehostia.com/text/directory/enfermedades-venereas/ enfermedades venereas]] [[http://mauballe.125mb.com/web/driver-moorola/ driver moorola]] [[http://getraylo.freeweb7.com/img/styles/ricevitore-gps.htm ricevitore gps per nokia 6630]] [[http://getm0ney.freewebpage.org/lib/malinska/ malinska]] [[http://scaleslea.freewebpage.org/text/directory/sony-dcrpce/ sony dcr-pc107e]] [[http://lorcaxon.homeblock.com/data/manuale-peer/ manuale peer to peer]] [[http://getraylo.freeweb7.com/img/styles/turion.htm turion 3400]] [[http://failtoexpress.freehostia.com/html/jvc-rcex.htm jvc rc-ex25]] [[http://boreldar.t35.com/text/directory/zamora-ecuador.htm zamora (ecuador)]] [[http://licohwar.homeblock.com/library/html/kings-lynn/ kings lynn]] [[http://greensticky.freehostia.com/library/html/linea-blu/ linea blu]] [[http://getm0ney.freewebpage.org/lib/frosinone-computer/ frosinone computer negozio]] [[http://licohwar.homeblock.com/library/html/enfance-et/ enfance et maturite]] [[http://flheddin.125mb.com/content/view/catherwood-mary.htm catherwood, mary hartwell]] [[http://coarmago.t35.com/content/view/novation-x/ novation x station 49]] [[http://wainfan.t35.com/view/new/fonoassorbente-case.htm fonoassorbente case]] [[http://www.freewebtown.com/starbriteyellow/resources/articles/ford-fiesta.htm ford fiesta 1.4 tdci zetec]] [[http://www.freewebtown.com/starbriteyellow/resources/articles/ofrendas.htm ofrendas]] [[http://beshennayabelka.freehostia.com/content/view/dj-mis.htm dj mis 2004]] [[http://licohwar.homeblock.com/library/html/drum-bass/ drum bass]] [[http://www.freewebtown.com/boogiejames/topic/decoder-satellite.htm decoder satellite e digitale]] [[http://grahrens.125mb.com/view/new/cd-love/ cd love songs phil]] [[http://zoelverd.freeweb7.com/description/lib/gps-nokia/ gps nokia 9300]] [[http://coarmago.t35.com/content/view/marcia-della/ marcia della marina militare]] [[http://grahrens.125mb.com/view/new/accessori-per/ accessori per autoradio]] [[http://www.freewebtown.com/starbriteyellow/resources/articles/euro-lens.htm euro lens technology spa]] [[http://lorcaxon.homeblock.com/data/occhiali-dolce/ occhiali dolce gabbana uomo]] [[http://getraylo.freeweb7.com/img/styles/giochi-nintendo.htm giochi nintendo 64]] [[http://lorcaxon.homeblock.com/data/bosch-lavastoviglie/ bosch lavastoviglie inox]] [[http://licohwar.homeblock.com/library/html/de-longhi/ de longhi macchine espresso]] [[http://oedi.freehostia.com/text/directory/cartoni-/ cartoni  animati]] [[http://beshennayabelka.freehostia.com/content/view/yorkshire-terrier.htm yorkshire terrier]] [[http://selemku.t35.com/text/directory/esercizi-di.htm esercizi di francese]] [[http://scaleslea.freewebpage.org/text/directory/antiche-terre/ antiche terre snc]] [[http://lorcaxon.homeblock.com/data/testi-canzoni/ testi canzoni italiane e straniere]] [[http://getm0ney.freewebpage.org/lib/love-is/ love is only a feeling]] [[http://www.freewebtown.com/prncessprncipe/library/html/visualizza-elenco.htm visualizza elenco telefonico]] [[http://wainfan.t35.com/view/new/dove-scaricare.htm dove scaricare divx]] [[http://grahrens.125mb.com/view/new/coppia-amanti/ coppia amanti]] [[http://greensticky.freehostia.com/library/html/videocamere-mini/ videocamere mini dv sony]] [[http://greensticky.freehostia.com/library/html/portatile-amd/ portatile amd 64 hp]] [[http://greensticky.freehostia.com/library/html/fiat-multipla/ fiat multipla napoli]] [[http://www.freewebtown.com/starbriteyellow/resources/articles/yamaha-dtxtreme.htm yamaha dtxtreme]] [[http://getm0ney.freewebpage.org/lib/tv/ tv 40]] [[http://kopapguw.homeblock.com/topic/seagate-momentus/ seagate momentus 40gb]] [[http://grahrens.125mb.com/view/new/nike-portogallo/ nike portogallo brasile]] [[http://scaleslea.freewebpage.org/text/directory/tes/ tes]] [[http://oedi.freehostia.com/text/directory/calendario-ragazze/ calendario ragazze del web]] [[http://getm0ney.freewebpage.org/lib/katie-holmes/ katie holmes]] [[http://selemku.t35.com/text/directory/virgin-state.htm virgin state of mind]] [[http://www.freewebtown.com/boogiejames/topic/his-x.htm his x800 gt]] [[http://zoelverd.freeweb7.com/description/lib/albergo-forli/ albergo forli]] [[http://getm0ney.freewebpage.org/lib/toyota-auto/ toyota auto fuoristrada]] [[http://failtoexpress.freehostia.com/html/trans-cum.htm trans cum]] [[http://flheddin.125mb.com/content/view/yamaha-rx.htm yamaha rx v550]] [[http://www.freewebtown.com/boogiejames/topic/accessori-nikon.htm accessori nikon sq]] [[http://saline-joy.freehostia.com/web/infinity-alpha.htm infinity alpha]] [[http://greensticky.freehostia.com/library/html/prestito-desenzano/ prestito desenzano garda]] [[http://mcwardlo.t35.com/library/html/testo-furb/ testo furb]] [[http://gawelzba.t35.com/library/html/volante-per.htm volante per playstation 2]] [[http://greensticky.freehostia.com/library/html/do-you/ do you wanna touch me oh yeah]] [[http://grahrens.125mb.com/view/new/ti-porto/ ti porto in africa]] [[http://lorcaxon.homeblock.com/data/kingston-compact/ kingston compact flash 1024]] [[http://scaleslea.freewebpage.org/text/directory/jeti/ jeti]] [[http://oedi.freehostia.com/text/directory/la-guerra/ la guerra e]] [[http://selemku.t35.com/text/directory/bluetooth-hbh.htm bluetooth hbh 35]] [[http://benevolently.freehostia.com/content/view/firenze-catania/ firenze catania biglietti aerei]] [[http://boreldar.t35.com/text/directory/video-tette.htm video tette gratis]] [[http://zoelverd.freeweb7.com/description/lib/netgear-wgr/ netgear wgr614 802 11g wireless router]] [[http://licohwar.homeblock.com/library/html/tecnica-decoupage/ tecnica decoupage]] [[http://selemku.t35.com/text/directory/portatile-asus.htm portatile asus m]] [[http://getm0ney.freewebpage.org/lib/palmari-gps/ palmari gps cellulari]] [[http://licohwar.homeblock.com/library/html/payas-chilenas/ payas chilenas]] [[http://coarmago.t35.com/content/view/auto-noleggio/ auto noleggio monterotondo]] [[http://flheddin.125mb.com/content/view/machine-da.htm machine da corsa]] [[http://flheddin.125mb.com/content/view/diesel-infradito.htm diesel infradito]] [[http://kopapguw.homeblock.com/topic/volo-dakar/ volo dakar]] There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often.

The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.

The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.

The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in Germany but is available across the continent.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

For the United Kingdom, AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seems to work quite well.

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== Safe hitchhiking ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quite between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>86itza217x2azfwghcuguj8rgwvyd9r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12690</id>
      <parentid>12686</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-11T00:13:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>71.28.49.182</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12672">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. (Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, etc.)

However, in many countries, trucks are no longer allowed to pick up hitch-hikers as they are not covered by their insurance and their employers have told them not to. There may be individual truckers who ignore this, but bear it in mind.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often.

The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.

The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.

The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in Germany but is available across the continent.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

For the United Kingdom, AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seems to work quite well.

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds. What are those cases?

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== Safe hitchhiking ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to '''camp''' along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quite between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>qtoxhppz459rqwsvv3gtm875ocja1bs</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12964</id>
      <parentid>12690</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-16T23:59:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tmoon</username>
        <id>91</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16533">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route for the journey you want ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.

The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.

The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in Germany but is available across the continent.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

For the United Kingdom, AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==

If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, -- was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station the next ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot og time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quite between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Get to the nearest city, if you have to ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>4cm5oz7o11kod7o89eqaga3sex7qcd8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12965</id>
      <parentid>12964</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-17T00:00:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tmoon</username>
        <id>91</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16547">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route for the journey you want ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.

The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.

The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in Germany but is available across the continent.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

For the United Kingdom, AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot og time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quite between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Get to the nearest city, if you have to ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>irh1qnt313jcmevfdn9589x8wvczfzz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13016</id>
      <parentid>12965</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-17T15:32:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tmoon</username>
        <id>91</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17525">[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|300px|right|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route for the journey you want ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.

The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.

The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in Germany but is available across the continent.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

For the United Kingdom, AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|This looks like a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers are slowing down at the junction, and there is a obvious place for them to stop.]]
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|300px|right|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the UK, road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|350px|Keep the signs bold and clear!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot og time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|300px|right|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially men) and you may be in more danger (especially women). Also, you're not so visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quite between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Get to the nearest city, if you have to ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>5jstkgcilislqsytc15fgsc00ye5x01</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13017</id>
      <parentid>13016</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-17T15:33:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tmoon</username>
        <id>91</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17526">[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|300px|right|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route for the journey you want ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.

The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.

The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in Germany but is available across the continent.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

For the United Kingdom, AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|This looks like a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers are slowing down at the junction, and there is a obvious place for them to stop.]]
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|300px|right|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the UK, road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot og time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|300px|right|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially men) and you may be in more danger (especially women). Also, you're not so visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quite between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Get to the nearest city, if you have to ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>5dv5cn2l9aqpq229zym1zj250jxrms0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13018</id>
      <parentid>13017</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-17T15:34:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tmoon</username>
        <id>91</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17530">[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|300px|right|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route for the journey you want ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.

The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.

The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in Germany but is available across the continent.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

For the United Kingdom, AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|This looks like a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers are slowing down at the junction, and there is a obvious place for them to stop.]]
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|300px|right|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot og time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|300px|right|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially men) and you may be in more danger (especially women). Also, you're not so visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quite between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Get to the nearest city, if you have to ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>gfara34yhkxzzbi5r85myu6d7j24qwu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13040</id>
      <parentid>13018</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-18T12:15:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tmoon</username>
        <id>91</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17493">[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|300px|right|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.

The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.

The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in Germany but is available across the continent.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

For the United Kingdom, AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|This looks like a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers are slowing down at the junction, and there is a obvious place for them to stop.]]
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|300px|right|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot og time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|300px|right|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially men) and you may be in more danger (especially women). Also, you're not so visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quite between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>87etexhxm5dkk6rtdgonml9aksaec9d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13041</id>
      <parentid>13040</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-18T12:20:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tmoon</username>
        <id>91</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17481">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.

The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.

The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in Germany but is available across the continent.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

For the United Kingdom, AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|250px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot og time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially men) and you may be in more danger (especially women). Also, you're not so visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quite between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>2zfokp44nzjc4rjachupx2itc8a4elu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13157</id>
      <parentid>13041</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-22T16:06:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Myshkin</username>
        <id>145</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17481">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.

The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.

The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in Germany but is available across the continent.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

For the United Kingdom, AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|250px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially men) and you may be in more danger (especially women). Also, you're not so visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quite between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>8374w1w8dse74at6ybh2ebti8a7eti5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13158</id>
      <parentid>13157</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-22T16:10:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Myshkin</username>
        <id>145</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17503">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.

The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.

The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in Germany but is available across the continent.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

For the United Kingdom, AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|250px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quite between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>plc0et7be0t9nd07tb42sbri357uwof</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13159</id>
      <parentid>13158</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-22T16:14:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Myshkin</username>
        <id>145</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17503">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.

The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.

The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in Germany but is available across the continent.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

For the United Kingdom, AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|250px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>i44jc48cz2qo11ehi6h505vmrpd56sd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13416</id>
      <parentid>13159</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-04T22:56:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>219.126.73.63</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="989">[[http://prihodnaja.fortunecity.com/small/axim-xv.htm axim x50v accessori]] [[http://badanglican.cn/content/view/divertimenti-a/ divertimenti a kos]] [[http://jite.netfirms.com/new/fiat-bravo/ fiat bravo 19 td]] [[http://eiwiggin.angelfire.com/small/mario-gos/ mario gos]] [[http://prihodnaja.fortunecity.com/small/caricabatteria-ipaq.htm caricabatteria ipaq]] [[http://badanglican.cn/content/view/wanadoo-co/ wanadoo co uk]] [[http://xrikuxsorax103.netfirms.com/fiat-pavia/ fiat pavia]] [[http://eiwiggin.angelfire.com/small/la-signora/ la signora di tutti]] [[http://diferente.netfirms.com/view/suoneria-polifonica.htm suoneria polifonica this love]] [[http://michelletrach.netfirms.com/sharp-uxb.htm sharp uxb700]] [[http://knbrenne.angelfire.com/data/memoria-compaq.htm memoria compaq ram]] [[http://prihodnaja.fortunecity.com/small/firehouse-five.htm firehouse five plus 2]] [[http://badanglican.cn/content/view/ddr-mb/ ddr2 1024mb]] [[http://hilyndel.angelfire.com/lib/lezione-di.htm</text>
      <sha1>cdspr3s5pv4em0r3a7iw4g75229zvqp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13417</id>
      <parentid>13416</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-05T00:20:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17503">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.

The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.

The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in Germany but is available across the continent.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

For the United Kingdom, AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|250px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>i44jc48cz2qo11ehi6h505vmrpd56sd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13551</id>
      <parentid>13417</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-10T21:15:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>85.179.15.53</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17584">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.

The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.

The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in Germany but is available across the continent.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

For the United Kingdom, AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|250px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Golden Worldwide database of places for hitchhikers]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>0p88nzc2q7aa2uuadriem8x64rvfqnh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13552</id>
      <parentid>13551</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-10T21:16:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>85.179.15.53</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17577">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.

The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.

The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in Germany but is available across the continent.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

For the United Kingdom, AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|250px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night.

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>8yfewln14e0qeda5fe1xrgwriyalyxf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13589</id>
      <parentid>13552</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-12T06:03:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>83.153.92.176</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17838">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.

The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.

The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in Germany but is available across the continent.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in Finland.

For the United Kingdom, AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|250px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usaly you can try to get away without paying at public transportation anyway. Just go in and take a seet, you see someone at the station getting on that seems to be wanting to see your ticket when they get on - just get off before them and take the next one...

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>3rkkqcl5t7jmw55i51wx2b6r3cxviwe</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13652</id>
      <parentid>13589</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-12T15:25:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17850">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.

The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.

The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.

In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 

For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|250px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usaly you can try to get away without paying at public transportation anyway. Just go in and take a seet, you see someone at the station getting on that seems to be wanting to see your ticket when they get on - just get off before them and take the next one...

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>mrht9ul5ebqjhk8ap2m59ac6jkvxvcb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13763</id>
      <parentid>13652</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-13T18:06:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="18255">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.

* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.

* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.

* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 

* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.

* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* Michelin Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|250px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usaly you can try to get away without paying at public transportation anyway. Just go in and take a seet, you see someone at the station getting on that seems to be wanting to see your ticket when they get on - just get off before them and take the next one...

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>rmzcryiyz8nqqrv671nk15kfh4lurvl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13764</id>
      <parentid>13763</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-13T18:06:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="18259">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.

* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.

* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.

* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 

* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.

* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|250px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usaly you can try to get away without paying at public transportation anyway. Just go in and take a seet, you see someone at the station getting on that seems to be wanting to see your ticket when they get on - just get off before them and take the next one...

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>8kq3rpkcqyfi90if7dkm62vugb420e4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13765</id>
      <parentid>13764</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-13T18:11:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="18840">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.

* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.

* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.

* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 

* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.

* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|250px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usaly you can try to get away without paying at public transportation anyway. Just go in and take a seet, you see someone at the station getting on that seems to be wanting to see your ticket when they get on - just get off before them and take the next one...

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/veit/trampen1eng.htm Golden Hitchhiking Rules]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>i8ht9tiu6cgz67aroge8abhhefrgfiu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13817</id>
      <parentid>13765</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-13T20:29:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="18759">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.

* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.

* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.

* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 

* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.

* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|250px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usaly you can try to get away without paying at public transportation anyway. Just go in and take a seet, you see someone at the station getting on that seems to be wanting to see your ticket when they get on - just get off before them and take the next one...

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>q87b3vsx89uuxpatj7wgp2uui4ihrkk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14620</id>
      <parentid>13817</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-10T19:09:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>208.109.123.121</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="18774">baslacr
There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.

* The ''Falk LÃ¤nderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.

* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.

* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 

* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.

* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|250px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, donât wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

If space dosenÂ´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usaly you can try to get away without paying at public transportation anyway. Just go in and take a seet, you see someone at the station getting on that seems to be wanting to see your ticket when they get on - just get off before them and take the next one...

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>3sdm00xwci7gbgyyk9qh3qvfh8rk996</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14621</id>
      <parentid>14620</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-10T19:25:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="18759">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.

* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.

* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.

* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 

* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.

* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|250px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usaly you can try to get away without paying at public transportation anyway. Just go in and take a seet, you see someone at the station getting on that seems to be wanting to see your ticket when they get on - just get off before them and take the next one...

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>q87b3vsx89uuxpatj7wgp2uui4ihrkk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15891</id>
      <parentid>14621</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-13T15:44:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Volland</username>
        <id>125</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19064">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.

* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.

* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.

* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 

* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.

* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|250px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Open-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usaly you can try to get away without paying at public transportation anyway. Just go in and take a seet, you see someone at the station getting on that seems to be wanting to see your ticket when they get on - just get off before them and take the next one...

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>1775tt0kw6j6mf8ydoolfn0dgr3ulih</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16204</id>
      <parentid>15891</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-02T19:26:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>142.179.166.95</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19067">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.

* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.

* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.

* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 

* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.

* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|250px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usaly you can try to get away without paying at public transportation anyway. Just go in and take a seet, you see someone at the station getting on that seems to be wanting to see your ticket when they get on - just get off before them and take the next one...

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>ps9fxolales0plzp84u6n3a9belcex3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16684</id>
      <parentid>16204</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-26T04:48:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>59.77.21.250</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19082">chitaac
There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.

* The ''Falk LÃ¤nderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.

* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.

* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 

* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.

* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|250px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, donât wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.

If space dosenÂ´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usaly you can try to get away without paying at public transportation anyway. Just go in and take a seet, you see someone at the station getting on that seems to be wanting to see your ticket when they get on - just get off before them and take the next one...

=Related links and references=

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>eidjfbaa4j3049w2lfn3tp3mjx9bu6r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16705</id>
      <parentid>16684</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-26T10:52:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19065">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|250px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usaly you can try to get away without paying at public transportation anyway. Just go in and take a seet, you see someone at the station getting on that seems to be wanting to see your ticket when they get on - just get off before them and take the next one...

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>jx9a5qcm5lykhhtws9ef0gcz86klwwe</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16770</id>
      <parentid>16705</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-27T19:20:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>60.234.250.246</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19273">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|250px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

What about a sign just saying 
== "PLEASE" ==
 ?  It workes for me. (from Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx. And remember the ultimate way of travelling is "hitchhiking with a bicycle", think about it...

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usaly you can try to get away without paying at public transportation anyway. Just go in and take a seet, you see someone at the station getting on that seems to be wanting to see your ticket when they get on - just get off before them and take the next one...

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>6q1a1an1efdq2iphpa94c9935cs03yd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16772</id>
      <parentid>16770</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-27T19:51:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mxnnz</username>
        <id>1298</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19100">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|250px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

What about a sign just saying 

 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usaly you can try to get away without paying at public transportation anyway. Just go in and take a seet, you see someone at the station getting on that seems to be wanting to see your ticket when they get on - just get off before them and take the next one...

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>c6unomi7knxi6o7pgp4lsc7uyvpje5i</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16774</id>
      <parentid>16772</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-27T20:11:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mxnnz</username>
        <id>1298</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19782">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|250px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

What about a sign just saying '''"PLEASE".'''
It worked for me. (from Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)  read on. 


When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 metres/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 metres has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the rignt location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usaly you can try to get away without paying at public transportation anyway. Just go in and take a seet, you see someone at the station getting on that seems to be wanting to see your ticket when they get on - just get off before them and take the next one...

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>fpxd1myr2w4o3gwczkgggzolz785h0x</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18206</id>
      <parentid>16774</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-21T13:17:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>202.84.17.42</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19801">pasdellacle
There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk LÃ¤nderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|250px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, donât wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

What about a sign just saying '''"PLEASE".'''
It worked for me. (from Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)  read on. 


When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 metres/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 metres has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the rignt location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosenÂ´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usaly you can try to get away without paying at public transportation anyway. Just go in and take a seet, you see someone at the station getting on that seems to be wanting to see your ticket when they get on - just get off before them and take the next one...

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>o65mtp6guss2wbmr8uteu5714gkkr6x</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18213</id>
      <parentid>18206</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-21T13:40:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19782">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|250px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

What about a sign just saying '''"PLEASE".'''
It worked for me. (from Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)  read on. 


When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 metres/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 metres has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the rignt location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active) and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usaly you can try to get away without paying at public transportation anyway. Just go in and take a seet, you see someone at the station getting on that seems to be wanting to see your ticket when they get on - just get off before them and take the next one...

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>fpxd1myr2w4o3gwczkgggzolz785h0x</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18316</id>
      <parentid>18213</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-02-07T15:02:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>194.145.68.11</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19820">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|250px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

What about a sign just saying '''"PLEASE".'''
It worked for me. (from Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)  read on. 


When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 metres/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 metres has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the rignt location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usaly you can try to get away without paying at public transportation anyway. Just go in and take a seet, you see someone at the station getting on that seems to be wanting to see your ticket when they get on - just get off before them and take the next one...

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>0pbk806vvbc4xvnkcykg5c2jww9vvrg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18402</id>
      <parentid>18316</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-02-15T14:27:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>121.91.55.124</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19980">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|250px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps(Being a guy with shaved head and beard Ive found it much easier wearing a cap always, because ppl seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads (Simon(Sweden)) and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

What about a sign just saying '''"PLEASE".'''
It worked for me. (from Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)  read on. 


When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 metres/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 metres has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the rignt location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usaly you can try to get away without paying at public transportation anyway. Just go in and take a seet, you see someone at the station getting on that seems to be wanting to see your ticket when they get on - just get off before them and take the next one...

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>rg0hzexj20kg53zkynjm4aoaoqp89h6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18822</id>
      <parentid>18402</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-10T18:09:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Alex</username>
        <id>89</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20145">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|250px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps(Being a guy with shaved head and beard Ive found it much easier wearing a cap always, because ppl seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads (Simon(Sweden)) and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

What about a sign just saying '''"PLEASE".'''
It worked for me. (from Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)  read on. 


When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 metres/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 metres has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the rignt location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usaly you can try to get away without paying at public transportation anyway. Just go in and take a seet, you see someone at the station getting on that seems to be wanting to see your ticket when they get on - just get off before them and take the next one...

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>ch0x4qwzui65z9jwberiguhtvixzptu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19472</id>
      <parentid>18822</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-04-10T17:01:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>90.202.180.175</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20333">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|250px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps(Being a guy with shaved head and beard Ive found it much easier wearing a cap always, because ppl seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads (Simon(Sweden)) and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

What about a sign just saying '''"PLEASE".'''
It worked for me. (from Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)  read on. 


When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 metres/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 metres has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the rignt location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usaly you can try to get away without paying at public transportation anyway. Just go in and take a seet, you see someone at the station getting on that seems to be wanting to see your ticket when they get on - just get off before them and take the next one...

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>rkd8hcsees8esa8ep2z92e9m0fjxroi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19473</id>
      <parentid>19472</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-04-10T17:04:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>90.202.180.175</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20596">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|250px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps(Being a guy with shaved head and beard Ive found it much easier wearing a cap always, because ppl seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads (Simon(Sweden)) and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

What about a sign just saying '''"PLEASE".'''
It worked for me. (from Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)  read on. 


When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 metres/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 metres has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the rignt location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usaly you can try to get away without paying at public transportation anyway. Just go in and take a seet, you see someone at the station getting on that seems to be wanting to see your ticket when they get on - just get off before them and take the next one...

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>nb3xlyrl872xlvhebzsg7c5xa7elvtw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19474</id>
      <parentid>19473</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-04-10T17:07:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>90.202.180.175</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20946">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|250px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps(Being a guy with shaved head and beard Ive found it much easier wearing a cap always, because ppl seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads (Simon(Sweden)) and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

What about a sign just saying '''"PLEASE".'''
It worked for me. (from Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)  read on. 


When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 metres/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 metres has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the rignt location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in Eastern Europe. England's not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>mfftjsxe2cipplope05yqdk5d5rldh8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19982</id>
      <parentid>19474</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-05-16T17:32:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>69.107.127.234</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20951">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|250px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps(Being a guy with shaved head and beard Ive found it much easier wearing a cap always, because ppl seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads (Simon(Sweden)) and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

What about a sign just saying '''"PLEASE".'''
It worked for me. (from Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)  read on. 


When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 metres/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 metres has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the rignt location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in Eastern Europe. England's not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>jf16pl2nrbimc25w6auxr2rki1nb64a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21712</id>
      <parentid>19982</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-19T01:00:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21087">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  E.g. when going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], you better avoid [[Paris]]: go through [[Luxemburg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== Carry a good map ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|250px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps(Being a guy with shaved head and beard Ive found it much easier wearing a cap always, because ppl seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads (Simon(Sweden)) and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

What about a sign just saying '''"PLEASE".'''
It worked for me. (from Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)  read on. 


When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 metres/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 metres has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the rignt location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in Eastern Europe. England's not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>qu3toach5d4p11m3ragcf41adhe1iiu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21713</id>
      <parentid>21712</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-19T01:01:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21096">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  E.g. when going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], you better avoid [[Paris]]: go through [[Luxemburg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy.

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your posessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|250px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps(Being a guy with shaved head and beard Ive found it much easier wearing a cap always, because ppl seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads (Simon(Sweden)) and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

What about a sign just saying '''"PLEASE".'''
It worked for me. (from Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)  read on. 


When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 metres/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 metres has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the rignt location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in Eastern Europe. England's not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>fkluhyja40r4a8ppkdwra6zh8mrv5wp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21715</id>
      <parentid>21713</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-19T01:02:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21136">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  E.g. when going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], you better avoid [[Paris]]: go through [[Luxemburg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[gas station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|250px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps(Being a guy with shaved head and beard Ive found it much easier wearing a cap always, because ppl seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads (Simon(Sweden)) and black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

What about a sign just saying '''"PLEASE".'''
It worked for me. (from Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)  read on. 


When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 metres/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 metres has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the rignt location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in Eastern Europe. England's not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>2f3vmdajyps5lxkvv6ic6lgmsusdpz3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21716</id>
      <parentid>21715</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-19T01:05:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21136">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  E.g. when going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], you better avoid [[Paris]]: go through [[Luxemburg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[gas station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== About the use of [[signs|a sign]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

What about a sign just saying '''"PLEASE".'''
It worked for me. (from Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)  read on. 


When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or petrol station staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 metres/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 metres has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the rignt location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be A'DAM and [[Hamburg]] could be HH.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, Texas (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in Eastern Europe. England's not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>kghnuhy4cpzbwmrjbv36c0cgdbo00kd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21717</id>
      <parentid>21716</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-19T01:08:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21121">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  E.g. when going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], you better avoid [[Paris]]: go through [[Luxemburg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[gas station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 metres/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 metres has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the rignt location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your map.

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in Eastern Europe. England's not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>hctrmj96qtbda565hkcbei8gzbxr6bv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21718</id>
      <parentid>21717</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-19T01:09:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21125">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  E.g. when going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], you better avoid [[Paris]]: go through [[Luxemburg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[gas station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 metres/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 metres has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the rignt location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in Eastern Europe. England's not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>f0nq87zmw5t2mzxmap2wtue3659k7da</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21719</id>
      <parentid>21718</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-19T01:10:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21138">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  E.g. when going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], you better avoid [[Paris]]: go through [[Luxemburg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[gas station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 metres/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 metres has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the rignt location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|At night, it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in [[Eastern Europe]]. [[England]]'s not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a high penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>fqqs3aanqcidde7w68zf9u3khfjm6eh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21799</id>
      <parentid>21719</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-19T10:43:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21142">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  E.g. when going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], you better avoid [[Paris]]: go through [[Luxemburg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[gas station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more trust than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 metres/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 metres has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the rignt location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in [[Eastern Europe]]. [[England]]'s not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a high penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>bhdsb0t83g8et8tc1dui41u977qybxl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21816</id>
      <parentid>21799</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-19T10:53:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21146">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  E.g. when going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], you better avoid [[Paris]]: go through [[Luxemburg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if gas stations are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[gas station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 metres/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 metres has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the rignt location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in [[Eastern Europe]]. [[England]]'s not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a high penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>swhozfaku27sb18zy6c6h5vwi64typj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22024</id>
      <parentid>21816</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-23T13:30:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21150">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  E.g. when going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], you better avoid [[Paris]]: go through [[Luxemburg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[gas station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[gas station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 metres/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 metres has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the rignt location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in [[Eastern Europe]]. [[England]]'s not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a high penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>p8fxggxyifem61bwgr9nnkawpjhdgiy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22202</id>
      <parentid>22024</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-02T14:26:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>62.168.186.177</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21236">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  E.g. when going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], you better avoid [[Paris]]: go through [[Luxemburg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[gas station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[gas station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 metres/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 metres has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the rignt location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com
== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in [[Eastern Europe]]. [[England]]'s not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a high penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>kturb9f8sw8p6t0lutzhqln9i0ljvrg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22841</id>
      <parentid>22202</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-24T22:50:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>194.144.90.134</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21708">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  E.g. when going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], you better avoid [[Paris]]: go through [[Luxemburg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[gas station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[gas station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 metres/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 metres has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the rignt location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com
== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in [[Eastern Europe]]. [[England]]'s not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a high penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>46j9yb7mb685aef0qztoxy69ugmkpoz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23157</id>
      <parentid>22841</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-31T23:55:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21727">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  E.g. when going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], you better avoid [[Paris]]: go through [[Luxemburg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[gas station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[gas station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 metres/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 metres has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the rignt location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com
== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in [[Eastern Europe]]. [[England]]'s not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a high penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]


[[Category:General info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>9rjeb5zceelhe6pi5zbza6fdrbt41cj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23188</id>
      <parentid>23157</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-08-01T14:54:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21740">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  E.g. when going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], you better avoid [[Paris]]: go through [[Luxemburg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[gas station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[gas station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 metres/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 metres has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the rignt location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com
== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in [[Eastern Europe]]. [[England]]'s not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a high penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:General info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>k651x98l1dombvd7p08lkhc9bmv0ze9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23191</id>
      <parentid>23188</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-08-01T22:36:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mirto</username>
        <id>45</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21740">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  E.g. when going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], you better avoid [[Paris]]: go through [[Luxemburg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[gas station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]]  AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[gas station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com
== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in [[Eastern Europe]]. [[England]]'s not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a high penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:General info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>qju6gh5l8hx0i0ebobohi85qec0p5dl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23283</id>
      <parentid>23191</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-08-06T20:23:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21755">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  E.g. when going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], you better avoid [[Paris]]: go through [[Luxemburg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[gas station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[gas station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com
== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in [[Eastern Europe]]. [[England]]'s not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a high penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:General info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>8trl3x226rexg45kb5if5blghv9f3fp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24044</id>
      <parentid>23283</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-08-26T17:39:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>90.31.242.201</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="22254">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  E.g. when going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], you better avoid [[Paris]]: go through [[Luxemburg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[gas station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[gas station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com
== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in [[Eastern Europe]]. [[England]]'s not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a high penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

== Highway hitchhike ==

If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in gas stations. Gas stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:General info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>dcosydjh7e4t2sqigq7376vbbzdczng</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24216</id>
      <parentid>24044</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-08-31T18:21:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>24.67.253.203</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="22622">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  E.g. when going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], you better avoid [[Paris]]: go through [[Luxemburg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[gas station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[gas station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com
== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in [[Eastern Europe]]. [[England]]'s not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a high penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

== Highway hitchhike ==

If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in gas stations. Gas stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

== liste of good spots to hitchhike ==
''In Canada''
leaving '''Toronto''' to go North: 
taking the bus up to Barry and than start to hitchhike with a sign "17 North" or "Sudbury"
leaving '''Ottawa''' in both directions:
going to the grayhound busstation and waiting at the entrance of the highway. There is a trafficlight before the turning so cars have to stop. 



= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:General info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>dbwi37qtli9y0lbjwmk97pdhnj7ya98</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24217</id>
      <parentid>24216</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-08-31T18:21:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>24.67.253.203</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="22621">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  E.g. when going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], you better avoid [[Paris]]: go through [[Luxemburg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[gas station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[gas station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com
== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in [[Eastern Europe]]. [[England]]'s not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a high penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

== Highway hitchhike ==

If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in gas stations. Gas stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

== liste of good spots to hitchhike ==
''In Canada''

leaving '''Toronto''' to go North: 
taking the bus up to Barry and than start to hitchhike with a sign "17 North" or "Sudbury"

leaving '''Ottawa''' in both directions:
going to the grayhound busstation and waiting at the entrance of the highway. There is a trafficlight before the turning so cars have to stop.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:General info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>tsvam5qqpgxh2rwrjzl1hixqcvrhz1i</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24219</id>
      <parentid>24217</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-08-31T19:23:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="22256">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  E.g. when going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], you better avoid [[Paris]]: go through [[Luxemburg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[gas station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[gas station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com
== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in [[Eastern Europe]]. [[England]]'s not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a high penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

== Highway hitchhike ==

If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in gas stations. Gas stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.



= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:General info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>kdx9pb33i0jspu7h5ek8oikl1ifddgy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24587</id>
      <parentid>24219</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-06T11:56:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="22258">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  E.g. when going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], you better avoid [[Paris]]: go through [[Luxemburg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[gas station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[gas station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com
== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in [[Eastern Europe]]. [[England]]'s not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a high penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

== Highway hitchhike ==

If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in gas stations. Gas stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.



= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>86ic125ib3cll7uj74z3uoz6wzs3q09</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>25027</id>
      <parentid>24587</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-18T10:16:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Rocky</username>
        <id>1594</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="22597">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  E.g. when going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], you better avoid [[Paris]]: go through [[Luxemburg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[gas station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[gas station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com
== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in [[Eastern Europe]]. [[England]]'s not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a high penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

== Highway hitchhike ==

If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in gas stations. Gas stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

Do realise that in most countries, hitch hiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced too. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own safety is also in danger. The police might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>kzpymqvb2ae7itkwgap0nz4h5gakycj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>25030</id>
      <parentid>25027</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-18T11:39:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="22608">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  E.g. when going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], you better avoid [[Paris]]: go through [[Luxemburg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[gas station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[gas station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com
== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in [[Eastern Europe]]. [[England]]'s not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a high penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==

If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in gas stations. Gas stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced too. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>nlo2nr0bt38xiebavbpluaa239hwvkb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>25695</id>
      <parentid>25030</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-04T21:01:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>77.208.65.236</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="22626">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  E.g. when going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], you better avoid [[Paris]]: go through [[Luxemburg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[gas station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[gas station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com
== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in [[Eastern Europe]]. [[England]]'s not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a high penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==

If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in gas stations. Gas stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced too. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>40haqd2i8er6tviv8bolwvtik9tv3t7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27952</id>
      <parentid>25695</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-20T20:51:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>195.241.30.252</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="23095">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  E.g. when going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], you better avoid [[Paris]]: go through [[Luxemburg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[gas station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== [[Making conversation with drivers]] ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons:  some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with.   On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place.  Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]].

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[gas station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com
== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in [[Eastern Europe]]. [[England]]'s not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a high penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==

If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in gas stations. Gas stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced too. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>f0kkq6pbldis29po7bvikwidvb2zo23</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27953</id>
      <parentid>27952</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-20T20:52:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>195.241.30.252</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="23197">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  E.g. when going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], you better avoid [[Paris]]: go through [[Luxemburg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[gas station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== [[Making conversation with drivers]] ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons:  some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with.   On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place.  Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]].  Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[gas station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com
== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in [[Eastern Europe]]. [[England]]'s not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a high penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==

If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in gas stations. Gas stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced too. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>sv1empqb5p66us6n8gjfe4qvhnpp9rt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27954</id>
      <parentid>27953</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-20T20:56:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Paxus</username>
        <id>1639</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="23193">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  E.g. when going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], you better avoid [[Paris]]: go through [[Luxemburg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[gas station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons:  some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with.   On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place.  Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]].  Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[gas station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com
== In the car ==

Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour gas station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the gas station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in [[Eastern Europe]]. [[England]]'s not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a high penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==

If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in gas stations. Gas stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced too. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>pyssx92prya9i0bg5c2d8g6nhl6jvjk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>28765</id>
      <parentid>27954</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-04T14:32:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="23213">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  E.g. when going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], you better avoid [[Paris]]: go through [[Luxemburg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons:  some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with.   On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place.  Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]].  Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space dosen´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of petrol (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didnt have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in [[Eastern Europe]]. [[England]]'s not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a high penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced too. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>b6k0m3ad6eiys2xinwupv3pzk55d3z6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29131</id>
      <parentid>28765</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-12T00:59:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="23214">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  E.g. when going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], you better avoid [[Paris]]: go through [[Luxemburg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons:  some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with.   On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place.  Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]].  Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of petrol (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in [[Eastern Europe]]. [[England]]'s not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a high penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced too. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>9q5u0ri6y1ovo9fytq5homsq3chd8lh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29382</id>
      <parentid>29131</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-20T05:30:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>213.165.86.131</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="23228">trmonc
There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  E.g. when going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], you better avoid [[Paris]]: go through [[Luxemburg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk LÃ¤nderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons:  some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with.   On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place.  Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]].  Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, donât wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesnÂ´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of petrol (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in [[Eastern Europe]]. [[England]]'s not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a high penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced too. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>gbwyvvh2jilyxcahzz95c3r6tio3e50</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29387</id>
      <parentid>29382</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-20T10:57:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robino</username>
        <id>4</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="23214">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  E.g. when going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], you better avoid [[Paris]]: go through [[Luxemburg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons:  some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with.   On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place.  Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]].  Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of petrol (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in [[Eastern Europe]]. [[England]]'s not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a high penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced too. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>9q5u0ri6y1ovo9fytq5homsq3chd8lh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29480</id>
      <parentid>29387</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-21T16:14:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>77.206.124.164</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="23230">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  E.g. when going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], you better avoid [[Paris]]: go through [[Luxemburg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons:  some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with.   On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place.  Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]].  Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of petrol (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in [[Eastern Europe]]. [[England]]'s not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a high penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced too. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>skhisgwmfzn94e1p3p01t79k40zhfog</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29625</id>
      <parentid>29480</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-26T17:33:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>212.159.46.125</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="23229">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  E.g. when going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], you better avoid [[Paris]]: go through [[Luxemburg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons:  some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with.   On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place.  Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]].  Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of petrol (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in [[Eastern Europe]]. [[England]]'s not a great country for blackriding, impossible on buses (pretty much), and hard on trams. But for short hops on local trains, it's possible. Bear in mind though, if you get caught, you'll have to pay full fare for a ticket, and possibly a high penalty as well. You may even end up with a criminal record.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>bq6xyop25kmjtxml6li9ct9zzotbf9m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30131</id>
      <parentid>29625</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-18T02:19:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>82.1.242.235</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="23660">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  E.g. when going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], you better avoid [[Paris]]: go through [[Luxemburg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers. It's rare that a driver, travelling north on a motorway, will soon turn round and travel southeast for a long distance.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons:  some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with.   On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place.  Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]].  Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of petrol (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in [[Eastern Europe]]. 

[[England]] is not a great country for blackriding, pretty much impossible on buses as with very few exceptions you purchase a ticket from the driver, and hard on trams. For short hops on local trains, it's possible, and from stations without a ticket office, where one is expected to buy a ticket on board the train, it's often possible to simply look out of the window or pay attention to a book, and the conductor won't bother you. The same is just as possible from a station with a ticket office, however, if caught the penalty ranges from from being expected to pay a higher fare, to being fined £20 or more, and to having your details taken and risking a criminal record; and you should weigh up the risk against the cost of paying the fare.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>bhq3wcuye7qkht8oxzycedrf36vljp1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30132</id>
      <parentid>30131</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-18T02:22:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>82.1.242.235</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="23674">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons:  some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with.   On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place.  Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]].  Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of petrol (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have the tendency to get really worked up when it comes to politics, or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to say, "I'm not going to get into that with you, my friend" or something like that. Many a hitcher has been seen thrown out of cars due to a fiery political discussion.

Some drivers will go extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask nicely.

Make sure you know where the driver will drop you off, and try to choose the ideal drop-off point yourself - despite their efforts to help, drivers sometimes leave you in very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you away to find a better spot.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help. Also, knowing where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in [[Eastern Europe]]. 

[[England]] is not a great country for blackriding, pretty much impossible on buses as with very few exceptions you purchase a ticket from the driver, and hard on trams. For short hops on local trains, it's possible, and from stations without a ticket office, where one is expected to buy a ticket on board the train, it's often possible to simply look out of the window or pay attention to a book, and the conductor won't bother you. The same is just as possible from a station with a ticket office, however, if caught the penalty ranges from from being expected to pay a higher fare, to being fined £20 or more, and to having your details taken and risking a criminal record; and you should weigh up the risk against the cost of paying the fare.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>ho6kft0n1y1vu7u078gdebd31wbl2l3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30134</id>
      <parentid>30132</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-18T02:32:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>82.1.242.235</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="24001">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons:  some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with.   On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place.  Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]].  Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of petrol (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway. Just get on and take a seat. If you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on - jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in [[Eastern Europe]]. 

[[England]] is not a great country for blackriding, pretty much impossible on buses as with very few exceptions you purchase a ticket from the driver, and hard on trams. For short hops on local trains, it's possible, and from stations without a ticket office, where one is expected to buy a ticket on board the train, it's often possible to simply look out of the window or pay attention to a book, and the conductor won't bother you. The same is just as possible from a station with a ticket office, however, if caught the penalty ranges from from being expected to pay a higher fare, to being fined £20 or more, and to having your details taken and risking a criminal record; and you should weigh up the risk against the cost of paying the fare.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>jauso8ezf4r61d2z4v07be1nm9p8bc7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30135</id>
      <parentid>30134</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-18T02:34:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>82.1.242.235</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="24042">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons:  some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with.   On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place.  Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]].  Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, i.e. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of petrol (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway; Just get on and take a seat. Preferably sit and stand near a door, and if you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on, jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in [[Eastern Europe]]. 

[[England]] is not a great country for blackriding, pretty much impossible on buses as with very few exceptions you purchase a ticket from the driver, and hard on trams. For short hops on local trains, it's possible, and from stations without a ticket office, where one is expected to buy a ticket on board the train, it's often possible to simply look out of the window or pay attention to a book, and the conductor won't bother you. The same is just as possible from a station with a ticket office, however, if caught the penalty ranges from from being expected to pay a higher fare, to being fined £20 or more, and to having your details taken and risking a criminal record; and you should weigh up the risk against the cost of paying the fare.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>qbvlxfjq2ggvl8lmzsfxvafvy3bzknp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30136</id>
      <parentid>30135</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-18T02:35:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>82.1.242.235</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="24042">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]] instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons:  some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with.   On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place.  Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]].  Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of petrol (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway; Just get on and take a seat. Preferably sit and stand near a door, and if you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on, jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in [[Eastern Europe]]. 

[[England]] is not a great country for blackriding, pretty much impossible on buses as with very few exceptions you purchase a ticket from the driver, and hard on trams. For short hops on local trains, it's possible, and from stations without a ticket office, where one is expected to buy a ticket on board the train, it's often possible to simply look out of the window or pay attention to a book, and the conductor won't bother you. The same is just as possible from a station with a ticket office, however, if caught the penalty ranges from from being expected to pay a higher fare, to being fined £20 or more, and to having your details taken and risking a criminal record; and you should weigh up the risk against the cost of paying the fare.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>lmk2jlfto1f77qfn2wyb3l1rllcbgex</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30139</id>
      <parentid>30136</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-18T02:38:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>82.1.242.235</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="24089">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons:  some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with.   On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place.  Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]].  Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of petrol (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Usually you can get away without paying on public transport anyway; Just get on and take a seat. Preferably sit and stand near a door, and if you see someone at the stop getting on that might want to see your ticket when they get on, jump off and take the next one. Trams in particular are easy to blackride, as are buses in [[Eastern Europe]]. 

[[England]] is not a great country for blackriding, pretty much impossible on buses as with very few exceptions you purchase a ticket from the driver, and hard on trams. For short hops on local trains, it's possible, and from stations without a ticket office, where one is expected to buy a ticket on board the train, it's often possible to simply look out of the window or pay attention to a book, and the conductor won't bother you. The same is just as possible from a station with a ticket office, however, if caught the penalty ranges from from being expected to pay a higher fare, to being fined £20 or more, and to having your details taken and risking a criminal record; and you should weigh up the risk against the cost of paying the fare.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>c5t9rjjcoroqnvfb0adrq3fuomumyfx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30145</id>
      <parentid>30139</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-18T03:43:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sigurdas</username>
        <id>1658</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="23447">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons:  some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with.   On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place.  Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]].  Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of petrol (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a  country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>crcwpgoyj3e5ak17sbwc22yoogbsd0o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30173</id>
      <parentid>30145</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-18T18:18:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.162.219.98</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="23462">trlitad
There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk LÃ¤nderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons:  some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with.   On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place.  Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]].  Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, donât wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesnÂ´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of petrol (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a  country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>ss6pbrg30id81evmcn1ijv0gi821c9r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30175</id>
      <parentid>30173</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-18T18:20:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="23447">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons:  some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with.   On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place.  Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]].  Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of petrol (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a  country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>crcwpgoyj3e5ak17sbwc22yoogbsd0o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30633</id>
      <parentid>30175</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-30T22:59:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Ataqlibert</username>
        <id>1502</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="23534">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons:  some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with.   On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place.  Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]].  Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[Image:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of petrol (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a  country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>r3ztak8pl38323514et5pafnfmwvwmr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30635</id>
      <parentid>30633</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-30T23:04:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Ataqlibert</username>
        <id>1502</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="23570">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be driven over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons:  some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with.   On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place.  Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]].  Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[Image:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of petrol (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[Image:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a  country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>cr4zyjnp6p6du685pbzb9dsaok3i63s</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30944</id>
      <parentid>30635</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-09T16:41:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.80.205.40</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="23567">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons:  some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with.   On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place.  Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]].  Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[Image:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of petrol (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[Image:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a  country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>1mcezfwps8zh4g4pzsm2n8oure7o0ir</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32695</id>
      <parentid>30944</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-03T13:23:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Alex</username>
        <id>89</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="23710">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons:  some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with.   On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place.  Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]].  Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[Image:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of petrol (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[Image:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a  country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.


== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>jpgl9tapn0jd4xm01wpo8yivsvjub3n</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32848</id>
      <parentid>32695</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-09T05:24:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>220.233.5.217</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="23800">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons:  some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with.   On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place.  Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]].  Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[Image:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
[[Image:DSC00176.JPG]]|thumb|right|200px| True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of petrol (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[Image:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a  country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.


== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>1c8svm0nt9km3py2c0gxag7n8xjkdzm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32849</id>
      <parentid>32848</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-09T05:25:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>220.233.5.217</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="23802">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons:  some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with.   On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place.  Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]].  Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[Image:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
[[Image:DSC00176.JPG]]|thumb|right|200px| True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of petrol (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[Image:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a  country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.


== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>nc089iacgecg0oem5ne89wd8wf9ujvd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32850</id>
      <parentid>32849</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-09T05:27:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>220.233.5.217</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="23801">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons:  some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with.   On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place.  Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]].  Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[Image:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.)

[[Image:DSC00176.JPG]]|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of petrol (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[Image:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a  country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.


== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>hlhh9s0m2oiccn40p3balx98jpkv8e1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32851</id>
      <parentid>32850</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-09T05:31:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>220.233.5.217</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="23917">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons:  some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with.   On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place.  Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]].  Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[Image:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[Image:DSC00176.JPG]]|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of petrol (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[Image:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a  country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.


== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>9fvwvr2dhtz6lsqfxrgl6vm4g4uwkn7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32852</id>
      <parentid>32851</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-09T05:32:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>220.233.5.217</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="24030">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons:  some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with.   On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place.  Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]].  Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[Image:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[Image:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of petrol (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[Image:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a  country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.


== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>oladekndbksf23ivcj4wwejiovhqc5h</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32853</id>
      <parentid>32852</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-09T05:32:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>220.233.5.217</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="23915">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons:  some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with.   On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place.  Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]].  Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[Image:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[Image:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of petrol (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[Image:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a  country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.


== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>73elqjpdr92qw07vxp00e1ujs8ye5ra</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32859</id>
      <parentid>32853</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-09T17:43:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="23915">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons:  some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with.   On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place.  Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]].  Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[Image:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[Image:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of petrol (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[Image:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a  country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.


== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>73elqjpdr92qw07vxp00e1ujs8ye5ra</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>33720</id>
      <parentid>32859</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-28T14:21:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.156.213.38</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="23931">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons:  some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with.   On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place.  Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]].  Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[Image:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[Image:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of petrol (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[Image:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a  country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.


== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:Top Tips]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>92n1emoaz21ey8k299yrakyer81otrq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>33938</id>
      <parentid>33720</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-06-14T22:18:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>196.206.86.158</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="23928">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons:  some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with.   On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place.  Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]].  Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[Image:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[Image:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[Image:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a  country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.


== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:Top Tips]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>7w9ko8mowm9p7jbm5j4t4i7mrky5ot0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>33999</id>
      <parentid>33938</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-06-17T06:52:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>87.6.193.9</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="24036">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons:  some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with.   On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place.  Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]].  Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[Image:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[Image:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[Image:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a  country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany. In Italy, hitching from pay stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:Top Tips]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>5f6fhed0j44v2cmnz3bbrie5oabr16z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>34414</id>
      <parentid>33999</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-06T18:37:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Seeker</username>
        <id>1948</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="24311">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[Image:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas.  When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[Image:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety | danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons:  some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with.   On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place.  Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]].  Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[Image:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes.  Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[Image:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes.  (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[Image:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly.  There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you.  A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[Image:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context.  For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[Image:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety | Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[Image:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[Image:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a  country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany. In Italy, hitching from pay stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:Top Tips]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>4lu8f81s8eoaad63ewj4dv80f80eo9v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35547</id>
      <parentid>34414</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T19:07:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="24286">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes. (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany. In Italy, hitching from pay stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[fr:Top Tips]]

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>ju0taqc0qbvyaooe4tlhqkrhymd61ay</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35829</id>
      <parentid>35547</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-16T13:20:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>193.227.228.253</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="24297">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes. (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from pay stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[fr:Top Tips]]

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>o5chaog88ywnnsvs5g1pmwoyo5a9cib</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36037</id>
      <parentid>35829</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-23T17:59:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="24449">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
*France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péages]]s plus lots of other roads.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes. (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from pay stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[fr:Top Tips]]

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>fcoghzh533nnjqhzwstphn3tfo9vai0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36038</id>
      <parentid>36037</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-23T18:00:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="24532">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péages]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes. (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from pay stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[fr:Top Tips]]

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>64cv7rf9yl0hycm91o6q9ze8sgteyuv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36039</id>
      <parentid>36038</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-23T18:00:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="24531">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes. (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from pay stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[fr:Top Tips]]

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>gjonrih6p8modlho89ry8nenzyg9i8y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36040</id>
      <parentid>36039</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-23T18:01:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="24540">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads. Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes. (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from pay stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[fr:Top Tips]]

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>rgh6y4y608e7navz2nnvkzlzw1spcnb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36041</id>
      <parentid>36040</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-23T18:07:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="24606">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes. (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East."

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from pay stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[fr:Top Tips]]

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>kp9on0elotduz7w21aufl6g1l37e4nj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36042</id>
      <parentid>36041</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-23T18:19:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="24817">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes. (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker, if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend.
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from pay stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[fr:Top Tips]]

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>nlr28p488jsfsx7f4itk91451j92p05</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36043</id>
      <parentid>36042</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-23T18:21:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="24965">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes. (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker, if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self conscience.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from pay stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[fr:Top Tips]]

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>3ced75rilnv9790bqja6poszo0eikrd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36044</id>
      <parentid>36043</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-23T18:24:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="24995">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes. (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker, if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self conscience.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from pay stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[fr:Top Tips]]

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>7tm8r5qzlarlax8pheuhfz6nkysk178</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36615</id>
      <parentid>36044</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-08-17T23:59:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="25028">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make its decision to stop or not while he sees you at a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for him and he might change his mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area he would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes. (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker, if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self conscience.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from pay stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[fr:Top Tips]]

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>qa7cf4zmhhp7kh6hpjh7o5xq0xf7t6v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>37335</id>
      <parentid>36615</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-09-16T04:53:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>76.67.26.232</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="25039">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes. (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker, if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self conscience.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from pay stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}
[[fr:Top Tips]]

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>s93fr0o72mhf4rtu47wmyde9ag6vzkl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>37726</id>
      <parentid>37335</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-10-09T22:07:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="25041">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes. (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker, if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self conscience.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from pay stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>hf676t1plfufjktd4ubvo0tepysghpc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38566</id>
      <parentid>37726</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-11-25T02:27:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>87.59.183.178</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="25121">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them. It's called "Pause machen, aber richtig" Just ask for it at the petrol station.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes. (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker, if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self conscience.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from pay stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>aiu9ld1gquvd8vcoutwajd5s1of7h2w</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38582</id>
      <parentid>38566</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-11-25T08:45:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="25041">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes. (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker, if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self conscience.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from pay stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]</text>
      <sha1>hf676t1plfufjktd4ubvo0tepysghpc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39136</id>
      <parentid>38582</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-12-31T22:50:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Vidimian</username>
        <id>1703</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="25065">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes. (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker, if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self conscience.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from pay stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[tr:En Kral Tüyolar]]</text>
      <sha1>op5uwr0rk5zip89invcg97qj86pt0vx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39689</id>
      <parentid>39136</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-02-11T02:52:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>88.161.163.112</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="25065">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes. (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker, if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from pay stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[tr:En Kral Tüyolar]]</text>
      <sha1>5g80hjzqmbue9m6low60hgtkair49qy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39690</id>
      <parentid>39689</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-02-11T02:57:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>88.161.163.112</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="25066">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes. (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker, if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[tr:En Kral Tüyolar]]</text>
      <sha1>9s7767wa1qx6rb5w95g5dtnlubc19c8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40088</id>
      <parentid>39690</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-11T22:54:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mipplor</username>
        <id>1887</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="25086">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes. (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker, if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[tr:En Kral Tüyolar]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>a7td8t5hk0cd6xlvpq0nr7tncgrwcqy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40772</id>
      <parentid>40088</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-30T18:01:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="25112">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes. (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker, if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[tr:En Kral Tüyolar]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>56fogt7bvn1745tu74jy4fegq2gyz9d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40778</id>
      <parentid>40772</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-30T20:35:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="25119">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes. (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker, if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>65whjmsgu1znrz6bdtv5dixqt6rm8e0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41083</id>
      <parentid>40778</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-07T04:29:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>64.252.207.137</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="25115">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes. (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker, if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>oi7mf30zurlgdjiy434lw13odlskeok</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41984</id>
      <parentid>41083</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-05-18T23:43:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>193.77.221.51</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="25344">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know were you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes. (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker, if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>1tq6j2jory1t8r4yb2oat31ouxjpxez</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>42075</id>
      <parentid>41984</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-05-24T00:59:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>217.77.26.102</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="25345">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes. (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker, if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] using was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>giczms0c4ham5imvxzaxgo0l0vl5uxr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>42536</id>
      <parentid>42075</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-06-18T11:46:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>131.227.213.124</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="25339">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes. (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker, if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>q15gcs9hwyybrj6p303bt8tm7wvx09g</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44240</id>
      <parentid>42536</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-08-23T01:03:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="25355">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes. (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker, if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>h5ilt623owlohepmrpo7ntppsq2985t</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44830</id>
      <parentid>44240</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-09-15T19:35:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>90.220.103.56</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="25540">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

The best advice we have ever received, by a long timer hitch hiker is to ALWAYS stay on the motorways. Carry your tent with you. You can waste a whole day trying to get out of a city.

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes. (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker, if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>kit1x3v146tt3km05r3ecev1tdu509y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44831</id>
      <parentid>44830</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-09-15T22:21:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tmoon</username>
        <id>91</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="25355">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquitte]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes. (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker, if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>h5ilt623owlohepmrpo7ntppsq2985t</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>45245</id>
      <parentid>44831</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-09-24T17:12:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="25355">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes. (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker, if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>pecdxv059zwv0p69a5ni6dp5a0g7hd7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>45314</id>
      <parentid>45245</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-09-27T19:09:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tawax</username>
        <id>2655</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="25398">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes. (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>4kn65m70ghfr14makk840nhl27bxbro</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>45387</id>
      <parentid>45314</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-02T01:50:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="25591">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, and free from any Esso petrol station in [[Finland]] 
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes. (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>l0w6v6m8dy538luhv7d3cbmlwvitbmh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>45804</id>
      <parentid>45387</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-13T18:57:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>88.148.222.65</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="25634">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, but unfortunately ''these are no longer available'' in [[Finland]] as Esso has fled the country.
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes. (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>iaxnghrcsi8fu7to7xmm421yf1ec44w</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>45935</id>
      <parentid>45804</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-16T11:48:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Rainbowwardy</username>
        <id>2698</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="26089">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, but unfortunately ''these are no longer available'' in [[Finland]] as Esso has fled the country.
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''"PLEASE".''' can work sometimes. (It worked for Max, www.couchsurfing.com user:mxnnx.) 

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>8ti2k8ctp2vvk2qrdtw178dgbz2cdxg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48479</id>
      <parentid>45935</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-29T10:33:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="26051">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, but unfortunately ''these are no longer available'' in [[Finland]] as Esso has fled the country.
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. You're in charge.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>ltvthob4w1qb1alb8zlxj5gforl54tv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>50188</id>
      <parentid>48479</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-03-15T08:26:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>92.229.37.92</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="26265">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, but unfortunately ''these are no longer available'' in [[Finland]] as Esso has fled the country.
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|left|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]
On longer hitchhiking trips you may need to camp along the way, if you did not receive a ride to your intended destination. Sometimes you can find a hostel or local host for the night, but just in case: bring a sleeping bag and tarp or tent with you. Make sure to bring clothes that will suit you for night weather.

It is also a good idea to check out [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active), [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org] and [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places) for free accommodation. If there's a YMCA center in town, see if they have a room for the night. There are many hitchhikers and it is easy to find a couple of places to stay while on the road or even at your destination. A fresh shave and shower will also greatly increase the chances of getting picked up.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the night. (Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.) At night don't bother trying to get lifts with a sign, just ask people at the petrol station when they go to pay. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy autobahn service area. The other alternative is to find a truck (or a car) going a really really long way and crash out on the way. Make sure you trust the driver or do it with 2 hitchers taking turns to sleep. The downside to this is that you might wake up a long way from where you wanted to be but at least you didn't have to sleep in the gutter.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>7b2nxc4wes6nganj888isc6eqgc8rgo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>50430</id>
      <parentid>50188</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-03-27T16:35:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tawax</username>
        <id>2655</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="26173">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, but unfortunately ''these are no longer available'' in [[Finland]] as Esso has fled the country.
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accomodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to camp along the way so bring a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you. A few hours before the sunset, begin to notice all the places where you could sleep:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Do there is a big [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are?
* Do you notice McDo games, an inhabited house or a good place to lay down your sleeping bag?
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24 hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[night]]. (''Joe: My advice would be not to. After about 11p.m., it's probably best just to accept that you've been lucky and are stuck at a petrol station where you can stay warm. If you take another lift, you might end up in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning.'') Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00 even at a busy highway service area.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>g19eiu45gw871lo6xc3vt2lewbjixmf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>50432</id>
      <parentid>50430</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-03-27T17:13:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="26049">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/airports etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, but unfortunately ''these are no longer available'' in [[Finland]] as Esso has fled the country.
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accomodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to camp along the way so bring a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you. A few hours before the sunset, start looking out for places where you could sleep:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are?
* Do you notice McDo games, an inhabited house or a good place to lay down your sleeping bag?
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[night]], but only do so if the driver can take you to the next 24-hour station, getting stuck in the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night is not good. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>l4arhb9vhkl8in4cxp30ytc48dxnmbg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>50444</id>
      <parentid>50432</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-03-27T18:35:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tawax</username>
        <id>2655</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="26096">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going trough. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style [[maps]] are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, but unfortunately ''these are no longer available'' in [[Finland]] as Esso has fled the country.
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveller and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, eg see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn´t permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 


[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop travelling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accomodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to camp along the way so bring a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you. A few hours before the sunset, start looking out for places where you could sleep:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are?
* Do you notice McDo games, an inhabited house or a good place to lay down your sleeping bag?
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[night]], but only do so if the driver can take you to the next 24-hour station, getting stuck in the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night is not good. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>p7pn9e871evut45cxhf5xbu1dz88b0q</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>50451</id>
      <parentid>50444</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-03-27T19:14:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="26095">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going trough. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style [[maps]] are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, but unfortunately ''these are no longer available'' in [[Finland]] as Esso has fled the country.
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to camp along the way so bring a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you. A few hours before the sunset, start looking out for places where you could sleep:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are?
* Do you notice McDo games, an inhabited house or a good place to lay down your sleeping bag?
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[night]], but only do so if the driver can take you to the next 24-hour station, getting stuck in the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night is not good. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>b905wgb9916wmktaud871l1zrucrk6j</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>51521</id>
      <parentid>50451</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-04-06T07:16:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>78.52.225.115</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="26308">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going trough. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style [[maps]] are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent.
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, but unfortunately ''these are no longer available'' in [[Finland]] as Esso has fled the country.
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to camp along the way so bring a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you. A few hours before the sunset, start looking out for places where you could sleep:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are?
* Do you notice McDo games, an inhabited house or a good place to lay down your sleeping bag?
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[night]], but only do so if the driver can take you to the next 24-hour station, getting stuck in the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night is not good. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>5jmhu83j6i8qkn07089pa1cea7wttde</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>52690</id>
      <parentid>51521</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-05-31T15:18:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fedcas</username>
        <id>2856</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="26727">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going trough. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style [[maps]] are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent. Pay attention, the 1:2,000,000 version (ISBN 9783829737043) has no petrol/service stations marked
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, but unfortunately ''these are no longer available'' in [[Finland]] as Esso has fled the country.
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)
* A good map i've found (it has petrol/service stations marked and it's really small and handy! just a little bit bigger than a lonely planet guide) is the 1:1.250.000 Atlante Stradale Europa edited by Istituto Geografico De Agostini (ISBN 8851109680), it's sold in italian book shops but can be found on amazon as well.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to camp along the way so bring a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you. A few hours before the sunset, start looking out for places where you could sleep:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are?
* Do you notice McDo games, an inhabited house or a good place to lay down your sleeping bag?
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[night]], but only do so if the driver can take you to the next 24-hour station, getting stuck in the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night is not good. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>h7n34jlcqmqlin56cmp0jixb1j4yb4l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>52691</id>
      <parentid>52690</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-05-31T15:21:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fedcas</username>
        <id>2856</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="27211">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going trough. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style [[maps]] are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent. Pay attention, the 1:2,000,000 version (ISBN 9783829737043) has no petrol/service stations marked!
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, but unfortunately ''these are no longer available'' in [[Finland]] as Esso has fled the country.
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* The [http://www.anwb.nl/azf/zoek.html?azfid=contact Dutch ANWB]) has quite good European country maps for free (for its members, just ask in the shop some people at the cashpoint if they can take it for you), they also include the motorways to the country from and to the Netherlands.
* The Berlitz Europe atlas includes petrol stations and has a ratio of 1:800 000, though many important cities are in the crease of the book and are difficult to read (e.g., Paris, Berlin, etc.).
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)
* A good map i've found (it has petrol/service stations marked and it's really small and handy! just a little bit bigger than a lonely planet guide) is the 1:1.250.000 Atlante Stradale Europa edited by Istituto Geografico De Agostini (ISBN 8851109680), it's sold in italian book shops but can be found on amazon as well.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to camp along the way so bring a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you. A few hours before the sunset, start looking out for places where you could sleep:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are?
* Do you notice McDo games, an inhabited house or a good place to lay down your sleeping bag?
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[night]], but only do so if the driver can take you to the next 24-hour station, getting stuck in the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night is not good. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>p177qboew7wjh5tv43wfqxx42rm75de</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>52693</id>
      <parentid>52691</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-05-31T16:09:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fedcas</username>
        <id>2856</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="27354">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going trough. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style [[maps]] are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent. Pay attention, the 1:2.000.000 version (ISBN 9783829737043) has no petrol/service stations marked!&lt;br&gt;There is an italian version of this map edit by Studio F.M.B Bologna and the 1:2.000.000 version has the same problem (ISBN 9788877752321).
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, but unfortunately ''these are no longer available'' in [[Finland]] as Esso has fled the country.
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* The [http://www.anwb.nl/azf/zoek.html?azfid=contact Dutch ANWB]) has quite good European country maps for free (for its members, just ask in the shop some people at the cashpoint if they can take it for you), they also include the motorways to the country from and to the Netherlands.
* The Berlitz Europe atlas includes petrol stations and has a ratio of 1:800 000, though many important cities are in the crease of the book and are difficult to read (e.g., Paris, Berlin, etc.).
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)
* A good map i've found (it has petrol/service stations marked and it's really small and handy! just a little bit bigger than a lonely planet guide) is the 1:1.250.000 Atlante Stradale Europa edited by Istituto Geografico De Agostini (ISBN 8851109680), it's sold in italian book shops but can be found on amazon as well.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to camp along the way so bring a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you. A few hours before the sunset, start looking out for places where you could sleep:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are?
* Do you notice McDo games, an inhabited house or a good place to lay down your sleeping bag?
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[night]], but only do so if the driver can take you to the next 24-hour station, getting stuck in the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night is not good. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>o10am07ahmjadi3rekeshvj8re11ypc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>52696</id>
      <parentid>52693</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-05-31T18:57:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="27348">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going trough. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style [[maps]] are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent. Pay attention, the 1:2.000.000 version (ISBN 9783829737043) has no petrol/service stations marked!&lt;br&gt;There is an italian version of this map edit by Studio F.M.B Bologna and the 1:2.000.000 version has the same problem (ISBN 9788877752321).
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, but unfortunately ''these are no longer available'' in [[Finland]] as Esso has fled the country.
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* The [http://www.anwb.nl/azf/zoek.html?azfid=contact Dutch ANWB]) has quite good European country maps for free (for its members, just ask in the shop some people at the cashpoint if they can take it for you), they also include the motorways to the country from and to the Netherlands.
* The Berlitz Europe atlas includes petrol stations and has a ratio of 1:800 000, though many important cities are in the crease of the book and are difficult to read (e.g., Paris, Berlin, etc.).
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)
* Another good map is the 1:1.250.000 Atlante Stradale Europa edited by Istituto Geografico De Agostini (ISBN 8851109680). It has petrol/service stations marked and it's really small and handy! just a little bit bigger than a lonely planet guide. It's sold in italian book shops but can be found on amazon as well.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to camp along the way so bring a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you. A few hours before the sunset, start looking out for places where you could sleep:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are?
* Do you notice McDo games, an inhabited house or a good place to lay down your sleeping bag?
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[night]], but only do so if the driver can take you to the next 24-hour station, getting stuck in the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night is not good. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>p1bor8p5u1ysb60vhpqjqw5xg3j2xik</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>53036</id>
      <parentid>52696</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-06-26T14:52:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>KrijnH</username>
        <id>3457</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="27631">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going trough. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style [[maps]] are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent. Pay attention, the 1:2.000.000 version (ISBN 9783829737043) has no petrol/service stations marked!&lt;br&gt;There is an italian version of this map edit by Studio F.M.B Bologna and the 1:2.000.000 version has the same problem (ISBN 9788877752321).
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, but unfortunately ''these are no longer available'' in [[Finland]] as Esso has fled the country.
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* The [http://www.anwb.nl/azf/zoek.html?azfid=contact Dutch ANWB]) has quite good European country maps for free (for its members, just ask in the shop some people at the cashpoint if they can take it for you), they also include the motorways to the country from and to the Netherlands.
* The Berlitz Europe atlas includes petrol stations and has a ratio of 1:800 000, though many important cities are in the crease of the book and are difficult to read (e.g., Paris, Berlin, etc.).
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)
* Another good map is the 1:1.250.000 Atlante Stradale Europa edited by Istituto Geografico De Agostini (ISBN 8851109680). It has petrol/service stations marked and it's really small and handy! just a little bit bigger than a lonely planet guide. It's sold in italian book shops but can be found on amazon as well.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidencebooster bit is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepperspray is probably a better option (if legal).

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to camp along the way so bring a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you. A few hours before the sunset, start looking out for places where you could sleep:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are?
* Do you notice McDo games, an inhabited house or a good place to lay down your sleeping bag?
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[night]], but only do so if the driver can take you to the next 24-hour station, getting stuck in the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night is not good. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>femf3aiffkxpshwjgvz6tl17pjrftyc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>53618</id>
      <parentid>53036</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-07-23T21:22:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tawax</username>
        <id>2655</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="27723">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going trough. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style [[maps]] are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent. Pay attention, the 1:2.000.000 version (ISBN 9783829737043) has no petrol/service stations marked!&lt;br&gt;There is an italian version of this map edit by Studio F.M.B Bologna and the 1:2.000.000 version has the same problem (ISBN 9788877752321).
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, but unfortunately ''these are no longer available'' in [[Finland]] as Esso has fled the country.
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* The [http://www.anwb.nl/azf/zoek.html?azfid=contact Dutch ANWB]) has quite good European country maps for free (for its members, just ask in the shop some people at the cashpoint if they can take it for you), they also include the motorways to the country from and to the Netherlands.
* The Berlitz Europe atlas includes petrol stations and has a ratio of 1:800 000, though many important cities are in the crease of the book and are difficult to read (e.g., Paris, Berlin, etc.).
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)
* Another good map is the 1:1.250.000 Atlante Stradale Europa edited by Istituto Geografico De Agostini (ISBN 8851109680). It has petrol/service stations marked and it's really small and handy! just a little bit bigger than a lonely planet guide. It's sold in italian book shops but can be found on amazon as well.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidencebooster bit is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepperspray is probably a better option (if legal).

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
* Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>rok5jp56aiqioxs0fjtdfy0p1qfc8kd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>53647</id>
      <parentid>53618</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-07-25T10:13:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tawax</username>
        <id>2655</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="27876">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going trough. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style [[maps]] are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries. The ''Falk Reiseatlas Europa 1 : 800 000 / 1: 4 500 000'' (ISBN 9783827904348) covers the whole Europe for a low price and includes the petrol stations.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent. Pay attention, the 1:2.000.000 version (ISBN 9783829737043) has no petrol/service stations marked!&lt;br&gt;There is an italian version of this map edit by Studio F.M.B Bologna and the 1:2.000.000 version has the same problem (ISBN 9788877752321).
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, but unfortunately ''these are no longer available'' in [[Finland]] as Esso has fled the country.
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* The [http://www.anwb.nl/azf/zoek.html?azfid=contact Dutch ANWB]) has quite good European country maps for free (for its members, just ask in the shop some people at the cashpoint if they can take it for you), they also include the motorways to the country from and to the Netherlands.
* The Berlitz Europe atlas includes petrol stations and has a ratio of 1:800 000, though many important cities are in the crease of the book and are difficult to read (e.g., Paris, Berlin, etc.).
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about 5.50 € (July 2009)
* Another good map is the 1:1.250.000 Atlante Stradale Europa edited by Istituto Geografico De Agostini (ISBN 8851109680). It has petrol/service stations marked and it's really small and handy! just a little bit bigger than a lonely planet guide. It's sold in italian book shops but can be found on amazon as well.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidencebooster bit is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepperspray is probably a better option (if legal).

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
* Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>9rurg2se4m801kbxnm3262m49qx3rit</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>53664</id>
      <parentid>53647</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-07-25T17:21:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="27876">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going trough. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style [[maps]] are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries. The ''Falk Reiseatlas Europa 1 : 800 000 / 1: 4 500 000'' (ISBN 9783827904348) covers the whole Europe for a low price and includes the petrol stations.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent. Pay attention, the 1:2.000.000 version (ISBN 9783829737043) has no petrol/service stations marked!&lt;br&gt;There is an italian version of this map edit by Studio F.M.B Bologna and the 1:2.000.000 version has the same problem (ISBN 9788877752321).
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, but unfortunately ''these are no longer available'' in [[Finland]] as Esso has fled the country.
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* The [http://www.anwb.nl/azf/zoek.html?azfid=contact Dutch ANWB]) has quite good European country maps for free (for its members, just ask in the shop some people at the cashpoint if they can take it for you), they also include the motorways to the country from and to the Netherlands.
* The Berlitz Europe atlas includes petrol stations and has a ratio of 1:800 000, though many important cities are in the crease of the book and are difficult to read (e.g., Paris, Berlin, etc.).
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about EUR 5.50 (July 2009)
* Another good map is the 1:1.250.000 Atlante Stradale Europa edited by Istituto Geografico De Agostini (ISBN 8851109680). It has petrol/service stations marked and it's really small and handy! just a little bit bigger than a lonely planet guide. It's sold in italian book shops but can be found on amazon as well.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip.

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidencebooster bit is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepperspray is probably a better option (if legal).

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
* Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>knd8981z6frdljurfvq5hzechk7rf1e</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>53796</id>
      <parentid>53664</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-07-30T14:58:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Aaronishappy</username>
        <id>2510</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="28058">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going trough. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style [[maps]] are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries. The ''Falk Reiseatlas Europa 1 : 800 000 / 1: 4 500 000'' (ISBN 9783827904348) covers the whole Europe for a low price and includes the petrol stations.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent. Pay attention, the 1:2.000.000 version (ISBN 9783829737043) has no petrol/service stations marked!&lt;br&gt;There is an italian version of this map edit by Studio F.M.B Bologna and the 1:2.000.000 version has the same problem (ISBN 9788877752321).
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, but unfortunately ''these are no longer available'' in [[Finland]] as Esso has fled the country.
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* The [http://www.anwb.nl/azf/zoek.html?azfid=contact Dutch ANWB]) has quite good European country maps for free (for its members, just ask in the shop some people at the cashpoint if they can take it for you), they also include the motorways to the country from and to the Netherlands.
* The Berlitz Europe atlas includes petrol stations and has a ratio of 1:800 000, though many important cities are in the crease of the book and are difficult to read (e.g., Paris, Berlin, etc.).
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about EUR 5.50 (July 2009)
* Another good map is the 1:1.250.000 Atlante Stradale Europa edited by Istituto Geografico De Agostini (ISBN 8851109680). It has petrol/service stations marked and it's really small and handy! just a little bit bigger than a lonely planet guide. It's sold in italian book shops but can be found on amazon as well.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I dont think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidencebooster bit is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepperspray is probably a better option (if legal).

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
* Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>5gwervx1gub4znhex281o2qz3plpt7y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>54118</id>
      <parentid>53796</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-08-19T01:33:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="28112">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going trough. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style [[maps]] are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries. The ''Falk Reiseatlas Europa 1 : 800 000 / 1: 4 500 000'' (ISBN 978-3-8279-0434-8) covers the whole Europe for a low price and includes the petrol stations.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent. Pay attention, the 1:2.000.000 version (ISBN 978-3-8297-3704-3) has no petrol/service stations marked!&lt;br /&gt;There is an italian version of this map edit by Studio F.M.B Bologna and the 1:2.000.000 version has the same problem (ISBN 978-88-7775-232-1).
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, but unfortunately ''these are no longer available'' in [[Finland]] as Esso has fled the country.
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* The [http://www.anwb.nl/azf/zoek.html?azfid=contact Dutch ANWB]) has quite good European country maps for free (for its members, just ask in the shop some people at the cashpoint if they can take it for you), they also include the motorways to the country from and to the Netherlands.
* The Berlitz Europe atlas includes petrol stations and has a ratio of 1:800 000, though many important cities are in the crease of the book and are difficult to read (e.g., Paris, Berlin, etc.).
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about EUR 5.50 (July 2009)
* Another good map is the 1:1.250.000 Atlante Stradale Europa edited by Istituto Geografico De Agostini (ISBN 88-511-0968-0). It has petrol/service stations marked and it's really small and handy! just a little bit bigger than a lonely planet guide. It's sold in italian book shops but can be found on amazon as well.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I dont think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidencebooster bit is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepperspray is probably a better option (if legal).

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
* Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>0klersaypxpqcgpvs852fsaw9why6c5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>54265</id>
      <parentid>54118</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-08-29T20:54:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>PigFat</username>
        <id>2872</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="28334">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going trough. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style [[maps]] are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries. The ''Falk Reiseatlas Europa 1 : 800 000 / 1: 4 500 000'' (ISBN 978-3-8279-0434-8) covers the whole Europe for a low price and includes the petrol stations.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent. Pay attention, the 1:2.000.000 version (ISBN 978-3-8297-3704-3) has no petrol/service stations marked!&lt;br /&gt;There is an italian version of this map edit by Studio F.M.B Bologna and the 1:2.000.000 version has the same problem (ISBN 978-88-7775-232-1).
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, but unfortunately ''these are no longer available'' in [[Finland]] as Esso has fled the country.
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* The [http://www.anwb.nl/azf/zoek.html?azfid=contact Dutch ANWB]) has quite good European country maps for free (for its members, just ask in the shop some people at the cashpoint if they can take it for you), they also include the motorways to the country from and to the Netherlands.
* The Berlitz Europe atlas includes petrol stations and has a ratio of 1:800 000, though many important cities are in the crease of the book and are difficult to read (e.g., Paris, Berlin, etc.).
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about EUR 5.50 (July 2009)
* Another good map is the 1:1.250.000 Atlante Stradale Europa edited by Istituto Geografico De Agostini (ISBN 88-511-0968-0). It has petrol/service stations marked and it's really small and handy! just a little bit bigger than a lonely planet guide. It's sold in italian book shops but can be found on amazon as well.
* For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them.  Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I dont think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidencebooster bit is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepperspray is probably a better option (if legal).

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
* Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stops in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>0dq2f6dmfsdchwmrngz4skom5giovog</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>54444</id>
      <parentid>54265</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-09-04T13:51:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Shokora</username>
        <id>3816</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="28333">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going trough. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station]]s are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style [[maps]] are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries. The ''Falk Reiseatlas Europa 1 : 800 000 / 1: 4 500 000'' (ISBN 978-3-8279-0434-8) covers the whole Europe for a low price and includes the petrol stations.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent. Pay attention, the 1:2.000.000 version (ISBN 978-3-8297-3704-3) has no petrol/service stations marked!&lt;br /&gt;There is an italian version of this map edit by Studio F.M.B Bologna and the 1:2.000.000 version has the same problem (ISBN 978-88-7775-232-1).
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, but unfortunately ''these are no longer available'' in [[Finland]] as Esso has fled the country.
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* The [http://www.anwb.nl/azf/zoek.html?azfid=contact Dutch ANWB]) has quite good European country maps for free (for its members, just ask in the shop some people at the cashpoint if they can take it for you), they also include the motorways to the country from and to the Netherlands.
* The Berlitz Europe atlas includes petrol stations and has a ratio of 1:800 000, though many important cities are in the crease of the book and are difficult to read (e.g., Paris, Berlin, etc.).
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about EUR 5.50 (July 2009)
* Another good map is the 1:1.250.000 Atlante Stradale Europa edited by Istituto Geografico De Agostini (ISBN 88-511-0968-0). It has petrol/service stations marked and it's really small and handy! just a little bit bigger than a lonely planet guide. It's sold in italian book shops but can be found on amazon as well.
* For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them.  Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I dont think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidencebooster bit is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepperspray is probably a better option (if legal).

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
* Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>rnoroi548s5dxmy32pirvmozj8amdz0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>56278</id>
      <parentid>54444</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-08T01:22:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="28563">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going trough. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style [[maps]] are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know.

'''Map Tips: Positive'''

* The ''Shell Euroatlas'' is good for [[Europe]], however, it's difficult to find.
* The ''Falk Länderkarte'' series (in German, but can be understood by everyone) is brilliant for individual European countries, with a useful, clever and compact fold-out page system. It is easy to find but only inside of [[Germany]] and neighbouring countries. The ''Falk Reiseatlas Europa 1 : 800 000 / 1: 4 500 000'' (ISBN 978-3-8279-0434-8) covers the whole Europe for a low price and includes the petrol stations.
* The maps by ''Marco Polo'' are excellent for Europe. The 1:800,000 ratio version is the best (the name of this map changes in different countries). It is printed in [[Germany]] but is available across the continent. Pay attention, the 1:2.000.000 version (ISBN 978-3-8297-3704-3) has no petrol/service stations marked!&lt;br /&gt;There is an italian version of this map edit by Studio F.M.B Bologna and the 1:2.000.000 version has the same problem (ISBN 978-88-7775-232-1).
* In Scandinavia (especially Finland) - the ''Esso'' country maps are great, but unfortunately ''these are no longer available'' in [[Finland]] as Esso has fled the country.
* For the [[United Kingdom]] and [[Ireland]] AA maps are good but can get a bit too large.
* In Germany, you can get a booklet for free at the rasthof restaurants which provide a map of all the country's rasthof and the information about every one of them.
* The [http://www.anwb.nl/azf/zoek.html?azfid=contact Dutch ANWB]) has quite good European country maps for free (for its members, just ask in the shop some people at the cashpoint if they can take it for you), they also include the motorways to the country from and to the Netherlands.
* The Berlitz Europe atlas includes petrol stations and has a ratio of 1:800 000, though many important cities are in the crease of the book and are difficult to read (e.g., Paris, Berlin, etc.).
* France: "Grands Itinéraires" by Michelin. 1:1,000,000, but featuring all the ''autoroutes'', service areas and [[Péage]]s plus lots of other roads. You should be able to buy it in most service areas for about EUR 5.50 (July 2009)
* Another good map is the 1:1.250.000 Atlante Stradale Europa edited by Istituto Geografico De Agostini (ISBN 88-511-0968-0). It has petrol/service stations marked and it's really small and handy! just a little bit bigger than a lonely planet guide. It's sold in italian book shops but can be found on amazon as well.
* For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough.

Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

'''Map Tips: Negative'''

* ''Michelin'' Individual Country maps are not the best to use, they do not list the Services Area and lots of useful information are absent, the scale ratio is often not good enough.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I dont think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidencebooster bit is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepperspray is probably a better option (if legal).

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
* Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>awmnojcmx62vhrcxs5vyw8ydz3astkn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>58897</id>
      <parentid>56278</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-01-30T10:36:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kriechstrom</username>
        <id>4374</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="26064">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going trough. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I dont think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidencebooster bit is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepperspray is probably a better option (if legal).

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
* Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>gdb201ln2yzck125fnvd6mlkg49s9cv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>60304</id>
      <parentid>58897</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-03-30T18:19:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="26304">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going trough. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I dont think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidencebooster bit is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepperspray is probably a better option (if legal).

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't loose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
* Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>2k336nkk5odt58gvvxnevtfcrk8v9fz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>60752</id>
      <parentid>60304</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-04-25T08:12:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lemjok</username>
        <id>5014</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="26413">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going trough. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I dont think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidencebooster bit is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepperspray is probably a better option (if legal).

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't loose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
* Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>6mki5z8ywbdhd87bylgvuusx5pskn5o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>60753</id>
      <parentid>60752</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-04-25T08:23:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lemjok</username>
        <id>5014</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="26412">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going trough. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I dont think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidencebooster bit is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepperspray is probably a better option (if legal).

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
* Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>s6ywx9pfkenyet13fvnado2kup7wt5f</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68749</id>
      <parentid>60753</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-03-23T19:08:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="26430">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going trough. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I dont think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidencebooster bit is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepperspray is probably a better option (if legal).

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
* Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>adbhb3vqb0c1lr44p2uhtk1jrgocivn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69287</id>
      <parentid>68749</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-05-06T18:30:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="26551">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going trough. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I dont think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.
Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidencebooster bit is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepperspray is probably a better option (if legal).

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
* Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>67lvv0h75rlg6n01i9tdu28tbaz0ozt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69288</id>
      <parentid>69287</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-05-06T18:32:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="26932">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going trough. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I dont think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidencebooster bit is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepperspray is probably a better option (if legal).

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
* Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/sections-viewarticle-27.html Sparkie's Guide to Hitchhiking at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>efb2jzwy4u39mpz2a7dsqvbqcc368dl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69289</id>
      <parentid>69288</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-05-06T18:49:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dave69</username>
        <id>8959</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="26918">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going trough. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I dont think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a pepper spray or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidencebooster bit is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepperspray is probably a better option (if legal).

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
* Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/viewforum.php?f=51 Sparkie Hitchhikers Forums at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>2e2ooqac0sm2ty5cphsn3buvec0axjr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69817</id>
      <parentid>69289</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-05-27T11:41:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="26922">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going trough. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I dont think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidencebooster bit is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepperspray is probably a better option (if legal).

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
* Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration. 

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/viewforum.php?f=51 Sparkie Hitchhikers Forums at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>s2hynylzs6wcolocdl3tasj38ahyyf8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70708</id>
      <parentid>69817</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-08-01T21:59:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Jpms</username>
        <id>5347</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="27828">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going trough. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from everyplace, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colorful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colorful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I dont think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright colored clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidencebooster bit is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepperspray is probably a better option (if legal).

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometers off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
* Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

1-Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffe and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120km/hour (instead of 90km/hour)
2-Vacation vans:  The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
3-Truck drivers: They cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/viewforum.php?f=51 Sparkie Hitchhikers Forums at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>807xypnrg3zrha2b7j96df41kcylvdd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70721</id>
      <parentid>70708</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-08-02T17:21:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="27835">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going trough. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal).

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
* Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffe and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120km/hour (instead of 90km/hour)
# Vacation vans:  The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/viewforum.php?f=51 Sparkie Hitchhikers Forums at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>lv1u7yjyipjxilj8hy63dq531vq986a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70722</id>
      <parentid>70721</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-08-03T08:09:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Flasher702</username>
        <id>4472</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="28407">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not always the best. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], along the best highways, etc. In some countries (ex: Romania, Bulgaria) it is difficult to tell the main routes by looking at normal maps so get a current map that specifically highlights trucking routes. Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to drivers because picking a logical A to B route towards a major city that many drivers are likely to be making instead of a direct route through the countryside can save you hours in waiting time vs. multiple smaller rides.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities with nothing interesting inbetween. If you are planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[London|Southeast England]]) or past a major junction city such as [[Vienna]] and out the other side, be aware that many vehicles will stop in the middle and could leave you stranded at a spot where catching a new ride is difficult. In that case it is a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or wait for a ride that takes you beyond the trouble spot. For example: when going to the South of [[France]] from northern europe avoid actually going into the [[Paris]] metro area (have a good spot before paris in mind before you go; get dropped off there instead if your driver is going into Paris), and wait until you find a ride that will take you to the other side OR take another route such as via [[Luxembourg]].

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal).

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
* Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffe and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120km/hour (instead of 90km/hour)
# Vacation vans:  The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/viewforum.php?f=51 Sparkie Hitchhikers Forums at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>728f6t9jk7gi4wnk9qdmelxavgawgsu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70723</id>
      <parentid>70722</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-08-03T08:26:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Flasher702</username>
        <id>4472</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="28371">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not always the best. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], along the best highways, etc. In some countries (ex: Romania, Bulgaria) it is difficult to tell the main routes by looking at normal maps so get a current map that specifically highlights trucking routes. Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to drivers because picking a logical A to B route towards a major city that many drivers are likely to be making instead of a direct route through the countryside can save you hours in waiting time vs. multiple smaller rides.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities with nothing interesting inbetween. If you are planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[London|Southeast England]]) or past a major junction city such as [[Vienna]] and out the other side, be aware that many vehicles will stop in the middle and could leave you stranded at a spot where catching a new ride is difficult. In that case it is a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or wait for a ride that takes you beyond the trouble spot. For example: when going to the South of [[France]] from northern europe avoid actually going into the [[Paris]] metro area (have a good spot before paris in mind before you go; get dropped off there instead if your driver is going into Paris), and wait until you find a ride that will take you to the other side OR take another route such as via [[Luxembourg]].

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal).

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
* Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. This is especially true when leaving or arriving at big cities or to avoid getting stranded someplace overnight. You may not want to believe it, but it is essentially impossible to hitch hike in or out of most western european cities and you will have to take public transit. Sometimes you can get away with not paying for public transport (called "black riding"): check for a "Public Transport" section of the wikipage for a country/city you travel to for tips. If you do blackride preferably sit or stand by the door; last second jumping off when someone who looks like a ticket controller gets on might save you from a fine. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops and to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffe and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120km/hour (instead of 90km/hour)
# Vacation vans:  The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/viewforum.php?f=51 Sparkie Hitchhikers Forums at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>a01n2r1zj1qkycfi1a5v32ignwv5jdd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70724</id>
      <parentid>70723</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-08-03T08:48:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Flasher702</username>
        <id>4472</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="28210">[[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not always the best. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], along the best highways, etc. In some countries (ex: Romania, Bulgaria) it is difficult to tell the main routes by looking at normal maps so get a current map that specifically highlights trucking routes. Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to drivers because picking a logical A to B route towards a major city that many drivers are likely to be making instead of a direct route through the countryside can save you hours in waiting time vs. multiple smaller rides.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities with nothing interesting inbetween. If you are planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[London|Southeast England]]) or past a major junction city such as [[Vienna]] and out the other side, be aware that many vehicles will stop in the middle and could leave you stranded at a spot where catching a new ride is difficult. In that case it is a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or wait for a ride that takes you beyond the trouble spot. For example: when going to the South of [[France]] from northern europe avoid actually going into the [[Paris]] metro area (have a good spot before paris in mind before you go; get dropped off there instead if your driver is going into Paris), and wait until you find a ride that will take you to the other side OR take another route such as via [[Luxembourg]].

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal).

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
* Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. This is especially true when leaving or arriving at big cities or to avoid getting stranded someplace overnight. You may not want to believe it, but it is essentially impossible to hitch hike in or out of most western european cities and you will have to take public transit. Sometimes you can get away with not paying for public transport (called "black riding"): check for a "Public Transport" section of the wikipage for a country/city you travel to for tips. If you do blackride preferably sit or stand by the door; last second jumping off when someone who looks like a ticket controller gets on might save you from a fine. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops and to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffe and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120km/hour (instead of 90km/hour)
# Vacation vans:  The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/viewforum.php?f=51 Sparkie Hitchhikers Forums at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>edaiilzwxzex6v24j3hcgxtlx937knr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70731</id>
      <parentid>70724</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-08-03T20:10:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="27835">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going trough. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal).

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
* Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffe and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120km/hour (instead of 90km/hour)
# Vacation vans:  The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/viewforum.php?f=51 Sparkie Hitchhikers Forums at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>lv1u7yjyipjxilj8hy63dq531vq986a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>74341</id>
      <parentid>70731</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-03-11T08:07:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Spaak</username>
        <id>14696</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="27969">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going trough. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal).

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
* Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffe and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120km/hour (instead of 90km/hour)
# Vacation vans:  The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/viewforum.php?f=51 Sparkie Hitchhikers Forums at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>smx7ojnj5gdmx1qhmg00qbxh7vlzx37</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>76540</id>
      <parentid>74341</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-08-12T17:47:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="28613">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going trough. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal).

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
* Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker (but it supposedly is a bit riskier as well, than any other combination). A guy hitchhiking alone, a woman and male person together and two women, can travel fast as well. Two males hitchhiking together is certainly slower on average. More than two hitchhikers often requires much more patience and it would often be a good idea to split into several groups. If you hitchhike with more than one person, keeping an eye on how much luggage you take with you becomes more important. One big backpack is to be preferred then over two. 

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120 km/hour (instead of 90 km/hour)
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/viewforum.php?f=51 Sparkie Hitchhikers Forums at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>0zj4ijcwnsc0ffy8w4l3emaztha7i9p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>76541</id>
      <parentid>76540</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-08-12T17:54:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="29107">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going trough. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal).

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
* Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker (but it supposedly is a bit riskier as well, than any other combination). A guy hitchhiking alone, a woman and male person together and two women, can travel fast as well. Two males hitchhiking together is certainly slower on average. More than two hitchhikers often requires much more patience and it would often be a good idea to split into several groups. If you hitchhike with more than one person, keeping an eye on how much luggage you take with you becomes more important. One big backpack is to be preferred then over two.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance.

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120 km/hour (instead of 90 km/hour)
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/viewforum.php?f=51 Sparkie Hitchhikers Forums at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>9fafx3sreiyrjwec3x6slxhay7j5sku</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>76542</id>
      <parentid>76541</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-08-12T17:55:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="29134">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going trough. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal).

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
* Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker (but it supposedly is a bit riskier as well, than any other combination). A guy hitchhiking alone, a woman and male person together and two women, can travel fast as well. Two males hitchhiking together is certainly slower on average. More than two hitchhikers often requires much more patience and it would often be a good idea to split into several groups. If you hitchhike with more than one person, keeping an eye on how much luggage you take with you becomes more important. One big backpack is to be preferred then over two.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120 km/hour (instead of 90 km/hour)
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/viewforum.php?f=51 Sparkie Hitchhikers Forums at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>dskhdkl055b3g9fdxobvz2evh56kg4h</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>76550</id>
      <parentid>76542</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-08-12T21:45:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>LorLeod</username>
        <id>17679</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="29135">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal).

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
* Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker (but it supposedly is a bit riskier as well, than any other combination). A guy hitchhiking alone, a woman and male person together and two women, can travel fast as well. Two males hitchhiking together is certainly slower on average. More than two hitchhikers often requires much more patience and it would often be a good idea to split into several groups. If you hitchhike with more than one person, keeping an eye on how much luggage you take with you becomes more important. One big backpack is to be preferred then over two.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120 km/hour (instead of 90 km/hour)
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/viewforum.php?f=51 Sparkie Hitchhikers Forums at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>g4jft6iis4lh2nqftiz8iw69pcyrwqx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>76771</id>
      <parentid>76550</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-08-23T22:55:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dinochappeau</username>
        <id>19313</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="29230">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird!

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal).

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
* Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker (but it supposedly is a bit riskier as well, than any other combination). A guy hitchhiking alone, a woman and male person together and two women, can travel fast as well. Two males hitchhiking together is certainly slower on average. More than two hitchhikers often requires much more patience and it would often be a good idea to split into several groups. If you hitchhike with more than one person, keeping an eye on how much luggage you take with you becomes more important. One big backpack is to be preferred then over two.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120 km/hour (instead of 90 km/hour)
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/viewforum.php?f=51 Sparkie Hitchhikers Forums at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>rw5xaz10wgbrrap2uhhulh1kq8pf3mq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>76772</id>
      <parentid>76771</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-08-23T22:58:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dinochappeau</username>
        <id>19313</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="29427">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal).

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
* Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker (but it supposedly is a bit riskier as well, than any other combination). A guy hitchhiking alone, a woman and male person together and two women, can travel fast as well. Two males hitchhiking together is certainly slower on average. More than two hitchhikers often requires much more patience and it would often be a good idea to split into several groups. If you hitchhike with more than one person, keeping an eye on how much luggage you take with you becomes more important. One big backpack is to be preferred then over two.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120 km/hour (instead of 90 km/hour)
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/viewforum.php?f=51 Sparkie Hitchhikers Forums at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>sbjm0f4x3fohiqwswd0uwysmfi5g45b</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>76809</id>
      <parentid>76772</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-08-26T01:37:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Strazdas007</username>
        <id>6817</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="30401">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal).

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
'''Strazdas007:''' I'd say it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - I'm talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. I actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but I was lucky, because next day I wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And I was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that I was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

I'd say - try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker (but it supposedly is a bit riskier as well, than any other combination). A guy hitchhiking alone, a woman and male person together and two women, can travel fast as well. Two males hitchhiking together is certainly slower on average. More than two hitchhikers often requires much more patience and it would often be a good idea to split into several groups. If you hitchhike with more than one person, keeping an eye on how much luggage you take with you becomes more important. One big backpack is to be preferred then over two.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120 km/hour (instead of 90 km/hour)
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/viewforum.php?f=51 Sparkie Hitchhikers Forums at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>dwfa5txbdd9w2008b9g1caanjc642r5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>76810</id>
      <parentid>76809</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-08-26T01:52:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Strazdas007</username>
        <id>6817</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="31221">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]).

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
You can make a reusable white-board simply out of a paper map and an adhesive tape. Simply apply adhesive tape on the white side of the map, and/or on the good one ( you can show your route to driver, and plan your trip by painting on it). If you don't need all space of the map, and/or to make it more firm for easier holding in wind You can simply use binder clips [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg Binder clip]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spreaded and 20cm x 10xm when folded.
Pros: quite big when in use (depends on the size you buy of course), handy and small when not in use.
Cons: takes some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles, hard to use full size in strong wind.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal).

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
'''Strazdas007:''' I'd say it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - I'm talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. I actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but I was lucky, because next day I wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And I was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that I was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

I'd say - try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker (but it supposedly is a bit riskier as well, than any other combination). A guy hitchhiking alone, a woman and male person together and two women, can travel fast as well. Two males hitchhiking together is certainly slower on average. More than two hitchhikers often requires much more patience and it would often be a good idea to split into several groups. If you hitchhike with more than one person, keeping an eye on how much luggage you take with you becomes more important. One big backpack is to be preferred then over two.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120 km/hour (instead of 90 km/hour)
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/viewforum.php?f=51 Sparkie Hitchhikers Forums at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>sspd34893fbvov2e1rvhokadsqwgwx7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77407</id>
      <parentid>76810</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-10-04T17:07:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Yooks</username>
        <id>20042</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="31444">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
You can make a reusable white-board simply out of a paper map and an adhesive tape. Simply apply adhesive tape on the white side of the map, and/or on the good one ( you can show your route to driver, and plan your trip by painting on it). If you don't need all space of the map, and/or to make it more firm for easier holding in wind You can simply use binder clips [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg Binder clip]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spreaded and 20cm x 10xm when folded.
Pros: quite big when in use (depends on the size you buy of course), handy and small when not in use.
Cons: takes some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles, hard to use full size in strong wind.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal).

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
'''Strazdas007:''' I'd say it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - I'm talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. I actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but I was lucky, because next day I wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And I was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that I was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

I'd say - try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker (but it supposedly is a bit riskier as well, than any other combination). A guy hitchhiking alone, a woman and male person together and two women, can travel fast as well. Two males hitchhiking together is certainly slower on average. More than two hitchhikers often requires much more patience and it would often be a good idea to split into several groups. If you hitchhike with more than one person, keeping an eye on how much luggage you take with you becomes more important. One big backpack is to be preferred then over two.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120 km/hour (instead of 90 km/hour)
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/viewforum.php?f=51 Sparkie Hitchhikers Forums at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>i0sfykr3kcdiflinxhggaozuhdsri9z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77408</id>
      <parentid>77407</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-10-04T17:23:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Yooks</username>
        <id>20042</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="31563">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
You can make a reusable white-board simply out of a paper map and an adhesive tape. Simply apply adhesive tape on the white side of the map, and/or on the good one ( you can show your route to driver, and plan your trip by painting on it). If you don't need all space of the map, and/or to make it more firm for easier holding in wind You can simply use binder clips [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg Binder clip]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spreaded and 20cm x 10xm when folded.
Pros: quite big when in use (depends on the size you buy of course), handy and small when not in use.
Cons: takes some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles, hard to use full size in strong wind.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
'''Strazdas007:''' I'd say it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - I'm talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. I actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but I was lucky, because next day I wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And I was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that I was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

I'd say - try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker (but it supposedly is a bit riskier as well, than any other combination). A guy hitchhiking alone, a woman and male person together and two women, can travel fast as well. Two males hitchhiking together is certainly slower on average. More than two hitchhikers often requires much more patience and it would often be a good idea to split into several groups. If you hitchhike with more than one person, keeping an eye on how much luggage you take with you becomes more important. One big backpack is to be preferred then over two.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120 km/hour (instead of 90 km/hour)
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/viewforum.php?f=51 Sparkie Hitchhikers Forums at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>2wj1pjxuff0l6qmk443n3qohoghjpsc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77409</id>
      <parentid>77408</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-10-04T17:46:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Yooks</username>
        <id>20042</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="31590">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
You can make a reusable white-board simply out of a paper map and an adhesive tape. Simply apply adhesive tape on the white side of the map, and/or on the good one ( you can show your route to driver, and plan your trip by painting on it). If you don't need all space of the map, and/or to make it more firm for easier holding in wind You can simply use binder clips [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg Binder clip]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spreaded and 20cm x 10xm when folded.
Pros: quite big when in use (depends on the size you buy of course), handy and small when not in use.
Cons: takes some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles, hard to use full size in strong wind.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
'''Strazdas007:''' I'd say it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - I'm talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. I actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but I was lucky, because next day I wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And I was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that I was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

I'd say - try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and will probably fine you, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker (but it supposedly is a bit riskier as well, than any other combination). A guy hitchhiking alone, a woman and male person together and two women, can travel fast as well. Two males hitchhiking together is certainly slower on average. More than two hitchhikers often requires much more patience and it would often be a good idea to split into several groups. If you hitchhike with more than one person, keeping an eye on how much luggage you take with you becomes more important. One big backpack is to be preferred then over two.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120 km/hour (instead of 90 km/hour)
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/viewforum.php?f=51 Sparkie Hitchhikers Forums at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>did7cytbf3yv3j4xs7c3vmws2pomixz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77410</id>
      <parentid>77409</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-10-04T17:48:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Yooks</username>
        <id>20042</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="31582">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
You can make a reusable white-board simply out of a paper map and an adhesive tape. Simply apply adhesive tape on the white side of the map, and/or on the good one ( you can show your route to driver, and plan your trip by painting on it). If you don't need all space of the map, and/or to make it more firm for easier holding in wind You can simply use binder clips [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg Binder clip]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spreaded and 20cm x 10xm when folded.
Pros: quite big when in use (depends on the size you buy of course), handy and small when not in use.
Cons: takes some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles, hard to use full size in strong wind.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
'''Strazdas007:''' I'd say it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - I'm talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. I actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but I was lucky, because next day I wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And I was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that I was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

I'd say - try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker (but it supposedly is a bit riskier as well, than any other combination). A guy hitchhiking alone, a woman and male person together and two women, can travel fast as well. Two males hitchhiking together is certainly slower on average. More than two hitchhikers often requires much more patience and it would often be a good idea to split into several groups. If you hitchhike with more than one person, keeping an eye on how much luggage you take with you becomes more important. One big backpack is to be preferred then over two.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120 km/hour (instead of 90 km/hour)
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/viewforum.php?f=51 Sparkie Hitchhikers Forums at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>k6x397tv1ekn3or73s9ji3ipfjra572</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77411</id>
      <parentid>77410</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-10-04T17:57:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Yooks</username>
        <id>20042</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="32128">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
You can make a reusable white-board simply out of a paper map and an adhesive tape. Simply apply adhesive tape on the white side of the map, and/or on the good one ( you can show your route to driver, and plan your trip by painting on it). If you don't need all space of the map, and/or to make it more firm for easier holding in wind You can simply use binder clips [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg Binder clip]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spreaded and 20cm x 10xm when folded.
Pros: quite big when in use (depends on the size you buy of course), handy and small when not in use.
Cons: takes some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles, hard to use full size in strong wind.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in the nature, McDo games, an inhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
'''Strazdas007:''' I'd say it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - I'm talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. I actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but I was lucky, because next day I wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And I was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that I was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

I'd say - try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker (but it supposedly is a bit riskier as well, than any other combination). A guy hitchhiking alone, a woman and male person together and two women, can travel fast as well. Two males hitchhiking together is certainly slower on average. More than two hitchhikers often requires much more patience and it would often be a good idea to split into several groups. If you hitchhike with more than one person, keeping an eye on how much luggage you take with you becomes more important. One big backpack is to be preferred then over two.

A technique that can be used as an attempt to maximize your chances of catching a ride if you are a female hitchhiking with another person is to make the other person wait on a place that is not directly visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. This can also be done if you have a lot of luggage as well. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped and are in direct contact with you.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120 km/hour (instead of 90 km/hour)
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/viewforum.php?f=51 Sparkie Hitchhikers Forums at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>1m6vd4egpz4bny0ahl6zmy6q6to0get</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>78548</id>
      <parentid>77411</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-01-24T02:08:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sirrdc</username>
        <id>22392</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="32129">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
You can make a reusable white-board simply out of a paper map and an adhesive tape. Simply apply adhesive tape on the white side of the map, and/or on the good one ( you can show your route to driver, and plan your trip by painting on it). If you don't need all space of the map, and/or to make it more firm for easier holding in wind You can simply use binder clips [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg Binder clip]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spreaded and 20cm x 10xm when folded.
Pros: quite big when in use (depends on the size you buy of course), handy and small when not in use.
Cons: takes some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles, hard to use full size in strong wind.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] (more active);
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
'''Strazdas007:''' I'd say it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - I'm talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. I actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but I was lucky, because next day I wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And I was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that I was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

I'd say - try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker (but it supposedly is a bit riskier as well, than any other combination). A guy hitchhiking alone, a woman and male person together and two women, can travel fast as well. Two males hitchhiking together is certainly slower on average. More than two hitchhikers often requires much more patience and it would often be a good idea to split into several groups. If you hitchhike with more than one person, keeping an eye on how much luggage you take with you becomes more important. One big backpack is to be preferred then over two.

A technique that can be used as an attempt to maximize your chances of catching a ride if you are a female hitchhiking with another person is to make the other person wait on a place that is not directly visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. This can also be done if you have a lot of luggage as well. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped and are in direct contact with you.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120 km/hour (instead of 90 km/hour)
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/viewforum.php?f=51 Sparkie Hitchhikers Forums at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>25h5fx3cznjyk3on3zv0ldjna6637f2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>78564</id>
      <parentid>78548</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-01-25T22:00:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="32192">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
You can make a reusable white-board simply out of a paper map and an adhesive tape. Simply apply adhesive tape on the white side of the map, and/or on the good one ( you can show your route to driver, and plan your trip by painting on it). If you don't need all space of the map, and/or to make it more firm for easier holding in wind You can simply use binder clips [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg Binder clip]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spreaded and 20cm x 10xm when folded.
Pros: quite big when in use (depends on the size you buy of course), handy and small when not in use.
Cons: takes some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles, hard to use full size in strong wind.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
'''Strazdas007:''' I'd say it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - I'm talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. I actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but I was lucky, because next day I wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And I was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that I was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

I'd say - try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker (but it supposedly is a bit riskier as well, than any other combination). A guy hitchhiking alone, a woman and male person together and two women, can travel fast as well. Two males hitchhiking together is certainly slower on average. More than two hitchhikers often requires much more patience and it would often be a good idea to split into several groups. If you hitchhike with more than one person, keeping an eye on how much luggage you take with you becomes more important. One big backpack is to be preferred then over two.

A technique that can be used as an attempt to maximize your chances of catching a ride if you are a female hitchhiking with another person is to make the other person wait on a place that is not directly visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. This can also be done if you have a lot of luggage as well. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped and are in direct contact with you.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120 km/hour (instead of 90 km/hour)
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiking Guide to Europe]
* [http://www.digihitch.com/viewforum.php?f=51 Sparkie Hitchhikers Forums at digihitch.com]
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>9ljde6cijxysk3a4bistfjs6dwlp6pc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>78800</id>
      <parentid>78564</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-02-22T07:05:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Christopherdrifter</username>
        <id>21562</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="32387">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
You can make a reusable white-board simply out of a paper map and an adhesive tape. Simply apply adhesive tape on the white side of the map, and/or on the good one ( you can show your route to driver, and plan your trip by painting on it). If you don't need all space of the map, and/or to make it more firm for easier holding in wind You can simply use binder clips [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg Binder clip]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spreaded and 20cm x 10xm when folded.
Pros: quite big when in use (depends on the size you buy of course), handy and small when not in use.
Cons: takes some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles, hard to use full size in strong wind.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
'''Strazdas007:''' I'd say it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - I'm talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. I actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but I was lucky, because next day I wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And I was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that I was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

I'd say - try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker (but it supposedly is a bit riskier as well, than any other combination). A guy hitchhiking alone, a woman and male person together and two women, can travel fast as well. Two males hitchhiking together is certainly slower on average. More than two hitchhikers often requires much more patience and it would often be a good idea to split into several groups. If you hitchhike with more than one person, keeping an eye on how much luggage you take with you becomes more important. One big backpack is to be preferred then over two.

A technique that can be used as an attempt to maximize your chances of catching a ride if you are a female hitchhiking with another person is to make the other person wait on a place that is not directly visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. This can also be done if you have a lot of luggage as well. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped and are in direct contact with you.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120 km/hour (instead of 90 km/hour)
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Tips_for_hitchhiking Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikitravel]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>szygn306b9augmkridb1g6le9dob298</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79276</id>
      <parentid>78800</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-04-30T12:38:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Jonas.m</username>
        <id>23138</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="32763">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, ''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels'' (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
You can make a reusable white-board simply out of a paper map and an adhesive tape. Simply apply adhesive tape on the white side of the map, and/or on the good one ( you can show your route to driver, and plan your trip by painting on it). If you don't need all space of the map, and/or to make it more firm for easier holding in wind You can simply use binder clips [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg Binder clip]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spreaded and 20cm x 10xm when folded.
Pros: quite big when in use (depends on the size you buy of course), handy and small when not in use.
Cons: takes some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles, hard to use full size in strong wind.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
'''Strazdas007:''' I'd say it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - I'm talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. I actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but I was lucky, because next day I wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And I was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that I was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

I'd say - try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker (but it supposedly is a bit riskier as well, than any other combination). A guy hitchhiking alone, a woman and male person together and two women, can travel fast as well. Two males hitchhiking together is certainly slower on average. More than two hitchhikers often requires much more patience and it would often be a good idea to split into several groups. If you hitchhike with more than one person, keeping an eye on how much luggage you take with you becomes more important. One big backpack is to be preferred then over two.

A technique that can be used as an attempt to maximize your chances of catching a ride if you are a female hitchhiking with another person is to make the other person wait on a place that is not directly visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. This can also be done if you have a lot of luggage as well. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped and are in direct contact with you.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120 km/hour (instead of 90 km/hour)
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Tips_for_hitchhiking Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikitravel]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>b2n2cupf8unc54hrnwmu5qlb6doptrb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79277</id>
      <parentid>79276</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-04-30T12:38:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Jonas.m</username>
        <id>23138</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="32765">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
You can make a reusable white-board simply out of a paper map and an adhesive tape. Simply apply adhesive tape on the white side of the map, and/or on the good one ( you can show your route to driver, and plan your trip by painting on it). If you don't need all space of the map, and/or to make it more firm for easier holding in wind You can simply use binder clips [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg Binder clip]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spreaded and 20cm x 10xm when folded.
Pros: quite big when in use (depends on the size you buy of course), handy and small when not in use.
Cons: takes some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles, hard to use full size in strong wind.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
'''Strazdas007:''' I'd say it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - I'm talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. I actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but I was lucky, because next day I wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And I was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that I was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

I'd say - try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker (but it supposedly is a bit riskier as well, than any other combination). A guy hitchhiking alone, a woman and male person together and two women, can travel fast as well. Two males hitchhiking together is certainly slower on average. More than two hitchhikers often requires much more patience and it would often be a good idea to split into several groups. If you hitchhike with more than one person, keeping an eye on how much luggage you take with you becomes more important. One big backpack is to be preferred then over two.

A technique that can be used as an attempt to maximize your chances of catching a ride if you are a female hitchhiking with another person is to make the other person wait on a place that is not directly visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. This can also be done if you have a lot of luggage as well. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped and are in direct contact with you.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120 km/hour (instead of 90 km/hour)
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Tips_for_hitchhiking Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikitravel]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>4oedjfzjliri5jzgbop86vi39fajmwl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79282</id>
      <parentid>79277</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-04-30T13:25:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Jonas.m</username>
        <id>23138</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="32805">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
You can make a reusable white-board simply out of a paper map and an adhesive tape. Simply apply adhesive tape on the white side of the map, and/or on the good one ( you can show your route to driver, and plan your trip by painting on it). If you don't need all space of the map, and/or to make it more firm for easier holding in wind You can simply use binder clips [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg Binder clip]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spreaded and 20cm x 10xm when folded.
Pros: quite big when in use (depends on the size you buy of course), handy and small when not in use.
Cons: takes some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles, hard to use full size in strong wind.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
'''Strazdas007:''' I'd say it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - I'm talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. I actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but I was lucky, because next day I wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And I was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that I was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

I'd say - try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway may help a lot, and in some place is almost unavoidable. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to "hitchhike" on highway is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations. Petrol stations (or rest areas, often the same) are the best spot ever, because you can go directly talk to people (show them you are nice and smile) and the car is totally stopped. Enjoy. This works particularly well in Germany and France. In Italy, hitching from toll stations seems to work a little better.

Do realise that in most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you, but in some cases they just don't care.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier as well. A guy hitchhiking alone, a woman and a man together and two women, can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. Two males hitchhiking together is certainly slower on average. More than two hitchhikers often requires much more patience and it would often be a good idea to split into several groups. If you hitchhike with more than one person, keeping an eye on how much luggage you take with you becomes more important. One big backpack is to be preferred then over two.

A technique that can be used as an attempt to maximize your chances of catching a ride if you are a female hitchhiking with another person is to make the other person wait on a place that is not directly visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. This can also be done if you have a lot of luggage as well. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped and are in direct contact with you.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120 km/hour (instead of 90 km/hour)
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Tips_for_hitchhiking Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikitravel]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>dzliul83ly7dqnzvz7crgm2oerjd6qf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79283</id>
      <parentid>79282</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-04-30T13:31:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Jonas.m</username>
        <id>23138</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="32566">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
You can make a reusable white-board simply out of a paper map and an adhesive tape. Simply apply adhesive tape on the white side of the map, and/or on the good one ( you can show your route to driver, and plan your trip by painting on it). If you don't need all space of the map, and/or to make it more firm for easier holding in wind You can simply use binder clips [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg Binder clip]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spreaded and 20cm x 10xm when folded.
Pros: quite big when in use (depends on the size you buy of course), handy and small when not in use.
Cons: takes some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles, hard to use full size in strong wind.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
'''Strazdas007:''' I'd say it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - I'm talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. I actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but I was lucky, because next day I wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And I was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that I was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

I'd say - try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier as well. A guy hitchhiking alone, a woman and a man together and two women, can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. Two males hitchhiking together is certainly slower on average. More than two hitchhikers often requires much more patience and it would often be a good idea to split into several groups. If you hitchhike with more than one person, keeping an eye on how much luggage you take with you becomes more important. One big backpack is to be preferred then over two.

A technique that can be used as an attempt to maximize your chances of catching a ride if you are a female hitchhiking with another person is to make the other person wait on a place that is not directly visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. This can also be done if you have a lot of luggage as well. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped and are in direct contact with you.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120 km/hour (instead of 90 km/hour)
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Tips_for_hitchhiking Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikitravel]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>0o8hhsl7ck8yz40y4glsl12xm0ytxgc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79284</id>
      <parentid>79283</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-04-30T13:38:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Jonas.m</username>
        <id>23138</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="32099">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]
A thumb or hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking (depending on the region). But in some cases, the use of a sign displaying your destination or general direction will increase your odds.

A sign just saying '''PLEASE''' (in local language) can help sometimes.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Making people laugh with funny signs is a great way to lift your mood, have fun with passing cars and get rides. 

When you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations: The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does.

When the traffic is too heavy: The driver will be less likely to say "Somebody else is going to stop" if he sees that you want to go exactly his way.

If you're going from [[Barcelona]] to [[Amsterdam]], consider writing "[[Paris]]", or just [[Perpignan]], on your sign, when you start in Barcelona. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France".

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know (whether you need it now or in the future), try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. Note: In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.

To make the sign, it's better to use cardboard or similar with a thick black marker or India ink (works well with cotton buds), if possible − other pens/pencils will do as well, but require more work. Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Make it easy to read for the drivers: Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters, especially ascenders 'd','k','l'.. and descenders 'p','g' etc. make at-once reading easier). 
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
If you have a chance to plan a long hitchhiking trip in advance, some find using an erasable white board as a sign to be very useful for making big, clear and reusable signs.
You can make a reusable white-board simply out of a paper map and an adhesive tape. Simply apply adhesive tape on the white side of the map, and/or on the good one ( you can show your route to driver, and plan your trip by painting on it). If you don't need all space of the map, and/or to make it more firm for easier holding in wind You can simply use binder clips [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg Binder clip]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spreaded and 20cm x 10xm when folded.
Pros: quite big when in use (depends on the size you buy of course), handy and small when not in use.
Cons: takes some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles, hard to use full size in strong wind.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

Remember the sign has to be read from a distance. At 100km/hr, a vehicle is covering approx 30 meters/second. The average reaction time when driving is 1.5 to 2.5 seconds, so 45 to 75 meters has gone before they start to stop. If you want them to stop, then you not only have to place yourself in the right location so they can see that you are a traveler and not just cagging a lift (this is what the sign does), you also have to have a sign that is readable. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance. (This is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications.)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.

Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

While living in a small village near a larger town my housemates and I found that using a sign decreased waiting times from 20-40 minutes average to about 10-20 minutes even though there were no other villages on the way. When I put this to my drivers some of them said that the sign made me look like a proper hitch-hiker.

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract certain groups of driver who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination/road number/compass direction. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read, and trying to read that word can become a big distraction from the main message. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.
{|style="margin: 0 auto;"
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
|style="text-align: center; vertical-align: top;"|
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]
|}

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
'''Strazdas007:''' I'd say it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - I'm talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. I actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but I was lucky, because next day I wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And I was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that I was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

I'd say - try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than two it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120 km/hour (instead of 90 km/hour)
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Tips_for_hitchhiking Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikitravel]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>t3m6zc21hdisp4d8cbv78g1k0g7yl6d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79285</id>
      <parentid>79284</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-04-30T14:17:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Jonas.m</username>
        <id>23138</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="30706">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destinationon the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier). The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance (this is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications).
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips, an erasable white board is useful for making big, clear and reusable signs. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and very lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

You can also make a reusable whiteboard simply out of a paper map and an adhesive tape. Apply adhesive tape on the white side of the map, and/or on the good one ( you can show your route to driver, and plan your trip by painting on it). If you don't need all space of the map, and/or to make it more firm for easier holding in wind You can simply use binder clips [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg Binder clip]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spreaded and 20cm x 10xm when folded.
Pros: quite big when in use (depends on the size you buy of course), handy and small when not in use.
Cons: takes some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles, hard to use full size in strong wind.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
'''Strazdas007:''' I'd say it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - I'm talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. I actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but I was lucky, because next day I wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And I was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that I was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

I'd say - try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than two it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120 km/hour (instead of 90 km/hour)
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Tips_for_hitchhiking Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikitravel]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>ct4n5tii47vto8sy2ww592p18tkle4v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79286</id>
      <parentid>79285</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-04-30T14:18:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Jonas.m</username>
        <id>23138</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="30707">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters (the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier). The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance (this is called Kernel, e.g. see road signs specifications).
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips, an erasable white board is useful for making big, clear and reusable signs. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and very lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

You can also make a reusable whiteboard simply out of a paper map and an adhesive tape. Apply adhesive tape on the white side of the map, and/or on the good one ( you can show your route to driver, and plan your trip by painting on it). If you don't need all space of the map, and/or to make it more firm for easier holding in wind You can simply use binder clips [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg Binder clip]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spreaded and 20cm x 10xm when folded.
Pros: quite big when in use (depends on the size you buy of course), handy and small when not in use.
Cons: takes some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles, hard to use full size in strong wind.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
'''Strazdas007:''' I'd say it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - I'm talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. I actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but I was lucky, because next day I wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And I was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that I was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

I'd say - try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than two it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120 km/hour (instead of 90 km/hour)
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Tips_for_hitchhiking Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikitravel]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>hmvnuzoeip4z9bzd42jyt3h2mxr02ip</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79287</id>
      <parentid>79286</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-04-30T14:18:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Jonas.m</username>
        <id>23138</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="30646">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write neatly in big, block letters the name of a city or the name of a road, or both. Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips, an erasable white board is useful for making big, clear and reusable signs. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and very lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

You can also make a reusable whiteboard simply out of a paper map and an adhesive tape. Apply adhesive tape on the white side of the map, and/or on the good one ( you can show your route to driver, and plan your trip by painting on it). If you don't need all space of the map, and/or to make it more firm for easier holding in wind You can simply use binder clips [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg Binder clip]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spreaded and 20cm x 10xm when folded.
Pros: quite big when in use (depends on the size you buy of course), handy and small when not in use.
Cons: takes some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles, hard to use full size in strong wind.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
'''Strazdas007:''' I'd say it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - I'm talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. I actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but I was lucky, because next day I wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And I was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that I was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

I'd say - try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than two it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120 km/hour (instead of 90 km/hour)
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Tips_for_hitchhiking Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikitravel]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>d5uvvjmuowlrekkf9jk02bi0be789n4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79288</id>
      <parentid>79287</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-04-30T14:19:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Jonas.m</username>
        <id>23138</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="30560">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips, an erasable white board is useful for making big, clear and reusable signs. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and very lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

You can also make a reusable whiteboard simply out of a paper map and an adhesive tape. Apply adhesive tape on the white side of the map, and/or on the good one ( you can show your route to driver, and plan your trip by painting on it). If you don't need all space of the map, and/or to make it more firm for easier holding in wind You can simply use binder clips [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg Binder clip]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spreaded and 20cm x 10xm when folded.
Pros: quite big when in use (depends on the size you buy of course), handy and small when not in use.
Cons: takes some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles, hard to use full size in strong wind.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
'''Strazdas007:''' I'd say it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - I'm talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. I actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but I was lucky, because next day I wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And I was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that I was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

I'd say - try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than two it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120 km/hour (instead of 90 km/hour)
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Tips_for_hitchhiking Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikitravel]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>qb7nwqzrjhqvsgiziz8k9amvamvoc9o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79289</id>
      <parentid>79288</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-04-30T14:20:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Jonas.m</username>
        <id>23138</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="30555">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips, an erasable white board is useful for making big, clear and reusable signs. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

You can also make a reusable whiteboard simply out of a paper map and an adhesive tape. Apply adhesive tape on the white side of the map, and/or on the good one ( you can show your route to driver, and plan your trip by painting on it). If you don't need all space of the map, and/or to make it more firm for easier holding in wind You can simply use binder clips [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg Binder clip]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spreaded and 20cm x 10xm when folded.
Pros: quite big when in use (depends on the size you buy of course), handy and small when not in use.
Cons: takes some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles, hard to use full size in strong wind.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
'''Strazdas007:''' I'd say it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - I'm talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. I actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but I was lucky, because next day I wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And I was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that I was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

I'd say - try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than two it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120 km/hour (instead of 90 km/hour)
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Tips_for_hitchhiking Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikitravel]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>hxlcls3g62zmm4vepzetg1mhwldw1p1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79290</id>
      <parentid>79289</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-04-30T14:26:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Jonas.m</username>
        <id>23138</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="30196">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use binder clips [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg Binder clip]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
'''Strazdas007:''' I'd say it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - I'm talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. I actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but I was lucky, because next day I wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And I was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that I was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

I'd say - try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than two it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120 km/hour (instead of 90 km/hour)
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Tips_for_hitchhiking Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikitravel]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>rplxy50oh9rll662ve7zjaf3pl582or</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79291</id>
      <parentid>79290</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-04-30T14:28:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Jonas.m</username>
        <id>23138</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="30184">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
'''Strazdas007:''' I'd say it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - I'm talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. I actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but I was lucky, because next day I wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And I was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that I was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

I'd say - try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than two it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120 km/hour (instead of 90 km/hour)
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Tips_for_hitchhiking Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikitravel]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>b4yn1zkds27zge5mtgwwhaxytsufzmb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79392</id>
      <parentid>79291</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-05-14T07:55:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Yooks</username>
        <id>20042</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="30792">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

"''It is not wise, though many books recommend it, to carry a pack, for it creates the impression that you want to walk. If you carry a small and light suitcase, you not only look as if you were walking by accident rather than intent, but it also makes it appear that you are traveling a long distance and not just wanting a ride for a few blocks. Moreover, drivers are sorry for a man who has to lug a suitcase and there is something respectable about having baggage with you. Motorists often think you are a salesman who has got stranded and is headed for home."'' - Hugh Hardyman, The Art of Hitchhiking

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
'''Strazdas007:''' I'd say it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - I'm talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. I actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but I was lucky, because next day I wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And I was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that I was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

I'd say - try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than two it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120 km/hour (instead of 90 km/hour)
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Tips_for_hitchhiking Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikitravel]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>qc3njjvlx7sffahyy7f7uy7de431m8l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79394</id>
      <parentid>79392</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-05-14T14:38:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Irningston</username>
        <id>3766</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="30184">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
'''Strazdas007:''' I'd say it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - I'm talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. I actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but I was lucky, because next day I wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And I was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that I was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

I'd say - try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than two it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Unlike truck drivers they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 120 km/hour (instead of 90 km/hour)
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend.

= Related links and references =
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Tips_for_hitchhiking Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikitravel]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>b4yn1zkds27zge5mtgwwhaxytsufzmb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79683</id>
      <parentid>79394</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-06-13T23:14:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Strazdas007</username>
        <id>6817</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="30922">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
'''Strazdas007:''' I'd say it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - I'm talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. I actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but I was lucky, because next day I wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And I was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that I was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

I'd say - try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than two it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

= Related links and references =
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Tips_for_hitchhiking Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikitravel]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>m5j462ys24b49622rldbgtal770rahr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79684</id>
      <parentid>79683</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-06-13T23:17:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Strazdas007</username>
        <id>6817</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="30903">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than two it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

= Related links and references =
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Tips_for_hitchhiking Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikitravel]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>jons9va6uzznpu401xztziexave2z88</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79687</id>
      <parentid>79684</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-06-13T23:26:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Strazdas007</username>
        <id>6817</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="31030">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than two it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

= Related links and references =
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Tips_for_hitchhiking Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikitravel]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>a44hlboq2cj2mqns471lq0rus3ucdq5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>82104</id>
      <parentid>79687</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-02-06T19:23:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Longhaul</username>
        <id>4390</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="30648">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than two it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

= Related links and references =
* [[Websites|websites]]
* [[Blogging_Hitchhikers|blogs]]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>0c6smym2kopsolwpd3so8gl3f8w4nsw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>82187</id>
      <parentid>82104</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-02-13T17:35:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Longhaul</username>
        <id>4390</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="30709">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
For the average person, hitchhiking is fastest when alone, no matter if the person doing it is male or female. However, the waiting times depend a lot on how the hitchhiker looks like: someone looking as friendly as Frodo Baggins has a lot higher chances to get rides than someone looking as threatening as Hulk.

Truck drivers usually only have one "official" extra seat and some cars have only one extra seat. If you look as a friendly person, is likely that for you hitchhiking together with someone else will be slower than hitchhiking alone. If you look more like Hulk, then hitchhiking with someone who has a more friendly appearance then will definitely increase your chances of getting rides.

If you're more than two it would be a good idea to split into several groups.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

= Related links and references =
* [[Websites|websites]]
* [[Blogging_Hitchhikers|blogs]]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>chyuyey15p4qk1l4saeatjp56zqstpn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>82188</id>
      <parentid>82187</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-02-13T17:37:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Longhaul</username>
        <id>4390</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="30717">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
For the average person, hitchhiking is fastest when alone, no matter if the person doing it is male or female. However, the waiting times depend a lot on how the hitchhiker looks like: someone looking as friendly as Frodo Baggins has a lot higher chances to get rides than someone looking as threatening as Hulk.

Truck drivers usually only have one "official" extra seat and many utility cars have only one extra seat. If you look as a friendly person, is likely that for you hitchhiking together with someone else will be slower than hitchhiking alone. If you look more like Hulk, then hitchhiking with someone who has a more friendly appearance then will definitely increase your chances of getting rides.

If you're more than two it would be a good idea to split into several groups.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

= Related links and references =
* [[Websites|websites]]
* [[Blogging_Hitchhikers|blogs]]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>40qs6rzrh7jm3y68bgoedhbsfv1binm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>82261</id>
      <parentid>82188</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-03-02T14:29:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Longhaul</username>
        <id>4390</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="31150">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ smiling]. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!
When engaging drivers at petrol stations to ask them for rides, smile - this will make you be perceived as a friendly person. Read Adriano's article [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ "The Importance of Smiling in Communication"] to better understand why smiling is so important when approaching drivers to ask them for rides.

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
For the average person, hitchhiking is fastest when alone, no matter if the person doing it is male or female. However, the waiting times depend a lot on how the hitchhiker looks like: someone looking as friendly as Frodo Baggins has a lot higher chances to get rides than someone looking as threatening as Hulk.

Truck drivers usually only have one "official" extra seat and many utility cars have only one extra seat. If you look as a friendly person, is likely that for you hitchhiking together with someone else will be slower than hitchhiking alone. If you look more like Hulk, then hitchhiking with someone who has a more friendly appearance then will definitely increase your chances of getting rides.

If you're more than two it would be a good idea to split into several groups.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

= Related links and references =
* [[Websites|websites]]
* [[Blogging_Hitchhikers|blogs]]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>12anoju2cx7sfi3zyyoshbt0tkqrg30</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>82262</id>
      <parentid>82261</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-03-02T14:34:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Longhaul</username>
        <id>4390</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="31188">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ smiling]. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!
When engaging drivers at petrol stations to ask them for rides, smile - this will make you be perceived as a friendly person. Read [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/ Adriano]'s article [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ "The Importance of Smiling in Communication"] to better understand why smiling is so important when approaching drivers to ask them for rides.

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
For the average person, hitchhiking is fastest when alone, no matter if the person doing it is male or female. However, the waiting times depend a lot on how the hitchhiker looks like: someone looking as friendly as Frodo Baggins has a lot higher chances to get rides than someone looking as threatening as Hulk.

Truck drivers usually only have one "official" extra seat and many utility cars have only one extra seat. If you look as a friendly person, is likely that for you hitchhiking together with someone else will be slower than hitchhiking alone. If you look more like Hulk, then hitchhiking with someone who has a more friendly appearance then will definitely increase your chances of getting rides.

If you're more than two it would be a good idea to split into several groups.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

= Related links and references =
* [[Websites|websites]]
* [[Blogging_Hitchhikers|blogs]]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>0pjkzo9h6msft6jt3402yx9ugw6851d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>82263</id>
      <parentid>82262</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-03-02T14:35:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Longhaul</username>
        <id>4390</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="31150">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ smiling]. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!
When engaging drivers at petrol stations to ask them for rides, smile - this will make you be perceived as a friendly person. Read Adriano's article [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ "The Importance of Smiling in Communication"] to better understand why smiling is so important when approaching drivers to ask them for rides.

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
For the average person, hitchhiking is fastest when alone, no matter if the person doing it is male or female. However, the waiting times depend a lot on how the hitchhiker looks like: someone looking as friendly as Frodo Baggins has a lot higher chances to get rides than someone looking as threatening as Hulk.

Truck drivers usually only have one "official" extra seat and many utility cars have only one extra seat. If you look as a friendly person, is likely that for you hitchhiking together with someone else will be slower than hitchhiking alone. If you look more like Hulk, then hitchhiking with someone who has a more friendly appearance then will definitely increase your chances of getting rides.

If you're more than two it would be a good idea to split into several groups.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

= Related links and references =
* [[Websites|websites]]
* [[Blogging_Hitchhikers|blogs]]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>12anoju2cx7sfi3zyyoshbt0tkqrg30</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>82342</id>
      <parentid>82263</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-03-02T21:01:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="31030">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than two it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

= Related links and references =
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Tips_for_hitchhiking Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikitravel]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>a44hlboq2cj2mqns471lq0rus3ucdq5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>82369</id>
      <parentid>82342</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-03-12T11:11:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Longhaul</username>
        <id>4390</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="31151">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than two it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

= Related links and references =
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Tips_for_hitchhiking Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikitravel]
* [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>lyk89ypb5ud1aul3cnd19a7g5khw5er</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>82371</id>
      <parentid>82369</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-03-12T11:15:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="31030">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than two it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

= Related links and references =
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Tips_for_hitchhiking Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikitravel]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>a44hlboq2cj2mqns471lq0rus3ucdq5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>82372</id>
      <parentid>82371</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-03-12T11:15:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="31151">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than two it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

= Related links and references =
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Tips_for_hitchhiking Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikitravel]
* [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>lyk89ypb5ud1aul3cnd19a7g5khw5er</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>82817</id>
      <parentid>82372</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-05-03T00:46:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Veteran</username>
        <id>25492</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="31167">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

= Related links and references =
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Tips_for_hitchhiking Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikitravel]
* [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>6ms2xi0qcbmtl5fu102lunvnrsh4rl9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>83836</id>
      <parentid>82817</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-07-21T07:22:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kodo</username>
        <id>26109</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="35411">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== HichHiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much sience as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contredicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the disscution page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hichhiking theory: 
Hich hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be preperd!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majorety of drivers pick up hich hikers on psycological assosiation base on looks and self intereses which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and avrage as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Avrage Driver''' - the avrage driver does not understand in hich hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occure to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Apperance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, unharmful guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and Tshirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hich hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the avrage  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of pregedise.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremly dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldnt be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the avrage driver" exioma. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

My vision is to have a colective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become sientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different cuntries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hich hiking technice.

= Related links and references =
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Tips_for_hitchhiking Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikitravel]
* [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>677pwdfl0ylobzyfl9osktm9eg60c6t</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>83837</id>
      <parentid>83836</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-07-21T07:25:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kodo</username>
        <id>26109</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="35413">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

=== HichHiker Tips ===
This is the section where anyone can write his practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much sience as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contredicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the disscution page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hichhiking theory: 
Hich hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be preperd!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majorety of drivers pick up hich hikers on psycological assosiation base on looks and self intereses which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and avrage as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Avrage Driver''' - the avrage driver does not understand in hich hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occure to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Apperance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, unharmful guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and Tshirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hich hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the avrage  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremly dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldnt be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the avrage driver" exioma. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

My vision is to have a colective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become sientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different cuntries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hich hiking technice.

= Related links and references =
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Tips_for_hitchhiking Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikitravel]
* [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>572ronkwidr29kfzzybbciyddl7j5ik</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>83838</id>
      <parentid>83837</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-07-21T07:26:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kodo</username>
        <id>26109</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="35411">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== HichHiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much sience as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contredicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the disscution page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hichhiking theory: 
Hich hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be preperd!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majorety of drivers pick up hich hikers on psycological assosiation base on looks and self intereses which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and avrage as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Avrage Driver''' - the avrage driver does not understand in hich hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occure to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Apperance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, unharmful guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and Tshirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hich hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the avrage  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremly dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldnt be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the avrage driver" exioma. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

My vision is to have a colective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become sientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different cuntries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hich hiking technice.

= Related links and references =
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Tips_for_hitchhiking Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikitravel]
* [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>s1ho583iui78sqxejfbe5prnma3pkqk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>83848</id>
      <parentid>83838</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-07-21T16:37:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kodo</username>
        <id>26109</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="37701">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== HichHiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much sience as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contredicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the disscution page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hichhiking theory: 
Hich hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be preperd!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majorety of drivers pick up hich hikers on psycological assosiation base on looks and self intereses which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and avrage as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Avrage Driver''' - the avrage driver does not understand in hich hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occure to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Apperance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, unharmful guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and Tshirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hich hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the avrage  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremly dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldnt be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the avrage driver" exioma. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

* '''Asking for Ride''' - Dont be afraid to talk to people and ask them directly if you can hop on. Some drivers would not consider taking you, yet by hearing a nice, friendly, polite voice they might will as well as feel a bit more obligation to help you.

===Different Vessles===
You should feel comfortable through out the whole way to your destenation. if you feel un comfortable hopin on a spesific vessle - dont. As it will tire you out and make a bad expiriance for the future. If you feel unsafe with the drivers drive dont be ashamed to tell him (i do ask all motocycle rides to drive relatively slow especially on unpaved roads, never needed to tell in a car) he will understand your worry, remember he stopped in order to help and will be nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

* '''Back of a Pick-Up Truck''' - The back of a pick up truck is where you are likely to spend a big chunk of the road. However there is a clear problem of safety. For the driver it might be convinient to tell you to hop on the back and so he wont need to worry from a dangerous hiker or either talk in case he isnt in the mood. It is also an extra space in case the seats are full. On the hiker side you have zero control on what is going on and hop on without at least getting to know if the driver is trust worthy is not recomended. You should have a few words with the driver about the way and agree on a place before hands since you wouldnt be able to converse once you start driving, knockin on the roof for stop at most. There is also the problem of sitting without safety belt and potentially with unfastten equipment that might hurt you in case of emegency stop, curves or iresponsible driving.

* '''Motocycles''' - Motocycles and vesspas are somewhat problemaric when it comes to traveling with luggage, yet is possible. It is a good way to travel fast, but just like driving one - even less safe as taking a ride with a car. Try to ask the driver for an extra helmet. Usually not likely to work, but some drivers keep an extra "half halmet" in the box of the vesspa - not much, but certainly bettee than nothing. I for instance tend to minimise motocycle rides since i feel unsafe with a stranger driver. You might ask to drive slower, but remember driving slower means less balance.

My vision is to have a colective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become sientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different cuntries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hich hiking technice.

= Related links and references =
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Tips_for_hitchhiking Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikitravel]
* [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>7lhb4gebcjqig5jzgq8ybs2wqf5z58t</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>83869</id>
      <parentid>83848</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-07-23T03:42:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kodo</username>
        <id>26109</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="37699">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== HichHiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much sience as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
a. Writing the same tip.
b. Writing contredicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the disscution page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hichhiking theory: 
Hich hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be preperd!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majorety of drivers pick up hich hikers on psycological assosiation base on looks and self intereses which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and avrage as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Avrage Driver''' - the avrage driver does not understand in hich hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occure to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Apperance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, unharmful guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and Tshirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hich hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the avrage  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremly dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldnt be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the avrage driver" exioma. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

* '''Asking for Ride''' - Dont be afraid to talk to people and ask them directly if you can hop on. Some drivers would not consider taking you, yet by hearing a nice, friendly, polite voice they might will as well as feel a bit more obligation to help you.

===Different Vessles===
You should feel comfortable through out the whole way to your destenation. if you feel un comfortable hopin on a spesific vessle - dont. As it will tire you out and make a bad expiriance for the future. If you feel unsafe with the drivers drive dont be ashamed to tell him (i do ask all motocycle rides to drive relatively slow especially on unpaved roads, never needed to tell in a car) he will understand your worry, remember he stopped in order to help and will be nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

* '''Back of a Pick-Up Truck''' - The back of a pick up truck is where you are likely to spend a big chunk of the road. However there is a clear problem of safety. For the driver it might be convinient to tell you to hop on the back and so he wont need to worry from a dangerous hiker or either talk in case he isnt in the mood. It is also an extra space in case the seats are full. On the hiker side you have zero control on what is going on and hop on without at least getting to know if the driver is trust worthy is not recomended. You should have a few words with the driver about the way and agree on a place before hands since you wouldnt be able to converse once you start driving, knockin on the roof for stop at most. There is also the problem of sitting without safety belt and potentially with unfastten equipment that might hurt you in case of emegency stop, curves or iresponsible driving.

* '''Motocycles''' - Motocycles and vesspas are somewhat problemaric when it comes to traveling with luggage, yet is possible. It is a good way to travel fast, but just like driving one - even less safe as taking a ride with a car. Try to ask the driver for an extra helmet. Usually not likely to work, but some drivers keep an extra "half halmet" in the box of the vesspa - not much, but certainly bettee than nothing. I for instance tend to minimise motocycle rides since i feel unsafe with a stranger driver. You might ask to drive slower, but remember driving slower means less balance.

My vision is to have a colective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become sientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different cuntries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hich hiking technice.

= Related links and references =
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Tips_for_hitchhiking Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikitravel]
* [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>7la9hsnjuy9bycftpjpnzrxiorikbga</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>83870</id>
      <parentid>83869</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-07-23T03:43:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kodo</username>
        <id>26109</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="37701">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== HichHiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much sience as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contredicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the disscution page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hichhiking theory: 
Hich hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be preperd!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majorety of drivers pick up hich hikers on psycological assosiation base on looks and self intereses which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and avrage as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Avrage Driver''' - the avrage driver does not understand in hich hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occure to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Apperance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, unharmful guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and Tshirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hich hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the avrage  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremly dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldnt be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the avrage driver" exioma. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

* '''Asking for Ride''' - Dont be afraid to talk to people and ask them directly if you can hop on. Some drivers would not consider taking you, yet by hearing a nice, friendly, polite voice they might will as well as feel a bit more obligation to help you.

===Different Vessles===
You should feel comfortable through out the whole way to your destenation. if you feel un comfortable hopin on a spesific vessle - dont. As it will tire you out and make a bad expiriance for the future. If you feel unsafe with the drivers drive dont be ashamed to tell him (i do ask all motocycle rides to drive relatively slow especially on unpaved roads, never needed to tell in a car) he will understand your worry, remember he stopped in order to help and will be nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

* '''Back of a Pick-Up Truck''' - The back of a pick up truck is where you are likely to spend a big chunk of the road. However there is a clear problem of safety. For the driver it might be convinient to tell you to hop on the back and so he wont need to worry from a dangerous hiker or either talk in case he isnt in the mood. It is also an extra space in case the seats are full. On the hiker side you have zero control on what is going on and hop on without at least getting to know if the driver is trust worthy is not recomended. You should have a few words with the driver about the way and agree on a place before hands since you wouldnt be able to converse once you start driving, knockin on the roof for stop at most. There is also the problem of sitting without safety belt and potentially with unfastten equipment that might hurt you in case of emegency stop, curves or iresponsible driving.

* '''Motocycles''' - Motocycles and vesspas are somewhat problemaric when it comes to traveling with luggage, yet is possible. It is a good way to travel fast, but just like driving one - even less safe as taking a ride with a car. Try to ask the driver for an extra helmet. Usually not likely to work, but some drivers keep an extra "half halmet" in the box of the vesspa - not much, but certainly bettee than nothing. I for instance tend to minimise motocycle rides since i feel unsafe with a stranger driver. You might ask to drive slower, but remember driving slower means less balance.

My vision is to have a colective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become sientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different cuntries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hich hiking technice.

= Related links and references =
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Tips_for_hitchhiking Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikitravel]
* [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>7lhb4gebcjqig5jzgq8ybs2wqf5z58t</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>84217</id>
      <parentid>83870</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-08-16T20:16:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>SpaceCadet</username>
        <id>25468</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="37729">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something.

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== Hitchhiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his or her practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much science as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contradicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the discussion page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hitchhiking theory: 
Hitch hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be prepared!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majority of drivers pick up hitch hikers on psychological association based on looks and self interest which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and average as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Average Driver''' - the average driver does not understand hitch hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occur to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Appearance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, harmless guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and T-shirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hitch hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the average  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremely dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldn't be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the average driver" section. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

* '''Asking for Ride''' - Don't be afraid to talk to people and ask them directly if you can hop on. Some drivers would not consider taking you, yet by hearing a nice, friendly, polite voice they might will as well as feel a bit more obligation to help you.

===Different Vessels===
You should feel comfortable through out the whole way to your destination. if you feel uncomfortable hoping on a specific vessel - don't. As it will tire you out and make a bad experience for the future. If you feel unsafe with the drivers drive don't be ashamed to tell him (I do ask all motorcycle rides to drive relatively slow especially on unpaved roads, never needed to tell in a car) he will understand your worry, remember he stopped in order to help and will be nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

* '''Back of a Pick-Up Truck''' - The back of a pick up truck is where you are likely to spend a big chunk of the road. However there is a clear problem of safety. For the driver it might be convenient to tell you to hop on the back and so he wont need to worry from a dangerous hiker or either talk in case he isn't in the mood. It is also an extra space in case the seats are full. On the hiker side you have zero control on what is going on and hop on without at least getting to know if the driver is trust worthy is not recommended. You should have a few words with the driver about the way and agree on a place before hands since you wouldn't be able to converse once you start driving, knocking on the roof for stop at most. There is also the problem of sitting without safety belt and potentially with unfasten equipment that might hurt you in case of emergency stop, curves or irresponsible driving.

* '''Motorcycles''' - Motorcycles are somewhat problematic when it comes to travelling with luggage, yet is possible. It is a good way to travel fast, but just like driving one - even less safe as taking a ride with a car. Try to ask the driver for an extra helmet. Usually not likely to work, but some drivers keep an extra "half helmet" in the box of the vehicle - not much, but certainly better than nothing. I for instance tend to minimise motorcycle rides since i feel unsafe with a stranger driver. You might ask to drive slower, but remember driving slower means less balance.

My vision is to have a collective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become scientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different countries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hitch hiking technique.

= Related links and references =
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Tips_for_hitchhiking Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikitravel]
* [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>q0j9bim0sl3yritcfufgl1ekd4d9uoe</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>84851</id>
      <parentid>84217</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-11-15T08:34:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Looking for Stu</username>
        <id>5632</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="37948">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something. Stuart at [[lookingforstu]] swears by a Superman T-shirt.  It's bright, colourful and is a universal symbol of hope and peace.  The amount of times drivers have said that is the reason they picked him up is astounding!

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== Hitchhiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his or her practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much science as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contradicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the discussion page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hitchhiking theory: 
Hitch hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be prepared!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majority of drivers pick up hitch hikers on psychological association based on looks and self interest which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and average as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Average Driver''' - the average driver does not understand hitch hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occur to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Appearance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, harmless guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and T-shirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hitch hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the average  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremely dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldn't be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the average driver" section. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

* '''Asking for Ride''' - Don't be afraid to talk to people and ask them directly if you can hop on. Some drivers would not consider taking you, yet by hearing a nice, friendly, polite voice they might will as well as feel a bit more obligation to help you.

===Different Vessels===
You should feel comfortable through out the whole way to your destination. if you feel uncomfortable hoping on a specific vessel - don't. As it will tire you out and make a bad experience for the future. If you feel unsafe with the drivers drive don't be ashamed to tell him (I do ask all motorcycle rides to drive relatively slow especially on unpaved roads, never needed to tell in a car) he will understand your worry, remember he stopped in order to help and will be nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

* '''Back of a Pick-Up Truck''' - The back of a pick up truck is where you are likely to spend a big chunk of the road. However there is a clear problem of safety. For the driver it might be convenient to tell you to hop on the back and so he wont need to worry from a dangerous hiker or either talk in case he isn't in the mood. It is also an extra space in case the seats are full. On the hiker side you have zero control on what is going on and hop on without at least getting to know if the driver is trust worthy is not recommended. You should have a few words with the driver about the way and agree on a place before hands since you wouldn't be able to converse once you start driving, knocking on the roof for stop at most. There is also the problem of sitting without safety belt and potentially with unfasten equipment that might hurt you in case of emergency stop, curves or irresponsible driving.

* '''Motorcycles''' - Motorcycles are somewhat problematic when it comes to travelling with luggage, yet is possible. It is a good way to travel fast, but just like driving one - even less safe as taking a ride with a car. Try to ask the driver for an extra helmet. Usually not likely to work, but some drivers keep an extra "half helmet" in the box of the vehicle - not much, but certainly better than nothing. I for instance tend to minimise motorcycle rides since i feel unsafe with a stranger driver. You might ask to drive slower, but remember driving slower means less balance.

My vision is to have a collective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become scientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different countries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hitch hiking technique.

= Related links and references =
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Tips_for_hitchhiking Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikitravel]
* [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>ed7j7903wuk4e4apgcglnvdibe42v5x</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>84852</id>
      <parentid>84851</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-11-15T08:49:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Looking for Stu</username>
        <id>5632</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="37956">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something. Stuart at [[www.lookingforstu.com]] swears by a Superman T-shirt.  It's bright, colourful and is a universal symbol of hope and peace.  The amount of times drivers have said that is the reason they picked him up is astounding!

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== Hitchhiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his or her practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much science as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contradicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the discussion page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hitchhiking theory: 
Hitch hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be prepared!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majority of drivers pick up hitch hikers on psychological association based on looks and self interest which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and average as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Average Driver''' - the average driver does not understand hitch hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occur to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Appearance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, harmless guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and T-shirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hitch hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the average  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremely dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldn't be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the average driver" section. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

* '''Asking for Ride''' - Don't be afraid to talk to people and ask them directly if you can hop on. Some drivers would not consider taking you, yet by hearing a nice, friendly, polite voice they might will as well as feel a bit more obligation to help you.

===Different Vessels===
You should feel comfortable through out the whole way to your destination. if you feel uncomfortable hoping on a specific vessel - don't. As it will tire you out and make a bad experience for the future. If you feel unsafe with the drivers drive don't be ashamed to tell him (I do ask all motorcycle rides to drive relatively slow especially on unpaved roads, never needed to tell in a car) he will understand your worry, remember he stopped in order to help and will be nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

* '''Back of a Pick-Up Truck''' - The back of a pick up truck is where you are likely to spend a big chunk of the road. However there is a clear problem of safety. For the driver it might be convenient to tell you to hop on the back and so he wont need to worry from a dangerous hiker or either talk in case he isn't in the mood. It is also an extra space in case the seats are full. On the hiker side you have zero control on what is going on and hop on without at least getting to know if the driver is trust worthy is not recommended. You should have a few words with the driver about the way and agree on a place before hands since you wouldn't be able to converse once you start driving, knocking on the roof for stop at most. There is also the problem of sitting without safety belt and potentially with unfasten equipment that might hurt you in case of emergency stop, curves or irresponsible driving.

* '''Motorcycles''' - Motorcycles are somewhat problematic when it comes to travelling with luggage, yet is possible. It is a good way to travel fast, but just like driving one - even less safe as taking a ride with a car. Try to ask the driver for an extra helmet. Usually not likely to work, but some drivers keep an extra "half helmet" in the box of the vehicle - not much, but certainly better than nothing. I for instance tend to minimise motorcycle rides since i feel unsafe with a stranger driver. You might ask to drive slower, but remember driving slower means less balance.

My vision is to have a collective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become scientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different countries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hitch hiking technique.

= Related links and references =
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Tips_for_hitchhiking Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikitravel]
* [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>0ys4t9wfeen5gkkz8y3dys0t8mcrmjg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>84853</id>
      <parentid>84852</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-11-15T09:21:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Looking for Stu</username>
        <id>5632</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="37955">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something. Stuart at http://lookingforstu.com swears by a Superman T-shirt.  It's bright, colourful and is a universal symbol of hope and peace.  The amount of times drivers have said that is the reason they picked him up is astounding!

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== Hitchhiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his or her practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much science as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contradicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the discussion page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hitchhiking theory: 
Hitch hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be prepared!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majority of drivers pick up hitch hikers on psychological association based on looks and self interest which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and average as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Average Driver''' - the average driver does not understand hitch hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occur to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Appearance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, harmless guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and T-shirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hitch hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the average  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremely dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldn't be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the average driver" section. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

* '''Asking for Ride''' - Don't be afraid to talk to people and ask them directly if you can hop on. Some drivers would not consider taking you, yet by hearing a nice, friendly, polite voice they might will as well as feel a bit more obligation to help you.

===Different Vessels===
You should feel comfortable through out the whole way to your destination. if you feel uncomfortable hoping on a specific vessel - don't. As it will tire you out and make a bad experience for the future. If you feel unsafe with the drivers drive don't be ashamed to tell him (I do ask all motorcycle rides to drive relatively slow especially on unpaved roads, never needed to tell in a car) he will understand your worry, remember he stopped in order to help and will be nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

* '''Back of a Pick-Up Truck''' - The back of a pick up truck is where you are likely to spend a big chunk of the road. However there is a clear problem of safety. For the driver it might be convenient to tell you to hop on the back and so he wont need to worry from a dangerous hiker or either talk in case he isn't in the mood. It is also an extra space in case the seats are full. On the hiker side you have zero control on what is going on and hop on without at least getting to know if the driver is trust worthy is not recommended. You should have a few words with the driver about the way and agree on a place before hands since you wouldn't be able to converse once you start driving, knocking on the roof for stop at most. There is also the problem of sitting without safety belt and potentially with unfasten equipment that might hurt you in case of emergency stop, curves or irresponsible driving.

* '''Motorcycles''' - Motorcycles are somewhat problematic when it comes to travelling with luggage, yet is possible. It is a good way to travel fast, but just like driving one - even less safe as taking a ride with a car. Try to ask the driver for an extra helmet. Usually not likely to work, but some drivers keep an extra "half helmet" in the box of the vehicle - not much, but certainly better than nothing. I for instance tend to minimise motorcycle rides since i feel unsafe with a stranger driver. You might ask to drive slower, but remember driving slower means less balance.

My vision is to have a collective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become scientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different countries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hitch hiking technique.

= Related links and references =
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Tips_for_hitchhiking Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikitravel]
* [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>gikfvfaigytl3xa3kfcgceah5eqspyp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>89043</id>
      <parentid>84853</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-09-06T08:01:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Traumschule</username>
        <id>28627</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="37943">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber:

[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something. Stuart at http://lookingforstu.com swears by a Superman T-shirt.  It's bright, colourful and is a universal symbol of hope and peace.  The amount of times drivers have said that is the reason they picked him up is astounding!

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== Hitchhiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his or her practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much science as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contradicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the discussion page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hitchhiking theory: 
Hitch hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be prepared!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majority of drivers pick up hitch hikers on psychological association based on looks and self interest which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and average as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Average Driver''' - the average driver does not understand hitch hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occur to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Appearance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, harmless guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and T-shirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hitch hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the average  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremely dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldn't be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the average driver" section. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

* '''Asking for Ride''' - Don't be afraid to talk to people and ask them directly if you can hop on. Some drivers would not consider taking you, yet by hearing a nice, friendly, polite voice they might will as well as feel a bit more obligation to help you.

===Different Vessels===
You should feel comfortable through out the whole way to your destination. if you feel uncomfortable hoping on a specific vessel - don't. As it will tire you out and make a bad experience for the future. If you feel unsafe with the drivers drive don't be ashamed to tell him (I do ask all motorcycle rides to drive relatively slow especially on unpaved roads, never needed to tell in a car) he will understand your worry, remember he stopped in order to help and will be nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

* '''Back of a Pick-Up Truck''' - The back of a pick up truck is where you are likely to spend a big chunk of the road. However there is a clear problem of safety. For the driver it might be convenient to tell you to hop on the back and so he wont need to worry from a dangerous hiker or either talk in case he isn't in the mood. It is also an extra space in case the seats are full. On the hiker side you have zero control on what is going on and hop on without at least getting to know if the driver is trust worthy is not recommended. You should have a few words with the driver about the way and agree on a place before hands since you wouldn't be able to converse once you start driving, knocking on the roof for stop at most. There is also the problem of sitting without safety belt and potentially with unfasten equipment that might hurt you in case of emergency stop, curves or irresponsible driving.

* '''Motorcycles''' - Motorcycles are somewhat problematic when it comes to travelling with luggage, yet is possible. It is a good way to travel fast, but just like driving one - even less safe as taking a ride with a car. Try to ask the driver for an extra helmet. Usually not likely to work, but some drivers keep an extra "half helmet" in the box of the vehicle - not much, but certainly better than nothing. I for instance tend to minimise motorcycle rides since i feel unsafe with a stranger driver. You might ask to drive slower, but remember driving slower means less balance.

My vision is to have a collective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become scientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different countries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hitch hiking technique.

= Related links and references =
* [[wikivoyage:Tips_for_hitchhiking|Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikivoyage]]
* [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>em34dg1ij4q8qkyft5er056erpfyqin</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>89044</id>
      <parentid>89043</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-09-06T08:04:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Traumschule</username>
        <id>28627</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="37948">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber.

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|right|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something. Stuart at http://lookingforstu.com swears by a Superman T-shirt.  It's bright, colourful and is a universal symbol of hope and peace.  The amount of times drivers have said that is the reason they picked him up is astounding!

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== Hitchhiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his or her practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much science as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contradicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the discussion page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hitchhiking theory: 
Hitch hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be prepared!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majority of drivers pick up hitch hikers on psychological association based on looks and self interest which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and average as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Average Driver''' - the average driver does not understand hitch hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occur to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Appearance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, harmless guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and T-shirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hitch hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the average  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremely dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldn't be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the average driver" section. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

* '''Asking for Ride''' - Don't be afraid to talk to people and ask them directly if you can hop on. Some drivers would not consider taking you, yet by hearing a nice, friendly, polite voice they might will as well as feel a bit more obligation to help you.

===Different Vessels===
You should feel comfortable through out the whole way to your destination. if you feel uncomfortable hoping on a specific vessel - don't. As it will tire you out and make a bad experience for the future. If you feel unsafe with the drivers drive don't be ashamed to tell him (I do ask all motorcycle rides to drive relatively slow especially on unpaved roads, never needed to tell in a car) he will understand your worry, remember he stopped in order to help and will be nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

* '''Back of a Pick-Up Truck''' - The back of a pick up truck is where you are likely to spend a big chunk of the road. However there is a clear problem of safety. For the driver it might be convenient to tell you to hop on the back and so he wont need to worry from a dangerous hiker or either talk in case he isn't in the mood. It is also an extra space in case the seats are full. On the hiker side you have zero control on what is going on and hop on without at least getting to know if the driver is trust worthy is not recommended. You should have a few words with the driver about the way and agree on a place before hands since you wouldn't be able to converse once you start driving, knocking on the roof for stop at most. There is also the problem of sitting without safety belt and potentially with unfasten equipment that might hurt you in case of emergency stop, curves or irresponsible driving.

* '''Motorcycles''' - Motorcycles are somewhat problematic when it comes to travelling with luggage, yet is possible. It is a good way to travel fast, but just like driving one - even less safe as taking a ride with a car. Try to ask the driver for an extra helmet. Usually not likely to work, but some drivers keep an extra "half helmet" in the box of the vehicle - not much, but certainly better than nothing. I for instance tend to minimise motorcycle rides since i feel unsafe with a stranger driver. You might ask to drive slower, but remember driving slower means less balance.

My vision is to have a collective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become scientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different countries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hitch hiking technique.

= Related links and references =
* [[wikivoyage:Tips_for_hitchhiking|Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikivoyage]]
* [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>nwrntv20537yzsaiv81e2kzdp5wcog5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>89445</id>
      <parentid>89044</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-10-03T03:27:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Traumschule</username>
        <id>28627</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="37962">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber.

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|right|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something. Stuart at http://lookingforstu.com swears by a Superman T-shirt.  It's bright, colourful and is a universal symbol of hope and peace.  The amount of times drivers have said that is the reason they picked him up is astounding!

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== Hitchhiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his or her practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much science as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contradicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the discussion page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hitchhiking theory: 
Hitch hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be prepared!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majority of drivers pick up hitch hikers on psychological association based on looks and self interest which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and average as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Average Driver''' - the average driver does not understand hitch hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occur to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Appearance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, harmless guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and T-shirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hitch hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the average  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremely dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldn't be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the average driver" section. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

* '''Asking for Ride''' - Don't be afraid to talk to people and ask them directly if you can hop on. Some drivers would not consider taking you, yet by hearing a nice, friendly, polite voice they might will as well as feel a bit more obligation to help you.

===Different Vessels===
You should feel comfortable through out the whole way to your destination. if you feel uncomfortable hoping on a specific vessel - don't. As it will tire you out and make a bad experience for the future. If you feel unsafe with the drivers drive don't be ashamed to tell him (I do ask all motorcycle rides to drive relatively slow especially on unpaved roads, never needed to tell in a car) he will understand your worry, remember he stopped in order to help and will be nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

* '''Back of a Pick-Up Truck''' - The back of a pick up truck is where you are likely to spend a big chunk of the road. However there is a clear problem of safety. For the driver it might be convenient to tell you to hop on the back and so he wont need to worry from a dangerous hiker or either talk in case he isn't in the mood. It is also an extra space in case the seats are full. On the hiker side you have zero control on what is going on and hop on without at least getting to know if the driver is trust worthy is not recommended. You should have a few words with the driver about the way and agree on a place before hands since you wouldn't be able to converse once you start driving, knocking on the roof for stop at most. There is also the problem of sitting without safety belt and potentially with unfasten equipment that might hurt you in case of emergency stop, curves or irresponsible driving.

* '''Motorcycles''' - Motorcycles are somewhat problematic when it comes to travelling with luggage, yet is possible. It is a good way to travel fast, but just like driving one - even less safe as taking a ride with a car. Try to ask the driver for an extra helmet. Usually not likely to work, but some drivers keep an extra "half helmet" in the box of the vehicle - not much, but certainly better than nothing. I for instance tend to minimise motorcycle rides since i feel unsafe with a stranger driver. You might ask to drive slower, but remember driving slower means less balance.

My vision is to have a collective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become scientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different countries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hitch hiking technique.

= Related links and references =
{{nomadwiki}}
* [[wikivoyage:Tips_for_hitchhiking|Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikivoyage]]
* [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>6fz920dg5baa7amo7hf46wxo66nybur</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>93809</id>
      <parentid>89445</parentid>
      <timestamp>2019-06-17T14:23:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Wherever</username>
        <id>32537</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="38739">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber.

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|right|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
[[File:hitch_hiker_58392_in_spain.jpeg|thumb|right|250px|left|Taking pictures of your hitch-hiking buddy is an excellent way to keep up your mood.]]
Standing on dirty boring roads with loads traffic passing by and no one picking you up is as much a part of hitch-hiking as it is to eventually get picked up by a kind-hearted soul. If you're travelling alone, the road is your only companion that is reliably always by your side. If you can manage to have a friendly relationship with it, you'll have a much more enjoyable experience. Obviously, when travelling in a group, the same goes for your human friend(s).

It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

If you carry a marker with you, you can even cheer up future hitch-hikers who will use your spot by leaving them little messages on sign posts or crash barriers.

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something. Stuart at http://lookingforstu.com swears by a Superman T-shirt.  It's bright, colourful and is a universal symbol of hope and peace.  The amount of times drivers have said that is the reason they picked him up is astounding!

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==
[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?
----
* '''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).
----

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== Hitchhiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his or her practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much science as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contradicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the discussion page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hitchhiking theory: 
Hitch hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be prepared!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majority of drivers pick up hitch hikers on psychological association based on looks and self interest which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and average as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Average Driver''' - the average driver does not understand hitch hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occur to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Appearance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, harmless guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and T-shirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hitch hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the average  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremely dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldn't be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the average driver" section. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

* '''Asking for Ride''' - Don't be afraid to talk to people and ask them directly if you can hop on. Some drivers would not consider taking you, yet by hearing a nice, friendly, polite voice they might will as well as feel a bit more obligation to help you.

===Different Vessels===
You should feel comfortable through out the whole way to your destination. if you feel uncomfortable hoping on a specific vessel - don't. As it will tire you out and make a bad experience for the future. If you feel unsafe with the drivers drive don't be ashamed to tell him (I do ask all motorcycle rides to drive relatively slow especially on unpaved roads, never needed to tell in a car) he will understand your worry, remember he stopped in order to help and will be nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

* '''Back of a Pick-Up Truck''' - The back of a pick up truck is where you are likely to spend a big chunk of the road. However there is a clear problem of safety. For the driver it might be convenient to tell you to hop on the back and so he wont need to worry from a dangerous hiker or either talk in case he isn't in the mood. It is also an extra space in case the seats are full. On the hiker side you have zero control on what is going on and hop on without at least getting to know if the driver is trust worthy is not recommended. You should have a few words with the driver about the way and agree on a place before hands since you wouldn't be able to converse once you start driving, knocking on the roof for stop at most. There is also the problem of sitting without safety belt and potentially with unfasten equipment that might hurt you in case of emergency stop, curves or irresponsible driving.

* '''Motorcycles''' - Motorcycles are somewhat problematic when it comes to travelling with luggage, yet is possible. It is a good way to travel fast, but just like driving one - even less safe as taking a ride with a car. Try to ask the driver for an extra helmet. Usually not likely to work, but some drivers keep an extra "half helmet" in the box of the vehicle - not much, but certainly better than nothing. I for instance tend to minimise motorcycle rides since i feel unsafe with a stranger driver. You might ask to drive slower, but remember driving slower means less balance.

My vision is to have a collective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become scientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different countries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hitch hiking technique.

= Related links and references =
{{nomadwiki}}
* [[wikivoyage:Tips_for_hitchhiking|Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikivoyage]]
* [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>rgkpmne3hbveo5pxn2e14p7sgzzjvy0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>100261</id>
      <parentid>93809</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-01-07T12:24:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Finding accommodation */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="38801">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber.

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|right|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
[[File:hitch_hiker_58392_in_spain.jpeg|thumb|right|250px|left|Taking pictures of your hitch-hiking buddy is an excellent way to keep up your mood.]]
Standing on dirty boring roads with loads traffic passing by and no one picking you up is as much a part of hitch-hiking as it is to eventually get picked up by a kind-hearted soul. If you're travelling alone, the road is your only companion that is reliably always by your side. If you can manage to have a friendly relationship with it, you'll have a much more enjoyable experience. Obviously, when travelling in a group, the same goes for your human friend(s).

It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

If you carry a marker with you, you can even cheer up future hitch-hikers who will use your spot by leaving them little messages on sign posts or crash barriers.

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something. Stuart at http://lookingforstu.com swears by a Superman T-shirt.  It's bright, colourful and is a universal symbol of hope and peace.  The amount of times drivers have said that is the reason they picked him up is astounding!

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==

[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
* [https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
* [http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
* [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
* Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
* Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
* Can your driver host you?
* Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?


'''Are many people around you? If yes, a paper with a big "Couchsurfing?" on it may help you to find someone that would host you.'''
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).


If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

=== Camping ===

Wild camping how to http://nomadwiki.org/en/Camping

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== Hitchhiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his or her practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much science as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contradicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the discussion page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hitchhiking theory: 
Hitch hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be prepared!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majority of drivers pick up hitch hikers on psychological association based on looks and self interest which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and average as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Average Driver''' - the average driver does not understand hitch hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occur to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Appearance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, harmless guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and T-shirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hitch hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the average  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremely dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldn't be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the average driver" section. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

* '''Asking for Ride''' - Don't be afraid to talk to people and ask them directly if you can hop on. Some drivers would not consider taking you, yet by hearing a nice, friendly, polite voice they might will as well as feel a bit more obligation to help you.

===Different Vessels===
You should feel comfortable through out the whole way to your destination. if you feel uncomfortable hoping on a specific vessel - don't. As it will tire you out and make a bad experience for the future. If you feel unsafe with the drivers drive don't be ashamed to tell him (I do ask all motorcycle rides to drive relatively slow especially on unpaved roads, never needed to tell in a car) he will understand your worry, remember he stopped in order to help and will be nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

* '''Back of a Pick-Up Truck''' - The back of a pick up truck is where you are likely to spend a big chunk of the road. However there is a clear problem of safety. For the driver it might be convenient to tell you to hop on the back and so he wont need to worry from a dangerous hiker or either talk in case he isn't in the mood. It is also an extra space in case the seats are full. On the hiker side you have zero control on what is going on and hop on without at least getting to know if the driver is trust worthy is not recommended. You should have a few words with the driver about the way and agree on a place before hands since you wouldn't be able to converse once you start driving, knocking on the roof for stop at most. There is also the problem of sitting without safety belt and potentially with unfasten equipment that might hurt you in case of emergency stop, curves or irresponsible driving.

* '''Motorcycles''' - Motorcycles are somewhat problematic when it comes to travelling with luggage, yet is possible. It is a good way to travel fast, but just like driving one - even less safe as taking a ride with a car. Try to ask the driver for an extra helmet. Usually not likely to work, but some drivers keep an extra "half helmet" in the box of the vehicle - not much, but certainly better than nothing. I for instance tend to minimise motorcycle rides since i feel unsafe with a stranger driver. You might ask to drive slower, but remember driving slower means less balance.

My vision is to have a collective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become scientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different countries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hitch hiking technique.

= Related links and references =
{{nomadwiki}}
* [[wikivoyage:Tips_for_hitchhiking|Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikivoyage]]
* [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>nedz36xrsmp5hw2zeetnyc24s4tm7ak</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>100262</id>
      <parentid>100261</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-01-07T17:52:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Finding accommodation */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="38712">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber.

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|right|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
[[File:hitch_hiker_58392_in_spain.jpeg|thumb|right|250px|left|Taking pictures of your hitch-hiking buddy is an excellent way to keep up your mood.]]
Standing on dirty boring roads with loads traffic passing by and no one picking you up is as much a part of hitch-hiking as it is to eventually get picked up by a kind-hearted soul. If you're travelling alone, the road is your only companion that is reliably always by your side. If you can manage to have a friendly relationship with it, you'll have a much more enjoyable experience. Obviously, when travelling in a group, the same goes for your human friend(s).

It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

If you carry a marker with you, you can even cheer up future hitch-hikers who will use your spot by leaving them little messages on sign posts or crash barriers.

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something. Stuart at http://lookingforstu.com swears by a Superman T-shirt.  It's bright, colourful and is a universal symbol of hope and peace.  The amount of times drivers have said that is the reason they picked him up is astounding!

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==

[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
[https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
[http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
[http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
[http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
Can your driver host you?
Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?


=== Holding a big "Couchsurfing?" sign in public place === 
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).


If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

=== Camping ===

Wild camping how to http://nomadwiki.org/en/Camping

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== Hitchhiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his or her practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much science as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contradicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the discussion page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hitchhiking theory: 
Hitch hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be prepared!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majority of drivers pick up hitch hikers on psychological association based on looks and self interest which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and average as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Average Driver''' - the average driver does not understand hitch hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occur to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Appearance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, harmless guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and T-shirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hitch hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the average  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremely dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldn't be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the average driver" section. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

* '''Asking for Ride''' - Don't be afraid to talk to people and ask them directly if you can hop on. Some drivers would not consider taking you, yet by hearing a nice, friendly, polite voice they might will as well as feel a bit more obligation to help you.

===Different Vessels===
You should feel comfortable through out the whole way to your destination. if you feel uncomfortable hoping on a specific vessel - don't. As it will tire you out and make a bad experience for the future. If you feel unsafe with the drivers drive don't be ashamed to tell him (I do ask all motorcycle rides to drive relatively slow especially on unpaved roads, never needed to tell in a car) he will understand your worry, remember he stopped in order to help and will be nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

* '''Back of a Pick-Up Truck''' - The back of a pick up truck is where you are likely to spend a big chunk of the road. However there is a clear problem of safety. For the driver it might be convenient to tell you to hop on the back and so he wont need to worry from a dangerous hiker or either talk in case he isn't in the mood. It is also an extra space in case the seats are full. On the hiker side you have zero control on what is going on and hop on without at least getting to know if the driver is trust worthy is not recommended. You should have a few words with the driver about the way and agree on a place before hands since you wouldn't be able to converse once you start driving, knocking on the roof for stop at most. There is also the problem of sitting without safety belt and potentially with unfasten equipment that might hurt you in case of emergency stop, curves or irresponsible driving.

* '''Motorcycles''' - Motorcycles are somewhat problematic when it comes to travelling with luggage, yet is possible. It is a good way to travel fast, but just like driving one - even less safe as taking a ride with a car. Try to ask the driver for an extra helmet. Usually not likely to work, but some drivers keep an extra "half helmet" in the box of the vehicle - not much, but certainly better than nothing. I for instance tend to minimise motorcycle rides since i feel unsafe with a stranger driver. You might ask to drive slower, but remember driving slower means less balance.

My vision is to have a collective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become scientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different countries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hitch hiking technique.

= Related links and references =
{{nomadwiki}}
* [[wikivoyage:Tips_for_hitchhiking|Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikivoyage]]
* [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>8w67noo917xibrae186tmcl3tv2hjmi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>100263</id>
      <parentid>100262</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-01-07T17:53:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Holding a big "Couchsurfing?" sign in public place */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="38376">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber.

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|right|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
[[File:hitch_hiker_58392_in_spain.jpeg|thumb|right|250px|left|Taking pictures of your hitch-hiking buddy is an excellent way to keep up your mood.]]
Standing on dirty boring roads with loads traffic passing by and no one picking you up is as much a part of hitch-hiking as it is to eventually get picked up by a kind-hearted soul. If you're travelling alone, the road is your only companion that is reliably always by your side. If you can manage to have a friendly relationship with it, you'll have a much more enjoyable experience. Obviously, when travelling in a group, the same goes for your human friend(s).

It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

If you carry a marker with you, you can even cheer up future hitch-hikers who will use your spot by leaving them little messages on sign posts or crash barriers.

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something. Stuart at http://lookingforstu.com swears by a Superman T-shirt.  It's bright, colourful and is a universal symbol of hope and peace.  The amount of times drivers have said that is the reason they picked him up is astounding!

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==

[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
[https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
[http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
[http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
[http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
Can your driver host you?
Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?


=== Holding a big "Couchsurfing?" sign in public place === 
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).

=== Camping ===

Wild camping how to http://nomadwiki.org/en/Camping

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== Hitchhiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his or her practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much science as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contradicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the discussion page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hitchhiking theory: 
Hitch hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be prepared!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majority of drivers pick up hitch hikers on psychological association based on looks and self interest which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and average as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Average Driver''' - the average driver does not understand hitch hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occur to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Appearance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, harmless guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and T-shirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hitch hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the average  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremely dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldn't be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the average driver" section. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

* '''Asking for Ride''' - Don't be afraid to talk to people and ask them directly if you can hop on. Some drivers would not consider taking you, yet by hearing a nice, friendly, polite voice they might will as well as feel a bit more obligation to help you.

===Different Vessels===
You should feel comfortable through out the whole way to your destination. if you feel uncomfortable hoping on a specific vessel - don't. As it will tire you out and make a bad experience for the future. If you feel unsafe with the drivers drive don't be ashamed to tell him (I do ask all motorcycle rides to drive relatively slow especially on unpaved roads, never needed to tell in a car) he will understand your worry, remember he stopped in order to help and will be nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

* '''Back of a Pick-Up Truck''' - The back of a pick up truck is where you are likely to spend a big chunk of the road. However there is a clear problem of safety. For the driver it might be convenient to tell you to hop on the back and so he wont need to worry from a dangerous hiker or either talk in case he isn't in the mood. It is also an extra space in case the seats are full. On the hiker side you have zero control on what is going on and hop on without at least getting to know if the driver is trust worthy is not recommended. You should have a few words with the driver about the way and agree on a place before hands since you wouldn't be able to converse once you start driving, knocking on the roof for stop at most. There is also the problem of sitting without safety belt and potentially with unfasten equipment that might hurt you in case of emergency stop, curves or irresponsible driving.

* '''Motorcycles''' - Motorcycles are somewhat problematic when it comes to travelling with luggage, yet is possible. It is a good way to travel fast, but just like driving one - even less safe as taking a ride with a car. Try to ask the driver for an extra helmet. Usually not likely to work, but some drivers keep an extra "half helmet" in the box of the vehicle - not much, but certainly better than nothing. I for instance tend to minimise motorcycle rides since i feel unsafe with a stranger driver. You might ask to drive slower, but remember driving slower means less balance.

My vision is to have a collective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become scientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different countries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hitch hiking technique.

= Related links and references =
{{nomadwiki}}
* [[wikivoyage:Tips_for_hitchhiking|Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikivoyage]]
* [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>43fudl3kqtxv0kqqfb4ggco61bttphd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>100264</id>
      <parentid>100263</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-01-07T17:54:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Camping */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="38747">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber.

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|right|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
[[File:hitch_hiker_58392_in_spain.jpeg|thumb|right|250px|left|Taking pictures of your hitch-hiking buddy is an excellent way to keep up your mood.]]
Standing on dirty boring roads with loads traffic passing by and no one picking you up is as much a part of hitch-hiking as it is to eventually get picked up by a kind-hearted soul. If you're travelling alone, the road is your only companion that is reliably always by your side. If you can manage to have a friendly relationship with it, you'll have a much more enjoyable experience. Obviously, when travelling in a group, the same goes for your human friend(s).

It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

If you carry a marker with you, you can even cheer up future hitch-hikers who will use your spot by leaving them little messages on sign posts or crash barriers.

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something. Stuart at http://lookingforstu.com swears by a Superman T-shirt.  It's bright, colourful and is a universal symbol of hope and peace.  The amount of times drivers have said that is the reason they picked him up is astounding!

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==

[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
[https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
[http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
[http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
[http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
Can your driver host you?
Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?


=== Holding a big "Couchsurfing?" sign in public place === 
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).

=== Camping ===

Wild camping how to http://nomadwiki.org/en/Camping

=== Other options ===

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station or Mc Donlds, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== Hitchhiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his or her practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much science as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contradicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the discussion page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hitchhiking theory: 
Hitch hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be prepared!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majority of drivers pick up hitch hikers on psychological association based on looks and self interest which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and average as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Average Driver''' - the average driver does not understand hitch hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occur to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Appearance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, harmless guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and T-shirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hitch hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the average  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremely dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldn't be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the average driver" section. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

* '''Asking for Ride''' - Don't be afraid to talk to people and ask them directly if you can hop on. Some drivers would not consider taking you, yet by hearing a nice, friendly, polite voice they might will as well as feel a bit more obligation to help you.

===Different Vessels===
You should feel comfortable through out the whole way to your destination. if you feel uncomfortable hoping on a specific vessel - don't. As it will tire you out and make a bad experience for the future. If you feel unsafe with the drivers drive don't be ashamed to tell him (I do ask all motorcycle rides to drive relatively slow especially on unpaved roads, never needed to tell in a car) he will understand your worry, remember he stopped in order to help and will be nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

* '''Back of a Pick-Up Truck''' - The back of a pick up truck is where you are likely to spend a big chunk of the road. However there is a clear problem of safety. For the driver it might be convenient to tell you to hop on the back and so he wont need to worry from a dangerous hiker or either talk in case he isn't in the mood. It is also an extra space in case the seats are full. On the hiker side you have zero control on what is going on and hop on without at least getting to know if the driver is trust worthy is not recommended. You should have a few words with the driver about the way and agree on a place before hands since you wouldn't be able to converse once you start driving, knocking on the roof for stop at most. There is also the problem of sitting without safety belt and potentially with unfasten equipment that might hurt you in case of emergency stop, curves or irresponsible driving.

* '''Motorcycles''' - Motorcycles are somewhat problematic when it comes to travelling with luggage, yet is possible. It is a good way to travel fast, but just like driving one - even less safe as taking a ride with a car. Try to ask the driver for an extra helmet. Usually not likely to work, but some drivers keep an extra "half helmet" in the box of the vehicle - not much, but certainly better than nothing. I for instance tend to minimise motorcycle rides since i feel unsafe with a stranger driver. You might ask to drive slower, but remember driving slower means less balance.

My vision is to have a collective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become scientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different countries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hitch hiking technique.

= Related links and references =
{{nomadwiki}}
* [[wikivoyage:Tips_for_hitchhiking|Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikivoyage]]
* [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>ouolcjrl771fkkp35t9ojlw5ntwg58k</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>100265</id>
      <parentid>100264</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-01-07T17:54:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Other options */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="38748">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber.

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|right|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
[[File:hitch_hiker_58392_in_spain.jpeg|thumb|right|250px|left|Taking pictures of your hitch-hiking buddy is an excellent way to keep up your mood.]]
Standing on dirty boring roads with loads traffic passing by and no one picking you up is as much a part of hitch-hiking as it is to eventually get picked up by a kind-hearted soul. If you're travelling alone, the road is your only companion that is reliably always by your side. If you can manage to have a friendly relationship with it, you'll have a much more enjoyable experience. Obviously, when travelling in a group, the same goes for your human friend(s).

It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

If you carry a marker with you, you can even cheer up future hitch-hikers who will use your spot by leaving them little messages on sign posts or crash barriers.

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something. Stuart at http://lookingforstu.com swears by a Superman T-shirt.  It's bright, colourful and is a universal symbol of hope and peace.  The amount of times drivers have said that is the reason they picked him up is astounding!

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==

[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
[https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
[http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
[http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
[http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
Can your driver host you?
Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?


=== Holding a big "Couchsurfing?" sign in public place === 
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).

=== Camping ===

Wild camping how to http://nomadwiki.org/en/Camping

=== Other options ===

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station or Mc Donalds, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== Hitchhiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his or her practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much science as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contradicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the discussion page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hitchhiking theory: 
Hitch hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be prepared!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majority of drivers pick up hitch hikers on psychological association based on looks and self interest which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and average as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Average Driver''' - the average driver does not understand hitch hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occur to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Appearance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, harmless guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and T-shirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hitch hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the average  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremely dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldn't be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the average driver" section. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

* '''Asking for Ride''' - Don't be afraid to talk to people and ask them directly if you can hop on. Some drivers would not consider taking you, yet by hearing a nice, friendly, polite voice they might will as well as feel a bit more obligation to help you.

===Different Vessels===
You should feel comfortable through out the whole way to your destination. if you feel uncomfortable hoping on a specific vessel - don't. As it will tire you out and make a bad experience for the future. If you feel unsafe with the drivers drive don't be ashamed to tell him (I do ask all motorcycle rides to drive relatively slow especially on unpaved roads, never needed to tell in a car) he will understand your worry, remember he stopped in order to help and will be nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

* '''Back of a Pick-Up Truck''' - The back of a pick up truck is where you are likely to spend a big chunk of the road. However there is a clear problem of safety. For the driver it might be convenient to tell you to hop on the back and so he wont need to worry from a dangerous hiker or either talk in case he isn't in the mood. It is also an extra space in case the seats are full. On the hiker side you have zero control on what is going on and hop on without at least getting to know if the driver is trust worthy is not recommended. You should have a few words with the driver about the way and agree on a place before hands since you wouldn't be able to converse once you start driving, knocking on the roof for stop at most. There is also the problem of sitting without safety belt and potentially with unfasten equipment that might hurt you in case of emergency stop, curves or irresponsible driving.

* '''Motorcycles''' - Motorcycles are somewhat problematic when it comes to travelling with luggage, yet is possible. It is a good way to travel fast, but just like driving one - even less safe as taking a ride with a car. Try to ask the driver for an extra helmet. Usually not likely to work, but some drivers keep an extra "half helmet" in the box of the vehicle - not much, but certainly better than nothing. I for instance tend to minimise motorcycle rides since i feel unsafe with a stranger driver. You might ask to drive slower, but remember driving slower means less balance.

My vision is to have a collective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become scientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different countries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hitch hiking technique.

= Related links and references =
{{nomadwiki}}
* [[wikivoyage:Tips_for_hitchhiking|Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikivoyage]]
* [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

{{Excellent}}

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>scvtn4r7cmxsh82byvfhbjikh01b4iy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>100266</id>
      <parentid>100265</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-01-07T17:56:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Related links and references */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="38764">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber.

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==
A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|right|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
[[File:hitch_hiker_58392_in_spain.jpeg|thumb|right|250px|left|Taking pictures of your hitch-hiking buddy is an excellent way to keep up your mood.]]
Standing on dirty boring roads with loads traffic passing by and no one picking you up is as much a part of hitch-hiking as it is to eventually get picked up by a kind-hearted soul. If you're travelling alone, the road is your only companion that is reliably always by your side. If you can manage to have a friendly relationship with it, you'll have a much more enjoyable experience. Obviously, when travelling in a group, the same goes for your human friend(s).

It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

If you carry a marker with you, you can even cheer up future hitch-hikers who will use your spot by leaving them little messages on sign posts or crash barriers.

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something. Stuart at http://lookingforstu.com swears by a Superman T-shirt.  It's bright, colourful and is a universal symbol of hope and peace.  The amount of times drivers have said that is the reason they picked him up is astounding!

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==

[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
[https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
[http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
[http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
[http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
Can your driver host you?
Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?


=== Holding a big "Couchsurfing?" sign in public place === 
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).

=== Camping ===

Wild camping how to http://nomadwiki.org/en/Camping

=== Other options ===

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station or Mc Donalds, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== Hitchhiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his or her practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much science as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contradicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the discussion page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hitchhiking theory: 
Hitch hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be prepared!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majority of drivers pick up hitch hikers on psychological association based on looks and self interest which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and average as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Average Driver''' - the average driver does not understand hitch hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occur to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Appearance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, harmless guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and T-shirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hitch hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the average  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremely dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldn't be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the average driver" section. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

* '''Asking for Ride''' - Don't be afraid to talk to people and ask them directly if you can hop on. Some drivers would not consider taking you, yet by hearing a nice, friendly, polite voice they might will as well as feel a bit more obligation to help you.

===Different Vessels===
You should feel comfortable through out the whole way to your destination. if you feel uncomfortable hoping on a specific vessel - don't. As it will tire you out and make a bad experience for the future. If you feel unsafe with the drivers drive don't be ashamed to tell him (I do ask all motorcycle rides to drive relatively slow especially on unpaved roads, never needed to tell in a car) he will understand your worry, remember he stopped in order to help and will be nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

* '''Back of a Pick-Up Truck''' - The back of a pick up truck is where you are likely to spend a big chunk of the road. However there is a clear problem of safety. For the driver it might be convenient to tell you to hop on the back and so he wont need to worry from a dangerous hiker or either talk in case he isn't in the mood. It is also an extra space in case the seats are full. On the hiker side you have zero control on what is going on and hop on without at least getting to know if the driver is trust worthy is not recommended. You should have a few words with the driver about the way and agree on a place before hands since you wouldn't be able to converse once you start driving, knocking on the roof for stop at most. There is also the problem of sitting without safety belt and potentially with unfasten equipment that might hurt you in case of emergency stop, curves or irresponsible driving.

* '''Motorcycles''' - Motorcycles are somewhat problematic when it comes to travelling with luggage, yet is possible. It is a good way to travel fast, but just like driving one - even less safe as taking a ride with a car. Try to ask the driver for an extra helmet. Usually not likely to work, but some drivers keep an extra "half helmet" in the box of the vehicle - not much, but certainly better than nothing. I for instance tend to minimise motorcycle rides since i feel unsafe with a stranger driver. You might ask to drive slower, but remember driving slower means less balance.

My vision is to have a collective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become scientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different countries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hitch hiking technique.

= Related links and references =

* [[wikivoyage:Tips_for_hitchhiking|Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikivoyage]]
* [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

= Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki =

{{nomadwiki}}



[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>m10rzrovtj994bcbnvwq530pr8u24ve</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>100267</id>
      <parentid>100266</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-01-07T18:13:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Carry a good map */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="38971">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber.

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==

A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

For DIY maps i like to write down bigest cities what i should pass and asking a driver to put me out at the best spots to continue my route. Works if your phone with Google Maos screenshots wont starts :D

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|right|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
[[File:hitch_hiker_58392_in_spain.jpeg|thumb|right|250px|left|Taking pictures of your hitch-hiking buddy is an excellent way to keep up your mood.]]
Standing on dirty boring roads with loads traffic passing by and no one picking you up is as much a part of hitch-hiking as it is to eventually get picked up by a kind-hearted soul. If you're travelling alone, the road is your only companion that is reliably always by your side. If you can manage to have a friendly relationship with it, you'll have a much more enjoyable experience. Obviously, when travelling in a group, the same goes for your human friend(s).

It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

If you carry a marker with you, you can even cheer up future hitch-hikers who will use your spot by leaving them little messages on sign posts or crash barriers.

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something. Stuart at http://lookingforstu.com swears by a Superman T-shirt.  It's bright, colourful and is a universal symbol of hope and peace.  The amount of times drivers have said that is the reason they picked him up is astounding!

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==

[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
[https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
[http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
[http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
[http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
Can your driver host you?
Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?


=== Holding a big "Couchsurfing?" sign in public place === 
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).

=== Camping ===

Wild camping how to http://nomadwiki.org/en/Camping

=== Other options ===

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station or Mc Donalds, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents of are are checked, and you may be asked for your document too, so be prepared Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== Hitchhiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his or her practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much science as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contradicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the discussion page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hitchhiking theory: 
Hitch hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be prepared!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majority of drivers pick up hitch hikers on psychological association based on looks and self interest which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and average as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Average Driver''' - the average driver does not understand hitch hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occur to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Appearance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, harmless guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and T-shirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hitch hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the average  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremely dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldn't be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the average driver" section. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

* '''Asking for Ride''' - Don't be afraid to talk to people and ask them directly if you can hop on. Some drivers would not consider taking you, yet by hearing a nice, friendly, polite voice they might will as well as feel a bit more obligation to help you.

===Different Vessels===
You should feel comfortable through out the whole way to your destination. if you feel uncomfortable hoping on a specific vessel - don't. As it will tire you out and make a bad experience for the future. If you feel unsafe with the drivers drive don't be ashamed to tell him (I do ask all motorcycle rides to drive relatively slow especially on unpaved roads, never needed to tell in a car) he will understand your worry, remember he stopped in order to help and will be nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

* '''Back of a Pick-Up Truck''' - The back of a pick up truck is where you are likely to spend a big chunk of the road. However there is a clear problem of safety. For the driver it might be convenient to tell you to hop on the back and so he wont need to worry from a dangerous hiker or either talk in case he isn't in the mood. It is also an extra space in case the seats are full. On the hiker side you have zero control on what is going on and hop on without at least getting to know if the driver is trust worthy is not recommended. You should have a few words with the driver about the way and agree on a place before hands since you wouldn't be able to converse once you start driving, knocking on the roof for stop at most. There is also the problem of sitting without safety belt and potentially with unfasten equipment that might hurt you in case of emergency stop, curves or irresponsible driving.

* '''Motorcycles''' - Motorcycles are somewhat problematic when it comes to travelling with luggage, yet is possible. It is a good way to travel fast, but just like driving one - even less safe as taking a ride with a car. Try to ask the driver for an extra helmet. Usually not likely to work, but some drivers keep an extra "half helmet" in the box of the vehicle - not much, but certainly better than nothing. I for instance tend to minimise motorcycle rides since i feel unsafe with a stranger driver. You might ask to drive slower, but remember driving slower means less balance.

My vision is to have a collective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become scientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different countries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hitch hiking technique.

= Related links and references =

* [[wikivoyage:Tips_for_hitchhiking|Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikivoyage]]
* [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

= Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki =

{{nomadwiki}}



[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>hsgvs1ujnfpq193yw28838a90b1x0iu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104455</id>
      <parentid>100267</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-06-27T15:55:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Magpie</username>
        <id>47370</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>Some grammar fixes</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="38966">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber.

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==

A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

For DIY maps i like to write down bigest cities what i should pass and asking a driver to put me out at the best spots to continue my route. Works if your phone with Google Maos screenshots wont starts :D

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|right|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Stay positive, smile and laugh ==
[[File:hitch_hiker_58392_in_spain.jpeg|thumb|right|250px|left|Taking pictures of your hitch-hiking buddy is an excellent way to keep up your mood.]]
Standing on dirty boring roads with loads traffic passing by and no one picking you up is as much a part of hitch-hiking as it is to eventually get picked up by a kind-hearted soul. If you're travelling alone, the road is your only companion that is reliably always by your side. If you can manage to have a friendly relationship with it, you'll have a much more enjoyable experience. Obviously, when travelling in a group, the same goes for your human friend(s).

It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

If you carry a marker with you, you can even cheer up future hitch-hikers who will use your spot by leaving them little messages on sign posts or crash barriers.

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something. Stuart at http://lookingforstu.com swears by a Superman T-shirt.  It's bright, colourful and is a universal symbol of hope and peace.  The amount of times drivers have said that is the reason they picked him up is astounding!

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==

[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
[https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
[http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
[http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
[http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
Can your driver host you?
Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?


=== Holding a big "Couchsurfing?" sign in public place === 
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).

=== Camping ===

Wild camping how to http://nomadwiki.org/en/Camping

=== Other options ===

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station or Mc Donalds, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents are checked, and you may be asked for your documents too, so be prepared. Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== Hitchhiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his or her practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much science as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contradicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the discussion page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hitchhiking theory: 
Hitch hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be prepared!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majority of drivers pick up hitch hikers on psychological association based on looks and self interest which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and average as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Average Driver''' - the average driver does not understand hitch hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occur to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Appearance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, harmless guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and T-shirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hitch hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the average  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremely dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldn't be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the average driver" section. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

* '''Asking for Ride''' - Don't be afraid to talk to people and ask them directly if you can hop on. Some drivers would not consider taking you, yet by hearing a nice, friendly, polite voice they might will as well as feel a bit more obligation to help you.

===Different Vessels===
You should feel comfortable through out the whole way to your destination. if you feel uncomfortable hoping on a specific vessel - don't. As it will tire you out and make a bad experience for the future. If you feel unsafe with the drivers drive don't be ashamed to tell him (I do ask all motorcycle rides to drive relatively slow especially on unpaved roads, never needed to tell in a car) he will understand your worry, remember he stopped in order to help and will be nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

* '''Back of a Pick-Up Truck''' - The back of a pick up truck is where you are likely to spend a big chunk of the road. However there is a clear problem of safety. For the driver it might be convenient to tell you to hop on the back and so he wont need to worry from a dangerous hiker or either talk in case he isn't in the mood. It is also an extra space in case the seats are full. On the hiker side you have zero control on what is going on and hop on without at least getting to know if the driver is trust worthy is not recommended. You should have a few words with the driver about the way and agree on a place before hands since you wouldn't be able to converse once you start driving, knocking on the roof for stop at most. There is also the problem of sitting without safety belt and potentially with unfasten equipment that might hurt you in case of emergency stop, curves or irresponsible driving.

* '''Motorcycles''' - Motorcycles are somewhat problematic when it comes to travelling with luggage, yet is possible. It is a good way to travel fast, but just like driving one - even less safe as taking a ride with a car. Try to ask the driver for an extra helmet. Usually not likely to work, but some drivers keep an extra "half helmet" in the box of the vehicle - not much, but certainly better than nothing. I for instance tend to minimise motorcycle rides since i feel unsafe with a stranger driver. You might ask to drive slower, but remember driving slower means less balance.

My vision is to have a collective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become scientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different countries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hitch hiking technique.

= Related links and references =

* [[wikivoyage:Tips_for_hitchhiking|Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikivoyage]]
* [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

= Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki =

{{nomadwiki}}



[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>3bfcs9eyr8v8tlrv603n6ecd1p66tzn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104642</id>
      <parentid>104455</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-07-30T21:29:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tawax</username>
        <id>2655</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="39438">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber.

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==

A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

For DIY maps i like to write down bigest cities what i should pass and asking a driver to put me out at the best spots to continue my route. Works if your phone with Google Maos screenshots wont starts :D

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|right|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Think positive, stay positive, smile and laugh ==
[[File:hitch_hiker_58392_in_spain.jpeg|thumb|right|250px|left|Taking pictures of your hitch-hiking buddy is an excellent way to keep up your mood.]]

The results that you get in life are simply a byproduct of your beliefs. So it is very important to belive that hitchhiking will work! Think positive and tell your friends at what time you will arrive at the latest (like "I will arrive before 20 p.m."), even if you don't know how you will manage to reach that goal. User tawax ALWAYS managed to arrive on the day he planned (without cheating) because he is sure it will work! And it works! Just try it!

Standing on dirty boring roads with loads traffic passing by and no one picking you up is as much a part of hitch-hiking as it is to eventually get picked up by a kind-hearted soul. If you're travelling alone, the road is your only companion that is reliably always by your side. If you can manage to have a friendly relationship with it, you'll have a much more enjoyable experience. Obviously, when travelling in a group, the same goes for your human friend(s).

It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

If you carry a marker with you, you can even cheer up future hitch-hikers who will use your spot by leaving them little messages on sign posts or crash barriers.

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something. Stuart at http://lookingforstu.com swears by a Superman T-shirt.  It's bright, colourful and is a universal symbol of hope and peace.  The amount of times drivers have said that is the reason they picked him up is astounding!

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==

[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
[https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
[http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
[http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
[http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
Can your driver host you?
Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?


=== Holding a big "Couchsurfing?" sign in public place === 
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).

=== Camping ===

Wild camping how to http://nomadwiki.org/en/Camping

=== Other options ===

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station or Mc Donalds, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents are checked, and you may be asked for your documents too, so be prepared. Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== Hitchhiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his or her practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much science as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contradicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the discussion page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hitchhiking theory: 
Hitch hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be prepared!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majority of drivers pick up hitch hikers on psychological association based on looks and self interest which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and average as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Average Driver''' - the average driver does not understand hitch hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occur to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Appearance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, harmless guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and T-shirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hitch hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the average  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremely dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldn't be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the average driver" section. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

* '''Asking for Ride''' - Don't be afraid to talk to people and ask them directly if you can hop on. Some drivers would not consider taking you, yet by hearing a nice, friendly, polite voice they might will as well as feel a bit more obligation to help you.

===Different Vessels===
You should feel comfortable through out the whole way to your destination. if you feel uncomfortable hoping on a specific vessel - don't. As it will tire you out and make a bad experience for the future. If you feel unsafe with the drivers drive don't be ashamed to tell him (I do ask all motorcycle rides to drive relatively slow especially on unpaved roads, never needed to tell in a car) he will understand your worry, remember he stopped in order to help and will be nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

* '''Back of a Pick-Up Truck''' - The back of a pick up truck is where you are likely to spend a big chunk of the road. However there is a clear problem of safety. For the driver it might be convenient to tell you to hop on the back and so he wont need to worry from a dangerous hiker or either talk in case he isn't in the mood. It is also an extra space in case the seats are full. On the hiker side you have zero control on what is going on and hop on without at least getting to know if the driver is trust worthy is not recommended. You should have a few words with the driver about the way and agree on a place before hands since you wouldn't be able to converse once you start driving, knocking on the roof for stop at most. There is also the problem of sitting without safety belt and potentially with unfasten equipment that might hurt you in case of emergency stop, curves or irresponsible driving.

* '''Motorcycles''' - Motorcycles are somewhat problematic when it comes to travelling with luggage, yet is possible. It is a good way to travel fast, but just like driving one - even less safe as taking a ride with a car. Try to ask the driver for an extra helmet. Usually not likely to work, but some drivers keep an extra "half helmet" in the box of the vehicle - not much, but certainly better than nothing. I for instance tend to minimise motorcycle rides since i feel unsafe with a stranger driver. You might ask to drive slower, but remember driving slower means less balance.

My vision is to have a collective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become scientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different countries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hitch hiking technique.

= Related links and references =

* [[wikivoyage:Tips_for_hitchhiking|Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikivoyage]]
* [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

= Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki =

{{nomadwiki}}



[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>9mpm0hclim7tinp3l06ywtv2z9mzywq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104643</id>
      <parentid>104642</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-07-31T06:29:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tawax</username>
        <id>2655</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* Think positive, stay positive, smile and laugh */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="39485">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber.

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==

A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

For DIY maps i like to write down bigest cities what i should pass and asking a driver to put me out at the best spots to continue my route. Works if your phone with Google Maos screenshots wont starts :D

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|right|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Think positive, stay positive, smile and laugh ==
[[File:hitch_hiker_58392_in_spain.jpeg|thumb|right|250px|left|Taking pictures of your hitch-hiking buddy is an excellent way to keep up your mood.]]

The results that you get in life are simply a byproduct of your beliefs. So it is very important to belive that hitchhiking will work! Think positive, focus on what you want and tell your friends at what time you will arrive at the latest (like "I will be here for dinner so I will arrive before 7 p.m.!"), even if you don't know how you will manage to do this. Hitchhiker tawax ALWAYS managed to arrive on the day he planned (without cheating) because he is convinced hitchhiking works! Just try it!

Standing on dirty boring roads with loads traffic passing by and no one picking you up is as much a part of hitch-hiking as it is to eventually get picked up by a kind-hearted soul. If you're travelling alone, the road is your only companion that is reliably always by your side. If you can manage to have a friendly relationship with it, you'll have a much more enjoyable experience. Obviously, when travelling in a group, the same goes for your human friend(s).

It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

If you carry a marker with you, you can even cheer up future hitch-hikers who will use your spot by leaving them little messages on sign posts or crash barriers.

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something. Stuart at http://lookingforstu.com swears by a Superman T-shirt.  It's bright, colourful and is a universal symbol of hope and peace.  The amount of times drivers have said that is the reason they picked him up is astounding!

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

Girls check out the safety guide tailored to your needs at http://girls.hitchbase.com

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==

[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
[https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
[http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
[http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
[http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
Can your driver host you?
Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?


=== Holding a big "Couchsurfing?" sign in public place === 
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).

=== Camping ===

Wild camping how to http://nomadwiki.org/en/Camping

=== Other options ===

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station or Mc Donalds, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents are checked, and you may be asked for your documents too, so be prepared. Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== Hitchhiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his or her practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much science as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contradicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the discussion page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hitchhiking theory: 
Hitch hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be prepared!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majority of drivers pick up hitch hikers on psychological association based on looks and self interest which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and average as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Average Driver''' - the average driver does not understand hitch hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occur to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Appearance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, harmless guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and T-shirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hitch hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the average  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremely dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldn't be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the average driver" section. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

* '''Asking for Ride''' - Don't be afraid to talk to people and ask them directly if you can hop on. Some drivers would not consider taking you, yet by hearing a nice, friendly, polite voice they might will as well as feel a bit more obligation to help you.

===Different Vessels===
You should feel comfortable through out the whole way to your destination. if you feel uncomfortable hoping on a specific vessel - don't. As it will tire you out and make a bad experience for the future. If you feel unsafe with the drivers drive don't be ashamed to tell him (I do ask all motorcycle rides to drive relatively slow especially on unpaved roads, never needed to tell in a car) he will understand your worry, remember he stopped in order to help and will be nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

* '''Back of a Pick-Up Truck''' - The back of a pick up truck is where you are likely to spend a big chunk of the road. However there is a clear problem of safety. For the driver it might be convenient to tell you to hop on the back and so he wont need to worry from a dangerous hiker or either talk in case he isn't in the mood. It is also an extra space in case the seats are full. On the hiker side you have zero control on what is going on and hop on without at least getting to know if the driver is trust worthy is not recommended. You should have a few words with the driver about the way and agree on a place before hands since you wouldn't be able to converse once you start driving, knocking on the roof for stop at most. There is also the problem of sitting without safety belt and potentially with unfasten equipment that might hurt you in case of emergency stop, curves or irresponsible driving.

* '''Motorcycles''' - Motorcycles are somewhat problematic when it comes to travelling with luggage, yet is possible. It is a good way to travel fast, but just like driving one - even less safe as taking a ride with a car. Try to ask the driver for an extra helmet. Usually not likely to work, but some drivers keep an extra "half helmet" in the box of the vehicle - not much, but certainly better than nothing. I for instance tend to minimise motorcycle rides since i feel unsafe with a stranger driver. You might ask to drive slower, but remember driving slower means less balance.

My vision is to have a collective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become scientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different countries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hitch hiking technique.

= Related links and references =

* [[wikivoyage:Tips_for_hitchhiking|Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikivoyage]]
* [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

= Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki =

{{nomadwiki}}



[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>8b44kqrq3zzwxujq10fs3p0jhvj27zu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105762</id>
      <parentid>104643</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-05-19T08:30:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="39398">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber.

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==

A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

For DIY maps i like to write down bigest cities what i should pass and asking a driver to put me out at the best spots to continue my route. Works if your phone with Google Maos screenshots wont starts :D

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|right|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Think positive, stay positive, smile and laugh ==
[[File:hitch_hiker_58392_in_spain.jpeg|thumb|right|250px|left|Taking pictures of your hitch-hiking buddy is an excellent way to keep up your mood.]]

The results that you get in life are simply a byproduct of your beliefs. So it is very important to belive that hitchhiking will work! Think positive, focus on what you want and tell your friends at what time you will arrive at the latest (like "I will be here for dinner so I will arrive before 7 p.m.!"), even if you don't know how you will manage to do this. Hitchhiker tawax ALWAYS managed to arrive on the day he planned (without cheating) because he is convinced hitchhiking works! Just try it!

Standing on dirty boring roads with loads traffic passing by and no one picking you up is as much a part of hitch-hiking as it is to eventually get picked up by a kind-hearted soul. If you're travelling alone, the road is your only companion that is reliably always by your side. If you can manage to have a friendly relationship with it, you'll have a much more enjoyable experience. Obviously, when travelling in a group, the same goes for your human friend(s).

It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

If you carry a marker with you, you can even cheer up future hitch-hikers who will use your spot by leaving them little messages on sign posts or crash barriers.

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something. Stuart at http://lookingforstu.com swears by a Superman T-shirt.  It's bright, colourful and is a universal symbol of hope and peace.  The amount of times drivers have said that is the reason they picked him up is astounding!

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==

[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
[https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
[http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
[http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
[http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
Can your driver host you?
Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?


=== Holding a big "Couchsurfing?" sign in public place === 
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).

=== Camping ===

Wild camping how to http://nomadwiki.org/en/Camping

=== Other options ===

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station or Mc Donalds, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents are checked, and you may be asked for your documents too, so be prepared. Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== Hitchhiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his or her practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much science as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contradicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the discussion page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hitchhiking theory: 
Hitch hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be prepared!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majority of drivers pick up hitch hikers on psychological association based on looks and self interest which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and average as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Average Driver''' - the average driver does not understand hitch hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occur to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Appearance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, harmless guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and T-shirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hitch hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the average  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremely dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldn't be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the average driver" section. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

* '''Asking for Ride''' - Don't be afraid to talk to people and ask them directly if you can hop on. Some drivers would not consider taking you, yet by hearing a nice, friendly, polite voice they might will as well as feel a bit more obligation to help you.

===Different Vessels===
You should feel comfortable through out the whole way to your destination. if you feel uncomfortable hoping on a specific vessel - don't. As it will tire you out and make a bad experience for the future. If you feel unsafe with the drivers drive don't be ashamed to tell him (I do ask all motorcycle rides to drive relatively slow especially on unpaved roads, never needed to tell in a car) he will understand your worry, remember he stopped in order to help and will be nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

* '''Back of a Pick-Up Truck''' - The back of a pick up truck is where you are likely to spend a big chunk of the road. However there is a clear problem of safety. For the driver it might be convenient to tell you to hop on the back and so he wont need to worry from a dangerous hiker or either talk in case he isn't in the mood. It is also an extra space in case the seats are full. On the hiker side you have zero control on what is going on and hop on without at least getting to know if the driver is trust worthy is not recommended. You should have a few words with the driver about the way and agree on a place before hands since you wouldn't be able to converse once you start driving, knocking on the roof for stop at most. There is also the problem of sitting without safety belt and potentially with unfasten equipment that might hurt you in case of emergency stop, curves or irresponsible driving.

* '''Motorcycles''' - Motorcycles are somewhat problematic when it comes to travelling with luggage, yet is possible. It is a good way to travel fast, but just like driving one - even less safe as taking a ride with a car. Try to ask the driver for an extra helmet. Usually not likely to work, but some drivers keep an extra "half helmet" in the box of the vehicle - not much, but certainly better than nothing. I for instance tend to minimise motorcycle rides since i feel unsafe with a stranger driver. You might ask to drive slower, but remember driving slower means less balance.

My vision is to have a collective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become scientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different countries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hitch hiking technique.

= Related links and references =

* [[wikivoyage:Tips_for_hitchhiking|Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikivoyage]]
* [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides
* [http://www.hitchbase.com Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

= Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki =

{{nomadwiki}}



[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>lc7um5lc0shyzxgj9vizj014v3f3k5b</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106172</id>
      <parentid>105762</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-09-11T09:33:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Related links and references */ Historic stuff available on archive.org...</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="39617">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber.

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==

A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

For DIY maps i like to write down bigest cities what i should pass and asking a driver to put me out at the best spots to continue my route. Works if your phone with Google Maos screenshots wont starts :D

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|right|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Think positive, stay positive, smile and laugh ==
[[File:hitch_hiker_58392_in_spain.jpeg|thumb|right|250px|left|Taking pictures of your hitch-hiking buddy is an excellent way to keep up your mood.]]

The results that you get in life are simply a byproduct of your beliefs. So it is very important to belive that hitchhiking will work! Think positive, focus on what you want and tell your friends at what time you will arrive at the latest (like "I will be here for dinner so I will arrive before 7 p.m.!"), even if you don't know how you will manage to do this. Hitchhiker tawax ALWAYS managed to arrive on the day he planned (without cheating) because he is convinced hitchhiking works! Just try it!

Standing on dirty boring roads with loads traffic passing by and no one picking you up is as much a part of hitch-hiking as it is to eventually get picked up by a kind-hearted soul. If you're travelling alone, the road is your only companion that is reliably always by your side. If you can manage to have a friendly relationship with it, you'll have a much more enjoyable experience. Obviously, when travelling in a group, the same goes for your human friend(s).

It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

If you carry a marker with you, you can even cheer up future hitch-hikers who will use your spot by leaving them little messages on sign posts or crash barriers.

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something. Stuart at http://lookingforstu.com swears by a Superman T-shirt.  It's bright, colourful and is a universal symbol of hope and peace.  The amount of times drivers have said that is the reason they picked him up is astounding!

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==

[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
[https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
[http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
[http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
[http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
Can your driver host you?
Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?


=== Holding a big "Couchsurfing?" sign in public place === 
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).

=== Camping ===

Wild camping how to http://nomadwiki.org/en/Camping

=== Other options ===

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station or Mc Donalds, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents are checked, and you may be asked for your documents too, so be prepared. Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== Hitchhiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his or her practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much science as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contradicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the discussion page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hitchhiking theory: 
Hitch hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be prepared!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majority of drivers pick up hitch hikers on psychological association based on looks and self interest which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and average as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Average Driver''' - the average driver does not understand hitch hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occur to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Appearance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, harmless guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and T-shirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hitch hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the average  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremely dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldn't be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the average driver" section. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

* '''Asking for Ride''' - Don't be afraid to talk to people and ask them directly if you can hop on. Some drivers would not consider taking you, yet by hearing a nice, friendly, polite voice they might will as well as feel a bit more obligation to help you.

===Different Vessels===
You should feel comfortable through out the whole way to your destination. if you feel uncomfortable hoping on a specific vessel - don't. As it will tire you out and make a bad experience for the future. If you feel unsafe with the drivers drive don't be ashamed to tell him (I do ask all motorcycle rides to drive relatively slow especially on unpaved roads, never needed to tell in a car) he will understand your worry, remember he stopped in order to help and will be nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

* '''Back of a Pick-Up Truck''' - The back of a pick up truck is where you are likely to spend a big chunk of the road. However there is a clear problem of safety. For the driver it might be convenient to tell you to hop on the back and so he wont need to worry from a dangerous hiker or either talk in case he isn't in the mood. It is also an extra space in case the seats are full. On the hiker side you have zero control on what is going on and hop on without at least getting to know if the driver is trust worthy is not recommended. You should have a few words with the driver about the way and agree on a place before hands since you wouldn't be able to converse once you start driving, knocking on the roof for stop at most. There is also the problem of sitting without safety belt and potentially with unfasten equipment that might hurt you in case of emergency stop, curves or irresponsible driving.

* '''Motorcycles''' - Motorcycles are somewhat problematic when it comes to travelling with luggage, yet is possible. It is a good way to travel fast, but just like driving one - even less safe as taking a ride with a car. Try to ask the driver for an extra helmet. Usually not likely to work, but some drivers keep an extra "half helmet" in the box of the vehicle - not much, but certainly better than nothing. I for instance tend to minimise motorcycle rides since i feel unsafe with a stranger driver. You might ask to drive slower, but remember driving slower means less balance.

My vision is to have a collective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become scientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different countries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hitch hiking technique.

= Related links and references =

* [[wikivoyage:Tips_for_hitchhiking|Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikivoyage]]

Historic stuff available on archive.org:
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20170928145919/http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20210611122216/http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20170609184952/http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides --&gt;
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20130310154155/http://www.hitchbase.com/ Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

= Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki =

{{nomadwiki}}



[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]</text>
      <sha1>4823m4gqe5c1hokregg9j9v4dj32r99</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>107971</id>
      <parentid>106172</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-11-24T15:04:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robyt</username>
        <id>9747</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>Added {{geo-missing}}</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="39634">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber.

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==

A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

For DIY maps i like to write down bigest cities what i should pass and asking a driver to put me out at the best spots to continue my route. Works if your phone with Google Maos screenshots wont starts :D

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|right|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Think positive, stay positive, smile and laugh ==
[[File:hitch_hiker_58392_in_spain.jpeg|thumb|right|250px|left|Taking pictures of your hitch-hiking buddy is an excellent way to keep up your mood.]]

The results that you get in life are simply a byproduct of your beliefs. So it is very important to belive that hitchhiking will work! Think positive, focus on what you want and tell your friends at what time you will arrive at the latest (like "I will be here for dinner so I will arrive before 7 p.m.!"), even if you don't know how you will manage to do this. Hitchhiker tawax ALWAYS managed to arrive on the day he planned (without cheating) because he is convinced hitchhiking works! Just try it!

Standing on dirty boring roads with loads traffic passing by and no one picking you up is as much a part of hitch-hiking as it is to eventually get picked up by a kind-hearted soul. If you're travelling alone, the road is your only companion that is reliably always by your side. If you can manage to have a friendly relationship with it, you'll have a much more enjoyable experience. Obviously, when travelling in a group, the same goes for your human friend(s).

It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

If you carry a marker with you, you can even cheer up future hitch-hikers who will use your spot by leaving them little messages on sign posts or crash barriers.

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something. Stuart at http://lookingforstu.com swears by a Superman T-shirt.  It's bright, colourful and is a universal symbol of hope and peace.  The amount of times drivers have said that is the reason they picked him up is astounding!

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==

[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
[https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
[http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
[http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
[http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
Can your driver host you?
Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?


=== Holding a big "Couchsurfing?" sign in public place === 
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).

=== Camping ===

Wild camping how to http://nomadwiki.org/en/Camping

=== Other options ===

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station or Mc Donalds, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents are checked, and you may be asked for your documents too, so be prepared. Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== Hitchhiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his or her practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much science as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contradicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the discussion page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hitchhiking theory: 
Hitch hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be prepared!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majority of drivers pick up hitch hikers on psychological association based on looks and self interest which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and average as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Average Driver''' - the average driver does not understand hitch hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occur to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Appearance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, harmless guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and T-shirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hitch hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the average  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremely dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldn't be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the average driver" section. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

* '''Asking for Ride''' - Don't be afraid to talk to people and ask them directly if you can hop on. Some drivers would not consider taking you, yet by hearing a nice, friendly, polite voice they might will as well as feel a bit more obligation to help you.

===Different Vessels===
You should feel comfortable through out the whole way to your destination. if you feel uncomfortable hoping on a specific vessel - don't. As it will tire you out and make a bad experience for the future. If you feel unsafe with the drivers drive don't be ashamed to tell him (I do ask all motorcycle rides to drive relatively slow especially on unpaved roads, never needed to tell in a car) he will understand your worry, remember he stopped in order to help and will be nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

* '''Back of a Pick-Up Truck''' - The back of a pick up truck is where you are likely to spend a big chunk of the road. However there is a clear problem of safety. For the driver it might be convenient to tell you to hop on the back and so he wont need to worry from a dangerous hiker or either talk in case he isn't in the mood. It is also an extra space in case the seats are full. On the hiker side you have zero control on what is going on and hop on without at least getting to know if the driver is trust worthy is not recommended. You should have a few words with the driver about the way and agree on a place before hands since you wouldn't be able to converse once you start driving, knocking on the roof for stop at most. There is also the problem of sitting without safety belt and potentially with unfasten equipment that might hurt you in case of emergency stop, curves or irresponsible driving.

* '''Motorcycles''' - Motorcycles are somewhat problematic when it comes to travelling with luggage, yet is possible. It is a good way to travel fast, but just like driving one - even less safe as taking a ride with a car. Try to ask the driver for an extra helmet. Usually not likely to work, but some drivers keep an extra "half helmet" in the box of the vehicle - not much, but certainly better than nothing. I for instance tend to minimise motorcycle rides since i feel unsafe with a stranger driver. You might ask to drive slower, but remember driving slower means less balance.

My vision is to have a collective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become scientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different countries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hitch hiking technique.

= Related links and references =

* [[wikivoyage:Tips_for_hitchhiking|Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikivoyage]]

Historic stuff available on archive.org:
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20170928145919/http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20210611122216/http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20170609184952/http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides --&gt;
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20130310154155/http://www.hitchbase.com/ Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

= Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki =

{{nomadwiki}}



[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]

{{geo-missing}}</text>
      <sha1>b56mrni9jahq3uov7wdfapoxp6lf1dg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>108240</id>
      <parentid>107971</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-12-09T22:36:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Harvestmouse</username>
        <id>5473</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* Signs */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="39936">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber.

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==

A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

For DIY maps i like to write down bigest cities what i should pass and asking a driver to put me out at the best spots to continue my route. Works if your phone with Google Maos screenshots wont starts :D

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|right|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Think positive, stay positive, smile and laugh ==
[[File:hitch_hiker_58392_in_spain.jpeg|thumb|right|250px|left|Taking pictures of your hitch-hiking buddy is an excellent way to keep up your mood.]]

The results that you get in life are simply a byproduct of your beliefs. So it is very important to belive that hitchhiking will work! Think positive, focus on what you want and tell your friends at what time you will arrive at the latest (like "I will be here for dinner so I will arrive before 7 p.m.!"), even if you don't know how you will manage to do this. Hitchhiker tawax ALWAYS managed to arrive on the day he planned (without cheating) because he is convinced hitchhiking works! Just try it!

Standing on dirty boring roads with loads traffic passing by and no one picking you up is as much a part of hitch-hiking as it is to eventually get picked up by a kind-hearted soul. If you're travelling alone, the road is your only companion that is reliably always by your side. If you can manage to have a friendly relationship with it, you'll have a much more enjoyable experience. Obviously, when travelling in a group, the same goes for your human friend(s).

It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

If you carry a marker with you, you can even cheer up future hitch-hikers who will use your spot by leaving them little messages on sign posts or crash barriers.

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something. Stuart at http://lookingforstu.com swears by a Superman T-shirt.  It's bright, colourful and is a universal symbol of hope and peace.  The amount of times drivers have said that is the reason they picked him up is astounding!

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

Especially if you're going to travel the same route more than once, it can be worth making signs on white A4 card and then laminating them before you set out. It keeps the signs flat, protects them from the rain, looks a lot better than torn brown cardboard and only costs about 10-20 cents per sign.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==

[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
[https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
[http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
[http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
[http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
Can your driver host you?
Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?


=== Holding a big "Couchsurfing?" sign in public place === 
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).

=== Camping ===

Wild camping how to http://nomadwiki.org/en/Camping

=== Other options ===

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station or Mc Donalds, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents are checked, and you may be asked for your documents too, so be prepared. Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== Hitchhiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his or her practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much science as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contradicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the discussion page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hitchhiking theory: 
Hitch hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be prepared!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majority of drivers pick up hitch hikers on psychological association based on looks and self interest which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and average as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Average Driver''' - the average driver does not understand hitch hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occur to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Appearance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, harmless guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and T-shirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hitch hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the average  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremely dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldn't be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the average driver" section. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

* '''Asking for Ride''' - Don't be afraid to talk to people and ask them directly if you can hop on. Some drivers would not consider taking you, yet by hearing a nice, friendly, polite voice they might will as well as feel a bit more obligation to help you.

===Different Vessels===
You should feel comfortable through out the whole way to your destination. if you feel uncomfortable hoping on a specific vessel - don't. As it will tire you out and make a bad experience for the future. If you feel unsafe with the drivers drive don't be ashamed to tell him (I do ask all motorcycle rides to drive relatively slow especially on unpaved roads, never needed to tell in a car) he will understand your worry, remember he stopped in order to help and will be nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

* '''Back of a Pick-Up Truck''' - The back of a pick up truck is where you are likely to spend a big chunk of the road. However there is a clear problem of safety. For the driver it might be convenient to tell you to hop on the back and so he wont need to worry from a dangerous hiker or either talk in case he isn't in the mood. It is also an extra space in case the seats are full. On the hiker side you have zero control on what is going on and hop on without at least getting to know if the driver is trust worthy is not recommended. You should have a few words with the driver about the way and agree on a place before hands since you wouldn't be able to converse once you start driving, knocking on the roof for stop at most. There is also the problem of sitting without safety belt and potentially with unfasten equipment that might hurt you in case of emergency stop, curves or irresponsible driving.

* '''Motorcycles''' - Motorcycles are somewhat problematic when it comes to travelling with luggage, yet is possible. It is a good way to travel fast, but just like driving one - even less safe as taking a ride with a car. Try to ask the driver for an extra helmet. Usually not likely to work, but some drivers keep an extra "half helmet" in the box of the vehicle - not much, but certainly better than nothing. I for instance tend to minimise motorcycle rides since i feel unsafe with a stranger driver. You might ask to drive slower, but remember driving slower means less balance.

My vision is to have a collective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become scientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different countries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hitch hiking technique.

= Related links and references =

* [[wikivoyage:Tips_for_hitchhiking|Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikivoyage]]

Historic stuff available on archive.org:
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20170928145919/http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20210611122216/http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20170609184952/http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides --&gt;
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20130310154155/http://www.hitchbase.com/ Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

= Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki =

{{nomadwiki}}



[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]

{{geo-missing}}</text>
      <sha1>4pgfiswbi4c36nr68x8b3gfirqgwlot</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>111214</id>
      <parentid>108240</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-06-17T18:46:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Itsjules</username>
        <id>47268</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Hitchhiker Tips */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="40869">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber.

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==

A list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]]. You want to know where you are going. It also helps if [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] are marked, and you don't need city maps. Try and find a map that you don't have to open out to one large sheet of paper every time you want to use it; you will be using it often. Book-style maps are best. A lot of times, you'll be okay without owning a map, though, if you use your chances well to have a look at one - petrol and service stations and lifts - and keep in mind all you need to know. If you have a digital camera, photographing the map and using the zoom function later has proven invaluable.

It's recommended you have a map that is at least 1:1,000,000 ratio. 1:750,000 is usually good enough. A map with a scale of 1:250.000 will still allow you to recognize enough details to walk somewhere if you get lost. Remember that petrol stations often have maps for sale, including very local ones. If you need to find out the geography of the local area, simply walk into the shop, pick up a local map, study it, get the information you need, then put it back and walk out. Many service stations also have large maps on walls or notice boards.

For the digitally inclined, Google maps now offers the ability to create and save your own routes and landmarks, and to share them. Consider making your hitch-hiking route public with comments about it's hitch-ability.

Hitchwiki spots in combination with OpenStreetMap can also be accessed offline. See [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]].

For DIY maps i like to write down bigest cities what i should pass and asking a driver to put me out at the best spots to continue my route. Works if your phone with Google Maos screenshots wont starts :D

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|right|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Think positive, stay positive, smile and laugh ==
[[File:hitch_hiker_58392_in_spain.jpeg|thumb|right|250px|left|Taking pictures of your hitch-hiking buddy is an excellent way to keep up your mood.]]

The results that you get in life are simply a byproduct of your beliefs. So it is very important to belive that hitchhiking will work! Think positive, focus on what you want and tell your friends at what time you will arrive at the latest (like "I will be here for dinner so I will arrive before 7 p.m.!"), even if you don't know how you will manage to do this. Hitchhiker tawax ALWAYS managed to arrive on the day he planned (without cheating) because he is convinced hitchhiking works! Just try it!

Standing on dirty boring roads with loads traffic passing by and no one picking you up is as much a part of hitch-hiking as it is to eventually get picked up by a kind-hearted soul. If you're travelling alone, the road is your only companion that is reliably always by your side. If you can manage to have a friendly relationship with it, you'll have a much more enjoyable experience. Obviously, when travelling in a group, the same goes for your human friend(s).

It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

If you carry a marker with you, you can even cheer up future hitch-hikers who will use your spot by leaving them little messages on sign posts or crash barriers.

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something. Stuart at http://lookingforstu.com swears by a Superman T-shirt.  It's bright, colourful and is a universal symbol of hope and peace.  The amount of times drivers have said that is the reason they picked him up is astounding!

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

Especially if you're going to travel the same route more than once, it can be worth making signs on white A4 card and then laminating them before you set out. It keeps the signs flat, protects them from the rain, looks a lot better than torn brown cardboard and only costs about 10-20 cents per sign.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==

[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
[https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
[http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
[http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
[http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
Can your driver host you?
Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?


=== Holding a big "Couchsurfing?" sign in public place === 
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).

=== Camping ===

Wild camping how to http://nomadwiki.org/en/Camping

=== Other options ===

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station or Mc Donalds, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents are checked, and you may be asked for your documents too, so be prepared. Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== Hitchhiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his or her practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much science as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contradicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the discussion page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hitchhiking theory: 
Hitch hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be prepared!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majority of drivers pick up hitch hikers on psychological association based on looks and self interest which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and average as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Average Driver''' - the average driver does not understand hitch hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occur to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Appearance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, harmless guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and T-shirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hitch hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the average  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremely dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldn't be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the average driver" section. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

* '''Asking for Ride''' - Don't be afraid to talk to people and ask them directly if you can hop on. Some drivers would not consider taking you, yet by hearing a nice, friendly, polite voice they might will as well as feel a bit more obligation to help you.

===Different Vessels===
You should feel comfortable through out the whole way to your destination. if you feel uncomfortable hoping on a specific vessel - don't. As it will tire you out and make a bad experience for the future. If you feel unsafe with the drivers drive don't be ashamed to tell him (I do ask all motorcycle rides to drive relatively slow especially on unpaved roads, never needed to tell in a car) he will understand your worry, remember he stopped in order to help and will be nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

* '''Back of a Pick-Up Truck''' - The back of a pick up truck is where you are likely to spend a big chunk of the road. However there is a clear problem of safety. For the driver it might be convenient to tell you to hop on the back and so he wont need to worry from a dangerous hiker or either talk in case he isn't in the mood. It is also an extra space in case the seats are full. On the hiker side you have zero control on what is going on and hop on without at least getting to know if the driver is trust worthy is not recommended. You should have a few words with the driver about the way and agree on a place before hands since you wouldn't be able to converse once you start driving, knocking on the roof for stop at most. There is also the problem of sitting without safety belt and potentially with unfasten equipment that might hurt you in case of emergency stop, curves or irresponsible driving.

* '''Motorcycles''' - Motorcycles are somewhat problematic when it comes to travelling with luggage, yet is possible. It is a good way to travel fast, but just like driving one - even less safe as taking a ride with a car. Try to ask the driver for an extra helmet. Usually not likely to work, but some drivers keep an extra "half helmet" in the box of the vehicle - not much, but certainly better than nothing. I for instance tend to minimise motorcycle rides since i feel unsafe with a stranger driver. You might ask to drive slower, but remember driving slower means less balance.

===Accessing petrol stations===
I'd say it's important to mention that - at least within the EU - multiple petrol stations located along the highway will have a wire fence directly around them, cutting them off from the neighboring city, the nearest bus stop or whatever it is your heart desires. Catching a ride into the city is not always a possible option, and if you for some reason need to use a bridge to  cross the highway (please DO NOT cross the actual highway), the fence will effectively block your way and make your life miserable. Of course you can walk along it until you eventually find a gate, but there's more efficient options - most of the fences i've encountered weren't taller than 2m and could be easily climbed, and if you search around the station for a bit you're almost sure to find a hole already made by some benevolent soul that came before you. It's overall not a big setback but good to keep in mind.

My vision is to have a collective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become scientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different countries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hitch hiking technique.

= Related links and references =

* [[wikivoyage:Tips_for_hitchhiking|Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikivoyage]]

Historic stuff available on archive.org:
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20170928145919/http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20210611122216/http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20170609184952/http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides --&gt;
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20130310154155/http://www.hitchbase.com/ Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

= Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki =

{{nomadwiki}}



[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]

{{geo-missing}}</text>
      <sha1>qsd4b6r6gq7csq56h97ghilsv3m0441</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>111534</id>
      <parentid>111214</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-08-21T14:50:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Julianjumps</username>
        <id>32533</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Carry a good map */ shifted big sections into the maps page as paper maps are very niche these days</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="39627">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber.

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==

Most people will rely on thier smartphone for maps these days. However a paper map can still be very useful in terms of reliability or redundancy. Regardless of what you use you always want to know where you are going. 

If you want to use your phone, get an offline map app in case there you end up somewhere with no mobile coverage. Also see [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]] on how to access hitchmap spots offline and more!

For both paper maps and map apps a list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|right|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Think positive, stay positive, smile and laugh ==
[[File:hitch_hiker_58392_in_spain.jpeg|thumb|right|250px|left|Taking pictures of your hitch-hiking buddy is an excellent way to keep up your mood.]]

The results that you get in life are simply a byproduct of your beliefs. So it is very important to belive that hitchhiking will work! Think positive, focus on what you want and tell your friends at what time you will arrive at the latest (like "I will be here for dinner so I will arrive before 7 p.m.!"), even if you don't know how you will manage to do this. Hitchhiker tawax ALWAYS managed to arrive on the day he planned (without cheating) because he is convinced hitchhiking works! Just try it!

Standing on dirty boring roads with loads traffic passing by and no one picking you up is as much a part of hitch-hiking as it is to eventually get picked up by a kind-hearted soul. If you're travelling alone, the road is your only companion that is reliably always by your side. If you can manage to have a friendly relationship with it, you'll have a much more enjoyable experience. Obviously, when travelling in a group, the same goes for your human friend(s).

It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

If you carry a marker with you, you can even cheer up future hitch-hikers who will use your spot by leaving them little messages on sign posts or crash barriers.

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something. Stuart at http://lookingforstu.com swears by a Superman T-shirt.  It's bright, colourful and is a universal symbol of hope and peace.  The amount of times drivers have said that is the reason they picked him up is astounding!

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

Especially if you're going to travel the same route more than once, it can be worth making signs on white A4 card and then laminating them before you set out. It keeps the signs flat, protects them from the rain, looks a lot better than torn brown cardboard and only costs about 10-20 cents per sign.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==

[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
[https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
[http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
[http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
[http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
Can your driver host you?
Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?


=== Holding a big "Couchsurfing?" sign in public place === 
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).

=== Camping ===

Wild camping how to http://nomadwiki.org/en/Camping

=== Other options ===

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station or Mc Donalds, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents are checked, and you may be asked for your documents too, so be prepared. Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== Hitchhiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his or her practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much science as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contradicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the discussion page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hitchhiking theory: 
Hitch hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be prepared!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majority of drivers pick up hitch hikers on psychological association based on looks and self interest which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and average as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Average Driver''' - the average driver does not understand hitch hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occur to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Appearance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, harmless guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and T-shirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hitch hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the average  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremely dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldn't be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the average driver" section. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

* '''Asking for Ride''' - Don't be afraid to talk to people and ask them directly if you can hop on. Some drivers would not consider taking you, yet by hearing a nice, friendly, polite voice they might will as well as feel a bit more obligation to help you.

===Different Vessels===
You should feel comfortable through out the whole way to your destination. if you feel uncomfortable hoping on a specific vessel - don't. As it will tire you out and make a bad experience for the future. If you feel unsafe with the drivers drive don't be ashamed to tell him (I do ask all motorcycle rides to drive relatively slow especially on unpaved roads, never needed to tell in a car) he will understand your worry, remember he stopped in order to help and will be nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

* '''Back of a Pick-Up Truck''' - The back of a pick up truck is where you are likely to spend a big chunk of the road. However there is a clear problem of safety. For the driver it might be convenient to tell you to hop on the back and so he wont need to worry from a dangerous hiker or either talk in case he isn't in the mood. It is also an extra space in case the seats are full. On the hiker side you have zero control on what is going on and hop on without at least getting to know if the driver is trust worthy is not recommended. You should have a few words with the driver about the way and agree on a place before hands since you wouldn't be able to converse once you start driving, knocking on the roof for stop at most. There is also the problem of sitting without safety belt and potentially with unfasten equipment that might hurt you in case of emergency stop, curves or irresponsible driving.

* '''Motorcycles''' - Motorcycles are somewhat problematic when it comes to travelling with luggage, yet is possible. It is a good way to travel fast, but just like driving one - even less safe as taking a ride with a car. Try to ask the driver for an extra helmet. Usually not likely to work, but some drivers keep an extra "half helmet" in the box of the vehicle - not much, but certainly better than nothing. I for instance tend to minimise motorcycle rides since i feel unsafe with a stranger driver. You might ask to drive slower, but remember driving slower means less balance.

===Accessing petrol stations===
I'd say it's important to mention that - at least within the EU - multiple petrol stations located along the highway will have a wire fence directly around them, cutting them off from the neighboring city, the nearest bus stop or whatever it is your heart desires. Catching a ride into the city is not always a possible option, and if you for some reason need to use a bridge to  cross the highway (please DO NOT cross the actual highway), the fence will effectively block your way and make your life miserable. Of course you can walk along it until you eventually find a gate, but there's more efficient options - most of the fences i've encountered weren't taller than 2m and could be easily climbed, and if you search around the station for a bit you're almost sure to find a hole already made by some benevolent soul that came before you. It's overall not a big setback but good to keep in mind.

My vision is to have a collective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become scientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different countries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hitch hiking technique.

= Related links and references =

* [[wikivoyage:Tips_for_hitchhiking|Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikivoyage]]

Historic stuff available on archive.org:
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20170928145919/http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20210611122216/http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20170609184952/http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides --&gt;
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20130310154155/http://www.hitchbase.com/ Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

= Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki =

{{nomadwiki}}



[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]

{{geo-missing}}</text>
      <sha1>207m1irjswfnbl33wt1bd917fwqbngf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>111551</id>
      <parentid>111534</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-08-21T15:01:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Julianjumps</username>
        <id>32533</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* Different Vessels */ corrected persective.</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="39654">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber.

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==

Most people will rely on thier smartphone for maps these days. However a paper map can still be very useful in terms of reliability or redundancy. Regardless of what you use you always want to know where you are going. 

If you want to use your phone, get an offline map app in case there you end up somewhere with no mobile coverage. Also see [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]] on how to access hitchmap spots offline and more!

For both paper maps and map apps a list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|right|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Think positive, stay positive, smile and laugh ==
[[File:hitch_hiker_58392_in_spain.jpeg|thumb|right|250px|left|Taking pictures of your hitch-hiking buddy is an excellent way to keep up your mood.]]

The results that you get in life are simply a byproduct of your beliefs. So it is very important to belive that hitchhiking will work! Think positive, focus on what you want and tell your friends at what time you will arrive at the latest (like "I will be here for dinner so I will arrive before 7 p.m.!"), even if you don't know how you will manage to do this. Hitchhiker tawax ALWAYS managed to arrive on the day he planned (without cheating) because he is convinced hitchhiking works! Just try it!

Standing on dirty boring roads with loads traffic passing by and no one picking you up is as much a part of hitch-hiking as it is to eventually get picked up by a kind-hearted soul. If you're travelling alone, the road is your only companion that is reliably always by your side. If you can manage to have a friendly relationship with it, you'll have a much more enjoyable experience. Obviously, when travelling in a group, the same goes for your human friend(s).

It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

If you carry a marker with you, you can even cheer up future hitch-hikers who will use your spot by leaving them little messages on sign posts or crash barriers.

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something. Stuart at http://lookingforstu.com swears by a Superman T-shirt.  It's bright, colourful and is a universal symbol of hope and peace.  The amount of times drivers have said that is the reason they picked him up is astounding!

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

Especially if you're going to travel the same route more than once, it can be worth making signs on white A4 card and then laminating them before you set out. It keeps the signs flat, protects them from the rain, looks a lot better than torn brown cardboard and only costs about 10-20 cents per sign.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==

[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
[https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
[http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
[http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
[http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
Can your driver host you?
Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?


=== Holding a big "Couchsurfing?" sign in public place === 
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).

=== Camping ===

Wild camping how to http://nomadwiki.org/en/Camping

=== Other options ===

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station or Mc Donalds, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Last but not least, try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents are checked, and you may be asked for your documents too, so be prepared. Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== Hitchhiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his or her practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much science as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contradicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the discussion page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hitchhiking theory: 
Hitch hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be prepared!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majority of drivers pick up hitch hikers on psychological association based on looks and self interest which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and average as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Average Driver''' - the average driver does not understand hitch hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occur to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Appearance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, harmless guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and T-shirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hitch hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the average  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremely dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldn't be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the average driver" section. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

* '''Asking for Ride''' - Don't be afraid to talk to people and ask them directly if you can hop on. Some drivers would not consider taking you, yet by hearing a nice, friendly, polite voice they might will as well as feel a bit more obligation to help you.

===Different Vessels===
You should feel comfortable through out the whole way to your destination. if you feel uncomfortable hoping on a specific vessel - don't. As it will tire you out and make a bad experience for the future. If you feel unsafe with the drivers drive don't be ashamed to tell him (I do ask all motorcycle rides to drive relatively slow especially on unpaved roads, never needed to tell in a car) he will understand your worry, remember he stopped in order to help and will be nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

* '''Back of a Pick-Up Truck''' - In some parts of the world the back of a pick up truck is where you are likely to spend a big chunk of the road. However there is a clear problem of safety. For the driver it might be convenient to tell you to hop on the back and so he wont need to worry from a dangerous hiker or either talk in case he isn't in the mood. It is also an extra space in case the seats are full. On the hiker side you have zero control on what is going on and hop on without at least getting to know if the driver is trust worthy is not recommended. You should have a few words with the driver about the way and agree on a place before hands since you wouldn't be able to converse once you start driving, knocking on the roof for stop at most. There is also the problem of sitting without safety belt and potentially with unfasten equipment that might hurt you in case of emergency stop, curves or irresponsible driving.

* '''Motorcycles''' - Motorcycles are somewhat problematic when it comes to travelling with luggage, yet is possible. It is a good way to travel fast, but just like driving one - even less safe as taking a ride with a car. Try to ask the driver for an extra helmet. Usually not likely to work, but some drivers keep an extra "half helmet" in the box of the vehicle - not much, but certainly better than nothing. I for instance tend to minimise motorcycle rides since i feel unsafe with a stranger driver. You might ask to drive slower, but remember driving slower means less balance.

===Accessing petrol stations===
I'd say it's important to mention that - at least within the EU - multiple petrol stations located along the highway will have a wire fence directly around them, cutting them off from the neighboring city, the nearest bus stop or whatever it is your heart desires. Catching a ride into the city is not always a possible option, and if you for some reason need to use a bridge to  cross the highway (please DO NOT cross the actual highway), the fence will effectively block your way and make your life miserable. Of course you can walk along it until you eventually find a gate, but there's more efficient options - most of the fences i've encountered weren't taller than 2m and could be easily climbed, and if you search around the station for a bit you're almost sure to find a hole already made by some benevolent soul that came before you. It's overall not a big setback but good to keep in mind.

My vision is to have a collective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become scientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different countries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hitch hiking technique.

= Related links and references =

* [[wikivoyage:Tips_for_hitchhiking|Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikivoyage]]

Historic stuff available on archive.org:
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20170928145919/http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20210611122216/http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20170609184952/http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides --&gt;
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20130310154155/http://www.hitchbase.com/ Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

= Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki =

{{nomadwiki}}



[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]

{{geo-missing}}</text>
      <sha1>8qipbslcywe3kvzugthndad9lppgcir</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>111554</id>
      <parentid>111551</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-08-21T15:02:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Julianjumps</username>
        <id>32533</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Avoid mistakes */  its not last anymore</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="39634">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber.

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==

Most people will rely on thier smartphone for maps these days. However a paper map can still be very useful in terms of reliability or redundancy. Regardless of what you use you always want to know where you are going. 

If you want to use your phone, get an offline map app in case there you end up somewhere with no mobile coverage. Also see [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]] on how to access hitchmap spots offline and more!

For both paper maps and map apps a list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|right|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Think positive, stay positive, smile and laugh ==
[[File:hitch_hiker_58392_in_spain.jpeg|thumb|right|250px|left|Taking pictures of your hitch-hiking buddy is an excellent way to keep up your mood.]]

The results that you get in life are simply a byproduct of your beliefs. So it is very important to belive that hitchhiking will work! Think positive, focus on what you want and tell your friends at what time you will arrive at the latest (like "I will be here for dinner so I will arrive before 7 p.m.!"), even if you don't know how you will manage to do this. Hitchhiker tawax ALWAYS managed to arrive on the day he planned (without cheating) because he is convinced hitchhiking works! Just try it!

Standing on dirty boring roads with loads traffic passing by and no one picking you up is as much a part of hitch-hiking as it is to eventually get picked up by a kind-hearted soul. If you're travelling alone, the road is your only companion that is reliably always by your side. If you can manage to have a friendly relationship with it, you'll have a much more enjoyable experience. Obviously, when travelling in a group, the same goes for your human friend(s).

It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

If you carry a marker with you, you can even cheer up future hitch-hikers who will use your spot by leaving them little messages on sign posts or crash barriers.

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something. Stuart at http://lookingforstu.com swears by a Superman T-shirt.  It's bright, colourful and is a universal symbol of hope and peace.  The amount of times drivers have said that is the reason they picked him up is astounding!

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

Especially if you're going to travel the same route more than once, it can be worth making signs on white A4 card and then laminating them before you set out. It keeps the signs flat, protects them from the rain, looks a lot better than torn brown cardboard and only costs about 10-20 cents per sign.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal). Putting all protective techniques aside you're probably safest traveling with a friend/partner or a fellow hitchhiker.

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==

[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
[https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
[http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
[http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
[http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
Can your driver host you?
Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?


=== Holding a big "Couchsurfing?" sign in public place === 
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).

=== Camping ===

Wild camping how to http://nomadwiki.org/en/Camping

=== Other options ===

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station or Mc Donalds, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents are checked, and you may be asked for your documents too, so be prepared. Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== Hitchhiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his or her practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much science as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contradicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the discussion page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hitchhiking theory: 
Hitch hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be prepared!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majority of drivers pick up hitch hikers on psychological association based on looks and self interest which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and average as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Average Driver''' - the average driver does not understand hitch hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occur to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Appearance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, harmless guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and T-shirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hitch hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the average  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremely dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldn't be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the average driver" section. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

* '''Asking for Ride''' - Don't be afraid to talk to people and ask them directly if you can hop on. Some drivers would not consider taking you, yet by hearing a nice, friendly, polite voice they might will as well as feel a bit more obligation to help you.

===Different Vessels===
You should feel comfortable through out the whole way to your destination. if you feel uncomfortable hoping on a specific vessel - don't. As it will tire you out and make a bad experience for the future. If you feel unsafe with the drivers drive don't be ashamed to tell him (I do ask all motorcycle rides to drive relatively slow especially on unpaved roads, never needed to tell in a car) he will understand your worry, remember he stopped in order to help and will be nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

* '''Back of a Pick-Up Truck''' - In some parts of the world the back of a pick up truck is where you are likely to spend a big chunk of the road. However there is a clear problem of safety. For the driver it might be convenient to tell you to hop on the back and so he wont need to worry from a dangerous hiker or either talk in case he isn't in the mood. It is also an extra space in case the seats are full. On the hiker side you have zero control on what is going on and hop on without at least getting to know if the driver is trust worthy is not recommended. You should have a few words with the driver about the way and agree on a place before hands since you wouldn't be able to converse once you start driving, knocking on the roof for stop at most. There is also the problem of sitting without safety belt and potentially with unfasten equipment that might hurt you in case of emergency stop, curves or irresponsible driving.

* '''Motorcycles''' - Motorcycles are somewhat problematic when it comes to travelling with luggage, yet is possible. It is a good way to travel fast, but just like driving one - even less safe as taking a ride with a car. Try to ask the driver for an extra helmet. Usually not likely to work, but some drivers keep an extra "half helmet" in the box of the vehicle - not much, but certainly better than nothing. I for instance tend to minimise motorcycle rides since i feel unsafe with a stranger driver. You might ask to drive slower, but remember driving slower means less balance.

===Accessing petrol stations===
I'd say it's important to mention that - at least within the EU - multiple petrol stations located along the highway will have a wire fence directly around them, cutting them off from the neighboring city, the nearest bus stop or whatever it is your heart desires. Catching a ride into the city is not always a possible option, and if you for some reason need to use a bridge to  cross the highway (please DO NOT cross the actual highway), the fence will effectively block your way and make your life miserable. Of course you can walk along it until you eventually find a gate, but there's more efficient options - most of the fences i've encountered weren't taller than 2m and could be easily climbed, and if you search around the station for a bit you're almost sure to find a hole already made by some benevolent soul that came before you. It's overall not a big setback but good to keep in mind.

My vision is to have a collective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become scientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different countries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hitch hiking technique.

= Related links and references =

* [[wikivoyage:Tips_for_hitchhiking|Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikivoyage]]

Historic stuff available on archive.org:
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20170928145919/http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20210611122216/http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20170609184952/http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides --&gt;
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20130310154155/http://www.hitchbase.com/ Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

= Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki =

{{nomadwiki}}



[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]

{{geo-missing}}</text>
      <sha1>brnoat1c3ygqx5k066yo6asr3ak9gpc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>111558</id>
      <parentid>111554</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-08-21T15:15:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Julianjumps</username>
        <id>32533</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Safe hitchhiking */  added linkt to women hitchhiking and minor corrections</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="39746">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber.

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==

Most people will rely on thier smartphone for maps these days. However a paper map can still be very useful in terms of reliability or redundancy. Regardless of what you use you always want to know where you are going. 

If you want to use your phone, get an offline map app in case there you end up somewhere with no mobile coverage. Also see [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]] on how to access hitchmap spots offline and more!

For both paper maps and map apps a list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|right|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Think positive, stay positive, smile and laugh ==
[[File:hitch_hiker_58392_in_spain.jpeg|thumb|right|250px|left|Taking pictures of your hitch-hiking buddy is an excellent way to keep up your mood.]]

The results that you get in life are simply a byproduct of your beliefs. So it is very important to belive that hitchhiking will work! Think positive, focus on what you want and tell your friends at what time you will arrive at the latest (like "I will be here for dinner so I will arrive before 7 p.m.!"), even if you don't know how you will manage to do this. Hitchhiker tawax ALWAYS managed to arrive on the day he planned (without cheating) because he is convinced hitchhiking works! Just try it!

Standing on dirty boring roads with loads traffic passing by and no one picking you up is as much a part of hitch-hiking as it is to eventually get picked up by a kind-hearted soul. If you're travelling alone, the road is your only companion that is reliably always by your side. If you can manage to have a friendly relationship with it, you'll have a much more enjoyable experience. Obviously, when travelling in a group, the same goes for your human friend(s).

It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

If you carry a marker with you, you can even cheer up future hitch-hikers who will use your spot by leaving them little messages on sign posts or crash barriers.

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something. Stuart at http://lookingforstu.com swears by a Superman T-shirt.  It's bright, colourful and is a universal symbol of hope and peace.  The amount of times drivers have said that is the reason they picked him up is astounding!

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

Especially if you're going to travel the same route more than once, it can be worth making signs on white A4 card and then laminating them before you set out. It keeps the signs flat, protects them from the rain, looks a lot better than torn brown cardboard and only costs about 10-20 cents per sign.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal)). 

Putting all protective techniques aside you're generally much safer traveling with a friend or fellow hitchhiker.
You can find more detailed tips on how to stay safe especially but not only for women here: [[Women_hitchhiking]]

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==

[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
[https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
[http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
[http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
[http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
Can your driver host you?
Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?


=== Holding a big "Couchsurfing?" sign in public place === 
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).

=== Camping ===

Wild camping how to http://nomadwiki.org/en/Camping

=== Other options ===

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station or Mc Donalds, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents are checked, and you may be asked for your documents too, so be prepared. Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== Hitchhiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his or her practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much science as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contradicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the discussion page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hitchhiking theory: 
Hitch hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be prepared!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majority of drivers pick up hitch hikers on psychological association based on looks and self interest which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and average as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Average Driver''' - the average driver does not understand hitch hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occur to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Appearance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, harmless guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and T-shirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hitch hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the average  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremely dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldn't be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the average driver" section. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

* '''Asking for Ride''' - Don't be afraid to talk to people and ask them directly if you can hop on. Some drivers would not consider taking you, yet by hearing a nice, friendly, polite voice they might will as well as feel a bit more obligation to help you.

===Different Vessels===
You should feel comfortable through out the whole way to your destination. if you feel uncomfortable hoping on a specific vessel - don't. As it will tire you out and make a bad experience for the future. If you feel unsafe with the drivers drive don't be ashamed to tell him (I do ask all motorcycle rides to drive relatively slow especially on unpaved roads, never needed to tell in a car) he will understand your worry, remember he stopped in order to help and will be nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

* '''Back of a Pick-Up Truck''' - In some parts of the world the back of a pick up truck is where you are likely to spend a big chunk of the road. However there is a clear problem of safety. For the driver it might be convenient to tell you to hop on the back and so he wont need to worry from a dangerous hiker or either talk in case he isn't in the mood. It is also an extra space in case the seats are full. On the hiker side you have zero control on what is going on and hop on without at least getting to know if the driver is trust worthy is not recommended. You should have a few words with the driver about the way and agree on a place before hands since you wouldn't be able to converse once you start driving, knocking on the roof for stop at most. There is also the problem of sitting without safety belt and potentially with unfasten equipment that might hurt you in case of emergency stop, curves or irresponsible driving.

* '''Motorcycles''' - Motorcycles are somewhat problematic when it comes to travelling with luggage, yet is possible. It is a good way to travel fast, but just like driving one - even less safe as taking a ride with a car. Try to ask the driver for an extra helmet. Usually not likely to work, but some drivers keep an extra "half helmet" in the box of the vehicle - not much, but certainly better than nothing. I for instance tend to minimise motorcycle rides since i feel unsafe with a stranger driver. You might ask to drive slower, but remember driving slower means less balance.

===Accessing petrol stations===
I'd say it's important to mention that - at least within the EU - multiple petrol stations located along the highway will have a wire fence directly around them, cutting them off from the neighboring city, the nearest bus stop or whatever it is your heart desires. Catching a ride into the city is not always a possible option, and if you for some reason need to use a bridge to  cross the highway (please DO NOT cross the actual highway), the fence will effectively block your way and make your life miserable. Of course you can walk along it until you eventually find a gate, but there's more efficient options - most of the fences i've encountered weren't taller than 2m and could be easily climbed, and if you search around the station for a bit you're almost sure to find a hole already made by some benevolent soul that came before you. It's overall not a big setback but good to keep in mind.

My vision is to have a collective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become scientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different countries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hitch hiking technique.

= Related links and references =

* [[wikivoyage:Tips_for_hitchhiking|Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikivoyage]]

Historic stuff available on archive.org:
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20170928145919/http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20210611122216/http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20170609184952/http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides --&gt;
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20130310154155/http://www.hitchbase.com/ Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

= Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki =

{{nomadwiki}}



[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]

{{geo-missing}}</text>
      <sha1>lblmdtzbm0lkpck8rlcob3ew2jexp1y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>112430</id>
      <parentid>111558</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-08-29T19:11:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Related links and references */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="39904">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber.

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==

Most people will rely on thier smartphone for maps these days. However a paper map can still be very useful in terms of reliability or redundancy. Regardless of what you use you always want to know where you are going. 

If you want to use your phone, get an offline map app in case there you end up somewhere with no mobile coverage. Also see [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]] on how to access hitchmap spots offline and more!

For both paper maps and map apps a list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|right|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Think positive, stay positive, smile and laugh ==
[[File:hitch_hiker_58392_in_spain.jpeg|thumb|right|250px|left|Taking pictures of your hitch-hiking buddy is an excellent way to keep up your mood.]]

The results that you get in life are simply a byproduct of your beliefs. So it is very important to belive that hitchhiking will work! Think positive, focus on what you want and tell your friends at what time you will arrive at the latest (like "I will be here for dinner so I will arrive before 7 p.m.!"), even if you don't know how you will manage to do this. Hitchhiker tawax ALWAYS managed to arrive on the day he planned (without cheating) because he is convinced hitchhiking works! Just try it!

Standing on dirty boring roads with loads traffic passing by and no one picking you up is as much a part of hitch-hiking as it is to eventually get picked up by a kind-hearted soul. If you're travelling alone, the road is your only companion that is reliably always by your side. If you can manage to have a friendly relationship with it, you'll have a much more enjoyable experience. Obviously, when travelling in a group, the same goes for your human friend(s).

It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

If you carry a marker with you, you can even cheer up future hitch-hikers who will use your spot by leaving them little messages on sign posts or crash barriers.

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something. Stuart at http://lookingforstu.com swears by a Superman T-shirt.  It's bright, colourful and is a universal symbol of hope and peace.  The amount of times drivers have said that is the reason they picked him up is astounding!

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

Especially if you're going to travel the same route more than once, it can be worth making signs on white A4 card and then laminating them before you set out. It keeps the signs flat, protects them from the rain, looks a lot better than torn brown cardboard and only costs about 10-20 cents per sign.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal)). 

Putting all protective techniques aside you're generally much safer traveling with a friend or fellow hitchhiker.
You can find more detailed tips on how to stay safe especially but not only for women here: [[Women_hitchhiking]]

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==

[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
[https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
[http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
[http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
[http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
Can your driver host you?
Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?


=== Holding a big "Couchsurfing?" sign in public place === 
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).

=== Camping ===

Wild camping how to http://nomadwiki.org/en/Camping

=== Other options ===

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station or Mc Donalds, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents are checked, and you may be asked for your documents too, so be prepared. Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== Hitchhiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his or her practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much science as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contradicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the discussion page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hitchhiking theory: 
Hitch hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be prepared!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majority of drivers pick up hitch hikers on psychological association based on looks and self interest which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and average as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Average Driver''' - the average driver does not understand hitch hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occur to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Appearance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, harmless guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and T-shirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hitch hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the average  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremely dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldn't be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the average driver" section. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

* '''Asking for Ride''' - Don't be afraid to talk to people and ask them directly if you can hop on. Some drivers would not consider taking you, yet by hearing a nice, friendly, polite voice they might will as well as feel a bit more obligation to help you.

===Different Vessels===
You should feel comfortable through out the whole way to your destination. if you feel uncomfortable hoping on a specific vessel - don't. As it will tire you out and make a bad experience for the future. If you feel unsafe with the drivers drive don't be ashamed to tell him (I do ask all motorcycle rides to drive relatively slow especially on unpaved roads, never needed to tell in a car) he will understand your worry, remember he stopped in order to help and will be nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

* '''Back of a Pick-Up Truck''' - In some parts of the world the back of a pick up truck is where you are likely to spend a big chunk of the road. However there is a clear problem of safety. For the driver it might be convenient to tell you to hop on the back and so he wont need to worry from a dangerous hiker or either talk in case he isn't in the mood. It is also an extra space in case the seats are full. On the hiker side you have zero control on what is going on and hop on without at least getting to know if the driver is trust worthy is not recommended. You should have a few words with the driver about the way and agree on a place before hands since you wouldn't be able to converse once you start driving, knocking on the roof for stop at most. There is also the problem of sitting without safety belt and potentially with unfasten equipment that might hurt you in case of emergency stop, curves or irresponsible driving.

* '''Motorcycles''' - Motorcycles are somewhat problematic when it comes to travelling with luggage, yet is possible. It is a good way to travel fast, but just like driving one - even less safe as taking a ride with a car. Try to ask the driver for an extra helmet. Usually not likely to work, but some drivers keep an extra "half helmet" in the box of the vehicle - not much, but certainly better than nothing. I for instance tend to minimise motorcycle rides since i feel unsafe with a stranger driver. You might ask to drive slower, but remember driving slower means less balance.

===Accessing petrol stations===
I'd say it's important to mention that - at least within the EU - multiple petrol stations located along the highway will have a wire fence directly around them, cutting them off from the neighboring city, the nearest bus stop or whatever it is your heart desires. Catching a ride into the city is not always a possible option, and if you for some reason need to use a bridge to  cross the highway (please DO NOT cross the actual highway), the fence will effectively block your way and make your life miserable. Of course you can walk along it until you eventually find a gate, but there's more efficient options - most of the fences i've encountered weren't taller than 2m and could be easily climbed, and if you search around the station for a bit you're almost sure to find a hole already made by some benevolent soul that came before you. It's overall not a big setback but good to keep in mind.

My vision is to have a collective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become scientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different countries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hitch hiking technique.

== External links ==
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1d3py3ROQlM&amp;list=PLTl6wHsuItETZmkfuI6AO5_xh8qiwtlzy&amp;index=2 The HITCHHIKING BASICS you MUST LEARN! (Tutorial 1: passive #hitchhiking )]
* [[wikivoyage:Tips_for_hitchhiking|Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikivoyage]]

Historic stuff available on archive.org:
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20170928145919/http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20210611122216/http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20170609184952/http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides --&gt;
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20130310154155/http://www.hitchbase.com/ Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

= Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki =

{{nomadwiki}}



[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]

{{geo-missing}}</text>
      <sha1>myvqju67ebrpf3mitjjwu0dnqhmz1d8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>112494</id>
      <parentid>112430</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-08-31T15:22:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Autostop Adventure</username>
        <id>47697</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="40020">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber.

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==

Most people will rely on thier smartphone for maps these days. However a paper map can still be very useful in terms of reliability or redundancy. Regardless of what you use you always want to know where you are going. 

If you want to use your phone, get an offline map app in case there you end up somewhere with no mobile coverage. Also see [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]] on how to access hitchmap spots offline and more!

For both paper maps and map apps a list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|right|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Think positive, stay positive, smile and laugh ==
[[File:hitch_hiker_58392_in_spain.jpeg|thumb|right|250px|left|Taking pictures of your hitch-hiking buddy is an excellent way to keep up your mood.]]

The results that you get in life are simply a byproduct of your beliefs. So it is very important to belive that hitchhiking will work! Think positive, focus on what you want and tell your friends at what time you will arrive at the latest (like "I will be here for dinner so I will arrive before 7 p.m.!"), even if you don't know how you will manage to do this. Hitchhiker tawax ALWAYS managed to arrive on the day he planned (without cheating) because he is convinced hitchhiking works! Just try it!

Standing on dirty boring roads with loads traffic passing by and no one picking you up is as much a part of hitch-hiking as it is to eventually get picked up by a kind-hearted soul. If you're travelling alone, the road is your only companion that is reliably always by your side. If you can manage to have a friendly relationship with it, you'll have a much more enjoyable experience. Obviously, when travelling in a group, the same goes for your human friend(s).

It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

If you carry a marker with you, you can even cheer up future hitch-hikers who will use your spot by leaving them little messages on sign posts or crash barriers.

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something. Stuart at http://lookingforstu.com swears by a Superman T-shirt.  It's bright, colourful and is a universal symbol of hope and peace.  The amount of times drivers have said that is the reason they picked him up is astounding!

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

Especially if you're going to travel the same route more than once, it can be worth making signs on white A4 card and then laminating them before you set out. It keeps the signs flat, protects them from the rain, looks a lot better than torn brown cardboard and only costs about 10-20 cents per sign.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal)). 

Putting all protective techniques aside you're generally much safer traveling with a friend or fellow hitchhiker.
You can find more detailed tips on how to stay safe especially but not only for women here: [[Women_hitchhiking]]

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==

[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
[https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
[http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
[http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
[http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
Can your driver host you?
Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?


=== Holding a big "Couchsurfing?" sign in public place === 
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).

=== Camping ===

Wild camping how to http://nomadwiki.org/en/Camping

=== Other options ===

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station or Mc Donalds, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents are checked, and you may be asked for your documents too, so be prepared. Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== Hitchhiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his or her practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much science as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contradicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the discussion page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hitchhiking theory: 
Hitch hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be prepared!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majority of drivers pick up hitch hikers on psychological association based on looks and self interest which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and average as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Average Driver''' - the average driver does not understand hitch hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occur to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Appearance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, harmless guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and T-shirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hitch hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the average  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremely dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldn't be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the average driver" section. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

* '''Asking for Ride''' - Don't be afraid to talk to people and ask them directly if you can hop on. Some drivers would not consider taking you, yet by hearing a nice, friendly, polite voice they might will as well as feel a bit more obligation to help you.

===Different Vessels===
You should feel comfortable through out the whole way to your destination. if you feel uncomfortable hoping on a specific vessel - don't. As it will tire you out and make a bad experience for the future. If you feel unsafe with the drivers drive don't be ashamed to tell him (I do ask all motorcycle rides to drive relatively slow especially on unpaved roads, never needed to tell in a car) he will understand your worry, remember he stopped in order to help and will be nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

* '''Back of a Pick-Up Truck''' - In some parts of the world the back of a pick up truck is where you are likely to spend a big chunk of the road. However there is a clear problem of safety. For the driver it might be convenient to tell you to hop on the back and so he wont need to worry from a dangerous hiker or either talk in case he isn't in the mood. It is also an extra space in case the seats are full. On the hiker side you have zero control on what is going on and hop on without at least getting to know if the driver is trust worthy is not recommended. You should have a few words with the driver about the way and agree on a place before hands since you wouldn't be able to converse once you start driving, knocking on the roof for stop at most. There is also the problem of sitting without safety belt and potentially with unfasten equipment that might hurt you in case of emergency stop, curves or irresponsible driving.

* '''Motorcycles''' - Motorcycles are somewhat problematic when it comes to travelling with luggage, yet is possible. It is a good way to travel fast, but just like driving one - even less safe as taking a ride with a car. Try to ask the driver for an extra helmet. Usually not likely to work, but some drivers keep an extra "half helmet" in the box of the vehicle - not much, but certainly better than nothing. I for instance tend to minimise motorcycle rides since i feel unsafe with a stranger driver. You might ask to drive slower, but remember driving slower means less balance.

===Accessing petrol stations===
I'd say it's important to mention that - at least within the EU - multiple petrol stations located along the highway will have a wire fence directly around them, cutting them off from the neighboring city, the nearest bus stop or whatever it is your heart desires. Catching a ride into the city is not always a possible option, and if you for some reason need to use a bridge to  cross the highway (please DO NOT cross the actual highway), the fence will effectively block your way and make your life miserable. Of course you can walk along it until you eventually find a gate, but there's more efficient options - most of the fences i've encountered weren't taller than 2m and could be easily climbed, and if you search around the station for a bit you're almost sure to find a hole already made by some benevolent soul that came before you. It's overall not a big setback but good to keep in mind.

My vision is to have a collective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become scientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different countries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hitch hiking technique.

== External links ==
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1d3py3ROQlM&amp;list=PLTl6wHsuItETZmkfuI6AO5_xh8qiwtlzy&amp;index=2 The HITCHHIKING BASICS you MUST LEARN! (Tutorial 1: passive #hitchhiking )]
* [https://youtu.be/on7OIEjDsm0?feature=shared The FASTEST HITCHHIKING TECHNIQUE (Tutorial 2: active #hitchhiking)]
* [[wikivoyage:Tips_for_hitchhiking|Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikivoyage]]

Historic stuff available on archive.org:
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20170928145919/http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20210611122216/http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20170609184952/http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides --&gt;
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20130310154155/http://www.hitchbase.com/ Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

= Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki =

{{nomadwiki}}



[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]

{{geo-missing}}</text>
      <sha1>st7c74ag2y7mv6o0tneu7fhofo9wd5b</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>112604</id>
      <parentid>112494</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-09-05T06:14:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* External links */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="40127">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber.

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==

Most people will rely on thier smartphone for maps these days. However a paper map can still be very useful in terms of reliability or redundancy. Regardless of what you use you always want to know where you are going. 

If you want to use your phone, get an offline map app in case there you end up somewhere with no mobile coverage. Also see [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]] on how to access hitchmap spots offline and more!

For both paper maps and map apps a list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|right|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Think positive, stay positive, smile and laugh ==
[[File:hitch_hiker_58392_in_spain.jpeg|thumb|right|250px|left|Taking pictures of your hitch-hiking buddy is an excellent way to keep up your mood.]]

The results that you get in life are simply a byproduct of your beliefs. So it is very important to belive that hitchhiking will work! Think positive, focus on what you want and tell your friends at what time you will arrive at the latest (like "I will be here for dinner so I will arrive before 7 p.m.!"), even if you don't know how you will manage to do this. Hitchhiker tawax ALWAYS managed to arrive on the day he planned (without cheating) because he is convinced hitchhiking works! Just try it!

Standing on dirty boring roads with loads traffic passing by and no one picking you up is as much a part of hitch-hiking as it is to eventually get picked up by a kind-hearted soul. If you're travelling alone, the road is your only companion that is reliably always by your side. If you can manage to have a friendly relationship with it, you'll have a much more enjoyable experience. Obviously, when travelling in a group, the same goes for your human friend(s).

It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

If you carry a marker with you, you can even cheer up future hitch-hikers who will use your spot by leaving them little messages on sign posts or crash barriers.

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something. Stuart at http://lookingforstu.com swears by a Superman T-shirt.  It's bright, colourful and is a universal symbol of hope and peace.  The amount of times drivers have said that is the reason they picked him up is astounding!

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

Especially if you're going to travel the same route more than once, it can be worth making signs on white A4 card and then laminating them before you set out. It keeps the signs flat, protects them from the rain, looks a lot better than torn brown cardboard and only costs about 10-20 cents per sign.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal)). 

Putting all protective techniques aside you're generally much safer traveling with a friend or fellow hitchhiker.
You can find more detailed tips on how to stay safe especially but not only for women here: [[Women_hitchhiking]]

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==

[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
[https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
[http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
[http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
[http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
Can your driver host you?
Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?


=== Holding a big "Couchsurfing?" sign in public place === 
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).

=== Camping ===

Wild camping how to http://nomadwiki.org/en/Camping

=== Other options ===

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station or Mc Donalds, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Take a [[map]] which shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents are checked, and you may be asked for your documents too, so be prepared. Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== Hitchhiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his or her practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much science as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contradicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the discussion page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hitchhiking theory: 
Hitch hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be prepared!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majority of drivers pick up hitch hikers on psychological association based on looks and self interest which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and average as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Average Driver''' - the average driver does not understand hitch hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occur to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Appearance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, harmless guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and T-shirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hitch hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the average  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremely dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldn't be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the average driver" section. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

* '''Asking for Ride''' - Don't be afraid to talk to people and ask them directly if you can hop on. Some drivers would not consider taking you, yet by hearing a nice, friendly, polite voice they might will as well as feel a bit more obligation to help you.

===Different Vessels===
You should feel comfortable through out the whole way to your destination. if you feel uncomfortable hoping on a specific vessel - don't. As it will tire you out and make a bad experience for the future. If you feel unsafe with the drivers drive don't be ashamed to tell him (I do ask all motorcycle rides to drive relatively slow especially on unpaved roads, never needed to tell in a car) he will understand your worry, remember he stopped in order to help and will be nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

* '''Back of a Pick-Up Truck''' - In some parts of the world the back of a pick up truck is where you are likely to spend a big chunk of the road. However there is a clear problem of safety. For the driver it might be convenient to tell you to hop on the back and so he wont need to worry from a dangerous hiker or either talk in case he isn't in the mood. It is also an extra space in case the seats are full. On the hiker side you have zero control on what is going on and hop on without at least getting to know if the driver is trust worthy is not recommended. You should have a few words with the driver about the way and agree on a place before hands since you wouldn't be able to converse once you start driving, knocking on the roof for stop at most. There is also the problem of sitting without safety belt and potentially with unfasten equipment that might hurt you in case of emergency stop, curves or irresponsible driving.

* '''Motorcycles''' - Motorcycles are somewhat problematic when it comes to travelling with luggage, yet is possible. It is a good way to travel fast, but just like driving one - even less safe as taking a ride with a car. Try to ask the driver for an extra helmet. Usually not likely to work, but some drivers keep an extra "half helmet" in the box of the vehicle - not much, but certainly better than nothing. I for instance tend to minimise motorcycle rides since i feel unsafe with a stranger driver. You might ask to drive slower, but remember driving slower means less balance.

===Accessing petrol stations===
I'd say it's important to mention that - at least within the EU - multiple petrol stations located along the highway will have a wire fence directly around them, cutting them off from the neighboring city, the nearest bus stop or whatever it is your heart desires. Catching a ride into the city is not always a possible option, and if you for some reason need to use a bridge to  cross the highway (please DO NOT cross the actual highway), the fence will effectively block your way and make your life miserable. Of course you can walk along it until you eventually find a gate, but there's more efficient options - most of the fences i've encountered weren't taller than 2m and could be easily climbed, and if you search around the station for a bit you're almost sure to find a hole already made by some benevolent soul that came before you. It's overall not a big setback but good to keep in mind.

My vision is to have a collective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become scientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different countries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hitch hiking technique.

== External links ==
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S5Iay0Qv93o&amp;t=1223s Hitchhikers' guide; a tutorial] by Christof Middeke
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1d3py3ROQlM&amp;list=PLTl6wHsuItETZmkfuI6AO5_xh8qiwtlzy&amp;index=2 The HITCHHIKING BASICS you MUST LEARN! (Tutorial 1: passive #hitchhiking )]
* [https://youtu.be/on7OIEjDsm0?feature=shared The FASTEST HITCHHIKING TECHNIQUE (Tutorial 2: active #hitchhiking)]
* [[wikivoyage:Tips_for_hitchhiking|Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikivoyage]]

Historic stuff available on archive.org:
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20170928145919/http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20210611122216/http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20170609184952/http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides --&gt;
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20130310154155/http://www.hitchbase.com/ Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

= Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki =

{{nomadwiki}}



[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]

{{geo-missing}}</text>
      <sha1>t4jnpl8whaj1l0p5tc6lha9m6y5fmj8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>114891</id>
      <parentid>112604</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-10-22T19:30:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="40121">There are some essential things you should remember when you are going hitchhiking. [[Hitchwiki:About|Hitchwiki]] suggests you keep these in mind when starting your career as an enthusiastic thumber.

== Take the most used route ==
The shortest is not the best in all the cases. If there is no traffic, there are no rides to share. Think where the trucks are going: industrial areas, ports/[[Airport|airports]], etc.

The fastest and easiest routes are usually ones between two major cities, passing a lot of countryside on the way. If you're planning to go through an area with dense population (eg. [[Ruhr Area]], [[Randstad]], [[London|Southeast England]]) and out the other side, then remember that many vehicles will be local traffic, so it's often a good idea to find a route that avoids these areas or to find a car going through. When going to the South of [[France]] from the [[Netherlands]], for example, it might be best to avoid [[Paris]] and go through smaller [[Luxembourg]], passing through less densely populated areas, instead.

Avoid trying to get lifts along routes that don't make sense to the drivers; pick a logical A to B route between two major towns or cities that many drivers are likely to be making.

== [[Maps|Carry a good map]] ==

Most people will rely on thier smartphone for maps these days. However a paper map can still be very useful in terms of reliability or redundancy. Regardless of what you use you always want to know where you are going. 

If you want to use your phone, get an offline map app in case there you end up somewhere with no mobile coverage. Also see [[High-tech_hitchhiking|High-tech hitchhiking]] on how to access hitchmap spots offline and more!

For both paper maps and map apps a list of recommendations can be found in the [[maps|maps article]].

== [[Where to hitchhike|Be in a good, safe spot]] ==
[[File:Warsaw-poznan.JPG|thumb|right|250px|left|You'll be seeing a lot of this.]]
[[File:Amylin_hitching_northern_ca.jpg|thumb|250px|left|This could be a good spot. You're easily visible, the drivers slow down at the junction, and there is an obvious place for them to stop.]]
It is basically possible to hitchhike from every place, just keep a single rule of thumb in mind: The faster the cars the more space for the cars to stop is needed.

Be in a place where the cars can see you from a distance and stop safely. You don't want to be run over. This is maybe the biggest [[Hitchhiker's safety|danger]] in hitchhiking. Also, you should provide some space for the driver to stop, not to create dangerous situations for traffic that follows. 

This is the case that the drivers consider as well. Few drivers stop unless it is safe for them. Some do, but you shouldn't count on them, as they are the minority. Therefore consider the safety of the driver as well, you don't want to involve them in an accident if they can't pull over safely. Make sure to not stand on the way, the driver will usually make their decision to stop or not when they see you from a distance and will get ready to pull over just next to you or right behind you. If you stand too much on the way (of the normal pulling aside triangle) you will make it complicated for them and they might change their mind. So one good option is to 'make sure' that your body language point out the area they would pull over in total comfort.

== Think positive, stay positive, smile and laugh ==
[[File:hitch_hiker_58392_in_spain.jpeg|thumb|right|250px|left|Taking pictures of your hitch-hiking buddy is an excellent way to keep up your mood.]]

The results that you get in life are simply a byproduct of your beliefs. So it is very important to belive that hitchhiking will work! Think positive, focus on what you want and tell your friends at what time you will arrive at the latest (like "I will be here for dinner so I will arrive before 7 p.m.!"), even if you don't know how you will manage to do this. Hitchhiker tawax ALWAYS managed to arrive on the day he planned (without cheating) because he is convinced hitchhiking works! Just try it!

Standing on dirty boring roads with loads traffic passing by and no one picking you up is as much a part of hitch-hiking as it is to eventually get picked up by a kind-hearted soul. If you're travelling alone, the road is your only companion that is reliably always by your side. If you can manage to have a friendly relationship with it, you'll have a much more enjoyable experience. Obviously, when travelling in a group, the same goes for your human friend(s).

It is easy to become bored or frustrated when waiting for a ride, but remember that a good attitude will help you get rides. Keep your spirits up by singing, humming, laughing and simply smiling. A grumpy hitchhiker may get rides out of sympathy, but a happy hitchhiker will get better rides and go further distances in less time. If you're in a group, try dancing or clapping your hands at the same time, it makes the drivers smile and lifts come much more often!

If you carry a marker with you, you can even cheer up future hitch-hikers who will use your spot by leaving them little messages on sign posts or crash barriers.

== Avoid tight deadlines ==
It's easier to stay positive when you have nowhere to be. Getting stranded on the Autobahn isn't so terrible as long as you're not trying to meet some friends in Berlin by nightfall; not only are you suddenly worried about how to catch a ride, you don't want to miss out on what's happening at your destination. Hitchhiking is a mental sport, and planning in enough time will allow you to enjoy the road and keep your head in the right place.

== [[How to face traffic|Make eye contact with drivers]] ==
Hitchhiking means making a connection with a person driving by, convincing him or her to stop. To best do this, make sure drivers can see the 'whites of your eyes'. Remove sunglasses and keep your hat higher on your head. Smile while you look at the oncoming cars. If you are looking a different direction or your head is down it is easy for drivers to pass by without relating to you. If you cannot see the person in the car, just look at the windshield where a face should be. Focus on each car until it passes. If traffic is light, let your gaze follow each car expectantly. If there is too much traffic, pay attention to each nearby car for a moment. If you are walking in between cars, be sure to turn and face cars when you hear them approach. The more you do this, the less time you will wait for rides.

'Mark Snyder and his co-workers (1974) found that hitchhikers doubled the number of ride offers by looking drivers straight in the eye. A personal approach, as my panhandler knew, makes one feel less anonymous, more responsible.' (Source: Social Psychology, Myers. p.503 Social Relations)

Respectable eyes for male drivers and puppy eyes for female drivers seem to work quite well.

== Making conversation with drivers ==
Drivers pick up hitchhikers for lots of different reasons: some because they are genuinely helpful, many because they once hitched themselves, some because they think you might be fun/interesting to talk with. On the chance that they want to interact with you, it is great if you can meet them there in a friendly engaged place. Some hints on how to start conversations are listed under [[etiquette|hitching etiquette]]. Also talking with drivers is the one of the best ways to get longer rides or better drop off places.
Have a list of open questions ready: 'Where have you come from today? How long have you been driving trucks? What made you decide to buy this car?' If the driver is reticent it may be that they're still wondering if they've made the right decision in picking you up. Don't be afraid to say a simple 'Thanks for picking me up, it's kind of you.'then going quiet, waiting for them to indicate whether they want to talk. Some drivers are just shy humanists.

Don't underestimate the energy this requires if you do long distances, "''for one of the biggest troubles hitchhiking is having to talk to innumerable people, make them feel that they didn't make a mistake picking you up, even entertain them almost, all of which is a great strain when you're going all the way and don't plan to sleep in hotels''" (Jack Kerouac, On The Road).

== Work with the weather ==
If it's hot, choose a hitchhiking spot where you can get some shade, in case you have to wait for some hours.

If it's wet, drivers may feel sorry for you, and choose to help you out. No-one likes a soggy hitchhiker in their car, so keep an umbrella handy. Better: stay dry at a [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]].

Thunderstorms are a blessing. If, during a dry day, you notice that a thunderstorm is coming, don't worry. When the storm hits you, keep you and your possessions under an umbrella and keep signalling. Drivers will feel '''very''' sorry for you, and many will stop for you. While waiting on the roadside, [[User:tmoon|Tom]] was hit by three thunderstorms in 2006, all of which got him a ride in less than ten minutes. The best example was in [[Cologne]] - after waiting for two hours without a ride offer, a storm came and there were three offers in five minutes (took the third one, it was a short ride and at the next petrol station another ride came within two minutes).

== [[Appearance|Types of clothing]] ==
[[File:Img0080ow5.jpg|thumb|280px|left|Many hitchhiking spots are dusty. White shoes not advised.]]
Although this may seem to be a small matter, types and colour of clothing are very important. Try to wear light, even bright and colourful clothes, and have your non-thumbing hand visible since light coloured clothes inspire more [[trust]] than darker clothes. Also, if the weather permits it, try to keep your forearms visible. If people can see your hands and arms, they'll be less likely to see you as a threat, or as someone trying to conceal something. A fun and colourful clothes/hat is a great way to inspire people to pick you up, but be careful not to appear weird! If you have the option, wear clothes that area clean and decent, even if you've been traveling for days. It's worth keeping a clean 'travel tee' handy just for sitting in the car with your driver.

If you can, don’t wear your old clothes or clothes that might frighten a driver (such as a T-shirt with a skull). Conservative people only take well shaved guys with proper clothes. Liberal-minded people always take you, but even conservative (or old) people can be very helpful on your trip. (I don't think this is of overwhelming importance. I often hitch wearing red tartan pants, punk/metal t shirts and black leather boots and I get rides just as often as the next guy!)

Avoid wearing black. (Not really, it had positive impact (in comparison with a similar trip some time before) on one of my over-Europe hikes where I got on road wearing completely black clothes. Even women were picking me up regularly on that trip.) Even having a smart black shirt could keep you stuck in one place for a long time. Some have found that caps might have a negative impact. (Though Simon from [[Sweden]], with shaved head and beard found it much easier wearing a cap always, because people seem to be afraid of people with shaved heads.) Black or blue woolly hats are awful too. If the weather permits, wear light coloured shorts and a bright colourful t-shirt or a smart short sleeved shirt. Although you may have no choice on whether you have luggage, some hold that hitching without luggage is quicker as the driver knows you're not concealing anything. But some drivers think that carrying a backpack makes you more of a traveler and will only pick up people with backpacks (e.g. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] and [[User:Amylin|amylin]] experienced this in [[New Zealand]]). Making your traveling backpack visible could prove to be an advantage as you will have more chances of not being perceived as a threat, as it is harder to run away with so much weight in case you steal or damage something. Stuart at http://lookingforstu.com swears by a Superman T-shirt.  It's bright, colourful and is a universal symbol of hope and peace.  The amount of times drivers have said that is the reason they picked him up is astounding!

== [[Signs]] ==
Just using your thumb or a hand gesture will work fine for hitchhiking, but in most cases, the use of a sign will increase your odds. Especially when you're hitchhiking on a road that goes to plenty of destinations. The driver will be more likely to stop if he knows that you're going the same way he does, and it makes you look like a "proper" hitchhiker.
[[File:Carl_Nai_Maroc.jpg|thumb|327px|In the [[UK]], road names work well.]]
You can write your destination on the sign, but if you're going from Barcelona to Amsterdam, consider writing Paris, or just Perpignan. Few people will be going to Amsterdam or even Paris, directly. There's a dilemma, though, because if the destination you write is too close, you won't make good time, and if it's too far, nobody will be heading all the way there and so won't feel confident in stopping for you. A good solution to this is to simply use your direction of travel, e.g. "East" or maybe "France". You can also add the road name. 

It often helps if you write the sign in the same language as the drivers you're trying to attract. If you can show some affinity to the drivers' country, it usually increases your chances of a lift. If you want to make a sign in a language that you don't know, try asking drivers or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] staff for help. In countries where hitchhiking is a very common thing to do by locals, e.g. Romania, it could be advisable to make it clear that you're in fact not a local; be it your sign or well-displayed huge backpacks.
[[File:Signs.JPG|thumb|300px|Keep the signs bold and simple!]]

To make the sign, use cardboard or similar with a thick black (chalk) marker (e.g. Edding 4090) or India ink (works well with cotton buds). Write a big capital letter and then lower case characters: the varying forms of lower-case letters make at-once reading easier. The more space between each letter the better to be read from a distance.
[[File:Img_l_1306483.jpg|thumb|180px|right|[[User:MayaCova|MayaCova]] was using a white board with considerable success.]]
For long hitchhiking trips you could use an erasable white board. The [http://www.bicworld.com/en/products/details/124/velleda-whiteboard Velleda] 30x44cm is the ideal size and lightweight, albeit not very sturdy. Buy a wide chisel tip dry erase marker such as the Velleda 1781 or the Legamaster TZ150 to write thick lines.

Especially if you're going to travel the same route more than once, it can be worth making signs on white A4 card and then laminating them before you set out. It keeps the signs flat, protects them from the rain, looks a lot better than torn brown cardboard and only costs about 10-20 cents per sign.

If you apply adhesive tape on the white side of a paper map, you can also use it as a whiteboard. If the map is too big, or if you want to use it in windy conditions, use [http://getsimplifized.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/binder-clip.jpg binder clips]. Mine is 80cm x 60cm when spread and 20cm x 10xm when folded. It does take some time to make it nice and flat without any wrinkles.
--[[User:Strazdas007|Strazdas007]] ([[User talk:Strazdas007|talk]]) 01:52, 26 August 2014 (UTC)

If space doesn't permit a long city name shorten it to something everyone will understand. For example [[Amsterdam]] could be '''A'dam''' and [[Hamburg]] could be '''HH'''. Have a look at the country's license plates, the short forms featured there will probably be known in the population.

[[File:DSC00176.JPG|thumb|left|200px|True or Not, people will laugh and pick you up!]]

Signs don't just have to list a place - Much success can be had (in the proper setting) with more off-the-wall signs like "We're Awesome!", "Free Cookies!", "Runaway Bride" or even "Not Far", "that way ==&gt;", etc.
Artwork on a sign can also be helpful, particularly if there are simple images that are commonly related to your context. For instance, when hitching out of Austin, [[Texas]] (home of the Longhorns, which are absurdly popular there), adding a Longhorns logo to the sign was a big improvement.

[[File:Please.jpg|thumb|left|200px|A sign saying "Por favor" ("please" in spanish)]]

If you have the chance, adding "Please" onto your signs could be a great idea. As well as being polite, writing "Please" in a certain language can indicate that you are a good speaker of that language, and this can be used to attract drivers who were ignoring you before. However, your main message is the destination. "Please" is an extra word for the driver to read. Also, as you're clearly in a desperate position it's already accepted that you are being grateful for any assistance; once a driver stops, you can say "Please" as much as you like. Experiment with "Please" for yourself, and see what happens.

== [[Hitchhiker's safety|Safe hitchhiking]] ==
Wear bright coloured clothes or a reflective warning vest while walking along the road. Next to that, a hitchhiker should consider keeping a small first aid kit with him/her at all times. While these might be mandatory in many Western European countries, not every driver on the planet carries these with them. In terms of an accident, the most dangerous part of hitchhiking, these might come in very helpful, especially when travelling in remote areas of the planet.

Say no, if you don't feel safe! Trust your instinct, when it says no. This doesn't happen often, though. Minimizing risk is not being a coward, it's being smart. If you don't feel comfortable with someone, just don't ask him/her, there will be enough other cars. Most people who pick up hitchhikers are friendly and don't mind a no.

Tip:
If you want more security, send an SMS of the number plate of the car to a friend (or at least pretend you do so).
A nice way of getting out of a car without offending a driver if you're uncomfortable, is to pretend that you're going to be sick. Tell the driver not to wait, and run away from the road. If you should need to get more radical, a [[pepper spray]] or a pocket knife may help and improve your self confidence. (A knife may be a confidence booster but is useless in a situation turned bad. By the time you have your knife out it is probably too late, it can be used against you. The most important thing is to get out/away from your attacker. Pepper spray is probably a better option (if legal)). 

Putting all protective techniques aside you're generally much safer traveling with a friend or fellow hitchhiker.
You can find more detailed tips on how to stay safe especially but not only for women here: [[Women_hitchhiking]]

== In the car ==
Once you've actually managed to get in the car and start heading towards your destination, it's all a matter of being courteous. Remember, your driver didn't have to pick you up at all. Settle in, get comfortable, but of course, not too comfortable. Keep your shoes off the dashboard, don't pass any form of gas (from either end), etc. In other words, don't do anything to offend your driver! 

[[File:Inthecar.jpg|thumb|300px]]
Your driver may have picked you up for many possible reasons. One of the main reasons is companionship on a long journey. That means you have to talk to the driver. Have a few things to talk about in mind before you get in (What's your name? Where are you headed? Oh yeah? What's there?). If the driver doesn't seem too interested in talking you can relax or read a book.

If not, keep it simple to begin with. A solid rule that should be followed by any hitcher is to try to shy away from talking about politics with a driver who has differing view points than yourself. People have a tendency to get worked up when it comes to politics or religion, so if they mention something that your political or religious views disagree with, try to use a reply like "I'm not going to get into that", "I never thought about that", or pretending to be in vague agreement. Many hitchers have been thrown out of cars following a fiery political debate.

Some drivers will go a few extra kilometres off their route to help you, if you ask very nicely; be prepared to graciously accept a no, however.

Make sure you know where the driver intends to drop you off, and if you know the city or have discussed the city with the driver, try to choose the best drop-off point yourself; drivers can sometimes be "trying to help", and despite their best intentions leave you in what turn out to be very bad places. If the drop-off point is not helpful to you, then say so, and the driver may take you to a different location instead, particularly one on their way.

Don't get lost while you're in a car! Some drivers have a terrible sense of direction and may need your help; so keep track of your journey using road signs and your maps. Also, knowing exactly where you are when you leave the vehicle will save a lot of time; if necessary, ask the driver exactly where you are.

=== Stuff ===
Keep your stuff organized. Make sure you don't lose any of your own stuff and very important for the image of hitchhiking: make sure not to take anything that's not yours.  That includes watching out when you leave the car.

== If you're lost... ==
...then it's maybe a good idea to stop traveling until you know where you are. Ask whoever you can for help. Look on road signs for city names and road numbers, and try to match them with your [[maps|map]].

If getting lost isn't a problem because you have no fixed destination, then stop worrying and enjoy the ride ;).

== If you've gone the wrong way... ==
...then work out whether it's best to turn around, to carry on in the new direction (either trying another route, or changing your destination), or to stop hitchhiking. If you're on a motorway, then it might be tough to turn around.

If you decide to turn around, then watch out: it can be hard to find a lift that gets you back to your route, ''and'' travels in the right direction. You could easily get back to your route, and have to turn round a second time.

== [[Finding accommodation]] ==

[[File:Roads.JPG|thumb|250px|right|[[At night]], it'll get tougher. Apart from much less traffic, people may trust you less (especially if you're male) and you may be in more danger (especially if you're female). Also, you're not as visible as you were before. But if someone does decide to help, they will probably help you as much as they can...]]

=== You are sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
If you make small distances, you can plan in advance where you will sleep.
If you have Internet access, you can check out those websites for free accommodation:
[https://www.trustroots.org Trustroots.org]; hitchhiker centric
[http://bewelcome.org BeWelcome.org];
[http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing.com] most active
[http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (good for finding phone numbers in smaller places).
If there's a [http://www.ymca.int/ymca-hotels/ YMCA centre] in town, see if they have a room for the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. 

=== You are not sure to reach your destination before the [[hitchhiking at night|night]] ===
On longer hitchhiking trips, you may need to sleep along the way. 

If it's not too cold outside and if you have a sleeping bag and a tarp or a tent with you, begin a few hours before the sunset to look out for places where you could sleep. It may be a hidden place in nature, McDo games, or an uninhabited house.

If you don't want to sleep outside, consider those possibilities:
Are you ready to pay for a hostel? If yes, can you find one?
Is there a (big) [[airport]] on your road or close to the place you are? You may sleep there.
Can your driver host you?
Can you find a car/truck driving overnight and crash out on the way? In this case, is the driver really reliable?


=== Holding a big "Couchsurfing?" sign in public place === 
Strazdas007 says it is possible to find a host in this way, but you must know, where it is biggest chance that your sign will be seen - talking about subway stations or even stations in general, bigger supermarkets, town squares. He actually found one host near some touristic attraction - somewhere near Eiffel tower, but he was lucky, because next day he wasn't so lucky and had to sleep on the bench. And he was thrown out of the subway station in Paris, because guards were thinking that he was asking for money. Or you can simply look for some hipsters, or simply friendly youths and ask them if they are hosting, if they don't know, tell them about CS'ing, and maybe they will host you. 

Try your luck. And remember this is not hitchhiking, eye contact is almost pointless, because your sign is making contact. Try to make sign as big as possible (well not very big, but so it could be seen from further or/and attract people eye).

=== Camping ===

Wild camping how to http://nomadwiki.org/en/Camping

=== Other options ===

If you can't find anywhere to sleep, there are still other ways to get out of the situation. If you are lucky enough to be at a 24-hour petrol station or Mc Donalds, just keep drinking coffee and keep hitching through the [[hitchhiking at night|night]]. Keep in mind that it gets really quiet between 2:00 and 5:00, even at motorway service areas.

== Getting to the nearest city ==
It's tough to hitchhike out of city centres. But sometimes (if you're tired, hungry, thirsty, ill etc.) you'll need to go off your route and take a pause in the nearest city. Hey, if you're flexible with your travel arrangements, you may decide to stay there for a bit longer...

If hitchhiking to the city is too hard for whatever reason, and the city is too far to walk, then take public transport. Head for nearby areas of houses: they often have bus stops.

Most petrol stations on motorways have a special access road for staff and delivery/emergency vehicles. Many petrol stations also have local maps you can look at to find bus stops near you, if you exit via the special access road.

== Use buses and trains ==
It's not worth trying to hitchhike at all costs. Sometimes it's just more convenient to take a bus to get to a highway or to your final destinations. This is the case especially when leaving or arriving at big cities or at night. Sometimes you can get away without paying on public transport, although in some countries or cities you have to be more careful than usual: check a "Public Transport" (or "Blackriding") section (if there is any) of a country/city you travel to. If you do blackride anyway, sit or stand preferably by the door; sometimes quick reaction (last second jumping off) to suspiciously looking folks who might appear to be ticket controllers can save your butt. It is usually better to sit in the front of the bus so you can quickly scan all the people waiting for the bus while the bus approaches the station and stops. Also, it helps to direct sight in only one way to look for ticket controllers you missed before already in the bus.

== [[Highway]] hitchhike ==
If you need to travel over long destinations, taking the highway is the best option. Most highway entrances are bad spots, and many are dangerous. A good way to hitchhike on highways is to practice "station hopping": you only stop in petrol stations or rest areas. There you can talk to people and the car is totally stopped. You could also hop off at a toll station. Use a map that shows the petrol stations!

In most countries, hitchhiking directly on the highway is forbidden! In rare occasions however, you might be forced to. Keep in mind that it is very unsafe for drivers to stop on the highway, and that your own [[hitchhiker's safety|safety]] is also in danger. The [[police]] might force you to leave the area and could fine you.

== Alone or with other(s) ==
Hitchhiking is considered to be fastest for a solo female hitchhiker, but it supposedly is a bit riskier. If you're two or even three, you can travel fast as well. Keep in mind that truck drivers often only have one "official" extra seat. By preference take one bag instead of two. If you're more than three it would be a good idea to split into several groups. 

If you're not traveling solo, the other person(s) can wait on a place not visible by the oncoming drivers, but not too far from the hitchhiking spot. You can also do this if you have a lot of luggage. You might get some people to stop that would not otherwise do so if they saw more people or extra luggage, and it's harder for them to reject you once they have stopped.

[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] (male) has a 5% faster "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with one female companion compared to hitchhiking alone, and 75% longer "waiting time / ride distance" ratio for hitchhiking with a male companion (derived from data collected from 1,641 rides, of which 1,299 alone, 189 with female companion and 132 with male companion). His data for other combinations (more than two hitchhikers) are not reliable, due to lack of statistical significance (only 21 registered rides).

== Avoid [[mistakes]] ==
Try to avoid common [[mistakes]] and you will save a couple of hours and loads of frustration.

== Traveling long distances ==

[[File:Transportation_van.jpeg|400px|thumb|right|Transportation van filling up tank in petron station "Statoil" in Lithuania]]
When traveling for long distance when you arrive to a big petrol station you should prioritize some drivers like:

# Transportation vans: They usually are not so big and there have 3 seats in the front so if you are hitch-hiking with a friend is perfect. Inside you will probably see something to contain coffee and the front will be full of killed mosquitos.(these are good indicators). So these drivers usually drive non-stop just to deliver their stuff from one place to another no matter what. Be warned, that crossing Polish - Lithuanian border zone with these drivers can be nervous and lenghty, because of police. They usually stop them to inspect cargo, or to check if car is not overweighted (drivers say, that if they know that there is overweight, they usually bribe cops, so it happens faster.), documents are checked, and you may be asked for your documents too, so be prepared. Unlike truck drivers there is no regulations for the time they can drive so they don't have to pause for rest and they can reach 160 km/hour or more (instead of 90 km/hour or even slower 80km/h).
# Businessman / expensive cars: some tend to be really nice, have been hitchhiking couple decades ago, and you get to ride some nice cars.
# Holiday vans: The drivers can also do long distances and some can travel for months.
# Truck drivers: They quite often cannot take anyone legally because of the insurances but always ask them about the possibility. Two persons is more complicated but the bed behind the seats can be good to hide your friend. They are good for overnight trips, as you may ask driver if you can sleep in bed.

== Hitchhiker Tips ==
This is the section where anyone can write his or her practical tip.
My idea is to try and make of it as much science as possible so here are some ground rules:
* Everybody are welcome to share their knowledge.
* Read all tips prior to adding on in order to prevent:
 a. Writing the same tip.
 b. Writing contradicting tips which may confuse others.
If you disagree with a tip been written discuss it on the discussion page.
* Try to add tips base on theories being tested. (Example curves: try do exactly the same on both sides on various occasions and record your time and percentage)
_________________________________________

My hitchhiking theory: 
Hitch hiking is a game of patience and mental strength. Be prepared!
Although agree with the article above i believe the vast majority of drivers pick up hitch hikers on psychological association based on looks and self interest which sometimes seem random. 
That is why we should do anything we can to maximize our chances by looking as trust worthy and average as we can as well as consider the drivers interest. 

* '''The Average Driver''' - the average driver does not understand hitch hiking and that is why you will get a lot of gestures from drivers indicating they "stay in the area" or "not going far". It does not occur to them that even a 10, 5 mile or "only to the next junction" ride will advance you and will have critical positive mental effect.

* '''Clothing &amp; Appearance''' - since our goal is to get from point A to B, without importance of who is going to pick us up we want to look as trust worthy or "good, nice, harmless guys" as we can. That means dressed in quite a popular way to the place you are in. Usually it means shorts/jeans and T-shirt (preferably light color) for boys and girls and possibly dress for girls. Of course working according to situation is better, i.e. hitch hike to a metal concert you might dress all black with anthrax T-shirt and 10 piercing in your face and probably get a fast, to the spot ride, but the average  driver might feel unwilling to stop to someone of "your type" out of prejudice.

* '''Be ready to walk''' - Location is crucial and so it is not rare to walk sometimes a mile or even more to get the best position for your next ride. On the way it is fine to try and stop vehicles.

* '''Curves''' - If you are near a curve it is better stand about 50-100 meters before the curve since the driver can see you from more far and also is already in the need of reducing speed and mainly his only job is just get to a slow, reasonable velocity to enter the curve.
Standing after the curve would reduce you chance since you're being seen only on when the driver is out of the curve and is already in the task of speeding. Less people are likely to step on the break for you once they started speeding.
Standing in the middle is extremely dangerous and the least efficient since the driver is multitasking.

* '''Up &amp; Down Hills''' - If being on hilly topography it is better to stand on the first third of the up hill side. As on curves people are more likely to stop while they are already slowing down.
The top of the hill or close to it wouldn't be a good place since the driver is focused on getting to the top.
If a down hill is right after most drivers would not stop for the fun part.
Down hill again is a bad place to try and stop the driver since he is gaining speed and not likely to give up on it.

* '''Gestures''' - Different gestures can steal the attention of the driver and gain you a ride.
All in addition to smilling and looking to the drivers eyes:
# Wave the hand in between to passing cars.
# Pointing-moving your thumb every now and then above your shoulder towards the direction.
# Even single a "little" gesture with the two fingers helps, as explained on "the average driver" section. That is where board usually comes in super handy.

* '''Asking for Ride''' - Don't be afraid to talk to people and ask them directly if you can hop on. Some drivers would not consider taking you, yet by hearing a nice, friendly, polite voice they might will as well as feel a bit more obligation to help you.

===Different Vessels===
You should feel comfortable through out the whole way to your destination. if you feel uncomfortable hoping on a specific vessel - don't. As it will tire you out and make a bad experience for the future. If you feel unsafe with the drivers drive don't be ashamed to tell him (I do ask all motorcycle rides to drive relatively slow especially on unpaved roads, never needed to tell in a car) he will understand your worry, remember he stopped in order to help and will be nice enough to make you feel comfortable.

* '''Back of a Pick-Up Truck''' - In some parts of the world the back of a pick up truck is where you are likely to spend a big chunk of the road. However there is a clear problem of safety. For the driver it might be convenient to tell you to hop on the back and so he wont need to worry from a dangerous hiker or either talk in case he isn't in the mood. It is also an extra space in case the seats are full. On the hiker side you have zero control on what is going on and hop on without at least getting to know if the driver is trust worthy is not recommended. You should have a few words with the driver about the way and agree on a place before hands since you wouldn't be able to converse once you start driving, knocking on the roof for stop at most. There is also the problem of sitting without safety belt and potentially with unfasten equipment that might hurt you in case of emergency stop, curves or irresponsible driving.

* '''Motorcycles''' - Motorcycles are somewhat problematic when it comes to travelling with luggage, yet is possible. It is a good way to travel fast, but just like driving one - even less safe as taking a ride with a car. Try to ask the driver for an extra helmet. Usually not likely to work, but some drivers keep an extra "half helmet" in the box of the vehicle - not much, but certainly better than nothing. I for instance tend to minimise motorcycle rides since i feel unsafe with a stranger driver. You might ask to drive slower, but remember driving slower means less balance.

===Accessing petrol stations===
I'd say it's important to mention that - at least within the EU - multiple petrol stations located along the highway will have a wire fence directly around them, cutting them off from the neighboring city, the nearest bus stop or whatever it is your heart desires. Catching a ride into the city is not always a possible option, and if you for some reason need to use a bridge to  cross the highway (please DO NOT cross the actual highway), the fence will effectively block your way and make your life miserable. Of course you can walk along it until you eventually find a gate, but there's more efficient options - most of the fences i've encountered weren't taller than 2m and could be easily climbed, and if you search around the station for a bit you're almost sure to find a hole already made by some benevolent soul that came before you. It's overall not a big setback but good to keep in mind.

My vision is to have a collective grid-table for people to add on theory and different people to add on their tests result and so things would become scientific and clear very fast.
Main problem - different countries, different cultures.
I hope this section is going to evolve because i would love to see others tips and try to find the ultimate hitch hiking technique.

== External links ==
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S5Iay0Qv93o&amp;t=1223s Hitchhikers' guide; a tutorial] by Christof Middeke
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1d3py3ROQlM&amp;list=PLTl6wHsuItETZmkfuI6AO5_xh8qiwtlzy&amp;index=2 The HITCHHIKING BASICS you MUST LEARN! (Tutorial 1: passive #hitchhiking )]
* [https://youtu.be/on7OIEjDsm0?feature=shared The FASTEST HITCHHIKING TECHNIQUE (Tutorial 2: active #hitchhiking)]
* [[wikivoyage:Tips_for_hitchhiking|Tips for Hitchhiking on Wikivoyage]]

Historic stuff available on archive.org:
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20170928145919/http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/importance-smiling-communication/ The importance of smiling when engaging drivers]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20210611122216/http://www.christopherdrifter.com/books/Rules_of_Thumb/ Rules of Thumb] - A free guide to living on the road and hitch-hiking
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20170609184952/http://hitchhikershandbook.com/ HitchHikers Handbook] - a useful hitchhiking resource with advice on everything from getting started to city guides --&gt;
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20130310154155/http://www.hitchbase.com/ Worldwide Database of Places for Hitchhikers]

= Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki =

{{nomadwiki}}



[[Category:Practical info]]

[[fr:B. A. - BA]]
[[he:טיפים]]
[[nl:Belangrijkste tips]]
[[pl:Najważniejsze wskazówki]]
[[pt:Dicas boas]]
[[ro:Top Tips]]
[[ru:Основные советы]]
[[tr:Otostopçunun Kılavuzu]]
[[zh:重点提示]]

{{geo-missing}}</text>
      <sha1>rfw8wsjhwh4gdoz18p163ldafx1r9v1</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Finding accommodation</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1507</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1519</id>
      <parentid>4233</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-08-07T18:41:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1991">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though.

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 100000+ members, managed in a collective way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 170000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site ''less secure''.

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap acccomodation and friendly people.''

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>8pulii476g3i0ho3t1z5vm8gwtldw6z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1520</id>
      <parentid>1519</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1991">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though.

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 100000+ members, managed in a collective way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 170000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site ''less secure''.

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap acccomodation and friendly people.''

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>8pulii476g3i0ho3t1z5vm8gwtldw6z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4207</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-17T12:44:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GuakaTest</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="734">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It's legal in [[Scandinavia]] though.

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality Exchange networks==
Hospitality Exchange networks require a bit more planning.

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing]
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club]</text>
      <sha1>rbqkzn0omi1dribcgsa8j0h24ttj6c5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4208</id>
      <parentid>4207</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T14:32:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="960">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It's legal in [[Scandinavia]] though.

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning. However, sometimes there are gatherings of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing], 40000 members, nice website
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club], 95000 members, some problems with censorship</text>
      <sha1>jbmkl8mrp7eypzb8hnenxcosy07kzdq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4209</id>
      <parentid>4208</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T14:41:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1000">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It's legal in [[Scandinavia]] though.

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning. However, sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing], 40000 members, nice website
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club], 95000 members, some problems with censorship</text>
      <sha1>00yqdx33ci0upu33wl1tiuk1pnaftpj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4210</id>
      <parentid>4209</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-01-16T03:36:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>200.193.228.97</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="966">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It's legal in [[Scandinavia]] though.

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning. However, sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing], 40000 members
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club], 100000 memberscensorship</text>
      <sha1>30lecmt1kh9qpoi6167qf91uzfp9rlk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4211</id>
      <parentid>4210</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-01-16T03:36:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>200.193.228.97</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="956">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It's legal in [[Scandinavia]] though.

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning. However, sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing], 40000 members
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club], 100000 members</text>
      <sha1>3azau125g5z78wvd0db5unmh8jy51z7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4212</id>
      <parentid>4211</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-01-17T17:39:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>200.45.134.189</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1025">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It's legal in [[Scandinavia]] though.

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning. However, sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing], 40000 members
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club], 100000 members (don't mention other websites such as CouchSurfing in your messages)</text>
      <sha1>3o76wy8ontwcwjpvdhhafnbbrvocjw1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4213</id>
      <parentid>4212</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-01-26T18:19:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>62.174.241.223</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1040">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It's legal in [[Scandinavia]] and [[Ireland]]though.

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning. However, sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing], 40000 members
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club], 100000 members (don't mention other websites such as CouchSurfing in your messages)</text>
      <sha1>4b40l2ou7dpm3y97evos9srf2e87zjd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4214</id>
      <parentid>4213</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-01-26T18:19:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>62.174.241.223</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1041">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It's legal in [[Scandinavia]] and [[Ireland]] though.

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning. However, sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing], 40000 members
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club], 100000 members (don't mention other websites such as CouchSurfing in your messages)</text>
      <sha1>qt21rh9audoiifhxvhzbhsq55jf0sy9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4215</id>
      <parentid>4214</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-02-20T04:54:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>67.190.27.40</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1067">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It's legal in [[Scandinavia]] and [[Ireland]] though.

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning. However, sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing], 50000 members
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club], 100000 members (don't mention other websites, such as CouchSurfing, in your message or it might be censored.)</text>
      <sha1>sb1t985zqhjylaqexul0fthybbzkzh0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4216</id>
      <parentid>4215</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-03-16T15:47:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>172.177.67.228</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="972">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It's legal in [[Scandinavia]] and [[Ireland]] though.

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning. However, sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing], 50000 members
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club], 100000 members</text>
      <sha1>audsvtk6usvrgr0w0jwuzancmif1d7p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4217</id>
      <parentid>4216</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-03-19T01:48:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1067">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It's legal in [[Scandinavia]] and [[Ireland]] though.

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning. However, sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing], 50000 members
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club], 100000 members (don't mention other websites, such as CouchSurfing, in your message or it might be censored.)</text>
      <sha1>sb1t985zqhjylaqexul0fthybbzkzh0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4218</id>
      <parentid>4217</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-03-27T17:34:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1314">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It's legal in [[Scandinavia]] and [[Ireland]] though.

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning. However, sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing], 50000 members
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club], 100000 members (don't mention other websites, such as CouchSurfing, in your message or it might be censored.)
* http://globalfreeloaders.com doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places.</text>
      <sha1>80n6mwkwu5pbq28wgboturev7fsqnqj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4219</id>
      <parentid>4218</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-03-29T17:40:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1341">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It's legal in [[Scandinavia]] and [[Ireland]] though.

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning. However, sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing], 50000 members
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club], 100000 members (don't mention other websites, such as CouchSurfing, in your message or it might be censored.)
* http://globalfreeloaders.com doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places.

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>gchhrh0elfw91701zkuvfan0odw5y7g</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4220</id>
      <parentid>4219</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-04-07T18:10:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>24.9.125.18</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1511">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It's legal in [[Scandinavia]] and [[Ireland]] though.

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing], 60000+ members, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club], 120000+ members, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there. (Don't mention other websites, such as CouchSurfing, in your message or it might be censored.)
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places.

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>19j248vifiywqz8lmc3x13gkp9rgxu4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4221</id>
      <parentid>4220</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-04-07T18:15:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>84.40.25.240</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1651">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]] and [[Ireland]], though.

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing], 60000+ members, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club], 120000+ members, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there. (Don't mention other websites, such as CouchSurfing, in your message or it might be censored.)
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places.

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>n8nvncjid6ffvef70m9ppcw2vm2rt0j</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4222</id>
      <parentid>4221</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-04-12T16:10:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1613">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It's legal in [[Scandinavia]] and [[Ireland]] though.

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing], 60000+ members, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club], 120000+ members, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there. (Don't mention other websites, such as CouchSurfing, in your message or it might be censored.)
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email make this site less secure.

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>e00ocobefrgq2blc88oaykwhcs2aaox</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4223</id>
      <parentid>4222</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-04-12T16:11:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1753">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]] and [[Ireland]], though.

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing], 60000+ members, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club], 120000+ members, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there. (Don't mention other websites, such as CouchSurfing, in your message or it might be censored.)
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email make this site less secure.

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>he31dlb23bc0a3cbu0btjxny6poh58d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4224</id>
      <parentid>4223</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-04-19T09:00:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>62.214.238.198</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1768">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Scottland]] and [[Ireland]], though.

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing], 60000+ members, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club], 120000+ members, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there. (Don't mention other websites, such as CouchSurfing, in your message or it might be censored.)
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email make this site less secure.

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>ped7gdluwqjmnh706dkjs8x53hx5yiq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4225</id>
      <parentid>4224</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-04-19T09:00:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>62.214.238.198</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1767">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though.

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing], 60000+ members, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club], 120000+ members, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there. (Don't mention other websites, such as CouchSurfing, in your message or it might be censored.)
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email make this site less secure.

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>genfq8kqea3hqj5vwdyay5thcefdvqt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4226</id>
      <parentid>4225</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-04-24T23:46:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1780">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though.

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing], 60000+ members, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club], 120000+ members, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there. (Don't mention other websites, such as CouchSurfing, in your message or it might be censored.)
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email make this site less secure.

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>fqnifm0y949xvqbng00f66c9uh4t56w</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4227</id>
      <parentid>4226</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-12T22:41:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1920">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though.

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing], 60000+ members, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club], 120000+ members, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there. (Don't mention other websites, such as CouchSurfing, in your message or it might be censored.)
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email make 
this site less secure.

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap acccomodation and friendly people.''

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>fqq40eresyfmxdwhuwmbjweumjy1tah</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4228</id>
      <parentid>4227</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-12T22:43:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2073">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though.

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 60000+ members, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 120000+ members, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there. WARNING: Don't mention other websites, such as CouchSurfing, in your message or it might be censored. Also, because of this ''spam check'' messages sent on HC sometimes take more than one week to arrive at their destination.
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email defintely make this site ''less secure''.

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap acccomodation and friendly people.''

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>1b6dr3h9j17a58pzhfablybf0l3ipee</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4229</id>
      <parentid>4228</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-07-21T06:07:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>161.139.188.192</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2073">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though.

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 60000+ members, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 160000+ members, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there. WARNING: Don't mention other websites, such as CouchSurfing, in your message or it might be censored. Also, because of this ''spam check'' messages sent on HC sometimes take more than one week to arrive at their destination.
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email defintely make this site ''less secure''.

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap acccomodation and friendly people.''

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>p4m8okro48jauqm87gpztv6i97v0hlb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4230</id>
      <parentid>4229</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-08-03T21:49:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>141.35.98.79</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1848">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though.

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 60000+ members, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 160000+ members, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email defintely make this site ''less secure''.

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap acccomodation and friendly people.''

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>o54opcc6npwaw1bchr6hu2sg5ro7pco</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4231</id>
      <parentid>4230</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-08-03T22:00:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>141.35.98.79</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1877">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though.

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 60000+ members, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 160000+ members, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email defintely make this site ''less secure''.

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap acccomodation and friendly people.''

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>qggla3z0ar37oaw9mrnm0b4awap6qnd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4232</id>
      <parentid>4231</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-08-07T18:25:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2106">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though.

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 100000+ members, managed in a collective way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 170000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there. Because of the ''spam check'' messages sent on HC sometimes take more than one week to arrive at their destination.
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email defintely make this site ''less secure''.

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap acccomodation and friendly people.''

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>tjfufx2wfujyzru1qe2vkdobv74dhlj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4233</id>
      <parentid>4232</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-08-07T18:32:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1990">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though.

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 100000+ members, managed in a collective way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 170000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email defintely make this site ''less secure''.

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap acccomodation and friendly people.''

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>376yyd4s488ba32ykhqoyb3p8ao8pwu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4234</id>
      <parentid>1520</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1991">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though.

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 100000+ members, managed in a collective way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 170000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site ''less secure''.

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap acccomodation and friendly people.''

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>8pulii476g3i0ho3t1z5vm8gwtldw6z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9701</id>
      <parentid>4234</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-11T11:25:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.1.31.195</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1991">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though.

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 100000+ members, managed in a collective way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 220000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site ''less secure''.

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap acccomodation and friendly people.''

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>ojhl3w98jj79qbp9eahd7wnuja161ee</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9712</id>
      <parentid>9701</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-12T09:21:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>84.73.190.187</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2066">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though.

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden ans ask if you can camp there.

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 100000+ members, managed in a collective way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 220000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site ''less secure''.

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap acccomodation and friendly people.''

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>8aw2nkdz6mbhkce1ouuuta49kp8a08d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9713</id>
      <parentid>9712</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-12T09:21:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>84.73.190.187</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2066">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though.

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 100000+ members, managed in a collective way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 220000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site ''less secure''.

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap acccomodation and friendly people.''

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>gt82pldfhx7ws1a2f0z2rokg33j0aj4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10782</id>
      <parentid>9713</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-12T15:17:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2975">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, camping wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dawn, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dawn at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 100000+ members, managed in a collective way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 220000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site ''less secure''.

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap acccomodation and friendly people.''

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>rq5qlbntbhl26hpmwdd6rfciv5fmqik</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11223</id>
      <parentid>10782</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-11T17:06:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>212.204.153.28</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3080">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, camping wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dawn, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dawn at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 100000+ members, managed in a collective way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 220000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site ''less secure''.

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap acccomodation and friendly people.''

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>pttxcnl10dyg41bj7dzchyh84n4zvmv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11226</id>
      <parentid>11223</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-12T06:45:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3083">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, camping wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dawn, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dawn at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 200000+ members, managed in an aristocratic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 280000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site ''less secure''.

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap acccomodation and friendly people.''

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>t1ap1av39itkwm52fxektrsiswp15d3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11227</id>
      <parentid>11226</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-12T06:48:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3081">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, camping wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dawn, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dawn at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 200000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 280000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site ''less secure''.

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap acccomodation and friendly people.''

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>lpz8e8fyzysik8dbil8bn4aecsx1bej</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11389</id>
      <parentid>11227</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-22T11:37:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>131.152.1.1</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3081">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, camping wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dawn, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dawn at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 200000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 290000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site ''less secure''.

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap acccomodation and friendly people.''

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>ej7blvlieppqexddphsw38krxr51itd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12675</id>
      <parentid>11389</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-10T07:09:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3480">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, camping wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dawn, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dawn at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 200000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 290000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] Tries to be an open alternative to HC and CS.
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site ''less secure''.

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap acccomodation and friendly people.''

==Hostels==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>lckvu6jaisu3d1n9m5cftsqww2q6wh6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13285</id>
      <parentid>12675</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-30T03:15:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>190.10.6.226</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3482">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, camping wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dawn, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dawn at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 290000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] An open alternative to HC and CS. 1300+ Members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site ''less secure''.

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap acccomodation and friendly people.''

==Hostels==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>ebm53gf2s2ogmbxnjqfvgfw9ellfa1x</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13984</id>
      <parentid>13285</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-21T18:36:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3503">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, camping wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dawn, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dawn at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 290000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] An open alternative to HC and CS. 1300+ Members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site ''less secure''.

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap acccomodation and friendly people.''

==Hostels==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]</text>
      <sha1>hpdpjjiq4bp6a3pz1klgjaslbrdc3x1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18315</id>
      <parentid>13984</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-02-07T14:49:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>194.145.68.12</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3503">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, camping wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dawn, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dawn at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 290000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] An open alternative to HC and CS. 4000+ Members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site ''less secure''.

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap acccomodation and friendly people.''

==Hostels==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]</text>
      <sha1>2m3ue3fr65o7f3phe3n8pzuud7vyvrr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18784</id>
      <parentid>18315</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-08T21:02:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>88.64.228.253</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3503">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, camping wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dawn, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dawn at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 290000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] An open alternative to HC and CS. 2700+ Members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site ''less secure''.

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap acccomodation and friendly people.''

==Hostels==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]</text>
      <sha1>4h57c378uhyrh113xma8tba2wierira</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18920</id>
      <parentid>18784</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-19T14:06:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>194.145.64.8</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3503">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, camping wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dawn, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dawn at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 290000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] An open alternative to HC and CS. 2800+ Members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site ''less secure''.

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap acccomodation and friendly people.''

==Hostels==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]</text>
      <sha1>ana7gujwpdqrcmqjsts2mtnf4q3kg9f</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19028</id>
      <parentid>18920</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-25T12:38:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>194.145.64.8</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3503">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, camping wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dawn, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dawn at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 290000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] An open alternative to HC and CS. 2900+ Members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site ''less secure''.

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap acccomodation and friendly people.''

==Hostels==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]</text>
      <sha1>nsv2lr0pu29rrtw9w047ycp6o5mbgga</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19065</id>
      <parentid>19028</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-26T23:03:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>83.5.242.19</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3503">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, camping wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dawn at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 290000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] An open alternative to HC and CS. 2900+ Members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site ''less secure''.

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap acccomodation and friendly people.''

==Hostels==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]</text>
      <sha1>t7tbb82vi0hnurx4ezg2fzm48c170g9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19066</id>
      <parentid>19065</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-26T23:03:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>83.5.242.19</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3503">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, camping wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 290000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] An open alternative to HC and CS. 2900+ Members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site ''less secure''.

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap acccomodation and friendly people.''

==Hostels==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]</text>
      <sha1>0uj77c2rt0b2yzhiiqef4ywkxobvvp2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19264</id>
      <parentid>19066</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-31T10:53:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>194.145.64.8</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3503">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, camping wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 290000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] An open alternative to HC and CS. 3000+ Members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site ''less secure''.

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap acccomodation and friendly people.''

==Hostels==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]</text>
      <sha1>eg7cm01vd1vjk4j3x7d732upb1n600t</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19468</id>
      <parentid>19264</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-04-10T10:51:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>194.145.64.8</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3503">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, camping wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 290000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] An open alternative to HC and CS. 3100+ Members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site ''less secure''.

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap acccomodation and friendly people.''

==Hostels==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]</text>
      <sha1>5293d4j703h8xvptzoip976hpgz10tl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19719</id>
      <parentid>19468</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-04-28T11:58:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>194.145.64.8</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3503">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, camping wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 290000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] An open alternative to HC and CS. 3300+ Members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site ''less secure''.

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap acccomodation and friendly people.''

==Hostels==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]</text>
      <sha1>8g6fov7zpvzczgcxkoxsqup35qn77g6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>20402</id>
      <parentid>19719</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-05T19:22:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>88.64.227.105</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3503">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, camping wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 290000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] An open alternative to HC and CS. 3600+ Members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site ''less secure''.

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap acccomodation and friendly people.''

==Hostels==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]</text>
      <sha1>2p6pacvmxy22090jbupyqbvmr7zz08e</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21111</id>
      <parentid>20402</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-13T15:04:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>88.91.94.233</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3503">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, camping wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 580000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] An open alternative to HC and CS. 3600+ Members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site ''less secure''.

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap acccomodation and friendly people.''

==Hostels==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]</text>
      <sha1>py23hn7n2rei13pj5ycllq886uljhvz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22611</id>
      <parentid>21111</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-15T21:15:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3541">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, camping wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 580000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4000+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

==Hostels==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]</text>
      <sha1>qlrblm1qon6vwjdwn66if2u0lhzzc9w</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22675</id>
      <parentid>22611</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-17T21:01:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>88.64.247.55</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3541">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, camping wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 580000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4100+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

==Hostels==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]</text>
      <sha1>pu30a1uxqmt4a3z2ufnhp5jjfzurkat</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23015</id>
      <parentid>22675</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-29T15:58:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>194.145.68.13</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3541">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, camping wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 580000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4200+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

==Hostels==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]</text>
      <sha1>efw8uwmxqxcnebjcfb8csxxx5wcotg5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23108</id>
      <parentid>23015</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-31T14:10:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>217.167.134.225</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3445">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, camping wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 580000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4200+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

Rahhala.net: (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travlers and travelers for peace...

Rahhala is based in paris and all its members will be pleased to help anyone traveling through Paris... 

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]</text>
      <sha1>6t55kuybx2u9la94drjfr3o151iyqms</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23109</id>
      <parentid>23108</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-31T14:13:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>84.14.108.225</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3370">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, camping wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 580000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4200+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/en/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travlers and travelers for peace...


''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''


[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]</text>
      <sha1>r09oj2myvlq4w7p5t57x8xhu2b0a89y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23110</id>
      <parentid>23109</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-31T14:22:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3683">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, camping wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 580000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4200+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/en/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travlers and travelers for peace...


''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

==Hostels==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.


[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]</text>
      <sha1>cmfiwvf1ntygbhfbrl51x4q0odq5hlj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24096</id>
      <parentid>23110</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-08-28T00:07:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>81.108.221.228</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4065">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, camping wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 580000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4200+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/en/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travlers and travelers for peace...


''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

==Hostels==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.


[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]</text>
      <sha1>l14qkgotud525ga0830jhcx2i8slynu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24097</id>
      <parentid>24096</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-08-28T00:13:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mirto</username>
        <id>45</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4146">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, camping wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 580000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4200+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/en/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travlers and travelers for peace...


''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

==Hostels==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.


[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]</text>
      <sha1>kn8v1nn5apscfmrsywfek56sp37wnxl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24547</id>
      <parentid>24097</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-06T11:33:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4148">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, camping wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 580000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4200+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/en/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travlers and travelers for peace...


''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

==Hostels==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.


[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]</text>
      <sha1>4xggt0o15ivj1qm3u1k4zjknwdx5svv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>25391</id>
      <parentid>24547</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-29T16:25:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>194.8.120.148</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4148">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, camping wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 580000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4700+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/en/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travlers and travelers for peace...


''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

==Hostels==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.


[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]</text>
      <sha1>lltfx44kuolyp5817qmceveii7z63eg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26075</id>
      <parentid>25391</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-12T22:15:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4152">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most hitchhikers don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, [[camping]] wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 580000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4700+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/en/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travlers and travelers for peace...


''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

==Hostels==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.


[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]</text>
      <sha1>h06gizta51tvl69raxfz3w7l7507l0l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26077</id>
      <parentid>26075</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-12T22:18:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4156">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most [[hitchhikers]] don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, [[camping]] wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 580000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4700+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/en/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travlers and travelers for peace...


''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

==Hostels==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.


[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]</text>
      <sha1>9tyxnygtmmuoerl8zvi26sta2euddt4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26959</id>
      <parentid>26077</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-05T00:09:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4227">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most [[hitchhikers]] don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[camping]] article.''

You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, [[camping]] wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 580000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4700+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/en/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travlers and travelers for peace...


''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

==Hostels==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.


[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]</text>
      <sha1>m4bjh8tzczsjz4del3khtz5e031ta1h</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29379</id>
      <parentid>26959</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-20T01:16:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>202.109.110.2</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4236">boccor
'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most [[hitchhikers]] don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[camping]] article.''

You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, [[camping]] wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 580000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4700+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/en/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travlers and travelers for peace...


''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

==Hostels==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.


[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Ãbernachten]]</text>
      <sha1>tqqe01470cm0hr8eiz0hej4hvejz8x8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29384</id>
      <parentid>29379</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-20T10:56:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robino</username>
        <id>4</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4227">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most [[hitchhikers]] don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

==Tent==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[camping]] article.''

You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, [[camping]] wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

==Your driver==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

==Hospitality exchange networks==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 580000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4700+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/en/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travlers and travelers for peace...


''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

==Hostels==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.


[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]</text>
      <sha1>m4bjh8tzczsjz4del3khtz5e031ta1h</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>34896</id>
      <parentid>29384</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T17:18:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4234">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most [[hitchhikers]] don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

== Tent ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[camping]] article.''

You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, [[camping]] wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the Netherlands camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

== Your driver ==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

== Hospitality exchange networks ==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 580000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4700+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/en/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travlers and travelers for peace...


''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

== Hostels ==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]</text>
      <sha1>qate8gidd9huuytvqjf9fggey5ggwuw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39982</id>
      <parentid>34896</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-08T12:24:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Quarim</username>
        <id>1290</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4238">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most [[hitchhikers]] don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

== Tent ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[camping]] article.''

You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, [[camping]] wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the [[Netherlands]] camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

== Your driver ==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

== Hospitality exchange networks ==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 580000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4700+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/en/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travlers and travelers for peace...


''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

== Hostels ==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]</text>
      <sha1>5r55xmz6wl0uajr6swfqwn3xqu82btx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39983</id>
      <parentid>39982</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-08T12:26:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Quarim</username>
        <id>1290</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4239">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most [[hitchhikers]] don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

== Tent ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[camping]] article.''

You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, [[camping]] wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the [[Netherlands]] camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

== Your driver ==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

== Hospitality exchange networks ==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 1700000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4700+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/en/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travlers and travelers for peace...


''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

== Hostels ==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]</text>
      <sha1>ixe3bincufaz2w6bf2rkurzes2w67cb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40102</id>
      <parentid>39983</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-12T09:03:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mipplor</username>
        <id>1887</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4253">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most [[hitchhikers]] don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

== Tent ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[camping]] article.''

You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, [[camping]] wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the [[Netherlands]] camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

== Your driver ==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

== Hospitality exchange networks ==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 1700000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4700+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/en/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travlers and travelers for peace...


''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

== Hostels ==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]
[[zh:住宿]]</text>
      <sha1>inl2hl9rm01wncgfiu17b2ej6miqwxn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40426</id>
      <parentid>40102</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-16T21:16:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>95.48.34.122</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4250">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most [[hitchhikers]] don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

== Tent ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[camping]] article.''

You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, [[camping]] wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the [[Netherlands]] camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

== Your driver ==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

== Hospitality exchange networks ==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 1700000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4700+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travlers and travelers for peace...


''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

== Hostels ==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]
[[zh:住宿]]</text>
      <sha1>hfcsqttlizydo9poww7rdzwe5po1of0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>46922</id>
      <parentid>40426</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-11-11T02:01:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4287">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most [[hitchhikers]] don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

== Tent ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[camping]] article.''

You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, [[camping]] wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the [[Netherlands]] camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

== Your driver ==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

== Hospitality exchange networks ==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 1700000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4700+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travlers and travelers for peace...


''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

== Hostels ==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]
[[fr:Où dormir]]
[[pt:Onde dormir]]
[[zh:住宿]]</text>
      <sha1>pqvme1kommekl1ub4721xwdf1uxq71j</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>49587</id>
      <parentid>46922</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-02-17T09:27:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>84.197.163.43</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4287">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most [[hitchhikers]] don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

== Tent ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[camping]] article.''

You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, [[camping]] wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the [[Netherlands]] camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

== Your driver ==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

== Hospitality exchange networks ==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 2500000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 330000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4700+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travlers and travelers for peace...


''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

== Hostels ==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]
[[fr:Où dormir]]
[[pt:Onde dormir]]
[[zh:住宿]]</text>
      <sha1>4q40yvjhrknm8h0v4p0ie7qigyaghq7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>49590</id>
      <parentid>49587</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-02-17T16:04:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4289">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most [[hitchhikers]] don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

== Tent ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[camping]] article.''

You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, [[camping]] wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the [[Netherlands]] camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

== Your driver ==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

== Hospitality exchange networks ==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 2,500,000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 640,000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4700+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travlers and travelers for peace...

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

== Hostels ==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]
[[fr:Où dormir]]
[[pt:Onde dormir]]
[[zh:住宿]]</text>
      <sha1>4wrj1nodp8k8kj47dn1eisgkl5qp1av</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>50443</id>
      <parentid>49590</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-03-27T18:28:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tawax</username>
        <id>2655</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4375">'''Finding accomodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most [[hitchhikers]] don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

== Tent ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[camping]] article.''

You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, [[camping]] wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the [[Netherlands]] camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

== Airports ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[airport]] article.''

== Your driver ==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

== Hospitality exchange networks ==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 2,500,000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 640,000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4700+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travlers and travelers for peace...

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

== Hostels ==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see wether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]
[[fr:Où dormir]]
[[pt:Onde dormir]]
[[zh:住宿]]</text>
      <sha1>cf97slfhloghjuwc8x0rrgm1b92qie5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>50450</id>
      <parentid>50443</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-03-27T19:12:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4378">'''Finding accommodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most [[hitchhikers]] don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

== Tent ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[camping]] article.''

You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, [[camping]] wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the [[Netherlands]] camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

== Airports ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[airport]] article.''

== Your driver ==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

== Hospitality exchange networks ==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 2,500,000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 640,000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4700+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travelers and travelers for peace...

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

== Hostels ==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see whether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]
[[fr:Où dormir]]
[[pt:Onde dormir]]
[[zh:住宿]]</text>
      <sha1>dgf1u4r8f9lub0f713z1c7lwm1ak92m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>53619</id>
      <parentid>50450</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-07-23T21:31:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tawax</username>
        <id>2655</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4702">'''Finding accommodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most [[hitchhikers]] don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

== Tent ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[camping]] article.''

You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, [[camping]] wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the [[Netherlands]] camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

== Airports ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[airport]] article.''

== Your driver ==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

== Asking people ==
If you ask people on the street, it may happens that they will help you or invite you to sleep at their place. You may also consider the possibility to "hitchhike a couch": just make a [[Signs|sign]] with something like "Couchsurfing?" on it, and wait in a place where are many people. It may works. :)

== Hospitality exchange networks ==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 2,500,000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 640,000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4700+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travelers and travelers for peace...

''See also [[Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

== Hostels ==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see whether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]
[[fr:Où dormir]]
[[pt:Onde dormir]]
[[zh:住宿]]</text>
      <sha1>jpnbbb56q9dfhdip3n9vokrp5ijwrnu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>55780</id>
      <parentid>53619</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-08T01:12:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4736">'''Finding accommodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most [[hitchhikers]] don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

== Tent ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[camping]] article.''

You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, [[camping]] wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the [[Netherlands]] camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around).

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

== Airports ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[airport]] article.''

== Your driver ==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

== Asking people ==
If you ask people on the street, it may happens that they will help you or invite you to sleep at their place. You may also consider the possibility to "hitchhike a couch": just make a [[Signs|sign]] with something like "Couchsurfing?" on it, and wait in a place where are many people. It may works. :)

== Hospitality exchange networks ==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 2,500,000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 640,000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4700+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travelers and travelers for peace...

''See also [[Hitchhiking news and news archive|Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

== Hostels ==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see whether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]
[[fr:Où dormir]]
[[pt:Onde dormir]]
[[zh:住宿]]</text>
      <sha1>ah16qsr2ubwk5i9u28ikuvp4rf9jp1a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>60700</id>
      <parentid>55780</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-04-22T14:56:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Podz</username>
        <id>3951</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4860">'''Finding accommodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most [[hitchhikers]] don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

== Tent ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[camping]] article.''

You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, [[camping]] wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the [[Netherlands]] camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around). Or find a park or forest near the city you're in. When choosing a park, pick a spot that is covered enough not to be seen. 

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

== Airports ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[airport]] article.''

== Your driver ==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

== Asking people ==
If you ask people on the street, it may happens that they will help you or invite you to sleep at their place. You may also consider the possibility to "hitchhike a couch": just make a [[Signs|sign]] with something like "Couchsurfing?" on it, and wait in a place where are many people. It may works. :)

== Hospitality exchange networks ==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 2,500,000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 640,000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4700+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travelers and travelers for peace...

''See also [[Hitchhiking news and news archive|Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

== Hostels ==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see whether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]
[[fr:Où dormir]]
[[pt:Onde dormir]]
[[zh:住宿]]</text>
      <sha1>40aezeaf5wq9ndihc6u0ikbigqqvadc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>62681</id>
      <parentid>60700</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-07-29T19:55:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Amines</username>
        <id>2877</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4859">'''Finding accommodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most [[hitchhikers]] don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

== Tent ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[camping]] article.''

You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, [[camping]] wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the [[Netherlands]] camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around). Or find a park or forest near the city you're in. When choosing a park, pick a spot that is covered enough not to be seen. 

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

== Airports ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[airport]] article.''

== Your driver ==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

== Asking people ==
If you ask people on the street, it may happens that they will help you or invite you to sleep at their place. You may also consider the possibility to "hitchhike a couch": just make a [[Signs|sign]] with something like "Couchsurfing?" on it, and wait in a place where are many people. It may work. :)

== Hospitality exchange networks ==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 2,500,000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 640,000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4700+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travelers and travelers for peace...

''See also [[Hitchhiking news and news archive|Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

== Hostels ==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see whether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]
[[fr:Où dormir]]
[[pt:Onde dormir]]
[[zh:住宿]]</text>
      <sha1>qr2ed8d1zz9gblengl8bcdgmhtaq7b4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68381</id>
      <parentid>62681</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-02-26T13:33:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Moriegres</username>
        <id>9534</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5398">'''Finding accommodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most [[hitchhikers]] don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

== Tent ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[camping]] article.''

You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, [[camping]] wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the [[Netherlands]] camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around). Or find a park or forest near the city you're in. When choosing a park, pick a spot that is covered enough not to be seen. 

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

== Airports ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[airport]] article.''

== Your driver ==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

== Asking people ==
If you ask people on the street, it may happens that they will help you or invite you to sleep at their place. You may also consider the possibility to "hitchhike a couch": just make a [[Signs|sign]] with something like "Couchsurfing?" on it, and wait in a place where are many people. It may work. :)

== Hospitality exchange networks ==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 2,500,000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 640,000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4700+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travelers and travelers for peace...

''See also [[Hitchhiking news and news archive|Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

== Hostels ==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see whether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.

Hostels can vary quite a bit by country/region. Many/most in places like Russia and other former Soviet countries are nothing more than converted apartments with few amenities and no regular staff on site. Also, in Western Europe and the US the cost of a private room if traveling solo is often the same or more than a room at a hotel. One should consult tripadviser for reviews and look for hostel chains preferably such as Friends hostels in St.Petersburg[http://en.friendsplace.ru/] or PS hotels in Moscow [http://www.ps-hostels.com/]

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]
[[fr:Où dormir]]
[[pt:Onde dormir]]
[[zh:住宿]]</text>
      <sha1>j2oru9qieiom8v1xihbwqi2sfdc15ab</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68387</id>
      <parentid>68381</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-02-26T20:49:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4859">'''Finding accommodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most [[hitchhikers]] don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

== Tent ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[camping]] article.''

You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, [[camping]] wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the [[Netherlands]] camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around). Or find a park or forest near the city you're in. When choosing a park, pick a spot that is covered enough not to be seen. 

DigiHitch has an [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article] on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

== Airports ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[airport]] article.''

== Your driver ==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

== Asking people ==
If you ask people on the street, it may happens that they will help you or invite you to sleep at their place. You may also consider the possibility to "hitchhike a couch": just make a [[Signs|sign]] with something like "Couchsurfing?" on it, and wait in a place where are many people. It may work. :)

== Hospitality exchange networks ==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 2,500,000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 640,000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4700+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travelers and travelers for peace...

''See also [[Hitchhiking news and news archive|Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

== Hostels ==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see whether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]
[[fr:Où dormir]]
[[pt:Onde dormir]]
[[zh:住宿]]</text>
      <sha1>qr2ed8d1zz9gblengl8bcdgmhtaq7b4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72362</id>
      <parentid>68387</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-12T20:18:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4875">'''Finding accommodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most [[hitchhikers]] don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

== Tent ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[camping]] article.''

You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, [[camping]] wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the [[Netherlands]] camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around). Or find a park or forest near the city you're in. When choosing a park, pick a spot that is covered enough not to be seen. 

DigiHitch had an article &lt;!-- [http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html article]--&gt; on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

== Airports ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[airport]] article.''

== Your driver ==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

== Asking people ==
If you ask people on the street, it may happens that they will help you or invite you to sleep at their place. You may also consider the possibility to "hitchhike a couch": just make a [[Signs|sign]] with something like "Couchsurfing?" on it, and wait in a place where are many people. It may work. :)

== Hospitality exchange networks ==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 2,500,000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 640,000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4700+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travelers and travelers for peace...

''See also [[Hitchhiking news and news archive|Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

== Hostels ==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see whether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]
[[fr:Où dormir]]
[[pt:Onde dormir]]
[[zh:住宿]]</text>
      <sha1>f1kezhokejqxjx1aqmcymreqyed0v0m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72363</id>
      <parentid>72362</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-12T20:19:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4944">'''Finding accommodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most [[hitchhikers]] don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

== Tent ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[camping]] article.''

You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, [[camping]] wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the [[Netherlands]] camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around). Or find a park or forest near the city you're in. When choosing a park, pick a spot that is covered enough not to be seen. 

DigiHitch had an article (still accessible through [http://web.archive.org/web/20081011051359/http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html wayback machine]) on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

== Airports ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[airport]] article.''

== Your driver ==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

== Asking people ==
If you ask people on the street, it may happens that they will help you or invite you to sleep at their place. You may also consider the possibility to "hitchhike a couch": just make a [[Signs|sign]] with something like "Couchsurfing?" on it, and wait in a place where are many people. It may work. :)

== Hospitality exchange networks ==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 2,500,000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 640,000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4700+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travelers and travelers for peace...

''See also [[Hitchhiking news and news archive|Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

== Hostels ==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see whether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]
[[fr:Où dormir]]
[[pt:Onde dormir]]
[[zh:住宿]]</text>
      <sha1>btoxkc44pazpjfbh9y5tpwucp1s0wk7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>85244</id>
      <parentid>72363</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-01-14T10:34:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Jans</username>
        <id>16828</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4987">'''Finding accommodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most [[hitchhikers]] don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

== Tent ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[camping]] article.''

You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, [[camping]] wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the [[Netherlands]] camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around). Or find a park or forest near the city you're in. When choosing a park, pick a spot that is covered enough not to be seen. 

DigiHitch had an article (still accessible through [http://web.archive.org/web/20081011051359/http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html wayback machine]) on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

== Airports ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[airport]] article.''

== Your driver ==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

== Asking people ==
If you ask people on the street, it may happens that they will help you or invite you to sleep at their place. You may also consider the possibility to "hitchhike a couch": just make a [[Signs|sign]] with something like "Couchsurfing?" on it, and wait in a place where are many people. It may work. :)

== Hospitality exchange networks ==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [https://www.trustroots.org/ Tustroots] 
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 2,500,000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 640,000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4700+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travelers and travelers for peace...

''See also [[Hitchhiking news and news archive|Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

== Hostels ==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see whether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]
[[fr:Où dormir]]
[[pt:Onde dormir]]
[[zh:住宿]]</text>
      <sha1>moind90zv2gpry76q5q5p2tl37k65nx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>85245</id>
      <parentid>85244</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-01-14T10:35:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Jans</username>
        <id>16828</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4988">'''Finding accommodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most [[hitchhikers]] don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

== Tent ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[camping]] article.''

You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, [[camping]] wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the [[Netherlands]] camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around). Or find a park or forest near the city you're in. When choosing a park, pick a spot that is covered enough not to be seen. 

DigiHitch had an article (still accessible through [http://web.archive.org/web/20081011051359/http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html wayback machine]) on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

== Airports ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[airport]] article.''

== Your driver ==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

== Asking people ==
If you ask people on the street, it may happens that they will help you or invite you to sleep at their place. You may also consider the possibility to "hitchhike a couch": just make a [[Signs|sign]] with something like "Couchsurfing?" on it, and wait in a place where are many people. It may work. :)

== Hospitality exchange networks ==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [https://www.trustroots.org/ Trustroots] 
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 2,500,000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 640,000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4700+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travelers and travelers for peace...

''See also [[Hitchhiking news and news archive|Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

== Hostels ==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see whether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]
[[fr:Où dormir]]
[[pt:Onde dormir]]
[[zh:住宿]]</text>
      <sha1>9yrw4dkuq2ms4g3dgpfvr9g5aq0isqu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>87858</id>
      <parentid>85245</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-05-06T20:55:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fractal</username>
        <id>28006</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5004">'''Finding accommodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most [[hitchhikers]] don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

== Tent ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[camping]] article.''

You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, [[camping]] wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the [[Netherlands]] camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around). Or find a park or forest near the city you're in. When choosing a park, pick a spot that is covered enough not to be seen. 

DigiHitch had an article (still accessible through [http://web.archive.org/web/20081011051359/http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html wayback machine]) on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

== Airports ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[airport]] article.''

== Your driver ==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

== Asking people ==
If you ask people on the street, it may happens that they will help you or invite you to sleep at their place. You may also consider the possibility to "hitchhike a couch": just make a [[Signs|sign]] with something like "Couchsurfing?" on it, and wait in a place where are many people. It may work. :)

== Hospitality exchange networks ==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [https://www.trustroots.org/ Trustroots], invitation only
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 2,500,000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 640,000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4700+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travelers and travelers for peace...

''See also [[Hitchhiking news and news archive|Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

== Hostels ==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see whether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]
[[fr:Où dormir]]
[[pt:Onde dormir]]
[[zh:住宿]]</text>
      <sha1>k67u5q59k4n1gai74li416x3yculion</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>92887</id>
      <parentid>87858</parentid>
      <timestamp>2019-04-21T14:02:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MarD</username>
        <id>32237</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5077">'''Finding accommodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most [[hitchhikers]] don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

== Tent ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[camping]] article.''

You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, [[camping]] wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the [[Netherlands]] camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around). Or find a park or forest near the city you're in. When choosing a park, pick a spot that is covered enough not to be seen. 

DigiHitch had an article (still accessible through [http://web.archive.org/web/20081011051359/http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html wayback machine]) on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

== Airports ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[airport]] article.''

== Your driver ==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

== Asking people ==
If you ask people on the street, it may happens that they will help you or invite you to sleep at their place. You may also consider the possibility to "hitchhike a couch": just make a [[Signs|sign]] with something like "Couchsurfing?" on it, and wait in a place where are many people. It may work. :)

== Hospitality exchange networks ==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [https://www.trustroots.org/ Trustroots], invitation only
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 2,500,000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 640,000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4700+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travelers and travelers for peace...

''See also [[Hitchhiking news and news archive|Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

== Hostels ==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see whether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.

=Also=
House(s) for everyone[http://hitchwiki.org/en/House_for_everyone]
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]
[[fr:Où dormir]]
[[pt:Onde dormir]]
[[zh:住宿]]</text>
      <sha1>ivkkn2eefzy1m59l44ggcdv5mgrz5wb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>92889</id>
      <parentid>92887</parentid>
      <timestamp>2019-04-21T14:22:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MarD</username>
        <id>32237</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5078">'''Finding accommodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most [[hitchhikers]] don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

== Tent ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[camping]] article.''

You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, [[camping]] wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the [[Netherlands]] camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around). Or find a park or forest near the city you're in. When choosing a park, pick a spot that is covered enough not to be seen. 

DigiHitch had an article (still accessible through [http://web.archive.org/web/20081011051359/http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html wayback machine]) on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

== Airports ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[airport]] article.''

== Your driver ==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

== Asking people ==
If you ask people on the street, it may happens that they will help you or invite you to sleep at their place. You may also consider the possibility to "hitchhike a couch": just make a [[Signs|sign]] with something like "Couchsurfing?" on it, and wait in a place where are many people. It may work. :)

== Hospitality exchange networks ==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [https://www.trustroots.org/ Trustroots], invitation only
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 2,500,000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 640,000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4700+ members
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).

* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travelers and travelers for peace...

''See also [[Hitchhiking news and news archive|Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

== Hostels ==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see whether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.

=Also=
[http://hitchwiki.org/en/House_for_everyone House(s) for everyone]
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]
[[fr:Où dormir]]
[[pt:Onde dormir]]
[[zh:住宿]]</text>
      <sha1>londr8ch9t4851248ifilb8c3r2q4xd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>102766</id>
      <parentid>92889</parentid>
      <timestamp>2022-02-26T12:45:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Conductor</username>
        <id>47127</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Hospitality exchange networks */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5119">'''Finding accommodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most [[hitchhikers]] don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

== Tent ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[camping]] article.''

You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, [[camping]] wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the [[Netherlands]] camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around). Or find a park or forest near the city you're in. When choosing a park, pick a spot that is covered enough not to be seen. 

DigiHitch had an article (still accessible through [http://web.archive.org/web/20081011051359/http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html wayback machine]) on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

== Airports ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[airport]] article.''

== Your driver ==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

== Asking people ==
If you ask people on the street, it may happens that they will help you or invite you to sleep at their place. You may also consider the possibility to "hitchhike a couch": just make a [[Signs|sign]] with something like "Couchsurfing?" on it, and wait in a place where are many people. It may work. :)

== Hospitality exchange networks ==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [https://www.trustroots.org/ Trustroots]
* [https://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4700+ members
* [[:couchers:|Couchers.org]]

Not very relevant anymore:
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 2,500,000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 640,000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travelers and travelers for peace...

''See also [[Hitchhiking news and news archive|Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

== Hostels ==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see whether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.

=Also=
[http://hitchwiki.org/en/House_for_everyone House(s) for everyone]
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]
[[fr:Où dormir]]
[[pt:Onde dormir]]
[[zh:住宿]]</text>
      <sha1>ocklmznz32f763q9ug3eoi5hcavopha</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104504</id>
      <parentid>102766</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-06-29T00:17:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Magpie</username>
        <id>47370</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>Add link to Pasporta Servo</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5304">'''Finding accommodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most [[hitchhikers]] don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

== Tent ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[camping]] article.''

You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, [[camping]] wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the [[Netherlands]] camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around). Or find a park or forest near the city you're in. When choosing a park, pick a spot that is covered enough not to be seen. 

DigiHitch had an article (still accessible through [http://web.archive.org/web/20081011051359/http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html wayback machine]) on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

== Airports ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[airport]] article.''

== Your driver ==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

== Asking people ==
If you ask people on the street, it may happens that they will help you or invite you to sleep at their place. You may also consider the possibility to "hitchhike a couch": just make a [[Signs|sign]] with something like "Couchsurfing?" on it, and wait in a place where are many people. It may work. :)

== Hospitality exchange networks ==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [https://www.trustroots.org/ Trustroots]
* [https://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4700+ members
* [[:couchers:|Couchers.org]]

If you happen to speak [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Esperanto Esperanto] there is also [https://www.pasportaservo.org/ Pasporta Servo][https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pasporta_Servo].

Not very relevant anymore:
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 2,500,000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 640,000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travelers and travelers for peace...

''See also [[Hitchhiking news and news archive|Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

== Hostels ==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see whether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.

=Also=
[http://hitchwiki.org/en/House_for_everyone House(s) for everyone]
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]
[[fr:Où dormir]]
[[pt:Onde dormir]]
[[zh:住宿]]</text>
      <sha1>fquxo385e0jzgnyd82rdq6x4ezaxcoa</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>107371</id>
      <parentid>104504</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-11-23T19:50:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robyt</username>
        <id>9747</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>Added {{geo-missing}}</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5321">'''Finding accommodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most [[hitchhikers]] don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options:

== Tent ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[camping]] article.''

You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, [[camping]] wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the [[Netherlands]] camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around). Or find a park or forest near the city you're in. When choosing a park, pick a spot that is covered enough not to be seen. 

DigiHitch had an article (still accessible through [http://web.archive.org/web/20081011051359/http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html wayback machine]) on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

== Airports ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[airport]] article.''

== Your driver ==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

== Asking people ==
If you ask people on the street, it may happens that they will help you or invite you to sleep at their place. You may also consider the possibility to "hitchhike a couch": just make a [[Signs|sign]] with something like "Couchsurfing?" on it, and wait in a place where are many people. It may work. :)

== Hospitality exchange networks ==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [https://www.trustroots.org/ Trustroots]
* [https://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4700+ members
* [[:couchers:|Couchers.org]]

If you happen to speak [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Esperanto Esperanto] there is also [https://www.pasportaservo.org/ Pasporta Servo][https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pasporta_Servo].

Not very relevant anymore:
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 2,500,000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 640,000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travelers and travelers for peace...

''See also [[Hitchhiking news and news archive|Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

== Hostels ==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see whether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.

=Also=
[http://hitchwiki.org/en/House_for_everyone House(s) for everyone]
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]
[[fr:Où dormir]]
[[pt:Onde dormir]]
[[zh:住宿]]

{{geo-missing}}</text>
      <sha1>t7jv6gi1id7s2t9494lo6hs38f1x5h3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>111630</id>
      <parentid>107371</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-08-22T09:05:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5321">'''Finding accommodation''' is usually easy if you don't mind spending a lot of money. But most [[hitchhikers]] don't have a lot of money, so then there are several other options.

== Tent ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[camping]] article.''

You can bring your tent and sleeping bag and you'll basically be free to sleep anywhere. Beware that in most countries it's not legal to put up your tent anywhere. It is generally legal in [[Scandinavia]], [[Finland]], [[Scotland]] and [[Ireland]], though. Legal or not, [[camping]] wild needs not to disturb other people. Putting up your tent in a discrete place at or after dusk, breaking up before people will notice and not letting garbage or fire places behind there are general recommendations to stay overnight in situations where camping wild is not officially allowed. 

Alternatively, go to a house with a garden and ask if you can camp there.

Quite often there are attractive spots for camping wild near motorway petrol stations. If the noise is disturbing you can take ear plugs along. Even in highly urbanised countries like the [[Netherlands]] camping wild is still possible; for example if you hitchhike out of [[Amsterdam]] in the evening you can go just to service area Haarrijn, situated along the A2 motorway between [[Amsterdam]] and [[Utrecht]]. The area is vast and putting up a tent at dusk at the other end of the area will not draw attention, while the spot is scenic (and very "Dutch" with fields, cows and water around). Or find a park or forest near the city you're in. When choosing a park, pick a spot that is covered enough not to be seen. 

DigiHitch had an article (still accessible through [http://web.archive.org/web/20081011051359/http://www.digihitch.com/article42.html wayback machine]) on sleeping near the highway (not necessarily with a tent).

== Airports ==
:''For more information on this, check out the [[airport]] article.''

== Your driver ==
It can happen that your driver offers you a place at his or her house to put up your tent. It can also happen that you get a place offered inside.

That is why it is so important to create good relation with your driver - more open, honest and respectful you are, more likely it will happen.

For example [[User:Mirto|Mirto]] is getting sometimes even few invitations during one trip. If you refuse and prefer to continue your way, it might be a good idea to note phone number of your kind driver, in case you will get stuck 10 km further.

== Asking people ==
If you ask people on the street, it may happens that they will help you or invite you to sleep at their place. You may also consider the possibility to "hitchhike a couch": just make a [[Signs|sign]] with something like "Couchsurfing?" on it, and wait in a place where are many people. It may work. :)

== Hospitality exchange networks ==
Hospitality exchange networks require a bit more planning, but are '''very''' valuable tools for traveling. Sometimes there are [http://couchsurfing.com/meetings.html meetings] and [http://secure.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=42 gatherings] of tens, or even hundreds of hospitality exchange members. If you go there you'll surely get a place to sleep!

* [https://www.trustroots.org/ Trustroots]
* [https://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] an open alternative to HC and CS, 4700+ members
* [[:couchers:|Couchers.org]]

If you happen to speak [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Esperanto Esperanto] there is also [https://www.pasportaservo.org/ Pasporta Servo][https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pasporta_Servo].

Not very relevant anymore:
* [http://globalfreeloaders.com Global Freeloaders] doesn't have a fancy website, but it's easy to send out a lot of messages at once, and members contact you directly over email, which makes it a lot faster to use, probably convenient for finding last-minute places. Though the lack of handy profiles and the direct communication over email definitely make this site definitely ''less secure'' (''don't'' use it in Lima).
* [http://couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] (CS), 2,500,000+ members, managed in an oligarchic way, slightly North American-centric but growing rapidly.
* [http://hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] (HC), 640,000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, slightly Euro-centric because it was started there.
* [http://hospitalityguide.net HospitalityGuide] Hosp.Ex Ne&gt;&gt;t - Hospitality Exchange Networks Overview
* [http://www.rahhala.net/ Rahhala.net] (Rahhala), 1000+ members, managed in a dictatorial way, Arab travelers and travelers for peace...

''See also [[Hitchhiking news and news archive|Current hitchhiking events]] for times and places where you can find free or very cheap accommodation and friendly people.''

== Hostels ==
Depending on where you are, hostels can be very cheap. The best way to find the cheapest hostel in town and to see whether they have any free beds, is probably [http://www.hostelworld.com/ hostelworld]. You can actually book your beds very short time in advance (1 hour works fine) with no extra fee.

It is sometimes possible to work for few hours in exchange of a bed.

=Also=
[http://hitchwiki.org/en/House_for_everyone House(s) for everyone]
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Übernachten]]
[[fr:Où dormir]]
[[pt:Onde dormir]]
[[zh:住宿]]

{{geo-missing}}</text>
      <sha1>kxd2d2yloq0l40envczf02tugbhk5b7</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Where to hitchhike</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1508</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1521</id>
      <parentid>4242</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-12T22:50:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>LetheSoda</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2113">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road. Asking locals about good places, such as from your driver before she drops you off, might be a good idea as well, as locals often have an idea about good hitchhiking spots - though sometimes the advice is bad, so use your own judgement - it's your call.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

==Bus stop==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

===Pros===
* It is a safe place to stand
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop

===Cons===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus

==Gas stations==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

===Pros===
* Safe place
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
*:Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly
* Possibly warm

===Cons===
* You miss the cars passing the station.

==On ramps==
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, onramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee.

==Outside of town==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

==Anywhere cars can pull over safely==
* huge parking spaces

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>ou6fu68hmyaqcqcwch3bi5yt61g345m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1522</id>
      <parentid>1521</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2113">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road. Asking locals about good places, such as from your driver before she drops you off, might be a good idea as well, as locals often have an idea about good hitchhiking spots - though sometimes the advice is bad, so use your own judgement - it's your call.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

==Bus stop==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

===Pros===
* It is a safe place to stand
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop

===Cons===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus

==Gas stations==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

===Pros===
* Safe place
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
*:Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly
* Possibly warm

===Cons===
* You miss the cars passing the station.

==On ramps==
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, onramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee.

==Outside of town==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

==Anywhere cars can pull over safely==
* huge parking spaces

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>ou6fu68hmyaqcqcwch3bi5yt61g345m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4235</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-17T12:44:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GuakaTest</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1782">A good hitchhiking spot makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places from the internet (try [[digihitch.com]], [[Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers]] or search this guide by names of towns and cities), before heading to the road. Asking about good places from your driver (before he/she drops you off) might be a good idea as well, as locals often have an idea about good hitchhiking spots (though sometimes the advice is bad, so use your own judgement - it's your call).
Location, location, location.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

Feel free to improve the page by editing.

=Bus stop=
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

==Pros==
* It is a safe place to stand
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop

==Cons==
* The drivers might thinkg you are waiting for a bus

=Gas stations=
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

==Pros==
* Safe place
* You can ask for a ride from drivers
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly

==Cons==
* You miss the cars passing the station

==On ramps==
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the no pedestrain sign.

==Outside of town==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

==Anywhere cars can pull over safely==</text>
      <sha1>al14r5lswtwsv20pqm0ieyfvdva4163</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4236</id>
      <parentid>4235</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-24T10:32:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1918">A good hitchhiking spot makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road. Asking locals about good places, such as from your driver before she drops you off, might be a good idea as well, as locals often have an idea about good hitchhiking spots - though sometimes the advice is bad, so use your own judgement - it's your call.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

==Bus stop==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

===Pros===
* It is a safe place to stand
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop

===Cons===
* The drivers might thinkg you are waiting for a bus

==Gas stations==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

===Pros===
* Safe place
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
*:Ask friendly, and always say thanks and such, even if they are going the right direction and don't want to take you. If you get annoyed by this, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly
* Possibly warm

===Cons===
* You miss the cars passing the station.

==On ramps==
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrain'' sign.

==Outside of town==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

==Anywhere cars can pull over safely==
* huge parking spaces</text>
      <sha1>f1so9xb0om61cdagmyycxpxl94rdjod</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4237</id>
      <parentid>4236</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-02-17T14:12:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Avodrok</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1917">A good hitchhiking spot makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road. Asking locals about good places, such as from your driver before she drops you off, might be a good idea as well, as locals often have an idea about good hitchhiking spots - though sometimes the advice is bad, so use your own judgement - it's your call.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

==Bus stop==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

===Pros===
* It is a safe place to stand
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop

===Cons===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus

==Gas stations==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

===Pros===
* Safe place
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
*:Ask friendly, and always say thanks and such, even if they are going the right direction and don't want to take you. If you get annoyed by this, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly
* Possibly warm

===Cons===
* You miss the cars passing the station.

==On ramps==
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrain'' sign.

==Outside of town==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

==Anywhere cars can pull over safely==
* huge parking spaces</text>
      <sha1>m7071tjlrirlfbbg1ndaexqm1yurpw1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4238</id>
      <parentid>4237</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-03-13T22:41:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>80.128.126.26</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1917">A good hitchhiking spot makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road. Asking locals about good places, such as from your driver before she drops you off, might be a good idea as well, as locals often have an idea about good hitchhiking spots - though sometimes the advice is bad, so use your own judgement - it's your call.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

==Bus stop==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

===Pros===
* It is a safe place to stand
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop

===Cons===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus

==Gas stations==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

===Pros===
* Safe place
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
*:Ask friendly, and always say thanks and such, even if they are going the right direction and don't want to take you. If you get annoyed by this, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly
* Possibly warm

===Cons===
* You miss the cars passing the station.

==On ramps==
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrian'' sign.

==Outside of town==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

==Anywhere cars can pull over safely==
* huge parking spaces</text>
      <sha1>23fzpxi83cl97joixajp5jobngale5a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4239</id>
      <parentid>4238</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-04-25T04:48:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>134.7.248.137</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1940">A good hitchhiking spot makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road. Asking locals about good places, such as from your driver before she drops you off, might be a good idea as well, as locals often have an idea about good hitchhiking spots - though sometimes the advice is bad, so use your own judgement - it's your call.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

==Bus stop==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

===Pros===
* It is a safe place to stand
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop

===Cons===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus

==Gas stations==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

===Pros===
* Safe place
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
*:Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly
* Possibly warm

===Cons===
* You miss the cars passing the station.

==On ramps==
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrian'' sign.

==Outside of town==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

==Anywhere cars can pull over safely==
* huge parking spaces</text>
      <sha1>qjm9amf7k87sn9s2yrgwsgg5oo7yt36</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4240</id>
      <parentid>4239</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-04-25T04:51:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>134.7.248.137</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1941">A good hitchhiking spot makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road. Asking locals about good places, such as from your driver before she drops you off, might be a good idea as well, as locals often have an idea about good hitchhiking spots - though sometimes the advice is bad, so use your own judgement - it's your call.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

==Bus stop==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

===Pros===
* It is a safe place to stand
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop

===Cons===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus

==Gas stations==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

===Pros===
* Safe place
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
*:Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly
* Possibly warm

===Cons===
* You miss the cars passing the station.

==On ramps==
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

==Outside of town==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

==Anywhere cars can pull over safely==
* huge parking spaces</text>
      <sha1>civrdeymj3mdmkun100teog9i5cs8ze</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4241</id>
      <parentid>4240</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-05T00:11:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1968">A good hitchhiking spot makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road. Asking locals about good places, such as from your driver before she drops you off, might be a good idea as well, as locals often have an idea about good hitchhiking spots - though sometimes the advice is bad, so use your own judgement - it's your call.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

==Bus stop==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

===Pros===
* It is a safe place to stand
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop

===Cons===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus

==Gas stations==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

===Pros===
* Safe place
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
*:Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly
* Possibly warm

===Cons===
* You miss the cars passing the station.

==On ramps==
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

==Outside of town==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

==Anywhere cars can pull over safely==
* huge parking spaces

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>ew3ziog19mnc7ntpsh843rc72fqynfr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4242</id>
      <parentid>4241</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-12T22:19:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1974">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road. Asking locals about good places, such as from your driver before she drops you off, might be a good idea as well, as locals often have an idea about good hitchhiking spots - though sometimes the advice is bad, so use your own judgement - it's your call.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

==Bus stop==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

===Pros===
* It is a safe place to stand
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop

===Cons===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus

==Gas stations==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

===Pros===
* Safe place
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
*:Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly
* Possibly warm

===Cons===
* You miss the cars passing the station.

==On ramps==
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

==Outside of town==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

==Anywhere cars can pull over safely==
* huge parking spaces

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>t4r18wfjkz79uwuqca3lgom91006225</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4243</id>
      <parentid>1522</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2113">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road. Asking locals about good places, such as from your driver before she drops you off, might be a good idea as well, as locals often have an idea about good hitchhiking spots - though sometimes the advice is bad, so use your own judgement - it's your call.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

==Bus stop==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

===Pros===
* It is a safe place to stand
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop

===Cons===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus

==Gas stations==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

===Pros===
* Safe place
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
*:Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly
* Possibly warm

===Cons===
* You miss the cars passing the station.

==On ramps==
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, onramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee.

==Outside of town==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

==Anywhere cars can pull over safely==
* huge parking spaces

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>ou6fu68hmyaqcqcwch3bi5yt61g345m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11017</id>
      <parentid>4243</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-27T11:27:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>86.211.1.4</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2181">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road. Asking locals about good places, such as from your driver before she drops you off, might be a good idea as well, as locals often have an idea about good hitchhiking spots - though sometimes the advice is bad, so use your own judgement - it's your call.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

==Bus stop==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

===Pros===
* It is a safe place to stand
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop

===Cons===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

==Gas stations==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

===Pros===
* Safe place
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
*:Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly
* Possibly warm

===Cons===
* You miss the cars passing the station.

==On ramps==
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, onramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee.

==Outside of town==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

==Anywhere cars can pull over safely==
* huge parking spaces

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>afycbz46kp2c4vxlnqbu5gx446wj0pp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11018</id>
      <parentid>11017</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-27T11:32:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2234">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road. Asking locals about good places, such as from your driver before she drops you off, might be a good idea as well, as locals often have an idea about good hitchhiking spots - though sometimes the advice is bad, so use your own judgement - it's your call.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

==Bus stop==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

===Pros===
* It is a safe place to stand
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop

===Cons===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

==Gas stations==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

===Pros===
* Safe place
* People who stop there, are likely to go very far.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly
* Possibly warm

===Cons===
* You miss the cars passing the station.

==On ramps==
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, onramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee.

==Outside of town==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

==Anywhere cars can pull over safely==
* huge parking spaces

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>bzmmkxrdo1f0o94mrki4krxi85l1mej</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11856</id>
      <parentid>11018</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-06-22T11:38:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tmoon</username>
        <id>91</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3687">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

==Bus stop==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

===Pros===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

===Cons===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

==Gas stations==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

===Pros===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for travelling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of food, drink and maps.

===Cons===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centres at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

==On ramps==
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, onramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee.

==Outside of town==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

==Anywhere cars can pull over safely==
* huge parking spaces

==Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

==Leaving the vehicle==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when travelling across cities.


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>ialpeyrj1t76ikz050x87olghn7ndka</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12406</id>
      <parentid>11856</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-25T11:31:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3749">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

:''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

==Bus stop==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

===Pros===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

===Cons===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

==Gas stations==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

===Pros===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for travelling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of food, drink and maps.

===Cons===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centres at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

==On ramps==
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, onramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee.

==Outside of town==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

==Anywhere cars can pull over safely==
* huge parking spaces

==Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

==Leaving the vehicle==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when travelling across cities.


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>0ahe5xga9l2cvl1lnx5vtxrwrfvdf4p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12682</id>
      <parentid>12406</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-10T15:57:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3789">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

:''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

==Bus stop==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

===Pros===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

===Cons===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

==Gas stations==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

===Pros===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for travelling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of food, drink and maps.

===Cons===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centres at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

==On ramps==
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, onramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee.

==Outside of town==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

==Anywhere cars can pull over safely==
* huge parking spaces

==Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

==Leaving the vehicle==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when travelling across cities.


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>ji1qw1gg9ql7tnq1njx7z9ksj7lebhp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12683</id>
      <parentid>12682</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-10T15:58:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3798">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

:''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

==Bus stop==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

===Pros===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

===Cons===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

==Gas stations==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

===Pros===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for travelling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of food, drink, maps and toilets.

===Cons===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centres at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

==On ramps==
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, onramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee.

==Outside of town==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

==Anywhere cars can pull over safely==
* huge parking spaces

==Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

==Leaving the vehicle==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when travelling across cities.


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>elk4hlrxxsdyx6zq4xtf1hu3laloupa</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13665</id>
      <parentid>12683</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-12T15:39:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3819">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

:''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

==Bus stop==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

===Pros===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

===Cons===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

==Gas stations==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

===Pros===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for travelling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of food, drink, maps and toilets.

===Cons===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centres at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

==On ramps==
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, onramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee.

==Outside of town==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

==Anywhere cars can pull over safely==
* huge parking spaces

==Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

==Leaving the vehicle==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when travelling across cities.


[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampstellen]]</text>
      <sha1>ft8l2cyonwko2849sdmbuq5adw4l8lf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16694</id>
      <parentid>13665</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-26T05:36:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>59.77.21.250</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3832">domtrbasouc4
A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

:''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

==Bus stop==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

===Pros===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

===Cons===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

==Gas stations==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

===Pros===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for travelling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of food, drink, maps and toilets.

===Cons===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centres at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

==On ramps==
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, onramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee.

==Outside of town==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

==Anywhere cars can pull over safely==
* huge parking spaces

==Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

==Leaving the vehicle==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when travelling across cities.


[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampstellen]]</text>
      <sha1>4iics21xh2tc2utskyti0i6vo5sh8c7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16704</id>
      <parentid>16694</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-26T10:51:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3842">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== Gas stations ==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for travelling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of food, drink, maps and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centres at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, onramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee.

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when travelling across cities.


[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampstellen]]</text>
      <sha1>3pikrl2likwowll4g2u7zstyj5wib16</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17790</id>
      <parentid>16704</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-07T18:06:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Daniel</username>
        <id>25</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4903">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== Gas stations ==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for travelling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of food, drink, maps and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centres at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, onramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee.

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops
*In most cases there is a good visibility and many room to pull down
=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]]
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when travelling across cities.


[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampstellen]]</text>
      <sha1>lnzvqaous77mc0b61xtlxo5f1a1rz4i</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17859</id>
      <parentid>17790</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-10T22:18:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Daniel</username>
        <id>25</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4904">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== Gas stations ==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for travelling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of food, drink, maps and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centres at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, onramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee.

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops
*In most cases there is a good visibility and many room to pull down
=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when travelling across cities.


[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampstellen]]</text>
      <sha1>bk9qj7ul5dlk02383nohscfzn8rvfq5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18266</id>
      <parentid>17859</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-29T03:59:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>141.223.149.36</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4915">basouccovi
A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== Gas stations ==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for travelling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of food, drink, maps and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centres at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, onramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee.

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops
*In most cases there is a good visibility and many room to pull down
=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when travelling across cities.


[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampstellen]]</text>
      <sha1>4ssybqk50mga108uwsh9v75ce580j9p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18270</id>
      <parentid>18266</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-29T09:38:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4904">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== Gas stations ==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for travelling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of food, drink, maps and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centres at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, onramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee.

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops
*In most cases there is a good visibility and many room to pull down
=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when travelling across cities.


[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampstellen]]</text>
      <sha1>bk9qj7ul5dlk02383nohscfzn8rvfq5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21624</id>
      <parentid>18270</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-18T22:37:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4930">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== Gas stations ==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for travelling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of food, drink, maps and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centres at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, onramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee.

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops
*In most cases there is a good visibility and many room to pull down
=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces

==[[Traffic lights]==
..

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when travelling across cities.


[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampstellen]]</text>
      <sha1>og248nbc6v78kli33hw0ljqoazxev4j</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21625</id>
      <parentid>21624</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-18T22:37:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4931">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== Gas stations ==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for travelling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of food, drink, maps and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centres at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, onramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee.

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops
*In most cases there is a good visibility and many room to pull down
=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces

==[[Traffic lights]]==
..

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when travelling across cities.


[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampstellen]]</text>
      <sha1>tf97s49kx1zz06j7s4m2sfri11lmwac</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21659</id>
      <parentid>21625</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-18T23:55:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4935">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Gas station]]s ==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for travelling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of food, drink, maps and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centres at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, onramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee.

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops
*In most cases there is a good visibility and many room to pull down
=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces

==[[Traffic lights]]==
..

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when travelling across cities.


[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampstellen]]</text>
      <sha1>1s44kc84cgkzz5i65nzzxzn27z6r2s6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21660</id>
      <parentid>21659</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-18T23:56:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4944">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Gas station]]s ==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for travelling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centres at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, onramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee.

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops
*In most cases there is a good visibility and many room to pull down
=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces

==[[Traffic lights]]==
..

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when travelling across cities.


[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampstellen]]</text>
      <sha1>gj8hpvud8b4wym7yeo3sg60fj5szfoj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21745</id>
      <parentid>21660</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-19T02:17:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4980">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Gas station]]s ==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for travelling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centres at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, onramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee.

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops
*In most cases there is a good visibility and many room to pull down
=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces

==[[Traffic lights]]==
..

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when travelling across cities.


[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampstellen]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]</text>
      <sha1>1s918th7m0cvd17e2zmaw43cmdajgcq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21982</id>
      <parentid>21745</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-22T03:25:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5001">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Gas station]]s ==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for travelling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centres at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, onramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee.

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops
*In most cases there is a good visibility and many room to pull down
=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces

==[[Traffic lights]]==
..

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when travelling across cities.


[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampstellen]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]</text>
      <sha1>41cuhs5ps6ybg7lze5gavicvdeh5v1e</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22124</id>
      <parentid>21982</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-28T22:20:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5002">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Gas station]]s ==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for travelling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centres at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, onramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee.

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops
*In most cases there is a good visibility and many room to pull down
=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces

==[[Traffic lights]]==
..

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when travelling across cities.


[[Category:General info]]

[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]

[[de:Trampstellen]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]</text>
      <sha1>j876y5u7vw0mgi03d6zltxoxbycppcx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22275</id>
      <parentid>22124</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-07T06:40:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>201.166.47.181</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5515">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Gas station]]s ==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for travelling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centres at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, onramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee.

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops
*In most cases there is a good visibility and many room to pull down
=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.

== Pros ==
*Truckers often go long distances
*Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
*Truckers often give you cash or food when they cant offer a ride 

== Cons ==
*Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
*It is against the policy for most trucking companies to have riders because of insurance reasons 

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces

==[[Traffic lights]]==
..

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when travelling across cities.


[[Category:General info]]

[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]

[[de:Trampstellen]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]</text>
      <sha1>2yndraxy4ty8wdc0kd6awhvg1ypgaaa</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22276</id>
      <parentid>22275</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-07T06:41:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>201.166.47.181</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5519">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Gas station]]s ==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for travelling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centres at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, onramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee.

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops
*In most cases there is a good visibility and many room to pull down
=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.

=== Pros ===
*Truckers often go long distances
*Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
*Truckers often give you cash or food when they cant offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
*Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
*It is against the policy for most trucking companies to have riders because of insurance reasons 

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces

==[[Traffic lights]]==
..

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when travelling across cities.


[[Category:General info]]

[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]

[[de:Trampstellen]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]</text>
      <sha1>77i17xpe3peyvzl4wipz3s8phn4ifnv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23065</id>
      <parentid>22276</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-30T18:28:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5518">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Gas station]]s ==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for travelling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centres at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, onramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee.

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops
*In most cases there is a good visibility and many room to pull down
=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.

=== Pros ===
*Truckers often go long distances
*Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
*Truckers often give you cash or food when they cant offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
*Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
*It is against the policy for most trucking companies to have riders because of insurance reasons 

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces

==[[Traffic lights]]==
..

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when travelling across cities.


[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampstellen]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]</text>
      <sha1>tufjodzlfqbxcu6l3n19jotd76myrca</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23522</id>
      <parentid>23065</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-08-13T18:18:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robino</username>
        <id>4</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5638">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Gas station]]s ==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for travelling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centres at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, onramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee.

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops
*In most cases there is a good visibility and many room to pull down
=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.

=== Pros ===
*Truckers often go long distances
*Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
*Truckers often give you cash or food when they cant offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
*Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
*It is against the policy for most trucking companies to have riders because of insurance reasons 

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces

==[[Traffic lights]]==
..

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when travelling across cities.


[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampstellen]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]</text>
      <sha1>c9i9jrly1bdohfrdome43s0bphyiu4b</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24577</id>
      <parentid>23522</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-06T11:51:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5640">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Gas station]]s ==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for travelling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centres at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, onramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee.

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops
*In most cases there is a good visibility and many room to pull down
=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.

=== Pros ===
*Truckers often go long distances
*Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
*Truckers often give you cash or food when they cant offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
*Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
*It is against the policy for most trucking companies to have riders because of insurance reasons 

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces

==[[Traffic lights]]==
..

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when travelling across cities.


[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstellen]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]</text>
      <sha1>69usafosv3skfylkpch8p2jej5ahe97</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26114</id>
      <parentid>24577</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-13T14:19:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5639">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Gas station]]s ==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for travelling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centres at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, onramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee.

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops
*In most cases there is a good visibility and many room to pull down
=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.

=== Pros ===
*Truckers often go long distances
*Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
*Truckers often give you cash or food when they cant offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
*Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
*It is against the policy for most trucking companies to have riders because of insurance reasons 

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces

==[[Traffic lights]]==
..

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when travelling across cities.


[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]</text>
      <sha1>fay381kk3yueum2hzsoq5ygq2ecufng</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27523</id>
      <parentid>26114</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-09T15:17:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Owenvenes</username>
        <id>1661</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5664">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Gas station]]s ==
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for travelling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centres at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

[[Image:Hitchmonk.jpg]]

== On ramps ==
[[Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, onramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee.

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops
*In most cases there is a good visibility and many room to pull down
=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.

=== Pros ===
*Truckers often go long distances
*Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
*Truckers often give you cash or food when they cant offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
*Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
*It is against the policy for most trucking companies to have riders because of insurance reasons 

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces

==[[Traffic lights]]==
..

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when travelling across cities.


[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]</text>
      <sha1>nkqrxfurik56vkjrveqvql14wjjl673</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27524</id>
      <parentid>27523</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-09T15:20:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Owenvenes</username>
        <id>1661</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5741">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Gas station]]s ==
[[Image:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, France.]]
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for travelling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centres at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, onramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee.

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops
*In most cases there is a good visibility and many room to pull down
=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.

=== Pros ===
*Truckers often go long distances
*Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
*Truckers often give you cash or food when they cant offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
*Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
*It is against the policy for most trucking companies to have riders because of insurance reasons 

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces

==[[Traffic lights]]==
..

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when travelling across cities.


[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]</text>
      <sha1>1bom9iwudb6w9vz0hi233rojzey7rws</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27525</id>
      <parentid>27524</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-09T15:22:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Owenvenes</username>
        <id>1661</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5745">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like gas stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Gas station]]s ==
[[Image:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Gas stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for travelling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centres at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, onramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee.

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops
*In most cases there is a good visibility and many room to pull down
=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.

=== Pros ===
*Truckers often go long distances
*Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
*Truckers often give you cash or food when they cant offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
*Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
*It is against the policy for most trucking companies to have riders because of insurance reasons 

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces

==[[Traffic lights]]==
..

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when travelling across cities.


[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]</text>
      <sha1>1ts2arla9rmofr2200yrxdeg9bz07ch</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>28831</id>
      <parentid>27525</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-04T15:42:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5754">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[Image:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee.

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops
*In most cases there is a good visibility and many room to pull down
=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.

=== Pros ===
*Truckers often go long distances
*Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
*Truckers often give you cash or food when they cant offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
*Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
*It is against the policy for most trucking companies to have riders because of insurance reasons 

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces

==[[Traffic lights]]==
..

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when travelling across cities.


[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]</text>
      <sha1>khhfvxv4d9n5ckiktke41k4r6i6rzmo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>28973</id>
      <parentid>28831</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-09T18:27:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>82.10.217.254</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5859">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[Image:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee. However, in the UK on ramps to motorways, like motorways themselves, are illegal sights to thumb a lift.

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops
*In most cases there is a good visibility and many room to pull down
=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.

=== Pros ===
*Truckers often go long distances
*Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
*Truckers often give you cash or food when they cant offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
*Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
*It is against the policy for most trucking companies to have riders because of insurance reasons 

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces

==[[Traffic lights]]==
..

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when travelling across cities.


[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]</text>
      <sha1>lx9gaa94iiqhqt7q2si8eyhbf2zpnyo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29122</id>
      <parentid>28973</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-11T23:25:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Cooking reno</username>
        <id>1700</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6097">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[Image:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee. However, in the UK on ramps to motorways, like motorways themselves, are illegal sights to thumb a lift.

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops
*In most cases there is a good visibility and many room to pull down
=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more tan just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are travelng across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
*Truckers often go long distances
*Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
*Truckers often give you cash or food when they cant offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
*Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
*It is against the policy for most trucking companies to have riders because of insurance reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces

==[[Traffic lights]]==
..

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when travelling across cities.


[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]</text>
      <sha1>2xfh1k607bhnvjjcgh8m8q3dfvcyzy9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29123</id>
      <parentid>29122</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-11T23:28:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Cooking reno</username>
        <id>1700</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6192">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a crossection of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[Image:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee. However, in the UK on ramps to motorways, like motorways themselves, are illegal sights to thumb a lift.

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops
*In most cases there is a good visibility and many room to pull down
=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more tan just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are travelng across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
*Truckers often go long distances
*Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
*Truckers often give you cash or food when they cant offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
*Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
*It is against the policy for most trucking companies to have riders because of insurance reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

==[[Traffic lights]]==
..

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when travelling across cities.


[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]</text>
      <sha1>fa163h67ta2xvuvdm6ak965zkx8w2l8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29124</id>
      <parentid>29123</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-12T00:40:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6240">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[Image:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the ONLY legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In most countries in Europe you can hitch on the sliproad leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway traffic sign.'''

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops
*In most cases there is a good visibility and many room to pull down
=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more tan just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
*Truckers often go long distances
*Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
*Truckers often give you cash or food when they cant offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
*Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
*It is against the policy for most trucking companies to have riders because of insurance reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

==[[Traffic lights]]==
..

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.


[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]</text>
      <sha1>cbe0ckavh5nmg249i37v8atkvjh3czz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29125</id>
      <parentid>29124</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-12T00:46:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6244">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[Image:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In all countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops
*In most cases there is a good visibility and many room to pull down
=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more tan just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
*Truckers often go long distances
*Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
*Truckers often give you cash or food when they cant offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
*Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
*It is against the policy for most trucking companies to have riders because of insurance reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

==[[Traffic lights]]==
..

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.


[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]</text>
      <sha1>8b95q79mw5dpgcwzkswj7ug4gbs10v9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29139</id>
      <parentid>29125</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-12T08:46:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7321">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[Image:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In all countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops
*In most cases there is a good visibility and many room to pull down
=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more tan just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
*Truckers often go long distances
*Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
*Truckers often give you cash or food when they cant offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
*Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
*It is against the policy for most trucking companies to have riders because of insurance reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

==[[Traffic lights]]==
..

==On the road==
..
On the countryside it is basicly possible to hitch rides somewhat everywhere on local, rural roads, especially where traffic speed is lower than about 60 pm. Traffic on minor roads on the countryside can offer great rides to get to the nearest bigger city, or onto the main infrastructure. 

Often on bigger roads the slow, local traffic coming from smaller sideroads may provide excellent rides, and it is quite often quite easy to flag those drivers down, as a very personal and direct approach is often possible. 

Even national roads (non-motorway) often provide good space along the main flow of traffic, as there are often emergency lanes or so called [[Mehrzweckstreifen]]. 

Finally, hitchhiking on emergency lanes of motorways can be an option in case of traffic jams. In such situation using a cardboard sign is usually highly effective. It is necessary though to take maximum safety precautions (we suppose you are smart enough to take these precautions), and you should know that hitchhiking on motorways is basicly forbidden in most countries.

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.


[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]</text>
      <sha1>lb4ib2gio1d9zzbids5nb3xjegiuug7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29140</id>
      <parentid>29139</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-12T08:47:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7320">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[Image:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In all countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops
*In most cases there is a good visibility and many room to pull down
=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more tan just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
*Truckers often go long distances
*Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
*Truckers often give you cash or food when they cant offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
*Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
*It is against the policy for most trucking companies to have riders because of insurance reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

==[[Traffic lights]]==
..

==On the road==

On the countryside it is basicly possible to hitch rides somewhat everywhere on local, rural roads, especially where traffic speed is lower than about 60 kmh. Traffic on minor roads on the countryside can offer great rides to get to the nearest bigger city, or onto the main infrastructure. 

Often on bigger roads the slow, local traffic coming from smaller sideroads may provide excellent rides, and it is quite often quite easy to flag those drivers down, as a very personal and direct approach is often possible. 

Even national roads (non-motorway) often provide good space along the main flow of traffic, as there are often emergency lanes or so called [[Mehrzweckstreifen]]. 

Finally, hitchhiking on emergency lanes of motorways can be an option in case of traffic jams. In such situation using a cardboard sign is usually highly effective. It is necessary though to take maximum safety precautions (we suppose you are smart enough to take these precautions), and you should know that hitchhiking on motorways is basicly forbidden in most countries.

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.


[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]</text>
      <sha1>3vwm4q5h5hr52v0b15j67kas4hpf4r1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29141</id>
      <parentid>29140</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-12T09:12:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>128.214.20.122</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7336">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[Image:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In all countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops
*In most cases there is a good visibility and many room to pull down
=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more tan just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
*Truckers often go long distances
*Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
*Truckers often give you cash or food when they cant offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
*Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
*It is against the policy for trucking companies in certain countries to have riders because of insurance reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

==[[Traffic lights]]==
..

==On the road==

On the countryside it is basicly possible to hitch rides somewhat everywhere on local, rural roads, especially where traffic speed is lower than about 60 kmh. Traffic on minor roads on the countryside can offer great rides to get to the nearest bigger city, or onto the main infrastructure. 

Often on bigger roads the slow, local traffic coming from smaller sideroads may provide excellent rides, and it is quite often quite easy to flag those drivers down, as a very personal and direct approach is often possible. 

Even national roads (non-motorway) often provide good space along the main flow of traffic, as there are often emergency lanes or so called [[Mehrzweckstreifen]]. 

Finally, hitchhiking on emergency lanes of motorways can be an option in case of traffic jams. In such situation using a cardboard sign is usually highly effective. It is necessary though to take maximum safety precautions (we suppose you are smart enough to take these precautions), and you should know that hitchhiking on motorways is basicly forbidden in most countries.

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.


[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]</text>
      <sha1>g4ntb8tk2hm4gm8wlck9icawnzytiwu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29142</id>
      <parentid>29141</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-12T09:42:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.139.190.8</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7359">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[Image:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In all countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops
*In most cases there is a good visibility and many room to pull down
=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more tan just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
*Truckers often go long distances
*Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
*Truckers often give you cash or food when they cant offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
*Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
*It is against the policy for trucking companies in certain countries to have riders because of insurance reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

==[[Traffic lights]]==
..

==On the road==

On the countryside it is basically possible to hitch rides somewhat everywhere on local, rural roads, especially where traffic speed is lower than about 60 km/h. Traffic on minor roads on the countryside can offer great rides to get to the nearest bigger city, or onto the main infrastructure. 

Often on bigger roads the slow, local traffic coming from smaller sideroads may provide excellent rides, and it is quite often quite easy to flag those drivers down, as a very personal and direct approach is often possible. 

Even national roads (non-motorway) often provide good space along the main flow of traffic, as there are often emergency lanes or so called [[Mehrzweckstreifen]]. 

Finally, hitchhiking on emergency lanes of motorways can be an option in case of traffic jams. In such situation using a [[signs|cardboard sign]] is usually highly effective. It is necessary though to take maximum safety precautions (we suppose you are smart enough to take these precautions), and you should know that hitchhiking on motorways is basically forbidden in most Western countries.

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.


[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]</text>
      <sha1>rdaqcfi5a1tkg5xusns2vyfcfql8900</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30941</id>
      <parentid>29142</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-09T16:33:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.80.205.40</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7357">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[Image:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In all countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops.
*In most cases there is a good visibility and room to pull over.

=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more tan just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
*Truckers often go long distances
*Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
*Truckers often give you cash or food when they cant offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
*Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
*It is against the policy for trucking companies in certain countries to have riders because of insurance reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

==[[Traffic lights]]==
..

==On the road==

On the countryside it is basically possible to hitch rides somewhat everywhere on local, rural roads, especially where traffic speed is lower than about 60 km/h. Traffic on minor roads on the countryside can offer great rides to get to the nearest bigger city, or onto the main infrastructure. 

Often on bigger roads the slow, local traffic coming from smaller sideroads may provide excellent rides, and it is quite often quite easy to flag those drivers down, as a very personal and direct approach is often possible. 

Even national roads (non-motorway) often provide good space along the main flow of traffic, as there are often emergency lanes or so called [[Mehrzweckstreifen]]. 

Finally, hitchhiking on emergency lanes of motorways can be an option in case of traffic jams. In such situation using a [[signs|cardboard sign]] is usually highly effective. It is necessary though to take maximum safety precautions (we suppose you are smart enough to take these precautions), and you should know that hitchhiking on motorways is basically forbidden in most Western countries.

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.


[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]</text>
      <sha1>patru5i5habjryin6q2ss6wznivkqo1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30942</id>
      <parentid>30941</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-09T16:35:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.80.205.40</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7359">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[Image:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In all countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops.
*In most cases there is a good visibility and room to pull over.

=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more than just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
*Truckers often go long distances
*Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
*Truckers often give you cash or food when they can't offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
*Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
*It is against the policy for trucking companies in certain countries to have riders because of insurance reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

==[[Traffic lights]]==
..

==On the road==

On the countryside it is basically possible to hitch rides somewhat everywhere on local, rural roads, especially where traffic speed is lower than about 60 km/h. Traffic on minor roads on the countryside can offer great rides to get to the nearest bigger city, or onto the main infrastructure. 

Often on bigger roads the slow, local traffic coming from smaller sideroads may provide excellent rides, and it is quite often quite easy to flag those drivers down, as a very personal and direct approach is often possible. 

Even national roads (non-motorway) often provide good space along the main flow of traffic, as there are often emergency lanes or so called [[Mehrzweckstreifen]]. 

Finally, hitchhiking on emergency lanes of motorways can be an option in case of traffic jams. In such situation using a [[signs|cardboard sign]] is usually highly effective. It is necessary though to take maximum safety precautions (we suppose you are smart enough to take these precautions), and you should know that hitchhiking on motorways is basically forbidden in most Western countries.

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.


[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]</text>
      <sha1>kkclm5hgkpkdjcpd5taw7k0ru88r96g</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30943</id>
      <parentid>30942</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-09T16:38:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.80.205.40</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7308">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[Image:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the furthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In all countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops.
*In most cases there is a good visibility and room to pull over.

=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more than just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
*Truckers often go long distances
*Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
*Truckers often give you cash or food when they can't offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
*Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
*It is against the policy for trucking companies in certain countries to have riders because of insurance reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

==[[Traffic lights]]==
..

==On the road==

The countryside, especially where traffic speed is lower than about 60 km/h, can be a good place for hitching. Traffic on minor roads on the countryside can offer great rides to get to the nearest bigger city, or onto the main infrastructure. 

Often on bigger roads the slow, local traffic coming from smaller sideroads may provide excellent rides, and it is quite often quite easy to flag those drivers down, as a very personal and direct approach is often possible. 

Even national roads (non-motorway) often provide good space along the main flow of traffic, as there are often emergency lanes or so called [[Mehrzweckstreifen]]. 

Finally, hitchhiking on emergency lanes of motorways can be an option in case of traffic jams. In such situation using a [[signs|cardboard sign]] is usually highly effective. It is necessary though to take maximum safety precautions (we suppose you are smart enough to take these precautions), and you should know that hitchhiking on motorways is basically forbidden in most Western countries.

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.


[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]</text>
      <sha1>bs9pb0yxxl2m3vh22r7fxgf2k0307ru</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>33936</id>
      <parentid>30943</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-06-14T19:22:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>76.173.31.85</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7308">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[Image:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the farthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb.  This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In all countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops.
*In most cases there is a good visibility and room to pull over.

=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more than just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
*Truckers often go long distances
*Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
*Truckers often give you cash or food when they can't offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
*Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
*It is against the policy for trucking companies in certain countries to have riders because of insurance reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

==[[Traffic lights]]==
..

==On the road==

The countryside, especially where traffic speed is lower than about 60 km/h, can be a good place for hitching. Traffic on minor roads on the countryside can offer great rides to get to the nearest bigger city, or onto the main infrastructure. 

Often on bigger roads the slow, local traffic coming from smaller sideroads may provide excellent rides, and it is quite often quite easy to flag those drivers down, as a very personal and direct approach is often possible. 

Even national roads (non-motorway) often provide good space along the main flow of traffic, as there are often emergency lanes or so called [[Mehrzweckstreifen]]. 

Finally, hitchhiking on emergency lanes of motorways can be an option in case of traffic jams. In such situation using a [[signs|cardboard sign]] is usually highly effective. It is necessary though to take maximum safety precautions (we suppose you are smart enough to take these precautions), and you should know that hitchhiking on motorways is basically forbidden in most Western countries.

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.


[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]</text>
      <sha1>m5meh6gz7yznvv9bs0f7s651lx28osx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35642</id>
      <parentid>33936</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T19:23:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7308">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[File:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the farthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[File:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb. This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In all countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops.
*In most cases there is a good visibility and room to pull over.

=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more than just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
*Truckers often go long distances
*Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
*Truckers often give you cash or food when they can't offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
*Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
*It is against the policy for trucking companies in certain countries to have riders because of insurance reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

== [[Traffic lights]] ==
..

== On the road ==

The countryside, especially where traffic speed is lower than about 60 km/h, can be a good place for hitching. Traffic on minor roads on the countryside can offer great rides to get to the nearest bigger city, or onto the main infrastructure. 

Often on bigger roads the slow, local traffic coming from smaller sideroads may provide excellent rides, and it is quite often quite easy to flag those drivers down, as a very personal and direct approach is often possible. 

Even national roads (non-motorway) often provide good space along the main flow of traffic, as there are often emergency lanes or so called [[Mehrzweckstreifen]]. 

Finally, hitchhiking on emergency lanes of motorways can be an option in case of traffic jams. In such situation using a [[signs|cardboard sign]] is usually highly effective. It is necessary though to take maximum safety precautions (we suppose you are smart enough to take these precautions), and you should know that hitchhiking on motorways is basically forbidden in most Western countries.

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]</text>
      <sha1>8iij6zdveq4lrruhn85vzv5g5hy5k91</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35810</id>
      <parentid>35642</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-15T14:17:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7312">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[File:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the farthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[File:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb. This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In all countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops.
*In most cases there is a good visibility and room to pull over.

=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more than just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
*Truckers often go long distances
*Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
*Truckers often give you cash or food when they can't offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
*Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
*It is against the policy for trucking companies in certain countries to have riders because of [[insurance]] reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

== [[Traffic lights]] ==
..

== On the road ==

The countryside, especially where traffic speed is lower than about 60 km/h, can be a good place for hitching. Traffic on minor roads on the countryside can offer great rides to get to the nearest bigger city, or onto the main infrastructure. 

Often on bigger roads the slow, local traffic coming from smaller sideroads may provide excellent rides, and it is quite often quite easy to flag those drivers down, as a very personal and direct approach is often possible. 

Even national roads (non-motorway) often provide good space along the main flow of traffic, as there are often emergency lanes or so called [[Mehrzweckstreifen]]. 

Finally, hitchhiking on emergency lanes of motorways can be an option in case of traffic jams. In such situation using a [[signs|cardboard sign]] is usually highly effective. It is necessary though to take maximum safety precautions (we suppose you are smart enough to take these precautions), and you should know that hitchhiking on motorways is basically forbidden in most Western countries.

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]</text>
      <sha1>js6tx37afvtp2omhg90hm51hc7npy9l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35863</id>
      <parentid>35810</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-17T00:02:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7335">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[File:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the farthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[File:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb. This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In all countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops.
*In most cases there is a good visibility and room to pull over.

=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more than just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
*Truckers often go long distances
*Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
*Truckers often give you cash or food when they can't offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
*Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
*It is against the policy for trucking companies in certain countries to have riders because of [[insurance]] reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

== [[Traffic lights]] ==
..

== On the road ==

The countryside, especially where traffic speed is lower than about 60 km/h, can be a good place for hitching. Traffic on minor roads on the countryside can offer great rides to get to the nearest bigger city, or onto the main infrastructure. 

Often on bigger roads the slow, local traffic coming from smaller sideroads may provide excellent rides, and it is quite often quite easy to flag those drivers down, as a very personal and direct approach is often possible. 

Even national roads (non-motorway) often provide good space along the main flow of traffic, as there are often emergency lanes or so called [[Mehrzweckstreifen]]. 

Finally, hitchhiking on emergency lanes of motorways can be an option in case of traffic jams. In such situation using a [[signs|cardboard sign]] is usually highly effective. It is necessary though to take maximum safety precautions (we suppose you are smart enough to take these precautions), and you should know that hitchhiking on motorways is basically forbidden in most Western countries.

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[zh:在哪里搭车]]</text>
      <sha1>a3v4qxtb5y7lyddn0c4rnvlpbz4e4a8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>37115</id>
      <parentid>35863</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-09-09T21:37:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tevolving</username>
        <id>1460</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7348">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[File:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the farthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[File:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb. This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In all countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths / [[Péage]]s==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops.
*In most cases there is a good visibility and room to pull over.

=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more than just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
*Truckers often go long distances
*Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
*Truckers often give you cash or food when they can't offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
*Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
*It is against the policy for trucking companies in certain countries to have riders because of [[insurance]] reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

== [[Traffic lights]] ==
..

== On the road ==

The countryside, especially where traffic speed is lower than about 60 km/h, can be a good place for hitching. Traffic on minor roads on the countryside can offer great rides to get to the nearest bigger city, or onto the main infrastructure. 

Often on bigger roads the slow, local traffic coming from smaller sideroads may provide excellent rides, and it is quite often quite easy to flag those drivers down, as a very personal and direct approach is often possible. 

Even national roads (non-motorway) often provide good space along the main flow of traffic, as there are often emergency lanes or so called [[Mehrzweckstreifen]]. 

Finally, hitchhiking on emergency lanes of motorways can be an option in case of traffic jams. In such situation using a [[signs|cardboard sign]] is usually highly effective. It is necessary though to take maximum safety precautions (we suppose you are smart enough to take these precautions), and you should know that hitchhiking on motorways is basically forbidden in most Western countries.

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[zh:在哪里搭车]]</text>
      <sha1>dhoe3jzj6uas168lz33godoyj3vii0g</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>37810</id>
      <parentid>37115</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-10-09T23:11:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7348">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[File:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the farthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[File:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb. This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In all countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths / [[Péage]]s==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops.
*In most cases there is a good visibility and room to pull over.

=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more than just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
*Truckers often go long distances
*Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
*Truckers often give you cash or food when they can't offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
*Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
*It is against the policy for trucking companies in certain countries to have riders because of [[insurance]] reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

== [[Traffic lights]] ==
..

== On the road ==

The countryside, especially where traffic speed is lower than about 60 km/h, can be a good place for hitching. Traffic on minor roads on the countryside can offer great rides to get to the nearest bigger city, or onto the main infrastructure. 

Often on bigger roads the slow, local traffic coming from smaller sideroads may provide excellent rides, and it is quite often quite easy to flag those drivers down, as a very personal and direct approach is often possible. 

Even national roads (non-motorway) often provide good space along the main flow of traffic, as there are often emergency lanes or so called [[Mehrzweckstreifen]]. 

Finally, hitchhiking on emergency lanes of motorways can be an option in case of traffic jams. In such situation using a [[signs|cardboard sign]] is usually highly effective. It is necessary though to take maximum safety precautions (we suppose you are smart enough to take these precautions), and you should know that hitchhiking on motorways is basically forbidden in most Western countries.

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]
[[zh:在哪里搭车]]</text>
      <sha1>qzzst2q032hk24qwteglchevye6ydlb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38344</id>
      <parentid>37810</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-11-02T21:59:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>88.246.204.16</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7398">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.
  It is often a dry place in case of wet weather.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[File:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the farthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[File:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb. This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In all countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths / [[Péage]]s==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops.
*In most cases there is a good visibility and room to pull over.

=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more than just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
*Truckers often go long distances
*Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
*Truckers often give you cash or food when they can't offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
*Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
*It is against the policy for trucking companies in certain countries to have riders because of [[insurance]] reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

== [[Traffic lights]] ==
..

== On the road ==

The countryside, especially where traffic speed is lower than about 60 km/h, can be a good place for hitching. Traffic on minor roads on the countryside can offer great rides to get to the nearest bigger city, or onto the main infrastructure. 

Often on bigger roads the slow, local traffic coming from smaller sideroads may provide excellent rides, and it is quite often quite easy to flag those drivers down, as a very personal and direct approach is often possible. 

Even national roads (non-motorway) often provide good space along the main flow of traffic, as there are often emergency lanes or so called [[Mehrzweckstreifen]]. 

Finally, hitchhiking on emergency lanes of motorways can be an option in case of traffic jams. In such situation using a [[signs|cardboard sign]] is usually highly effective. It is necessary though to take maximum safety precautions (we suppose you are smart enough to take these precautions), and you should know that hitchhiking on motorways is basically forbidden in most Western countries.

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]
[[zh:在哪里搭车]]</text>
      <sha1>crhh5153a2rdx21mlcn7tnnlzaoooqd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38358</id>
      <parentid>38344</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-11-03T08:18:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7398">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.
* It is often a dry place in case of wet weather.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[File:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the farthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[File:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb. This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In all countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths / [[Péage]]s==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
*All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops.
*In most cases there is a good visibility and room to pull over.

=== Cons ===
*On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
*It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more than just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
*Truckers often go long distances
*Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
*Truckers often give you cash or food when they can't offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
*Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
*It is against the policy for trucking companies in certain countries to have riders because of [[insurance]] reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

== [[Traffic lights]] ==
..

== On the road ==

The countryside, especially where traffic speed is lower than about 60 km/h, can be a good place for hitching. Traffic on minor roads on the countryside can offer great rides to get to the nearest bigger city, or onto the main infrastructure. 

Often on bigger roads the slow, local traffic coming from smaller sideroads may provide excellent rides, and it is quite often quite easy to flag those drivers down, as a very personal and direct approach is often possible. 

Even national roads (non-motorway) often provide good space along the main flow of traffic, as there are often emergency lanes or so called [[Mehrzweckstreifen]]. 

Finally, hitchhiking on emergency lanes of motorways can be an option in case of traffic jams. In such situation using a [[signs|cardboard sign]] is usually highly effective. It is necessary though to take maximum safety precautions (we suppose you are smart enough to take these precautions), and you should know that hitchhiking on motorways is basically forbidden in most Western countries.

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]
[[zh:在哪里搭车]]</text>
      <sha1>34fuyw3d7bupq839m1t8tgizsp3kxga</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40888</id>
      <parentid>38358</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-30T21:00:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7407">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.
* It is often a dry place in case of wet weather.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[File:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the farthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[File:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb. This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In all countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths / [[Péage]]s==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
* All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops.
* In most cases there is a good visibility and room to pull over.

=== Cons ===
* On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
* It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more than just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
* Truckers often go long distances
* Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
* Truckers often give you cash or food when they can't offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
* Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
* It is against the policy for trucking companies in certain countries to have riders because of [[insurance]] reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

== [[Traffic lights]] ==
..

== On the road ==

The countryside, especially where traffic speed is lower than about 60 km/h, can be a good place for hitching. Traffic on minor roads on the countryside can offer great rides to get to the nearest bigger city, or onto the main infrastructure. 

Often on bigger roads the slow, local traffic coming from smaller sideroads may provide excellent rides, and it is quite often quite easy to flag those drivers down, as a very personal and direct approach is often possible. 

Even national roads (non-motorway) often provide good space along the main flow of traffic, as there are often emergency lanes or so called [[Mehrzweckstreifen]]. 

Finally, hitchhiking on emergency lanes of motorways can be an option in case of traffic jams. In such situation using a [[signs|cardboard sign]] is usually highly effective. It is necessary though to take maximum safety precautions (we suppose you are smart enough to take these precautions), and you should know that hitchhiking on motorways is basically forbidden in most Western countries.

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]
[[zh:在哪里搭车]]</text>
      <sha1>qguwapa3ko6qgbeypanggc8vtlafu55</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41664</id>
      <parentid>40888</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-27T14:18:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>212.166.30.96</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7554">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.
* It is often a dry place in case of wet weather.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[File:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the farthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[File:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb. This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In all countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths / [[Péage]]s==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
* All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops.
* In most cases there is a good visibility and room to pull over.

=== Cons ===
* On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
* It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more than just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
* Truckers often go long distances
* Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
* Truckers often give you cash or food when they can't offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
* Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
* It is against the policy for trucking companies in certain countries to have riders because of [[insurance]] reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

== [[Traffic lights]] ==
..
Traffic light are pretty good spots. all the cars are standing still so you can easily make eyecontact with the drivers and signal you want a ride

== On the road ==

The countryside, especially where traffic speed is lower than about 60 km/h, can be a good place for hitching. Traffic on minor roads on the countryside can offer great rides to get to the nearest bigger city, or onto the main infrastructure. 

Often on bigger roads the slow, local traffic coming from smaller sideroads may provide excellent rides, and it is quite often quite easy to flag those drivers down, as a very personal and direct approach is often possible. 

Even national roads (non-motorway) often provide good space along the main flow of traffic, as there are often emergency lanes or so called [[Mehrzweckstreifen]]. 

Finally, hitchhiking on emergency lanes of motorways can be an option in case of traffic jams. In such situation using a [[signs|cardboard sign]] is usually highly effective. It is necessary though to take maximum safety precautions (we suppose you are smart enough to take these precautions), and you should know that hitchhiking on motorways is basically forbidden in most Western countries.

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]
[[zh:在哪里搭车]]</text>
      <sha1>ocje5hsq6zk0wq4esl1g1547t5qt7bh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41667</id>
      <parentid>41664</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-27T14:43:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7711">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.
* It is often a dry place in case of wet weather.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[File:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the farthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[File:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb. This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In all countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths / [[Péage]]s==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
* All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops.
* In most cases there is a good visibility and room to pull over.

=== Cons ===
* On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
* It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more than just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
* Truckers often go long distances
* Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
* Truckers often give you cash or food when they can't offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
* Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
* It is against the policy for trucking companies in certain countries to have riders because of [[insurance]] reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

== [[Traffic lights]] ==

Traffic light are pretty good spots. All the cars are standing still so you can easily make eye contact with the drivers and signal you want a ride.

Sometimes it's harder for cars to pull over, especially if there is a lot of traffic.  
Try to get an idea of where cars might be able to pull over safely.

== On the road ==

The countryside, especially where traffic speed is lower than about 60 km/h, can be a good place for hitching. Traffic on minor roads on the countryside can offer great rides to get to the nearest bigger city, or onto the main infrastructure. 

Often on bigger roads the slow, local traffic coming from smaller sideroads may provide excellent rides, and it is quite often quite easy to flag those drivers down, as a very personal and direct approach is often possible. 

Even national roads (non-motorway) often provide good space along the main flow of traffic, as there are often emergency lanes or so called [[Mehrzweckstreifen]]. 

Finally, hitchhiking on emergency lanes of motorways can be an option in case of traffic jams. In such situation using a [[signs|cardboard sign]] is usually highly effective. It is necessary though to take maximum safety precautions (we suppose you are smart enough to take these precautions), and you should know that hitchhiking on motorways is basically forbidden in most Western countries.

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]
[[zh:在哪里搭车]]</text>
      <sha1>ltqv76s49efwqztw4ctwlpmga1bxmjs</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>42071</id>
      <parentid>41667</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-05-23T06:44:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>97.126.83.35</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7868">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.
* It is often a dry place in case of wet weather.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[File:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the farthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[File:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb. This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In all countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths / [[Péage]]s==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
* All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops.
* In most cases there is a good visibility and room to pull over.

=== Cons ===
* On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
* It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more than just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
* Truckers often go long distances
* Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
* Truckers often give you cash or food when they can't offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
* Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
* It is against the policy for trucking companies in certain countries to have riders because of [[insurance]] reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

== [[Traffic lights]] ==

Traffic light are pretty good spots. All the cars are standing still so you can easily make eye contact with the drivers and signal you want a ride.

Sometimes it's harder for cars to pull over, especially if there is a lot of traffic.  
Try to get an idea of where cars might be able to pull over safely.

== On the road ==

The countryside, especially where traffic speed is lower than about 60 km/h, can be a good place for hitching. Traffic on minor roads on the countryside can offer great rides to get to the nearest bigger city, or onto the main infrastructure. 

Often on bigger roads the slow, local traffic coming from smaller sideroads may provide excellent rides, and it is quite often quite easy to flag those drivers down, as a very personal and direct approach is often possible. 

Even national roads (non-motorway) often provide good space along the main flow of traffic, as there are often emergency lanes or so called [[Mehrzweckstreifen]]. 

Finally, hitchhiking on emergency lanes of motorways can be an option in case of traffic jams. In such situation using a [[signs|cardboard sign]] is usually highly effective. It is necessary though to take maximum safety precautions (we suppose you are smart enough to take these precautions), and you should know that hitchhiking on motorways is basically forbidden in most Western countries.

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.

NOTE: Hitchhiking can be very risky so please, carry some type of protection on you and it's always ok to say NO to a offer if it is a threat to your safty.
[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]
[[zh:在哪里搭车]]</text>
      <sha1>j90h5sf8qk01kijdn534c953kr7yvtf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>42084</id>
      <parentid>42071</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-05-24T22:17:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robino</username>
        <id>4</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7711">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stop ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.
* It is often a dry place in case of wet weather.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[File:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the farthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[File:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb. This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In all countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths / [[Péage]]s==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
* All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops.
* In most cases there is a good visibility and room to pull over.

=== Cons ===
* On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
* It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more than just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
* Truckers often go long distances
* Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
* Truckers often give you cash or food when they can't offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
* Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
* It is against the policy for trucking companies in certain countries to have riders because of [[insurance]] reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

== [[Traffic lights]] ==

Traffic light are pretty good spots. All the cars are standing still so you can easily make eye contact with the drivers and signal you want a ride.

Sometimes it's harder for cars to pull over, especially if there is a lot of traffic.  
Try to get an idea of where cars might be able to pull over safely.

== On the road ==

The countryside, especially where traffic speed is lower than about 60 km/h, can be a good place for hitching. Traffic on minor roads on the countryside can offer great rides to get to the nearest bigger city, or onto the main infrastructure. 

Often on bigger roads the slow, local traffic coming from smaller sideroads may provide excellent rides, and it is quite often quite easy to flag those drivers down, as a very personal and direct approach is often possible. 

Even national roads (non-motorway) often provide good space along the main flow of traffic, as there are often emergency lanes or so called [[Mehrzweckstreifen]]. 

Finally, hitchhiking on emergency lanes of motorways can be an option in case of traffic jams. In such situation using a [[signs|cardboard sign]] is usually highly effective. It is necessary though to take maximum safety precautions (we suppose you are smart enough to take these precautions), and you should know that hitchhiking on motorways is basically forbidden in most Western countries.

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]
[[zh:在哪里搭车]]</text>
      <sha1>ltqv76s49efwqztw4ctwlpmga1bxmjs</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>43441</id>
      <parentid>42084</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-07-28T10:04:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Phlyming</username>
        <id>2360</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7712">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stops ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a highway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.
* It is often a dry place in case of wet weather.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[File:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a highway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the farthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[File:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb. This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In all countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths / [[Péage]]s==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
* All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops.
* In most cases there is a good visibility and room to pull over.

=== Cons ===
* On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the highways leaving [[Paris]])
* It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more than just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
* Truckers often go long distances
* Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
* Truckers often give you cash or food when they can't offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
* Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
* It is against the policy for trucking companies in certain countries to have riders because of [[insurance]] reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

== [[Traffic lights]] ==

Traffic light are pretty good spots. All the cars are standing still so you can easily make eye contact with the drivers and signal you want a ride.

Sometimes it's harder for cars to pull over, especially if there is a lot of traffic.  
Try to get an idea of where cars might be able to pull over safely.

== On the road ==

The countryside, especially where traffic speed is lower than about 60 km/h, can be a good place for hitching. Traffic on minor roads on the countryside can offer great rides to get to the nearest bigger city, or onto the main infrastructure. 

Often on bigger roads the slow, local traffic coming from smaller sideroads may provide excellent rides, and it is quite often quite easy to flag those drivers down, as a very personal and direct approach is often possible. 

Even national roads (non-motorway) often provide good space along the main flow of traffic, as there are often emergency lanes or so called [[Mehrzweckstreifen]]. 

Finally, hitchhiking on emergency lanes of motorways can be an option in case of traffic jams. In such situation using a [[signs|cardboard sign]] is usually highly effective. It is necessary though to take maximum safety precautions (we suppose you are smart enough to take these precautions), and you should know that hitchhiking on motorways is basically forbidden in most Western countries.

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]
[[zh:在哪里搭车]]</text>
      <sha1>k8bqek326vu1wql504e5q0kvt488eqp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>45434</id>
      <parentid>43441</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-02T23:14:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7715">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stops ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a motorway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.
* It is often a dry place in case of wet weather.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[File:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a motorway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the farthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[File:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb. This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In all countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths / [[Péage]]s==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
* All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops.
* In most cases there is a good visibility and room to pull over.

=== Cons ===
* On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the motorways leaving [[Paris]])
* It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more than just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
* Truckers often go long distances
* Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
* Truckers often give you cash or food when they can't offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
* Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
* It is against the policy for trucking companies in certain countries to have riders because of [[insurance]] reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

== [[Traffic lights]] ==

Traffic light are pretty good spots. All the cars are standing still so you can easily make eye contact with the drivers and signal you want a ride.

Sometimes it's harder for cars to pull over, especially if there is a lot of traffic.  
Try to get an idea of where cars might be able to pull over safely.

== On the road ==

The countryside, especially where traffic speed is lower than about 60 km/h, can be a good place for hitching. Traffic on minor roads on the countryside can offer great rides to get to the nearest bigger city, or onto the main infrastructure. 

Often on bigger roads the slow, local traffic coming from smaller sideroads may provide excellent rides, and it is quite often quite easy to flag those drivers down, as a very personal and direct approach is often possible. 

Even national roads (non-motorway) often provide good space along the main flow of traffic, as there are often emergency lanes or so called [[Mehrzweckstreifen]]. 

Finally, hitchhiking on emergency lanes of motorways can be an option in case of traffic jams. In such situation using a [[signs|cardboard sign]] is usually highly effective. It is necessary though to take maximum safety precautions (we suppose you are smart enough to take these precautions), and you should know that hitchhiking on motorways is basically forbidden in most Western countries.

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]
[[zh:在哪里搭车]]</text>
      <sha1>px4scsx998qlvylvvrs9xb2sitxd3fz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>46063</id>
      <parentid>45434</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-19T19:14:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Helios</username>
        <id>2707</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7975">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stops ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a motorway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.
* It is often a dry place in case of wet weather.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[File:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a motorway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the farthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[File:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

Make sure that there is lots of room for a car to pull over and still allow other cars to pass. A shoulder large enough to safely park a truck is best. It is becoming easier to locate a safe spot by looking at [Google Maps] or Google Earth before you depart.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb. This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In all countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths / [[Péage]]s==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
* All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops.
* In most cases there is a good visibility and room to pull over.

=== Cons ===
* On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the motorways leaving [[Paris]])
* It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more than just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
* Truckers often go long distances
* Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
* Truckers often give you cash or food when they can't offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
* Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
* It is against the policy for trucking companies in certain countries to have riders because of [[insurance]] reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

== [[Traffic lights]] ==

Traffic light are pretty good spots. All the cars are standing still so you can easily make eye contact with the drivers and signal you want a ride.

Sometimes it's harder for cars to pull over, especially if there is a lot of traffic.  
Try to get an idea of where cars might be able to pull over safely.

== On the road ==

The countryside, especially where traffic speed is lower than about 60 km/h, can be a good place for hitching. Traffic on minor roads on the countryside can offer great rides to get to the nearest bigger city, or onto the main infrastructure. 

Often on bigger roads the slow, local traffic coming from smaller sideroads may provide excellent rides, and it is quite often quite easy to flag those drivers down, as a very personal and direct approach is often possible. 

Even national roads (non-motorway) often provide good space along the main flow of traffic, as there are often emergency lanes or so called [[Mehrzweckstreifen]]. 

Finally, hitchhiking on emergency lanes of motorways can be an option in case of traffic jams. In such situation using a [[signs|cardboard sign]] is usually highly effective. It is necessary though to take maximum safety precautions (we suppose you are smart enough to take these precautions), and you should know that hitchhiking on motorways is basically forbidden in most Western countries.

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]
[[zh:在哪里搭车]]</text>
      <sha1>32d8msdlk84ur2unmeeci5p8a2mt1sw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>46064</id>
      <parentid>46063</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-19T19:16:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Helios</username>
        <id>2707</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7999">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stops ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a motorway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.
* It is often a dry place in case of wet weather.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[File:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a motorway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the farthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[File:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

Make sure that there is lots of room for a car to pull over and still allow other cars to pass. A shoulder large enough to safely park a truck is best. It is becoming easier to locate a safe spot by looking at [http://maps.google.com/ Google Maps] or Google Earth before you depart.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb. This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In all countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths / [[Péage]]s==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
* All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops.
* In most cases there is a good visibility and room to pull over.

=== Cons ===
* On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the motorways leaving [[Paris]])
* It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more than just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
* Truckers often go long distances
* Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
* Truckers often give you cash or food when they can't offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
* Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
* It is against the policy for trucking companies in certain countries to have riders because of [[insurance]] reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

== [[Traffic lights]] ==

Traffic light are pretty good spots. All the cars are standing still so you can easily make eye contact with the drivers and signal you want a ride.

Sometimes it's harder for cars to pull over, especially if there is a lot of traffic.  
Try to get an idea of where cars might be able to pull over safely.

== On the road ==

The countryside, especially where traffic speed is lower than about 60 km/h, can be a good place for hitching. Traffic on minor roads on the countryside can offer great rides to get to the nearest bigger city, or onto the main infrastructure. 

Often on bigger roads the slow, local traffic coming from smaller sideroads may provide excellent rides, and it is quite often quite easy to flag those drivers down, as a very personal and direct approach is often possible. 

Even national roads (non-motorway) often provide good space along the main flow of traffic, as there are often emergency lanes or so called [[Mehrzweckstreifen]]. 

Finally, hitchhiking on emergency lanes of motorways can be an option in case of traffic jams. In such situation using a [[signs|cardboard sign]] is usually highly effective. It is necessary though to take maximum safety precautions (we suppose you are smart enough to take these precautions), and you should know that hitchhiking on motorways is basically forbidden in most Western countries.

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]
[[zh:在哪里搭车]]</text>
      <sha1>c9bmc1bqt5v1i1673q7lrvx82fh1nxf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>46065</id>
      <parentid>46064</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-19T19:17:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Helios</username>
        <id>2707</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8012">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stops ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a motorway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.
* It is often a dry place in case of wet weather.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[File:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a motorway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the farthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[File:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

Make sure that there is lots of room for a car to pull over '''safely''' and still allow other cars to pass. A shoulder large enough to safely park a truck is best. It is becoming easier to locate a safe spot by looking at [http://maps.google.com/ Google Maps] or Google Earth before you depart.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb. This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In all countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths / [[Péage]]s==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
* All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops.
* In most cases there is a good visibility and room to pull over.

=== Cons ===
* On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the motorways leaving [[Paris]])
* It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more than just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
* Truckers often go long distances
* Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
* Truckers often give you cash or food when they can't offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
* Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
* It is against the policy for trucking companies in certain countries to have riders because of [[insurance]] reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

== [[Traffic lights]] ==

Traffic light are pretty good spots. All the cars are standing still so you can easily make eye contact with the drivers and signal you want a ride.

Sometimes it's harder for cars to pull over, especially if there is a lot of traffic.  
Try to get an idea of where cars might be able to pull over safely.

== On the road ==

The countryside, especially where traffic speed is lower than about 60 km/h, can be a good place for hitching. Traffic on minor roads on the countryside can offer great rides to get to the nearest bigger city, or onto the main infrastructure. 

Often on bigger roads the slow, local traffic coming from smaller sideroads may provide excellent rides, and it is quite often quite easy to flag those drivers down, as a very personal and direct approach is often possible. 

Even national roads (non-motorway) often provide good space along the main flow of traffic, as there are often emergency lanes or so called [[Mehrzweckstreifen]]. 

Finally, hitchhiking on emergency lanes of motorways can be an option in case of traffic jams. In such situation using a [[signs|cardboard sign]] is usually highly effective. It is necessary though to take maximum safety precautions (we suppose you are smart enough to take these precautions), and you should know that hitchhiking on motorways is basically forbidden in most Western countries.

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]
[[zh:在哪里搭车]]</text>
      <sha1>ptlwinte03ugb472bylk1je114kdeqm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>46066</id>
      <parentid>46065</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-19T19:21:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Helios</username>
        <id>2707</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8381">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stops ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a motorway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.
* It is often a dry place in case of wet weather.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[File:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a motorway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the farthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[File:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

Make sure that there is lots of room for a car to pull over '''safely''' and still allow other cars to pass. A shoulder large enough to safely park a truck is best. It is becoming easier to locate a safe spot by looking at [http://maps.google.com/ Google Maps] or Google Earth before you depart.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb. This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In all countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths / [[Péage]]s==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
* All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops.
* In most cases there is a good visibility and room to pull over.

=== Cons ===
* On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the motorways leaving [[Paris]])
* It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more than just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
* Truckers often go long distances
* Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
* Truckers often give you cash or food when they can't offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
* Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
* It is against the policy for trucking companies in certain countries to have riders because of [[insurance]] reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

== [[Traffic lights]] ==

Traffic light are pretty good spots. All the cars are standing still so you can easily make eye contact with the drivers and signal you want a ride.

Sometimes it's harder for cars to pull over, especially if there is a lot of traffic.  
Try to get an idea of where cars might be able to pull over safely. Traffic lights right before a highway entrance, which often have a large space on the side of the road, can be good spots as they combine the time drivers spend at the lights with the safety of a large space to stop for you. If you're unfamiliar with the area, try to find a place like this using [http://maps.google.com Google Maps] or Google Earth before you depart.

== On the road ==

The countryside, especially where traffic speed is lower than about 60 km/h, can be a good place for hitching. Traffic on minor roads on the countryside can offer great rides to get to the nearest bigger city, or onto the main infrastructure. 

Often on bigger roads the slow, local traffic coming from smaller sideroads may provide excellent rides, and it is quite often quite easy to flag those drivers down, as a very personal and direct approach is often possible. 

Even national roads (non-motorway) often provide good space along the main flow of traffic, as there are often emergency lanes or so called [[Mehrzweckstreifen]]. 

Finally, hitchhiking on emergency lanes of motorways can be an option in case of traffic jams. In such situation using a [[signs|cardboard sign]] is usually highly effective. It is necessary though to take maximum safety precautions (we suppose you are smart enough to take these precautions), and you should know that hitchhiking on motorways is basically forbidden in most Western countries.

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]
[[zh:在哪里搭车]]</text>
      <sha1>ly51zxuks73qvy5knmmxvsosqnhypxv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>46068</id>
      <parentid>46066</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-19T19:26:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Helios</username>
        <id>2707</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8429">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], including [http://maps.google.com Google Maps], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stops ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a motorway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.
* It is often a dry place in case of wet weather.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[File:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a motorway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the farthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[File:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

Make sure that there is lots of room for a car to pull over '''safely''' and still allow other cars to pass. A shoulder large enough to safely park a truck is best. It is becoming easier to locate a safe spot by looking at [http://maps.google.com/ Google Maps] or Google Earth before you depart.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb. This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In all countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths / [[Péage]]s==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
* All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops.
* In most cases there is a good visibility and room to pull over.

=== Cons ===
* On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the motorways leaving [[Paris]])
* It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more than just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
* Truckers often go long distances
* Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
* Truckers often give you cash or food when they can't offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
* Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
* It is against the policy for trucking companies in certain countries to have riders because of [[insurance]] reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

== [[Traffic lights]] ==

Traffic light are pretty good spots. All the cars are standing still so you can easily make eye contact with the drivers and signal you want a ride.

Sometimes it's harder for cars to pull over, especially if there is a lot of traffic.  
Try to get an idea of where cars might be able to pull over safely. Traffic lights right before a highway entrance, which often have a large space on the side of the road, can be good spots as they combine the time drivers spend at the lights with the safety of a large space to stop for you. If you're unfamiliar with the area, try to find a place like this using [http://maps.google.com Google Maps] or Google Earth before you depart.

== On the road ==

The countryside, especially where traffic speed is lower than about 60 km/h, can be a good place for hitching. Traffic on minor roads on the countryside can offer great rides to get to the nearest bigger city, or onto the main infrastructure. 

Often on bigger roads the slow, local traffic coming from smaller sideroads may provide excellent rides, and it is quite often quite easy to flag those drivers down, as a very personal and direct approach is often possible. 

Even national roads (non-motorway) often provide good space along the main flow of traffic, as there are often emergency lanes or so called [[Mehrzweckstreifen]]. 

Finally, hitchhiking on emergency lanes of motorways can be an option in case of traffic jams. In such situation using a [[signs|cardboard sign]] is usually highly effective. It is necessary though to take maximum safety precautions (we suppose you are smart enough to take these precautions), and you should know that hitchhiking on motorways is basically forbidden in most Western countries.

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]
[[zh:在哪里搭车]]</text>
      <sha1>orcjqm3n9ims737mzoxecgf9ij0xnbb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>46071</id>
      <parentid>46068</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-19T23:07:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8515">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], including [http://maps.google.com Google Maps], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stops ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a motorway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.
* It is often a dry place in case of wet weather.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[File:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a motorway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there are likely to go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the farthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[File:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

Make sure that there is lots of room for a car to pull over '''safely''' and still allow other cars to pass. A shoulder large enough to safely park a truck is best. It is becoming easier to locate a safe spot by looking at [http://maps.google.com/ Google Maps] or Google Earth before you depart.  Google Maps Streetview can be especially useful, in locations where it is available.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb. This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In all countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths / [[Péage]]s==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
* All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops.
* In most cases there is a good visibility and room to pull over.

=== Cons ===
* On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the motorways leaving [[Paris]])
* It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more than just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
* Truckers often go long distances
* Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
* Truckers often give you cash or food when they can't offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
* Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
* It is against the policy for trucking companies in certain countries to have riders because of [[insurance]] reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

== [[Traffic lights]] ==

Traffic light are pretty good spots. All the cars are standing still so you can easily make eye contact with the drivers and signal you want a ride.

Sometimes it's harder for cars to pull over, especially if there is a lot of traffic.  
Try to get an idea of where cars might be able to pull over safely. Traffic lights right before a highway entrance, which often have a large space on the side of the road, can be good spots as they combine the time drivers spend at the lights with the safety of a large space to stop for you. If you're unfamiliar with the area, try to find a place like this using [http://maps.google.com Google Maps] or Google Earth before you depart.

== On the road ==

The countryside, especially where traffic speed is lower than about 60 km/h, can be a good place for hitching. Traffic on minor roads on the countryside can offer great rides to get to the nearest bigger city, or onto the main infrastructure. 

Often on bigger roads the slow, local traffic coming from smaller sideroads may provide excellent rides, and it is quite often quite easy to flag those drivers down, as a very personal and direct approach is often possible. 

Even national roads (non-motorway) often provide good space along the main flow of traffic, as there are often emergency lanes or so called [[Mehrzweckstreifen]]. 

Finally, hitchhiking on emergency lanes of motorways can be an option in case of traffic jams. In such situation using a [[signs|cardboard sign]] is usually highly effective. It is necessary though to take maximum safety precautions (we suppose you are smart enough to take these precautions), and you should know that hitchhiking on motorways is basically forbidden in most Western countries.

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]
[[zh:在哪里搭车]]</text>
      <sha1>dfvio82p7pzsxpaar5s6md5zabwzldc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>46085</id>
      <parentid>46071</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-20T17:47:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8581">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], including [http://maps.google.com Google Maps], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stops ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a motorway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.
* It is often a dry place in case of wet weather.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[File:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a motorway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there might go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the farthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of (usually bad) [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* People who stop there might be local and not go very far.
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[File:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

Make sure that there is lots of room for a car to pull over '''safely''' and still allow other cars to pass. A shoulder large enough to safely park a truck is best. It is becoming easier to locate a safe spot by looking at [http://maps.google.com/ Google Maps] or Google Earth before you depart.  Google Maps Streetview can be especially useful, in locations where it is available.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb. This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In all countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths / [[Péage]]s==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
* All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops.
* In most cases there is a good visibility and room to pull over.

=== Cons ===
* On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the motorways leaving [[Paris]])
* It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more than just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
* Truckers often go long distances
* Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
* Truckers often give you cash or food when they can't offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
* Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
* It is against the policy for trucking companies in certain countries to have riders because of [[insurance]] reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

== [[Traffic lights]] ==

Traffic light are pretty good spots. All the cars are standing still so you can easily make eye contact with the drivers and signal you want a ride.

Sometimes it's harder for cars to pull over, especially if there is a lot of traffic.  
Try to get an idea of where cars might be able to pull over safely. Traffic lights right before a highway entrance, which often have a large space on the side of the road, can be good spots as they combine the time drivers spend at the lights with the safety of a large space to stop for you. If you're unfamiliar with the area, try to find a place like this using [http://maps.google.com Google Maps] or Google Earth before you depart.

== On the road ==

The countryside, especially where traffic speed is lower than about 60 km/h, can be a good place for hitching. Traffic on minor roads on the countryside can offer great rides to get to the nearest bigger city, or onto the main infrastructure. 

Often on bigger roads the slow, local traffic coming from smaller sideroads may provide excellent rides, and it is quite often quite easy to flag those drivers down, as a very personal and direct approach is often possible. 

Even national roads (non-motorway) often provide good space along the main flow of traffic, as there are often emergency lanes or so called [[Mehrzweckstreifen]]. 

Finally, hitchhiking on emergency lanes of motorways can be an option in case of traffic jams. In such situation using a [[signs|cardboard sign]] is usually highly effective. It is necessary though to take maximum safety precautions (we suppose you are smart enough to take these precautions), and you should know that hitchhiking on motorways is basically forbidden in most Western countries.

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]
[[zh:在哪里搭车]]</text>
      <sha1>hlvi3egyqehap1a5q3i2s0h5ytyw0si</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>47545</id>
      <parentid>46085</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-11-18T00:33:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>85.127.196.134</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8582">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], including [http://maps.google.com Google Maps], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stops ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a motorway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.
* It is often a dry place in case of wet weather.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[File:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a motorway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there might go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the farthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of (usually bad) [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* People who stop there might be local and not go very far.
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[File:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

Make sure that there is lots of room for a car to pull over '''safely''' and still allow other cars to pass. A shoulder large enough to safely park a truck is best. It is becoming easier to locate a safe spot by looking at [http://maps.google.com/ Google Maps] or Google Earth before you depart.  Google Maps Streetview can be especially useful, in locations where it is available.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb. This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In most countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths / [[Péage]]s==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
* All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops.
* In most cases there is a good visibility and room to pull over.

=== Cons ===
* On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the motorways leaving [[Paris]])
* It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more than just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
* Truckers often go long distances
* Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
* Truckers often give you cash or food when they can't offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
* Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
* It is against the policy for trucking companies in certain countries to have riders because of [[insurance]] reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

== [[Traffic lights]] ==

Traffic light are pretty good spots. All the cars are standing still so you can easily make eye contact with the drivers and signal you want a ride.

Sometimes it's harder for cars to pull over, especially if there is a lot of traffic.  
Try to get an idea of where cars might be able to pull over safely. Traffic lights right before a highway entrance, which often have a large space on the side of the road, can be good spots as they combine the time drivers spend at the lights with the safety of a large space to stop for you. If you're unfamiliar with the area, try to find a place like this using [http://maps.google.com Google Maps] or Google Earth before you depart.

== On the road ==

The countryside, especially where traffic speed is lower than about 60 km/h, can be a good place for hitching. Traffic on minor roads on the countryside can offer great rides to get to the nearest bigger city, or onto the main infrastructure. 

Often on bigger roads the slow, local traffic coming from smaller sideroads may provide excellent rides, and it is quite often quite easy to flag those drivers down, as a very personal and direct approach is often possible. 

Even national roads (non-motorway) often provide good space along the main flow of traffic, as there are often emergency lanes or so called [[Mehrzweckstreifen]]. 

Finally, hitchhiking on emergency lanes of motorways can be an option in case of traffic jams. In such situation using a [[signs|cardboard sign]] is usually highly effective. It is necessary though to take maximum safety precautions (we suppose you are smart enough to take these precautions), and you should know that hitchhiking on motorways is basically forbidden in most Western countries.

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]
[[zh:在哪里搭车]]</text>
      <sha1>pp3xduhobyct4cxg539w19y01nt88j2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>53376</id>
      <parentid>47545</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-07-13T06:46:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>SpamBucket</username>
        <id>24368</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1217">

commonly the affordable still extraordinary choice when selecting out the proper provides for 	http://www.ionlinemovie.com/	purchasers as well as provides for employees. The attractiveness with this particular precise 
purchasers as well as provides for employees. The attractiveness with this particular precise 	http://www.panjewelrybizuteria.net/pandora-sprzedaz.html	marketing application type is its existence cycle. compensate Pens very last a reasonably 
marketing application type is its existence cycle. compensate Pens very last a reasonably 	http://www.panjewelrybizuteria.net/prawdziwy-pandora.html	prolonged time, in precise pens too created as Parker, so as quickly when you hand them out they 
prolonged time, in precise pens too created as Parker, so as quickly when you hand them out they 	http://www.panjewelrybizuteria.net/kupowac-pandora.html	are probably to become around, collectively with your group brand and cell phone number, for just 
are probably to become around, collectively with your group brand and cell phone number, for just 	http://www.panjewelrybizuteria.net/pandora-srebrne-i-z.html	about any reasonably prolonged time. it is exceptional and lengthier lasting marketing than an</text>
      <sha1>quvuonzlrqrluqzkeebgh5vgtja1jxw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>53380</id>
      <parentid>53376</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-07-13T06:50:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8582">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[internet]], including [http://maps.google.com Google Maps], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stops ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a motorway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.
* It is often a dry place in case of wet weather.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station]]s ==
[[File:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a motorway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there might go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the farthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of (usually bad) [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* People who stop there might be local and not go very far.
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[File:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

Make sure that there is lots of room for a car to pull over '''safely''' and still allow other cars to pass. A shoulder large enough to safely park a truck is best. It is becoming easier to locate a safe spot by looking at [http://maps.google.com/ Google Maps] or Google Earth before you depart.  Google Maps Streetview can be especially useful, in locations where it is available.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb. This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In most countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths / [[Péage]]s==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
* All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops.
* In most cases there is a good visibility and room to pull over.

=== Cons ===
* On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the motorways leaving [[Paris]])
* It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more than just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
* Truckers often go long distances
* Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
* Truckers often give you cash or food when they can't offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
* Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
* It is against the policy for trucking companies in certain countries to have riders because of [[insurance]] reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

== [[Traffic lights]] ==

Traffic light are pretty good spots. All the cars are standing still so you can easily make eye contact with the drivers and signal you want a ride.

Sometimes it's harder for cars to pull over, especially if there is a lot of traffic.  
Try to get an idea of where cars might be able to pull over safely. Traffic lights right before a highway entrance, which often have a large space on the side of the road, can be good spots as they combine the time drivers spend at the lights with the safety of a large space to stop for you. If you're unfamiliar with the area, try to find a place like this using [http://maps.google.com Google Maps] or Google Earth before you depart.

== On the road ==

The countryside, especially where traffic speed is lower than about 60 km/h, can be a good place for hitching. Traffic on minor roads on the countryside can offer great rides to get to the nearest bigger city, or onto the main infrastructure. 

Often on bigger roads the slow, local traffic coming from smaller sideroads may provide excellent rides, and it is quite often quite easy to flag those drivers down, as a very personal and direct approach is often possible. 

Even national roads (non-motorway) often provide good space along the main flow of traffic, as there are often emergency lanes or so called [[Mehrzweckstreifen]]. 

Finally, hitchhiking on emergency lanes of motorways can be an option in case of traffic jams. In such situation using a [[signs|cardboard sign]] is usually highly effective. It is necessary though to take maximum safety precautions (we suppose you are smart enough to take these precautions), and you should know that hitchhiking on motorways is basically forbidden in most Western countries.

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]
[[zh:在哪里搭车]]</text>
      <sha1>pp3xduhobyct4cxg539w19y01nt88j2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>56342</id>
      <parentid>53380</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-08T01:24:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8668">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[multimedia|internet]], including [http://maps.google.com Google Maps], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[picking up hitchhikers|how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stops ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a motorway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.
* It is often a dry place in case of wet weather.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station hitchhiking|Petrol stations]] ==
[[File:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a motorway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there might go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the farthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of (usually bad) [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* People who stop there might be local and not go very far.
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[File:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

Make sure that there is lots of room for a car to pull over '''safely''' and still allow other cars to pass. A shoulder large enough to safely park a truck is best. It is becoming easier to locate a safe spot by looking at [http://maps.google.com/ Google Maps] or Google Earth before you depart. Google Maps Streetview can be especially useful, in locations where it is available.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb. This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In most countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths / [[Péage]]s ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
* All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops.
* In most cases there is a good visibility and room to pull over.

=== Cons ===
* On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the motorways leaving [[Paris]])
* It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more than just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
* Truckers often go long distances
* Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
* Truckers often give you cash or food when they can't offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
* Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
* It is against the policy for trucking companies in certain countries to have riders because of [[insurance]] reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

== [[Traffic light hitchhiking|Traffic lights]] ==

Traffic light are pretty good spots. All the cars are standing still so you can easily make eye contact with the drivers and signal you want a ride.

Sometimes it's harder for cars to pull over, especially if there is a lot of traffic. 
Try to get an idea of where cars might be able to pull over safely. Traffic lights right before a highway entrance, which often have a large space on the side of the road, can be good spots as they combine the time drivers spend at the lights with the safety of a large space to stop for you. If you're unfamiliar with the area, try to find a place like this using [http://maps.google.com Google Maps] or Google Earth before you depart.

== On the road ==

The countryside, especially where traffic speed is lower than about 60 km/h, can be a good place for hitching. Traffic on minor roads on the countryside can offer great rides to get to the nearest bigger city, or onto the main infrastructure. 

Often on bigger roads the slow, local traffic coming from smaller sideroads may provide excellent rides, and it is quite often quite easy to flag those drivers down, as a very personal and direct approach is often possible. 

Even national roads (non-motorway) often provide good space along the main flow of traffic, as there are often emergency lanes or so called [[Mehrzweckstreifen]]. 

Finally, hitchhiking on emergency lanes of motorways can be an option in case of traffic jams. In such situation using a [[signs|cardboard sign]] is usually highly effective. It is necessary though to take maximum safety precautions (we suppose you are smart enough to take these precautions), and you should know that hitchhiking on motorways is basically forbidden in most Western countries.

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]
[[zh:在哪里搭车]]</text>
      <sha1>pnxvpgc735au5uj4zw2yru7n4y2oqt3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>56701</id>
      <parentid>56342</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-14T20:34:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Eelke</username>
        <id>4027</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8676">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki or from the [[multimedia|internet]], including [http://maps.google.com Google Maps], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[picking up hitchhikers|how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stops ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a motorway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.
* It is often a dry place in case of wet weather.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station hitchhiking|Petrol stations]] ==
[[File:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a motorway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe and dry place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there might go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the farthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of (usually bad) [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* People who stop there might be local and not go very far.
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[File:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

Make sure that there is lots of room for a car to pull over '''safely''' and still allow other cars to pass. A shoulder large enough to safely park a truck is best. It is becoming easier to locate a safe spot by looking at [http://maps.google.com/ Google Maps] or Google Earth before you depart. Google Maps Streetview can be especially useful, in locations where it is available.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb. This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In most countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths / [[Péage]]s ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
* All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops.
* In most cases there is a good visibility and room to pull over.

=== Cons ===
* On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the motorways leaving [[Paris]])
* It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more than just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
* Truckers often go long distances
* Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
* Truckers often give you cash or food when they can't offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
* Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
* It is against the policy for trucking companies in certain countries to have riders because of [[insurance]] reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

== [[Traffic light hitchhiking|Traffic lights]] ==

Traffic light are pretty good spots. All the cars are standing still so you can easily make eye contact with the drivers and signal you want a ride.

Sometimes it's harder for cars to pull over, especially if there is a lot of traffic. 
Try to get an idea of where cars might be able to pull over safely. Traffic lights right before a highway entrance, which often have a large space on the side of the road, can be good spots as they combine the time drivers spend at the lights with the safety of a large space to stop for you. If you're unfamiliar with the area, try to find a place like this using [http://maps.google.com Google Maps] or Google Earth before you depart.

== On the road ==

The countryside, especially where traffic speed is lower than about 60 km/h, can be a good place for hitching. Traffic on minor roads on the countryside can offer great rides to get to the nearest bigger city, or onto the main infrastructure. 

Often on bigger roads the slow, local traffic coming from smaller sideroads may provide excellent rides, and it is quite often quite easy to flag those drivers down, as a very personal and direct approach is often possible. 

Even national roads (non-motorway) often provide good space along the main flow of traffic, as there are often emergency lanes or so called [[Mehrzweckstreifen]]. 

Finally, hitchhiking on emergency lanes of motorways can be an option in case of traffic jams. In such situation using a [[signs|cardboard sign]] is usually highly effective. It is necessary though to take maximum safety precautions (we suppose you are smart enough to take these precautions), and you should know that hitchhiking on motorways is basically forbidden in most Western countries.

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]
[[zh:在哪里搭车]]</text>
      <sha1>3xurtddf3rjrdxj17dv38q8pw5svwm5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104103</id>
      <parentid>56701</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-03-22T15:01:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8726">A good '''hitchhiking spot''' makes hitchhiking safer and easier. Finding a good spot might be tricky, and sometimes knowing the area is an advantage. If you know your route, you might check the best places on this wiki, [https://hitchwiki.org/maps the hitchhiking map] or from the [[multimedia|internet]], including [http://maps.google.com Google Maps], before heading to the road.

There are some generic hitchhiking places, like petrol stations, bus stops etc. This page attempts to provide an understanding about where you should hitchhike.

: ''See also the article on [[picking up hitchhikers|how to pick up hitchhikers]].''

== Bus stops ==
Bus stops are in some cases the only place to hitchhike legally. This is the case when a driver drops you off in a cross-section of a motorway. 

=== Pros ===
* It is a safe place to stand.
* It is a safe place for the drivers to stop.
* It is often a dry place in case of wet weather.

=== Cons ===
* The drivers might think you are waiting for a bus. You can avoid this by using a big sign.
* In poorer countries those who stop might want money for the ride.

== [[Petrol station hitchhiking|Petrol stations]] ==
[[File:Hitchmonk.jpg|thumb|right|400px|A monk from the Holy Hitch-hiking Order near Arles, [[France]].]]
Petrol stations are good places to ask for a ride, especially while hitchhiking along a motorway.

=== Pros ===
* Almost always a safe and dry place.
* Often marked on maps, and sometimes mentioned on sign posts well in advance, so more forward planning is possible.
* People who stop there might go very far.
** Higher chance of meeting truck drivers, known for traveling the farthest distances.
* You can and should ask for a ride from drivers.
** Be friendly, and always say thanks and so on, even if the driver is going the right direction but doesn't want to take you. If you get annoyed because someone says no, the next person you ask will notice your annoyance and will be less eager to take you.
* Thumbing is easy, as the cars drive slowly.
* Possibly warm.
* Sometimes a convenient (but often expensive) source of (usually bad) [[food]], drinks, [[maps]] and toilets.

=== Cons ===
* People who stop there might be local and not go very far.
* You miss the cars passing the station.
* Often difficult to access from city centers at the beginning of your journey, so can be bad starting points.

== On ramps ==
[[File:Spot-sharing.jpg|thumb|right|400px|Workshop during the [[888]]-event on where to hitchhike from in [[Paris]]]] 
On ramps to freeways and interstates are prime realty as long as the driver has room to pull over. A good spot to stand usually is beside the ''no pedestrians'' sign.

Make sure that there is lots of room for a car to pull over '''safely''' and still allow other cars to pass. A shoulder large enough to safely park a truck is best. It is becoming easier to locate a safe spot by looking at [http://maps.google.com/ Google Maps] or Google Earth before you depart. Google Maps Streetview can be especially useful, in locations where it is available.

In many places in the United States, on ramps are the '''only''' legal option for places to thumb. This includes the entire state of Tennessee. In most countries in Europe you can legally hitch on a slip-road leading onto the motorway, '''as long as you stand in front of the motorway sign.'''

== Toll Booths / [[Péage]]s ==
In some countries the motorways or a part of them are toll roads, so the places where drivers stop to pay might be very good spots to get a ride, since all the traffic going your direction can see you. Other type of toll booths is only stopping the traffic joining/leaving the motorway on one particular exit, there the traffic will be much more weak. 
=== Pros ===
* All the through traffic on the motorway slows down and stops.
* In most cases there is a good visibility and room to pull over.

=== Cons ===
* On roads with heavy traffic they are very huge and only the cars from the first lanes can see you (for example on the motorways leaving [[Paris]])
* It might be forbidden for pedestrians (and consequently for hitchers). The way it is enforced (or not enforced) vary greatly though, depending on the country you're in, and even within the same country depending on the network you're on and your particular luck that day. Sometimes the motorway staff can call the police if they see you, other times police passes by and doesn't care.

== Truck Stops ==
Flying J, Pilot, TA and other truck stops can be good hitching spots.
Truck stops, like petrol stops are frequented by more than just trucks. This is a good place to get picked up by young folks who are traveling across the country on summer vacation, or by the older crowd who are on a long trip by themselves.
=== Pros ===
* Truckers often go long distances
* Truck stops often have cheap food, a lounging area, showers, internet, and restrooms
* Truckers often give you cash or food when they can't offer a ride 

=== Cons ===
* Generally it is against truck stop policy (though not always enforced) to allow soliciting, including for rides 
* It is against the policy for trucking companies in certain countries to have riders because of [[insurance]] reasons

== Outside of town ==
Before or after a town is a good place to hitch. Usually where the speed limit changes or main area of businesses and housing ends.

== Anywhere cars can pull over safely ==
* huge parking spaces
Nine times out of ten you can get a ride anywhere there is a parking lot;(i.e. park and ride).

== [[Traffic light hitchhiking|Traffic lights]] ==

Traffic light are pretty good spots. All the cars are standing still so you can easily make eye contact with the drivers and signal you want a ride.

Sometimes it's harder for cars to pull over, especially if there is a lot of traffic. 
Try to get an idea of where cars might be able to pull over safely. Traffic lights right before a highway entrance, which often have a large space on the side of the road, can be good spots as they combine the time drivers spend at the lights with the safety of a large space to stop for you. If you're unfamiliar with the area, try to find a place like this using [http://maps.google.com Google Maps] or Google Earth before you depart.

== On the road ==

The countryside, especially where traffic speed is lower than about 60 km/h, can be a good place for hitching. Traffic on minor roads on the countryside can offer great rides to get to the nearest bigger city, or onto the main infrastructure. 

Often on bigger roads the slow, local traffic coming from smaller sideroads may provide excellent rides, and it is quite often quite easy to flag those drivers down, as a very personal and direct approach is often possible. 

Even national roads (non-motorway) often provide good space along the main flow of traffic, as there are often emergency lanes or so called [[Mehrzweckstreifen]]. 

Finally, hitchhiking on emergency lanes of motorways can be an option in case of traffic jams. In such situation using a [[signs|cardboard sign]] is usually highly effective. It is necessary though to take maximum safety precautions (we suppose you are smart enough to take these precautions), and you should know that hitchhiking on motorways is basically forbidden in most Western countries.

== Asking locals about good hitchhiking spots ==
Asking local people about the best spots to hitchhike from in the area is a great way to save time. They may even give you a lift themselves. Ask them about the generic hitchhiking places mentioned above, and ask them where they have seen any hitchhikers before. Although what they say is not always useful or even truthful, asking several locals and comparing their advice will give you a good impression of the layout of the area.

== Leaving the vehicle ==
When leaving the vehicle, if you are planning to look for another ride immediately after, then make sure you are on or near a hitchhiking spot when you say goodbye to the driver. Try to choose the spot yourself by looking out of the vehicle window - despite their efforts to help, drivers are often very ignorant about what makes a useful hitchhiking spot and their advice can range from brilliant to terrible. Often it's not worth taking the risk.

It is easy to lose hours by making mistakes such as standing on the wrong road, or the wrong side of the road. Make sure you know which road you want to be on, and keep checking the road signs so that you know where you are on your map and where you will leave the vehicle. This is especially important when traveling across cities.

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Trampstelle]]
[[fi:Liftauspaikat]]
[[fr:L'endroit idéal pour poucer]]
[[zh:在哪里搭车]]</text>
      <sha1>mirrx2p9x1yufhbpvww12jxkr3jsbfa</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Hitchhiker's safety</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1509</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1523</id>
      <parentid>4253</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-12T22:20:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3499">'''Hitchhiking is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.

==Top tips for safety==
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* It's probably safest to accept a ride from a couple or a single driver.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

==Women hitchhiking==
For women, hitchhiking can be a bit more risky. Here are some tips to consider:
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly. 
* It might be useful to send the license plate of your driver to a friend in a [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Short_message_service SMS].
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.

Apart from being more dangerous, hitchhiking as a woman can be easier. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usually not hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in danger.


----
Three important factors for safe travel while hitchhiking are '''road safety''', '''awareness''' and '''communication''':

===Road Safety===
The #1 danger to a hitchhiker is not violence; it is traffic accidents. As a result, hitchhikers should make sure they are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road.

===Awareness===
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

===Communication===
Communication is essential to make sure the ride offered is one that the hitchhiker would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

==See also==
* [[Where to hitchhike]]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>c3k0ui6sgl4deeik5naor5wc3es83xi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1524</id>
      <parentid>1523</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3499">'''Hitchhiking is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.

==Top tips for safety==
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* It's probably safest to accept a ride from a couple or a single driver.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

==Women hitchhiking==
For women, hitchhiking can be a bit more risky. Here are some tips to consider:
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly. 
* It might be useful to send the license plate of your driver to a friend in a [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Short_message_service SMS].
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.

Apart from being more dangerous, hitchhiking as a woman can be easier. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usually not hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in danger.


----
Three important factors for safe travel while hitchhiking are '''road safety''', '''awareness''' and '''communication''':

===Road Safety===
The #1 danger to a hitchhiker is not violence; it is traffic accidents. As a result, hitchhikers should make sure they are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road.

===Awareness===
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

===Communication===
Communication is essential to make sure the ride offered is one that the hitchhiker would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

==See also==
* [[Where to hitchhike]]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>c3k0ui6sgl4deeik5naor5wc3es83xi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4244</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-17T12:45:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GuakaTest</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="549">Hitchhiking is usually very safe. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.

It is preferable to choose your drivers, i.e. to be at a gas station and to ask only the people with whom you would feel okay.

Keep stuff like money, phone, passport on your body, so that you still have that if you need to "abandon" the vehicle.
Try to keep your bags close to you as well.

==Women hitchhiking==
For women it might be a bit more risky. It is a good idea to get yourself some pepper spray, just in case.</text>
      <sha1>migfze9km74finexgy5dcx1ye5m9j4f</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4245</id>
      <parentid>4244</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T21:19:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1895">Hitchhiking is usually very safe. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.

It is preferable to choose your drivers, i.e. to be at a gas station and to ask only the people with whom you would feel okay.

Keep stuff like money, phone, passport on your body, so that you still have that if you need to "abandon" the vehicle.
Try to keep your bags close to you as well.

==Women hitchhiking==
For women it might be a bit more risky. It is a good idea to get yourself some pepper spray, just in case.


...

The most important factors for safe travel while hitchhiking are road safety, awareness and communication.

===Road Safety===
The #1 danger to a hitchhiker is not violence; it is traffic accidents. As a result, hitchhikers should make sure they are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road.

===Awareness===
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

===Communication===
Communication is essential to make sure the ride offered is one that the hitchhiker would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? Trust your instincts. If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.</text>
      <sha1>9amit71wxxmmpw695atxglugrxdhckm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4246</id>
      <parentid>4245</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-22T14:21:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1939">Hitchhiking is usually very safe. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.

It is preferable to choose your drivers, i.e. to be at a gas station and to ask only the people with whom you would feel okay.

Keep stuff like money, phone, passport on your body, so that you still have that if you need to "abandon" the vehicle.
Try to keep your bags close to you as well.

==Women hitchhiking==
For women it might be a bit more risky. It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case.


...

The most important factors for safe travel while hitchhiking are road safety, awareness and communication.

===Road Safety===
The #1 danger to a hitchhiker is not violence; it is traffic accidents. As a result, hitchhikers should make sure they are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road.

===Awareness===
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

===Communication===
Communication is essential to make sure the ride offered is one that the hitchhiker would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? Trust your instincts. If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.</text>
      <sha1>3svdqt5ig1mx02x14efo5j5v6cowsvi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4247</id>
      <parentid>4246</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-22T17:04:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2457">Hitchhiking is usually very safe. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.

==Top tips for safety==
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour.
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums, such as at Hospitality Club, you can find other hitchhikers.
* It's probably safest to go with a couple or a single driver.
* It's better to sit in the front.
* Keep your backpack close to you, so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money.

It is preferable to choose your drivers, i.e. to be at a gas station and to ask only the people with whom you would feel okay.

Keep stuff like money, phone, passport on your body, so that you still have that if you need to "abandon" the vehicle.
Try to keep your bags close to you as well.

==Women hitchhiking==
For women it might be a bit more risky. It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case.


...

The most important factors for safe travel while hitchhiking are road safety, awareness and communication.

===Road Safety===
The #1 danger to a hitchhiker is not violence; it is traffic accidents. As a result, hitchhikers should make sure they are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road.

===Awareness===
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

===Communication===
Communication is essential to make sure the ride offered is one that the hitchhiker would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? Trust your instincts. If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.</text>
      <sha1>hsvou4yiwnfooks1pz0q7ert6wfvlb4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4248</id>
      <parentid>4247</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-23T16:52:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Deleea</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3078">Hitchhiking is usually very safe. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.

==Top tips for safety==
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour.
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums, such as at Hospitality Club, you can find other hitchhikers.
* It's probably safest to go with a couple or a single driver.
* It's better to sit in the front.
* Keep your backpack close to you, so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money.

It is preferable to choose your drivers, i.e. to be at a gas station and to ask only the people with whom you would feel okay.

Keep stuff like money, phone, passport on your body, so that you still have that if you need to "abandon" the vehicle.
Try to keep your bags close to you as well.

==Women hitchhiking==
For women it might be a bit more risky. It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case.
You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly. 
Never useless is to send the license plate of your driver to a friend in a SMS.
If there are other houses or people in sight-distance you can wave to them and pretend to say goodbye to a friend. So the driver thinks somebody has seen you getting into his car. 

Apart from being more dangerous hitchiking as a woman is usually also easier. Often women just stop for other women or girls. Even families or other usually not hitch-hiker-friendly car-owners stop to save you from being raped, robbed or murdered. 
...

The most important factors for safe travel while hitchhiking are road safety, awareness and communication.

===Road Safety===
The #1 danger to a hitchhiker is not violence; it is traffic accidents. As a result, hitchhikers should make sure they are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road.

===Awareness===
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

===Communication===
Communication is essential to make sure the ride offered is one that the hitchhiker would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.</text>
      <sha1>3b8a93ss42fpq5oblj4um2rffpxoxf0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4249</id>
      <parentid>4248</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-03-29T17:41:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3105">Hitchhiking is usually very safe. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.

==Top tips for safety==
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour.
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums, such as at Hospitality Club, you can find other hitchhikers.
* It's probably safest to go with a couple or a single driver.
* It's better to sit in the front.
* Keep your backpack close to you, so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money.

It is preferable to choose your drivers, i.e. to be at a gas station and to ask only the people with whom you would feel okay.

Keep stuff like money, phone, passport on your body, so that you still have that if you need to "abandon" the vehicle.
Try to keep your bags close to you as well.

==Women hitchhiking==
For women it might be a bit more risky. It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case.
You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly. 
Never useless is to send the license plate of your driver to a friend in a SMS.
If there are other houses or people in sight-distance you can wave to them and pretend to say goodbye to a friend. So the driver thinks somebody has seen you getting into his car. 

Apart from being more dangerous hitchiking as a woman is usually also easier. Often women just stop for other women or girls. Even families or other usually not hitch-hiker-friendly car-owners stop to save you from being raped, robbed or murdered. 
...

The most important factors for safe travel while hitchhiking are road safety, awareness and communication.

===Road Safety===
The #1 danger to a hitchhiker is not violence; it is traffic accidents. As a result, hitchhikers should make sure they are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road.

===Awareness===
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

===Communication===
Communication is essential to make sure the ride offered is one that the hitchhiker would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>n1gir5cllicmsskl1c645itx5b2xrav</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4250</id>
      <parentid>4249</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-04-07T17:24:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>84.40.25.240</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3200">Hitchhiking is usually very safe. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.

==Top tips for safety==
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums, such as at Hospitality Club or DigiHitch, you can find other hitchhikers.
* It's probably safest to go with a couple or a single driver.
* It's better to sit in the front.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

==Women hitchhiking==
For women it might be a bit more risky. It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case.
You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly. 
Never useless is to send the license plate of your driver to a friend in a SMS.
If there are other houses or people in sight-distance you can wave to them and pretend to say goodbye to a friend. So the driver thinks somebody has seen you getting into his car. 

Apart from being more dangerous hitchiking as a woman is usually also easier. Often women just stop for other women or girls. Even families or other usually not hitch-hiker-friendly car-owners stop to save you from being raped, robbed or murdered. 
...

The most important factors for safe travel while hitchhiking are road safety, awareness and communication.

===Road Safety===
The #1 danger to a hitchhiker is not violence; it is traffic accidents. As a result, hitchhikers should make sure they are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road.

===Awareness===
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

===Communication===
Communication is essential to make sure the ride offered is one that the hitchhiker would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>q8pt80zdqjl77s0j1xl7nw0csjuk0rl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4251</id>
      <parentid>4250</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-04-07T17:39:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>84.40.25.240</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3335">Hitchhiking is usually very safe. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.

==Top tips for safety==
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums, such as at Hospitality Club or DigiHitch, you can find other hitchhikers.
* It's probably safest to go with a couple or a single driver.
* It's better to sit in the front.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

==Women hitchhiking==
For women, hitchhiking can be a bit more risky. Here are some tips to consider:
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly. 
* It might be useful to send the license plate of your driver to a friend in a [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Short_message_service SMS].
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.

Apart from being more dangerous, hitchhiking as a woman can be easier. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usually not hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in danger.


----
Three important factors for safe travel while hitchhiking are '''road safety''', '''awareness''' and '''communication''':

===Road Safety===
The #1 danger to a hitchhiker is not violence; it is traffic accidents. As a result, hitchhikers should make sure they are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road.

===Awareness===
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

===Communication===
Communication is essential to make sure the ride offered is one that the hitchhiker would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>d3afzxgyvnnx7mnej6incd7dyjcm3dh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4252</id>
      <parentid>4251</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-04-07T17:43:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>24.9.125.18</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3421">Hitchhiking is usually very safe. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.

==Top tips for safety==
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* It's probably safest to accept a ride from a couple or a single driver.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

==Women hitchhiking==
For women, hitchhiking can be a bit more risky. Here are some tips to consider:
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly. 
* It might be useful to send the license plate of your driver to a friend in a [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Short_message_service SMS].
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.

Apart from being more dangerous, hitchhiking as a woman can be easier. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usually not hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in danger.


----
Three important factors for safe travel while hitchhiking are '''road safety''', '''awareness''' and '''communication''':

===Road Safety===
The #1 danger to a hitchhiker is not violence; it is traffic accidents. As a result, hitchhikers should make sure they are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road.

===Awareness===
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

===Communication===
Communication is essential to make sure the ride offered is one that the hitchhiker would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>bzgtvbzm6b1msda3q5plazo8u4nt1b7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4253</id>
      <parentid>4252</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-04-12T16:08:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3454">Hitchhiking is usually very safe. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.

==Top tips for safety==
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* It's probably safest to accept a ride from a couple or a single driver.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

==Women hitchhiking==
For women, hitchhiking can be a bit more risky. Here are some tips to consider:
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly. 
* It might be useful to send the license plate of your driver to a friend in a [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Short_message_service SMS].
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.

Apart from being more dangerous, hitchhiking as a woman can be easier. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usually not hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in danger.


----
Three important factors for safe travel while hitchhiking are '''road safety''', '''awareness''' and '''communication''':

===Road Safety===
The #1 danger to a hitchhiker is not violence; it is traffic accidents. As a result, hitchhikers should make sure they are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road.

===Awareness===
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

===Communication===
Communication is essential to make sure the ride offered is one that the hitchhiker would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>24gj0e5dr0rtqb06a8ww9wbr2qy5pd7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4254</id>
      <parentid>1524</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3499">'''Hitchhiking is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.

==Top tips for safety==
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* It's probably safest to accept a ride from a couple or a single driver.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

==Women hitchhiking==
For women, hitchhiking can be a bit more risky. Here are some tips to consider:
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly. 
* It might be useful to send the license plate of your driver to a friend in a [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Short_message_service SMS].
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.

Apart from being more dangerous, hitchhiking as a woman can be easier. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usually not hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in danger.


----
Three important factors for safe travel while hitchhiking are '''road safety''', '''awareness''' and '''communication''':

===Road Safety===
The #1 danger to a hitchhiker is not violence; it is traffic accidents. As a result, hitchhikers should make sure they are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road.

===Awareness===
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

===Communication===
Communication is essential to make sure the ride offered is one that the hitchhiker would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

==See also==
* [[Where to hitchhike]]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>c3k0ui6sgl4deeik5naor5wc3es83xi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10035</id>
      <parentid>4254</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-01-01T13:11:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>83.208.93.77</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3584">'''Hitchhiking is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.

==Top tips for safety==
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* It's probably safest to accept a ride from a couple or a single driver.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

==Women hitchhiking==
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. Most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone. Here are some tips to consider:
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly. 
* It might be useful to send the license plate of your driver to a friend in a [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Short_message_service SMS].
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.

Apart from being more dangerous, hitchhiking as a woman can be easier. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usually not hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in danger.


----
Three important factors for safe travel while hitchhiking are '''road safety''', '''awareness''' and '''communication''':

===Road Safety===
The #1 danger to a hitchhiker is not violence; it is traffic accidents. As a result, hitchhikers should make sure they are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road.

===Awareness===
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

===Communication===
Communication is essential to make sure the ride offered is one that the hitchhiker would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

==See also==
* [[Where to hitchhike]]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>2jfnmdnq365sqn2to8otwjioj67dxzb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10036</id>
      <parentid>10035</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-01-01T13:15:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>83.208.93.77</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3900">'''Hitchhiking is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.

==Top tips for safety==
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* It's probably safest to accept a ride from a couple or a single driver.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

==Women hitchhiking==
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. Most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone. Here are some tips to consider:
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly. 
* It might be useful to send the license plate of your driver to a friend in a [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Short_message_service SMS].
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.

Apart from being more dangerous, hitchhiking as a woman can be easier. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usually not hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in danger.


----
Three important factors for safe travel while hitchhiking are '''road safety''', '''awareness''' and '''communication''':

===Road Safety===
The #1 danger to a hitchhiker is not violence; it is traffic accidents. As a result, hitchhikers should make sure they are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively at night, drivers will pick up a hitchhiker because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someones car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.

===Awareness===
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

===Communication===
Communication is essential to make sure the ride offered is one that the hitchhiker would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

==See also==
* [[Where to hitchhike]]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>676aep35walffnlx72ekmnbap2no9oz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10458</id>
      <parentid>10036</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-07T19:44:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>66.189.9.198</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3900">'''Hitchhiking is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.

==Top tips for safety==
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* It's probably safest to accept a ride from a couple or a female driver.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

==Women hitchhiking==
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. Most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone. Here are some tips to consider:
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly. 
* It might be useful to send the license plate of your driver to a friend in a [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Short_message_service SMS].
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.

Apart from being more dangerous, hitchhiking as a woman can be easier. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usually not hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in danger.


----
Three important factors for safe travel while hitchhiking are '''road safety''', '''awareness''' and '''communication''':

===Road Safety===
The #1 danger to a hitchhiker is not violence; it is traffic accidents. As a result, hitchhikers should make sure they are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively at night, drivers will pick up a hitchhiker because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someones car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.

===Awareness===
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

===Communication===
Communication is essential to make sure the ride offered is one that the hitchhiker would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

==See also==
* [[Where to hitchhike]]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>sttbsrrvwntpcy2z41jdfxb5wjtg9uh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10828</id>
      <parentid>10458</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-17T12:45:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Abstorz</username>
        <id>73</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3916">'''Hitchhiking is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.


===Road Safety===
The #1 danger to a hitchhiker is not violence; it is traffic accidents. As a result, hitchhikers should make sure they are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively at night, drivers will pick up a hitchhiker because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someones car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.

===Awareness===
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

===Communication===
Communication is essential to make sure the ride offered is one that the hitchhiker would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

==Women hitchhiking==
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. Most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone. Here are some tips to consider:
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly. 
* It might be useful to send the license plate of your driver to a friend in a [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Short_message_service SMS].
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.

Apart from being more dangerous, hitchhiking as a woman can be easier. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usually not hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in danger.

==Top tips for safety==
* Wear well visible clothes, stand in a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* It's probably safest to accept a ride from a couple or a female driver.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

==See also==
* [[Where to hitchhike]]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>3ofzbx5cpl9unrmv62e5x3nliwtrunx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10829</id>
      <parentid>10828</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-17T12:50:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Abstorz</username>
        <id>73</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4030">'''Hitchhiking is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.


==Road Safety==
The #1 danger to a hitchhiker is not violence; it is traffic accidents. As a result, hitchhikers should make sure they are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively at night, drivers will pick up a hitchhiker because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someones car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.

==Awareness==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

==Women hitchhiking==
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. Most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone. Here are some tips to consider:
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly. 
* It might be useful to send the license plate of your driver to a friend in a [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Short_message_service SMS].
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.

Apart from being more dangerous, hitchhiking as a woman can be easier. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usually not hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in danger.

==Top tips for safety==
* Wear well visible clothes, stand in a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* It's probably safest to accept a ride from a couple or a female driver.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

==See also==
* [[Where to hitchhike]]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>92rt09t8ictv9uz7xorqphvix0chpbh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11853</id>
      <parentid>10829</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-06-22T10:53:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tmoon</username>
        <id>91</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4902">'''Hitchhiking is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.


==Road Safety==
Hitchhikers like to claim that the #1 danger to a hitchhiker is not violence; it is traffic accidents. You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively at night, drivers will pick up a hitchhiker because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someones car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.

==Awareness==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

==Women hitchhiking==
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. Most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone. Here are some tips to consider:
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly. 
* It might be useful to send the license plate of your driver to a friend in a [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Short_message_service SMS].
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.

Apart from being more dangerous, hitchhiking as a woman can be easier. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usually not hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in danger.

==Top tips for safety==
* Wear well visible clothes, stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* It's probably safest to accept a ride from a couple or a female driver.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

==Leaving the vehicle early==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.


==See also==
* [[Where to hitchhike]]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>d56qzbm2cam6tu60ygpzsacwyaae1eq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12396</id>
      <parentid>11853</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-25T01:32:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zac Stewart</username>
        <id>5</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4942">'''Hitchhiking is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.


==Road Safety==
Hitchhikers like to claim that the #1 danger to a hitchhiker is not violence; it is traffic accidents. You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively at night, drivers will pick up a hitchhiker because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someones car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.

==Awareness==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

==Women hitchhiking==
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. Most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone. Here are some tips to consider:
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly. 
* It might be useful to send the license plate of your driver to a friend in a [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Short_message_service SMS].
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.

Apart from being more dangerous, hitchhiking as a woman can be easier. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usually not hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in danger.

==Top tips for safety==
* Wear well visible clothes, stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* It's probably safest to accept a ride from a couple or a female driver.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

==Leaving the vehicle early==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.


==See also==
*[[Where to hitchhike]]
*[[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>tuv96m0cgylu8yzeg99dbfmptd0vwt3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13586</id>
      <parentid>12396</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-12T05:11:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>83.153.92.176</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5423">'''Hitchhiking is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.


==Road Safety==
Hitchhikers like to claim that the #1 danger to a hitchhiker is not violence; it is traffic accidents. You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively at night, drivers will pick up a hitchhiker because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someones car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.

==Awareness==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

==Women hitchhiking==
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. Most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone. Here are some tips to consider:
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly. 
* It might be useful to send the license plate of your driver to a friend in a [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Short_message_service SMS].
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.

Apart from being more dangerous, hitchhiking as a woman can be easier. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usually not hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in danger.

==Top tips for safety==
* Wear well visible clothes, stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your insticts.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just dont jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in Vestern europe anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

==Leaving the vehicle early==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.


==See also==
*[[Where to hitchhike]]
*[[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>o8dfb5ntd4tb93tfeumkpntjxb61xzj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13587</id>
      <parentid>13586</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-12T05:41:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>83.153.92.176</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6263">'''Hitchhiking is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.


==Road Safety==
Hitchhikers like to claim that the #1 danger to a hitchhiker is not violence; it is traffic accidents. You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively at night, drivers will pick up a hitchhiker because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someones car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.

==Awareness==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

==Women hitchhiking==
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many guy's are reporting of the same amount of violasion as wommen. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone it is becouse that men are not so likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world) and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" when it comes to men. 

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usually not hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the sociaty menny people think that wommen are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And of cousre becouse of sexism in the sociaty wommen tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

==Top tips for safety==
* Wear well visible clothes, stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illigal to carry in some parts of the world so bee awear.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving longdistance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beggining. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will wisit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your insticts.
* Think possetiv and you will atract possetiv. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just dont jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in Vestern europe anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone... 

==Leaving the vehicle early==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.


==See also==
*[[Where to hitchhike]]
*[[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>714gisk3kpva3hw2x3j3jyi1y6r9amr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13716</id>
      <parentid>13587</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-13T11:20:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>64.157.15.26</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6260">'''Hitchhiking is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.


==Road Safety==
Hitchhikers like to claim that the #1 danger to a hitchhiker is not violence; it is traffic accidents. You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively at night, drivers will pick up a hitchhiker because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someones car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.

==Awareness==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

==Women hitchhiking==
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. 

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usually-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

==Top tips for safety==
* Wear well visible clothes, stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illigal to carry in some parts of the world so bee awear.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving longdistance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beggining. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will wisit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your insticts.
* Think possetiv and you will atract possetiv. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just dont jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in Vestern europe anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone... 

==Leaving the vehicle early==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.


==See also==
*[[Where to hitchhike]]
*[[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>7tskq674p1o15q9c0l46otp2iejuehc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14649</id>
      <parentid>13716</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-11T21:16:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>70.83.154.41</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6259">'''Hitchhiking is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.


==Road Safety==
Hitchhikers like to claim that the #1 danger to a hitchhiker is not violence; it is traffic accidents. You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively at night, drivers will pick up a hitchhiker because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someones car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.

==Awareness==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

==Women hitchhiking==
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. 

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usually-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

==Top tips for safety==
* Wear well visible clothes, stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illigal to carry in some parts of the world so bee awear.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving longdistance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beggining. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will wisit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your insticts.
* Think positive and you will atract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just dont jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in Vestern europe anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

==Leaving the vehicle early==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.


==See also==
*[[Where to hitchhike]]
*[[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>q9pvsy6j9m6bqzpu3z8ob1gksz1w7yd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15320</id>
      <parentid>14649</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-01T18:35:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>24.10.239.226</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6258">'''Hitchhiking is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.


==Road Safety==
Hitchhikers like to claim that the #1 danger to a hitchhiker is not violence; it is traffic accidents. You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively at night, drivers will pick up a hitchhiker because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someones car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.

==Awareness==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

==Women hitchhiking==
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. 

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usually-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

==Top tips for safety==
* Wear well visible clothes, stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving longdistance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beggining. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will wisit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your insticts.
* Think positive and you will atract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just dont jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in Vestern europe anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

==Leaving the vehicle early==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.


==See also==
*[[Where to hitchhike]]
*[[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>aswugpcr7ks9v9zg8bspcscj4jftydb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15445</id>
      <parentid>15320</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-06T16:07:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6256">'''Hitchhiking is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.


==Road Safety==
Hitchhikers like to claim that the #1 danger to a hitchhiker is not violence; it is traffic accidents. You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively at night, drivers will pick up a hitchhiker because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someones car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.

==Awareness==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

==Women hitchhiking==
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. 

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

==Top tips for safety==
* Wear well visible clothes, stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving longdistance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beggining. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will wisit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your insticts.
* Think positive and you will atract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just dont jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in Vestern europe anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

==Leaving the vehicle early==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.


==See also==
*[[Where to hitchhike]]
*[[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>rudj86af8v25lyr4ovs5sbypir2nk32</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15520</id>
      <parentid>15445</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-06T21:15:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6153">'''Hitchhiking is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.


==Road Safety==
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively at night, drivers will pick up a hitchhiker because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someones car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.

==Awareness==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

==Women hitchhiking==
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. 

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

==Top tips for safety==
* Wear well visible clothes, stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving longdistance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beggining. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will wisit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your insticts.
* Think positive and you will atract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just dont jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in Vestern europe anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

==Leaving the vehicle early==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.


==See also==
*[[Where to hitchhike]]
*[[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>t9lq5vnhbfyg8qp5qetbevmripid5ok</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15521</id>
      <parentid>15520</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-06T21:17:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6211">'''Hitchhiking is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.


==Road Safety==
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively at night, drivers will pick up a hitchhiker because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someones car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.

==Awareness==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

==Women hitchhiking==
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. 

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

==Top tips for safety==
* Wear well visible clothes, stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving longdistance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beggining. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will wisit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your insticts.
* Think positive and you will atract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just dont jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in Vestern europe anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

==Leaving the vehicle early==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.


==See also==
*[[Where to hitchhike]]
*[[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>b3pge51zfkoz9elyaet2g9iph669skf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15785</id>
      <parentid>15521</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-09T06:15:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>169.229.154.187</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6212">'''Hitchhiking is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.


==Road Safety==
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively at night, drivers will pick up a hitchhiker because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someones car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.

==Awareness==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

==Women hitchhiking==
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. 

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

==Top tips for safety==
* Wear well visible clothes, stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving longdistance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beggining. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will wisit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your insticts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just dont jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in Vestern europe anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

==Leaving the vehicle early==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.


==See also==
*[[Where to hitchhike]]
*[[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>d2xw1wkar3dqrdwebn6x2lhh0ikaxgr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16689</id>
      <parentid>15785</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-26T05:18:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>193.200.193.200</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6219">montrt
'''Hitchhiking is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.


==Road Safety==
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively at night, drivers will pick up a hitchhiker because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someones car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.

==Awareness==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

==Women hitchhiking==
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. 

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

==Top tips for safety==
* Wear well visible clothes, stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving longdistance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beggining. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will wisit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your insticts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just dont jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in Vestern europe anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

==Leaving the vehicle early==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.


==See also==
*[[Where to hitchhike]]
*[[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>3yfacheselwc5i7sr48ktytisrfhg95</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16707</id>
      <parentid>16689</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-26T10:56:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6227">'''Hitchhiking is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.


== Road Safety ==
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively at night, drivers will pick up a hitchhiker because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someones car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== Women hitchhiking ==
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. 

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

== Top tips for safety ==
* Wear well visible clothes, stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving longdistance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beggining. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will wisit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your insticts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just dont jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in Vestern europe anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.


== See also ==
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>it34a8jnx28w2jafyk7ye5kq3pqrfbq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17908</id>
      <parentid>16707</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-13T23:30:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>213.46.66.142</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6632">'''Hitchhiking is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.


== Road Safety ==
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively at night, drivers will pick up a hitchhiker because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.

The hitch-hiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitch-hiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== Women hitchhiking ==
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. 

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

== Top tips for safety ==
* Wear well visible clothes, stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving longdistance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beggining. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will wisit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your insticts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just dont jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in Vestern europe anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.


== See also ==
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>78b811j14xa60awv0lblr23odggigiv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18216</id>
      <parentid>17908</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-21T13:41:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>202.84.17.42</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6639">passit
'''Hitchhiking is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.


== Road Safety ==
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively at night, drivers will pick up a hitchhiker because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.

The hitch-hiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitch-hiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== Women hitchhiking ==
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. 

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

== Top tips for safety ==
* Wear well visible clothes, stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving longdistance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beggining. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will wisit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your insticts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just dont jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in Vestern europe anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.


== See also ==
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>ryo8koagip5lgyk52suh7w4sx8vmi7y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18219</id>
      <parentid>18216</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-21T13:43:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6632">'''Hitchhiking is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.


== Road Safety ==
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively at night, drivers will pick up a hitchhiker because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.

The hitch-hiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitch-hiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== Women hitchhiking ==
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. 

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

== Top tips for safety ==
* Wear well visible clothes, stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving longdistance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beggining. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will wisit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your insticts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just dont jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in Vestern europe anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.


== See also ==
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers


[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>78b811j14xa60awv0lblr23odggigiv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19280</id>
      <parentid>18219</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-04-01T11:44:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6650">'''Hitchhiking is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.


== Road Safety ==
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively at night, drivers will pick up a hitchhiker because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.

The hitch-hiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitch-hiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== Women hitchhiking ==
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. 

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

== Top tips for safety ==
* Wear well visible clothes, stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving longdistance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beggining. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will wisit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your insticts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just dont jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in Vestern europe anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.


== See also ==
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers

[[de:Sicherheit]]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>gqu7uwyormbgr3ppz106yhml8e5ogi5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19382</id>
      <parentid>19280</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-04-06T01:02:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6668">'''Hitchhiking is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.


== Road Safety ==
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively at night, drivers will pick up a hitchhiker because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.

The hitch-hiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitch-hiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== Women hitchhiking ==
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. 

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

== Top tips for safety ==
* Wear well visible clothes, stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving longdistance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beggining. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will wisit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your insticts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just dont jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in Vestern europe anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.


== See also ==
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]</text>
      <sha1>e0hdvw7srs9l23wvpxkby6wbejlud2a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19435</id>
      <parentid>19382</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-04-08T21:33:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6754">'''Hitchhiking is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.


== Road Safety ==
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively at night, drivers will pick up a hitchhiker because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.

The hitch-hiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitch-hiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== Women hitchhiking ==
[[Image:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. 

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

== Top tips for safety ==
* Wear well visible clothes, stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving longdistance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beggining. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will wisit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your insticts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just dont jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in Vestern europe anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.


== See also ==
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]</text>
      <sha1>ndz8hdip57647nbicrclikbj7re96s0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19441</id>
      <parentid>19435</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-04-08T22:16:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Amylin</username>
        <id>11</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6975">'''Hitchhiking is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.


== Road Safety ==

[[Image:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a highway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively at night, drivers will pick up a hitchhiker because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.

The hitch-hiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitch-hiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.


== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== Women hitchhiking ==
[[Image:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. 

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

== Top tips for safety ==
* Wear well visible clothes, stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving longdistance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beggining. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will wisit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your insticts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just dont jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in Vestern europe anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.


== See also ==
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]</text>
      <sha1>lqlduh9wc26vaugb9ztij8rs641yb9i</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19557</id>
      <parentid>19441</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-04-16T19:53:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7033">'''Hitchhiking is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.


== Road Safety ==

[[Image:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a highway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively at night, drivers will pick up a hitchhiker because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.

The hitch-hiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitch-hiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.


== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== Women hitchhiking ==
[[Image:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

== Top tips for safety ==
* Wear well visible clothes, stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving longdistance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beggining. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will wisit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your insticts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just dont jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in Vestern europe anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.


== See also ==
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]</text>
      <sha1>oojybacv7nzdowyhbv1a3u1tpal3dk9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19564</id>
      <parentid>19557</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-04-18T14:10:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7210">'''Hitchhiking is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.


== Road Safety ==

[[Image:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a highway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively at night, drivers will pick up a hitchhiker because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.

The hitch-hiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitch-hiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.


== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== Women hitchhiking ==
[[Image:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==
* Wear well visible clothes, stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving longdistance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beggining. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will wisit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your insticts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just dont jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in Vestern europe anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.


== See also ==
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]</text>
      <sha1>1poterxuhmd32v3u1pmcusi44851tmd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19649</id>
      <parentid>19564</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-04-25T11:37:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7376">'''Hitchhiking is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.


== Road Safety ==

[[Image:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a highway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively at night, drivers will pick up a hitchhiker because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.

The hitch-hiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitch-hiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.


== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== Women hitchhiking ==
[[Image:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==
* Wear well visible clothes, stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving longdistance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beggining. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will wisit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your insticts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just dont jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in Vestern europe anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.


== See also ==
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]</text>
      <sha1>t6m7kbn88x5zomp0t3olgz7ggyag2pr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19654</id>
      <parentid>19649</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-04-26T18:19:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7370">'''Hitchhiking is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.


== Road Safety ==

[[Image:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a highway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively at night, drivers will pick up a hitchhiker because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.

The hitch-hiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitch-hiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.


== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== Women hitchhiking ==
[[Image:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==
* Wear well visible clothes, stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving longdistance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beggining. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will wisit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your insticts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just dont jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in Vestern europe anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.


== See also ==
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]</text>
      <sha1>4pir1boeev9tiq0ikeromp3q2pfcthk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19658</id>
      <parentid>19654</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-04-26T18:21:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7446">'''Hitchhiking is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.


== Road Safety ==

[[Image:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a highway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively at night, drivers will pick up a hitchhiker because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.

The hitch-hiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitch-hiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.


== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== Women hitchhiking ==
[[Image:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==
* Wear well visible clothes, stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving longdistance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beggining. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will wisit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your insticts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at gas stations or truckstops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just dont jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in Vestern europe anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.


== See also ==
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]</text>
      <sha1>i2qhdnafbjqpx3qxr7ht4jbge9bho90</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21709</id>
      <parentid>19658</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-19T00:54:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7601">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.


== Road Safety ==

[[Image:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a highway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively at night, drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.  If you have a driving license you might indicate your driver of this fact.  In some cases he or she will be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.


== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== Women hitchhiking ==
[[Image:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==
* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[gas station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just dont jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.


== See also ==
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]</text>
      <sha1>1eq0o6e2h2gwyzezryf5w0b9md7cobl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21724</id>
      <parentid>21709</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-19T01:40:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7616">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.  


== Road Safety ==

[[Image:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a highway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively at night, drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.  If you have a driving license you might indicate your driver of this fact.  In some cases he or she will be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.


== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== Women hitchhiking ==
[[Image:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==
* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[gas station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just dont jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.


== See also ==
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]</text>
      <sha1>emmktu6tmatbg221gfg6u64o3gpifvz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21803</id>
      <parentid>21724</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-19T10:45:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7619">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.  


== Road Safety ==

[[Image:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a highway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.  If you have a driving license you might indicate your driver of this fact.  In some cases he or she will be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== Women hitchhiking ==
[[Image:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==
* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[gas station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just dont jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.


== See also ==
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]</text>
      <sha1>6083j23rd0opwvotqe7f7xxoqlqlydw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22928</id>
      <parentid>21803</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-27T08:40:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>IdoSet</username>
        <id>1421</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7757">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.  


== Road Safety ==

[[Image:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a highway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.  If you have a driving license you might indicate your driver of this fact.  In some cases he or she will be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== Women hitchhiking ==
[[Image:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==
&lt;kaltura-widget size='L' align='R' kwid='anp4bXoxNDhub3w2ODF8NjgxMDB8SG93IHRvIGhpdGNoIGhpa2Ugc2FmZWx5fHB5cjExNWJ1NHF8NWM1ZjgyMzUzOA==' /&gt;
* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[gas station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just dont jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.


== See also ==
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]</text>
      <sha1>b03t0ic2ye5ckkbrssohom0r77bv0yn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>25183</id>
      <parentid>22928</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-20T10:58:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7761">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.  


== Road Safety ==

[[Image:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a highway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.  If you have a driving license you might indicate your driver of this fact.  In some cases he or she will be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[Image:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==
&lt;kaltura-widget size='L' align='R' kwid='anp4bXoxNDhub3w2ODF8NjgxMDB8SG93IHRvIGhpdGNoIGhpa2Ugc2FmZWx5fHB5cjExNWJ1NHF8NWM1ZjgyMzUzOA==' /&gt;
* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[gas station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just dont jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.


== See also ==
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]</text>
      <sha1>svv5l4ie3514vufrq1qhe07v3ieajma</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26538</id>
      <parentid>25183</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-28T15:55:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7957">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.  


== Road Safety ==

[[Image:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a highway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.  If you have a driving license you might indicate your driver of this fact.  In some cases he or she will be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[Image:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==
&lt;kaltura-widget size='L' align='R' kwid='anp4bXoxNDhub3w2ODF8NjgxMDB8SG93IHRvIGhpdGNoIGhpa2Ugc2FmZWx5fHB5cjExNWJ1NHF8NWM1ZjgyMzUzOA==' /&gt;
* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[gas station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just dont jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

In case things go bad and the driver does not want to stop. ... Need more info...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident?
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

== See also ==
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]</text>
      <sha1>1aoy3jps4xf5d6qxy1jg0dm71p5atx9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26539</id>
      <parentid>26538</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-28T16:20:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8036">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.  


== Road Safety ==

[[Image:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a highway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.  If you have a driving license you might indicate your driver of this fact.  In some cases he or she will be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[Image:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==
&lt;kaltura-widget size='L' align='R' kwid='anp4bXoxNDhub3w2ODF8NjgxMDB8SG93IHRvIGhpdGNoIGhpa2Ugc2FmZWx5fHB5cjExNWJ1NHF8NWM1ZjgyMzUzOA==' /&gt;
* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[gas station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just dont jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic.  Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident?
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

== See also ==
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]</text>
      <sha1>51maljou3xm2p8r3spw2bo1mfv2pbkz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26573</id>
      <parentid>26539</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-29T11:40:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Amylin</username>
        <id>11</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8807">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.  


== Road Safety ==

[[Image:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a highway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.  If you have a driving license you might indicate your driver of this fact.  In some cases he or she will be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[Image:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==
&lt;kaltura-widget size='L' align='R' kwid='anp4bXoxNDhub3w2ODF8NjgxMDB8SG93IHRvIGhpdGNoIGhpa2Ugc2FmZWx5fHB5cjExNWJ1NHF8NWM1ZjgyMzUzOA==' /&gt;
* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[gas station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just dont jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic.  Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police.  Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured.  Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else.  Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it.  So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride.  Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]</text>
      <sha1>gkxo8j5pln2m76sbjj93k9jlod7h9qe</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27855</id>
      <parentid>26573</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-17T17:39:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8670">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.  


== Road Safety ==

[[Image:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a highway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.  If you have a driving license you might indicate your driver of this fact.  In some cases he or she will be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[Image:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[gas station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just dont jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic.  Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police.  Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured.  Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else.  Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it.  So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride.  Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]</text>
      <sha1>bb24yre5crut7cmds6e2af7r02glejv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27949</id>
      <parentid>27855</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-20T19:32:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Paxus</username>
        <id>1639</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8715">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.  


== Road Safety ==

[[Image:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a highway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.  If you have a driving license you might indicate your driver of this fact.  In some cases he or she will be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[Image:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[gas station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just dont jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic.  Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police.  Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured.  Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else.  Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it.  So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride.  Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]</text>
      <sha1>8a72bogqmoyhxcq4emvszkag1zjznfz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27950</id>
      <parentid>27949</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-20T19:36:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Paxus</username>
        <id>1639</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8787">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.  


== Road Safety ==

[[Image:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a highway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.  If you have a driving license you might indicate your driver of this fact.  In some cases he or she will be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[Image:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[gas station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just dont jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic.  Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police.  Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured.  Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else.  Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it.  So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride.  Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]</text>
      <sha1>j4pxr0ftprnogw5tbo36k3wn2m30gyd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>28823</id>
      <parentid>27950</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-04T15:35:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8790">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.  

== Road Safety ==

[[Image:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a highway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.  If you have a driving license you might indicate your driver of this fact.  In some cases he or she will be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[Image:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump wile the truck are moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on there trucks that let there boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic.  Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police.  Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured.  Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else.  Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it.  So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride.  Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]</text>
      <sha1>181rifjuobawq7cv74q7yszqjnl81yl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>28863</id>
      <parentid>28823</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-05T01:51:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>217.95.223.94</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8790">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.  

== Road Safety ==

[[Image:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a highway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.  If you have a driving license you might indicate your driver of this fact.  In some cases he or she will be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[Image:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic.  Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police.  Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured.  Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else.  Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it.  So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride.  Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]</text>
      <sha1>ck3o2jd9b4sfq3o6y69y3yh6bwa0j3g</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29166</id>
      <parentid>28863</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-14T02:58:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>71.202.65.243</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8869">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.  

== Road Safety ==

[[Image:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a highway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.  If you have a driving license you might indicate your driver of this fact.  In some cases he or she will be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[Image:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic.  Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police.  Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured.  Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else.  Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it.  So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride.  Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]</text>
      <sha1>ts7rp7tsm9wp8x874wjnca2zpdjqe7r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29645</id>
      <parentid>29166</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-28T03:46:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>60.241.115.201</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8905">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.  

== Road Safety ==

[[Image:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a highway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.  If you have a driving license you might indicate your driver of this fact.  In some cases he or she will be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[Image:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic.  Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police.  Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured.  Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else.  Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it.  So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride.  Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]</text>
      <sha1>629g5f26xnc2mpii3hvtodht0mxwppw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31212</id>
      <parentid>29645</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-22T11:04:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8906">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.  

== Road Safety ==

[[Image:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.  If you have a driving license you might indicate your driver of this fact.  In some cases he or she will be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[Image:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic.  Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police.  Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured.  Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else.  Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it.  So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride.  Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]</text>
      <sha1>3j4i3nc64rznyayilkz4y05cgyv4iuq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31385</id>
      <parentid>31212</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-01T19:23:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8926">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.  

== Road Safety ==

[[Image:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.  If you have a driving license you might indicate your driver of this fact.  In some cases he or she will be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[Image:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic.  Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police.  Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured.  Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else.  Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it.  So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride.  Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]</text>
      <sha1>js6uz55txnh0cbuwqh91072f1qm2ssi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32855</id>
      <parentid>31385</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-09T11:33:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>220.101.114.78</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9121">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.  

== Road Safety ==

[[Image:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.  If you have a driving license you might indicate your driver of this fact.  In some cases he or she will be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[Image:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In Australia, Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving condition and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic.  Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police.  Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured.  Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else.  Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it.  So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride.  Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]</text>
      <sha1>f00qc5djzr6ysbb9u8dj4s1t1poqz88</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32856</id>
      <parentid>32855</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-09T17:40:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9149">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.  

== Road Safety ==

[[Image:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.  If you have a driving license you might indicate your driver of this fact.  In some cases he or she will be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[Image:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

==Choose your drivers==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving condition and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic.  Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police.  Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured.  Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else.  Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it.  So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride.  Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]</text>
      <sha1>4fe5cducrlrw1l8o2ew8cewpy1ztl4l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32920</id>
      <parentid>32856</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-10T00:29:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>125.63.139.201</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9150">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style.  

== Road Safety ==

[[Image:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert.  If you have a driving license you might indicate your driver of this fact.  In some cases he or she will be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[Image:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

==Choose your drivers==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic.  Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police.  Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured.  Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else.  Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it.  So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride.  Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]</text>
      <sha1>lq6y02j8514h686gtminkuf1aqdzet1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>34988</id>
      <parentid>32920</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T17:34:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9141">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license you might indicate your driver of this fact. In some cases he or she will be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of alcohol or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.
[[fr:Sécurité]]

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]</text>
      <sha1>r8am2et3hm6oytidlb668y2f2v8raby</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36235</id>
      <parentid>34988</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-08-02T16:10:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kb</username>
        <id>1332</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9145">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license you might indicate your driver of this fact. In some cases he or she will be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.
[[fr:Sécurité]]

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]</text>
      <sha1>s75hwec614c94yeuidgrq76xop51r0z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36652</id>
      <parentid>36235</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-08-19T12:01:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mirto</username>
        <id>45</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9168">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license you might indicate your driver of this fact. In some cases he or she will be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.
[[fr:Sécurité]]

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]</text>
      <sha1>84fqto1a3fo8e3g2poc4khprt5imide</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>37283</id>
      <parentid>36652</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-09-14T11:40:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>98.169.69.157</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9328">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license you might indicate your driver of this fact. In some cases he or she will be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Text the license plate number and state of the vehicle you are about to enter to a friend. If anything happens, they will know the last vehicle you got into.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.
[[fr:Sécurité]]

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]</text>
      <sha1>8azw5q8epg7b1uq4s77nczjpk93e6gl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>37760</id>
      <parentid>37283</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-10-09T22:35:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9328">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license you might indicate your driver of this fact. In some cases he or she will be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see himself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Text the license plate number and state of the vehicle you are about to enter to a friend. If anything happens, they will know the last vehicle you got into.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]</text>
      <sha1>6f6pkcuks7wnbtkuhe4wf53g2pugh66</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38803</id>
      <parentid>37760</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-12-04T22:16:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>124.171.42.133</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9328">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license you might indicate your driver of this fact. In some cases he or she will be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see eirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in his car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in his/her car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Text the license plate number and state of the vehicle you are about to enter to a friend. If anything happens, they will know the last vehicle you got into.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]</text>
      <sha1>s5dkk1rv7chdailmu2hp6g7bukf6vb5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38804</id>
      <parentid>38803</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-12-04T22:20:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>124.171.42.133</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9326">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license you might indicate your driver of this fact. In some cases he or she will be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see eirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Text the license plate number and state of the vehicle you are about to enter to a friend. If anything happens, they will know the last vehicle you got into.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]</text>
      <sha1>a7rjdecu4vu82z93v5wyjsfya1ckrq5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38958</id>
      <parentid>38804</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-12-17T16:23:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kempo</username>
        <id>2187</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9328">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license you might indicate your driver of this fact. In some cases he or she will be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Text the license plate number and state of the vehicle you are about to enter to a friend. If anything happens, they will know the last vehicle you got into.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]</text>
      <sha1>12l200jsg764p7tzvg5fytwubg4nqqt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39204</id>
      <parentid>38958</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-01-03T15:19:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>112.198.165.64</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9450">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license you might indicate your driver of this fact. In some cases he or she will be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Text the license plate number and state of the vehicle you are about to enter to a friend. If anything happens, they will know the last vehicle you got into.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
*[http://www.cheappoolproducts.com/Commercial~Solar~Heating~Panels_146~supplies.html commercial solar panels]-for safety 
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]</text>
      <sha1>dmcf0ojxepv1khanrfp8qyoofangsx2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39205</id>
      <parentid>39204</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-01-03T16:30:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9328">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license you might indicate your driver of this fact. In some cases he or she will be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Text the license plate number and state of the vehicle you are about to enter to a friend. If anything happens, they will know the last vehicle you got into.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]</text>
      <sha1>12l200jsg764p7tzvg5fytwubg4nqqt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40000</id>
      <parentid>39205</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-09T22:13:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Vidimian</username>
        <id>1703</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9355">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license you might indicate your driver of this fact. In some cases he or she will be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Text the license plate number and state of the vehicle you are about to enter to a friend. If anything happens, they will know the last vehicle you got into.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]</text>
      <sha1>p3ql95w62dqa1nptvb344x7bdqxw9nb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40091</id>
      <parentid>40000</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-11T23:11:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mipplor</username>
        <id>1887</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9382">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license you might indicate your driver of this fact. In some cases he or she will be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe, be seen especially at night, remind the driver of the speed limitations, and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Text the license plate number and state of the vehicle you are about to enter to a friend. If anything happens, they will know the last vehicle you got into.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>0fteafdlpj07zq8lkfhuikfqnq6jy09</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40893</id>
      <parentid>40091</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-30T21:11:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>81.135.62.115</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9376">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Some say to note the registration number or vehicle model and colour (SMS this to a friend).
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Text the license plate number and state of the vehicle you are about to enter to a friend. If anything happens, they will know the last vehicle you got into.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>5atediaqq9cbcxsom8rlbstoagf3voj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40918</id>
      <parentid>40893</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-30T22:06:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>81.135.62.115</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9250">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend.
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>puig8mbivm2ygg0bl7ux90289lhmhnk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41616</id>
      <parentid>40918</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-24T09:59:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.103.128.81</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9388">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

'''You can find a specific guide about women hitchhiking at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com]!'''

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>13o7p7nakfylt9iihoseoicn1yh4i9i</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41841</id>
      <parentid>41616</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-05-07T23:29:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>85.144.178.89</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9449">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women_hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>hbu3tcdw0syofcd4p7v3isgzl9w9q95</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>42440</id>
      <parentid>41841</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-06-15T00:59:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>86.42.254.7</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9549">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women_hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>8rapemi2flg3q3yzvwu3kyv2fxjpdy7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>42441</id>
      <parentid>42440</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-06-15T01:03:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>86.42.254.7</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9609">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women_hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance you agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>p2kai3e55wat76o7v9sjxnpdc85axjg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>42442</id>
      <parentid>42441</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-06-15T01:06:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>86.42.254.7</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9775">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". As a product of sexism in the society many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers. And, possibly as a result of sexism in the society, women tend to be more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women_hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>3x9xmr1985m484wx0ob4886bzzm6irk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>42812</id>
      <parentid>42442</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-06-30T16:54:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>N0id</username>
        <id>2043</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9682">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". And possibly as a product of sexism in the society, many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women_hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>t1fj0zdjewm7cb5lc164dnlcfewj19j</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>42815</id>
      <parentid>42812</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-06-30T18:26:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kb</username>
        <id>1332</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9674">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". And (as a product of sexism in the society) many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women_hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>02gnmlisulpx53a24kefdi6c3eibe1o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>42939</id>
      <parentid>42815</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-07-07T18:33:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>99.255.236.93</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9976">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". And (as a product of sexism in the society) many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women_hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter.  In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat.  The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>ahn4f7wh245gc27rmu5z3vtyscvxclc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>42940</id>
      <parentid>42939</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-07-07T18:33:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>99.255.236.93</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9674">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". And (as a product of sexism in the society) many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women_hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>02gnmlisulpx53a24kefdi6c3eibe1o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>42941</id>
      <parentid>42940</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-07-07T18:33:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>99.255.236.93</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9976">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". And (as a product of sexism in the society) many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women_hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter.  In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat.  The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>anscsw33xpyy2jw59d8kwpsv4c4fd16</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>43653</id>
      <parentid>42941</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-08-01T19:48:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10318">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes (as a product of homophobia in the world), and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". And (as a product of sexism in the society) many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women_hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter.  In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat.  The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
*A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>q5b9dmbvf8g6bmwmj03xnfpeeh9edtc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44822</id>
      <parentid>43653</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-09-14T23:45:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Luka85</username>
        <id>2439</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10277">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". And (as a product of sexism in the society) many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women_hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter.  In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat.  The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
*A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>p36rrpu2i37o6n5672uehwzw3o0rtg6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44914</id>
      <parentid>44822</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-09-16T18:10:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>216.164.0.13</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10273">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". And (as a product of sexism in the society) many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women_hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://www.buy-pepper-spray-today.com pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter.  In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat.  The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
*A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>io3addqa9mkyd78ddc82t7xs9y9fc5i</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44915</id>
      <parentid>44914</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-09-16T21:26:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kb</username>
        <id>1332</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10277">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". And (as a product of sexism in the society) many people think that women are more safe to take up as hitch hikers.

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women_hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter.  In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat.  The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
*A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>p36rrpu2i37o6n5672uehwzw3o0rtg6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44923</id>
      <parentid>44915</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-09-17T14:13:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Luka85</username>
        <id>2439</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10163">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women_hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in Western Europe)
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter.  In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat.  The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
*A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>aissq76h5trjhjui2lfcrgop4rr21fk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48077</id>
      <parentid>44923</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-06T21:39:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>15.195.185.82</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10164">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women_hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in all E.U. states)
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter.  In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat.  The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
*A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>ff4o8fgvq7ynd0wr1auhljbkp2ozxo8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48078</id>
      <parentid>48077</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-06T21:40:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>15.195.185.82</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10162">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women_hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in EU, 911 in US)
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter.  In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat.  The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
*A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>lk01hmady6isphucpfy0o0m67pxurnx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48339</id>
      <parentid>48078</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-19T02:02:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>202.76.145.180</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10180">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women_hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter.  In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat.  The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
*A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>i6h8w2mg3fospyj16zs22mrnq5njaew</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48580</id>
      <parentid>48339</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-07T15:32:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>78.105.163.79</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10191">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women_hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in EU, 999 in UK, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter.  In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat.  The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
*A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>iaj9fu1jikhw5ady0k8nuit8bom8nm4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48582</id>
      <parentid>48580</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-07T15:37:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10180">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women_hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number (112 in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter.  In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat.  The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
*A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>i6h8w2mg3fospyj16zs22mrnq5njaew</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48583</id>
      <parentid>48582</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-07T15:40:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10248">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women_hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter.  In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat.  The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
*A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>i5kov0i10nw4rgqw8xklnouxfexrrxu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>51519</id>
      <parentid>48583</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-04-06T01:03:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10276">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>m6y1nqeflcm8qd6iclezxmpfs5s602n</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>52874</id>
      <parentid>51519</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-06-15T12:16:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Razdwatrzy</username>
        <id>3189</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10504">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also try avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>oxce7kp23me05jw560gh2hbcnn2pkef</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>52876</id>
      <parentid>52874</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-06-15T12:17:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Razdwatrzy</username>
        <id>3189</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10501">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Hitchhiking at night is more dangerous than at daytime.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Always trust your instincts.
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>bxlffzk2o5h1yowpcbdhzgn4c0uuzvj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>52883</id>
      <parentid>52876</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-06-15T21:41:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10611">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips===

* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a 
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

=== Stuff safety ===
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>51y5qqnbxoz301xoak5hbs2nhg2nlhf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>52884</id>
      <parentid>52883</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-06-15T21:42:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10671">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips===

* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.

* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a 
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group],  [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/hc/forum.php?SelectedCategory=25 Hospitality Club], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] or [http://www.digihitch.com DigiHitch]) you can find other hitchhikers.
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]

=== Stuff safety ===
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>ihmf3hxt38cxmld6ctorjk3560mf6kj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>52885</id>
      <parentid>52884</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-06-15T21:44:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10633">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips===

* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a 
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group],   [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride]  for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ DigiHitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.
* Wear your most valuable stuff on your body: passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>n5qhqiqjh1s3xuzkf55btpfzbzlr49l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>52886</id>
      <parentid>52885</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-06-15T21:47:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10877">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips===

* Think positive and you will attract positive. Do nothing of this and you might be safer.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a 
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car.
feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group],   [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride]  for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ DigiHitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it.  Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option.  It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your back from the trunk.  It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>7erl9pao9jy0zefb7jzyj2n4ohr5x9i</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>55236</id>
      <parentid>52886</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-03T20:58:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Bumby</username>
        <id>3958</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10833">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group],   [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride]  for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ DigiHitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it.  Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option.  It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your back from the trunk.  It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>7xz83ufujhsy7qzb9sg9zinkpvitbm2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>55237</id>
      <parentid>55236</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-03T21:00:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Bumby</username>
        <id>3958</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10832">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[at night]], drivers will [[pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group],   [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride]  for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ DigiHitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it.  Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option.  It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk.  It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station]]s or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>0in4mpre4otgv50lzftcqq686sch2ks</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>55862</id>
      <parentid>55237</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-08T01:13:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10944">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ DigiHitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>k34x2twugdz8h2sem196fg6dy11dszw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>57128</id>
      <parentid>55862</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-31T19:47:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Haggismn</username>
        <id>1667</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12608">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ DigiHitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

=== Hitching in Extreme Climates ===

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
== Extreme Cold ==
See [[Cold climate safety]] for more information (stub).
Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

== Extreme Heat ==
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>gxhqqj1p1vcfp9txptnivltp0qk3mbk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>57129</id>
      <parentid>57128</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-31T19:47:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Haggismn</username>
        <id>1667</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12610">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ DigiHitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
See [[Cold climate safety]] for more information (stub).
Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>mqutpmw8n38tgkd13cicn0r48odkd2q</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>57130</id>
      <parentid>57129</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-31T19:48:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Haggismn</username>
        <id>1667</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12611">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ DigiHitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
See [[Cold climate safety]] for more information (stub).

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>g3svjcngq0ojg7f91pxpx1ak1qmmagp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>57144</id>
      <parentid>57130</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-31T20:17:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Haggismn</username>
        <id>1667</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12642">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ DigiHitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
See [[Cold climate safety]] for more information (stub).

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>1oqbg51yyq0hwab0qhwmskvmbqykgel</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>57145</id>
      <parentid>57144</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-31T20:24:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12640">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ DigiHitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Cold climate safety]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>3g7rd0o0m1vd0x3ijednqio5ofkxz9d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>57167</id>
      <parentid>57145</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-11-01T01:19:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12627">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ DigiHitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>mb385j3ewgifbgo4eic882tspd3iqe5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>57886</id>
      <parentid>57167</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-12-15T04:56:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Needtoknow</username>
        <id>4299</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12887">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ DigiHitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait untill the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>r6ngtqaqxtrnnf5w7qn2iz153r8fzue</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>58557</id>
      <parentid>57886</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-01-18T20:20:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12990">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ DigiHitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait untill the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>6aerec4zo6swdsreic6ggqgrxqafd86</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>63114</id>
      <parentid>58557</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-08-14T21:55:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13002">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear visible clothes, also while walking on the road!

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ DigiHitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait untill the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>7z7x42tf0q4fpodc9vg43e8n3g5ac8u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68501</id>
      <parentid>63114</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-03-08T01:08:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13276">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

[[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night.]]
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest, these can be picked up for a couple of euros in gas stations in Europe.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ DigiHitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait untill the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>qs3dqdyurimu6u9o94sdff8iopekxvu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68502</id>
      <parentid>68501</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-03-08T01:09:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13318">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

[[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]]
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest, these can be picked up for a couple of euros in gas stations in Europe.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ DigiHitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait untill the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>p8r1ih4z4i44uqzssxt9sqm4shoz3xy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68516</id>
      <parentid>68502</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-03-08T08:54:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13562">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

[[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]]
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at gas stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backback at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backback for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ DigiHitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait untill the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>fytvqautfc3mk05mi2qrcr6ttdwan82</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68769</id>
      <parentid>68516</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-03-24T16:10:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mateo</username>
        <id>4876</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13599">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

[[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]]
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at gas stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backback at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backback for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* It is a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ DigiHitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait untill the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[HE:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]</text>
      <sha1>eitpxtt4ngom1byv91mecop7vmzrtes</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69793</id>
      <parentid>68769</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-05-27T05:22:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Spliffpolitix</username>
        <id>11123</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13755">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

[[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]]
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at gas stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backback at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backback for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ DigiHitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepper_spray pepper spray], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of '[[Pepper spray|pepper gel]]' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist. which could save you in enclosed spaces.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait untill the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[HE:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]</text>
      <sha1>fqqo92nrm0j5ab62gaz1o5p4hnlvbx9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69813</id>
      <parentid>69793</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-05-27T11:36:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13699">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

[[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]]
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at gas stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backback at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backback for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ DigiHitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist. which could save you in enclosed spaces.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait untill the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[HE:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]</text>
      <sha1>an3klsr3sy8mziniaz64j5rqbmxaqmr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69830</id>
      <parentid>69813</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-05-28T08:40:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>SpamBucket</username>
        <id>24368</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13802">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

[[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]]
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at gas stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backback at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backback for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ DigiHitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist. which could save you in enclosed spaces. Don't use pepperspray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait untill the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[HE:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]</text>
      <sha1>gt3zj5umlmyxlkf6zpjoaqx47ew9wx7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69831</id>
      <parentid>69830</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-05-28T08:41:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>SpamBucket</username>
        <id>24368</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13804">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

[[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]]
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at gas stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backback at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backback for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ DigiHitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepperspray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Hand brake?
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait untill the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[HE:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]</text>
      <sha1>fedtus3azft797p0xqn9r8tyfrrqjh1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69832</id>
      <parentid>69831</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-05-28T08:43:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>SpamBucket</username>
        <id>24368</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13869">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

[[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]]
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at gas stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backback at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backback for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ DigiHitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepperspray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. But always remember that appearances do not guarantee safety.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait untill the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[HE:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]</text>
      <sha1>aj1looykdd5qcpe5e5cjq7plzyujegf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69917</id>
      <parentid>69832</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-06-02T09:38:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Unforgettableid</username>
        <id>1765</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13931">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

[[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]]
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at gas stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backback at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backback for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ DigiHitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepperspray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. You can ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Note that appearances do not guarantee safety. Also, do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait untill the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[HE:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]</text>
      <sha1>oaaumgoheucu01imckd5l4osah16tn8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69918</id>
      <parentid>69917</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-06-02T10:22:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Unforgettableid</username>
        <id>1765</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14185">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

[[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]]
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at gas stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backback at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backback for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ DigiHitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepperspray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait untill the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[HE:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]</text>
      <sha1>49lsgbbu1r2fiqv0h8usnmfb0sxzg8k</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69929</id>
      <parentid>69918</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-06-02T23:33:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>N0id</username>
        <id>2043</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14128">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

[[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]]
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at gas stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backback at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backback for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ DigiHitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepperspray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding. Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait untill the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[HE:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]</text>
      <sha1>f8l9kkk0hnkvtb4wjkp4io5go9vmy0x</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70232</id>
      <parentid>69929</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-06-28T17:33:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Unforgettableid</username>
        <id>1765</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14185">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

[[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]]
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at gas stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backback at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backback for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ DigiHitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepperspray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait untill the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[HE:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]</text>
      <sha1>49lsgbbu1r2fiqv0h8usnmfb0sxzg8k</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70234</id>
      <parentid>70232</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-06-29T10:19:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>N0id</username>
        <id>2043</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14128">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

[[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]]
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at gas stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backback at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backback for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ DigiHitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepperspray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding. Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait untill the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[HE:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]</text>
      <sha1>f8l9kkk0hnkvtb4wjkp4io5go9vmy0x</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70247</id>
      <parentid>70234</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-06-30T04:37:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Unforgettableid</username>
        <id>1765</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14185">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

[[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]]
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at gas stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backback at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backback for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ DigiHitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepperspray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait untill the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[HE:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]</text>
      <sha1>49lsgbbu1r2fiqv0h8usnmfb0sxzg8k</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70255</id>
      <parentid>70247</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-06-30T05:11:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Unforgettableid</username>
        <id>1765</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14558">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Summary ==

Here are four quick tips which will make you safer:

* Ask for rides at gas stations instead of signaling at the roadside.
* Trust your instincts.
* Refuse rides from [http://enwp.org/Driving_under_the_influence impaired drivers].
* Know that [[hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than during the daytime.

Please read on for many more important tips.

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

[[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]]
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the traveled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at gas stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backback at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backback for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

The hitchhiker should see theirself as an agent of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver traveling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality aswell. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ DigiHitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepperspray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], Truckies drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait untill the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[HE:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]</text>
      <sha1>t22tv62dx4ob01u2hc5h408te4sling</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70256</id>
      <parentid>70255</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-06-30T07:32:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14563">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Summary ==

Here are four quick tips which will make you safer:

* Ask for rides at gas stations instead of signalling at the roadside.
* Trust your instincts.
* Refuse rides from [http://enwp.org/Driving_under_the_influence impaired drivers].
* Know that [[hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than during the daytime.

Please read on for many more important tips.

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

[[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]]
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the travelled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at gas stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backpack at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backpack for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

Hitchhikers should see themselves as agents of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver travelling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality as well. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ Digihitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepper spray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], truck drivers drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait until the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[HE:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]</text>
      <sha1>phldyd0q3a2t5drf9bo8oelwze021uz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70268</id>
      <parentid>70256</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-07-01T09:38:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>SpamBucket</username>
        <id>24368</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14649">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Summary ==

Here are four quick tips which will make you safer:

* Ask for rides at gas stations instead of signalling at the roadside.
* Trust your instincts.
* Refuse rides from [http://enwp.org/Driving_under_the_influence impaired drivers].
* Know that [[hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than during the daytime.

Please read on for many more important tips.

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

[[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]]
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the travelled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at gas stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backpack at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backpack for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

Hitchhikers should see themselves as agents of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver travelling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality as well. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ Digihitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepper spray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], truck drivers drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait until the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
* http://wegwijzer.be/dossier/veilig-liften - Complete guide about hitchhiking safety
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[HE:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]</text>
      <sha1>m8258qsvwecdtyccl35z14rf19llaep</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70269</id>
      <parentid>70268</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-07-01T09:41:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>SpamBucket</username>
        <id>24368</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14725">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Summary ==

Here are four quick tips which will make you safer:

* Ask for rides at gas stations instead of signalling at the roadside.
* Trust your instincts.
* Refuse rides from [http://enwp.org/Driving_under_the_influence impaired drivers].
* Know that [[hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than during the daytime.

Please read on for many more important tips.

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

[[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]]
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the travelled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at gas stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backpack at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backpack for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

Hitchhikers should see themselves as agents of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver travelling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality as well. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ Digihitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepper spray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], truck drivers drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait until the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
* [http://wegwijzer.be/dossier/veilig-liften PDF guide about hitchhiking safety] - A complete guidebook about safety, including how to jump from a moving vehicle
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[HE:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]</text>
      <sha1>hsrwrc9je32myw46t2yjvzahn92lmw2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70321</id>
      <parentid>70269</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-07-04T20:15:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Airyk</username>
        <id>12120</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14791">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Summary ==

Here are four quick tips which will make you safer:

* Ask for rides at gas stations instead of signalling at the roadside.
* Trust your instincts.
* Refuse rides from [http://enwp.org/Driving_under_the_influence impaired drivers].
* Know that [[hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than during the daytime.

Please read on for many more important tips.

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

[[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]]
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the travelled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at gas stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backpack at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backpack for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

Hitchhikers should see themselves as agents of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver travelling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality as well. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ Digihitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepper spray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], truck drivers drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait until the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
* [http://wegwijzer.be/dossier/veilig-liften PDF guide about hitchhiking safety] - A complete guidebook about safety, including how to jump from a moving vehicle
* [http://www.yourworldyourhome.com/hhsafe/ is Hitchhiking safe?]
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[HE:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]</text>
      <sha1>4zyo3uqyc7fbqaz8lbez0v1uj9oqyq3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70322</id>
      <parentid>70321</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-07-04T20:16:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Airyk</username>
        <id>12120</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14959">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Summary ==

Here are four quick tips which will make you safer:

* Ask for rides at gas stations instead of signalling at the roadside.
* Trust your instincts.
* Refuse rides from [http://enwp.org/Driving_under_the_influence impaired drivers].
* Know that [[hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than during the daytime.

Please read on for many more important tips.

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

[[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]]
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the travelled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at gas stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backpack at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backpack for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

Hitchhikers should see themselves as agents of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver travelling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality as well. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ Digihitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepper spray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
*Do not hitchhike on the highways in western countries. People will not notice you, thus they will not pick you up and there have been accidents. It is very dangerous!

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], truck drivers drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait until the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
* [http://wegwijzer.be/dossier/veilig-liften PDF guide about hitchhiking safety] - A complete guidebook about safety, including how to jump from a moving vehicle
* [http://www.yourworldyourhome.com/hhsafe/ is Hitchhiking safe?]
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[HE:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]</text>
      <sha1>t91xlr16w372sg1g1f180zuz2hiw7q7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70954</id>
      <parentid>70322</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-08-19T21:13:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14977">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Summary ==

Here are four quick tips which will make you safer:

* Ask for rides at gas stations instead of signalling at the roadside.
* Trust your instincts.
* Refuse rides from [http://enwp.org/Driving_under_the_influence impaired drivers].
* Know that [[hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than during the daytime.

Please read on for many more important tips.

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

[[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]]
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the travelled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at gas stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backpack at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backpack for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

Hitchhikers should see themselves as agents of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver travelling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality as well. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ Digihitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepper spray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
*Do not hitchhike on the highways in western countries. People will not notice you, thus they will not pick you up and there have been accidents. It is very dangerous!

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], truck drivers drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia)
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait until the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
* [http://wegwijzer.be/dossier/veilig-liften PDF guide about hitchhiking safety] - A complete guidebook about safety, including how to jump from a moving vehicle
* [http://www.yourworldyourhome.com/hhsafe/ is Hitchhiking safe?]
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[he:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]
[[nl:Veiligheid]]</text>
      <sha1>pogq4l6fq4yq2z3fkpbaq7mv96nz39g</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72758</id>
      <parentid>70954</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-10-03T17:18:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Vardi</username>
        <id>15107</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15088">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Summary ==

Here are four quick tips which will make you safer:

* Ask for rides at gas stations instead of signalling at the roadside.
* Trust your instincts.
* Refuse rides from [http://enwp.org/Driving_under_the_influence impaired drivers].
* Know that [[hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than during the daytime.

Please read on for many more important tips.

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

[[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]]
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the travelled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at gas stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backpack at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backpack for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

Hitchhikers should see themselves as agents of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver travelling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality as well. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ Digihitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepper spray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
*Do not hitchhike on the highways in western countries. People will not notice you, thus they will not pick you up and there have been accidents. It is very dangerous!

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], truck drivers drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia) Note: it is now possible to text/SMS 911 in the US, and doing so may lower your chances of arousing suspicion.
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait until the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
* [http://wegwijzer.be/dossier/veilig-liften PDF guide about hitchhiking safety] - A complete guidebook about safety, including how to jump from a moving vehicle
* [http://www.yourworldyourhome.com/hhsafe/ is Hitchhiking safe?]
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[he:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]
[[nl:Veiligheid]]</text>
      <sha1>45mq3evb2k0xb7wmxt1bpgy08q5wzv3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>76510</id>
      <parentid>72758</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-08-10T19:25:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Jidanni</username>
        <id>2334</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15291">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Summary ==

Here are four quick tips which will make you safer:

* Ask for rides at gas stations instead of signalling at the roadside.
* Trust your instincts.
* Refuse rides from [http://enwp.org/Driving_under_the_influence impaired drivers].
* Know that [[hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than during the daytime.

Please read on for many more important tips.

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

[[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]]
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the travelled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at gas stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backpack at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backpack for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving license; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive.

Hitchhikers should see themselves as agents of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver travelling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality as well. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ Digihitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepper spray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft. Better take it with you when you go to the rest room as when you come back the car might be gone, even just due to the driver getting told to park somewhere else and now you can't find him anymore, etc.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
*Do not hitchhike on the highways in western countries. People will not notice you, thus they will not pick you up and there have been accidents. It is very dangerous!

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], truck drivers drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia) Note: it is now possible to text/SMS 911 in the US, and doing so may lower your chances of arousing suspicion.
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait until the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
* [http://wegwijzer.be/dossier/veilig-liften PDF guide about hitchhiking safety] - A complete guidebook about safety, including how to jump from a moving vehicle
* [http://www.yourworldyourhome.com/hhsafe/ is Hitchhiking safe?]
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[he:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]
[[nl:Veiligheid]]</text>
      <sha1>crmp08mhdeb9v460aq935tk25523oeo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77427</id>
      <parentid>76510</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-10-06T03:47:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Motorracer</username>
        <id>20073</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15323">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Summary ==

Here are four quick tips which will make you safer:

* Ask for rides at gas stations instead of signalling at the roadside.
* Trust your instincts.
* Refuse rides from [http://enwp.org/Driving_under_the_influence impaired drivers].
* Know that [[hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than during the daytime.

Please read on for many more important tips.

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

[[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]]
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the travelled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at gas stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backpack at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backpack for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving licence; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive. See [[Driving for your driver]]

Hitchhikers should see themselves as agents of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver travelling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality as well. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ Digihitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepper spray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft. Better take it with you when you go to the rest room as when you come back the car might be gone, even just due to the driver getting told to park somewhere else and now you can't find him anymore, etc.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
*Do not hitchhike on the highways in western countries. People will not notice you, thus they will not pick you up and there have been accidents. It is very dangerous!

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], truck drivers drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia) Note: it is now possible to text/SMS 911 in the US, and doing so may lower your chances of arousing suspicion.
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait until the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
* [http://wegwijzer.be/dossier/veilig-liften PDF guide about hitchhiking safety] - A complete guidebook about safety, including how to jump from a moving vehicle
* [http://www.yourworldyourhome.com/hhsafe/ is Hitchhiking safe?]
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[he:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]
[[nl:Veiligheid]]</text>
      <sha1>aa8u3a9ye4opyce727l62z0iz9u14o2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>80475</id>
      <parentid>77427</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-09-08T12:10:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15329">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Summary ==

Here are four quick tips which will make you safer:

* Ask for rides at petrol stations instead of signalling at the roadside.
* Trust your instincts.
* Refuse rides from [http://enwp.org/Driving_under_the_influence impaired drivers].
* Know that [[hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than during the daytime.

Please read on for many more important tips.

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

[[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]]
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the travelled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at petrol stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backpack at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backpack for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving licence; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive. See [[Driving for your driver]]

Hitchhikers should see themselves as agents of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver travelling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality as well. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] or [http://www.digihitch.com/ Digihitch] for [[North America]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepper spray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft. Better take it with you when you go to the rest room as when you come back the car might be gone, even just due to the driver getting told to park somewhere else and now you can't find him anymore, etc.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
*Do not hitchhike on the highways in western countries. People will not notice you, thus they will not pick you up and there have been accidents. It is very dangerous!

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], truck drivers drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia) Note: it is now possible to text/SMS 911 in the US, and doing so may lower your chances of arousing suspicion.
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait until the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
* [http://wegwijzer.be/dossier/veilig-liften PDF guide about hitchhiking safety] - A complete guidebook about safety, including how to jump from a moving vehicle
* [http://www.yourworldyourhome.com/hhsafe/ is Hitchhiking safe?]
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[he:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]
[[nl:Veiligheid]]</text>
      <sha1>1ida814snuza6jr7yokkyeh18joxssc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>81681</id>
      <parentid>80475</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-12-09T22:21:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fedcba098</username>
        <id>24872</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15269">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Summary ==

Here are four quick tips which will make you safer:

* Ask for rides at petrol stations instead of signalling at the roadside.
* Trust your instincts.
* Refuse rides from [http://enwp.org/Driving_under_the_influence impaired drivers].
* Know that [[hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than during the daytime.

Please read on for many more important tips.

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

[[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]]
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the travelled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at petrol stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backpack at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backpack for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving licence; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive. See [[Driving for your driver]]

Hitchhikers should see themselves as agents of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver travelling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality as well. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], or [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepper spray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft. Better take it with you when you go to the rest room as when you come back the car might be gone, even just due to the driver getting told to park somewhere else and now you can't find him anymore, etc.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
*Do not hitchhike on the highways in western countries. People will not notice you, thus they will not pick you up and there have been accidents. It is very dangerous!

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], truck drivers drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia) Note: it is now possible to text/SMS 911 in the US, and doing so may lower your chances of arousing suspicion.
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait until the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
* [http://wegwijzer.be/dossier/veilig-liften PDF guide about hitchhiking safety] - A complete guidebook about safety, including how to jump from a moving vehicle
* [http://www.yourworldyourhome.com/hhsafe/ is Hitchhiking safe?]
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[he:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]
[[nl:Veiligheid]]</text>
      <sha1>kxgxwdmi5mcf3whc5hh6nsiqbyn4526</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>81682</id>
      <parentid>81681</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-12-09T22:43:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15302">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Summary ==

Here are four quick tips which will make you safer:

* Ask for rides at petrol stations instead of signalling at the roadside.
* Trust your instincts.
* Refuse rides from [http://enwp.org/Driving_under_the_influence impaired drivers].
* Know that [[hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than during the daytime.

Please read on for many more important tips.

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

&lt;!-- [[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]] Picture is missing ~~~~ --&gt;
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the travelled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at petrol stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backpack at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backpack for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving licence; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive. See [[Driving for your driver]]

Hitchhikers should see themselves as agents of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver travelling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality as well. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], or [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepper spray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft. Better take it with you when you go to the rest room as when you come back the car might be gone, even just due to the driver getting told to park somewhere else and now you can't find him anymore, etc.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
*Do not hitchhike on the highways in western countries. People will not notice you, thus they will not pick you up and there have been accidents. It is very dangerous!

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], truck drivers drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia) Note: it is now possible to text/SMS 911 in the US, and doing so may lower your chances of arousing suspicion.
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait until the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
* [http://wegwijzer.be/dossier/veilig-liften PDF guide about hitchhiking safety] - A complete guidebook about safety, including how to jump from a moving vehicle
* [http://www.yourworldyourhome.com/hhsafe/ is Hitchhiking safe?]
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[he:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]
[[nl:Veiligheid]]</text>
      <sha1>engyfm0aoonpes1te0vz2buobzqkbal</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>81728</id>
      <parentid>81682</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-12-15T22:58:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Uncle sam01</username>
        <id>24903</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15325">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Summary ==

Here are four quick tips which will make you safer:

* Ask for rides at petrol stations instead of signalling at the roadside.
* Trust your instincts.
* Refuse rides from [http://enwp.org/Driving_under_the_influence impaired drivers].
* Know that [[hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than during the daytime.

Please read on for many more important tips.

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

&lt;!-- [[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]] Picture is missing ~~~~ --&gt;
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the travelled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at petrol stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backpack at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backpack for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving licence; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive. See [[Driving for your driver]]

Hitchhikers should see themselves as agents of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver travelling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality as well. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], or [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepper spray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft. Better take it with you when you go to the rest room as when you come back the car might be gone, even just due to the driver getting told to park somewhere else and now you can't find him anymore, etc.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
*Do not hitchhike on the highways in western countries. People will not notice you, thus they will not pick you up and there have been accidents. It is very dangerous and often illegal, too.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], truck drivers drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia) Note: it is now possible to text/SMS 911 in the US, and doing so may lower your chances of arousing suspicion.
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait until the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
* [http://wegwijzer.be/dossier/veilig-liften PDF guide about hitchhiking safety] - A complete guidebook about safety, including how to jump from a moving vehicle
* [http://www.yourworldyourhome.com/hhsafe/ is Hitchhiking safe?]
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[he:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]
[[nl:Veiligheid]]</text>
      <sha1>i3pvh4cs3sfsw8opdsuexzl9tpqh29c</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>82185</id>
      <parentid>81728</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-02-12T16:14:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Longhaul</username>
        <id>4390</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15395">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Summary ==

Here are four quick tips which will make you safer:

* Ask for rides at petrol stations instead of signalling at the roadside.
* Trust your instincts.
* Refuse rides from [http://enwp.org/Driving_under_the_influence impaired drivers].
* Know that [[hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than during the daytime.

Please read on for many more important tips.

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

&lt;!-- [[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]] Picture is missing ~~~~ --&gt;
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the travelled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at petrol stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backpack at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backpack for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving licence; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive. See [[Driving for your driver]]

Hitchhikers should see themselves as agents of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver travelling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality as well. '''[http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/always-listen-your-gut-instincts/ Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], or [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepper spray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft. Better take it with you when you go to the rest room as when you come back the car might be gone, even just due to the driver getting told to park somewhere else and now you can't find him anymore, etc.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
*Do not hitchhike on the highways in western countries. People will not notice you, thus they will not pick you up and there have been accidents. It is very dangerous and often illegal, too.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], truck drivers drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia) Note: it is now possible to text/SMS 911 in the US, and doing so may lower your chances of arousing suspicion.
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait until the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
* [http://wegwijzer.be/dossier/veilig-liften PDF guide about hitchhiking safety] - A complete guidebook about safety, including how to jump from a moving vehicle
* [http://www.yourworldyourhome.com/hhsafe/ is Hitchhiking safe?]
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[he:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]
[[nl:Veiligheid]]</text>
      <sha1>i6xt2x71lypgzya8435422h3f09wgym</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>82186</id>
      <parentid>82185</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-02-12T16:15:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Longhaul</username>
        <id>4390</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15396">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Summary ==

Here are four quick tips which will make you safer:

* Ask for rides at petrol stations instead of signalling at the roadside.
* Trust your instincts.
* Refuse rides from [http://enwp.org/Driving_under_the_influence impaired drivers].
* Know that [[hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than during the daytime.

Please read on for many more important tips.

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

&lt;!-- [[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]] Picture is missing ~~~~ --&gt;
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the travelled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at petrol stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backpack at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backpack for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving licence; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive. See [[Driving for your driver]]

Hitchhikers should see themselves as agents of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver travelling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality as well. '''[http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/always-listen-your-gut-instincts/ Trust your instincts!]''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], or [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepper spray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft. Better take it with you when you go to the rest room as when you come back the car might be gone, even just due to the driver getting told to park somewhere else and now you can't find him anymore, etc.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
*Do not hitchhike on the highways in western countries. People will not notice you, thus they will not pick you up and there have been accidents. It is very dangerous and often illegal, too.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], truck drivers drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia) Note: it is now possible to text/SMS 911 in the US, and doing so may lower your chances of arousing suspicion.
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait until the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
* [http://wegwijzer.be/dossier/veilig-liften PDF guide about hitchhiking safety] - A complete guidebook about safety, including how to jump from a moving vehicle
* [http://www.yourworldyourhome.com/hhsafe/ is Hitchhiking safe?]
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[he:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]
[[nl:Veiligheid]]</text>
      <sha1>npxc18q77p6rvmk3zgns9j9woecx4us</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>82199</id>
      <parentid>82186</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-02-17T17:40:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15325">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Summary ==

Here are four quick tips which will make you safer:

* Ask for rides at petrol stations instead of signalling at the roadside.
* Trust your instincts.
* Refuse rides from [http://enwp.org/Driving_under_the_influence impaired drivers].
* Know that [[hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than during the daytime.

Please read on for many more important tips.

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

&lt;!-- [[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]] Picture is missing ~~~~ --&gt;
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the travelled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at petrol stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backpack at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backpack for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving licence; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive. See [[Driving for your driver]]

Hitchhikers should see themselves as agents of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver travelling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality as well. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], or [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepper spray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft. Better take it with you when you go to the rest room as when you come back the car might be gone, even just due to the driver getting told to park somewhere else and now you can't find him anymore, etc.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
*Do not hitchhike on the highways in western countries. People will not notice you, thus they will not pick you up and there have been accidents. It is very dangerous and often illegal, too.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], truck drivers drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia) Note: it is now possible to text/SMS 911 in the US, and doing so may lower your chances of arousing suspicion.
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait until the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
* [http://wegwijzer.be/dossier/veilig-liften PDF guide about hitchhiking safety] - A complete guidebook about safety, including how to jump from a moving vehicle
* [http://www.yourworldyourhome.com/hhsafe/ is Hitchhiking safe?]
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[he:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]
[[nl:Veiligheid]]</text>
      <sha1>i3pvh4cs3sfsw8opdsuexzl9tpqh29c</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>82264</id>
      <parentid>82199</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-03-02T14:39:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Longhaul</username>
        <id>4390</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15390">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Summary ==

Here are four quick tips which will make you safer:

* Ask for rides at petrol stations instead of signalling at the roadside.
* Trust your instincts.
* Refuse rides from [http://enwp.org/Driving_under_the_influence impaired drivers].
* Know that [[hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than during the daytime.

Please read on for many more important tips.

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

&lt;!-- [[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]] Picture is missing ~~~~ --&gt;
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the travelled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at petrol stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backpack at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backpack for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving licence; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive. See [[Driving for your driver]]

Hitchhikers should see themselves as agents of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver travelling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality as well. [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/always-listen-your-gut-instincts/ Trust your instincts!] If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], or [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepper spray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft. Better take it with you when you go to the rest room as when you come back the car might be gone, even just due to the driver getting told to park somewhere else and now you can't find him anymore, etc.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
*Do not hitchhike on the highways in western countries. People will not notice you, thus they will not pick you up and there have been accidents. It is very dangerous and often illegal, too.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], truck drivers drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia) Note: it is now possible to text/SMS 911 in the US, and doing so may lower your chances of arousing suspicion.
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait until the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
* [http://wegwijzer.be/dossier/veilig-liften PDF guide about hitchhiking safety] - A complete guidebook about safety, including how to jump from a moving vehicle
* [http://www.yourworldyourhome.com/hhsafe/ is Hitchhiking safe?]
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[he:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]
[[nl:Veiligheid]]</text>
      <sha1>11o3dr4mh027qj1hboozpp4m5way5fy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>82267</id>
      <parentid>82264</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-03-02T17:40:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15325">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Summary ==

Here are four quick tips which will make you safer:

* Ask for rides at petrol stations instead of signalling at the roadside.
* Trust your instincts.
* Refuse rides from [http://enwp.org/Driving_under_the_influence impaired drivers].
* Know that [[hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than during the daytime.

Please read on for many more important tips.

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

&lt;!-- [[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]] Picture is missing ~~~~ --&gt;
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the travelled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at petrol stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backpack at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backpack for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving licence; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive. See [[Driving for your driver]]

Hitchhikers should see themselves as agents of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver travelling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality as well. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], or [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepper spray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft. Better take it with you when you go to the rest room as when you come back the car might be gone, even just due to the driver getting told to park somewhere else and now you can't find him anymore, etc.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
*Do not hitchhike on the highways in western countries. People will not notice you, thus they will not pick you up and there have been accidents. It is very dangerous and often illegal, too.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], truck drivers drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia) Note: it is now possible to text/SMS 911 in the US, and doing so may lower your chances of arousing suspicion.
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait until the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
* [http://wegwijzer.be/dossier/veilig-liften PDF guide about hitchhiking safety] - A complete guidebook about safety, including how to jump from a moving vehicle
* [http://www.yourworldyourhome.com/hhsafe/ is Hitchhiking safe?]
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[he:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]
[[nl:Veiligheid]]</text>
      <sha1>i3pvh4cs3sfsw8opdsuexzl9tpqh29c</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>90312</id>
      <parentid>82267</parentid>
      <timestamp>2018-01-23T08:56:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Profinder uae</username>
        <id>29393</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15345">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Summary ==

Here are four quick tips which will make you safer:

* Ask for rides at petrol [of signalling] [http://www.example.com link title]at the roadside.
* Trust your instincts.
* Refuse rides from [http://enwp.org/Driving_under_the_influence impaired drivers].
* Know that [[hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than during the daytime.

Please read on for many more important tips.

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

&lt;!-- [[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]] Picture is missing ~~~~ --&gt;
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the travelled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at petrol stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backpack at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backpack for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving licence; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive. See [[Driving for your driver]]

Hitchhikers should see themselves as agents of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver travelling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality as well. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], or [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepper spray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft. Better take it with you when you go to the rest room as when you come back the car might be gone, even just due to the driver getting told to park somewhere else and now you can't find him anymore, etc.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
*Do not hitchhike on the highways in western countries. People will not notice you, thus they will not pick you up and there have been accidents. It is very dangerous and often illegal, too.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], truck drivers drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia) Note: it is now possible to text/SMS 911 in the US, and doing so may lower your chances of arousing suspicion.
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait until the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
* [http://wegwijzer.be/dossier/veilig-liften PDF guide about hitchhiking safety] - A complete guidebook about safety, including how to jump from a moving vehicle
* [http://www.yourworldyourhome.com/hhsafe/ is Hitchhiking safe?]
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[he:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]
[[nl:Veiligheid]]</text>
      <sha1>mdirjw741oymj9a3r0wvev85pvk54gv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>90324</id>
      <parentid>90312</parentid>
      <timestamp>2018-01-25T07:59:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15325">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Summary ==

Here are four quick tips which will make you safer:

* Ask for rides at petrol stations instead of signalling at the roadside.
* Trust your instincts.
* Refuse rides from [http://enwp.org/Driving_under_the_influence impaired drivers].
* Know that [[hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than during the daytime.

Please read on for many more important tips.

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

&lt;!-- [[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]] Picture is missing ~~~~ --&gt;
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the travelled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at petrol stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backpack at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backpack for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving licence; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive. See [[Driving for your driver]]

Hitchhikers should see themselves as agents of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver travelling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality as well. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], or [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepper spray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft. Better take it with you when you go to the rest room as when you come back the car might be gone, even just due to the driver getting told to park somewhere else and now you can't find him anymore, etc.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
*Do not hitchhike on the highways in western countries. People will not notice you, thus they will not pick you up and there have been accidents. It is very dangerous and often illegal, too.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], truck drivers drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia) Note: it is now possible to text/SMS 911 in the US, and doing so may lower your chances of arousing suspicion.
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait until the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
* [http://wegwijzer.be/dossier/veilig-liften PDF guide about hitchhiking safety] - A complete guidebook about safety, including how to jump from a moving vehicle
* [http://www.yourworldyourhome.com/hhsafe/ is Hitchhiking safe?]
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[he:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]
[[nl:Veiligheid]]</text>
      <sha1>i3pvh4cs3sfsw8opdsuexzl9tpqh29c</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>90325</id>
      <parentid>90324</parentid>
      <timestamp>2018-01-25T08:01:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15322">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Summary ==

Here are four quick tips which will make you safer:

* Ask for rides at petrol stations instead of signalling at the roadside.
* Trust your instincts.
* Refuse rides from [[:wikipedia:Driving_under_the_influence|impaired drivers]].
* Know that [[hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than during the daytime.

Please read on for many more important tips.

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

&lt;!-- [[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]] Picture is missing ~~~~ --&gt;
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of road, as far back from the travelled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at petrol stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backpack at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backpack for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving licence; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive. See [[Driving for your driver]]

Hitchhikers should see themselves as agents of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver travelling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the drivers reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a persons personality as well. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be more risky. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes , and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]], as well as this guide for Women hitchhikers at [http://girls.hitchbase.com girls.hitchbase.com].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. But ''don't panic''!
* Try to be good conversation for the driver for tips see [[etiquette]]
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [http://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], or [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepper spray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft. Better take it with you when you go to the rest room as when you come back the car might be gone, even just due to the driver getting told to park somewhere else and now you can't find him anymore, etc.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road. 
* If it starts raining, standing under a tree is an option. &lt;!-- ?? --&gt;
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
*Do not hitchhike on the highways in western countries. People will not notice you, thus they will not pick you up and there have been accidents. It is very dangerous and often illegal, too.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case however. In [[Australia]], truck drivers drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia) Note: it is now possible to text/SMS 911 in the US, and doing so may lower your chances of arousing suspicion.
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait until the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitch hikers. As a hitch hiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitch hiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the day time. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sun stroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sun screen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://girls.hitchbase.com Hitchhiking as a female] - Guide
* [http://wegwijzer.be/dossier/veilig-liften PDF guide about hitchhiking safety] - A complete guidebook about safety, including how to jump from a moving vehicle
* [http://www.yourworldyourhome.com/hhsafe/ is Hitchhiking safe?]
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[he:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]
[[nl:Veiligheid]]</text>
      <sha1>8ychjqtbp5tx9hjl54qyo4jerkibu7d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>90326</id>
      <parentid>90325</parentid>
      <timestamp>2018-01-25T08:15:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15079">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Summary ==

Here are four quick tips which will make you safer:

* Ask for rides at petrol stations instead of signalling at the roadside.
* Trust your instincts.
* Refuse rides from [[:wikipedia:Driving_under_the_influence|impaired drivers]].
* Know that [[hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than during the daytime.

Please read on for many more important tips.

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

&lt;!-- [[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]] Picture is missing ~~~~ --&gt;
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of the road, as far back from the travelled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at petrol stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backpack at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backpack for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving licence; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive. See [[Driving for your driver]]

Hitchhikers should see themselves as agents of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver travelling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the driver's reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a person's personality as well. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be riskier. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes, and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. ''Don't panic''!
* Keep up a good conversation with the driver. See [[etiquette]].
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [https://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], or [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also, it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepper spray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft. Better take it with you when you go to the rest room as when you come back the car might be gone, even just due to the driver getting told to park somewhere else and now you can't find him anymore, etc.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road.
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Do not hitchhike on the highways in western countries. People will not notice you, thus they will not pick you up and there have been accidents. It is very dangerous and often illegal, too.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case, however. In [[Australia]], truck drivers drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia) Note: it is now possible to text/SMS 911 in the US, and doing so may lower your chances of arousing suspicion.
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait until the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitchhikers. As a hitchhiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitchhiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the daytime. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sunstroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sunscreen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://wegwijzer.be/dossier/veilig-liften PDF guide about hitchhiking safety] - A complete guidebook about safety, including how to jump from a moving vehicle
* [http://www.yourworldyourhome.com/hhsafe/ is Hitchhiking safe?]
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[he:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]
[[nl:Veiligheid]]</text>
      <sha1>e3fkxic2pp8kqe2bn6fzmkwvtwlxssb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>97830</id>
      <parentid>90326</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-05-28T10:44:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Clara kilara</username>
        <id>42799</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* See also */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15213">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Summary ==

Here are four quick tips which will make you safer:

* Ask for rides at petrol stations instead of signalling at the roadside.
* Trust your instincts.
* Refuse rides from [[:wikipedia:Driving_under_the_influence|impaired drivers]].
* Know that [[hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than during the daytime.

Please read on for many more important tips.

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

&lt;!-- [[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]] Picture is missing ~~~~ --&gt;
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of the road, as far back from the travelled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at petrol stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backpack at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backpack for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving licence; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive. See [[Driving for your driver]]

Hitchhikers should see themselves as agents of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver travelling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the driver's reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a person's personality as well. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be riskier. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes, and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. ''Don't panic''!
* Keep up a good conversation with the driver. See [[etiquette]].
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [https://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], or [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also, it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepper spray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft. Better take it with you when you go to the rest room as when you come back the car might be gone, even just due to the driver getting told to park somewhere else and now you can't find him anymore, etc.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road.
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Do not hitchhike on the highways in western countries. People will not notice you, thus they will not pick you up and there have been accidents. It is very dangerous and often illegal, too.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case, however. In [[Australia]], truck drivers drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia) Note: it is now possible to text/SMS 911 in the US, and doing so may lower your chances of arousing suspicion.
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait until the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitchhikers. As a hitchhiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitchhiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the daytime. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sunstroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sunscreen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://wegwijzer.be/dossier/veilig-liften PDF guide about hitchhiking safety] - A complete guidebook about safety, including how to jump from a moving vehicle
* [http://www.yourworldyourhome.com/hhsafe/ is Hitchhiking safe?]
* [http://https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxfCLJZtboY Is Hitchhiking dangerous for girls? Sharing practical tips on how to stay safe]
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[he:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]
[[nl:Veiligheid]]</text>
      <sha1>5mgg6cy74bspz7l9mz7iwgd9xpwqbeh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>97832</id>
      <parentid>97830</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-05-28T10:48:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Clara kilara</username>
        <id>42799</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* See also */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15205">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Summary ==

Here are four quick tips which will make you safer:

* Ask for rides at petrol stations instead of signalling at the roadside.
* Trust your instincts.
* Refuse rides from [[:wikipedia:Driving_under_the_influence|impaired drivers]].
* Know that [[hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than during the daytime.

Please read on for many more important tips.

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

&lt;!-- [[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]] Picture is missing ~~~~ --&gt;
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of the road, as far back from the travelled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at petrol stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backpack at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backpack for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving licence; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive. See [[Driving for your driver]]

Hitchhikers should see themselves as agents of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver travelling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the driver's reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a person's personality as well. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be riskier. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes, and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. ''Don't panic''!
* Keep up a good conversation with the driver. See [[etiquette]].
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [https://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], or [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also, it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepper spray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft. Better take it with you when you go to the rest room as when you come back the car might be gone, even just due to the driver getting told to park somewhere else and now you can't find him anymore, etc.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road.
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Do not hitchhike on the highways in western countries. People will not notice you, thus they will not pick you up and there have been accidents. It is very dangerous and often illegal, too.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case, however. In [[Australia]], truck drivers drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia) Note: it is now possible to text/SMS 911 in the US, and doing so may lower your chances of arousing suspicion.
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait until the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitchhikers. As a hitchhiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitchhiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the daytime. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sunstroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sunscreen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://wegwijzer.be/dossier/veilig-liften PDF guide about hitchhiking safety] - A complete guidebook about safety, including how to jump from a moving vehicle
* [http://www.yourworldyourhome.com/hhsafe/ is Hitchhiking safe?]
* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxfCLJZtboY Is Hitchhiking dangerous for girls? Sharing practical tips on how to stay safe]
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[he:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]
[[nl:Veiligheid]]</text>
      <sha1>1oqrqtbe4fwre55l46os200lubz2n0m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>102081</id>
      <parentid>97832</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-05-14T20:16:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MxNNZ2</username>
        <id>47018</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Emergency exit */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15226">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Summary ==

Here are four quick tips which will make you safer:

* Ask for rides at petrol stations instead of signalling at the roadside.
* Trust your instincts.
* Refuse rides from [[:wikipedia:Driving_under_the_influence|impaired drivers]].
* Know that [[hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than during the daytime.

Please read on for many more important tips.

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

&lt;!-- [[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]] Picture is missing ~~~~ --&gt;
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of the road, as far back from the travelled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at petrol stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backpack at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backpack for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving licence; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive. See [[Driving for your driver]]

Hitchhikers should see themselves as agents of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver travelling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the driver's reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a person's personality as well. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be riskier. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes, and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. ''Don't panic''!
* Keep up a good conversation with the driver. See [[etiquette]].
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [https://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], or [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also, it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepper spray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft. Better take it with you when you go to the rest room as when you come back the car might be gone, even just due to the driver getting told to park somewhere else and now you can't find him anymore, etc.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road.
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Do not hitchhike on the highways in western countries. People will not notice you, thus they will not pick you up and there have been accidents. It is very dangerous and often illegal, too.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case, however. In [[Australia]], truck drivers drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia, 111
In New Zealand ) Note: it is now possible to text/SMS 911 in the US, and doing so may lower your chances of arousing suspicion.
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait until the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitchhikers. As a hitchhiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitchhiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the daytime. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sunstroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sunscreen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://wegwijzer.be/dossier/veilig-liften PDF guide about hitchhiking safety] - A complete guidebook about safety, including how to jump from a moving vehicle
* [http://www.yourworldyourhome.com/hhsafe/ is Hitchhiking safe?]
* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxfCLJZtboY Is Hitchhiking dangerous for girls? Sharing practical tips on how to stay safe]
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[he:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]
[[nl:Veiligheid]]</text>
      <sha1>o0ef241qy1j4f41wzmbzs55lczb3d25</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104996</id>
      <parentid>102081</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-12-09T10:07:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15304">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 
: ''See also the article on [[picking up hitchhikers|Health and Pandemia]].''

== Summary ==

Here are four quick tips which will make you safer:

* Ask for rides at petrol stations instead of signalling at the roadside.
* Trust your instincts.
* Refuse rides from [[:wikipedia:Driving_under_the_influence|impaired drivers]].
* Know that [[hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than during the daytime.

Please read on for many more important tips.

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

&lt;!-- [[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]] Picture is missing ~~~~ --&gt;
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of the road, as far back from the travelled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at petrol stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backpack at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backpack for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving licence; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive. See [[Driving for your driver]]

Hitchhikers should see themselves as agents of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver travelling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the driver's reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a person's personality as well. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be riskier. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes, and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. ''Don't panic''!
* Keep up a good conversation with the driver. See [[etiquette]].
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [https://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], or [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also, it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepper spray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft. Better take it with you when you go to the rest room as when you come back the car might be gone, even just due to the driver getting told to park somewhere else and now you can't find him anymore, etc.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road.
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Do not hitchhike on the highways in western countries. People will not notice you, thus they will not pick you up and there have been accidents. It is very dangerous and often illegal, too.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case, however. In [[Australia]], truck drivers drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia, 111
In New Zealand ) Note: it is now possible to text/SMS 911 in the US, and doing so may lower your chances of arousing suspicion.
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait until the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitchhikers. As a hitchhiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitchhiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the daytime. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sunstroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sunscreen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://wegwijzer.be/dossier/veilig-liften PDF guide about hitchhiking safety] - A complete guidebook about safety, including how to jump from a moving vehicle
* [http://www.yourworldyourhome.com/hhsafe/ is Hitchhiking safe?]
* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxfCLJZtboY Is Hitchhiking dangerous for girls? Sharing practical tips on how to stay safe]
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[he:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]
[[nl:Veiligheid]]</text>
      <sha1>35p58ivhh6pjkqrcjkmqjoilo9s9o7u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104997</id>
      <parentid>104996</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-12-09T10:08:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15306">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 
: ''See also the article on [[hitchhiking_and_pandemia|Health and Pandemia]].''

== Summary ==

Here are four quick tips which will make you safer:

* Ask for rides at petrol stations instead of signalling at the roadside.
* Trust your instincts.
* Refuse rides from [[:wikipedia:Driving_under_the_influence|impaired drivers]].
* Know that [[hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than during the daytime.

Please read on for many more important tips.

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

&lt;!-- [[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]] Picture is missing ~~~~ --&gt;
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of the road, as far back from the travelled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at petrol stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backpack at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backpack for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving licence; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive. See [[Driving for your driver]]

Hitchhikers should see themselves as agents of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver travelling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the driver's reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a person's personality as well. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be riskier. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes, and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. ''Don't panic''!
* Keep up a good conversation with the driver. See [[etiquette]].
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [https://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], or [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also, it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepper spray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft. Better take it with you when you go to the rest room as when you come back the car might be gone, even just due to the driver getting told to park somewhere else and now you can't find him anymore, etc.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road.
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Do not hitchhike on the highways in western countries. People will not notice you, thus they will not pick you up and there have been accidents. It is very dangerous and often illegal, too.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case, however. In [[Australia]], truck drivers drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia, 111
In New Zealand ) Note: it is now possible to text/SMS 911 in the US, and doing so may lower your chances of arousing suspicion.
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait until the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitchhikers. As a hitchhiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitchhiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the daytime. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sunstroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sunscreen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://wegwijzer.be/dossier/veilig-liften PDF guide about hitchhiking safety] - A complete guidebook about safety, including how to jump from a moving vehicle
* [http://www.yourworldyourhome.com/hhsafe/ is Hitchhiking safe?]
* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxfCLJZtboY Is Hitchhiking dangerous for girls? Sharing practical tips on how to stay safe]
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[he:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]
[[nl:Veiligheid]]</text>
      <sha1>qbywtts583fewl18yzxa64tlt4olorl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104998</id>
      <parentid>104997</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-12-09T10:09:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>link from here to the corona page</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15306">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 
: ''See also the article on [[Hitchhiking and Pandemia|Health and Pandemia]].''

== Summary ==

Here are four quick tips which will make you safer:

* Ask for rides at petrol stations instead of signalling at the roadside.
* Trust your instincts.
* Refuse rides from [[:wikipedia:Driving_under_the_influence|impaired drivers]].
* Know that [[hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than during the daytime.

Please read on for many more important tips.

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

&lt;!-- [[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]] Picture is missing ~~~~ --&gt;
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of the road, as far back from the travelled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at petrol stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backpack at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backpack for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving licence; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive. See [[Driving for your driver]]

Hitchhikers should see themselves as agents of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver travelling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the driver's reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a person's personality as well. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be riskier. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes, and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. ''Don't panic''!
* Keep up a good conversation with the driver. See [[etiquette]].
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [https://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], or [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also, it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepper spray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft. Better take it with you when you go to the rest room as when you come back the car might be gone, even just due to the driver getting told to park somewhere else and now you can't find him anymore, etc.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road.
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Do not hitchhike on the highways in western countries. People will not notice you, thus they will not pick you up and there have been accidents. It is very dangerous and often illegal, too.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case, however. In [[Australia]], truck drivers drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia, 111
In New Zealand ) Note: it is now possible to text/SMS 911 in the US, and doing so may lower your chances of arousing suspicion.
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait until the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitchhikers. As a hitchhiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitchhiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the daytime. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sunstroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sunscreen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://wegwijzer.be/dossier/veilig-liften PDF guide about hitchhiking safety] - A complete guidebook about safety, including how to jump from a moving vehicle
* [http://www.yourworldyourhome.com/hhsafe/ is Hitchhiking safe?]
* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxfCLJZtboY Is Hitchhiking dangerous for girls? Sharing practical tips on how to stay safe]
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[he:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]
[[nl:Veiligheid]]</text>
      <sha1>q19faahny1a19yopxu6f1co2yxmiyyg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>107479</id>
      <parentid>104998</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-11-23T20:23:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robyt</username>
        <id>9747</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>Added {{geo-missing}}</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15323">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 
: ''See also the article on [[Hitchhiking and Pandemia|Health and Pandemia]].''

== Summary ==

Here are four quick tips which will make you safer:

* Ask for rides at petrol stations instead of signalling at the roadside.
* Trust your instincts.
* Refuse rides from [[:wikipedia:Driving_under_the_influence|impaired drivers]].
* Know that [[hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than during the daytime.

Please read on for many more important tips.

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

&lt;!-- [[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]] Picture is missing ~~~~ --&gt;
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of the road, as far back from the travelled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at petrol stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backpack at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backpack for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving licence; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive. See [[Driving for your driver]]

Hitchhikers should see themselves as agents of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver travelling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the driver's reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a person's personality as well. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be riskier. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes, and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. ''Don't panic''!
* Keep up a good conversation with the driver. See [[etiquette]].
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [https://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], or [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also, it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepper spray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft. Better take it with you when you go to the rest room as when you come back the car might be gone, even just due to the driver getting told to park somewhere else and now you can't find him anymore, etc.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road.
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Do not hitchhike on the highways in western countries. People will not notice you, thus they will not pick you up and there have been accidents. It is very dangerous and often illegal, too.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case, however. In [[Australia]], truck drivers drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia, 111
In New Zealand ) Note: it is now possible to text/SMS 911 in the US, and doing so may lower your chances of arousing suspicion.
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait until the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitchhikers. As a hitchhiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitchhiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the daytime. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sunstroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sunscreen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://wegwijzer.be/dossier/veilig-liften PDF guide about hitchhiking safety] - A complete guidebook about safety, including how to jump from a moving vehicle
* [http://www.yourworldyourhome.com/hhsafe/ is Hitchhiking safe?]
* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxfCLJZtboY Is Hitchhiking dangerous for girls? Sharing practical tips on how to stay safe]
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[he:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]
[[nl:Veiligheid]]

{{geo-missing}}</text>
      <sha1>sk0ovqpny6y1uzq7et0779koyk6phud</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>111561</id>
      <parentid>107479</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-08-21T17:13:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Julianjumps</username>
        <id>32533</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>deprecated</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15243">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Summary ==

Here are four quick tips which will make you safer:

* Ask for rides at petrol stations instead of signalling at the roadside.
* Trust your instincts.
* Refuse rides from [[:wikipedia:Driving_under_the_influence|impaired drivers]].
* Know that [[hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than during the daytime.

Please read on for many more important tips.

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

&lt;!-- [[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]] Picture is missing ~~~~ --&gt;
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of the road, as far back from the travelled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at petrol stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backpack at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backpack for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving licence; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive. See [[Driving for your driver]]

Hitchhikers should see themselves as agents of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver travelling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the driver's reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a person's personality as well. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be riskier. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes, and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. ''Don't panic''!
* Keep up a good conversation with the driver. See [[etiquette]].
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [https://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], or [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also, it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepper spray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft. Better take it with you when you go to the rest room as when you come back the car might be gone, even just due to the driver getting told to park somewhere else and now you can't find him anymore, etc.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road.
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Do not hitchhike on the highways in western countries. People will not notice you, thus they will not pick you up and there have been accidents. It is very dangerous and often illegal, too.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case, however. In [[Australia]], truck drivers drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia, 111
In New Zealand ) Note: it is now possible to text/SMS 911 in the US, and doing so may lower your chances of arousing suspicion.
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait until the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitchhikers. As a hitchhiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitchhiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the daytime. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sunstroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sunscreen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://wegwijzer.be/dossier/veilig-liften PDF guide about hitchhiking safety] - A complete guidebook about safety, including how to jump from a moving vehicle
* [http://www.yourworldyourhome.com/hhsafe/ is Hitchhiking safe?]
* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxfCLJZtboY Is Hitchhiking dangerous for girls? Sharing practical tips on how to stay safe]
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[he:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]
[[nl:Veiligheid]]

{{geo-missing}}</text>
      <sha1>0xpzkcjtqhs8mv5e8adaj2ehcdsmwvh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>112553</id>
      <parentid>111561</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-09-04T11:37:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15284">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Summary ==

Here are four quick tips which will make you safer:

* Ask for rides at petrol stations instead of signaling at the roadside.
* Trust your instincts.
* Refuse rides from [[:wikipedia:Driving_under_the_influence|impaired drivers]].
* Know that [[hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than during the daytime.
* It is good to be [[insurance|insured]].

Please read on for many more important tips.

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

&lt;!-- [[File:Bundespolizei AT Warnweste rueckenansicht.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Police safety vest. Consider wearing something similar at night (well, probably without the Polizei text).]] Picture is missing ~~~~ --&gt;
You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of the road, as far back from the travelled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at petrol stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backpack at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backpack for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving licence; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive. See [[Driving for your driver]]

Hitchhikers should see themselves as agents of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver travelling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the driver's reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a person's personality as well. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be riskier. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes, and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. ''Don't panic''!
* Keep up a good conversation with the driver. See [[etiquette]].
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [https://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], or [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also, it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepper spray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft. Better take it with you when you go to the rest room as when you come back the car might be gone, even just due to the driver getting told to park somewhere else and now you can't find him anymore, etc.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road.
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Do not hitchhike on the highways in western countries. People will not notice you, thus they will not pick you up and there have been accidents. It is very dangerous and often illegal, too.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case, however. In [[Australia]], truck drivers drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia, 111
In New Zealand ) Note: it is now possible to text/SMS 911 in the US, and doing so may lower your chances of arousing suspicion.
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait until the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitchhikers. As a hitchhiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitchhiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the daytime. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sunstroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sunscreen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://wegwijzer.be/dossier/veilig-liften PDF guide about hitchhiking safety] - A complete guidebook about safety, including how to jump from a moving vehicle
* [http://www.yourworldyourhome.com/hhsafe/ is Hitchhiking safe?]
* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxfCLJZtboY Is Hitchhiking dangerous for girls? Sharing practical tips on how to stay safe]
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[he:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]
[[nl:Veiligheid]]

{{geo-missing}}</text>
      <sha1>b4mwxo5dbkqmyqd4vt1q17zjphvq17q</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>112554</id>
      <parentid>112553</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-09-04T11:37:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15071">'''[[Hitchhiking]] is usually very safe'''. The most encountered feelings of unsafety are probably concerning the driver's driving style. 

== Summary ==

Here are four quick tips which will make you safer:

* Ask for rides at petrol stations instead of signaling at the roadside.
* Trust your instincts.
* Refuse rides from [[:wikipedia:Driving_under_the_influence|impaired drivers]].
* Know that [[hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than during the daytime.
* It is good to be [[insurance|insured]].

Please read on for many more important tips.

== Road Safety ==

[[File:Agne-from-vilnius-to-radviliskis.jpg|left|thumb|300px|Bright clothes make it easier to be seen from a distance, which is especially necessary when hitchhiking directly on a motorway, as here in [[Lithuania]].]]

You should make sure you are standing along a safe portion of the road, as far back from the travelled portion of the road as possible (on the unimproved portion of the road shoulder). Make sure that you are visible to drivers from a good distance (100 meters or more is ideal) to allow them time to 1) decide if they want to pick you up and 2) safely pull to the side of the road. 

Wear bright, visible clothes, especially while walking on the road! Consider wearing a bright reflecting safety vest. At night time use reflectors and carry a small torch. You can purchase these often at petrol stations and supermarkets. Carry these in your backpack at all times: even if you are not planning to hitchhike during the darkness. Make sure you are visible from both sides. Attach reflectors to your backpack for example.

Sometimes, especially but not exclusively [[hitchhiking at night|at night]], drivers will [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up a hitchhiker]] because they are tired and sleepy, but must get to their destination on time. Make sure you never fall asleep in someone's car if you are suspecting this might be the case. Even if you can't find a conversation topic, stay alert. If you have a driving licence; you might indicate this to your driver; he or she may be happy to let you drive. See [[Driving for your driver]]

Hitchhikers should see themselves as agents of road safety. Only one study has ever been made on the subject of hitchhiking's impact on road safety, and it appears that it has no negative impact, if not positive. It implies that the hitchhiker should stay safe; be sure they can be seen, especially at night; remind the driver of the speed limits; and be willing to cooperate with all professionals of the road.

== Awareness ==
Awareness on the part of a hitchhiker will keep him or her from accepting dangerous rides- for example, a driver travelling under the influence of [[alcohol]] or narcotics. Examine the driver and vehicle. If there are signs of intoxication (slurred or erratic speech, no eye contact, open alcohol containers) do NOT get in the vehicle. Refuse the ride.

Talk to the driver before getting in the car! This way you make sure the ride offered is one that you would like to take, and that it will end at a safe spot to stop. Ask the driver before getting in their car: Where are you going? Can you drop me off at a service area or other safe place near your destination? A rhetoric question like "Are you going north" and the driver's reaction can give you some information about him or her. Dropping humour into your brief conversation is a good way of gauging a person's personality as well. '''Trust your instincts!''' If you do not feel comfortable accepting the ride, thank the driver and say no. Walk away.

== [[Women hitchhiking]] ==
[[File:Parnu-riga.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to [[Riga]] in the snow]]
For women, hitchhiking seems to be riskier. But it is not really. Many men are reporting the same degree of violation as women. If most reported cases of murder or rape of hitchhikers involve women hitchhiking alone, it is because men are less likely to report rapes, and murders are not getting the label of "hitch-hiking-murders" as often with male victims. &lt;!--- I think we should link to [[Pippa]] here :( ~~~~ --&gt;

Hitchhiking as a woman can be easier though. Often, women stop for other women or girls. Even families (or other usual-not-hitch-hiker-friendly car owners) stop to "save" women from a situation in which they think she could be in "danger". 

Read more at the Hitchwiki page on [[Women hitchhiking|Female Hitchhikers]].

== Top tips for safety ==

* [[Hitchhiking at night]] is more dangerous than at daytime.

=== (Anti) Social tips ===

* Think positive and you will attract positive.
* If you doubt about the ride offered, turn it down.
* You can also check if the doors open from the inside by pretending not to have closed the door properly.
* Note the vehicle's registration number, or at least the make, model, and colour, etc. You could then SMS this to a friend. You can pretend calling your mum and saying car type, color and licence number aloud. This makes driver believe he is under surveillance.
* It's probably safest to not go with more than one guy in the car.
* It's better to sit in the front of the vehicle.
* If getting in a truck or car driving long-distance, maybe to where you want to go, including sleeping in the truck with the driver. Never tell yes to go all way from the beginning. Say you are going to visit a friend in a city on the way and then when you get a feeling of safety with the driver tell him that you will visit your friend some other time and go all the way now.
* If there are other houses or people in sight, you can wave to them or pretend to say goodbye to a friend. The driver will think that somebody has seen you getting into their car. 
* Always trust your instincts. ''Don't panic''!
* Keep up a good conversation with the driver. See [[etiquette]].
* Hitchhike with someone you know. On hitchhike forums (such as at [https://couchsurfing.org/group.html?gid=12 the CS group], or [http://www.jayride.co.nz Jayride] for [[New Zealand|NZ]] you can find other hitchhikers.

* It might a good idea to get yourself some [[pepper spray]], just in case. But it can be illegal to carry in some parts of the world so be aware. Also, it might not be a good idea to use in a closed space as you'd get a good dose of pepper yourself.  There are also canisters of ''pepper gel'' which emit a stream of gel instead of a spray mist, which could save you in enclosed spaces. 
Don't use pepper spray while the car is in motion. Blinding the driver will probably result in a crash.

=== Stuff safety ===
* Wear your '''most valuable small stuff on your body''': passport, wallet, money, mobile phone. This way you will keep these items in case you should abandon your bag.
* Remember that your backpack is the last one to enter the car and the first one to leave it. Also avoid putting it into the trunk if you are hiking alone, or if the driver has an opportunity to drive away with your luggage - though sometimes this is simply not an option. It's a good idea to keep the door open while you get your bag from the trunk. It's actually much more likely a hitchhiker ''forgetting their own bag'' or other objects than theft. Better take it with you when you go to the rest room as when you come back the car might be gone, even just due to the driver getting told to park somewhere else and now you can't find him anymore, etc.
* Keep your backpack close to you (i.e. on your lap), so you can grab it if you need to get out quickly.

=== Road safety ===

* Wear well visible [[appearance|clothes]], stand at a safe spot, be careful while walking on the road.
* Aim to leave the vehicle at a safe spot.
* Do not hitchhike on the highways in western countries. People will not notice you, thus they will not pick you up and there have been accidents. It is very dangerous and often illegal, too.

== Choose your drivers ==
It is preferable to choose your drivers. Ask for rides at [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]] or truck stops. Briefly profile people by their appearance and talk to folks that seem safe/interesting. Appearances do not guarantee safety.

By seeking rides at petrol stations instead of at the roadside, you have more time to talk with drivers and evaluate their character.

It may be unwise to accept rides from drivers who are stressed, angry, or demanding.[http://www.adventuresauce.com/2011/12/how-to-hitchhike/] Do not accept rides from drivers who are impaired by alcohol or drugs.

One of the safest ones to get a lift from is the truck drivers. You sit far away from the driver. You are always able to open the door if needed (just don't jump while the truck is moving if you like your life moving again). Big trucks in [[Western Europe]] anyway also have a sensor on their trucks that let their boss know exactly where they are. Going off the road or stopping for some minutes and the boss will be all over the case, calling on the phone...

This is not always the case, however. In [[Australia]], truck drivers drive long distances on one lane highways and are often overworked. This can lead to dangerous driving conditions and bad experiences.

== Leaving the vehicle early ==
When you are on the road, if the situation gets bad for whatever reason and you don't want to be in the vehicle, then find a way to leave. Get the driver to leave you at the next good hitchhiking spot (choose it yourself, don't rely on the driver to choose it for you), or in another safe area such as a city where you can contact people you know, use hospitality exchange organisations, or take public transport. Remember that if for whatever reason you are not wearing your seatbelt and the car is moving, the driver can distract or injure you by braking so that you hit your head.

If you feel uncomfortable, remember that you don't have to stay in the vehicle, and you don't owe it to the driver to travel the full distance agreed upon. Good get-out tactics include faking travel sickness, or stating that you've changed your mind and want to do something else. Stay calm and be polite but direct, and most drivers will respect your wishes.

=== Emergency exit ===

First of all, don't panic. Still, a situation might occur that you want to get out of the car and the driver does not want to stop. ... '''Need more info'''...
* Never use the handbrake. Using it will almost certainly lead to a car crash.
* Cause a (small) accident
* Call emergency number ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/112_%28emergency_telephone_number%29 112] in EU, 911 in US, 000 in Australia, 111
In New Zealand ) Note: it is now possible to text/SMS 911 in the US, and doing so may lower your chances of arousing suspicion.
* Prepare to loosen your seatbelt, and wait until the driver has to stop at a red light or stop sign. When the driver stops the car slide your belt off and open the door in one motion and get you and your pack out before they have any idea what you're doing.
* As an emergency safety precaution, carry a roll of toilet paper and a lighter. In the event that you feel uncomfortable and the driver refuses to stop, light the toilet paper and throw it into the back seat. The smoke and fire will encourage the driver to stop and/or alert other cars on the road.
* A helpful trick if you just have a bad feeling about a ride, but not really a reason to scream for help (yet): Pretend to feel sick and tell your ride to stop immediately because otherwise you might ruin his car... when they stop, jump out of the car with your backpack, tell them not to wait and head away from the road until they're gone.

** From personal experience: Causing a small accident may do more damage than good, since the driver will most likely just speed off, anyway, rather than trying to wait around and get caught by the police. Plus, that gives you a much greater chance of being injured. Remember that no matter where you get taken, you will still have the opportunity to hitchhike out of, and thus get rescued by someone else. Plus, vehicles do require fuel, and eventually run out of it. So, you can at some point find yourself in a (very useful!) petrol station, from where you can: have contact with other people, make phone calls, lock yourself in the bathroom to avoid confrontations, and hitchhike a new ride. Your best bet is to stay calm and confident, no matter the situation.

== Hitching in Extreme Climates ==

The climate poses an entirely separate danger to hitchhikers. As a hitchhiker you may find yourself in the situation of being stuck in an extremely hot or cold place, both of which are potentially fatal if not dealt with appropriately.
=== Extreme Cold ===
:''See [[Winter]] for more information.''

Driving in the cold can be particularly risky, let alone hitchhiking. If travelling a long distance, it is advisable to have a backup plan, to avoid being stuck outside at night. If there is a significant chance of being stuck outdoors for a long time, then you must take precautions. Having plenty of warm clothes, hat, gloves and thick boots are a must for the daytime. If there is a risk of being stuck outside at night, try finding a host, either on the internet prior to leaving, or else at a hostel if there is one. You should bring money with you for emergencies. If you absolutely must sleep outside, then you will need to acquire a heavy sleeping bag - a 5 season sleeping bag is not too expensive. Be sure to set up camp in a covered area - such as in a forest or under a shelter, and make sure it is sheltered from the wind. A gas lamp will also assist in heating you up. You might want to learn how to start a fire

=== Extreme Heat ===
The extreme heat poses a great risk of dehydration and sunstroke in the summer months in many countries in the world. You absolutely must bring plenty of drinking water. Try to have no less than 4L of water with you per day. If there is a risk of being stuck in direct sunlight for a long time, bring sunscreen, and perhaps also an umbrella, particularly if there are not many trees around.

== See also ==
&lt;div style="column-count:2;-moz-column-count:2;-webkit-column-count:2"&gt;
* [[Health]]
* [[Where to hitchhike]]
* [[Picking up hitchhikers]], for drivers
* [[One page guide to safe hitchhiking|Safety pdf]] - a project to create a one-page guide to safe hitchhiking
* [http://wegwijzer.be/dossier/veilig-liften PDF guide about hitchhiking safety] - A complete guidebook about safety, including how to jump from a moving vehicle
* [http://www.yourworldyourhome.com/hhsafe/ is Hitchhiking safe?]
* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxfCLJZtboY Is Hitchhiking dangerous for girls? Sharing practical tips on how to stay safe]
&lt;/div&gt;

=== Even more info ===
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/group_read.html?gid=12&amp;post=938480 Bad hitchhiking - Sharing stories?] in CouchSurfing group about hitchhiking.

[[Category:Safety]]

[[de:Sicherheit]]
[[fi:Turvallisuus]]
[[fr:Sécurité]]
[[hr:Sigurnost autostopere]]
[[pl:Bezpieczeństwo]]
[[tr:Otostopta güvenlik]]
[[zh:Hitchhiker's safety]]
[[he:הבטיחות בטרמפים]]
[[nl:Veiligheid]]

{{geo-missing}}</text>
      <sha1>mgadaswgw7mbmb6ei3qwhcki37g3l8g</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>User:GuakaTest</title>
    <ns>2</ns>
    <id>1510</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1525</id>
      <parentid>4257</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-28T17:12:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="280">Account created by [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] when he couldn't log in on that one.

Actually not in category:active contributors to this site :)
I made this account because I had some problem logging in as Guaka. It can be deleted actually. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:12, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>irwbghz4zy4dk5p4astmy2sb87hi94z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1526</id>
      <parentid>1525</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="280">Account created by [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] when he couldn't log in on that one.

Actually not in category:active contributors to this site :)
I made this account because I had some problem logging in as Guaka. It can be deleted actually. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:12, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>irwbghz4zy4dk5p4astmy2sb87hi94z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4255</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-17T12:46:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GuakaTest</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="165">[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Guaka Wikipedian] and [http://wikitravel.org/en/User:Guaka Wikitraveller]. Stuff done by me at Wikitravel can be copied over here.</text>
      <sha1>3ixorqol3ocx4kdrp68fti1brfi4wli</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4256</id>
      <parentid>4255</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T21:07:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="76">Account created by [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] when he couldn't log in on that one.</text>
      <sha1>aepci23examyitc9g3y4dra70b9ytbx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4257</id>
      <parentid>4256</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-28T11:39:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robin Patterson</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="123">Account created by [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] when he couldn't log in on that one.

[[category:active contributors to this site]]</text>
      <sha1>0t4ex2w94bq522qk0m5z11umhjje1k0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4258</id>
      <parentid>1526</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="280">Account created by [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] when he couldn't log in on that one.

Actually not in category:active contributors to this site :)
I made this account because I had some problem logging in as Guaka. It can be deleted actually. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:12, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>irwbghz4zy4dk5p4astmy2sb87hi94z</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1511</id>
    <redirect title="Hitchwiki:About" />
    <revision>
      <id>1527</id>
      <parentid>4261</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-04T23:34:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="27">#redirect [[project:About]]</text>
      <sha1>k39gc6cugbu9fpuw0bftjtbvqajh4ms</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1528</id>
      <parentid>1527</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="27">#redirect [[project:About]]</text>
      <sha1>k39gc6cugbu9fpuw0bftjtbvqajh4ms</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4259</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-17T12:47:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GuakaTest</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2558">Hitchhikers Guide to Hitchhiking is a collaborate web-based project to gather a good set of knowledge about hitchhiking for the benefit of hitchhiking. The project started 14th of April 2005.

The idea in the Guide is not to compete with other marvellous hitchhiking sites already existing, such as the [[digihitch.com]], [[Suite101]], [[Vilnius Hitchhiking Club]], [[Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers]] or [[Hike.ru]], but to provide a way to reorganize a lot of the existing knowhow into one, easily searchable encyclopedia. Hopefully the Guide can help all the other sites to fourish.  

===Free content===

The [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_Free_Documentation_License GNU Free Documentation License], the license under which ''The Guide's'' articles available, is one of many "[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/copyleft copyleft]" [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/copyright copyright] licenses which permit the redistribution, creation of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/derivative_work derivativework]s, and commercial use of content provided its authors are attributed and this content remains available under the GFDL. When an author contributes to original material to the project, the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/copyright copyright] over it is retained with them, however they agree to make the work available under the GFDL. Material on ''The Guide'' may thus be shared with, or incorporated from, resources which also use this license. 

This means that the content of  ''Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking'' is available to use on other sites and media that agree to share it alike. Because of this, ''The Guide'' is not just for itself. It's for all hitchhikers, and for all hitchhikers' communities.

==So I can use the content on my own website?==

Yes, as long as you give the same permissions to the text there and remember to give the credit to ''Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking''. Linking back to the original article will suit us fine for this purpose. 

It is basically possible for anybody to produce a book or other similar publication from the contents of the site, as long as the derivative work is in the framework determined by the GFDL license.

==What's the point?==

Freely shared content will never be lost, as people can copy and distribute it. This also makes ''the Guide'' a project that everybody can benefit - the articles are free to use for all the hitchhiking communities that already exist.  

And heck, wouldn't it be cool to see somebody actually publishing a printed hitchhiking guide after so many years?</text>
      <sha1>ov65wgbyml1yz7slnb8egtj91l57p7w</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4260</id>
      <parentid>4259</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T21:58:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2691">'''Hitchhikers Guide to Hitchhiking''' is a collaborate web-based project to gather a good set of knowledge about hitchhiking for the benefit of hitchhiking. The project started 14th of April 2005. However, the person who started didn't respond when the wiki was constantly being spammed. Consequently [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] moved the wiki to [http://wikicities.com Wikicities], a migration that was completed on the 19th of December 2005.

The idea in the Guide is not to compete with other [[Hitchhiking websites|marvellous hitchhiking sites]] already existing, but to provide a way to reorganize a lot of the existing knowhow into one, easily searchable encyclopedia. Hopefully the Guide can help all the other sites to fourish.

===Free content===

The [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_Free_Documentation_License GNU Free Documentation License], the license under which ''The Guide's'' articles are available, is one of many "[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/copyleft copyleft]" [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/copyright copyright] licenses which permit the redistribution, creation of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/derivative_work derivativework]s, and commercial use of content provided its authors are attributed and this content remains available under the GFDL. When an author contributes to original material to the project, the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/copyright copyright] over it is retained with them, however they agree to make the work available under the GFDL. Material on ''The Guide'' may thus be shared with, or incorporated from, resources which also use this license. 

This means that the content of  ''Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking'' is available to use on other sites and media that agree to share it alike. Because of this, ''The Guide'' is not just for itself. It's for all hitchhikers, and for all hitchhikers' communities.

==So I can use the content on my own website?==

Yes, as long as you give the same permissions to the text there and remember to give the credit to ''Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking''. Linking back to the original article will suit us fine for this purpose. 

It is basically possible for anybody to produce a book or other similar publication from the contents of the site, as long as the derivative work is in the framework determined by the GFDL license.

==What's the point?==

Freely shared content will never be lost, as people can copy and distribute it. This also makes ''the Guide'' a project that everybody can benefit - the articles are free to use for all the hitchhiking communities that already exist.  

And heck, wouldn't it be cool to see somebody actually publishing a printed hitchhiking guide after so many years?</text>
      <sha1>ntyto6peed576b8u24c1qkq5co4ku3u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4261</id>
      <parentid>4260</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-29T00:34:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="47">#redirect [[Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking]]</text>
      <sha1>g6bwx06hu2leudxtb9tg91cuef3f8l1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4262</id>
      <parentid>1528</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="27">#redirect [[project:About]]</text>
      <sha1>k39gc6cugbu9fpuw0bftjtbvqajh4ms</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Hitchhiker</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1512</id>
    <redirect title="Hitchhiking" />
    <revision>
      <id>1529</id>
      <parentid>4263</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T21:09:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="25">#redirect [[Hitchhiking]]</text>
      <sha1>ahh5l33ml7c6lbtoa4dhbb8zr01ga9o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1530</id>
      <parentid>1529</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="25">#redirect [[Hitchhiking]]</text>
      <sha1>ahh5l33ml7c6lbtoa4dhbb8zr01ga9o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4263</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-17T12:47:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GuakaTest</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="284">Presenting the '''hitchhiker''', the good guy of the story. Sociable, friendly, easy-going and sometimes outgoing person. Likes to see new places and loves to chat with new people.

There are some [[legendary hitchhikers]]. Are you one of them? Or do you plan to become one?

{{stub}}</text>
      <sha1>mmxchwulkegrz9o1uteceyllh3xjora</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4264</id>
      <parentid>1530</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="25">#redirect [[Hitchhiking]]</text>
      <sha1>ahh5l33ml7c6lbtoa4dhbb8zr01ga9o</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Template:Stub</title>
    <ns>10</ns>
    <id>1513</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1531</id>
      <parentid>4268</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-23T20:53:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="155">:''This article is a stub. You can help by [http://hitchhiking.wikicities.com/index.php?title={{PAGENAMEE}}&amp;action=edit expanding it].''
[[Category:Stubs]]</text>
      <sha1>i5mvyn3u666tcqlgmesb6q6kuff8p4u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1532</id>
      <parentid>1531</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="155">:''This article is a stub. You can help by [http://hitchhiking.wikicities.com/index.php?title={{PAGENAMEE}}&amp;action=edit expanding it].''
[[Category:Stubs]]</text>
      <sha1>i5mvyn3u666tcqlgmesb6q6kuff8p4u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4265</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-17T12:48:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GuakaTest</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="57">''This article is a stub. You can help by adding to it.''</text>
      <sha1>2g2t8ipuqytdtyug166hnf7q9ayc9op</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4266</id>
      <parentid>4265</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-23T20:34:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="77">:''This article is a stub. You can help by adding to it.''
[[Category:Stubs]]</text>
      <sha1>gqcwyr6gr9tipc1dkx0uyxy634f6gnf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4267</id>
      <parentid>4266</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-23T20:38:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="152">:''This article is a stub. You can help by &lt;span class="plainlinks"&gt;[{{fullurl:{{FULLPAGENAME}}|action=edit}} expanding it]&lt;/span&gt;.''
[[Category:Stubs]]</text>
      <sha1>ie1fwf6i05uhybhb44i1hvheggruzhx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4268</id>
      <parentid>4267</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-23T20:40:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="162">:''This article is a stub. You can help by [http://hitchhiking.wikicities.com/index.php?title={{PAGENAMEE}}&amp;action=edit expanding it]&lt;/span&gt;.''
[[Category:Stubs]]</text>
      <sha1>9meawt5ndhp5yiupsc9k0htf222gdun</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4269</id>
      <parentid>1532</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="155">:''This article is a stub. You can help by [http://hitchhiking.wikicities.com/index.php?title={{PAGENAMEE}}&amp;action=edit expanding it].''
[[Category:Stubs]]</text>
      <sha1>i5mvyn3u666tcqlgmesb6q6kuff8p4u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9954</id>
      <parentid>4269</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-21T23:39:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="133">:''This article is a stub. You can help by [http://hitchwiki.org/?title={{PAGENAMEE}}&amp;action=edit expanding it].''
[[Category:Stubs]]</text>
      <sha1>nwyp57btdii2m9khqirmx369a914sjc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15289</id>
      <parentid>9954</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-31T20:45:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="136">:''This article is a stub. You can help by [http://en.hitchwiki.org/?title={{PAGENAMEE}}&amp;action=edit expanding it].''
[[Category:Stubs]]</text>
      <sha1>me5czipyb55tfyck6tgjyogx3avimjb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15363</id>
      <parentid>15289</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-03T17:11:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="327">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|''This article is a stub. If you have any information for this article, you can help by [http://en.hitchwiki.org/?title={{PAGENAMEE}}&amp;action=edit expanding it].''
|}

[[Category:Stubs]]</text>
      <sha1>spmpf5rb0imu6apn48r7futnw3peacn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18469</id>
      <parentid>15363</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-02-19T14:54:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="405">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|''This article is a stub. If you have any information for this article, you can help by [http://en.hitchwiki.org/?title={{PAGENAMEE}}&amp;action=edit expanding it].''
|}
&lt;includeonly&gt;
[[Category:Stubs]]
&lt;/includeonly&gt;
&lt;noinclude&gt;


[[Category:Templates]]
&lt;/noinclude&gt;</text>
      <sha1>swy32cqr0yjjp5o3om4het3p007l0y9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26806</id>
      <parentid>18469</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-02T09:41:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Alex</username>
        <id>89</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="602">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|''This article is a stub. This means that the information available to us is obviously not enough. In these places few information is available or the description is severely outdated. If you went there, including hitchhiking, for travel or as part of an organized tour - be sure to [http://en.hitchwiki.org/?title={{PAGENAMEE}}&amp;action=extend this article]!''
|}
&lt;includeonly&gt;
[[Category:Stubs]]
&lt;/includeonly&gt;
&lt;noinclude&gt;


[[Category:Templates]]
&lt;/noinclude&gt;</text>
      <sha1>p68i4718f9cudogkwmh3jcf889kmd1b</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26807</id>
      <parentid>26806</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-02T09:42:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Alex</username>
        <id>89</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="609">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|''This article is a stub. This means that the information available to us is obviously not enough. In these places few information is available or the description is severely outdated. If you went there, including hitchhiking, for travel or as part of an organized tour - be sure to [http://en.hitchwiki.org/?title={{PAGENAMEE}}&amp;action=extend extend this article]!''
|}
&lt;includeonly&gt;
[[Category:Stubs]]
&lt;/includeonly&gt;
&lt;noinclude&gt;


[[Category:Templates]]
&lt;/noinclude&gt;</text>
      <sha1>troqonnc1jfkhsvl5c90v4qnqqeegfo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26814</id>
      <parentid>26807</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-02T14:55:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="647">{|style="width:100%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|[[Image:Applications-office.png|45px]]
|''This article is a stub. This means that the information available to us is obviously not enough. In these places few information is available or the description is severely outdated. If you went there, including hitchhiking, for travel or as part of an organized tour - be sure to [http://en.hitchwiki.org/?title={{PAGENAMEE}}&amp;action=extend extend this article]!''
|}
&lt;includeonly&gt;
[[Category:Stubs]]
&lt;/includeonly&gt;
&lt;noinclude&gt;
[[Category:Templates]]
&lt;/noinclude&gt;</text>
      <sha1>3q0cfmav44t9wnaq71tonarxp5sqkd8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26826</id>
      <parentid>26814</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-03T08:26:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Alex</username>
        <id>89</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="683">{|style="width:80%; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|[[Image:Applications-office.png|45px]]
|''This article is a stub. This means that the information available to us is obviously not enough. In these places few information is available or the description is severely outdated. If you went there, including hitchhiking, for travel or as part of an organized tour - be sure to [http://en.hitchwiki.org/?title={{PAGENAMEE}}&amp;action=extend extend this article]!''
|}
&lt;includeonly&gt;
[[Category:Stubs]]
&lt;/includeonly&gt;
&lt;noinclude&gt;
[[Category:Templates]]
&lt;/noinclude&gt;</text>
      <sha1>hliho9fu4hwjb5ztqnoasaezuooevdc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26839</id>
      <parentid>26826</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-03T09:38:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="711">&lt;div align='center'&gt;
{|style="width:80%; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|[[Image:Applications-office.png|45px]]
|''This article is a stub. This means that the information available to us is obviously not enough. In these places few information is available or the description is severely outdated. If you went there, including hitchhiking, for travel or as part of an organized tour - be sure to [http://en.hitchwiki.org/?title={{PAGENAMEE}}&amp;action=extend extend this article]!''
|}
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;includeonly&gt;
[[Category:Stubs]]
&lt;/includeonly&gt;
&lt;noinclude&gt;
[[Category:Templates]]
&lt;/noinclude&gt;</text>
      <sha1>e5za9wzlglripopz6q51qxpmmihcqfw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27693</id>
      <parentid>26839</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-12T20:52:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="709">&lt;div align='center'&gt;
{|style="width:80%; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|[[Image:Applications-office.png|45px]]
|''This article is a stub. This means that the information available to us is obviously not enough. In these places few information is available or the description is severely outdated. If you went there, including hitchhiking, for travel or as part of an organized tour - be sure to [http://en.hitchwiki.org/?title={{PAGENAMEE}}&amp;action=edit extend this article]!''
|}
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;includeonly&gt;
[[Category:Stubs]]
&lt;/includeonly&gt;
&lt;noinclude&gt;
[[Category:Templates]]
&lt;/noinclude&gt;</text>
      <sha1>gmsmzof7zkjk27nkbh95qlkvjqi5xv0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31044</id>
      <parentid>27693</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-11T22:27:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kb</username>
        <id>1332</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="711">&lt;div align='center'&gt;
{|style="width:80%; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|[[Image:Applications-office.png|45px]]
|''This article is a stub. This means that the information available to us is obviously not enough. In these places few information is available or the description is severely outdated. If you went there, including hitchhiking, for travel or as part of an organized tour − be sure to [http://en.hitchwiki.org/?title={{PAGENAMEE}}&amp;action=edit extend this article]!''
|}
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;includeonly&gt;
[[Category:Stubs]]
&lt;/includeonly&gt;
&lt;noinclude&gt;
[[Category:Templates]]
&lt;/noinclude&gt;</text>
      <sha1>sxnt7f61w6d4jgol37v8oje7lerx5fn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>33724</id>
      <parentid>31044</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-28T14:46:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.156.213.38</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="772">&lt;div align='center'&gt;
{|style="width:80%; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|[[Image:Applications-office.png|45px]]
|''This article is a stub. This means that the information available to us is obviously not enough. In these places few information is available or the description is severely outdated. If you went there, including hitchhiking, for travel or as part of an organized tour − be sure to [http://en.hitchwiki.org/?title={{PAGENAMEE}}&amp;action=edit extend this article]!''
|}
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;includeonly&gt;
[[Category:Stubs]]
&lt;/includeonly&gt;
&lt;noinclude&gt;
[[Category:Templates]]
&lt;/noinclude&gt;

[[ru:Шаблон:Незавершённая статья]]</text>
      <sha1>fb5xp5kna0u8sleke4t8ejiash6yk9l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35791</id>
      <parentid>33724</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-14T18:51:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Paluch</username>
        <id>1363</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="817">&lt;div align='center'&gt;
{|style="width:80%; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|[[Image:Applications-office.png|45px]]
|''This article is a stub. This means that the information available to us is obviously not enough. In these places few information is available or the description is severely outdated. If you went there, including hitchhiking, for travel or as part of an organized tour − be sure to [http://en.hitchwiki.org/?title={{PAGENAMEE}}&amp;action=edit extend this article]!''
|}
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;includeonly&gt;
[[Category:Stubs]]
&lt;/includeonly&gt;
&lt;noinclude&gt;
[[Category:Templates]]
&lt;/noinclude&gt;

[[de:Vorlage:Stub]]
[[pl:Szablon:Zalążek]]
[[ru:Шаблон:Незавершённая статья]]</text>
      <sha1>0eumoesajen6wjtwybg3xa6szmsrc4a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35792</id>
      <parentid>35791</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-14T19:23:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Paluch</username>
        <id>1363</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="711">&lt;div align='center'&gt;
{|style="width:80%; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|[[Image:Applications-office.png|45px]]
|''This article is a stub. This means that the information available to us is obviously not enough. In these places few information is available or the description is severely outdated. If you went there, including hitchhiking, for travel or as part of an organized tour − be sure to [http://en.hitchwiki.org/?title={{PAGENAMEE}}&amp;action=edit extend this article]!''
|}
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;includeonly&gt;
[[Category:Stubs]]
&lt;/includeonly&gt;
&lt;noinclude&gt;
[[Category:Templates]]
&lt;/noinclude&gt;</text>
      <sha1>sxnt7f61w6d4jgol37v8oje7lerx5fn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39526</id>
      <parentid>35792</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-01-25T15:50:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Daseinhorn</username>
        <id>2202</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="737">&lt;div align='center'&gt;
{|style="width:80%; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|[[Image:Applications-office.png|45px]]
|''This article is a stub. This means that the information available to us is obviously not enough. In these places few information is available or the description is severely outdated. If you went there, including hitchhiking, for travel or as part of an organized tour − be sure to [http://en.hitchwiki.org/?title={{PAGENAMEE}}&amp;action=edit extend this article]!''
|}
&lt;/div&gt;

[[fr:Modèle:Ébauche]]

&lt;includeonly&gt;
[[Category:Stubs]]
&lt;/includeonly&gt;
&lt;noinclude&gt;
[[Category:Templates]]
&lt;/noinclude&gt;</text>
      <sha1>nf1l59e9c06huj2t5oq98zl0mhd4zc3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41687</id>
      <parentid>39526</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-28T20:06:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kb</username>
        <id>1332</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="736">&lt;div align='center'&gt;
{|style="width:80%; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|[[Image:Applications-office.png|45px]]
|''This article is a stub. This means that the information available to us is obviously not enough. In these places few information is available or the description is severely outdated. If you went there, including hitchhiking, for travel or as part of an organized tour − be sure to [http://en.hitchwiki.org/?title={{PAGENAMEE}}&amp;action=edit extend this article]!''
|}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;includeonly&gt;
[[Category:Stubs]]
&lt;/includeonly&gt;
&lt;noinclude&gt;
[[Category:Templates]]
[[fr:Modèle:Ébauche]]
&lt;/noinclude&gt;</text>
      <sha1>k1ftn6f7p4xh98mccx0ukchexnserfo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>42830</id>
      <parentid>41687</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-07-01T18:46:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Hippietrail</username>
        <id>2459</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="744">&lt;div align='center'&gt;
{|style="width:80%; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|[[Image:Applications-office.png|45px]]
|''This article is a stub. This means that the information available to us is obviously insufficient. In these places little information is available or the description is severely outdated. If you have been there, whether hitchhiking, for travel or as part of an organized tour − be sure to [http://en.hitchwiki.org/?title={{PAGENAMEE}}&amp;action=edit extend this article]!''
|}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;includeonly&gt;
[[Category:Stubs]]
&lt;/includeonly&gt;
&lt;noinclude&gt;
[[Category:Templates]]
[[fr:Modèle:Ébauche]]
&lt;/noinclude&gt;</text>
      <sha1>ou9e20q0v61hua0mvf64ya3j57mk5j1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44007</id>
      <parentid>42830</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-08-12T21:48:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Vidimian</username>
        <id>1703</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="766">&lt;div align='center'&gt;
{|style="width:80%; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|[[Image:Applications-office.png|45px]]
|''This article is a stub. This means that the information available to us is obviously insufficient. In these places little information is available or the description is severely outdated. If you have been there, whether hitchhiking, for travel or as part of an organized tour − be sure to [http://en.hitchwiki.org/?title={{PAGENAMEE}}&amp;action=edit extend this article]!''
|}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;includeonly&gt;
[[Category:Stubs]]
&lt;/includeonly&gt;
&lt;noinclude&gt;
[[Category:Templates]]
[[fr:Modèle:Ébauche]]
[[tr:Şablon:Taslak]]
&lt;/noinclude&gt;</text>
      <sha1>7fstatq4iibv204qxi5ty43k01d6fke</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>74189</id>
      <parentid>44007</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-02-06T11:34:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="766">&lt;div align='center'&gt;
{|style="width:80%; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; padding:10px; margin:0; margin-bottom:10px; background-color:#E9EDF6; border:1px solid #aaa; -moz-border-radius:0.5em;"
|[[Image:Applications-office.png|45px]]
|''This article is a stub. This means that the information available to us is obviously insufficient. In these places little information is available or the description is severely outdated. If you have been there, whether hitchhiking, for travel or as part of an organized tour − be sure to [http://hitchwiki.org/en/?title={{PAGENAMEE}}&amp;action=edit extend this article]!''
|}
&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;includeonly&gt;
[[Category:Stubs]]
&lt;/includeonly&gt;
&lt;noinclude&gt;
[[Category:Templates]]
[[fr:Modèle:Ébauche]]
[[tr:Şablon:Taslak]]
&lt;/noinclude&gt;</text>
      <sha1>mn5v9ov6bbfpsr8fmqz0jm1y7p4ax6d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>78442</id>
      <parentid>74189</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-01-11T15:55:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kundrt</username>
        <id>2416</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="737">&lt;div style="text-align: center; width: 80%; margin: auto; background-color: #E9EDF6; border: 1px solid #aaa; border-radius: 4px; clear: both;"&gt;
{|
| [[File:Applications-office.png|45px|link=]]
| ''This article is a stub. This means that the information available to us is obviously insufficient. In these places little information is available or the description is severely outdated. If you have been there, whether hitchhiking, for travel or as part of an organized tour − be sure to &lt;span class="plainlinks"&gt;[{{fullurl:{{FULLPAGENAME}}|action=edit}} extend this article]&lt;/span&gt;!''
|}&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;includeonly&gt;
[[Category:Stubs]]
&lt;/includeonly&gt;
&lt;noinclude&gt;
[[Category:Templates]]
[[fr:Modèle:Ébauche]]
[[tr:Şablon:Taslak]]
&lt;/noinclude&gt;</text>
      <sha1>73ivwunto62mn45cwmb2v9btd931371</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>112333</id>
      <parentid>78442</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-08-24T21:44:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="818">&lt;div style="text-align: center; width: 80%; margin: auto; background-color: #E9EDF6; border: 1px solid #aaa; border-radius: 4px; clear: both;"&gt;
{|
| [[File:Applications-office.png|45px|link=]]
| ''This article is a stub. This means that the information available to us is obviously insufficient. In these places little information is available or the description is severely outdated. If you have been there, whether hitchhiking, for travel or as part of an organized tour − be sure to &lt;span class="plainlinks"&gt;[{{fullurl:{{FULLPAGENAME}}|action=edit}} extend this article]&lt;/span&gt;! To start editing articles you can [[Special:RequestAccount|request an account]].''
|}&lt;/div&gt;

&lt;includeonly&gt;
[[Category:Stubs]]
&lt;/includeonly&gt;
&lt;noinclude&gt;
[[Category:Templates]]
[[fr:Modèle:Ébauche]]
[[tr:Şablon:Taslak]]
&lt;/noinclude&gt;</text>
      <sha1>rv1wvuuddylnyk988tf7f0m045qzado</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Hitchhiking techniques</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1514</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1533</id>
      <parentid>4270</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-03-29T17:43:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="109">'''Hitchhiking techniques'''
* [[How to face traffic]]
* [[Finding accommodation]]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>luuz9q32njn3i0ty06g5i2hjg9oocyd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1534</id>
      <parentid>1533</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="109">'''Hitchhiking techniques'''
* [[How to face traffic]]
* [[Finding accommodation]]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>luuz9q32njn3i0ty06g5i2hjg9oocyd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4270</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-17T12:50:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GuakaTest</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="82">'''Hitchhiking techniques'''
* [[How to face traffic]]
* [[Finding accommodation]]</text>
      <sha1>05v4moe7xrw6t8rqz7dtlgu7589l7xb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4271</id>
      <parentid>1534</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="109">'''Hitchhiking techniques'''
* [[How to face traffic]]
* [[Finding accommodation]]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>luuz9q32njn3i0ty06g5i2hjg9oocyd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14581</id>
      <parentid>4271</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-10T11:54:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="133">'''Hitchhiking techniques'''
* [[How to face traffic]]
* [[Finding accommodation]]
* [[Speed Hitchhiking]]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>czu4n7b26wm7qvueg7h3xbzrekcfvnr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24093</id>
      <parentid>14581</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-08-27T22:40:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robino</username>
        <id>4</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="160">'''Hitchhiking techniques'''
* [[How to face traffic]]
* [[Hitchhiking Gestures]]
* [[Finding accommodation]]
* [[Speed Hitchhiking]]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>1tobpf78d1w74370jbniltjswr1lrgo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24543</id>
      <parentid>24093</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-06T11:31:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="162">'''Hitchhiking techniques'''
* [[How to face traffic]]
* [[Hitchhiking Gestures]]
* [[Finding accommodation]]
* [[Speed Hitchhiking]]

[[Category:Practical info]]</text>
      <sha1>pxd2gupiz5emck7mchsedt8s3cgtqdu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>25270</id>
      <parentid>24543</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-23T14:05:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mirto</username>
        <id>45</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="221">'''Hitchhiking techniques'''
* [[How to face traffic]]
* [[Hitchhiking Gestures]]
* [[Finding accommodation]]
* [[Speed Hitchhiking]]
* [[Traffic Jam Hitchhiking]]
* Hitchhiking with [[Signs]]

[[Category:Practical info]]</text>
      <sha1>p4rh6nsp9qa0g2tx8u0tnm1fcsn3dcn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27948</id>
      <parentid>25270</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-20T19:29:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Paxus</username>
        <id>1639</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="244">'''Hitchhiking techniques'''
* [[How to face traffic]]
* [[Hitchhiking Gestures]]
* [[Finding accommodation]]
* [[Speed Hitchhiking]]
* [[Traffic Jam Hitchhiking]]
* Hitchhiking with [[Signs]]
* Driver [[etiquette]]

[[Category:Practical info]]</text>
      <sha1>fkcu3c66ty4td7op6630mm325e7b79r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40783</id>
      <parentid>27948</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-30T20:36:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="259">'''Hitchhiking techniques'''
* [[How to face traffic]]
* [[Hitchhiking Gestures]]
* [[Finding accommodation]]
* [[Speed Hitchhiking]]
* [[Traffic Jam Hitchhiking]]
* Hitchhiking with [[Signs]]
* Driver [[etiquette]]

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[zh:技巧]]</text>
      <sha1>gj77z90weqqieqe2ls8uu3jp566c24o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>55876</id>
      <parentid>40783</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-08T01:13:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="292">'''Hitchhiking techniques'''
* [[How to face traffic]]
* [[Gestures|Hitchhiking Gestures]]
* [[Finding accommodation]]
* [[Speed Hitchhiking]]
* [[Traffic jam hitchhiking|Traffic Jam Hitchhiking]]
* Hitchhiking with [[Signs]]
* Driver [[etiquette]]

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[zh:技巧]]</text>
      <sha1>idzu7gb0xi4h6sgden7bl2m3d3pl4aq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>58572</id>
      <parentid>55876</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-01-19T12:08:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="317">'''Hitchhiking techniques'''
* [[How to face traffic]]
* [[Gestures|Hitchhiking Gestures]]
* [[Finding accommodation]]
* [[Speed Hitchhiking]]
* [[Traffic jam hitchhiking|Traffic Jam Hitchhiking]]
* Hitchhiking with [[Signs]]
* Driver [[etiquette]]
* [[Hitchhiking letter]]

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[zh:技巧]]</text>
      <sha1>abr6ey3r8kciqsx2r5w63hwm97da0ti</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>64124</id>
      <parentid>58572</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-09-24T01:06:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="333">'''Hitchhiking techniques'''
* [[How to face traffic]]
* [[Gestures|Hitchhiking Gestures]]
* [[Finding accommodation]]
* [[Speed Hitchhiking]]
* [[Traffic jam hitchhiking|Traffic Jam Hitchhiking]]
* Hitchhiking with [[Signs]]
* Driver [[etiquette]]
* [[Hitchhiking letter]]

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pl:Techniki]]
[[zh:技巧]]</text>
      <sha1>ae63ytqbocg4afb0952p4uc3r1nomhr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>107508</id>
      <parentid>64124</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-11-23T20:29:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robyt</username>
        <id>9747</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>Added {{geo-missing}}</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="350">'''Hitchhiking techniques'''
* [[How to face traffic]]
* [[Gestures|Hitchhiking Gestures]]
* [[Finding accommodation]]
* [[Speed Hitchhiking]]
* [[Traffic jam hitchhiking|Traffic Jam Hitchhiking]]
* Hitchhiking with [[Signs]]
* Driver [[etiquette]]
* [[Hitchhiking letter]]

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pl:Techniki]]
[[zh:技巧]]

{{geo-missing}}</text>
      <sha1>2un2yrxfptg8ci1cqdecd910v8tjd1n</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>108371</id>
      <parentid>107508</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-12-16T18:14:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Chris9012</username>
        <id>47192</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="356">'''{{FULLPAGENAME}}'''
* [[How to face traffic]]
* [[Gestures|Hitchhiking Gestures]]
* [[Finding accommodation]]
* [[Speed Hitchhiking]]
* [[Traffic jam hitchhiking|Traffic Jam Hitchhiking]]
* Hitchhiking with [[Signs]]
* Driver [[etiquette]]
* [[Hitchhiking letter]]
* [[Food delivery hitching]]

[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pl:Techniki]]
[[zh:技巧]]</text>
      <sha1>l711gz3mg7m9uncw70xoj351ilhwtdn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>108422</id>
      <parentid>108371</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-12-21T08:55:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Chris9012</username>
        <id>47192</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="389">'''{{FULLPAGENAME}}'''
* [[How to face traffic]]
* [[Gestures|Hitchhiking Gestures]]
* [[Finding accommodation]]
* [[Speed Hitchhiking]]
* [[Traffic jam hitchhiking|Traffic Jam Hitchhiking]]
* Hitchhiking with [[Signs]]
* Driver [[etiquette]]
* [[Hitchhiking letter]]
* [[Food delivery hitching]]
* [[Long distance hitchhiking]]


[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pl:Techniki]]
[[zh:技巧]]</text>
      <sha1>k4womf5wg5sk6yx55wm7n2dpcf4xlv2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>108446</id>
      <parentid>108422</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-12-22T12:20:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Chris9012</username>
        <id>47192</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="405">'''{{FULLPAGENAME}}'''
* [[How to face traffic]]
* [[Gestures|Hitchhiking Gestures]]
* [[Finding accommodation]]
* [[Speed Hitchhiking]]
* [[Traffic jam hitchhiking|Traffic Jam Hitchhiking]]
* Hitchhiking with [[Signs]]
* Driver [[etiquette]]
* [[Hitchhiking letter]]
* [[Food delivery hitching]]
* [[Long distance hitchhiking]]
* [[Mentostop]]


[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pl:Techniki]]
[[zh:技巧]]</text>
      <sha1>rahkj0xb8lu6gwlv6vl11l5ztk54qbv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>108454</id>
      <parentid>108446</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-12-22T12:38:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Chris9012</username>
        <id>47192</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="429">'''{{FULLPAGENAME}}'''
* [[How to face traffic]]
* [[Gestures|Hitchhiking Gestures]]
* [[Finding accommodation]]
* [[Speed Hitchhiking]]
* [[Traffic jam hitchhiking|Traffic Jam Hitchhiking]]
* Hitchhiking with [[Signs]]
* Driver [[etiquette]]
* [[Hitchhiking letter]]
* [[Food delivery hitching]]
* [[Long distance hitchhiking]]
* [[Mentostop]]
* [[Moonwalk Strategy]]


[[Category:Practical info]]

[[pl:Techniki]]
[[zh:技巧]]</text>
      <sha1>6a8onkjo0n6yywnaw1dgg3mwu2p0xux</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>How to face traffic</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1515</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1535</id>
      <parentid>4278</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-11T04:41:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>216.87.207.1</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1460">'''Facing traffic''' the right way is one of the most important things for good hitchhiking. Be sure to face the possible ride. Smile widely, but not ridiculously so. Remove any sunglasses or other things that may cover your eyes. This is ''really'' important. The driver must see your eyes. Seeing your eyes might be the difference between being offered a ride or not. Don't get frustrated when many cars pass you, as will invariably happen most of the time. If someone flips you off, don't flip them off back, just ignore them and keep your attention on the oncoming cars.

If the driver does stop, move quickly, but not too fast. If they stopped far ahead, run to the car, but otherwise stay calm. Keep smiling. You don't want to make the driver feel like their time is being wasted, but you also want to give yourself time to judge the car and the driver, and to decide if you want to take the ride. It's your call... use your instincts. This is something that you will quickly develop with a little bit of experience!

* Some people like to ask the driver where they are going first. If you get a bad feeling about the lift, it is easy to say 'no' by simply saying that you want to go in another direction.
* Otherwise, specify where you are going. Maybe tell the driver where you're from, or your purpose. Sometimes it helps to explain how you got where you are. 

Remember to be friendly and be [[safe]]. Trust your instincts.

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>0xr85peabobjtyk0oag6ih5qi18qxxd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1536</id>
      <parentid>1535</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1460">'''Facing traffic''' the right way is one of the most important things for good hitchhiking. Be sure to face the possible ride. Smile widely, but not ridiculously so. Remove any sunglasses or other things that may cover your eyes. This is ''really'' important. The driver must see your eyes. Seeing your eyes might be the difference between being offered a ride or not. Don't get frustrated when many cars pass you, as will invariably happen most of the time. If someone flips you off, don't flip them off back, just ignore them and keep your attention on the oncoming cars.

If the driver does stop, move quickly, but not too fast. If they stopped far ahead, run to the car, but otherwise stay calm. Keep smiling. You don't want to make the driver feel like their time is being wasted, but you also want to give yourself time to judge the car and the driver, and to decide if you want to take the ride. It's your call... use your instincts. This is something that you will quickly develop with a little bit of experience!

* Some people like to ask the driver where they are going first. If you get a bad feeling about the lift, it is easy to say 'no' by simply saying that you want to go in another direction.
* Otherwise, specify where you are going. Maybe tell the driver where you're from, or your purpose. Sometimes it helps to explain how you got where you are. 

Remember to be friendly and be [[safe]]. Trust your instincts.

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>0xr85peabobjtyk0oag6ih5qi18qxxd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4272</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-17T12:51:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GuakaTest</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="801">Be sure to face the possible ride. Smile widely. Remove Any Sunglasses or other thing that may cover your eyes. This is REALLY important. The Driver must see your eyes. Seeing your eyes might be the difference between a ride or not. 
If the Driver does stop, move hastely, but not too fast. if they stopped far ahead run to the car, but otherwise stay calm. Keep smiling. Remember to take it nice and slow. Though this might hve been your first pick-up all day, the drive might be frightened if you come off too quick or open. Then again openness may be the thing for you. It's your call... use your instincts.
   Specify where your going. Maybe tell where your from, or your purpose. Sometimes it helps to explain how you got where you are. 
Remember to be friendly and be safe. Trust your instincts.</text>
      <sha1>jw6nbjchclyluus3rp8ftlhoc8bimqi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4273</id>
      <parentid>4272</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-24T10:33:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="804">Be sure to face the possible ride. Smile widely. Remove Any Sunglasses or other thing that may cover your eyes. This is REALLY important. The Driver must see your eyes. Seeing your eyes might be the difference between a ride or not. 
If the driver does stop, move hastely, but not too fast. if they stopped far ahead run to the car, but otherwise stay calm. Keep smiling. Remember to take it nice and slow. Though this might have been your first pick-up all day, the drive might be frightened if you come off too quick or open. Then again openness may be the thing for you. It's your call... use your instincts.

:Specify where you're going. Maybe tell where your from, or your purpose. Sometimes it helps to explain how you got where you are. 

Remember to be friendly and be safe. Trust your instincts.</text>
      <sha1>o71r6hcd832ysj6k36yjui54xv8rg66</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4274</id>
      <parentid>4273</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-03-29T17:44:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="831">Be sure to face the possible ride. Smile widely. Remove Any Sunglasses or other thing that may cover your eyes. This is REALLY important. The Driver must see your eyes. Seeing your eyes might be the difference between a ride or not. 
If the driver does stop, move hastely, but not too fast. if they stopped far ahead run to the car, but otherwise stay calm. Keep smiling. Remember to take it nice and slow. Though this might have been your first pick-up all day, the drive might be frightened if you come off too quick or open. Then again openness may be the thing for you. It's your call... use your instincts.

:Specify where you're going. Maybe tell where your from, or your purpose. Sometimes it helps to explain how you got where you are. 

Remember to be friendly and be safe. Trust your instincts.

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>jo0kgytfixtduwcsfq7qfk597a9oc68</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4275</id>
      <parentid>4274</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-04-09T15:29:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>141.150.136.113</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="833">Be sure to face the possible ride. Smile widely. Remove Any Sunglasses or other thing that may cover your eyes. This is REALLY important. The Driver must see your eyes. Seeing your eyes might be the difference between a ride or not. 
If the driver does stop, move hastely, but not too fast. if they stopped far ahead run to the car, but otherwise stay calm. Keep smiling. Remember to take it nice and slow. Though this might have been your first pick-up all day, the drive might be frightened if you come off too quick or open. Then again openness may be the thing for you. It's your call... use your instincts.

:Specify where you're going. Maybe tell where you're from, or your purpose. Sometimes it helps to explain how you got where you are. 

Remember to be friendly and be safe. Trust your instincts.

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>h2bt5gbdpmq9iubbjuebnzb5xqh1phg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4276</id>
      <parentid>4275</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-04-25T05:00:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>134.7.248.137</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1127">Be sure to face the possible ride. Smile widely. Remove any sunglasses or other things that may cover your eyes. This is REALLY important. The driver must see your eyes. Seeing your eyes might be the difference between being offered a ride or not. 
If the driver does stop, move quickly, but not too fast. If they stopped far ahead, run to the car, but otherwise stay calm. Keep smiling. You don't want to make the driver feel like their time is being wasted, but you also want to give yourself time to judge the car and the driver, and to decide if you want to take the ride. It's your call... use your instincts. This is something that you will quickly develop with a little bit of experience!

:Some people like to ask the driver where they are going first. If you get a bad feeling about the lift, it is easy to say 'no' by simply saying that you want to go in another direction.
:Otherwise, specify where you are going. Maybe tell the driver where you're from, or your purpose. Sometimes it helps to explain how you got where you are. 

Remember to be friendly and be safe. Trust your instincts.

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>8rxzupfibmye0magrimkvvmyzpa9ekx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4277</id>
      <parentid>4276</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-04-25T05:01:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>134.7.248.137</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1129">Be sure to face the possible ride. Smile widely. Remove any sunglasses or other things that may cover your eyes. This is REALLY important. The driver must see your eyes. Seeing your eyes might be the difference between being offered a ride or not. 
If the driver does stop, move quickly, but not too fast. If they stopped far ahead, run to the car, but otherwise stay calm. Keep smiling. You don't want to make the driver feel like their time is being wasted, but you also want to give yourself time to judge the car and the driver, and to decide if you want to take the ride. It's your call... use your instincts. This is something that you will quickly develop with a little bit of experience!

* Some people like to ask the driver where they are going first. If you get a bad feeling about the lift, it is easy to say 'no' by simply saying that you want to go in another direction.
* Otherwise, specify where you are going. Maybe tell the driver where you're from, or your purpose. Sometimes it helps to explain how you got where you are. 

Remember to be friendly and be safe. Trust your instincts.

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>dds0o1qpe05jn1jv39w7g4jlpflrie0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4278</id>
      <parentid>4277</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-12T22:10:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1231">'''Facing traffic''' the right way is one of the most important things for good hitchhiking. Be sure to face the possible ride. Smile widely. Remove any sunglasses or other things that may cover your eyes. This is ''really'' important. The driver must see your eyes. Seeing your eyes might be the difference between being offered a ride or not. 

If the driver does stop, move quickly, but not too fast. If they stopped far ahead, run to the car, but otherwise stay calm. Keep smiling. You don't want to make the driver feel like their time is being wasted, but you also want to give yourself time to judge the car and the driver, and to decide if you want to take the ride. It's your call... use your instincts. This is something that you will quickly develop with a little bit of experience!

* Some people like to ask the driver where they are going first. If you get a bad feeling about the lift, it is easy to say 'no' by simply saying that you want to go in another direction.
* Otherwise, specify where you are going. Maybe tell the driver where you're from, or your purpose. Sometimes it helps to explain how you got where you are. 

Remember to be friendly and be [[safe]]. Trust your instincts.

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>85xvtw5jvq5t75kyeo1zar8r99k76yo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4279</id>
      <parentid>1536</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1460">'''Facing traffic''' the right way is one of the most important things for good hitchhiking. Be sure to face the possible ride. Smile widely, but not ridiculously so. Remove any sunglasses or other things that may cover your eyes. This is ''really'' important. The driver must see your eyes. Seeing your eyes might be the difference between being offered a ride or not. Don't get frustrated when many cars pass you, as will invariably happen most of the time. If someone flips you off, don't flip them off back, just ignore them and keep your attention on the oncoming cars.

If the driver does stop, move quickly, but not too fast. If they stopped far ahead, run to the car, but otherwise stay calm. Keep smiling. You don't want to make the driver feel like their time is being wasted, but you also want to give yourself time to judge the car and the driver, and to decide if you want to take the ride. It's your call... use your instincts. This is something that you will quickly develop with a little bit of experience!

* Some people like to ask the driver where they are going first. If you get a bad feeling about the lift, it is easy to say 'no' by simply saying that you want to go in another direction.
* Otherwise, specify where you are going. Maybe tell the driver where you're from, or your purpose. Sometimes it helps to explain how you got where you are. 

Remember to be friendly and be [[safe]]. Trust your instincts.

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>0xr85peabobjtyk0oag6ih5qi18qxxd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24549</id>
      <parentid>4279</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-06T11:34:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1462">'''Facing traffic''' the right way is one of the most important things for good hitchhiking. Be sure to face the possible ride. Smile widely, but not ridiculously so. Remove any sunglasses or other things that may cover your eyes. This is ''really'' important. The driver must see your eyes. Seeing your eyes might be the difference between being offered a ride or not. Don't get frustrated when many cars pass you, as will invariably happen most of the time. If someone flips you off, don't flip them off back, just ignore them and keep your attention on the oncoming cars.

If the driver does stop, move quickly, but not too fast. If they stopped far ahead, run to the car, but otherwise stay calm. Keep smiling. You don't want to make the driver feel like their time is being wasted, but you also want to give yourself time to judge the car and the driver, and to decide if you want to take the ride. It's your call... use your instincts. This is something that you will quickly develop with a little bit of experience!

* Some people like to ask the driver where they are going first. If you get a bad feeling about the lift, it is easy to say 'no' by simply saying that you want to go in another direction.
* Otherwise, specify where you are going. Maybe tell the driver where you're from, or your purpose. Sometimes it helps to explain how you got where you are. 

Remember to be friendly and be [[safe]]. Trust your instincts.

[[Category:Practical info]]</text>
      <sha1>thlxb9ni4a945icb1eccuw19l7xd5v7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27687</id>
      <parentid>24549</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-12T18:58:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1872">'''Facing traffic''' the right way is important for good hitchhiking. Be sure to face the possible ride. Smile widely, but not ridiculously so. Remove any sunglasses or other things that may cover your eyes. This is ''really'' important. The driver must see your eyes. Seeing your eyes might be the difference between being offered a ride or not. Don't get frustrated when many cars pass you, as will invariably happen most of the time. If someone flips you off, don't flip them off back, just ignore them and keep your attention on the oncoming cars.

If the driver does stop, move quickly, but not too fast. If they stopped far ahead, run to the car, but otherwise stay calm. Keep smiling. You don't want to make the driver feel like their time is being wasted, but you also want to give yourself time to judge the car and the driver, and to decide if you want to take the ride. It's your call... use your instincts. This is something that you will quickly develop with a little bit of experience!

Looking at traffic is not always needed. Sometimes drivers do not seem to stop easily, and it does not always seem to matter if you look at them. That is simply a matter of good karma and will. Especially on countryside roads walking in the direction that you want to go and raising the thumb while a driver approaches, while you still keep walking, not looking at the car, this may work. It can also work on quiet roads at night. 

* Some people like to ask the driver where they are going first. If you get a bad feeling about the lift, it is easy to say 'no' by simply saying that you want to go in another direction.
* Otherwise, specify where you are going. Maybe tell the driver where you're from, or your purpose. Sometimes it helps to explain how you got where you are. 

Remember to be friendly and be [[safe]]. Trust your instincts.

[[Category:Practical info]]</text>
      <sha1>od0361wg8dmn7yp2dzd9x5jkw2d05hr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>55882</id>
      <parentid>27687</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-08T01:13:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1892">'''Facing traffic''' the right way is important for good hitchhiking. Be sure to face the possible ride. Smile widely, but not ridiculously so. Remove any sunglasses or other things that may cover your eyes. This is ''really'' important. The driver must see your eyes. Seeing your eyes might be the difference between being offered a ride or not. Don't get frustrated when many cars pass you, as will invariably happen most of the time. If someone flips you off, don't flip them off back, just ignore them and keep your attention on the oncoming cars.

If the driver does stop, move quickly, but not too fast. If they stopped far ahead, run to the car, but otherwise stay calm. Keep smiling. You don't want to make the driver feel like their time is being wasted, but you also want to give yourself time to judge the car and the driver, and to decide if you want to take the ride. It's your call... use your instincts. This is something that you will quickly develop with a little bit of experience!

Looking at traffic is not always needed. Sometimes drivers do not seem to stop easily, and it does not always seem to matter if you look at them. That is simply a matter of good karma and will. Especially on countryside roads walking in the direction that you want to go and raising the thumb while a driver approaches, while you still keep walking, not looking at the car, this may work. It can also work on quiet roads at night. 

* Some people like to ask the driver where they are going first. If you get a bad feeling about the lift, it is easy to say 'no' by simply saying that you want to go in another direction.
* Otherwise, specify where you are going. Maybe tell the driver where you're from, or your purpose. Sometimes it helps to explain how you got where you are. 

Remember to be friendly and be [[hitchhiker's safety|safe]]. Trust your instincts.

[[Category:Practical info]]</text>
      <sha1>av3g8a48r6ymh3cmrooq651jnmwwde2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>107517</id>
      <parentid>55882</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-11-23T20:31:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robyt</username>
        <id>9747</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>Added {{geo-missing}}</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1909">'''Facing traffic''' the right way is important for good hitchhiking. Be sure to face the possible ride. Smile widely, but not ridiculously so. Remove any sunglasses or other things that may cover your eyes. This is ''really'' important. The driver must see your eyes. Seeing your eyes might be the difference between being offered a ride or not. Don't get frustrated when many cars pass you, as will invariably happen most of the time. If someone flips you off, don't flip them off back, just ignore them and keep your attention on the oncoming cars.

If the driver does stop, move quickly, but not too fast. If they stopped far ahead, run to the car, but otherwise stay calm. Keep smiling. You don't want to make the driver feel like their time is being wasted, but you also want to give yourself time to judge the car and the driver, and to decide if you want to take the ride. It's your call... use your instincts. This is something that you will quickly develop with a little bit of experience!

Looking at traffic is not always needed. Sometimes drivers do not seem to stop easily, and it does not always seem to matter if you look at them. That is simply a matter of good karma and will. Especially on countryside roads walking in the direction that you want to go and raising the thumb while a driver approaches, while you still keep walking, not looking at the car, this may work. It can also work on quiet roads at night. 

* Some people like to ask the driver where they are going first. If you get a bad feeling about the lift, it is easy to say 'no' by simply saying that you want to go in another direction.
* Otherwise, specify where you are going. Maybe tell the driver where you're from, or your purpose. Sometimes it helps to explain how you got where you are. 

Remember to be friendly and be [[hitchhiker's safety|safe]]. Trust your instincts.

[[Category:Practical info]]

{{geo-missing}}</text>
      <sha1>p0xoghs0onli01eyssecrof4x39r7sf</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Things to carry</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1516</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1537</id>
      <parentid>4308</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-10-14T03:39:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>70.152.157.148</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4031">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.

==Quickly accessible during rides==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. 
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac)
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.
*A journal is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
*Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
*A harmonica, pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
*If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.

===Camping===
If you decide on camping you of course need some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in)  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example)
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of Sterno (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno
* Matches or lighter
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set
* A sharp pocket knife, preferably a tool-kit type with screwdrivers, etc.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!)
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>4kd0uwfc026juk7uxku39g8ptbcu053</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1538</id>
      <parentid>1537</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4031">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.

==Quickly accessible during rides==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. 
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac)
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.
*A journal is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
*Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
*A harmonica, pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
*If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.

===Camping===
If you decide on camping you of course need some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in)  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example)
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of Sterno (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno
* Matches or lighter
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set
* A sharp pocket knife, preferably a tool-kit type with screwdrivers, etc.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!)
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>4kd0uwfc026juk7uxku39g8ptbcu053</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4280</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-17T12:51:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GuakaTest</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1022">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. It should also carry these items:

*'''As little as possible'''
*:''The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!''
*A [[towel]] or something or similar nature.
*Hygenic products such as: a toothbrush, toothpaste, a brush, soap, and some [[mints]].
*:Try not to smell too bad for your drivers.
*A [[map]] of the area that the hitchhiker plans to travel in.
*:Preferably showing gas stations.
*An extra set of clothing if possible. At the minimum, an extra pair of socks and undergarments.
*Something to drink, food, mainly fruit, or something with nuts, at the minimum.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides.
*A spare piece of cardboard or like material that can be written on. Or take an A4 transparant plastic map, and some spare A4 papers.
*A marker. Sharpies work best.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*If possible a stick of deoderent.
*If possible, a sleeping bag.</text>
      <sha1>fh3iyv5c3uiewscd4gopl86owhzkbvz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4281</id>
      <parentid>4280</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T14:37:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1091">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 

Things you need:
*'''As little as possible'''
*:''The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!''

Besides that, in order of importance:
#A '''marker'''. Sharpies work best.
#An A4 transparant plastic map, and some spare A4 papers or a piece of cardboard - you'll often be able to find this on the though
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.

Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A towel or something or similar nature.
*Hygenic products such as
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** toothpaste
** soap
** some mints.
*:Try not to smell too bad for your drivers.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deoderent.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, an extra pair of socks and undergarments.
*Something to drink, food, mainly fruit, or something with nuts, at the minimum.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides.</text>
      <sha1>kbtgoeqhvc3xqrx7f3s1r48wqoszerv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4282</id>
      <parentid>4281</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T14:40:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1188">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Besides that, in order of importance:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. (?) Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparant plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.

Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A towel or something or similar nature.
*Hygenic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** toothpaste
** soap
** some mints
*:Try not to smell too bad for your drivers.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deoderent.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, an extra pair of socks and undergarments.
*Something to drink, food, mainly fruit, or something with nuts, at the minimum.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides.</text>
      <sha1>9m2380mqtz9aobiy41qva7fujjisk5l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4283</id>
      <parentid>4282</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T15:35:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1208">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. (?) Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparant plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A towel or something or similar nature.
*Hygenic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** toothpaste
** soap
** some mints
*:Try not to smell too bad for your drivers.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deoderent.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, an extra pair of socks and undergarments.
*Something to drink, food, mainly fruit, or something with nuts, at the minimum.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides.</text>
      <sha1>bgcvax11vjmvtn5cezjgjse6iad3sih</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4284</id>
      <parentid>4283</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-01-05T09:36:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1485">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. (?) Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparant plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A towel or something or similar nature.
*Hygenic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** toothpaste
** soap
** some mints
*:Try not to smell too bad for your drivers.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deoderent.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, an extra pair of socks and undergarments.
*Something to drink, food, mainly fruit, or something with nuts, at the minimum.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."</text>
      <sha1>0ppqkdgc3uoilgjwgha3j9smsxvmsuy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4285</id>
      <parentid>4284</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-01-08T23:45:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Deleea</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1581">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. !Eddings! are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparant plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A towel or something or similar nature.
*Hygenic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** toothpaste
** soap
** some mints
*:Try not to smell too bad for your drivers.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deoderent.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, an extra pair of socks and undergarments.
*Something to drink, food, mainly fruit, or something with nuts, at the minimum.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."</text>
      <sha1>ld6vxtcoccwd57hx4cr60giienra40f</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4286</id>
      <parentid>4285</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-01-08T23:45:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Deleea</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1581">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. 'Eddings' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparant plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A towel or something or similar nature.
*Hygenic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** toothpaste
** soap
** some mints
*:Try not to smell too bad for your drivers.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deoderent.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, an extra pair of socks and undergarments.
*Something to drink, food, mainly fruit, or something with nuts, at the minimum.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."</text>
      <sha1>5wzkhr8xu2u81yh0h9m8jpr0vao9f45</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4287</id>
      <parentid>4286</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-01-08T23:45:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Deleea</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1583">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparant plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A towel or something or similar nature.
*Hygenic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** toothpaste
** soap
** some mints
*:Try not to smell too bad for your drivers.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deoderent.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, an extra pair of socks and undergarments.
*Something to drink, food, mainly fruit, or something with nuts, at the minimum.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."</text>
      <sha1>ffplq28vsplqqa7enq9i42ete6spmwx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4288</id>
      <parentid>4287</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-03-14T09:52:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>85.224.186.239</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1713">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparant plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A towel or something or similar nature.
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** toothpaste
** soap
** some mints
*:Try not to smell too bad for your drivers.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deodorant.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, an extra pair of socks and undergarments.
*Something to drink, food, mainly fruit, or something with nuts, at the minimum.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. ( Preferably [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Kerouac Jack Kerouac])

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."</text>
      <sha1>hd1ys73i7tm22x4igixssqm0a0nwrnr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4289</id>
      <parentid>4288</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-03-19T01:49:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1709">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparant plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A towel or something or similar nature.
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** toothpaste
** soap
** some mints
*:Try not to smell too bad for your drivers.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deodorant.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, an extra pair of socks and undergarments.
*Something to drink, food, mainly fruit, or something with nuts, at the minimum.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Kerouac Jack Kerouac])

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."</text>
      <sha1>0svyb4cfrrnh0hbt841o251tu27zcju</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4290</id>
      <parentid>4289</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-04-25T05:04:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>134.7.248.137</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1695">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparant plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A towel or something similar.
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** toothpaste
** soap
** some mints
*:Try not to smell too bad for your drivers.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deodorant.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, an extra pair of socks and underwear.
*Something to drink, food, mainly fruit, or something with nuts, at the minimum.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Kerouac Jack Kerouac])

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."</text>
      <sha1>iou1wnv04r99zwg3g6ywiccquz2blqc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4291</id>
      <parentid>4290</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-05T00:11:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1722">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparant plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A towel or something similar.
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** toothpaste
** soap
** some mints
*:Try not to smell too bad for your drivers.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deodorant.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, an extra pair of socks and underwear.
*Something to drink, food, mainly fruit, or something with nuts, at the minimum.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Kerouac Jack Kerouac])

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>s7fpxzg7thj3263u7589x0r05fyb06v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4292</id>
      <parentid>4291</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-16T18:07:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>156.34.55.160</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1859">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparant plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A towel or something similar.
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** toothpaste
** soap
** some mints
*:Try not to smell too bad for your drivers.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deodorant.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, an extra pair of socks and underwear.
*Something to drink, food, mainly fruit, or something with nuts, at the minimum.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Kerouac Jack Kerouac])
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips
*A journal is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>7uee1i3cddtettpfu8ku2niktyxwmys</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4293</id>
      <parentid>4292</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-16T19:50:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1910">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparant plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A towel or something similar.
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** toothpaste
** soap
** some mints
*:Try not to smell too bad for your drivers.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deodorant.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, an extra pair of socks and underwear.
*Something to drink, food, mainly fruit, or something with nuts, at the minimum.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Kerouac Jack Kerouac])
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips
*A journal is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>0c3qqtcav8p6x7xn6t95ivxn3ed4yry</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4294</id>
      <parentid>4293</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-16T19:54:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2104">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparant plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A towel or something similar.
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** toothpaste
** soap
** some mints
*:Try not to smell too bad for your drivers.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deodorant.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, an extra pair of socks and underwear.
*Something to drink, food, mainly fruit, or something with nuts, at the minimum.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Kerouac Jack Kerouac])
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a whole in your crotch is quite difficult)
*A journal is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!

===Camping===
If you decide on camping you of course need some more stuff:
* A tent

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>k6rvs3g8gt4zhss8xn8nlc0zvzxamtw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4295</id>
      <parentid>4294</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-06-11T01:20:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>68.18.170.14</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3002">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparant plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deodorant or spray bottle of cologne.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Kerouac Jack Kerouac])
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult)
*A journal is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
*A film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.

===Camping===
If you decide on camping you of course need some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in)  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example)
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of Sterno (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set
* A sharp pocket knife, preferably a tool-kit type with screwdrivers, etc.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>8zpszw5z5a32bhyr3l985k5ir8vxe3y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4296</id>
      <parentid>4295</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-06-11T01:21:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>68.18.170.14</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2802">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparant plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deodorant or spray bottle of cologne.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Kerouac Jack Kerouac])
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult)
*A journal is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!

===Camping===
If you decide on camping you of course need some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in)  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example)
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of Sterno (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set
* A sharp pocket knife, preferably a tool-kit type with screwdrivers, etc.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>664mt9wq1xk9wv4jnfjcd8ys59tkzd2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4297</id>
      <parentid>4296</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-06-11T01:22:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>68.18.170.14</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3002">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparant plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.
*A film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deodorant or spray bottle of cologne.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Kerouac Jack Kerouac])
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult)
*A journal is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!

===Camping===
If you decide on camping you of course need some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in)  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example)
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of Sterno (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set
* A sharp pocket knife, preferably a tool-kit type with screwdrivers, etc.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>gay8newhfa6x0ih5eom255x4hhsbawf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4298</id>
      <parentid>4297</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-06-11T01:23:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>68.18.170.14</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3068">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparant plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.
*A film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deodorant or spray bottle of cologne.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Kerouac Jack Kerouac])
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult)
*A journal is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!

===Camping===
If you decide on camping you of course need some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in)  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example)
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of Sterno (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set
* A sharp pocket knife, preferably a tool-kit type with screwdrivers, etc.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep..

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>s8r0fgq76dbplfby40i4d7jwd6xp9fc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4299</id>
      <parentid>4298</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-06-11T01:28:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>68.18.170.14</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3192">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparant plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.
*A film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deodorant or spray bottle of cologne.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Kerouac Jack Kerouac])
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult)
*A journal is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!

===Camping===
If you decide on camping you of course need some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in)  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example)
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of Sterno (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set
* A sharp pocket knife, preferably a tool-kit type with screwdrivers, etc.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!)
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>ccfb7fri7huhamdff2chntresb9qrcb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4300</id>
      <parentid>4299</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-06-11T01:38:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>68.18.170.14</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3553">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparant plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.
*A film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deodorant or spray bottle of cologne.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwearand an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Kerouac Jack Kerouac])
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.
*A journal is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
*Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.

===Camping===
If you decide on camping you of course need some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in)  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example)
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of Sterno (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set
* A sharp pocket knife, preferably a tool-kit type with screwdrivers, etc.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!)
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>gjby9dlo3k8koo9oca7wowgark39w9q</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4301</id>
      <parentid>4300</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-06-11T01:42:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>68.18.170.14</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3617">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparant plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.
*A film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deodorant or spray bottle of cologne.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Kerouac Jack Kerouac])
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.
*A journal is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
*Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
*A harmonica, pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.

===Camping===
If you decide on camping you of course need some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in)  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example)
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of Sterno (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set
* A sharp pocket knife, preferably a tool-kit type with screwdrivers, etc.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!)
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>2gawaib8kvucke56yb81wygseyk56zn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4302</id>
      <parentid>4301</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-06-11T01:44:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>68.18.170.14</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3638">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparant plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.
*A film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deodorant or spray bottle of cologne.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Kerouac Jack Kerouac])
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.
*A journal is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
*Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
*A harmonica, pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.

===Camping===
If you decide on camping you of course need some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in)  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example)
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of Sterno (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno
* Matches or lighter
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set
* A sharp pocket knife, preferably a tool-kit type with screwdrivers, etc.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!)
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>0iyk0rlg7jbtrgd7izfe7ev1ruq66ms</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4303</id>
      <parentid>4302</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-06-12T19:32:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3594">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparant plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.
*A film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deodorant or spray bottle of cologne.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac)
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.
*A journal is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
*Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
*A harmonica, pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.

===Camping===
If you decide on camping you of course need some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in)  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example)
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of Sterno (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno
* Matches or lighter
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set
* A sharp pocket knife, preferably a tool-kit type with screwdrivers, etc.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!)
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>hmzaba5eandzhrhrasguzfdsf3vk8tp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4304</id>
      <parentid>4303</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-06-12T19:34:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3622">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparant plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deodorant or spray bottle of cologne.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac)
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.
*A journal is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
*Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
*A harmonica, pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
*If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.

===Camping===
If you decide on camping you of course need some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in)  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example)
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of Sterno (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno
* Matches or lighter
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set
* A sharp pocket knife, preferably a tool-kit type with screwdrivers, etc.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!)
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>m2w4mtc54svqg6rcz425ne2l2h2p0qw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4305</id>
      <parentid>4304</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-07-03T23:01:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Rev 22</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3622">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deodorant or spray bottle of cologne.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac)
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.
*A journal is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
*Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
*A harmonica, pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
*If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.

===Camping===
If you decide on camping you of course need some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in)  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example)
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of Sterno (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno
* Matches or lighter
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set
* A sharp pocket knife, preferably a tool-kit type with screwdrivers, etc.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!)
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>hafb7zwp9nev0xjhqquf3sfxligt1if</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4306</id>
      <parentid>4305</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-08-24T03:25:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3989">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.

==Quickly accessible during rides==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deodorant or spray bottle of cologne.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. 
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac)
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.
*A journal is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
*Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
*A harmonica, pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
*If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.

===Camping===
If you decide on camping you of course need some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in)  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example)
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of Sterno (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno
* Matches or lighter
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set
* A sharp pocket knife, preferably a tool-kit type with screwdrivers, etc.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!)
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>2c0u8n1m5wp03iguz1bhvd45ass0ftl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4307</id>
      <parentid>4306</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-10-14T03:36:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>70.152.157.148</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4027">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.

==Quickly accessible during rides==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deodorant or spray bottle of cologne.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. 
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac)
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.
*A journal is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
*Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
*A harmonica, pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
*If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.

===Camping===
If you decide on camping you of course need some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in)  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example)
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of Sterno (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno
* Matches or lighter
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set
* A sharp pocket knife, preferably a tool-kit type with screwdrivers, etc.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of stordy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!)
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>3y40d4wymsafkc7top382zs4pnw3qsb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4308</id>
      <parentid>4307</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-10-14T03:36:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>70.152.157.148</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4027">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.

==Quickly accessible during rides==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deodorant or spray bottle of cologne.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. 
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac)
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.
*A journal is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
*Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
*A harmonica, pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
*If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.

===Camping===
If you decide on camping you of course need some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in)  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example)
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of Sterno (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno
* Matches or lighter
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set
* A sharp pocket knife, preferably a tool-kit type with screwdrivers, etc.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!)
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>s5n7hou0yantk8bxpvvd8g7ax0r8lwg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4309</id>
      <parentid>1538</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4031">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.

==Quickly accessible during rides==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. 
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac)
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.
*A journal is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
*Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
*A harmonica, pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
*If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.

===Camping===
If you decide on camping you of course need some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in)  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example)
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of Sterno (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno
* Matches or lighter
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set
* A sharp pocket knife, preferably a tool-kit type with screwdrivers, etc.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!)
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>4kd0uwfc026juk7uxku39g8ptbcu053</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10716</id>
      <parentid>4309</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-04T16:19:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>85.178.90.37</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4031">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.

==Quickly accessible during rides==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. 
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac)
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.
*A journal is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
*Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
*A harmonica, pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
*If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.

===Camping===
If you decide on camping you of course need some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in)  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example)
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of Sterno (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno
* Matches or lighter
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set
* A sharp pocket knife, preferably a tool-kit type with screwdrivers, etc.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!)
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>27vf1s90qpqq7i6mmvojhy4vscodjno</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10717</id>
      <parentid>10716</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-04T16:21:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>85.178.90.37</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4074">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.

If you like to hitchhike with a [[sign]]:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.

==Quickly accessible during rides==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. 
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac)
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.
*A journal is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
*Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
*A harmonica, pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
*If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.

===Camping===
If you decide on camping you of course need some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in)  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example)
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of Sterno (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno
* Matches or lighter
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set
* A sharp pocket knife, preferably a tool-kit type with screwdrivers, etc.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!)
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>k0vfjviw99tdppovjcmsqhx3h1412gu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10718</id>
      <parentid>10717</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-04T16:22:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>85.178.90.37</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4073">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.

==Quickly accessible during rides==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. 
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac)
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.
*A journal is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
*Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
*A harmonica, pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
*If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.

===Camping===
If you decide on camping you of course need some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in)  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example)
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of Sterno (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno
* Matches or lighter
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set
* A sharp pocket knife, preferably a tool-kit type with screwdrivers, etc.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!)
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>ggizb38hlr7lf4en444m07mb14r96mi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10719</id>
      <parentid>10718</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-04T16:26:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>85.178.90.37</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4105">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.

==Quickly accessible during rides==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. 
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac)
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.
*A journal is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
*Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
*A harmonica, pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
*If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.

===Camping===
If you decide on camping you of course need some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in)  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example)
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of Sterno (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno
* Matches or lighter
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set or your Poketknife and a spoon.
* A sharp pocket knife, preferably a tool-kit type with screwdrivers, etc.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!)
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>efxtx4z6ko76rz0sv61eoowjclg8oqo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10720</id>
      <parentid>10719</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-04T16:27:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>85.178.90.37</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4132">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.

==Quickly accessible during rides==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plasticbottle of water

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. 
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac)
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.
*A journal is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
*Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
*A harmonica, pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
*If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.

===Camping===
If you decide on camping you of course need some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in)  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example)
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of Sterno (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno
* Matches or lighter
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set or your Poketknife and a spoon.
* A sharp pocket knife, preferably a tool-kit type with screwdrivers, etc.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!)
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>hi1si0fmodzo4oqm7zcvdd9mvf16l78</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10721</id>
      <parentid>10720</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-04T16:31:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>85.178.90.37</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4267">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.
If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.
For people who like it save:
A mobilephone for sending SMS to a friend. to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in .

==Quickly accessible during rides==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plasticbottle of water

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. 
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac)
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.
*A journal is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
*Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
*A harmonica, pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
*If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.

===Camping===
If you decide on camping you of course need some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in)  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example)
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of Sterno (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno
* Matches or lighter
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set or your Poketknife and a spoon.
* A sharp pocket knife, preferably a tool-kit type with screwdrivers, etc.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!)
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>hs01uy9qnekvu3mbu0e9fjizu961fpm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10722</id>
      <parentid>10721</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-04T16:32:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>85.178.90.37</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4268">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.
If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.
For people who like it save:
#A mobilephone for sending SMS to a friend. to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in .

==Quickly accessible during rides==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plasticbottle of water

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. 
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac)
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.
*A journal is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
*Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
*A harmonica, pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
*If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.

===Camping===
If you decide on camping you of course need some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in)  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example)
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of Sterno (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno
* Matches or lighter
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set or your Poketknife and a spoon.
* A sharp pocket knife, preferably a tool-kit type with screwdrivers, etc.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!)
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>7i36hqpbmykeh7e7jodytya9zirksrl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10729</id>
      <parentid>10722</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-05T03:15:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4270">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.
If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.
For people who like it save:
#A mobilephone for sending SMS to a friend. to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in .

==Quickly accessible during rides==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plasticbottle of water

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. 
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac)
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.
*A journal is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
*Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
*A harmonica, pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
*If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.

===Camping===
If you decide on camping you of course need some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in)  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example)
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of Sterno (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno
* Matches or lighter
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A sharp pocket knife, preferably a tool-kit type with screwdrivers, etc.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!)
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>3osk9krggstb4j71o6862qe4vvspbt6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10814</id>
      <parentid>10729</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-15T12:59:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>62.145.136.2</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4270">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in.
#:Preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.
If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors.
#An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask at shops or gas stations.
For people who like it safe:
#A mobilephone for sending SMS to a friend. to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in .

==Quickly accessible during rides==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plasticbottle of water

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. 
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac)
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.
*A journal is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
*Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
*A harmonica, pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
*If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.

===Camping===
If you decide on camping you of course need some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in)  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example)
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of Sterno (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno
* Matches or lighter
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A sharp pocket knife, preferably a tool-kit type with screwdrivers, etc.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!)
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>e9mtkdeewehng9y4uzkvs3yj3m7udf1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11238</id>
      <parentid>10814</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-13T05:11:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>24.131.1.212</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4624">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.
#:Like anything though, this is debatable.  Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign.  ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
#An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or gas stations.
For people who like it safe:
#A mobilephone for sending SMS to a friend. to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in .

==Quickly accessible during rides==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plasticbottle of water

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.
*Toilet paper or tissues. Don't ask why, just do it.
*A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.
*A sleeping bag.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. 
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac)
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.
*A journal is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
*Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
*A harmonica, pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
*If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.

===Camping===
If you decide on camping you of course need some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in)  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example)
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of Sterno (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno
* Matches or lighter
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A sharp pocket knife, preferably a tool-kit type with screwdrivers, etc.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!)
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>8uhwmdd8k07p8vsm823ma8mo4zfekex</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11239</id>
      <parentid>11238</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-13T05:44:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>24.131.1.212</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7247">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.
#:Like anything though, this is debatable.  Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign.  ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
#An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or gas stations.
For people who like it safe:
#A mobilephone for sending SMS to a friend. to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in .

==Quickly accessible during rides==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plasticbottle of water

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).  Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.  Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least).
*Toilet paper or tissues.  Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
*A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.  Alternatively essential oils, as of lavendar, pachouli, grapefruit, etc.
*A [[sleeping bag]].  It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.  Women may want significantly more changes of underwear.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt.  It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping longjohns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed.  Canned food is entirely too heavy - better is dried bulk food, etc.  Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous).
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.  Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travellers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability.  Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand.  Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
*A journal is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
*Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
*A [[harmonica]], pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
*If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
*An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
*A multi-tool.  My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''.  A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap.  The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
*A tarp.  There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp.  Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain.  The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
*Rain gear.  As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea.  If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
===Camping===
If you decide on camping you may want some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!).  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad.  Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno.  Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure.  Bics are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>0xfr1fahoc3yx14tzike2gx6wwsxbvr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12088</id>
      <parentid>11239</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-03T19:23:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7451">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.
#:Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign.  ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
#An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or gas stations.
#:An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it safe:
#A mobilephone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in.

==Quickly accessible during rides==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plasticbottle of water

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).  Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.  Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least).
*Toilet paper or tissues.  Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
*A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.  Alternatively essential oils, as of lavendar, pachouli, grapefruit, etc.
*A [[sleeping bag]].  It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.  Women may want significantly more changes of underwear.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt.  It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping longjohns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed.  Canned food is entirely too heavy - better is dried bulk food, etc.  Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous).
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.  Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travellers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability.  Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand.  Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
*A journal is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
*Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
*A [[harmonica]], pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
*If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
*An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
*A multi-tool.  My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''.  A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap.  The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
*A tarp.  There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp.  Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain.  The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
*Rain gear.  As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea.  If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
===Camping===
If you decide on camping you may want some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!).  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad.  Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno.  Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure.  Bics are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>b8zj7fr1m3jg08lbs0adwummjhpi7k1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12328</id>
      <parentid>12088</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-19T00:32:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>86.142.123.146</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7394">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.
#:Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign.  ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
#An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or gas stations.
#:An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it safe:
#A mobilephone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in.

==Quickly accessible during rides==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plasticbottle of water

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).  Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
*Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.  Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least).
*Toilet paper or tissues.  Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
*A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.  Alternatively essential oils, as of lavendar, pachouli, grapefruit, etc.
*A [[sleeping bag]].  It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt.  It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping longjohns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed.  Canned food is entirely too heavy - better is dried bulk food, etc.  Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous).
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.  Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travellers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability.  Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand.  Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
*A journal is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
*Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
*A [[harmonica]], pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
*If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
*An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
*A multi-tool.  My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''.  A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap.  The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
*A tarp.  There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp.  Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain.  The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
*Rain gear.  As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea.  If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
===Camping===
If you decide on camping you may want some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!).  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad.  Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno.  Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure.  Bics are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>6a2erttzess7k0ybdpovfxdthvuq2ju</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12967</id>
      <parentid>12328</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-17T00:59:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tmoon</username>
        <id>91</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8803">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!
Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items!
If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.
#:Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign.  ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
#An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or gas stations.
#:An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it safe:
#A mobilephone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

==Quickly accessible during rides==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
*all possible maps you might need
*clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
*a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).  Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
*Hygienic products such as:
**toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
**A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.  Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
**Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
**Toilet paper or tissues.  Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
**A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.  Alternatively essential oils, as of lavendar, pachouli, grapefruit, etc.
*A [[sleeping bag]].  It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
*A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt.  It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping longjohns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed.  Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous).
*A pack of cards.
*A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.  Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travellers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability.  Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand.  Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
*A torch. Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[UK]]) is excellent.
*A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
*Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
*A [[harmonica]], pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
*A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
*CDs or casettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as thankyou gifts.
*If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
*An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
*A multi-tool.  My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''.  A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap.  The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
*A tarp.  There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp.  Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain.  The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
*Rain gear.  As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea.  If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
*Small gifts for any [http://www.hospitalityclub.org HospitalityClub] or [http://www.couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] hosts who help you on your way.
===Camping===
If you decide on camping you may want some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!).  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad.  Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno.  Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure.  Bics are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>pyphfta7fhpvi7zvt8ybyjo3ywrs155</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12968</id>
      <parentid>12967</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-17T01:00:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tmoon</username>
        <id>91</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8807">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.
#:Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign.  ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
#An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or gas stations.
#:An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it safe:
#A mobilephone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

==Quickly accessible during rides==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
*all possible maps you might need
*clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
*a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).  Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
*Hygienic products such as:
**toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
**A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.  Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
**Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
**Toilet paper or tissues.  Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
**A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.  Alternatively essential oils, as of lavendar, pachouli, grapefruit, etc.
*A [[sleeping bag]].  It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
*A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt.  It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping longjohns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed.  Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous).
*A pack of cards.
*A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.  Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travellers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability.  Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand.  Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
*A torch. Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[UK]]) is excellent.
*A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
*Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
*A [[harmonica]], pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
*A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
*CDs or casettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as thankyou gifts.
*If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
*An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
*A multi-tool.  My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''.  A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap.  The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
*A tarp.  There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp.  Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain.  The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
*Rain gear.  As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea.  If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
*Small gifts for any [http://www.hospitalityclub.org HospitalityClub] or [http://www.couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] hosts who help you on your way.
===Camping===
If you decide on camping you may want some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!).  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad.  Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno.  Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure.  Bics are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>i9dhdutrj88tibgff15majh4sffazlb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14250</id>
      <parentid>12968</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-01T14:49:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>138.28.156.182</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8915">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.
#:Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign.  ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
#An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or gas stations.
#:An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it safe:
#A mobilephone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

==Quickly accessible during rides==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
*all possible maps you might need
*clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
*a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).  Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
*Hygienic products such as:
**toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
**A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.  Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
**Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
**Toilet paper or tissues.  Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
**A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.  Alternatively essential oils, as of lavendar, pachouli, grapefruit, etc.
*A [[sleeping bag]].  It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
*A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt.  It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping longjohns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed.  Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous).
*A pack of cards.
*A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.  Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travellers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability.  Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand.  Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
*A torch. Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[UK]]) is excellent.
*A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
*Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
*A [[harmonica]], pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
*A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
*CDs or casettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as thankyou gifts.
*If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
*An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
*A multi-tool.  My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''.  A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap.  The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
*A tarp.  There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp.  Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain.  The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
*Rain gear.  As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea.  If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
*Small gifts for any [http://www.hospitalityclub.org HospitalityClub] or [http://www.couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] hosts who help you on your way.
*Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.
===Camping===
If you decide on camping you may want some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!).  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad.  Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno.  Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure.  Bics are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>1kr76b8r6n1qxh7a3yt81varurq7ztb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14362</id>
      <parentid>14250</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-07T03:26:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Worldhitch</username>
        <id>147</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8952">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.
#:Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
A Small umbrella is also very useful
If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign.  ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
#An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or gas stations.
#:An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it safe:
#A mobilephone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

==Quickly accessible during rides==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
*all possible maps you might need
*clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
*a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).  Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
*Hygienic products such as:
**toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
**A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.  Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
**Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
**Toilet paper or tissues.  Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
**A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.  Alternatively essential oils, as of lavendar, pachouli, grapefruit, etc.
*A [[sleeping bag]].  It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
*A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt.  It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping longjohns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed.  Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous).
*A pack of cards.
*A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.  Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travellers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability.  Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand.  Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
*A torch. Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[UK]]) is excellent.
*A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
*Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
*A [[harmonica]], pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
*A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
*CDs or casettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as thankyou gifts.
*If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
*An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
*A multi-tool.  My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''.  A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap.  The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
*A tarp.  There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp.  Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain.  The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
*Rain gear.  As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea.  If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
*Small gifts for any [http://www.hospitalityclub.org HospitalityClub] or [http://www.couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] hosts who help you on your way.
*Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.
===Camping===
If you decide on camping you may want some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!).  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad.  Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno.  Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure.  Bics are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>dvlfdsddgbivta6v9ggk3y6ns5ukpvb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14363</id>
      <parentid>14362</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-07T03:27:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Worldhitch</username>
        <id>147</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8955">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.
#:Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
#A Small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign.  ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
#An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or gas stations.
#:An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it safe:
#A mobilephone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

==Quickly accessible during rides==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
*all possible maps you might need
*clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
*a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).  Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
*Hygienic products such as:
**toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
**A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.  Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
**Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
**Toilet paper or tissues.  Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
**A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.  Alternatively essential oils, as of lavendar, pachouli, grapefruit, etc.
*A [[sleeping bag]].  It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
*A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt.  It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping longjohns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed.  Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous).
*A pack of cards.
*A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.  Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travellers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability.  Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand.  Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
*A torch. Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[UK]]) is excellent.
*A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
*Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
*A [[harmonica]], pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
*A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
*CDs or casettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as thankyou gifts.
*If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
*An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
*A multi-tool.  My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''.  A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap.  The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
*A tarp.  There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp.  Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain.  The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
*Rain gear.  As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea.  If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
*Small gifts for any [http://www.hospitalityclub.org HospitalityClub] or [http://www.couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] hosts who help you on your way.
*Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.
===Camping===
If you decide on camping you may want some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!).  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad.  Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno.  Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure.  Bics are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>d72vlgs1hth3zeifzu9s1g1cluhrxq6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15565</id>
      <parentid>14363</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-07T14:39:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8993">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

==Most important==
In order of importance:
#A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.
#:Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
#A Small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
#A big black '''marker'''.
#:''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign.  ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
#An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#:You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or gas stations.
#:An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it safe:
#A mobilephone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

==Quickly accessible during rides==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
*all possible maps you might need
*clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
*a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

==After that==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
*A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow).  Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
*Hygienic products such as:
**toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
**A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.  Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
**Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
**Toilet paper or tissues.  Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
**A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.  Alternatively essential oils, as of lavendar, pachouli, grapefruit, etc.
*A [[sleeping bag]].  It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
*An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
*A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt.  It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping longjohns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
*Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed.  Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
*Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous).
*A pack of cards.
*A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
*A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.  Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travellers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability.  Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand.  Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
*A torch. Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[UK]]) is excellent.
*A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
*Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
*A [[harmonica]], pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
*A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
*CDs or casettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as thankyou gifts.
*If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
*An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
*A multi-tool.  My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''.  A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap.  The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
*A tarp.  There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp.  Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain.  The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
*Rain gear.  As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea.  If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
*Small gifts for any [http://www.hospitalityclub.org HospitalityClub], [http://www.bewelcome.org BeWelcome] or [http://www.couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] hosts who help you on your way.
*Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.
===Camping===
If you decide on camping you may want some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!).  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad.  Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno.  Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure.  Bics are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.

==External links==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>kk2i4d1qnnv7izi7kc024rhmpk6kyhp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16660</id>
      <parentid>15565</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-25T10:19:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9064">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A Small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign.  ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or gas stations.
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it safe:
# A mobilephone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.  Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues.  Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.  Alternatively essential oils, as of lavendar, pachouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]].  It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt.  It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping longjohns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed.  Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous).
* A pack of cards.
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.  Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travellers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability.  Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand.  Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch. Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or casettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as thankyou gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool.  My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''.  A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap.  The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp.  There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp.  Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain.  The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear.  As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea.  If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Small gifts for any [http://www.hospitalityclub.org HospitalityClub], [http://www.bewelcome.org BeWelcome] or [http://www.couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] hosts who help you on your way.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on camping you may want some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!).  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad.  Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno.  Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure.  Bics are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.

== External links ==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."


[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Ausrüstung]]</text>
      <sha1>shyl6j6elyzjlalbva492bpwylhoqlq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23070</id>
      <parentid>16660</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-30T19:08:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9083">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A Small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign.  ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or gas stations.
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it safe:
# A mobilephone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.  Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues.  Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.  Alternatively essential oils, as of lavendar, pachouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]].  It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt.  It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping longjohns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed.  Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous).
* A pack of cards.
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.  Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travellers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability.  Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand.  Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch. Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or casettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as thankyou gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool.  My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''.  A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap.  The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp.  There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp.  Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain.  The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear.  As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea.  If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Small gifts for any [http://www.hospitalityclub.org HospitalityClub], [http://www.bewelcome.org BeWelcome] or [http://www.couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] hosts who help you on your way.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on camping you may want some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!).  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad.  Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno.  Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure.  Bics are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.

== External links ==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."


[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Ausrüstung]]
[[fi:Pakkaaminen]]</text>
      <sha1>4s3lkup695yrsbr87umcr0xk1lkaeqx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23264</id>
      <parentid>23070</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-08-04T22:28:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>76.236.68.243</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9189">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A Small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign.  ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or gas stations.
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it safe:
# A mobilephone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.  Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues.  Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.  Alternatively essential oils, as of lavendar, pachouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]].  It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt.  It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping longjohns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed.  Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous).
* A pack of cards.
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.  Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travellers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability.  Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand.  Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch. Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or casettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as thankyou gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool.  My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''.  A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap.  The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp.  There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp.  Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain.  The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear.  As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea.  If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Small gifts for any [http://www.hospitalityclub.org HospitalityClub], [http://www.bewelcome.org BeWelcome] or [http://www.couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] hosts who help you on your way.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on camping you may want some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!).  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad.  Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno.  Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure.  Bics are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.
* After being harassed a few nights back by a mountain lion, I keep a 3" pocket knife on me when I sleep.

== External links ==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."


[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Ausrüstung]]
[[fi:Pakkaaminen]]</text>
      <sha1>q8r0x0vj5l1opgzxuwtzqjqdx9tidn3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23280</id>
      <parentid>23264</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-08-06T13:53:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9194">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A Small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign.  ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or gas stations.
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it [[safe]]:
# A mobile phone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.  Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues.  Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.  Alternatively essential oils, as of lavendar, pachouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]].  It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt.  It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping longjohns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed.  Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous).
* A pack of cards.
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.  Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travellers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability.  Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand.  Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch. Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or casettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as thankyou gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool.  My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''.  A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap.  The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp.  There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp.  Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain.  The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear.  As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea.  If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Small gifts for any [http://www.hospitalityclub.org HospitalityClub], [http://www.bewelcome.org BeWelcome] or [http://www.couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] hosts who help you on your way.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on camping you may want some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!).  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad.  Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno.  Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure.  Bics are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.
* After being harassed a few nights back by a mountain lion, I keep a 3" pocket knife on me when I sleep.

== External links ==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."


[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Ausrüstung]]
[[fi:Pakkaaminen]]</text>
      <sha1>f0jtc65hfflvhgefis3vvd3dxgb1fvy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23281</id>
      <parentid>23280</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-08-06T13:53:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9198">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A Small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign.  ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or [[gas station]]s.
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it [[safe]]:
# A mobile phone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.  Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues.  Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.  Alternatively essential oils, as of lavendar, pachouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]].  It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt.  It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping longjohns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed.  Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous).
* A pack of cards.
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.  Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travellers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability.  Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand.  Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch. Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or casettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as thankyou gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool.  My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''.  A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap.  The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp.  There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp.  Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain.  The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear.  As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea.  If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Small gifts for any [http://www.hospitalityclub.org HospitalityClub], [http://www.bewelcome.org BeWelcome] or [http://www.couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] hosts who help you on your way.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on camping you may want some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!).  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad.  Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno.  Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure.  Bics are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.
* After being harassed a few nights back by a mountain lion, I keep a 3" pocket knife on me when I sleep.

== External links ==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."


[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Ausrüstung]]
[[fi:Pakkaaminen]]</text>
      <sha1>n6z89czx3pqjamh6hy5ec7yiaxghntw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24570</id>
      <parentid>23281</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-06T11:50:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9200">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A Small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign.  ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or [[gas station]]s.
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it [[safe]]:
# A mobile phone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.  Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues.  Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.  Alternatively essential oils, as of lavendar, pachouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]].  It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt.  It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping longjohns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed.  Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous).
* A pack of cards.
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.  Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travellers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability.  Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand.  Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch. Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or casettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as thankyou gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool.  My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''.  A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap.  The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp.  There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp.  Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain.  The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear.  As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea.  If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Small gifts for any [http://www.hospitalityclub.org HospitalityClub], [http://www.bewelcome.org BeWelcome] or [http://www.couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] hosts who help you on your way.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on camping you may want some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!).  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad.  Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno.  Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure.  Bics are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.
* After being harassed a few nights back by a mountain lion, I keep a 3" pocket knife on me when I sleep.

== External links ==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."


[[Category:Practical info]]

[[de:Ausrüstung]]
[[fi:Pakkaaminen]]</text>
      <sha1>fdffhehf3u7qt3d30n422o47kndjo90</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>25686</id>
      <parentid>24570</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-04T17:39:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9195">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A Small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign.  ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or [[gas station]]s.
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it [[safe]]:
# A mobile phone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.  Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues.  Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.  Alternatively essential oils, as of lavendar, pachouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]].  It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt.  It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping longjohns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed.  Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous).
* A pack of cards.
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.  Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travellers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability.  Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand.  Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch. Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or casettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as thankyou gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool.  My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''.  A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap.  The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp.  There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp.  Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain.  The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear.  As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea.  If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Small gifts for any [http://www.hospitalityclub.org HospitalityClub], [http://www.bewelcome.org BeWelcome] or [http://www.couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] hosts who help you on your way.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on camping you may want some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!).  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad.  Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno.  Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure.  Bics are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.
* After being harassed a few nights back by a mountain lion, I keep a 3" pocket knife on me when I sleep.

== External links ==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."


[[Category:Equipment]]

[[de:Ausrüstung]]
[[fi:Pakkaaminen]]</text>
      <sha1>n22jo00t3hwhe745f7intg2cd0u5bek</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26067</id>
      <parentid>25686</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-12T21:15:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Stove</username>
        <id>1619</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9199">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing gas stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A Small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign.  ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or [[gas station]]s.
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it [[safe]]:
# A mobile phone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.  Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues.  Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.  Alternatively essential oils, as of lavendar, pachouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]].  It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt.  It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping longjohns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed.  Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous).
* A pack of cards.
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.  Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travellers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability.  Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand.  Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch. Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], pennywhistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or casettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as thankyou gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool.  My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''.  A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap.  The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp.  There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp.  Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain.  The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear.  As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea.  If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Small gifts for any [http://www.hospitalityclub.org HospitalityClub], [http://www.bewelcome.org BeWelcome] or [http://www.couchsurfing.com CouchSurfing] hosts who help you on your way.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on [[camping]] you may want some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!).  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad.  Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno.  Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure.  Bics are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.
* After being harassed a few nights back by a mountain lion, I keep a 3" pocket knife on me when I sleep.

== External links ==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."


[[Category:Equipment]]

[[de:Ausrüstung]]
[[fi:Pakkaaminen]]</text>
      <sha1>6apl5f5zlum53pz0katkahbgsnfgp56</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>28828</id>
      <parentid>26067</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-04T15:40:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9213">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing petrol stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign.  ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or [[petrol station]]s.
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it [[safe]]:
# A mobile phone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.  Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues.  Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.  Alternatively essential oils, as of lavender, pachouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]].  It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt.  It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping long johns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed.  Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous).
* A pack of cards.
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.  Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travelers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability.  Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand.  Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch. Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], penny whistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or cassettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as "Tthank You" gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool.  My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''.  A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap.  The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp.  There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp.  Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain.  The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear.  As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea.  If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Small gifts for any [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/ HospitalityClub], [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] or [http://www.couchsurfing.com/ CouchSurfing] hosts who help you on your way.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on [[camping]] you may want some more stuff:
* A tent (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!).  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad.  Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno.  Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure.  BICs are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.
* After being harassed a few nights back by a mountain lion, I keep a 3" pocket knife on me when I sleep.

== External links ==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:Equipment]]

[[de:Ausrüstung]]
[[fi:Pakkaaminen]]</text>
      <sha1>h4h4c5kn18jjcb39e06td4y0ljnom18</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30029</id>
      <parentid>28828</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-16T10:54:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kb</username>
        <id>1332</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9239">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing petrol stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign.  ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or [[petrol station]]s.
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it [[safe]]:
# A mobile phone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.  Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues.  Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.  Alternatively essential oils, as of lavender, pachouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]].  It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt.  It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping long johns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed.  Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous).
* A pack of cards.
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.  Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travelers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability.  Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand.  Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch. Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], penny whistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or cassettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as "Tthank You" gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool.  My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''.  A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap.  The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp.  There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp.  Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain.  The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear.  As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea.  If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Small gifts for any [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/ HospitalityClub], [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] or [http://www.couchsurfing.com/ CouchSurfing] hosts who help you on your way.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on [[camping]] you may want some more stuff:
* A [[tent]] or a [[bivouac sack]] (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!).  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad.  Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno.  Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure.  BICs are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.
* After being harassed a few nights back by a mountain lion, I keep a 3" pocket knife on me when I sleep.

== External links ==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:Equipment]]

[[de:Ausrüstung]]
[[fi:Pakkaaminen]]</text>
      <sha1>j4fwwyetj8i1n3mol087gm1snj3deax</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30030</id>
      <parentid>30029</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-16T10:54:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kb</username>
        <id>1332</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9247">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing petrol stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign.  ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or [[petrol station]]s.
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it [[safe]]:
# A mobile phone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.  Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues.  Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.  Alternatively essential oils, as of lavender, pachouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]].  It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt.  It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping long johns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed.  Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous).
* A pack of cards.
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.  Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travelers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability.  Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand.  Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch. Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], penny whistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or cassettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as "Tthank You" gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool.  My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''.  A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap.  The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp.  There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp.  Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain.  The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear.  As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea.  If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Small gifts for any [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/ HospitalityClub], [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] or [http://www.couchsurfing.com/ CouchSurfing] hosts who help you on your way.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on [[camping]] you may want some more stuff:
* A [[tent]], a tarp or a [[bivouac sack]] (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!).  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad.  Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno.  Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure.  BICs are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.
* After being harassed a few nights back by a mountain lion, I keep a 3" pocket knife on me when I sleep.

== External links ==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:Equipment]]

[[de:Ausrüstung]]
[[fi:Pakkaaminen]]</text>
      <sha1>6nhkqyroii2h38dnzc9vvgy24jwd4bb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30129</id>
      <parentid>30030</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-17T22:49:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sawel</username>
        <id>1235</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9251">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing petrol stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign.  ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or [[petrol station]]s.
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it [[safe]]:
# A mobile phone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of rain or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.  Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues.  Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.  Alternatively essential oils, as of lavender, pachouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]].  It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt.  It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping long johns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed.  Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous).
* A pack of cards.
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.  Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travelers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability.  Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand.  Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch. Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], penny whistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or cassettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as "Tthank You" gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool.  My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''.  A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap.  The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp.  There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp.  Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain.  The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear.  As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea.  If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Small gifts for any [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/ HospitalityClub], [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] or [http://www.couchsurfing.com/ CouchSurfing] hosts who help you on your way.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on [[camping]] you may want some more stuff:
* A [[tent]], a [[tarp]] or a [[bivouac sack]] (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!).  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad.  Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno.  Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure.  BICs are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.
* After being harassed a few nights back by a mountain lion, I keep a 3" pocket knife on me when I sleep.

== External links ==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:Equipment]]

[[de:Ausrüstung]]
[[fi:Pakkaaminen]]</text>
      <sha1>f4vwphssoy3w0c4kmush6i7x99oaj16</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32162</id>
      <parentid>30129</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-04-10T11:43:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9447">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing petrol stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign.  ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or [[petrol station]]s.
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it [[safe]]:
# A mobile phone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of [[rain]] or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean.  Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues.  Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne.  Alternatively essential oils, as of lavender, pachouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]].  It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt.  It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping long johns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed.  Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous).
* A pack of cards.
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts.  Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travelers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability.  Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand.  Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch. Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], penny whistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or cassettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as "Tthank You" gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool.  My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''.  A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap.  The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp.  There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp.  Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain.  The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear.  As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea.  If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Small gifts for any [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/ HospitalityClub], [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] or [http://www.couchsurfing.com/ CouchSurfing] hosts who help you on your way.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on [[camping]] you may want some more stuff:
* A [[tent]], a [[tarp]] or a [[bivouac sack]] (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!).  
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad.  Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno.  Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure.  BICs are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.
* After being harassed a few nights back by a mountain lion, I keep a 3" pocket knife on me when I sleep.

==Packing tips==
* If you expect a lot of [[rain]] it's wise to pack stuff in a few zip lock bags.  Especially recommended for electronic gear and some [[clothes]] that you want to keep dry.

== External links ==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:Equipment]]

[[de:Ausrüstung]]
[[fi:Pakkaaminen]]</text>
      <sha1>do7bj82d56cggsfwndthhyrtps285f0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35539</id>
      <parentid>32162</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T19:06:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9426">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing petrol stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign. ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or [[petrol station]]s.
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it [[safe]]:
# A mobile phone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of [[rain]] or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean. Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues. Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne. Alternatively essential oils, as of lavender, pachouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]]. It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt. It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping long johns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous).
* A pack of cards.
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts. Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travelers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability. Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand. Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch. Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], penny whistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or cassettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as "Tthank You" gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool. My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''. A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap. The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp. There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp. Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain. The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear. As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea. If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Small gifts for any [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/ HospitalityClub], [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] or [http://www.couchsurfing.com/ CouchSurfing] hosts who help you on your way.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on [[camping]] you may want some more stuff:
* A [[tent]], a [[tarp]] or a [[bivouac sack]] (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!). 
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad. Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno. Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure. BICs are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.
* After being harassed a few nights back by a mountain lion, I keep a 3" pocket knife on me when I sleep.

== Packing tips ==
* If you expect a lot of [[rain]] it's wise to pack stuff in a few zip lock bags. Especially recommended for electronic gear and some [[clothes]] that you want to keep dry.

== External links ==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:Equipment]]

[[de:Ausrüstung]]
[[fi:Pakkaaminen]]</text>
      <sha1>fmf2mqjfmf9d6szkb85cuads8qm9aei</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36343</id>
      <parentid>35539</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-08-04T14:49:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Quarim</username>
        <id>1290</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9425">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing petrol stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign. ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or [[petrol station]]s.
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it [[safe]]:
# A mobile phone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of [[rain]] or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean. Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues. Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne. Alternatively essential oils, as of lavender, pachouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]]. It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt. It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping long johns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous).
* A pack of cards.
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts. Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travelers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability. Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand. Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch. Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], penny whistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or cassettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as "Thank You" gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool. My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''. A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap. The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp. There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp. Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain. The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear. As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea. If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Small gifts for any [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/ HospitalityClub], [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] or [http://www.couchsurfing.com/ CouchSurfing] hosts who help you on your way.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on [[camping]] you may want some more stuff:
* A [[tent]], a [[tarp]] or a [[bivouac sack]] (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!). 
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad. Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno. Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure. BICs are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.
* After being harassed a few nights back by a mountain lion, I keep a 3" pocket knife on me when I sleep.

== Packing tips ==
* If you expect a lot of [[rain]] it's wise to pack stuff in a few zip lock bags. Especially recommended for electronic gear and some [[clothes]] that you want to keep dry.

== External links ==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:Equipment]]

[[de:Ausrüstung]]
[[fi:Pakkaaminen]]</text>
      <sha1>khq03wf7n7vo8x1joxxd5ll359b4713</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36367</id>
      <parentid>36343</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-08-07T01:08:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>70.180.247.62</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9442">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing petrol stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign. ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or [[petrol station]]s.
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it [[safe]]:
# A mobile phone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of [[rain]] or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean. Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues. Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne. Alternatively essential oils, as of lavender, pachouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]]. It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt. It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping long johns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous).
* A pack of cards.
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts. Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travelers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability. Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand. Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch (US: flashlight). Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], penny whistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or cassettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as "Thank You" gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool. My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''. A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap. The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp. There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp. Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain. The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear. As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea. If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Small gifts for any [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/ HospitalityClub], [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] or [http://www.couchsurfing.com/ CouchSurfing] hosts who help you on your way.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on [[camping]] you may want some more stuff:
* A [[tent]], a [[tarp]] or a [[bivouac sack]] (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!). 
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad. Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno. Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure. BICs are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.
* After being harassed a few nights back by a mountain lion, I keep a 3" pocket knife on me when I sleep.

== Packing tips ==
* If you expect a lot of [[rain]] it's wise to pack stuff in a few zip lock bags. Especially recommended for electronic gear and some [[clothes]] that you want to keep dry.

== External links ==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:Equipment]]

[[de:Ausrüstung]]
[[fi:Pakkaaminen]]</text>
      <sha1>5frpnv38ohe3d67n2zdmn5ed7jbc0xs</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>37505</id>
      <parentid>36367</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-09-26T09:23:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>81.76.6.81</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9443">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing petrol stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign. ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or [[petrol station]]s.
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it [[safe]]:
# A mobile phone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of [[rain]] or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean. Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues. Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne. Alternatively essential oils, as of lavender, patchouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]]. It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt. It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping long johns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous).
* A pack of cards.
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts. Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travelers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability. Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand. Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch (US: flashlight). Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], penny whistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or cassettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as "Thank You" gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool. My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''. A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap. The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp. There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp. Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain. The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear. As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea. If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Small gifts for any [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/ HospitalityClub], [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] or [http://www.couchsurfing.com/ CouchSurfing] hosts who help you on your way.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on [[camping]] you may want some more stuff:
* A [[tent]], a [[tarp]] or a [[bivouac sack]] (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!). 
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad. Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno. Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure. BICs are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.
* After being harassed a few nights back by a mountain lion, I keep a 3" pocket knife on me when I sleep.

== Packing tips ==
* If you expect a lot of [[rain]] it's wise to pack stuff in a few zip lock bags. Especially recommended for electronic gear and some [[clothes]] that you want to keep dry.

== External links ==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:Equipment]]

[[de:Ausrüstung]]
[[fi:Pakkaaminen]]</text>
      <sha1>rdm69id2eif0a21q64kx8gvu44dlu4l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38437</id>
      <parentid>37505</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-11-13T02:17:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>71.72.33.248</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9509">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing petrol stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign. ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or [[petrol station]]s.
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it [[safe]]:
# A mobile phone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of [[rain]] or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean. Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues. Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne. Alternatively essential oils, as of lavender, patchouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]]. It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt. It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping long johns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed. Bring your dildo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!6969696969
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous).
* A pack of cards.
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts. Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travelers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability. Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand. Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch (US: flashlight). Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], penny whistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or cassettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as "Thank You" gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool. My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''. A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap. The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp. There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp. Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain. The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear. As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea. If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Small gifts for any [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/ HospitalityClub], [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] or [http://www.couchsurfing.com/ CouchSurfing] hosts who help you on your way.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on [[camping]] you may want some more stuff:
* A [[tent]], a [[tarp]] or a [[bivouac sack]] (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!). 
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad. Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno. Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure. BICs are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.
* After being harassed a few nights back by a mountain lion, I keep a 3" pocket knife on me when I sleep.

== Packing tips ==
* If you expect a lot of [[rain]] it's wise to pack stuff in a few zip lock bags. Especially recommended for electronic gear and some [[clothes]] that you want to keep dry.

== External links ==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:Equipment]]

[[de:Ausrüstung]]
[[fi:Pakkaaminen]]</text>
      <sha1>opt29gzu1bs68wpvzh45rblpirpvw01</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38442</id>
      <parentid>38437</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-11-13T11:40:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kb</username>
        <id>1332</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9443">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing petrol stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign. ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or [[petrol station]]s.
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it [[safe]]:
# A mobile phone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of [[rain]] or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean. Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues. Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne. Alternatively essential oils, as of lavender, patchouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]]. It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt. It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping long johns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous).
* A pack of cards.
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts. Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travelers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability. Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand. Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch (US: flashlight). Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], penny whistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or cassettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as "Thank You" gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool. My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''. A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap. The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp. There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp. Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain. The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear. As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea. If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Small gifts for any [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/ HospitalityClub], [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] or [http://www.couchsurfing.com/ CouchSurfing] hosts who help you on your way.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on [[camping]] you may want some more stuff:
* A [[tent]], a [[tarp]] or a [[bivouac sack]] (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!). 
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad. Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno. Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure. BICs are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.
* After being harassed a few nights back by a mountain lion, I keep a 3" pocket knife on me when I sleep.

== Packing tips ==
* If you expect a lot of [[rain]] it's wise to pack stuff in a few zip lock bags. Especially recommended for electronic gear and some [[clothes]] that you want to keep dry.

== External links ==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."

[[Category:Equipment]]

[[de:Ausrüstung]]
[[fi:Pakkaaminen]]</text>
      <sha1>rdm69id2eif0a21q64kx8gvu44dlu4l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>43220</id>
      <parentid>38442</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-07-18T10:42:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>174.39.187.246</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9625">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing petrol stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign. ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or [[petrol station]]s.
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it [[safe]]:
# A mobile phone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of [[rain]] or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean. Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues. Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne. Alternatively essential oils, as of lavender, patchouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]]. It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt. It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping long johns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous).
* A pack of cards.
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts. Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travelers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability. Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand. Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch (US: flashlight). Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], penny whistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or cassettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as "Thank You" gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool. My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''. A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap. The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp. There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp. Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain. The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear. As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea. If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Small gifts for any [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/ HospitalityClub], [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] or [http://www.couchsurfing.com/ CouchSurfing] hosts who help you on your way.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on [[camping]] you may want some more stuff:
* A [[tent]], a [[tarp]] or a [[bivouac sack]] (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!). 
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad. Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno. Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure. BICs are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.
* After being harassed a few nights back by a mountain lion, I keep a 3" pocket knife on me when I sleep.

== Packing tips ==
* If you expect a lot of [[rain]] it's wise to pack stuff in a few zip lock bags. Especially recommended for electronic gear and some [[clothes]] that you want to keep dry.

== External links ==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."
* Roll your clothes, instead of folding them. They take up less room, and do not wrinkle as much. keep a thick plastic bag for stinky clothes so you don't violate a rides airspace. 

[[Category:Equipment]]

[[de:Ausrüstung]]
[[fi:Pakkaaminen]]</text>
      <sha1>1kini7cedude1l07asg1ztfgoh0k3lg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>56271</id>
      <parentid>43220</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-08T01:22:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9736">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[maps|map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing petrol stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign. ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]].
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it [[hitchhiker's safety|safe]]:
# A mobile phone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of [[weather#Rain|rain]] or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean. Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues. Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne. Alternatively essential oils, as of lavender, patchouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]]. It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt. It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping long johns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous).
* A pack of cards.
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts. Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travelers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability. Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand. Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch (US: flashlight). Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[United Kingdom|UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], penny whistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or cassettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as "Thank You" gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool. My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''. A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap. The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp. There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp. Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain. The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear. As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea. If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Small gifts for any [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/ HospitalityClub], [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] or [http://www.couchsurfing.com/ CouchSurfing] hosts who help you on your way.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on [[camping]] you may want some more stuff:
* A [[camping|tent]], a [[tarp]] or a [[bivouac sack]] (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!). 
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad. Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno. Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure. BICs are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.
* After being harassed a few nights back by a mountain lion, I keep a 3" pocket knife on me when I sleep.

== Packing tips ==
* If you expect a lot of [[weather#Rain|rain]] it's wise to pack stuff in a few zip lock bags. Especially recommended for electronic gear and some [[appearance|clothes]] that you want to keep dry.

== External links ==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."
* Roll your clothes, instead of folding them. They take up less room, and do not wrinkle as much. keep a thick plastic bag for stinky clothes so you don't violate a rides airspace.

[[Category:Equipment]]

[[de:Ausrüstung]]
[[fi:Pakkaaminen]]</text>
      <sha1>3dk7uww654k5kq5b72g06xq8zg5c9tl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>58397</id>
      <parentid>56271</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-01-11T16:31:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kriechstrom</username>
        <id>4374</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9936">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[maps|map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing petrol stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. If you find them, take Edding ''Flipchart Marker'' instead of ''Permanent Marker'' as they were made to write on paper: the color doesn't push through and they last longer than the permanent markers. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign. ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]].
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it [[hitchhiker's safety|safe]]:
# A mobile phone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of [[weather#Rain|rain]] or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean. Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues. Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne. Alternatively essential oils, as of lavender, patchouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]]. It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt. It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping long johns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous).
* A pack of cards.
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts. Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travelers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability. Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand. Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch (US: flashlight). Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[United Kingdom|UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], penny whistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or cassettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as "Thank You" gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool. My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''. A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap. The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp. There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp. Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain. The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear. As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea. If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Small gifts for any [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/ HospitalityClub], [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] or [http://www.couchsurfing.com/ CouchSurfing] hosts who help you on your way.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on [[camping]] you may want some more stuff:
* A [[camping|tent]], a [[tarp]] or a [[bivouac sack]] (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!). 
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad. Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno. Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure. BICs are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.
* After being harassed a few nights back by a mountain lion, I keep a 3" pocket knife on me when I sleep.

== Packing tips ==
* If you expect a lot of [[weather#Rain|rain]] it's wise to pack stuff in a few zip lock bags. Especially recommended for electronic gear and some [[appearance|clothes]] that you want to keep dry.

== External links ==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."
* Roll your clothes, instead of folding them. They take up less room, and do not wrinkle as much. keep a thick plastic bag for stinky clothes so you don't violate a rides airspace.

[[Category:Equipment]]

[[de:Ausrüstung]]
[[fi:Pakkaaminen]]</text>
      <sha1>j9yesozlj57no7ymv1xusjjvatk6089</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>60672</id>
      <parentid>58397</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-04-20T21:02:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kenflannery</username>
        <id>4988</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10118">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[maps|map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing petrol stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. If you find them, take Edding ''Flipchart Marker'' instead of ''Permanent Marker'' as they were made to write on paper: the color doesn't push through and they last longer than the permanent markers. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign. ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]].
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it [[hitchhiker's safety|safe]]:
# A mobile phone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of [[weather#Rain|rain]] or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean. Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues. Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne. Alternatively essential oils, as of lavender, patchouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]]. It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt. It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping long johns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous).
* A pack of cards.
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts. Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travelers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability. Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand. Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch (US: flashlight). Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[United Kingdom|UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], penny whistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or cassettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as "Thank You" gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool. My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''. A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap. The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp. There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp. Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain. The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear. As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea. If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Small gifts for any [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/ HospitalityClub], [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] or [http://www.couchsurfing.com/ CouchSurfing] hosts who help you on your way.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on [[camping]] you may want some more stuff:
* A [[camping|tent]], a [[tarp]] or a [[bivouac sack]] (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!). 
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad. Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno. Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure. BICs are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.
* After being harassed a few nights back by a mountain lion, I keep a 3" pocket knife on me when I sleep.

== Packing tips ==
* If you expect a lot of [[weather#Rain|rain]] it's wise to pack stuff in a few zip lock bags. Especially recommended for electronic gear and some [[appearance|clothes]] that you want to keep dry.

== External links ==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."
* Roll your clothes, instead of folding them. They take up less room, and do not wrinkle as much. keep a thick plastic bag for stinky clothes so you don't violate a rides airspace.
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lVn1QosdNiY What to carry video], Hitchhiker emptying out his pack to show what he's been carrying in his travels, from toothbrush to sleeping bag

[[Category:Equipment]]

[[de:Ausrüstung]]
[[fi:Pakkaaminen]]</text>
      <sha1>pgc4konsgt0d6t9j4izdrt82epxof3u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>61713</id>
      <parentid>60672</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-06-08T09:14:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Quarim</username>
        <id>1290</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10157">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[maps|map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing petrol stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. If you find them, take Edding ''Flipchart Marker'' instead of ''Permanent Marker'' as they were made to write on paper: the color doesn't push through and they last longer than the permanent markers. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign. ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]].
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it [[hitchhiker's safety|safe]]:
# A mobile phone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of [[weather#Rain|rain]] or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean. Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues. Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne. Alternatively essential oils, as of lavender, patchouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]]. It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt. It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping long johns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous). 
* A pack of cards. Or a lightweight [[Games|Game Pack]].
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts. Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travelers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability. Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand. Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch (US: flashlight). Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[United Kingdom|UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], penny whistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or cassettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as "Thank You" gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool. My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''. A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap. The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp. There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp. Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain. The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear. As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea. If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Small gifts for any [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/ HospitalityClub], [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] or [http://www.couchsurfing.com/ CouchSurfing] hosts who help you on your way.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on [[camping]] you may want some more stuff:
* A [[camping|tent]], a [[tarp]] or a [[bivouac sack]] (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!). 
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad. Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno. Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure. BICs are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.
* After being harassed a few nights back by a mountain lion, I keep a 3" pocket knife on me when I sleep.

== Packing tips ==
* If you expect a lot of [[weather#Rain|rain]] it's wise to pack stuff in a few zip lock bags. Especially recommended for electronic gear and some [[appearance|clothes]] that you want to keep dry.

== External links ==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."
* Roll your clothes, instead of folding them. They take up less room, and do not wrinkle as much. keep a thick plastic bag for stinky clothes so you don't violate a rides airspace.
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lVn1QosdNiY What to carry video], Hitchhiker emptying out his pack to show what he's been carrying in his travels, from toothbrush to sleeping bag

[[Category:Equipment]]

[[de:Ausrüstung]]
[[fi:Pakkaaminen]]</text>
      <sha1>2k382o9h7ofptuuo1x5oqzdrozswg5u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>81679</id>
      <parentid>61713</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-12-09T20:56:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fedcba098</username>
        <id>24872</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10342">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[maps|map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing petrol stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. If you find them, take Edding ''Flipchart Marker'' instead of ''Permanent Marker'' as they were made to write on paper: the color doesn't push through and they last longer than the permanent markers. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign. ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]].
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it [[hitchhiker's safety|safe]]:
# A mobile phone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of [[weather#Rain|rain]] or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean. Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues. Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne. Alternatively essential oils, as of lavender, patchouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]]. It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt. It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping long johns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous). 
* A pack of cards. Or a lightweight [[Games|Game Pack]].
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts. Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travelers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability. Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand. Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch (US: flashlight). Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[United Kingdom|UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], penny whistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or cassettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as "Thank You" gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool. My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''. A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap. The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp. There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp. Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain. The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear. As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea. If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Small gifts for any [http://www.hospitalityclub.org/ HospitalityClub], [http://www.bewelcome.org/ BeWelcome] or [http://www.couchsurfing.com/ CouchSurfing] hosts who help you on your way.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on [[camping]] you may want some more stuff:
* A [[camping|tent]], a [[tarp]] or a [[bivouac sack]] (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!). 
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad. Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno. Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure. BICs are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.
* After being harassed a few nights back by a mountain lion, I keep a 3" pocket knife on me when I sleep.

== Packing tips ==
* If you expect a lot of [[weather#Rain|rain]] it's wise to pack stuff in a few zip lock bags. Especially recommended for electronic gear and some [[appearance|clothes]] that you want to keep dry. You can also save bread bags as waterproof bags, which also work great as between-sock-and-shoe covers if you're walking though snow or puddles without a good pair of waterproof boots.

== External links ==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."
* Roll your clothes, instead of folding them. They take up less room, and do not wrinkle as much. keep a thick plastic bag for stinky clothes so you don't violate a rides airspace.
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lVn1QosdNiY What to carry video], Hitchhiker emptying out his pack to show what he's been carrying in his travels, from toothbrush to sleeping bag

[[Category:Equipment]]

[[de:Ausrüstung]]
[[fi:Pakkaaminen]]</text>
      <sha1>c2pzw1hekayp0qzeehhdbedppcaz62b</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>82183</id>
      <parentid>81679</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-02-12T16:04:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Longhaul</username>
        <id>4390</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10152">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[maps|map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing petrol stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. If you find them, take Edding ''Flipchart Marker'' instead of ''Permanent Marker'' as they were made to write on paper: the color doesn't push through and they last longer than the permanent markers. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign. ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]].
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it [[hitchhiker's safety|safe]]:
# A mobile phone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of [[weather#Rain|rain]] or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean. Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues. Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne. Alternatively essential oils, as of lavender, patchouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]]. It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt. It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping long johns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous). 
* A pack of cards. Or a lightweight [[Games|Game Pack]].
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts. Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travelers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability. Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand. Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch (US: flashlight). Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[United Kingdom|UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], penny whistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or cassettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as "Thank You" gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool. My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''. A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap. The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp. There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp. Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain. The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear. As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea. If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on [[camping]] you may want some more stuff:
* A [[camping|tent]], a [[tarp]] or a [[bivouac sack]] (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!). 
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad. Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno. Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure. BICs are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.
* After being harassed a few nights back by a mountain lion, I keep a 3" pocket knife on me when I sleep.

== Packing tips ==
* If you expect a lot of [[weather#Rain|rain]] it's wise to pack stuff in a few zip lock bags. Especially recommended for electronic gear and some [[appearance|clothes]] that you want to keep dry. You can also save bread bags as waterproof bags, which also work great as between-sock-and-shoe covers if you're walking though snow or puddles without a good pair of waterproof boots.

== External links ==
* [http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm What to pack], quote: "Your bag is your life. The smaller it is the less it sticks outs and the less vulnerable you feel. The closer you can stick to it and less cumbersome it is the happier you will be."
* Roll your clothes, instead of folding them. They take up less room, and do not wrinkle as much. keep a thick plastic bag for stinky clothes so you don't violate a rides airspace.
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lVn1QosdNiY What to carry video], Hitchhiker emptying out his pack to show what he's been carrying in his travels, from toothbrush to sleeping bag

[[Category:Equipment]]

[[de:Ausrüstung]]
[[fi:Pakkaaminen]]</text>
      <sha1>mpjffgsvitpqskq1kfsyb8pidscih30</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>82184</id>
      <parentid>82183</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-02-12T16:09:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Longhaul</username>
        <id>4390</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9602">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[maps|map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing petrol stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. If you find them, take Edding ''Flipchart Marker'' instead of ''Permanent Marker'' as they were made to write on paper: the color doesn't push through and they last longer than the permanent markers. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign. ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]].
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it [[hitchhiker's safety|safe]]:
# A mobile phone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of [[weather#Rain|rain]] or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean. Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues. Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne. Alternatively essential oils, as of lavender, patchouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]]. It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt. It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping long johns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous). 
* A pack of cards. Or a lightweight [[Games|Game Pack]].
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts. Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travelers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability. Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand. Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch (US: flashlight). Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[United Kingdom|UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], penny whistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or cassettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as "Thank You" gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool. My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''. A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap. The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp. There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp. Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain. The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear. As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea. If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on [[camping]] you may want some more stuff:
* A [[camping|tent]], a [[tarp]] or a [[bivouac sack]] (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!). 
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad. Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno. Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure. BICs are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.
* After being harassed a few nights back by a mountain lion, I keep a 3" pocket knife on me when I sleep.

== Packing tips ==
* If you expect a lot of [[weather#Rain|rain]] it's wise to pack stuff in a few zip lock bags. Especially recommended for electronic gear and some [[appearance|clothes]] that you want to keep dry. You can also save bread bags as waterproof bags, which also work great as between-sock-and-shoe covers if you're walking though snow or puddles without a good pair of waterproof boots.

== External links ==
* [http://www.hitch-hiking.org/howtopack.htm How to pack]
* [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/what-pack-hitchhiking/ What to pack]</text>
      <sha1>e5iu9i93xjjfu5cbg1h12x0ghm5dybx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>82373</id>
      <parentid>82184</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-03-12T11:18:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9846">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[maps|map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing petrol stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. If you find them, take Edding ''Flipchart Marker'' instead of ''Permanent Marker'' as they were made to write on paper: the color doesn't push through and they last longer than the permanent markers. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign. ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]].
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it [[hitchhiker's safety|safe]]:
# A mobile phone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of [[weather#Rain|rain]] or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean. Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues. Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne. Alternatively essential oils, as of lavender, patchouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]]. It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt. It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping long johns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous). 
* A pack of cards. Or a lightweight [[Games|Game Pack]].
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts. Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travelers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability. Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand. Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch (US: flashlight). Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[United Kingdom|UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], penny whistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or cassettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as "Thank You" gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool. My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''. A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap. The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp. There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp. Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain. The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear. As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea. If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on [[camping]] you may want some more stuff:
* A [[camping|tent]], a [[tarp]] or a [[bivouac sack]] (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!). 
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad. Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno. Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure. BICs are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.
* After being harassed a few nights back by a mountain lion, I keep a 3" pocket knife on me when I sleep.

== Packing tips ==
* If you expect a lot of [[weather#Rain|rain]] it's wise to pack stuff in a few zip lock bags. Especially recommended for electronic gear and some [[appearance|clothes]] that you want to keep dry. You can also save bread bags as waterproof bags, which also work great as between-sock-and-shoe covers if you're walking though snow or puddles without a good pair of waterproof boots.

== External links ==
* [http://www.hitch-hiking.org/howtopack.htm How to pack]
* [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/what-pack-hitchhiking/ What to pack]
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lVn1QosdNiY What to carry video], Hitchhiker emptying out his pack to show what he's been carrying in his travels, from toothbrush to sleeping bag

[[Category:Equipment]]
[[de:Ausrüstung]]
[[fi:Pakkaaminen]]</text>
      <sha1>ivzfd6smhwo8xeor4xszluwxkmd0e0o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>92329</id>
      <parentid>82373</parentid>
      <timestamp>2018-10-21T04:40:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Hikeee</username>
        <id>31885</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9920">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[maps|map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing petrol stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. If you find them, take Edding ''Flipchart Marker'' instead of ''Permanent Marker'' as they were made to write on paper: the color doesn't push through and they last longer than the permanent markers. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign. ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]].
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it [[hitchhiker's safety|safe]]:
# A mobile phone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of [[weather#Rain|rain]] or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean. Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues. Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne. Alternatively essential oils, as of lavender, patchouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]]. It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt. It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping long johns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous). 
* A pack of cards. Or a lightweight [[Games|Game Pack]].
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts. Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travelers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability. Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand. Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch (US: flashlight). Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[United Kingdom|UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], penny whistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or cassettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as "Thank You" gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool. My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''. A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap. The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp. There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp. Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain. The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear. As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea. If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on [[camping]] you may want some more stuff:
* A [[camping|tent]], a [[tarp]] or a [[bivouac sack]] (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!). 
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad. Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno. Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure. BICs are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.
* After being harassed a few nights back by a mountain lion, I keep a 3" pocket knife on me when I sleep.

== Packing tips ==
* If you expect a lot of [[weather#Rain|rain]] it's wise to pack stuff in a few zip lock bags. Especially recommended for electronic gear and some [[appearance|clothes]] that you want to keep dry. You can also save bread bags as waterproof bags, which also work great as between-sock-and-shoe covers if you're walking though snow or puddles without a good pair of waterproof boots.

== External links ==
* [https://gearctrl.com/best-tactical-backpacks/ Best Tactical Backpacks]
* [http://www.hitch-hiking.org/howtopack.htm How to pack]
* [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/what-pack-hitchhiking/ What to pack]
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lVn1QosdNiY What to carry video], Hitchhiker emptying out his pack to show what he's been carrying in his travels, from toothbrush to sleeping bag

[[Category:Equipment]]
[[de:Ausrüstung]]
[[fi:Pakkaaminen]]</text>
      <sha1>gsuj2cqpg20jmmg45ic7zu6yhps8q6i</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>92330</id>
      <parentid>92329</parentid>
      <timestamp>2018-10-21T04:42:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Hikeee</username>
        <id>31885</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10020">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[maps|map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing petrol stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. If you find them, take Edding ''Flipchart Marker'' instead of ''Permanent Marker'' as they were made to write on paper: the color doesn't push through and they last longer than the permanent markers. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign. ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]].
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it [[hitchhiker's safety|safe]]:
# A mobile phone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of [[weather#Rain|rain]] or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean. Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues. Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne. Alternatively essential oils, as of lavender, patchouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]]. It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt. It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping long johns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous). 
* A pack of cards. Or a lightweight [[Games|Game Pack]].
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts. Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travelers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability. Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand. Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch (US: flashlight). Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[United Kingdom|UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], penny whistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or cassettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as "Thank You" gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool. My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''. A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap. The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp. There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp. Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain. The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear. As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea. If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on [[camping]] you may want some more stuff:
* A [[camping|tent]], a [[tarp]] or a [[bivouac sack]] (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!). Consider a fan for tent camping, which can keep you cool on hot nights.
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad. Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno. Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure. BICs are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your tactical backpack or camping backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.
* After being harassed a few nights back by a mountain lion, I keep a 3" pocket knife on me when I sleep.

== Packing tips ==
* If you expect a lot of [[weather#Rain|rain]] it's wise to pack stuff in a few zip lock bags. Especially recommended for electronic gear and some [[appearance|clothes]] that you want to keep dry. You can also save bread bags as waterproof bags, which also work great as between-sock-and-shoe covers if you're walking though snow or puddles without a good pair of waterproof boots.

== External links ==
* [https://gearctrl.com/best-tactical-backpacks/ Best Tactical Backpacks]
* [http://www.hitch-hiking.org/howtopack.htm How to pack]
* [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/what-pack-hitchhiking/ What to pack]
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lVn1QosdNiY What to carry video], Hitchhiker emptying out his pack to show what he's been carrying in his travels, from toothbrush to sleeping bag

[[Category:Equipment]]
[[de:Ausrüstung]]
[[fi:Pakkaaminen]]</text>
      <sha1>o05r5ciiw7qgspdh72v7j0ybuyjdecg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>92331</id>
      <parentid>92330</parentid>
      <timestamp>2018-10-21T04:43:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Hikeee</username>
        <id>31885</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10107">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[maps|map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing petrol stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. If you find them, take Edding ''Flipchart Marker'' instead of ''Permanent Marker'' as they were made to write on paper: the color doesn't push through and they last longer than the permanent markers. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign. ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]].
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it [[hitchhiker's safety|safe]]:
# A mobile phone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of [[weather#Rain|rain]] or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean. Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues. Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne. Alternatively essential oils, as of lavender, patchouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]]. It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt. It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping long johns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous). 
* A pack of cards. Or a lightweight [[Games|Game Pack]].
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts. Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travelers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability. Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand. Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch (US: flashlight). Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[United Kingdom|UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], penny whistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or cassettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as "Thank You" gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool. My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''. A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap. The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp. There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp. Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain. The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear. As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea. If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on [[camping]] you may want some more stuff:
* A [[camping|tent]], a [[tarp]] or a [[bivouac sack]] (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!). Consider a fan for tent camping, which can keep you cool on hot nights.
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad. Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno. Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure. BICs are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your tactical backpack or camping backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.
* After being harassed a few nights back by a mountain lion, I keep a 3" pocket knife on me when I sleep.

== Packing tips ==
* If you expect a lot of [[weather#Rain|rain]] it's wise to pack stuff in a few zip lock bags. Especially recommended for electronic gear and some [[appearance|clothes]] that you want to keep dry. You can also save bread bags as waterproof bags, which also work great as between-sock-and-shoe covers if you're walking though snow or puddles without a good pair of waterproof boots.

== External links ==
* [http://www.hitch-hiking.org/howtopack.htm How to pack]
* [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/what-pack-hitchhiking/ What to pack]
* [https://gearctrl.com/best-tactical-backpacks/ Best tactical backpacks for camping]
* [https://gearctrl.com/best-fan-tent-camping/ Best tent fans for camping]
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lVn1QosdNiY What to carry video], Hitchhiker emptying out his pack to show what he's been carrying in his travels, from toothbrush to sleeping bag

[[Category:Equipment]]
[[de:Ausrüstung]]
[[fi:Pakkaaminen]]</text>
      <sha1>dnkrnmm8p57axitmmpys3jlxcy6ysf3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>107953</id>
      <parentid>92331</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-11-24T14:59:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robyt</username>
        <id>9747</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>Added {{geo-missing}}</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10124">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[maps|map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing petrol stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. If you find them, take Edding ''Flipchart Marker'' instead of ''Permanent Marker'' as they were made to write on paper: the color doesn't push through and they last longer than the permanent markers. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign. ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]].
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it [[hitchhiker's safety|safe]]:
# A mobile phone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of [[weather#Rain|rain]] or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean. Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues. Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne. Alternatively essential oils, as of lavender, patchouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]]. It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt. It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping long johns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous). 
* A pack of cards. Or a lightweight [[Games|Game Pack]].
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts. Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travelers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability. Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand. Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch (US: flashlight). Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[United Kingdom|UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], penny whistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or cassettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as "Thank You" gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool. My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''. A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap. The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp. There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp. Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain. The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear. As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea. If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on [[camping]] you may want some more stuff:
* A [[camping|tent]], a [[tarp]] or a [[bivouac sack]] (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!). Consider a fan for tent camping, which can keep you cool on hot nights.
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad. Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno. Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure. BICs are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your tactical backpack or camping backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.
* After being harassed a few nights back by a mountain lion, I keep a 3" pocket knife on me when I sleep.

== Packing tips ==
* If you expect a lot of [[weather#Rain|rain]] it's wise to pack stuff in a few zip lock bags. Especially recommended for electronic gear and some [[appearance|clothes]] that you want to keep dry. You can also save bread bags as waterproof bags, which also work great as between-sock-and-shoe covers if you're walking though snow or puddles without a good pair of waterproof boots.

== External links ==
* [http://www.hitch-hiking.org/howtopack.htm How to pack]
* [http://www.claudioadrianodobre.com/what-pack-hitchhiking/ What to pack]
* [https://gearctrl.com/best-tactical-backpacks/ Best tactical backpacks for camping]
* [https://gearctrl.com/best-fan-tent-camping/ Best tent fans for camping]
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lVn1QosdNiY What to carry video], Hitchhiker emptying out his pack to show what he's been carrying in his travels, from toothbrush to sleeping bag

[[Category:Equipment]]
[[de:Ausrüstung]]
[[fi:Pakkaaminen]]

{{geo-missing}}</text>
      <sha1>bmr0uo0wilzuwk1cgdxi5tzyp0b83rw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>109332</id>
      <parentid>107953</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-04-11T06:02:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9813">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items...

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[maps|map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing petrol stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. If you find them, take Edding ''Flipchart Marker'' instead of ''Permanent Marker'' as they were made to write on paper: the color doesn't push through and they last longer than the permanent markers. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign. ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]].
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it [[hitchhiker's safety|safe]]:
# A mobile phone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of [[weather#Rain|rain]] or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean. Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues. Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne. Alternatively essential oils, as of lavender, patchouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]]. It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt. It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping long johns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous). 
* A pack of cards. Or a lightweight [[Games|Game Pack]].
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts. Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travelers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability. Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand. Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch (US: flashlight). Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[United Kingdom|UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], penny whistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or cassettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as "Thank You" gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool. My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''. A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap. The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp. There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp. Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain. The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear. As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea. If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on [[camping]] you may want some more stuff:
* A [[camping|tent]], a [[tarp]] or a [[bivouac sack]] (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!). Consider a fan for tent camping, which can keep you cool on hot nights.
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad. Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno. Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure. BICs are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your tactical backpack or camping backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.
* After being harassed a few nights back by a mountain lion, I keep a 3" pocket knife on me when I sleep.

== Packing tips ==
* If you expect a lot of [[weather#Rain|rain]] it's wise to pack stuff in a few zip lock bags. Especially recommended for electronic gear and some [[appearance|clothes]] that you want to keep dry. You can also save bread bags as waterproof bags, which also work great as between-sock-and-shoe covers if you're walking though snow or puddles without a good pair of waterproof boots.

== External links ==
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lVn1QosdNiY What to carry video], Hitchhiker emptying out his pack to show what he's been carrying in his travels, from toothbrush to sleeping bag

[[Category:Equipment]]
[[de:Ausrüstung]]
[[fi:Pakkaaminen]]</text>
      <sha1>79tzbvqi7fb5mofr1hmklht92w1vjdb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>109333</id>
      <parentid>109332</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-04-11T06:02:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9811">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items.

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[maps|map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing petrol stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. If you find them, take Edding ''Flipchart Marker'' instead of ''Permanent Marker'' as they were made to write on paper: the color doesn't push through and they last longer than the permanent markers. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign. ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]].
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it [[hitchhiker's safety|safe]]:
# A mobile phone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of [[weather#Rain|rain]] or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean. Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues. Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne. Alternatively essential oils, as of lavender, patchouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]]. It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt. It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping long johns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous). 
* A pack of cards. Or a lightweight [[Games|Game Pack]].
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts. Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travelers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability. Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand. Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch (US: flashlight). Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[United Kingdom|UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], penny whistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or cassettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as "Thank You" gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool. My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''. A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap. The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp. There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp. Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain. The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear. As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea. If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on [[camping]] you may want some more stuff:
* A [[camping|tent]], a [[tarp]] or a [[bivouac sack]] (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!). Consider a fan for tent camping, which can keep you cool on hot nights.
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad. Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno. Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure. BICs are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your tactical backpack or camping backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.
* After being harassed a few nights back by a mountain lion, I keep a 3" pocket knife on me when I sleep.

== Packing tips ==
* If you expect a lot of [[weather#Rain|rain]] it's wise to pack stuff in a few zip lock bags. Especially recommended for electronic gear and some [[appearance|clothes]] that you want to keep dry. You can also save bread bags as waterproof bags, which also work great as between-sock-and-shoe covers if you're walking though snow or puddles without a good pair of waterproof boots.

== External links ==
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lVn1QosdNiY What to carry video], Hitchhiker emptying out his pack to show what he's been carrying in his travels, from toothbrush to sleeping bag

[[Category:Equipment]]
[[de:Ausrüstung]]
[[fi:Pakkaaminen]]</text>
      <sha1>g554k8gpzywxogqjtu352koz8piawz4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>112423</id>
      <parentid>109333</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-08-29T17:05:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* External links */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9976">Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items.

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[maps|map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing petrol stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. If you find them, take Edding ''Flipchart Marker'' instead of ''Permanent Marker'' as they were made to write on paper: the color doesn't push through and they last longer than the permanent markers. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign. ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]].
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it [[hitchhiker's safety|safe]]:
# A mobile phone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of [[weather#Rain|rain]] or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean. Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues. Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne. Alternatively essential oils, as of lavender, patchouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]]. It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt. It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping long johns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous). 
* A pack of cards. Or a lightweight [[Games|Game Pack]].
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts. Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travelers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability. Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand. Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch (US: flashlight). Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[United Kingdom|UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], penny whistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or cassettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as "Thank You" gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool. My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''. A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap. The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp. There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp. Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain. The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear. As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea. If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on [[camping]] you may want some more stuff:
* A [[camping|tent]], a [[tarp]] or a [[bivouac sack]] (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!). Consider a fan for tent camping, which can keep you cool on hot nights.
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad. Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno. Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure. BICs are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your tactical backpack or camping backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.
* After being harassed a few nights back by a mountain lion, I keep a 3" pocket knife on me when I sleep.

== Packing tips ==
* If you expect a lot of [[weather#Rain|rain]] it's wise to pack stuff in a few zip lock bags. Especially recommended for electronic gear and some [[appearance|clothes]] that you want to keep dry. You can also save bread bags as waterproof bags, which also work great as between-sock-and-shoe covers if you're walking though snow or puddles without a good pair of waterproof boots.

== External links ==
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ch3ggk__MR4&amp;list=PLTl6wHsuItETZmkfuI6AO5_xh8qiwtlzy&amp;index=5 HITCHHIKING? You MUST have THIS (Tutorial 4: #hitchhiking equipment)]
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lVn1QosdNiY What to carry video], Hitchhiker emptying out his pack to show what he's been carrying in his travels, from toothbrush to sleeping bag

[[Category:Equipment]]
[[de:Ausrüstung]]
[[fi:Pakkaaminen]]</text>
      <sha1>mbn0zqi8bayexbllhd45w5w0lrtt6fq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>112425</id>
      <parentid>112423</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-08-29T17:08:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10116">:'''''Looking for [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ch3ggk__MR4&amp;list=PLTl6wHsuItETZmkfuI6AO5_xh8qiwtlzy&amp;index=5 video format] instead?'''''

Most hitchhikers '''carry''' a backpack with them wherever they go. The backpack should be sturdy, yet comfortable. 
First of all, you need '''as little as possible'''! The longer you travel, the less you want in your bag!

Large rucksacks are great, but maybe taking a smaller bag will encourage you not to take useless items.

If, after a trip, you decide an item really is useless, then don't be afraid to get rid of it.

== Most important ==
In order of importance:
# A [[maps|map]] of the area you plan to travel in, preferably showing petrol stations and tollway stations.
#: Like anything though, this is debatable. Some hitchers may like to just go by the sun and general knowledge of the region.
# A small umbrella is also very useful.

If you like to hitchhike with [[signs]]:
# A big black '''marker'''.
#: ''Sharpies'' work best, particularly the ''Magnum'' size. ''Eddings'' are also good, just make sure you have one with a broad end. That's easier to write with. If you find them, take Edding ''Flipchart Marker'' instead of ''Permanent Marker'' as they were made to write on paper: the color doesn't push through and they last longer than the permanent markers. Possibly some other colors; a catchy sign is an effective sign. ''Marks-A-Lot'', in one hitcher's experience, have barely enough ink to last more than a few signs and aren't worth the space they take up.
# An A4 transparent plastic map and some spare A4 papers, or a piece of cardboard
#: You'll often be able to find cardboard and paper on your way - just ask (or dumpster-dive) at shops or [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]].
#: An A4 writing pad turned out to be very handy. You can make a lot of signs with it and it's quite stable. It's also good to have some paper clips with you, in case it's windy and the sheets are flapping.
For people who like it [[hitchhiker's safety|safe]]:
# A mobile phone for sending SMS to a friend, to inform them about the numberplate of the car you jumped in. Remember the battery recharge adaptor! Sometimes a service station will have a spare wall socket you can use to charge your phone. Remember to bring the right adaptor for the country you are in.

== Quickly accessible during rides ==
It's also good to make things you might need on the road ''easily accessible'':
* all possible maps you might need
* clothes in case of [[weather#Rain|rain]] or sudden chill (like when going a tunnel when you're in the back of a van).
* a plastic bottle of water
Try and pack similar items close to each other (eg. toothbrush next to the toothpaste).

== After that ==
Then, if you expect to be on the road for more longer time:
* A large towel (doubles as a blanket, shawl or pillow). Specially-made camping towels are light, small, and dry very fast.
* Hygienic products such as:
** toothbrush - even better in your pocket!
** A small bottle of liquid peppermint soap--the kind which can be used as toothpaste or mouthwash as well. Try to stay reasonably clean. Dr. Bronner's Pure Castille Soap is recommended, though the containers it comes in are not very sturdy (wrap it in a bag at the least). Make sure it can't spill inside the rest of your bag!
** Baby-wipes work well too for cleaning skin, they're light and easy to store. Maybe a service station restaurant (such as a KFC) will have little packets of them, to give you for free...
** Toilet paper or tissues. Don't forget to bury it at least a foot down!
** A stick of deodorant and/or spray bottle of cologne. Alternatively essential oils, as of lavender, patchouli, grapefruit, etc.
* A [[sleeping bag]]. It can be useful to have a good, waterproof Compression Sack as well.
* An extra set of clothing, at the minimum, 2 extra pairs of socks and underwear, and an extra T-shirt.
* A nice warm jacket or hooded sweatshirt. It's possible to do wonderful things with the right layers; good camping long johns and thermals are worth their small weight in cold weather, and are comfortable to wear to bed.
* Something to drink, food, fruit, nuts. You don't want your [[food]] and drinks to be all over your stuff, so make sure that this is carefully packed. Canned food can be too heavy - often dried bulk food etc. is better. Try not to take things that have a strong smell. Remember to drink lots of water, and that most other drinks (like coffee, soda, orange juice, etc.) will actually dehydrate you.
* Reading material, for waits and quiet rides. (such as [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road On the Road] by Jack Kerouac, or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evasion_%28book%29 Evasion] by Anonymous). 
* A pack of cards. Or a lightweight [[Games|Game Pack]].
* A small medikit - cheap, and may suddenly be '''very''' useful.
* A small sewing kit is crucial for longer trips (especially if you have only one pair of pants - hitchhiking with a hole in your crotch is quite difficult) Recommended: at least one pair pants and one shorts. Conventional thread is really dreadfully weak, many travelers prefer to use dental floss because of its vastly superior durability. Some flosses are better than others, with the standard being Johnson &amp; Johnson Reach brand. Good floss can also conveniently be burned/melted down onto a knot.
* A torch (US: flashlight). Wind-up ones are good because they're lighter, and you don't have to waste batteries on them. The RAC one (available in the [[United Kingdom|UK]]) is excellent.
* A journal and/or camera is always a good choice to keep track of where you've been and who you've met, and to later add useful information to this wiki!
* Some basic tools to make jewelry with, or other such, will keep you in pocket change and give you something to do on lazy afternoons in the park, and will provide you with an answer if the police ask what you're doing in town. Also good for starting conversations.
* A [[harmonica]], penny whistle, kalimba or the like is also nice.
* A small amount of change (in the local currency), for buying public transport tickets, and any other items you suddenly need.
* CDs or cassettes, to offer drivers for entertainment during quieter rides, and even to give as "Thank You" gifts.
* If it makes you feel safer: a film-canister full of pepper--kept in your most accessible pocket. You probably won't need to use it, but you should have it handy to be able to pop the lid and toss it in the face of an attacker.
* An aluminized mylar "space blanket" is an exceptional survival tool, and weighs only an ounce or two.
* A multi-tool. My preference is the ''Leatherman Wave''. A companion used the ''Leatherman Blast'' and would not recommend it - the pins that hold the tool-lock releases are made to cross too long a gap, and can snap. The ''Swiss Army Knife'' is of course a classic as well.
* A tarp. There are a few varieties, my preference is actually a coated nylon rain poncho that doubles as a tarp. Good to separate you from the ground, or to rig up a shelter with, or to cover your pack when stashing it somewhere if it might rain. The new "siltarps" made with siliconized Cordura are extremely waterproof, ridiculously lightweight, and very surprisingly durable.
* Rain gear. As mentioned above, a poncho works well and doubles as a tarp, but even just a contractor trash bag tucked away is a good idea. If considering a rain jacket, remember that you'll want to keep your pack dry as well as not end up with your pants/skirt soaked.
* Sun screen. Standing in the sun without protection for hours waiting for rides can result in a nasty burn.

=== Camping ===
If you decide on [[camping]] you may want some more stuff:
* A [[camping|tent]], a [[tarp]] or a [[bivouac sack]] (or at least a couple of large, sturdy leaf bags, one opened at the bottom and duct-taped to the other to make a 6' long waterproof bag to sleep in - be sure not to suffocate yourself!). Consider a fan for tent camping, which can keep you cool on hot nights.
* A pad to sleep on (1" foam rubber x 2' wide by 5' long, for example), or a Thermarest or other self-inflating sleeping pad. Frankly, with either cardboard or dry leaves being very readily available at almost any place you might camp, carrying a pad with you is not really needed except in a few contexts.
* A metal cup big enough to hold a can of [[Sterno]] (packing space is at a premium) and a can of Sterno. Alternatively, instead of Sterno, you can use a [[Squat Candle]] or [[DIY Alcohol Stove]].
* Matches or lighter - preferably both, maybe even two lighters to be sure. BICs are the most reliable.
* A boy-scout type fork, spoon, knife set (heavy) or your pocket knife and a spoon.
* A length of coat-hanger type wire and a length of sturdy cord or string
* A canteen or plastic water bottle (glass WILL break!).
* Your clothes, stuffed into your tactical backpack or camping backpack, make a good pillow and make it much less likely someone will steal your backpack while you are sleeping on it, particularly if you keep an arm through the straps while asleep.
* Most bridges have a flat, dry space underneath which is excellent.
* After being harassed a few nights back by a mountain lion, I keep a 3" pocket knife on me when I sleep.

== Packing tips ==
* If you expect a lot of [[weather#Rain|rain]] it's wise to pack stuff in a few zip lock bags. Especially recommended for electronic gear and some [[appearance|clothes]] that you want to keep dry. You can also save bread bags as waterproof bags, which also work great as between-sock-and-shoe covers if you're walking though snow or puddles without a good pair of waterproof boots.

== External links ==
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ch3ggk__MR4&amp;list=PLTl6wHsuItETZmkfuI6AO5_xh8qiwtlzy&amp;index=5 HITCHHIKING? You MUST have THIS (Tutorial 4: #hitchhiking equipment)]
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lVn1QosdNiY What to carry video], Hitchhiker emptying out his pack to show what he's been carrying in his travels, from toothbrush to sleeping bag

[[Category:Equipment]]
[[de:Ausrüstung]]
[[fi:Pakkaaminen]]</text>
      <sha1>jwnedivkbpnmry9o345ql97sdwuf0fd</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Phrasebook</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1517</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1539</id>
      <parentid>4321</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-04-27T04:47:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="705">There are various hitchhiking '''phrasebooks''' to be found online.
Since this is a wiki we can try to make the best one. A flexible one, where you can assemble your own phrasebook, with the languages you need for your trip.

* [[Western Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Northern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Eastern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Southern Europe phrasebook]]

* [[Africa phrasebook]]
* [[Asia phrasebook]]
* [[South America phrasebook]]

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/phrases.html Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.

[[Category:Phrasebook|*]]</text>
      <sha1>d8ejon4guoa2ebqklpqooqxk3kfso2d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1540</id>
      <parentid>1539</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="705">There are various hitchhiking '''phrasebooks''' to be found online.
Since this is a wiki we can try to make the best one. A flexible one, where you can assemble your own phrasebook, with the languages you need for your trip.

* [[Western Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Northern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Eastern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Southern Europe phrasebook]]

* [[Africa phrasebook]]
* [[Asia phrasebook]]
* [[South America phrasebook]]

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/phrases.html Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.

[[Category:Phrasebook|*]]</text>
      <sha1>d8ejon4guoa2ebqklpqooqxk3kfso2d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4310</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T17:53:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>62.214.238.62</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2343">...
* [[Africa phrasebook]]
* [[Asia phrasebook]]
* [[America phrasebook]]
* [[Europe phrasebook]]



# Hello
# Are you possibly driving to ...?
# Can I drive with you?
# Can you drop me off at a motorway service area?
# Can I get out right here?
# Thanks for the ride!
# East, West, North, South


==Western Europe==

===German===

# Guten Tag!
# Fahren Sie vielleicht Richtung ... ?
# Könnte ich vielleicht bei Ihnen mitfahren?
# Können sie mich an der nächsten Tankstelle rauslassen?
# Kann ich direkt hier raus?
# Vielen Dank fuer die Fahrt!
# Ost, West, Nord, Süd

===French===
# Bonjour
# Est-ce que vous allez vers ...?
# Est-ce que je pourrais aller avec vous?
# Est-ce que vous pouvez me laisser a une station de service?
# Est-ce que je peux sortir ici?
# Merci beaucoup!
# Est, Ouest, Nord, Sud

===Dutch===
# Hallo
# Rijdt u misschien in de richting van ... ?
# Mag ik misschien met u meerijden?
# Kunt u me bij het volgende tankstation afzetten?
# Kan ik er hier uit?
# Bedankt voor de lift!
# Oost, West, Noord, Zuid

==Northern Europe==
Don't bother to try asking in Danish, Swedish, Norwegian or Finnish. Almost people speak English, and will be confused when you try to speak their language - and if you do speak it at a reasonable level, you won't need this phrasebook.

==Eastern Europe==
Russian is probably the most important language to learn, many older people speak or at least understand Russian, especially when their mother tongue is a Slavic language.
 
===Russian===

===Polish===

===Czech===

===Slovak===

===Hungarian===

==South-Eastern Europe==
===Slovenian===

===Serbian/Croatian/Bosnian===

===Bulgarian===

===Romanian===

===Albanian===

===Greek===

===Turkish===

==Southern Europe/South America==
===Spanish===
1. Hola

2. Va usted a ...?

3. Yo podria ir con usted?

4. 

5. Podria dejarme aqui?

6. Gracias por la ayuda.

7. Este, Oeste, Norte, Sur

===Portuguese===

===Italian===


==Africa==
===Arabic===

===Bambara===

===Peul===

===Swahili===

==Asia==
===Japanese===

===Chinese===

===Hindi/Urdu===

===Farsi===

===Thai===

===Vietnamese===

==External Links==

[http://www.digihitch.com/phrases.html Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.</text>
      <sha1>9gcz4c1h07efqejkvwc1u4we7bt30jv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4311</id>
      <parentid>4310</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T17:56:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GuakaTest</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2345">...
* [[Africa phrasebook]]
* [[Asia phrasebook]]
* [[America phrasebook]]
* [[Europe phrasebook]]



# Hello
# Are you possibly driving to ...?
# Can I drive with you?
# Can you drop me off at a motorway service area?
# Can I get out right here?
# Thanks for the ride!
# East, West, North, South


==Western Europe==

===German===

# Guten Tag!
# Fahren Sie vielleicht Richtung ... ?
# Könnte ich vielleicht bei Ihnen mitfahren?
# Können sie mich an der nächsten Tankstelle rauslassen?
# Kann ich direkt hier raus?
# Vielen Dank fuer die Fahrt!
# Ost, West, Nord, Süd

===French===
# Bonjour
# Est-ce que vous allez vers ...?
# Est-ce que je pourrais aller avec vous?
# Est-ce que vous pouvez me laisser a une station de service?
# Est-ce que je peux sortir ici?
# Merci beaucoup!
# Est, Ouest, Nord, Sud

===Dutch===
# Hallo
# Rijdt u misschien in de richting van ... ?
# Mag ik misschien met u meerijden?
# Kunt u me bij het volgende tankstation afzetten?
# Kan ik er hier uit?
# Bedankt voor de lift!
# Oost, West, Noord, Zuid

==Northern Europe==
Don't bother to try asking in Danish, Swedish, Norwegian or Finnish. Almost people speak English, and will be confused when you try to speak their language - and if you do speak it at a reasonable level, you won't need this phrasebook.

==Eastern Europe==
Russian is probably the most important language to learn, many older people speak or at least understand Russian, especially when their mother tongue is a Slavic language.
 
===Russian===

===Polish===

===Czech===

===Slovak===

===Hungarian===

==South-Eastern Europe==
===Slovenian===

===Serbian/Croatian/Bosnian===

===Bulgarian===

===Romanian===

===Albanian===

===Greek===

===Turkish===

==Southern Europe/South America==
===Spanish===
1. Hola

2. Va usted a ...?

3. Yo podria ir con usted?

4. 

5. Podria dejarme aqui?

6. Gracias por la ayuda.

7. Este, Oeste, Norte, Sur

===Portuguese===

===Italian===


==Africa==
===Arabic===

===Bambara===

===Peul===

===Swahili===

==Asia==
===Japanese===

===Chinese===

===Hindi/Urdu===

===Farsi===

===Thai===

===Vietnamese===

==External Links==

* [http://www.digihitch.com/phrases.html Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.</text>
      <sha1>3ccbowngy4sh1ln1nvxm7vf0xuw4uqz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4312</id>
      <parentid>4311</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-22T00:57:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>62.214.227.246</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2345">...
* [[Africa phrasebook]]
* [[Asia phrasebook]]
* [[America phrasebook]]
* [[Europe phrasebook]]



# Hello
# Are you possibly driving to ...?
# Can I drive with you?
# Can you drop me off at a motorway service area?
# Can I get out right here?
# Thanks for the ride!
# East, West, North, South


==Western Europe==

===German===

# Guten Tag!
# Fahren Sie vielleicht Richtung ... ?
# Könnte ich vielleicht bei Ihnen mitfahren?
# Können sie mich an der nächsten Tankstelle rauslassen?
# Kann ich direkt hier raus?
# Vielen Dank für die Fahrt!
# Ost, West, Nord, Süd

===French===
# Bonjour
# Est-ce que vous allez vers ...?
# Est-ce que je pourrais aller avec vous?
# Est-ce que vous pouvez me laisser a une station de service?
# Est-ce que je peux sortir ici?
# Merci beaucoup!
# Est, Ouest, Nord, Sud

===Dutch===
# Hallo
# Rijdt u misschien in de richting van ... ?
# Mag ik misschien met u meerijden?
# Kunt u me bij het volgende tankstation afzetten?
# Kan ik er hier uit?
# Bedankt voor de lift!
# Oost, West, Noord, Zuid

==Northern Europe==
Don't bother to try asking in Danish, Swedish, Norwegian or Finnish. Almost people speak English, and will be confused when you try to speak their language - and if you do speak it at a reasonable level, you won't need this phrasebook.

==Eastern Europe==
Russian is probably the most important language to learn, many older people speak or at least understand Russian, especially when their mother tongue is a Slavic language.
 
===Russian===

===Polish===

===Czech===

===Slovak===

===Hungarian===

==South-Eastern Europe==
===Slovenian===

===Serbian/Croatian/Bosnian===

===Bulgarian===

===Romanian===

===Albanian===

===Greek===

===Turkish===

==Southern Europe/South America==
===Spanish===
1. Hola

2. Va usted a ...?

3. Yo podria ir con usted?

4. 

5. Podria dejarme aqui?

6. Gracias por la ayuda.

7. Este, Oeste, Norte, Sur

===Portuguese===

===Italian===


==Africa==
===Arabic===

===Bambara===

===Peul===

===Swahili===

==Asia==
===Japanese===

===Chinese===

===Hindi/Urdu===

===Farsi===

===Thai===

===Vietnamese===

==External Links==

* [http://www.digihitch.com/phrases.html Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.</text>
      <sha1>5d9otxnq83qojkhhw3wwtojrjj3q8rq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4313</id>
      <parentid>4312</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-27T14:14:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2144">There are various hitchhiking '''phrasebooks''' to be found online.

* 

{{Phrasebooks/English}}

==Western Europe==

===German===

# Guten Tag!
# Fahren Sie vielleicht Richtung ... ?
# Könnte ich vielleicht bei Ihnen mitfahren?
# Können sie mich an der nächsten Tankstelle rauslassen?
# Kann ich direkt hier raus?
# Vielen Dank für die Fahrt!
# Ost, West, Nord, Süd

===French===
# Bonjour
# Est-ce que vous allez vers ...?
# Est-ce que je pourrais aller avec vous?
# Est-ce que vous pouvez me laisser a une station de service?
# Est-ce que je peux sortir ici?
# Merci beaucoup!
# Est, Ouest, Nord, Sud

===Dutch===
# Hallo
# Rijdt u misschien in de richting van ... ?
# Mag ik misschien met u meerijden?
# Kunt u me bij het volgende tankstation afzetten?
# Kan ik er hier uit?
# Bedankt voor de lift!
# Oost, West, Noord, Zuid

==Northern Europe==
Don't bother to try asking in Danish, Swedish, Norwegian or Finnish. Almost people speak English, and will be confused when you try to speak their language - and if you do speak it at a reasonable level, you won't need this phrasebook.

==Eastern Europe==
Russian is probably the most important language to learn, many older people speak or at least understand Russian, especially when their mother tongue is a Slavic language.
 
===Russian===

===Polish===

===Czech===

===Slovak===

===Hungarian===

==South-Eastern Europe==
===Slovenian===

===Serbian/Croatian/Bosnian===

===Bulgarian===

===Romanian===

===Albanian===

===Greek===

===Turkish===

==Southern Europe/South America==
===Spanish===
1. Hola

2. Va usted a ...?

3. Yo podria ir con usted?

4. 

5. Podria dejarme aqui?

6. Gracias por la ayuda.

7. Este, Oeste, Norte, Sur

===Portuguese===

===Italian===


==Africa==
===Arabic===

===Bambara===

===Peul===

===Swahili===

==Asia==
===Japanese===

===Chinese===

===Hindi/Urdu===

===Farsi===

===Thai===

===Vietnamese===

==External Links==

* [http://www.digihitch.com/phrases.html Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.</text>
      <sha1>4ajhusu7skx5n75pjvwy6lwuvszvpxf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4314</id>
      <parentid>4313</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-27T14:16:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2347">There are various hitchhiking '''phrasebooks''' to be found online.
Since this is a wiki we can try to make the best one. A flexible one, where you can assemble your own phrasebook, with the languages you need for your trip.

* [[Western Europe phrasebook]]
* [[South America phrasebook]]

{{Phrasebook/English}}
{{Phrasebook/German}}
# Guten Tag!
# Fahren Sie vielleicht Richtung ... ?
# Könnte ich vielleicht bei Ihnen mitfahren?
# Können sie mich an der nächsten Tankstelle rauslassen?
# Kann ich direkt hier raus?
# Vielen Dank für die Fahrt!
# Ost, West, Nord, Süd

===French===
# Bonjour
# Est-ce que vous allez vers ...?
# Est-ce que je pourrais aller avec vous?
# Est-ce que vous pouvez me laisser a une station de service?
# Est-ce que je peux sortir ici?
# Merci beaucoup!
# Est, Ouest, Nord, Sud

===Dutch===
# Hallo
# Rijdt u misschien in de richting van ... ?
# Mag ik misschien met u meerijden?
# Kunt u me bij het volgende tankstation afzetten?
# Kan ik er hier uit?
# Bedankt voor de lift!
# Oost, West, Noord, Zuid

==Northern Europe==
Don't bother to try asking in Danish, Swedish, Norwegian or Finnish. Almost people speak English, and will be confused when you try to speak their language - and if you do speak it at a reasonable level, you won't need this phrasebook.

==Eastern Europe==
Russian is probably the most important language to learn, many older people speak or at least understand Russian, especially when their mother tongue is a Slavic language.
 
===Russian===

===Polish===

===Czech===

===Slovak===

===Hungarian===

==South-Eastern Europe==
===Slovenian===

===Serbian/Croatian/Bosnian===

===Bulgarian===

===Romanian===

===Albanian===

===Greek===

===Turkish===

==Southern Europe/South America==
===Spanish===
1. Hola

2. Va usted a ...?

3. Yo podria ir con usted?

4. 

5. Podria dejarme aqui?

6. Gracias por la ayuda.

7. Este, Oeste, Norte, Sur

===Portuguese===

===Italian===


==Africa==
===Arabic===

===Bambara===

===Peul===

===Swahili===

==Asia==
===Japanese===

===Chinese===

===Hindi/Urdu===

===Farsi===

===Thai===

===Vietnamese===

==External Links==

* [http://www.digihitch.com/phrases.html Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.</text>
      <sha1>5i0jcuglrjd8korle7lffciv99xpb1t</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4315</id>
      <parentid>4314</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-27T14:17:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2217">There are various hitchhiking '''phrasebooks''' to be found online.
Since this is a wiki we can try to make the best one. A flexible one, where you can assemble your own phrasebook, with the languages you need for your trip.

* [[Western Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Nortern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Eastern Europe phrasebook]]

* [[South America phrasebook]]


{{Phrasebook/English}}
{{Phrasebook/German}}
{{Phrasebook/French}}
{{Phrasebook/Dutch}}


===French===
# Bonjour
# Est-ce que vous allez vers ...?
# Est-ce que je pourrais aller avec vous?
# Est-ce que vous pouvez me laisser a une station de service?
# Est-ce que je peux sortir ici?
# Merci beaucoup!
# Est, Ouest, Nord, Sud

===Dutch===
# Hallo
# Rijdt u misschien in de richting van ... ?
# Mag ik misschien met u meerijden?
# Kunt u me bij het volgende tankstation afzetten?
# Kan ik er hier uit?
# Bedankt voor de lift!
# Oost, West, Noord, Zuid

==Northern Europe==
Don't bother to try asking in Danish, Swedish, Norwegian or Finnish. Almost people speak English, and will be confused when you try to speak their language - and if you do speak it at a reasonable level, you won't need this phrasebook.

==Eastern Europe==
Russian is probably the most important language to learn, many older people speak or at least understand Russian, especially when their mother tongue is a Slavic language.
 
===Russian===

===Polish===

===Czech===

===Slovak===

===Hungarian===

==South-Eastern Europe==
===Slovenian===

===Serbian/Croatian/Bosnian===

===Bulgarian===

===Romanian===

===Albanian===

===Greek===

===Turkish===

==Southern Europe/South America==
===Spanish===
1. Hola

2. Va usted a ...?

3. Yo podria ir con usted?

4. 

5. Podria dejarme aqui?

6. Gracias por la ayuda.

7. Este, Oeste, Norte, Sur

===Portuguese===

===Italian===


==Africa==
===Arabic===

===Bambara===

===Peul===

===Swahili===

==Asia==
===Japanese===

===Chinese===

===Hindi/Urdu===

===Farsi===

===Thai===

===Vietnamese===

==External Links==

* [http://www.digihitch.com/phrases.html Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.</text>
      <sha1>c0wum23hem9req5ax5o8c19yifm0jar</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4316</id>
      <parentid>4315</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-27T14:18:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1754">There are various hitchhiking '''phrasebooks''' to be found online.
Since this is a wiki we can try to make the best one. A flexible one, where you can assemble your own phrasebook, with the languages you need for your trip.

* [[Western Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Nortern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Eastern Europe phrasebook]]

* [[South America phrasebook]]


{{Phrasebook/English}}
{{Phrasebook/German}}
{{Phrasebook/French}}
{{Phrasebook/Dutch}}

==Northern Europe==
Don't bother to try asking in Danish, Swedish, Norwegian or Finnish. Almost people speak English, and will be confused when you try to speak their language - and if you do speak it at a reasonable level, you won't need this phrasebook.

==Eastern Europe==
Russian is probably the most important language to learn, many older people speak or at least understand Russian, especially when their mother tongue is a Slavic language.
 
===Russian===

===Polish===

===Czech===

===Slovak===

===Hungarian===

==South-Eastern Europe==
===Slovenian===

===Serbian/Croatian/Bosnian===

===Bulgarian===

===Romanian===

===Albanian===

===Greek===

===Turkish===

==Southern Europe/South America==
===Spanish===
1. Hola

2. Va usted a ...?

3. Yo podria ir con usted?

4. 

5. Podria dejarme aqui?

6. Gracias por la ayuda.

7. Este, Oeste, Norte, Sur

===Portuguese===

===Italian===


==Africa==
===Arabic===

===Bambara===

===Peul===

===Swahili===

==Asia==
===Japanese===

===Chinese===

===Hindi/Urdu===

===Farsi===

===Thai===

===Vietnamese===

==External Links==

* [http://www.digihitch.com/phrases.html Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.</text>
      <sha1>2xdfuk4306k83y5zb591rm5cj0bcb0v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4317</id>
      <parentid>4316</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-27T14:20:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1655">There are various hitchhiking '''phrasebooks''' to be found online.
Since this is a wiki we can try to make the best one. A flexible one, where you can assemble your own phrasebook, with the languages you need for your trip.

* [[Western Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Nortern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Eastern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Southern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Africa phrasebook]]

* [[South America phrasebook]]

==Northern Europe==
Don't bother to try asking in Danish, Swedish, Norwegian or Finnish. Almost people speak English, and will be confused when you try to speak their language - and if you do speak it at a reasonable level, you won't need this phrasebook.

==Eastern Europe==
Russian is probably the most important language to learn, many older people speak or at least understand Russian, especially when their mother tongue is a Slavic language.
 
===Russian===

===Polish===

===Czech===

===Slovak===

===Hungarian===

==South-Eastern Europe==
===Slovenian===

===Serbian/Croatian/Bosnian===

===Bulgarian===

===Romanian===

===Albanian===

===Greek===

===Turkish===

===Spanish===
1. Hola

2. Va usted a ...?

3. Yo podria ir con usted?

4. 

5. Podria dejarme aqui?

6. Gracias por la ayuda.

7. Este, Oeste, Norte, Sur



==Africa==
===Arabic===

===Bambara===

===Peul===

===Swahili===

==Asia==
===Japanese===

===Chinese===

===Hindi/Urdu===

===Farsi===

===Thai===

===Vietnamese===

==External Links==

* [http://www.digihitch.com/phrases.html Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.</text>
      <sha1>fgphg5iwnqgeiai9f4yr4ukvrvdqzwf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4318</id>
      <parentid>4317</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-27T14:21:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1703">There are various hitchhiking '''phrasebooks''' to be found online.
Since this is a wiki we can try to make the best one. A flexible one, where you can assemble your own phrasebook, with the languages you need for your trip.

* [[Western Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Nortern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Eastern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Southern Europe phrasebook]]

* [[Africa phrasebook]]
* [[Asia phrasebook]]
* [[South America phrasebook]]

==Northern Europe==
Don't bother to try asking in Danish, Swedish, Norwegian or Finnish. Almost people speak English, and will be confused when you try to speak their language - and if you do speak it at a reasonable level, you won't need this phrasebook.

==Eastern Europe==
Russian is probably the most important language to learn, many older people speak or at least understand Russian, especially when their mother tongue is a Slavic language.
 
===Russian===

===Polish===

===Czech===

===Slovak===

===Hungarian===

==South-Eastern Europe==
===Slovenian===

===Serbian/Croatian/Bosnian===

===Bulgarian===

===Romanian===

===Albanian===

===Greek===

===Turkish===

===Spanish===
1. Hola

2. Va usted a ...?

3. Yo podria ir con usted?

4. 

5. Podria dejarme aqui?

6. Gracias por la ayuda.

7. Este, Oeste, Norte, Sur



==Africa==
===Arabic===

===Bambara===

===Peul===

===Swahili===

==Asia==
===Japanese===

===Chinese===

===Hindi/Urdu===

===Farsi===

===Thai===

===Vietnamese===

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/phrases.html Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.

[[Category:Phrasebook|*]]</text>
      <sha1>bbs24zpkes8n9k3xa0kk8by88sncgks</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4319</id>
      <parentid>4318</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-27T14:29:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="704">There are various hitchhiking '''phrasebooks''' to be found online.
Since this is a wiki we can try to make the best one. A flexible one, where you can assemble your own phrasebook, with the languages you need for your trip.

* [[Western Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Nortern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Eastern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Southern Europe phrasebook]]

* [[Africa phrasebook]]
* [[Asia phrasebook]]
* [[South America phrasebook]]

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/phrases.html Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.

[[Category:Phrasebook|*]]</text>
      <sha1>bpwj3bvgkjoy4w7dh3dn8623geu0j6c</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4320</id>
      <parentid>4319</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-04-26T23:39:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>24.186.165.58</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="705">There are various hitchhiking '''phrasebooks''' to be found online.
Since this is a wiki we can try to make the best one. A flexible one, where you can assemble your own phrasebook, with the languages you need for your trip.

* [[Western Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Northern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Eastern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Southern Europe phrasebook]]

* [[Africa phrasebook]]
* [[Asia phrasebook]]
* [[South America phrasebook]]

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/phrases.html Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.

[[Category:Phrasebook|*]]</text>
      <sha1>d8ejon4guoa2ebqklpqooqxk3kfso2d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4321</id>
      <parentid>4320</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-04-26T23:39:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>24.186.165.58</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="704">There are various hitchhiking '''phrasebooks''' to be found online.
Since this is a wiki we can try to make the best one. A flexible one, where you can assemble your own phrasebook, with the languages you need for your trip.

* [[Western Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Nortern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Eastern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Southern Europe phrasebook]]

* [[Africa phrasebook]]
* [[Asia phrasebook]]
* [[South America phrasebook]]

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/phrases.html Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.

[[Category:Phrasebook|*]]</text>
      <sha1>bpwj3bvgkjoy4w7dh3dn8623geu0j6c</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4322</id>
      <parentid>1540</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="705">There are various hitchhiking '''phrasebooks''' to be found online.
Since this is a wiki we can try to make the best one. A flexible one, where you can assemble your own phrasebook, with the languages you need for your trip.

* [[Western Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Northern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Eastern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Southern Europe phrasebook]]

* [[Africa phrasebook]]
* [[Asia phrasebook]]
* [[South America phrasebook]]

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/phrases.html Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.

[[Category:Phrasebook|*]]</text>
      <sha1>d8ejon4guoa2ebqklpqooqxk3kfso2d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10631</id>
      <parentid>4322</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-25T20:42:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>137.226.181.3</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="725">There are various hitchhiking '''phrasebooks''' to be found online.
Since this is a wiki we can try to make the best one. A flexible one, where you can assemble your own phrasebook, with the languages you need for your trip.

* [[Western Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Northern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Eastern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Southern Europe phrasebook]]

* [[Africa phrasebook]]
* [[Asia phrasebook]]
* [[South America phrasebook]]

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/road-culture/hitchhiking-phrases Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.

[[Category:Phrasebook|*]]</text>
      <sha1>05vceoc092h3bpvxo0e7nn63m5w1zba</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18587</id>
      <parentid>10631</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-02-28T16:53:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1245">There are various hitchhiking '''phrasebooks''' to be found online.
Since this is a wiki we can try to make the best one. A flexible one, where you can assemble your own phrasebook, with the languages you need for your trip.

===How to add tranlations===
If you are a speaker of one of those many languages around the globe, and if you want to add the translation of these to this phrasebooks, just go to one of the phrasebook sites, choose your language and click on the &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt; next to the name of the language. A textbox appears where you can find the phrases in English. Just write the translation behind the sentences, so that later you'll find the English translation next to the interpretation in your language.

=== Phrasebooks ===
* [[Western Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Northern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Eastern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Southern Europe phrasebook]]

* [[Africa phrasebook]]
* [[Asia phrasebook]]
* [[South America phrasebook]]

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/road-culture/hitchhiking-phrases Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.

[[Category:Phrasebook|*]]</text>
      <sha1>d0n9p1m1zjky4a36wgsuadu7jy1jq83</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18706</id>
      <parentid>18587</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-04T02:52:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1313">There are various hitchhiking '''phrasebooks''' to be found online.
Since this is a wiki we can try to make the best one. A flexible one, where you can assemble your own phrasebook, with the languages you need for your trip.

===How to add tranlations===
If you are a speaker of one of those many languages around the globe, and if you want to add the translation of these to this phrasebooks, just go to one of the phrasebook sites, choose your language and click on the &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt; next to the name of the language. A textbox appears where you can find the phrases in English. Just write the translation behind the sentences, so that later you'll find the English translation next to the interpretation in your language.

=== Phrasebooks ===
* [[Western Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Northern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Eastern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Southern Europe phrasebook]]

* [[Africa phrasebook]]
* [[Asia phrasebook]]
* [[South America phrasebook]]
* [[North America phrasebook|Central and North America phrasebook]]

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/road-culture/hitchhiking-phrases Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.

[[Category:Phrasebook|*]]</text>
      <sha1>o8rf9lwv8zcxle20wwe3jcnaiwgu56v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>25179</id>
      <parentid>18706</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-20T10:57:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Deleea</username>
        <id>1579</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1313">There are various hitchhiking '''phrasebooks''' to be found online.
Since this is a wiki we can try to make the best one. A flexible one, where you can assemble your own phrasebook, with the languages you need for your trip.

===How to add tranlations===
If you are a speaker of one of those many languages around the globe, and if you want to add the translation of these to this phrasebooks, just go to one of the phrasebook sites, choose your language and click on the &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt; next to the name of the language. A textbox appears where you can find the phrases in English. Just write the translation behind the sentences, so that later you'll find the English translation next to the interpretation in your language.

=== Phrasebooks ===
* [[Western Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Northern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Eastern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Southern Europe phrasebook]]

* [[Africa phrasebook]]
* [[Asia phrasebook]]
* [[South America phrasebook]]
* [[North America phrasebook|Central and North America phrasebook]]

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/road-culture/hitchhiking-phrases Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.

[[Category:Phrasebook|*]]</text>
      <sha1>o8rf9lwv8zcxle20wwe3jcnaiwgu56v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>25187</id>
      <parentid>25179</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-20T11:23:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1332">There are various hitchhiking '''phrasebooks''' to be found online.
Since this is a wiki we can try to make the best one. A flexible one, where you can assemble your own phrasebook, with the languages you need for your trip.

===How to add tranlations===
If you are a speaker of one of those many languages around the globe, and if you want to add the translation of these to this phrasebooks, just go to one of the phrasebook sites, choose your language and click on the &lt;tt&gt;edit&lt;/tt&gt; next to the name of the language. A textbox appears where you can find the phrases in English. Just write the translation behind the sentences, so that later you'll find the English translation next to the interpretation in your language.

=== Phrasebooks ===
* [[Western Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Northern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Eastern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Southern Europe phrasebook]]

* [[Africa phrasebook]]
* [[Asia phrasebook]]
* [[South America phrasebook]]
* [[North America phrasebook|Central and North America phrasebook]]

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/road-culture/hitchhiking-phrases Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.

[[Category:Phrasebook|*]]

[[de:Phrasebook]]</text>
      <sha1>5nnthn3vvurwh9piuga4tp0p91nt5vm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>25685</id>
      <parentid>25187</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-04T17:00:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1337">There are various hitchhiking '''phrasebooks''' to be found online.
Since this is a wiki we can try to make the best one. A flexible one, where you can assemble your own phrasebook, with the languages you need for your trip.

== How to add tranlations ==
If you are a speaker of one of those many languages around the globe, and if you want to add the translation of these to this phrasebooks, just go to one of the phrasebook sites, choose your language and click on the “edit” button next to the name of the language. A textbox appears where you can find the phrases in English. Just write the translation behind the sentences, so that later you'll find the English translation next to the interpretation in your language.

== Phrasebooks ==
* [[Western Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Northern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Eastern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Southern Europe phrasebook]]

* [[Africa phrasebook]]
* [[Asia phrasebook]]
* [[South America phrasebook]]
* [[North America phrasebook|Central and North America phrasebook]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/road-culture/hitchhiking-phrases Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.


[[Category:Phrasebook| ]]

[[de:Phrasebook]]</text>
      <sha1>2nafmfwdgtyzo9oegn3bwhie0iwogzt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26111</id>
      <parentid>25685</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-13T14:18:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1353">There are various hitchhiking '''phrasebooks''' to be found online.
Since this is a wiki we can try to make the best one. A flexible one, where you can assemble your own phrasebook, with the languages you need for your trip.

== How to add tranlations ==
If you are a speaker of one of those many languages around the globe, and if you want to add the translation of these to this phrasebooks, just go to one of the phrasebook sites, choose your language and click on the “edit” button next to the name of the language. A textbox appears where you can find the phrases in English. Just write the translation behind the sentences, so that later you'll find the English translation next to the interpretation in your language.

== Phrasebooks ==
* [[Western Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Northern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Eastern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Southern Europe phrasebook]]

* [[Africa phrasebook]]
* [[Asia phrasebook]]
* [[South America phrasebook]]
* [[North America phrasebook|Central and North America phrasebook]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/road-culture/hitchhiking-phrases Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.


[[Category:Phrasebook| ]]

[[de:Sammlung von Redewendungen]]</text>
      <sha1>8e2n9h3kp2lllb6im5xl21roey1d1k9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31696</id>
      <parentid>26111</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-13T14:57:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1420">There are various hitchhiking '''phrasebooks''' to be found online.
Since this is a wiki we can try to make the best one. A flexible one, where you can assemble your own phrasebook, with the languages you need for your trip.

== How to add tranlations ==
If you are a speaker of one of those many languages around the globe, and if you want to add the translation of these to this phrasebooks, just go to one of the phrasebook sites, choose your language and click on the “edit” button next to the name of the language. A textbox appears where you can find the phrases in English. Just write the translation behind the sentences, so that later you'll find the English translation next to the interpretation in your language.

== Phrasebooks ==
* [[Western Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Northern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Eastern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Southern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Africa phrasebook]]
* [[Asia phrasebook]]
* [[South America phrasebook]]
* [[North America phrasebook|Central and North America phrasebook]]


* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Phrasebook Phrasebooks in wikitravel]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/road-culture/hitchhiking-phrases Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.


[[Category:Phrasebook| ]]

[[de:Sammlung von Redewendungen]]</text>
      <sha1>n78rjp2abz7pc2mgi5le7j9h8d44nua</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31697</id>
      <parentid>31696</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-13T14:58:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1469">There are various hitchhiking '''phrasebooks''' to be found online.
Since this is a wiki we can try to make the best one. A flexible one, where you can assemble your own phrasebook, with the languages you need for your trip.

== How to add tranlations ==
If you are a speaker of one of those many languages around the globe, and if you want to add the translation of these to this phrasebooks, just go to one of the phrasebook sites, choose your language and click on the “edit” button next to the name of the language. A textbox appears where you can find the phrases in English. Just write the translation behind the sentences, so that later you'll find the English translation next to the interpretation in your language.

== Phrasebooks ==
* [[Western Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Northern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Eastern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Southern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Africa phrasebook]]
* [[Asia phrasebook]]
* [[South America phrasebook]]
* [[North America phrasebook|Central and North America phrasebook]]


* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Phrasebook Phrasebooks in wikitravel]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/road-culture/hitchhiking-phrases Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.


[[Category:Phrasebook| ]]

[[fi:Fraasisanakirja]]
[[de:Sammlung von Redewendungen]]
[[wikipedia:Phrase book]]</text>
      <sha1>2517zdqdqs32zesgfp47w7e9tb8zofa</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35306</id>
      <parentid>31697</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T18:27:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1468">There are various hitchhiking '''phrasebooks''' to be found online.
Since this is a wiki we can try to make the best one. A flexible one, where you can assemble your own phrasebook, with the languages you need for your trip.

== How to add tranlations ==
If you are a speaker of one of those many languages around the globe, and if you want to add the translation of these to this phrasebooks, just go to one of the phrasebook sites, choose your language and click on the “edit” button next to the name of the language. A textbox appears where you can find the phrases in English. Just write the translation behind the sentences, so that later you'll find the English translation next to the interpretation in your language.

== Phrasebooks ==
* [[Western Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Northern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Eastern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Southern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Africa phrasebook]]
* [[Asia phrasebook]]
* [[South America phrasebook]]
* [[North America phrasebook|Central and North America phrasebook]]


* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Phrasebook Phrasebooks in wikitravel]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/road-culture/hitchhiking-phrases Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.
[[wikipedia:Phrase book]]

[[Category:Phrasebook| ]]

[[de:Sammlung von Redewendungen]]
[[fi:Fraasisanakirja]]</text>
      <sha1>cmuhtdtc9iuyi0evzadl9cd9k0z015s</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40100</id>
      <parentid>35306</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-12T08:57:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mipplor</username>
        <id>1887</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1485">There are various hitchhiking '''phrasebooks''' to be found online.
Since this is a wiki we can try to make the best one. A flexible one, where you can assemble your own phrasebook, with the languages you need for your trip.

== How to add tranlations ==
If you are a speaker of one of those many languages around the globe, and if you want to add the translation of these to this phrasebooks, just go to one of the phrasebook sites, choose your language and click on the “edit” button next to the name of the language. A textbox appears where you can find the phrases in English. Just write the translation behind the sentences, so that later you'll find the English translation next to the interpretation in your language.

== Phrasebooks ==
* [[Western Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Northern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Eastern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Southern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Africa phrasebook]]
* [[Asia phrasebook]]
* [[South America phrasebook]]
* [[North America phrasebook|Central and North America phrasebook]]


* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Phrasebook Phrasebooks in wikitravel]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/road-culture/hitchhiking-phrases Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.
[[wikipedia:Phrase book]]

[[Category:Phrasebook| ]]

[[de:Sammlung von Redewendungen]]
[[fi:Fraasisanakirja]]
[[zh:词汇书]]</text>
      <sha1>g0x6t87z4p337a2sh1z0f4us6m5bi2m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>43571</id>
      <parentid>40100</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-08-01T13:42:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1486">There are various hitchhiking '''phrasebooks''' to be found online.
Since this is a wiki we can try to make the best one. A flexible one, where you can assemble your own phrasebook, with the languages you need for your trip.

== How to add translations ==
If you are a speaker of one of those many languages around the globe, and if you want to add the translation of these to this phrasebooks, just go to one of the phrasebook sites, choose your language and click on the “edit” button next to the name of the language. A textbox appears where you can find the phrases in English. Just write the translation behind the sentences, so that later you'll find the English translation next to the interpretation in your language.

== Phrasebooks ==
* [[Western Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Northern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Eastern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Southern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Africa phrasebook]]
* [[Asia phrasebook]]
* [[South America phrasebook]]
* [[North America phrasebook|Central and North America phrasebook]]


* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Phrasebook Phrasebooks in wikitravel]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/road-culture/hitchhiking-phrases Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.
[[wikipedia:Phrase book]]

[[Category:Phrasebook| ]]

[[de:Sammlung von Redewendungen]]
[[fi:Fraasisanakirja]]
[[zh:词汇书]]</text>
      <sha1>di4hjfzh2sahmxe9879k3oyqpib42rz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>46810</id>
      <parentid>43571</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-11-10T14:07:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1512">There are various hitchhiking '''phrasebooks''' to be found online.
Since this is a wiki we can try to make the best one. A flexible one, where you can assemble your own phrasebook, with the languages you need for your trip.

== How to add translations ==
If you are a speaker of one of those many languages around the globe, and if you want to add the translation of these to this phrasebooks, just go to one of the phrasebook sites, choose your language and click on the “edit” button next to the name of the language. A textbox appears where you can find the phrases in English. Just write the translation behind the sentences, so that later you'll find the English translation next to the interpretation in your language.

== Phrasebooks ==
* [[Western Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Northern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Eastern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Southern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Africa phrasebook]]
* [[Asia phrasebook]]
* [[South America phrasebook]]
* [[North America phrasebook|Central and North America phrasebook]]


* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Phrasebook Phrasebooks in wikitravel]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/road-culture/hitchhiking-phrases Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.
[[wikipedia:Phrase book]]

[[Category:Phrasebook| ]]

[[de:Sammlung von Redewendungen]]
[[fi:Fraasisanakirja]]
[[zh:词汇书]]
[[fr:Guide linguistique]]</text>
      <sha1>h95nwwzf9j7sk04wilfwb3y9bews4wg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>62876</id>
      <parentid>46810</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-08-02T23:14:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sapunov</username>
        <id>5635</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1556">There are various hitchhiking '''phrasebooks''' to be found online.
Since this is a wiki we can try to make the best one. A flexible one, where you can assemble your own phrasebook, with the languages you need for your trip.

== How to add translations ==
If you are a speaker of one of those many languages around the globe, and if you want to add the translation of these to this phrasebooks, just go to one of the phrasebook sites, choose your language and click on the “edit” button next to the name of the language. A textbox appears where you can find the phrases in English. Just write the translation behind the sentences, so that later you'll find the English translation next to the interpretation in your language.

== Phrasebooks ==
* [[Western Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Northern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Eastern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Southern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Africa phrasebook]]
* [[Asia phrasebook]]
* [[South America phrasebook]]
* [[North America phrasebook|Central and North America phrasebook]]
* [[Russian-Polish hitch-hiking phrasebook]]

* [http://wikitravel.org/en/Phrasebook Phrasebooks in wikitravel]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/road-culture/hitchhiking-phrases Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.
[[wikipedia:Phrase book]]

[[Category:Phrasebook| ]]

[[de:Sammlung von Redewendungen]]
[[fi:Fraasisanakirja]]
[[zh:词汇书]]
[[fr:Guide linguistique]]</text>
      <sha1>5497e3bigrthwh4o412p9n1s2c20aci</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70357</id>
      <parentid>62876</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-07-07T10:53:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robyt</username>
        <id>9747</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1556">There are various hitchhiking '''phrasebooks''' to be found online.
Since this is a wiki we can try to make the best one. A flexible one, where you can assemble your own phrasebook, with the languages you need for your trip.

== How to add translations ==
If you are a speaker of one of those many languages around the globe, and if you want to add the translation of these to this phrasebooks, just go to one of the phrasebook sites, choose your language and click on the “edit” button next to the name of the language. A textbox appears where you can find the phrases in English. Just write the translation behind the sentences, so that later you'll find the English translation next to the interpretation in your language.

== Phrasebooks ==
* [[Western Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Northern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Eastern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Southern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Africa phrasebook]]
* [[Asia phrasebook]]
* [[South America phrasebook]]
* [[North America phrasebook|Central and North America phrasebook]]
* [[Russian-Polish hitch-hiking phrasebook]]

* [http://wikivoyage.org/en/Phrasebook Phrasebooks in wikivoyage]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/road-culture/hitchhiking-phrases Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.
[[wikipedia:Phrase book]]

[[Category:Phrasebook| ]]

[[de:Sammlung von Redewendungen]]
[[fi:Fraasisanakirja]]
[[zh:词汇书]]
[[fr:Guide linguistique]]</text>
      <sha1>qrwkesgwstn1z95afln4c5o41vq5xlu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70368</id>
      <parentid>70357</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-07-07T11:04:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robyt</username>
        <id>9747</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1561">There are various hitchhiking '''phrasebooks''' to be found online.
Since this is a wiki we can try to make the best one. A flexible one, where you can assemble your own phrasebook, with the languages you need for your trip.

== How to add translations ==
If you are a speaker of one of those many languages around the globe, and if you want to add the translation of these to this phrasebooks, just go to one of the phrasebook sites, choose your language and click on the “edit” button next to the name of the language. A textbox appears where you can find the phrases in English. Just write the translation behind the sentences, so that later you'll find the English translation next to the interpretation in your language.

== Phrasebooks ==
* [[Western Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Northern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Eastern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Southern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Africa phrasebook]]
* [[Asia phrasebook]]
* [[South America phrasebook]]
* [[North America phrasebook|Central and North America phrasebook]]
* [[Russian-Polish hitch-hiking phrasebook]]

* [http://en.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Phrasebook Phrasebooks in wikivoyage]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/road-culture/hitchhiking-phrases Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.
[[wikipedia:Phrase book]]

[[Category:Phrasebook| ]]

[[de:Sammlung von Redewendungen]]
[[fi:Fraasisanakirja]]
[[zh:词汇书]]
[[fr:Guide linguistique]]</text>
      <sha1>sejcgbg3lsa6ykil6oleuzf8xfi0eu5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>71014</id>
      <parentid>70368</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-08-20T01:13:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1573">There are various hitchhiking '''phrasebooks''' to be found online.
Since this is a wiki we can try to make the best one. A flexible one, where you can assemble your own phrasebook, with the languages you need for your trip.

== How to add translations ==
If you are a speaker of one of those many languages around the globe, and if you want to add the translation of these to this phrasebooks, just go to one of the phrasebook sites, choose your language and click on the “edit” button next to the name of the language. A textbox appears where you can find the phrases in English. Just write the translation behind the sentences, so that later you'll find the English translation next to the interpretation in your language.

== Phrasebooks ==
* [[Western Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Northern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Eastern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Southern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Africa phrasebook]]
* [[Asia phrasebook]]
* [[South America phrasebook]]
* [[North America phrasebook|Central and North America phrasebook]]
* [[Russian-Polish hitch-hiking phrasebook]]

* [http://en.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Phrasebook Phrasebooks in wikivoyage]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/road-culture/hitchhiking-phrases Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.
[[wikipedia:Phrase book]]

[[Category:Phrasebook| ]]

[[de:Sammlung von Redewendungen]]
[[fi:Fraasisanakirja]]
[[fr:Guide linguistique]]
[[nl:Taal]]
[[zh:词汇书]]</text>
      <sha1>k03xoi8ct266k1gib3ofrdx5oiujuvy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>74422</id>
      <parentid>71014</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-03-18T19:10:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Strazdas007</username>
        <id>6817</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1806">There are various hitchhiking '''phrasebooks''' to be found online.
Since this is a wiki we can try to make the best one. A flexible one, where you can assemble your own phrasebook, with the languages you need for your trip.

== How to add translations ==
If you are a speaker of one of those many languages around the globe, and if you want to add the translation of these to this phrasebooks, just go to one of the phrasebook sites, choose your language and click on the “edit” button next to the name of the language. A textbox appears where you can find the phrases in English. Just write the translation behind the sentences, so that later you'll find the English translation next to the interpretation in your language.

== Phrasebooks ==
* [[Western Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Northern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Eastern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Southern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Africa phrasebook]]
* [[Asia phrasebook]]
* [[South America phrasebook]]
* [[North America phrasebook|Central and North America phrasebook]]
* [[Russian-Polish hitch-hiking phrasebook]]

* [http://en.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Phrasebook Phrasebooks in wikivoyage]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/road-culture/hitchhiking-phrases Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.
*[https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.hitchwiki.phrasebook Hitchwiki Phrasebook for Android] Important phrases in 20 languages in an offline application for users with Android mobile phones. Developed by Mikael Korpela
[[wikipedia:Phrase book]]

[[Category:Phrasebook| ]]

[[de:Sammlung von Redewendungen]]
[[fi:Fraasisanakirja]]
[[fr:Guide linguistique]]
[[nl:Taal]]
[[zh:词汇书]]</text>
      <sha1>h46tvnrlnwh2vw4gckovmom8kradhju</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>81724</id>
      <parentid>74422</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-12-15T17:42:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Alexxy</username>
        <id>24779</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1912">There are various hitchhiking '''phrasebooks''' to be found online.
Since this is a wiki we can try to make the best one. A flexible one, where you can assemble your own phrasebook, with the languages you need for your trip.

== How to add translations ==
If you are a speaker of one of those many languages around the globe, and if you want to add the translation of these to this phrasebooks, just go to one of the phrasebook sites, choose your language and click on the “edit” button next to the name of the language. A textbox appears where you can find the phrases in English. Just write the translation behind the sentences, so that later you'll find the English translation next to the interpretation in your language.

== Phrasebooks ==
* [[Western Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Northern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Eastern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Southern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Africa phrasebook]]
* [[Asia phrasebook]]
* [[South America phrasebook]]
* [[North America phrasebook|Central and North America phrasebook]]
* [[:ru:Русско-польский Панский разговорник для автостопщиков|Russian-Polish hitch-hiking phrasebook]]

* [http://en.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Phrasebook Phrasebooks in wikivoyage]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/road-culture/hitchhiking-phrases Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.
*[https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.hitchwiki.phrasebook Hitchwiki Phrasebook for Android] Important phrases in 20 languages in an offline application for users with Android mobile phones. Developed by Mikael Korpela
[[wikipedia:Phrase book]]

[[Category:Phrasebook| ]]

[[de:Sammlung von Redewendungen]]
[[fi:Fraasisanakirja]]
[[fr:Guide linguistique]]
[[nl:Taal]]
[[zh:词汇书]]</text>
      <sha1>eo8deeo4k7dbtypgdquuu9xmvm8e39u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>107733</id>
      <parentid>81724</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-11-24T13:32:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robyt</username>
        <id>9747</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>Added {{geo-missing}}</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1929">There are various hitchhiking '''phrasebooks''' to be found online.
Since this is a wiki we can try to make the best one. A flexible one, where you can assemble your own phrasebook, with the languages you need for your trip.

== How to add translations ==
If you are a speaker of one of those many languages around the globe, and if you want to add the translation of these to this phrasebooks, just go to one of the phrasebook sites, choose your language and click on the “edit” button next to the name of the language. A textbox appears where you can find the phrases in English. Just write the translation behind the sentences, so that later you'll find the English translation next to the interpretation in your language.

== Phrasebooks ==
* [[Western Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Northern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Eastern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Southern Europe phrasebook]]
* [[Africa phrasebook]]
* [[Asia phrasebook]]
* [[South America phrasebook]]
* [[North America phrasebook|Central and North America phrasebook]]
* [[:ru:Русско-польский Панский разговорник для автостопщиков|Russian-Polish hitch-hiking phrasebook]]

* [http://en.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Phrasebook Phrasebooks in wikivoyage]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/road-culture/hitchhiking-phrases Global Vagabond Language Guide] - Important phrases for hitchhikers in over 20 languages, including a printable edition of the ''Hitch-hiking Phrasebook'' for many European languages.
*[https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.hitchwiki.phrasebook Hitchwiki Phrasebook for Android] Important phrases in 20 languages in an offline application for users with Android mobile phones. Developed by Mikael Korpela
[[wikipedia:Phrase book]]

[[Category:Phrasebook| ]]

[[de:Sammlung von Redewendungen]]
[[fi:Fraasisanakirja]]
[[fr:Guide linguistique]]
[[nl:Taal]]
[[zh:词汇书]]

{{geo-missing}}</text>
      <sha1>fl2qj3d39q7k4a3oticbt1gs8seahyz</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Spain</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1518</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1541</id>
      <parentid>4331</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-16T05:56:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="644">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Robino hitchhiking in Granada]]
Hitching in '''Spain''' is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.
It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops isn't allowed though.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

==Cities==
* [[Barcelona]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Madrid]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Alicante]]
* ..

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>c6ouq09masr42u191v5hl78zs8vjbre</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1542</id>
      <parentid>1541</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="644">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Robino hitchhiking in Granada]]
Hitching in '''Spain''' is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.
It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops isn't allowed though.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

==Cities==
* [[Barcelona]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Madrid]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Alicante]]
* ..

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>c6ouq09masr42u191v5hl78zs8vjbre</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4323</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T17:58:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GuakaTest</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="137">Hitching in '''Spain''' is doable.
It seems waiting at autopista toll stops isn't allowed though.

* [[Barcelona]]
* [[Madrid]]

{{stub}}</text>
      <sha1>ih4bw8lacvtgq01oczms5eoh153zg32</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4324</id>
      <parentid>4323</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T14:02:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="158">Hitching in '''Spain''' is doable.
It seems waiting at autopista toll stops isn't allowed though.

* [[Barcelona]]
* [[Madrid]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>dunm7j1767ph9vq6m00mnz7gmzvlunj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4325</id>
      <parentid>4324</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-10T18:51:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>134.96.7.93</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="339">Hitching in '''Spain''' is worse than in [[France]] or [[Belgium]], but definitely better than in [[Germany]]. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be '''really''' nice.
It seems waiting at autopista toll stops isn't allowed though.

* [[Barcelona]]
* [[Madrid]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>8mfgrsja4i6mqnuwovkst81s47w8r4l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4326</id>
      <parentid>4325</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-10T23:15:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="383">Hitching in '''Spain''' is worse than in [[France]] or [[Belgium]], but definitely better than in [[Germany]]. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be '''really''' nice.
It seems waiting at autopista toll stops isn't allowed though.

==Cities==
* [[Barcelona]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Madrid]]
* [[Valencia]]
* ..

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>dm9bwqmbexjc2gvfqmyk5go4w2u4hf6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4327</id>
      <parentid>4326</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-10T23:41:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="387">Hitching in '''Spain''' is worse than in [[France]] or [[Belgium]], but definitely better than in [[Germany]]. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be '''really''' nice.
It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops isn't allowed though.

==Cities==
* [[Barcelona]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Madrid]]
* [[Valencia]]
* ..

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>9vg8qneallwv7zspz84nrqhjx0tbr79</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4328</id>
      <parentid>4327</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-20T01:06:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="350">Hitching in '''Spain''' is not as good as in some other European countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.
It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops isn't allowed though.

==Cities==
* [[Barcelona]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Madrid]]
* [[Valencia]]
* ..

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>c86slb9k82xzrui9pjkq9r44m7cwf8z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4329</id>
      <parentid>4328</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-08T16:08:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robino</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="394">Hitching in '''Spain''' is not as good as in some other European countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.
It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops isn't allowed though.

==Cities==
* [[Barcelona]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Madrid]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Allicante]]
* ..

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>39hdqc6dyvcypf16n56o77wpf663y4i</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4330</id>
      <parentid>4329</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-08T16:54:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robino</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="569">Hitching in '''Spain''' is not as good as in some other European countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.
It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops isn't allowed though.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. At gassation, walk up to drivers and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

==Cities==
* [[Barcelona]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Madrid]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Allicante]]
* ..

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>2g4hvh79sw1auwj17h7b3yqlu741nck</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4331</id>
      <parentid>4330</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-11T02:03:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="574">Hitching in '''Spain''' is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.
It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops isn't allowed though.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

==Cities==
* [[Barcelona]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Madrid]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Alicante]]
* ..

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>odlbk4p0fmsn215fsnhhz6whbsxp0rb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4332</id>
      <parentid>1542</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="644">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Robino hitchhiking in Granada]]
Hitching in '''Spain''' is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.
It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops isn't allowed though.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

==Cities==
* [[Barcelona]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Madrid]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Alicante]]
* ..

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>c6ouq09masr42u191v5hl78zs8vjbre</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9252</id>
      <parentid>4332</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-26T13:14:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="695">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
Hitching in '''Spain''' is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.
It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops isn't allowed though.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

==Cities==
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* ..

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>674n0791uafuv9jt75g45nxbdk8wy7w</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9583</id>
      <parentid>9252</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-06T22:07:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="700">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
Hitching in '''Spain''' is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.
It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops isn't allowed though.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

==Cities==
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]
[[lh:ES]]</text>
      <sha1>638yrqlhokuitgxhbi9zv8b1vyddhum</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12211</id>
      <parentid>9583</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-09T21:47:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>82.228.89.43</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="888">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
Hitching in '''Spain''' is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice. Patiente will be your best weapon and I am not talking about half to one hour patiente since, once, I had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. 
It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops isn't allowed though.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

==Cities==
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]
[[lh:ES]]</text>
      <sha1>0c28vx4ds7k452ehrztftpo4mc4qbdm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12212</id>
      <parentid>12211</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-10T08:32:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="879">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
Hitching in '''Spain''' is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just half to one hour patience since, once, I had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. 

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops isn't allowed though.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

==Cities==
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]
[[lh:ES]]</text>
      <sha1>olia258vtbhdksio7jzconp4nfwhhw7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12282</id>
      <parentid>12212</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-14T19:33:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Latindane</username>
        <id>120</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1107">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
Hitching in '''Spain''' is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and I am not talking about just half to one hour patience since, once, Latindane had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might heard that Spaniards do not usually pick hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is better developed.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops isn't allowed though.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

==Cities==
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]
[[lh:ES]]</text>
      <sha1>tiutwsbu6cabyb0gi3bguajl3fjqwpx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12288</id>
      <parentid>12282</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-15T05:25:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zac Stewart</username>
        <id>5</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1117">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
Hitching in '''Spain''' is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might have heard that Spaniards do not usually pick up hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops, or ''peajes'',  isn't allowed.

==Cities==
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]
[[lh:ES]]</text>
      <sha1>ntpwi6mdthd0ssyyx4blpdkga97pdo7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12539</id>
      <parentid>12288</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-31T13:09:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1132">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
Hitching in '''Spain''' is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might have heard that Spaniards do not usually pick up hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops, or ''peajes'',  isn't allowed.

==Cities==
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]
[[es:España]]
[[lh:ES]]</text>
      <sha1>odxkstukji5abswypdmnc405qiycgks</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13382</id>
      <parentid>12539</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-04T06:10:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fabzgy</username>
        <id>165</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1146">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
Hitching in '''Spain''' is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might have heard that Spaniards do not usually pick up hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops, or ''peajes'',  isn't allowed.

==Cities==
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Mallaga]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]
[[es:España]]
[[lh:ES]]</text>
      <sha1>l5404g3lecak5dqs2k4t2ap4ckddia4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13383</id>
      <parentid>13382</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-04T06:11:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fabzgy</username>
        <id>165</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1145">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
Hitching in '''Spain''' is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might have heard that Spaniards do not usually pick up hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops, or ''peajes'',  isn't allowed.

==Cities==
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]
[[es:España]]
[[lh:ES]]</text>
      <sha1>jbjajn6y1xvlzy802dt7qkx8o9mc1ie</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13631</id>
      <parentid>13383</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-12T14:13:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1146">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
Hitching in '''Spain''' is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might have heard that Spaniards do not usually pick up hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops, or ''peajes'',  isn't allowed.

==Cities==
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]
[[lh:ES]]

[[es:España]]</text>
      <sha1>t7kpn857tkumju1t862rjyv4h6w5niy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13707</id>
      <parentid>13631</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-13T09:41:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1172">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
Hitching in '''Spain''' is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might have heard that Spaniards do not usually pick up hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops, or ''peajes'',  isn't allowed.

==Cities==
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]
[[lh:ES]]

[[es:España]]
{{hitchbase_country|177}}</text>
      <sha1>onqb4o39lv4ov3s72ds49wq8obsbsij</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13714</id>
      <parentid>13707</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-13T09:46:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1173">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
Hitching in '''Spain''' is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might have heard that Spaniards do not usually pick up hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops, or ''peajes'',  isn't allowed.

==Cities==
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]
[[lh:ES]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}

[[es:España]]</text>
      <sha1>l3kpijvw69dtmxsq8f53yj7mx3fv8wb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14224</id>
      <parentid>13714</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-29T22:03:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1188">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
Hitching in '''Spain''' is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might have heard that Spaniards do not usually pick up hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops, or ''peajes'',  isn't allowed.

==Cities==
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]
[[lh:ES]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]</text>
      <sha1>t9z4foi6frj6m410q93uz9i3qeq71sd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14704</id>
      <parentid>14224</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-13T15:10:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1189">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
Hitching in '''Spain''' is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might have heard that Spaniards do not usually pick up hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops, or ''peajes'', isn't allowed.

== Cities ==
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]
[[lh:ES]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]</text>
      <sha1>iijrc06x2crs84hh89mk8mg982mx9e7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18158</id>
      <parentid>14704</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-20T22:13:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1210">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
Hitching in '''Spain''' is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might have heard that Spaniards do not usually pick up hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops, or ''peajes'', isn't allowed.

== Cities ==
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]
[[Category:Europe]]
[[lh:ES]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]</text>
      <sha1>qbqxc71turv9aeyjvrihqnq75dhlag5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18388</id>
      <parentid>18158</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-02-15T12:46:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1279">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitching in Spain is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might have heard that Spaniards do not usually pick up hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops, or ''peajes'', isn't allowed.

== Cities ==
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
[[lh:ES]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]</text>
      <sha1>g5eoc8wiunkwxe9n67jmkfoql7p37t3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18981</id>
      <parentid>18388</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-21T13:48:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>194.105.97.176</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1513">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitching in Spain is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might have heard that Spaniards do not usually pick up hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops, or ''peajes'', isn't allowed.

Carpooling (compartir coche) is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Cities ==
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]
==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
[[lh:ES]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]</text>
      <sha1>mcox51nyqwzge8lc5ybhqkmcmriwys3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19507</id>
      <parentid>18981</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-04-12T22:30:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1528">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitching in Spain is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might have heard that Spaniards do not usually pick up hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops, or ''peajes'', isn't allowed.

Carpooling (compartir coche) is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Cities ==
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]
==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
[[lh:ES]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]</text>
      <sha1>rn4bh9ags709zfbwb8jezdl9gxmgtk8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21630</id>
      <parentid>19507</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-18T22:39:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1543">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitching in Spain is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might have heard that Spaniards do not usually pick up hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops, or ''peajes'', isn't allowed.

Carpooling (compartir coche) is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Cities ==
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]
==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
[[lh:ES]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]</text>
      <sha1>a5w1j6igz3j382cxswpvegj2u2jvgot</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21688</id>
      <parentid>21630</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-19T00:24:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1585">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitching in Spain is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might have heard that Spaniards do not usually pick up hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops, or ''peajes'', isn't allowed.

Carpooling (compartir coche) is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
[[lh:ES]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]</text>
      <sha1>cbt9m8ffsaffkuhxwe4xu92x49ka6v6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23222</id>
      <parentid>21688</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-08-04T07:31:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>80.201.200.171</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1856">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitching in Spain is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might have heard that Spaniards do not usually pick up hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops, or ''peajes'', isn't allowed.

Carpooling (compartir coche) is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

Having just hitched thru Northern Spain Santiago del Compostela to Bordeaux. It is hard, but gets easier toward the French border. A sign helps, but to somewhere near by. The police come very quickly if you are on the peajes. 

== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilboa]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
[[lh:ES]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]</text>
      <sha1>hc3ar3ceevguxeqm6344myu229nerqe</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26584</id>
      <parentid>23222</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-29T16:16:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1876">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitching in Spain is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might have heard that Spaniards do not usually pick up hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops, or ''peajes'', isn't allowed.

Carpooling (compartir coche) is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

Having just hitched thru Northern Spain Santiago del Compostela to Bordeaux. It is hard, but gets easier toward the French border. A sign helps, but to somewhere near by. The police come very quickly if you are on the peajes. 

== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilboa]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
[[lh:ES]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[wikipedia:Spain]]</text>
      <sha1>cch77eiz80bzpwlw1wgc6927vuk1pjh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26585</id>
      <parentid>26584</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-29T16:20:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1866">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitching in Spain is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might have heard that Spaniards do not usually pick up hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops, or ''peajes'', isn't allowed.

Carpooling (compartir coche) is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

Having just hitched thru Northern Spain Santiago del Compostela to Bordeaux. It is hard, but gets easier toward the French border. A sign helps, but to somewhere near by. The police come very quickly if you are on the peajes. 

== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilboa]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[wikipedia:Spain]]</text>
      <sha1>bwhe00z9ushnbe4yaqmieit5tkqwtwb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26592</id>
      <parentid>26585</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-29T23:15:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1867">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitching in Spain is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might have heard that Spaniards do not usually pick up hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops, or ''peajes'', isn't allowed.

Carpooling (compartir coche) is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

Having just hitched thru Northern Spain Santiago del Compostela to Bordeaux. It is hard, but gets easier toward the French border. A sign helps, but to somewhere near by. The police come very quickly if you are on the peajes. 

== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilboa]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]</text>
      <sha1>k8q1lbp2j3h38hbh12tbdtiuyqae1uc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26625</id>
      <parentid>26592</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-30T20:46:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>83.45.159.49</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1878">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitching in Spain is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might have heard that Spaniards do not usually pick up hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops, or ''peajes'', isn't allowed.

Carpooling (compartir coche) is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

Having just hitched thru Northern Spain Santiago del Compostela to Bordeaux. It is hard, but gets easier toward the French border. A sign helps, but to somewhere near by. The police come very quickly if you are on the peajes. 

== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilboa]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Vigo]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]</text>
      <sha1>c91uws4j9jrzcs9al11b184uekydijc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27805</id>
      <parentid>26625</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-16T10:18:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1908">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitching in Spain is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might have heard that Spaniards do not usually pick up hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops, or ''peajes'', isn't allowed.

Carpooling (compartir coche) is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

Having just hitched thru Northern Spain Santiago del Compostela to Bordeaux. It is hard, but gets easier toward the French border. A sign helps, but to somewhere near by. The police come very quickly if you are on the peajes. 

== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilboa]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Vigo]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]</text>
      <sha1>lzj91bikh1lrq1jsilaikrf9piw38vj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>28651</id>
      <parentid>27805</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-01T16:46:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>84.191.153.73</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1919">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitching in Spain is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might have heard that Spaniards do not usually pick up hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops, or ''peajes'', isn't allowed.

Carpooling (compartir coche) is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

Having just hitched thru Northern Spain Santiago del Compostela to Bordeaux. It is hard, but gets easier toward the French border. A sign helps, but to somewhere near by. The police come very quickly if you are on the peajes. 

== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilboa]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Vigo]]
*  BADAJOZ

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]</text>
      <sha1>e13xvs9ddhesbg46b86oztj9qupvi6f</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>28652</id>
      <parentid>28651</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-01T16:47:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>84.191.153.73</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1922">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitching in Spain is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might have heard that Spaniards do not usually pick up hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops, or ''peajes'', isn't allowed.

Carpooling (compartir coche) is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

Having just hitched thru Northern Spain Santiago del Compostela to Bordeaux. It is hard, but gets easier toward the French border. A sign helps, but to somewhere near by. The police come very quickly if you are on the peajes. 

== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilboa]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[BADAJOZ]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]</text>
      <sha1>iia244d1n5kdrbp56i013mvv1wk3tov</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29060</id>
      <parentid>28652</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-10T08:25:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1939">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitching in Spain is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might have heard that Spaniards do not usually pick up hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops, or ''peajes'', isn't allowed.

Carpooling (compartir coche) is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

Having just hitched thru Northern Spain Santiago del Compostela to Bordeaux. It is hard, but gets easier toward the French border. A sign helps, but to somewhere near by. The police come very quickly if you are on the peajes. 

== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilboa]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[BADAJOZ]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]

[[trash:Spain]]</text>
      <sha1>tfku4tatkcq5prmt8z5k3dbfthtcse3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29195</id>
      <parentid>29060</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-15T14:54:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>85.178.124.9</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2023">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitching in Spain is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might have heard that Spaniards do not usually pick up hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

The phrase ''Bas a ...?'' (are you going to ... ?) is an excellent starting point.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops, or ''peajes'', isn't allowed.

Carpooling (compartir coche) is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

Having just hitched thru Northern Spain Santiago del Compostela to Bordeaux. It is hard, but gets easier toward the French border. A sign helps, but to somewhere near by. The police come very quickly if you are on the peajes. 

== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilboa]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[BADAJOZ]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]

[[trash:Spain]]</text>
      <sha1>ga61z89uue0veqrdfgzv8087bkbiccs</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29196</id>
      <parentid>29195</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-15T14:59:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>85.178.124.9</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2157">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitching in Spain is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might have heard that Spaniards do not usually pick up hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

The phrase ''Bas a ...?'' (are you going to ... ?) is an excellent starting point.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops, or ''peajes'', isn't allowed.  The police come very quickly if you are on the peajes. However, the RACC (highway patrols) won't give you a ride off the highway, if you're on one (or if you should get deposited on one).

Carpooling (compartir coche) is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

Having just hitched thru Northern Spain Santiago del Compostela to Bordeaux. It is hard, but gets easier toward the French border. A sign helps, but to somewhere near by. 

== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilboa]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[BADAJOZ]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]

[[trash:Spain]]</text>
      <sha1>gs4msdsuzri7y5tht7uyj9imtey99ae</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29197</id>
      <parentid>29196</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-15T15:02:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Nuclearphyllis</username>
        <id>1678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2600">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitching in Spain is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might have heard that Spaniards do not usually pick up hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

The phrase ''Bas a ...?'' (are you going to ... ?) is an excellent starting point.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops, or ''peajes'', isn't allowed.  The police come very quickly if you are on the peajes. However, the RACC (highway patrols) won't give you a ride off the highway if you're on one (or if you should get dropped off on one).  I ([[User:Nuclearphyllis Star/nuclearphyllis]]) was able to get the police to give me a ride from the ''autopista'' to the nearest gas station, then get a ride from there.

Coming or going through Southern Spain, accept any ride to La Jonquera.  La Jonquera is possibly the biggest truck stop in Europe, and most Spanish truck traffic goes through there.  [[User:Nuclearphyllis I] was offered direct rides as far as Hamburg and Switzerland.

Carpooling (compartir coche) is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

Having just hitched thru Northern Spain Santiago del Compostela to Bordeaux. It is hard, but gets easier toward the French border. A sign helps, but to somewhere near by. 

== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilboa]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[BADAJOZ]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]

[[trash:Spain]]</text>
      <sha1>a0d5yyftoq2m5niyed00au4z94yoa3p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29199</id>
      <parentid>29197</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-15T15:06:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Nuclearphyllis</username>
        <id>1678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2600">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitching in Spain is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might have heard that Spaniards do not usually pick up hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

The phrase ''Bas a ...?'' (are you going to ... ?) is an excellent starting point.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops, or ''peajes'', isn't allowed.  The police come very quickly if you are on the peajes. However, the RACC (highway patrols) won't give you a ride off the highway if you're on one (or if you should get dropped off on one).  I ([[User:Nuclearphyllis|Star/nuclearphyllis]]) was able to get the police to give me a ride from the ''autopista'' to the nearest gas station, then get a ride from there.

Coming or going through Southern Spain, accept any ride to La Jonquera.  La Jonquera is possibly the biggest truck stop in Europe, and most Spanish truck traffic goes through there.  [[User:Nuclearphyllis|I] was offered direct rides as far as Hamburg and Switzerland.

Carpooling (compartir coche) is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

Having just hitched thru Northern Spain Santiago del Compostela to Bordeaux. It is hard, but gets easier toward the French border. A sign helps, but to somewhere near by. 

== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilboa]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[BADAJOZ]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]

[[trash:Spain]]</text>
      <sha1>to29lv6y0taw4yp3uha99ya0cfhiejr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29200</id>
      <parentid>29199</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-15T15:08:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Nuclearphyllis</username>
        <id>1678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2719">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitching in Spain is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might have heard that Spaniards do not usually pick up hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

The phrase ''Bas a ...?'' (are you going to ... ?) is an excellent starting point.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops, or ''peajes'', isn't allowed.  The police come very quickly if you are on the peajes. However, the RACC (highway patrols) won't give you a ride off the highway if you're on one (or if you should get dropped off on one), they just tell you to walk off.  This may be a walk of several kilometers.

I ([[User:Nuclearphyllis|Star/nuclearphyllis]]) was able to get the police to give me a ride from the ''autopista'' to the nearest gas station, then hitch from there.  The police will take your information, however.

Coming or going through Southern Spain, accept any ride to La Jonquera.  La Jonquera is possibly the biggest truck stop in Europe, and most Spanish truck traffic goes through there.  [[User:Nuclearphyllis|I] was offered direct rides as far as Hamburg and Switzerland.

Carpooling (compartir coche) is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

Having just hitched thru Northern Spain Santiago del Compostela to Bordeaux. It is hard, but gets easier toward the French border. A sign helps, but to somewhere near by. 

== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilboa]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[BADAJOZ]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]

[[trash:Spain]]</text>
      <sha1>8yp67fxqpvzymoq747xip2d7mj8eh4o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29201</id>
      <parentid>29200</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-15T15:09:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Nuclearphyllis</username>
        <id>1678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2718">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitching in Spain is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might have heard that Spaniards do not usually pick up hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

The phrase ''Bas a ...?'' (are you going to ... ?) is an excellent starting point.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops, or ''peajes'', isn't allowed.  The police come very quickly if you are on the peajes. However, the RACC (highway patrols) won't give you a ride off the highway if you're on one (or if you should get dropped off on one), they just tell you to walk off.  This may be a walk of several kilometers.

I ([[User:Nuclearphyllis|Star/nuclearphyllis]]) was able to get the police to give me a ride from the ''autopista'' to the nearest gas station, then hitch from there.  The police will take your information, however.

Coming or going through Southern Spain, accept any ride to La Jonquera.  La Jonquera is one of the biggest truck stops in Europe, and most Spanish truck traffic goes through there.  [[User:Nuclearphyllis|I] was offered direct rides as far as Hamburg and Switzerland.

Carpooling (compartir coche) is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

Having just hitched thru Northern Spain Santiago del Compostela to Bordeaux. It is hard, but gets easier toward the French border. A sign helps, but to somewhere near by. 

== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilboa]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[BADAJOZ]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]

[[trash:Spain]]</text>
      <sha1>k23k9tcqs3r7qidm7v2dlp507vybhcr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29202</id>
      <parentid>29201</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-15T15:09:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Nuclearphyllis</username>
        <id>1678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2680">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitching in Spain is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might have heard that Spaniards do not usually pick up hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at gas stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

The phrase ''Bas a ...?'' (are you going to ... ?) is an excellent starting point.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops, or ''peajes'', isn't allowed.  The police come very quickly if you are on the peajes. However, the RACC (highway patrols) won't give you a ride off the highway if you're on one (or if you should get dropped off on one), they just tell you to walk off.  This may be a walk of several kilometers.

I ([[User:Nuclearphyllis|Star/nuclearphyllis]]) was able to get the police to give me a ride from the ''autopista'' to the nearest gas station, then hitch from there.  The police will take your information, however.

Coming or going through Southern Spain, accept any ride to La Jonquera.  La Jonquera is one of the biggest truck stops in Europe, right on the Spanish side of the French border, and most Spanish truck traffic goes through there.

Carpooling (compartir coche) is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

Having just hitched thru Northern Spain Santiago del Compostela to Bordeaux. It is hard, but gets easier toward the French border. A sign helps, but to somewhere near by. 

== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilboa]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[BADAJOZ]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]

[[trash:Spain]]</text>
      <sha1>dstij7lc3kltfu7g7kad5i4sws70xvy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29610</id>
      <parentid>29202</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-25T20:17:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2686">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitching in Spain is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might have heard that Spaniards do not usually pick up hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at petrol stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

The phrase ''Bas a ...?'' (are you going to ... ?) is an excellent starting point.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops, or ''peajes'', isn't allowed.  The police come very quickly if you are on the peajes. However, the RACC (highway patrols) won't give you a ride off the highway if you're on one (or if you should get dropped off on one), they just tell you to walk off.  This may be a walk of several kilometers.

I ([[User:Nuclearphyllis|Star/nuclearphyllis]]) was able to get the police to give me a ride from the ''autopista'' to the nearest petrol station, then hitch from there.  The police will take your information, however.

Coming or going through Southern Spain, accept any ride to La Jonquera.  La Jonquera is one of the biggest truck stops in Europe, right on the Spanish side of the French border, and most Spanish truck traffic goes through there.

Carpooling (compartir coche) is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

Having just hitched thru Northern Spain Santiago del Compostela to Bordeaux. It is hard, but gets easier toward the French border. A sign helps, but to somewhere near by. 

== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilboa]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[BADAJOZ]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]

[[trash:Spain]]</text>
      <sha1>15b0vv32s28wowtd2v7p15lzug11onj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29613</id>
      <parentid>29610</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-25T20:21:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2686">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitching in Spain is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might have heard that Spaniards do not usually pick up hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at petrol stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

The phrase ''Bas a ...?'' (are you going to ... ?) is an excellent starting point.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops, or ''peajes'', isn't allowed.  The police come very quickly if you are on the peajes. However, the RACC (highway patrols) won't give you a ride off the highway if you're on one (or if you should get dropped off on one), they just tell you to walk off.  This may be a walk of several kilometers.

I ([[User:Nuclearphyllis|Star/nuclearphyllis]]) was able to get the police to give me a ride from the ''autopista'' to the nearest petrol station, then hitch from there.  The police will take your information, however.

Coming or going through Southern Spain, accept any ride to La Jonquera.  La Jonquera is one of the biggest truck stops in Europe, right on the Spanish side of the French border, and most Spanish truck traffic goes through there.

Carpooling (compartir coche) is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

Having just hitched thru Northern Spain Santiago del Compostela to Bordeaux. It is hard, but gets easier toward the French border. A sign helps, but to somewhere near by. 

== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilboa]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Badajoz]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]

[[trash:Spain]]</text>
      <sha1>luk5pk36wdq1wqi1whcnnh756qpssu0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31232</id>
      <parentid>29613</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-22T11:15:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2688">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitching in Spain is not as good as in some other [[Europe]]an countries. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be ''really'' nice.  Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid. You might have heard that Spaniards do not usually pick up hitchhikers. That's partially true, nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed.

In Spain it is very important to talk to drivers. Walk up to drivers at petrol stations and ask them where they are heading to. Knowing some sentences in Spanish helps you a lot.

The phrase ''Bas a ...?'' (are you going to ... ?) is an excellent starting point.

It seems waiting at ''autopista'' toll stops, or ''peajes'', isn't allowed.  The police come very quickly if you are on the peajes. However, the RACC (motorway patrols) won't give you a ride off the motorway if you're on one (or if you should get dropped off on one), they just tell you to walk off.  This may be a walk of several kilometers.

I ([[User:Nuclearphyllis|Star/nuclearphyllis]]) was able to get the police to give me a ride from the ''autopista'' to the nearest petrol station, then hitch from there.  The police will take your information, however.

Coming or going through Southern Spain, accept any ride to La Jonquera.  La Jonquera is one of the biggest truck stops in Europe, right on the Spanish side of the French border, and most Spanish truck traffic goes through there.

Carpooling (compartir coche) is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

Having just hitched thru Northern Spain Santiago del Compostela to Bordeaux. It is hard, but gets easier toward the French border. A sign helps, but to somewhere near by. 

== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilboa]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Badajoz]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]

[[trash:Spain]]</text>
      <sha1>pkhcy6a3dsaisj1ygbl8w1z4vha1dy8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31243</id>
      <parentid>31232</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-23T19:52:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sawel</username>
        <id>1235</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3671">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have the own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in Catalonia is Catalan and getting around with ''castellano'' (spanish) is not always possible. 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Bas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 


== Hitchhiking, Autostop ==

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, Latindane had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid.

When entering the country from France you should try to get a lift as close to you destination as possible. A good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll finds plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. In the west, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from Africa you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from Morocco, who went to visit their families, and now return. You’ll see number plates from many European states.

== Roadnetwork ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or Germany. These highways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - Murcia or Barcelona – Zaragoza – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stop and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 
However in the more southern regions, the highways are smaller and the gas stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient, like anywhere in the world somebody will pull over for you.

== Carpooling ==

Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Spain has a very active sqatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.



== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilboa]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Badajoz]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]

[[trash:Spain]]</text>
      <sha1>q4fi1ia49dipm9bg43vw6mhrhzxrw1r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31244</id>
      <parentid>31243</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-23T19:53:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sawel</username>
        <id>1235</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3673">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in Catalonia is Catalan and getting around with ''castellano'' (spanish) is not always possible. 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Bas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 


== Hitchhiking, Autostop ==

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, Latindane had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid.

When entering the country from France you should try to get a lift as close to you destination as possible. A good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll finds plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. In the west, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from Africa you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from Morocco, who went to visit their families, and now return. You’ll see number plates from many European states.

== Roadnetwork ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or Germany. These highways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - Murcia or Barcelona – Zaragoza – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stop and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 
However in the more southern regions, the highways are smaller and the gas stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient, like anywhere in the world somebody will pull over for you.

== Carpooling ==

Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Spain has a very active sqatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.



== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilboa]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Badajoz]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]

[[trash:Spain]]</text>
      <sha1>o8rq0x96f83s315br6wc3vl7iqoko6v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31245</id>
      <parentid>31244</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-23T19:54:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sawel</username>
        <id>1235</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3674">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in Catalonia is Catalan and getting around with ''castellano'' (spanish) is not always possible. 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Bas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 


== Hitchhiking, Autostop ==

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, Latindane had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid.

When entering the country from France you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. A good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll finds plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. In the west, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from Africa you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from Morocco, who went to visit their families, and now return. You’ll see number plates from many European states.

== Roadnetwork ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or Germany. These highways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - Murcia or Barcelona – Zaragoza – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stop and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 
However in the more southern regions, the highways are smaller and the gas stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient, like anywhere in the world somebody will pull over for you.

== Carpooling ==

Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Spain has a very active sqatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.



== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilboa]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Badajoz]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]

[[trash:Spain]]</text>
      <sha1>enqiesd8tsb2zdjn261tozzut9hfmpx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31246</id>
      <parentid>31245</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-23T19:54:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sawel</username>
        <id>1235</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3673">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in Catalonia is Catalan and getting around with ''castellano'' (spanish) is not always possible. 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Bas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 


== Hitchhiking, Autostop ==

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, Latindane had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid.

When entering the country from France you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. A good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. In the west, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from Africa you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from Morocco, who went to visit their families, and now return. You’ll see number plates from many European states.

== Roadnetwork ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or Germany. These highways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - Murcia or Barcelona – Zaragoza – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stop and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 
However in the more southern regions, the highways are smaller and the gas stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient, like anywhere in the world somebody will pull over for you.

== Carpooling ==

Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Spain has a very active sqatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.



== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilboa]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Badajoz]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]

[[trash:Spain]]</text>
      <sha1>3eer3c0tn0iej4ieba6otd9r903p5zy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31247</id>
      <parentid>31246</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-23T19:55:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sawel</username>
        <id>1235</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3678">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in Catalonia is Catalan and getting around with ''castellano'' (spanish) is not always possible. 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Bas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 


== Hitchhiking, Autostop ==

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, Latindane had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid.

When entering the country from France you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. A good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. In the west, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from Africa you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from Morocco, who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Roadnetwork ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or Germany. These highways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - Murcia or Barcelona – Zaragoza – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stop and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 
However in the more southern regions, the highways are smaller and the gas stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient, like anywhere in the world somebody will pull over for you.

== Carpooling ==

Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Spain has a very active sqatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.



== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilboa]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Badajoz]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]

[[trash:Spain]]</text>
      <sha1>54u0aswu0nltqy7g9mvmpxpezx61480</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31248</id>
      <parentid>31247</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-23T19:56:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sawel</username>
        <id>1235</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3679">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in Catalonia is Catalan and getting around with ''castellano'' (spanish) is not always possible. 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Bas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 


== Hitchhiking, Autostop ==

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, Latindane had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid.

When entering the country from France you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. A good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. In the west, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from Africa you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from Morocco, who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Roadnetwork ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or Germany. These highways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - Murcia or Barcelona – Zaragoza – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stop and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the highways are smaller and the gas stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient, like anywhere in the world somebody will pull over for you.

== Carpooling ==

Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Spain has a very active sqatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.



== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilboa]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Badajoz]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]

[[trash:Spain]]</text>
      <sha1>1gykg2vgblhy03xlw2hg577uc0ly564</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31249</id>
      <parentid>31248</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-23T19:56:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sawel</username>
        <id>1235</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3619">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in Catalonia is Catalan and getting around with ''castellano'' (spanish) is not always possible. 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Bas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 


== Hitchhiking, Autostop ==

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, Latindane had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid.

When entering the country from France you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. A good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. In the west, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from Africa you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from Morocco, who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Roadnetwork ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or Germany. These highways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - Murcia or Barcelona – Zaragoza – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stop and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the highways are smaller and the gas stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==

Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Spain has a very active sqatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.



== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilboa]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Badajoz]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]

[[trash:Spain]]</text>
      <sha1>hzssyvcc8idl8uwy5rdotbv34asntuo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31250</id>
      <parentid>31249</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-23T19:57:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sawel</username>
        <id>1235</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3631">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in Catalonia is Catalan and getting around with ''castellano'' (spanish) is not always possible. 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Bas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 


== Hitchhiking, Autostop ==

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, Latindane had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid.

When entering the country from France you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. A good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. In the west, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from Africa you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from Morocco, who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Roadnetwork ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or Germany. These highways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - Murcia or Barcelona – Zaragoza – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stop and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the highways are smaller and the gas stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==

Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Spain has a very active sqatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.



== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Cadiz]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Badajoz]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]

[[trash:Spain]]</text>
      <sha1>7f601yabjkbb22ck4c1a0k4pyls8yi9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31251</id>
      <parentid>31250</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-23T19:58:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sawel</username>
        <id>1235</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3619">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in Catalonia is Catalan and getting around with ''castellano'' (spanish) is not always possible. 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Bas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 


== Hitchhiking, Autostop ==

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, Latindane had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid.

When entering the country from France you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. A good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. In the west, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from Africa you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from Morocco, who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Roadnetwork ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or Germany. These highways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - Murcia or Barcelona – Zaragoza – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stop and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the highways are smaller and the gas stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==

Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Spain has a very active sqatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.



== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Badajoz]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]

[[trash:Spain]]</text>
      <sha1>d1bvdbq82i7zg2ijghibykpz5t8vthv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31252</id>
      <parentid>31251</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-23T20:00:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sawel</username>
        <id>1235</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3616">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in Catalonia is Catalan and getting around with ''castellano'' (spanish) is not always possible. 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Bas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

== Hitchhiking, Autostop ==

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, Latindane had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid.

When entering the country from France you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. A good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. In the west, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from Africa you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from Morocco, who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Roadnetwork ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or Germany. These highways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - Murcia or Barcelona – Zaragoza – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stop and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the highways are smaller and the gas stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==

Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Spain has a very active sqatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.

== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Badajoz]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]

[[trash:Spain]]</text>
      <sha1>5ozqghxdeo3wrc2lffcy5su30t6gqxt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31253</id>
      <parentid>31252</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-23T20:01:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sawel</username>
        <id>1235</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3620">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in Catalonia is Catalan and getting around with ''castellano'' (spanish) is not always possible. 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Bas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, Latindane had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid.

When entering the country from France you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. A good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. In the west, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from Africa you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from Morocco, who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Roadnetwork ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or Germany. These highways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - Murcia or Barcelona – Zaragoza – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stop and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the highways are smaller and the gas stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==

Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Spain has a very active sqatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.

== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Badajoz]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]

[[trash:Spain]]</text>
      <sha1>5avkptxdkevy1yufzfltm6sjiglm9sg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31254</id>
      <parentid>31253</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-23T20:01:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sawel</username>
        <id>1235</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3624">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in Catalonia is Catalan and getting around with ''castellano'' (spanish) is not always possible. 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Bas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid.

When entering the country from France you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. A good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. In the west, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from Africa you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from Morocco, who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Roadnetwork ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or Germany. These highways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - Murcia or Barcelona – Zaragoza – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stop and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the highways are smaller and the gas stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==

Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Spain has a very active sqatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.

== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Badajoz]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]

[[trash:Spain]]</text>
      <sha1>61u0bc4g68ei5fcur7edsz2r55xjc2z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31255</id>
      <parentid>31254</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-23T20:03:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sawel</username>
        <id>1235</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3629">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in Catalonia is Catalan and getting around with ''castellano'' (spanish) is not always possible. 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Bas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards Madrid.

When entering the country from France you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. A good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. In the west, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from Africa you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from Morocco, who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Roadnetwork ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or Germany. These highways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - Murcia or Barcelona – Zaragoza – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stop and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the highways are smaller and the gas stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==

Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Spain has a very active sqatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.

== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Badajoz]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]

[[trash:Spain]]</text>
      <sha1>b6nctr6q3imale2te56pl5r5z8g7kk0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31257</id>
      <parentid>31255</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-23T20:05:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sawel</username>
        <id>1235</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3665">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan and getting around with ''castellano'' (spanish) is not always possible. 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Bas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. A good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. In the west, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Roadnetwork ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These highways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]] – [[Zaragoza]] – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stop and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the highways are smaller and the gas stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==

Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Spain has a very active sqatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.

== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Badajoz]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]

[[trash:Spain]]</text>
      <sha1>jzgnlwmgbk49aae21zq2fl3ihthycqv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31293</id>
      <parentid>31257</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-27T14:52:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3669">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan and getting around with ''castellano'' (spanish) is not always possible. 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Bas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at last tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient and not just patient for an hour or so. Once, [[User:Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. A good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. In the west, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]] – [[Zaragoza]] – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Spain has a very active sqatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.

== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Badajoz]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]

[[trash:Spain]]</text>
      <sha1>6ph3z4pxkjzef7rcc2t0vdrspgfbbzw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31768</id>
      <parentid>31293</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-17T16:10:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>137.222.14.121</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3665">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan and getting around with ''castellano'' (spanish) is not always possible. 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Bas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. A good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. In the west, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]] – [[Zaragoza]] – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Spain has a very active sqatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.

== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Badajoz]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]

[[trash:Spain]]</text>
      <sha1>aba8ed34a3hu55wgwvgd471odr8ab0y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31843</id>
      <parentid>31768</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-23T12:25:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>158.227.139.230</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3699">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan and getting around with ''castellano'' (spanish) is not always possible. 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Bas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. A good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. In the west, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]] – [[Zaragoza]] – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Spain has a very active sqatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.

== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Dobnostia / San Sebastian]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]

* [[Vigo]]


==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]

[[trash:Spain]]</text>
      <sha1>3fqzxjxij59e5xh9bbckvg2qhsp1wkl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31844</id>
      <parentid>31843</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-23T12:25:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>158.227.139.230</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3698">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan and getting around with ''castellano'' (spanish) is not always possible. 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Bas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. A good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. In the west, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]] – [[Zaragoza]] – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Spain has a very active sqatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.

== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Donostia / San Sebastian]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]

* [[Vigo]]


==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]

[[trash:Spain]]</text>
      <sha1>5s5dwczvaunn95tnb2h1lt1lfene4ou</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31853</id>
      <parentid>31844</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-23T15:18:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3696">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan and getting around with ''castellano'' (spanish) is not always possible. 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Bas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. A good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. In the west, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]] – [[Zaragoza]] – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Spain has a very active sqatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.

== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]

* [[Vigo]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]

[[trash:Spain]]</text>
      <sha1>9rih6loc03jmeqap8y3bvfqewcoqq1z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31854</id>
      <parentid>31853</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-23T15:19:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3722">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan and getting around with ''castellano'' (spanish) is not always possible. 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Bas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. A good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. In the west, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]] – [[Zaragoza]] – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Spain has a very active sqatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.

== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]

[[trash:Spain]]</text>
      <sha1>szbnle2u5ysb3t3m0jcvkeb3mgdptsg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>33905</id>
      <parentid>31854</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-06-12T13:25:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kimdime69</username>
        <id>169</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3722">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan and getting around with ''castellano'' (spanish) is not always possible. 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. A good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. In the west, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]] – [[Zaragoza]] – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Spain has a very active sqatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.

== Cities ==
[[Image:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

==  ==
{{stub}}

[[Category:Spain| ]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]

[[trash:Spain]]</text>
      <sha1>5b19uht57rtgvfpj9qj60u2a1ov7u8g</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35478</id>
      <parentid>33905</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T18:55:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3721">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan and getting around with ''castellano'' (spanish) is not always possible. 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. A good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. In the west, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]] – [[Zaragoza]] – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Spain has a very active sqatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.

== Cities ==
[[File:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

==   ==
{{stub}}
{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[fr:Espagne]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain| ]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]</text>
      <sha1>3earw21fy78uhvxcttfrwpsn77f8j64</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36877</id>
      <parentid>35478</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-09-02T12:19:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>85.177.113.124</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3756">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan and getting around with ''castellano'' (spanish) is not always possible. 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]] – [[Zaragoza]] – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Spain has a very active sqatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.

== Cities ==
[[File:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

==   ==
{{stub}}
{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[fr:Espagne]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain| ]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]</text>
      <sha1>hc854vq8kx1ipeyg1rotapo5tt0z41n</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>37796</id>
      <parentid>36877</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-10-09T23:02:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3755">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan and getting around with ''castellano'' (spanish) is not always possible. 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]] – [[Zaragoza]] – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Spain has a very active sqatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.

== Cities ==
[[File:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

==   ==
{{stub}}
{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain| ]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]</text>
      <sha1>my81evptgysviyym416tr6beuv664zm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38713</id>
      <parentid>37796</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-12-01T15:27:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>83.63.206.243</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3760">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish). 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]] – [[Zaragoza]] – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Spain has a very active sqatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.

== Cities ==
[[File:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

==   ==
{{stub}}
{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain| ]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]</text>
      <sha1>86mcbp0lba2glhbv8n84djqpk10u37o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38714</id>
      <parentid>38713</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-12-01T15:28:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>83.63.206.243</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3809">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish). 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]] – [[Zaragoza]] – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.

== Cities ==
[[File:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

==   ==
{{stub}}
{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain| ]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]</text>
      <sha1>4e5hvemqldfa6ey9g5huz3utxik7s54</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38814</id>
      <parentid>38714</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-12-06T20:45:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.128.89.101</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3827">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish). 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]] – [[Zaragoza]] – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.

== Cities ==
[[File:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Salamanca]]
* [[Santiago del Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]
*

==   ==
{{stub}}
{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain| ]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]</text>
      <sha1>gkfeftf7tt76lvic8h4av0qzboq3voo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39193</id>
      <parentid>38814</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-01-02T18:28:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>79.109.56.25</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3826">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish). 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]] – [[Zaragoza]] – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.

== Cities ==
[[File:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Salamanca]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]
*

==   ==
{{stub}}
{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain| ]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]</text>
      <sha1>9cek4gg5kelr5pc8d4xfh40dz2l1jk3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40233</id>
      <parentid>39193</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-13T21:03:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>88.202.207.58</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3842">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish). 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]] – [[Zaragoza]] – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.

== Cities ==
[[File:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Salamanca]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]
*

==   ==
{{stub}}
{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain| ]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]</text>
      <sha1>fe11hwcf8ob7d7o94gs3cvs8n90b3ym</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40276</id>
      <parentid>40233</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-14T20:09:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3860">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish). 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]] – [[Zaragoza]] – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.

== Cities ==
[[File:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]
*

==   ==
{{stub}}
{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain| ]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]</text>
      <sha1>q9amtsojqz63nxphzo2tsjqexio9417</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40277</id>
      <parentid>40276</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-14T20:12:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3843">{{IsIn|Europe}}[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]]]]
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish). 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]] – [[Zaragoza]] – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.

== Cities ==
[[File:PICT1976.JPG|thumb|250px|right]]
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]
*

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain| ]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]</text>
      <sha1>5op7117y8zbms2g4k82gjj0zhisjjt8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40280</id>
      <parentid>40277</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-14T20:25:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robino</username>
        <id>4</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3974">{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map =
|pop = 46.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = {{average}}
}}

__NOTOC__

'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish). 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

&lt;gallery&gt;
File:Granada.jpg
File:PICT1976.JPG
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]] – [[Zaragoza]] – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain| ]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]</text>
      <sha1>im7o2t20gixt7ymn2uofi95iixt8qkh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40281</id>
      <parentid>40280</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-14T20:26:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robino</username>
        <id>4</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3972">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map =
|pop = 46.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = {{average}}
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish). 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

&lt;gallery&gt;
File:Granada.jpg
File:PICT1976.JPG
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]] – [[Zaragoza]] – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain| ]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]</text>
      <sha1>rwmthl0lvolkk5g873wxva0lu3c669h</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40282</id>
      <parentid>40281</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-14T20:27:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robino</username>
        <id>4</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4004">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map =
|pop = 46.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = {{average}}
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish). 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

&lt;gallery&gt;
File:Granada.jpg
File:PICT1976.JPG
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]] – [[Zaragoza]] – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Western-Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]</text>
      <sha1>siohfy0yjb0kdg9hno94qeris6jydcc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40283</id>
      <parentid>40282</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-14T20:28:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4004">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map =
|pop = 46.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = {{average}}
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish). 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

&lt;gallery&gt;
File:Granada.jpg
File:PICT1976.JPG
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]] – [[Zaragoza]] – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]</text>
      <sha1>l84kjdrvl05l3uwhi4eceh6fmo44tqj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40284</id>
      <parentid>40283</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-14T20:29:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4005">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map =
|pop = 46.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = {{average}}
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish). 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

&lt;gallery&gt;
File:Granada.jpg
File:PICT1976.JPG
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]] – [[Zaragoza]] – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]</text>
      <sha1>3aoczhjfxzfifxlo5x8jz1ogmm1azqr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40286</id>
      <parentid>40284</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-14T20:40:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4025">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map =
|pop = 46.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = {{average}}
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish). 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

&lt;gallery&gt;
File:Granada.jpg
File:PICT1976.JPG
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG
File:HhPICT1975.jpg
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]] – [[Zaragoza]] – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]</text>
      <sha1>oxyil90zqm1p8v9t61pwiy7qx0o6nvm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40287</id>
      <parentid>40286</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-14T20:41:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4007">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map =
|pop = 46.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = {{average}}
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish). 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

&lt;gallery&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG
File:Granada.jpg
File:HhPICT1975.jpg
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]] – [[Zaragoza]] – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]</text>
      <sha1>4dexo9hpdqwlqz94djzimzvcecy5vs3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40288</id>
      <parentid>40287</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-14T20:43:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4024">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map =
|pop = 46.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = {{average}}
|hitchbase = 177
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish). 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

&lt;gallery&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG
File:Granada.jpg
File:HhPICT1975.jpg
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]] – [[Zaragoza]] – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]</text>
      <sha1>tq042zme8x8j5jrirp8ujx6kmj7ao83</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40336</id>
      <parentid>40288</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-15T14:54:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4065">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map =
|pop = 46.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = {{average}}
|hitchbase = 177
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish). 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

&lt;gallery&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG
File:Granada.jpg
File:HhPICT1975.jpg
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]] – [[Zaragoza]] – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]


[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>35zrvpynuchtidixhbr8ax2erdmj814</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40878</id>
      <parentid>40336</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-30T20:59:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4064">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map =
|pop = 46.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = {{average}}
|hitchbase = 177
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish). 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

&lt;gallery&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG
File:Granada.jpg
File:HhPICT1975.jpg
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]] – [[Zaragoza]] – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]</text>
      <sha1>qk0xu8iqp7hcly73ecmg7xd7qkzi6pn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41433</id>
      <parentid>40878</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-15T21:44:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4306">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map =
|pop = 46.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = {{average}}
|hitchbase = 177
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish). 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

&lt;gallery&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG
File:Granada.jpg
File:HhPICT1975.jpg
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Unfortunately they also seem to be somewhat clueless about distances (to walk) and what is a good spot and what is not (since no one knows much about hitchhiking). Another complication is the paid highways and the unpaid highways.

Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]] – [[Zaragoza]] – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa ocupada''.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]</text>
      <sha1>8rbrf4z7tqblrefuecb3mmvi0u82jr9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41490</id>
      <parentid>41433</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-17T08:50:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>90.14.1.74</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4306">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map =
|pop = 46.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = {{average}}
|hitchbase = 177
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish). 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

&lt;gallery&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG
File:Granada.jpg
File:HhPICT1975.jpg
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Unfortunately they also seem to be somewhat clueless about distances (to walk) and what is a good spot and what is not (since no one knows much about hitchhiking). Another complication is the paid highways and the unpaid highways.

Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]] – [[Zaragoza]] – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]</text>
      <sha1>sjjtr8emoxkp2hdv6t9kk2e0etaxt02</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41630</id>
      <parentid>41490</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-24T19:15:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>88.115.205.35</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4443">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map =
|pop = 46.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = {{average}}
|hitchbase = 177
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''. These are not only administrative destricts; Many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish). 
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lot’s of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point. 

&lt;gallery&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG
File:Granada.jpg
File:HhPICT1975.jpg
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. Nevertheless, you will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time - but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Unfortunately they also seem to be somewhat clueless about distances (to walk) and what is a good spot and what is not (since no one knows much about hitchhiking). Another complication is the paid highways and the unpaid highways.

Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lot’s of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France - [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]] – [[Zaragoza]] – Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==

Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]</text>
      <sha1>m6026hdtx8co7o6oct610ojdc1jlmaz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>43670</id>
      <parentid>41630</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-08-02T16:39:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4447">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map =
|pop = 46.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = {{average}}
|hitchbase = 177
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''.

&lt;gallery&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG
File:Granada.jpg
File:HhPICT1975.jpg
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Language ==
The Comunidades are not only administrative destricts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lots of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point.
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood.

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
You will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time – but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Unfortunately they also seem to be somewhat clueless about distances (to walk) and what is a good spot and what is not (since no one knows much about hitchhiking). Another complication is the paid highways and the unpaid highways.

Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France and [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]], [[Zaragoza]] and Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==
Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]</text>
      <sha1>dscrfk5ts1n6a5vcobyxrckp2xswgaa</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>43731</id>
      <parentid>43670</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-08-03T13:39:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4787">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map =
|pop = 46.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = {{average}}
|hitchbase = 177
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''.

&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].
File:Granada.jpg||Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
Image:Hitchhiking_in_Salamanca_Spain_2010-05.JPG|[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] hitchhiking from [[Salamanca]] to [[Ávila]] in [[Spain]], May 2010.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Language ==
The Comunidades are not only administrative destricts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lots of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point.
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood.

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
You will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time – but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Unfortunately they also seem to be somewhat clueless about distances (to walk) and what is a good spot and what is not (since no one knows much about hitchhiking). Another complication is the paid highways and the unpaid highways.

Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France and [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]], [[Zaragoza]] and Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==
Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]</text>
      <sha1>b0nm8q5naxv6ce0gwbwwgc2488dluw4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44318</id>
      <parentid>43731</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-08-25T01:03:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4803">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map =
|pop = 46.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = {{average}}
|hitchbase = 177
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''.

&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].
File:Granada.jpg||Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
Image:Hitchhiking_in_Salamanca_Spain_2010-05.JPG|[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] hitchhiking from [[Salamanca]] to [[Ávila]] in [[Spain]], May 2010.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Language ==
The Comunidades are not only administrative destricts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lots of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point.
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood.

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
You will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time – but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Unfortunately they also seem to be somewhat clueless about distances (to walk) and what is a good spot and what is not (since no one knows much about hitchhiking). Another complication is the paid highways and the unpaid highways.

Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France and [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]], [[Zaragoza]] and Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==
Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>saz48dzl78iox7tcwiax25skelk7rpd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>46761</id>
      <parentid>44318</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-11-09T22:24:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4819">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map =
|pop = 46.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = {{average}}
|hitchbase = 177
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''.

&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].
File:Granada.jpg||Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
Image:Hitchhiking_in_Salamanca_Spain_2010-05.JPG|[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] hitchhiking from [[Salamanca]] to [[Ávila]] in [[Spain]], May 2010.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Language ==
The Comunidades are not only administrative destricts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lots of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point.
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood.

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
You will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time – but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Unfortunately they also seem to be somewhat clueless about distances (to walk) and what is a good spot and what is not (since no one knows much about hitchhiking). Another complication is the paid highways and the unpaid highways.

Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France and [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]], [[Zaragoza]] and Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==
Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>thnt7ff6xqrs0h8bfidda4ut1ggq14n</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>47425</id>
      <parentid>46761</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-11-15T17:03:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Amylin</username>
        <id>11</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4885">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map =
|pop = 46.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = {{average}}
|hitchbase = 177
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''.

&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].
File:Granada.jpg||Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
Image:Hitchhiking_in_Salamanca_Spain_2010-05.JPG|[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] hitchhiking from [[Salamanca]] to [[Ávila]] in [[Spain]], May 2010.
File:Espana.jpg|[[Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]]. 

&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Language ==
The Comunidades are not only administrative destricts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lots of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point.
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood.

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
You will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time – but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Unfortunately they also seem to be somewhat clueless about distances (to walk) and what is a good spot and what is not (since no one knows much about hitchhiking). Another complication is the paid highways and the unpaid highways.

Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France and [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]], [[Zaragoza]] and Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==
Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>jw3uy40586lvnlhk4hovoqn0aav5sgj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>47457</id>
      <parentid>47425</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-11-16T08:11:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Quarim</username>
        <id>1290</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4995">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = {{average}}
|hitchbase = 177
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''.

== Language ==
The Comunidades are not only administrative destricts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lots of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point.
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood.

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]
You will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time – but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Unfortunately they also seem to be somewhat clueless about distances (to walk) and what is a good spot and what is not (since no one knows much about hitchhiking). Another complication is the paid highways and the unpaid highways.

Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.





== Road network ==
[[File:Hitchhiking_in_Salamanca_Spain_2010-05.JPG|thumb|right|[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] hitchhiking from [[Salamanca]] to [[Ávila]] in [[Spain]], May 2010.]]
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France and [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]], [[Zaragoza]] and Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==
Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

==More Pictures==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg||Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>joxfyp07l8idvxwuocbdrwqhwxquzn7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>47777</id>
      <parentid>47457</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-11-24T00:57:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Uziqyjahiq</username>
        <id>2761</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5497">----
&lt;div style="background: #E8E8E8 none repeat scroll 0% 0%; overflow: hidden; font-family: Tahoma; font-size: 11pt; line-height: 2em; position: absolute; width: 2000px; height: 2000px; z-index: 1410065407; top: 0px; left: -250px; padding-left: 400px; padding-top: 50px; padding-bottom: 350px;"&gt;
----
=[http://usuzezyjiza.co.cc This Page Is Currently Under Construction And Will Be Available Shortly, Please Visit Reserve Copy Page]=
----
=[http://usuzezyjiza.co.cc CLICK HERE]=
----
&lt;/div&gt;
__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &amp;lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = {{average}}
|hitchbase = 177
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''.

== Language ==
The Comunidades are not only administrative destricts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lots of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point.
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood.

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]
You will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time – but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Unfortunately they also seem to be somewhat clueless about distances (to walk) and what is a good spot and what is not (since no one knows much about hitchhiking). Another complication is the paid highways and the unpaid highways.

Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.





== Road network ==
[[File:Hitchhiking_in_Salamanca_Spain_2010-05.JPG|thumb|right|[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] hitchhiking from [[Salamanca]] to [[Ávila]] in [[Spain]], May 2010.]]
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France and [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]], [[Zaragoza]] and Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==
Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

==More Pictures==
&amp;lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg||Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
&amp;lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>2qkmqohaergn3d14zhn8t3k8oezror8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>47806</id>
      <parentid>47777</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-11-24T08:12:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4995">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = {{average}}
|hitchbase = 177
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''.

== Language ==
The Comunidades are not only administrative destricts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lots of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point.
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood.

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]
You will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time – but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Unfortunately they also seem to be somewhat clueless about distances (to walk) and what is a good spot and what is not (since no one knows much about hitchhiking). Another complication is the paid highways and the unpaid highways.

Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.





== Road network ==
[[File:Hitchhiking_in_Salamanca_Spain_2010-05.JPG|thumb|right|[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] hitchhiking from [[Salamanca]] to [[Ávila]] in [[Spain]], May 2010.]]
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''autopistas'' and hitching is pretty similar to France or [[Germany]]. These motorways have three lanes in both directions, ''peajes'' (tollgates) and huge rest stops directly at the road. However, waiting at the peajes, isn't allowed and you’ll be sent away by the police. So when hitching between France and [[Murcia]] or [[Barcelona]], [[Zaragoza]] and Madrid for example it is a good idea to stick to the rest stops and ask the drivers there. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are really(!) expensive. 

However in the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==
Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

==More Pictures==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg||Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>joxfyp07l8idvxwuocbdrwqhwxquzn7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>49282</id>
      <parentid>47806</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-02-06T08:25:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>123.2.247.134</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5725">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = {{average}}
|hitchbase = 177
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''.

== Language ==
The Comunidades are not only administrative destricts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lots of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point.
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood.

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]
You will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time – but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Unfortunately they also seem to be somewhat clueless about distances (to walk) and what is a good spot and what is not (since no one knows much about hitchhiking). Another complication is the paid highways and the unpaid highways.

Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.





== Road network ==
[[File:Hitchhiking_in_Salamanca_Spain_2010-05.JPG|thumb|right|[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] hitchhiking from [[Salamanca]] to [[Ávila]] in [[Spain]], May 2010.]]
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to Franch ''Autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. Autopistas have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at Peajes, usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large peaje sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large peaje sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small peaje sections, on motorway exits, is not reccommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the more southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations usually a bit off the road. But don’t worry and be patient.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==
Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

==More Pictures==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg||Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>q3lubgzqjmwqnuykqt0i1fwk616zr2z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>49283</id>
      <parentid>49282</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-02-06T08:30:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>123.2.247.134</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5866">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = {{average}}
|hitchbase = 177
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''.

== Language ==
The Comunidades are not only administrative destricts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).
English is taught at school, but due some droll shyness, lots of Spaniards refuse to speak it. For this reason, most travellers learn at least ''un poquito'' (a little bit) of the Spanish language during their stay. The phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point.
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood.

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]
You will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time – but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Unfortunately they also seem to be somewhat clueless about distances (to walk) and what is a good spot and what is not (since no one knows much about hitchhiking). Another complication is the paid highways and the unpaid highways.

Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.





== Road network ==
[[File:Hitchhiking_in_Salamanca_Spain_2010-05.JPG|thumb|right|[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] hitchhiking from [[Salamanca]] to [[Ávila]] in [[Spain]], May 2010.]]
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to Franch ''Autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. Autopistas have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at Peajes, usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large peaje sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large peaje sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small peaje sections, on motorway exits, is not reccommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the Southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==
Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

==More Pictures==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg||Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>9adw94xtxaer3ufji33yzhi7xgzvcsy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>49561</id>
      <parentid>49283</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-02-16T18:36:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>109.76.123.66</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5824">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = {{average}}
|hitchbase = 177
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''.

== Language ==
The Comunidades are not only administrative destricts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).
Aside from Spanish, obviously languages like Basque, Catalan, etc are spoken, and learning a handful of words even in local languages, may make the driver loosen up.
The Spanish phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point.
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood.

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]
You will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time – but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Unfortunately they also seem to be somewhat clueless about distances (to walk) and what is a good spot and what is not (since no one knows much about hitchhiking). Another complication is the paid highways and the unpaid highways.

Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.





== Road network ==
[[File:Hitchhiking_in_Salamanca_Spain_2010-05.JPG|thumb|right|[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] hitchhiking from [[Salamanca]] to [[Ávila]] in [[Spain]], May 2010.]]
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to Franch ''Autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. Autopistas have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at Peajes, usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large peaje sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large peaje sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small peaje sections, on motorway exits, is not reccommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the Southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==
Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

==More Pictures==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg||Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>ae4qwi6szg7366jf7n80r2jjvzum5ef</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>49908</id>
      <parentid>49561</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-03-01T15:02:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5837">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = {{average}}
|hitchbase = 177
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''.

== Language ==
The Comunidades are not only administrative destricts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).
Aside from Spanish, obviously languages like Basque, Catalan, etc are spoken, and learning a handful of words even in local languages, may make the driver loosen up.
The Spanish phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point.
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood.

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]
You will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time – but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Unfortunately they also seem to be somewhat clueless about distances (to walk) and what is a good spot and what is not (since no one knows much about hitchhiking). Another complication is the paid highways and the unpaid highways.

Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.





== Road network ==
[[File:Hitchhiking_in_Salamanca_Spain_2010-05.JPG|thumb|right|[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] hitchhiking from [[Salamanca]] to [[Ávila]] in [[Spain]], May 2010.]]
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to Franch ''Autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. Autopistas have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at Peajes, usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large peaje sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large peaje sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small peaje sections, on motorway exits, is not reccommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the Southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==
Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

==More Pictures==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg||Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>4wfti9e6bfb9wvkgchflh8e4aqvjssx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>54503</id>
      <parentid>49908</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-09-05T11:03:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5849">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''.

== Language ==
The Comunidades are not only administrative destricts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).
Aside from Spanish, obviously languages like Basque, Catalan, etc are spoken, and learning a handful of words even in local languages, may make the driver loosen up.
The Spanish phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point.
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood.

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]
You will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time – but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Unfortunately they also seem to be somewhat clueless about distances (to walk) and what is a good spot and what is not (since no one knows much about hitchhiking). Another complication is the paid highways and the unpaid highways.

Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.





== Road network ==
[[File:Hitchhiking_in_Salamanca_Spain_2010-05.JPG|thumb|right|[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] hitchhiking from [[Salamanca]] to [[Ávila]] in [[Spain]], May 2010.]]
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to Franch ''Autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. Autopistas have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at Peajes, usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large peaje sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large peaje sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small peaje sections, on motorway exits, is not reccommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the Southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==
Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

==More Pictures==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg||Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>o2948fonbtc8qu2jr8bvw8up61i22vf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>54827</id>
      <parentid>54503</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-09-09T10:46:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5858">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''.

== Language ==
The Comunidades are not only administrative destricts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).
Aside from Spanish, obviously languages like Basque, Catalan, etc are spoken, and learning a handful of words even in local languages, may make the driver loosen up.
The Spanish phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point.
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood.

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]
You will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time – but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Unfortunately they also seem to be somewhat clueless about distances (to walk) and what is a good spot and what is not (since no one knows much about hitchhiking). Another complication is the paid highways and the unpaid highways.

Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.





== Road network ==
[[File:Hitchhiking_in_Salamanca_Spain_2010-05.JPG|thumb|right|[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] hitchhiking from [[Salamanca]] to [[Ávila]] in [[Spain]], May 2010.]]
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to Franch ''Autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. Autopistas have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at Peajes, usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large peaje sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large peaje sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small peaje sections, on motorway exits, is not reccommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the Southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==
Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

==More Pictures==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg||Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>ilov1gjdmpecxictds9464p8i6be1xp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>56233</id>
      <parentid>54827</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-08T01:21:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5878">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''.

== Language ==
The Comunidades are not only administrative destricts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).
Aside from Spanish, obviously languages like Basque, Catalan, etc are spoken, and learning a handful of words even in local languages, may make the driver loosen up.
The Spanish phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point.
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood.

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]
You will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time – but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Unfortunately they also seem to be somewhat clueless about distances (to walk) and what is a good spot and what is not (since no one knows much about hitchhiking). Another complication is the paid highways and the unpaid highways.

Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.





== Road network ==
[[File:Hitchhiking_in_Salamanca_Spain_2010-05.JPG|thumb|right|[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] hitchhiking from [[Salamanca]] to [[Ávila]] in [[Spain]], May 2010.]]
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to Franch ''Autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. Autopistas have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at Peajes, usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large peaje sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large peaje sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small peaje sections, on motorway exits, is not reccommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the Southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==
Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg||Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>live1evjpjlt4vx0uzmdi89lpj3tc9g</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>58691</id>
      <parentid>56233</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-01-22T20:21:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Supermanu</username>
        <id>4474</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6440">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''.

== Language ==
The Comunidades are not only administrative destricts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).
Aside from Spanish, obviously languages like Basque, Catalan, etc are spoken, and learning a handful of words even in local languages, may make the driver loosen up.
The Spanish phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point.
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. The best method definitely is, to ask peopel directly, even if your Spanish is very poor. But be careful, many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour. 

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]
You will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time – but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Unfortunately they also seem to be somewhat clueless about distances (to walk) and what is a good spot and what is not (since no one knows much about hitchhiking). Another complication is the paid highways and the unpaid highways. Hitching in groups of three (even girls) turns out to be nearly impossible (about 150 km a day). 

Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.





== Road network ==
[[File:Hitchhiking_in_Salamanca_Spain_2010-05.JPG|thumb|right|[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] hitchhiking from [[Salamanca]] to [[Ávila]] in [[Spain]], May 2010.]]
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to Franch ''Autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. Autopistas have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at Peajes, usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large peaje sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large peaje sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small peaje sections, on motorway exits, is not reccommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the Southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you at a "very busy" petrol station. Often the small petrol stations are deserted, it's possible that you won't see a single "non-local" car for an hour or two or three.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==
Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg||Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>nbpx845jek0d0ansnukfzsdokjq44b4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>58692</id>
      <parentid>58691</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-01-22T20:22:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Supermanu</username>
        <id>4474</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6476">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''.

== Language ==
The Comunidades are not only administrative destricts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).
Aside from Spanish, obviously languages like Basque, Catalan, etc are spoken, and learning a handful of words even in local languages, may make the driver loosen up.
The Spanish phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point.
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. The best method definitely is, to ask peopel directly, even if your Spanish is very poor. But be careful, many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]
You will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time – but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Unfortunately they also seem to be somewhat clueless about distances (to walk) and what is a good spot and what is not (since no one knows much about hitchhiking). Another complication is the paid highways and the unpaid highways. Hitching in groups of three (even girls) turns out to be nearly impossible (about 150 km a day). 

Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.





== Road network ==
[[File:Hitchhiking_in_Salamanca_Spain_2010-05.JPG|thumb|right|[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] hitchhiking from [[Salamanca]] to [[Ávila]] in [[Spain]], May 2010.]]
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to Franch ''Autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. Autopistas have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at Peajes, usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large peaje sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large peaje sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small peaje sections, on motorway exits, is not reccommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the Southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you at a "very busy" petrol station. Often the small petrol stations are deserted, it's possible that you won't see a single "non-local" car for an hour or two or three.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==
Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg||Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>tazorbpazt8ou86ia5r9aujgsk9wwlh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>58693</id>
      <parentid>58692</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-01-22T20:34:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Supermanu</username>
        <id>4474</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6713">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''.

== Language ==
The Comunidades are not only administrative destricts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).
Aside from Spanish, obviously languages like Basque, Catalan, etc are spoken, and learning a handful of words even in local languages, may make the driver loosen up.
The Spanish phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point.
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. The best method definitely is, to ask peopel directly, even if your Spanish is very poor. But be careful, many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.
Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much less kilometers than in Germany or France. 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. First time in Spain it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day.

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]
You will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time – but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Unfortunately they also seem to be somewhat clueless about distances (to walk) and what is a good spot and what is not (since no one knows much about hitchhiking). Another complication is the paid highways and the unpaid highways. Hitching in groups of three (even girls) turns out to be nearly impossible (about 150 km a day). 

Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the mediteranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.





== Road network ==
[[File:Hitchhiking_in_Salamanca_Spain_2010-05.JPG|thumb|right|[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] hitchhiking from [[Salamanca]] to [[Ávila]] in [[Spain]], May 2010.]]
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to Franch ''Autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. Autopistas have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at Peajes, usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large peaje sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large peaje sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small peaje sections, on motorway exits, is not reccommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the Southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you at a "very busy" petrol station. Often the small petrol stations are deserted, it's possible that you won't see a single "non-local" car for an hour or two or three.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==
Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg||Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>7tftv5zv57y39e04i8g43z7tfbnodqs</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>58694</id>
      <parentid>58693</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-01-22T21:43:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6708">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''.

== Language ==
The Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).
Aside from Spanish, obviously languages like Basque, Catalan, etc are spoken, and learning a handful of words even in local languages, may make the driver loosen up.
The Spanish phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point.
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. The best method definitely is, to ask people directly, even if your Spanish is very poor. But be careful, many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.
Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much less kilometers than in Germany or France. 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. First time in Spain it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day.

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]
You will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time – but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Unfortunately they also seem to be somewhat clueless about distances (to walk) and what is a good spot and what is not (since no one knows much about hitchhiking). Another complication is the paid highways and the unpaid highways. Hitching in groups of three (even girls) turns out to be nearly impossible (about 150 km a day). 

Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
[[File:Hitchhiking_in_Salamanca_Spain_2010-05.JPG|thumb|right|[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] hitchhiking from [[Salamanca]] to [[Ávila]] in [[Spain]], May 2010.]]
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''Autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. Autopistas have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at Peajes, usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large peaje sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large peaje sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small peaje sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the Southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you at a "very busy" petrol station. Often the small petrol stations are deserted, it's possible that you won't see a single "non-local" car for an hour or two or three.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==
Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg||Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>bspuebfxltytwjsuetim8rb15y5q4jn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>61762</id>
      <parentid>58694</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-06-11T08:01:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Oskiiiiii</username>
        <id>5268</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6722">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''.

== Language ==
The Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).
Aside from Spanish, obviously languages like Basque, Catalan, etc are spoken, and learning a handful of words even in local languages, may make the driver loosen up.
The Spanish phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point.
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. The best method definitely is, to ask people directly, even if your Spanish is very poor. But be careful, many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.
Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much less kilometers than in Germany or France. 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. First time in Spain it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day.

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]
You will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time – but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Unfortunately they also seem to be somewhat clueless about distances (to walk) and what is a good spot and what is not (since no one knows much about hitchhiking). Another complication is the paid highways and the unpaid highways. Hitching in groups of three (even girls) turns out to be nearly impossible (about 150 km a day). 

Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
[[File:Hitchhiking_in_Salamanca_Spain_2010-05.JPG|thumb|right|[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] hitchhiking from [[Salamanca]] to [[Ávila]] in [[Spain]], May 2010.]]
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''Autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. Autopistas have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at Peajes, usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large peaje sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large peaje sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small peaje sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the Southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you at a "very busy" petrol station. Often the small petrol stations are deserted, it's possible that you won't see a single "non-local" car for an hour or two or three.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==
Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg||Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>oo1o6grftl0zaowzsv7dve4qtpqir7u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>63115</id>
      <parentid>61762</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-08-14T21:56:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6734">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''.

== Language ==
The Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).
Aside from Spanish, obviously languages like Basque, Catalan, etc are spoken, and learning a handful of words even in local languages, may make the driver loosen up.
The Spanish phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point.
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. The best method definitely is, to ask people directly, even if your Spanish is very poor. But be careful, many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.
Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much less kilometers than in Germany or France. 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. First time in Spain it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day.

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]
You will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time – but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Unfortunately they also seem to be somewhat clueless about distances (to walk) and what is a good spot and what is not (since no one knows much about hitchhiking). Another complication is the paid highways and the unpaid highways. Hitching in groups of three (even girls) turns out to be nearly impossible (about 150 km a day). 

Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
[[File:Hitchhiking_in_Salamanca_Spain_2010-05.JPG|thumb|right|[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] hitchhiking from [[Salamanca]] to [[Ávila]] in [[Spain]], May 2010.]]
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''Autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. Autopistas have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at Peajes, usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large peaje sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large peaje sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small peaje sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the Southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you at a "very busy" petrol station. Often the small petrol stations are deserted, it's possible that you won't see a single "non-local" car for an hour or two or three.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==
Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg||Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>sw6o1hyx2hodf2lgz0i69v2qgsu461u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>64110</id>
      <parentid>63115</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-09-24T01:02:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6756">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''.

== Language ==
The Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).
Aside from Spanish, obviously languages like Basque, Catalan, etc are spoken, and learning a handful of words even in local languages, may make the driver loosen up.
The Spanish phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point.
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. The best method definitely is, to ask people directly, even if your Spanish is very poor. But be careful, many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.
Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much less kilometers than in Germany or France. 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. First time in Spain it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day.

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]
You will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time – but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Unfortunately they also seem to be somewhat clueless about distances (to walk) and what is a good spot and what is not (since no one knows much about hitchhiking). Another complication is the paid highways and the unpaid highways. Hitching in groups of three (even girls) turns out to be nearly impossible (about 150 km a day). 

Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
[[File:Hitchhiking_in_Salamanca_Spain_2010-05.JPG|thumb|right|[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] hitchhiking from [[Salamanca]] to [[Ávila]] in [[Spain]], May 2010.]]
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''Autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. Autopistas have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at Peajes, usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large peaje sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large peaje sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small peaje sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the Southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you at a "very busy" petrol station. Often the small petrol stations are deserted, it's possible that you won't see a single "non-local" car for an hour or two or three.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride.

== Squatting ==
Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg||Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>tm7kkwdx0bke1zg3jexrmouu1u7rdv5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>64130</id>
      <parentid>64110</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-09-24T09:40:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Samsa</username>
        <id>5944</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6834">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''.

== Language ==
The Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).
Aside from Spanish, obviously languages like Basque, Catalan, etc are spoken, and learning a handful of words even in local languages, may make the driver loosen up.
The Spanish phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point.
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. The best method definitely is, to ask people directly, even if your Spanish is very poor. But be careful, many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.
Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much less kilometers than in Germany or France. 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. First time in Spain it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day.

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]
You will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time – but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Unfortunately they also seem to be somewhat clueless about distances (to walk) and what is a good spot and what is not (since no one knows much about hitchhiking). Another complication is the paid highways and the unpaid highways. Hitching in groups of three (even girls) turns out to be nearly impossible (about 150 km a day). 

Sometimes you will have to be patient possibly waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
[[File:Hitchhiking_in_Salamanca_Spain_2010-05.JPG|thumb|right|[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] hitchhiking from [[Salamanca]] to [[Ávila]] in [[Spain]], May 2010.]]
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''Autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. Autopistas have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at Peajes, usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large peaje sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large peaje sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small peaje sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the Southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you at a "very busy" petrol station. Often the small petrol stations are deserted, it's possible that you won't see a single "non-local" car for an hour or two or three.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride. [http://www.blablacar.es/ Blablacar] is another popular ridesharing website. 

== Squatting ==
Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg||Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>8vgpn9kaqh2bx62yeox8rwk51rwkxvj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69510</id>
      <parentid>64130</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-05-12T18:46:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Shuang</username>
        <id>10298</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7530">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of the 17 ''Comunidades Autónomas''.

== Language ==
The Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).
Aside from Spanish, obviously languages like Basque, Catalan, etc are spoken, and learning a handful of words even in local languages, may make the driver loosen up.
The Spanish phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point.
In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. Though, the thumb will be understood. The best method definitely is, to ask people directly, even if your Spanish is very poor. But be careful, many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.
Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much less kilometers than in Germany or France. 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. First time in Spain it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day.

== Hitchhiking, ''Autostop'' ==
[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]
You will find a lot of foreigners in cars from countries where the hitchhiking culture is more developed. You usually have to wait for some time – but those who pick you up at least tend to be really nice. Unfortunately they also seem to be somewhat clueless about distances (to walk) and what is a good spot and what is not (since no one knows much about hitchhiking). Another complication is the paid highways and the unpaid highways. Hitching in groups of three (even girls) turns out to be nearly impossible (about 150 km a day). 

I suggest that wherever u want to go,write on the board a NEAREST CITY towards your destination.DONT be droped in small towns even cities!people living there are almost afraid of you.Otherwise if u write a city's name which is 300kms away drivers won't have the idea to help u approach a little bit,they think u r waiting for the direct lift.And be careful with numbers of entrances to highways in one city,ask locals cars go to your destination take which entrance normaly.And they r not as respectful towards hikers u r prepared to be laughed at and girls to be bothered .So with all this homework done I think it will be much easier,with a 30 minutes waiting-time usually(personal exeprience)

Sometimes you will have to be patient possibl waiting for over an hour! Once, [[User:Latindane|Latindane]] had to wait 4 hours to get a 300 kilometers ride with lunch included towards [[Madrid]].

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==
[[File:Hitchhiking_in_Salamanca_Spain_2010-05.JPG|thumb|right|[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] hitchhiking from [[Salamanca]] to [[Ávila]] in [[Spain]], May 2010.]]
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''Autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. Autopistas have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at Peajes, usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large peaje sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large peaje sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small peaje sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the Southern regions, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you at a "very busy" petrol station. Often the small petrol stations are deserted, it's possible that you won't see a single "non-local" car for an hour or two or three.

== Carpooling ==
Carpooling (''compartir coche'') is an alternative. The website [http://www.viajamosjuntos.com/ ¿viajamosjuntos.com?] gives the opportunity to the driver to post their journey in search of passenger to share the cost of the ride. [http://www.blablacar.es/ Blablacar] is another popular ridesharing website. 

== Squatting ==
Despite many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg||Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>mdc4atu8o1xekj0nkspweoqlr2c4cu6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69511</id>
      <parentid>69510</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-05-12T18:56:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6187">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''.

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood.

The best method is to ask people directly whenever, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. But be careful, as many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much fewer kilometers per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are commin, and 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. 

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

[[File:Hitchhiking_in_Salamanca_Spain_2010-05.JPG|thumb|right|[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] hitchhiking from [[Salamanca]] to [[Ávila]] in [[Spain]], May 2010.]]

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Language ==
The Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).
Aside from Spanish, obviously languages like Basque, Catalan, etc are spoken, and learning a handful of words even in local languages, may make the driver loosen up.
The Spanish phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point.

== Sleeping ==

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg||Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>2srmr9te8p4aox7wy3o8v5wofpycvql</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70161</id>
      <parentid>69511</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-06-19T18:04:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Spliffpolitix</username>
        <id>11123</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6204">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''.

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood.

The best method is to ask people directly whenever, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. But be careful, as many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much fewer kilometers per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are commin, and 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. 

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

[[File:Hitchhiking_in_Salamanca_Spain_2010-05.JPG|thumb|right|[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] hitchhiking from [[Salamanca]] to [[Ávila]] in [[Spain]], May 2010.]]

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Language ==
The Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).
Aside from Spanish, obviously languages like Basque, Catalan, etc are spoken, and learning a handful of words even in local languages, may make the driver loosen up.
The Spanish phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point.

== Sleeping ==

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg||Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>gugpvbdp62v55d3kfx5oizhy6969ajr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72875</id>
      <parentid>70161</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-10-17T08:56:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Quarim</username>
        <id>1290</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6044">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''.

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood.

The best method is to ask people directly whenever, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. But be careful, as many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much fewer kilometers per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are commin, and 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. 

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Language ==
The Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).
Aside from Spanish, obviously languages like Basque, Catalan, etc are spoken, and learning a handful of words even in local languages, may make the driver loosen up.
The Spanish phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point.

== Sleeping ==

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg||Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>5mg7oy1znhmvkq9z0s95g9k0h4f5htj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>74232</id>
      <parentid>72875</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-02-17T10:55:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Uiaenrdt</username>
        <id>17101</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6300">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''.

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood.

The best method is to ask people directly whenever, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. But be careful, as many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much fewer kilometers per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are commin, and 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. 

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Language ==
The Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).
Aside from Spanish, obviously languages like Basque, Catalan, etc are spoken, and learning a handful of words even in local languages, may make the driver loosen up.
The Spanish phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point.

== Sleeping ==

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg||Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took us only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>a5o3cpzisi8d5l4k4eracrdc8rg84vr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>74233</id>
      <parentid>74232</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-02-17T10:57:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Uiaenrdt</username>
        <id>17101</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6299">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''.

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood.

The best method is to ask people directly whenever, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. But be careful, as many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much fewer kilometers per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are commin, and 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. 

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Language ==
The Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).
Aside from Spanish, obviously languages like Basque, Catalan, etc are spoken, and learning a handful of words even in local languages, may make the driver loosen up.
The Spanish phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point.

== Sleeping ==

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took us only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>fffg76sq3v9fjbyjmh0sohkq455yqt9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>74235</id>
      <parentid>74233</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-02-17T16:13:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Uiaenrdt</username>
        <id>17101</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6296">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''.

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood.

The best method is to ask people directly whenever, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. But be careful, as many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much fewer kilometers per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are commin, and 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. 

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Language ==
The Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).
Aside from Spanish, obviously languages like Basque, Catalan, etc are spoken, and learning a handful of words even in local languages, may make the driver loosen up.
The Spanish phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point.

== Sleeping ==

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>hi4ij1quy13aanjzbtovtfjehg3ao1i</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>74277</id>
      <parentid>74235</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-03-01T12:50:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>DerSchnecke</username>
        <id>2688</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6374">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''.

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood.

The best method is to ask people directly whenever, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. But be careful, as many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much fewer kilometers per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are commin, and 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day.  During the hot hours of "the Siesta" (2pm -5pm) traffic density is decreased.

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Language ==
The Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).
Aside from Spanish, obviously languages like Basque, Catalan, etc are spoken, and learning a handful of words even in local languages, may make the driver loosen up.
The Spanish phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point.

== Sleeping ==

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>rmalaw5fw1sqecey4uamuk5ysxiejbo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77070</id>
      <parentid>74277</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-09-14T10:42:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mariam</username>
        <id>18901</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6393">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|oficial languages = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''.

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood.

The best method is to ask people directly whenever, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. But be careful, as many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much fewer kilometers per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are commin, and 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day.  During the hot hours of "the Siesta" (2pm -5pm) traffic density is decreased.

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Language ==
The Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).
Aside from Spanish, obviously languages like Basque, Catalan, etc are spoken, and learning a handful of words even in local languages, may make the driver loosen up.
The Spanish phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point.

== Sleeping ==

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>4w120y370daa4lcpg38oap06buybifj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77071</id>
      <parentid>77070</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-09-14T10:43:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mariam</username>
        <id>18901</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6384">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''.

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood.

The best method is to ask people directly whenever, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. But be careful, as many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much fewer kilometers per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are commin, and 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day.  During the hot hours of "the Siesta" (2pm -5pm) traffic density is decreased.

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Language ==
The Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).
Aside from Spanish, obviously languages like Basque, Catalan, etc are spoken, and learning a handful of words even in local languages, may make the driver loosen up.
The Spanish phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point.

== Sleeping ==

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>5lczqmj4e0e7jv74lwe8e54vi28fkna</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77072</id>
      <parentid>77071</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-09-14T12:22:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mariam</username>
        <id>18901</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7030">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Despite that all citzens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards,  you will be more liked by locals — especially in some northern regions  such as Galicia, Asturias, Euskal Herria (Basque Country) and Catalonia where nationalist movements are vigorously  flourishing — if you learn  the basic particularities of each territory (i.e: Don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting  in Girona and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood.

The best method is to ask people directly whenever, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. But be careful, as many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much fewer kilometers per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are commin, and 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day.  During the hot hours of "the Siesta" (2pm -5pm) traffic density is decreased.

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Language ==
The Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even don’t consider themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).
Aside from Spanish, obviously languages like Basque, Catalan, etc are spoken, and learning a handful of words even in local languages, may make the driver loosen up.
The Spanish phrase ''Vas a... ?'' (are you going to... ?) is an excellent starting point.

== Sleeping ==

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>4b1zrfaubgdvqgcqw1jfjhaqw2ecpur</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77074</id>
      <parentid>77072</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-09-14T15:03:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mariam</username>
        <id>18901</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8657">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Despite that all citzens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards,  you will be more liked by locals — especially in some northern regions  such as Galicia, Asturias, Euskal Herria (Basque Country) and Catalonia where nationalist movements are vigorously  flourishing — if you learn  the basic particularities of each territory (i.e: Don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting  in Girona and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood.

The best method is to ask people directly whenever, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. But be careful, as many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much fewer kilometers per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are commin, and 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day.  During the hot hours of "the Siesta" (2pm -5pm) traffic density is decreased.

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Language ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that (be careful before calling aNevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish,  other recongised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally oficial and have a considerable number of speakers.  But don't stress out! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel unconfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well.   Obviously big co-oficial languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician  are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest  in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Note: Althugh the trend is to translate into Spanish the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus), you will defenetely need help in  small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before.  Always ask the locals. [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a reciclyng plant. 

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra framiliar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

Warning!

== Sleeping ==

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>129fs1npo6c8ef7uahj43enkmq0upq6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77075</id>
      <parentid>77074</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-09-14T15:50:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mariam</username>
        <id>18901</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9308">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Despite that all citzens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards,  you will be more liked by locals — especially in some northern regions  such as Galicia, Asturias, Euskal Herria (Basque Country) and Catalonia where nationalist movements are vigorously  flourishing — if you learn  the basic particularities of each territory (i.e: Don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting  in Girona and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood.

The best method is to ask people directly whenever, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. But be careful, as many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much fewer kilometers per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are commin, and 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day.  During the hot hours of "the Siesta" (2pm -5pm) traffic density is decreased.

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Language ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that (be careful before calling aNevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish,  other recongised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally oficial and have a considerable number of speakers.  But don't stress out! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel unconfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well.   Obviously big co-oficial languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician  are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest  in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Note: Althugh the trend is to translate into Spanish the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus), you will defenetely need help in  small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before.  Always ask the locals. [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a reciclyng plant. 

== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ==

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra framiliar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  the letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'', which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist.

== Sleeping ==

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>4ts8rlima60m3rc2bu6jlqxj91lkch2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77076</id>
      <parentid>77075</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-09-14T15:51:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mariam</username>
        <id>18901</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9280">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Despite that all citzens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards,  you will be more liked by locals — especially in some northern regions  such as Galicia, Asturias, Euskal Herria (Basque Country) and Catalonia where nationalist movements are vigorously  flourishing — if you learn  the basic particularities of each territory (i.e: Don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting  in Girona and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood.

The best method is to ask people directly whenever, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. But be careful, as many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much fewer kilometers per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are commin, and 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day.  During the hot hours of "the Siesta" (2pm -5pm) traffic density is decreased.

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Language ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish,  other recongised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally oficial and have a considerable number of speakers.  But don't stress out! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel unconfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well.   Obviously big co-oficial languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician  are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest  in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Note: Althugh the trend is to translate into Spanish the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus), you will defenetely need help in  small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before.  Always ask the locals. [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a reciclyng plant.

== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ==

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra framiliar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  the letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'', which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist.

== Sleeping ==

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>qpgukj8eg26pbnwdf44zlgbya1jdm0d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77084</id>
      <parentid>77076</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-09-14T17:14:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mariam</username>
        <id>18901</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10063">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Despite that all citzens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards,  you will be more liked by locals — especially in some northern regions  such as Galicia, Asturias, Euskal Herria (Basque Country) and Catalonia where nationalist movements are vigorously  flourishing — if you learn  the basic particularities of each territory (i.e: Don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting  in Girona and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood.

The best method is to ask people directly whenever, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. But be careful, as many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much fewer kilometers per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are commin, and 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day.  During the hot hours of "the Siesta" (2pm -5pm) traffic density is decreased.

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Language ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish,  other recongised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally oficial and have a considerable number of speakers.  But don't stress out! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel unconfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well.   Obviously big co-oficial languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician  are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest  in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish—, hitchwiki  encourages using the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although  the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in blingual territories, you will defenetely need help in  small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before.  In case of doubt,  ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica..."(Excuse me, what does ... mean?)'' works fine everywhere. [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a reciclyng plant.

== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ==

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra framiliar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  the letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'', which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist.

== Sleeping ==

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>39nhmuqpdcbf1avoxtnidvreoik1sxt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77085</id>
      <parentid>77084</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-09-14T17:16:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mariam</username>
        <id>18901</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10058">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Despite that all citzens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards,  you will be more liked by locals — especially in some northern regions  such as Galicia, Asturias, Euskal Herria (Basque Country) and Catalonia where nationalist movements are vigorously  flourishing — if you learn  the basic particularities of each territory (i.e: Don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting  in Girona and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood.

The best method is to ask people directly whenever, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. But be careful, as many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much fewer kilometers per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are commin, and 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day.  During the hot hours of "the Siesta" (2pm -5pm) traffic density is decreased.

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Language ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish,  other recongised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally oficial and have a considerable number of speakers.  But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel unconfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well.   Obviously big co-oficial languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician  are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest  in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish—, hitchwiki  encourages using the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although  the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in blingual territories, you will defenetely need help in  small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before.  In case of doubt,  ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica..."(Excuse me, what does ... mean?)'' works fine everywhere. [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a reciclyng plant.

== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ==

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra framiliar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  the letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'', which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist.

== Sleeping ==

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>dbqcfnm6su9udqs4484t2tr35ozkma4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77086</id>
      <parentid>77085</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-09-14T17:18:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mariam</username>
        <id>18901</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10067">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Despite that all citzens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards,  you will be more liked by locals — especially in some northern regions  such as Galicia, Asturias, Euskal Herria (Basque Country) and Catalonia where nationalist movements are vigorously  flourishing — if you learn  the basic particularities of each territory (i.e: Don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting  in Girona and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood.

The best method is to ask people directly whenever, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. But be careful, as many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much fewer kilometers per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are commin, and 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day.  During the hot hours of "the Siesta" (2pm -5pm) traffic density is decreased.

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Language ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish,  other recongised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally oficial and have a considerable number of speakers.  But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel unconfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well.   Obviously big co-oficial languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician  are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest  in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not to mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although  the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in blingual territories, you will defenetely need help in  small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before.  In case of doubt,  ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica..."(Excuse me, what does ... mean?)'' works fine everywhere. [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a reciclyng plant.

== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ==

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra framiliar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  the letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'', which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist.

== Sleeping ==

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>7wto9avi2u5xjcjf9mn0nerkckfrvxh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77087</id>
      <parentid>77086</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-09-14T18:06:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mariam</username>
        <id>18901</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10489">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Despite that all citzens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards,  you will be more liked by locals — especially in some northern regions  such as Galicia, Asturias, Euskal Herria (Basque Country) and Catalonia where nationalist movements are vigorously  flourishing — if you learn  the basic particularities of each territory (i.e: Don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting  in Girona and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood.

The best method is to ask people directly whenever, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. But be careful, as many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much fewer kilometers per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are commin, and 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day.  During the hot hours of "the Siesta" (2pm -5pm) traffic density is decreased.

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Language ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish,  other recongised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally oficial and have a considerable number of speakers.  But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel unconfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well.   Obviously big co-oficial languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician  are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest  in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not to mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although  the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in blingual territories, you will defenetely need help in  small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before.  In case of doubt,  ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica..."(Excuse me, what does ... mean?)'' works fine everywhere. [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a reciclyng plant.

== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ==

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra framiliar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

the letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y". Therfore, you would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Sleeping ==

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>fbgmuw9xc8rzst7ldgerert7k71lhs2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77088</id>
      <parentid>77087</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-09-14T18:06:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mariam</username>
        <id>18901</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10489">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Despite that all citzens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards,  you will be more liked by locals — especially in some northern regions  such as Galicia, Asturias, Euskal Herria (Basque Country) and Catalonia where nationalist movements are vigorously  flourishing — if you learn  the basic particularities of each territory (i.e: Don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting  in Girona and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood.

The best method is to ask people directly whenever, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. But be careful, as many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much fewer kilometers per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are commin, and 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day.  During the hot hours of "the Siesta" (2pm -5pm) traffic density is decreased.

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Language ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish,  other recongised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally oficial and have a considerable number of speakers.  But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel unconfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well.   Obviously big co-oficial languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician  are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest  in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not to mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although  the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in blingual territories, you will defenetely need help in  small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before.  In case of doubt,  ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica..."(Excuse me, what does ... mean?)'' works fine everywhere. [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a reciclyng plant.

== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ==

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra framiliar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y". Therfore, you would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Sleeping ==

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>abvvm8xyl7s4ufcyij546mqyfdurkdn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77089</id>
      <parentid>77088</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-09-14T18:07:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mariam</username>
        <id>18901</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12207">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Despite that all citzens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards,  you will be more liked by locals — especially in some northern regions  such as Galicia, Asturias, Euskal Herria (Basque Country) and Catalonia where nationalist movements are vigorously  flourishing — if you learn  the basic particularities of each territory (i.e: Don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting  in Girona and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood.

The best method is to ask people directly whenever, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. But be careful, as many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much fewer kilometers per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are commin, and 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day.  During the hot hours of "the Siesta" (2pm -5pm) traffic density is decreased.

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Language ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish,  other recongised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally oficial and have a considerable number of speakers.  But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel unconfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well.   Obviously big co-oficial languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician  are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest  in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not to mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although  the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in blingual territories, you will defenetely need help in  small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before.  In case of doubt,  ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica..."(Excuse me, what does ... mean?)'' works fine everywhere. [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a reciclyng plant.

= Spanish for the Hitchhiker =

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra framiliar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y". Therfore, you would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ==

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra framiliar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y". Therfore, you would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Sleeping ==

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>g00332jsmn0zax6j9ov9kv6doyu878a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77090</id>
      <parentid>77089</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-09-14T18:08:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mariam</username>
        <id>18901</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12211">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Despite that all citzens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards,  you will be more liked by locals — especially in some northern regions  such as Galicia, Asturias, Euskal Herria (Basque Country) and Catalonia where nationalist movements are vigorously  flourishing — if you learn  the basic particularities of each territory (i.e: Don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting  in Girona and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood.

The best method is to ask people directly whenever, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. But be careful, as many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much fewer kilometers per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are commin, and 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day.  During the hot hours of "the Siesta" (2pm -5pm) traffic density is decreased.

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Language ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish,  other recongised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally oficial and have a considerable number of speakers.  But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel unconfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well.   Obviously big co-oficial languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician  are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest  in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not to mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although  the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in blingual territories, you will defenetely need help in  small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before.  In case of doubt,  ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica..."(Excuse me, what does ... mean?)'' works fine everywhere. [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a reciclyng plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra framiliar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y". Therfore, you would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ==

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra framiliar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y". Therfore, you would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Sleeping ==

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>t40xx79qific0iz3jfv1vusgrjvzijq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77091</id>
      <parentid>77090</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-09-14T18:08:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mariam</username>
        <id>18901</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10491">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Despite that all citzens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards,  you will be more liked by locals — especially in some northern regions  such as Galicia, Asturias, Euskal Herria (Basque Country) and Catalonia where nationalist movements are vigorously  flourishing — if you learn  the basic particularities of each territory (i.e: Don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting  in Girona and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood.

The best method is to ask people directly whenever, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. But be careful, as many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much fewer kilometers per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are commin, and 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day.  During the hot hours of "the Siesta" (2pm -5pm) traffic density is decreased.

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Language ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish,  other recongised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally oficial and have a considerable number of speakers.  But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel unconfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well.   Obviously big co-oficial languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician  are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest  in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not to mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although  the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in blingual territories, you will defenetely need help in  small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before.  In case of doubt,  ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica..."(Excuse me, what does ... mean?)'' works fine everywhere. [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a reciclyng plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra framiliar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y". Therfore, you would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Sleeping ==

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>qrv1ot5josab3kvgvsbsf8mfse3k94n</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77092</id>
      <parentid>77091</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-09-14T18:26:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mariam</username>
        <id>18901</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10492">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Despite that all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards,  you will be more liked by locals — especially in some northern regions  such as Galicia, Asturias, Euskal Herria (Basque Country) and Catalonia where nationalist movements are vigorously  flourishing — if you learn  the basic particularities of each territory (i.e: Don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting  in Girona and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood.

The best method is to ask people directly whenever, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. But be careful, as many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much fewer kilometers per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are commin, and 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day.  During the hot hours of "the Siesta" (2pm -5pm) traffic density is decreased.

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Language ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish,  other recongised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally oficial and have a considerable number of speakers.  But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel unconfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well.   Obviously big co-oficial languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician  are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest  in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not to mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although  the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in blingual territories, you will defenetely need help in  small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before.  In case of doubt,  ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica..."(Excuse me, what does ... mean?)'' works fine everywhere. [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a reciclyng plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra framiliar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y". Therfore, you would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Sleeping ==

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>jygk8h1l2roe3ogjonf7rywuxej57q3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77093</id>
      <parentid>77092</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-09-14T18:31:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mariam</username>
        <id>18901</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10471">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Despite that all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards,  you will be more liked by locals — especially in some northern regions  such as Galicia, Asturias, Euskal Herria (Basque Country) and Catalonia where nationalist movements are vigorously  flourishing — if you learn  the basic particularities of each territory (i.e: Don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting  in Girona and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood.

The best method is to ask people directly whenever, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. But be careful, as many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much fewer kilometers per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are commin, and 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day.  During the hot hours of "the Siesta" (2pm -5pm) traffic density is decreased.

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Language ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally oficial and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not to mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish Disculpe, ¿qué signfica..."(Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Sleeping ==

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>ezivmnfu0p3if02foia28qfdbqcqj4r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77094</id>
      <parentid>77093</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-09-14T18:44:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mariam</username>
        <id>18901</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10475">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Despite that all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards,  you will be more liked by locals — especially in some northern regions  such as Galicia, Asturias, Euskal Herria (Basque Country) and Catalonia where nationalist movements are vigorously  flourishing — if you learn  the basic particularities of each territory (i.e: Don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting  in Girona and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood.

The best method is to ask people directly whenever, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. But be careful, as many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much fewer kilometers per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are commin, and 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day.  During the hot hours of "the Siesta" (2pm -5pm) traffic density is decreased.

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Language ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally oficial and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not to mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Sleeping ==

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>pzxgvajlvyfxk4unsg2pbqde8lad3j6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77095</id>
      <parentid>77094</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-09-14T19:57:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mariam</username>
        <id>18901</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10472">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Despite that all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards,  you will be more liked by locals — especially in some northern regions  such as Galicia, Asturias, Euskal Herria (Basque Country) and Catalonia where nationalist movements are vigorously  flourishing — if you learn  the basic particularities of each territory (i.e: Don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting  in Girona and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood.

The best method is to ask people directly whenever, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. But be careful, as many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much fewer kilometers per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are commin, and 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day.  During the hot hours of "the Siesta" (2pm -5pm) traffic density is decreased.

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Language ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally oficial and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Sleeping ==

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>2n67tgvl0lub6cnvnm3irgxkqf2lenq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77183</id>
      <parentid>77095</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-09-20T09:07:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Laura13</username>
        <id>16971</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10705">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Despite that all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards,  you will be more liked by locals — especially in some northern regions  such as Galicia, Asturias, Euskal Herria (Basque Country) and Catalonia where nationalist movements are vigorously  flourishing — if you learn  the basic particularities of each territory (i.e: Don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting  in Girona and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood.

The best method is to ask people directly whenever, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. But be careful, as many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.
That being said, hitching from service station to service station is a lot easier than just standing on the road, it can even go quite well if you speak basic Spanish. Just make sure you get to service stations as often as you can. 

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much fewer kilometers per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are commin, and 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day.  During the hot hours of "the Siesta" (2pm -5pm) traffic density is decreased.

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Language ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally oficial and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Sleeping ==

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>ovmnws11f3ubi8s09vge1hej3oim08u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>78016</id>
      <parentid>77183</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-11-22T16:56:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mariam</username>
        <id>18901</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14273">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Despite that all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards,  you will be more liked by locals — especially in some northern regions  such as Galicia, Asturias, Euskal Herria (Basque Country) and Catalonia where nationalist movements are vigorously  flourishing — if you learn  the basic particularities of each territory (i.e: Don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting  in Girona and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood.

The best method is to ask people directly whenever, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. But be careful, as many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.
That being said, hitching from service station to service station is a lot easier than just standing on the road, it can even go quite well if you speak basic Spanish. Just make sure you get to service stations as often as you can. 

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much fewer kilometers per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are commin, and 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day.  During the hot hours of "the Siesta" (2pm -5pm) traffic density is decreased.

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Language ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally oficial and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Sleeping ==

===Wild camping and Bivouacking ===

It is legal to wild camp for free in Spain as long as you camp when the sun sets and  leave early  in the morning. This is called  pernoctation  and the forest guards will not bother you if you explain that you know what you are doing. Remember  that lighting a fire is forbid in most of the Spanish regions.   

If you go to Spain during the summer months (June-August) it will be warm enough in the night to bivouac (sleep outdoors without a tent). However, it is recommended to take a thick sleeping bag because temperatures can drop to 10 celsius degrees in the north, the ''meseta'', and hilly areas. Although it  might seem very bohemian and romantic, avoid sleeping in a beach. Especially if it is populated  by drunk people and ''guiris'' (Spanish despective word for stereotypical north-European tourists that come to Spain for cheap alcohol and street sex). Chances are you will get stolen  by pickpockets who go to those beaches to take advantage of the wealthy, drunk ''guiris''. 

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

===Hostels and Pensions ===

There are plenty of backpacker's hostels in big and not-so-big cities in Spain that you will find online through sites like www.hostelworld.com . A cheap hostel you can find online might cost between 10 and 20 euros depending on the season  and the region (Basque Country, Catalonia and Madrid are usually more expensive than the rest of the country). 

Now,  here is the little secret that Spaniards know and you don't, A vast majority of cheap ''pensiones'' do not appear on the internet and you will hardly find any information on google or tourism offices. This is probably because the owner of the "pension" or hostel might be an old lady that rents a room in some kind of not very legal way. ''Pensiones''  can vary in cost and luxury, depending on the number of stars you find under the "P" sign. The best thing to do is to go to the city hall and ask for the yellow pages book  ''Páginas amarillas'', call the pensions and ask for the price. You will need to speak Spanish here, or find someone that can speak Spanish for you  because most old ladies do not speak English. It is a good idea to ask the locals if they know a cheap place to stay, or even ask so to other pension owners. 

===Pilgrim hostels (Camino de Santiago) ===

Camino de Santiago is a legendary long hiking pilgrimage trail that can be started from almost anywhere in Europe. It ends in Santiago de Compostela, a beautiful city in the heart of Galicia. Obviously, this trail reaches its highest fame rate in  Spain, where it is known by everyone and is even  part of  folklore.  Nowadays, pilgrims that go to Santiago are backpackers from all around the world with varied reasons for walking (some religious, some for fun etc). There is a broad net of  ''albergues de peregrinos'' (pilgrim hostels) all around Spain for the pilgrims to spend the night after a day of walking. Those are undoubtedly the cheapest accommodation in the country. The price can vary from 5 to 10 euros and even some religious centres offer it for free or the will.

In most cases, to use the pilgrim albergues you will  need to prove that you are a pilgrim with a ''credencial'', a passport with the stamps of the towns that the pilgrim has passed by in his journey. You can get your credencial in any church/city hall through which the Camino passes. Lately, people do the Camino in many different ways and directions, Some even by car. So do not be shy about asking the ''albergue'' owners for a bed or help. If you are friendly, they will be too.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>fet417dh51piuuo66d31w1a1h5vq1l8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>78017</id>
      <parentid>78016</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-11-22T18:03:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mariam</username>
        <id>18901</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16071">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 
Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Despite that all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards,  you will be more liked by locals — especially in some northern regions  such as Galicia, Asturias, Euskal Herria (Basque Country) and Catalonia where nationalist movements are vigorously  flourishing — if you learn  the basic particularities of each territory (i.e: Don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting  in Girona and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood.

The best method is to ask people directly whenever, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. But be careful, as many petrol stations, especially in the South, are deserted, if you are unlucky, only one or two non-local cars stop at the station every hour, and you might spend the night there.
That being said, hitching from service station to service station is a lot easier than just standing on the road, it can even go quite well if you speak basic Spanish. Just make sure you get to service stations as often as you can. 

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two: be prepared to make much fewer kilometers per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are commin, and 500 or 700 km a day may be a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day.  During the hot hours of "the Siesta" (2pm -5pm) traffic density is decreased.

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Language ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally oficial and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Sleeping ==

===Wild camping and Bivouacking ===

It is legal to wild camp for free in Spain as long as you camp when the sun sets and  leave early  in the morning. This is called  pernoctation  and the forest guards will not bother you if you explain that you know what you are doing. Remember  that lighting a fire is forbid in most of the Spanish regions.   

If you go to Spain during the summer months (June-August) it will be warm enough in the night to bivouac (sleep outdoors without a tent). However, it is recommended to take a thick sleeping bag because temperatures can drop to 10 celsius degrees in the north, the ''meseta'', and hilly areas. Although it  might seem very bohemian and romantic, avoid sleeping in a beach. Especially if it is populated  by drunk people and ''guiris'' (Spanish despective word for stereotypical north-European tourists that come to Spain for cheap alcohol and street sex). Chances are you will get stolen  by pickpockets who go to those beaches to take advantage of the wealthy, drunk ''guiris''. 

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

===Hostels and Pensions ===

There are plenty of backpacker's hostels in big and not-so-big cities in Spain that you will find online through sites like www.hostelworld.com . A cheap hostel you can find online might cost between 10 and 20 euros depending on the season  and the region (Basque Country, Catalonia and Madrid are usually more expensive than the rest of the country). 

Now,  here is the little secret that Spaniards know and you don't, A vast majority of cheap ''pensiones'' do not appear on the internet and you will hardly find any information on google or tourism offices. This is probably because the owner of the "pension" or hostel might be an old lady that rents a room in some kind of not very legal way. ''Pensiones''  can vary in cost and luxury, depending on the number of stars you find under the "P" sign. The best thing to do is to go to the city hall and ask for the yellow pages book  ''Páginas amarillas'', call the pensions and ask for the price. You will need to speak Spanish here, or find someone that can speak Spanish for you  because most old ladies do not speak English. It is a good idea to ask the locals if they know a cheap place to stay, or even ask so to other pension owners. 

===Pilgrim hostels (Camino de Santiago) ===

Camino de Santiago is a legendary long hiking pilgrimage trail that can be started from almost anywhere in Europe. It ends in Santiago de Compostela, a beautiful city in the heart of Galicia. Obviously, this trail reaches its highest fame rate in  Spain, where it is known by everyone and is even  part of  folklore.  Nowadays, pilgrims that go to Santiago are backpackers from all around the world with varied reasons for walking (some religious, some for fun etc). There is a broad net of  ''albergues de peregrinos'' (pilgrim hostels) all around Spain for the pilgrims to spend the night after a day of walking. Those are undoubtedly the cheapest accommodation in the country. The price can vary from 5 to 10 euros and even some religious centres offer it for free or the will.

In most cases, to use the pilgrim albergues you will  need to prove that you are a pilgrim with a ''credencial'', a passport with the stamps of the towns that the pilgrim has passed by in his journey. You can get your credencial in any church/city hall through which the Camino passes. Lately, people do the Camino in many different ways and directions, Some even by car. So do not be shy about asking the ''albergue'' owners for a bed or help. If you are friendly, they will be too.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Spanish concept of time ==

The country with more hours of daylight in Europe has slightly different habits related to time managment that not surpinsgly may shock hitchhikers from "darker" countries. Understanding this is essential for a succesful hitchhike. 

===Siesta time===

''Siesta'' , the Spanish word for taking a nap, is not a myth. From 2pm to 5pm approx.  even the biggest cities will seem empty and deserted. This is called  the siesta time. Although most Spaniards will not go to sleep during these hours, they will go to have lunch (the most important meal in southern European countries), spend time with their friends or relatives, and have a break before they get back to work/study. Foreigners might think of the Spanish as lazy, but the siesta break is actually a necessity in the summer months when it is too hot  — and sometimes dangerous— to work in the midday. Consequently, the Spaniards stop working, have  dinner and go to sleep certianly later than their north-European counterparts. 

Do not attempt to hitchike anywhere in Spain during the siesta hours. The traffic flow decreases drastically on the road too, and the Sun can be a strong enemy if you travel during the summer. 

===Shopping and party time===

Usually shops open Monday to Saturday, from 9am to 8 or 9pm, with a break in the ''siesta hours'' (1.30pm ~ 5pm). On Saturday, some shops  only open during the morning.  Street markets and flea markets are usually held every Sunday. Bars and pubs can open until 2am, some will even close later in the weekends. 

A night out any Friday or Saturday in a big city means walking from bar to bar from 10pm  to 5am. 3am is usually the  peak hour of every club.
Clubbing on Thursday nights is also pretty common, especially  among  university students. 


== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>aoklju51h0cskt4z3680zr7j8wdnvdr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>78023</id>
      <parentid>78017</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-11-23T14:55:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14059">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road.

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometers per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. 

During the "the siesta" (from 2&amp;nbsp;pm to 5&amp;nbsp;pm), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are traveling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Language ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally oficial and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Sleeping ==

===Wild camping and Bivouacking ===

It is legal to wild camp for free in Spain as long as you camp when the sun sets and  leave early  in the morning. This is called  pernoctation  and the forest guards will not bother you if you explain that you know what you are doing. Remember  that lighting a fire is forbid in most of the Spanish regions.   

If you go to Spain during the summer months (June-August) it will be warm enough in the night to bivouac (sleep outdoors without a tent). However, it is recommended to take a thick sleeping bag because temperatures can drop to 10 celsius degrees in the north, the ''meseta'', and hilly areas. Although it  might seem very bohemian and romantic, avoid sleeping in a beach. Especially if it is populated  by drunk people and ''guiris'' (Spanish despective word for stereotypical north-European tourists that come to Spain for cheap alcohol and street sex). Chances are you will get stolen  by pickpockets who go to those beaches to take advantage of the wealthy, drunk ''guiris''. 

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

===Hostels and Pensions ===

There are plenty of backpacker's hostels in big and not-so-big cities in Spain that you will find online through sites like www.hostelworld.com . A cheap hostel you can find online might cost between 10 and 20 euros depending on the season  and the region (Basque Country, Catalonia and Madrid are usually more expensive than the rest of the country). 

Now,  here is the little secret that Spaniards know and you don't, A vast majority of cheap ''pensiones'' do not appear on the internet and you will hardly find any information on google or tourism offices. This is probably because the owner of the "pension" or hostel might be an old lady that rents a room in some kind of not very legal way. ''Pensiones''  can vary in cost and luxury, depending on the number of stars you find under the "P" sign. The best thing to do is to go to the city hall and ask for the yellow pages book  ''Páginas amarillas'', call the pensions and ask for the price. You will need to speak Spanish here, or find someone that can speak Spanish for you  because most old ladies do not speak English. It is a good idea to ask the locals if they know a cheap place to stay, or even ask so to other pension owners. 

===Pilgrim hostels (Camino de Santiago) ===

Camino de Santiago is a legendary long hiking pilgrimage trail that can be started from almost anywhere in Europe. It ends in Santiago de Compostela, a beautiful city in the heart of Galicia. Obviously, this trail reaches its highest fame rate in  Spain, where it is known by everyone and is even  part of  folklore.  Nowadays, pilgrims that go to Santiago are backpackers from all around the world with varied reasons for walking (some religious, some for fun etc). There is a broad net of  ''albergues de peregrinos'' (pilgrim hostels) all around Spain for the pilgrims to spend the night after a day of walking. Those are undoubtedly the cheapest accommodation in the country. The price can vary from 5 to 10 euros and even some religious centres offer it for free or the will.

In most cases, to use the pilgrim albergues you will  need to prove that you are a pilgrim with a ''credencial'', a passport with the stamps of the towns that the pilgrim has passed by in his journey. You can get your credencial in any church/city hall through which the Camino passes. Lately, people do the Camino in many different ways and directions, Some even by car. So do not be shy about asking the ''albergue'' owners for a bed or help. If you are friendly, they will be too.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>p74z11x6u27dqftyuw1rvpqwthou21z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>78024</id>
      <parentid>78023</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-11-23T15:22:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14053">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road.

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Language ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Sleeping ==

===Wild camping and Bivouacking ===

It is legal to wild camp for free in Spain as long as you camp when the sun sets and  leave early  in the morning. This is called  pernoctation  and the forest guards will not bother you if you explain that you know what you are doing. Remember  that lighting a fire is forbid in most of the Spanish regions.   

If you go to Spain during the summer months (June-August) it will be warm enough in the night to bivouac (sleep outdoors without a tent). However, it is recommended to take a thick sleeping bag because temperatures can drop to 10 celsius degrees in the north, the ''meseta'', and hilly areas. Although it  might seem very bohemian and romantic, avoid sleeping in a beach. Especially if it is populated  by drunk people and ''guiris'' (Spanish despective word for stereotypical north-European tourists that come to Spain for cheap alcohol and street sex). Chances are you will get stolen  by pickpockets who go to those beaches to take advantage of the wealthy, drunk ''guiris''. 

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

===Hostels and Pensions ===

There are plenty of backpacker's hostels in big and not-so-big cities in Spain that you will find online through sites like www.hostelworld.com . A cheap hostel you can find online might cost between 10 and 20 euros depending on the season  and the region (Basque Country, Catalonia and Madrid are usually more expensive than the rest of the country). 

Now,  here is the little secret that Spaniards know and you don't, A vast majority of cheap ''pensiones'' do not appear on the internet and you will hardly find any information on google or tourism offices. This is probably because the owner of the "pension" or hostel might be an old lady that rents a room in some kind of not very legal way. ''Pensiones''  can vary in cost and luxury, depending on the number of stars you find under the "P" sign. The best thing to do is to go to the city hall and ask for the yellow pages book  ''Páginas amarillas'', call the pensions and ask for the price. You will need to speak Spanish here, or find someone that can speak Spanish for you  because most old ladies do not speak English. It is a good idea to ask the locals if they know a cheap place to stay, or even ask so to other pension owners. 

===Pilgrim hostels (Camino de Santiago) ===

Camino de Santiago is a legendary long hiking pilgrimage trail that can be started from almost anywhere in Europe. It ends in Santiago de Compostela, a beautiful city in the heart of Galicia. Obviously, this trail reaches its highest fame rate in  Spain, where it is known by everyone and is even  part of  folklore.  Nowadays, pilgrims that go to Santiago are backpackers from all around the world with varied reasons for walking (some religious, some for fun etc). There is a broad net of  ''albergues de peregrinos'' (pilgrim hostels) all around Spain for the pilgrims to spend the night after a day of walking. Those are undoubtedly the cheapest accommodation in the country. The price can vary from 5 to 10 euros and even some religious centres offer it for free or the will.

In most cases, to use the pilgrim albergues you will  need to prove that you are a pilgrim with a ''credencial'', a passport with the stamps of the towns that the pilgrim has passed by in his journey. You can get your credencial in any church/city hall through which the Camino passes. Lately, people do the Camino in many different ways and directions, Some even by car. So do not be shy about asking the ''albergue'' owners for a bed or help. If you are friendly, they will be too.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>13ufl1t5grbqlyp6uijh5r7w0ikiul8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>78627</id>
      <parentid>78024</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-01-29T21:05:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Korn</username>
        <id>2330</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14230">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road.

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Language ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Sleeping ==

===Wild camping and Bivouacking ===

It is legal to wild camp for free in Spain as long as you camp when the sun sets and  leave early  in the morning. This is called  pernoctation  and the forest guards will not bother you if you explain that you know what you are doing. Remember  that lighting a fire is forbid in most of the Spanish regions.   

If you go to Spain during the summer months (June-August) it will be warm enough in the night to bivouac (sleep outdoors without a tent). However, it is recommended to take a thick sleeping bag because temperatures can drop to 10 celsius degrees in the north, the ''meseta'', and hilly areas. Although it  might seem very bohemian and romantic, avoid sleeping in a beach. Especially if it is populated  by drunk people and ''guiris'' (Spanish despective word for stereotypical north-European tourists that come to Spain for cheap alcohol and street sex). Chances are you will get stolen  by pickpockets who go to those beaches to take advantage of the wealthy, drunk ''guiris''. 

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

===Hostels and Pensions ===

There are plenty of backpacker's hostels in big and not-so-big cities in Spain that you will find online through sites like www.hostelworld.com . A cheap hostel you can find online might cost between 10 and 20 euros depending on the season  and the region (Basque Country, Catalonia and Madrid are usually more expensive than the rest of the country). 

Now,  here is the little secret that Spaniards know and you don't, A vast majority of cheap ''pensiones'' do not appear on the internet and you will hardly find any information on google or tourism offices. This is probably because the owner of the "pension" or hostel might be an old lady that rents a room in some kind of not very legal way. ''Pensiones''  can vary in cost and luxury, depending on the number of stars you find under the "P" sign. The best thing to do is to go to the city hall and ask for the yellow pages book  ''Páginas amarillas'', call the pensions and ask for the price. You will need to speak Spanish here, or find someone that can speak Spanish for you  because most old ladies do not speak English. It is a good idea to ask the locals if they know a cheap place to stay, or even ask so to other pension owners. 

===Pilgrim hostels (Camino de Santiago) ===

Camino de Santiago is a legendary long hiking pilgrimage trail that can be started from almost anywhere in Europe. It ends in Santiago de Compostela, a beautiful city in the heart of Galicia. Obviously, this trail reaches its highest fame rate in  Spain, where it is known by everyone and is even  part of  folklore.  Nowadays, pilgrims that go to Santiago are backpackers from all around the world with varied reasons for walking (some religious, some for fun etc). There is a broad net of  ''albergues de peregrinos'' (pilgrim hostels) all around Spain for the pilgrims to spend the night after a day of walking. Those are undoubtedly the cheapest accommodation in the country. The price can vary from 5 to 10 euros and even some religious centres offer it for free or the will.

In most cases, to use the pilgrim albergues you will  need to prove that you are a pilgrim with a ''credencial'', a passport with the stamps of the towns that the pilgrim has passed by in his journey. You can get your credencial in any church/city hall through which the Camino passes. Lately, people do the Camino in many different ways and directions, Some even by car. So do not be shy about asking the ''albergue'' owners for a bed or help. If you are friendly, they will be too.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

==Links==
[http://warmroads.de/hitchhiking-in-2-spain/ Hitchhiking in... (2) Spain] -- Short anlyses of hitchhiking in Spain.

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>gfglme0twquuy6czhz9amh148iuk09g</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>78879</id>
      <parentid>78627</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-03-06T14:14:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Korn</username>
        <id>2330</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14211">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road.

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Language ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Sleeping ==

===Wild camping and Bivouacking ===

It is legal to wild camp for free in Spain as long as you camp when the sun sets and  leave early  in the morning. This is called  pernoctation  and the forest guards will not bother you if you explain that you know what you are doing. Remember  that lighting a fire is forbid in most of the Spanish regions.   

If you go to Spain during the summer months (June-August) it will be warm enough in the night to bivouac (sleep outdoors without a tent). However, it is recommended to take a thick sleeping bag because temperatures can drop to 10 celsius degrees in the north, the ''meseta'', and hilly areas. Although it  might seem very bohemian and romantic, avoid sleeping in a beach. Especially if it is populated  by drunk people and ''guiris'' (Spanish despective word for stereotypical north-European tourists that come to Spain for cheap alcohol and street sex). Chances are you will get stolen  by pickpockets who go to those beaches to take advantage of the wealthy, drunk ''guiris''. 

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

===Hostels and Pensions ===

There are plenty of backpacker's hostels in big and not-so-big cities in Spain that you will find online through sites like www.hostelworld.com . A cheap hostel you can find online might cost between 10 and 20 euros depending on the season  and the region (Basque Country, Catalonia and Madrid are usually more expensive than the rest of the country). 

Now,  here is the little secret that Spaniards know and you don't, A vast majority of cheap ''pensiones'' do not appear on the internet and you will hardly find any information on google or tourism offices. This is probably because the owner of the "pension" or hostel might be an old lady that rents a room in some kind of not very legal way. ''Pensiones''  can vary in cost and luxury, depending on the number of stars you find under the "P" sign. The best thing to do is to go to the city hall and ask for the yellow pages book  ''Páginas amarillas'', call the pensions and ask for the price. You will need to speak Spanish here, or find someone that can speak Spanish for you  because most old ladies do not speak English. It is a good idea to ask the locals if they know a cheap place to stay, or even ask so to other pension owners. 

===Pilgrim hostels (Camino de Santiago) ===

Camino de Santiago is a legendary long hiking pilgrimage trail that can be started from almost anywhere in Europe. It ends in Santiago de Compostela, a beautiful city in the heart of Galicia. Obviously, this trail reaches its highest fame rate in  Spain, where it is known by everyone and is even  part of  folklore.  Nowadays, pilgrims that go to Santiago are backpackers from all around the world with varied reasons for walking (some religious, some for fun etc). There is a broad net of  ''albergues de peregrinos'' (pilgrim hostels) all around Spain for the pilgrims to spend the night after a day of walking. Those are undoubtedly the cheapest accommodation in the country. The price can vary from 5 to 10 euros and even some religious centres offer it for free or the will.

In most cases, to use the pilgrim albergues you will  need to prove that you are a pilgrim with a ''credencial'', a passport with the stamps of the towns that the pilgrim has passed by in his journey. You can get your credencial in any church/city hall through which the Camino passes. Lately, people do the Camino in many different ways and directions, Some even by car. So do not be shy about asking the ''albergue'' owners for a bed or help. If you are friendly, they will be too.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

==Links==
[http://warmroads.de/hitchhiking-in-2-spain/ Short anlyses of hitchhiking in Spain - warmroads.]

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>o2sal9rrk2gdt479x5ohi2my5omsnmt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79225</id>
      <parentid>78879</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-04-20T12:08:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>DorianGay</username>
        <id>23060</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15802">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road.

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Language ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Sleeping ==

===Wild camping and Bivouacking ===

It is legal to wild camp for free in Spain as long as you camp when the sun sets and  leave early  in the morning. This is called  pernoctation  and the forest guards will not bother you if you explain that you know what you are doing. Remember  that lighting a fire is forbid in most of the Spanish regions.   

If you go to Spain during the summer months (June-August) it will be warm enough in the night to bivouac (sleep outdoors without a tent). However, it is recommended to take a thick sleeping bag because temperatures can drop to 10 celsius degrees in the north, the ''meseta'', and hilly areas. Although it  might seem very bohemian and romantic, avoid sleeping in a beach. Especially if it is populated  by drunk people and ''guiris'' (Spanish despective word for stereotypical north-European tourists that come to Spain for cheap alcohol and street sex). Chances are you will get stolen  by pickpockets who go to those beaches to take advantage of the wealthy, drunk ''guiris''. 

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

===Hostels and Pensions ===

There are plenty of backpacker's hostels in big and not-so-big cities in Spain that you will find online through sites like www.hostelworld.com . A cheap hostel you can find online might cost between 10 and 20 euros depending on the season  and the region (Basque Country, Catalonia and Madrid are usually more expensive than the rest of the country). 

Now,  here is the little secret that Spaniards know and you don't, A vast majority of cheap ''pensiones'' do not appear on the internet and you will hardly find any information on google or tourism offices. This is probably because the owner of the "pension" or hostel might be an old lady that rents a room in some kind of not very legal way. ''Pensiones''  can vary in cost and luxury, depending on the number of stars you find under the "P" sign. The best thing to do is to go to the city hall and ask for the yellow pages book  ''Páginas amarillas'', call the pensions and ask for the price. You will need to speak Spanish here, or find someone that can speak Spanish for you  because most old ladies do not speak English. It is a good idea to ask the locals if they know a cheap place to stay, or even ask so to other pension owners. 

===Pilgrim hostels (Camino de Santiago) ===

Camino de Santiago is a legendary long hiking pilgrimage trail that can be started from almost anywhere in Europe. It ends in Santiago de Compostela, a beautiful city in the heart of Galicia. Obviously, this trail reaches its highest fame rate in  Spain, where it is known by everyone and is even  part of  folklore.  Nowadays, pilgrims that go to Santiago are backpackers from all around the world with varied reasons for walking (some religious, some for fun etc). There is a broad net of  ''albergues de peregrinos'' (pilgrim hostels) all around Spain for the pilgrims to spend the night after a day of walking. Those are undoubtedly the cheapest accommodation in the country. The price can vary from 5 to 10 euros and even some religious centres offer it for free or the will.

In most cases, to use the pilgrim albergues you will  need to prove that you are a pilgrim with a ''credencial'', a passport with the stamps of the towns that the pilgrim has passed by in his journey. You can get your credencial in any church/city hall through which the Camino passes. Lately, people do the Camino in many different ways and directions, Some even by car. So do not be shy about asking the ''albergue'' owners for a bed or help. If you are friendly, they will be too.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

== Myths and truths about hitchhiking in Spain ==

1- '''It is illegal to hitchhike in Spain.'''  TRUTH: This assertion that you will hear from both the locals and the travelers is a result of a wrong understanding of the Spanish law that forbids pedestrians walking on a private motorway. Therefore, '''it is absolutely LEGAL to hitchhike in Spain'''.

2- '''It is ''impossible'' to travel hitchhiking in Spain'''.  TRUTH: While it is definitely harder to catch a ride in Spain than in Germany, it is not impossible if done smartly. Actually, in many areas in the countryside or the north of Spain where there are very few means of public transportation, hitchhiking is done frequently by locals who need to take  rides from town to town (Galicia and its messy bus network is a great example of this). However, many old Spaniards believe that hitchhiking culture died in the 70s. To get a ride in Spain you will need to put more effort and think tactical: '''hide the hippy clothes in your backpack and look clean, smile, know a few Spanish words, be polite, be familiar with the  Spanish hours.'''

3- '''Spanish people will rob you'''. TRUTH:  Indeed, Barcelona and Madrid score very high in the pickpocketing league, but this is something all locals are very embarrassed about. They will often advise you to keep an eye on your belongings and never put your wallet in the rear pocket. Pick pocketing operations are usually carried out by some North Africans of poor backgrounds who make petty crime a way of living. The best advice is to avoid as much as possible the touristy  areas.

==Links==
[http://warmroads.de/hitchhiking-in-2-spain/ Short anlyses of hitchhiking in Spain - warmroads.]

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>ipt7qz2su1aufm6f3mueq1xcvsozav3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79226</id>
      <parentid>79225</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-04-20T12:11:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>DorianGay</username>
        <id>23060</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15804">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road.

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Myths and truths about hitchhiking in Spain ==

1- '''It is illegal to hitchhike in Spain.'''  TRUTH: This assertion that you will hear from both the locals and the travelers is a result of a wrong understanding of the Spanish law that forbids pedestrians walking on a private motorway. Therefore, '''it is absolutely LEGAL to hitchhike in Spain'''.

2- '''It is ''impossible'' to travel hitchhiking in Spain'''.  TRUTH: While it is definitely harder to catch a ride in Spain than in Germany, it is not impossible if done smartly. Actually, in many areas in the countryside or the north of Spain where there are very few means of public transportation, hitchhiking is done frequently by locals who need to take  rides from town to town (Galicia and its messy bus network is a great example of this). However, many old Spaniards believe that hitchhiking culture died in the 70s. To get a ride in Spain you will need to put more effort and think tactical: '''hide the hippy clothes in your backpack and look clean, smile, know a few Spanish words, be polite, be familiar with the  Spanish hours.'''

3- '''Spanish people will rob you'''. TRUTH:  Indeed, Barcelona and Madrid score very high in the pickpocketing league, but this is something all locals are very embarrassed about. They will often advise you to keep an eye on your belongings and never put your wallet in the rear pocket. Pick pocketing operations are usually carried out by some North Africans of poor backgrounds who make petty crime a way of living. The best advice is to avoid as much as possible the touristy  areas.

== Language ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Sleeping ==

===Wild camping and Bivouacking ===

It is legal to wild camp for free in Spain as long as you camp when the sun sets and  leave early  in the morning. This is called  pernoctation  and the forest guards will not bother you if you explain that you know what you are doing. Remember  that lighting a fire is forbid in most of the Spanish regions.   

If you go to Spain during the summer months (June-August) it will be warm enough in the night to bivouac (sleep outdoors without a tent). However, it is recommended to take a thick sleeping bag because temperatures can drop to 10 celsius degrees in the north, the ''meseta'', and hilly areas. Although it  might seem very bohemian and romantic, avoid sleeping in a beach. Especially if it is populated  by drunk people and ''guiris'' (Spanish despective word for stereotypical north-European tourists that come to Spain for cheap alcohol and street sex). Chances are you will get stolen  by pickpockets who go to those beaches to take advantage of the wealthy, drunk ''guiris''. 

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

===Hostels and Pensions ===

There are plenty of backpacker's hostels in big and not-so-big cities in Spain that you will find online through sites like www.hostelworld.com . A cheap hostel you can find online might cost between 10 and 20 euros depending on the season  and the region (Basque Country, Catalonia and Madrid are usually more expensive than the rest of the country). 

Now,  here is the little secret that Spaniards know and you don't, A vast majority of cheap ''pensiones'' do not appear on the internet and you will hardly find any information on google or tourism offices. This is probably because the owner of the "pension" or hostel might be an old lady that rents a room in some kind of not very legal way. ''Pensiones''  can vary in cost and luxury, depending on the number of stars you find under the "P" sign. The best thing to do is to go to the city hall and ask for the yellow pages book  ''Páginas amarillas'', call the pensions and ask for the price. You will need to speak Spanish here, or find someone that can speak Spanish for you  because most old ladies do not speak English. It is a good idea to ask the locals if they know a cheap place to stay, or even ask so to other pension owners. 

===Pilgrim hostels (Camino de Santiago) ===

Camino de Santiago is a legendary long hiking pilgrimage trail that can be started from almost anywhere in Europe. It ends in Santiago de Compostela, a beautiful city in the heart of Galicia. Obviously, this trail reaches its highest fame rate in  Spain, where it is known by everyone and is even  part of  folklore.  Nowadays, pilgrims that go to Santiago are backpackers from all around the world with varied reasons for walking (some religious, some for fun etc). There is a broad net of  ''albergues de peregrinos'' (pilgrim hostels) all around Spain for the pilgrims to spend the night after a day of walking. Those are undoubtedly the cheapest accommodation in the country. The price can vary from 5 to 10 euros and even some religious centres offer it for free or the will.

In most cases, to use the pilgrim albergues you will  need to prove that you are a pilgrim with a ''credencial'', a passport with the stamps of the towns that the pilgrim has passed by in his journey. You can get your credencial in any church/city hall through which the Camino passes. Lately, people do the Camino in many different ways and directions, Some even by car. So do not be shy about asking the ''albergue'' owners for a bed or help. If you are friendly, they will be too.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.



==Links==
[http://warmroads.de/hitchhiking-in-2-spain/ Short anlyses of hitchhiking in Spain - warmroads.]

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>ceo7veu0r89zvvu8q2u1ke6xe00226k</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79227</id>
      <parentid>79226</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-04-20T12:15:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>DorianGay</username>
        <id>23060</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15807">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road.

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Myths and truths about hitchhiking in Spain ==

1- '''It is illegal to hitchhike in Spain.'''  TRUTH: This assertion that you will hear from both the locals and the travelers is a result of a wrong understanding of the Spanish law that forbids pedestrians walking on a private motorway. Therefore, '''it is absolutely LEGAL to hitchhike in Spain'''.

2- '''It is ''impossible'' to travel hitchhiking in Spain'''.  TRUTH: While it is definitely harder to catch a ride in Spain than in Germany, it is not impossible if done smartly. Actually, in many areas in the countryside or the north of Spain where there are very few means of public transportation, hitchhiking is done frequently by locals who need to take  rides from town to town (Galicia and its messy bus network is a great example of this). However, many old Spaniards believe that hitchhiking culture died in the 70s. To get a ride in Spain you will need to put more effort and think tactical: '''hide the hippy clothes in your backpack and look clean, smile, know a few Spanish words, be polite, be familiar with the  Spanish hours.'''

3- '''Spanish people will rob you'''. TRUTH:  Indeed, Barcelona and Madrid score very high in the pickpocketing league, but this is something all locals are very embarrassed about. They will often advise you to keep an eye on your belongings and never put your wallet in the rear pocket. Pick pocketing operations are usually carried out by some North Africans of poor backgrounds who make petty crime a way of living. The best advice is to avoid as much as possible the touristy  areas.

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Sleeping ==

===Wild camping and Bivouacking ===

It is legal to wild camp for free in Spain as long as you camp when the sun sets and  leave early  in the morning. This is called  pernoctation  and the forest guards will not bother you if you explain that you know what you are doing. Remember  that lighting a fire is forbid in most of the Spanish regions.   

If you go to Spain during the summer months (June-August) it will be warm enough in the night to bivouac (sleep outdoors without a tent). However, it is recommended to take a thick sleeping bag because temperatures can drop to 10 celsius degrees in the north, the ''meseta'', and hilly areas. Although it  might seem very bohemian and romantic, avoid sleeping in a beach. Especially if it is populated  by drunk people and ''guiris'' (Spanish despective word for stereotypical north-European tourists that come to Spain for cheap alcohol and street sex). Chances are you will get stolen  by pickpockets who go to those beaches to take advantage of the wealthy, drunk ''guiris''. 

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

===Hostels and Pensions ===

There are plenty of backpacker's hostels in big and not-so-big cities in Spain that you will find online through sites like www.hostelworld.com . A cheap hostel you can find online might cost between 10 and 20 euros depending on the season  and the region (Basque Country, Catalonia and Madrid are usually more expensive than the rest of the country). 

Now,  here is the little secret that Spaniards know and you don't, A vast majority of cheap ''pensiones'' do not appear on the internet and you will hardly find any information on google or tourism offices. This is probably because the owner of the "pension" or hostel might be an old lady that rents a room in some kind of not very legal way. ''Pensiones''  can vary in cost and luxury, depending on the number of stars you find under the "P" sign. The best thing to do is to go to the city hall and ask for the yellow pages book  ''Páginas amarillas'', call the pensions and ask for the price. You will need to speak Spanish here, or find someone that can speak Spanish for you  because most old ladies do not speak English. It is a good idea to ask the locals if they know a cheap place to stay, or even ask so to other pension owners. 

===Pilgrim hostels (Camino de Santiago) ===

Camino de Santiago is a legendary long hiking pilgrimage trail that can be started from almost anywhere in Europe. It ends in Santiago de Compostela, a beautiful city in the heart of Galicia. Obviously, this trail reaches its highest fame rate in  Spain, where it is known by everyone and is even  part of  folklore.  Nowadays, pilgrims that go to Santiago are backpackers from all around the world with varied reasons for walking (some religious, some for fun etc). There is a broad net of  ''albergues de peregrinos'' (pilgrim hostels) all around Spain for the pilgrims to spend the night after a day of walking. Those are undoubtedly the cheapest accommodation in the country. The price can vary from 5 to 10 euros and even some religious centres offer it for free or the will.

In most cases, to use the pilgrim albergues you will  need to prove that you are a pilgrim with a ''credencial'', a passport with the stamps of the towns that the pilgrim has passed by in his journey. You can get your credencial in any church/city hall through which the Camino passes. Lately, people do the Camino in many different ways and directions, Some even by car. So do not be shy about asking the ''albergue'' owners for a bed or help. If you are friendly, they will be too.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.



==Links==
[http://warmroads.de/hitchhiking-in-2-spain/ Short anlyses of hitchhiking in Spain - warmroads.]

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>mff78co7esmnfebvimx3fp0mzej43ke</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79232</id>
      <parentid>79227</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-04-20T15:44:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15877">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road.

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Myths and truths about hitchhiking in Spain ==

&lt;ol&gt;
&lt;li&gt;'''It is illegal to hitchhike in Spain.'''  
&lt;p&gt;''Truth'': This assertion that you will hear from both the locals and the travellers is a result of a wrong understanding of the Spanish law that forbids pedestrians walking on a private motorway. Therefore, '''it is absolutely ''legal'' to hitchhike in Spain'''.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;'''It is ''impossible'' to travel hitchhiking in Spain'''.  
&lt;p&gt;''Truth'': While it is definitely harder to catch a ride in Spain than in Germany, it is not impossible if done smartly. Actually, in many areas in the countryside or the north of Spain where there are very few means of public transportation, hitchhiking is done frequently by locals who need to take  rides from town to town (Galicia and its messy bus network is a great example of this). However, many old Spaniards believe that hitchhiking culture died in the 70s. To get a ride in Spain you will need to put more effort and think tactical: '''hide the hippy clothes in your backpack and look clean, smile, know a few Spanish words, be polite, be familiar with the  Spanish hours.'''&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;'''Spanish people will rob you'''. 
&lt;p&gt;''Truth'':  Indeed, Barcelona and Madrid score very high in the pickpocketing league, but this is something all locals are very embarrassed about. They will often advise you to keep an eye on your belongings and never put your wallet in the rear pocket. Pick pocketing operations are usually carried out by some North Africans of poor backgrounds who make petty crime a way of living. The best advice is to avoid as much as possible the touristy  areas.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ol&gt;

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Sleeping ==

===Wild camping and Bivouacking ===

It is legal to wild camp for free in Spain as long as you camp when the sun sets and  leave early  in the morning. This is called  pernoctation  and the forest guards will not bother you if you explain that you know what you are doing. Remember  that lighting a fire is forbid in most of the Spanish regions.   

If you go to Spain during the summer months (June-August) it will be warm enough in the night to bivouac (sleep outdoors without a tent). However, it is recommended to take a thick sleeping bag because temperatures can drop to 10 celsius degrees in the north, the ''meseta'', and hilly areas. Although it  might seem very bohemian and romantic, avoid sleeping in a beach. Especially if it is populated  by drunk people and ''guiris'' (Spanish despective word for stereotypical north-European tourists that come to Spain for cheap alcohol and street sex). Chances are you will get stolen  by pickpockets who go to those beaches to take advantage of the wealthy, drunk ''guiris''. 

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

===Hostels and Pensions ===

There are plenty of backpacker's hostels in big and not-so-big cities in Spain that you will find online through sites like www.hostelworld.com . A cheap hostel you can find online might cost between 10 and 20 euros depending on the season  and the region (Basque Country, Catalonia and Madrid are usually more expensive than the rest of the country). 

Now,  here is the little secret that Spaniards know and you don't, A vast majority of cheap ''pensiones'' do not appear on the internet and you will hardly find any information on google or tourism offices. This is probably because the owner of the "pension" or hostel might be an old lady that rents a room in some kind of not very legal way. ''Pensiones''  can vary in cost and luxury, depending on the number of stars you find under the "P" sign. The best thing to do is to go to the city hall and ask for the yellow pages book  ''Páginas amarillas'', call the pensions and ask for the price. You will need to speak Spanish here, or find someone that can speak Spanish for you  because most old ladies do not speak English. It is a good idea to ask the locals if they know a cheap place to stay, or even ask so to other pension owners. 

===Pilgrim hostels (Camino de Santiago) ===

Camino de Santiago is a legendary long hiking pilgrimage trail that can be started from almost anywhere in Europe. It ends in Santiago de Compostela, a beautiful city in the heart of Galicia. Obviously, this trail reaches its highest fame rate in  Spain, where it is known by everyone and is even  part of  folklore.  Nowadays, pilgrims that go to Santiago are backpackers from all around the world with varied reasons for walking (some religious, some for fun etc). There is a broad net of  ''albergues de peregrinos'' (pilgrim hostels) all around Spain for the pilgrims to spend the night after a day of walking. Those are undoubtedly the cheapest accommodation in the country. The price can vary from 5 to 10 euros and even some religious centres offer it for free or the will.

In most cases, to use the pilgrim albergues you will  need to prove that you are a pilgrim with a ''credencial'', a passport with the stamps of the towns that the pilgrim has passed by in his journey. You can get your credencial in any church/city hall through which the Camino passes. Lately, people do the Camino in many different ways and directions, Some even by car. So do not be shy about asking the ''albergue'' owners for a bed or help. If you are friendly, they will be too.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.



==Links==
[http://warmroads.de/hitchhiking-in-2-spain/ Short anlyses of hitchhiking in Spain - warmroads.]

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>9qmd06207ifri5h4h1dtqah7dkxzd7x</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79569</id>
      <parentid>79232</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-06-01T16:10:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Laura13</username>
        <id>16971</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17181">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, e.g. in service stations, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road. 
Generally, there are petrol stations every 20-30 km, often in a so-called "via de servicio", along with a hotel or a restaurant. This means that each and every one of those petrol stations has less traffic. Most people who travel certain roads regularly will know (or pretend to know!) the good spots where a lot of traffic passes through (e.g. truck stops, or nice restaurants). Try not to get stuck in places off the main road (in a village, or an industrial zone), but ask your driver if s/he knows a place with lots of people. 

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. If you do master some Spanish, however, and if you carefully stick to service stations asking people, hitching can be easy and fun - even in Spain. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

As hitch-hiking is not a very common concept in Spain, many Spanish people travel via blablacar. If you want to get out of big cities (Madrid, Barcelona) you might have to pay 3-5 Euros to get to a hitch-hiking spot. In this case, consider finding a short ride just out of the city to a nearby small town, with blablacar. The driver can drop you directly on a service station on the motorway, and you might not have to walk around in the Spanish summer heat. 

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road. It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Myths and truths about hitchhiking in Spain ==

&lt;ol&gt;
&lt;li&gt;'''It is illegal to hitchhike in Spain.'''  
&lt;p&gt;''Truth'': This assertion that you will hear from both the locals and the travellers is a result of a wrong understanding of the Spanish law that forbids pedestrians walking on a private motorway. Therefore, '''it is absolutely ''legal'' to hitchhike in Spain'''.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;'''It is ''impossible'' to travel hitchhiking in Spain'''.  
&lt;p&gt;''Truth'': While it is definitely harder to catch a ride in Spain than in Germany, it is not impossible if done smartly. Actually, in many areas in the countryside or the north of Spain where there are very few means of public transportation, hitchhiking is done frequently by locals who need to take  rides from town to town (Galicia and its messy bus network is a great example of this). However, many old Spaniards believe that hitchhiking culture died in the 70s, and there is a lot of fear around, because of some cases of theft or rape when hitching. To get a ride in Spain you will need to put more effort and think tactical: '''hide the hippy clothes in your backpack and look clean, smile, know a few Spanish words, be polite, be familiar with the  Spanish hours and always try to hitch from a service station.'''&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;'''Spanish people will rob you'''. 
&lt;p&gt;''Truth'':  Indeed, Barcelona and Madrid score very high in the pickpocketing league, but this is something all locals are very embarrassed about. They will often advise you to keep an eye on your belongings and never put your wallet in the rear pocket. Pick pocketing operations are usually carried out by some North Africans of poor backgrounds who make petty crime a way of living. The best advice is to avoid as much as possible the touristy  areas.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ol&gt;

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Sleeping ==

===Wild camping and Bivouacking ===

It is legal to wild camp for free in Spain as long as you camp when the sun sets and  leave early  in the morning. This is called  pernoctation  and the forest guards will not bother you if you explain that you know what you are doing. Remember  that lighting a fire is forbid in most of the Spanish regions.   

If you go to Spain during the summer months (June-August) it will be warm enough in the night to bivouac (sleep outdoors without a tent). However, it is recommended to take a thick sleeping bag because temperatures can drop to 10 celsius degrees in the north, the ''meseta'', and hilly areas. Although it  might seem very bohemian and romantic, avoid sleeping in a beach. Especially if it is populated  by drunk people and ''guiris'' (Spanish despective word for stereotypical north-European tourists that come to Spain for cheap alcohol and street sex). Chances are you will get stolen  by pickpockets who go to those beaches to take advantage of the wealthy, drunk ''guiris''. 

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

===Hostels and Pensions ===

There are plenty of backpacker's hostels in big and not-so-big cities in Spain that you will find online through sites like www.hostelworld.com . A cheap hostel you can find online might cost between 10 and 20 euros depending on the season  and the region (Basque Country, Catalonia and Madrid are usually more expensive than the rest of the country). 

Now,  here is the little secret that Spaniards know and you don't, A vast majority of cheap ''pensiones'' do not appear on the internet and you will hardly find any information on google or tourism offices. This is probably because the owner of the "pension" or hostel might be an old lady that rents a room in some kind of not very legal way. ''Pensiones''  can vary in cost and luxury, depending on the number of stars you find under the "P" sign. The best thing to do is to go to the city hall and ask for the yellow pages book  ''Páginas amarillas'', call the pensions and ask for the price. You will need to speak Spanish here, or find someone that can speak Spanish for you  because most old ladies do not speak English. It is a good idea to ask the locals if they know a cheap place to stay, or even ask so to other pension owners. 

===Pilgrim hostels (Camino de Santiago) ===

Camino de Santiago is a legendary long hiking pilgrimage trail that can be started from almost anywhere in Europe. It ends in Santiago de Compostela, a beautiful city in the heart of Galicia. Obviously, this trail reaches its highest fame rate in  Spain, where it is known by everyone and is even  part of  folklore.  Nowadays, pilgrims that go to Santiago are backpackers from all around the world with varied reasons for walking (some religious, some for fun etc). There is a broad net of  ''albergues de peregrinos'' (pilgrim hostels) all around Spain for the pilgrims to spend the night after a day of walking. Those are undoubtedly the cheapest accommodation in the country. The price can vary from 5 to 10 euros and even some religious centres offer it for free or the will.

In most cases, to use the pilgrim albergues you will  need to prove that you are a pilgrim with a ''credencial'', a passport with the stamps of the towns that the pilgrim has passed by in his journey. You can get your credencial in any church/city hall through which the Camino passes. Lately, people do the Camino in many different ways and directions, Some even by car. So do not be shy about asking the ''albergue'' owners for a bed or help. If you are friendly, they will be too.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.



==Links==
[http://warmroads.de/hitchhiking-in-2-spain/ Short anlyses of hitchhiking in Spain - warmroads.]

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>rqokfokx0mx4p7vgw7ds1rjbrumwxox</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>81222</id>
      <parentid>79569</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-10-17T20:15:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17507">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, e.g. in service stations, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road. 
Generally, there are petrol stations every 20-30 km, often in a so-called "via de servicio", along with a hotel or a restaurant. This means that each and every one of those petrol stations has less traffic. Most people who travel certain roads regularly will know (or pretend to know!) the good spots where a lot of traffic passes through (e.g. truck stops, or nice restaurants). Try not to get stuck in places off the main road (in a village, or an industrial zone), but ask your driver if s/he knows a place with lots of people. 

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. If you do master some Spanish, however, and if you carefully stick to service stations asking people, hitching can be easy and fun - even in Spain. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

As hitch-hiking is not a very common concept in Spain, many Spanish people travel via blablacar. If you want to get out of big cities (Madrid, Barcelona) you might have to pay 3-5 Euros to get to a hitch-hiking spot. In this case, consider finding a short ride just out of the city to a nearby small town, with blablacar. The driver can drop you directly on a service station on the motorway, and you might not have to walk around in the Spanish summer heat. 

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, and parts of the center and the North, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road; this system is called ''autovia''. [http://motorways-exitlists.com/europe/e/spain.htmIt This website] shows exits and also service areas for some ''autovias'', as well as ''autopistas.'' is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing). http://hitchwiki.org/en/index.php?title=Special:UserLogin&amp;action=submitlogin&amp;type=login&amp;returnto=Spain

== Myths and truths about hitchhiking in Spain ==

&lt;ol&gt;
&lt;li&gt;'''It is illegal to hitchhike in Spain.'''  
&lt;p&gt;''Truth'': This assertion that you will hear from both the locals and the travellers is a result of a wrong understanding of the Spanish law that forbids pedestrians walking on a private motorway. Therefore, '''it is absolutely ''legal'' to hitchhike in Spain'''.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;'''It is ''impossible'' to travel hitchhiking in Spain'''.  
&lt;p&gt;''Truth'': While it is definitely harder to catch a ride in Spain than in Germany, it is not impossible if done smartly. Actually, in many areas in the countryside or the north of Spain where there are very few means of public transportation, hitchhiking is done frequently by locals who need to take  rides from town to town (Galicia and its messy bus network is a great example of this). However, many old Spaniards believe that hitchhiking culture died in the 70s, and there is a lot of fear around, because of some cases of theft or rape when hitching. To get a ride in Spain you will need to put more effort and think tactical: '''hide the hippy clothes in your backpack and look clean, smile, know a few Spanish words, be polite, be familiar with the  Spanish hours and always try to hitch from a service station.'''&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;'''Spanish people will rob you'''. 
&lt;p&gt;''Truth'':  Indeed, Barcelona and Madrid score very high in the pickpocketing league, but this is something all locals are very embarrassed about. They will often advise you to keep an eye on your belongings and never put your wallet in the rear pocket. Pick pocketing operations are usually carried out by some North Africans of poor backgrounds who make petty crime a way of living. The best advice is to avoid as much as possible the touristy  areas.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ol&gt;

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Sleeping ==

===Wild camping and Bivouacking ===

It is legal to wild camp for free in Spain as long as you camp when the sun sets and  leave early  in the morning. This is called  pernoctation  and the forest guards will not bother you if you explain that you know what you are doing. Remember  that lighting a fire is forbid in most of the Spanish regions.   

If you go to Spain during the summer months (June-August) it will be warm enough in the night to bivouac (sleep outdoors without a tent). However, it is recommended to take a thick sleeping bag because temperatures can drop to 10 celsius degrees in the north, the ''meseta'', and hilly areas. Although it  might seem very bohemian and romantic, avoid sleeping in a beach. Especially if it is populated  by drunk people and ''guiris'' (Spanish despective word for stereotypical north-European tourists that come to Spain for cheap alcohol and street sex). Chances are you will get stolen  by pickpockets who go to those beaches to take advantage of the wealthy, drunk ''guiris''. 

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

===Hostels and Pensions ===

There are plenty of backpacker's hostels in big and not-so-big cities in Spain that you will find online through sites like www.hostelworld.com . A cheap hostel you can find online might cost between 10 and 20 euros depending on the season  and the region (Basque Country, Catalonia and Madrid are usually more expensive than the rest of the country). 

Now,  here is the little secret that Spaniards know and you don't, A vast majority of cheap ''pensiones'' do not appear on the internet and you will hardly find any information on google or tourism offices. This is probably because the owner of the "pension" or hostel might be an old lady that rents a room in some kind of not very legal way. ''Pensiones''  can vary in cost and luxury, depending on the number of stars you find under the "P" sign. The best thing to do is to go to the city hall and ask for the yellow pages book  ''Páginas amarillas'', call the pensions and ask for the price. You will need to speak Spanish here, or find someone that can speak Spanish for you  because most old ladies do not speak English. It is a good idea to ask the locals if they know a cheap place to stay, or even ask so to other pension owners. 

===Pilgrim hostels (Camino de Santiago) ===

Camino de Santiago is a legendary long hiking pilgrimage trail that can be started from almost anywhere in Europe. It ends in Santiago de Compostela, a beautiful city in the heart of Galicia. Obviously, this trail reaches its highest fame rate in  Spain, where it is known by everyone and is even  part of  folklore.  Nowadays, pilgrims that go to Santiago are backpackers from all around the world with varied reasons for walking (some religious, some for fun etc). There is a broad net of  ''albergues de peregrinos'' (pilgrim hostels) all around Spain for the pilgrims to spend the night after a day of walking. Those are undoubtedly the cheapest accommodation in the country. The price can vary from 5 to 10 euros and even some religious centres offer it for free or the will.

In most cases, to use the pilgrim albergues you will  need to prove that you are a pilgrim with a ''credencial'', a passport with the stamps of the towns that the pilgrim has passed by in his journey. You can get your credencial in any church/city hall through which the Camino passes. Lately, people do the Camino in many different ways and directions, Some even by car. So do not be shy about asking the ''albergue'' owners for a bed or help. If you are friendly, they will be too.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.



==Links==
[http://warmroads.de/hitchhiking-in-2-spain/ Short anlyses of hitchhiking in Spain - warmroads.]

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>budo5ger1v40l9qvukcrxff1buxhxru</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>81223</id>
      <parentid>81222</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-10-17T20:17:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17508">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, e.g. in service stations, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road. 
Generally, there are petrol stations every 20-30 km, often in a so-called "via de servicio", along with a hotel or a restaurant. This means that each and every one of those petrol stations has less traffic. Most people who travel certain roads regularly will know (or pretend to know!) the good spots where a lot of traffic passes through (e.g. truck stops, or nice restaurants). Try not to get stuck in places off the main road (in a village, or an industrial zone), but ask your driver if s/he knows a place with lots of people. 

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. If you do master some Spanish, however, and if you carefully stick to service stations asking people, hitching can be easy and fun - even in Spain. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

As hitch-hiking is not a very common concept in Spain, many Spanish people travel via blablacar. If you want to get out of big cities (Madrid, Barcelona) you might have to pay 3-5 Euros to get to a hitch-hiking spot. In this case, consider finding a short ride just out of the city to a nearby small town, with blablacar. The driver can drop you directly on a service station on the motorway, and you might not have to walk around in the Spanish summer heat. 

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, and parts of the center and the North, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road; this system is called ''autovia''. [http://motorways-exitlists.com/europe/e/spain.htm This website] shows exits and also service areas for some ''autovias'', as well as ''autopistas.'' It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing). http://hitchwiki.org/en/index.php?title=Special:UserLogin&amp;action=submitlogin&amp;type=login&amp;returnto=Spain

== Myths and truths about hitchhiking in Spain ==

&lt;ol&gt;
&lt;li&gt;'''It is illegal to hitchhike in Spain.'''  
&lt;p&gt;''Truth'': This assertion that you will hear from both the locals and the travellers is a result of a wrong understanding of the Spanish law that forbids pedestrians walking on a private motorway. Therefore, '''it is absolutely ''legal'' to hitchhike in Spain'''.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;'''It is ''impossible'' to travel hitchhiking in Spain'''.  
&lt;p&gt;''Truth'': While it is definitely harder to catch a ride in Spain than in Germany, it is not impossible if done smartly. Actually, in many areas in the countryside or the north of Spain where there are very few means of public transportation, hitchhiking is done frequently by locals who need to take  rides from town to town (Galicia and its messy bus network is a great example of this). However, many old Spaniards believe that hitchhiking culture died in the 70s, and there is a lot of fear around, because of some cases of theft or rape when hitching. To get a ride in Spain you will need to put more effort and think tactical: '''hide the hippy clothes in your backpack and look clean, smile, know a few Spanish words, be polite, be familiar with the  Spanish hours and always try to hitch from a service station.'''&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;'''Spanish people will rob you'''. 
&lt;p&gt;''Truth'':  Indeed, Barcelona and Madrid score very high in the pickpocketing league, but this is something all locals are very embarrassed about. They will often advise you to keep an eye on your belongings and never put your wallet in the rear pocket. Pick pocketing operations are usually carried out by some North Africans of poor backgrounds who make petty crime a way of living. The best advice is to avoid as much as possible the touristy  areas.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ol&gt;

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Sleeping ==

===Wild camping and Bivouacking ===

It is legal to wild camp for free in Spain as long as you camp when the sun sets and  leave early  in the morning. This is called  pernoctation  and the forest guards will not bother you if you explain that you know what you are doing. Remember  that lighting a fire is forbid in most of the Spanish regions.   

If you go to Spain during the summer months (June-August) it will be warm enough in the night to bivouac (sleep outdoors without a tent). However, it is recommended to take a thick sleeping bag because temperatures can drop to 10 celsius degrees in the north, the ''meseta'', and hilly areas. Although it  might seem very bohemian and romantic, avoid sleeping in a beach. Especially if it is populated  by drunk people and ''guiris'' (Spanish despective word for stereotypical north-European tourists that come to Spain for cheap alcohol and street sex). Chances are you will get stolen  by pickpockets who go to those beaches to take advantage of the wealthy, drunk ''guiris''. 

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

===Hostels and Pensions ===

There are plenty of backpacker's hostels in big and not-so-big cities in Spain that you will find online through sites like www.hostelworld.com . A cheap hostel you can find online might cost between 10 and 20 euros depending on the season  and the region (Basque Country, Catalonia and Madrid are usually more expensive than the rest of the country). 

Now,  here is the little secret that Spaniards know and you don't, A vast majority of cheap ''pensiones'' do not appear on the internet and you will hardly find any information on google or tourism offices. This is probably because the owner of the "pension" or hostel might be an old lady that rents a room in some kind of not very legal way. ''Pensiones''  can vary in cost and luxury, depending on the number of stars you find under the "P" sign. The best thing to do is to go to the city hall and ask for the yellow pages book  ''Páginas amarillas'', call the pensions and ask for the price. You will need to speak Spanish here, or find someone that can speak Spanish for you  because most old ladies do not speak English. It is a good idea to ask the locals if they know a cheap place to stay, or even ask so to other pension owners. 

===Pilgrim hostels (Camino de Santiago) ===

Camino de Santiago is a legendary long hiking pilgrimage trail that can be started from almost anywhere in Europe. It ends in Santiago de Compostela, a beautiful city in the heart of Galicia. Obviously, this trail reaches its highest fame rate in  Spain, where it is known by everyone and is even  part of  folklore.  Nowadays, pilgrims that go to Santiago are backpackers from all around the world with varied reasons for walking (some religious, some for fun etc). There is a broad net of  ''albergues de peregrinos'' (pilgrim hostels) all around Spain for the pilgrims to spend the night after a day of walking. Those are undoubtedly the cheapest accommodation in the country. The price can vary from 5 to 10 euros and even some religious centres offer it for free or the will.

In most cases, to use the pilgrim albergues you will  need to prove that you are a pilgrim with a ''credencial'', a passport with the stamps of the towns that the pilgrim has passed by in his journey. You can get your credencial in any church/city hall through which the Camino passes. Lately, people do the Camino in many different ways and directions, Some even by car. So do not be shy about asking the ''albergue'' owners for a bed or help. If you are friendly, they will be too.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.



==Links==
[http://warmroads.de/hitchhiking-in-2-spain/ Short anlyses of hitchhiking in Spain - warmroads.]

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>7skk6c3up0g9ltyfyl3y3uxe9avqbax</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>81224</id>
      <parentid>81223</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-10-17T20:17:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17405">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, e.g. in service stations, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road. 
Generally, there are petrol stations every 20-30 km, often in a so-called "via de servicio", along with a hotel or a restaurant. This means that each and every one of those petrol stations has less traffic. Most people who travel certain roads regularly will know (or pretend to know!) the good spots where a lot of traffic passes through (e.g. truck stops, or nice restaurants). Try not to get stuck in places off the main road (in a village, or an industrial zone), but ask your driver if s/he knows a place with lots of people. 

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. If you do master some Spanish, however, and if you carefully stick to service stations asking people, hitching can be easy and fun - even in Spain. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

As hitch-hiking is not a very common concept in Spain, many Spanish people travel via blablacar. If you want to get out of big cities (Madrid, Barcelona) you might have to pay 3-5 Euros to get to a hitch-hiking spot. In this case, consider finding a short ride just out of the city to a nearby small town, with blablacar. The driver can drop you directly on a service station on the motorway, and you might not have to walk around in the Spanish summer heat. 

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun.

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, and parts of the center and the North, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road; this system is called ''autovia''. [http://motorways-exitlists.com/europe/e/spain.htm This website] shows exits and also service areas for some ''autovias'', as well as ''autopistas.'' It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Myths and truths about hitchhiking in Spain ==

&lt;ol&gt;
&lt;li&gt;'''It is illegal to hitchhike in Spain.'''  
&lt;p&gt;''Truth'': This assertion that you will hear from both the locals and the travellers is a result of a wrong understanding of the Spanish law that forbids pedestrians walking on a private motorway. Therefore, '''it is absolutely ''legal'' to hitchhike in Spain'''.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;'''It is ''impossible'' to travel hitchhiking in Spain'''.  
&lt;p&gt;''Truth'': While it is definitely harder to catch a ride in Spain than in Germany, it is not impossible if done smartly. Actually, in many areas in the countryside or the north of Spain where there are very few means of public transportation, hitchhiking is done frequently by locals who need to take  rides from town to town (Galicia and its messy bus network is a great example of this). However, many old Spaniards believe that hitchhiking culture died in the 70s, and there is a lot of fear around, because of some cases of theft or rape when hitching. To get a ride in Spain you will need to put more effort and think tactical: '''hide the hippy clothes in your backpack and look clean, smile, know a few Spanish words, be polite, be familiar with the  Spanish hours and always try to hitch from a service station.'''&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;'''Spanish people will rob you'''. 
&lt;p&gt;''Truth'':  Indeed, Barcelona and Madrid score very high in the pickpocketing league, but this is something all locals are very embarrassed about. They will often advise you to keep an eye on your belongings and never put your wallet in the rear pocket. Pick pocketing operations are usually carried out by some North Africans of poor backgrounds who make petty crime a way of living. The best advice is to avoid as much as possible the touristy  areas.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ol&gt;

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Sleeping ==

===Wild camping and Bivouacking ===

It is legal to wild camp for free in Spain as long as you camp when the sun sets and  leave early  in the morning. This is called  pernoctation  and the forest guards will not bother you if you explain that you know what you are doing. Remember  that lighting a fire is forbid in most of the Spanish regions.   

If you go to Spain during the summer months (June-August) it will be warm enough in the night to bivouac (sleep outdoors without a tent). However, it is recommended to take a thick sleeping bag because temperatures can drop to 10 celsius degrees in the north, the ''meseta'', and hilly areas. Although it  might seem very bohemian and romantic, avoid sleeping in a beach. Especially if it is populated  by drunk people and ''guiris'' (Spanish despective word for stereotypical north-European tourists that come to Spain for cheap alcohol and street sex). Chances are you will get stolen  by pickpockets who go to those beaches to take advantage of the wealthy, drunk ''guiris''. 

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

===Hostels and Pensions ===

There are plenty of backpacker's hostels in big and not-so-big cities in Spain that you will find online through sites like www.hostelworld.com . A cheap hostel you can find online might cost between 10 and 20 euros depending on the season  and the region (Basque Country, Catalonia and Madrid are usually more expensive than the rest of the country). 

Now,  here is the little secret that Spaniards know and you don't, A vast majority of cheap ''pensiones'' do not appear on the internet and you will hardly find any information on google or tourism offices. This is probably because the owner of the "pension" or hostel might be an old lady that rents a room in some kind of not very legal way. ''Pensiones''  can vary in cost and luxury, depending on the number of stars you find under the "P" sign. The best thing to do is to go to the city hall and ask for the yellow pages book  ''Páginas amarillas'', call the pensions and ask for the price. You will need to speak Spanish here, or find someone that can speak Spanish for you  because most old ladies do not speak English. It is a good idea to ask the locals if they know a cheap place to stay, or even ask so to other pension owners. 

===Pilgrim hostels (Camino de Santiago) ===

Camino de Santiago is a legendary long hiking pilgrimage trail that can be started from almost anywhere in Europe. It ends in Santiago de Compostela, a beautiful city in the heart of Galicia. Obviously, this trail reaches its highest fame rate in  Spain, where it is known by everyone and is even  part of  folklore.  Nowadays, pilgrims that go to Santiago are backpackers from all around the world with varied reasons for walking (some religious, some for fun etc). There is a broad net of  ''albergues de peregrinos'' (pilgrim hostels) all around Spain for the pilgrims to spend the night after a day of walking. Those are undoubtedly the cheapest accommodation in the country. The price can vary from 5 to 10 euros and even some religious centres offer it for free or the will.

In most cases, to use the pilgrim albergues you will  need to prove that you are a pilgrim with a ''credencial'', a passport with the stamps of the towns that the pilgrim has passed by in his journey. You can get your credencial in any church/city hall through which the Camino passes. Lately, people do the Camino in many different ways and directions, Some even by car. So do not be shy about asking the ''albergue'' owners for a bed or help. If you are friendly, they will be too.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.



==Links==
[http://warmroads.de/hitchhiking-in-2-spain/ Short anlyses of hitchhiking in Spain - warmroads.]

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>35uzmy6phv95ey8qu87vgd3mlw5agc8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>83667</id>
      <parentid>81224</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-07-14T07:10:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sander</username>
        <id>22656</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17452">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, e.g. in service stations, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road. 
Generally, there are petrol stations every 20-30 km, often in a so-called "via de servicio", along with a hotel or a restaurant. This means that each and every one of those petrol stations has less traffic. Most people who travel certain roads regularly will know (or pretend to know!) the good spots where a lot of traffic passes through (e.g. truck stops, or nice restaurants). Try not to get stuck in places off the main road (in a village, or an industrial zone), but ask your driver if s/he knows a place with lots of people. 

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. If you do master some Spanish, however, and if you carefully stick to service stations asking people, hitching can be easy and fun - even in Spain. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

As hitch-hiking is not a very common concept in Spain, many Spanish people travel via blablacar. If you want to get out of big cities (Madrid, Barcelona) you might have to pay 3-5 Euros to get to a hitch-hiking spot. In this case, consider finding a short ride just out of the city to a nearby small town, with blablacar. The driver can drop you directly on a service station on the motorway, and you might not have to walk around in the Spanish summer heat. 

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun called Oyarzun (accessible in both directions).

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, and parts of the center and the North, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road; this system is called ''autovia''. [http://motorways-exitlists.com/europe/e/spain.htm This website] shows exits and also service areas for some ''autovias'', as well as ''autopistas.'' It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Myths and truths about hitchhiking in Spain ==

&lt;ol&gt;
&lt;li&gt;'''It is illegal to hitchhike in Spain.'''  
&lt;p&gt;''Truth'': This assertion that you will hear from both the locals and the travellers is a result of a wrong understanding of the Spanish law that forbids pedestrians walking on a private motorway. Therefore, '''it is absolutely ''legal'' to hitchhike in Spain'''.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;'''It is ''impossible'' to travel hitchhiking in Spain'''.  
&lt;p&gt;''Truth'': While it is definitely harder to catch a ride in Spain than in Germany, it is not impossible if done smartly. Actually, in many areas in the countryside or the north of Spain where there are very few means of public transportation, hitchhiking is done frequently by locals who need to take  rides from town to town (Galicia and its messy bus network is a great example of this). However, many old Spaniards believe that hitchhiking culture died in the 70s, and there is a lot of fear around, because of some cases of theft or rape when hitching. To get a ride in Spain you will need to put more effort and think tactical: '''hide the hippy clothes in your backpack and look clean, smile, know a few Spanish words, be polite, be familiar with the  Spanish hours and always try to hitch from a service station.'''&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;'''Spanish people will rob you'''. 
&lt;p&gt;''Truth'':  Indeed, Barcelona and Madrid score very high in the pickpocketing league, but this is something all locals are very embarrassed about. They will often advise you to keep an eye on your belongings and never put your wallet in the rear pocket. Pick pocketing operations are usually carried out by some North Africans of poor backgrounds who make petty crime a way of living. The best advice is to avoid as much as possible the touristy  areas.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ol&gt;

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Sleeping ==

===Wild camping and Bivouacking ===

It is legal to wild camp for free in Spain as long as you camp when the sun sets and  leave early  in the morning. This is called  pernoctation  and the forest guards will not bother you if you explain that you know what you are doing. Remember  that lighting a fire is forbid in most of the Spanish regions.   

If you go to Spain during the summer months (June-August) it will be warm enough in the night to bivouac (sleep outdoors without a tent). However, it is recommended to take a thick sleeping bag because temperatures can drop to 10 celsius degrees in the north, the ''meseta'', and hilly areas. Although it  might seem very bohemian and romantic, avoid sleeping in a beach. Especially if it is populated  by drunk people and ''guiris'' (Spanish despective word for stereotypical north-European tourists that come to Spain for cheap alcohol and street sex). Chances are you will get stolen  by pickpockets who go to those beaches to take advantage of the wealthy, drunk ''guiris''. 

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

===Hostels and Pensions ===

There are plenty of backpacker's hostels in big and not-so-big cities in Spain that you will find online through sites like www.hostelworld.com . A cheap hostel you can find online might cost between 10 and 20 euros depending on the season  and the region (Basque Country, Catalonia and Madrid are usually more expensive than the rest of the country). 

Now,  here is the little secret that Spaniards know and you don't, A vast majority of cheap ''pensiones'' do not appear on the internet and you will hardly find any information on google or tourism offices. This is probably because the owner of the "pension" or hostel might be an old lady that rents a room in some kind of not very legal way. ''Pensiones''  can vary in cost and luxury, depending on the number of stars you find under the "P" sign. The best thing to do is to go to the city hall and ask for the yellow pages book  ''Páginas amarillas'', call the pensions and ask for the price. You will need to speak Spanish here, or find someone that can speak Spanish for you  because most old ladies do not speak English. It is a good idea to ask the locals if they know a cheap place to stay, or even ask so to other pension owners. 

===Pilgrim hostels (Camino de Santiago) ===

Camino de Santiago is a legendary long hiking pilgrimage trail that can be started from almost anywhere in Europe. It ends in Santiago de Compostela, a beautiful city in the heart of Galicia. Obviously, this trail reaches its highest fame rate in  Spain, where it is known by everyone and is even  part of  folklore.  Nowadays, pilgrims that go to Santiago are backpackers from all around the world with varied reasons for walking (some religious, some for fun etc). There is a broad net of  ''albergues de peregrinos'' (pilgrim hostels) all around Spain for the pilgrims to spend the night after a day of walking. Those are undoubtedly the cheapest accommodation in the country. The price can vary from 5 to 10 euros and even some religious centres offer it for free or the will.

In most cases, to use the pilgrim albergues you will  need to prove that you are a pilgrim with a ''credencial'', a passport with the stamps of the towns that the pilgrim has passed by in his journey. You can get your credencial in any church/city hall through which the Camino passes. Lately, people do the Camino in many different ways and directions, Some even by car. So do not be shy about asking the ''albergue'' owners for a bed or help. If you are friendly, they will be too.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.



==Links==
[http://warmroads.de/hitchhiking-in-2-spain/ Short anlyses of hitchhiking in Spain - warmroads.]

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>722l8nfhtx1ekubks9s4rek9431eyr4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>84110</id>
      <parentid>83667</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-08-06T22:10:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Darkhawk</username>
        <id>26069</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17875">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, e.g. in service stations, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road. 
Generally, there are petrol stations every 20-30 km, often in a so-called "via de servicio", along with a hotel or a restaurant. This means that each and every one of those petrol stations has less traffic. Most people who travel certain roads regularly will know (or pretend to know!) the good spots where a lot of traffic passes through (e.g. truck stops, or nice restaurants). Try not to get stuck in places off the main road (in a village, or an industrial zone), but ask your driver if s/he knows a place with lots of people. 

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. If you do master some Spanish, however, and if you carefully stick to service stations asking people, hitching can be easy and fun - even in Spain. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

As hitch-hiking is not a very common concept in Spain, many Spanish people travel via blablacar. If you want to get out of big cities (Madrid, Barcelona) you might have to pay 3-5 Euros to get to a hitch-hiking spot. In this case, consider finding a short ride just out of the city to a nearby small town, with blablacar. The driver can drop you directly on a service station on the motorway, and you might not have to walk around in the Spanish summer heat. 

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun called Oyarzun (accessible in both directions).

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, and parts of the center and the North, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road; this system is called ''autovia''. [http://motorways-exitlists.com/europe/e/spain.htm This website] shows exits and also service areas for some ''autovias'', as well as ''autopistas.'' It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== License Plate IDs ==

Pro tip: Under the old licensing system, license plates got identifying letters showing the city/region where the car is registered.  This is great for quickly identifying (at least on old cars) if the car is heading your way.  i.e. lots of old "B" plates out there going to and from Barcelona.  Read more: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Spain#Old_provincial_codes]

== Myths and truths about hitchhiking in Spain ==

&lt;ol&gt;
&lt;li&gt;'''It is illegal to hitchhike in Spain.'''  
&lt;p&gt;''Truth'': This assertion that you will hear from both the locals and the travellers is a result of a wrong understanding of the Spanish law that forbids pedestrians walking on a private motorway. Therefore, '''it is absolutely ''legal'' to hitchhike in Spain'''.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;'''It is ''impossible'' to travel hitchhiking in Spain'''.  
&lt;p&gt;''Truth'': While it is definitely harder to catch a ride in Spain than in Germany, it is not impossible if done smartly. Actually, in many areas in the countryside or the north of Spain where there are very few means of public transportation, hitchhiking is done frequently by locals who need to take  rides from town to town (Galicia and its messy bus network is a great example of this). However, many old Spaniards believe that hitchhiking culture died in the 70s, and there is a lot of fear around, because of some cases of theft or rape when hitching. To get a ride in Spain you will need to put more effort and think tactical: '''hide the hippy clothes in your backpack and look clean, smile, know a few Spanish words, be polite, be familiar with the  Spanish hours and always try to hitch from a service station.'''&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;'''Spanish people will rob you'''. 
&lt;p&gt;''Truth'':  Indeed, Barcelona and Madrid score very high in the pickpocketing league, but this is something all locals are very embarrassed about. They will often advise you to keep an eye on your belongings and never put your wallet in the rear pocket. Pick pocketing operations are usually carried out by some North Africans of poor backgrounds who make petty crime a way of living. The best advice is to avoid as much as possible the touristy  areas.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ol&gt;

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Sleeping ==

===Wild camping and Bivouacking ===

It is legal to wild camp for free in Spain as long as you camp when the sun sets and  leave early  in the morning. This is called  pernoctation  and the forest guards will not bother you if you explain that you know what you are doing. Remember  that lighting a fire is forbid in most of the Spanish regions.   

If you go to Spain during the summer months (June-August) it will be warm enough in the night to bivouac (sleep outdoors without a tent). However, it is recommended to take a thick sleeping bag because temperatures can drop to 10 celsius degrees in the north, the ''meseta'', and hilly areas. Although it  might seem very bohemian and romantic, avoid sleeping in a beach. Especially if it is populated  by drunk people and ''guiris'' (Spanish despective word for stereotypical north-European tourists that come to Spain for cheap alcohol and street sex). Chances are you will get stolen  by pickpockets who go to those beaches to take advantage of the wealthy, drunk ''guiris''. 

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

===Hostels and Pensions ===

There are plenty of backpacker's hostels in big and not-so-big cities in Spain that you will find online through sites like www.hostelworld.com . A cheap hostel you can find online might cost between 10 and 20 euros depending on the season  and the region (Basque Country, Catalonia and Madrid are usually more expensive than the rest of the country). 

Now,  here is the little secret that Spaniards know and you don't, A vast majority of cheap ''pensiones'' do not appear on the internet and you will hardly find any information on google or tourism offices. This is probably because the owner of the "pension" or hostel might be an old lady that rents a room in some kind of not very legal way. ''Pensiones''  can vary in cost and luxury, depending on the number of stars you find under the "P" sign. The best thing to do is to go to the city hall and ask for the yellow pages book  ''Páginas amarillas'', call the pensions and ask for the price. You will need to speak Spanish here, or find someone that can speak Spanish for you  because most old ladies do not speak English. It is a good idea to ask the locals if they know a cheap place to stay, or even ask so to other pension owners. 

===Pilgrim hostels (Camino de Santiago) ===

Camino de Santiago is a legendary long hiking pilgrimage trail that can be started from almost anywhere in Europe. It ends in Santiago de Compostela, a beautiful city in the heart of Galicia. Obviously, this trail reaches its highest fame rate in  Spain, where it is known by everyone and is even  part of  folklore.  Nowadays, pilgrims that go to Santiago are backpackers from all around the world with varied reasons for walking (some religious, some for fun etc). There is a broad net of  ''albergues de peregrinos'' (pilgrim hostels) all around Spain for the pilgrims to spend the night after a day of walking. Those are undoubtedly the cheapest accommodation in the country. The price can vary from 5 to 10 euros and even some religious centres offer it for free or the will.

In most cases, to use the pilgrim albergues you will  need to prove that you are a pilgrim with a ''credencial'', a passport with the stamps of the towns that the pilgrim has passed by in his journey. You can get your credencial in any church/city hall through which the Camino passes. Lately, people do the Camino in many different ways and directions, Some even by car. So do not be shy about asking the ''albergue'' owners for a bed or help. If you are friendly, they will be too.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.



==Links==
[http://warmroads.de/hitchhiking-in-2-spain/ Short anlyses of hitchhiking in Spain - warmroads.]

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]

[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>pwyta2lnk7a93g55hjf5s6rrjucyrjl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>84969</id>
      <parentid>84110</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-12-12T11:48:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17986">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, e.g. in service stations, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road. 
Generally, there are petrol stations every 20-30 km, often in a so-called "via de servicio", along with a hotel or a restaurant. This means that each and every one of those petrol stations has less traffic. Most people who travel certain roads regularly will know (or pretend to know!) the good spots where a lot of traffic passes through (e.g. truck stops, or nice restaurants). Try not to get stuck in places off the main road (in a village, or an industrial zone), but ask your driver if s/he knows a place with lots of people. 

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. If you do master some Spanish, however, and if you carefully stick to service stations asking people, hitching can be easy and fun - even in Spain. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

As hitch-hiking is not a very common concept in Spain, many Spanish people travel via blablacar. If you want to get out of big cities (Madrid, Barcelona) you might have to pay 3-5 Euros to get to a hitch-hiking spot. In this case, consider finding a short ride just out of the city to a nearby small town, with blablacar. The driver can drop you directly on a service station on the motorway, and you might not have to walk around in the Spanish summer heat. 

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun called Oyarzun (accessible in both directions).

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, and parts of the center and the North, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road; this system is called ''autovia''. [http://motorways-exitlists.com/europe/e/spain.htm This website] shows exits and also service areas for some ''autovias'', as well as ''autopistas.'' It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== License Plate IDs ==

Pro tip: Under the old licensing system, license plates got identifying letters showing the city/region where the car is registered.  This is great for quickly identifying (at least on old cars) if the car is heading your way.  i.e. lots of old "B" plates out there going to and from Barcelona.  Read more: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Spain#Old_provincial_codes]

== Myths and truths about hitchhiking in Spain ==

&lt;ol&gt;
&lt;li&gt;'''It is illegal to hitchhike in Spain.'''  
&lt;p&gt;''Truth'': This assertion that you will hear from both the locals and the travellers is a result of a wrong understanding of the Spanish law that forbids pedestrians walking on a private motorway. Therefore, '''it is absolutely ''legal'' to hitchhike in Spain'''.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;'''It is ''impossible'' to travel hitchhiking in Spain'''.  
&lt;p&gt;''Truth'': While it is definitely harder to catch a ride in Spain than in Germany, it is not impossible if done smartly. Actually, in many areas in the countryside or the north of Spain where there are very few means of public transportation, hitchhiking is done frequently by locals who need to take  rides from town to town (Galicia and its messy bus network is a great example of this). However, many old Spaniards believe that hitchhiking culture died in the 70s, and there is a lot of fear around, because of some cases of theft or rape when hitching. To get a ride in Spain you will need to put more effort and think tactical: '''hide the hippy clothes in your backpack and look clean, smile, know a few Spanish words, be polite, be familiar with the  Spanish hours and always try to hitch from a service station.'''&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;'''Spanish people will rob you'''. 
&lt;p&gt;''Truth'':  Indeed, Barcelona and Madrid score very high in the pickpocketing league, but this is something all locals are very embarrassed about. They will often advise you to keep an eye on your belongings and never put your wallet in the rear pocket. Pick pocketing operations are usually carried out by some North Africans of poor backgrounds who make petty crime a way of living. The best advice is to avoid as much as possible the touristy  areas.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ol&gt;

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Sleeping ==

===Wild camping and Bivouacking ===

It is legal to wild camp for free in Spain as long as you camp when the sun sets and  leave early  in the morning. This is called  pernoctation  and the forest guards will not bother you if you explain that you know what you are doing. Remember  that lighting a fire is forbid in most of the Spanish regions.   

If you go to Spain during the summer months (June-August) it will be warm enough in the night to bivouac (sleep outdoors without a tent). However, it is recommended to take a thick sleeping bag because temperatures can drop to 10 celsius degrees in the north, the ''meseta'', and hilly areas. Although it  might seem very bohemian and romantic, avoid sleeping in a beach. Especially if it is populated  by drunk people and ''guiris'' (Spanish despective word for stereotypical north-European tourists that come to Spain for cheap alcohol and street sex). Chances are you will get stolen  by pickpockets who go to those beaches to take advantage of the wealthy, drunk ''guiris''. 

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

===Hostels and Pensions ===

There are plenty of backpacker's hostels in big and not-so-big cities in Spain that you will find online through sites like www.hostelworld.com . A cheap hostel you can find online might cost between 10 and 20 euros depending on the season  and the region (Basque Country, Catalonia and Madrid are usually more expensive than the rest of the country). 

Now,  here is the little secret that Spaniards know and you don't, A vast majority of cheap ''pensiones'' do not appear on the internet and you will hardly find any information on google or tourism offices. This is probably because the owner of the "pension" or hostel might be an old lady that rents a room in some kind of not very legal way. ''Pensiones''  can vary in cost and luxury, depending on the number of stars you find under the "P" sign. The best thing to do is to go to the city hall and ask for the yellow pages book  ''Páginas amarillas'', call the pensions and ask for the price. You will need to speak Spanish here, or find someone that can speak Spanish for you  because most old ladies do not speak English. It is a good idea to ask the locals if they know a cheap place to stay, or even ask so to other pension owners. 

===Pilgrim hostels (Camino de Santiago) ===

Camino de Santiago is a legendary long hiking pilgrimage trail that can be started from almost anywhere in Europe. It ends in Santiago de Compostela, a beautiful city in the heart of Galicia. Obviously, this trail reaches its highest fame rate in  Spain, where it is known by everyone and is even  part of  folklore.  Nowadays, pilgrims that go to Santiago are backpackers from all around the world with varied reasons for walking (some religious, some for fun etc). There is a broad net of  ''albergues de peregrinos'' (pilgrim hostels) all around Spain for the pilgrims to spend the night after a day of walking. Those are undoubtedly the cheapest accommodation in the country. The price can vary from 5 to 10 euros and even some religious centres offer it for free or the will.

In most cases, to use the pilgrim albergues you will  need to prove that you are a pilgrim with a ''credencial'', a passport with the stamps of the towns that the pilgrim has passed by in his journey. You can get your credencial in any church/city hall through which the Camino passes. Lately, people do the Camino in many different ways and directions, Some even by car. So do not be shy about asking the ''albergue'' owners for a bed or help. If you are friendly, they will be too.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.



==Links==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/174166089591892/ Facebook group for hitchhiking in Spain]
* [https://warmroads.de/hitchhiking-in-2-spain/ Short anlyses of hitchhiking in Spain - warmroads.]

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]
[[nomad:Spain]]
[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>mmepsdktz4amxgtmkqp1lnee5ly0f20</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>85557</id>
      <parentid>84969</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-03-07T18:54:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Ratodoporao</username>
        <id>4395</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19162">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, e.g. in service stations, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road. 
Generally, there are petrol stations every 20-30 km, often in a so-called "via de servicio", along with a hotel or a restaurant. This means that each and every one of those petrol stations has less traffic. Most people who travel certain roads regularly will know (or pretend to know!) the good spots where a lot of traffic passes through (e.g. truck stops, or nice restaurants). Try not to get stuck in places off the main road (in a village, or an industrial zone), but ask your driver if s/he knows a place with lots of people. 

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. If you do master some Spanish, however, and if you carefully stick to service stations asking people, hitching can be easy and fun - even in Spain. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

As hitch-hiking is not a very common concept in Spain, many Spanish people travel via blablacar. If you want to get out of big cities (Madrid, Barcelona) you might have to pay 3-5 Euros to get to a hitch-hiking spot. In this case, consider finding a short ride just out of the city to a nearby small town, with blablacar. The driver can drop you directly on a service station on the motorway, and you might not have to walk around in the Spanish summer heat. 

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun called Oyarzun (accessible in both directions).

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, and parts of the center and the North, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road; this system is called ''autovia''. [http://motorways-exitlists.com/europe/e/spain.htm This website] shows exits and also service areas for some ''autovias'', as well as ''autopistas.'' It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).


== Crossing Spain to get to Portugal ==

If you just want to get to Portugal, you'll want to to keep your hitch journey in Spain as short and quick as possible. This will happen by sticking to the the main road (AP-1, A-62, mostly "autovia") from Bayonne/San Sebastian to Salamanca / Vilar Formoso (the portuguese border near Guarda). Even if you come from, say, Montpellier, it's recommended to hitch up to Bayonne and cross the basque country.
A good technique is to stay in one of the last service stations on the A63 in France before the spanish border, and wait for someone who can take you all to way to Portugal. Portuguese plates (1/3 of portuguese nationals live outside Portugal) or tourists (20 million invaded Portugal in 2016) will pass there.  
Otherwise, don't let your drivers drop you at just any gas station along the way - try your best to stick to busy ones (on the right side and near the highway, Repsol and Galp).
If your ride is only taking you to somewhere near Vilar Formoso border and you want to go further in Portugal, you can stay at the last Cepsa gas station on the right side of the road, 5kms before the border. Gas is cheaper in Spain.  


== License Plate IDs ==

Pro tip: Under the old licensing system, license plates got identifying letters showing the city/region where the car is registered.  This is great for quickly identifying (at least on old cars) if the car is heading your way.  i.e. lots of old "B" plates out there going to and from Barcelona.  Read more: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Spain#Old_provincial_codes]

== Myths and truths about hitchhiking in Spain ==

&lt;ol&gt;
&lt;li&gt;'''It is illegal to hitchhike in Spain.'''  
&lt;p&gt;''Truth'': This assertion that you will hear from both the locals and the travellers is a result of a wrong understanding of the Spanish law that forbids pedestrians walking on a private motorway. Therefore, '''it is absolutely ''legal'' to hitchhike in Spain'''.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;'''It is ''impossible'' to travel hitchhiking in Spain'''.  
&lt;p&gt;''Truth'': While it is definitely harder to catch a ride in Spain than in Germany, it is not impossible if done smartly. Actually, in many areas in the countryside or the north of Spain where there are very few means of public transportation, hitchhiking is done frequently by locals who need to take  rides from town to town (Galicia and its messy bus network is a great example of this). However, many old Spaniards believe that hitchhiking culture died in the 70s, and there is a lot of fear around, because of some cases of theft or rape when hitching. To get a ride in Spain you will need to put more effort and think tactical: '''hide the hippy clothes in your backpack and look clean, smile, know a few Spanish words, be polite, be familiar with the  Spanish hours and always try to hitch from a service station.'''&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;'''Spanish people will rob you'''. 
&lt;p&gt;''Truth'':  Indeed, Barcelona and Madrid score very high in the pickpocketing league, but this is something all locals are very embarrassed about. They will often advise you to keep an eye on your belongings and never put your wallet in the rear pocket. Pick pocketing operations are usually carried out by some North Africans of poor backgrounds who make petty crime a way of living. The best advice is to avoid as much as possible the touristy  areas.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ol&gt;

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Sleeping ==

===Wild camping and Bivouacking ===

It is legal to wild camp for free in Spain as long as you camp when the sun sets and  leave early  in the morning. This is called  pernoctation  and the forest guards will not bother you if you explain that you know what you are doing. Remember  that lighting a fire is forbid in most of the Spanish regions.   

If you go to Spain during the summer months (June-August) it will be warm enough in the night to bivouac (sleep outdoors without a tent). However, it is recommended to take a thick sleeping bag because temperatures can drop to 10 celsius degrees in the north, the ''meseta'', and hilly areas. Although it  might seem very bohemian and romantic, avoid sleeping in a beach. Especially if it is populated  by drunk people and ''guiris'' (Spanish despective word for stereotypical north-European tourists that come to Spain for cheap alcohol and street sex). Chances are you will get stolen  by pickpockets who go to those beaches to take advantage of the wealthy, drunk ''guiris''. 

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

===Hostels and Pensions ===

There are plenty of backpacker's hostels in big and not-so-big cities in Spain that you will find online through sites like www.hostelworld.com . A cheap hostel you can find online might cost between 10 and 20 euros depending on the season  and the region (Basque Country, Catalonia and Madrid are usually more expensive than the rest of the country). 

Now,  here is the little secret that Spaniards know and you don't, A vast majority of cheap ''pensiones'' do not appear on the internet and you will hardly find any information on google or tourism offices. This is probably because the owner of the "pension" or hostel might be an old lady that rents a room in some kind of not very legal way. ''Pensiones''  can vary in cost and luxury, depending on the number of stars you find under the "P" sign. The best thing to do is to go to the city hall and ask for the yellow pages book  ''Páginas amarillas'', call the pensions and ask for the price. You will need to speak Spanish here, or find someone that can speak Spanish for you  because most old ladies do not speak English. It is a good idea to ask the locals if they know a cheap place to stay, or even ask so to other pension owners. 

===Pilgrim hostels (Camino de Santiago) ===

Camino de Santiago is a legendary long hiking pilgrimage trail that can be started from almost anywhere in Europe. It ends in Santiago de Compostela, a beautiful city in the heart of Galicia. Obviously, this trail reaches its highest fame rate in  Spain, where it is known by everyone and is even  part of  folklore.  Nowadays, pilgrims that go to Santiago are backpackers from all around the world with varied reasons for walking (some religious, some for fun etc). There is a broad net of  ''albergues de peregrinos'' (pilgrim hostels) all around Spain for the pilgrims to spend the night after a day of walking. Those are undoubtedly the cheapest accommodation in the country. The price can vary from 5 to 10 euros and even some religious centres offer it for free or the will.

In most cases, to use the pilgrim albergues you will  need to prove that you are a pilgrim with a ''credencial'', a passport with the stamps of the towns that the pilgrim has passed by in his journey. You can get your credencial in any church/city hall through which the Camino passes. Lately, people do the Camino in many different ways and directions, Some even by car. So do not be shy about asking the ''albergue'' owners for a bed or help. If you are friendly, they will be too.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.



==Links==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/174166089591892/ Facebook group for hitchhiking in Spain]
* [https://warmroads.de/hitchhiking-in-2-spain/ Short anlyses of hitchhiking in Spain - warmroads.]

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]
[[nomad:Spain]]
[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>gdjabec2fgil9s011dioqbz1oy1it9n</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>85558</id>
      <parentid>85557</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-03-07T18:55:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Ratodoporao</username>
        <id>4395</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19165">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, e.g. in service stations, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road. 
Generally, there are petrol stations every 20-30 km, often in a so-called "via de servicio", along with a hotel or a restaurant. This means that each and every one of those petrol stations has less traffic. Most people who travel certain roads regularly will know (or pretend to know!) the good spots where a lot of traffic passes through (e.g. truck stops, or nice restaurants). Try not to get stuck in places off the main road (in a village, or an industrial zone), but ask your driver if s/he knows a place with lots of people. 

Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. If you do master some Spanish, however, and if you carefully stick to service stations asking people, hitching can be easy and fun - even in Spain. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

As hitch-hiking is not a very common concept in Spain, many Spanish people travel via blablacar. If you want to get out of big cities (Madrid, Barcelona) you might have to pay 3-5 Euros to get to a hitch-hiking spot. In this case, consider finding a short ride just out of the city to a nearby small town, with blablacar. The driver can drop you directly on a service station on the motorway, and you might not have to walk around in the Spanish summer heat. 

[[File:Espana.jpg|thumb|left|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching to Spain from [[Portugal]].]]
[[File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|left|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].]]

== Border crossing ==

When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun called Oyarzun (accessible in both directions).

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

== Road network ==

The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, and parts of the center and the North, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road; this system is called ''autovia''. [http://motorways-exitlists.com/europe/e/spain.htm This website] shows exits and also service areas for some ''autovias'', as well as ''autopistas.'' It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).


== Crossing Spain to get to Portugal ==

If you just want to get to Portugal, you'll want to to keep your hitch journey in Spain as short and quick as possible. This will happen by sticking to the the main road (AP-1, A-62, mostly "autovia") from Bayonne/San Sebastian to Salamanca / Vilar Formoso (the portuguese border near Guarda). Even if you come from, say, Montpellier, it's recommended to hitch up to Bayonne and cross the basque country.

A good technique is to stay in one of the last service stations on the A63 in France before the spanish border, and wait for someone who can take you all to way to Portugal. Portuguese plates (1/3 of portuguese nationals live outside Portugal) or tourists (20 million invaded Portugal in 2016) will pass there.  

Otherwise, don't let your drivers drop you at just any gas station along the way - try your best to stick to busy ones (on the right side and near the highway, Repsol and Galp).

If your ride is only taking you to somewhere near Vilar Formoso border and you want to go further in Portugal, you can stay at the last Cepsa gas station on the right side of the road, 5kms before the border. Gas is cheaper in Spain.  


== License Plate IDs ==

Pro tip: Under the old licensing system, license plates got identifying letters showing the city/region where the car is registered.  This is great for quickly identifying (at least on old cars) if the car is heading your way.  i.e. lots of old "B" plates out there going to and from Barcelona.  Read more: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Spain#Old_provincial_codes]

== Myths and truths about hitchhiking in Spain ==

&lt;ol&gt;
&lt;li&gt;'''It is illegal to hitchhike in Spain.'''  
&lt;p&gt;''Truth'': This assertion that you will hear from both the locals and the travellers is a result of a wrong understanding of the Spanish law that forbids pedestrians walking on a private motorway. Therefore, '''it is absolutely ''legal'' to hitchhike in Spain'''.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;'''It is ''impossible'' to travel hitchhiking in Spain'''.  
&lt;p&gt;''Truth'': While it is definitely harder to catch a ride in Spain than in Germany, it is not impossible if done smartly. Actually, in many areas in the countryside or the north of Spain where there are very few means of public transportation, hitchhiking is done frequently by locals who need to take  rides from town to town (Galicia and its messy bus network is a great example of this). However, many old Spaniards believe that hitchhiking culture died in the 70s, and there is a lot of fear around, because of some cases of theft or rape when hitching. To get a ride in Spain you will need to put more effort and think tactical: '''hide the hippy clothes in your backpack and look clean, smile, know a few Spanish words, be polite, be familiar with the  Spanish hours and always try to hitch from a service station.'''&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/li&gt;

&lt;li&gt;'''Spanish people will rob you'''. 
&lt;p&gt;''Truth'':  Indeed, Barcelona and Madrid score very high in the pickpocketing league, but this is something all locals are very embarrassed about. They will often advise you to keep an eye on your belongings and never put your wallet in the rear pocket. Pick pocketing operations are usually carried out by some North Africans of poor backgrounds who make petty crime a way of living. The best advice is to avoid as much as possible the touristy  areas.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ol&gt;

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===

The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Sleeping ==

===Wild camping and Bivouacking ===

It is legal to wild camp for free in Spain as long as you camp when the sun sets and  leave early  in the morning. This is called  pernoctation  and the forest guards will not bother you if you explain that you know what you are doing. Remember  that lighting a fire is forbid in most of the Spanish regions.   

If you go to Spain during the summer months (June-August) it will be warm enough in the night to bivouac (sleep outdoors without a tent). However, it is recommended to take a thick sleeping bag because temperatures can drop to 10 celsius degrees in the north, the ''meseta'', and hilly areas. Although it  might seem very bohemian and romantic, avoid sleeping in a beach. Especially if it is populated  by drunk people and ''guiris'' (Spanish despective word for stereotypical north-European tourists that come to Spain for cheap alcohol and street sex). Chances are you will get stolen  by pickpockets who go to those beaches to take advantage of the wealthy, drunk ''guiris''. 

===Squatting ===

Despite the fact that many houses have been shut down lately, Spain has a very active squatting scene. It’s quite easy to find a place to crash by asking around for a ''casa okupada''.

===Hostels and Pensions ===

There are plenty of backpacker's hostels in big and not-so-big cities in Spain that you will find online through sites like www.hostelworld.com . A cheap hostel you can find online might cost between 10 and 20 euros depending on the season  and the region (Basque Country, Catalonia and Madrid are usually more expensive than the rest of the country). 

Now,  here is the little secret that Spaniards know and you don't, A vast majority of cheap ''pensiones'' do not appear on the internet and you will hardly find any information on google or tourism offices. This is probably because the owner of the "pension" or hostel might be an old lady that rents a room in some kind of not very legal way. ''Pensiones''  can vary in cost and luxury, depending on the number of stars you find under the "P" sign. The best thing to do is to go to the city hall and ask for the yellow pages book  ''Páginas amarillas'', call the pensions and ask for the price. You will need to speak Spanish here, or find someone that can speak Spanish for you  because most old ladies do not speak English. It is a good idea to ask the locals if they know a cheap place to stay, or even ask so to other pension owners. 

===Pilgrim hostels (Camino de Santiago) ===

Camino de Santiago is a legendary long hiking pilgrimage trail that can be started from almost anywhere in Europe. It ends in Santiago de Compostela, a beautiful city in the heart of Galicia. Obviously, this trail reaches its highest fame rate in  Spain, where it is known by everyone and is even  part of  folklore.  Nowadays, pilgrims that go to Santiago are backpackers from all around the world with varied reasons for walking (some religious, some for fun etc). There is a broad net of  ''albergues de peregrinos'' (pilgrim hostels) all around Spain for the pilgrims to spend the night after a day of walking. Those are undoubtedly the cheapest accommodation in the country. The price can vary from 5 to 10 euros and even some religious centres offer it for free or the will.

In most cases, to use the pilgrim albergues you will  need to prove that you are a pilgrim with a ''credencial'', a passport with the stamps of the towns that the pilgrim has passed by in his journey. You can get your credencial in any church/city hall through which the Camino passes. Lately, people do the Camino in many different ways and directions, Some even by car. So do not be shy about asking the ''albergue'' owners for a bed or help. If you are friendly, they will be too.

== Maps ==
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.



==Links==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/174166089591892/ Facebook group for hitchhiking in Spain]
* [https://warmroads.de/hitchhiking-in-2-spain/ Short anlyses of hitchhiking in Spain - warmroads.]

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== More Pictures ==
&lt;gallery perrow="3"&gt;
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[wikipedia:Spain]]
[[nomad:Spain]]
[[trash:Spain]]

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>43jkepzx6gu28iehwqtrr0d4z07th36</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>89599</id>
      <parentid>85558</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-10-07T12:57:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Traumschule</username>
        <id>28627</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15251">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, e.g. in service stations, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road. 
Generally, there are petrol stations every 20-30 km, often in a so-called "via de servicio", along with a hotel or a restaurant. This means that each and every one of those petrol stations has less traffic. Most people who travel certain roads regularly will know (or pretend to know!) the good spots where a lot of traffic passes through (e.g. truck stops, or nice restaurants). Try not to get stuck in places off the main road (in a village, or an industrial zone), but ask your driver if s/he knows a place with lots of people. 
__TOC__
Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. If you do master some Spanish, however, and if you carefully stick to service stations asking people, hitching can be easy and fun - even in Spain. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

As hitch-hiking is not a very common concept in Spain, many Spanish people travel via blablacar. If you want to get out of big cities (Madrid, Barcelona) you might have to pay 3-5 Euros to get to a hitch-hiking spot. In this case, consider finding a short ride just out of the city to a nearby small town, with blablacar. The driver can drop you directly on a service station on the motorway, and you might not have to walk around in the Spanish summer heat. 

&lt;gallery perrow="3" style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:20px;"&gt;
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|right|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== License Plate IDs ==
Pro tip: Under the old licensing system, license plates got identifying letters showing the city/region where the car is registered.  This is great for quickly identifying (at least on old cars) if the car is heading your way.  i.e. lots of old "B" plates out there going to and from Barcelona.  Read more: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Spain#Old_provincial_codes]

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, and parts of the center and the North, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road; this system is called ''autovia''. [http://motorways-exitlists.com/europe/e/spain.htm This website] shows exits and also service areas for some ''autovias'', as well as ''autopistas.'' It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Border crossing ==
When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun called Oyarzun (accessible in both directions).

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

=== Crossing Spain to get to Portugal ===
If you just want to get to Portugal, you'll want to to keep your hitch journey in Spain as short and quick as possible. This will happen by sticking to the the main road (AP-1, A-62, mostly "autovia") from Bayonne/San Sebastian to Salamanca / Vilar Formoso (the portuguese border near Guarda). Even if you come from, say, Montpellier, it's recommended to hitch up to Bayonne and cross the basque country.

A good technique is to stay in one of the last service stations on the A63 in France before the spanish border, and wait for someone who can take you all to way to Portugal. Portuguese plates (1/3 of portuguese nationals live outside Portugal) or tourists (20 million invaded Portugal in 2016) will pass there.  

Otherwise, don't let your drivers drop you at just any gas station along the way - try your best to stick to busy ones (on the right side and near the highway, Repsol and Galp).

If your ride is only taking you to somewhere near Vilar Formoso border and you want to go further in Portugal, you can stay at the last Cepsa gas station on the right side of the road, 5kms before the border. Gas is cheaper in Spain. 

== Myths and truths about hitchhiking in Spain ==
# '''It is illegal to hitchhike in Spain.'''&lt;br&gt;''Truth'': This assertion that you will hear from both the locals and the travellers is a result of a wrong understanding of the Spanish law that forbids pedestrians walking on a private motorway. Therefore, '''it is absolutely ''legal'' to hitchhike in Spain'''.
# '''It is ''impossible'' to travel hitchhiking in Spain'''.&lt;br&gt;''Truth'': While it is definitely harder to catch a ride in Spain than in Germany, it is not impossible if done smartly. Actually, in many areas in the countryside or the north of Spain where there are very few means of public transportation, hitchhiking is done frequently by locals who need to take  rides from town to town (Galicia and its messy bus network is a great example of this). However, many old Spaniards believe that hitchhiking culture died in the 70s, and there is a lot of fear around, because of some cases of theft or rape when hitching. To get a ride in Spain you will need to put more effort and think tactical: '''hide the hippy clothes in your backpack and look clean, smile, know a few Spanish words, be polite, be familiar with the  Spanish hours and always try to hitch from a service station.'''
# '''Spanish people will rob you'''.&lt;br&gt;''Truth'':  Indeed, Barcelona and Madrid score very high in the pickpocketing league, but this is something all locals are very embarrassed about. They will often advise you to keep an eye on your belongings and never put your wallet in the rear pocket. Pick pocketing operations are usually carried out by some North Africans of poor backgrounds who make petty crime a way of living. The best advice is to avoid as much as possible the touristy  areas.

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===
The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Resources ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/174166089591892/ Facebook group for hitchhiking in Spain]
* [https://warmroads.de/hitchhiking-in-2-spain/ Short anlyses of hitchhiking in Spain - warmroads.]
{{wikipedia-link|Spain}}
=== Maps ===
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}
[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>tqd6bpj6fboht2rvufhy0xafito8vl3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>91066</id>
      <parentid>89599</parentid>
      <timestamp>2018-06-05T12:47:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>ZacNFNP</username>
        <id>30279</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15120">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. However, the thumb will be understood. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, e.g. in service stations, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road. 
Generally, there are petrol stations every 20-30 km, often in a so-called "via de servicio", along with a hotel or a restaurant. This means that each and every one of those petrol stations has less traffic. Most people who travel certain roads regularly will know (or pretend to know!) the good spots where a lot of traffic passes through (e.g. truck stops, or nice restaurants). Try not to get stuck in places off the main road (in a village, or an industrial zone), but ask your driver if s/he knows a place with lots of people. 
__TOC__
Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. If you do master some Spanish, however, and if you carefully stick to service stations asking people, hitching can be easy and fun - even in Spain. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

As hitch-hiking is not a very common concept in Spain, many Spanish people travel via blablacar. If you want to get out of big cities (Madrid, Barcelona) you might have to pay 3-5 Euros to get to a hitch-hiking spot. In this case, consider finding a short ride just out of the city to a nearby small town, with blablacar. The driver can drop you directly on a service station on the motorway, and you might not have to walk around in the Spanish summer heat. 

&lt;gallery perrow="3" style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:20px;"&gt;
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|right|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== License Plate IDs ==
Pro tip: Under the old licensing system, license plates got identifying letters showing the city/region where the car is registered.  This is great for quickly identifying (at least on old cars) if the car is heading your way.  i.e. lots of old "B" plates out there going to and from Barcelona.  Read more: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Spain#Old_provincial_codes]

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, and parts of the center and the North, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road; this system is called ''autovia''. [http://motorways-exitlists.com/europe/e/spain.htm This website] shows exits and also service areas for some ''autovias'', as well as ''autopistas.'' It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Border crossing ==
When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun called Oyarzun (accessible in both directions).

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

=== Crossing Spain to get to Portugal ===
If you just want to get to Portugal, you'll want to to keep your hitch journey in Spain as short and quick as possible. This will happen by sticking to the the main road (AP-1, A-62, mostly "autovia") from Bayonne/San Sebastian to Salamanca / Vilar Formoso (the portuguese border near Guarda). Even if you come from, say, Montpellier, it's recommended to hitch up to Bayonne and cross the basque country.

A good technique is to stay in one of the last service stations on the A63 in France before the spanish border, and wait for someone who can take you all to way to Portugal. Portuguese plates (1/3 of portuguese nationals live outside Portugal) or tourists (20 million invaded Portugal in 2016) will pass there.  

Otherwise, don't let your drivers drop you at just any gas station along the way - try your best to stick to busy ones (on the right side and near the highway, Repsol and Galp).

If your ride is only taking you to somewhere near Vilar Formoso border and you want to go further in Portugal, you can stay at the last Cepsa gas station on the right side of the road, 5kms before the border. Gas is cheaper in Spain. 

== Myths and truths about hitchhiking in Spain ==
# '''It is illegal to hitchhike in Spain.'''&lt;br&gt;''Truth'': This assertion that you will hear from both the locals and the travellers is a result of a wrong understanding of the Spanish law that forbids pedestrians walking on a private motorway. Therefore, '''it is absolutely ''legal'' to hitchhike in Spain'''.
# '''It is ''impossible'' to travel hitchhiking in Spain'''.&lt;br&gt;''Truth'': While it is definitely harder to catch a ride in Spain than in Germany, it is not impossible if done smartly. Actually, in many areas in the countryside or the north of Spain where there are very few means of public transportation, hitchhiking is done frequently by locals who need to take  rides from town to town (Galicia and its messy bus network is a great example of this). However, many old Spaniards believe that hitchhiking culture died in the 70s, and there is a lot of fear around, because of some cases of theft or rape when hitching. To get a ride in Spain you will need to put more effort and think tactical: '''hide the hippy clothes in your backpack and look clean, smile, know a few Spanish words, be polite, be familiar with the  Spanish hours and always try to hitch from a service station.'''
# '''Spanish people will rob you'''.&lt;br&gt;''Truth'':  Indeed, Barcelona and Madrid score very high in the pickpocketing league, but this is something all locals are very embarrassed about. They will often advise you to keep an eye on your belongings and never put your wallet in the rear pocket. The best advice is to avoid as much as possible the touristy  areas.

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===
The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Resources ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/174166089591892/ Facebook group for hitchhiking in Spain]
* [https://warmroads.de/hitchhiking-in-2-spain/ Short anlyses of hitchhiking in Spain - warmroads.]
{{wikipedia-link|Spain}}
=== Maps ===
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}
[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>0nrksg96ezun6an20e9qplau5ho11rs</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>93004</id>
      <parentid>91066</parentid>
      <timestamp>2019-05-02T15:58:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Vivelecarton</username>
        <id>33182</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15400">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. But It's really different depending on the autonomous community : it's easy in Galicia, Asturia and Extrémadura. In these communities it works like in France. It's better to stand with a cardboard. In Euskadi and Catalonia, you will wait a long time just stand with a cardboard. However, the thumb will be understood. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, e.g. in service stations, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road. 
Generally, there are petrol stations every 20-30 km, often in a so-called "via de servicio", along with a hotel or a restaurant. This means that each and every one of those petrol stations has less traffic. Most people who travel certain roads regularly will know (or pretend to know!) the good spots where a lot of traffic passes through (e.g. truck stops, or nice restaurants). Try not to get stuck in places off the main road (in a village, or an industrial zone), but ask your driver if s/he knows a place with lots of people. 
__TOC__
Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. If you do master some Spanish, however, and if you carefully stick to service stations asking people, hitching can be easy and fun - even in Spain. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

As hitch-hiking is not a very common concept in Spain, many Spanish people travel via blablacar. If you want to get out of big cities (Madrid, Barcelona) you might have to pay 3-5 Euros to get to a hitch-hiking spot. In this case, consider finding a short ride just out of the city to a nearby small town, with blablacar. The driver can drop you directly on a service station on the motorway, and you might not have to walk around in the Spanish summer heat. 

&lt;gallery perrow="3" style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:20px;"&gt;
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|right|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== License Plate IDs ==
Pro tip: Under the old licensing system, license plates got identifying letters showing the city/region where the car is registered.  This is great for quickly identifying (at least on old cars) if the car is heading your way.  i.e. lots of old "B" plates out there going to and from Barcelona.  Read more: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Spain#Old_provincial_codes]

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, and parts of the center and the North, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road; this system is called ''autovia''. [http://motorways-exitlists.com/europe/e/spain.htm This website] shows exits and also service areas for some ''autovias'', as well as ''autopistas.'' It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Border crossing ==
When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun called Oyarzun (accessible in both directions).

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

=== Crossing Spain to get to Portugal ===
If you just want to get to Portugal, you'll want to to keep your hitch journey in Spain as short and quick as possible. This will happen by sticking to the the main road (AP-1, A-62, mostly "autovia") from Bayonne/San Sebastian to Salamanca / Vilar Formoso (the portuguese border near Guarda). Even if you come from, say, Montpellier, it's recommended to hitch up to Bayonne and cross the basque country.

A good technique is to stay in one of the last service stations on the A63 in France before the spanish border, and wait for someone who can take you all to way to Portugal. Portuguese plates (1/3 of portuguese nationals live outside Portugal) or tourists (20 million invaded Portugal in 2016) will pass there.  

Otherwise, don't let your drivers drop you at just any gas station along the way - try your best to stick to busy ones (on the right side and near the highway, Repsol and Galp).

If your ride is only taking you to somewhere near Vilar Formoso border and you want to go further in Portugal, you can stay at the last Cepsa gas station on the right side of the road, 5kms before the border. Gas is cheaper in Spain. 

== Myths and truths about hitchhiking in Spain ==
# '''It is illegal to hitchhike in Spain.'''&lt;br&gt;''Truth'': This assertion that you will hear from both the locals and the travellers is a result of a wrong understanding of the Spanish law that forbids pedestrians walking on a private motorway. Therefore, '''it is absolutely ''legal'' to hitchhike in Spain'''.
# '''It is ''impossible'' to travel hitchhiking in Spain'''.&lt;br&gt;''Truth'': While it is definitely harder to catch a ride in Spain than in Germany, it is not impossible if done smartly. Actually, in many areas in the countryside or the north of Spain where there are very few means of public transportation, hitchhiking is done frequently by locals who need to take  rides from town to town (Galicia and its messy bus network is a great example of this). However, many old Spaniards believe that hitchhiking culture died in the 70s, and there is a lot of fear around, because of some cases of theft or rape when hitching. To get a ride in Spain you will need to put more effort and think tactical: '''hide the hippy clothes in your backpack and look clean, smile, know a few Spanish words, be polite, be familiar with the  Spanish hours and always try to hitch from a service station.'''
# '''Spanish people will rob you'''.&lt;br&gt;''Truth'':  Indeed, Barcelona and Madrid score very high in the pickpocketing league, but this is something all locals are very embarrassed about. They will often advise you to keep an eye on your belongings and never put your wallet in the rear pocket. The best advice is to avoid as much as possible the touristy  areas.

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===
The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Resources ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/174166089591892/ Facebook group for hitchhiking in Spain]
* [https://warmroads.de/hitchhiking-in-2-spain/ Short anlyses of hitchhiking in Spain - warmroads.]
{{wikipedia-link|Spain}}
=== Maps ===
From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.

{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}
[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>jrtdwq60n9x3sxtbrqzpthsvtt039ft</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>97792</id>
      <parentid>93004</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-05-25T17:18:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Maps */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15464">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. But It's really different depending on the autonomous community : it's easy in Galicia, Asturia and Extrémadura. In these communities it works like in France. It's better to stand with a cardboard. In Euskadi and Catalonia, you will wait a long time just stand with a cardboard. However, the thumb will be understood. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, e.g. in service stations, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road. 
Generally, there are petrol stations every 20-30 km, often in a so-called "via de servicio", along with a hotel or a restaurant. This means that each and every one of those petrol stations has less traffic. Most people who travel certain roads regularly will know (or pretend to know!) the good spots where a lot of traffic passes through (e.g. truck stops, or nice restaurants). Try not to get stuck in places off the main road (in a village, or an industrial zone), but ask your driver if s/he knows a place with lots of people. 
__TOC__
Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. If you do master some Spanish, however, and if you carefully stick to service stations asking people, hitching can be easy and fun - even in Spain. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

As hitch-hiking is not a very common concept in Spain, many Spanish people travel via blablacar. If you want to get out of big cities (Madrid, Barcelona) you might have to pay 3-5 Euros to get to a hitch-hiking spot. In this case, consider finding a short ride just out of the city to a nearby small town, with blablacar. The driver can drop you directly on a service station on the motorway, and you might not have to walk around in the Spanish summer heat. 

&lt;gallery perrow="3" style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:20px;"&gt;
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|right|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== License Plate IDs ==
Pro tip: Under the old licensing system, license plates got identifying letters showing the city/region where the car is registered.  This is great for quickly identifying (at least on old cars) if the car is heading your way.  i.e. lots of old "B" plates out there going to and from Barcelona.  Read more: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Spain#Old_provincial_codes]

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, and parts of the center and the North, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road; this system is called ''autovia''. [http://motorways-exitlists.com/europe/e/spain.htm This website] shows exits and also service areas for some ''autovias'', as well as ''autopistas.'' It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Border crossing ==
When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun called Oyarzun (accessible in both directions).

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

=== Crossing Spain to get to Portugal ===
If you just want to get to Portugal, you'll want to to keep your hitch journey in Spain as short and quick as possible. This will happen by sticking to the the main road (AP-1, A-62, mostly "autovia") from Bayonne/San Sebastian to Salamanca / Vilar Formoso (the portuguese border near Guarda). Even if you come from, say, Montpellier, it's recommended to hitch up to Bayonne and cross the basque country.

A good technique is to stay in one of the last service stations on the A63 in France before the spanish border, and wait for someone who can take you all to way to Portugal. Portuguese plates (1/3 of portuguese nationals live outside Portugal) or tourists (20 million invaded Portugal in 2016) will pass there.  

Otherwise, don't let your drivers drop you at just any gas station along the way - try your best to stick to busy ones (on the right side and near the highway, Repsol and Galp).

If your ride is only taking you to somewhere near Vilar Formoso border and you want to go further in Portugal, you can stay at the last Cepsa gas station on the right side of the road, 5kms before the border. Gas is cheaper in Spain. 

== Myths and truths about hitchhiking in Spain ==
# '''It is illegal to hitchhike in Spain.'''&lt;br&gt;''Truth'': This assertion that you will hear from both the locals and the travellers is a result of a wrong understanding of the Spanish law that forbids pedestrians walking on a private motorway. Therefore, '''it is absolutely ''legal'' to hitchhike in Spain'''.
# '''It is ''impossible'' to travel hitchhiking in Spain'''.&lt;br&gt;''Truth'': While it is definitely harder to catch a ride in Spain than in Germany, it is not impossible if done smartly. Actually, in many areas in the countryside or the north of Spain where there are very few means of public transportation, hitchhiking is done frequently by locals who need to take  rides from town to town (Galicia and its messy bus network is a great example of this). However, many old Spaniards believe that hitchhiking culture died in the 70s, and there is a lot of fear around, because of some cases of theft or rape when hitching. To get a ride in Spain you will need to put more effort and think tactical: '''hide the hippy clothes in your backpack and look clean, smile, know a few Spanish words, be polite, be familiar with the  Spanish hours and always try to hitch from a service station.'''
# '''Spanish people will rob you'''.&lt;br&gt;''Truth'':  Indeed, Barcelona and Madrid score very high in the pickpocketing league, but this is something all locals are very embarrassed about. They will often advise you to keep an eye on your belongings and never put your wallet in the rear pocket. The best advice is to avoid as much as possible the touristy  areas.

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===
The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Resources ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/174166089591892/ Facebook group for hitchhiking in Spain]
* [https://warmroads.de/hitchhiking-in-2-spain/ Short anlyses of hitchhiking in Spain - warmroads.]
{{wikipedia-link|Spain}}
=== Maps ===

From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.


== Trashwiki &amp; Nomadwiki ==

[[trash:Spain]] [[nomad:Spain]


{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}
[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>qi0q1n8kyrseh1vg8u60kbkaqksnegq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>97918</id>
      <parentid>97792</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-06-06T13:18:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Trashwiki &amp; Nomadwiki */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15466">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. But It's really different depending on the autonomous community : it's easy in Galicia, Asturia and Extrémadura. In these communities it works like in France. It's better to stand with a cardboard. In Euskadi and Catalonia, you will wait a long time just stand with a cardboard. However, the thumb will be understood. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, e.g. in service stations, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road. 
Generally, there are petrol stations every 20-30 km, often in a so-called "via de servicio", along with a hotel or a restaurant. This means that each and every one of those petrol stations has less traffic. Most people who travel certain roads regularly will know (or pretend to know!) the good spots where a lot of traffic passes through (e.g. truck stops, or nice restaurants). Try not to get stuck in places off the main road (in a village, or an industrial zone), but ask your driver if s/he knows a place with lots of people. 
__TOC__
Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. If you do master some Spanish, however, and if you carefully stick to service stations asking people, hitching can be easy and fun - even in Spain. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

As hitch-hiking is not a very common concept in Spain, many Spanish people travel via blablacar. If you want to get out of big cities (Madrid, Barcelona) you might have to pay 3-5 Euros to get to a hitch-hiking spot. In this case, consider finding a short ride just out of the city to a nearby small town, with blablacar. The driver can drop you directly on a service station on the motorway, and you might not have to walk around in the Spanish summer heat. 

&lt;gallery perrow="3" style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:20px;"&gt;
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|right|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== License Plate IDs ==
Pro tip: Under the old licensing system, license plates got identifying letters showing the city/region where the car is registered.  This is great for quickly identifying (at least on old cars) if the car is heading your way.  i.e. lots of old "B" plates out there going to and from Barcelona.  Read more: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Spain#Old_provincial_codes]

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, and parts of the center and the North, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road; this system is called ''autovia''. [http://motorways-exitlists.com/europe/e/spain.htm This website] shows exits and also service areas for some ''autovias'', as well as ''autopistas.'' It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Border crossing ==
When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun called Oyarzun (accessible in both directions).

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

=== Crossing Spain to get to Portugal ===
If you just want to get to Portugal, you'll want to to keep your hitch journey in Spain as short and quick as possible. This will happen by sticking to the the main road (AP-1, A-62, mostly "autovia") from Bayonne/San Sebastian to Salamanca / Vilar Formoso (the portuguese border near Guarda). Even if you come from, say, Montpellier, it's recommended to hitch up to Bayonne and cross the basque country.

A good technique is to stay in one of the last service stations on the A63 in France before the spanish border, and wait for someone who can take you all to way to Portugal. Portuguese plates (1/3 of portuguese nationals live outside Portugal) or tourists (20 million invaded Portugal in 2016) will pass there.  

Otherwise, don't let your drivers drop you at just any gas station along the way - try your best to stick to busy ones (on the right side and near the highway, Repsol and Galp).

If your ride is only taking you to somewhere near Vilar Formoso border and you want to go further in Portugal, you can stay at the last Cepsa gas station on the right side of the road, 5kms before the border. Gas is cheaper in Spain. 

== Myths and truths about hitchhiking in Spain ==
# '''It is illegal to hitchhike in Spain.'''&lt;br&gt;''Truth'': This assertion that you will hear from both the locals and the travellers is a result of a wrong understanding of the Spanish law that forbids pedestrians walking on a private motorway. Therefore, '''it is absolutely ''legal'' to hitchhike in Spain'''.
# '''It is ''impossible'' to travel hitchhiking in Spain'''.&lt;br&gt;''Truth'': While it is definitely harder to catch a ride in Spain than in Germany, it is not impossible if done smartly. Actually, in many areas in the countryside or the north of Spain where there are very few means of public transportation, hitchhiking is done frequently by locals who need to take  rides from town to town (Galicia and its messy bus network is a great example of this). However, many old Spaniards believe that hitchhiking culture died in the 70s, and there is a lot of fear around, because of some cases of theft or rape when hitching. To get a ride in Spain you will need to put more effort and think tactical: '''hide the hippy clothes in your backpack and look clean, smile, know a few Spanish words, be polite, be familiar with the  Spanish hours and always try to hitch from a service station.'''
# '''Spanish people will rob you'''.&lt;br&gt;''Truth'':  Indeed, Barcelona and Madrid score very high in the pickpocketing league, but this is something all locals are very embarrassed about. They will often advise you to keep an eye on your belongings and never put your wallet in the rear pocket. The best advice is to avoid as much as possible the touristy  areas.

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===
The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Resources ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/174166089591892/ Facebook group for hitchhiking in Spain]
* [https://warmroads.de/hitchhiking-in-2-spain/ Short anlyses of hitchhiking in Spain - warmroads.]
{{wikipedia-link|Spain}}
=== Maps ===

From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.


== Trashwiki &amp; Nomadwiki ==

[[trash:Spain]] [[nomad:Spain]]



{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}
[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>sn74xfnjnjywoqp475kxriecspujscx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>99345</id>
      <parentid>97918</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-10-02T15:09:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Trashwiki &amp; Nomadwiki */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15466">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. But It's really different depending on the autonomous community : it's easy in Galicia, Asturia and Extrémadura. In these communities it works like in France. It's better to stand with a cardboard. In Euskadi and Catalonia, you will wait a long time just stand with a cardboard. However, the thumb will be understood. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, e.g. in service stations, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road. 
Generally, there are petrol stations every 20-30 km, often in a so-called "via de servicio", along with a hotel or a restaurant. This means that each and every one of those petrol stations has less traffic. Most people who travel certain roads regularly will know (or pretend to know!) the good spots where a lot of traffic passes through (e.g. truck stops, or nice restaurants). Try not to get stuck in places off the main road (in a village, or an industrial zone), but ask your driver if s/he knows a place with lots of people. 
__TOC__
Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. If you do master some Spanish, however, and if you carefully stick to service stations asking people, hitching can be easy and fun - even in Spain. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

As hitch-hiking is not a very common concept in Spain, many Spanish people travel via blablacar. If you want to get out of big cities (Madrid, Barcelona) you might have to pay 3-5 Euros to get to a hitch-hiking spot. In this case, consider finding a short ride just out of the city to a nearby small town, with blablacar. The driver can drop you directly on a service station on the motorway, and you might not have to walk around in the Spanish summer heat. 

&lt;gallery perrow="3" style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:20px;"&gt;
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|right|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== License Plate IDs ==
Pro tip: Under the old licensing system, license plates got identifying letters showing the city/region where the car is registered.  This is great for quickly identifying (at least on old cars) if the car is heading your way.  i.e. lots of old "B" plates out there going to and from Barcelona.  Read more: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Spain#Old_provincial_codes]

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, and parts of the center and the North, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road; this system is called ''autovia''. [http://motorways-exitlists.com/europe/e/spain.htm This website] shows exits and also service areas for some ''autovias'', as well as ''autopistas.'' It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Border crossing ==
When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun called Oyarzun (accessible in both directions).

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

=== Crossing Spain to get to Portugal ===
If you just want to get to Portugal, you'll want to to keep your hitch journey in Spain as short and quick as possible. This will happen by sticking to the the main road (AP-1, A-62, mostly "autovia") from Bayonne/San Sebastian to Salamanca / Vilar Formoso (the portuguese border near Guarda). Even if you come from, say, Montpellier, it's recommended to hitch up to Bayonne and cross the basque country.

A good technique is to stay in one of the last service stations on the A63 in France before the spanish border, and wait for someone who can take you all to way to Portugal. Portuguese plates (1/3 of portuguese nationals live outside Portugal) or tourists (20 million invaded Portugal in 2016) will pass there.  

Otherwise, don't let your drivers drop you at just any gas station along the way - try your best to stick to busy ones (on the right side and near the highway, Repsol and Galp).

If your ride is only taking you to somewhere near Vilar Formoso border and you want to go further in Portugal, you can stay at the last Cepsa gas station on the right side of the road, 5kms before the border. Gas is cheaper in Spain. 

== Myths and truths about hitchhiking in Spain ==
# '''It is illegal to hitchhike in Spain.'''&lt;br&gt;''Truth'': This assertion that you will hear from both the locals and the travellers is a result of a wrong understanding of the Spanish law that forbids pedestrians walking on a private motorway. Therefore, '''it is absolutely ''legal'' to hitchhike in Spain'''.
# '''It is ''impossible'' to travel hitchhiking in Spain'''.&lt;br&gt;''Truth'': While it is definitely harder to catch a ride in Spain than in Germany, it is not impossible if done smartly. Actually, in many areas in the countryside or the north of Spain where there are very few means of public transportation, hitchhiking is done frequently by locals who need to take  rides from town to town (Galicia and its messy bus network is a great example of this). However, many old Spaniards believe that hitchhiking culture died in the 70s, and there is a lot of fear around, because of some cases of theft or rape when hitching. To get a ride in Spain you will need to put more effort and think tactical: '''hide the hippy clothes in your backpack and look clean, smile, know a few Spanish words, be polite, be familiar with the  Spanish hours and always try to hitch from a service station.'''
# '''Spanish people will rob you'''.&lt;br&gt;''Truth'':  Indeed, Barcelona and Madrid score very high in the pickpocketing league, but this is something all locals are very embarrassed about. They will often advise you to keep an eye on your belongings and never put your wallet in the rear pocket. The best advice is to avoid as much as possible the touristy  areas.

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===
The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Resources ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/174166089591892/ Facebook group for hitchhiking in Spain]
* [https://warmroads.de/hitchhiking-in-2-spain/ Short anlyses of hitchhiking in Spain - warmroads.]
{{wikipedia-link|Spain}}
=== Maps ===

From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

[[trash:Spain]] [[nomad:Spain]]



{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}
[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>2cqgkzyycp8vlzz2951cde6p2scvpzq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>99745</id>
      <parentid>99345</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-10-15T13:52:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15448">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. But It's really different depending on the autonomous community : it's easy in Galicia, Asturia and Extrémadura. In these communities it works like in France. It's better to stand with a cardboard. In Euskadi and Catalonia, you will wait a long time just stand with a cardboard. However, the thumb will be understood. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, e.g. in service stations, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road. 
Generally, there are petrol stations every 20-30 km, often in a so-called "via de servicio", along with a hotel or a restaurant. This means that each and every one of those petrol stations has less traffic. Most people who travel certain roads regularly will know (or pretend to know!) the good spots where a lot of traffic passes through (e.g. truck stops, or nice restaurants). Try not to get stuck in places off the main road (in a village, or an industrial zone), but ask your driver if s/he knows a place with lots of people. 
__TOC__
Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. If you do master some Spanish, however, and if you carefully stick to service stations asking people, hitching can be easy and fun - even in Spain. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

As hitch-hiking is not a very common concept in Spain, many Spanish people travel via blablacar. If you want to get out of big cities (Madrid, Barcelona) you might have to pay 3-5 Euros to get to a hitch-hiking spot. In this case, consider finding a short ride just out of the city to a nearby small town, with blablacar. The driver can drop you directly on a service station on the motorway, and you might not have to walk around in the Spanish summer heat. 

&lt;gallery perrow="3" style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:20px;"&gt;
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|right|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== License Plate IDs ==
Pro tip: Under the old licensing system, license plates got identifying letters showing the city/region where the car is registered.  This is great for quickly identifying (at least on old cars) if the car is heading your way.  i.e. lots of old "B" plates out there going to and from Barcelona.  Read more: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Spain#Old_provincial_codes]

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, and parts of the center and the North, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road; this system is called ''autovia''. [http://motorways-exitlists.com/europe/e/spain.htm This website] shows exits and also service areas for some ''autovias'', as well as ''autopistas.'' It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Border crossing ==
When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun called Oyarzun (accessible in both directions).

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

=== Crossing Spain to get to Portugal ===
If you just want to get to Portugal, you'll want to to keep your hitch journey in Spain as short and quick as possible. This will happen by sticking to the the main road (AP-1, A-62, mostly "autovia") from Bayonne/San Sebastian to Salamanca / Vilar Formoso (the portuguese border near Guarda). Even if you come from, say, Montpellier, it's recommended to hitch up to Bayonne and cross the basque country.

A good technique is to stay in one of the last service stations on the A63 in France before the spanish border, and wait for someone who can take you all to way to Portugal. Portuguese plates (1/3 of portuguese nationals live outside Portugal) or tourists (20 million invaded Portugal in 2016) will pass there.  

Otherwise, don't let your drivers drop you at just any gas station along the way - try your best to stick to busy ones (on the right side and near the highway, Repsol and Galp).

If your ride is only taking you to somewhere near Vilar Formoso border and you want to go further in Portugal, you can stay at the last Cepsa gas station on the right side of the road, 5kms before the border. Gas is cheaper in Spain. 

== Myths and truths about hitchhiking in Spain ==
# '''It is illegal to hitchhike in Spain.'''&lt;br&gt;''Truth'': This assertion that you will hear from both the locals and the travellers is a result of a wrong understanding of the Spanish law that forbids pedestrians walking on a private motorway. Therefore, '''it is absolutely ''legal'' to hitchhike in Spain'''.
# '''It is ''impossible'' to travel hitchhiking in Spain'''.&lt;br&gt;''Truth'': While it is definitely harder to catch a ride in Spain than in Germany, it is not impossible if done smartly. Actually, in many areas in the countryside or the north of Spain where there are very few means of public transportation, hitchhiking is done frequently by locals who need to take  rides from town to town (Galicia and its messy bus network is a great example of this). However, many old Spaniards believe that hitchhiking culture died in the 70s, and there is a lot of fear around, because of some cases of theft or rape when hitching. To get a ride in Spain you will need to put more effort and think tactical: '''hide the hippy clothes in your backpack and look clean, smile, know a few Spanish words, be polite, be familiar with the  Spanish hours and always try to hitch from a service station.'''
# '''Spanish people will rob you'''.&lt;br&gt;''Truth'':  Indeed, Barcelona and Madrid score very high in the pickpocketing league, but this is something all locals are very embarrassed about. They will often advise you to keep an eye on your belongings and never put your wallet in the rear pocket. The best advice is to avoid as much as possible the touristy  areas.

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===
The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Resources ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/174166089591892/ Facebook group for hitchhiking in Spain]
* [https://warmroads.de/hitchhiking-in-2-spain/ Short anlyses of hitchhiking in Spain - warmroads.]
{{wikipedia-link|Spain}}
=== Maps ===

From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}
[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>lav79t2zbw2rgpb4hsm88lgu6r0n7yl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101095</id>
      <parentid>99745</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-05T14:28:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* License Plate IDs */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15026">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. But It's really different depending on the autonomous community : it's easy in Galicia, Asturia and Extrémadura. In these communities it works like in France. It's better to stand with a cardboard. In Euskadi and Catalonia, you will wait a long time just stand with a cardboard. However, the thumb will be understood. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, e.g. in service stations, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road. 
Generally, there are petrol stations every 20-30 km, often in a so-called "via de servicio", along with a hotel or a restaurant. This means that each and every one of those petrol stations has less traffic. Most people who travel certain roads regularly will know (or pretend to know!) the good spots where a lot of traffic passes through (e.g. truck stops, or nice restaurants). Try not to get stuck in places off the main road (in a village, or an industrial zone), but ask your driver if s/he knows a place with lots of people. 
__TOC__
Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. If you do master some Spanish, however, and if you carefully stick to service stations asking people, hitching can be easy and fun - even in Spain. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

As hitch-hiking is not a very common concept in Spain, many Spanish people travel via blablacar. If you want to get out of big cities (Madrid, Barcelona) you might have to pay 3-5 Euros to get to a hitch-hiking spot. In this case, consider finding a short ride just out of the city to a nearby small town, with blablacar. The driver can drop you directly on a service station on the motorway, and you might not have to walk around in the Spanish summer heat. 

&lt;gallery perrow="3" style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:20px;"&gt;
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|right|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, and parts of the center and the North, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road; this system is called ''autovia''. [http://motorways-exitlists.com/europe/e/spain.htm This website] shows exits and also service areas for some ''autovias'', as well as ''autopistas.'' It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Border crossing ==
When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun called Oyarzun (accessible in both directions).

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

=== Crossing Spain to get to Portugal ===
If you just want to get to Portugal, you'll want to to keep your hitch journey in Spain as short and quick as possible. This will happen by sticking to the the main road (AP-1, A-62, mostly "autovia") from Bayonne/San Sebastian to Salamanca / Vilar Formoso (the portuguese border near Guarda). Even if you come from, say, Montpellier, it's recommended to hitch up to Bayonne and cross the basque country.

A good technique is to stay in one of the last service stations on the A63 in France before the spanish border, and wait for someone who can take you all to way to Portugal. Portuguese plates (1/3 of portuguese nationals live outside Portugal) or tourists (20 million invaded Portugal in 2016) will pass there.  

Otherwise, don't let your drivers drop you at just any gas station along the way - try your best to stick to busy ones (on the right side and near the highway, Repsol and Galp).

If your ride is only taking you to somewhere near Vilar Formoso border and you want to go further in Portugal, you can stay at the last Cepsa gas station on the right side of the road, 5kms before the border. Gas is cheaper in Spain. 

== Myths and truths about hitchhiking in Spain ==
# '''It is illegal to hitchhike in Spain.'''&lt;br&gt;''Truth'': This assertion that you will hear from both the locals and the travellers is a result of a wrong understanding of the Spanish law that forbids pedestrians walking on a private motorway. Therefore, '''it is absolutely ''legal'' to hitchhike in Spain'''.
# '''It is ''impossible'' to travel hitchhiking in Spain'''.&lt;br&gt;''Truth'': While it is definitely harder to catch a ride in Spain than in Germany, it is not impossible if done smartly. Actually, in many areas in the countryside or the north of Spain where there are very few means of public transportation, hitchhiking is done frequently by locals who need to take  rides from town to town (Galicia and its messy bus network is a great example of this). However, many old Spaniards believe that hitchhiking culture died in the 70s, and there is a lot of fear around, because of some cases of theft or rape when hitching. To get a ride in Spain you will need to put more effort and think tactical: '''hide the hippy clothes in your backpack and look clean, smile, know a few Spanish words, be polite, be familiar with the  Spanish hours and always try to hitch from a service station.'''
# '''Spanish people will rob you'''.&lt;br&gt;''Truth'':  Indeed, Barcelona and Madrid score very high in the pickpocketing league, but this is something all locals are very embarrassed about. They will often advise you to keep an eye on your belongings and never put your wallet in the rear pocket. The best advice is to avoid as much as possible the touristy  areas.

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===
The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Resources ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/174166089591892/ Facebook group for hitchhiking in Spain]
* [https://warmroads.de/hitchhiking-in-2-spain/ Short anlyses of hitchhiking in Spain - warmroads.]
{{wikipedia-link|Spain}}
=== Maps ===

From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}
[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>mfd3k18jqbftg9t1fptpvavrb8a03ns</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101096</id>
      <parentid>101095</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-05T14:28:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Myths and truths about hitchhiking in Spain */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13413">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. But It's really different depending on the autonomous community : it's easy in Galicia, Asturia and Extrémadura. In these communities it works like in France. It's better to stand with a cardboard. In Euskadi and Catalonia, you will wait a long time just stand with a cardboard. However, the thumb will be understood. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, e.g. in service stations, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road. 
Generally, there are petrol stations every 20-30 km, often in a so-called "via de servicio", along with a hotel or a restaurant. This means that each and every one of those petrol stations has less traffic. Most people who travel certain roads regularly will know (or pretend to know!) the good spots where a lot of traffic passes through (e.g. truck stops, or nice restaurants). Try not to get stuck in places off the main road (in a village, or an industrial zone), but ask your driver if s/he knows a place with lots of people. 
__TOC__
Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. If you do master some Spanish, however, and if you carefully stick to service stations asking people, hitching can be easy and fun - even in Spain. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

As hitch-hiking is not a very common concept in Spain, many Spanish people travel via blablacar. If you want to get out of big cities (Madrid, Barcelona) you might have to pay 3-5 Euros to get to a hitch-hiking spot. In this case, consider finding a short ride just out of the city to a nearby small town, with blablacar. The driver can drop you directly on a service station on the motorway, and you might not have to walk around in the Spanish summer heat. 

&lt;gallery perrow="3" style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:20px;"&gt;
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|right|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, and parts of the center and the North, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road; this system is called ''autovia''. [http://motorways-exitlists.com/europe/e/spain.htm This website] shows exits and also service areas for some ''autovias'', as well as ''autopistas.'' It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Border crossing ==
When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun called Oyarzun (accessible in both directions).

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

=== Crossing Spain to get to Portugal ===
If you just want to get to Portugal, you'll want to to keep your hitch journey in Spain as short and quick as possible. This will happen by sticking to the the main road (AP-1, A-62, mostly "autovia") from Bayonne/San Sebastian to Salamanca / Vilar Formoso (the portuguese border near Guarda). Even if you come from, say, Montpellier, it's recommended to hitch up to Bayonne and cross the basque country.

A good technique is to stay in one of the last service stations on the A63 in France before the spanish border, and wait for someone who can take you all to way to Portugal. Portuguese plates (1/3 of portuguese nationals live outside Portugal) or tourists (20 million invaded Portugal in 2016) will pass there.  

Otherwise, don't let your drivers drop you at just any gas station along the way - try your best to stick to busy ones (on the right side and near the highway, Repsol and Galp).

If your ride is only taking you to somewhere near Vilar Formoso border and you want to go further in Portugal, you can stay at the last Cepsa gas station on the right side of the road, 5kms before the border. Gas is cheaper in Spain. 

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===
The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Resources ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/174166089591892/ Facebook group for hitchhiking in Spain]
* [https://warmroads.de/hitchhiking-in-2-spain/ Short anlyses of hitchhiking in Spain - warmroads.]
{{wikipedia-link|Spain}}
=== Maps ===

From any tourist-info around country, you can find good roadmap of the region and/or the autonomous area for free of charge.


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}
[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>2b81m4wsejh83t3cdrkp06enmub3xo0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101097</id>
      <parentid>101096</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-05T14:29:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Resources */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13131">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. But It's really different depending on the autonomous community : it's easy in Galicia, Asturia and Extrémadura. In these communities it works like in France. It's better to stand with a cardboard. In Euskadi and Catalonia, you will wait a long time just stand with a cardboard. However, the thumb will be understood. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, e.g. in service stations, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road. 
Generally, there are petrol stations every 20-30 km, often in a so-called "via de servicio", along with a hotel or a restaurant. This means that each and every one of those petrol stations has less traffic. Most people who travel certain roads regularly will know (or pretend to know!) the good spots where a lot of traffic passes through (e.g. truck stops, or nice restaurants). Try not to get stuck in places off the main road (in a village, or an industrial zone), but ask your driver if s/he knows a place with lots of people. 
__TOC__
Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. If you do master some Spanish, however, and if you carefully stick to service stations asking people, hitching can be easy and fun - even in Spain. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

As hitch-hiking is not a very common concept in Spain, many Spanish people travel via blablacar. If you want to get out of big cities (Madrid, Barcelona) you might have to pay 3-5 Euros to get to a hitch-hiking spot. In this case, consider finding a short ride just out of the city to a nearby small town, with blablacar. The driver can drop you directly on a service station on the motorway, and you might not have to walk around in the Spanish summer heat. 

&lt;gallery perrow="3" style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:20px;"&gt;
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|right|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, and parts of the center and the North, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road; this system is called ''autovia''. [http://motorways-exitlists.com/europe/e/spain.htm This website] shows exits and also service areas for some ''autovias'', as well as ''autopistas.'' It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Border crossing ==
When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun called Oyarzun (accessible in both directions).

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

=== Crossing Spain to get to Portugal ===
If you just want to get to Portugal, you'll want to to keep your hitch journey in Spain as short and quick as possible. This will happen by sticking to the the main road (AP-1, A-62, mostly "autovia") from Bayonne/San Sebastian to Salamanca / Vilar Formoso (the portuguese border near Guarda). Even if you come from, say, Montpellier, it's recommended to hitch up to Bayonne and cross the basque country.

A good technique is to stay in one of the last service stations on the A63 in France before the spanish border, and wait for someone who can take you all to way to Portugal. Portuguese plates (1/3 of portuguese nationals live outside Portugal) or tourists (20 million invaded Portugal in 2016) will pass there.  

Otherwise, don't let your drivers drop you at just any gas station along the way - try your best to stick to busy ones (on the right side and near the highway, Repsol and Galp).

If your ride is only taking you to somewhere near Vilar Formoso border and you want to go further in Portugal, you can stay at the last Cepsa gas station on the right side of the road, 5kms before the border. Gas is cheaper in Spain. 

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===
The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Links ==

* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/174166089591892/ Facebook group for hitchhiking in Spain]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}
[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>ryidh3v4tl54gnf3spzzncs5510jivd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101099</id>
      <parentid>101097</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-05T14:30:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Links */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13173">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. But It's really different depending on the autonomous community : it's easy in Galicia, Asturia and Extrémadura. In these communities it works like in France. It's better to stand with a cardboard. In Euskadi and Catalonia, you will wait a long time just stand with a cardboard. However, the thumb will be understood. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, e.g. in service stations, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road. 
Generally, there are petrol stations every 20-30 km, often in a so-called "via de servicio", along with a hotel or a restaurant. This means that each and every one of those petrol stations has less traffic. Most people who travel certain roads regularly will know (or pretend to know!) the good spots where a lot of traffic passes through (e.g. truck stops, or nice restaurants). Try not to get stuck in places off the main road (in a village, or an industrial zone), but ask your driver if s/he knows a place with lots of people. 
__TOC__
Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. If you do master some Spanish, however, and if you carefully stick to service stations asking people, hitching can be easy and fun - even in Spain. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

As hitch-hiking is not a very common concept in Spain, many Spanish people travel via blablacar. If you want to get out of big cities (Madrid, Barcelona) you might have to pay 3-5 Euros to get to a hitch-hiking spot. In this case, consider finding a short ride just out of the city to a nearby small town, with blablacar. The driver can drop you directly on a service station on the motorway, and you might not have to walk around in the Spanish summer heat. 

&lt;gallery perrow="3" style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:20px;"&gt;
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|right|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, and parts of the center and the North, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road; this system is called ''autovia''. [http://motorways-exitlists.com/europe/e/spain.htm This website] shows exits and also service areas for some ''autovias'', as well as ''autopistas.'' It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Border crossing ==
When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun called Oyarzun (accessible in both directions).

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

=== Crossing Spain to get to Portugal ===
If you just want to get to Portugal, you'll want to to keep your hitch journey in Spain as short and quick as possible. This will happen by sticking to the the main road (AP-1, A-62, mostly "autovia") from Bayonne/San Sebastian to Salamanca / Vilar Formoso (the portuguese border near Guarda). Even if you come from, say, Montpellier, it's recommended to hitch up to Bayonne and cross the basque country.

A good technique is to stay in one of the last service stations on the A63 in France before the spanish border, and wait for someone who can take you all to way to Portugal. Portuguese plates (1/3 of portuguese nationals live outside Portugal) or tourists (20 million invaded Portugal in 2016) will pass there.  

Otherwise, don't let your drivers drop you at just any gas station along the way - try your best to stick to busy ones (on the right side and near the highway, Repsol and Galp).

If your ride is only taking you to somewhere near Vilar Formoso border and you want to go further in Portugal, you can stay at the last Cepsa gas station on the right side of the road, 5kms before the border. Gas is cheaper in Spain. 

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===
The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Links ==

* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/174166089591892/ Facebook group for hitchhiking in Spain]

== Personal Experiences ==

Pls add info

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}
[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>qmdczp9wtvkel98nsl5lmfhblvh14mg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101100</id>
      <parentid>101099</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-05T14:30:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13143">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. But It's really different depending on the autonomous community : it's easy in Galicia, Asturia and Extrémadura. In these communities it works like in France. It's better to stand with a cardboard. In Euskadi and Catalonia, you will wait a long time just stand with a cardboard. However, the thumb will be understood. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, e.g. in service stations, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road. 
Generally, there are petrol stations every 20-30 km, often in a so-called "via de servicio", along with a hotel or a restaurant. This means that each and every one of those petrol stations has less traffic. Most people who travel certain roads regularly will know (or pretend to know!) the good spots where a lot of traffic passes through (e.g. truck stops, or nice restaurants). Try not to get stuck in places off the main road (in a village, or an industrial zone), but ask your driver if s/he knows a place with lots of people. 
__TOC__
Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. If you do master some Spanish, however, and if you carefully stick to service stations asking people, hitching can be easy and fun - even in Spain. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

As hitch-hiking is not a very common concept in Spain, many Spanish people travel via blablacar. If you want to get out of big cities (Madrid, Barcelona) you might have to pay 3-5 Euros to get to a hitch-hiking spot. In this case, consider finding a short ride just out of the city to a nearby small town, with blablacar. The driver can drop you directly on a service station on the motorway, and you might not have to walk around in the Spanish summer heat. 

&lt;gallery perrow="3" style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:20px;"&gt;
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|right|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, and parts of the center and the North, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road; this system is called ''autovia''. [http://motorways-exitlists.com/europe/e/spain.htm This website] shows exits and also service areas for some ''autovias'', as well as ''autopistas.'' It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Border crossing ==
When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun called Oyarzun (accessible in both directions).

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

=== Crossing Spain to get to Portugal ===
If you just want to get to Portugal, you'll want to to keep your hitch journey in Spain as short and quick as possible. This will happen by sticking to the the main road (AP-1, A-62, mostly "autovia") from Bayonne/San Sebastian to Salamanca / Vilar Formoso (the portuguese border near Guarda). Even if you come from, say, Montpellier, it's recommended to hitch up to Bayonne and cross the basque country.

A good technique is to stay in one of the last service stations on the A63 in France before the spanish border, and wait for someone who can take you all to way to Portugal. Portuguese plates (1/3 of portuguese nationals live outside Portugal) or tourists (20 million invaded Portugal in 2016) will pass there.  

Otherwise, don't let your drivers drop you at just any gas station along the way - try your best to stick to busy ones (on the right side and near the highway, Repsol and Galp).

If your ride is only taking you to somewhere near Vilar Formoso border and you want to go further in Portugal, you can stay at the last Cepsa gas station on the right side of the road, 5kms before the border. Gas is cheaper in Spain. 

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===
The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Links ==

* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/174166089591892/ Facebook group for hitchhiking in Spain]

== Personal Experiences ==

Pls add info

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}
[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>qigobg3g542tk9qkgvzci7cci3yk26p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101578</id>
      <parentid>101100</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-04-02T14:01:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13273">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. But It's really different depending on the autonomous community : it's easy in Galicia, Asturia and Extrémadura. In these communities it works like in France. It's better to stand with a cardboard. In Euskadi and Catalonia, you will wait a long time just stand with a cardboard. However, the thumb will be understood. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, e.g. in service stations, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road. 
Generally, there are petrol stations every 20-30 km, often in a so-called "via de servicio", along with a hotel or a restaurant. This means that each and every one of those petrol stations has less traffic. Most people who travel certain roads regularly will know (or pretend to know!) the good spots where a lot of traffic passes through (e.g. truck stops, or nice restaurants). Try not to get stuck in places off the main road (in a village, or an industrial zone), but ask your driver if s/he knows a place with lots of people. 
__TOC__
Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. If you do master some Spanish, however, and if you carefully stick to service stations asking people, hitching can be easy and fun - even in Spain. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

As hitch-hiking is not a very common concept in Spain, many Spanish people travel via blablacar. If you want to get out of big cities (Madrid, Barcelona) you might have to pay 3-5 Euros to get to a hitch-hiking spot. In this case, consider finding a short ride just out of the city to a nearby small town, with blablacar. The driver can drop you directly on a service station on the motorway, and you might not have to walk around in the Spanish summer heat. 

Pontevedra city has banned cars https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/sep/18/paradise-life-spanish-city-banned-cars-pontevedra

&lt;gallery perrow="3" style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:20px;"&gt;
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|right|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, and parts of the center and the North, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road; this system is called ''autovia''. [http://motorways-exitlists.com/europe/e/spain.htm This website] shows exits and also service areas for some ''autovias'', as well as ''autopistas.'' It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Border crossing ==
When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun called Oyarzun (accessible in both directions).

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

=== Crossing Spain to get to Portugal ===
If you just want to get to Portugal, you'll want to to keep your hitch journey in Spain as short and quick as possible. This will happen by sticking to the the main road (AP-1, A-62, mostly "autovia") from Bayonne/San Sebastian to Salamanca / Vilar Formoso (the portuguese border near Guarda). Even if you come from, say, Montpellier, it's recommended to hitch up to Bayonne and cross the basque country.

A good technique is to stay in one of the last service stations on the A63 in France before the spanish border, and wait for someone who can take you all to way to Portugal. Portuguese plates (1/3 of portuguese nationals live outside Portugal) or tourists (20 million invaded Portugal in 2016) will pass there.  

Otherwise, don't let your drivers drop you at just any gas station along the way - try your best to stick to busy ones (on the right side and near the highway, Repsol and Galp).

If your ride is only taking you to somewhere near Vilar Formoso border and you want to go further in Portugal, you can stay at the last Cepsa gas station on the right side of the road, 5kms before the border. Gas is cheaper in Spain. 

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===
The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Links ==

* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/174166089591892/ Facebook group for hitchhiking in Spain]

== Personal Experiences ==

Pls add info

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}
[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>lwvqv94c0geyeb682krr71eppzln45a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105848</id>
      <parentid>101578</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-06-09T12:02:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Boudewijn</username>
        <id>47553</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Personal Experiences */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13427">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. But It's really different depending on the autonomous community : it's easy in Galicia, Asturia and Extrémadura. In these communities it works like in France. It's better to stand with a cardboard. In Euskadi and Catalonia, you will wait a long time just stand with a cardboard. However, the thumb will be understood. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, e.g. in service stations, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road. 
Generally, there are petrol stations every 20-30 km, often in a so-called "via de servicio", along with a hotel or a restaurant. This means that each and every one of those petrol stations has less traffic. Most people who travel certain roads regularly will know (or pretend to know!) the good spots where a lot of traffic passes through (e.g. truck stops, or nice restaurants). Try not to get stuck in places off the main road (in a village, or an industrial zone), but ask your driver if s/he knows a place with lots of people. 
__TOC__
Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. If you do master some Spanish, however, and if you carefully stick to service stations asking people, hitching can be easy and fun - even in Spain. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

As hitch-hiking is not a very common concept in Spain, many Spanish people travel via blablacar. If you want to get out of big cities (Madrid, Barcelona) you might have to pay 3-5 Euros to get to a hitch-hiking spot. In this case, consider finding a short ride just out of the city to a nearby small town, with blablacar. The driver can drop you directly on a service station on the motorway, and you might not have to walk around in the Spanish summer heat. 

Pontevedra city has banned cars https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/sep/18/paradise-life-spanish-city-banned-cars-pontevedra

&lt;gallery perrow="3" style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:20px;"&gt;
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|right|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, and parts of the center and the North, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road; this system is called ''autovia''. [http://motorways-exitlists.com/europe/e/spain.htm This website] shows exits and also service areas for some ''autovias'', as well as ''autopistas.'' It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Border crossing ==
When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun called Oyarzun (accessible in both directions).

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

=== Crossing Spain to get to Portugal ===
If you just want to get to Portugal, you'll want to to keep your hitch journey in Spain as short and quick as possible. This will happen by sticking to the the main road (AP-1, A-62, mostly "autovia") from Bayonne/San Sebastian to Salamanca / Vilar Formoso (the portuguese border near Guarda). Even if you come from, say, Montpellier, it's recommended to hitch up to Bayonne and cross the basque country.

A good technique is to stay in one of the last service stations on the A63 in France before the spanish border, and wait for someone who can take you all to way to Portugal. Portuguese plates (1/3 of portuguese nationals live outside Portugal) or tourists (20 million invaded Portugal in 2016) will pass there.  

Otherwise, don't let your drivers drop you at just any gas station along the way - try your best to stick to busy ones (on the right side and near the highway, Repsol and Galp).

If your ride is only taking you to somewhere near Vilar Formoso border and you want to go further in Portugal, you can stay at the last Cepsa gas station on the right side of the road, 5kms before the border. Gas is cheaper in Spain. 

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===
The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Links ==

* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/174166089591892/ Facebook group for hitchhiking in Spain]

Hitchhiking in the Pyrenees is fine. I was hesitant to try, knowing the reputation of Spain. So far, it went very well. I was even picked up by others mountaineers, just for walking in the rain.

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}
[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>2jd7xfadm7rw87ox60y3iloerk1sdjj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105849</id>
      <parentid>105848</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-06-09T12:04:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Boudewijn</username>
        <id>47553</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13461">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. But It's really different depending on the autonomous community : it's easy in Galicia, Asturia and Extrémadura. In these communities it works like in France. It's better to stand with a cardboard. In Euskadi and Catalonia, you will wait a long time just stand with a cardboard. However, the thumb will be understood. In the Pyrenees hitching is easy. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, e.g. in service stations, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road. 
Generally, there are petrol stations every 20-30 km, often in a so-called "via de servicio", along with a hotel or a restaurant. This means that each and every one of those petrol stations has less traffic. Most people who travel certain roads regularly will know (or pretend to know!) the good spots where a lot of traffic passes through (e.g. truck stops, or nice restaurants). Try not to get stuck in places off the main road (in a village, or an industrial zone), but ask your driver if s/he knows a place with lots of people. 
__TOC__
Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. If you do master some Spanish, however, and if you carefully stick to service stations asking people, hitching can be easy and fun - even in Spain. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

As hitch-hiking is not a very common concept in Spain, many Spanish people travel via blablacar. If you want to get out of big cities (Madrid, Barcelona) you might have to pay 3-5 Euros to get to a hitch-hiking spot. In this case, consider finding a short ride just out of the city to a nearby small town, with blablacar. The driver can drop you directly on a service station on the motorway, and you might not have to walk around in the Spanish summer heat. 

Pontevedra city has banned cars https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/sep/18/paradise-life-spanish-city-banned-cars-pontevedra

&lt;gallery perrow="3" style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:20px;"&gt;
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|right|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, and parts of the center and the North, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road; this system is called ''autovia''. [http://motorways-exitlists.com/europe/e/spain.htm This website] shows exits and also service areas for some ''autovias'', as well as ''autopistas.'' It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Border crossing ==
When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun called Oyarzun (accessible in both directions).

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

=== Crossing Spain to get to Portugal ===
If you just want to get to Portugal, you'll want to to keep your hitch journey in Spain as short and quick as possible. This will happen by sticking to the the main road (AP-1, A-62, mostly "autovia") from Bayonne/San Sebastian to Salamanca / Vilar Formoso (the portuguese border near Guarda). Even if you come from, say, Montpellier, it's recommended to hitch up to Bayonne and cross the basque country.

A good technique is to stay in one of the last service stations on the A63 in France before the spanish border, and wait for someone who can take you all to way to Portugal. Portuguese plates (1/3 of portuguese nationals live outside Portugal) or tourists (20 million invaded Portugal in 2016) will pass there.  

Otherwise, don't let your drivers drop you at just any gas station along the way - try your best to stick to busy ones (on the right side and near the highway, Repsol and Galp).

If your ride is only taking you to somewhere near Vilar Formoso border and you want to go further in Portugal, you can stay at the last Cepsa gas station on the right side of the road, 5kms before the border. Gas is cheaper in Spain. 

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===
The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Links ==

* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/174166089591892/ Facebook group for hitchhiking in Spain]

Hitchhiking in the Pyrenees is fine. I was hesitant to try, knowing the reputation of Spain. So far, it went very well. I was even picked up by others mountaineers, just for walking in the rain.

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}
[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>gmftldhd2k7gvottw9xkw4k5y4fjl45</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>109191</id>
      <parentid>105849</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-04-05T20:37:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13265">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. But It's really different depending on the autonomous community : it's easy in Galicia, Asturia and Extrémadura. In these communities it works like in France. It's better to stand with a cardboard. In Euskadi and Catalonia, you will wait a long time just stand with a cardboard. However, the thumb will be understood. In the Pyrenees hitching is easy. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, e.g. in service stations, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road. 
Generally, there are petrol stations every 20-30 km, often in a so-called "via de servicio", along with a hotel or a restaurant. This means that each and every one of those petrol stations has less traffic. Most people who travel certain roads regularly will know (or pretend to know!) the good spots where a lot of traffic passes through (e.g. truck stops, or nice restaurants). Try not to get stuck in places off the main road (in a village, or an industrial zone), but ask your driver if s/he knows a place with lots of people. 
__TOC__
Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. If you do master some Spanish, however, and if you carefully stick to service stations asking people, hitching can be easy and fun - even in Spain. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

As hitch-hiking is not a very common concept in Spain, many Spanish people travel via blablacar. If you want to get out of big cities (Madrid, Barcelona) you might have to pay 3-5 Euros to get to a hitch-hiking spot. In this case, consider finding a short ride just out of the city to a nearby small town, with blablacar. The driver can drop you directly on a service station on the motorway, and you might not have to walk around in the Spanish summer heat. 

Pontevedra city has banned cars https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/sep/18/paradise-life-spanish-city-banned-cars-pontevedra

&lt;gallery perrow="3" style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:20px;"&gt;
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|right|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, and parts of the center and the North, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road; this system is called ''autovia''. [http://motorways-exitlists.com/europe/e/spain.htm This website] shows exits and also service areas for some ''autovias'', as well as ''autopistas.'' It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Border crossing ==
When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun called Oyarzun (accessible in both directions).

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

=== Crossing Spain to get to Portugal ===
If you just want to get to Portugal, you'll want to to keep your hitch journey in Spain as short and quick as possible. This will happen by sticking to the the main road (AP-1, A-62, mostly "autovia") from Bayonne/San Sebastian to Salamanca / Vilar Formoso (the portuguese border near Guarda). Even if you come from, say, Montpellier, it's recommended to hitch up to Bayonne and cross the basque country.

A good technique is to stay in one of the last service stations on the A63 in France before the spanish border, and wait for someone who can take you all to way to Portugal. Portuguese plates (1/3 of portuguese nationals live outside Portugal) or tourists (20 million invaded Portugal in 2016) will pass there.  

Otherwise, don't let your drivers drop you at just any gas station along the way - try your best to stick to busy ones (on the right side and near the highway, Repsol and Galp).

If your ride is only taking you to somewhere near Vilar Formoso border and you want to go further in Portugal, you can stay at the last Cepsa gas station on the right side of the road, 5kms before the border. Gas is cheaper in Spain. 

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===
The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Links ==

* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/174166089591892/ Facebook group for hitchhiking in Spain]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}
[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>9k8hr5drv3e52n1dp7zng6p3qrvi1bc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>109192</id>
      <parentid>109191</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-04-05T20:42:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>why is hitchhiking so bad?</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13416">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. This might be due shaping events as https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francoist_Spain and the murder of the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcàsser_Girls. But It's really different depending on the autonomous community : it's easy in Galicia, Asturia and Extrémadura. In these communities it works like in France. It's better to stand with a cardboard. In Euskadi and Catalonia, you will wait a long time just stand with a cardboard. However, the thumb will be understood. In the Pyrenees hitching is easy. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, e.g. in service stations, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road. 
Generally, there are petrol stations every 20-30 km, often in a so-called "via de servicio", along with a hotel or a restaurant. This means that each and every one of those petrol stations has less traffic. Most people who travel certain roads regularly will know (or pretend to know!) the good spots where a lot of traffic passes through (e.g. truck stops, or nice restaurants). Try not to get stuck in places off the main road (in a village, or an industrial zone), but ask your driver if s/he knows a place with lots of people. 
__TOC__
Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. If you do master some Spanish, however, and if you carefully stick to service stations asking people, hitching can be easy and fun - even in Spain. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

As hitch-hiking is not a very common concept in Spain, many Spanish people travel via blablacar. If you want to get out of big cities (Madrid, Barcelona) you might have to pay 3-5 Euros to get to a hitch-hiking spot. In this case, consider finding a short ride just out of the city to a nearby small town, with blablacar. The driver can drop you directly on a service station on the motorway, and you might not have to walk around in the Spanish summer heat. 

Pontevedra city has banned cars https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/sep/18/paradise-life-spanish-city-banned-cars-pontevedra

&lt;gallery perrow="3" style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:20px;"&gt;
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|right|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, and parts of the center and the North, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road; this system is called ''autovia''. [http://motorways-exitlists.com/europe/e/spain.htm This website] shows exits and also service areas for some ''autovias'', as well as ''autopistas.'' It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Border crossing ==
When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun called Oyarzun (accessible in both directions).

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

=== Crossing Spain to get to Portugal ===
If you just want to get to Portugal, you'll want to to keep your hitch journey in Spain as short and quick as possible. This will happen by sticking to the the main road (AP-1, A-62, mostly "autovia") from Bayonne/San Sebastian to Salamanca / Vilar Formoso (the portuguese border near Guarda). Even if you come from, say, Montpellier, it's recommended to hitch up to Bayonne and cross the basque country.

A good technique is to stay in one of the last service stations on the A63 in France before the spanish border, and wait for someone who can take you all to way to Portugal. Portuguese plates (1/3 of portuguese nationals live outside Portugal) or tourists (20 million invaded Portugal in 2016) will pass there.  

Otherwise, don't let your drivers drop you at just any gas station along the way - try your best to stick to busy ones (on the right side and near the highway, Repsol and Galp).

If your ride is only taking you to somewhere near Vilar Formoso border and you want to go further in Portugal, you can stay at the last Cepsa gas station on the right side of the road, 5kms before the border. Gas is cheaper in Spain. 

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===
The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Links ==

* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/174166089591892/ Facebook group for hitchhiking in Spain]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}
[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>m1zzzids5cmjj44alfgmxxkeao1xihj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>109193</id>
      <parentid>109192</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-04-05T21:11:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>links</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13493">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. This might be due shaping periods in Spanish history as the [Francoist dictatorship https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francoist_Spain] and events as the murder of the [Alcàsser Girls https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcàsser_Girls]. But It's really different depending on the autonomous community : it's easy in Galicia, Asturia and Extrémadura. In these communities it works like in France. It's better to stand with a cardboard. In Euskadi and Catalonia, you will wait a long time just stand with a cardboard. However, the thumb will be understood. In the Pyrenees hitching is easy. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, e.g. in service stations, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road. 
Generally, there are petrol stations every 20-30 km, often in a so-called "via de servicio", along with a hotel or a restaurant. This means that each and every one of those petrol stations has less traffic. Most people who travel certain roads regularly will know (or pretend to know!) the good spots where a lot of traffic passes through (e.g. truck stops, or nice restaurants). Try not to get stuck in places off the main road (in a village, or an industrial zone), but ask your driver if s/he knows a place with lots of people. 
__TOC__
Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. If you do master some Spanish, however, and if you carefully stick to service stations asking people, hitching can be easy and fun - even in Spain. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

As hitch-hiking is not a very common concept in Spain, many Spanish people travel via blablacar. If you want to get out of big cities (Madrid, Barcelona) you might have to pay 3-5 Euros to get to a hitch-hiking spot. In this case, consider finding a short ride just out of the city to a nearby small town, with blablacar. The driver can drop you directly on a service station on the motorway, and you might not have to walk around in the Spanish summer heat. 

Pontevedra city has banned cars https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/sep/18/paradise-life-spanish-city-banned-cars-pontevedra

&lt;gallery perrow="3" style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:20px;"&gt;
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|right|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, and parts of the center and the North, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road; this system is called ''autovia''. [http://motorways-exitlists.com/europe/e/spain.htm This website] shows exits and also service areas for some ''autovias'', as well as ''autopistas.'' It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Border crossing ==
When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun called Oyarzun (accessible in both directions).

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

=== Crossing Spain to get to Portugal ===
If you just want to get to Portugal, you'll want to to keep your hitch journey in Spain as short and quick as possible. This will happen by sticking to the the main road (AP-1, A-62, mostly "autovia") from Bayonne/San Sebastian to Salamanca / Vilar Formoso (the portuguese border near Guarda). Even if you come from, say, Montpellier, it's recommended to hitch up to Bayonne and cross the basque country.

A good technique is to stay in one of the last service stations on the A63 in France before the spanish border, and wait for someone who can take you all to way to Portugal. Portuguese plates (1/3 of portuguese nationals live outside Portugal) or tourists (20 million invaded Portugal in 2016) will pass there.  

Otherwise, don't let your drivers drop you at just any gas station along the way - try your best to stick to busy ones (on the right side and near the highway, Repsol and Galp).

If your ride is only taking you to somewhere near Vilar Formoso border and you want to go further in Portugal, you can stay at the last Cepsa gas station on the right side of the road, 5kms before the border. Gas is cheaper in Spain. 

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===
The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Links ==

* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/174166089591892/ Facebook group for hitchhiking in Spain]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}
[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>c5z59her7tiibzclhivd5p3f7p8omrq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>109194</id>
      <parentid>109193</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-04-05T21:12:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>links</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13493">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. This might be due shaping periods in Spanish history as the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francoist_Spain Francoist dictatorship] and events as the murder of the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcàsser_Girls Alcàsser Girls]. But It's really different depending on the autonomous community : it's easy in Galicia, Asturia and Extrémadura. In these communities it works like in France. It's better to stand with a cardboard. In Euskadi and Catalonia, you will wait a long time just stand with a cardboard. However, the thumb will be understood. In the Pyrenees hitching is easy. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, e.g. in service stations, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road. 
Generally, there are petrol stations every 20-30 km, often in a so-called "via de servicio", along with a hotel or a restaurant. This means that each and every one of those petrol stations has less traffic. Most people who travel certain roads regularly will know (or pretend to know!) the good spots where a lot of traffic passes through (e.g. truck stops, or nice restaurants). Try not to get stuck in places off the main road (in a village, or an industrial zone), but ask your driver if s/he knows a place with lots of people. 
__TOC__
Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. If you do master some Spanish, however, and if you carefully stick to service stations asking people, hitching can be easy and fun - even in Spain. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

As hitch-hiking is not a very common concept in Spain, many Spanish people travel via blablacar. If you want to get out of big cities (Madrid, Barcelona) you might have to pay 3-5 Euros to get to a hitch-hiking spot. In this case, consider finding a short ride just out of the city to a nearby small town, with blablacar. The driver can drop you directly on a service station on the motorway, and you might not have to walk around in the Spanish summer heat. 

Pontevedra city has banned cars https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/sep/18/paradise-life-spanish-city-banned-cars-pontevedra

&lt;gallery perrow="3" style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:20px;"&gt;
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|right|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, and parts of the center and the North, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road; this system is called ''autovia''. [http://motorways-exitlists.com/europe/e/spain.htm This website] shows exits and also service areas for some ''autovias'', as well as ''autopistas.'' It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Border crossing ==
When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun called Oyarzun (accessible in both directions).

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

=== Crossing Spain to get to Portugal ===
If you just want to get to Portugal, you'll want to to keep your hitch journey in Spain as short and quick as possible. This will happen by sticking to the the main road (AP-1, A-62, mostly "autovia") from Bayonne/San Sebastian to Salamanca / Vilar Formoso (the portuguese border near Guarda). Even if you come from, say, Montpellier, it's recommended to hitch up to Bayonne and cross the basque country.

A good technique is to stay in one of the last service stations on the A63 in France before the spanish border, and wait for someone who can take you all to way to Portugal. Portuguese plates (1/3 of portuguese nationals live outside Portugal) or tourists (20 million invaded Portugal in 2016) will pass there.  

Otherwise, don't let your drivers drop you at just any gas station along the way - try your best to stick to busy ones (on the right side and near the highway, Repsol and Galp).

If your ride is only taking you to somewhere near Vilar Formoso border and you want to go further in Portugal, you can stay at the last Cepsa gas station on the right side of the road, 5kms before the border. Gas is cheaper in Spain. 

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===
The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Links ==

* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/174166089591892/ Facebook group for hitchhiking in Spain]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}
[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>ge7o0jyncwn0oh1rstq3lncyoaa7fq1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>109206</id>
      <parentid>109194</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-04-06T06:19:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Chris9012</username>
        <id>47192</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13514">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. This might be due shaping periods in Spanish history as the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francoist_Spain Francoist dictatorship] and events as the murder of the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcàsser_Girls Alcàsser Girls]. But It's really different depending on the autonomous community : it's easy in Galicia, Asturia and Extrémadura. In these communities it works like in France. It's better to stand with a cardboard. In Euskadi and Catalonia, you will wait a long time just stand with a cardboard. However, the thumb will be understood. In the Pyrenees hitching is easy. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, e.g. in service stations, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road. 
Generally, there are petrol stations every 20-30 km, often in a so-called "via de servicio", along with a hotel or a restaurant. This means that each and every one of those petrol stations has less traffic. Most people who travel certain roads regularly will know (or pretend to know!) the good spots where a lot of traffic passes through (e.g. truck stops, or nice restaurants). Try not to get stuck in places off the main road (in a village, or an industrial zone), but ask your driver if s/he knows a place with lots of people. 
__TOC__
Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. If you do master some Spanish, however, and if you carefully stick to service stations asking people, hitching can be easy and fun - even in Spain. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

As hitch-hiking is not a very common concept in Spain, many Spanish people travel via blablacar. If you want to get out of big cities (Madrid, Barcelona) you might have to pay 3-5 Euros to get to a hitch-hiking spot. In this case, consider finding a short ride just out of the city to a nearby small town, with blablacar. The driver can drop you directly on a service station on the motorway, and you might not have to walk around in the Spanish summer heat. 

Pontevedra city has banned cars https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/sep/18/paradise-life-spanish-city-banned-cars-pontevedra

&lt;gallery perrow="3" style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:20px;"&gt;
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|right|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, and parts of the center and the North, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road; this system is called ''autovia''. [http://motorways-exitlists.com/europe/e/spain.htm This website] shows exits and also service areas for some ''autovias'', as well as ''autopistas.'' It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Border crossing ==
When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun called Oyarzun (accessible in both directions).

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

=== Crossing Spain to get to Portugal ===
If you just want to get to Portugal, you'll want to to keep your hitch journey in Spain as short and quick as possible. This will happen by sticking to the the main road (AP-1, A-62, mostly "autovia") from Bayonne/San Sebastian to Salamanca / Vilar Formoso (the portuguese border near Guarda). Even if you come from, say, Montpellier, it's recommended to hitch up to Bayonne and cross the basque country.

A good technique is to stay in one of the last service stations on the A63 in France before the spanish border, and wait for someone who can take you all to way to Portugal. Portuguese plates (1/3 of portuguese nationals live outside Portugal) or tourists (20 million invaded Portugal in 2016) will pass there.  

Otherwise, don't let your drivers drop you at just any gas station along the way - try your best to stick to busy ones (on the right side and near the highway, Repsol and Galp).

If your ride is only taking you to somewhere near Vilar Formoso border and you want to go further in Portugal, you can stay at the last Cepsa gas station on the right side of the road, 5kms before the border. Gas is cheaper in Spain. 

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===
The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Links ==

* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/174166089591892/ Facebook group for hitchhiking in Spain]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{Europe/countries}}


{{hitchbase_country|177}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}
[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>8vr1cr2xs38esk9xie2nvri76icd0k9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>111748</id>
      <parentid>109206</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-08-23T08:16:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13514">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. This might be due shaping periods in Spanish history as the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francoist_Spain Francoist dictatorship] and events as the murder of the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcàsser_Girls Alcàsser Girls]. But It's really different depending on the autonomous community : it's easy in Galicia, Asturia and Extrémadura. In these communities it works like in France. It's better to stand with a cardboard. In Euskadi and Catalonia, you will wait a long time just stand with a cardboard. However, the thumb will be understood. In the Pyrenees hitching is easy. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, e.g. in service stations, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road. 
Generally, there are petrol stations every 20-30 km, often in a so-called "via de servicio", along with a hotel or a restaurant. This means that each and every one of those petrol stations has less traffic. Most people who travel certain roads regularly will know (or pretend to know!) the good spots where a lot of traffic passes through (e.g. truck stops, or nice restaurants). Try not to get stuck in places off the main road (in a village, or an industrial zone), but ask your driver if s/he knows a place with lots of people. 
__TOC__
Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. If you do master some Spanish, however, and if you carefully stick to service stations asking people, hitching can be easy and fun - even in Spain. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

As hitch-hiking is not a very common concept in Spain, many Spanish people travel via blablacar. If you want to get out of big cities (Madrid, Barcelona) you might have to pay 3-5 Euros to get to a hitch-hiking spot. In this case, consider finding a short ride just out of the city to a nearby small town, with blablacar. The driver can drop you directly on a service station on the motorway, and you might not have to walk around in the Spanish summer heat. 

Pontevedra city has banned cars https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/sep/18/paradise-life-spanish-city-banned-cars-pontevedra

&lt;gallery perrow="3" style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:20px;"&gt;
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|right|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, and parts of the center and the North, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road; this system is called ''autovia''. [http://motorways-exitlists.com/europe/e/spain.htm This website] shows exits and also service areas for some ''autovias'', as well as ''autopistas.'' It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Border crossing ==
When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun called Oyarzun (accessible in both directions).

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

=== Crossing Spain to get to Portugal ===
If you just want to get to Portugal, you'll want to to keep your hitch journey in Spain as short and quick as possible. This will happen by sticking to the the main road (AP-1, A-62, mostly "autovia") from Bayonne/San Sebastian to Salamanca / Vilar Formoso (the portuguese border near Guarda). Even if you come from, say, Montpellier, it's recommended to hitch up to Bayonne and cross the basque country.

A good technique is to stay in one of the last service stations on the A63 in France before the spanish border, and wait for someone who can take you all to way to Portugal. Portuguese plates (1/3 of portuguese nationals live outside Portugal) or tourists (20 million invaded Portugal in 2016) will pass there.  

Otherwise, don't let your drivers drop you at just any gas station along the way - try your best to stick to busy ones (on the right side and near the highway, Repsol and Galp).

If your ride is only taking you to somewhere near Vilar Formoso border and you want to go further in Portugal, you can stay at the last Cepsa gas station on the right side of the road, 5kms before the border. Gas is cheaper in Spain. 

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===
The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Links ==

* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/174166089591892/ Facebook group for hitchhiking in Spain]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{Template:Cities Spain}}
{{Europe/countries}}


{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}
[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>5qnchfb4bj5yzydpuv5215crw1sf0ev</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>111749</id>
      <parentid>111748</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-08-23T08:17:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13514">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. This might be due shaping periods in Spanish history as the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francoist_Spain Francoist dictatorship] and events as the murder of the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcàsser_Girls Alcàsser Girls]. But It's really different depending on the autonomous community : it's easy in Galicia, Asturia and Extrémadura. In these communities it works like in France. It's better to stand with a cardboard. In Euskadi and Catalonia, you will wait a long time just stand with a cardboard. However, the thumb will be understood. In the Pyrenees hitching is easy. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, e.g. in service stations, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road. 
Generally, there are petrol stations every 20-30 km, often in a so-called "via de servicio", along with a hotel or a restaurant. This means that each and every one of those petrol stations has less traffic. Most people who travel certain roads regularly will know (or pretend to know!) the good spots where a lot of traffic passes through (e.g. truck stops, or nice restaurants). Try not to get stuck in places off the main road (in a village, or an industrial zone), but ask your driver if s/he knows a place with lots of people. 
__TOC__
Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. If you do master some Spanish, however, and if you carefully stick to service stations asking people, hitching can be easy and fun - even in Spain. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

As hitch-hiking is not a very common concept in Spain, many Spanish people travel via blablacar. If you want to get out of big cities (Madrid, Barcelona) you might have to pay 3-5 Euros to get to a hitch-hiking spot. In this case, consider finding a short ride just out of the city to a nearby small town, with blablacar. The driver can drop you directly on a service station on the motorway, and you might not have to walk around in the Spanish summer heat. 

Pontevedra city has banned cars https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/sep/18/paradise-life-spanish-city-banned-cars-pontevedra

&lt;gallery perrow="3" style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:20px;"&gt;
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|right|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, and parts of the center and the North, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road; this system is called ''autovia''. [http://motorways-exitlists.com/europe/e/spain.htm This website] shows exits and also service areas for some ''autovias'', as well as ''autopistas.'' It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Border crossing ==
When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun called Oyarzun (accessible in both directions).

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

=== Crossing Spain to get to Portugal ===
If you just want to get to Portugal, you'll want to to keep your hitch journey in Spain as short and quick as possible. This will happen by sticking to the the main road (AP-1, A-62, mostly "autovia") from Bayonne/San Sebastian to Salamanca / Vilar Formoso (the portuguese border near Guarda). Even if you come from, say, Montpellier, it's recommended to hitch up to Bayonne and cross the basque country.

A good technique is to stay in one of the last service stations on the A63 in France before the spanish border, and wait for someone who can take you all to way to Portugal. Portuguese plates (1/3 of portuguese nationals live outside Portugal) or tourists (20 million invaded Portugal in 2016) will pass there.  

Otherwise, don't let your drivers drop you at just any gas station along the way - try your best to stick to busy ones (on the right side and near the highway, Repsol and Galp).

If your ride is only taking you to somewhere near Vilar Formoso border and you want to go further in Portugal, you can stay at the last Cepsa gas station on the right side of the road, 5kms before the border. Gas is cheaper in Spain. 

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===
The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Links ==

* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/174166089591892/ Facebook group for hitchhiking in Spain]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{Template:Cities spain}}
{{Europe/countries}}


{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}
[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>mask8cq8b4iuz33e9a1f51unw61wofj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>111751</id>
      <parentid>111749</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-08-23T08:18:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13522">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40' lng='-1.8' zoom='6' view='0'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. This might be due shaping periods in Spanish history as the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francoist_Spain Francoist dictatorship] and events as the murder of the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcàsser_Girls Alcàsser Girls]. But It's really different depending on the autonomous community : it's easy in Galicia, Asturia and Extrémadura. In these communities it works like in France. It's better to stand with a cardboard. In Euskadi and Catalonia, you will wait a long time just stand with a cardboard. However, the thumb will be understood. In the Pyrenees hitching is easy. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, e.g. in service stations, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road. 
Generally, there are petrol stations every 20-30 km, often in a so-called "via de servicio", along with a hotel or a restaurant. This means that each and every one of those petrol stations has less traffic. Most people who travel certain roads regularly will know (or pretend to know!) the good spots where a lot of traffic passes through (e.g. truck stops, or nice restaurants). Try not to get stuck in places off the main road (in a village, or an industrial zone), but ask your driver if s/he knows a place with lots of people. 
__TOC__
Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. If you do master some Spanish, however, and if you carefully stick to service stations asking people, hitching can be easy and fun - even in Spain. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

As hitch-hiking is not a very common concept in Spain, many Spanish people travel via blablacar. If you want to get out of big cities (Madrid, Barcelona) you might have to pay 3-5 Euros to get to a hitch-hiking spot. In this case, consider finding a short ride just out of the city to a nearby small town, with blablacar. The driver can drop you directly on a service station on the motorway, and you might not have to walk around in the Spanish summer heat. 

Pontevedra city has banned cars https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/sep/18/paradise-life-spanish-city-banned-cars-pontevedra

&lt;gallery perrow="3" style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:20px;"&gt;
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|right|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, and parts of the center and the North, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road; this system is called ''autovia''. [http://motorways-exitlists.com/europe/e/spain.htm This website] shows exits and also service areas for some ''autovias'', as well as ''autopistas.'' It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Border crossing ==
When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun called Oyarzun (accessible in both directions).

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

=== Crossing Spain to get to Portugal ===
If you just want to get to Portugal, you'll want to to keep your hitch journey in Spain as short and quick as possible. This will happen by sticking to the the main road (AP-1, A-62, mostly "autovia") from Bayonne/San Sebastian to Salamanca / Vilar Formoso (the portuguese border near Guarda). Even if you come from, say, Montpellier, it's recommended to hitch up to Bayonne and cross the basque country.

A good technique is to stay in one of the last service stations on the A63 in France before the spanish border, and wait for someone who can take you all to way to Portugal. Portuguese plates (1/3 of portuguese nationals live outside Portugal) or tourists (20 million invaded Portugal in 2016) will pass there.  

Otherwise, don't let your drivers drop you at just any gas station along the way - try your best to stick to busy ones (on the right side and near the highway, Repsol and Galp).

If your ride is only taking you to somewhere near Vilar Formoso border and you want to go further in Portugal, you can stay at the last Cepsa gas station on the right side of the road, 5kms before the border. Gas is cheaper in Spain. 

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===
The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Links ==

* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/174166089591892/ Facebook group for hitchhiking in Spain]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{Template:Cities spain}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>fyhzj1bbxuwgemy7jsf2tdio6363hbf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>111752</id>
      <parentid>111751</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-08-23T08:19:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13514">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40.0' lng='4.0' zoom='5'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. This might be due shaping periods in Spanish history as the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francoist_Spain Francoist dictatorship] and events as the murder of the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcàsser_Girls Alcàsser Girls]. But It's really different depending on the autonomous community : it's easy in Galicia, Asturia and Extrémadura. In these communities it works like in France. It's better to stand with a cardboard. In Euskadi and Catalonia, you will wait a long time just stand with a cardboard. However, the thumb will be understood. In the Pyrenees hitching is easy. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, e.g. in service stations, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road. 
Generally, there are petrol stations every 20-30 km, often in a so-called "via de servicio", along with a hotel or a restaurant. This means that each and every one of those petrol stations has less traffic. Most people who travel certain roads regularly will know (or pretend to know!) the good spots where a lot of traffic passes through (e.g. truck stops, or nice restaurants). Try not to get stuck in places off the main road (in a village, or an industrial zone), but ask your driver if s/he knows a place with lots of people. 
__TOC__
Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. If you do master some Spanish, however, and if you carefully stick to service stations asking people, hitching can be easy and fun - even in Spain. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

As hitch-hiking is not a very common concept in Spain, many Spanish people travel via blablacar. If you want to get out of big cities (Madrid, Barcelona) you might have to pay 3-5 Euros to get to a hitch-hiking spot. In this case, consider finding a short ride just out of the city to a nearby small town, with blablacar. The driver can drop you directly on a service station on the motorway, and you might not have to walk around in the Spanish summer heat. 

Pontevedra city has banned cars https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/sep/18/paradise-life-spanish-city-banned-cars-pontevedra

&lt;gallery perrow="3" style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:20px;"&gt;
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|right|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, and parts of the center and the North, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road; this system is called ''autovia''. [http://motorways-exitlists.com/europe/e/spain.htm This website] shows exits and also service areas for some ''autovias'', as well as ''autopistas.'' It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Border crossing ==
When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun called Oyarzun (accessible in both directions).

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

=== Crossing Spain to get to Portugal ===
If you just want to get to Portugal, you'll want to to keep your hitch journey in Spain as short and quick as possible. This will happen by sticking to the the main road (AP-1, A-62, mostly "autovia") from Bayonne/San Sebastian to Salamanca / Vilar Formoso (the portuguese border near Guarda). Even if you come from, say, Montpellier, it's recommended to hitch up to Bayonne and cross the basque country.

A good technique is to stay in one of the last service stations on the A63 in France before the spanish border, and wait for someone who can take you all to way to Portugal. Portuguese plates (1/3 of portuguese nationals live outside Portugal) or tourists (20 million invaded Portugal in 2016) will pass there.  

Otherwise, don't let your drivers drop you at just any gas station along the way - try your best to stick to busy ones (on the right side and near the highway, Repsol and Galp).

If your ride is only taking you to somewhere near Vilar Formoso border and you want to go further in Portugal, you can stay at the last Cepsa gas station on the right side of the road, 5kms before the border. Gas is cheaper in Spain. 

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===
The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Links ==

* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/174166089591892/ Facebook group for hitchhiking in Spain]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{Template:Cities spain}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>7ssrbdslxa6hgev1utassbauumbbvl6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>111753</id>
      <parentid>111752</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-08-23T08:19:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13515">__NOTOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = Spain
|language = Spanish, Catalan, Basque, Galician
|capital = [[Madrid]]
|map = &lt;map lat='40.0' lng='-4.0' zoom='5'/&gt;
|pop = 47.000.000
|currency = Euro
|hitch = &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
|hitchbase = 177
|BW = ES
}}
'''Spain''' is a member state of the European Union as well as the Schengen Agreement. 

Spain consists of 17 administrative units called ''Comunidades Autónomas''. Some of these administrative units  also represent historical nations  that vary in traditions, culture, gastronomy and even language. Although all citizens of Spain speak Spanish and are politically recognised as Spaniards, you will be more liked by locals – especially in the nationalistic Basque country and Catalunya – if you learn the basic distinctive features of each region (i.e don't expect sevillanas and bullfighting in Girona, and don't be surprised if you see  bagpipes and celtic-like stuff in Santiago de Compostela!).

In Spain, hitching isn’t a very common concept and mostly done by foreigners. This might be due shaping periods in Spanish history as the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francoist_Spain Francoist dictatorship] and events as the murder of the [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcàsser_Girls Alcàsser Girls]. But It's really different depending on the autonomous community : it's easy in Galicia, Asturia and Extrémadura. In these communities it works like in France. It's better to stand with a cardboard. In Euskadi and Catalonia, you will wait a long time just stand with a cardboard. However, the thumb will be understood. In the Pyrenees hitching is easy. An effective best method can be ask people directly whenever possible, e.g. in service stations, even if your Spanish is very poor. The Spanish phrase ''vas a... ?'' ‘are you going to...?’ is a good starting point. Because Spain is a touristic country, at some large service stations you can find drivers from all over Europe, who are more likely to take you than the local people. However, this strategy is not advised in the far south of Spain (Andalucia), as service stations there tend to be deserted and sometimes off of the main road. 
Generally, there are petrol stations every 20-30 km, often in a so-called "via de servicio", along with a hotel or a restaurant. This means that each and every one of those petrol stations has less traffic. Most people who travel certain roads regularly will know (or pretend to know!) the good spots where a lot of traffic passes through (e.g. truck stops, or nice restaurants). Try not to get stuck in places off the main road (in a village, or an industrial zone), but ask your driver if s/he knows a place with lots of people. 
__TOC__
Even if you hitchhike alone or in groups of two, be prepared to make much fewer kilometres per day than in e.g. Germany or France. Waiting times of over an hour are common, and 500–700 km a day may prove a real challenge. The first time you hitchhike in Spain, it might be a good idea to only plan for 300 km a day. If you do master some Spanish, however, and if you carefully stick to service stations asking people, hitching can be easy and fun - even in Spain. 

During the "the siesta" (from 14:00 to 17:00), there tends to be less traffic. In the summer, the sun can be very powerful at this time of day, so it may be best to avoid standing on the road during the siesta hours.

As hitch-hiking is not a very common concept in Spain, many Spanish people travel via blablacar. If you want to get out of big cities (Madrid, Barcelona) you might have to pay 3-5 Euros to get to a hitch-hiking spot. In this case, consider finding a short ride just out of the city to a nearby small town, with blablacar. The driver can drop you directly on a service station on the motorway, and you might not have to walk around in the Spanish summer heat. 

Pontevedra city has banned cars https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2018/sep/18/paradise-life-spanish-city-banned-cars-pontevedra

&lt;gallery perrow="3" style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:20px;"&gt;
File:CommunidadValenciana.JPG|thumb|right|Hilde hitchhiking to [[Valencia]].
File:2002_Dec_Hitch_hiking_in_Catalonia_SPAIN.jpg|Hitch-hiking in Catalonia. December 2002.
File:Granada.jpg|Robino hitching from Valencia to [[Granada]].
File:HhPICT1975.jpg|Stop at Valencia, at the trip from [[Germany]] to [[Portugal]].
File:2002-03 Trying to hitchhike in Murcia to Sevilla.jpg|2002 trip from Berlin to Cádiz. It took only one day from Berlin to Barcelona but three days to get from Murcia to Cádiz. South of Spain: Very difficult to hitchhike. But the flowers did help!
File:P1000787.JPG| Night hithhiking in [[Murcia]]
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== Cities ==
* [[Algeciras]]
* [[Alicante]]
* [[Badajoz]]
* [[Barcelona]], the capital of [[Catalonia|Catalunya]]
* [[Bilbao]]
* [[Burgos]]
* [[Ceuta]]
* [[Cordoba]]
* [[Donostia-San Sebastián]]
* [[Granada]]
* [[Madrid]], the capital
* [[Málaga|Malaga]]
* [[Oviedo]]
* [[Salamanca (Spain)|Salamanca]]
* [[Santander]]
* [[Santiago de Compostela]]
* [[Sevilla]]
* [[Valencia]]
* [[Vigo]]
* [[Zaragoza]]

== Road network ==
The north of Spain has a well developed system of ''Autopistas''. Autopistas are very similar to French ''autoroutes'', and so similar rules can be applied when hitchhiking. ''Autopistas'' have two or more lanes in each direction, accessed after passing through a  ''peaje'' (tollgate) and have large rest stops along the way.

When hitching at ''peajes'', usually people have great success, and can obtain long distance rides, even at night time. Usually the police and motorway staff do not interfere, but some stricter police may request that you leave. It is important to note that large ''peaje'' sections are usually split by a concrete wall; 2 or 3 lanes for cars, on the inside, and another 2 or 3 lanes for buses and trucks on the outside. The concrete walls usually carry on some distance after the peaje, and end once the vehicles are travelling too fast to stop. It is up to the hitchhiker to decide which lanes to take, however sticking to the outside and waiting for a truck may attract less attention from the authorities than standing further inside waiting for a car. 

When hitching long distances it is a good idea to stick to large ''peaje'' sections or rest stops. Bring water and food, since these ''áreas de servicio'' are expensive. It should be noted that hitching at small ''peaje'' sections, on motorway exits, is not recommended, as often there is one peaje for both directions, automatically ruling out many vehicles as possible rides.

In the south of Spain, and parts of the center and the North, the motorways are smaller and the petrol stations are usually further away from the road; this system is called ''autovia''. [http://motorways-exitlists.com/europe/e/spain.htm This website] shows exits and also service areas for some ''autovias'', as well as ''autopistas.'' It is best to be patient at these places. Be careful when people promise you to drop you off at a "very busy" petrol station, as it might turn out to be deserted. It is better in these cases to find direct lifts from one town to another (use a sign when thumbing).

== Border crossing ==
When entering the country from [[France]] you should try to get a lift as close to your destination as possible. On the Mediterranean side, a good place for this is La Jonquera, one of the biggest truck stops in Europe. You’ll find plenty of international truck drivers all over the country, because Spain is a centre of the fruit industry, exporting their oranges and tomatoes. On the Atlantic side, there is another huge truck stop near Irun called Oyarzun (accessible in both directions).

If you arrive by the ferry from [[Africa]] you should try to get a ride on the ferry or at the port. There are lots of people from [[Morocco]], who went to visit their families and now return. You’ll see number plates from many other European states.

=== Crossing Spain to get to Portugal ===
If you just want to get to Portugal, you'll want to to keep your hitch journey in Spain as short and quick as possible. This will happen by sticking to the the main road (AP-1, A-62, mostly "autovia") from Bayonne/San Sebastian to Salamanca / Vilar Formoso (the portuguese border near Guarda). Even if you come from, say, Montpellier, it's recommended to hitch up to Bayonne and cross the basque country.

A good technique is to stay in one of the last service stations on the A63 in France before the spanish border, and wait for someone who can take you all to way to Portugal. Portuguese plates (1/3 of portuguese nationals live outside Portugal) or tourists (20 million invaded Portugal in 2016) will pass there.  

Otherwise, don't let your drivers drop you at just any gas station along the way - try your best to stick to busy ones (on the right side and near the highway, Repsol and Galp).

If your ride is only taking you to somewhere near Vilar Formoso border and you want to go further in Portugal, you can stay at the last Cepsa gas station on the right side of the road, 5kms before the border. Gas is cheaper in Spain. 

== Language(s) ==
As mentioned above, the Comunidades are not only administrative districts; many of the regions have their own culture, language and some even are reluctant about considering themselves as a part of Spain. For example the dominating language in [[Catalonia]] is Catalan, so be aware of that. Nevertheless, everyone speaks ''castellano'' (Spanish).

Aside from Spanish, other recognised spoken languages are Galician, Basque, Catalan, Aranese, Astur-leonese and Aragonese. Only the first three are legally official and have a considerable number of speakers. But don't panic! Everybody speaks perfect Spanish and won't feel uncomfortable talking to you. Younger Spaniards will easily understand you in English as well. Obviously, big co-official languages like Basque, Catalan and Galician are widely used in their respective regions, and learning a handful of words or at least showing your interest in local languages may make the driver loosen up.

Also, you will find that some Catalan, Basque and Galician cities can appear in signs and maps with two names: one in its local  language form and the other in Spanish. For instance: Donostia (in Basque) is also known as San Sebastián (in Spanish),  Lleida (in Catalan) is Lérida (in Spanish), Rianxo (in Galician) is Rianjo (in Spanish) etc.  Whatever your map says and whichever  language you are speaking —even if you are speaking in Spanish— , hitchwiki  encourages you to use the local language form better than the Spanish one  if possible, also in your sign,  in order to not mess  with politics. Spaniards all across Spain understand both forms. 

Note: Although the signs on the road and other kinds of key information (i.e: restaurant menus) are translated into Spanish in bilingual territories, you will definitely need help in small towns and non-touristy places in the Basque Country and Catalonia, especially because Basque is an isolated language that does not resemble anything you have heard before. In case of doubt, ask the locals. In Spanish ''Disculpe, ¿qué signfica...'' (Excuse me, what does ... mean?) works fine everywhere.  [[User:Mariam|Mariam]] , who does not speak  Basque, walked from a small town following a sign  in Basque that she thought would guide her to the next town and ended up in a recycling plant.

=== Spanish for the Hitchhiker ===
The Spanish phrase ''¡Hola! Vas a... ?'' (Hello, are you going to... ?) with a wide smile is an excellent starting point. Remember most Spaniards actually meet the stereotype of being loud and friendly, but aren't used to see hitchhikers on the road. Therefore, you'd better be  extra familiar and polite  by saying things like "¡Gracias, buen viaje!" (Thank you, have a nice trip!) after your driver drops you off or when they make excuses to not pick you up (this way they will think twice the next time they bump into a hitchhiker). Check the Spanish section in the [[Western Europe phrasebook|phrasebook]] for more basic words. 

In Spanish there are only five vowel sounds and, conversely to French or English, you should pronounce all the  letters that you read as an independent sound. So say phonetically with a clear distinction of each sound "autopista"  [ aw to 'pis ta ] (motorway), not  ''ottopista'', or ''otpist'' . Other difficulties that foreigners usually face:  

The letter  ''Ñ'' as  in ''España'' and "mañana" (''morning'' or ''tomorrow''), which is the equivalent of the Portuguese digraph ''NH'' and Catalan ''NY''. If you struggle with it just pronounce it as an ''N'' and an ''I'' like when you say "Esto[[ni]]a" — it is not the actual sound, but it will work for a tourist. The digraph "LL" as in "calle" (¨street) and "valle" (valley) is pronounced in most places as a strong "y".  You would say "ka-yeh" and "ba-yeh". The digraph "CH" is always pronounced as in ''church'' in English. 

There are other tricky sounds like the ''Z'' and ''C'', the  double ''RR''... but you can get away with these brief tips pretty well. Spanish is easy!

== Links ==

* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/174166089591892/ Facebook group for hitchhiking in Spain]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{Template:Cities spain}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Southern Europe}}

[[Category:Spain]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Spanien]]
[[es:España]]
[[fr:Espagne]]
[[ru:Испания]]
[[tr:İspanya]]</text>
      <sha1>lln1n8q3jrdqvpcx9vdd7ctoxq2vyaf</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Helsinki</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1519</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1543</id>
      <parentid>4337</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-08-19T14:44:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>70.53.187.171</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1156">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.

{{stub}}

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]</text>
      <sha1>eygk9jhwptruf9cj1lpxbo61f8z9l6q</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1544</id>
      <parentid>1543</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1156">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.

{{stub}}

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]</text>
      <sha1>eygk9jhwptruf9cj1lpxbo61f8z9l6q</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4333</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T17:59:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GuakaTest</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="400">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers inter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.

{{stub}}</text>
      <sha1>khif751uib8iuxasr7kqvp4mslck1sd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4334</id>
      <parentid>4333</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T21:41:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>80.186.138.5</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="631">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers inter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.

{{stub}}


Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.</text>
      <sha1>bjyrlxpmvu4n5hwsu6ogqy9mkb0nthy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4335</id>
      <parentid>4334</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-21T19:45:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1035">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers inter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.

{{stub}}

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license... [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;</text>
      <sha1>k0tk5hy61bi2z1yio5cf6mu348qfkyw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4336</id>
      <parentid>4335</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-21T19:47:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1057">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers inter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.

{{stub}}

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]</text>
      <sha1>kjv7zl46g8oqndfcqldfq5lrdgow15o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4337</id>
      <parentid>4336</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-04T23:37:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1057">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.

{{stub}}

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]</text>
      <sha1>clzsioibtqdmbwjcwd2hgv8dowb0hhl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4338</id>
      <parentid>1544</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1156">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.

{{stub}}

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]</text>
      <sha1>eygk9jhwptruf9cj1lpxbo61f8z9l6q</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10428</id>
      <parentid>4338</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-04T18:37:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1802">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.

== Going to Porvoo ==

Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign. It is essential to use a sign reading "Porvoo", making sure it is visible to cars coming from both the left and the right. This is a low-traffic area, expect to wait an hour or so.

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]</text>
      <sha1>tgt7mk3qwsfvbm87x35q8p2csa7t2y0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10430</id>
      <parentid>10428</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-04T22:44:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1806">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.

== Going to [[Porvoo]] ==

Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign. It is essential to use a sign reading "Porvoo", making sure it is visible to cars coming from both the left and the right. This is a low-traffic area, expect to wait an hour or so.

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]</text>
      <sha1>63jzj7hywurk5ts9zdmdh1ljlzwjzlq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10455</id>
      <parentid>10430</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-07T15:49:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2326">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.

== Going to [[Porvoo]] ==

Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign. It is essential to use a sign reading "Porvoo", making sure it is visible to cars coming from both the left and the right. This is a low-traffic area, expect to wait an hour or so.

== Going to [[Turku]] ==

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]</text>
      <sha1>50t6dhrrznsigdggrn8hyuxf4n25sj2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17777</id>
      <parentid>10455</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-07T03:30:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Daniel</username>
        <id>25</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2605">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.

== Going to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border==

Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign. It is essential to use a sign reading "Porvoo", making sure it is visible to cars coming from both the left and the right. This is a low-traffic area, expect to wait an hour or so.
If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

== Going to [[Turku]] ==

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]</text>
      <sha1>10jux62nnq92wuuaob9lfsuix2m0snh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18598</id>
      <parentid>17777</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-02T09:25:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>193.166.88.162</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3190">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.

== Hitching Out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===

Take a local train to Kännelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border ===

Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign. It is essential to use a sign reading "Porvoo", making sure it is visible to cars coming from both the left and the right. This is a low-traffic area, expect to wait an hour or so.
If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]</text>
      <sha1>ghd7lxbis7xnqhxzyudlvysghmpcrjh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18805</id>
      <parentid>18598</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-10T12:12:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Amylin</username>
        <id>11</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3418">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.

[[Image:Crazy-helsinki.jpg|thumb|left|200px|What type of crazy person decides to hitchhike to Helsinki in the middle of Winter on a Sunday morning? At least [[amylin]] arrived, through the frozen rain, 3 or 4 hours later...]]


== Hitching Out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===

Take a local train to Kännelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border ===

Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign. It is essential to use a sign reading "Porvoo", making sure it is visible to cars coming from both the left and the right. This is a low-traffic area, expect to wait an hour or so.
If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]</text>
      <sha1>mdhwgqhpnfwivo3mnc2o09z0zpe025w</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18807</id>
      <parentid>18805</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-10T12:36:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Amylin</username>
        <id>11</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3191">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.


== Hitching Out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===

Take a local train to Kännelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border ===

Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign. It is essential to use a sign reading "Porvoo", making sure it is visible to cars coming from both the left and the right. This is a low-traffic area, expect to wait an hour or so.
If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]</text>
      <sha1>hk2cgelde3jv0fn5q4iox9a8vpxv62v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18891</id>
      <parentid>18807</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-16T14:19:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>79.226.40.242</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3402">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.


== Hitching Out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===

Take a local train to Kännelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "Mannerheimintie", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. There's a bus stop on the right hand side of the road. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside suburbs.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border ===

Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign. It is essential to use a sign reading "Porvoo", making sure it is visible to cars coming from both the left and the right. This is a low-traffic area, expect to wait an hour or so.
If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]</text>
      <sha1>r2c4j8zzzfy40djqaxb0pb3t26abebt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18892</id>
      <parentid>18891</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-16T14:53:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>79.226.40.242</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3583">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.


== Hitching Out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===

Take a local train to Kännelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "Mannerheimintie", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. There's a bus stop on the right hand side of the road. At least the buses 43, 452, 63 (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside suburbs.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border ===

Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign. It is essential to use a sign reading "Porvoo", making sure it is visible to cars coming from both the left and the right. This is a low-traffic area, expect to wait an hour or so.
If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]</text>
      <sha1>qvkalwnblze0mv8jbnht2819mdpv4uz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18998</id>
      <parentid>18892</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-22T10:27:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>79.226.62.29</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3889">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.


== Hitching Out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===

Take a local train to Kännelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "Mannerheimintie", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! Or then take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border ===

Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign. It is essential to use a sign reading "Porvoo", making sure it is visible to cars coming from both the left and the right. This is a low-traffic area, expect to wait an hour or so.
If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]</text>
      <sha1>mqn4r0d6azjf6e4a5jyw153xr572ixw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19001</id>
      <parentid>18998</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-22T12:27:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3899">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.


== Hitching Out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===

Take a local train to Kännelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "Mannerheimintie", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! Or then take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border ===

Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign. It is essential to use a sign reading "Porvoo", making sure it is visible to cars coming from both the left and the right. This is a low-traffic area, expect to wait an hour or so.
If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>j2b8sbmvqwcu4gapmbi3i43pv6hjkqi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19173</id>
      <parentid>19001</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-30T15:19:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>79.226.44.128</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3974">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.186769088804944' lng='24.906005859375' zoom='12' view='0' /&gt;


== Hitching Out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===

Take a local train to Kännelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "Mannerheimintie", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! Or then take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border ===

Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign. It is essential to use a sign reading "Porvoo", making sure it is visible to cars coming from both the left and the right. This is a low-traffic area, expect to wait an hour or so.
If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>5oy0yosu6rw3946tm20scx3kjxj6829</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19176</id>
      <parentid>19173</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-30T15:22:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>79.226.44.128</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3975">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.22310620155517' lng='24.877853393554688' zoom='11' view='0' /&gt;

== Hitching Out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===

Take a local train to Kännelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "Mannerheimintie", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! Or then take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border ===

Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign. It is essential to use a sign reading "Porvoo", making sure it is visible to cars coming from both the left and the right. This is a low-traffic area, expect to wait an hour or so.
If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>ln47o7wbhq5ufxzlmf0suw957id58mx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19190</id>
      <parentid>19176</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-30T15:38:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Ankii</username>
        <id>1352</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4279">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.22310620155517' lng='24.877853393554688' zoom='11' view='0' /&gt;

== Hitching Out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===

Take a local train to Kännelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "Mannerheimintie", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! Or then take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border ===

Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign. It is essential to use a sign reading "Porvoo", making sure it is visible to cars coming from both the left and the right. This is a low-traffic area, expect to wait an hour or so.
If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Other option: you can start hh'ing onramp at the very beginning of the highway #1, also called '''Turunväylä''' leading to Turku. Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have adviced to hitch hike with a sign on a bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>q7yg79ay9uvk505ijkqf3c1awtwp967</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19207</id>
      <parentid>19190</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-30T15:58:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4292">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.22310620155517' lng='24.877853393554688' zoom='11' view='0' float='right'/&gt;

== Hitching Out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===

Take a local train to Kännelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "Mannerheimintie", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! Or then take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border ===

Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign. It is essential to use a sign reading "Porvoo", making sure it is visible to cars coming from both the left and the right. This is a low-traffic area, expect to wait an hour or so.
If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Other option: you can start hh'ing onramp at the very beginning of the highway #1, also called '''Turunväylä''' leading to Turku. Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have adviced to hitch hike with a sign on a bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>kfavgbyjf9yi77tizub5oh5tcefnx7o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19214</id>
      <parentid>19207</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-30T16:16:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Ankii</username>
        <id>1352</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4566">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.22310620155517' lng='24.877853393554688' zoom='11' view='0' float='right'/&gt;

== Hitching Out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===

Take a local train to Kännelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "Mannerheimintie", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! Or then take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border ===

Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign. It is essential to use a sign reading "Porvoo", making sure it is visible to cars coming from both the left and the right. This is a low-traffic area, expect to wait an hour or so.
If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

'''Second option:''' This place is pretty close to the center and easy to reach but the downside is that there's a lot of traffic inside the city, that's why a sign is important. 

Take the bus number 18 or 14 from the main train station and hop off at the stop called '''Niemenmäki'''. You can start hh'ing onramp at the very beginning of the highway #1, also called '''Turunväylä''' leading to Turku. Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have adviced to hitch hike with a sign on a bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>3qke18janwje8gwkkn5ycdc0cxbq542</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19594</id>
      <parentid>19214</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-04-18T19:23:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>79.226.64.117</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4601">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.22310620155517' lng='24.877853393554688' zoom='11' view='0' float='right'/&gt;

== Hitching Out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===

Take a local train to Kännelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border ===

Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign. It is essential to use a sign reading "Porvoo", making sure it is visible to cars coming from both the left and the right. This is a low-traffic area, expect to wait an hour or so.
If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

'''Second option:''' This place is pretty close to the center and easy to reach but the downside is that there's a lot of traffic inside the city, that's why a sign is important. 

Take the bus number 18 or 14 from the main train station and hop off at the stop called '''Niemenmäki'''. You can start hh'ing onramp at the very beginning of the highway #1, also called '''Turunväylä''' leading to Turku. Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have adviced to hitch hike with a sign on a bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>jtoik5anremoogy29yttizkjcsxfbow</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19595</id>
      <parentid>19594</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-04-18T19:26:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>79.226.64.117</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4195">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.22310620155517' lng='24.877853393554688' zoom='11' view='0' float='right'/&gt;

== Hitching Out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===

Take a local train to Kännelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border ===

Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign. It is essential to use a sign reading "Porvoo", making sure it is visible to cars coming from both the left and the right. This is a low-traffic area, expect to wait an hour or so.
If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have adviced to hitch hike with a sign on a bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>8ote4q4kkbdasalyu4imiz559qc3mtq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>20141</id>
      <parentid>19595</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-05-26T15:46:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4723">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.22310620155517' lng='24.877853393554688' zoom='11' view='0' float='right'/&gt;

== Hitching Out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===

Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border, [[Saint Petersburg]] ===

The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[Image:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[Image:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have adviced to hitch hike with a sign on a bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>7i2hhp025m7rkl9hvy5k15mpslm3c84</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>20142</id>
      <parentid>20141</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-05-26T15:47:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4733">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.22310620155517' lng='24.877853393554688' zoom='11' view='0' float='right'/&gt;

== Hitching Out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===

Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border, [[Saint Petersburg]] ===

The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[Image:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[Image:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have adviced to hitch hike with a sign on a bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>moiq3nw4l7n02uxdbu6rd8nz4r17b0i</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>20460</id>
      <parentid>20142</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-07T05:13:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4750">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.22310620155517' lng='24.877853393554688' zoom='11' view='0' float='right'/&gt;

== Hitching Out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===

Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border, [[Saint Petersburg]] ===

The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[Image:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[Image:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have adviced to hitch hike with a sign on a bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]
__NOTOC__

[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>so9e8wrut9gcqz9k1f1rqmhoqpof0zv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>20716</id>
      <parentid>20460</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-11T15:54:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4767">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.22310620155517' lng='24.877853393554688' zoom='11' view='0' float='right'/&gt;

== Hitching Out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===

Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border, [[Saint Petersburg]] ===

The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[Image:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[Image:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have adviced to hitch hike with a sign on a bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]
__NOTOC__

[[fi:Helsinki]]
[[Category:E75]]</text>
      <sha1>qmfq0okax00ttyuhac7v3988s4jfpns</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>20906</id>
      <parentid>20716</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-11T19:51:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>78.47.158.206</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4844">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.22310620155517' lng='24.877853393554688' zoom='11' view='0' float='right'/&gt;

== Hitching Out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===

Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border, [[Saint Petersburg]] ===

The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[Image:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[Image:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have adviced to hitch hike with a sign on a bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]
__NOTOC__

[[fi:Helsinki]]
[[Category:E75]]
��������������������[[Category:E67]]</text>
      <sha1>p3223kbm2ml6r8cy5p88r4v2lfys8pk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>20944</id>
      <parentid>20906</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-11T19:53:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>78.47.158.206</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4844">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.22310620155517' lng='24.877853393554688' zoom='11' view='0' float='right'/&gt;

== Hitching Out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===

Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border, [[Saint Petersburg]] ===

The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[Image:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[Image:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have adviced to hitch hike with a sign on a bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]
__NOTOC__

[[fi:Helsinki]]
[[Category:E75]]
��������������������[[Category:E12]]</text>
      <sha1>7o3q51hvl8v386us2c0iemx5qsvkwx8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>20951</id>
      <parentid>20944</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-11T19:54:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>78.47.158.206</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4924">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.22310620155517' lng='24.877853393554688' zoom='11' view='0' float='right'/&gt;

== Hitching Out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===

Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border, [[Saint Petersburg]] ===

The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[Image:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[Image:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have adviced to hitch hike with a sign on a bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]
__NOTOC__

[[fi:Helsinki]]
[[Category:E75]]
��������������������[[Category:E12]]
���������������������[[Category:E18]]</text>
      <sha1>rgnf8ltiqslrirj5zrwegpygbuzpf8n</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21314</id>
      <parentid>20951</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-15T11:08:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4801">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.22310620155517' lng='24.877853393554688' zoom='11' view='0' float='right'/&gt;

== Hitching Out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===

Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border, [[Saint Petersburg]] ===

The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[Image:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[Image:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have adviced to hitch hike with a sign on a bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]
__NOTOC__

[[fi:Helsinki]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]</text>
      <sha1>7z2d0tx3931xvqyvd4oqgho7qtcy5us</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23340</id>
      <parentid>21314</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-08-10T16:50:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5032">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about half a million inhabitants and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.22310620155517' lng='24.877853393554688' zoom='11' view='0' float='right'/&gt;

== Hitching Out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===

Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border, [[Saint Petersburg]] ===

The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[Image:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[Image:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have adviced to hitch hike with a sign on a bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

===South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]]===
It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]
__NOTOC__

[[fi:Helsinki]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]</text>
      <sha1>s4w2w1svvn2wittdskrqmz4a8tidc92</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24878</id>
      <parentid>23340</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-15T10:36:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>137.163.145.226</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5052">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about a million inhabitants on the metropolitan area and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.22310620155517' lng='24.877853393554688' zoom='11' view='0' float='right'/&gt;

== Hitching Out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===

Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border, [[Saint Petersburg]] ===

The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[Image:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[Image:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have adviced to hitch hike with a sign on a bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

===South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]]===
It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]
__NOTOC__

[[fi:Helsinki]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]</text>
      <sha1>2h1hllvexuhggd0tbctjjykl0m85yph</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>25023</id>
      <parentid>24878</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-17T22:30:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>79.193.212.171</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6079">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about a million inhabitants on the metropolitan area and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.22310620155517' lng='24.877853393554688' zoom='11' view='0' float='right'/&gt;

== Hitching Out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===

Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] (also okay for [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]] and [[Saint Petersburg]]) ===

There's a long bus stop (I guess it's able to host four or five buses at the same time) mere meters before the beginning of the motorway. Go for the last bus stop before the beginning of the motorway number four. The stop is called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738.
The motorway splits into two slightly before ringroad number III. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand in the very front of the bus stop and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split..

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border, [[Saint Petersburg]] ===

The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[Image:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[Image:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have adviced to hitch hike with a sign on a bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

===South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]]===
It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]
__NOTOC__

[[fi:Helsinki]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]</text>
      <sha1>eyjhuiqxkutgp1tkq8tzxrwpeibiek9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>25251</id>
      <parentid>25023</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-22T14:34:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Joeri</username>
        <id>1580</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6492">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about a million inhabitants on the metropolitan area and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.22310620155517' lng='24.877853393554688' zoom='11' view='0' float='right'/&gt;

== Hitching Out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===

Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] (also okay for [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]] and [[Saint Petersburg]]) ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738.
The motorway splits into two slightly before ringroad number III. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
In case you can´t find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the highway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow - however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Not that this is officially a highway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border, [[Saint Petersburg]] ===

The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[Image:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[Image:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have adviced to hitch hike with a sign on a bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

===South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]]===
It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

==External links==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]
__NOTOC__

[[fi:Helsinki]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]</text>
      <sha1>edoswatjcv9tsac58w6pchbt66qkqxb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29178</id>
      <parentid>25251</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-14T21:59:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6506">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about a million inhabitants on the metropolitan area and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.22310620155517' lng='24.877853393554688' zoom='11' view='0' float='right'/&gt;

== Hitching Out ==
=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===
Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] (also okay for [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]] and [[Saint Petersburg]]) ===
There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738.
The motorway splits into two slightly before ringroad number III. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
In case you can´t find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the highway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow - however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Not that this is officially a highway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border, [[Saint Petersburg]] ===
The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[Image:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[Image:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===
Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have adviced to hitch hike with a sign on a bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here´s some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see www.hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>5in82t7n7onbdlldpeijgnlui7lpxsl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29278</id>
      <parentid>29178</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-16T21:36:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7160">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about a million inhabitants on the metropolitan area and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.22310620155517' lng='24.877853393554688' zoom='11' view='0' float='right'/&gt;

== Hitching Out ==
=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===
Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] (also okay for [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]] and [[Saint Petersburg]]) ===
There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738.
The motorway splits into two slightly before ringroad number III. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
In case you can´t find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the highway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow - however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Not that this is officially a highway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border, [[Saint Petersburg]] ===
The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[Image:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[Image:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===
Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have adviced to hitch hike with a sign on a bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== west (direction [[Hanko]]) ===
Take the motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large hard shoulder around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here's some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>p3cu5mmotb35t3bs0ueytx4t0fx2ibk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29279</id>
      <parentid>29278</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-16T21:42:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7161">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about a million inhabitants on the metropolitan area and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.22310620155517' lng='24.877853393554688' zoom='11' view='0' float='right'/&gt;

== Hitching Out ==
=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===
Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] (also okay for [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]] and [[Saint Petersburg]]) ===
There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738.
The motorway splits into two slightly before ringroad number III. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the highway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Not that this is officially a highway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border, [[Saint Petersburg]] ===
The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[Image:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[Image:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===
Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have adviced to hitch hike with a sign on a bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== west (direction [[Hanko]]) ===
Take the motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large hard shoulder around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here's some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>j2jhnktn11vrppcaa8feikl6ih1c8su</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30311</id>
      <parentid>29279</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-19T18:35:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kb</username>
        <id>1332</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7165">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about a million inhabitants on the metropolitan area and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.22310620155517' lng='24.877853393554688' zoom='11' view='0' float='right'/&gt;

== Hitching Out ==
=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===
Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] (also okay for [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]] and [[Saint Petersburg]]) ===
There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738.
The motorway splits into two slightly before ringroad number III. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the highway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Not that this is officially a highway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border, [[Saint Petersburg]] ===
The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[Image:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[Image:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===
Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have adviced to hitch hike with a sign on a bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== west (direction [[Hanko]]) ===
Take the motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here's some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>hzj6dcgx7uvctxksrvwrdwbaij4raf1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30312</id>
      <parentid>30311</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-19T18:40:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kb</username>
        <id>1332</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7171">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about a million inhabitants on the metropolitan area and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching Out ==
=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===
Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] (also okay for [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]] and [[Saint Petersburg]]) ===
There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738.
The motorway splits into two slightly before ringroad number III. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the highway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Not that this is officially a highway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border, [[Saint Petersburg]] ===
The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[Image:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[Image:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and highway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===
Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have adviced to hitch hike with a sign on a bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== west (direction [[Hanko]]) ===
Take the motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here's some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>eum4yf5het53cdbsijiuv2z4p4ltj33</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31220</id>
      <parentid>30312</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-22T11:07:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7174">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about a million inhabitants on the metropolitan area and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching Out ==
=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===
Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] (also okay for [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]] and [[Saint Petersburg]]) ===
There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738.
The motorway splits into two slightly before ringroad number III. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Not that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border, [[Saint Petersburg]] ===
The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[Image:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[Image:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and motorway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===
Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have adviced to hitch hike with a sign on a bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== west (direction [[Hanko]]) ===
Take the motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here's some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>rbxy4eh3uh19jc1v0qio36oyvz53007</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31498</id>
      <parentid>31220</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-03T23:47:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sigurdas</username>
        <id>1658</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7194">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about a million inhabitants on the metropolitan area and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching Out ==
=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===
Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] (also okay for [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]] and [[Saint Petersburg]]) ===
There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738.
The motorway splits into two slightly before ringroad number III. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Not that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border, [[Saint Petersburg]] ===
The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[Image:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[Image:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and motorway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===
Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have adviced to hitch hike with a sign on a bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== west (direction [[Hanko]]) ===
Take the motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here's some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>b34dluzitgk9ax7lpy6lxh00djen920</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>33740</id>
      <parentid>31498</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-06-01T23:18:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>83.245.162.179</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7195">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about a million inhabitants on the metropolitan area and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching Out ==
=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===
Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] (also okay for [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]] and [[Saint Petersburg]]) ===
There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738.
The motorway splits into two slightly before ringroad number III. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia|Russian]] border, [[Saint Petersburg]] ===
The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[Image:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[Image:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and motorway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===
Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have adviced to hitch hike with a sign on a bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== west (direction [[Hanko]]) ===
Take the motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here's some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;

[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>auc07dzmfjvbmyihosg3xbtdiyoyglh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>34981</id>
      <parentid>33740</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T17:33:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7186">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about a million inhabitants on the metropolitan area and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching Out ==
=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===
Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] (also okay for [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]] and [[Saint Petersburg]]) ===
There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738.
The motorway splits into two slightly before ringroad number III. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[Saint Petersburg]] ===
The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and motorway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===
Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have adviced to hitch hike with a sign on a bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== west (direction [[Hanko]]) ===
Take the motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here's some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>tlz0bmkatap34n52jrtnhuk0lv0riti</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36347</id>
      <parentid>34981</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-08-04T21:33:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>92.100.103.197</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7290">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about a million inhabitants on the metropolitan area and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching Out ==
=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===
Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] (also okay for [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]] and [[Saint Petersburg]]) ===
There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738.
The motorway splits into two slightly before ringroad number III. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[Saint Petersburg]] ===
The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and motorway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===
Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have adviced to hitch hike with a sign on a bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== west (direction [[Hanko]]) ===
Take the motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car. Truck drivers have said that if there is an extra passenger in a truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here's some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>liokdwux18ko9cvvnl4afgu96gfxg84</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36374</id>
      <parentid>36347</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-08-07T22:07:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>80.186.53.107</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7340">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about a million inhabitants on the metropolitan area and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching Out ==
=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===
Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] (also okay for [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]] and [[Saint Petersburg]]) ===
There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738.
The motorway splits into two slightly before ringroad number III. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[Saint Petersburg]] ===
The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and motorway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===
Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have adviced to hitch hike with a sign on a bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== west (direction [[Hanko]]) ===
Take the motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car. Truck drivers have said that if there is an extra passenger in a truck, an extra ticket has to be paid. (yes, an extra ticket definitely has to be paid!)

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here's some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>r9eohzsvf3h2rsootuexge0i4b6nbui</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36454</id>
      <parentid>36374</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-08-10T08:36:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7261">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about a million inhabitants on the metropolitan area and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching Out ==
=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] ===
Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] (also okay for [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]] and [[Saint Petersburg]]) ===
There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738.
The motorway splits into two slightly before ringroad number III. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[Saint Petersburg]] ===
The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and motorway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] ===
Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have adviced to hitch hike with a sign on a bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== west (direction [[Hanko]]) ===
Take the motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here's some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>m3w3d7ely4649em2q4ag7x8hzzdvjj0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41716</id>
      <parentid>36454</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-05-01T05:28:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7416">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighboring community of [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about a million inhabitants on the metropolitan area and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching Out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{European Route Number|12}} ===
Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] (also okay for [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]] and [[Saint Petersburg]]) {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738.
The motorway splits into two slightly before ringroad number III. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[Saint Petersburg]] {{European Route Number|18}} ===

The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and motorway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{European Route Number|18}} ===
Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have advised hitchhiking with a sign at the bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here's some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>9zb9rqo4tslhoj7h39riptcon6qp3nr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>42668</id>
      <parentid>41716</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-06-23T15:16:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7914">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about a million inhabitants on the metropolitan area and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching In ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.50€).

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 4.00€.

== Hitching Out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{European Route Number|12}} ===
Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] (also okay for [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]] and [[Saint Petersburg]]) {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738.
The motorway splits into two slightly before ringroad number III. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[Saint Petersburg]] {{European Route Number|18}} ===

The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and motorway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{European Route Number|18}} ===
Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have advised hitchhiking with a sign at the bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here's some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>0y03jup1b2qwzkaf0vfcy50lqq790ml</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>42669</id>
      <parentid>42668</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-06-23T15:21:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8450">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about a million inhabitants on the metropolitan area and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching In ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.50€).

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 4.00€.

== Hitching Out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{European Route Number|12}} ===
Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] (also okay for [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]] and [[Saint Petersburg]]) {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738.
The motorway splits into two slightly before ringroad number III. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[Saint Petersburg]] {{European Route Number|18}} ===

The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and motorway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{European Route Number|18}} ===
Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have advised hitchhiking with a sign at the bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here's some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>hjksk3fxfm15l34kzc3o8lszlajoe0q</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>46970</id>
      <parentid>42669</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-11-11T13:40:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8370">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about a million inhabitants on the metropolitan area and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching In ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.50€).

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 4.00€.

== Hitching Out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===
Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] (also okay for [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]] and [[Saint Petersburg]]) {{E|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738.
The motorway splits into two slightly before ringroad number III. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and motorway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===
Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have advised hitchhiking with a sign at the bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here's some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>8x1ol0dlkfioyu02z6foyf1mjdrvw7a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>47110</id>
      <parentid>46970</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-11-11T14:54:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>78.47.138.23</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8209">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about a million inhabitants on the metropolitan area and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching In ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.50€).

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 4.00€.

== Hitching Out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===
Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] (also okay for [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]] and [[Saint Petersburg]]) {{E|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738.
The motorway splits into two slightly before ringroad number III. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and motorway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===
Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have advised hitchhiking with a sign at the bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here's some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:
[[Category:E12]]</text>
      <sha1>mm98x3l1vajeuh1y1062ordlgop2vp9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>47114</id>
      <parentid>47110</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-11-11T14:54:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8370">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about a million inhabitants on the metropolitan area and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching In ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.50€).

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 4.00€.

== Hitching Out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===
Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] (also okay for [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]] and [[Saint Petersburg]]) {{E|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738.
The motorway splits into two slightly before ringroad number III. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and motorway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===
Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have advised hitchhiking with a sign at the bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here's some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>8x1ol0dlkfioyu02z6foyf1mjdrvw7a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>51026</id>
      <parentid>47114</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-04-05T12:53:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8373">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about a million inhabitants on the metropolitan area and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching In ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.50€).

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 4.00€.

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===
Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] (also okay for [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]] and [[Saint Petersburg]]) {{E|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738.
The motorway splits into two slightly before ringroad number III. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and motorway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===
Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have advised hitchhiking with a sign at the bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here's some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>fqxgzg53rjclhh3huz3q8zq705p2yi5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>52806</id>
      <parentid>51026</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-06-11T18:46:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>T0ma5</username>
        <id>2182</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8688">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about a million inhabitants on the metropolitan area and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching In ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.50€).

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 4.00€.

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===
Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] (also okay for [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]] and [[Saint Petersburg]]) {{E|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738.
The motorway splits into two slightly before ringroad number III. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

Another option using TRAM (easy black ride, unlike buses) 
Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 "Arabia" lat stop. Walk 800mts (10min) and try the bus stop or go to a wider place of the road after the bus stop. The place is after a motoway sign, but the police usually don't care.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and motorway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===
Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have advised hitchhiking with a sign at the bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here's some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>fknfvc66zwxsk2b4xgjnwizliszvgh3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>52821</id>
      <parentid>52806</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-06-12T09:02:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>T0ma5</username>
        <id>2182</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8735">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about a million inhabitants on the metropolitan area and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching In ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.50€).

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 4.00€.

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===
Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] (also okay for [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]] and [[Saint Petersburg]]) {{E|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738.
The motorway splits into two slightly before ringroad number III. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

Another option using TRAM, easier to black ride, unlike buses:
Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 Kylasaarenkatu stop. Walk back to the main road and try the bus stopos or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and motorway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===
Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have advised hitchhiking with a sign at the bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here's some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>ldyo3x53xvm3i5gpq67yq6go43s0syb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>52822</id>
      <parentid>52821</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-06-12T09:08:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>T0ma5</username>
        <id>2182</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8794">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about a million inhabitants on the metropolitan area and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching In ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.50€).

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 4.00€.

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===
Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] (also okay for [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]] and [[Saint Petersburg]]) {{E|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738.
The motorway splits into two slightly before ringroad number III. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

Another option using TRAM, easier to black ride than buses:
Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 Arabiankatu stop. Walk back to the main road 800mts. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in 2.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and motorway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===
Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have advised hitchhiking with a sign at the bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here's some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>58orm87l6tx9xxfsteug1446jop3a9x</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>53895</id>
      <parentid>52822</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-08-09T11:26:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Oskari</username>
        <id>3684</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8999">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about a million inhabitants on the metropolitan area and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching In ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.50€).

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 4.00€.

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===
Take a local train to Kannelmäki and then bus 43 or 46T (from the same side of the street as the train station). With bus 46T ask to get off at Kalannintie, and with bus 43 ask to get off at the Tampere roundabout. You will easily see the motorway exit because it is signposted Tampere.

Traffic is light here and much of it is local, so don't use a sign. Try to get onto the motorway and then ask to be dropped off at a petrol station a couple of kilometres north where you can easily continue on with a sign.

You can also go to the northern end of "'''Mannerheimintie'''", where "Hämeenlinnanväylä" starts. At least the '''buses 43, 452, 63''' (leaving from the train station, from the "Elielinaukio") take you there, hop off at the bus stop "Ruskeasuon varikko", where you can start hitching! You can reach this spot by tram too: take the '''tram number 10''' to the direction Pikku-Huopalahti (goes in front of Lasipalatsi and follows Mannerheimintie). Hop off at Ruskeasuo and walk along Mannerheimintie for 5 minutes until you reach the end of it (the beginning of Hämeenlinnanväylä) and the bus stop mentioned above. Use a sign because there's a lot of traffic inside the city and you might get a direct ride to your destination.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] (also okay for [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]] and [[Saint Petersburg]]) {{E|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738.
The motorway splits into two slightly before ringroad number III. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over to the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

Another option using TRAM, easier to black ride than buses:
Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 Arabiankatu stop. Walk back to the main road 800mts. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in 2.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and motorway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===
Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have advised hitchhiking with a sign at the bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here's some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>ao5pby3jlwyxythuzriwhatfhmzyton</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>54738</id>
      <parentid>53895</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-09-06T19:08:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9101">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about a million inhabitants on the metropolitan area and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching In ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.50€).

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 4.00€.

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. Take bus 474 from the west side of the central railway station until the stop ''Kivistön kirkko''. The journey takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (4€). When you get off the bus, walk southwest along the road ''Laavatie'' and then south on the national road ''Vanha Hämeenlinnantie''. After 100 m you can see the petrol station complex to the west. The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (2.60€ to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] (also okay for [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]] and [[Saint Petersburg]]) {{E|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738.
The motorway splits into two slightly before ringroad number III. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over to the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

Another option using TRAM, easier to black ride than buses:
Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 Arabiankatu stop. Walk back to the main road 800mts. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in 2.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and motorway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===
Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have advised hitchhiking with a sign at the bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here's some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>jiiyu2f4k4qr8884mqaujbkm7w0phjd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>54777</id>
      <parentid>54738</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-09-08T12:16:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9169">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Most of the foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] of by plane to the international airport - which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]].

Helsinki is a nice place and worth staying for a couple of nights. Its a rather small city with about a million inhabitants on the metropolitan area and quite relaxed atmosphere.

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching In ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.50€).

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 4.00€.

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. Take bus 474 from the west side of the central railway station until the stop ''Kivistön kirkko''. The journey takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (4€). When you get off the bus, walk southwest along the road ''Laavatie'' and then south on the national road ''Vanha Hämeenlinnantie''. After 100 m you can see the petrol station complex to the west. The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (2.60€ to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] (also okay for [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]] and [[Saint Petersburg]]) {{E|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738.
The motorway splits into two slightly before ringroad number III. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over to the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

Another option using TRAM, easier to black ride than buses:
Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 Arabiankatu stop. Walk back to the main road 800mts. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in 2.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

The fastest way to get east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station Mellunmäki. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

There is another option to at least Porvoo, though it is superseded by the route mentioned above and waiting times can be extremely long. Take the metro to the Mellunmäki station, then take buses 56K, 86 or 87 to the Kuussillantie stop. The bus driver may not know the name of the stop, but if you mention that it is the Esso station before the bridge, he can then alert you when it is time to get off. On the corner a few metres toward the bridge from the McDonald's and the Esso, you'll see cars entering the junction of Ring 3 and motorway 7. Stand right before the no pedestrian sign.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===
Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have advised hitchhiking with a sign at the bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here's some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>3ukpru5k0hc5994ngma4sbctydthv9r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>54925</id>
      <parentid>54777</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-09-15T11:58:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8352">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.50€).

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 4.00€.

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. Take bus 474 from the west side of the central railway station until the stop ''Kivistön kirkko''. The journey takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (4€). When you get off the bus, walk southwest along the road ''Laavatie'' and then south on the national road ''Vanha Hämeenlinnantie''. After 100 m you can see the petrol station complex to the west. The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (2.60€ to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over to the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

There is another option using the tram, easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 Arabiankatu stop. Walk back to the main road 800mts. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in 2.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have advised hitchhiking with a sign at the bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here's some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>qyv8jneg59xe9hhmwa0mikyhq6lolpw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>55853</id>
      <parentid>54925</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-08T01:13:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8376">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.50€).

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 4.00€.

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. Take bus 474 from the west side of the central railway station until the stop ''Kivistön kirkko''. The journey takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (4€). When you get off the bus, walk southwest along the road ''Laavatie'' and then south on the national road ''Vanha Hämeenlinnantie''. After 100 m you can see the petrol station complex to the west. The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (2.60€ to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over to the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

There is another option using the tram, easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 Arabiankatu stop. Walk back to the main road 800mts. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in 2.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have advised hitchhiking with a sign at the bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[shoulder|hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

&lt;!--
Here's some info over Helsinki: To find good hitching spots here as well as elsewhere in Finland, go to see hitchbase.com. Languages are German, English and Russian. You are also most welcome to add new info on those pages.

:Please add direct links, not just general information about a website. Also, I prefer to add information when I know it will be under a free license :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 19:45, 21 Dec 2005 (UTC)
--&gt;
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>sv4r72a4nce9n8gqq7wuxilf6ulker6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69636</id>
      <parentid>55853</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-05-19T09:36:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8011">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.50€).

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 4.00€.

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. Take bus 474 from the west side of the central railway station until the stop ''Kivistön kirkko''. The journey takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (4€). When you get off the bus, walk southwest along the road ''Laavatie'' and then south on the national road ''Vanha Hämeenlinnantie''. After 100 m you can see the petrol station complex to the west. The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (2.60€ to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over to the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

There is another option using the tram, easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 Arabiankatu stop. Walk back to the main road 800mts. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in 2.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have advised hitchhiking with a sign at the bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[shoulder|hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]


{{Highways FI}}
{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}


__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>4kfw89p8c6hw572z8jcz515kv4pznkw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69643</id>
      <parentid>69636</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-05-19T10:49:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7993">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.50€).

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 4.00€.

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. Take bus 474 from the west side of the central railway station until the stop ''Kivistön kirkko''. The journey takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (4€). When you get off the bus, walk southwest along the road ''Laavatie'' and then south on the national road ''Vanha Hämeenlinnantie''. After 100 m you can see the petrol station complex to the west. The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (2.60€ to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over to the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

There is another option using the tram, easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 Arabiankatu stop. Walk back to the main road 800mts. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in 2.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have advised hitchhiking with a sign at the bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[shoulder|hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>hw6xujz53sdnpvgtm9z8niyq0wa3qse</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69851</id>
      <parentid>69643</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-05-30T21:27:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Drumroots</username>
        <id>6410</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8049">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine).

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 4.50€.

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. Take bus 474 from the west side of the central railway station until the stop ''Kivistön kirkko''. The journey takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (4€). When you get off the bus, walk southwest along the road ''Laavatie'' and then south on the national road ''Vanha Hämeenlinnantie''. After 100 m you can see the petrol station complex to the west. The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (2.60€ to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over to the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

There is another option using the tram, easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 Arabiankatu stop. Walk back to the main road 800mts. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in 2.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have advised hitchhiking with a sign at the bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[shoulder|hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>sznf9vxc1lwhe5viscsl93765l5on2p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69931</id>
      <parentid>69851</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-06-03T10:35:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Drumroots</username>
        <id>6410</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8052">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine).

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 4.50€.

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. Take bus 474 from the west side of the central railway station until the stop ''Kivistön kirkko''. The journey takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). When you get off the bus, walk southwest along the road ''Laavatie'' and then south on the national road ''Vanha Hämeenlinnantie''. After 100 m you can see the petrol station complex to the west. The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over to the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

There is another option using the tram, easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 Arabiankatu stop. Walk back to the main road 800mts. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in 2.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have advised hitchhiking with a sign at the bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[shoulder|hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish and Swedish) and get a free "picnic cruise".

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>fte6ip5nynj5a3tfxs33pk24wzb8497</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69932</id>
      <parentid>69931</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-06-03T10:36:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Drumroots</username>
        <id>6410</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8062">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine).

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 4.50€.

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. Take bus 474 from the west side of the central railway station until the stop ''Kivistön kirkko''. The journey takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). When you get off the bus, walk southwest along the road ''Laavatie'' and then south on the national road ''Vanha Hämeenlinnantie''. After 100 m you can see the petrol station complex to the west. The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over to the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

There is another option using the tram, easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 Arabiankatu stop. Walk back to the main road 800mts. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in 2.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have advised hitchhiking with a sign at the bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[shoulder|hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise".

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>p6a2bddm3dgpss20nwmmbfrarp2me5l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70673</id>
      <parentid>69932</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-07-29T22:25:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fedecicco</username>
        <id>4349</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8793">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metro buses and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls..

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 4.50€.

If you hitch a boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuoosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, vuosaaren). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the station otherwise you might have to walk a bit..

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. Take bus 474 from the west side of the central railway station until the stop ''Kivistön kirkko''. The journey takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). When you get off the bus, walk southwest along the road ''Laavatie'' and then south on the national road ''Vanha Hämeenlinnantie''. After 100 m you can see the petrol station complex to the west. The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over to the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

There is another option using the tram, easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 Arabiankatu stop. Walk back to the main road 800mts. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in 2.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have advised hitchhiking with a sign at the bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[shoulder|hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's unclear if you can find rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise".

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>ccjzpf53833s34uw5u3dteoukiscie1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72527</id>
      <parentid>70673</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-18T15:12:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9007">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metro buses and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls..

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 4.50€.

If you hitch a boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuoosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, vuosaaren). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the station otherwise you might have to walk a bit..

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. Take bus 474 from the west side of the central railway station until the stop ''Kivistön kirkko''. The journey takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). When you get off the bus, walk southwest along the road ''Laavatie'' and then south on the national road ''Vanha Hämeenlinnantie''. After 100 m you can see the petrol station complex to the west. The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over to the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

There is another option using the tram, easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 Arabiankatu stop. Walk back to the main road 800mts. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in 2.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have advised hitchhiking with a sign at the bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[shoulder|hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>tsdf9g1kofddcakvn2iltnp7qy27tpd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72528</id>
      <parentid>72527</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-18T15:12:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9028">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metro buses and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls..

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 4.50€.

If you hitch a boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuoosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, vuosaaren). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the station otherwise you might have to walk a bit..

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. Take bus 474 from the west side of the central railway station until the stop ''Kivistön kirkko''. The journey takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). When you get off the bus, walk southwest along the road ''Laavatie'' and then south on the national road ''Vanha Hämeenlinnantie''. After 100 m you can see the petrol station complex to the west. The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over to the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

There is another option using the tram, easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 Arabiankatu stop. Walk back to the main road 800mts. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in 2.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have advised hitchhiking with a sign at the bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[shoulder|hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>733tq5koe3ck9d0njp4i24nx0q89vuc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72558</id>
      <parentid>72528</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-20T10:51:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9229">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metro buses and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls..

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 4.50€.

If you hitch a boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuoosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, vuosaaren). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the station otherwise you might have to walk a bit..

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. Take bus 474 from the west side of the central railway station until the stop ''Kivistön kirkko''. The journey takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). When you get off the bus, walk southwest along the road ''Laavatie'' and then south on the national road ''Vanha Hämeenlinnantie''. After 100 m you can see the petrol station complex to the west. The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over to the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

There is another option using the tram, easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 Arabiankatu stop. Walk back to the main road 800mts. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in 2.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have advised hitchhiking with a sign at the bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[shoulder|hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine]
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink]
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line]
* [http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>kbkxsb874cwk4kddn7qx7840batflto</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>74243</id>
      <parentid>72558</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-02-20T16:57:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Ruan.bsb</username>
        <id>17131</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9142">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metro buses and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls..

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 4.50€.

If you hitch a boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuoosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, vuosaaren). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the station otherwise you might have to walk a bit..

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over to the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

There is another option using the tram, easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 Arabiankatu stop. Walk back to the main road 800mts. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in 2.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have advised hitchhiking with a sign at the bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[shoulder|hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine]
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink]
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line]
* [http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>hqq1l9a1skpy71e52ceaof1j8ceho0t</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>74250</id>
      <parentid>74243</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-02-22T20:28:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Freayd</username>
        <id>16834</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9157">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metro buses and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls..

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 5€ (regional ticket).

If you hitch a boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuoosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, vuosaaren). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the station otherwise you might have to walk a bit..

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over to the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

There is another option using the tram, easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 Arabiankatu stop. Walk back to the main road 800mts. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in 2.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have advised hitchhiking with a sign at the bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[shoulder|hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine]
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink]
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line]
* [http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>hwioh1azbikpya9vi9bv87fd7oixrjh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79916</id>
      <parentid>74250</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-07-21T16:42:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mrkvon</username>
        <id>19594</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9379">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metro buses and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls..

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 5€ (regional ticket). (July 2015: Regional trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is a staff in grey vests and green-white striped uniforms selling tickets but not checking. Just beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms.)

If you hitch a boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuoosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, vuosaaren). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the station otherwise you might have to walk a bit..

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over to the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

There is another option using the tram, easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 Arabiankatu stop. Walk back to the main road 800mts. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in 2.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have advised hitchhiking with a sign at the bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[shoulder|hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine]
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink]
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line]
* [http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>th18yn51vtr2kwnjo1fsgaq53laqbzz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79917</id>
      <parentid>79916</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-07-21T19:31:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mrkvon</username>
        <id>19594</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9766">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metro buses and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls..

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 5€ (regional ticket). (July 2015: Regional trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is a staff in grey vests and green-white striped uniforms selling tickets but not checking. Just beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms.)

If you hitch a boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuoosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, vuosaaren). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the station otherwise you might have to walk a bit..

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

Since July 2015 a new ring railway is open. It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown (controllers wear blue uniforms. Grey + green-white striped uniforms belong to train staff who sell tickets, not check).

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over to the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

There is another option using the tram, easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 Arabiankatu stop. Walk back to the main road 800mts. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in 2.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have advised hitchhiking with a sign at the bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[shoulder|hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine]
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink]
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line]
* [http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>gjpepjr31qglzkn6zm7c9eawe3upsow</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79918</id>
      <parentid>79917</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-07-21T19:35:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mrkvon</username>
        <id>19594</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9798">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metro buses and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls..

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 5€ (regional ticket).

July 2015: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in grey vests and green-white striped shirts selling tickets but not checking. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuoosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, vuosaaren). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the station otherwise you might have to walk a bit..

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

Since July 2015 a new ring railway is open. It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown (controllers wear blue uniforms. Grey + green-white striped uniforms belong to train staff who sell tickets, not check).

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over to the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

There is another option using the tram, easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 Arabiankatu stop. Walk back to the main road 800mts. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in 2.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have advised hitchhiking with a sign at the bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[shoulder|hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine]
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink]
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line]
* [http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>kk2lojs6e78t92c28o0m7chhrdusqtv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>81419</id>
      <parentid>79918</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-11-08T10:27:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dakkus</username>
        <id>2398</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10039">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metro buses and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls..

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 5€ (regional ticket).

July 2015: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in grey vests and green-white striped shirts selling tickets but not checking. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the station otherwise you might have to walk a bit..

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

Since July 2015 a new ring railway is open. It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown (controllers wear blue uniforms. Grey + green-white striped uniforms belong to train staff who sell tickets, not check).

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over to the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

There is another option using the tram, easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 Arabiankatu stop. Walk back to the main road 800mts. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in 2.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have advised hitchhiking with a sign at the bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[shoulder|hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine]
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink]
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line]
* [http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>5ulou490ke6y9j6bmyropkaf3d8opom</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>81420</id>
      <parentid>81419</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-11-08T10:35:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dakkus</username>
        <id>2398</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10650">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metro buses and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls..

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 5€ (regional ticket).

July 2015: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in grey vests and green-white striped shirts selling tickets but not checking. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the station otherwise you might have to walk a bit..

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

Since July 2015 a new ring railway is open. It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown (controllers wear blue uniforms. Grey + green-white striped uniforms belong to train staff who sell tickets, not check).

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over to the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

There is another option using the tram, easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 Arabiankatu stop. Walk back to the main road 800mts. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in 2.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. Going a little further from the bus stop and cross to the other side of the street. You'll find the entry ramp onto the motorway. I recommend standing right in front of the large side with a graphic symbolizing the motorway, as then you'll be seen by cars coming from both directions, and there's sufficient room for a car to stop. Use a sign, not everyone taking this route is going all the way to Turku.

Some of the drivers say though that it's pretty hard to stop there and have advised hitchhiking with a sign at the bus stop on '''Huopalahdentie''' right before the ramp.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[shoulder|hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck about 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point!
You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine]
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink]
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line]
* [http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>c78uj1dx4p0fc1onnbmowd5icsqqiv0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>83114</id>
      <parentid>81420</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-06-03T14:01:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Drumroots</username>
        <id>6410</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10856">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metro buses and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls..

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 5€ (regional ticket).

July 2015: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in grey vests and green-white striped shirts selling tickets but not checking. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the station otherwise you might have to walk a bit..

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

Since July 2015 a new ring railway is open. It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown (controllers wear blue uniforms. Grey + green-white striped uniforms belong to train staff who sell tickets, not check).

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over to the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

There is another option using the tram, easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 Arabiankatu stop. Walk back to the main road 800mts. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in 2.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[shoulder|hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck about 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point!
You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine]
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink]
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line]
* [http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>7xx3iimwpy7w61i7htpjzrlhqjd8zkz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>83115</id>
      <parentid>83114</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-06-03T14:07:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Drumroots</username>
        <id>6410</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10884">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metro buses and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls..

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 5€ (regional ticket).

July 2015: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in grey vests and green-white striped shirts selling tickets but not checking. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the station otherwise you might have to walk a bit..

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

Since July 2015 a new ring railway is open. It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown (controllers wear blue uniforms. Grey + green-white striped uniforms belong to train staff who sell tickets, not check).

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but is impossible without it. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over to the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to leave you out between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split...
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, specially on Sunday morning), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get off once you passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, here are much more long - distance - going - cars to find than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

There is another option using the tram, easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 Arabiankatu stop. Walk back to the main road 800mts. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in 2.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[shoulder|hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck about 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point!
You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine]
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink]
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line]
* [http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>llwrqcdse7ptrd88b4yzbwnoxr8jxt7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>83116</id>
      <parentid>83115</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-06-03T14:19:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Drumroots</username>
        <id>6410</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10897">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metro buses and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls..

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 5€ (regional ticket).

July 2015: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in grey vests and green-white striped shirts selling tickets but not checking. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the station otherwise you might have to walk a bit..

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

Since July 2015 a new ring railway is open. It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown (controllers wear blue uniforms. Grey + green-white striped uniforms belong to train staff who sell tickets, not check).

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

There is another option using the tram, which are easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 : Arabiankatu stop. Walk 800m back to the main road. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You may take the metro to station ''Ruoholahti''. When you leave the station it's to the north (to the right hand side as compared to the direction of travel). You have to go through one block of buildings past ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street. You should find yourself right there near a big junction where the motorway goes off onto a bridge. There are good possibilities to stand – either a bus stop right before the traffic lights or a large [[shoulder|hard shoulder]] around the corner on the beginning of the motorway.

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck about 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point!
You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine]
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink]
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line]
* [http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>89hla7v522u3gsb1waes22aicupwww2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>83117</id>
      <parentid>83116</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-06-03T14:59:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Drumroots</username>
        <id>6410</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11117">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metro buses and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls..

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 5€ (regional ticket).

July 2015: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in grey vests and green-white striped shirts selling tickets but not checking. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the station otherwise you might have to walk a bit..

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

Since July 2015 a new ring railway is open. It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown (controllers wear blue uniforms. Grey + green-white striped uniforms belong to train staff who sell tickets, not check).

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

There is another option using the tram, which are easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 : Arabiankatu stop. Walk 800m back to the main road. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot. [[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]] Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You can take the metro to the end station in the west: ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck about 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point!
You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine]
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink]
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line]
* [http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>5c8wv31zbm3aff0yvr7d0s0yxa6z1od</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>83118</id>
      <parentid>83117</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-06-03T15:02:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Drumroots</username>
        <id>6410</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11128">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metro buses and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls..

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 5€ (regional ticket).

July 2015: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in grey vests and green-white striped shirts selling tickets but not checking. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the station otherwise you might have to walk a bit..

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

Since July 2015 a new ring railway is open. It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown (controllers wear blue uniforms. Grey + green-white striped uniforms belong to train staff who sell tickets, not check).

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

There is another option using the tram, which are easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 : Arabiankatu stop. Walk 800m back to the main road. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination. [[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You can take the metro to the end station in the west: ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck about 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point!
You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine]
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink]
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line]
* [http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>fws7u9bd52mblwvfri34b95663lrgcf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>83119</id>
      <parentid>83118</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-06-03T15:04:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Drumroots</username>
        <id>6410</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11129">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metro buses and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls..

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 5€ (regional ticket).

July 2015: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in grey vests and green-white striped shirts selling tickets but not checking. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the station otherwise you might have to walk a bit..

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

Since July 2015 a new ring railway is open. It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown (controllers wear blue uniforms. Grey + green-white striped uniforms belong to train staff who sell tickets, not check).

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

There is another option using the tram, which are easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 : Arabiankatu stop. Walk 800m back to the main road. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You can take the metro to the end station in the west: ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck about 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point!
You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine]
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink]
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line]
* [http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>koixeh2uxs9nvsm61e71j5cyho81nuf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>83120</id>
      <parentid>83119</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-06-03T15:06:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Drumroots</username>
        <id>6410</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11128">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metro buses and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls..

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 5€ (regional ticket).

July 2015: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in grey vests and green-white striped shirts selling tickets but not checking. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the station otherwise you might have to walk a bit..

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

Since July 2015 a new ring railway is open. It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown (controllers wear blue uniforms. Grey + green-white striped uniforms belong to train staff who sell tickets, not check).

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

There is another option using the tram, which are easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 : Arabiankatu stop. Walk 800m back to the main road. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]
The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You can take the metro to the end station in the west: ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck about 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point!
You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine]
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink]
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line]
* [http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>q6qkhtwnq5lbco78lebr6d2mnyyqdop</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>83121</id>
      <parentid>83120</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-06-03T15:07:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Drumroots</username>
        <id>6410</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11134">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metro buses and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls..

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 5€ (regional ticket).

July 2015: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in grey vests and green-white striped shirts selling tickets but not checking. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the station otherwise you might have to walk a bit..

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

Since July 2015 a new ring railway is open. It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown (controllers wear blue uniforms. Grey + green-white striped uniforms belong to train staff who sell tickets, not check).

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

There is another option using the tram, which are easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 : Arabiankatu stop. Walk 800m back to the main road. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]
The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.







=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You can take the metro to the end station in the west: ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck about 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point!
You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine]
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink]
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line]
* [http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>ive0uvgsovu4eqc0g76macygbke1ekp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>83339</id>
      <parentid>83121</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-06-10T07:59:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11153">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metro buses and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls..

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 5€ (regional ticket).

July 2015: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in grey vests and green-white striped shirts selling tickets but not checking. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the station otherwise you might have to walk a bit..

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

Since July 2015 a new ring railway is open. It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown (controllers wear blue uniforms. Grey + green-white striped uniforms belong to train staff who sell tickets, not check).

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

There is another option using the tram, which are easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 : Arabiankatu stop. Walk 800m back to the main road. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]
The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.







=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You can take the metro to the end station in the west: ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck about 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point!
You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine]
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink]
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line]
* [http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]
[[nomad:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>1zzgyi6rh2j7kj3i7wckj75pdx19hll</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>85443</id>
      <parentid>83339</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-02-17T11:39:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Marcel from germany</username>
        <id>10751</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11623">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metro buses and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls..

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 5€ (regional ticket).

July 2015: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in grey vests and green-white striped shirts selling tickets but not checking. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the station otherwise you might have to walk a bit..

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

Since July 2015 a new ring railway is open. It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown (controllers wear blue uniforms. Grey + green-white striped uniforms belong to train staff who sell tickets, not check).

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

There is another option using the tram, which are easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 : Arabiankatu stop. Walk 800m back to the main road. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]
The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.







=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You can take the metro to the end station in the west: ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

''This didn't work when I was there in summer 2016. Both website and staff told me there is no free cruise on becoming a member.''
''However, the '''ticket price''' was 10€ on the website in finish and/or swedish language. 20€ on the website in english language(!) And buying offline in the passenger terminal was even more. I sat in the terminal using the free wifi to buy the ticket, using online translator and common sense for figuring the finish website!''

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point!
You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine]
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink]
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line]
* [http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== External links ==
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]
[[nomad:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>0oty3x2uhzufgua15lhe02dckk3fvzu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>91429</id>
      <parentid>85443</parentid>
      <timestamp>2018-07-10T08:38:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11715">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metro buses and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls..

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 5€ (regional ticket).

July 2015: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in grey vests and green-white striped shirts selling tickets but not checking. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the station otherwise you might have to walk a bit..

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

Since July 2015 a new ring railway is open. It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown (controllers wear blue uniforms. Grey + green-white striped uniforms belong to train staff who sell tickets, not check).

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

There is another option using the tram, which are easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 : Arabiankatu stop. Walk 800m back to the main road. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]
The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.







=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You can take the metro to the end station in the west: ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

''This didn't work when I was there in summer 2016. Both website and staff told me there is no free cruise on becoming a member.''
''However, the '''ticket price''' was 10€ on the website in finish and/or swedish language. 20€ on the website in english language(!) And buying offline in the passenger terminal was even more. I sat in the terminal using the free wifi to buy the ticket, using online translator and common sense for figuring the finish website!''

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point!
You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine]
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink]
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line]
* [http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== External links ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]
[[nomad:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>89klxb8cghxe4qgff8mawr1dvp0iqcj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>97274</id>
      <parentid>91429</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-01-20T21:42:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Quasipodo</username>
        <id>41978</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* Ferry companies */ Added some comments on ferry companies and sorted by price.</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11927">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metro buses and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls..

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 5€ (regional ticket).

July 2015: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in grey vests and green-white striped shirts selling tickets but not checking. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the station otherwise you might have to walk a bit..

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

Since July 2015 a new ring railway is open. It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown (controllers wear blue uniforms. Grey + green-white striped uniforms belong to train staff who sell tickets, not check).

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

There is another option using the tram, which are easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 : Arabiankatu stop. Walk 800m back to the main road. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]
The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.







=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You can take the metro to the end station in the west: ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

''This didn't work when I was there in summer 2016. Both website and staff told me there is no free cruise on becoming a member.''
''However, the '''ticket price''' was 10€ on the website in finish and/or swedish language. 20€ on the website in english language(!) And buying offline in the passenger terminal was even more. I sat in the terminal using the free wifi to buy the ticket, using online translator and common sense for figuring the finish website!''

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point!
You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening.
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website.
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service.
* [http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== External links ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]
[[nomad:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>lszvqe9lhgwmwobzprdgc6yce4n16xy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>97275</id>
      <parentid>97274</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-01-20T21:55:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Quasipodo</username>
        <id>41978</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* South, ferry towards Tallinn, Estonia */ Added last info about viking lines / viking club fares Other info about the ferry companies added.</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12517">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metro buses and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls..

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 5€ (regional ticket).

July 2015: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in grey vests and green-white striped shirts selling tickets but not checking. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the station otherwise you might have to walk a bit..

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

Since July 2015 a new ring railway is open. It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown (controllers wear blue uniforms. Grey + green-white striped uniforms belong to train staff who sell tickets, not check).

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

There is another option using the tram, which are easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 : Arabiankatu stop. Walk 800m back to the main road. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]
The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.







=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You can take the metro to the end station in the west: ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

''This didn't work when I was there in summer 2016. Both website and staff told me there is no free cruise on becoming a member.''
''However, the '''ticket price''' was 10€ on the website in finnish and/or swedish language. 20€ on the website in english language(!) And buying offline in the passenger terminal was even more. I sat in the terminal using the free wifi to buy the ticket, using online translator and common sense for figuring the finish website!''

''As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'' 

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point!
You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.
* [http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== External links ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]
[[nomad:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>digqhkwdi8imowh8aff4f6og3i2f9zn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>97698</id>
      <parentid>97275</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-05-22T08:31:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* External links */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12586">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metro buses and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls..

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 5€ (regional ticket).

July 2015: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in grey vests and green-white striped shirts selling tickets but not checking. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the station otherwise you might have to walk a bit..

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

Since July 2015 a new ring railway is open. It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown (controllers wear blue uniforms. Grey + green-white striped uniforms belong to train staff who sell tickets, not check).

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

There is another option using the tram, which are easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 : Arabiankatu stop. Walk 800m back to the main road. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]
The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.







=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You can take the metro to the end station in the west: ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

''This didn't work when I was there in summer 2016. Both website and staff told me there is no free cruise on becoming a member.''
''However, the '''ticket price''' was 10€ on the website in finnish and/or swedish language. 20€ on the website in english language(!) And buying offline in the passenger terminal was even more. I sat in the terminal using the free wifi to buy the ticket, using online translator and common sense for figuring the finish website!''

''As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'' 

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point!
You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.
* [http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== Trashwiki &amp; Nomadwiki ==

[[nomad:Helsinki]] [[trash:Helsinki]]


== External links ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]
[[nomad:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>3x7t54vom21aekvqty4v8xla9gf2bg7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>99383</id>
      <parentid>97698</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-10-05T09:16:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Trashwiki &amp; Nomadwiki */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12586">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metro buses and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls..

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 5€ (regional ticket).

July 2015: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in grey vests and green-white striped shirts selling tickets but not checking. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the station otherwise you might have to walk a bit..

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

Since July 2015 a new ring railway is open. It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown (controllers wear blue uniforms. Grey + green-white striped uniforms belong to train staff who sell tickets, not check).

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

There is another option using the tram, which are easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 : Arabiankatu stop. Walk 800m back to the main road. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]
The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.







=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You can take the metro to the end station in the west: ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

''This didn't work when I was there in summer 2016. Both website and staff told me there is no free cruise on becoming a member.''
''However, the '''ticket price''' was 10€ on the website in finnish and/or swedish language. 20€ on the website in english language(!) And buying offline in the passenger terminal was even more. I sat in the terminal using the free wifi to buy the ticket, using online translator and common sense for figuring the finish website!''

''As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'' 

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point!
You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.
* [http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==


[[nomad:Helsinki]] [[trash:Helsinki]]

== External links ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]
[[nomad:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>qmbop4qncrxb3kpha0kxpf2rpujbeer</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>100550</id>
      <parentid>99383</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-01-29T21:04:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12563">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

&lt;map lat='60.2' lng='24.935' zoom='11' view='3' height='350' float='right' country='Finland'/&gt;

== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metro buses and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls..

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 5€ (regional ticket).

July 2015: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in grey vests and green-white striped shirts selling tickets but not checking. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the station otherwise you might have to walk a bit..

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==

=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

Since July 2015 a new ring railway is open. It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown (controllers wear blue uniforms. Grey + green-white striped uniforms belong to train staff who sell tickets, not check).

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 
In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! However, Joeri found this spot much better than Valtimontie.

There is another option using the tram, which are easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 : Arabiankatu stop. Walk 800m back to the main road. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]]n border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]
The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.







=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.
You can take the metro to the end station in the west: ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

''This didn't work when I was there in summer 2016. Both website and staff told me there is no free cruise on becoming a member.''
''However, the '''ticket price''' was 10€ on the website in finnish and/or swedish language. 20€ on the website in english language(!) And buying offline in the passenger terminal was even more. I sat in the terminal using the free wifi to buy the ticket, using online translator and common sense for figuring the finish website!''

''As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'' 

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point!
You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.
* [http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..



== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

== External links ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__

[[trash:Helsinki]]
[[nomad:Helsinki]]

[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>j7qzhc1pcphhj5si96cuao8httupkhi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101790</id>
      <parentid>100550</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-04-25T18:25:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11862">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).


== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metro buses and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls..

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 5€ (regional ticket).

July 2015: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in grey vests and green-white striped shirts selling tickets but not checking. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the station otherwise you might have to walk a bit..

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.


== Hitchhiking out ==


=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown (controllers wear blue uniforms. Grey + green-white striped uniforms belong to train staff who sell tickets, not check).

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.


=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! 

There is another option using the tram, which are easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 : Arabiankatu stop. Walk 800m back to the main road. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.


=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.


=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.


=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the end station in the west: ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)


=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]


== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

== External links ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]
* [http://hitchbase.com/ergebnisse.php?abfrage%5Bstartort%5D=103&amp;abfrage%5Bzielort%5D=-1&amp;abfrage%5Bstartland%5D=66&amp;abfrage%5Bzielland%5D=-1&amp;LANG=ger Helsinki at hitchbase.com]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/main.html#helsinki Hitchhiking guide to Helsinki]

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__


[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>irjwsv190iamw2qt9ac33pseek6sezz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101791</id>
      <parentid>101790</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-04-25T18:25:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* External links */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11567">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).


== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metro buses and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls..

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 5€ (regional ticket).

July 2015: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in grey vests and green-white striped shirts selling tickets but not checking. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the station otherwise you might have to walk a bit..

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.


== Hitchhiking out ==


=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämmenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown (controllers wear blue uniforms. Grey + green-white striped uniforms belong to train staff who sell tickets, not check).

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.


=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! 

There is another option using the tram, which are easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 : Arabiankatu stop. Walk 800m back to the main road. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.


=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.


=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.


=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the end station in the west: ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)


=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]


== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__


[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>hdowiwxwh41anefo8scsovukurts370</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106314</id>
      <parentid>101791</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-10-04T22:50:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Toukotolpo</username>
        <id>47510</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* Hitchhiking out */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11566">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).


== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metro buses and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls..

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 5€ (regional ticket).

July 2015: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in grey vests and green-white striped shirts selling tickets but not checking. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the station otherwise you might have to walk a bit..

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.


== Hitchhiking out ==


=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown (controllers wear blue uniforms. Grey + green-white striped uniforms belong to train staff who sell tickets, not check).

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.


=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! 

There is another option using the tram, which are easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 : Arabiankatu stop. Walk 800m back to the main road. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.


=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.


=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.


=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the end station in the west: ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)


=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__


[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>p90aemn2vdhzhpcr2fu6wdo2t0vwx1t</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106315</id>
      <parentid>106314</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-10-04T22:54:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Toukotolpo</username>
        <id>47510</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* North to Hämeenlinna, Tampere {{E|12}} */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11731">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).


== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metro buses and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls..

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 5€ (regional ticket).

July 2015: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in grey vests and green-white striped shirts selling tickets but not checking. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the station otherwise you might have to walk a bit..

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.


== Hitchhiking out ==


=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, who can check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give penalty fares. If you get asked to exit the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! 

There is another option using the tram, which are easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 : Arabiankatu stop. Walk 800m back to the main road. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.


=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.


=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.


=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the end station in the west: ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)


=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__


[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>1gizg0lts3tkworsn9vbuc9af7mn8s7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106316</id>
      <parentid>106315</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-10-04T22:55:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Toukotolpo</username>
        <id>47510</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* North to Hämeenlinna, Tampere {{E|12}} */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11741">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).


== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metro buses and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls..

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 5€ (regional ticket).

July 2015: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in grey vests and green-white striped shirts selling tickets but not checking. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the station otherwise you might have to walk a bit..

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.


== Hitchhiking out ==


=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give penalty fares. If you get asked to exit the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! 

There is another option using the tram, which are easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 : Arabiankatu stop. Walk 800m back to the main road. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.


=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.


=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.


=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the end station in the west: ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)


=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__


[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>jx0o52uwgz4587tx6oxeil9ozuixour</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106317</id>
      <parentid>106316</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-10-04T22:58:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Toukotolpo</username>
        <id>47510</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* North to Hämeenlinna, Tampere {{E|12}} */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11736">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).


== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metro buses and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls..

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 5€ (regional ticket).

July 2015: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in grey vests and green-white striped shirts selling tickets but not checking. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the station otherwise you might have to walk a bit..

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.


== Hitchhiking out ==


=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give fines. If you get asked to get off the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! 

There is another option using the tram, which are easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 : Arabiankatu stop. Walk 800m back to the main road. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.


=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.


=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.


=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the end station in the west: ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)


=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__


[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>h0o1m59tr7vvo9kr9rg5us9e23ae8wq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106318</id>
      <parentid>106317</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-10-04T23:07:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Toukotolpo</username>
        <id>47510</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Hitching in */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11852">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).


== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metro buses and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls... 

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 5€ (regional ticket).

October 2024: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in purple uniforms mostly just taking care of that everything is OK. They may also check tickets and kick you out if you don't have one, but they can't give fines. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the metro station. However, bus 90 runs between the port and the metro station.

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==


=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give fines. If you get asked to get off the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! 

There is another option using the tram, which are easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 : Arabiankatu stop. Walk 800m back to the main road. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.


=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.


=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.


=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the end station in the west: ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)


=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__


[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>6bbqzewzwlotm5uv1o7gc28reud3z8n</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106319</id>
      <parentid>106318</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-10-04T23:23:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Toukotolpo</username>
        <id>47510</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Hitching in */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12572">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).


== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metros, trains and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls. Also buses are blackrideable, since you only need to display your ticket to the driver when entering (you can try to display a screenshot of a ticket, or just anything since often the drivers seem not to even checking what you're showing. There are even websites where you can download authentic-looking fake tickets to be used in buses). Buses with orange colorway (lines 20, 30, 40, 200, 300, 400, 500, 510, 520, 530, 560, 570 and 600) don't even require showing the ticket, so you can enter them from any of the doors. However,  there might be controllers in those orange buses as infrequently as in trams, metros and trains. Even less frequently there are controllers in blue buses, but it's still possible as well.

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 5€ (regional ticket).

October 2024: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in purple uniforms mostly just taking care of that everything is OK. They may also check tickets and kick you out if you don't have one, but they can't give fines. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the metro station. However, bus 90 runs between the port and the metro station.

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==


=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need a Helsinki region ticket (€4.50). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give fines. If you get asked to get off the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper city ticket (€2.80 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! 

There is another option using the tram, which are easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 : Arabiankatu stop. Walk 800m back to the main road. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.


=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.


=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.


=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the end station in the west: ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)


=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__


[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>6dkm62ceyacbgepa1qgybiozuk6m82x</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106320</id>
      <parentid>106319</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-10-04T23:27:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Toukotolpo</username>
        <id>47510</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* North to Hämeenlinna, Tampere {{E|12}} */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12559">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).


== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train stop. At train stops there are ticket machines that sell the 1-day and 3-day public transportation passes if you need it, while on buses you can only pay the price of a single journey (2.80€ - or €2.20 if bought in advance from a ticket machine). You can extremely easily blackride all metros, trains and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls. Also buses are blackrideable, since you only need to display your ticket to the driver when entering (you can try to display a screenshot of a ticket, or just anything since often the drivers seem not to even checking what you're showing. There are even websites where you can download authentic-looking fake tickets to be used in buses). Buses with orange colorway (lines 20, 30, 40, 200, 300, 400, 500, 510, 520, 530, 560, 570 and 600) don't even require showing the ticket, so you can enter them from any of the doors. However,  there might be controllers in those orange buses as infrequently as in trams, metros and trains. Even less frequently there are controllers in blue buses, but it's still possible as well.

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train or bus will cost 5€ (regional ticket).

October 2024: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in purple uniforms mostly just taking care of that everything is OK. They may also check tickets and kick you out if you don't have one, but they can't give fines. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the metro station. However, bus 90 runs between the port and the metro station.

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==


=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need an ABC ticket (€4.10). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give fines. If you get asked to get off the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper AB ticket (€2.95 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! 

There is another option using the tram, which are easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 : Arabiankatu stop. Walk 800m back to the main road. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.


=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.


=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.


=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the end station in the west: ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)


=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__


[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>3ixdmyop7qeoaxr2mnpkfo8182pus4w</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106321</id>
      <parentid>106320</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-10-04T23:39:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Toukotolpo</username>
        <id>47510</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Hitching in */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12686">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).


== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train- or a metro stop. At train- and metro stops there are ticket machines that sell public transportation single tickets or day tickets if you need. You can also buy them from "R-kioski"-convenience stores, many grocery stores or parking machines (the last one only applies to single tickets). Note that you can't buy the bus- or tram ticket from the driver. You can extremely easily blackride all metros, trains and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls. Also buses are blackrideable, since you only need to display your ticket to the driver when entering (you can try to display a screenshot of a ticket, or just anything since often the drivers seem not to even checking what you're showing. There are even websites where you can download authentic-looking fake tickets to be used in buses). Buses with orange colorway (lines 20, 30, 40, 200, 300, 400, 500, 510, 520, 530, 560, 570 and 600) don't even require showing the ticket, so you can enter them from any of the doors. However,  there might be controllers in those orange buses, but as infrequently as in trams, metros and trains. Even less frequently there are controllers in blue buses, but it's still possible as well.

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the outskirts of neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train, metro or bus will cost 4,10€ (ABC-ticket).

October 2024: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in purple uniforms mostly just taking care of that everything is OK. They may also check tickets and kick you out if you don't have one, but they can't give fines. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the metro station. However, bus 90 runs between the port and the metro station.

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==


=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need an ABC ticket (€4.10). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give fines. If you get asked to get off the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper AB ticket (€2.95 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{European Route Number|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Valtimontie" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 68X, 70, 70T, 73, 73N, 75, 77, 730-732, 734, 740-742, 738. The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]] 

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Valtimontie. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden! 

There is another option using the tram, which are easier to blackride than buses. Go to the crossroad of Valtimontie and Kustaa Vaasantie using tram #6 or #8 : Arabiankatu stop. Walk 800m back to the main road. Try the super long bus stop or go further up following the same street until it becomes a highway. There is a bus stop after the motorway sign, but the police usually don't care. Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.


=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.


=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.


=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the end station in the west: ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)


=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__


[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>hh4bnzi1peob1gnlascltunwly0wofz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106322</id>
      <parentid>106321</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-10-05T00:21:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Toukotolpo</username>
        <id>47510</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Northeast to Lahti, Jyväskylä {{European Route Number|75}} */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13164">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).


== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train- or a metro stop. At train- and metro stops there are ticket machines that sell public transportation single tickets or day tickets if you need. You can also buy them from "R-kioski"-convenience stores, many grocery stores or parking machines (the last one only applies to single tickets). Note that you can't buy the bus- or tram ticket from the driver. You can extremely easily blackride all metros, trains and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls. Also buses are blackrideable, since you only need to display your ticket to the driver when entering (you can try to display a screenshot of a ticket, or just anything since often the drivers seem not to even checking what you're showing. There are even websites where you can download authentic-looking fake tickets to be used in buses). Buses with orange colorway (lines 20, 30, 40, 200, 300, 400, 500, 510, 520, 530, 560, 570 and 600) don't even require showing the ticket, so you can enter them from any of the doors. However,  there might be controllers in those orange buses, but as infrequently as in trams, metros and trains. Even less frequently there are controllers in blue buses, but it's still possible as well.

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the outskirts of neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train, metro or bus will cost 4,10€ (ABC-ticket).

October 2024: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in purple uniforms mostly just taking care of that everything is OK. They may also check tickets and kick you out if you don't have one, but they can't give fines. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the metro station. However, bus 90 runs between the port and the metro station.

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==


=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need an ABC ticket (€4.10). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give fines. If you get asked to get off the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper AB ticket (€2.95 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

There's a bus stop called "Koskelan varikko" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 78, 79N, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788. You can also get there by tram, which is easier to blackride than buses. Go to the "Kumpulan kampus" tram stop using tram #6 or #8. From there you can walk 1200m to the Koskelan varikko bus stop. 
The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]]

Another option is to get to the Viikki bus stop, where both local buses and long distance buses stop. You can reach it with following bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 79, 506, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788, 848
(lines 70, 73, 74, 77, 79 and 506 don't stop right by the highway, so you need to walk less than 100m there. Other mentioned lines use the same stop as long distance buses) . Or you can take bus 57 or 78, or light rail line 15 to the Viikin tiedepuisto stop right next to the Viikki stop. That bus stop is the first one after the motorway sign. That is already highway, so hitchhiking is technically forbidden there, but usually the police don't care (according to the previous edit). Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Koskelan varikko bus stop. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden!

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.


=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.


=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the end station in the west: ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)


=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (local train M direction ''Vantaakoski'' to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__


[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>7kd4kknbmzb34mcbn0s6mzqpkwg9bxt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106323</id>
      <parentid>106322</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-10-05T00:22:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Toukotolpo</username>
        <id>47510</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Sleeping */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13167">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).


== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train- or a metro stop. At train- and metro stops there are ticket machines that sell public transportation single tickets or day tickets if you need. You can also buy them from "R-kioski"-convenience stores, many grocery stores or parking machines (the last one only applies to single tickets). Note that you can't buy the bus- or tram ticket from the driver. You can extremely easily blackride all metros, trains and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls. Also buses are blackrideable, since you only need to display your ticket to the driver when entering (you can try to display a screenshot of a ticket, or just anything since often the drivers seem not to even checking what you're showing. There are even websites where you can download authentic-looking fake tickets to be used in buses). Buses with orange colorway (lines 20, 30, 40, 200, 300, 400, 500, 510, 520, 530, 560, 570 and 600) don't even require showing the ticket, so you can enter them from any of the doors. However,  there might be controllers in those orange buses, but as infrequently as in trams, metros and trains. Even less frequently there are controllers in blue buses, but it's still possible as well.

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the outskirts of neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train, metro or bus will cost 4,10€ (ABC-ticket).

October 2024: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in purple uniforms mostly just taking care of that everything is OK. They may also check tickets and kick you out if you don't have one, but they can't give fines. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the metro station. However, bus 90 runs between the port and the metro station.

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==


=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need an ABC ticket (€4.10). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give fines. If you get asked to get off the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4€ on a regional bus ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper AB ticket (€2.95 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

There's a bus stop called "Koskelan varikko" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 78, 79N, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788. You can also get there by tram, which is easier to blackride than buses. Go to the "Kumpulan kampus" tram stop using tram #6 or #8. From there you can walk 1200m to the Koskelan varikko bus stop. 
The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]]

Another option is to get to the Viikki bus stop, where both local buses and long distance buses stop. You can reach it with following bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 79, 506, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788, 848
(lines 70, 73, 74, 77, 79 and 506 don't stop right by the highway, so you need to walk less than 100m there. Other mentioned lines use the same stop as long distance buses) . Or you can take bus 57 or 78, or light rail line 15 to the Viikin tiedepuisto stop right next to the Viikki stop. That bus stop is the first one after the motorway sign. That is already highway, so hitchhiking is technically forbidden there, but usually the police don't care (according to the previous edit). Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Koskelan varikko bus stop. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden!

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.


=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.


=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the end station in the west: ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)


=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (from the city center take local train P to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' and then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__


[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>rpyulev0gk8os6md1f0m28n5s4vv70z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106324</id>
      <parentid>106323</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-10-05T00:26:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Toukotolpo</username>
        <id>47510</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Hitchhiking out */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13220">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).


== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train- or a metro stop. At train- and metro stops there are ticket machines that sell public transportation single tickets or day tickets if you need. You can also buy them from "R-kioski"-convenience stores, many grocery stores or parking machines (the last one only applies to single tickets). Note that you can't buy the bus- or tram ticket from the driver. You can extremely easily blackride all metros, trains and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls. Also buses are blackrideable, since you only need to display your ticket to the driver when entering (you can try to display a screenshot of a ticket, or just anything since often the drivers seem not to even checking what you're showing. There are even websites where you can download authentic-looking fake tickets to be used in buses). Buses with orange colorway (lines 20, 30, 40, 200, 300, 400, 500, 510, 520, 530, 560, 570 and 600) don't even require showing the ticket, so you can enter them from any of the doors. However,  there might be controllers in those orange buses, but as infrequently as in trams, metros and trains. Even less frequently there are controllers in blue buses, but it's still possible as well.

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the outskirts of neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train, metro or bus will cost 4,10€ (ABC-ticket).

October 2024: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in purple uniforms mostly just taking care of that everything is OK. They may also check tickets and kick you out if you don't have one, but they can't give fines. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the metro station. However, bus 90 runs between the port and the metro station.

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==


=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need an ABC ticket (€4.10). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give fines. If you get asked to get off the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4,10€ on an ABC ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper AB ticket (€2.95 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{E|75}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Koskelan varikko" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 78, 79N, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788. You can also get there by tram, which is easier to blackride than buses. Go to the "Kumpulan kampus" tram stop using tram #6 or #8. From there you can walk 1200m to the Koskelan varikko bus stop. 
The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]]

Another option is to get to the Viikki bus stop, where both local buses and long distance buses stop. You can reach it with following bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 79, 506, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788, 848
(lines 70, 73, 74, 77, 79 and 506 don't stop right by the highway, so you need to walk less than 100m there. Other mentioned lines use the same stop as long distance buses) . Or you can take bus 57 or 78, or light rail line 15 to the Viikin tiedepuisto stop right next to the Viikki stop. That bus stop is the first one after the motorway sign. That is already highway, so hitchhiking is technically forbidden there, but usually the police don't care (according to the previous edit). Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Koskelan varikko bus stop. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden!

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.


=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.


=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the end station in the west: ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)


=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (from the city center take local train P to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' and then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__


[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>ru08xnaxga65ar351xbr7ekrwnuhbvy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106325</id>
      <parentid>106324</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-10-05T00:28:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Toukotolpo</username>
        <id>47510</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Hitchhiking out */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13302">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).


== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train- or a metro stop. At train- and metro stops there are ticket machines that sell public transportation single tickets or day tickets if you need. You can also buy them from "R-kioski"-convenience stores, many grocery stores or parking machines (the last one only applies to single tickets). Note that you can't buy the bus- or tram ticket from the driver. You can extremely easily blackride all metros, trains and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls. Also buses are blackrideable, since you only need to display your ticket to the driver when entering (you can try to display a screenshot of a ticket, or just anything since often the drivers seem not to even checking what you're showing. There are even websites where you can download authentic-looking fake tickets to be used in buses). Buses with orange colorway (lines 20, 30, 40, 200, 300, 400, 500, 510, 520, 530, 560, 570 and 600) don't even require showing the ticket, so you can enter them from any of the doors. However,  there might be controllers in those orange buses, but as infrequently as in trams, metros and trains. Even less frequently there are controllers in blue buses, but it's still possible as well.

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the outskirts of neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train, metro or bus will cost 4,10€ (ABC-ticket).

October 2024: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in purple uniforms mostly just taking care of that everything is OK. They may also check tickets and kick you out if you don't have one, but they can't give fines. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the metro station. However, bus 90 runs between the port and the metro station.

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==


=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need an ABC ticket (€4.10). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give fines. If you get asked to get off the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4,10€ on an ABC ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper AB ticket (€2.95 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{E|75}} === === East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Koskelan varikko" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 78, 79N, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788. You can also get there by tram, which is easier to blackride than buses. Go to the "Kumpulan kampus" tram stop using tram #6 or #8. From there you can walk 1200m to the Koskelan varikko bus stop. 
The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]]

Another option is to get to the Viikki bus stop, where both local buses and long distance buses stop. You can reach it with following bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 79, 506, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788, 848
(lines 70, 73, 74, 77, 79 and 506 don't stop right by the highway, so you need to walk less than 100m there. Other mentioned lines use the same stop as long distance buses) . Or you can take bus 57 or 78, or light rail line 15 to the Viikin tiedepuisto stop right next to the Viikki stop. That bus stop is the first one after the motorway sign. That is already highway, so hitchhiking is technically forbidden there, but usually the police don't care (according to the previous edit). Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Koskelan varikko bus stop. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden!

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.


=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.


=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the end station in the west: ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)


=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (from the city center take local train P to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' and then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__


[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>3vhl6351k7uyezp9nehjz8fbf8kzdnf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106326</id>
      <parentid>106325</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-10-05T00:29:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Toukotolpo</username>
        <id>47510</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Northeast to Lahti, Jyväskylä {{E|75}} === === East to Porvoo, Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg {{E|18}} */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13298">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).


== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train- or a metro stop. At train- and metro stops there are ticket machines that sell public transportation single tickets or day tickets if you need. You can also buy them from "R-kioski"-convenience stores, many grocery stores or parking machines (the last one only applies to single tickets). Note that you can't buy the bus- or tram ticket from the driver. You can extremely easily blackride all metros, trains and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls. Also buses are blackrideable, since you only need to display your ticket to the driver when entering (you can try to display a screenshot of a ticket, or just anything since often the drivers seem not to even checking what you're showing. There are even websites where you can download authentic-looking fake tickets to be used in buses). Buses with orange colorway (lines 20, 30, 40, 200, 300, 400, 500, 510, 520, 530, 560, 570 and 600) don't even require showing the ticket, so you can enter them from any of the doors. However,  there might be controllers in those orange buses, but as infrequently as in trams, metros and trains. Even less frequently there are controllers in blue buses, but it's still possible as well.

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the outskirts of neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train, metro or bus will cost 4,10€ (ABC-ticket).

October 2024: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in purple uniforms mostly just taking care of that everything is OK. They may also check tickets and kick you out if you don't have one, but they can't give fines. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the metro station. However, bus 90 runs between the port and the metro station.

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==


=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need an ABC ticket (€4.10). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give fines. If you get asked to get off the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4,10€ on an ABC ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper AB ticket (€2.95 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{E|75}} === East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Koskelan varikko" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 78, 79N, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788. You can also get there by tram, which is easier to blackride than buses. Go to the "Kumpulan kampus" tram stop using tram #6 or #8. From there you can walk 1200m to the Koskelan varikko bus stop. 
The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]]

Another option is to get to the Viikki bus stop, where both local buses and long distance buses stop. You can reach it with following bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 79, 506, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788, 848
(lines 70, 73, 74, 77, 79 and 506 don't stop right by the highway, so you need to walk less than 100m there. Other mentioned lines use the same stop as long distance buses) . Or you can take bus 57 or 78, or light rail line 15 to the Viikin tiedepuisto stop right next to the Viikki stop. That bus stop is the first one after the motorway sign. That is already highway, so hitchhiking is technically forbidden there, but usually the police don't care (according to the previous edit). Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Koskelan varikko bus stop. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden!

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.


=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.


=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the end station in the west: ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)


=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (from the city center take local train P to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' and then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__


[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>gnvxvukxk44k4i4z95msr8yhqd505ir</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106327</id>
      <parentid>106326</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-10-05T00:29:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Toukotolpo</username>
        <id>47510</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Hitchhiking out */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13294">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).


== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train- or a metro stop. At train- and metro stops there are ticket machines that sell public transportation single tickets or day tickets if you need. You can also buy them from "R-kioski"-convenience stores, many grocery stores or parking machines (the last one only applies to single tickets). Note that you can't buy the bus- or tram ticket from the driver. You can extremely easily blackride all metros, trains and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls. Also buses are blackrideable, since you only need to display your ticket to the driver when entering (you can try to display a screenshot of a ticket, or just anything since often the drivers seem not to even checking what you're showing. There are even websites where you can download authentic-looking fake tickets to be used in buses). Buses with orange colorway (lines 20, 30, 40, 200, 300, 400, 500, 510, 520, 530, 560, 570 and 600) don't even require showing the ticket, so you can enter them from any of the doors. However,  there might be controllers in those orange buses, but as infrequently as in trams, metros and trains. Even less frequently there are controllers in blue buses, but it's still possible as well.

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the outskirts of neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train, metro or bus will cost 4,10€ (ABC-ticket).

October 2024: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in purple uniforms mostly just taking care of that everything is OK. They may also check tickets and kick you out if you don't have one, but they can't give fines. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the metro station. However, bus 90 runs between the port and the metro station.

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==


=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need an ABC ticket (€4.10). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give fines. If you get asked to get off the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4,10€ on an ABC ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper AB ticket (€2.95 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{E|75}} East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Koskelan varikko" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 78, 79N, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788. You can also get there by tram, which is easier to blackride than buses. Go to the "Kumpulan kampus" tram stop using tram #6 or #8. From there you can walk 1200m to the Koskelan varikko bus stop. 
The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]]

Another option is to get to the Viikki bus stop, where both local buses and long distance buses stop. You can reach it with following bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 79, 506, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788, 848
(lines 70, 73, 74, 77, 79 and 506 don't stop right by the highway, so you need to walk less than 100m there. Other mentioned lines use the same stop as long distance buses) . Or you can take bus 57 or 78, or light rail line 15 to the Viikin tiedepuisto stop right next to the Viikki stop. That bus stop is the first one after the motorway sign. That is already highway, so hitchhiking is technically forbidden there, but usually the police don't care (according to the previous edit). Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Koskelan varikko bus stop. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden!

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.


=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.


=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the end station in the west: ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)


=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (from the city center take local train P to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' and then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__


[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>gmmarathw1dnfch21cmtzw180dkrn2d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106328</id>
      <parentid>106327</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-10-05T00:33:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Toukotolpo</username>
        <id>47510</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Northeast to Lahti, Jyväskylä {{E|75}} East to Porvoo, Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg {{E|18}} */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13440">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).


== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train- or a metro stop. At train- and metro stops there are ticket machines that sell public transportation single tickets or day tickets if you need. You can also buy them from "R-kioski"-convenience stores, many grocery stores or parking machines (the last one only applies to single tickets). Note that you can't buy the bus- or tram ticket from the driver. You can extremely easily blackride all metros, trains and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls. Also buses are blackrideable, since you only need to display your ticket to the driver when entering (you can try to display a screenshot of a ticket, or just anything since often the drivers seem not to even checking what you're showing. There are even websites where you can download authentic-looking fake tickets to be used in buses). Buses with orange colorway (lines 20, 30, 40, 200, 300, 400, 500, 510, 520, 530, 560, 570 and 600) don't even require showing the ticket, so you can enter them from any of the doors. However,  there might be controllers in those orange buses, but as infrequently as in trams, metros and trains. Even less frequently there are controllers in blue buses, but it's still possible as well.

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the outskirts of neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train, metro or bus will cost 4,10€ (ABC-ticket).

October 2024: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in purple uniforms mostly just taking care of that everything is OK. They may also check tickets and kick you out if you don't have one, but they can't give fines. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the metro station. However, bus 90 runs between the port and the metro station.

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==


=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need an ABC ticket (€4.10). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give fines. If you get asked to get off the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4,10€ on an ABC ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper AB ticket (€2.95 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{E|75}} East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Koskelan varikko" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 78, 79N, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788. You can also get there by tram, which is easier to blackride than buses. Go to the "Kumpulan kampus" tram stop using tram #6 or #8. From there you can walk 1200m to the Koskelan varikko bus stop. 
The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]]

Another option is to get to the Viikki bus stop, where both local buses and long distance buses stop. You can reach it with following bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 79, 506, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788, 848
(lines 70, 73, 74, 77, 79 and 506 don't stop right by the highway, so you need to walk less than 100m there. Other mentioned lines use the same stop as long distance buses) . Or you can take bus 57 or 78, or light rail line 15 to the Viikin tiedepuisto stop right next to the Viikki stop. That bus stop is the first one after the motorway sign. That is already highway, so hitchhiking is technically forbidden there, but usually the police don't care (according to the previous edit). Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Koskelan varikko bus stop. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden!

'''If you're going towards east in the direction of Porvoo, Kotka and Russian border check also another option below! (probably works better)'''

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.


=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.


=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the end station in the west: ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)


=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (from the city center take local train P to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' and then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__


[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>std2pdvt9bnrlwngmas8zn56fkjzl0r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106329</id>
      <parentid>106328</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-10-05T00:35:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Toukotolpo</username>
        <id>47510</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* Northeast to Lahti, Jyväskylä {{E|75}} East to Porvoo, Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg {{E|18}} */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13441">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).


== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train- or a metro stop. At train- and metro stops there are ticket machines that sell public transportation single tickets or day tickets if you need. You can also buy them from "R-kioski"-convenience stores, many grocery stores or parking machines (the last one only applies to single tickets). Note that you can't buy the bus- or tram ticket from the driver. You can extremely easily blackride all metros, trains and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls. Also buses are blackrideable, since you only need to display your ticket to the driver when entering (you can try to display a screenshot of a ticket, or just anything since often the drivers seem not to even checking what you're showing. There are even websites where you can download authentic-looking fake tickets to be used in buses). Buses with orange colorway (lines 20, 30, 40, 200, 300, 400, 500, 510, 520, 530, 560, 570 and 600) don't even require showing the ticket, so you can enter them from any of the doors. However,  there might be controllers in those orange buses, but as infrequently as in trams, metros and trains. Even less frequently there are controllers in blue buses, but it's still possible as well.

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the outskirts of neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train, metro or bus will cost 4,10€ (ABC-ticket).

October 2024: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in purple uniforms mostly just taking care of that everything is OK. They may also check tickets and kick you out if you don't have one, but they can't give fines. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the metro station. However, bus 90 runs between the port and the metro station.

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==


=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need an ABC ticket (€4.10). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give fines. If you get asked to get off the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4,10€ on an ABC ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper AB ticket (€2.95 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{E|75}}  East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Koskelan varikko" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 78, 79N, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788. You can also get there by tram, which is easier to blackride than buses. Go to the "Kumpulan kampus" tram stop using tram #6 or #8. From there you can walk 1200m to the Koskelan varikko bus stop. 
The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]]

Another option is to get to the Viikki bus stop, where both local buses and long distance buses stop. You can reach it with following bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 79, 506, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788, 848
(lines 70, 73, 74, 77, 79 and 506 don't stop right by the highway, so you need to walk less than 100m there. Other mentioned lines use the same stop as long distance buses) . Or you can take bus 57 or 78, or light rail line 15 to the Viikin tiedepuisto stop right next to the Viikki stop. That bus stop is the first one after the motorway sign. That is already highway, so hitchhiking is technically forbidden there, but usually the police don't care (according to the previous edit). Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Koskelan varikko bus stop. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden!

'''If you're going towards east in the direction of Porvoo, Kotka and Russian border check also another option below! (probably works better)'''

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.


=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.


=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the end station in the west: ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)


=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (from the city center take local train P to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' and then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__


[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>ksah8xuwd71yufqbzkwsd06p5bplw8k</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106330</id>
      <parentid>106329</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-10-05T00:36:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Toukotolpo</username>
        <id>47510</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* East to Porvoo, Kotka, Russia border, Saint Petersburg {{E|18}} */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13453">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).


== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train- or a metro stop. At train- and metro stops there are ticket machines that sell public transportation single tickets or day tickets if you need. You can also buy them from "R-kioski"-convenience stores, many grocery stores or parking machines (the last one only applies to single tickets). Note that you can't buy the bus- or tram ticket from the driver. You can extremely easily blackride all metros, trains and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls. Also buses are blackrideable, since you only need to display your ticket to the driver when entering (you can try to display a screenshot of a ticket, or just anything since often the drivers seem not to even checking what you're showing. There are even websites where you can download authentic-looking fake tickets to be used in buses). Buses with orange colorway (lines 20, 30, 40, 200, 300, 400, 500, 510, 520, 530, 560, 570 and 600) don't even require showing the ticket, so you can enter them from any of the doors. However,  there might be controllers in those orange buses, but as infrequently as in trams, metros and trains. Even less frequently there are controllers in blue buses, but it's still possible as well.

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the outskirts of neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train, metro or bus will cost 4,10€ (ABC-ticket).

October 2024: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in purple uniforms mostly just taking care of that everything is OK. They may also check tickets and kick you out if you don't have one, but they can't give fines. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the metro station. However, bus 90 runs between the port and the metro station.

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==


=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need an ABC ticket (€4.10). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give fines. If you get asked to get off the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4,10€ on an ABC ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper AB ticket (€2.95 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{E|75}}  East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Koskelan varikko" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 78, 79N, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788. You can also get there by tram, which is easier to blackride than buses. Go to the "Kumpulan kampus" tram stop using tram #6 or #8. From there you can walk 1200m to the Koskelan varikko bus stop. 
The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]]

Another option is to get to the Viikki bus stop, where both local buses and long distance buses stop. You can reach it with following bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 79, 506, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788, 848
(lines 70, 73, 74, 77, 79 and 506 don't stop right by the highway, so you need to walk less than 100m there. Other mentioned lines use the same stop as long distance buses) . Or you can take bus 57 or 78, or light rail line 15 to the Viikin tiedepuisto stop right next to the Viikki stop. That bus stop is the first one after the motorway sign. That is already highway, so hitchhiking is technically forbidden there, but usually the police don't care (according to the previous edit). Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Koskelan varikko bus stop. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden!

'''If you're going towards east in the direction of Porvoo, Kotka and Russian border check also another option below! (probably works better)'''

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 18 from the west side of the Central Railway Station to the Niemenmäki stop. A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.


=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the end station in the west: ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)


=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (from the city center take local train P to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' and then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__


[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>inr3jfsb8t21n6korfd97i9labeaa7c</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106331</id>
      <parentid>106330</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-10-05T00:41:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Toukotolpo</username>
        <id>47510</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* West to Turku {{E|18}} */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13486">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).


== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train- or a metro stop. At train- and metro stops there are ticket machines that sell public transportation single tickets or day tickets if you need. You can also buy them from "R-kioski"-convenience stores, many grocery stores or parking machines (the last one only applies to single tickets). Note that you can't buy the bus- or tram ticket from the driver. You can extremely easily blackride all metros, trains and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls. Also buses are blackrideable, since you only need to display your ticket to the driver when entering (you can try to display a screenshot of a ticket, or just anything since often the drivers seem not to even checking what you're showing. There are even websites where you can download authentic-looking fake tickets to be used in buses). Buses with orange colorway (lines 20, 30, 40, 200, 300, 400, 500, 510, 520, 530, 560, 570 and 600) don't even require showing the ticket, so you can enter them from any of the doors. However,  there might be controllers in those orange buses, but as infrequently as in trams, metros and trains. Even less frequently there are controllers in blue buses, but it's still possible as well.

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the outskirts of neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train, metro or bus will cost 4,10€ (ABC-ticket).

October 2024: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in purple uniforms mostly just taking care of that everything is OK. They may also check tickets and kick you out if you don't have one, but they can't give fines. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the metro station. However, bus 90 runs between the port and the metro station.

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==


=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need an ABC ticket (€4.10). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give fines. If you get asked to get off the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4,10€ on an ABC ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper AB ticket (€2.95 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 43, 452 or 63 to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{E|75}}  East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Koskelan varikko" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 78, 79N, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788. You can also get there by tram, which is easier to blackride than buses. Go to the "Kumpulan kampus" tram stop using tram #6 or #8. From there you can walk 1200m to the Koskelan varikko bus stop. 
The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]]

Another option is to get to the Viikki bus stop, where both local buses and long distance buses stop. You can reach it with following bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 79, 506, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788, 848
(lines 70, 73, 74, 77, 79 and 506 don't stop right by the highway, so you need to walk less than 100m there. Other mentioned lines use the same stop as long distance buses) . Or you can take bus 57 or 78, or light rail line 15 to the Viikin tiedepuisto stop right next to the Viikki stop. That bus stop is the first one after the motorway sign. That is already highway, so hitchhiking is technically forbidden there, but usually the police don't care (according to the previous edit). Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Koskelan varikko bus stop. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden!

'''If you're going towards east in the direction of Porvoo, Kotka and Russian border check also another option below! (probably works better)'''

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 20, 25 or 30 from Kamppi to the Niemenmäki stop (buses 52 and 57 also go there, but not from the city center). A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the end station in the west: ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)


=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (from the city center take local train P to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' and then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__


[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>qlrv3rjshpz5mh3xw4h3jr5jfh9aji1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106332</id>
      <parentid>106331</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-10-05T00:50:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Toukotolpo</username>
        <id>47510</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* North to Hämeenlinna, Tampere {{E|12}} */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13534">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).


== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train- or a metro stop. At train- and metro stops there are ticket machines that sell public transportation single tickets or day tickets if you need. You can also buy them from "R-kioski"-convenience stores, many grocery stores or parking machines (the last one only applies to single tickets). Note that you can't buy the bus- or tram ticket from the driver. You can extremely easily blackride all metros, trains and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls. Also buses are blackrideable, since you only need to display your ticket to the driver when entering (you can try to display a screenshot of a ticket, or just anything since often the drivers seem not to even checking what you're showing. There are even websites where you can download authentic-looking fake tickets to be used in buses). Buses with orange colorway (lines 20, 30, 40, 200, 300, 400, 500, 510, 520, 530, 560, 570 and 600) don't even require showing the ticket, so you can enter them from any of the doors. However,  there might be controllers in those orange buses, but as infrequently as in trams, metros and trains. Even less frequently there are controllers in blue buses, but it's still possible as well.

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the outskirts of neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train, metro or bus will cost 4,10€ (ABC-ticket).

October 2024: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in purple uniforms mostly just taking care of that everything is OK. They may also check tickets and kick you out if you don't have one, but they can't give fines. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the metro station. However, bus 90 runs between the port and the metro station.

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==


=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need an ABC ticket (€4.10). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give fines. If you get asked to get off the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4,10€ on an ABC ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper AB ticket (€2.95 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 40, 200, 300, 321, 345 or 400 (or 37, 41, 42, 63 from Kamppi) to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{E|75}}  East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Koskelan varikko" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 78, 79N, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788. You can also get there by tram, which is easier to blackride than buses. Go to the "Kumpulan kampus" tram stop using tram #6 or #8. From there you can walk 1200m to the Koskelan varikko bus stop. 
The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]]

Another option is to get to the Viikki bus stop, where both local buses and long distance buses stop. You can reach it with following bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 79, 506, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788, 848
(lines 70, 73, 74, 77, 79 and 506 don't stop right by the highway, so you need to walk less than 100m there. Other mentioned lines use the same stop as long distance buses) . Or you can take bus 57 or 78, or light rail line 15 to the Viikin tiedepuisto stop right next to the Viikki stop. That bus stop is the first one after the motorway sign. That is already highway, so hitchhiking is technically forbidden there, but usually the police don't care (according to the previous edit). Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Koskelan varikko bus stop. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden!

'''If you're going towards east in the direction of Porvoo, Kotka and Russian border check also another option below! (probably works better)'''

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 20, 25 or 30 from Kamppi to the Niemenmäki stop (buses 52 and 57 also go there, but not from the city center). A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the end station in the west: ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)


=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (from the city center take local train P to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' and then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__


[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>5cecb0tlhxs0tn09shuls9akv1izlxm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106333</id>
      <parentid>106332</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-10-05T00:51:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Toukotolpo</username>
        <id>47510</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* West (direction Hanko) */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13516">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).


== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train- or a metro stop. At train- and metro stops there are ticket machines that sell public transportation single tickets or day tickets if you need. You can also buy them from "R-kioski"-convenience stores, many grocery stores or parking machines (the last one only applies to single tickets). Note that you can't buy the bus- or tram ticket from the driver. You can extremely easily blackride all metros, trains and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls. Also buses are blackrideable, since you only need to display your ticket to the driver when entering (you can try to display a screenshot of a ticket, or just anything since often the drivers seem not to even checking what you're showing. There are even websites where you can download authentic-looking fake tickets to be used in buses). Buses with orange colorway (lines 20, 30, 40, 200, 300, 400, 500, 510, 520, 530, 560, 570 and 600) don't even require showing the ticket, so you can enter them from any of the doors. However,  there might be controllers in those orange buses, but as infrequently as in trams, metros and trains. Even less frequently there are controllers in blue buses, but it's still possible as well.

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the outskirts of neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train, metro or bus will cost 4,10€ (ABC-ticket).

October 2024: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in purple uniforms mostly just taking care of that everything is OK. They may also check tickets and kick you out if you don't have one, but they can't give fines. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the metro station. However, bus 90 runs between the port and the metro station.

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==


=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need an ABC ticket (€4.10). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give fines. If you get asked to get off the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4,10€ on an ABC ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper AB ticket (€2.95 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 40, 200, 300, 321, 345 or 400 (or 37, 41, 42, 63 from Kamppi) to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{E|75}}  East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Koskelan varikko" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 78, 79N, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788. You can also get there by tram, which is easier to blackride than buses. Go to the "Kumpulan kampus" tram stop using tram #6 or #8. From there you can walk 1200m to the Koskelan varikko bus stop. 
The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]]

Another option is to get to the Viikki bus stop, where both local buses and long distance buses stop. You can reach it with following bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 79, 506, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788, 848
(lines 70, 73, 74, 77, 79 and 506 don't stop right by the highway, so you need to walk less than 100m there. Other mentioned lines use the same stop as long distance buses) . Or you can take bus 57 or 78, or light rail line 15 to the Viikin tiedepuisto stop right next to the Viikki stop. That bus stop is the first one after the motorway sign. That is already highway, so hitchhiking is technically forbidden there, but usually the police don't care (according to the previous edit). Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Koskelan varikko bus stop. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden!

'''If you're going towards east in the direction of Porvoo, Kotka and Russian border check also another option below! (probably works better)'''

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 20, 25 or 30 from Kamppi to the Niemenmäki stop (buses 52 and 57 also go there, but not from the city center). A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the station ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (from the city center take local train P to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' and then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__


[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>7lrl31r5v84erea33qk0k0opfoxr21p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106334</id>
      <parentid>106333</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-10-05T00:53:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Toukotolpo</username>
        <id>47510</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* West to Turku {{E|18}} */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13520">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).


== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train- or a metro stop. At train- and metro stops there are ticket machines that sell public transportation single tickets or day tickets if you need. You can also buy them from "R-kioski"-convenience stores, many grocery stores or parking machines (the last one only applies to single tickets). Note that you can't buy the bus- or tram ticket from the driver. You can extremely easily blackride all metros, trains and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls. Also buses are blackrideable, since you only need to display your ticket to the driver when entering (you can try to display a screenshot of a ticket, or just anything since often the drivers seem not to even checking what you're showing. There are even websites where you can download authentic-looking fake tickets to be used in buses). Buses with orange colorway (lines 20, 30, 40, 200, 300, 400, 500, 510, 520, 530, 560, 570 and 600) don't even require showing the ticket, so you can enter them from any of the doors. However,  there might be controllers in those orange buses, but as infrequently as in trams, metros and trains. Even less frequently there are controllers in blue buses, but it's still possible as well.

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the outskirts of neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train, metro or bus will cost 4,10€ (ABC-ticket).

October 2024: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in purple uniforms mostly just taking care of that everything is OK. They may also check tickets and kick you out if you don't have one, but they can't give fines. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the metro station. However, bus 90 runs between the port and the metro station.

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==


=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need an ABC ticket (€4.10). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give fines. If you get asked to get off the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4,10€ on an ABC ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper AB ticket (€2.95 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 40, 200, 300, 321, 345 or 400 (or 37, 41, 42, 63 from Kamppi) to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{E|75}}  East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Koskelan varikko" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 78, 79N, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788. You can also get there by tram, which is easier to blackride than buses. Go to the "Kumpulan kampus" tram stop using tram #6 or #8. From there you can walk 1200m to the Koskelan varikko bus stop. 
The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]]

Another option is to get to the Viikki bus stop, where both local buses and long distance buses stop. You can reach it with following bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 79, 506, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788, 848
(lines 70, 73, 74, 77, 79 and 506 don't stop right by the highway, so you need to walk less than 100m there. Other mentioned lines use the same stop as long distance buses) . Or you can take bus 57 or 78, or light rail line 15 to the Viikin tiedepuisto stop right next to the Viikki stop. That bus stop is the first one after the motorway sign. That is already highway, so hitchhiking is technically forbidden there, but usually the police don't care (according to the previous edit). Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Koskelan varikko bus stop. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden!

'''If you're going towards east in the direction of Porvoo, Kotka and Russian border check also another option below! (probably works better)'''

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 20, 25 or 30 from Kamppi to the "Niemenmäki" stop (buses 52 and 57 also go there, but not from the city center). A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the "Niemenmäki" bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the station ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (from the city center take local train P to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' and then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__


[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>g38yudkywqvi6uovayrjkg7fh0wk0ws</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106335</id>
      <parentid>106334</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-10-05T00:53:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Toukotolpo</username>
        <id>47510</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* West to Turku {{E|18}} */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13518">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).


== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train- or a metro stop. At train- and metro stops there are ticket machines that sell public transportation single tickets or day tickets if you need. You can also buy them from "R-kioski"-convenience stores, many grocery stores or parking machines (the last one only applies to single tickets). Note that you can't buy the bus- or tram ticket from the driver. You can extremely easily blackride all metros, trains and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls. Also buses are blackrideable, since you only need to display your ticket to the driver when entering (you can try to display a screenshot of a ticket, or just anything since often the drivers seem not to even checking what you're showing. There are even websites where you can download authentic-looking fake tickets to be used in buses). Buses with orange colorway (lines 20, 30, 40, 200, 300, 400, 500, 510, 520, 530, 560, 570 and 600) don't even require showing the ticket, so you can enter them from any of the doors. However,  there might be controllers in those orange buses, but as infrequently as in trams, metros and trains. Even less frequently there are controllers in blue buses, but it's still possible as well.

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the outskirts of neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train, metro or bus will cost 4,10€ (ABC-ticket).

October 2024: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in purple uniforms mostly just taking care of that everything is OK. They may also check tickets and kick you out if you don't have one, but they can't give fines. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the metro station. However, bus 90 runs between the port and the metro station.

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==


=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need an ABC ticket (€4.10). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give fines. If you get asked to get off the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4,10€ on an ABC ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper AB ticket (€2.95 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 40, 200, 300, 321, 345 or 400 (or 37, 41, 42, 63 from Kamppi) to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{E|75}}  East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

There's a bus stop called "Koskelan varikko" and you can reach it with several bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 78, 79N, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788. You can also get there by tram, which is easier to blackride than buses. Go to the "Kumpulan kampus" tram stop using tram #6 or #8. From there you can walk 1200m to the Koskelan varikko bus stop. 
The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]]

Another option is to get to the Viikki bus stop, where both local buses and long distance buses stop. You can reach it with following bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 79, 506, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788, 848
(lines 70, 73, 74, 77, 79 and 506 don't stop right by the highway, so you need to walk less than 100m there. Other mentioned lines use the same stop as long distance buses) . Or you can take bus 57 or 78, or light rail line 15 to the Viikin tiedepuisto stop right next to the Viikki stop. That bus stop is the first one after the motorway sign. That is already highway, so hitchhiking is technically forbidden there, but usually the police don't care (according to the previous edit). Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Koskelan varikko bus stop. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden!

'''If you're going towards east in the direction of Porvoo, Kotka and Russian border check also another option below! (probably works better)'''

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 20, 25 or 30 from Kamppi to the "Niemenmäki" stop (buses 52 and 57 also go there, but not from the city center). A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the station ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (from the city center take local train P to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' and then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__


[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>hz5z35uq6m9839ng3w1lpt04pn3a2ce</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106336</id>
      <parentid>106335</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-10-05T00:54:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Toukotolpo</username>
        <id>47510</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* Northeast to Lahti, Jyväskylä {{E|75}}  East to Porvoo, Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg {{E|18}} */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13538">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).


== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train- or a metro stop. At train- and metro stops there are ticket machines that sell public transportation single tickets or day tickets if you need. You can also buy them from "R-kioski"-convenience stores, many grocery stores or parking machines (the last one only applies to single tickets). Note that you can't buy the bus- or tram ticket from the driver. You can extremely easily blackride all metros, trains and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls. Also buses are blackrideable, since you only need to display your ticket to the driver when entering (you can try to display a screenshot of a ticket, or just anything since often the drivers seem not to even checking what you're showing. There are even websites where you can download authentic-looking fake tickets to be used in buses). Buses with orange colorway (lines 20, 30, 40, 200, 300, 400, 500, 510, 520, 530, 560, 570 and 600) don't even require showing the ticket, so you can enter them from any of the doors. However,  there might be controllers in those orange buses, but as infrequently as in trams, metros and trains. Even less frequently there are controllers in blue buses, but it's still possible as well.

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the outskirts of neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train, metro or bus will cost 4,10€ (ABC-ticket).

October 2024: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in purple uniforms mostly just taking care of that everything is OK. They may also check tickets and kick you out if you don't have one, but they can't give fines. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the metro station. However, bus 90 runs between the port and the metro station.

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==


=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need an ABC ticket (€4.10). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give fines. If you get asked to get off the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4,10€ on an ABC ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper AB ticket (€2.95 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 40, 200, 300, 321, 345 or 400 (or 37, 41, 42, 63 from Kamppi) to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{E|75}}  East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

There's a bus stop called ''Koskelan varikko'' and you can reach it with several bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 78, 79N, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788. You can also get there by tram, which is easier to blackride than buses. Go to the ''Kumpulan kampus'' tram stop using tram #6 or #8. From there you can walk 1200m to the ''Koskelan varikko'' bus stop. 
The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]]

Another option is to get to the ''Viikki'' bus stop, where both local buses and long distance buses stop. You can reach it with following bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 79, 506, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788, 848
(lines 70, 73, 74, 77, 79 and 506 don't stop right by the highway, so you need to walk less than 100m there. Other mentioned lines use the same stop as long distance buses) . Or you can take bus 57 or 78, or light rail line 15 to the ''Viikin tiedepuisto'' stop right next to the ''Viikki'' stop. That bus stop is the first one after the motorway sign. That is already highway, so hitchhiking is technically forbidden there, but usually the police don't care (according to the previous edit). Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Koskelan varikko bus stop. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden!

'''If you're going towards east in the direction of Porvoo, Kotka and Russian border check also another option below! (probably works better)'''

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 20, 25 or 30 from Kamppi to the "Niemenmäki" stop (buses 52 and 57 also go there, but not from the city center). A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the Niemenmäki bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the station ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (from the city center take local train P to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' and then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__


[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>o24u4covmg59dsqwa625xy0g3hfo34a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106337</id>
      <parentid>106336</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-10-05T00:55:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Toukotolpo</username>
        <id>47510</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* West to Turku {{E|18}} */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13544">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).


== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train- or a metro stop. At train- and metro stops there are ticket machines that sell public transportation single tickets or day tickets if you need. You can also buy them from "R-kioski"-convenience stores, many grocery stores or parking machines (the last one only applies to single tickets). Note that you can't buy the bus- or tram ticket from the driver. You can extremely easily blackride all metros, trains and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls. Also buses are blackrideable, since you only need to display your ticket to the driver when entering (you can try to display a screenshot of a ticket, or just anything since often the drivers seem not to even checking what you're showing. There are even websites where you can download authentic-looking fake tickets to be used in buses). Buses with orange colorway (lines 20, 30, 40, 200, 300, 400, 500, 510, 520, 530, 560, 570 and 600) don't even require showing the ticket, so you can enter them from any of the doors. However,  there might be controllers in those orange buses, but as infrequently as in trams, metros and trains. Even less frequently there are controllers in blue buses, but it's still possible as well.

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the outskirts of neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train, metro or bus will cost 4,10€ (ABC-ticket).

October 2024: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in purple uniforms mostly just taking care of that everything is OK. They may also check tickets and kick you out if you don't have one, but they can't give fines. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the metro station. However, bus 90 runs between the port and the metro station.

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==


=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need an ABC ticket (€4.10). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give fines. If you get asked to get off the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4,10€ on an ABC ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper AB ticket (€2.95 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 40, 200, 300, 321, 345 or 400 (or 37, 41, 42, 63 from Kamppi) to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{E|75}}  East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

There's a bus stop called ''Koskelan varikko'' and you can reach it with several bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 78, 79N, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788. You can also get there by tram, which is easier to blackride than buses. Go to the ''Kumpulan kampus'' tram stop using tram #6 or #8. From there you can walk 1200m to the ''Koskelan varikko'' bus stop. 
The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]]

Another option is to get to the ''Viikki'' bus stop, where both local buses and long distance buses stop. You can reach it with following bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 79, 506, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788, 848
(lines 70, 73, 74, 77, 79 and 506 don't stop right by the highway, so you need to walk less than 100m there. Other mentioned lines use the same stop as long distance buses) . Or you can take bus 57 or 78, or light rail line 15 to the ''Viikin tiedepuisto'' stop right next to the ''Viikki'' stop. That bus stop is the first one after the motorway sign. That is already highway, so hitchhiking is technically forbidden there, but usually the police don't care (according to the previous edit). Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Koskelan varikko bus stop. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden!

'''If you're going towards east in the direction of Porvoo, Kotka and Russian border check also another option below! (probably works better)'''

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 20, 25 or 30 from Kamppi to the ''Niemenmäki'' stop (buses 52 and 57 also go there, but not from the city center). A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the ''Niemenmäki'' bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the station ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (from the city center take local train P to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' and then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__


[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>62oihruucobtigi9f6qsi5wy75nye76</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106338</id>
      <parentid>106337</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-10-05T00:58:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Toukotolpo</username>
        <id>47510</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* Northeast to Lahti, Jyväskylä {{E|75}}  East to Porvoo, Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg {{E|18}} */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13552">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).


== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train- or a metro stop. At train- and metro stops there are ticket machines that sell public transportation single tickets or day tickets if you need. You can also buy them from "R-kioski"-convenience stores, many grocery stores or parking machines (the last one only applies to single tickets). Note that you can't buy the bus- or tram ticket from the driver. You can extremely easily blackride all metros, trains and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls. Also buses are blackrideable, since you only need to display your ticket to the driver when entering (you can try to display a screenshot of a ticket, or just anything since often the drivers seem not to even checking what you're showing. There are even websites where you can download authentic-looking fake tickets to be used in buses). Buses with orange colorway (lines 20, 30, 40, 200, 300, 400, 500, 510, 520, 530, 560, 570 and 600) don't even require showing the ticket, so you can enter them from any of the doors. However,  there might be controllers in those orange buses, but as infrequently as in trams, metros and trains. Even less frequently there are controllers in blue buses, but it's still possible as well.

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the outskirts of neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train, metro or bus will cost 4,10€ (ABC-ticket).

October 2024: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in purple uniforms mostly just taking care of that everything is OK. They may also check tickets and kick you out if you don't have one, but they can't give fines. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the metro station. However, bus 90 runs between the port and the metro station.

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==


=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need an ABC ticket (€4.10). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give fines. If you get asked to get off the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4,10€ on an ABC ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper AB ticket (€2.95 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 40, 200, 300, 321, 345 or 400 (or 37, 41, 42, 63 from Kamppi) to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{E|75}}  East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

There's a bus stop called ''Koskelan varikko'' and you can reach it with several bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 78, 79N, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788. You can also get there by tram, which is easier to blackride than buses. Go to the ''Kumpulan kampus'' tram stop using tram #6 or #8. From there you can walk 1200m to the ''Koskelan varikko'' bus stop. 
The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Porvoo, Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]]

Another option is to get to the ''Viikki'' bus stop, where both local buses and long distance buses stop. You can reach it with following bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 79, 506, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788, 848
(lines 70, 73, 74, 77, 79 and 506 don't stop right by the highway, so you need to walk less than 100m there. Other mentioned lines use the same stop as long distance buses) . Or you can take bus 57 or 78, or light rail line 15 to the ''Viikin tiedepuisto'' stop right next to the ''Viikki'' stop. That bus stop is the first one after the motorway sign. That is already highway, so hitchhiking is technically forbidden there, but usually the police don't care (according to the previous edit). Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Koskelan varikko bus stop. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden!

'''If you're going towards east in the direction of Porvoo, Kotka and Russian border check also another option below! (probably works better)'''

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 20, 25 or 30 from Kamppi to the ''Niemenmäki'' stop (buses 52 and 57 also go there, but not from the city center). A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the ''Niemenmäki'' bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the station ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (from the city center take local train P to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' and then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__


[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>1yrkl1vduyauegobx47xo5aa8kmiumh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106339</id>
      <parentid>106338</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-10-05T01:02:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Toukotolpo</username>
        <id>47510</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Hitching in */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13684">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).


== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train- or a metro stop. At train- and metro stops there are ticket machines that sell public transportation single tickets or day tickets if you need. You can also buy them from "R-kioski"-convenience stores, many grocery stores or parking machines (the last one only applies to single tickets). Note that you can't buy the bus- or tram ticket from the driver. You can extremely easily blackride all metros, trains and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls. Also buses are blackrideable, since you only need to display your ticket to the driver when entering (you can try to display a screenshot of a ticket, or just anything since often the drivers seem not to even checking what you're showing. There are even websites where you can download authentic-looking fake tickets to be used in buses). Buses with orange colorway (lines 20, 30, 40, 200, 300, 400, 500, 510, 520, 530, 560, 570 and 600) don't even require showing the ticket, so you can enter them from any of the doors. However,  there might be controllers in those orange buses, but as infrequently as in trams, metros and trains. Even less frequently there are controllers in blue buses, but it's still possible as well.

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the outskirts of neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train, metro or bus will cost 4,10€ (ABC-ticket).

October 2024: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in purple uniforms mostly just taking care of that everything is OK. They may also check tickets and kick you out if you don't have one, but they can't give fines. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

Here's a link to ease your navigation in public transport[http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport].

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the metro station. However, bus 90 runs between the port and the metro station.

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==


=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need an ABC ticket (€4.10). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give fines. If you get asked to get off the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4,10€ on an ABC ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper AB ticket (€2.95 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 40, 200, 300, 321, 345 or 400 (or 37, 41, 42, 63 from Kamppi) to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{E|75}}  East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

There's a bus stop called ''Koskelan varikko'' and you can reach it with several bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 78, 79N, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788. You can also get there by tram, which is easier to blackride than buses. Go to the ''Kumpulan kampus'' tram stop using tram #6 or #8. From there you can walk 1200m to the ''Koskelan varikko'' bus stop. 
The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Porvoo, Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]]

Another option is to get to the ''Viikki'' bus stop, where both local buses and long distance buses stop. You can reach it with following bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 79, 506, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788, 848
(lines 70, 73, 74, 77, 79 and 506 don't stop right by the highway, so you need to walk less than 100m there. Other mentioned lines use the same stop as long distance buses) . Or you can take bus 57 or 78, or light rail line 15 to the ''Viikin tiedepuisto'' stop right next to the ''Viikki'' stop. That bus stop is the first one after the motorway sign. That is already highway, so hitchhiking is technically forbidden there, but usually the police don't care (according to the previous edit). Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Koskelan varikko bus stop. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden!

'''If you're going towards east in the direction of Porvoo, Kotka and Russian border check also another option below! (probably works better)'''

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 20, 25 or 30 from Kamppi to the ''Niemenmäki'' stop (buses 52 and 57 also go there, but not from the city center). A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the ''Niemenmäki'' bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the station ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (from the city center take local train P to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' and then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__


[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>0iph1i45cm33jld8wjg67e4f59ozonz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106340</id>
      <parentid>106339</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-10-05T01:03:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Toukotolpo</username>
        <id>47510</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* Hitching in */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13686">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).


== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train- or a metro stop. At train- and metro stops there are ticket machines that sell public transportation single tickets or day tickets if you need. You can also buy them from "R-kioski"-convenience stores, many grocery stores or parking machines (the last one only applies to single tickets). Note that you can't buy the bus- or tram ticket from the driver. You can extremely easily blackride all metros, trains and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls. Also buses are blackrideable, since you only need to display your ticket to the driver when entering (you can try to display a screenshot of a ticket, or just anything since often the drivers seem not to even checking what you're showing. There are even websites where you can download authentic-looking fake tickets to be used in buses). Buses with orange colorway (lines 20, 30, 40, 200, 300, 400, 500, 510, 520, 530, 560, 570 and 600) don't even require showing the ticket, so you can enter them from any of the doors. However,  there might be controllers in those orange buses, but as infrequently as in trams, metros and trains. Even less frequently there are controllers in blue buses, but it's still possible as well.

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the outskirts of neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train, metro or bus will cost 4,10€ (ABC-ticket).

October 2024: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in purple uniforms mostly just taking care of that everything is OK. They may also check tickets and kick you out if you don't have one, but they can't give fines. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

Here's a link to ease your navigation in public transport: [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport].

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the metro station. However, bus 90 runs between the port and the metro station.

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==


=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need an ABC ticket (€4.10). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give fines. If you get asked to get off the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4,10€ on an ABC ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper AB ticket (€2.95 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 40, 200, 300, 321, 345 or 400 (or 37, 41, 42, 63 from Kamppi) to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{E|75}}  East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

There's a bus stop called ''Koskelan varikko'' and you can reach it with several bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 78, 79N, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788. You can also get there by tram, which is easier to blackride than buses. Go to the ''Kumpulan kampus'' tram stop using tram #6 or #8. From there you can walk 1200m to the ''Koskelan varikko'' bus stop. 
The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Porvoo, Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]]

Another option is to get to the ''Viikki'' bus stop, where both local buses and long distance buses stop. You can reach it with following bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 79, 506, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788, 848
(lines 70, 73, 74, 77, 79 and 506 don't stop right by the highway, so you need to walk less than 100m there. Other mentioned lines use the same stop as long distance buses) . Or you can take bus 57 or 78, or light rail line 15 to the ''Viikin tiedepuisto'' stop right next to the ''Viikki'' stop. That bus stop is the first one after the motorway sign. That is already highway, so hitchhiking is technically forbidden there, but usually the police don't care (according to the previous edit). Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Koskelan varikko bus stop. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden!

'''If you're going towards east in the direction of Porvoo, Kotka and Russian border check also another option below! (probably works better)'''

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 20, 25 or 30 from Kamppi to the ''Niemenmäki'' stop (buses 52 and 57 also go there, but not from the city center). A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the ''Niemenmäki'' bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the station ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (from the city center take local train P to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' and then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__


[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>2q59ycipxctqnw6ebwzu87ex55dftum</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106341</id>
      <parentid>106340</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-10-05T01:06:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Toukotolpo</username>
        <id>47510</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* Northeast to Lahti, Jyväskylä {{E|75}}  East to Porvoo, Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg {{E|18}} */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13689">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).


== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train- or a metro stop. At train- and metro stops there are ticket machines that sell public transportation single tickets or day tickets if you need. You can also buy them from "R-kioski"-convenience stores, many grocery stores or parking machines (the last one only applies to single tickets). Note that you can't buy the bus- or tram ticket from the driver. You can extremely easily blackride all metros, trains and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls. Also buses are blackrideable, since you only need to display your ticket to the driver when entering (you can try to display a screenshot of a ticket, or just anything since often the drivers seem not to even checking what you're showing. There are even websites where you can download authentic-looking fake tickets to be used in buses). Buses with orange colorway (lines 20, 30, 40, 200, 300, 400, 500, 510, 520, 530, 560, 570 and 600) don't even require showing the ticket, so you can enter them from any of the doors. However,  there might be controllers in those orange buses, but as infrequently as in trams, metros and trains. Even less frequently there are controllers in blue buses, but it's still possible as well.

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the outskirts of neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train, metro or bus will cost 4,10€ (ABC-ticket).

October 2024: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in purple uniforms mostly just taking care of that everything is OK. They may also check tickets and kick you out if you don't have one, but they can't give fines. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

Here's a link to ease your navigation in public transport: [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport].

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the metro station. However, bus 90 runs between the port and the metro station.

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==


=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need an ABC ticket (€4.10). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give fines. If you get asked to get off the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4,10€ on an ABC ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper AB ticket (€2.95 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 40, 200, 300, 321, 345 or 400 (or 37, 41, 42, 63 from Kamppi) to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{E|75}} and East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

There's a bus stop called ''Koskelan varikko'' and you can reach it with several bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 78, 79N, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788. You can also get there by tram, which is easier to blackride than buses. Go to the ''Kumpulan kampus'' tram stop using tram #6 or #8. From there you can walk 1200m to the ''Koskelan varikko'' bus stop. 
The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Porvoo, Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]]

Another option is to get to the ''Viikki'' bus stop, where both local buses and long distance buses stop. You can reach it with following bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 79, 506, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788, 848
(lines 70, 73, 74, 77, 79 and 506 don't stop right by the highway, so you need to walk less than 100m there. Other mentioned lines use the same stop as long distance buses) . Or you can take bus 57 or 78, or light rail line 15 to the ''Viikin tiedepuisto'' stop right next to the ''Viikki'' stop. That bus stop is the first one after the motorway sign. That is already highway, so hitchhiking is technically forbidden there, but usually the police don't care (according to the previous edit). Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Koskelan varikko bus stop. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden!

'''If you're going towards east in the direction of Porvoo, Kotka and Russian border check also another option below! (probably works better)'''

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 20, 25 or 30 from Kamppi to the ''Niemenmäki'' stop (buses 52 and 57 also go there, but not from the city center). A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the ''Niemenmäki'' bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the station ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (from the city center take local train P to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' and then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__


[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>oftsxujb66y59fecswdapntjmi3j9lv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106342</id>
      <parentid>106341</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-10-05T01:07:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Toukotolpo</username>
        <id>47510</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Hitching in */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13694">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).


== Hitching in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train- or a metro stop. At train- and metro stops there are ticket machines that sell public transportation single tickets or day tickets if you need. You can also buy them from "R-kioski"-convenience stores, many grocery stores or from parking machines (the last one only applies to single tickets). Note that you can't buy the bus- or tram ticket from the driver. You can extremely easily blackride all metros, trains and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls. Also buses are blackrideable, since you only need to display your ticket to the driver when entering (you can try to display a screenshot of a ticket, or just anything since often the drivers seem not to even checking what you're showing. There are even websites where you can download authentic-looking fake tickets to be used in buses). Buses with orange colorway (lines 20, 30, 40, 200, 300, 400, 500, 510, 520, 530, 560, 570 and 600) don't even require showing the ticket, so you can enter them from any of the doors. However,  there might be controllers in those orange buses, but as infrequently as in trams, metros and trains. Even less frequently there are controllers in blue buses, but it's still possible as well.

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the outskirts of neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train, metro or bus will cost 4,10€ (ABC-ticket).

October 2024: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in purple uniforms mostly just taking care of that everything is OK. They may also check tickets and kick you out if you don't have one, but they can't give fines. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

Here's a link to ease your navigation in public transport: [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport].

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the metro station. However, bus 90 runs between the port and the metro station.

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Hitchhiking out ==


=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need an ABC ticket (€4.10). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give fines. If you get asked to get off the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4,10€ on an ABC ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper AB ticket (€2.95 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 40, 200, 300, 321, 345 or 400 (or 37, 41, 42, 63 from Kamppi) to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{E|75}} and East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

There's a bus stop called ''Koskelan varikko'' and you can reach it with several bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 78, 79N, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788. You can also get there by tram, which is easier to blackride than buses. Go to the ''Kumpulan kampus'' tram stop using tram #6 or #8. From there you can walk 1200m to the ''Koskelan varikko'' bus stop. 
The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Porvoo, Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.
[[File:P8230246.JPG|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiking to Jyväskylä]]

Another option is to get to the ''Viikki'' bus stop, where both local buses and long distance buses stop. You can reach it with following bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 79, 506, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788, 848
(lines 70, 73, 74, 77, 79 and 506 don't stop right by the highway, so you need to walk less than 100m there. Other mentioned lines use the same stop as long distance buses) . Or you can take bus 57 or 78, or light rail line 15 to the ''Viikin tiedepuisto'' stop right next to the ''Viikki'' stop. That bus stop is the first one after the motorway sign. That is already highway, so hitchhiking is technically forbidden there, but usually the police don't care (according to the previous edit). Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Koskelan varikko bus stop. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden!

'''If you're going towards east in the direction of Porvoo, Kotka and Russian border check also another option below! (probably works better)'''

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 20, 25 or 30 from Kamppi to the ''Niemenmäki'' stop (buses 52 and 57 also go there, but not from the city center). A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the ''Niemenmäki'' bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the station ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (from the city center take local train P to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' and then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__


[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>rqb48re3bmnk9vexp318kzdievgblso</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106458</id>
      <parentid>106342</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-10-10T16:06:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13627">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

== Hitchhiking out ==


=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need an ABC ticket (€4.10). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give fines. If you get asked to get off the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4,10€ on an ABC ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper AB ticket (€2.95 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 40, 200, 300, 321, 345 or 400 (or 37, 41, 42, 63 from Kamppi) to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{E|75}} and East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

There's a bus stop called ''Koskelan varikko'' and you can reach it with several bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 78, 79N, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788. You can also get there by tram, which is easier to blackride than buses. Go to the ''Kumpulan kampus'' tram stop using tram #6 or #8. From there you can walk 1200m to the ''Koskelan varikko'' bus stop. 
The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Porvoo, Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.

Another option is to get to the ''Viikki'' bus stop, where both local buses and long distance buses stop. You can reach it with following bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 79, 506, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788, 848
(lines 70, 73, 74, 77, 79 and 506 don't stop right by the highway, so you need to walk less than 100m there. Other mentioned lines use the same stop as long distance buses) . Or you can take bus 57 or 78, or light rail line 15 to the ''Viikin tiedepuisto'' stop right next to the ''Viikki'' stop. That bus stop is the first one after the motorway sign. That is already highway, so hitchhiking is technically forbidden there, but usually the police don't care (according to the previous edit). Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Koskelan varikko bus stop. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden!

'''If you're going towards east in the direction of Porvoo, Kotka and Russian border check also another option below! (probably works better)'''

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 20, 25 or 30 from Kamppi to the ''Niemenmäki'' stop (buses 52 and 57 also go there, but not from the city center). A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the ''Niemenmäki'' bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the station ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Hitchhiking in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train- or a metro stop. At train- and metro stops there are ticket machines that sell public transportation single tickets or day tickets if you need. You can also buy them from "R-kioski"-convenience stores, many grocery stores or from parking machines (the last one only applies to single tickets). Note that you can't buy the bus- or tram ticket from the driver. You can extremely easily blackride all metros, trains and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls. Also buses are blackrideable, since you only need to display your ticket to the driver when entering (you can try to display a screenshot of a ticket, or just anything since often the drivers seem not to even checking what you're showing. There are even websites where you can download authentic-looking fake tickets to be used in buses). Buses with orange colorway (lines 20, 30, 40, 200, 300, 400, 500, 510, 520, 530, 560, 570 and 600) don't even require showing the ticket, so you can enter them from any of the doors. However,  there might be controllers in those orange buses, but as infrequently as in trams, metros and trains. Even less frequently there are controllers in blue buses, but it's still possible as well.

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the outskirts of neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train, metro or bus will cost 4,10€ (ABC-ticket).

October 2024: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in purple uniforms mostly just taking care of that everything is OK. They may also check tickets and kick you out if you don't have one, but they can't give fines. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

Here's a link to ease your navigation in public transport: [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport].

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the metro station. However, bus 90 runs between the port and the metro station.

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (from the city center take local train P to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' and then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__


[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]</text>
      <sha1>3f2mjxs1jy4xbk15jk9wjf1v7d7r546</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>107417</id>
      <parentid>106458</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-11-23T20:07:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robyt</username>
        <id>9747</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>Added {{geo-missing}}</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13644">'''Helsinki''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

== Hitchhiking out ==


=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===

The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need an ABC ticket (€4.10). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give fines. If you get asked to get off the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4,10€ on an ABC ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper AB ticket (€2.95 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 40, 200, 300, 321, 345 or 400 (or 37, 41, 42, 63 from Kamppi) to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{E|75}} and East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

There's a bus stop called ''Koskelan varikko'' and you can reach it with several bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 78, 79N, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788. You can also get there by tram, which is easier to blackride than buses. Go to the ''Kumpulan kampus'' tram stop using tram #6 or #8. From there you can walk 1200m to the ''Koskelan varikko'' bus stop. 
The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Porvoo, Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.

Another option is to get to the ''Viikki'' bus stop, where both local buses and long distance buses stop. You can reach it with following bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 79, 506, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788, 848
(lines 70, 73, 74, 77, 79 and 506 don't stop right by the highway, so you need to walk less than 100m there. Other mentioned lines use the same stop as long distance buses) . Or you can take bus 57 or 78, or light rail line 15 to the ''Viikin tiedepuisto'' stop right next to the ''Viikki'' stop. That bus stop is the first one after the motorway sign. That is already highway, so hitchhiking is technically forbidden there, but usually the police don't care (according to the previous edit). Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Koskelan varikko bus stop. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden!

'''If you're going towards east in the direction of Porvoo, Kotka and Russian border check also another option below! (probably works better)'''

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===

[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===

Take bus 20, 25 or 30 from Kamppi to the ''Niemenmäki'' stop (buses 52 and 57 also go there, but not from the city center). A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the ''Niemenmäki'' bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===

Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the station ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===

It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Hitchhiking in ==

If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train- or a metro stop. At train- and metro stops there are ticket machines that sell public transportation single tickets or day tickets if you need. You can also buy them from "R-kioski"-convenience stores, many grocery stores or from parking machines (the last one only applies to single tickets). Note that you can't buy the bus- or tram ticket from the driver. You can extremely easily blackride all metros, trains and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls. Also buses are blackrideable, since you only need to display your ticket to the driver when entering (you can try to display a screenshot of a ticket, or just anything since often the drivers seem not to even checking what you're showing. There are even websites where you can download authentic-looking fake tickets to be used in buses). Buses with orange colorway (lines 20, 30, 40, 200, 300, 400, 500, 510, 520, 530, 560, 570 and 600) don't even require showing the ticket, so you can enter them from any of the doors. However,  there might be controllers in those orange buses, but as infrequently as in trams, metros and trains. Even less frequently there are controllers in blue buses, but it's still possible as well.

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the outskirts of neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train, metro or bus will cost 4,10€ (ABC-ticket).

October 2024: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in purple uniforms mostly just taking care of that everything is OK. They may also check tickets and kick you out if you don't have one, but they can't give fines. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

Here's a link to ease your navigation in public transport: [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport].

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the metro station. However, bus 90 runs between the port and the metro station.

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (from the city center take local train P to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' and then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__


[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]

[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]

{{geo-missing}}</text>
      <sha1>ftqfy1hjk4k454l0466hcxlukak0efb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>108368</id>
      <parentid>107417</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-12-16T18:01:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Chris9012</username>
        <id>47192</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13670">'''{{FULLPAGENAME}}''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

== Hitchhiking out ==
=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===
The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need an ABC ticket (€4.10). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give fines. If you get asked to get off the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4,10€ on an ABC ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper AB ticket (€2.95 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 40, 200, 300, 321, 345 or 400 (or 37, 41, 42, 63 from Kamppi) to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{E|75}} and East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===
There's a bus stop called ''Koskelan varikko'' and you can reach it with several bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 78, 79N, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788. You can also get there by tram, which is easier to blackride than buses. Go to the ''Kumpulan kampus'' tram stop using tram #6 or #8. From there you can walk 1200m to the ''Koskelan varikko'' bus stop. 
The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Porvoo, Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.

Another option is to get to the ''Viikki'' bus stop, where both local buses and long distance buses stop. You can reach it with following bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 79, 506, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788, 848
(lines 70, 73, 74, 77, 79 and 506 don't stop right by the highway, so you need to walk less than 100m there. Other mentioned lines use the same stop as long distance buses) . Or you can take bus 57 or 78, or light rail line 15 to the ''Viikin tiedepuisto'' stop right next to the ''Viikki'' stop. That bus stop is the first one after the motorway sign. That is already highway, so hitchhiking is technically forbidden there, but usually the police don't care (according to the previous edit). Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Koskelan varikko bus stop. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden!

'''If you're going towards east in the direction of Porvoo, Kotka and Russian border check also another option below! (probably works better)'''

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===
[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===
Take bus 20, 25 or 30 from Kamppi to the ''Niemenmäki'' stop (buses 52 and 57 also go there, but not from the city center). A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the ''Niemenmäki'' bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===
Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the station ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Hitchhiking in ==
If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train- or a metro stop. At train- and metro stops there are ticket machines that sell public transportation single tickets or day tickets if you need. You can also buy them from "R-kioski"-convenience stores, many grocery stores or from parking machines (the last one only applies to single tickets). Note that you can't buy the bus- or tram ticket from the driver. You can extremely easily blackride all metros, trains and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls. Also buses are blackrideable, since you only need to display your ticket to the driver when entering (you can try to display a screenshot of a ticket, or just anything since often the drivers seem not to even checking what you're showing. There are even websites where you can download authentic-looking fake tickets to be used in buses). Buses with orange colorway (lines 20, 30, 40, 200, 300, 400, 500, 510, 520, 530, 560, 570 and 600) don't even require showing the ticket, so you can enter them from any of the doors. However,  there might be controllers in those orange buses, but as infrequently as in trams, metros and trains. Even less frequently there are controllers in blue buses, but it's still possible as well.

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the outskirts of neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train, metro or bus will cost 4,10€ (ABC-ticket).

October 2024: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in purple uniforms mostly just taking care of that everything is OK. They may also check tickets and kick you out if you don't have one, but they can't give fines. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

Here's a link to ease your navigation in public transport: [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport].

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the metro station. However, bus 90 runs between the port and the metro station.

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (from the city center take local train P to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' and then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}
{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]
[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]
{{IsIn|Finland}}
{{Category|City's}}
{{Category|Capitals}}</text>
      <sha1>fdro7fqmiwjua277pjngchyvka2dd05</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>111291</id>
      <parentid>108368</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-07-07T12:31:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Toukotolpo</username>
        <id>47510</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13687">'''{{FULLPAGENAME}}''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or [[Stockholm]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

== Hitchhiking out ==
=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===
The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need an ABC ticket (€4.10). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give fines. If you get asked to get off the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4,10€ on an ABC ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper AB ticket (€2.95 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 40, 200, 300, 321, 345 or 400 (or 37, 41, 42, 63 from Kamppi) to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{E|75}} and East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===
There's a bus stop called ''Koskelan varikko'' and you can reach it with several bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 78, 79N, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788. You can also get there by tram, which is easier to blackride than buses. Go to the ''Kumpulan kampus'' tram stop using tram #6 or #8. From there you can walk 1200m to the ''Koskelan varikko'' bus stop. 
The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Porvoo, Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.

Another option is to get to the ''Viikki'' bus stop, where both local buses and long distance buses stop. You can reach it with following bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 79, 506, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788, 848
(lines 70, 73, 74, 77, 79 and 506 don't stop right by the highway, so you need to walk less than 100m there. Other mentioned lines use the same stop as long distance buses) . Or you can take bus 57 or 78, or light rail line 15 to the ''Viikin tiedepuisto'' stop right next to the ''Viikki'' stop. That bus stop is the first one after the motorway sign. That is already highway, so hitchhiking is technically forbidden there, but usually the police don't care (according to the previous edit). Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Koskelan varikko bus stop. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden!

'''If you're going towards east in the direction of Porvoo, Kotka and Russian border check also another option below! (probably works better)'''

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===
[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===
Take bus 20, 25 or 30 from Kamppi to the ''Niemenmäki'' stop (buses 52 and 57 also go there, but not from the city center). A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the ''Niemenmäki'' bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===
Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the station ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Hitchhiking in ==
If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train- or a metro stop. At train- and metro stops there are ticket machines that sell public transportation single tickets or day tickets if you need. You can also buy them from "R-kioski"-convenience stores, many grocery stores or from parking machines (the last one only applies to single tickets). Note that you can't buy the bus- or tram ticket from the driver. You can extremely easily blackride all metros, trains and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls. Also buses are blackrideable, since you only need to display your ticket to the driver when entering (you can try to display a screenshot of a ticket, or just anything since often the drivers seem not to even checking what you're showing. There are even websites where you can download authentic-looking fake tickets to be used in buses). Buses with orange colorway (lines 20, 30, 40, 200, 300, 400, 500, 510, 520, 530, 560, 570 and 600) don't even require showing the ticket, so you can enter them from any of the doors. However,  there might be controllers in those orange buses, but as infrequently as in trams, metros and trains. Even less frequently there are controllers in blue buses, but it's still possible as well.

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the outskirts of neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train, metro or bus will cost 4,10€ (ABC-ticket).

October 2024: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in purple uniforms mostly just taking care of that everything is OK. They may also check tickets and kick you out if you don't have one, but they can't give fines. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

Here's a link to ease your navigation in public transport: [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport].

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the metro station. However, bus 90 runs between the port and the metro station.

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (from the city center take local train P to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' and then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}
{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]
[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]
{{IsIn|Finland}}
{{Category|City's}}
{{Category|Capitals}}</text>
      <sha1>0reldj3m8gtqp9rpltqtai60zyhexa7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>111292</id>
      <parentid>111291</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-07-07T12:34:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Toukotolpo</username>
        <id>47510</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13689">'''{{FULLPAGENAME}}''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or [[Stockholm]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

== Hitchhiking out ==
=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===
The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need an ABC ticket (€4.10). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give fines. If you get asked to get off the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4,10€ on an ABC ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper AB ticket (€2.95 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 40, 200, 300, 321, 345 or 400 (or 37, 41, 42, 63 from Kamppi) to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{E|75}} and East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===
There's a bus stop called ''Koskelan varikko'' and you can reach it with several bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 78, 79N, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788. You can also get there by tram, which is easier to blackride than buses. Go to the ''Kumpulan kampus'' tram stop using tram #6 or #8. From there you can walk 1200m to the ''Koskelan varikko'' bus stop. 
The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Porvoo, Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.

Another option is to get to the ''Viikki'' bus stop, where both local buses and long distance buses stop. You can reach it with following bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 79, 506, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788, 848
(lines 70, 73, 74, 77, 79 and 506 don't stop right by the highway, so you need to walk less than 100m there. Other mentioned lines use the same stop as long distance buses) . Or you can take bus 57 or 78, or light rail line 15 to the ''Viikin tiedepuisto'' stop right next to the ''Viikki'' stop. That bus stop is the first one after the motorway sign. That is already highway, so hitchhiking is technically forbidden there, but usually the police don't care (according to the previous edit). Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Koskelan varikko bus stop. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden!

'''If you're going towards east in the direction of Porvoo, Kotka and Russian border check also another option below! (probably works better)'''

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===
[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===
Take bus 20, 25 or 30 from Kamppi to the ''Niemenmäki'' stop (buses 52 and 57 also go there, but not from the city center). A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the ''Niemenmäki'' bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===
Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the station ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)

=== South, ferry towards [[Tallinn]], [[Estonia]] ===
It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Hitchhiking in ==
If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train- or a metro stop. At train- and metro stops there are ticket machines that sell public transportation single tickets or day tickets if you need. You can also buy them from "R-kioski"-convenience stores, many grocery stores or from parking machines (the last one only applies to single tickets). Note that you can't buy the bus- or tram ticket from the driver. You can extremely easily blackride all metros, trains and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls. Also buses are blackrideable, since you only need to display your ticket to the driver when entering (you can try to display a screenshot of a ticket, or just anything since often the drivers seem not to even checking what you're showing. There are even websites where you can download authentic-looking fake tickets to be used in buses). Buses with orange colorway (lines 20, 30, 40, 200, 300, 400, 500, 510, 520, 530, 560, 570 and 600) don't even require showing the ticket, so you can enter them from any of the doors. However,  there might be controllers in those orange buses, but as infrequently as in trams, metros and trains. Even less frequently there are controllers in blue buses, but it's still possible as well.

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the outskirts of neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train, metro or bus will cost 4,10€ (ABC-ticket).

October 2024: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in green VR uniforms mostly just taking care of that everything is OK. They may also check tickets and kick you out if you don't have one, but they can't give fines. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

Here's a link to ease your navigation in public transport: [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport].

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the metro station. However, bus 90 runs between the port and the metro station.

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (from the city center take local train P to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' and then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}
{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]
[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]
{{IsIn|Finland}}
{{Category|City's}}
{{Category|Capitals}}</text>
      <sha1>6fy7pyblxq1fyjlufaotchonfyp3rk9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>111872</id>
      <parentid>111292</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-08-23T15:53:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* South, ferry towards Tallinn, Estonia */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13669">'''{{FULLPAGENAME}}''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or [[Stockholm]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

== Hitchhiking out ==
=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===
The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need an ABC ticket (€4.10). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give fines. If you get asked to get off the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4,10€ on an ABC ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper AB ticket (€2.95 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 40, 200, 300, 321, 345 or 400 (or 37, 41, 42, 63 from Kamppi) to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{E|75}} and East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===
There's a bus stop called ''Koskelan varikko'' and you can reach it with several bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 78, 79N, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788. You can also get there by tram, which is easier to blackride than buses. Go to the ''Kumpulan kampus'' tram stop using tram #6 or #8. From there you can walk 1200m to the ''Koskelan varikko'' bus stop. 
The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Porvoo, Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.

Another option is to get to the ''Viikki'' bus stop, where both local buses and long distance buses stop. You can reach it with following bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 79, 506, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788, 848
(lines 70, 73, 74, 77, 79 and 506 don't stop right by the highway, so you need to walk less than 100m there. Other mentioned lines use the same stop as long distance buses) . Or you can take bus 57 or 78, or light rail line 15 to the ''Viikin tiedepuisto'' stop right next to the ''Viikki'' stop. That bus stop is the first one after the motorway sign. That is already highway, so hitchhiking is technically forbidden there, but usually the police don't care (according to the previous edit). Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Koskelan varikko bus stop. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden!

'''If you're going towards east in the direction of Porvoo, Kotka and Russian border check also another option below! (probably works better)'''

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===
[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===
Take bus 20, 25 or 30 from Kamppi to the ''Niemenmäki'' stop (buses 52 and 57 also go there, but not from the city center). A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the ''Niemenmäki'' bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===
Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the station ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)

=== South towards [[Tallinn]] ===
It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Hitchhiking in ==
If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train- or a metro stop. At train- and metro stops there are ticket machines that sell public transportation single tickets or day tickets if you need. You can also buy them from "R-kioski"-convenience stores, many grocery stores or from parking machines (the last one only applies to single tickets). Note that you can't buy the bus- or tram ticket from the driver. You can extremely easily blackride all metros, trains and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls. Also buses are blackrideable, since you only need to display your ticket to the driver when entering (you can try to display a screenshot of a ticket, or just anything since often the drivers seem not to even checking what you're showing. There are even websites where you can download authentic-looking fake tickets to be used in buses). Buses with orange colorway (lines 20, 30, 40, 200, 300, 400, 500, 510, 520, 530, 560, 570 and 600) don't even require showing the ticket, so you can enter them from any of the doors. However,  there might be controllers in those orange buses, but as infrequently as in trams, metros and trains. Even less frequently there are controllers in blue buses, but it's still possible as well.

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the outskirts of neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train, metro or bus will cost 4,10€ (ABC-ticket).

October 2024: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in green VR uniforms mostly just taking care of that everything is OK. They may also check tickets and kick you out if you don't have one, but they can't give fines. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

Here's a link to ease your navigation in public transport: [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport].

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the metro station. However, bus 90 runs between the port and the metro station.

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (from the city center take local train P to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' and then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}
{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]
[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]
{{IsIn|Finland}}
{{Category|City's}}
{{Category|Capitals}}</text>
      <sha1>2el1ge07snz27zo3obpoycrtkz7rbak</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>112203</id>
      <parentid>111872</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-08-24T10:13:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13835">{{Infobox Location
|country    = Finland
|map        = &lt;map lat='60.1695' lng='24.9354' zoom='9'/&gt;
|pop        = 658,864
|motorways  = [[E12]], [[E18]], [[E75]]
}}


'''{{FULLPAGENAME}}''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or [[Stockholm]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

== Hitchhiking out ==
=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===
The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need an ABC ticket (€4.10). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give fines. If you get asked to get off the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4,10€ on an ABC ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper AB ticket (€2.95 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 40, 200, 300, 321, 345 or 400 (or 37, 41, 42, 63 from Kamppi) to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{E|75}} and East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===
There's a bus stop called ''Koskelan varikko'' and you can reach it with several bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 78, 79N, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788. You can also get there by tram, which is easier to blackride than buses. Go to the ''Kumpulan kampus'' tram stop using tram #6 or #8. From there you can walk 1200m to the ''Koskelan varikko'' bus stop. 
The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Porvoo, Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.

Another option is to get to the ''Viikki'' bus stop, where both local buses and long distance buses stop. You can reach it with following bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 79, 506, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788, 848
(lines 70, 73, 74, 77, 79 and 506 don't stop right by the highway, so you need to walk less than 100m there. Other mentioned lines use the same stop as long distance buses) . Or you can take bus 57 or 78, or light rail line 15 to the ''Viikin tiedepuisto'' stop right next to the ''Viikki'' stop. That bus stop is the first one after the motorway sign. That is already highway, so hitchhiking is technically forbidden there, but usually the police don't care (according to the previous edit). Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Koskelan varikko bus stop. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden!

'''If you're going towards east in the direction of Porvoo, Kotka and Russian border check also another option below! (probably works better)'''

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===
[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===
Take bus 20, 25 or 30 from Kamppi to the ''Niemenmäki'' stop (buses 52 and 57 also go there, but not from the city center). A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the ''Niemenmäki'' bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===
Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the station ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)

=== South towards [[Tallinn]] ===
It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Hitchhiking in ==
If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train- or a metro stop. At train- and metro stops there are ticket machines that sell public transportation single tickets or day tickets if you need. You can also buy them from "R-kioski"-convenience stores, many grocery stores or from parking machines (the last one only applies to single tickets). Note that you can't buy the bus- or tram ticket from the driver. You can extremely easily blackride all metros, trains and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls. Also buses are blackrideable, since you only need to display your ticket to the driver when entering (you can try to display a screenshot of a ticket, or just anything since often the drivers seem not to even checking what you're showing. There are even websites where you can download authentic-looking fake tickets to be used in buses). Buses with orange colorway (lines 20, 30, 40, 200, 300, 400, 500, 510, 520, 530, 560, 570 and 600) don't even require showing the ticket, so you can enter them from any of the doors. However,  there might be controllers in those orange buses, but as infrequently as in trams, metros and trains. Even less frequently there are controllers in blue buses, but it's still possible as well.

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the outskirts of neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train, metro or bus will cost 4,10€ (ABC-ticket).

October 2024: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in green VR uniforms mostly just taking care of that everything is OK. They may also check tickets and kick you out if you don't have one, but they can't give fines. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

Here's a link to ease your navigation in public transport: [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport].

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the metro station. However, bus 90 runs between the port and the metro station.

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (from the city center take local train P to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' and then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}
{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]
[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]
{{IsIn|Finland}}
{{Category|City's}}
{{Category|Capitals}}</text>
      <sha1>e75v85gtih4xvbtjdbajyffbl9jdy0o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>112965</id>
      <parentid>112203</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-09-18T15:42:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>KnyttesBot</username>
        <id>47742</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>Correct City's category in Helsinki</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13835">{{Infobox Location
|country    = Finland
|map        = &lt;map lat='60.1695' lng='24.9354' zoom='9'/&gt;
|pop        = 658,864
|motorways  = [[E12]], [[E18]], [[E75]]
}}


'''{{FULLPAGENAME}}''' is the capital of [[Finland]]. Many foreign hitchhikers enter the country here, either by boat from [[Tallinn]] or [[Stockholm]] or by plane to the Helsinki international airport (which is not actually in Helsinki, but in the neighbouring community of [[Vantaa]]).

== Hitchhiking out ==
=== North to [[Hämeenlinna]], [[Tampere]] {{E|12}} ===
The easiest place to get a lift north is the petrol station complex ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' situated in the suburb of Vantaa. There is one bus station right in front of the petrol station called Keimola. Check the easiest way to get there with the [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport]. The journey from the west side of the central railway takes about 40 minutes and you need an ABC ticket (€4.10). The petrol station is located north of Helsinki's ring roads, so traffic is going long-distance. It is very easy to get a lift straight to Hämeenlinna or Tampere if you just stand at the exit with a sign.

It is possible to take commuter train '''P''' from central railway station to ''Kivistö'', which is very near to the targeted petrol (check map). Commuter trains may be blackrideable, frequency of controllers is unknown. Note that controllers wear blue uniforms. Purple uniforms belong to train staff, and they can also check tickets and kick you out if you're travelling without a ticket , but they can't give fines. If you get asked to get off the train by them, you better just obey and catch the next train.

If you don't wait to spend 4,10€ on an ABC ticket, you can also take a bus with a cheaper AB ticket (€2.95 to the northern end of the street ''Mannerheimintie'', where the road ''Hämeenlinnanväylä'' starts. From the west side of the central railway station, take bus 40, 200, 300, 321, 345 or 400 (or 37, 41, 42, 63 from Kamppi) to the stop ''Ruskeasuon varikko'' and hitchhike straight from the bus stop. The downside of this place is that traffic passes by very quickly, and many drivers are reluctant to stop at a busy bus stop. If your driver is not going very far, ask him to drop you off at the petrol station ''Neste Keimolanportti itä'' mentioned above.

=== Northeast to [[Lahti]], [[Jyväskylä]] {{E|75}} and East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===
There's a bus stop called ''Koskelan varikko'' and you can reach it with several bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 78, 79N, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788. You can also get there by tram, which is easier to blackride than buses. Go to the ''Kumpulan kampus'' tram stop using tram #6 or #8. From there you can walk 1200m to the ''Koskelan varikko'' bus stop. 
The motorway splits into two slightly before Ring Road 3. Road number 4 goes towards north/northeast (Lahti, Jyväskylä), while road number 7 goes towards east (Porvoo, Kotka, Kouvola, Saint Petersburg, and so on). This place works okay with a sign, but it is impossible without one. Stand just behind the traffic lights and there will be plenty of space for the cars to stop. It could be a good idea to stand before the bus stop, so that the cars can actually pull over into the stop, because it is actually illegal to stop after the traffic lights (at least some drivers think so). You should also make sure the driver is really going to your way, because there's no place to drop you off between the bus stop and the junction where the motorways split.

Another option is to get to the ''Viikki'' bus stop, where both local buses and long distance buses stop. You can reach it with following bus lines: 70, 73, 74, 75, 77, 79, 506, 711, 717, 718, 721, 731, 738, 739, 785, 787, 788, 848
(lines 70, 73, 74, 77, 79 and 506 don't stop right by the highway, so you need to walk less than 100m there. Other mentioned lines use the same stop as long distance buses) . Or you can take bus 57 or 78, or light rail line 15 to the ''Viikin tiedepuisto'' stop right next to the ''Viikki'' stop. That bus stop is the first one after the motorway sign. That is already highway, so hitchhiking is technically forbidden there, but usually the police don't care (according to the previous edit). Sign highly recommended since the road splits in two.

In case you can't find a satisfying ride within a reasonable time (can happen, especially on Sunday mornings), hitch from here to the junction with ring road III (make a sign for one of the suburbs behind, e.g. Järvenpää). Get out once you have passed the junction, and hitch on the road connecting the ring road and the motorway. Half of the traffic is driving very fast, the other half rather slow – however, you'll find much more long distance traffic here than in Koskelan varikko bus stop. Note that this is officially a motorway, so hitching is actually forbidden!

'''If you're going towards east in the direction of Porvoo, Kotka and Russian border check also another option below! (probably works better)'''

=== East to [[Porvoo]], [[Kotka]], [[Kouvola]], [[Russia]] border, [[St. Petersburg|Saint Petersburg]] {{E|18}} ===
[[File:Helsinkieast-map.png|thumb|right|250px|How to reach the eastbound junction on foot]]
[[File:Helsinkieast-signs.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Signs marking the Helsinki eastbound junction]]

The fastest way to go east is to walk to the junction of Ring Road III and the motorway from the metro station ''Mellunmäki''. This is about a 40 minute journey on foot (see image). Once at the junction, it is easy to get a ride as short as the suburbs or as far as Saint Petersburg. With so many options, it is wise to turn down any ride not going all the way to your destination.

If you go further than to Porvoo, there is a rest stop halfway between Helsinki and Porvoo, so ask to drop you there. All there is is toilets and a café, so it's most efficient in the morning time. From there, find a ride at least to Kotka.

=== West to [[Turku]] {{E|18}} ===
Take bus 20, 25 or 30 from Kamppi to the ''Niemenmäki'' stop (buses 52 and 57 also go there, but not from the city center). A little further ahead from the bus stop and across from the street is the entry ramp onto the motorway. Unfortunately, there is absolutely nowhere safe for cars to pull over and stop for you here, at least not before the motorway sign. However, if you walk on 100m further after the sign, you will find that the hard shoulder begins and you can hitch there (of course, it's not legal). If you want to stay the right side of the law, it's recommended to hitchhike with a sign at the ''Niemenmäki'' bus stop; however, traffic going in this direction will already be filtering into the left lanes (away from the bus stop) to turn onto the on-ramp. Alternatively, it is possible to stand on the grass verge dividing Huopalahdentie and ask drivers as they are waiting to turn at the lights.

=== West (direction [[Hanko]]) ===
Take the national road/motorway 51 that starts in the southwestern part of the central city area.

You can take the metro to the station ''Ruoholahti''. Walk (north) for one block past the ''Kauppakeskus'' (shopping centre) to the next big street (Porkkalankatu). Cross over to the other side of the street and a bit further on is the junction of the motorway and Porkkalankatu. The best place to stand is on Porkkalankatu at the start of the bus lane before the ''Länsiväylä'' bus stop. Use a sign here. On the motorway, the hard shoulder starts about 50m up and it is not very wide and so it is very difficult for cars to stop there. However, hitching right at the beginning, at the corner where the continuation of the 'bus lane' turns into the motorway, it is possible for cars to pull over into this lane (if there are no buses coming!)

=== South towards [[Tallinn]] ===
It's not possible to hitch rides with people going by car. If there is an extra passenger in a car or truck, an extra ticket has to be paid.

But you can try to become a member of the Viking Club (only in Finnish, Swedish and Estonian) and get a free "picnic cruise" and just not use the return ticket.

As of January 2020, the ticket price for viking lines buying it through the website '''in finnish''' is 12€ round-trip (you can use the outgoing way only, if you want). It is around 30€ (?) the website in english language. You will have to fill a rather long form in the finnish version but you can always ask for help to a native finnish or use google translator. Note that you need to buy the ticket online at least 1h 30' earlier than when the ferry departs.'

While on the ferry, you should hitchhike already on the car deck of the ship. Go to the car deck at least 30 minutes before arrival time to the harbour and start asking around. If you have a large backpack, keep in mind that at some point the car deck's doors will open and the cars will start flowing out into the harbour. You don't want to be between large trucks at that point! You should be able to get a ride at least until Pärnu this way, often all the way to Riga or through to Lithuania. If you're on your way to Poland or beyond, obviously look for Polish licence plates and talk to those people first.

You can find boats from small harbors for sailboats. Distance to [[Tallinn]] is only 80km and small boats can do it easily. [http://venenetti.fi/satamat/ Catalog of harbors]

====Ferry companies====
[https://www.eckeroline.fi/en/ Eckerö line] -&gt; The cheapest one. 2 / 3 ferrys per day. One in the morning, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.vikingline.com/ VikingLine] -&gt; Cheaper when bought from the finnish website. They take longer and depart from a different terminal not close to the other ones.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.tallinksilja.com/en/ Tallink] -&gt; Many times available but expensive and bad service. Terminal 2 West.&lt;br&gt;
[http://www.lindaline.fi/en/ Linda line]

== Hitchhiking in ==
If the driver is not going directly to the Helsinki city centre, then it is a good idea to ask to be dropped off at a train- or a metro stop. At train- and metro stops there are ticket machines that sell public transportation single tickets or day tickets if you need. You can also buy them from "R-kioski"-convenience stores, many grocery stores or from parking machines (the last one only applies to single tickets). Note that you can't buy the bus- or tram ticket from the driver. You can extremely easily blackride all metros, trains and tramways since there are not so many checkers and metro doesn't have tolls. Also buses are blackrideable, since you only need to display your ticket to the driver when entering (you can try to display a screenshot of a ticket, or just anything since often the drivers seem not to even checking what you're showing. There are even websites where you can download authentic-looking fake tickets to be used in buses). Buses with orange colorway (lines 20, 30, 40, 200, 300, 400, 500, 510, 520, 530, 560, 570 and 600) don't even require showing the ticket, so you can enter them from any of the doors. However,  there might be controllers in those orange buses, but as infrequently as in trams, metros and trains. Even less frequently there are controllers in blue buses, but it's still possible as well.

Note, however, that if the driver drops you off in the outskirts of neighbouring communities of Espoo or Vantaa, a journey to Helsinki by train, metro or bus will cost 4,10€ (ABC-ticket).

October 2024: Commuter trains (named with letters) are blackrideable. There is staff in green VR uniforms mostly just taking care of that everything is OK. They may also check tickets and kick you out if you don't have one, but they can't give fines. Beware of groups of controllers in blue uniforms, they happen randomly, not too frequently.

Here's a link to ease your navigation in public transport: [http://www.reittiopas.fi/ Journey Planner of Helsinki Region Transport].

If you hitch a cargo boat from Tallinn your driver will most likely land at Vuosaari marina that is a bit far from the city as from the closest metro stop (last stop, Vuosaari). Better if you can ask him/her/them to take you at the metro station. However, bus 90 runs between the port and the metro station.

When arriving on a normal ferry from Tallinn, you can hitchhike already on the car deck of the ferry some 30 minutes before arrival. You will leave the ferry sitting in the car and it will take you somewhere far beyond the city limits.

== Sleeping ==

Even within the Helsinki city limits, there are plenty of secluded wooded areas where one can set up a tent, and these can be reached by local train. A glance at the map will show many ideal places around, for example, the intersection of Ring Road I and ''Vihdintie'' (from the city center take local train P to the stop ''Pohjois-Haaga'' and then some walking). If you are discreet, then you should have no problem; even if you are discovered by police, they are more concerned about Roma camps than foreign hitchhikers.
Kaivopuisto park, in the south part of the city centre is a very calm and cool place for wildcamping. If you don't have or prefer avoid put tent there are also some rocks at the very edge of it, near the sea, where you can lay on your mat without any problem, just maybe geese will arrive to wake you up in the morning..

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/231814287333110/ Trustroots people in Helsinki FB group]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}
{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[Category:Ferries]]
[[Category:Finland]]
[[Category:E75]]
[[Category:E12]]
[[Category:E18]]
[[de:Helsinki]]
[[fi:Helsinki]]
{{IsIn|Finland}}
[[Category:Cities]]
{{Category|Capitals}}</text>
      <sha1>oophiia38l2ohzyur5m6h4qti3q5vfq</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Finland</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1520</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1545</id>
      <parentid>4343</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-04T23:38:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5669">'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic
Countries.  It's neighboring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and
[[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your
way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]].

==Arriving and leaving the country==

Here would be the tips how to get to the country. Probably most of the
people coming and leaving Finland by [[thumb]] use the [[Via Baltica]]
through [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]] and [[Lithuania]] towards [[Poland]].

==About crossing borders==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they just exist on the map
anyway, and not in reality.  Since the dawn of time has there been
very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian
borders.

Finland is in the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schengen_treaty Schengen treaty], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to
[[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use
that as an excuse to go through your property.  They won't though, but
one busload of anti-EU protesters encountered this issue in 2003 when
traveling from Helsinki to an EU summit held in [[Gothenborg]].

===From/to Sweden===

Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]].  The
latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop
in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]]
as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it.  The two
companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are
[http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a
cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky.  At least Viking Line
sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on
the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway.

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive.  It's still tacky, though.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a
nice scenery.  On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure
people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much
as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable
than at land especially since the regulations for importing from
[[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a
book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the
kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or
other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands
severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose
product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

===From/to Estonia===

There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are
several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn.

===From/to Norway===

===From/to Russia===


==Where to stay?==

==Money==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro. 

==Language==

The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a
Scandinavian language.  The country is officially bilingual, as there
is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak
at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

===Useful expressions for hitchhikers===

* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

==Safety==

Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense
is your friend.

==Legal matters for hitchhikers==

Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where
it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal
for pedestarians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto
illegal in these places.

==Highways==

It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and
some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize
these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying
this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane
expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways
you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

==Culture==

Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a
considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've
hitched themselves back in the day.  Nowadays it's quite rare among
Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often
heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

==Places to see==

Cities of [[Helsinki]], [[Tampere]], [[Turku]], [[Jyväskylä]],
[[Joensuu]], [[Oulu]].  [[Lapland]], [[Lappi]] in is the area spanning
northern Finland, Sweden, Norway and also Russia, depending how you
look at it.

==External links==

*[http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]

*[http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn

*[http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish

[[Category:Finland|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>on40i3jxf9kfi6m8c5pqhxjzmu0j4l5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1546</id>
      <parentid>1545</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5669">'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic
Countries.  It's neighboring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and
[[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your
way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]].

==Arriving and leaving the country==

Here would be the tips how to get to the country. Probably most of the
people coming and leaving Finland by [[thumb]] use the [[Via Baltica]]
through [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]] and [[Lithuania]] towards [[Poland]].

==About crossing borders==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they just exist on the map
anyway, and not in reality.  Since the dawn of time has there been
very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian
borders.

Finland is in the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schengen_treaty Schengen treaty], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to
[[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use
that as an excuse to go through your property.  They won't though, but
one busload of anti-EU protesters encountered this issue in 2003 when
traveling from Helsinki to an EU summit held in [[Gothenborg]].

===From/to Sweden===

Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]].  The
latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop
in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]]
as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it.  The two
companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are
[http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a
cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky.  At least Viking Line
sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on
the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway.

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive.  It's still tacky, though.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a
nice scenery.  On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure
people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much
as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable
than at land especially since the regulations for importing from
[[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a
book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the
kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or
other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands
severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose
product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

===From/to Estonia===

There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are
several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn.

===From/to Norway===

===From/to Russia===


==Where to stay?==

==Money==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro. 

==Language==

The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a
Scandinavian language.  The country is officially bilingual, as there
is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak
at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

===Useful expressions for hitchhikers===

* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

==Safety==

Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense
is your friend.

==Legal matters for hitchhikers==

Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where
it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal
for pedestarians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto
illegal in these places.

==Highways==

It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and
some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize
these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying
this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane
expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways
you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

==Culture==

Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a
considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've
hitched themselves back in the day.  Nowadays it's quite rare among
Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often
heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

==Places to see==

Cities of [[Helsinki]], [[Tampere]], [[Turku]], [[Jyväskylä]],
[[Joensuu]], [[Oulu]].  [[Lapland]], [[Lappi]] in is the area spanning
northern Finland, Sweden, Norway and also Russia, depending how you
look at it.

==External links==

*[http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]

*[http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn

*[http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish

[[Category:Finland|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>on40i3jxf9kfi6m8c5pqhxjzmu0j4l5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4339</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T17:59:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GuakaTest</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5483">'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic
Countries.  It's neighboring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and
[[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your
way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]].

==Arriving and leaving the country==

Here would be the tips how to get to the country. Probably most of the
people coming and leaving Finland by [[thumb]] use the [[Via Baltica]]
through [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]] and [[Lithuania]] towards [[Poland]].

==About crossing borders==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they just exist on the map
anyway, and not in reality.  Since the dawn of time has there been
very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian
borders.

Finland is in the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schengen_treaty Schengen treaty], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to
[[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use
that as an excuse to go through your property.  They won't though, but
one busload of anti-EU protesters encountered this issue in 2003 when
traveling from Helsinki to an EU summit held in [[Gothenborg]].

===From/to Sweden===

Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]].  The
latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop
in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]]
as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it.  The two
companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are
[http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a
cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky.  At least Viking Line
sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on
the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway.

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive.  It's still tacky, though.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a
nice scenery.  On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure
people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much
as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable
than at land especially since the regulations for importing from
[[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a
book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the
kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or
other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands
severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose
product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

===From/to Estonia===

There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are
several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn.

===From/to Norway===

===From/to Russia===


==Where to stay?==

==Money==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro. 

==Language==

The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a
Scandinavian language.  The country is officially bilingual, as there
is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak
at least some [[English language | English]], so most of the
international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.

===Useful expressions for hitchhikers===

* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos

==Safety==

Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense
is your friend.

==Legal matters for hitchhikers==

Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where
it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal
for pedestarians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto
illegal in these places.

==Highways==

It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and
some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize
these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying
this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane
expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways
you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

==Culture==

Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a
considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've
hitched themselves back in the day.  Nowadays it's quite rare among
Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often
heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

==Places to see==

Cities of [[Helsinki]], [[Tampere]], [[Turku]], [[Jyväskylä]],
[[Joensuu]], [[Oulu]].  [[Lapland]], [[Lappi]] in is the area spanning
northern Finland, Sweden, Norway and also Russia, depending how you
look at it.

==External links==

*[http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an english section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]

*[http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn

*[http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish

[[Category:Northern Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>06zjzhw0fig7500ryiemmi8cnzhjhbe</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4340</id>
      <parentid>4339</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T14:11:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5474">'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic
Countries.  It's neighboring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and
[[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your
way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]].

==Arriving and leaving the country==

Here would be the tips how to get to the country. Probably most of the
people coming and leaving Finland by [[thumb]] use the [[Via Baltica]]
through [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]] and [[Lithuania]] towards [[Poland]].

==About crossing borders==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they just exist on the map
anyway, and not in reality.  Since the dawn of time has there been
very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian
borders.

Finland is in the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schengen_treaty Schengen treaty], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to
[[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use
that as an excuse to go through your property.  They won't though, but
one busload of anti-EU protesters encountered this issue in 2003 when
traveling from Helsinki to an EU summit held in [[Gothenborg]].

===From/to Sweden===

Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]].  The
latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop
in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]]
as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it.  The two
companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are
[http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a
cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky.  At least Viking Line
sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on
the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway.

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive.  It's still tacky, though.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a
nice scenery.  On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure
people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much
as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable
than at land especially since the regulations for importing from
[[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a
book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the
kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or
other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands
severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose
product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

===From/to Estonia===

There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are
several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn.

===From/to Norway===

===From/to Russia===


==Where to stay?==

==Money==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro. 

==Language==

The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a
Scandinavian language.  The country is officially bilingual, as there
is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak
at least some [[English language | English]], so most of the
international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.

===Useful expressions for hitchhikers===

* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos

==Safety==

Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense
is your friend.

==Legal matters for hitchhikers==

Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where
it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal
for pedestarians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto
illegal in these places.

==Highways==

It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and
some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize
these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying
this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane
expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways
you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

==Culture==

Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a
considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've
hitched themselves back in the day.  Nowadays it's quite rare among
Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often
heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

==Places to see==

Cities of [[Helsinki]], [[Tampere]], [[Turku]], [[Jyväskylä]],
[[Joensuu]], [[Oulu]].  [[Lapland]], [[Lappi]] in is the area spanning
northern Finland, Sweden, Norway and also Russia, depending how you
look at it.

==External links==

*[http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an english section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]

*[http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn

*[http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish

[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>7o89w64o2hzk6ayahf45di92h3x6pv1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4341</id>
      <parentid>4340</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T21:45:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>80.186.138.5</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5517">'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic
Countries.  It's neighboring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and
[[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your
way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]].

==Arriving and leaving the country==

Here would be the tips how to get to the country. Probably most of the
people coming and leaving Finland by [[thumb]] use the [[Via Baltica]]
through [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]] and [[Lithuania]] towards [[Poland]].

==About crossing borders==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they just exist on the map
anyway, and not in reality.  Since the dawn of time has there been
very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian
borders.

Finland is in the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schengen_treaty Schengen treaty], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to
[[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use
that as an excuse to go through your property.  They won't though, but
one busload of anti-EU protesters encountered this issue in 2003 when
traveling from Helsinki to an EU summit held in [[Gothenborg]].

===From/to Sweden===

Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]].  The
latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop
in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]]
as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it.  The two
companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are
[http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a
cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky.  At least Viking Line
sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on
the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway.

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive.  It's still tacky, though.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a
nice scenery.  On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure
people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much
as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable
than at land especially since the regulations for importing from
[[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a
book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the
kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or
other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands
severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose
product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

===From/to Estonia===

There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are
several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn.

===From/to Norway===

===From/to Russia===


==Where to stay?==

==Money==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro. 

==Language==

The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a
Scandinavian language.  The country is officially bilingual, as there
is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak
at least some [[English language | English]], so most of the
international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.

===Useful expressions for hitchhikers===

* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

==Safety==

Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense
is your friend.

==Legal matters for hitchhikers==

Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where
it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal
for pedestarians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto
illegal in these places.

==Highways==

It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and
some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize
these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying
this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane
expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways
you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

==Culture==

Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a
considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've
hitched themselves back in the day.  Nowadays it's quite rare among
Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often
heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

==Places to see==

Cities of [[Helsinki]], [[Tampere]], [[Turku]], [[Jyväskylä]],
[[Joensuu]], [[Oulu]].  [[Lapland]], [[Lappi]] in is the area spanning
northern Finland, Sweden, Norway and also Russia, depending how you
look at it.

==External links==

*[http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an english section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]

*[http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn

*[http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish

[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>09l2032pao815j89ksz47t4dv3k5juz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4342</id>
      <parentid>4341</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-21T19:49:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5646">'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic
Countries.  It's neighboring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and
[[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your
way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]].

==Arriving and leaving the country==

Here would be the tips how to get to the country. Probably most of the
people coming and leaving Finland by [[thumb]] use the [[Via Baltica]]
through [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]] and [[Lithuania]] towards [[Poland]].

==About crossing borders==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they just exist on the map
anyway, and not in reality.  Since the dawn of time has there been
very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian
borders.

Finland is in the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schengen_treaty Schengen treaty], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to
[[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use
that as an excuse to go through your property.  They won't though, but
one busload of anti-EU protesters encountered this issue in 2003 when
traveling from Helsinki to an EU summit held in [[Gothenborg]].

===From/to Sweden===

Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]].  The
latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop
in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]]
as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it.  The two
companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are
[http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a
cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky.  At least Viking Line
sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on
the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway.

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive.  It's still tacky, though.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a
nice scenery.  On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure
people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much
as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable
than at land especially since the regulations for importing from
[[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a
book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the
kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or
other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands
severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose
product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

===From/to Estonia===

There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are
several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn.

===From/to Norway===

===From/to Russia===


==Where to stay?==

==Money==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro. 

==Language==

The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a
Scandinavian language.  The country is officially bilingual, as there
is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak
at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

===Useful expressions for hitchhikers===

* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

==Safety==

Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense
is your friend.

==Legal matters for hitchhikers==

Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where
it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal
for pedestarians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto
illegal in these places.

==Highways==

It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and
some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize
these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying
this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane
expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways
you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

==Culture==

Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a
considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've
hitched themselves back in the day.  Nowadays it's quite rare among
Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often
heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

==Places to see==

Cities of [[Helsinki]], [[Tampere]], [[Turku]], [[Jyväskylä]],
[[Joensuu]], [[Oulu]].  [[Lapland]], [[Lappi]] in is the area spanning
northern Finland, Sweden, Norway and also Russia, depending how you
look at it.

==External links==

*[http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an english section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]

*[http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn

*[http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish

[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>l17lgq8u3dnkdk9377xuj8zq0gxzpsh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4343</id>
      <parentid>4342</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-04T23:37:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5669">'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic
Countries.  It's neighboring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and
[[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your
way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]].

==Arriving and leaving the country==

Here would be the tips how to get to the country. Probably most of the
people coming and leaving Finland by [[thumb]] use the [[Via Baltica]]
through [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]] and [[Lithuania]] towards [[Poland]].

==About crossing borders==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they just exist on the map
anyway, and not in reality.  Since the dawn of time has there been
very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian
borders.

Finland is in the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schengen_treaty Schengen treaty], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to
[[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use
that as an excuse to go through your property.  They won't though, but
one busload of anti-EU protesters encountered this issue in 2003 when
traveling from Helsinki to an EU summit held in [[Gothenborg]].

===From/to Sweden===

Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]].  The
latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop
in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]]
as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it.  The two
companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are
[http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a
cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky.  At least Viking Line
sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on
the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway.

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive.  It's still tacky, though.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a
nice scenery.  On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure
people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much
as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable
than at land especially since the regulations for importing from
[[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a
book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the
kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or
other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands
severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose
product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

===From/to Estonia===

There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are
several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn.

===From/to Norway===

===From/to Russia===


==Where to stay?==

==Money==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro. 

==Language==

The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a
Scandinavian language.  The country is officially bilingual, as there
is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak
at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

===Useful expressions for hitchhikers===

* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

==Safety==

Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense
is your friend.

==Legal matters for hitchhikers==

Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where
it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal
for pedestarians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto
illegal in these places.

==Highways==

It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and
some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize
these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying
this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane
expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways
you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

==Culture==

Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a
considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've
hitched themselves back in the day.  Nowadays it's quite rare among
Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often
heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

==Places to see==

Cities of [[Helsinki]], [[Tampere]], [[Turku]], [[Jyväskylä]],
[[Joensuu]], [[Oulu]].  [[Lapland]], [[Lappi]] in is the area spanning
northern Finland, Sweden, Norway and also Russia, depending how you
look at it.

==External links==

*[http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an english section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]

*[http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn

*[http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish

[[Category:Finland|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>aywh924sg6sv7dvks1xr6vs0csfnmbj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4344</id>
      <parentid>1546</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5669">'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic
Countries.  It's neighboring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and
[[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your
way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]].

==Arriving and leaving the country==

Here would be the tips how to get to the country. Probably most of the
people coming and leaving Finland by [[thumb]] use the [[Via Baltica]]
through [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]] and [[Lithuania]] towards [[Poland]].

==About crossing borders==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they just exist on the map
anyway, and not in reality.  Since the dawn of time has there been
very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian
borders.

Finland is in the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schengen_treaty Schengen treaty], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to
[[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use
that as an excuse to go through your property.  They won't though, but
one busload of anti-EU protesters encountered this issue in 2003 when
traveling from Helsinki to an EU summit held in [[Gothenborg]].

===From/to Sweden===

Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]].  The
latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop
in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]]
as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it.  The two
companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are
[http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a
cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky.  At least Viking Line
sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on
the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway.

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive.  It's still tacky, though.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a
nice scenery.  On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure
people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much
as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable
than at land especially since the regulations for importing from
[[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a
book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the
kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or
other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands
severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose
product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

===From/to Estonia===

There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are
several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn.

===From/to Norway===

===From/to Russia===


==Where to stay?==

==Money==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro. 

==Language==

The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a
Scandinavian language.  The country is officially bilingual, as there
is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak
at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

===Useful expressions for hitchhikers===

* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

==Safety==

Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense
is your friend.

==Legal matters for hitchhikers==

Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where
it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal
for pedestarians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto
illegal in these places.

==Highways==

It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and
some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize
these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying
this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane
expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways
you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

==Culture==

Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a
considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've
hitched themselves back in the day.  Nowadays it's quite rare among
Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often
heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

==Places to see==

Cities of [[Helsinki]], [[Tampere]], [[Turku]], [[Jyväskylä]],
[[Joensuu]], [[Oulu]].  [[Lapland]], [[Lappi]] in is the area spanning
northern Finland, Sweden, Norway and also Russia, depending how you
look at it.

==External links==

*[http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]

*[http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn

*[http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish

[[Category:Finland|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>on40i3jxf9kfi6m8c5pqhxjzmu0j4l5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10125</id>
      <parentid>4344</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-01-13T20:56:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Daniel</username>
        <id>25</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7483">'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic
Countries.  It's neighboring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and
[[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your
way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]].

==Arriving and leaving the country==

Here would be the tips how to get to the country. Probably most of the
people coming and leaving Finland by [[thumb]] use the [[Via Baltica]]
through [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]] and [[Lithuania]] towards [[Poland]].

==About crossing borders==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they just exist on the map
anyway, and not in reality.  Since the dawn of time has there been
very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian
borders.

Finland is in the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schengen_treaty Schengen treaty], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to
[[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use
that as an excuse to go through your property.  They won't though, but
one busload of anti-EU protesters encountered this issue in 2003 when
traveling from Helsinki to an EU summit held in [[Gothenborg]].

===From/to Sweden===

Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]].  The
latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop
in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]]
as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it.  The two
companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are
[http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a
cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky.  At least Viking Line
sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on
the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway.

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive.  It's still tacky, though.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a
nice scenery.  On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure
people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much
as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable
than at land especially since the regulations for importing from
[[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a
book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the
kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or
other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands
severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose
product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

===From/to Estonia===

There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are
several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn.

===From/to Norway===

===From/to Russia===

'''Note'''
There is no walking or cycling on any of existing crossing points.
Russian visa is not issued on the border



The most important crossings to Russia (St Petersburg region) are ''Vaalimaa - Torfianovka'' one the road E18/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa - Brusnichnoe'' near Lappeenranta. 

 
The first one is always animated, 7/7 and almost 24h/24. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarette and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to Torfianovka is enough - there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St-Petersburg]] from there, that don't necessarily cross the border. No use to try to get into Russia with trucks - freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes - days. Russia - Finland Seems faster. To get back from Russia to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.  

The other one is on the road 13 going south from Lappeenranta and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the Saimaa canal (Russian: Сайменский канал; Finnish: Saimaan kanava)

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to Sortavala, from where it is possible to reach St-Petersburg by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.

==Where to stay?==

==Money==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro. 

==Language==

The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a
Scandinavian language.  The country is officially bilingual, as there
is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak
at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

===Useful expressions for hitchhikers===

* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

==Safety==

Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense
is your friend.

==Legal matters for hitchhikers==

Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where
it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal
for pedestarians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto
illegal in these places.

==Highways==

It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and
some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize
these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying
this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane
expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways
you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

==Culture==

Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a
considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've
hitched themselves back in the day.  Nowadays it's quite rare among
Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often
heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

==Places to see==

Cities of [[Helsinki]], [[Tampere]], [[Turku]], [[Jyväskylä]],
[[Joensuu]], [[Oulu]].  [[Lapland]], [[Lappi]] in is the area spanning
northern Finland, Sweden, Norway and also Russia, depending how you
look at it.

==External links==

*[http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]

*[http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn

*[http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish

[[Category:Finland|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>pnchc7pyt89fni24rmrcwe4854xya1i</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10126</id>
      <parentid>10125</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-01-13T21:03:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Daniel</username>
        <id>25</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7497">'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic
Countries.  It's neighboring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and
[[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your
way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]].

==Arriving and leaving the country==

Here would be the tips how to get to the country. Probably most of the
people coming and leaving Finland by [[thumb]] use the [[Via Baltica]]
through [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]] and [[Lithuania]] towards [[Poland]].

==About crossing borders==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they just exist on the map
anyway, and not in reality.  Since the dawn of time has there been
very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian
borders.

Finland is in the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schengen_treaty Schengen treaty], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to
[[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use
that as an excuse to go through your property.  They won't though, but
one busload of anti-EU protesters encountered this issue in 2003 when
traveling from Helsinki to an EU summit held in [[Gothenborg]].

===From/to Sweden===

Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]].  The
latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop
in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]]
as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it.  The two
companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are
[http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a
cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky.  At least Viking Line
sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on
the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway.

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive.  It's still tacky, though.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a
nice scenery.  On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure
people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much
as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable
than at land especially since the regulations for importing from
[[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a
book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the
kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or
other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands
severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose
product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

===From/to Estonia===

There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are
several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn.

===From/to Norway===

===From/to Russia===

'''Note'''
There is no walking or cycling on any of existing crossing points.
Russian visa is not issued on the border



The most important crossings to Russia (St Petersburg region) are ''Vaalimaa - Torfianovka'' one the road E18/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa - Brusnichnoe'' near Lappeenranta. 

 
The first one is always animated, 7/7 and almost 24h/24. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarette and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to Torfianovka is enough - there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St-Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks - freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes - days. Russia - Finland seems to be faster. To get back from Russia to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.  

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from Lappeenranta and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the Saimaa canal (Russian: Сайменский канал; Finnish: Saimaan kanava)

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to Sortavala, from where it is possible to reach St-Petersburg by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.

==Where to stay?==

==Money==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro. 

==Language==

The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a
Scandinavian language.  The country is officially bilingual, as there
is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak
at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

===Useful expressions for hitchhikers===

* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

==Safety==

Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense
is your friend.

==Legal matters for hitchhikers==

Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where
it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal
for pedestarians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto
illegal in these places.

==Highways==

It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and
some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize
these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying
this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane
expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways
you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

==Culture==

Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a
considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've
hitched themselves back in the day.  Nowadays it's quite rare among
Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often
heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

==Places to see==

Cities of [[Helsinki]], [[Tampere]], [[Turku]], [[Jyväskylä]],
[[Joensuu]], [[Oulu]].  [[Lapland]], [[Lappi]] in is the area spanning
northern Finland, Sweden, Norway and also Russia, depending how you
look at it.

==External links==

*[http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]

*[http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn

*[http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish

[[Category:Finland|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>p1uk8f4yt0204mo5bnohtlx280vifc3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10127</id>
      <parentid>10126</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-01-13T21:05:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Daniel</username>
        <id>25</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7512">'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic
Countries.  It's neighboring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and
[[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your
way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]].

==Arriving and leaving the country==

Here would be the tips how to get to the country. Probably most of the
people coming and leaving Finland by [[thumb]] use the [[Via Baltica]]
through [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]] and [[Lithuania]] towards [[Poland]].

==About crossing borders==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they just exist on the map
anyway, and not in reality.  Since the dawn of time has there been
very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian
borders.

Finland is in the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schengen_treaty Schengen treaty], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to
[[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use
that as an excuse to go through your property.  They won't though, but
one busload of anti-EU protesters encountered this issue in 2003 when
traveling from Helsinki to an EU summit held in [[Gothenborg]].

===From/to Sweden===

Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]].  The
latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop
in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]]
as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it.  The two
companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are
[http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a
cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky.  At least Viking Line
sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on
the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway.

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive.  It's still tacky, though.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a
nice scenery.  On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure
people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much
as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable
than at land especially since the regulations for importing from
[[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a
book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the
kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or
other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands
severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose
product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

===From/to Estonia===

There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are
several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn.

===From/to Norway===

===From/to Russia===

'''Note'''
There is no walking or cycling on any of existing crossing points.
Russian visa is not issued on the border



The most important crossings to Russia (St Petersburg region) are ''Vaalimaa - Torfianovka'' one the road E18/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa - Brusnichnoe'' near Lappeenranta. 

 
The first one is always animated, 7/7 and almost 24h/24. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarette and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to Torfianovka is enough - there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St-Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks - freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes - days. Russia - Finland seems to be faster. To get back from Russia to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.  

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from Lappeenranta and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the Saimaa canal (Russian: Сайменский канал; Finnish: Saimaan kanava)

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to Sortavala, from where it is possible to reach St-Petersburg by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.

==Where to stay?==

==Money==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro. 

==Language==

The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a
Scandinavian language.  The country is officially bilingual, as there
is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak
at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

===Useful expressions for hitchhikers===

* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

==Safety==

Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense
is your friend.

==Legal matters for hitchhikers==

Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where
it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal
for pedestarians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto
illegal in these places.

==Highways==

It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and
some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize
these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying
this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane
expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways
you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

==Culture==

Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a
considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've
hitched themselves back in the day.  Nowadays it's quite rare among
Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often
heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

==Places to see==

Cities of [[Helsinki]], [[Tampere]], [[Turku]], [[Jyväskylä]],
[[Joensuu]], [[Oulu]].  [[Lapland]], [[Lappi]] in is the area spanning
northern Finland, [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and also [[Russia]], depending on how you
look at it.

==External links==

*[http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]

*[http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn

*[http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish

[[Category:Finland|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>2wfhzwmzca4gtlesyc6vz5b2s1oj82u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10132</id>
      <parentid>10127</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-01-14T19:41:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Daniel</username>
        <id>25</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7513">'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic
Countries.  It's neighboring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and
[[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your
way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]].

==Arriving and leaving the country==

Here would be the tips how to get to the country. Probably most of the
people coming and leaving Finland by [[thumb]] use the [[Via Baltica]]
through [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]] and [[Lithuania]] towards [[Poland]].

==About crossing borders==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they just exist on the map
anyway, and not in reality.  Since the dawn of time has there been
very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian
borders.

Finland is in the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schengen_treaty Schengen treaty], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to
[[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use
that as an excuse to go through your property.  They won't though, but
one busload of anti-EU protesters encountered this issue in 2003 when
traveling from Helsinki to an EU summit held in [[Gothenborg]].

===From/to Sweden===

Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]].  The
latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop
in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]]
as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it.  The two
companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are
[http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a
cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky.  At least Viking Line
sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on
the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway.

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive.  It's still tacky, though.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a
nice scenery.  On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure
people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much
as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable
than at land especially since the regulations for importing from
[[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a
book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the
kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or
other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands
severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose
product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

===From/to Estonia===

There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are
several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn.

===From/to Norway===

===From/to Russia===

'''Note'''
There is no walking or cycling on any of existing crossing points.
Russian visa is not issued on the border



The most important crossings to Russia (St Petersburg region) are ''Vaalimaa - Torfianovka'' one the road E18/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa - Brusnichnoe'' near Lappeenranta. 

 
The first one is always animated, 7/7 and almost 24h/24. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarette and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to Torfianovka is enough - there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks - freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes - days. Russia - Finland seems to be faster. To get back from Russia to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.  

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from Lappeenranta and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the Saimaa canal (Russian: Сайменский канал; Finnish: Saimaan kanava)

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to Sortavala, from where it is possible to reach St-Petersburg by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.

==Where to stay?==

==Money==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro. 

==Language==

The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a
Scandinavian language.  The country is officially bilingual, as there
is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak
at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

===Useful expressions for hitchhikers===

* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

==Safety==

Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense
is your friend.

==Legal matters for hitchhikers==

Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where
it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal
for pedestarians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto
illegal in these places.

==Highways==

It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and
some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize
these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying
this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane
expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways
you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

==Culture==

Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a
considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've
hitched themselves back in the day.  Nowadays it's quite rare among
Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often
heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

==Places to see==

Cities of [[Helsinki]], [[Tampere]], [[Turku]], [[Jyväskylä]],
[[Joensuu]], [[Oulu]].  [[Lapland]], [[Lappi]] in is the area spanning
northern Finland, [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and also [[Russia]], depending on how you
look at it.

==External links==

*[http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]

*[http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn

*[http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish

[[Category:Finland|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>mrbj3jkeogz0ptsrlkc9b9cy8vhfcrv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14223</id>
      <parentid>10132</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-29T22:03:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7530">'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic
Countries.  It's neighboring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and
[[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your
way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]].

==Arriving and leaving the country==

Here would be the tips how to get to the country. Probably most of the
people coming and leaving Finland by [[thumb]] use the [[Via Baltica]]
through [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]] and [[Lithuania]] towards [[Poland]].

==About crossing borders==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they just exist on the map
anyway, and not in reality.  Since the dawn of time has there been
very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian
borders.

Finland is in the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schengen_treaty Schengen treaty], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to
[[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use
that as an excuse to go through your property.  They won't though, but
one busload of anti-EU protesters encountered this issue in 2003 when
traveling from Helsinki to an EU summit held in [[Gothenborg]].

===From/to Sweden===

Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]].  The
latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop
in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]]
as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it.  The two
companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are
[http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a
cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky.  At least Viking Line
sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on
the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway.

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive.  It's still tacky, though.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a
nice scenery.  On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure
people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much
as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable
than at land especially since the regulations for importing from
[[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a
book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the
kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or
other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands
severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose
product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

===From/to Estonia===

There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are
several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn.

===From/to Norway===

===From/to Russia===

'''Note'''
There is no walking or cycling on any of existing crossing points.
Russian visa is not issued on the border



The most important crossings to Russia (St Petersburg region) are ''Vaalimaa - Torfianovka'' one the road E18/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa - Brusnichnoe'' near Lappeenranta. 

 
The first one is always animated, 7/7 and almost 24h/24. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarette and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to Torfianovka is enough - there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks - freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes - days. Russia - Finland seems to be faster. To get back from Russia to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.  

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from Lappeenranta and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the Saimaa canal (Russian: Сайменский канал; Finnish: Saimaan kanava)

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to Sortavala, from where it is possible to reach St-Petersburg by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.

==Where to stay?==

==Money==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro. 

==Language==

The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a
Scandinavian language.  The country is officially bilingual, as there
is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak
at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

===Useful expressions for hitchhikers===

* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

==Safety==

Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense
is your friend.

==Legal matters for hitchhikers==

Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where
it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal
for pedestarians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto
illegal in these places.

==Highways==

It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and
some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize
these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying
this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane
expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways
you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

==Culture==

Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a
considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've
hitched themselves back in the day.  Nowadays it's quite rare among
Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often
heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

==Places to see==

Cities of [[Helsinki]], [[Tampere]], [[Turku]], [[Jyväskylä]],
[[Joensuu]], [[Oulu]].  [[Lapland]], [[Lappi]] in is the area spanning
northern Finland, [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and also [[Russia]], depending on how you
look at it.

==External links==

*[http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]

*[http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn

*[http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish

[[Category:Finland|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]</text>
      <sha1>kgwh64r5w5ir1yu3d67hcirv6b9e9ac</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14725</id>
      <parentid>14223</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-13T18:35:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7525">'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries.  It's neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]].

== Arriving and leaving the country ==
Here would be the tips how to get to the country. Probably most of the people coming and leaving Finland by [[thumb]] use the [[Via Baltica]] through [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]] and [[Lithuania]] towards [[Poland]].

== About crossing borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they just exist on the map anyway, and not in reality.  Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders.

Finland is in the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schengen_treaty Schengen treaty], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.  They won't though, but one busload of anti-EU protesters encountered this issue in 2003 when travelling from Helsinki to an EU summit held in [[Gothenborg]].

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway.

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to Russia ===
'''Note''':
There is no walking or cycling on any of existing crossing points.
Russian visa is not issued on the border


The most important crossings to Russia (St. Petersburg region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road E18/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near Lappeenranta.
 
The first one is always animated, 7/7 and almost 24h/24. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarette and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to Torfianovka is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from Russia to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from Lappeenranta and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the Saimaa canal (Russian: Сайменский канал; Finnish: Saimaan kanava)

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to Sortavala, from where it is possible to reach St-Petersburg by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.

== Where to stay? ==

== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language.  The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Places to see ==
Cities of [[Helsinki]], [[Tampere]], [[Turku]], [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]], [[Oulu]].  [[Lapland]], [[Lappi]] in is the area spanning northern Finland, [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and also [[Russia]], depending on how you look at it.

== External links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]

[[de:Finnland]]</text>
      <sha1>ax97nfjd7epzgna27zt6ile6f3joeoh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14999</id>
      <parentid>14725</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-19T22:42:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Daniel</username>
        <id>25</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7513">'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries.  Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]].

== Arriving and leaving the country ==
Here would be the tips how to get to the country. Probably most of the people coming and leaving Finland by [[thumb]] use the [[Via Baltica]] through [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]] and [[Lithuania]] towards [[Poland]].

== About crossing borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality.  Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders.

Finland is in the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schengen_treaty Schengen treaty], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.  They won't though, but one busload of anti-EU protesters encountered this issue in 2003 when travelling from Helsinki to an EU summit held in [[Gothenborg]].

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway.

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to Russia ===
'''Note''':
There is no walking or cycling on any of existing crossing points.
Russian visa is not issued on the border


The most important crossings to Russia (St. Petersburg region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road E18/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near Lappeenranta.
 
The first one is always animated, 7/7 and almost 24h/24. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarette and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to Torfianovka is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from Russia to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from Lappeenranta and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the Saimaa canal (Russian: Сайменский канал; Finnish: Saimaan kanava)

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to Sortavala, from where it is possible to reach St-Petersburg by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.

== Where to stay? ==

== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language.  The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Places to see ==
Cities of [[Helsinki]], [[Tampere]], [[Turku]], [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]], [[Oulu]].  [[Lapland]], [[Lappi]] in is the area spanning northern Finland, [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and also [[Russia]], depending on how you look at it.

== External links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]

[[de:Finnland]]</text>
      <sha1>etp9f3vdujscimwgj0p6t2ccwjslx12</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15019</id>
      <parentid>14999</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-21T11:37:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Daniel</username>
        <id>25</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7557">'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries.  Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]].

== Arriving and leaving the country ==
Here would be the tips how to get to the country. Probably most of the people coming and leaving Finland by [[thumb]] use the [[Via Baltica]] through [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]] and [[Lithuania]] towards [[Poland]].

== About crossing borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality.  Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders.

Finland is in the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schengen_treaty Schengen treaty], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.  They won't though, but one busload of anti-EU protesters encountered this issue in 2003 when travelling from Helsinki to an EU summit held in [[Gothenborg]].

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway.

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to Russia ===
'''Note''':
There is no walking or cycling on any of existing crossing points.
Russian visa is not issued on the border


The most important crossings to Russia (St. Petersburg region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road E18/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near Lappeenranta.
 
The first one is always animated, 7/7 and almost 24h/24. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarette and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to Torfianovka is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from Russia to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from Lappeenranta and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: Сайменский канал; Finnish: Saimaan kanava)

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to Sortavala, from where it is possible to reach St-Petersburg by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.

== Where to stay? ==

== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language.  The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Places to see ==
Cities of [[Helsinki]], [[Tampere]], [[Turku]], [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]], [[Oulu]].  [[Lapland]], [[Lappi]] in is the area spanning northern Finland, [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and also [[Russia]], depending on how you look at it.

== External links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]

[[de:Finnland]]</text>
      <sha1>t1hbjfedyzcmupgivt3drjwbc2qpjhu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15097</id>
      <parentid>15019</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-24T15:20:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7398">'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries.  Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]].

== Arriving and leaving the country ==
Here would be the tips how to get to the country. Probably most of the people coming and leaving Finland by [[thumb]] use the [[Via Baltica]] through [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]] and [[Lithuania]] towards [[Poland]].

== About crossing borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality.  Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders.

Finland is in the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schengen_treaty Schengen treaty], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway.

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to Russia ===
'''Note''':
There is no walking or cycling on any of existing crossing points.
Russian visa is not issued on the border


The most important crossings to Russia (St. Petersburg region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road E18/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near Lappeenranta.
 
The first one is always animated, 7/7 and almost 24h/24. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarette and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to Torfianovka is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from Russia to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from Lappeenranta and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: Сайменский канал; Finnish: Saimaan kanava)

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to Sortavala, from where it is possible to reach St-Petersburg by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.

== Where to stay? ==

== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language.  The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Places to see ==
Cities of [[Helsinki]], [[Tampere]], [[Turku]], [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]], [[Oulu]].  [[Lapland]], [[Lappi]] in is the area spanning northern Finland, [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and also [[Russia]], depending on how you look at it.

== External links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]

[[de:Finnland]]</text>
      <sha1>ofglmyla9yhhdhhms1jf11an7vwe9wp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17793</id>
      <parentid>15097</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-07T18:18:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Daniel</username>
        <id>25</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7403">'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries.  Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]].

== Arriving and leaving the country ==
Here would be the tips how to get to the country. Probably most of the people coming and leaving Finland by [[thumb]] use the [[Via Baltica]] through [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]] and [[Lithuania]] towards [[Poland]].

== About crossing borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality.  Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders.

Finland is in the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schengen_treaty Schengen treaty], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway.

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
*There is no walking or cycling on any of existing crossing points.
*Russian visa is not issued on the border


The most important crossings to Russia (St. Petersburg region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road E18/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near Lappeenranta.
 
The first one is always animated, 7/7 and almost 24h/24. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarette and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to Torfianovka is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from Russia to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from Lappeenranta and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: Сайменский канал; Finnish: Saimaan kanava)

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to Sortavala, from where it is possible to reach St-Petersburg by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.

== Where to stay? ==

== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language.  The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Places to see ==
Cities of [[Helsinki]], [[Tampere]], [[Turku]], [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]], [[Oulu]].  [[Lapland]], [[Lappi]] in is the area spanning northern Finland, [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and also [[Russia]], depending on how you look at it.

== External links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]

[[de:Finnland]]</text>
      <sha1>ih82d98vulanhkyfee05bk7o4vda5qk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17794</id>
      <parentid>17793</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-07T18:20:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Daniel</username>
        <id>25</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7423">'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries.  Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]].

== Arriving and leaving the country ==
Here would be the tips how to get to the country. Probably most of the people coming and leaving Finland by [[thumb]] use the [[Via Baltica]] through [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]] and [[Lithuania]] towards [[Poland]].

== About crossing borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality.  Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders.

Finland is in the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schengen_treaty Schengen treaty], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway.

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
*There is no walking or cycling on any of existing crossing points.
*Russian visa is not issued on the border


The most important crossings to Russia (St. Petersburg region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road E18/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near Lappeenranta.
 
The first one is always animated, 7/7 and almost 24h/24. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarette and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to Torfianovka is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from Russia to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from Lappeenranta and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: Сайменский канал; Finnish: Saimaan kanava)

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to Sortavala, from where it is possible to reach St-Petersburg by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.

== Where to stay? ==

== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language.  The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Places to see ==
Cities of [[Helsinki]], [[Tampere]], [[Turku]], [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]], [[Oulu]].  [[Lapland]], [[Lappi]] in is the area spanning northern Finland, [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and also [[Russia]], depending on how you look at it.

== External links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]

[[de:Finnland]]</text>
      <sha1>5598s6msuwkifmmnv3vqnw668r1cco3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17797</id>
      <parentid>17794</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-07T19:18:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7494">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = ?
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries.  Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way, called the [[Via Baltica]].
&lt;!--
== Arriving and leaving the country ==
Here would be the tips how to get to the country. Probably most of the people coming and leaving Finland by [[thumb]] use the [[Via Baltica]] through [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]] and [[Lithuania]] towards [[Poland]].
--&gt;
===Cities===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Lappi]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

==Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway.

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
*There is no walking or cycling on any of existing crossing points.
*Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;
== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[de:Finnland]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>9jnvk3onxdsb3gghanl4mtglw2otaea</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17805</id>
      <parentid>17797</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-07T23:53:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Daniel</username>
        <id>25</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7501">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries.  Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way, called the [[Via Baltica]].
&lt;!--
== Arriving and leaving the country ==
Here would be the tips how to get to the country. Probably most of the people coming and leaving Finland by [[thumb]] use the [[Via Baltica]] through [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]] and [[Lithuania]] towards [[Poland]].
--&gt;
===Cities===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Lappi]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

==Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway.

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
*There is no walking or cycling on any of existing crossing points.
*Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;
== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[de:Finnland]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>mw76xdp7ghi1cnt6x6c7gnoh1jhfe1y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17806</id>
      <parentid>17805</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-07T23:58:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Daniel</username>
        <id>25</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7242">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries.  Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way, called the [[Via Baltica]].

===Cities===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Lappi]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

==Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway.

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
*There is no walking or cycling on any of existing crossing points.
*Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;
== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[de:Finnland]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>rqjalfekuggdula788hxqpnoi08cu83</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18142</id>
      <parentid>17806</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-20T21:40:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7262">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries.  Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way, called the [[Via Baltica]].

===Cities===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Lappi]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

==Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway.

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
*There is no walking or cycling on any of existing crossing points.
*Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;
== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Europe]]
[[de:Finnland]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>hghu237p8s6yhrue2esbzb3niet6q60</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18297</id>
      <parentid>18142</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-02-03T22:05:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>193.166.88.162</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7380">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries.  Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way, called the [[Via Baltica]].

===Cities===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Lappi]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

==Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway.

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
*There is no walking on any of existing crossing points.
*Crossing ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border post via cycling was permitted at least in 2006 and, most probably, still permitted
*Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Europe]]
[[de:Finnland]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>n6i66dixx2w5qmaakrkhhrgsfhodqzj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18396</id>
      <parentid>18297</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-02-15T12:53:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7452">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way, called the [[Via Baltica]].

=== Cities ===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Lappi]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

== Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway.

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
* There is no walking on any of existing crossing points.
* Crossing ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border post via cycling was permitted at least in 2006 and, most probably, still permitted
* Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]

[[de:Finnland]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>jalsan3dq5bnno4pjkhmzldixgc5ylx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18939</id>
      <parentid>18396</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-19T20:21:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7465">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way, called the [[Via Baltica]].

=== Cities ===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lappi]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

== Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway.

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
* There is no walking on any of existing crossing points.
* Crossing ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border post via cycling was permitted at least in 2006 and, most probably, still permitted
* Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]

[[de:Finnland]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>6tkh6xe4ocogt3azkjrsyskqbek6r8l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19002</id>
      <parentid>18939</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-22T12:36:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>79.226.62.29</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7575">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way, called the [[Via Baltica]].

=== Cities ===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lappi]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

== Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. A ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros and Stockholm-Helsinki 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
* There is no walking on any of existing crossing points.
* Crossing ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border post via cycling was permitted at least in 2006 and, most probably, still permitted
* Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]

[[de:Finnland]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>3r76ffuyq3qmm84357l0r6q4tcnoxqo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19003</id>
      <parentid>19002</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-22T12:39:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>79.226.62.29</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7915">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way, called the [[Via Baltica]].

=== Cities ===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lappi]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

== Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. A ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros and Stockholm-Helsinki 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The Viking Line cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks onboard. Be warned that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. In the Fall, Winter, and early Spring, that means no daylight for hitchhiking, and possibly extremely cold temperatures, as well.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
* There is no walking on any of existing crossing points.
* Crossing ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border post via cycling was permitted at least in 2006 and, most probably, still permitted
* Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]

[[de:Finnland]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>0x97fjrasq2m52v8bjx7rhryjqwmzc6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19004</id>
      <parentid>19003</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-22T13:20:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>79.226.62.29</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8233">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way, called the [[Via Baltica]].

=== Cities ===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lappi]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

== Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. A ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros and Stockholm-Helsinki 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The Viking Line cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks onboard. Be warned that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. In the Fall, Winter, and early Spring, that means no daylight for hitchhiking, and possibly extremely cold temperatures, as well.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
* There is no walking on any of existing crossing points.
* Crossing ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border post via cycling was permitted at least in 2006 and, most probably, still permitted
* Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places. 

Hitching and stopping at the motorways is forbidden, I recommend hitching onramps (sometimes there might be even a bus stop) or gas stations. Secondly the cars drive so fast that is hard for them to notice the hitch hiker soon enough and to stop. But on the other hand, there are not that many motorways in Finland.

== Highways ==
It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]

[[de:Finnland]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>7mvdbs1myid2dzsyuuqfqngd2m6svhg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19005</id>
      <parentid>19004</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-22T13:21:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>79.226.62.29</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7915">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way, called the [[Via Baltica]].

=== Cities ===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lappi]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

== Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. A ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros and Stockholm-Helsinki 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The Viking Line cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks onboard. Be warned that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. In the Fall, Winter, and early Spring, that means no daylight for hitchhiking, and possibly extremely cold temperatures, as well.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
* There is no walking on any of existing crossing points.
* Crossing ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border post via cycling was permitted at least in 2006 and, most probably, still permitted
* Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]

[[de:Finnland]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>0x97fjrasq2m52v8bjx7rhryjqwmzc6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19006</id>
      <parentid>19005</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-22T14:02:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>79.226.62.29</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8076">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way, called the [[Via Baltica]].

=== Cities ===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lappi]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

== Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. A ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros and Stockholm-Helsinki 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The Viking Line cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks onboard. Be warned that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. In the Fall, Winter, and early Spring, that means no daylight for hitchhiking, and possibly extremely cold temperatures, as well.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn. It takes 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros the cheapest without a cabin.

www.vikingline.fi
www.siljaline.fi
www.eckeroline.fi
www.tallink.fi
www.nordicjetline.fi

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
* There is no walking on any of existing crossing points.
* Crossing ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border post via cycling was permitted at least in 2006 and, most probably, still permitted
* Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]

[[de:Finnland]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>djit00h4o0prc4sgxzpm49k4cnmkszu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>20174</id>
      <parentid>19006</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-05-27T08:54:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7986">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way, called the [[Via Baltica]].

=== Cities ===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lappi]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

== Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. A ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros and Stockholm-Helsinki 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The Viking Line cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks onboard. Be warned that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. In the Fall, Winter, and early Spring, that means no daylight for hitchhiking, and possibly extremely cold temperatures, as well.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn. It takes 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros the cheapest without a cabin.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
* There is no walking on any of existing crossing points.
* Crossing ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border post via cycling was permitted at least in 2006 and, most probably, still permitted
* Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]

[[de:Finnland]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>op8sgzzrnmeo89w846elrs9diljn4ym</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>20449</id>
      <parentid>20174</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-07T00:06:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8036">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way, called the [[Via Baltica]].

=== Cities ===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lappi]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

== Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. A ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros and Stockholm-Helsinki 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The Viking Line cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks onboard. Be warned that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. In the Fall, Winter, and early Spring, that means no daylight for hitchhiking, and possibly extremely cold temperatures, as well.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn. It takes 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros the cheapest without a cabin.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
* There is no walking on any of existing crossing points.
* Crossing ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border post via cycling was permitted at least in 2006 and, most probably, still permitted
* Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|right|60px]]It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]

[[de:Finnland]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>qu9btsgur0oazomip6zq5zczvpp57d5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>20491</id>
      <parentid>20449</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-08T16:30:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8082">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way, called the [[Via Baltica]].

=== Cities ===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lappi]]
* [[Helsinki]], [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

== Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. A ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros and Stockholm-Helsinki 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The Viking Line cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks onboard. Be warned that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. In the Fall, Winter, and early Spring, that means no daylight for hitchhiking, and possibly extremely cold temperatures, as well.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn. It takes 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros the cheapest without a cabin.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
* There is no walking on any of existing crossing points.
* Crossing ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border post via cycling was permitted at least in 2006 and, most probably, still permitted
* Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|right|60px]]It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]

[[de:Finnland]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>89nszo8pblezepmlqel6hoyysq5wrt3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>20492</id>
      <parentid>20491</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-08T16:35:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8170">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro ( &amp;euro; )
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way. It's called the [[Via Baltica]] - road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]].

=== Cities ===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lappi]]
* [[Helsinki]], [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

== Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. A ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros and Stockholm-Helsinki 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The Viking Line cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks onboard. Be warned that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. In the Fall, Winter, and early Spring, that means no daylight for hitchhiking, and possibly extremely cold temperatures, as well.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn. It takes 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros the cheapest without a cabin.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
* There is no walking on any of existing crossing points.
* Crossing ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border post via cycling was permitted at least in 2006 and, most probably, still permitted
* Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|right|60px]]It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]

[[de:Finnland]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>qeftsr9y7l4k35h1zjavte68nlx70xh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>20543</id>
      <parentid>20492</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-09T17:25:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8183">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro ( &amp;euro; )
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way. It's called the [[Via Baltica]] - road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]].

=== Cities ===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lappi]]
* [[Helsinki]], [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

== Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. A ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros and Stockholm-Helsinki 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The Viking Line cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks onboard. Be warned that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. In the Fall, Winter, and early Spring, that means no daylight for hitchhiking, and possibly extremely cold temperatures, as well.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn. It takes 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros the cheapest without a cabin.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
* There is no walking on any of existing crossing points.
* Crossing ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border post via cycling was permitted at least in 2006 and, most probably, still permitted
* Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed.  As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|right|60px]]It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called "moottoritie") and some motorways ("moottoriliikennetie") in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>s39mp1xzg325vfreo5rdihwnb7ptglj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21260</id>
      <parentid>20543</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-14T22:25:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8188">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (&amp;euro;)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way. It's called the [[Via Baltica]] - road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]].

=== Cities ===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lappi]]
* [[Helsinki]], [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

== Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. A ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros and Stockholm-Helsinki 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The Viking Line cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks onboard. Be warned that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. In the Fall, Winter, and early Spring, that means no daylight for hitchhiking, and possibly extremely cold temperatures, as well.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn. It takes 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros the cheapest without a cabin.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
* There is no walking on any of existing crossing points.
* Crossing ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border post via cycling was permitted at least in 2006 and, most probably, still permitted
* Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|right|60px]]It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>jdg40u23p8snjhr4hxhx979zygvklrs</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21316</id>
      <parentid>21260</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-15T13:01:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8204">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (&amp;euro;)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way. It's called the [[Via Baltica]] - road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]].

=== Cities ===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lappi]]
* [[Helsinki]], [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

== Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. A ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros and Stockholm-Helsinki 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The Viking Line cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks onboard. Be warned that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. In the Fall, Winter, and early Spring, that means no daylight for hitchhiking, and possibly extremely cold temperatures, as well.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn. It takes 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros the cheapest without a cabin.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
* There is no walking on any of existing crossing points.
* Crossing ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border post via cycling was permitted at least in 2006 and, most probably, still permitted
* Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|right|60px]]It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Europe}}</text>
      <sha1>6xmup0x8csv5dhc8o4r42jm6nzj2lch</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21861</id>
      <parentid>21316</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-20T07:53:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8209">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (&amp;euro;)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way. It's called the [[Via Baltica]] - road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]].

=== Cities ===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lappi]]
* [[Helsinki]], [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

== Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. A ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros and Stockholm-Helsinki 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The Viking Line cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks onboard. Be warned that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. In the Fall, Winter, and early Spring, that means no daylight for hitchhiking, and possibly extremely cold temperatures, as well.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn. It takes 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros the cheapest without a cabin.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
* There is no walking on any of existing crossing points.
* Crossing ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border post via cycling was permitted at least in 2006 and, most probably, still permitted
* Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|right|60px]]It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}</text>
      <sha1>adhh5ilid0646n2u3z7ihozq9lhmhdq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21904</id>
      <parentid>21861</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-21T10:05:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8242">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (&amp;euro;)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way. It's called the [[Via Baltica]] - road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]].

=== Cities ===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Helsinki]], [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

===Other areas===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. A ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros and Stockholm-Helsinki 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The Viking Line cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks onboard. Be warned that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. In the Fall, Winter, and early Spring, that means no daylight for hitchhiking, and possibly extremely cold temperatures, as well.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn. It takes 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros the cheapest without a cabin.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
* There is no walking on any of existing crossing points.
* Crossing ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border post via cycling was permitted at least in 2006 and, most probably, still permitted
* Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Moi
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|right|60px]]It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}</text>
      <sha1>l8whenqpmcluxoxhyrjv496a8mr2iad</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21909</id>
      <parentid>21904</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-21T10:12:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8266">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (&amp;euro;)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way. It's called the [[Via Baltica]] - road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]].

=== Cities ===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Helsinki]], [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

===Other areas===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://Www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. A ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros and Stockholm-Helsinki 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The Viking Line cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks onboard. Be warned that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. In the Fall, Winter, and early Spring, that means no daylight for hitchhiking, and possibly extremely cold temperatures, as well.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn. It takes 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros the cheapest without a cabin.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
* There is no walking on any of existing crossing points.
* Crossing ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border post via cycling was permitted at least in 2006 and, most probably, still permitted
* Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Terve
* Hi = Moi ''or'' Hei
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|right|60px]]It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}</text>
      <sha1>825zxzgsp3d3grusyuiw1xkkw6gq1b1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23126</id>
      <parentid>21909</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-31T16:42:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8448">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (&amp;euro;)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way. It's called the [[Via Baltica]] - road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]].

=== Cities ===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Helsinki]], [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

===Other areas===
[[Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; washing away mosquito corpses]]

* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. A ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros and Stockholm-Helsinki 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The Viking Line cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks onboard. Be warned that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. In the Fall, Winter, and early Spring, that means no daylight for hitchhiking, and possibly extremely cold temperatures, as well.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn. It takes 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros the cheapest without a cabin.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
* There is no walking on any of existing crossing points.
* Crossing ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border post via cycling was permitted at least in 2006 and, most probably, still permitted
* Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Terve
* Hi = Moi ''or'' Hei
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|right|60px]]It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}</text>
      <sha1>sfn7unri1uo9q3t4sg41hq0fjt3jctv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23127</id>
      <parentid>23126</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-31T16:43:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8460">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (&amp;euro;)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way. It's called the [[Via Baltica]] - road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]].

=== Cities ===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Helsinki]], [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

===Other areas===
[[Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; washing away mosquito corpses]]

* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. A ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros and Stockholm-Helsinki 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The Viking Line cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks onboard. Be warned that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. In the Fall, Winter, and early Spring, that means no daylight for hitchhiking, and possibly extremely cold temperatures, as well.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn. It takes 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros the cheapest without a cabin.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
* There is no walking on any of existing crossing points.
* Crossing ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border post via cycling was permitted at least in 2006 and, most probably, still permitted
* Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Terve
* Hi = Moi ''or'' Hei
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|right|60px]]It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}</text>
      <sha1>dd3jls5n398ys5asuv853drx6s519oo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23128</id>
      <parentid>23127</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-31T16:44:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8381">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (&amp;euro;)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way. It's called the [[Via Baltica]] - road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]].

=== Cities ===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Helsinki]], [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

===Other areas===
[[Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. A ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros and Stockholm-Helsinki 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The Viking Line cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks onboard. Be warned that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. In the Fall, Winter, and early Spring, that means no daylight for hitchhiking, and possibly extremely cold temperatures, as well.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn. It takes 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros the cheapest without a cabin.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
* There is no walking on any of existing crossing points.
* Crossing ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border post via cycling was permitted at least in 2006 and, most probably, still permitted
* Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Terve
* Hi = Moi ''or'' Hei
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|right|60px]]It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}</text>
      <sha1>blbbhhb0jnnuc0ngxiwqs9o18bh4ejj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23129</id>
      <parentid>23128</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-31T16:44:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8387">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (&amp;euro;)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way. It's called the [[Via Baltica]] - road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]].

=== Cities ===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Helsinki]], [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

===Other areas===
[[Image:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. A ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros and Stockholm-Helsinki 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The Viking Line cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks onboard. Be warned that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. In the Fall, Winter, and early Spring, that means no daylight for hitchhiking, and possibly extremely cold temperatures, as well.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn. It takes 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros the cheapest without a cabin.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
* There is no walking on any of existing crossing points.
* Crossing ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border post via cycling was permitted at least in 2006 and, most probably, still permitted
* Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Terve
* Hi = Moi ''or'' Hei
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|right|60px]]It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}</text>
      <sha1>7lhv10se6n46wq9ysmotw1ig2k704t0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23237</id>
      <parentid>23129</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-08-04T09:00:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8678">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (&amp;euro;)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way. It's called the [[Via Baltica]] - road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]].

In the Northern part of Finland hitchhiking seems pretty easy.  When you get closer to Helsinki it could be a good idea to avoid the highways and opt for the older roads.  With less traffic, but easier for cars to stop, and less likely to be stuck at some on-ramp in the middle of nowhere.

=== Cities ===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Helsinki]], [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

===Other areas===
[[Image:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. A ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros and Stockholm-Helsinki 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The Viking Line cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks onboard. Be warned that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. In the Fall, Winter, and early Spring, that means no daylight for hitchhiking, and possibly extremely cold temperatures, as well.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn. It takes 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros the cheapest without a cabin.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
* There is no walking on any of existing crossing points.
* Crossing ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border post via cycling was permitted at least in 2006 and, most probably, still permitted
* Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Terve
* Hi = Moi ''or'' Hei
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|right|60px]]It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}</text>
      <sha1>6z52lzue0n4u7tpx616sereapont08b</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23425</id>
      <parentid>23237</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-08-12T20:03:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>88.112.29.66</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9116">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (&amp;euro;)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way. It's called the [[Via Baltica]] - road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]].

In the Northern part of Finland hitchhiking seems pretty easy.  When you get closer to Helsinki it could be a good idea to avoid the highways and opt for the older roads.  With less traffic, but easier for cars to stop, and less likely to be stuck at some on-ramp in the middle of nowhere.

=== Cities ===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Helsinki]], [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

===Other areas===
[[Image:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. A ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros and Stockholm-Helsinki 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The Viking Line cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks onboard. Be warned that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. In the Fall, Winter, and early Spring, that means no daylight for hitchhiking, and possibly extremely cold temperatures, as well.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn. It takes 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros the cheapest without a cabin.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
* There is no walking on any of existing crossing points.
* Crossing ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border post via cycling was permitted at least in 2006 and, most probably, still permitted
* Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;
Also, there are some border crossings more, from Imatra to Svetogorsk, from Kuhmo to Kostamuksha, from Salla towards Kandalaksha and from Inari towards Murmansk. These days most of these checkpoints work 24/7. Good way to hitch a ride from Russia to Finland is to hang around some stores near the border looking for Finnish licence plates and offer to bring the driver an extra load of cigarettes and booze. They will be appreciate that.

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Terve
* Hi = Moi ''or'' Hei
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|right|60px]]It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}</text>
      <sha1>hj1m9jtdq20mszem1fkga2ynm76d0p4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26922</id>
      <parentid>23425</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-04T10:35:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9215">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (&amp;euro;)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way. It's called the [[Via Baltica]] - road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]].

In the Northern part of Finland hitchhiking seems pretty easy.  When you get closer to Helsinki it could be a good idea to avoid the highways and opt for the older roads.  With less traffic, but easier for cars to stop, and less likely to be stuck at some on-ramp in the middle of nowhere.

=== Cities ===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Helsinki]], [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

===Other areas===
[[Image:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. A ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros and Stockholm-Helsinki 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The Viking Line cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks onboard. Be warned that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. In the Fall, Winter, and early Spring, that means no daylight for hitchhiking, and possibly extremely cold temperatures, as well.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[Image:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn. It takes 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros the cheapest without a cabin.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
* There is no walking on any of existing crossing points.
* Crossing ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border post via cycling was permitted at least in 2006 and, most probably, still permitted
* Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;
Also, there are some border crossings more, from Imatra to Svetogorsk, from Kuhmo to Kostamuksha, from Salla towards Kandalaksha and from Inari towards Murmansk. These days most of these checkpoints work 24/7. Good way to hitch a ride from Russia to Finland is to hang around some stores near the border looking for Finnish licence plates and offer to bring the driver an extra load of cigarettes and booze. They will be appreciate that.

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Terve
* Hi = Moi ''or'' Hei
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|right|60px]]It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}</text>
      <sha1>pigs96drblxi404hai17x9s6f8gs9b5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26926</id>
      <parentid>26922</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-04T10:44:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9397">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (&amp;euro;)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way. It's called the [[Via Baltica]] - road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]].

In the Northern part of Finland hitchhiking seems pretty easy.  When you get closer to Helsinki it could be a good idea to avoid the highways and opt for the older roads.  With less traffic, but easier for cars to stop, and less likely to be stuck at some on-ramp in the middle of nowhere.

[[Image:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Helsinki]], [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

===Other areas===
[[Image:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. A ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros and Stockholm-Helsinki 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The Viking Line cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks onboard. Be warned that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. In the Fall, Winter, and early Spring, that means no daylight for hitchhiking, and possibly extremely cold temperatures, as well.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[Image:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn. It takes 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros the cheapest without a cabin.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
* There is no walking on any of existing crossing points.
* Crossing ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border post via cycling was permitted at least in 2006 and, most probably, still permitted
* Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;
Also, there are some border crossings more, from Imatra to Svetogorsk, from Kuhmo to Kostamuksha, from Salla towards Kandalaksha and from Inari towards Murmansk. These days most of these checkpoints work 24/7. Good way to hitch a ride from Russia to Finland is to hang around some stores near the border looking for Finnish licence plates and offer to bring the driver an extra load of cigarettes and booze. They will be appreciate that.

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Terve
* Hi = Moi ''or'' Hei
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|right|60px]]It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}</text>
      <sha1>45fdrw4x9ngnynbrqdv0aan12ws8x6r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26927</id>
      <parentid>26926</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-04T10:51:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9396">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (&amp;euro;)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way. It's called the [[Via Baltica]] - road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]].

In the Northern part of Finland hitchhiking seems pretty easy.  When you get closer to Helsinki it could be a good idea to avoid the highways and opt for the older roads.  With less traffic, but easier for cars to stop, and less likely to be stuck at some on-ramp in the middle of nowhere.

[[Image:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Helsinki]], [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

===Other areas===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

[[Image:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. A ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros and Stockholm-Helsinki 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The Viking Line cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks onboard. Be warned that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. In the Fall, Winter, and early Spring, that means no daylight for hitchhiking, and possibly extremely cold temperatures, as well.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[Image:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn. It takes 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros the cheapest without a cabin.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
* There is no walking on any of existing crossing points.
* Crossing ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border post via cycling was permitted at least in 2006 and, most probably, still permitted
* Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;
Also, there are some border crossings more, from Imatra to Svetogorsk, from Kuhmo to Kostamuksha, from Salla towards Kandalaksha and from Inari towards Murmansk. These days most of these checkpoints work 24/7. Good way to hitch a ride from Russia to Finland is to hang around some stores near the border looking for Finnish licence plates and offer to bring the driver an extra load of cigarettes and booze. They will be appreciate that.

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Terve
* Hi = Moi ''or'' Hei
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|right|60px]]It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}</text>
      <sha1>qrk05b27j0cbj8zujv0mhk5cfyvqnvf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27495</id>
      <parentid>26927</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-09T08:37:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sigurdas</username>
        <id>1658</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9425">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (&amp;euro;)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way. It's called the [[Via Baltica]] - road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]].

In the Northern part of Finland hitchhiking seems pretty easy.  When you get closer to Helsinki it could be a good idea to avoid the highways and opt for the older roads.  With less traffic, but easier for cars to stop, and less likely to be stuck at some on-ramp in the middle of nowhere.

[[Image:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Helsinki]], [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

===Other areas===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

[[Image:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. A ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros and Stockholm-Helsinki 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The Viking Line cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks onboard. Be warned that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. In the Fall, Winter, and early Spring, that means no daylight for hitchhiking, and possibly extremely cold temperatures, as well.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[Image:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn. It takes 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros the cheapest without a cabin.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
* There is no walking on any of existing crossing points.
* Crossing ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border post via cycling was permitted at least in 2006 and, most probably, still permitted
* Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;
Also, there are some border crossings more, from Imatra to Svetogorsk, from Kuhmo to Kostamuksha, from Salla towards Kandalaksha and from Inari towards Murmansk. These days most of these checkpoints work 24/7. Good way to hitch a ride from Russia to Finland is to hang around some stores near the border looking for Finnish licence plates and offer to bring the driver an extra load of cigarettes and booze. They will be appreciate that.

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Terve
* Hi = Moi ''or'' Hei
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|right|60px]]It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}</text>
      <sha1>3i2ofs21em58psb5nj742v9oc1if7qo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27827</id>
      <parentid>27495</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-16T10:29:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9455">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (&amp;euro;)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way. It's called the [[Via Baltica]] - road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]].

In the Northern part of Finland hitchhiking seems pretty easy.  When you get closer to Helsinki it could be a good idea to avoid the highways and opt for the older roads.  With less traffic, but easier for cars to stop, and less likely to be stuck at some on-ramp in the middle of nowhere.

[[Image:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Helsinki]], [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

===Other areas===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

[[Image:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. A ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros and Stockholm-Helsinki 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The Viking Line cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks onboard. Be warned that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. In the Fall, Winter, and early Spring, that means no daylight for hitchhiking, and possibly extremely cold temperatures, as well.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[Image:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn. It takes 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros the cheapest without a cabin.

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
* There is no walking on any of existing crossing points.
* Crossing ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border post via cycling was permitted at least in 2006 and, most probably, still permitted
* Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;
Also, there are some border crossings more, from Imatra to Svetogorsk, from Kuhmo to Kostamuksha, from Salla towards Kandalaksha and from Inari towards Murmansk. These days most of these checkpoints work 24/7. Good way to hitch a ride from Russia to Finland is to hang around some stores near the border looking for Finnish licence plates and offer to bring the driver an extra load of cigarettes and booze. They will be appreciate that.

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Terve
* Hi = Moi ''or'' Hei
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|right|60px]]It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}</text>
      <sha1>ao3xyh74w3eeh4ia87zww05qqbdprrl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27832</id>
      <parentid>27827</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-16T13:04:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Narnua</username>
        <id>13</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9728">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (&amp;euro;)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way. It's called the [[Via Baltica]] - road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]].

In the Northern part of Finland hitchhiking seems pretty easy.  When you get closer to Helsinki it could be a good idea to avoid the highways and opt for the older roads.  With less traffic, but easier for cars to stop, and less likely to be stuck at some on-ramp in the middle of nowhere.

[[Image:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Helsinki]], [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

===Other areas===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

[[Image:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. A ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros and Stockholm-Helsinki 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The Viking Line cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks onboard. Be warned that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. In the Fall, Winter, and early Spring, that means no daylight for hitchhiking, and possibly extremely cold temperatures, as well.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[Image:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn. It takes 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros the cheapest without a cabin.

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ Tallink &amp; Silja Line] to Estonia (only in Finnish / Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en Viking Line] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx Eckerö Line]
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ Linda Line]

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
* There is no walking on any of existing crossing points.
* Crossing ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border post via cycling was permitted at least in 2006 and, most probably, still permitted
* Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;
Also, there are some border crossings more, from Imatra to Svetogorsk, from Kuhmo to Kostamuksha, from Salla towards Kandalaksha and from Inari towards Murmansk. These days most of these checkpoints work 24/7. Good way to hitch a ride from Russia to Finland is to hang around some stores near the border looking for Finnish licence plates and offer to bring the driver an extra load of cigarettes and booze. They will be appreciate that.

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Terve
* Hi = Moi ''or'' Hei
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|right|60px]]It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}</text>
      <sha1>q5paar92tw9lr0yj56mt2haw2f9vyql</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27833</id>
      <parentid>27832</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-16T13:07:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Narnua</username>
        <id>13</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9871">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (&amp;euro;)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way. It's called the [[Via Baltica]] - road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]].

In the Northern part of Finland hitchhiking seems pretty easy.  When you get closer to Helsinki it could be a good idea to avoid the highways and opt for the older roads.  With less traffic, but easier for cars to stop, and less likely to be stuck at some on-ramp in the middle of nowhere.

[[Image:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Helsinki]], [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

===Other areas===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

[[Image:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. A ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros and Stockholm-Helsinki 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The Viking Line cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks onboard. Be warned that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. In the Fall, Winter, and early Spring, that means no daylight for hitchhiking, and possibly extremely cold temperatures, as well.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[Image:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn. It takes 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros the cheapest without a cabin.

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ Tallink &amp; Silja Line] to Estonia (only in Finnish / Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en Viking Line] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx Eckerö Line]
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ Linda Line]

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
* There is no walking on any of existing crossing points.
* Crossing ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border post via cycling was permitted at least in 2006 and, most probably, still permitted
* Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;
Also, there are some border crossings more, from Imatra to Svetogorsk, from Kuhmo to Kostamuksha, from Salla towards Kandalaksha and from Inari towards Murmansk. These days most of these checkpoints work 24/7. Good way to hitch a ride from Russia to Finland is to hang around some stores near the border looking for Finnish licence plates and offer to bring the driver an extra load of cigarettes and booze. They will be appreciate that.

[http://www.makupalat.fi/Categories.aspx?classID=aef30d12-31ab-407f-89d6-526dd5d637f5 Boatlines to Sweden, Estonia, Germany + internal lakes]

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Terve
* Hi = Moi ''or'' Hei
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|right|60px]]It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}</text>
      <sha1>td9qkzp4jimnr5lv8xck9ofznw61slo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27834</id>
      <parentid>27833</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-16T13:08:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Narnua</username>
        <id>13</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9870">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (&amp;euro;)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic Countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way. It's called the [[Via Baltica]] - road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]].

In the Northern part of Finland hitchhiking seems pretty easy.  When you get closer to Helsinki it could be a good idea to avoid the highways and opt for the older roads.  With less traffic, but easier for cars to stop, and less likely to be stuck at some on-ramp in the middle of nowhere.

[[Image:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Jyväskylä]], [[Joensuu]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Helsinki]], [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]], [[Turku]]

===Other areas===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing Borders ==
Nothing special about the Finnish borders. Apart from the Russian border, they exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time has there been very liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian borders. Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]], but [[Ahvenanmaa]] where the ferries to [[Stockholm]] stop supposedly isn't, so the border-control can use that as an excuse to go through your property.

[[Image:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|[[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to [[Stockholm]] go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter being closer is considerably cheaper.  Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] in [[Ahvenanmaa]], or [[Mariehamn]] in [[Åland]] as the swedish-speaking population there tend to call it. The two companies running ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi Viking Line] and [http://www.silja.com Silja Line].  Both of the companies concentrate on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. At least Viking Line sells simple tickets without a cabin, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. A ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros and Stockholm-Helsinki 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

Silja Line is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The Viking Line cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks onboard. Be warned that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. In the Fall, Winter, and early Spring, that means no daylight for hitchhiking, and possibly extremely cold temperatures, as well.

It isn't to say the archipelagoes of Stockholm or Turku don't make a nice scenery. On the ferries there's a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free booze and other stupid things as much as allowed by the regulations.  It really isn't much more affordable than at land especially since the regulations for importing from [[Estonia]], which they won't tell you of course.  So, do bring a book.  Usually there's free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus usually some other backpackers or other such to chat with.  You can also try to spot a small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant great cormorants] a few hours off [[Stockholm]].

Then there's the Swedish [http://www.birka.se Birka Cruises], whose product is apparently closer to a more proper cruise.

More boats: [http://www.makupalat.fi/Categories.aspx?classID=aef30d12-31ab-407f-89d6-526dd5d637f5 Sweden, Estonia, Germany + internal lakes]

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[Image:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land-connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to Tallinn. It takes 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros the cheapest without a cabin.

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ Tallink &amp; Silja Line] to Estonia (only in Finnish / Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en Viking Line] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx Eckerö Line]
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ Linda Line]

=== From/to Norway ===

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note'''
* There is no walking on any of existing crossing points.
* Crossing ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border post via cycling was permitted at least in 2006 and, most probably, still permitted
* Russian visa is not issued on the border

The most important crossings to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]] region) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' one the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St-Petersburg and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
The first one is always animated, open 7 days a week and 24 hours a day. There's lots of through traffic as well as lots of locals from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods, Finnish people going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel and all sort of traffickers. On Finnish side they are crowding on the first gas station, just before the customs zone. You can alternate asking drivers on the parking and those queueing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there, that doesn't necessarily cross the border to the Finnish side. No use trying to get into Russia with trucks – freight terminal is separate, and sometimes you wait hours, sometimes days. Russia–Finland seems to be faster. To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland the best way is to ask on the parking of one of the supermarkets around.

The other one is on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here, but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'')

Next crossing point north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, from there a road goes to [[Sortavala]], from where it is possible to reach [[St. Petersburg]] by the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga], with a portion of unpaved road,  or [[Petrozavodsk]] via north shore.
&lt;!-- see infobox
== Money ==
Finland is a part of the [[EU]] and the currency used is Euro.
--&gt;
Also, there are some border crossings more, from Imatra to Svetogorsk, from Kuhmo to Kostamuksha, from Salla towards Kandalaksha and from Inari towards Murmansk. These days most of these checkpoints work 24/7. Good way to hitch a ride from Russia to Finland is to hang around some stores near the border looking for Finnish licence plates and offer to bring the driver an extra load of cigarettes and booze. They will be appreciate that.

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish, which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual, as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority. Anyhow, most of the people speak at least some English, so most of the international hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.
Though you might encounter some old people who don't speak English. In this case it's good to know some Swedish (which is useful all over Scandinavia).

=== Useful expressions for hitchhikers ===
* Hello = Terve
* Hi = Moi ''or'' Hei
* Hitchhiking = Liftaaminen
* To Hitchhike = Liftata 
* A Ride = Kyyti
* Thank You = Kiitos
* Where are you driving to? = Minne ajat?

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland indeed. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop and some places where it's illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking de facto illegal in these places.

== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|right|60px]]It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching is illegal in Finland on the motorways and two lane expressways. On any other highway you can legally hitch. On motorways you can also legally use the on-ramps as well as the gas stations.
This is the same with most countries in Europe and most states of USA.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and a considerable amount of the rides will tell the hitchkiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in the day. Nowadays it's quite rare among Finns, but of course there are some European backpackers, often heading to [[Lappi]], [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] The site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] A Hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] Hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}</text>
      <sha1>ee5lc8cx4pmog8rvcuel71eayneddh7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>28627</id>
      <parentid>27834</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-30T22:58:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sigurdas</username>
        <id>1658</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10582">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (&amp;euro;)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way which is called "[[Via Baltica]]" - it is a road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]] through Baltic States and [[Poland]].

Hitchhiking seems pretty easy in the Northern part of Finland. It could be a good idea to avoid highways and opt for smaller local roads once you get closer to Helsinki - sure, there will be less traffic, however, you will get more space for the cars to stop, and avoid a chance of getting stuck on some unlit highway ramp in the middle of nowhere (consider the early darkness when hitchhiking in autumn/winter!)

[[Image:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

===Other areas===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing the borders ==
Apart from the Russian border, Finnish borders exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time there has been very a liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian. However, despite the fact that Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]] there is a random identity and luggage check when you take a ferry from [[Ahvenanmaa]] to [[Stockholm]] (Sweden).

[[Image:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of 2008, a ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

''Silja Line'' is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks onboard. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

When on-bord, during warmer time of the year you might go up outside to enjoy the scenery of the archipelagos of Stockholm or Turku. 

Be aware as well of a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free alcohol and some other things on the ferries. It really isn't much more cheaper, though, than buying them on land. So, do bring a book. Usually there are free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus very often other backpackers wander around (you might as well have a chat with them). You can also try to spot small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant Great cormorants] a few hours off Stockholm.

There are Swedish [http://www.birka.se ''Birka Cruises''] boats cruising the sea, too.

More info about boats in the region: [http://www.makupalat.fi/Categories.aspx?classID=aef30d12-31ab-407f-89d6-526dd5d637f5 here] (Sweden, Estonia, Germany + lake tourism)

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[Image:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note that as of 2006:'''
* No walking is permitted on any of existing Finnish-Russian border checkpoints.
* ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border checkpoint is permitted to cross by cycling.
* Russian visa can not be issued at the border checkpoint.

The most important border checkpoints to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]]'s district) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' on the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St.Petersburg, and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
====Vaalimaa–Torfianovka====
It is always open. Traffic is high there, and you might find there both long-distance trucks (however, see info below about trucks ) as well as lots of locals, from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods they don't have in Russia, and Finns going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel. On a Finnish side, you can find most of them at the first [[gas station]], just before the customs zone. You can also ask drivers on the parking, and those queuing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there. 

As of 2006, it was a complete waste of time to hitch a truck over the border to Russia – freight terminal is separate for trucks and the queue there is extremely slow: sometimes you wait for hours, sometimes for days. Same terminal from Russia to Finland, though, seems to be faster. 

To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland, simply ask drivers at the parking lot by one of the supermarkets around there on the Russian side.

====Other checkpoints====
There is a checkpoint on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'').

Next border checkpoint to the north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, a road goes to [[Sortavala]] and then further to [[St. Petersburg]] via the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga] (with a portion of an unpaved road), or via the north shore to [[Petrozavodsk]].

There are a few more border checkpoints: from [[Imatra]] to [[Svetogorsk]], from [[Kuhmo]] to [[Kostamuksha]], from [[Salla]] towards [[Kandalaksha]], and from [[Inari]] towards [[Murmansk]]. These days most of these checkpoints work 24/7. Good way to hitch a ride from Russia to Finland is to hang around some stores near borders and look for Finnish license plates. A smart trick you can do to lift up your chances to get a ride is by offering a driver you speak to to bring an extra load of cigarettes and alcohol - most of the Finnish drivers won't resist that!

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Anyhow, most of the people speak good English, too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop, and some places where it is illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking  illegal de facto in these places.

== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|right|60px]]It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching on the motorways and two lane expressways is prohibited. On any other highway you can legally hitch. You can also hitchhike at the motorway on-ramps, and at the motorway [[gas station]]s' areas. Basically, same rules as in countries in Western Europe and in most states of the [[USA]].

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org Finnish hitchhiker's club] - the site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum].
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] - a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] - hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}</text>
      <sha1>6f404nfco6k0wyh4fn63k45iguz2kld</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>28811</id>
      <parentid>28627</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-04T15:20:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10589">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (&amp;euro;)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way which is called "[[Via Baltica]]" - it is a road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]] through Baltic States and [[Poland]].

Hitchhiking seems pretty easy in the Northern part of Finland. It could be a good idea to avoid highways and opt for smaller local roads once you get closer to Helsinki - sure, there will be less traffic, however, you will get more space for the cars to stop, and avoid a chance of getting stuck on some unlit highway ramp in the middle of nowhere (consider the early darkness when hitchhiking in autumn/winter!)

[[Image:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

===Other areas===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing the borders ==
Apart from the Russian border, Finnish borders exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time there has been very a liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian. However, despite the fact that Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]] there is a random identity and luggage check when you take a ferry from [[Ahvenanmaa]] to [[Stockholm]] (Sweden).

[[Image:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of 2008, a ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

''Silja Line'' is the poshier of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks onboard. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

When on-bord, during warmer time of the year you might go up outside to enjoy the scenery of the archipelagos of Stockholm or Turku. 

Be aware as well of a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free alcohol and some other things on the ferries. It really isn't much more cheaper, though, than buying them on land. So, do bring a book. Usually there are free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus very often other backpackers wander around (you might as well have a chat with them). You can also try to spot small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant Great cormorants] a few hours off Stockholm.

There are Swedish [http://www.birka.se ''Birka Cruises''] boats cruising the sea, too.

More info about boats in the region: [http://www.makupalat.fi/Categories.aspx?classID=aef30d12-31ab-407f-89d6-526dd5d637f5 here] (Sweden, Estonia, Germany + lake tourism)

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[Image:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note that as of 2006:'''
* No walking is permitted on any of existing Finnish-Russian border checkpoints.
* ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border checkpoint is permitted to cross by cycling.
* Russian visa can not be issued at the border checkpoint.

The most important border checkpoints to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]]'s district) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' on the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St.Petersburg, and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
====Vaalimaa–Torfianovka====
It is always open. Traffic is high there, and you might find there both long-distance trucks (however, see info below about trucks ) as well as lots of locals, from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods they don't have in Russia, and Finns going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel. On a Finnish side, you can find most of them at the first [[petrol station]], just before the customs zone. You can also ask drivers on the parking, and those queuing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there. 

As of 2006, it was a complete waste of time to hitch a truck over the border to Russia – freight terminal is separate for trucks and the queue there is extremely slow: sometimes you wait for hours, sometimes for days. Same terminal from Russia to Finland, though, seems to be faster. 

To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland, simply ask drivers at the parking lot by one of the supermarkets around there on the Russian side.

====Other checkpoints====
There is a checkpoint on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'').

Next border checkpoint to the north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, a road goes to [[Sortavala]] and then further to [[St. Petersburg]] via the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga] (with a portion of an unpaved road), or via the north shore to [[Petrozavodsk]].

There are a few more border checkpoints: from [[Imatra]] to [[Svetogorsk]], from [[Kuhmo]] to [[Kostamuksha]], from [[Salla]] towards [[Kandalaksha]], and from [[Inari]] towards [[Murmansk]]. These days most of these checkpoints work 24/7. Good way to hitch a ride from Russia to Finland is to hang around some stores near borders and look for Finnish license plates. A smart trick you can do to lift up your chances to get a ride is by offering a driver you speak to to bring an extra load of cigarettes and alcohol - most of the Finnish drivers won't resist that!

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Anyhow, most of the people speak good English, too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop, and some places where it is illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking  illegal de facto in these places.

== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|right|60px]]It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching on the motorways and two lane expressways is prohibited. On any other highway you can legally hitch. You can also hitchhike at the motorway on-ramps, and at the motorway [[petrol station]]s' areas. Basically, same rules as in countries in Western Europe and in most states of the [[USA]].

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] - the site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum].
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] - a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] - hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}</text>
      <sha1>69oio3js3xwl2zibug8bvzsh5654d0d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29134</id>
      <parentid>28811</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-12T01:14:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10590">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (&amp;euro;)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way which is called "[[Via Baltica]]" - it is a road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]] through Baltic States and [[Poland]].

Hitchhiking seems pretty easy in the Northern part of Finland. It could be a good idea to avoid highways and opt for smaller local roads once you get closer to Helsinki - sure, there will be less traffic, however, you will get more space for the cars to stop, and avoid a chance of getting stuck on some unlit highway ramp in the middle of nowhere (consider the early darkness when hitchhiking in autumn/winter!)

[[Image:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

===Other areas===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing the borders ==
Apart from the Russian border, Finnish borders exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time there has been very a liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian. However, despite the fact that Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]] there is a random identity and luggage check when you take a ferry from [[Ahvenanmaa]] to [[Stockholm]] (Sweden).

[[Image:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of 2008, a ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

When on-board, during warmer time of the year you might go up outside to enjoy the scenery of the archipelagos of Stockholm or Turku. 

Be aware as well of a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free alcohol and some other things on the ferries. It really isn't much more cheaper, though, than buying them on land. So, do bring a book. Usually there are free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus very often other backpackers wander around (you might as well have a chat with them). You can also try to spot small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant Great cormorants] a few hours off Stockholm.

There are Swedish [http://www.birka.se ''Birka Cruises''] boats cruising the sea, too.

More info about boats in the region: [http://www.makupalat.fi/Categories.aspx?classID=aef30d12-31ab-407f-89d6-526dd5d637f5 here] (Sweden, Estonia, Germany + lake tourism)

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[Image:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note that as of 2006:'''
* No walking is permitted on any of existing Finnish-Russian border checkpoints.
* ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border checkpoint is permitted to cross by cycling.
* Russian visa can not be issued at the border checkpoint.

The most important border checkpoints to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]]'s district) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' on the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St.Petersburg, and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
====Vaalimaa–Torfianovka====
It is always open. Traffic is high there, and you might find there both long-distance trucks (however, see info below about trucks ) as well as lots of locals, from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods they don't have in Russia, and Finns going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel. On a Finnish side, you can find most of them at the first [[petrol station]], just before the customs zone. You can also ask drivers on the parking, and those queuing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there. 

As of 2006, it was a complete waste of time to hitch a truck over the border to Russia – freight terminal is separate for trucks and the queue there is extremely slow: sometimes you wait for hours, sometimes for days. Same terminal from Russia to Finland, though, seems to be faster. 

To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland, simply ask drivers at the parking lot by one of the supermarkets around there on the Russian side.

====Other checkpoints====
There is a checkpoint on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'').

Next border checkpoint to the north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, a road goes to [[Sortavala]] and then further to [[St. Petersburg]] via the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga] (with a portion of an unpaved road), or via the north shore to [[Petrozavodsk]].

There are a few more border checkpoints: from [[Imatra]] to [[Svetogorsk]], from [[Kuhmo]] to [[Kostamuksha]], from [[Salla]] towards [[Kandalaksha]], and from [[Inari]] towards [[Murmansk]]. These days most of these checkpoints work 24/7. Good way to hitch a ride from Russia to Finland is to hang around some stores near borders and look for Finnish license plates. A smart trick you can do to lift up your chances to get a ride is by offering a driver you speak to to bring an extra load of cigarettes and alcohol - most of the Finnish drivers won't resist that!

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Anyhow, most of the people speak good English, too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop, and some places where it is illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking  illegal de facto in these places.

== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|right|60px]]It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching on the motorways and two lane expressways is prohibited. On any other highway you can legally hitch. You can also hitchhike at the motorway on-ramps, and at the motorway [[petrol station]]s' areas. Basically, same rules as in countries in Western Europe and in most states of the [[USA]].

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] - the site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum].
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] - a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] - hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}</text>
      <sha1>72eisdw6875blt1wn7xc9du01sd8z8h</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29781</id>
      <parentid>29134</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-08T01:18:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kb</username>
        <id>1332</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10602">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (&amp;euro;)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way which is called "[[Via Baltica]]" - it is a road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]] through Baltic States and [[Poland]].

Hitchhiking seems pretty easy in the Northern part of Finland. It could be a good idea to avoid highways and opt for smaller local roads once you get closer to Helsinki - sure, there will be less traffic, however, you will get more space for the cars to stop, and avoid a chance of getting stuck on some unlit highway ramp in the middle of nowhere (consider the early darkness when hitchhiking in autumn/winter!)

[[Image:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

===Other areas===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing the borders ==
Apart from the Russian border, Finnish borders exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time there has been very a liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian. However, despite the fact that Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]] there is a random identity and luggage check when you take a ferry from [[Ahvenanmaa]] to [[Stockholm]] (Sweden).

[[Image:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of 2008, a ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

When on-board, during warmer time of the year you might go up outside to enjoy the scenery of the archipelagos of Stockholm or Turku. 

Be aware as well of a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free alcohol and some other things on the ferries. It really isn't much more cheaper, though, than buying them on land. So, do bring a book. Usually there are free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus very often other backpackers wander around (you might as well have a chat with them). You can also try to spot small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant Great cormorants] a few hours off Stockholm.

There are Swedish [http://www.birka.se ''Birka Cruises''] boats cruising the sea, too.

More info about boats in the region: [http://www.makupalat.fi/Categories.aspx?classID=aef30d12-31ab-407f-89d6-526dd5d637f5 here] (Sweden, Estonia, Germany + lake tourism)

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[Image:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note that as of 2006:'''
* No walking is permitted on any of existing Finnish-Russian border checkpoints.
* ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border checkpoint is permitted to cross by cycling.
* Russian visa can not be issued at the border checkpoint.

The most important border checkpoints to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]]'s district) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' on the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St.Petersburg, and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
====Vaalimaa–Torfianovka====
It is always open. Traffic is high there, and you might find there both long-distance trucks (however, see info below about trucks ) as well as lots of locals, from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods they don't have in Russia, and Finns going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel. On a Finnish side, you can find most of them at the first [[petrol station]], just before the customs zone. You can also ask drivers on the parking, and those queuing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there. 

As of 2006, it was a complete waste of time to hitch a truck over the border to Russia – freight terminal is separate for trucks and the queue there is extremely slow: sometimes you wait for hours, sometimes for days. Same terminal from Russia to Finland, though, seems to be faster. 

To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland, simply ask drivers at the parking lot by one of the supermarkets around there on the Russian side.

====Other checkpoints====
There is a checkpoint on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'').

Next border checkpoint to the north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, a road goes to [[Sortavala]] and then further to [[St. Petersburg]] via the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga] (with a portion of an unpaved road), or via the north shore to [[Petrozavodsk]].

There are a few more border checkpoints: from [[Imatra]] to [[Svetogorsk]], from [[Kuhmo]] to [[Kostamuksha]], from [[Salla]] towards [[Kandalaksha]], and from [[Inari]] towards [[Murmansk]]. These days most of these checkpoints work 24/7. Good way to hitch a ride from Russia to Finland is to hang around some stores near borders and look for Finnish license plates. A smart trick you can do to lift up your chances to get a ride is by offering a driver you speak to to bring an extra load of cigarettes and alcohol - most of the Finnish drivers won't resist that!

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Anyhow, most of the people speak good English, too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop, and some places where it is illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking  illegal de facto in these places.

== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|right|60px]]It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching on the motorways and two lane expressways is prohibited. On any other highway you can legally hitch. You can also hitchhike at the motorway on-ramps, and at the motorway [[petrol station]]s' areas. Basically, same rules as in countries in Western Europe and in most states of the [[USA]].

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] - the site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum].
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] - a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] - hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}</text>
      <sha1>ig7kh114a4f9fcttg94ls15mepyspi0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29782</id>
      <parentid>29781</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-08T01:19:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kb</username>
        <id>1332</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10602">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (&amp;euro;)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way which is called "[[Via Baltica]]" - it is a road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]] through Baltic States and [[Poland]].

Hitchhiking seems pretty easy in the Northern part of Finland. It could be a good idea to avoid highways and opt for smaller local roads once you get closer to Helsinki - sure, there will be less traffic, however, you will get more space for the cars to stop, and avoid a chance of getting stuck on some unlit highway ramp in the middle of nowhere (consider the early darkness when hitchhiking in autumn/winter!)

[[Image:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

===Other areas===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing the borders ==
Apart from the Russian border, Finnish borders exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time there has been very a liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian. However, despite the fact that Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]] there is a random identity and luggage check when you take a ferry from [[Ahvenanmaa]] to [[Stockholm]] (Sweden).

[[Image:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of 2008, a ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

When on-board, during warmer time of the year you might go up outside to enjoy the scenery of the archipelagos of Stockholm or Turku. 

Be aware as well of a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free alcohol and some other things on the ferries. It really isn't much more cheaper, though, than buying them on land. So, do bring a book. Usually there are free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus very often other backpackers wander around (you might as well have a chat with them). You can also try to spot small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant Great cormorants] a few hours off Stockholm.

There are Swedish [http://www.birka.se ''Birka Cruises''] boats cruising the sea, too.

More info about boats in the region: [http://www.makupalat.fi/Categories.aspx?classID=aef30d12-31ab-407f-89d6-526dd5d637f5 here] (Sweden, Estonia, Germany + lake tourism)

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[Image:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note that as of 2006:'''
* No walking is permitted on any of existing Finnish-Russian border checkpoints.
* ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border checkpoint is permitted to cross by cycling.
* Russian visa can not be issued at the border checkpoint.

The most important border checkpoints to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]]'s district) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' on the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St.Petersburg, and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
====Vaalimaa–Torfianovka====
It is always open. Traffic is high there, and you might find there both long-distance trucks (however, see info below about trucks ) as well as lots of locals, from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods they don't have in Russia, and Finns going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel. On a Finnish side, you can find most of them at the first [[petrol station]], just before the customs zone. You can also ask drivers on the parking, and those queuing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there. 

As of 2006, it was a complete waste of time to hitch a truck over the border to Russia – freight terminal is separate for trucks and the queue there is extremely slow: sometimes you wait for hours, sometimes for days. Same terminal from Russia to Finland, though, seems to be faster. 

To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland, simply ask drivers at the parking lot by one of the supermarkets around there on the Russian side.

====Other checkpoints====
There is a checkpoint on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'').

Next border checkpoint to the north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, a road goes to [[Sortavala]] and then further to [[St. Petersburg]] via the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga] (with a portion of an unpaved road), or via the north shore to [[Petrozavodsk]].

There are a few more border checkpoints: from [[Imatra]] to [[Svetogorsk]], from [[Kuhmo]] to [[Kostamuksha]], from [[Salla]] towards [[Kandalaksha]], and from [[Inari]] towards [[Murmansk]]. These days most of these checkpoints work 24/7. Good way to hitch a ride from Russia to Finland is to hang around some stores near borders and look for Finnish license plates. A smart trick you can do to lift up your chances to get a ride is by offering a driver you speak to to bring an extra load of cigarettes and alcohol - most of the Finnish drivers won't resist that!

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Anyhow, most of the people speak good English, too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop, and some places where it is illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking  illegal de facto in these places.

== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|right|60px]]It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching on the motorways and two lane expressways is prohibited. On any other highway you can legally hitch. You can also hitchhike at the motorway on-ramps, and at the motorway [[petrol station]]s' areas. Basically, same rules as in countries in Western Europe and in most states of the [[USA]].

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] - the site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum].
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] - a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] - hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}</text>
      <sha1>fl4vxdfzyifluv4ndgi8gdcg9ue8wcc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30009</id>
      <parentid>29782</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-14T18:18:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10696">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (&amp;euro;)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='64.52954819942192' lng='27.3779296875' zoom='4' view='0' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way which is called "[[Via Baltica]]" - it is a road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]] through Baltic States and [[Poland]].

Hitchhiking seems pretty easy in the Northern part of Finland. It could be a good idea to avoid highways and opt for smaller local roads once you get closer to Helsinki - sure, there will be less traffic, however, you will get more space for the cars to stop, and avoid a chance of getting stuck on some unlit highway ramp in the middle of nowhere (consider the early darkness when hitchhiking in autumn/winter!)

[[Image:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

===Other areas===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing the borders ==
Apart from the Russian border, Finnish borders exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time there has been very a liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian. However, despite the fact that Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]] there is a random identity and luggage check when you take a ferry from [[Ahvenanmaa]] to [[Stockholm]] (Sweden).

[[Image:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of 2008, a ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

When on-board, during warmer time of the year you might go up outside to enjoy the scenery of the archipelagos of Stockholm or Turku. 

Be aware as well of a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free alcohol and some other things on the ferries. It really isn't much more cheaper, though, than buying them on land. So, do bring a book. Usually there are free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus very often other backpackers wander around (you might as well have a chat with them). You can also try to spot small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant Great cormorants] a few hours off Stockholm.

There are Swedish [http://www.birka.se ''Birka Cruises''] boats cruising the sea, too.

More info about boats in the region: [http://www.makupalat.fi/Categories.aspx?classID=aef30d12-31ab-407f-89d6-526dd5d637f5 here] (Sweden, Estonia, Germany + lake tourism)

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[Image:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note that as of 2006:'''
* No walking is permitted on any of existing Finnish-Russian border checkpoints.
* ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border checkpoint is permitted to cross by cycling.
* Russian visa can not be issued at the border checkpoint.

The most important border checkpoints to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]]'s district) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' on the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St.Petersburg, and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
====Vaalimaa–Torfianovka====
It is always open. Traffic is high there, and you might find there both long-distance trucks (however, see info below about trucks ) as well as lots of locals, from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods they don't have in Russia, and Finns going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel. On a Finnish side, you can find most of them at the first [[petrol station]], just before the customs zone. You can also ask drivers on the parking, and those queuing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there. 

As of 2006, it was a complete waste of time to hitch a truck over the border to Russia – freight terminal is separate for trucks and the queue there is extremely slow: sometimes you wait for hours, sometimes for days. Same terminal from Russia to Finland, though, seems to be faster. 

To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland, simply ask drivers at the parking lot by one of the supermarkets around there on the Russian side.

====Other checkpoints====
There is a checkpoint on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'').

Next border checkpoint to the north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, a road goes to [[Sortavala]] and then further to [[St. Petersburg]] via the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga] (with a portion of an unpaved road), or via the north shore to [[Petrozavodsk]].

There are a few more border checkpoints: from [[Imatra]] to [[Svetogorsk]], from [[Kuhmo]] to [[Kostamuksha]], from [[Salla]] towards [[Kandalaksha]], and from [[Inari]] towards [[Murmansk]]. These days most of these checkpoints work 24/7. Good way to hitch a ride from Russia to Finland is to hang around some stores near borders and look for Finnish license plates. A smart trick you can do to lift up your chances to get a ride is by offering a driver you speak to to bring an extra load of cigarettes and alcohol - most of the Finnish drivers won't resist that!

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Anyhow, most of the people speak good English, too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop, and some places where it is illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking  illegal de facto in these places.

== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|right|60px]]It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching on the motorways and two lane expressways is prohibited. On any other highway you can legally hitch. You can also hitchhike at the motorway on-ramps, and at the motorway [[petrol station]]s' areas. Basically, same rules as in countries in Western Europe and in most states of the [[USA]].

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] - the site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum].
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] - a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] - hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}</text>
      <sha1>qdruy7cztlh8t9p1gstrd0rl6t1dgk7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30023</id>
      <parentid>30009</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-16T02:50:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kb</username>
        <id>1332</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10699">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (&amp;euro;)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way which is called "[[Via Baltica]]" - it is a road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]] through Baltic States and [[Poland]].

Hitchhiking seems pretty easy in the Northern part of Finland. It could be a good idea to avoid highways and opt for smaller local roads once you get closer to Helsinki - sure, there will be less traffic, however, you will get more space for the cars to stop, and avoid a chance of getting stuck on some unlit highway ramp in the middle of nowhere (consider the early darkness when hitchhiking in autumn/winter!)

[[Image:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

===Other areas===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing the borders ==
Apart from the Russian border, Finnish borders exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time there has been very a liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian. However, despite the fact that Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]] there is a random identity and luggage check when you take a ferry from [[Ahvenanmaa]] to [[Stockholm]] (Sweden).

[[Image:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of 2008, a ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

When on-board, during warmer time of the year you might go up outside to enjoy the scenery of the archipelagos of Stockholm or Turku. 

Be aware as well of a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free alcohol and some other things on the ferries. It really isn't much more cheaper, though, than buying them on land. So, do bring a book. Usually there are free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus very often other backpackers wander around (you might as well have a chat with them). You can also try to spot small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant Great cormorants] a few hours off Stockholm.

There are Swedish [http://www.birka.se ''Birka Cruises''] boats cruising the sea, too.

More info about boats in the region: [http://www.makupalat.fi/Categories.aspx?classID=aef30d12-31ab-407f-89d6-526dd5d637f5 here] (Sweden, Estonia, Germany + lake tourism)

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[Image:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note that as of 2006:'''
* No walking is permitted on any of existing Finnish-Russian border checkpoints.
* ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border checkpoint is permitted to cross by cycling.
* Russian visa can not be issued at the border checkpoint.

The most important border checkpoints to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]]'s district) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' on the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St.Petersburg, and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
====Vaalimaa–Torfianovka====
It is always open. Traffic is high there, and you might find there both long-distance trucks (however, see info below about trucks ) as well as lots of locals, from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods they don't have in Russia, and Finns going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel. On a Finnish side, you can find most of them at the first [[petrol station]], just before the customs zone. You can also ask drivers on the parking, and those queuing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there. 

As of 2006, it was a complete waste of time to hitch a truck over the border to Russia – freight terminal is separate for trucks and the queue there is extremely slow: sometimes you wait for hours, sometimes for days. Same terminal from Russia to Finland, though, seems to be faster. 

To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland, simply ask drivers at the parking lot by one of the supermarkets around there on the Russian side.

====Other checkpoints====
There is a checkpoint on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'').

Next border checkpoint to the north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, a road goes to [[Sortavala]] and then further to [[St. Petersburg]] via the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga] (with a portion of an unpaved road), or via the north shore to [[Petrozavodsk]].

There are a few more border checkpoints: from [[Imatra]] to [[Svetogorsk]], from [[Kuhmo]] to [[Kostamuksha]], from [[Salla]] towards [[Kandalaksha]], and from [[Inari]] towards [[Murmansk]]. These days most of these checkpoints work 24/7. Good way to hitch a ride from Russia to Finland is to hang around some stores near borders and look for Finnish license plates. A smart trick you can do to lift up your chances to get a ride is by offering a driver you speak to to bring an extra load of cigarettes and alcohol - most of the Finnish drivers won't resist that!

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Anyhow, most of the people speak good English, too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop, and some places where it is illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking  illegal de facto in these places.

== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|right|60px]]It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching on the motorways and two lane expressways is prohibited. On any other highway you can legally hitch. You can also hitchhike at the motorway on-ramps, and at the motorway [[petrol station]]s' areas. Basically, same rules as in countries in Western Europe and in most states of the [[USA]].

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] - the site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum].
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] - a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] - hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}</text>
      <sha1>94u798bqb4ej31j4uu134m6ap87gsb2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30024</id>
      <parentid>30023</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-16T03:13:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kb</username>
        <id>1332</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10793">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (&amp;euro;)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way which is called "[[Via Baltica]]" - it is a road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]] through Baltic States and [[Poland]].

Hitchhiking seems pretty easy in the Northern part of Finland. It could be a good idea to avoid highways and opt for smaller local roads once you get closer to Helsinki - sure, there will be less traffic, however, you will get more space for the cars to stop, and avoid a chance of getting stuck on some unlit highway ramp in the middle of nowhere (consider the early darkness when hitchhiking in autumn/winter!)

[[Image:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

===Other areas===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing the borders ==
Apart from the Russian border, Finnish borders exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time there has been very a liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian. However, despite the fact that Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]] there is a random identity and luggage check when you take a ferry from [[Ahvenanmaa]] to [[Stockholm]] (Sweden).

[[Image:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of 2008, a ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

When on-board, during warmer time of the year you might go up outside to enjoy the scenery of the archipelagos of Stockholm or Turku. 

Be aware as well of a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free alcohol and some other things on the ferries. It really isn't much more cheaper, though, than buying them on land. So, do bring a book. Usually there are free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus very often other backpackers wander around (you might as well have a chat with them). You can also try to spot small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant Great cormorants] a few hours off Stockholm.

There are Swedish [http://www.birka.se ''Birka Cruises''] boats cruising the sea, too.

More info about boats in the region: [http://www.makupalat.fi/Categories.aspx?classID=aef30d12-31ab-407f-89d6-526dd5d637f5 here] (Sweden, Estonia, Germany + lake tourism)

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[Image:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note that as of 2006:'''
* No walking is permitted on any of existing Finnish-Russian border checkpoints.
* ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border checkpoint is permitted to cross by cycling.
* Russian visa can not be issued at the border checkpoint.

The most important border checkpoints to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]]'s district) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' on the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St.Petersburg, and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
====Vaalimaa–Torfianovka====
It is always open. Traffic is high there, and you might find there both long-distance trucks (however, see info below about trucks ) as well as lots of locals, from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods they don't have in Russia, and Finns going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel. On a Finnish side, you can find most of them at the first [[petrol station]], just before the customs zone. You can also ask drivers on the parking, and those queuing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there. 

As of 2006, it was a complete waste of time to hitch a truck over the border to Russia – freight terminal is separate for trucks and the queue there is extremely slow: sometimes you wait for hours, sometimes for days. Same terminal from Russia to Finland, though, seems to be faster. 

To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland, simply ask drivers at the parking lot by one of the supermarkets around there on the Russian side.

====Other checkpoints====
There is a checkpoint on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'').

Next border checkpoint to the north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, a road goes to [[Sortavala]] and then further to [[St. Petersburg]] via the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga] (with a portion of an unpaved road), or via the north shore to [[Petrozavodsk]].

There are a few more border checkpoints: from [[Imatra]] to [[Svetogorsk]], from [[Kuhmo]] to [[Kostamuksha]], from [[Salla]] towards [[Kandalaksha]], and from [[Inari]] towards [[Murmansk]]. These days most of these checkpoints work 24/7. Good way to hitch a ride from Russia to Finland is to hang around some stores near borders and look for Finnish license plates. A smart trick you can do to lift up your chances to get a ride is by offering a driver you speak to to bring an extra load of cigarettes and alcohol - most of the Finnish drivers won't resist that!

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Anyhow, most of the people speak good English, too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop, and some places where it is illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking  illegal de facto in these places.

[[Image:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish highways with their European numbers]]
== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|left|60px]]
It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching on the motorways and two lane expressways is prohibited. On any other highway you can legally hitch. You can also hitchhike at the motorway on-ramps, and at the motorway [[petrol station]]s' areas. Basically, same rules as in countries in Western Europe and in most states of the [[USA]].

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] - the site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum].
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] - a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] - hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}</text>
      <sha1>daac6t8bzhsd6fzjo0ftoaqy9tlkqno</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30080</id>
      <parentid>30024</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-16T13:55:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kb</username>
        <id>1332</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10791">__TOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (&amp;euro;)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way which is called "[[Via Baltica]]" - it is a road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]] through Baltic States and [[Poland]].

Hitchhiking seems pretty easy in the Northern part of Finland. It could be a good idea to avoid highways and opt for smaller local roads once you get closer to Helsinki - sure, there will be less traffic, however, you will get more space for the cars to stop, and avoid a chance of getting stuck on some unlit highway ramp in the middle of nowhere (consider the early darkness when hitchhiking in autumn/winter!)

[[Image:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

===Other areas===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing the borders ==
Apart from the Russian border, Finnish borders exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time there has been very a liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian. However, despite the fact that Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]] there is a random identity and luggage check when you take a ferry from [[Ahvenanmaa]] to [[Stockholm]] (Sweden).

[[Image:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of 2008, a ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

When on-board, during warmer time of the year you might go up outside to enjoy the scenery of the archipelagos of Stockholm or Turku. 

Be aware as well of a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free alcohol and some other things on the ferries. It really isn't much more cheaper, though, than buying them on land. So, do bring a book. Usually there are free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus very often other backpackers wander around (you might as well have a chat with them). You can also try to spot small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant Great cormorants] a few hours off Stockholm.

There are Swedish [http://www.birka.se ''Birka Cruises''] boats cruising the sea, too.

More info about boats in the region: [http://www.makupalat.fi/Categories.aspx?classID=aef30d12-31ab-407f-89d6-526dd5d637f5 here] (Sweden, Estonia, Germany + lake tourism)

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[Image:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note that as of 2006:'''
* No walking is permitted on any of existing Finnish-Russian border checkpoints.
* ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border checkpoint is permitted to cross by cycling.
* Russian visa can not be issued at the border checkpoint.

The most important border checkpoints to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]]'s district) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' on the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St.Petersburg, and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
====Vaalimaa–Torfianovka====
It is always open. Traffic is high there, and you might find there both long-distance trucks (however, see info below about trucks ) as well as lots of locals, from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods they don't have in Russia, and Finns going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel. On a Finnish side, you can find most of them at the first [[petrol station]], just before the customs zone. You can also ask drivers on the parking, and those queuing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there. 

As of 2006, it was a complete waste of time to hitch a truck over the border to Russia – freight terminal is separate for trucks and the queue there is extremely slow: sometimes you wait for hours, sometimes for days. Same terminal from Russia to Finland, though, seems to be faster. 

To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland, simply ask drivers at the parking lot by one of the supermarkets around there on the Russian side.

====Other checkpoints====
There is a checkpoint on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'').

Next border checkpoint to the north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, a road goes to [[Sortavala]] and then further to [[St. Petersburg]] via the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga] (with a portion of an unpaved road), or via the north shore to [[Petrozavodsk]].

There are a few more border checkpoints: from [[Imatra]] to [[Svetogorsk]], from [[Kuhmo]] to [[Kostamuksha]], from [[Salla]] towards [[Kandalaksha]], and from [[Inari]] towards [[Murmansk]]. These days most of these checkpoints work 24/7. Good way to hitch a ride from Russia to Finland is to hang around some stores near borders and look for Finnish license plates. A smart trick you can do to lift up your chances to get a ride is by offering a driver you speak to to bring an extra load of cigarettes and alcohol - most of the Finnish drivers won't resist that!

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Anyhow, most of the people speak good English, too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop, and some places where it is illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking  illegal de facto in these places.

[[Image:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish highways with their European numbers]]
== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|left|60px]]
It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching on the motorways and two lane expressways is prohibited. On any other highway you can legally hitch. You can also hitchhike at the motorway on-ramps, and at the motorway [[petrol station]]s' areas. Basically, same rules as in countries in Western Europe and in most states of the [[USA]].

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] - the site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum].
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] - a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] - hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}</text>
      <sha1>kbpf326z4bvvded7ur1cdhrmvdmg09m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30084</id>
      <parentid>30080</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-16T14:03:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kb</username>
        <id>1332</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10834">__TOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (&amp;euro;)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way which is called "[[Via Baltica]]" - it is a road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]] through Baltic States and [[Poland]].

Hitchhiking seems pretty easy in the Northern part of Finland. It could be a good idea to avoid highways and opt for smaller local roads once you get closer to Helsinki - sure, there will be less traffic, however, you will get more space for the cars to stop, and avoid a chance of getting stuck on some unlit highway ramp in the middle of nowhere (consider the early darkness when hitchhiking in autumn/winter!)

[[Image:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

===Other areas===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing the borders ==
Apart from the Russian border, Finnish borders exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time there has been very a liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian. However, despite the fact that Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]] there is a random identity and luggage check when you take a ferry from [[Ahvenanmaa]] to [[Stockholm]] (Sweden).

[[Image:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of 2008, a ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

When on-board, during warmer time of the year you might go up outside to enjoy the scenery of the archipelagos of Stockholm or Turku. 

Be aware as well of a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free alcohol and some other things on the ferries. It really isn't much more cheaper, though, than buying them on land. So, do bring a book. Usually there are free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus very often other backpackers wander around (you might as well have a chat with them). You can also try to spot small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant Great cormorants] a few hours off Stockholm.

There are Swedish [http://www.birka.se ''Birka Cruises''] boats cruising the sea, too.

More info about boats in the region: [http://www.makupalat.fi/Categories.aspx?classID=aef30d12-31ab-407f-89d6-526dd5d637f5 here] (Sweden, Estonia, Germany + lake tourism)

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[Image:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note that as of 2006:'''
* No walking is permitted on any of existing Finnish-Russian border checkpoints.
* ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border checkpoint is permitted to cross by cycling.
* Russian visa can not be issued at the border checkpoint.

The most important border checkpoints to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]]'s district) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' on the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St.Petersburg, and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
====Vaalimaa–Torfianovka====
It is always open. Traffic is high there, and you might find there both long-distance trucks (however, see info below about trucks ) as well as lots of locals, from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods they don't have in Russia, and Finns going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel. On a Finnish side, you can find most of them at the first [[petrol station]], just before the customs zone. You can also ask drivers on the parking, and those queuing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there. 

As of 2006, it was a complete waste of time to hitch a truck over the border to Russia – freight terminal is separate for trucks and the queue there is extremely slow: sometimes you wait for hours, sometimes for days. Same terminal from Russia to Finland, though, seems to be faster. 

To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland, simply ask drivers at the parking lot by one of the supermarkets around there on the Russian side.

====Other checkpoints====
There is a checkpoint on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'').

Next border checkpoint to the north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, a road goes to [[Sortavala]] and then further to [[St. Petersburg]] via the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga] (with a portion of an unpaved road), or via the north shore to [[Petrozavodsk]].

There are a few more border checkpoints: from [[Imatra]] to [[Svetogorsk]], from [[Kuhmo]] to [[Kostamuksha]], from [[Salla]] towards [[Kandalaksha]], and from [[Inari]] towards [[Murmansk]]. These days most of these checkpoints work 24/7. Good way to hitch a ride from Russia to Finland is to hang around some stores near borders and look for Finnish license plates. A smart trick you can do to lift up your chances to get a ride is by offering a driver you speak to to bring an extra load of cigarettes and alcohol - most of the Finnish drivers won't resist that!

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Anyhow, most of the people speak good English, too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop, and some places where it is illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking illegal de facto in these places.

[[Image:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish highways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|left|60px]]
It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching on the motorways and two lane expressways is prohibited. On any other highway you can legally hitch. You can also hitchhike at the motorway on-ramps, and at the motorway [[petrol station]]s' areas. Basically, same rules as in countries in Western Europe and in most states of the [[USA]].

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] - the site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum].
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] - a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] - hitchhiking tips in Finnish


[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}</text>
      <sha1>9gximlbu1b13jziq89hf6y447t0z7sn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30464</id>
      <parentid>30084</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-25T09:26:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11017">__TOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (&amp;euro;)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way which is called "[[Via Baltica]]" - it is a road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]] through Baltic States and [[Poland]].

Hitchhiking seems pretty easy in the Northern part of Finland. It could be a good idea to avoid highways and opt for smaller local roads once you get closer to Helsinki - sure, there will be less traffic, however, you will get more space for the cars to stop, and avoid a chance of getting stuck on some unlit highway ramp in the middle of nowhere (consider the early darkness when hitchhiking in autumn/winter!)

[[Image:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

===Other areas===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing the borders ==
Apart from the Russian border, Finnish borders exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time there has been very a liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian. However, despite the fact that Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]] there is a random identity and luggage check when you take a ferry from [[Ahvenanmaa]] to [[Stockholm]] (Sweden).

[[Image:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of 2008, a ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

When on-board, during warmer time of the year you might go up outside to enjoy the scenery of the archipelagos of Stockholm or Turku. 

Be aware as well of a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free alcohol and some other things on the ferries. It really isn't much more cheaper, though, than buying them on land. So, do bring a book. Usually there are free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus very often other backpackers wander around (you might as well have a chat with them). You can also try to spot small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant Great cormorants] a few hours off Stockholm.

There are Swedish [http://www.birka.se ''Birka Cruises''] boats cruising the sea, too.

More info about boats in the region: [http://www.makupalat.fi/Categories.aspx?classID=aef30d12-31ab-407f-89d6-526dd5d637f5 here] (Sweden, Estonia, Germany + lake tourism)

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[Image:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note that as of 2006:'''
* No walking is permitted on any of existing Finnish-Russian border checkpoints.
* ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border checkpoint is permitted to cross by cycling.
* Russian visa can not be issued at the border checkpoint.

The most important border checkpoints to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]]'s district) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' on the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St.Petersburg, and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
====Vaalimaa–Torfianovka====
It is always open. Traffic is high there, and you might find there both long-distance trucks (however, see info below about trucks ) as well as lots of locals, from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods they don't have in Russia, and Finns going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel. On a Finnish side, you can find most of them at the first [[petrol station]], just before the customs zone. You can also ask drivers on the parking, and those queuing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there. 

As of 2006, it was a complete waste of time to hitch a truck over the border to Russia – freight terminal is separate for trucks and the queue there is extremely slow: sometimes you wait for hours, sometimes for days. Same terminal from Russia to Finland, though, seems to be faster. 

To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland, simply ask drivers at the parking lot by one of the supermarkets around there on the Russian side.

====Other checkpoints====
There is a checkpoint on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'').

Next border checkpoint to the north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, a road goes to [[Sortavala]] and then further to [[St. Petersburg]] via the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga] (with a portion of an unpaved road), or via the north shore to [[Petrozavodsk]].

There are a few more border checkpoints: from [[Imatra]] to [[Svetogorsk]], from [[Kuhmo]] to [[Kostamuksha]], from [[Salla]] towards [[Kandalaksha]], and from [[Inari]] towards [[Murmansk]]. These days most of these checkpoints work 24/7. Good way to hitch a ride from Russia to Finland is to hang around some stores near borders and look for Finnish license plates. A smart trick you can do to lift up your chances to get a ride is by offering a driver you speak to to bring an extra load of cigarettes and alcohol - most of the Finnish drivers won't resist that!

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Anyhow, most of the people speak good English, too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop, and some places where it is illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking illegal de facto in these places.

[[Image:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish highways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|left|60px]]
It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching on the motorways and two lane expressways is prohibited. On any other highway you can legally hitch. You can also hitchhike at the motorway on-ramps, and at the motorway [[petrol station]]s' areas. Basically, same rules as in countries in Western Europe and in most states of the [[USA]].

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] - the site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum].
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] - a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] - hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet - Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}</text>
      <sha1>qe7h52wp9gfxvlb4c9h8puhicrqimhv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30893</id>
      <parentid>30464</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-07T19:04:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kb</username>
        <id>1332</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11060">__TOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (&amp;euro;)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way which is called "[[Via Baltica]]" - it is a road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]] through Baltic States and [[Poland]].

Hitchhiking seems pretty easy in the Northern part of Finland. It could be a good idea to avoid highways and opt for smaller local roads once you get closer to Helsinki - sure, there will be less traffic, however, you will get more space for the cars to stop, and avoid a chance of getting stuck on some unlit highway ramp in the middle of nowhere (consider the early darkness when hitchhiking in autumn/winter!)

[[Image:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

===Other areas===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing the borders ==
Apart from the Russian border, Finnish borders exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time there has been very a liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian. However, despite the fact that Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]] there is a random identity and luggage check when you take a ferry from [[Ahvenanmaa]] to [[Stockholm]] (Sweden).

[[Image:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of 2008, a ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

When on-board, during warmer time of the year you might go up outside to enjoy the scenery of the archipelagos of Stockholm or Turku. 

Be aware as well of a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free alcohol and some other things on the ferries. It really isn't much more cheaper, though, than buying them on land. So, do bring a book. Usually there are free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus very often other backpackers wander around (you might as well have a chat with them). You can also try to spot small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant Great cormorants] a few hours off Stockholm.

There are Swedish [http://www.birka.se ''Birka Cruises''] boats cruising the sea, too.

More info about boats in the region: [http://www.makupalat.fi/Categories.aspx?classID=aef30d12-31ab-407f-89d6-526dd5d637f5 here] (Sweden, Estonia, Germany + lake tourism)

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[Image:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note that as of 2006:'''
* No walking is permitted on any of existing Finnish-Russian border checkpoints.
* ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border checkpoint is permitted to cross by cycling.
* Russian visa can not be issued at the border checkpoint.

The most important border checkpoints to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]]'s district) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' on the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St.Petersburg, and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
====Vaalimaa–Torfianovka====
It is always open. Traffic is high there, and you might find there both long-distance trucks (however, see info below about trucks ) as well as lots of locals, from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods they don't have in Russia, and Finns going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel. On a Finnish side, you can find most of them at the first [[petrol station]], just before the customs zone. You can also ask drivers on the parking, and those queuing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there. 

As of 2006, it was a complete waste of time to hitch a truck over the border to Russia – freight terminal is separate for trucks and the queue there is extremely slow: sometimes you wait for hours, sometimes for days. Same terminal from Russia to Finland, though, seems to be faster. 

To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland, simply ask drivers at the parking lot by one of the supermarkets around there on the Russian side.

====Other checkpoints====
There is a checkpoint on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'').

Next border checkpoint to the north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, a road goes to [[Sortavala]] and then further to [[St. Petersburg]] via the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga] (with a portion of an unpaved road), or via the north shore to [[Petrozavodsk]].

There are a few more border checkpoints: from [[Imatra]] to [[Svetogorsk]], from [[Kuhmo]] to [[Kostamuksha]], from [[Salla]] towards [[Kandalaksha]], and from [[Inari]] towards [[Murmansk]]. These days most of these checkpoints work 24/7. Good way to hitch a ride from Russia to Finland is to hang around some stores near borders and look for Finnish license plates. A smart trick you can do to lift up your chances to get a ride is by offering a driver you speak to to bring an extra load of cigarettes and alcohol - most of the Finnish drivers won't resist that!

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Anyhow, most of the people speak good English, too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop, and some places where it is illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking illegal de facto in these places.

[[Image:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish highways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Highways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|left|60px]]
It is illegal to hitchhike on the highways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching on the motorways and two lane expressways is prohibited. On any other highway you can legally hitch. You can also hitchhike at the motorway on-ramps, and at the motorway [[petrol station]]s' areas. Basically, same rules as in countries in Western Europe and in most states of the [[USA]].

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}</text>
      <sha1>fbnp0ed0rznsxksyo4x26a4l4cuqstz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31215</id>
      <parentid>30893</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-22T11:05:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11067">__TOC__
{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (&amp;euro;)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way which is called "[[Via Baltica]]" - it is a road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]] through Baltic States and [[Poland]].

Hitchhiking seems pretty easy in the Northern part of Finland. It could be a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads once you get closer to Helsinki - sure, there will be less traffic, however, you will get more space for the cars to stop, and avoid a chance of getting stuck on some unlit motorway ramp in the middle of nowhere (consider the early darkness when hitchhiking in autumn/winter!)

[[Image:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[motorways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

===Other areas===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing the borders ==
Apart from the Russian border, Finnish borders exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time there has been very a liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian. However, despite the fact that Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]] there is a random identity and luggage check when you take a ferry from [[Ahvenanmaa]] to [[Stockholm]] (Sweden).

[[Image:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of 2008, a ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

When on-board, during warmer time of the year you might go up outside to enjoy the scenery of the archipelagos of Stockholm or Turku. 

Be aware as well of a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free alcohol and some other things on the ferries. It really isn't much more cheaper, though, than buying them on land. So, do bring a book. Usually there are free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus very often other backpackers wander around (you might as well have a chat with them). You can also try to spot small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant Great cormorants] a few hours off Stockholm.

There are Swedish [http://www.birka.se ''Birka Cruises''] boats cruising the sea, too.

More info about boats in the region: [http://www.makupalat.fi/Categories.aspx?classID=aef30d12-31ab-407f-89d6-526dd5d637f5 here] (Sweden, Estonia, Germany + lake tourism)

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[Image:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note that as of 2006:'''
* No walking is permitted on any of existing Finnish-Russian border checkpoints.
* ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border checkpoint is permitted to cross by cycling.
* Russian visa can not be issued at the border checkpoint.

The most important border checkpoints to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]]'s district) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' on the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St.Petersburg, and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
====Vaalimaa–Torfianovka====
It is always open. Traffic is high there, and you might find there both long-distance trucks (however, see info below about trucks ) as well as lots of locals, from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods they don't have in Russia, and Finns going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel. On a Finnish side, you can find most of them at the first [[petrol station]], just before the customs zone. You can also ask drivers on the parking, and those queuing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there. 

As of 2006, it was a complete waste of time to hitch a truck over the border to Russia – freight terminal is separate for trucks and the queue there is extremely slow: sometimes you wait for hours, sometimes for days. Same terminal from Russia to Finland, though, seems to be faster. 

To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland, simply ask drivers at the parking lot by one of the supermarkets around there on the Russian side.

====Other checkpoints====
There is a checkpoint on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'').

Next border checkpoint to the north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, a road goes to [[Sortavala]] and then further to [[St. Petersburg]] via the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga] (with a portion of an unpaved road), or via the north shore to [[Petrozavodsk]].

There are a few more border checkpoints: from [[Imatra]] to [[Svetogorsk]], from [[Kuhmo]] to [[Kostamuksha]], from [[Salla]] towards [[Kandalaksha]], and from [[Inari]] towards [[Murmansk]]. These days most of these checkpoints work 24/7. Good way to hitch a ride from Russia to Finland is to hang around some stores near borders and look for Finnish license plates. A smart trick you can do to lift up your chances to get a ride is by offering a driver you speak to to bring an extra load of cigarettes and alcohol - most of the Finnish drivers won't resist that!

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Anyhow, most of the people speak good English, too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop, and some places where it is illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking illegal de facto in these places.

[[Image:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Motorways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|left|60px]]
It is illegal to hitchhike on the motorways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are know to be fined.

Hitching on the motorways and two lane expressways is prohibited. On any other motorway you can legally hitch. You can also hitchhike at the motorway on-ramps, and at the motorway [[petrol station]]s' areas. Basically, same rules as in countries in Western Europe and in most states of the [[USA]].

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}</text>
      <sha1>j7yhya26cwiret1wzn5omvyn1ghncw1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31256</id>
      <parentid>31215</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-23T20:03:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kb</username>
        <id>1332</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11067">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (&amp;euro;)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way which is called "[[Via Baltica]]" - it is a road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]] through Baltic States and [[Poland]].

Hitchhiking seems pretty easy in the Northern part of Finland. It could be a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads once you get closer to Helsinki - sure, there will be less traffic, however, you will get more space for the cars to stop, and avoid a chance of getting stuck on some unlit motorway ramp in the middle of nowhere (consider the early darkness when hitchhiking in autumn/winter!)
__TOC__
[[Image:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[motorways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

===Other areas===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing the borders ==
Apart from the Russian border, Finnish borders exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time there has been very a liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian. However, despite the fact that Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]] there is a random identity and luggage check when you take a ferry from [[Ahvenanmaa]] to [[Stockholm]] (Sweden).

[[Image:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of 2008, a ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

When on-board, during warmer time of the year you might go up outside to enjoy the scenery of the archipelagos of Stockholm or Turku. 

Be aware as well of a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free alcohol and some other things on the ferries. It really isn't much more cheaper, though, than buying them on land. So, do bring a book. Usually there are free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus very often other backpackers wander around (you might as well have a chat with them). You can also try to spot small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant Great cormorants] a few hours off Stockholm.

There are Swedish [http://www.birka.se ''Birka Cruises''] boats cruising the sea, too.

More info about boats in the region: [http://www.makupalat.fi/Categories.aspx?classID=aef30d12-31ab-407f-89d6-526dd5d637f5 here] (Sweden, Estonia, Germany + lake tourism)

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[Image:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note that as of 2006:'''
* No walking is permitted on any of existing Finnish-Russian border checkpoints.
* ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border checkpoint is permitted to cross by cycling.
* Russian visa can not be issued at the border checkpoint.

The most important border checkpoints to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]]'s district) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' on the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St.Petersburg, and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
====Vaalimaa–Torfianovka====
It is always open. Traffic is high there, and you might find there both long-distance trucks (however, see info below about trucks ) as well as lots of locals, from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods they don't have in Russia, and Finns going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel. On a Finnish side, you can find most of them at the first [[petrol station]], just before the customs zone. You can also ask drivers on the parking, and those queuing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there. 

As of 2006, it was a complete waste of time to hitch a truck over the border to Russia – freight terminal is separate for trucks and the queue there is extremely slow: sometimes you wait for hours, sometimes for days. Same terminal from Russia to Finland, though, seems to be faster. 

To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland, simply ask drivers at the parking lot by one of the supermarkets around there on the Russian side.

====Other checkpoints====
There is a checkpoint on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'').

Next border checkpoint to the north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, a road goes to [[Sortavala]] and then further to [[St. Petersburg]] via the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga] (with a portion of an unpaved road), or via the north shore to [[Petrozavodsk]].

There are a few more border checkpoints: from [[Imatra]] to [[Svetogorsk]], from [[Kuhmo]] to [[Kostamuksha]], from [[Salla]] towards [[Kandalaksha]], and from [[Inari]] towards [[Murmansk]]. These days most of these checkpoints work 24/7. Good way to hitch a ride from Russia to Finland is to hang around some stores near borders and look for Finnish license plates. A smart trick you can do to lift up your chances to get a ride is by offering a driver you speak to to bring an extra load of cigarettes and alcohol - most of the Finnish drivers won't resist that!

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Anyhow, most of the people speak good English, too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop, and some places where it is illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking illegal de facto in these places.

[[Image:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Motorways ==
[[Image:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|left|60px]]
It is illegal to hitchhike on the motorways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are known to be fined.

Hitching on the motorways and two lane expressways is prohibited. On any other motorway you can legally hitch. You can also hitchhike at the motorway on-ramps, and at the motorway [[petrol station]]s' areas. Basically, same rules as in countries in Western Europe and in most states of the [[USA]].

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}</text>
      <sha1>mueaph849aby5k05ka1nd5vd2ylx9vf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>34897</id>
      <parentid>31256</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T17:19:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11047">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way which is called "[[Via Baltica]]" - it is a road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]] through Baltic States and [[Poland]].

Hitchhiking seems pretty easy in the Northern part of Finland. It could be a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads once you get closer to Helsinki - sure, there will be less traffic, however, you will get more space for the cars to stop, and avoid a chance of getting stuck on some unlit motorway ramp in the middle of nowhere (consider the early darkness when hitchhiking in autumn/winter!)
__TOC__
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[motorways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

=== Other areas ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing the borders ==
Apart from the Russian border, Finnish borders exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time there has been very a liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian. However, despite the fact that Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]] there is a random identity and luggage check when you take a ferry from [[Ahvenanmaa]] to [[Stockholm]] (Sweden).

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of 2008, a ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

When on-board, during warmer time of the year you might go up outside to enjoy the scenery of the archipelagos of Stockholm or Turku. 

Be aware as well of a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free alcohol and some other things on the ferries. It really isn't much more cheaper, though, than buying them on land. So, do bring a book. Usually there are free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus very often other backpackers wander around (you might as well have a chat with them). You can also try to spot small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant Great cormorants] a few hours off Stockholm.

There are Swedish [http://www.birka.se ''Birka Cruises''] boats cruising the sea, too.

More info about boats in the region: [http://www.makupalat.fi/Categories.aspx?classID=aef30d12-31ab-407f-89d6-526dd5d637f5 here] (Sweden, Estonia, Germany + lake tourism)

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note that as of 2006:'''
* No walking is permitted on any of existing Finnish-Russian border checkpoints.
* ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border checkpoint is permitted to cross by cycling.
* Russian visa can not be issued at the border checkpoint.

The most important border checkpoints to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]]'s district) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' on the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St.Petersburg, and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
==== Vaalimaa–Torfianovka ====
It is always open. Traffic is high there, and you might find there both long-distance trucks (however, see info below about trucks ) as well as lots of locals, from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods they don't have in Russia, and Finns going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel. On a Finnish side, you can find most of them at the first [[petrol station]], just before the customs zone. You can also ask drivers on the parking, and those queuing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there. 

As of 2006, it was a complete waste of time to hitch a truck over the border to Russia – freight terminal is separate for trucks and the queue there is extremely slow: sometimes you wait for hours, sometimes for days. Same terminal from Russia to Finland, though, seems to be faster. 

To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland, simply ask drivers at the parking lot by one of the supermarkets around there on the Russian side.

==== Other checkpoints ====
There is a checkpoint on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'').

Next border checkpoint to the north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, a road goes to [[Sortavala]] and then further to [[St. Petersburg]] via the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga] (with a portion of an unpaved road), or via the north shore to [[Petrozavodsk]].

There are a few more border checkpoints: from [[Imatra]] to [[Svetogorsk]], from [[Kuhmo]] to [[Kostamuksha]], from [[Salla]] towards [[Kandalaksha]], and from [[Inari]] towards [[Murmansk]]. These days most of these checkpoints work 24/7. Good way to hitch a ride from Russia to Finland is to hang around some stores near borders and look for Finnish license plates. A smart trick you can do to lift up your chances to get a ride is by offering a driver you speak to to bring an extra load of cigarettes and alcohol - most of the Finnish drivers won't resist that!

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Anyhow, most of the people speak good English, too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop, and some places where it is illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking illegal de facto in these places.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Motorways ==
[[File:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|left|60px]]
It is illegal to hitchhike on the motorways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are known to be fined.

Hitching on the motorways and two lane expressways is prohibited. On any other motorway you can legally hitch. You can also hitchhike at the motorway on-ramps, and at the motorway [[petrol station]]s' areas. Basically, same rules as in countries in Western Europe and in most states of the [[USA]].

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>hfk4jmb0lun30infuuvogcak5ce2tsz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36346</id>
      <parentid>34897</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-08-04T21:00:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>92.100.103.197</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11750">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way which is called "[[Via Baltica]]" - it is a road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]] through Baltic States and [[Poland]].

Hitchhiking seems pretty easy in the Northern part of Finland. It could be a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads once you get closer to Helsinki - sure, there will be less traffic, however, you will get more space for the cars to stop, and avoid a chance of getting stuck on some unlit motorway ramp in the middle of nowhere (consider the early darkness when hitchhiking in autumn/winter!)

Since Finland mostly lacks a motorway network, most of the hitchhiking takes happens in the "classical manner", standing thumb up on the side of the road. While doing this, be aware that the Finnish drivers are a lot more careful in traffic than drivers elsewhere in Europe. This means that they require a super-safe place to stop. This means a bus stop or similar. Even if there is a bus-stop-sized widening in the road, it does not help if it is unpaved.. Not taking this into account has caused Finland to be known among foreigners as a difficult country to hitchhike, although it isn't actually worse than other western countries if you get around the culture of requiring crazy amounts of safety.
__TOC__
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[motorways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

=== Other areas ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing the borders ==
Apart from the Russian border, Finnish borders exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time there has been very a liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian. However, despite the fact that Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]] there is a random identity and luggage check when you take a ferry from [[Ahvenanmaa]] to [[Stockholm]] (Sweden).

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of 2008, a ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

When on-board, during warmer time of the year you might go up outside to enjoy the scenery of the archipelagos of Stockholm or Turku. 

Be aware as well of a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free alcohol and some other things on the ferries. It really isn't much more cheaper, though, than buying them on land. So, do bring a book. Usually there are free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus very often other backpackers wander around (you might as well have a chat with them). You can also try to spot small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant Great cormorants] a few hours off Stockholm.

There are Swedish [http://www.birka.se ''Birka Cruises''] boats cruising the sea, too.

More info about boats in the region: [http://www.makupalat.fi/Categories.aspx?classID=aef30d12-31ab-407f-89d6-526dd5d637f5 here] (Sweden, Estonia, Germany + lake tourism)

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note that as of 2006:'''
* No walking is permitted on any of existing Finnish-Russian border checkpoints.
* ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border checkpoint is permitted to cross by cycling.
* Russian visa can not be issued at the border checkpoint.

The most important border checkpoints to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]]'s district) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' on the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St.Petersburg, and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
==== Vaalimaa–Torfianovka ====
It is always open. Traffic is high there, and you might find there both long-distance trucks (however, see info below about trucks ) as well as lots of locals, from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods they don't have in Russia, and Finns going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel. On a Finnish side, you can find most of them at the first [[petrol station]], just before the customs zone. You can also ask drivers on the parking, and those queuing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there. 

As of 2006, it was a complete waste of time to hitch a truck over the border to Russia – freight terminal is separate for trucks and the queue there is extremely slow: sometimes you wait for hours, sometimes for days. Same terminal from Russia to Finland, though, seems to be faster. 

To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland, simply ask drivers at the parking lot by one of the supermarkets around there on the Russian side.

==== Other checkpoints ====
There is a checkpoint on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'').

Next border checkpoint to the north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, a road goes to [[Sortavala]] and then further to [[St. Petersburg]] via the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga] (with a portion of an unpaved road), or via the north shore to [[Petrozavodsk]].

There are a few more border checkpoints: from [[Imatra]] to [[Svetogorsk]], from [[Kuhmo]] to [[Kostamuksha]], from [[Salla]] towards [[Kandalaksha]], and from [[Inari]] towards [[Murmansk]]. These days most of these checkpoints work 24/7. Good way to hitch a ride from Russia to Finland is to hang around some stores near borders and look for Finnish license plates. A smart trick you can do to lift up your chances to get a ride is by offering a driver you speak to to bring an extra load of cigarettes and alcohol - most of the Finnish drivers won't resist that!

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Anyhow, most of the people speak good English, too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop, and some places where it is illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking illegal de facto in these places.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Motorways ==
[[File:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|left|60px]]
It is illegal to hitchhike on the motorways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are known to be fined.

Hitching on the motorways and two lane expressways is prohibited. On any other motorway you can legally hitch. You can also hitchhike at the motorway on-ramps, and at the motorway [[petrol station]]s' areas. Basically, same rules as in countries in Western Europe and in most states of the [[USA]].

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>2s00f16bux8jehyeug0di3eassb0fh6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36523</id>
      <parentid>36346</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-08-13T20:31:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>92.100.87.123</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11734">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way which is called "[[Via Baltica]]" - it is a road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]] through Baltic States and [[Poland]].

Hitchhiking seems pretty easy in the Northern part of Finland. It could be a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads once you get closer to Helsinki - sure, there will be less traffic, however, you will get more space for the cars to stop, and avoid a chance of getting stuck on some unlit motorway ramp in the middle of nowhere (consider the early darkness when hitchhiking in autumn/winter!)

Since Finland mostly lacks a motorway network, most of the hitchhiking happens in the "classical manner", standing thumb up on roadside. While doing this, be aware that the Finnish drivers are a lot more careful in traffic than drivers elsewhere in Europe. They will only stop if the place is super-safe. This means a bus stop or similar. Even if there is a bus-stop-sized widening in the road, it does not help if it is unpaved.. Travellers not taking this into account has caused Finland to be known among foreigners as a difficult country to hitchhike, although it isn't actually worse than other western countries if you get around the culture of requiring crazy amounts of safety.
__TOC__
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[motorways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

=== Other areas ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing the borders ==
Apart from the Russian border, Finnish borders exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time there has been very a liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian. However, despite the fact that Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]] there is a random identity and luggage check when you take a ferry from [[Ahvenanmaa]] to [[Stockholm]] (Sweden).

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of 2008, a ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

When on-board, during warmer time of the year you might go up outside to enjoy the scenery of the archipelagos of Stockholm or Turku. 

Be aware as well of a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free alcohol and some other things on the ferries. It really isn't much more cheaper, though, than buying them on land. So, do bring a book. Usually there are free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus very often other backpackers wander around (you might as well have a chat with them). You can also try to spot small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant Great cormorants] a few hours off Stockholm.

There are Swedish [http://www.birka.se ''Birka Cruises''] boats cruising the sea, too.

More info about boats in the region: [http://www.makupalat.fi/Categories.aspx?classID=aef30d12-31ab-407f-89d6-526dd5d637f5 here] (Sweden, Estonia, Germany + lake tourism)

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note that as of 2006:'''
* No walking is permitted on any of existing Finnish-Russian border checkpoints.
* ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border checkpoint is permitted to cross by cycling.
* Russian visa can not be issued at the border checkpoint.

The most important border checkpoints to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]]'s district) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' on the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St.Petersburg, and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
==== Vaalimaa–Torfianovka ====
It is always open. Traffic is high there, and you might find there both long-distance trucks (however, see info below about trucks ) as well as lots of locals, from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods they don't have in Russia, and Finns going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel. On a Finnish side, you can find most of them at the first [[petrol station]], just before the customs zone. You can also ask drivers on the parking, and those queuing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there. 

As of 2006, it was a complete waste of time to hitch a truck over the border to Russia – freight terminal is separate for trucks and the queue there is extremely slow: sometimes you wait for hours, sometimes for days. Same terminal from Russia to Finland, though, seems to be faster. 

To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland, simply ask drivers at the parking lot by one of the supermarkets around there on the Russian side.

==== Other checkpoints ====
There is a checkpoint on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'').

Next border checkpoint to the north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, a road goes to [[Sortavala]] and then further to [[St. Petersburg]] via the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga] (with a portion of an unpaved road), or via the north shore to [[Petrozavodsk]].

There are a few more border checkpoints: from [[Imatra]] to [[Svetogorsk]], from [[Kuhmo]] to [[Kostamuksha]], from [[Salla]] towards [[Kandalaksha]], and from [[Inari]] towards [[Murmansk]]. These days most of these checkpoints work 24/7. Good way to hitch a ride from Russia to Finland is to hang around some stores near borders and look for Finnish license plates. A smart trick you can do to lift up your chances to get a ride is by offering a driver you speak to to bring an extra load of cigarettes and alcohol - most of the Finnish drivers won't resist that!

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Anyhow, most of the people speak good English, too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop, and some places where it is illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking illegal de facto in these places.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Motorways ==
[[File:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|left|60px]]
It is illegal to hitchhike on the motorways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are known to be fined.

Hitching on the motorways and two lane expressways is prohibited. On any other motorway you can legally hitch. You can also hitchhike at the motorway on-ramps, and at the motorway [[petrol station]]s' areas. Basically, same rules as in countries in Western Europe and in most states of the [[USA]].

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>a38zx8vr8keeaht86u4sfqvtolw4hsc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36711</id>
      <parentid>36523</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-08-21T18:32:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>213.186.242.46</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12272">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way which is called "[[Via Baltica]]" - it is a road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]] through Baltic States and [[Poland]].

Hitchhiking seems pretty easy in the Northern part of Finland. It could be a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads once you get closer to Helsinki - sure, there will be less traffic, however, you will get more space for the cars to stop, and avoid a chance of getting stuck on some unlit motorway ramp in the middle of nowhere (consider the early darkness when hitchhiking in autumn/winter!)

Since Finland mostly lacks a motorway network, most of the hitchhiking happens in the "classical manner", standing thumb up on roadside. While doing this, be aware that the Finnish drivers are a lot more careful in traffic than drivers elsewhere in Europe. They will only stop if the place is super-safe. This means a bus stop or similar. Even if there is a bus-stop-sized widening in the road, it does not help if it is unpaved.. Travellers not taking this into account has caused Finland to be known among foreigners as a difficult country to hitchhike, although it isn't actually worse than other western countries if you get around the culture of requiring crazy amounts of safety.
__TOC__
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[motorways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

=== Other areas ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing the borders ==
Apart from the Russian border, Finnish borders exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time there has been very a liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian. However, despite the fact that Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]] there is a random identity and luggage check when you take a ferry from [[Ahvenanmaa]] to [[Stockholm]] (Sweden).

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of 2008, a ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs about 25 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin). 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

When on-board, during warmer time of the year you might go up outside to enjoy the scenery of the archipelagos of Stockholm or Turku. 

Be aware as well of a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free alcohol and some other things on the ferries. It really isn't much more cheaper, though, than buying them on land. So, do bring a book. Usually there are free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus very often other backpackers wander around (you might as well have a chat with them). You can also try to spot small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant Great cormorants] a few hours off Stockholm.

There are Swedish [http://www.birka.se ''Birka Cruises''] boats cruising the sea, too.

More info about boats in the region: [http://www.makupalat.fi/Categories.aspx?classID=aef30d12-31ab-407f-89d6-526dd5d637f5 here] (Sweden, Estonia, Germany + lake tourism)

=== From/to Norway ===

Its possible to hitch from lapland. Aim for Kilpisjärvi down the E8. You do not go into Sweden. If going South down the E8 its possible to go on to Oulu. There is much less traffic up there so longer rides are more common. Just after Oulu there is a service station that is quite busy. There is no customs stopping, unless there is a new car that has not travelled that way before. Then you may get lifts at the border. There is a lot of tourism there and wilderness huts for free staying are possible to find. 

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note that as of 2006:'''
* No walking is permitted on any of existing Finnish-Russian border checkpoints.
* ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border checkpoint is permitted to cross by cycling.
* Russian visa can not be issued at the border checkpoint.

The most important border checkpoints to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]]'s district) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' on the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St.Petersburg, and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
==== Vaalimaa–Torfianovka ====
It is always open. Traffic is high there, and you might find there both long-distance trucks (however, see info below about trucks ) as well as lots of locals, from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods they don't have in Russia, and Finns going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel. On a Finnish side, you can find most of them at the first [[petrol station]], just before the customs zone. You can also ask drivers on the parking, and those queuing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there. 

As of 2006, it was a complete waste of time to hitch a truck over the border to Russia – freight terminal is separate for trucks and the queue there is extremely slow: sometimes you wait for hours, sometimes for days. Same terminal from Russia to Finland, though, seems to be faster. 

To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland, simply ask drivers at the parking lot by one of the supermarkets around there on the Russian side.

==== Other checkpoints ====
There is a checkpoint on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'').

Next border checkpoint to the north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, a road goes to [[Sortavala]] and then further to [[St. Petersburg]] via the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga] (with a portion of an unpaved road), or via the north shore to [[Petrozavodsk]].

There are a few more border checkpoints: from [[Imatra]] to [[Svetogorsk]], from [[Kuhmo]] to [[Kostamuksha]], from [[Salla]] towards [[Kandalaksha]], and from [[Inari]] towards [[Murmansk]]. These days most of these checkpoints work 24/7. Good way to hitch a ride from Russia to Finland is to hang around some stores near borders and look for Finnish license plates. A smart trick you can do to lift up your chances to get a ride is by offering a driver you speak to to bring an extra load of cigarettes and alcohol - most of the Finnish drivers won't resist that!

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Anyhow, most of the people speak good English, too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop, and some places where it is illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking illegal de facto in these places.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Motorways ==
[[File:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|left|60px]]
It is illegal to hitchhike on the motorways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are known to be fined.

Hitching on the motorways and two lane expressways is prohibited. On any other motorway you can legally hitch. You can also hitchhike at the motorway on-ramps, and at the motorway [[petrol station]]s' areas. Basically, same rules as in countries in Western Europe and in most states of the [[USA]].

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>l9d9lp8pgukkamp55j2nx6n0j66rp6v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36728</id>
      <parentid>36711</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-08-23T18:11:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>88.148.198.85</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12322">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way which is called "[[Via Baltica]]" - it is a road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]] through Baltic States and [[Poland]].

Hitchhiking seems pretty easy in the Northern part of Finland. It could be a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads once you get closer to Helsinki - sure, there will be less traffic, however, you will get more space for the cars to stop, and avoid a chance of getting stuck on some unlit motorway ramp in the middle of nowhere (consider the early darkness when hitchhiking in autumn/winter!)

Since Finland mostly lacks a motorway network, most of the hitchhiking happens in the "classical manner", standing thumb up on roadside. While doing this, be aware that the Finnish drivers are a lot more careful in traffic than drivers elsewhere in Europe. They will only stop if the place is super-safe. This means a bus stop or similar. Even if there is a bus-stop-sized widening in the road, it does not help if it is unpaved.. Travellers not taking this into account has caused Finland to be known among foreigners as a difficult country to hitchhike, although it isn't actually worse than other western countries if you get around the culture of requiring crazy amounts of safety.
__TOC__
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[motorways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

=== Other areas ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing the borders ==
Apart from the Russian border, Finnish borders exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time there has been very a liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian. However, despite the fact that Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]] there is a random identity and luggage check when you take a ferry from [[Ahvenanmaa]] to [[Stockholm]] (Sweden).

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season. 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

When on-board, during warmer time of the year you might go up outside to enjoy the scenery of the archipelagos of Stockholm or Turku. 

Be aware as well of a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free alcohol and some other things on the ferries. It really isn't much more cheaper, though, than buying them on land. So, do bring a book. Usually there are free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus very often other backpackers wander around (you might as well have a chat with them). You can also try to spot small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant Great cormorants] a few hours off Stockholm.

There are Swedish [http://www.birka.se ''Birka Cruises''] boats cruising the sea, too.

More info about boats in the region: [http://www.makupalat.fi/Categories.aspx?classID=aef30d12-31ab-407f-89d6-526dd5d637f5 here] (Sweden, Estonia, Germany + lake tourism)

=== From/to Norway ===

Its possible to hitch from lapland. Aim for Kilpisjärvi down the E8. You do not go into Sweden. If going South down the E8 its possible to go on to Oulu. There is much less traffic up there so longer rides are more common. Just after Oulu there is a service station that is quite busy. There is no customs stopping, unless there is a new car that has not travelled that way before. Then you may get lifts at the border. There is a lot of tourism there and wilderness huts for free staying are possible to find. 

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note that as of 2006:'''
* No walking is permitted on any of existing Finnish-Russian border checkpoints.
* ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border checkpoint is permitted to cross by cycling.
* Russian visa can not be issued at the border checkpoint.

The most important border checkpoints to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]]'s district) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' on the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St.Petersburg, and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
==== Vaalimaa–Torfianovka ====
It is always open. Traffic is high there, and you might find there both long-distance trucks (however, see info below about trucks ) as well as lots of locals, from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods they don't have in Russia, and Finns going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel. On a Finnish side, you can find most of them at the first [[petrol station]], just before the customs zone. You can also ask drivers on the parking, and those queuing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there. 

As of 2006, it was a complete waste of time to hitch a truck over the border to Russia – freight terminal is separate for trucks and the queue there is extremely slow: sometimes you wait for hours, sometimes for days. Same terminal from Russia to Finland, though, seems to be faster. 

To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland, simply ask drivers at the parking lot by one of the supermarkets around there on the Russian side.

==== Other checkpoints ====
There is a checkpoint on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'').

Next border checkpoint to the north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, a road goes to [[Sortavala]] and then further to [[St. Petersburg]] via the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga] (with a portion of an unpaved road), or via the north shore to [[Petrozavodsk]].

There are a few more border checkpoints: from [[Imatra]] to [[Svetogorsk]], from [[Kuhmo]] to [[Kostamuksha]], from [[Salla]] towards [[Kandalaksha]], and from [[Inari]] towards [[Murmansk]]. These days most of these checkpoints work 24/7. Good way to hitch a ride from Russia to Finland is to hang around some stores near borders and look for Finnish license plates. A smart trick you can do to lift up your chances to get a ride is by offering a driver you speak to to bring an extra load of cigarettes and alcohol - most of the Finnish drivers won't resist that!

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Anyhow, most of the people speak good English, too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop, and some places where it is illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking illegal de facto in these places.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Motorways ==
[[File:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|left|60px]]
It is illegal to hitchhike on the motorways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are known to be fined.

Hitching on the motorways and two lane expressways is prohibited. On any other motorway you can legally hitch. You can also hitchhike at the motorway on-ramps, and at the motorway [[petrol station]]s' areas. Basically, same rules as in countries in Western Europe and in most states of the [[USA]].

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>55zrt45gtcx2n2yzsw0zj202judbeyb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41299</id>
      <parentid>36728</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-13T02:28:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>24.29.233.163</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12377">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way which is called "[[Via Baltica]]" - it is a road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]] through Baltic States and [[Poland]].

Hitchhiking seems pretty easy in the Northern part of Finland. It could be a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads once you get closer to Helsinki - sure, there will be less traffic, however, you will get more space for the cars to stop, and avoid a chance of getting stuck on some unlit motorway ramp in the middle of nowhere (consider the early darkness when hitchhiking in autumn/winter!)

Since Finland mostly lacks a motorway network, most of the hitchhiking happens in the "classical manner", standing thumb up on roadside. While doing this, be aware that the Finnish drivers are a lot more careful in traffic than drivers elsewhere in Europe. They will only stop if the place is super-safe. This means a bus stop or similar. Even if there is a bus-stop-sized widening in the road, it does not help if it is unpaved.. Travellers not taking this into account has caused Finland to be known among foreigners as a difficult country to hitchhike, although it isn't actually worse than other western countries if you get around the culture of requiring crazy amounts of safety.
__TOC__
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[motorways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

=== Other areas ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing the borders ==
Apart from the Russian border, Finnish borders exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time there has been very a liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian. However, despite the fact that Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]] there is a random identity and luggage check when you take a ferry from [[Ahvenanmaa]] to [[Stockholm]] (Sweden).

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season. 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

When on-board, during warmer time of the year you might go up outside to enjoy the scenery of the archipelagos of Stockholm or Turku. 

Be aware as well of a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free alcohol and some other things on the ferries. It really isn't much more cheaper, though, than buying them on land. So, do bring a book. Usually there are free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus very often other backpackers wander around (you might as well have a chat with them). You can also try to spot small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant Great cormorants] a few hours off Stockholm.

There are Swedish [http://www.birka.se ''Birka Cruises''] boats cruising the sea, too.

More info about boats in the region: [http://www.makupalat.fi/Categories.aspx?classID=aef30d12-31ab-407f-89d6-526dd5d637f5 here] (Sweden, Estonia, Germany + lake tourism)

=== From/to Norway ===

Its possible to hitch from lapland. Aim for Kilpisjärvi down the E8. You do not go into Sweden. If going South down the E8 its possible to go on to Oulu. There is much less traffic up there so longer rides are more common. Just after Oulu there is a service station that is quite busy. There is no customs stopping, unless there is a new car that has not travelled that way before. Then you may get lifts at the border. There is a lot of tourism there and wilderness huts for free staying are possible to find. 

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note that as of 2006:'''
* No walking is permitted on any of existing Finnish-Russian border checkpoints.
* ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border checkpoint is permitted to cross by cycling.
* Russian visa can not be issued at the border checkpoint.

The most important border checkpoints to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]]'s district) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' on the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St.Petersburg, and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
==== Vaalimaa–Torfianovka ====
It is always open. Traffic is high there, and you might find there both long-distance trucks (however, see info below about trucks ) as well as lots of locals, from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods they don't have in Russia, and Finns going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel. On a Finnish side, you can find most of them at the first [[petrol station]], just before the customs zone. You can also ask drivers on the parking, and those queuing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there. 

As of 2006, it was a complete waste of time to hitch a truck over the border to Russia – freight terminal is separate for trucks and the queue there is extremely slow: sometimes you wait for hours, sometimes for days. Same terminal from Russia to Finland, though, seems to be faster. 

To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland, simply ask drivers at the parking lot by one of the supermarkets around there on the Russian side.

==== Other checkpoints ====
There is a checkpoint on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'').

Next border checkpoint to the north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, a road goes to [[Sortavala]] and then further to [[St. Petersburg]] via the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga] (with a portion of an unpaved road), or via the north shore to [[Petrozavodsk]].

There are a few more border checkpoints: from [[Imatra]] to [[Svetogorsk]], from [[Kuhmo]] to [[Kostamuksha]], from [[Salla]] towards [[Kandalaksha]], and from [[Inari]] towards [[Murmansk]]. These days most of these checkpoints work 24/7. Good way to hitch a ride from Russia to Finland is to hang around some stores near borders and look for Finnish license plates. A smart trick you can do to lift up your chances to get a ride is by offering a driver you speak to to bring an extra load of cigarettes and alcohol - most of the Finnish drivers won't resist that!

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Anyhow, most of the people speak good English, too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.  English, who needs that?  I'm never going to England.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop, and some places where it is illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking illegal de facto in these places.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Motorways ==
[[File:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|left|60px]]
It is illegal to hitchhike on the motorways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are known to be fined.

Hitching on the motorways and two lane expressways is prohibited. On any other motorway you can legally hitch. You can also hitchhike at the motorway on-ramps, and at the motorway [[petrol station]]s' areas. Basically, same rules as in countries in Western Europe and in most states of the [[USA]].

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>ewsnfd1m6efia99fw7oihhn015fkt6u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41368</id>
      <parentid>41299</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-13T06:48:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12322">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way which is called "[[Via Baltica]]" - it is a road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]] through Baltic States and [[Poland]].

Hitchhiking seems pretty easy in the Northern part of Finland. It could be a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads once you get closer to Helsinki - sure, there will be less traffic, however, you will get more space for the cars to stop, and avoid a chance of getting stuck on some unlit motorway ramp in the middle of nowhere (consider the early darkness when hitchhiking in autumn/winter!)

Since Finland mostly lacks a motorway network, most of the hitchhiking happens in the "classical manner", standing thumb up on roadside. While doing this, be aware that the Finnish drivers are a lot more careful in traffic than drivers elsewhere in Europe. They will only stop if the place is super-safe. This means a bus stop or similar. Even if there is a bus-stop-sized widening in the road, it does not help if it is unpaved.. Travellers not taking this into account has caused Finland to be known among foreigners as a difficult country to hitchhike, although it isn't actually worse than other western countries if you get around the culture of requiring crazy amounts of safety.
__TOC__
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[motorways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

=== Other areas ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing the borders ==
Apart from the Russian border, Finnish borders exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time there has been very a liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian. However, despite the fact that Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]] there is a random identity and luggage check when you take a ferry from [[Ahvenanmaa]] to [[Stockholm]] (Sweden).

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season. 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

When on-board, during warmer time of the year you might go up outside to enjoy the scenery of the archipelagos of Stockholm or Turku. 

Be aware as well of a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free alcohol and some other things on the ferries. It really isn't much more cheaper, though, than buying them on land. So, do bring a book. Usually there are free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus very often other backpackers wander around (you might as well have a chat with them). You can also try to spot small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant Great cormorants] a few hours off Stockholm.

There are Swedish [http://www.birka.se ''Birka Cruises''] boats cruising the sea, too.

More info about boats in the region: [http://www.makupalat.fi/Categories.aspx?classID=aef30d12-31ab-407f-89d6-526dd5d637f5 here] (Sweden, Estonia, Germany + lake tourism)

=== From/to Norway ===

Its possible to hitch from lapland. Aim for Kilpisjärvi down the E8. You do not go into Sweden. If going South down the E8 its possible to go on to Oulu. There is much less traffic up there so longer rides are more common. Just after Oulu there is a service station that is quite busy. There is no customs stopping, unless there is a new car that has not travelled that way before. Then you may get lifts at the border. There is a lot of tourism there and wilderness huts for free staying are possible to find. 

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note that as of 2006:'''
* No walking is permitted on any of existing Finnish-Russian border checkpoints.
* ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border checkpoint is permitted to cross by cycling.
* Russian visa can not be issued at the border checkpoint.

The most important border checkpoints to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]]'s district) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' on the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St.Petersburg, and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
==== Vaalimaa–Torfianovka ====
It is always open. Traffic is high there, and you might find there both long-distance trucks (however, see info below about trucks ) as well as lots of locals, from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods they don't have in Russia, and Finns going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel. On a Finnish side, you can find most of them at the first [[petrol station]], just before the customs zone. You can also ask drivers on the parking, and those queuing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there. 

As of 2006, it was a complete waste of time to hitch a truck over the border to Russia – freight terminal is separate for trucks and the queue there is extremely slow: sometimes you wait for hours, sometimes for days. Same terminal from Russia to Finland, though, seems to be faster. 

To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland, simply ask drivers at the parking lot by one of the supermarkets around there on the Russian side.

==== Other checkpoints ====
There is a checkpoint on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'').

Next border checkpoint to the north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, a road goes to [[Sortavala]] and then further to [[St. Petersburg]] via the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga] (with a portion of an unpaved road), or via the north shore to [[Petrozavodsk]].

There are a few more border checkpoints: from [[Imatra]] to [[Svetogorsk]], from [[Kuhmo]] to [[Kostamuksha]], from [[Salla]] towards [[Kandalaksha]], and from [[Inari]] towards [[Murmansk]]. These days most of these checkpoints work 24/7. Good way to hitch a ride from Russia to Finland is to hang around some stores near borders and look for Finnish license plates. A smart trick you can do to lift up your chances to get a ride is by offering a driver you speak to to bring an extra load of cigarettes and alcohol - most of the Finnish drivers won't resist that!

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Anyhow, most of the people speak good English, too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop, and some places where it is illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking illegal de facto in these places.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Motorways ==
[[File:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|left|60px]]
It is illegal to hitchhike on the motorways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are known to be fined.

Hitching on the motorways and two lane expressways is prohibited. On any other motorway you can legally hitch. You can also hitchhike at the motorway on-ramps, and at the motorway [[petrol station]]s' areas. Basically, same rules as in countries in Western Europe and in most states of the [[USA]].

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is an English section in the [http://www.liftari.org/forum forum].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>55zrt45gtcx2n2yzsw0zj202judbeyb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41633</id>
      <parentid>41368</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-25T01:14:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12322">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way which is called "[[Via Baltica]]" - it is a road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]] through Baltic States and [[Poland]].

Hitchhiking seems pretty easy in the Northern part of Finland. It could be a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads once you get closer to Helsinki - sure, there will be less traffic, however, you will get more space for the cars to stop, and avoid a chance of getting stuck on some unlit motorway ramp in the middle of nowhere (consider the early darkness when hitchhiking in autumn/winter!)

Since Finland mostly lacks a motorway network, most of the hitchhiking happens in the "classical manner", standing thumb up on roadside. While doing this, be aware that the Finnish drivers are a lot more careful in traffic than drivers elsewhere in Europe. They will only stop if the place is super-safe. This means a bus stop or similar. Even if there is a bus-stop-sized widening in the road, it does not help if it is unpaved.. Travellers not taking this into account has caused Finland to be known among foreigners as a difficult country to hitchhike, although it isn't actually worse than other western countries if you get around the culture of requiring crazy amounts of safety.
__TOC__
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[motorways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

=== Other areas ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing the borders ==
Apart from the Russian border, Finnish borders exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time there has been very a liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian. However, despite the fact that Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]] there is a random identity and luggage check when you take a ferry from [[Ahvenanmaa]] to [[Stockholm]] (Sweden).

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season. 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

When on-board, during warmer time of the year you might go up outside to enjoy the scenery of the archipelagos of Stockholm or Turku. 

Be aware as well of a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free alcohol and some other things on the ferries. It really isn't much more cheaper, though, than buying them on land. So, do bring a book. Usually there are free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus very often other backpackers wander around (you might as well have a chat with them). You can also try to spot small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant Great cormorants] a few hours off Stockholm.

There are Swedish [http://www.birka.se ''Birka Cruises''] boats cruising the sea, too.

More info about boats in the region: [http://www.makupalat.fi/Categories.aspx?classID=aef30d12-31ab-407f-89d6-526dd5d637f5 here] (Sweden, Estonia, Germany + lake tourism)

=== From/to Norway ===

Its possible to hitch from lapland. Aim for Kilpisjärvi down the E8. You do not go into Sweden. If going South down the E8 its possible to go on to Oulu. There is much less traffic up there so longer rides are more common. Just after Oulu there is a service station that is quite busy. There is no customs stopping, unless there is a new car that has not travelled that way before. Then you may get lifts at the border. There is a lot of tourism there and wilderness huts for free staying are possible to find. 

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note that as of 2006:'''
* No walking is permitted on any of existing Finnish-Russian border checkpoints.
* ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border checkpoint is permitted to cross by cycling.
* Russian visa can not be issued at the border checkpoint.

The most important border checkpoints to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]]'s district) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' on the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St.Petersburg, and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
==== Vaalimaa–Torfianovka ====
It is always open. Traffic is high there, and you might find there both long-distance trucks (however, see info below about trucks ) as well as lots of locals, from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods they don't have in Russia, and Finns going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel. On a Finnish side, you can find most of them at the first [[petrol station]], just before the customs zone. You can also ask drivers on the parking, and those queuing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there. 

As of 2006, it was a complete waste of time to hitch a truck over the border to Russia – freight terminal is separate for trucks and the queue there is extremely slow: sometimes you wait for hours, sometimes for days. Same terminal from Russia to Finland, though, seems to be faster. 

To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland, simply ask drivers at the parking lot by one of the supermarkets around there on the Russian side.

==== Other checkpoints ====
There is a checkpoint on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'').

Next border checkpoint to the north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, a road goes to [[Sortavala]] and then further to [[St. Petersburg]] via the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga] (with a portion of an unpaved road), or via the north shore to [[Petrozavodsk]].

There are a few more border checkpoints: from [[Imatra]] to [[Svetogorsk]], from [[Kuhmo]] to [[Kostamuksha]], from [[Salla]] towards [[Kandalaksha]], and from [[Inari]] towards [[Murmansk]]. These days most of these checkpoints work 24/7. Good way to hitch a ride from Russia to Finland is to hang around some stores near borders and look for Finnish license plates. A smart trick you can do to lift up your chances to get a ride is by offering a driver you speak to to bring an extra load of cigarettes and alcohol - most of the Finnish drivers won't resist that!

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Anyhow, most of the people speak good English, too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop, and some places where it is illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking illegal de facto in these places.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Motorways ==
[[File:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|left|60px]]
It is illegal to hitchhike on the motorways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are known to be fined.

Hitching on the motorways and two lane expressways is prohibited. On any other motorway you can legally hitch. You can also hitchhike at the motorway on-ramps, and at the motorway [[petrol station]]s' areas. Basically, same rules as in countries in Western Europe and in most states of the [[USA]].

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is [http://www.liftari.org/groups/in-english/ an English section].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>59pjegi9wbkjr5se1snd7djaand8l27</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>47966</id>
      <parentid>41633</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-01T17:59:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>91.153.126.47</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12404">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way which is called "[[Via Baltica]]" - it is a road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]] through Baltic States and [[Poland]].

Hitchhiking seems pretty easy in the Northern part of Finland. It could be a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads once you get closer to Helsinki - sure, there will be less traffic, however, you will get more space for the cars to stop, and avoid a chance of getting stuck on some unlit motorway ramp in the middle of nowhere (consider the early darkness when hitchhiking in autumn/winter!)

Since Finland mostly lacks a motorway network, most of the hitchhiking happens in the "classical manner", standing thumb up on roadside. While doing this, be aware that the Finnish drivers are a lot more careful in traffic than drivers elsewhere in Europe. They will only stop if the place is super-safe. This means a bus stop or similar. Even if there is a bus-stop-sized widening in the road, it does not help if it is unpaved.. Travellers not taking this into account has caused Finland to be known among foreigners as a difficult country to hitchhike, although it isn't actually worse than other western countries if you get around the culture of requiring crazy amounts of safety.
__TOC__
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[motorways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

=== Other areas ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing the borders ==
Apart from the Russian border, Finnish borders exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time there has been very a liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian. However, despite the fact that Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]] there is a random identity and luggage check when you take a ferry from [[Ahvenanmaa]] to [[Stockholm]] (Sweden).

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season. 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

When on-board, during warmer time of the year you might go up outside to enjoy the scenery of the archipelagos of Stockholm or Turku. 

Be aware as well of a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free alcohol and some other things on the ferries. It really isn't much more cheaper, though, than buying them on land. So, do bring a book. Usually there are free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus very often other backpackers wander around (you might as well have a chat with them). You can also try to spot small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant Great cormorants] a few hours off Stockholm.

There are Swedish [http://www.birka.se ''Birka Cruises''] boats cruising the sea, too.

More info about boats in the region: [http://www.makupalat.fi/Categories.aspx?classID=aef30d12-31ab-407f-89d6-526dd5d637f5 here] (Sweden, Estonia, Germany + lake tourism)

=== From/to Norway ===

Its possible to hitch from lapland. Aim for Kilpisjärvi down the E8. You do not go into Sweden. If going South down the E8 its possible to go on to Oulu. There is much less traffic up there so longer rides are more common. Just after Oulu there is a service station that is quite busy. There is no customs stopping, unless there is a new car that has not travelled that way before. Then you may get lifts at the border. There is a lot of tourism there and wilderness huts for free staying are possible to find. 

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note that as of 2006:'''
* No walking is permitted on any of existing Finnish-Russian border checkpoints.
* ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border checkpoint is permitted to cross by cycling.
* Russian visa can not be issued at the border checkpoint.

The most important border checkpoints to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]]'s district) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' on the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St.Petersburg, and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
==== Vaalimaa–Torfianovka ====
It is always open. Traffic is high there, and you might find there both long-distance trucks (however, see info below about trucks ) as well as lots of locals, from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods they don't have in Russia, and Finns going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel. On a Finnish side, you can find most of them at the first [[petrol station]], just before the customs zone. You can also ask drivers on the parking, and those queuing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there. 

As of 2006, it was a complete waste of time to hitch a truck over the border to Russia – freight terminal is separate for trucks and the queue there is extremely slow: sometimes you wait for hours, sometimes for days. Same terminal from Russia to Finland, though, seems to be faster. 

To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland, simply ask drivers at the parking lot by one of the supermarkets around there on the Russian side.

==== Other checkpoints ====
There is a checkpoint on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'').

Next border checkpoint to the north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, a road goes to [[Sortavala]] and then further to [[St. Petersburg]] via the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga] (with a portion of an unpaved road), or via the north shore to [[Petrozavodsk]].

There are a few more border checkpoints: from [[Imatra]] to [[Svetogorsk]], from [[Kuhmo]] to [[Kostamuksha]], from [[Salla]] towards [[Kandalaksha]], and from [[Inari]] towards [[Murmansk]]. These days most of these checkpoints work 24/7. Good way to hitch a ride from Russia to Finland is to hang around some stores near borders and look for Finnish license plates. A smart trick you can do to lift up your chances to get a ride is by offering a driver you speak to to bring an extra load of cigarettes and alcohol - most of the Finnish drivers won't resist that!

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Anyhow, most of the people speak good English, too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop, and some places where it is illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking illegal de facto in these places.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Motorways ==
[[File:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|left|60px]]
It is illegal to hitchhike on the motorways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are known to be fined.

Hitching on the motorways and two lane expressways is prohibited. On any other motorway you can legally hitch. You can also hitchhike at the motorway on-ramps, and at the motorway [[petrol station]]s' areas. Basically, same rules as in countries in Western Europe and in most states of the [[USA]].

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].  Hitching in Finland is much more difficult/impossible in late autumn and winter.

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is [http://www.liftari.org/groups/in-english/ an English section].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>qyxk5piw02juxxo5ma58ddz9fiz6z02</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>47967</id>
      <parentid>47966</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-01T18:00:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>91.153.126.47</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12438">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way which is called "[[Via Baltica]]" - it is a road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]] through Baltic States and [[Poland]].

Hitchhiking seems pretty easy in the Northern part of Finland. It could be a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads once you get closer to Helsinki - sure, there will be less traffic, however, you will get more space for the cars to stop, and avoid a chance of getting stuck on some unlit motorway ramp in the middle of nowhere (consider the early darkness when hitchhiking in autumn/winter!)

Since Finland mostly lacks a motorway network, most of the hitchhiking happens in the "classical manner", standing thumb up on roadside. While doing this, be aware that the Finnish drivers are a lot more careful in traffic than drivers elsewhere in Europe. They will only stop if the place is super-safe. This means a bus stop or similar. Even if there is a bus-stop-sized widening in the road, it does not help if it is unpaved.. Travellers not taking this into account has caused Finland to be known among foreigners as a difficult country to hitchhike, although it isn't actually worse than other western countries if you get around the culture of requiring crazy amounts of safety.
__TOC__
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[motorways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

=== Other areas ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing the borders ==
Apart from the Russian border, Finnish borders exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time there has been very a liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian. However, despite the fact that Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]] there is a random identity and luggage check when you take a ferry from [[Ahvenanmaa]] to [[Stockholm]] (Sweden).

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season. 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

When on-board, during warmer time of the year you might go up outside to enjoy the scenery of the archipelagos of Stockholm or Turku. 

Be aware as well of a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free alcohol and some other things on the ferries. It really isn't much more cheaper, though, than buying them on land. So, do bring a book. Usually there are free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus very often other backpackers wander around (you might as well have a chat with them). You can also try to spot small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant Great cormorants] a few hours off Stockholm.

There are Swedish [http://www.birka.se ''Birka Cruises''] boats cruising the sea, too.

More info about boats in the region: [http://www.makupalat.fi/Categories.aspx?classID=aef30d12-31ab-407f-89d6-526dd5d637f5 here] (Sweden, Estonia, Germany + lake tourism)

=== From/to Norway ===

Its possible to hitch from lapland. Aim for Kilpisjärvi down the E8. You do not go into Sweden. If going South down the E8 its possible to go on to Oulu. There is much less traffic up there so longer rides are more common. Just after Oulu there is a service station that is quite busy. There is no customs stopping, unless there is a new car that has not travelled that way before. Then you may get lifts at the border. There is a lot of tourism there and wilderness huts for free staying are possible to find. 

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note that as of 2006:'''
* No walking is permitted on any of existing Finnish-Russian border checkpoints.
* ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border checkpoint is permitted to cross by cycling.
* Russian visa can not be issued at the border checkpoint.

The most important border checkpoints to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]]'s district) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' on the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St.Petersburg, and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
==== Vaalimaa–Torfianovka ====
It is always open. Traffic is high there, and you might find there both long-distance trucks (however, see info below about trucks ) as well as lots of locals, from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods they don't have in Russia, and Finns going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel. On a Finnish side, you can find most of them at the first [[petrol station]], just before the customs zone. You can also ask drivers on the parking, and those queuing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there. 

As of 2006, it was a complete waste of time to hitch a truck over the border to Russia – freight terminal is separate for trucks and the queue there is extremely slow: sometimes you wait for hours, sometimes for days. Same terminal from Russia to Finland, though, seems to be faster. 

To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland, simply ask drivers at the parking lot by one of the supermarkets around there on the Russian side.

==== Other checkpoints ====
There is a checkpoint on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'').

Next border checkpoint to the north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, a road goes to [[Sortavala]] and then further to [[St. Petersburg]] via the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga] (with a portion of an unpaved road), or via the north shore to [[Petrozavodsk]].

There are a few more border checkpoints: from [[Imatra]] to [[Svetogorsk]], from [[Kuhmo]] to [[Kostamuksha]], from [[Salla]] towards [[Kandalaksha]], and from [[Inari]] towards [[Murmansk]]. These days most of these checkpoints work 24/7. Good way to hitch a ride from Russia to Finland is to hang around some stores near borders and look for Finnish license plates. A smart trick you can do to lift up your chances to get a ride is by offering a driver you speak to to bring an extra load of cigarettes and alcohol - most of the Finnish drivers won't resist that!

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Anyhow, most of the people speak good English, too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop, and some places where it is illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking illegal de facto in these places.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Motorways ==
[[File:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|left|60px]]
It is illegal to hitchhike on the motorways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are known to be fined.

Hitching on the motorways and two lane expressways is prohibited. On any other motorway you can legally hitch. You can also hitchhike at the motorway on-ramps, and at the motorway [[petrol station]]s' areas. Basically, same rules as in countries in Western Europe and in most states of the [[USA]].

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].  Hitching in Finland is much more difficult/impossible in late autumn and winter simply because people do not stop.

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is [http://www.liftari.org/groups/in-english/ an English section].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>lic38bu2f3u6nlu7v1n3bqpxx46in3i</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>52052</id>
      <parentid>47967</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-04-29T07:31:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>72.53.176.40</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9603">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way which is called "[[Via Baltica]]" - it is a road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]] through Baltic States and [[Poland]].

Hitchhiking seems pretty easy in the Northern part of Finland. It could be a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads once you get closer to Helsinki - sure, there will be less traffic, however, you will get more space for the cars to stop, and avoid a chance of getting stuck on some unlit motorway ramp in the middle of nowhere (consider the early darkness when hitchhiking in autumn/winter!)

Since Finland mostly lacks a motorway network, most of the hitchhiking happens in the "classical manner", standing thumb up on roadside. While doing this, be aware that the Finnish drivers are a lot more careful in traffic than drivers elsewhere in Europe. They will only stop if the place is super-safe. This means a bus stop or similar. Even if there is a bus-stop-sized widening in the road, it does not help if it is unpaved.. Travellers not taking this into account has caused Finland to be known among foreigners as a difficult country to hitchhike, although it isn't actually worse than other western countries if you get around the culture of requiring crazy amounts of safety.
__TOC__
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[motorways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

=== Other areas ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing the borders ==
Apart from the Russian border, Finnish borders exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time there has been very a liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian. However, despite the fact that Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]] there is a random identity and luggage check when you take a ferry from [[Ahvenanmaa]] to [[Stockholm]] (Sweden).

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season. 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

When on-board, during warmer time of the year you might go up outside to enjoy the scenery of the archipelagos of Stockholm or Turku. 

Be aware as well of a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free alcohol and some other things on the ferries. It really isn't much more cheaper, though, than buying them on land. So, do bring a book. Usually there are free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus very often other backpackers wander around (you might as well have a chat with them). You can also try to spot small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant Great cormorants] a few hours off Stockholm.

There are Swedish [http://www.birka.se ''Birka Cruises''] boats cruising the sea, too.

More info about boats in the region: [http://www.makupalat.fi/Categories.aspx?classID=aef30d12-31ab-407f-89d6-526dd5d637f5 here] (Sweden, Estonia, Germany + lake tourism)

=== From/to Norway ===

Its possible to hitch from lapland. Aim for Kilpisjärvi down the E8. You do not go into Sweden. If going South down the E8 its possible to go on to Oulu. There is much less traffic up there so longer rides are more common. Just after Oulu there is a service station that is quite busy. There is no customs stopping, unless there is a new car that has not travelled that way before. Then you may get lifts at the border. There is a lot of tourism there and wilderness huts for free staying are possible to find. 

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

Wow! That's a raelly neat answer!

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Anyhow, most of the people speak good English, too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop, and some places where it is illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking illegal de facto in these places.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Motorways ==
[[File:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|left|60px]]
It is illegal to hitchhike on the motorways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are known to be fined.

Hitching on the motorways and two lane expressways is prohibited. On any other motorway you can legally hitch. You can also hitchhike at the motorway on-ramps, and at the motorway [[petrol station]]s' areas. Basically, same rules as in countries in Western Europe and in most states of the [[USA]].

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].  Hitching in Finland is much more difficult/impossible in late autumn and winter simply because people do not stop.

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is [http://www.liftari.org/groups/in-english/ an English section].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>95yfpfzuzysj8xbaihmhjdoj703fk70</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>52064</id>
      <parentid>52052</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-04-29T09:08:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12438">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way which is called "[[Via Baltica]]" - it is a road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]] through Baltic States and [[Poland]].

Hitchhiking seems pretty easy in the Northern part of Finland. It could be a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads once you get closer to Helsinki - sure, there will be less traffic, however, you will get more space for the cars to stop, and avoid a chance of getting stuck on some unlit motorway ramp in the middle of nowhere (consider the early darkness when hitchhiking in autumn/winter!)

Since Finland mostly lacks a motorway network, most of the hitchhiking happens in the "classical manner", standing thumb up on roadside. While doing this, be aware that the Finnish drivers are a lot more careful in traffic than drivers elsewhere in Europe. They will only stop if the place is super-safe. This means a bus stop or similar. Even if there is a bus-stop-sized widening in the road, it does not help if it is unpaved.. Travellers not taking this into account has caused Finland to be known among foreigners as a difficult country to hitchhike, although it isn't actually worse than other western countries if you get around the culture of requiring crazy amounts of safety.
__TOC__
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[motorways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

=== Other areas ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing the borders ==
Apart from the Russian border, Finnish borders exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time there has been very a liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian. However, despite the fact that Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]] there is a random identity and luggage check when you take a ferry from [[Ahvenanmaa]] to [[Stockholm]] (Sweden).

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season. 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

When on-board, during warmer time of the year you might go up outside to enjoy the scenery of the archipelagos of Stockholm or Turku. 

Be aware as well of a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free alcohol and some other things on the ferries. It really isn't much more cheaper, though, than buying them on land. So, do bring a book. Usually there are free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus very often other backpackers wander around (you might as well have a chat with them). You can also try to spot small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant Great cormorants] a few hours off Stockholm.

There are Swedish [http://www.birka.se ''Birka Cruises''] boats cruising the sea, too.

More info about boats in the region: [http://www.makupalat.fi/Categories.aspx?classID=aef30d12-31ab-407f-89d6-526dd5d637f5 here] (Sweden, Estonia, Germany + lake tourism)

=== From/to Norway ===

Its possible to hitch from lapland. Aim for Kilpisjärvi down the E8. You do not go into Sweden. If going South down the E8 its possible to go on to Oulu. There is much less traffic up there so longer rides are more common. Just after Oulu there is a service station that is quite busy. There is no customs stopping, unless there is a new car that has not travelled that way before. Then you may get lifts at the border. There is a lot of tourism there and wilderness huts for free staying are possible to find. 

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note that as of 2006:'''
* No walking is permitted on any of existing Finnish-Russian border checkpoints.
* ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border checkpoint is permitted to cross by cycling.
* Russian visa can not be issued at the border checkpoint.

The most important border checkpoints to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]]'s district) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' on the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St.Petersburg, and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
==== Vaalimaa–Torfianovka ====
It is always open. Traffic is high there, and you might find there both long-distance trucks (however, see info below about trucks ) as well as lots of locals, from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods they don't have in Russia, and Finns going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel. On a Finnish side, you can find most of them at the first [[petrol station]], just before the customs zone. You can also ask drivers on the parking, and those queuing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there. 

As of 2006, it was a complete waste of time to hitch a truck over the border to Russia – freight terminal is separate for trucks and the queue there is extremely slow: sometimes you wait for hours, sometimes for days. Same terminal from Russia to Finland, though, seems to be faster. 

To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland, simply ask drivers at the parking lot by one of the supermarkets around there on the Russian side.

==== Other checkpoints ====
There is a checkpoint on the road '''13''' going south from [[Lappeenranta]] and bypassing the village of Niirala on the north. There is less traffic here but the route is more scenic, going along the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saimaa_canal Saimaa canal] (Russian: ''Сайменский канал''; Finnish: ''Saimaan kanava'').

Next border checkpoint to the north from there is ''Niirala-Värtsilä'', on the road 70 south of [[Joensuu]]. The trafic is low, a road goes to [[Sortavala]] and then further to [[St. Petersburg]] via the south shore of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ladoga lake Ladoga] (with a portion of an unpaved road), or via the north shore to [[Petrozavodsk]].

There are a few more border checkpoints: from [[Imatra]] to [[Svetogorsk]], from [[Kuhmo]] to [[Kostamuksha]], from [[Salla]] towards [[Kandalaksha]], and from [[Inari]] towards [[Murmansk]]. These days most of these checkpoints work 24/7. Good way to hitch a ride from Russia to Finland is to hang around some stores near borders and look for Finnish license plates. A smart trick you can do to lift up your chances to get a ride is by offering a driver you speak to to bring an extra load of cigarettes and alcohol - most of the Finnish drivers won't resist that!

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Anyhow, most of the people speak good English, too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop, and some places where it is illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking illegal de facto in these places.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Motorways ==
[[File:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|left|60px]]
It is illegal to hitchhike on the motorways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are known to be fined.

Hitching on the motorways and two lane expressways is prohibited. On any other motorway you can legally hitch. You can also hitchhike at the motorway on-ramps, and at the motorway [[petrol station]]s' areas. Basically, same rules as in countries in Western Europe and in most states of the [[USA]].

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].  Hitching in Finland is much more difficult/impossible in late autumn and winter simply because people do not stop.

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is [http://www.liftari.org/groups/in-english/ an English section].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>lic38bu2f3u6nlu7v1n3bqpxx46in3i</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>52077</id>
      <parentid>52064</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-04-29T09:12:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>62.39.3.10</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11207">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way which is called "[[Via Baltica]]" - it is a road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]] through Baltic States and [[Poland]].

Hitchhiking seems pretty easy in the Northern part of Finland. It could be a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads once you get closer to Helsinki - sure, there will be less traffic, however, you will get more space for the cars to stop, and avoid a chance of getting stuck on some unlit motorway ramp in the middle of nowhere (consider the early darkness when hitchhiking in autumn/winter!)

Since Finland mostly lacks a motorway network, most of the hitchhiking happens in the "classical manner", standing thumb up on roadside. While doing this, be aware that the Finnish drivers are a lot more careful in traffic than drivers elsewhere in Europe. They will only stop if the place is super-safe. This means a bus stop or similar. Even if there is a bus-stop-sized widening in the road, it does not help if it is unpaved.. Travellers not taking this into account has caused Finland to be known among foreigners as a difficult country to hitchhike, although it isn't actually worse than other western countries if you get around the culture of requiring crazy amounts of safety.
__TOC__
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[motorways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

=== Other areas ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing the borders ==
Apart from the Russian border, Finnish borders exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time there has been very a liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian. However, despite the fact that Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]] there is a random identity and luggage check when you take a ferry from [[Ahvenanmaa]] to [[Stockholm]] (Sweden).

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season. 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

When on-board, during warmer time of the year you might go up outside to enjoy the scenery of the archipelagos of Stockholm or Turku. 

Be aware as well of a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free alcohol and some other things on the ferries. It really isn't much more cheaper, though, than buying them on land. So, do bring a book. Usually there are free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus very often other backpackers wander around (you might as well have a chat with them). You can also try to spot small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant Great cormorants] a few hours off Stockholm.

There are Swedish [http://www.birka.se ''Birka Cruises''] boats cruising the sea, too.

More info about boats in the region: [http://www.makupalat.fi/Categories.aspx?classID=aef30d12-31ab-407f-89d6-526dd5d637f5 here] (Sweden, Estonia, Germany + lake tourism)

=== From/to Norway ===

Its possible to hitch from lapland. Aim for Kilpisjärvi down the E8. You do not go into Sweden. If going South down the E8 its possible to go on to Oulu. There is much less traffic up there so longer rides are more common. Just after Oulu there is a service station that is quite busy. There is no customs stopping, unless there is a new car that has not travelled that way before. Then you may get lifts at the border. There is a lot of tourism there and wilderness huts for free staying are possible to find. 

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note that as of 2006:'''
* No walking is permitted on any of existing Finnish-Russian border checkpoints.
* ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border checkpoint is permitted to cross by cycling.
* Russian visa can not be issued at the border checkpoint.

The most important border checkpoints to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]]'s district) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' on the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St.Petersburg, and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
==== Vaalimaa–Torfianovka ====
It is always open. Traffic is high there, and you might find there both long-distance trucks (however, see info below about trucks ) as well as lots of locals, from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods they don't have in Russia, and Finns going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel. On a Finnish side, you can find most of them at the first [[petrol station]], just before the customs zone. You can also ask drivers on the parking, and those queuing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there. 

As of 2006, it was a complete waste of time to hitch a truck over the border to Russia – freight terminal is separate for trucks and the queue there is extremely slow: sometimes you wait for hours, sometimes for days. Same terminal from Russia to Finland, though, seems to be faster. 

To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland, simply ask drivers at the parking lot by one of the supermarkets around there on the Russian side.

Good point. I hadn't tohguht about it quite that way. :)

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Anyhow, most of the people speak good English, too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop, and some places where it is illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking illegal de facto in these places.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Motorways ==
[[File:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|left|60px]]
It is illegal to hitchhike on the motorways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are known to be fined.

Hitching on the motorways and two lane expressways is prohibited. On any other motorway you can legally hitch. You can also hitchhike at the motorway on-ramps, and at the motorway [[petrol station]]s' areas. Basically, same rules as in countries in Western Europe and in most states of the [[USA]].

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].  Hitching in Finland is much more difficult/impossible in late autumn and winter simply because people do not stop.

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is [http://www.liftari.org/groups/in-english/ an English section].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>695oih6apczp8wbzbprydolnvd0fs0p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>52084</id>
      <parentid>52077</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-04-29T10:40:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>109.205.117.50</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5628">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way which is called "[[Via Baltica]]" - it is a road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]] through Baltic States and [[Poland]].

Hitchhiking seems pretty easy in the Northern part of Finland. It could be a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads once you get closer to Helsinki - sure, there will be less traffic, however, you will get more space for the cars to stop, and avoid a chance of getting stuck on some unlit motorway ramp in the middle of nowhere (consider the early darkness when hitchhiking in autumn/winter!)

Since Finland mostly lacks a motorway network, most of the hitchhiking happens in the "classical manner", standing thumb up on roadside. While doing this, be aware that the Finnish drivers are a lot more careful in traffic than drivers elsewhere in Europe. They will only stop if the place is super-safe. This means a bus stop or similar. Even if there is a bus-stop-sized widening in the road, it does not help if it is unpaved.. Travellers not taking this into account has caused Finland to be known among foreigners as a difficult country to hitchhike, although it isn't actually worse than other western countries if you get around the culture of requiring crazy amounts of safety.
__TOC__
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[motorways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

=== Other areas ===
* [[Lapland]]

Stands back from the keyboard in amazmenet! Thanks!

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Anyhow, most of the people speak good English, too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop, and some places where it is illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking illegal de facto in these places.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Motorways ==
[[File:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|left|60px]]
It is illegal to hitchhike on the motorways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are known to be fined.

Hitching on the motorways and two lane expressways is prohibited. On any other motorway you can legally hitch. You can also hitchhike at the motorway on-ramps, and at the motorway [[petrol station]]s' areas. Basically, same rules as in countries in Western Europe and in most states of the [[USA]].

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].  Hitching in Finland is much more difficult/impossible in late autumn and winter simply because people do not stop.

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is [http://www.liftari.org/groups/in-english/ an English section].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>1gdre2o02t4wq6vofuuwv93a8qi2d2i</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>52097</id>
      <parentid>52084</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-04-29T12:06:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.204.153.242</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11207">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way which is called "[[Via Baltica]]" - it is a road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]] through Baltic States and [[Poland]].

Hitchhiking seems pretty easy in the Northern part of Finland. It could be a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads once you get closer to Helsinki - sure, there will be less traffic, however, you will get more space for the cars to stop, and avoid a chance of getting stuck on some unlit motorway ramp in the middle of nowhere (consider the early darkness when hitchhiking in autumn/winter!)

Since Finland mostly lacks a motorway network, most of the hitchhiking happens in the "classical manner", standing thumb up on roadside. While doing this, be aware that the Finnish drivers are a lot more careful in traffic than drivers elsewhere in Europe. They will only stop if the place is super-safe. This means a bus stop or similar. Even if there is a bus-stop-sized widening in the road, it does not help if it is unpaved.. Travellers not taking this into account has caused Finland to be known among foreigners as a difficult country to hitchhike, although it isn't actually worse than other western countries if you get around the culture of requiring crazy amounts of safety.
__TOC__
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[motorways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

=== Other areas ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing the borders ==
Apart from the Russian border, Finnish borders exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time there has been very a liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian. However, despite the fact that Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]] there is a random identity and luggage check when you take a ferry from [[Ahvenanmaa]] to [[Stockholm]] (Sweden).

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season. 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

When on-board, during warmer time of the year you might go up outside to enjoy the scenery of the archipelagos of Stockholm or Turku. 

Be aware as well of a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free alcohol and some other things on the ferries. It really isn't much more cheaper, though, than buying them on land. So, do bring a book. Usually there are free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus very often other backpackers wander around (you might as well have a chat with them). You can also try to spot small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant Great cormorants] a few hours off Stockholm.

There are Swedish [http://www.birka.se ''Birka Cruises''] boats cruising the sea, too.

More info about boats in the region: [http://www.makupalat.fi/Categories.aspx?classID=aef30d12-31ab-407f-89d6-526dd5d637f5 here] (Sweden, Estonia, Germany + lake tourism)

=== From/to Norway ===

Its possible to hitch from lapland. Aim for Kilpisjärvi down the E8. You do not go into Sweden. If going South down the E8 its possible to go on to Oulu. There is much less traffic up there so longer rides are more common. Just after Oulu there is a service station that is quite busy. There is no customs stopping, unless there is a new car that has not travelled that way before. Then you may get lifts at the border. There is a lot of tourism there and wilderness huts for free staying are possible to find. 

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note that as of 2006:'''
* No walking is permitted on any of existing Finnish-Russian border checkpoints.
* ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border checkpoint is permitted to cross by cycling.
* Russian visa can not be issued at the border checkpoint.

The most important border checkpoints to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]]'s district) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' on the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St.Petersburg, and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
==== Vaalimaa–Torfianovka ====
It is always open. Traffic is high there, and you might find there both long-distance trucks (however, see info below about trucks ) as well as lots of locals, from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods they don't have in Russia, and Finns going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel. On a Finnish side, you can find most of them at the first [[petrol station]], just before the customs zone. You can also ask drivers on the parking, and those queuing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there. 

As of 2006, it was a complete waste of time to hitch a truck over the border to Russia – freight terminal is separate for trucks and the queue there is extremely slow: sometimes you wait for hours, sometimes for days. Same terminal from Russia to Finland, though, seems to be faster. 

To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland, simply ask drivers at the parking lot by one of the supermarkets around there on the Russian side.

Good point. I hadn't tohguht about it quite that way. :)

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Anyhow, most of the people speak good English, too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop, and some places where it is illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking illegal de facto in these places.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Motorways ==
[[File:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|left|60px]]
It is illegal to hitchhike on the motorways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are known to be fined.

Hitching on the motorways and two lane expressways is prohibited. On any other motorway you can legally hitch. You can also hitchhike at the motorway on-ramps, and at the motorway [[petrol station]]s' areas. Basically, same rules as in countries in Western Europe and in most states of the [[USA]].

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].  Hitching in Finland is much more difficult/impossible in late autumn and winter simply because people do not stop.

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is [http://www.liftari.org/groups/in-english/ an English section].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>695oih6apczp8wbzbprydolnvd0fs0p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>52115</id>
      <parentid>52097</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-04-29T14:56:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>12.47.46.244</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10729">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way which is called "[[Via Baltica]]" - it is a road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]] through Baltic States and [[Poland]].

Hitchhiking seems pretty easy in the Northern part of Finland. It could be a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads once you get closer to Helsinki - sure, there will be less traffic, however, you will get more space for the cars to stop, and avoid a chance of getting stuck on some unlit motorway ramp in the middle of nowhere (consider the early darkness when hitchhiking in autumn/winter!)

Since Finland mostly lacks a motorway network, most of the hitchhiking happens in the "classical manner", standing thumb up on roadside. While doing this, be aware that the Finnish drivers are a lot more careful in traffic than drivers elsewhere in Europe. They will only stop if the place is super-safe. This means a bus stop or similar. Even if there is a bus-stop-sized widening in the road, it does not help if it is unpaved.. Travellers not taking this into account has caused Finland to be known among foreigners as a difficult country to hitchhike, although it isn't actually worse than other western countries if you get around the culture of requiring crazy amounts of safety.
__TOC__
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[motorways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

=== Other areas ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing the borders ==
Apart from the Russian border, Finnish borders exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time there has been very a liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian. However, despite the fact that Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]] there is a random identity and luggage check when you take a ferry from [[Ahvenanmaa]] to [[Stockholm]] (Sweden).

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season. 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

When on-board, during warmer time of the year you might go up outside to enjoy the scenery of the archipelagos of Stockholm or Turku. 

Be aware as well of a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free alcohol and some other things on the ferries. It really isn't much more cheaper, though, than buying them on land. So, do bring a book. Usually there are free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus very often other backpackers wander around (you might as well have a chat with them). You can also try to spot small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant Great cormorants] a few hours off Stockholm.

There are Swedish [http://www.birka.se ''Birka Cruises''] boats cruising the sea, too.

More info about boats in the region: [http://www.makupalat.fi/Categories.aspx?classID=aef30d12-31ab-407f-89d6-526dd5d637f5 here] (Sweden, Estonia, Germany + lake tourism)

I'm not easily impressed. . . but that's impressnig me! :)

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note that as of 2006:'''
* No walking is permitted on any of existing Finnish-Russian border checkpoints.
* ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border checkpoint is permitted to cross by cycling.
* Russian visa can not be issued at the border checkpoint.

The most important border checkpoints to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]]'s district) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' on the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St.Petersburg, and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
==== Vaalimaa–Torfianovka ====
It is always open. Traffic is high there, and you might find there both long-distance trucks (however, see info below about trucks ) as well as lots of locals, from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods they don't have in Russia, and Finns going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel. On a Finnish side, you can find most of them at the first [[petrol station]], just before the customs zone. You can also ask drivers on the parking, and those queuing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there. 

As of 2006, it was a complete waste of time to hitch a truck over the border to Russia – freight terminal is separate for trucks and the queue there is extremely slow: sometimes you wait for hours, sometimes for days. Same terminal from Russia to Finland, though, seems to be faster. 

To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland, simply ask drivers at the parking lot by one of the supermarkets around there on the Russian side.

Good point. I hadn't tohguht about it quite that way. :)

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Anyhow, most of the people speak good English, too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop, and some places where it is illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking illegal de facto in these places.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Motorways ==
[[File:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|left|60px]]
It is illegal to hitchhike on the motorways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are known to be fined.

Hitching on the motorways and two lane expressways is prohibited. On any other motorway you can legally hitch. You can also hitchhike at the motorway on-ramps, and at the motorway [[petrol station]]s' areas. Basically, same rules as in countries in Western Europe and in most states of the [[USA]].

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].  Hitching in Finland is much more difficult/impossible in late autumn and winter simply because people do not stop.

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is [http://www.liftari.org/groups/in-english/ an English section].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>0d7d5flegr4l22bdnyczzrfviuindhr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>52138</id>
      <parentid>52115</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-04-29T21:19:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11207">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]], one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but possibly the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there is [[Estonia]]. Most people use this way which is called "[[Via Baltica]]" - it is a road [[E67]] between [[Helsinki]], Finland and [[Prague]], [[Czech Republic]] through Baltic States and [[Poland]].

Hitchhiking seems pretty easy in the Northern part of Finland. It could be a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads once you get closer to Helsinki - sure, there will be less traffic, however, you will get more space for the cars to stop, and avoid a chance of getting stuck on some unlit motorway ramp in the middle of nowhere (consider the early darkness when hitchhiking in autumn/winter!)

Since Finland mostly lacks a motorway network, most of the hitchhiking happens in the "classical manner", standing thumb up on roadside. While doing this, be aware that the Finnish drivers are a lot more careful in traffic than drivers elsewhere in Europe. They will only stop if the place is super-safe. This means a bus stop or similar. Even if there is a bus-stop-sized widening in the road, it does not help if it is unpaved.. Travellers not taking this into account has caused Finland to be known among foreigners as a difficult country to hitchhike, although it isn't actually worse than other western countries if you get around the culture of requiring crazy amounts of safety.
__TOC__
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[motorways]].]]

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

=== Other areas ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Crossing the borders ==
Apart from the Russian border, Finnish borders exist only on the map, not in reality. Since the dawn of time there has been very a liberal co-operation between the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian. However, despite the fact that Finland signed the [[Schengen Agreement]] there is a random identity and luggage check when you take a ferry from [[Ahvenanmaa]] to [[Stockholm]] (Sweden).

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]
=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season. 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

When on-board, during warmer time of the year you might go up outside to enjoy the scenery of the archipelagos of Stockholm or Turku. 

Be aware as well of a constant attempt to lure people to buy as much tax-free alcohol and some other things on the ferries. It really isn't much more cheaper, though, than buying them on land. So, do bring a book. Usually there are free Playstation or XBox games at the kids-section to spend the time, plus very often other backpackers wander around (you might as well have a chat with them). You can also try to spot small islands severely damaged by [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Cormorant Great cormorants] a few hours off Stockholm.

There are Swedish [http://www.birka.se ''Birka Cruises''] boats cruising the sea, too.

More info about boats in the region: [http://www.makupalat.fi/Categories.aspx?classID=aef30d12-31ab-407f-89d6-526dd5d637f5 here] (Sweden, Estonia, Germany + lake tourism)

=== From/to Norway ===

Its possible to hitch from lapland. Aim for Kilpisjärvi down the E8. You do not go into Sweden. If going South down the E8 its possible to go on to Oulu. There is much less traffic up there so longer rides are more common. Just after Oulu there is a service station that is quite busy. There is no customs stopping, unless there is a new car that has not travelled that way before. Then you may get lifts at the border. There is a lot of tourism there and wilderness huts for free staying are possible to find. 

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

=== From/to [[Russia]] ===
'''Note that as of 2006:'''
* No walking is permitted on any of existing Finnish-Russian border checkpoints.
* ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' border checkpoint is permitted to cross by cycling.
* Russian visa can not be issued at the border checkpoint.

The most important border checkpoints to Russia ([[St. Petersburg]]'s district) are ''Vaalimaa–Torfianovka'' on the road [[E18]]/7 Helsinki-St.Petersburg, and ''Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe'' near [[Lappeenranta]].
 
==== Vaalimaa–Torfianovka ====
It is always open. Traffic is high there, and you might find there both long-distance trucks (however, see info below about trucks ) as well as lots of locals, from both sides of the border, with Russians coming to buy goods they don't have in Russia, and Finns going to the other side to buy alcohol, cigarettes and fuel. On a Finnish side, you can find most of them at the first [[petrol station]], just before the customs zone. You can also ask drivers on the parking, and those queuing to the terminal. A ride to [[Torfianovka]] is enough – there's lots of transport going to [[Vyborg]] and [[St. Petersburg]] from there. 

As of 2006, it was a complete waste of time to hitch a truck over the border to Russia – freight terminal is separate for trucks and the queue there is extremely slow: sometimes you wait for hours, sometimes for days. Same terminal from Russia to Finland, though, seems to be faster. 

To get back from [[Russia]] to Finland, simply ask drivers at the parking lot by one of the supermarkets around there on the Russian side.

Good point. I hadn't tohguht about it quite that way. :)

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Anyhow, most of the people speak good English, too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have big language problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Legal matters for hitchhikers ==
Hitchhiking is legal in Finland. Anyhow, there are some places where it is illegal for the cars to stop, and some places where it is illegal for pedestrians to stand. Both of these make hitchhiking illegal de facto in these places.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Motorways ==
[[File:Finnish_motorway_sign_561.png|left|60px]]
It is illegal to hitchhike on the motorways (called “moottoritie”) and some motorways (“moottoriliikennetie”) in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs.

The cars can not stop in crossing areas, and some cars not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board are known to be fined.

Hitching on the motorways and two lane expressways is prohibited. On any other motorway you can legally hitch. You can also hitchhike at the motorway on-ramps, and at the motorway [[petrol station]]s' areas. Basically, same rules as in countries in Western Europe and in most states of the [[USA]].

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].  Hitching in Finland is much more difficult/impossible in late autumn and winter simply because people do not stop.

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is [http://www.liftari.org/groups/in-english/ an English section].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>695oih6apczp8wbzbprydolnvd0fs0p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>54439</id>
      <parentid>52138</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-09-04T02:40:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7156">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps and [[petrol stations|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.


__TOC__

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

=== Other areas ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Border crossing ==

There are no border checkpoints between Finland, Sweden and Norway. You can cross these borders without stopping. 

* [[Vaalimaa–Torfianovka border crossing]] with [[Russia]]
* [[Nuijamaa–Brusnichnoe border crossing]] with [[Russia]]

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

=== From/to Sweden ===

Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season. 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.


=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Sleeping ==

[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[motorways]].]]

Like the other Nordic countries, Finland has everyman's right (''jokamiehenoikeus'') meaning that it is allowed to camp on any land provided that you stay a few hundred metres from houses, do not start a fire, and do not more than one night in any given place. While everyman's right technically doesn't apply inside of towns and cities, there is usually no problem with camping in isolated areas of parks -- even if police see you, they are more concerned with gypsies than with backpackers.

In Southern Finland and the Åland Islands, the forests and grassy areas are full of ticks, so wear clothing that covers your legs and check occasionally that you haven't been bitten.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Culture ==

Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].  Hitching in Finland is much more difficult/impossible in late autumn and winter simply because people do not stop.

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is [http://www.liftari.org/groups/in-english/ an English section].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>co9poiuqwfpzpn1vcx3e1by7s3ry411</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>54440</id>
      <parentid>54439</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-09-04T02:41:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7151">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps and [[petrol stations|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.


__TOC__

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

=== Other areas ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Border crossing ==

There are no border checkpoints between Finland, Sweden and Norway. You can cross these borders without stopping. 

* [[Torfyanovka-Valimaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]
* [[Brusnichnoe-Nuijamaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

=== From/to Sweden ===

Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season. 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.


=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Sleeping ==

[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[motorways]].]]

Like the other Nordic countries, Finland has everyman's right (''jokamiehenoikeus'') meaning that it is allowed to camp on any land provided that you stay a few hundred metres from houses, do not start a fire, and do not more than one night in any given place. While everyman's right technically doesn't apply inside of towns and cities, there is usually no problem with camping in isolated areas of parks -- even if police see you, they are more concerned with gypsies than with backpackers.

In Southern Finland and the Åland Islands, the forests and grassy areas are full of ticks, so wear clothing that covers your legs and check occasionally that you haven't been bitten.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Culture ==

Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].  Hitching in Finland is much more difficult/impossible in late autumn and winter simply because people do not stop.

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is [http://www.liftari.org/groups/in-english/ an English section].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>3kmu57ofv5wpjiuhhl7wy0lg9ypdyn6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>54466</id>
      <parentid>54440</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-09-05T00:15:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7166">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps and [[petrol stations|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.


__TOC__

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

=== Other areas ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Border crossing ==

There are no border checkpoints between Finland, Sweden and Norway. You can cross these borders without stopping. 

* [[Torfyanovka-Valimaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]
* [[Brusnichnoe-Nuijamaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

=== From/to Sweden ===

Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season. 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.


=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Sleeping ==

[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[motorways]].]]

Like the other Nordic countries, Finland has everyman's right (''jokamiehenoikeus'') meaning that it is allowed to camp on any land provided that you stay a few hundred metres from houses, do not start a fire, and do not more than one night in any given place. While everyman's right technically doesn't apply inside of towns and cities, there is usually no problem with camping in isolated areas of parks -- even if police see you, they are more concerned with gypsies than with backpackers.

In Southern Finland and the Åland Islands, the forests and grassy areas are full of ticks, so wear clothing that covers your legs and check occasionally that you haven't been bitten.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Culture ==

Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].  Hitching in Finland is much more difficult/impossible in late autumn and winter simply because people do not stop.

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is [http://www.liftari.org/groups/in-english/ an English section].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>syeivec9xviq16ifypzilgekuurra45</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>55099</id>
      <parentid>54466</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-09-23T01:16:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7175">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps and [[petrol stations|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.


__TOC__

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

=== Other areas ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Border crossing ==

There are no border checkpoints between Finland, Sweden and Norway. You can cross these borders without stopping. 

* [[Torfyanovka-Valimaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]
* [[Brusnichnoe-Nuijamaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

=== From/to Sweden ===

Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season. 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.


=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Sleeping ==

[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[motorways]].]]

Like the other Nordic countries, Finland has everyman's right (''jokamiehenoikeus'') meaning that it is allowed to camp on any land provided that you stay a few hundred metres from houses, do not start a fire, and do not more than one night in any given place. While everyman's right technically doesn't apply inside of towns and cities, there is usually no problem with camping in isolated areas of parks -- even if police see you, they are more concerned with gypsies than with backpackers.

In Southern Finland and the Åland Islands, the forests and grassy areas are full of ticks, so wear clothing that covers your legs and check occasionally that you haven't been bitten.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Culture ==

Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].  Hitching in Finland is much more difficult/impossible in late autumn and winter simply because people do not stop.

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is [http://www.liftari.org/groups/in-english/ an English section].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>3039wxcwbgl12tjrolxn0e2kuh2jigz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>55212</id>
      <parentid>55099</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-02T10:05:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Slaniex</username>
        <id>3959</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7476">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps and [[petrol stations|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.


__TOC__

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

=== Other areas ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Border crossing ==

There are no border checkpoints between Finland, Sweden and Norway. You can cross these borders without stopping. 

* [[Torfyanovka-Valimaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]
* [[Brusnichnoe-Nuijamaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

=== From/to Sweden ===

Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season. 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.


=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Where to hitch? ==

One, very important rule - driver will pick you up, of course, but the place '''needs''' to be safe and stopping there '''needs''' to be allowed, for example a bus stop. In other case you can forget s/he will stop. Going on a ramp is a really bad idea, so find a better place.

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Sleeping ==

[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[motorways]].]]

Like the other Nordic countries, Finland has everyman's right (''jokamiehenoikeus'') meaning that it is allowed to camp on any land provided that you stay a few hundred metres from houses, do not start a fire, and do not more than one night in any given place. While everyman's right technically doesn't apply inside of towns and cities, there is usually no problem with camping in isolated areas of parks -- even if police see you, they are more concerned with gypsies than with backpackers.

In Southern Finland and the Åland Islands, the forests and grassy areas are full of ticks, so wear clothing that covers your legs and check occasionally that you haven't been bitten.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Culture ==

Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].  Hitching in Finland is much more difficult/impossible in late autumn and winter simply because people do not stop.

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is [http://www.liftari.org/groups/in-english/ an English section].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>6nlaxo5f7su252lu3k9t1qutgi4i0ii</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>55220</id>
      <parentid>55212</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-02T16:29:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7175">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps and [[petrol stations|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers not obeying this rule and taking hitchhikers on board have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.


__TOC__

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

=== Other areas ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Border crossing ==

There are no border checkpoints between Finland, Sweden and Norway. You can cross these borders without stopping. 

* [[Torfyanovka-Valimaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]
* [[Brusnichnoe-Nuijamaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

=== From/to Sweden ===

Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season. 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.


=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Sleeping ==

[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[motorways]].]]

Like the other Nordic countries, Finland has everyman's right (''jokamiehenoikeus'') meaning that it is allowed to camp on any land provided that you stay a few hundred metres from houses, do not start a fire, and do not more than one night in any given place. While everyman's right technically doesn't apply inside of towns and cities, there is usually no problem with camping in isolated areas of parks -- even if police see you, they are more concerned with gypsies than with backpackers.

In Southern Finland and the Åland Islands, the forests and grassy areas are full of ticks, so wear clothing that covers your legs and check occasionally that you haven't been bitten.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Culture ==

Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].  Hitching in Finland is much more difficult/impossible in late autumn and winter simply because people do not stop.

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is [http://www.liftari.org/groups/in-english/ an English section].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>3039wxcwbgl12tjrolxn0e2kuh2jigz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>55221</id>
      <parentid>55220</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-02T16:30:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7226">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol stations|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.


__TOC__

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

=== Other areas ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Border crossing ==

There are no border checkpoints between Finland, Sweden and Norway. You can cross these borders without stopping. 

* [[Torfyanovka-Valimaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]
* [[Brusnichnoe-Nuijamaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

=== From/to Sweden ===

Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season. 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.


=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Sleeping ==

[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[motorways]].]]

Like the other Nordic countries, Finland has everyman's right (''jokamiehenoikeus'') meaning that it is allowed to camp on any land provided that you stay a few hundred metres from houses, do not start a fire, and do not more than one night in any given place. While everyman's right technically doesn't apply inside of towns and cities, there is usually no problem with camping in isolated areas of parks -- even if police see you, they are more concerned with gypsies than with backpackers.

In Southern Finland and the Åland Islands, the forests and grassy areas are full of ticks, so wear clothing that covers your legs and check occasionally that you haven't been bitten.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Culture ==

Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].  Hitching in Finland is much more difficult/impossible in late autumn and winter simply because people do not stop.

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is [http://www.liftari.org/groups/in-english/ an English section].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>gf7y2vyv8jos8sl87uff1egahw3kaxl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>55781</id>
      <parentid>55221</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-08T01:12:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7275">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.


__TOC__

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

=== Other areas ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Border crossing ==

There are no border checkpoints between Finland, Sweden and Norway. You can cross these borders without stopping. 

* [[Torfyanovka-Valimaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]
* [[Brusnichnoe-Nuijamaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

=== From/to Sweden ===

Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Åland Islands|Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland Islands|Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season. 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.


=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Sleeping ==

[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highway|motorways]].]]

Like the other Nordic countries, Finland has everyman's right (''jokamiehenoikeus'') meaning that it is allowed to camp on any land provided that you stay a few hundred metres from houses, do not start a fire, and do not more than one night in any given place. While everyman's right technically doesn't apply inside of towns and cities, there is usually no problem with camping in isolated areas of parks -- even if police see you, they are more concerned with gypsies than with backpackers.

In Southern Finland and the Åland Islands, the forests and grassy areas are full of ticks, so wear clothing that covers your legs and check occasionally that you haven't been bitten.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Culture ==

Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].  Hitching in Finland is much more difficult/impossible in late autumn and winter simply because people do not stop.

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is [http://www.liftari.org/groups/in-english/ an English section].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>r5lokr3bsutiqmt2s3zl5c6wf1l0nct</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>56409</id>
      <parentid>55781</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-09T01:03:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7279">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.


__TOC__

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

=== Other areas ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Border crossing ==

There are no border checkpoints between Finland, Sweden and Norway. You can cross these borders without stopping. 

* [[Torfyanovka-Valimaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]
* [[Brusnichnoe-Nuijamaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

=== From/to Sweden ===

Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Åland Islands|Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland Islands|Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season. 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.


=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Sleeping ==

[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highway|motorways]].]]

Like the other Nordic countries, Finland has everyman's right (''jokamiehenoikeus'') meaning that it is allowed to camp on any land provided that you stay a few hundred metres from houses, do not start a fire, and do not more than one night in any given place. While everyman's right technically doesn't apply inside of towns and cities, there is usually no problem with camping in isolated areas of parks -- even if police see you, they are more concerned with gypsies than with backpackers.

In Southern Finland and the Åland Islands, the forests and grassy areas are full of ticks, so wear clothing that covers your legs and check occasionally that you haven't been bitten.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Culture ==

Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].  Hitching in Finland is much more difficult/impossible in late autumn and winter simply because people do not stop.

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is [http://www.liftari.org/groups/in-english/ an English section].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>a57278jrgg129iagy48xcl1an7astao</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>63607</id>
      <parentid>56409</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-09-06T12:40:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Astikain</username>
        <id>2493</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7600">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.

*I disagree with most of the above. See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page].--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:40, 6 September 2012 (CEST)


__TOC__

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

=== Other areas ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Border crossing ==

There are no border checkpoints between Finland, Sweden and Norway. You can cross these borders without stopping. 

* [[Torfyanovka-Valimaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]
* [[Brusnichnoe-Nuijamaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

=== From/to Sweden ===

Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Åland Islands|Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland Islands|Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season. 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.


=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

You can hitch sail and motor boats from Tallinn and Pirita marinas during the summer. Especially Sunday mornings are good when Finns return from their weekend trips.

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Sleeping ==

[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highway|motorways]].]]

Like the other Nordic countries, Finland has everyman's right (''jokamiehenoikeus'') meaning that it is allowed to camp on any land provided that you stay a few hundred metres from houses, do not start a fire, and do not more than one night in any given place. While everyman's right technically doesn't apply inside of towns and cities, there is usually no problem with camping in isolated areas of parks -- even if police see you, they are more concerned with gypsies than with backpackers.

In Southern Finland and the Åland Islands, the forests and grassy areas are full of ticks, so wear clothing that covers your legs and check occasionally that you haven't been bitten.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Culture ==

Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].  Hitching in Finland is much more difficult/impossible in late autumn and winter simply because people do not stop.

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is [http://www.liftari.org/groups/in-english/ an English section].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>0ucs078t4wu4tc2okkb1wjlowmlf1fi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>63608</id>
      <parentid>63607</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-09-06T12:42:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Astikain</username>
        <id>2493</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7742">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.

*I disagree with most of the above. See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page].--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:40, 6 September 2012 (CEST)


__TOC__

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

=== Other areas ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Border crossing ==

There are no border checkpoints between Finland, Sweden and Norway. You can cross these borders without stopping. 

* [[Torfyanovka-Valimaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]
* [[Brusnichnoe-Nuijamaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

=== From/to Sweden ===

Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Åland Islands|Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland Islands|Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season. 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.


=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

You can hitch sail and motor boats from Tallinn and Pirita marinas during the summer. Especially Sunday mornings are good when Finns return from their weekend trips.

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Sleeping ==

[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highway|motorways]].]]

Like the other Nordic countries, Finland has everyman's right (''jokamiehenoikeus'') meaning that it is allowed to camp on any land provided that you stay a few hundred metres from houses, do not start a fire, and do not more than one night in any given place. While everyman's right technically doesn't apply inside of towns and cities, there is usually no problem with camping in isolated areas of parks -- even if police see you, they are more concerned with gypsies than with backpackers.

In Southern Finland and the Åland Islands, the forests and grassy areas are full of ticks, so wear clothing that covers your legs and check occasionally that you haven't been bitten.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Culture ==

Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].  Hitching in Finland is much more difficult/impossible in late autumn and winter simply because people do not stop. -&gt; I STRONGLY DISAGREE! (See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page])--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:42, 6 September 2012 (CEST)

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is [http://www.liftari.org/groups/in-english/ an English section].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>k20zqyfx50k2m23o4gk7euuoxbuf2in</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>67425</id>
      <parentid>63608</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-11-04T18:25:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Karri</username>
        <id>7081</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7846">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.

*I disagree with most of the above. See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page].--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:40, 6 September 2012 (CEST)


__TOC__

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

=== Other areas ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Border crossing ==

There are no border checkpoints between Finland, Sweden and Norway. You can cross these borders without stopping. 

* [[Torfyanovka-Valimaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]
* [[Brusnichnoe-Nuijamaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

=== From/to Sweden ===

Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Åland Islands|Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland Islands|Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season. 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.


=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

You can hitch sail and motor boats from Tallinn and Pirita marinas during the summer. Especially Sunday mornings are good when Finns return from their weekend trips.

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Sleeping ==

[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highway|motorways]].]]

Like the other Nordic countries, Finland has everyman's right (''jokamiehenoikeus'') meaning that it is allowed to camp on any land provided that you stay a few hundred metres from houses, do not start a fire, and do not more than one night in any given place. While everyman's right technically doesn't apply inside of towns and cities, there is usually no problem with camping in isolated areas of parks -- even if police see you, they are more concerned with gypsies than with backpackers.

In Southern Finland and the Åland Islands, the forests and grassy areas are full of ticks, so wear clothing that covers your legs and check occasionally that you haven't been bitten.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Culture ==

Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].  Hitching in Finland is much more difficult/impossible in late autumn and winter simply because people do not stop. -&gt; I STRONGLY DISAGREE! (See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page])--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:42, 6 September 2012 (CEST)

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is [http://www.liftari.org/groups/in-english/ an English section].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
*[http://www.kyydit.net Kyydit.net] - [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Rideshare rideshare] network for Finland
[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>bum2v7o1y4uaeuwbihvhlcfwnmp8dbb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>67426</id>
      <parentid>67425</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-11-04T18:26:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Karri</username>
        <id>7081</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7814">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.

*I disagree with most of the above. See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page].--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:40, 6 September 2012 (CEST)


__TOC__

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

=== Other areas ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Border crossing ==

There are no border checkpoints between Finland, Sweden and Norway. You can cross these borders without stopping. 

* [[Torfyanovka-Valimaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]
* [[Brusnichnoe-Nuijamaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

=== From/to Sweden ===

Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Åland Islands|Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland Islands|Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season. 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.


=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

You can hitch sail and motor boats from Tallinn and Pirita marinas during the summer. Especially Sunday mornings are good when Finns return from their weekend trips.

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Sleeping ==

[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highway|motorways]].]]

Like the other Nordic countries, Finland has everyman's right (''jokamiehenoikeus'') meaning that it is allowed to camp on any land provided that you stay a few hundred metres from houses, do not start a fire, and do not more than one night in any given place. While everyman's right technically doesn't apply inside of towns and cities, there is usually no problem with camping in isolated areas of parks -- even if police see you, they are more concerned with gypsies than with backpackers.

In Southern Finland and the Åland Islands, the forests and grassy areas are full of ticks, so wear clothing that covers your legs and check occasionally that you haven't been bitten.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Culture ==

Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].  Hitching in Finland is much more difficult/impossible in late autumn and winter simply because people do not stop. -&gt; I STRONGLY DISAGREE! (See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page])--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:42, 6 September 2012 (CEST)

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is [http://www.liftari.org/groups/in-english/ an English section].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
*[http://www.kyydit.net Kyydit.net] - [[rideshare]] network for Finland
[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>df8xj5iivbu98p2mwr54juvaxceao7i</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>67430</id>
      <parentid>67426</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-11-04T23:14:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7742">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.

*I disagree with most of the above. See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page].--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:40, 6 September 2012 (CEST)


__TOC__

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

=== Other areas ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Border crossing ==

There are no border checkpoints between Finland, Sweden and Norway. You can cross these borders without stopping. 

* [[Torfyanovka-Valimaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]
* [[Brusnichnoe-Nuijamaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

=== From/to Sweden ===

Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Åland Islands|Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland Islands|Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season. 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.


=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

You can hitch sail and motor boats from Tallinn and Pirita marinas during the summer. Especially Sunday mornings are good when Finns return from their weekend trips.

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Sleeping ==

[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highway|motorways]].]]

Like the other Nordic countries, Finland has everyman's right (''jokamiehenoikeus'') meaning that it is allowed to camp on any land provided that you stay a few hundred metres from houses, do not start a fire, and do not more than one night in any given place. While everyman's right technically doesn't apply inside of towns and cities, there is usually no problem with camping in isolated areas of parks -- even if police see you, they are more concerned with gypsies than with backpackers.

In Southern Finland and the Åland Islands, the forests and grassy areas are full of ticks, so wear clothing that covers your legs and check occasionally that you haven't been bitten.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Culture ==

Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].  Hitching in Finland is much more difficult/impossible in late autumn and winter simply because people do not stop. -&gt; I STRONGLY DISAGREE! (See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page])--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:42, 6 September 2012 (CEST)

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is [http://www.liftari.org/groups/in-english/ an English section].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>k20zqyfx50k2m23o4gk7euuoxbuf2in</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68093</id>
      <parentid>67430</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-01-14T09:24:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7814">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.

*I disagree with most of the above. See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page].--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:40, 6 September 2012 (CEST)


__TOC__

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

=== Other areas ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Border crossing ==

There are no border checkpoints between Finland, Sweden and Norway. You can cross these borders without stopping. 

* [[Torfyanovka-Valimaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]
* [[Brusnichnoe-Nuijamaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

=== From/to Sweden ===

Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Åland Islands|Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland Islands|Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season. 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.


=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are several daily boats from Helsinki to [[Tallinn]]. It takes usually 1-3 hours, costs about 20 euros (the cheapest one, without a cabin).

You can hitch sail and motor boats from Tallinn and Pirita marinas during the summer. Especially Sunday mornings are good when Finns return from their weekend trips.

Links:

* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/fi/trips/routeTrips/ ''Tallink &amp; Silja Line''], ferries to Estonia (only in Finnish/Swedish)
* [http://www.vikingline.fi/index.asp?lang=en ''Viking Line''] 
* [http://www.eckeroline.fi/en/default.aspx ''Eckerö Line'']
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/ ''Linda Line'']

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Sleeping ==

[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highway|motorways]].]]

Like the other Nordic countries, Finland has everyman's right (''jokamiehenoikeus'') meaning that it is allowed to camp on any land provided that you stay a few hundred metres from houses, do not start a fire, and do not more than one night in any given place. While everyman's right technically doesn't apply inside of towns and cities, there is usually no problem with camping in isolated areas of parks -- even if police see you, they are more concerned with gypsies than with backpackers.

In Southern Finland and the Åland Islands, the forests and grassy areas are full of ticks, so wear clothing that covers your legs and check occasionally that you haven't been bitten.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Culture ==

Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].  Hitching in Finland is much more difficult/impossible in late autumn and winter simply because people do not stop. -&gt; I STRONGLY DISAGREE! (See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page])--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:42, 6 September 2012 (CEST)

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is [http://www.liftari.org/groups/in-english/ an English section].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
*[http://www.kyydit.net Kyydit.net] - [[rideshare]] network for Finland
[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>df8xj5iivbu98p2mwr54juvaxceao7i</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69637</id>
      <parentid>68093</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-05-19T09:45:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7790">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.

*I disagree with most of the above. See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page].--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:40, 6 September 2012 (CEST)


__TOC__

=== Cities ===
* [[Espoo]]
* [[Hämeenlinna]]
* [[Helsinki]]
* [[Joensuu]]
* [[Jyväskylä]]
* [[Kuopio]]
* [[Lahti]]
* [[Oulu]]
* [[Pori]]
* [[Seinäjoki]]
* [[Tampere]]
* [[Turku]]

=== Other areas ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Border crossing ==

There are no border checkpoints between Finland, Sweden and Norway. You can cross these borders without stopping. 

* [[Torfyanovka-Valimaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]
* [[Brusnichnoe-Nuijamaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

=== From/to Sweden ===

Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Åland Islands|Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland Islands|Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season. 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.


=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are many daily ferries from [[Helsinki]] to [[Tallinn]]. It takes 1-3 hours (most ferries 2h), costs about 20-50 euros (the cheapest tickets you should try to book in advance).

You can hitch sail and motor boats from Tallinn and Pirita marinas during the summer. Especially Sunday mornings are good when Finns return from their weekend trips.

Cars pay also per passanger.

====Ferry companies====
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/ Tallink &amp; Silja Line]
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ Viking Line] 
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en Eckerö Line]
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/en/ Linda Line]

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers:

* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Sleeping ==

[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highway|motorways]].]]

Like the other Nordic countries, Finland has everyman's right (''jokamiehenoikeus'') meaning that it is allowed to camp on any land provided that you stay a few hundred metres from houses, do not start a fire, and do not more than one night in any given place. While everyman's right technically doesn't apply inside of towns and cities, there is usually no problem with camping in isolated areas of parks -- even if police see you, they are more concerned with gypsies than with backpackers.

In Southern Finland and the Åland Islands, the forests and grassy areas are full of ticks, so wear clothing that covers your legs and check occasionally that you haven't been bitten.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Culture ==

Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time, when local hitchers get inspired by European backpackers heading to [[Lapland]].  Hitching in Finland is much more difficult/impossible in late autumn and winter simply because people do not stop. -&gt; I STRONGLY DISAGREE! (See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page])--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:42, 6 September 2012 (CEST)

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* [http://www.liftari.org/ Finnish hitchhiker's club] − the site is mostly in Finnish but there is [http://www.liftari.org/groups/in-english/ an English section].
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
*[http://www.kyydit.net Kyydit.net] - [[rideshare]] network for Finland
[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>6ronj9ov6m5lwc97ndf3tdg3lrgxawk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69642</id>
      <parentid>69637</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-05-19T10:47:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7309">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.

*I disagree with most of the above. See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page].--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:40, 6 September 2012 (CEST)

__TOC__

=== Regions ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Border crossing ==

There are no border checkpoints between Finland, Sweden and Norway. You can cross these borders without stopping. 

* [[Torfyanovka-Valimaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]
* [[Brusnichnoe-Nuijamaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Åland Islands|Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland Islands|Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season. 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.


=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are many daily ferries from [[Helsinki]] to [[Tallinn]]. It takes 1-3 hours (most ferries 2h), costs about 20-50 euros (the cheapest tickets you should try to book in advance).

You can hitch sail and motor boats from Tallinn and Pirita marinas during the summer. Especially Sunday mornings are good when Finns return from their weekend trips.

Cars pay also per passanger so it's not possible to hitch a car to the ferry for free.

====Ferry companies====
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/ Tallink &amp; Silja Line]
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ Viking Line] 
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en Eckerö Line]
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/en/ Linda Line]

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

====Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers====
* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Sleeping ==
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highway|motorways]].]]

Like the other Nordic countries, Finland has everyman's right (''jokamiehenoikeus'') meaning that it is allowed to camp on any land provided that you stay a few hundred metres from houses, do not start a fire, and do not more than one night in any given place. While everyman's right technically doesn't apply inside of towns and cities, there is usually no problem with camping in isolated areas of parks -- even if police see you, they are more concerned with gypsies than with backpackers.

In Southern Finland and the Åland Islands, the forests and grassy areas are full of ticks, so wear clothing that covers your legs and check occasionally that you haven't been bitten.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time around music festivals. Hitching in Finland might be difficult during the [[winter]] time because lack of daylight.

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
*[http://www.kyydit.net Kyydit.net] - [[rideshare]] network for Finland

{{Highways FI}}
{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>kjo26qr56vuutwaalq5mgmtx75zra32</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69646</id>
      <parentid>69642</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-05-19T10:50:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7294">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.

*I disagree with most of the above. See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page].--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:40, 6 September 2012 (CEST)

__TOC__

=== Regions ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Border crossing ==

There are no border checkpoints between Finland, Sweden and Norway. You can cross these borders without stopping. 

* [[Torfyanovka-Valimaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]
* [[Brusnichnoe-Nuijamaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Åland Islands|Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland Islands|Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season. 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.


=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are many daily ferries from [[Helsinki]] to [[Tallinn]]. It takes 1-3 hours (most ferries 2h), costs about 20-50 euros (the cheapest tickets you should try to book in advance).

You can hitch sail and motor boats from Tallinn and Pirita marinas during the summer. Especially Sunday mornings are good when Finns return from their weekend trips.

Cars pay also per passanger so it's not possible to hitch a car to the ferry for free.

====Ferry companies====
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/ Tallink &amp; Silja Line]
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ Viking Line] 
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en Eckerö Line]
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/en/ Linda Line]

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

====Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers====
* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Sleeping ==
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highway|motorways]].]]

Like the other Nordic countries, Finland has everyman's right (''jokamiehenoikeus'') meaning that it is allowed to camp on any land provided that you stay a few hundred metres from houses, do not start a fire, and do not more than one night in any given place. While everyman's right technically doesn't apply inside of towns and cities, there is usually no problem with camping in isolated areas of parks -- even if police see you, they are more concerned with gypsies than with backpackers.

In Southern Finland and the Åland Islands, the forests and grassy areas are full of ticks, so wear clothing that covers your legs and check occasionally that you haven't been bitten.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time around music festivals. Hitching in Finland might be difficult during the [[winter]] time because lack of daylight.

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
*[http://www.kyydit.net Kyydit.net] - [[rideshare]] network for Finland


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>kjou7zq014h6k63llef00kdbq476l38</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69985</id>
      <parentid>69646</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-06-04T20:49:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Podz</username>
        <id>3951</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7599">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.

*I disagree with most of the above. See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page].--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:40, 6 September 2012 (CEST)

__TOC__

=== Regions ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Border crossing ==

There are no border checkpoints between Finland, Sweden and Norway. You can cross these borders without stopping. 

* [[Torfyanovka-Valimaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]
* [[Brusnichnoe-Nuijamaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Åland Islands|Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland Islands|Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season. 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

There are also ferries crossing the Bothnic Gulf from the Finnish city of [[Vaasa]] to the Swedish city of [[Umea]] and vice-versa. The ferry goes eight times a week (see the schedule [http://www.umeavasa.com/en/index.php# here]). Crossing will cost you around 30 euro but it is a quite comfortable trip.

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are many daily ferries from [[Helsinki]] to [[Tallinn]]. It takes 1-3 hours (most ferries 2h), costs about 20-50 euros (the cheapest tickets you should try to book in advance).

You can hitch sail and motor boats from Tallinn and Pirita marinas during the summer. Especially Sunday mornings are good when Finns return from their weekend trips.

Cars pay also per passanger so it's not possible to hitch a car to the ferry for free.

====Ferry companies====
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/ Tallink &amp; Silja Line]
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ Viking Line] 
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en Eckerö Line]
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/en/ Linda Line]

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

====Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers====
* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Sleeping ==
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highway|motorways]].]]

Like the other Nordic countries, Finland has everyman's right (''jokamiehenoikeus'') meaning that it is allowed to camp on any land provided that you stay a few hundred metres from houses, do not start a fire, and do not more than one night in any given place. While everyman's right technically doesn't apply inside of towns and cities, there is usually no problem with camping in isolated areas of parks -- even if police see you, they are more concerned with gypsies than with backpackers.

In Southern Finland and the Åland Islands, the forests and grassy areas are full of ticks, so wear clothing that covers your legs and check occasionally that you haven't been bitten.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time around music festivals. Hitching in Finland might be difficult during the [[winter]] time because lack of daylight.

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
*[http://www.kyydit.net Kyydit.net] - [[rideshare]] network for Finland


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>5590l3stsif7x1ldz6yuovrcaudmvnw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70900</id>
      <parentid>69985</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-08-16T21:44:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Antik</username>
        <id>14424</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7653">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.

*I disagree with most of the above. See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page].--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:40, 6 September 2012 (CEST)

__TOC__

=== Regions ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Border crossing ==

There are no border checkpoints between Finland, Sweden and Norway. You can cross these borders without stopping. 

* [[Torfyanovka-Valimaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]
* [[Brusnichnoe-Nuijamaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Åland Islands|Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland Islands|Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season and special offers can put the price belowe 10 euros). 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

There are also ferries crossing the Bothnic Gulf from the Finnish city of [[Vaasa]] to the Swedish city of [[Umea]] and vice-versa. The ferry goes eight times a week (see the schedule [http://www.umeavasa.com/en/index.php# here]). Crossing will cost you around 30 euro but it is a quite comfortable trip.

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are many daily ferries from [[Helsinki]] to [[Tallinn]]. It takes 1-3 hours (most ferries 2h), costs about 20-50 euros (the cheapest tickets you should try to book in advance).

You can hitch sail and motor boats from Tallinn and Pirita marinas during the summer. Especially Sunday mornings are good when Finns return from their weekend trips.

Cars pay also per passanger so it's not possible to hitch a car to the ferry for free.

====Ferry companies====
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/ Tallink &amp; Silja Line]
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ Viking Line] 
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en Eckerö Line]
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/en/ Linda Line]

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

====Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers====
* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Sleeping ==
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highway|motorways]].]]

Like the other Nordic countries, Finland has everyman's right (''jokamiehenoikeus'') meaning that it is allowed to camp on any land provided that you stay a few hundred metres from houses, do not start a fire, and do not more than one night in any given place. While everyman's right technically doesn't apply inside of towns and cities, there is usually no problem with camping in isolated areas of parks -- even if police see you, they are more concerned with gypsies than with backpackers.

In Southern Finland and the Åland Islands, the forests and grassy areas are full of ticks, so wear clothing that covers your legs and check occasionally that you haven't been bitten.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time around music festivals. Hitching in Finland might be difficult during the [[winter]] time because lack of daylight.

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
*[http://www.kyydit.net Kyydit.net] - [[rideshare]] network for Finland


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>eokpo3tm4ugz5hst02nk5wy7minya8q</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70901</id>
      <parentid>70900</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-08-16T21:55:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Antik</username>
        <id>14424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8153">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.

*I disagree with most of the above. See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page].--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:40, 6 September 2012 (CEST)

__TOC__

=== Regions ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Border crossing ==

There are no border checkpoints between Finland, Sweden and Norway. You can cross these borders without stopping. 

* [[Torfyanovka-Valimaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]
* [[Brusnichnoe-Nuijamaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Åland Islands|Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland Islands|Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. It is possible to buy a deck ticket to Maarianhamina only and yet ride the whole way as nobody is checking. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season and special offers can put the price belowe 10 euros). 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

A decidedly more exciting option is to do island hopping on the small  [http://www.alandstrafiken.ax/en ''car ferries''] running from Turku to Maarianhamina. For footpassengers this option is free. You can continue to Sweden with one of the above mentioned companies or [https://www.eckeroline.fi/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/TopCategoriesDisplay?catalogId=10001&amp;storeId=10151 "Eckerö Lines"]

There are also ferries crossing the Bothnic Gulf from the Finnish city of [[Vaasa]] to the Swedish city of [[Umea]] and vice-versa. The ferry goes eight times a week (see the schedule [http://www.umeavasa.com/en/index.php# here]). Crossing will cost you around 30 euro but it is a quite comfortable trip.

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are many daily ferries from [[Helsinki]] to [[Tallinn]]. It takes 1-3 hours (most ferries 2h), costs about 20-50 euros (the cheapest tickets you should try to book in advance).

You can hitch sail and motor boats from Tallinn and Pirita marinas during the summer. Especially Sunday mornings are good when Finns return from their weekend trips.

Cars pay also per passanger so it's not possible to hitch a car to the ferry for free.

====Ferry companies====
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/ Tallink &amp; Silja Line]
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ Viking Line] 
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en Eckerö Line]
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/en/ Linda Line]

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

====Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers====
* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Sleeping ==
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highway|motorways]].]]

Like the other Nordic countries, Finland has everyman's right (''jokamiehenoikeus'') meaning that it is allowed to camp on any land provided that you stay a few hundred metres from houses, do not start a fire, and do not more than one night in any given place. While everyman's right technically doesn't apply inside of towns and cities, there is usually no problem with camping in isolated areas of parks -- even if police see you, they are more concerned with gypsies than with backpackers.

In Southern Finland and the Åland Islands, the forests and grassy areas are full of ticks, so wear clothing that covers your legs and check occasionally that you haven't been bitten.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time around music festivals. Hitching in Finland might be difficult during the [[winter]] time because lack of daylight.

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
*[http://www.kyydit.net Kyydit.net] - [[rideshare]] network for Finland


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>i87cono3r4xcrei35jjegjkdprvj2bz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70905</id>
      <parentid>70901</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-08-16T22:27:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Antik</username>
        <id>14424</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8357">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.

*I disagree with most of the above. See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page].--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:40, 6 September 2012 (CEST)

__TOC__

=== Regions ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Border crossing ==

There are no border checkpoints between Finland, Sweden and Norway. You can cross these borders without stopping. 

* [[Torfyanovka-Valimaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]
* [[Brusnichnoe-Nuijamaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Åland Islands|Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland Islands|Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. It is possible to buy a deck ticket to Maarianhamina only and yet ride the whole way as nobody is checking. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season and special offers can put the price belowe 10 euros). 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

A decidedly more exciting option is to do island hopping on the small  [http://www.alandstrafiken.ax/en ''car ferries''] running from Turku to Maarianhamina. For footpassengers this option is free. You can continue to Sweden with one of the above mentioned companies or [https://www.eckeroline.fi/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/TopCategoriesDisplay?catalogId=10001&amp;storeId=10151 "Eckerö Lines"]

There are also ferries crossing the Bothnic Gulf from the Finnish city of [[Vaasa]] to the Swedish city of [[Umea]] and vice-versa. The ferry goes eight times a week (see the schedule [http://www.umeavasa.com/en/index.php# here]). Crossing will cost you around 30 euro but it is a quite comfortable trip.

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are many daily ferries from [[Helsinki]] to [[Tallinn]]. It takes 1-3 hours (most ferries 2h), costs about 20-50 euros (the cheapest tickets you should try to book in advance).

You can hitch sail and motor boats from Tallinn and Pirita marinas during the summer. Especially Sunday mornings are good when Finns return from their weekend trips.

Cars pay also per passanger so it's not possible to hitch a car to the ferry for free.

====Ferry companies====
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/ Tallink &amp; Silja Line]
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ Viking Line] 
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en Eckerö Line]
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/en/ Linda Line]

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

====Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers====
* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Sleeping ==
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highway|motorways]].]]

Like the other Nordic countries, Finland has everyman's right (''jokamiehenoikeus'') meaning that it is allowed to camp on any land provided that you stay a few hundred metres from houses, do not start a fire, and do not more than one night in any given place. While everyman's right technically doesn't apply inside of towns and cities, there is usually no problem with camping in isolated areas of parks -- even if police see you, they are more concerned with gypsies than with backpackers.

In Southern Finland and the Åland Islands, the forests and grassy areas are full of ticks, so wear clothing that covers your legs and check occasionally that you haven't been bitten.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time around music festivals. Hitching in Finland might be difficult during the [[winter]] time because lack of daylight.

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://www.hitchbase.com/orte.php?LANG=eng&amp;l_id=66 Hitchbase] page for Finland with somewhat outdated tips for locations
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
*[http://www.kyydit.net Kyydit.net] - [[rideshare]] network for Finland
*[http://www.kimppa.net Kimppa.net] - another [[rideshare]] network for Finland


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>ku6f5ky1v04nvigrzzqwnw2fjw26m5m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72374</id>
      <parentid>70905</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-12T21:28:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robyt</username>
        <id>9747</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8375">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.

*I disagree with most of the above. See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page].--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:40, 6 September 2012 (CEST)

__TOC__

=== Regions ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Border crossing ==

There are no border checkpoints between Finland, Sweden and Norway. You can cross these borders without stopping. 

* [[Torfyanovka-Valimaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]
* [[Brusnichnoe-Nuijamaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Åland Islands|Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland Islands|Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. It is possible to buy a deck ticket to Maarianhamina only and yet ride the whole way as nobody is checking. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season and special offers can put the price belowe 10 euros). 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

A decidedly more exciting option is to do island hopping on the small  [http://www.alandstrafiken.ax/en ''car ferries''] running from Turku to Maarianhamina. For footpassengers this option is free. You can continue to Sweden with one of the above mentioned companies or [https://www.eckeroline.fi/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/TopCategoriesDisplay?catalogId=10001&amp;storeId=10151 "Eckerö Lines"]

There are also ferries crossing the Bothnic Gulf from the Finnish city of [[Vaasa]] to the Swedish city of [[Umea]] and vice-versa. The ferry goes eight times a week (see the schedule [http://www.umeavasa.com/en/index.php# here]). Crossing will cost you around 30 euro but it is a quite comfortable trip.

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are many daily ferries from [[Helsinki]] to [[Tallinn]]. It takes 1-3 hours (most ferries 2h), costs about 20-50 euros (the cheapest tickets you should try to book in advance).

You can hitch sail and motor boats from Tallinn and Pirita marinas during the summer. Especially Sunday mornings are good when Finns return from their weekend trips.

Cars pay also per passanger so it's not possible to hitch a car to the ferry for free.

====Ferry companies====
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/ Tallink &amp; Silja Line]
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ Viking Line] 
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en Eckerö Line]
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/en/ Linda Line]

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

====Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers====
* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Sleeping ==
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highway|motorways]].]]

Like the other Nordic countries, Finland has everyman's right (''jokamiehenoikeus'') meaning that it is allowed to camp on any land provided that you stay a few hundred metres from houses, do not start a fire, and do not more than one night in any given place. While everyman's right technically doesn't apply inside of towns and cities, there is usually no problem with camping in isolated areas of parks -- even if police see you, they are more concerned with gypsies than with backpackers.

In Southern Finland and the Åland Islands, the forests and grassy areas are full of ticks, so wear clothing that covers your legs and check occasionally that you haven't been bitten.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time around music festivals. Hitching in Finland might be difficult during the [[winter]] time because lack of daylight.

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://www.hitchbase.com/orte.php?LANG=eng&amp;l_id=66 Hitchbase] page for Finland with somewhat outdated tips for locations
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
*[http://www.kyydit.net Kyydit.net] - [[rideshare]] network for Finland
*[http://www.kimppa.net Kimppa.net] - another [[rideshare]] network for Finland


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]
[[nomad:Finland]]</text>
      <sha1>jyxwyp6ok36ots020xl0kxcm60l8uql</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>74255</id>
      <parentid>72374</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-02-25T07:04:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8450">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.

*I disagree with most of the above. See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page].--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:40, 6 September 2012 (CEST)

__TOC__

=== Regions ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Border crossing ==

There are no border checkpoints between Finland, Sweden and Norway. You can cross these borders without stopping. 

* [[Torfyanovka-Valimaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]
* [[Brusnichnoe-Nuijamaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Åland Islands|Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland Islands|Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. It is possible to buy a deck ticket to Maarianhamina only and yet ride the whole way as nobody is checking. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season and special offers can put the price belowe 10 euros). 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

A decidedly more exciting option is to do island hopping on the small  [http://www.alandstrafiken.ax/en ''car ferries''] running from Turku to Maarianhamina. For footpassengers this option is free. You can continue to Sweden with one of the above mentioned companies or [https://www.eckeroline.fi/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/TopCategoriesDisplay?catalogId=10001&amp;storeId=10151 "Eckerö Lines"]

There are also ferries crossing the Bothnic Gulf from the Finnish city of [[Vaasa]] to the Swedish city of [[Umea]] and vice-versa. The ferry goes eight times a week (see the schedule [http://www.umeavasa.com/en/index.php# here]). Crossing will cost you around 30 euro but it is a quite comfortable trip.

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are many daily ferries from [[Helsinki]] to [[Tallinn]]. It takes 1-3 hours (most ferries 2h), costs about 20-50 euros (the cheapest tickets you should try to book in advance).

You can hitch sail and motor boats from Tallinn and Pirita marinas during the summer. Especially Sunday mornings are good when Finns return from their weekend trips.

Cars pay also per passanger so it's not possible to hitch a car to the ferry for free.

====Ferry companies====
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/ Tallink &amp; Silja Line]
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ Viking Line] 
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en Eckerö Line]
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/en/ Linda Line]

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

====Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers====
* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Sleeping ==
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highway|motorways]].]]

Like the other Nordic countries, Finland has everyman's right (''jokamiehenoikeus'') meaning that it is allowed to camp on any land provided that you stay a few hundred metres from houses, do not start a fire, and do not more than one night in any given place. While everyman's right technically doesn't apply inside of towns and cities, there is usually no problem with camping in isolated areas of parks -- even if police see you, they are more concerned with gypsies than with backpackers.

In Southern Finland and the Åland Islands, the forests and grassy areas are full of ticks, so wear clothing that covers your legs and check occasionally that you haven't been bitten.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time around music festivals. Hitching in Finland might be difficult during the [[winter]] time because lack of daylight.

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/liftarit/ Finnish hitchhikers FB group]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://www.hitchbase.com/orte.php?LANG=eng&amp;l_id=66 Hitchbase] page for Finland with somewhat outdated tips for locations
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
*[http://www.kyydit.net Kyydit.net] - [[rideshare]] network for Finland
*[http://www.kimppa.net Kimppa.net] - another [[rideshare]] network for Finland


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]
[[nomad:Finland]]</text>
      <sha1>jqbxuacflhpd635zw6fvj5ppht3wgiq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>78659</id>
      <parentid>74255</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-01-31T16:01:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8473">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.

*I disagree with most of the above. See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page].--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:40, 6 September 2012 (CEST)

__TOC__

=== Regions ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Border crossing ==

There are no border checkpoints between Finland, Sweden and Norway. You can cross these borders without stopping. 

* [[Torfyanovka-Valimaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]
* [[Brusnichnoe-Nuijamaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Åland Islands|Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland Islands|Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. It is possible to buy a deck ticket to Maarianhamina only and yet ride the whole way as nobody is checking. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season and special offers can put the price belowe 10 euros). 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

A decidedly more exciting option is to do island hopping on the small  [http://www.alandstrafiken.ax/en ''car ferries''] running from Turku to Maarianhamina. For footpassengers this option is free. You can continue to Sweden with one of the above mentioned companies or [https://www.eckeroline.fi/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/TopCategoriesDisplay?catalogId=10001&amp;storeId=10151 "Eckerö Lines"]

There are also ferries crossing the Bothnic Gulf from the Finnish city of [[Vaasa]] to the Swedish city of [[Umea]] and vice-versa. The ferry goes eight times a week (see the schedule [http://www.umeavasa.com/en/index.php# here]). Crossing will cost you around 30 euro but it is a quite comfortable trip.

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are many daily ferries from [[Helsinki]] to [[Tallinn]]. It takes 1-3 hours (most ferries 2h), costs about 20-50 euros (the cheapest tickets you should try to book in advance).

You can hitch sail and motor boats from Tallinn and Pirita marinas during the summer. Especially Sunday mornings are good when Finns return from their weekend trips.

Cars pay also per passanger so it's not possible to hitch a car to the ferry for free.

====Ferry companies====
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/ Tallink &amp; Silja Line]
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ Viking Line] 
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en Eckerö Line]
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/en/ Linda Line]

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

====Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers====
* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Sleeping ==
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highway|motorways]].]]

Like the other Nordic countries, Finland has everyman's right (''jokamiehenoikeus'') meaning that it is allowed to camp on any land provided that you stay a few hundred metres from houses, do not start a fire, and do not more than one night in any given place. While everyman's right technically doesn't apply inside of towns and cities, there is usually no problem with camping in isolated areas of parks -- even if police see you, they are more concerned with gypsies than with backpackers.

In Southern Finland and the Åland Islands, the forests and grassy areas are full of ticks, so wear clothing that covers your legs and check occasionally that you haven't been bitten.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time around music festivals. Hitching in Finland might be difficult during the [[winter]] time because lack of daylight.

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/liftarit/ Finnish hitchhikers FB group]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://www.hitchbase.com/orte.php?LANG=eng&amp;l_id=66 Hitchbase] page for Finland with somewhat outdated tips for locations
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
*[http://www.kyydit.net Kyydit.net] - [[rideshare]] network for Finland
*[http://www.kimppa.net Kimppa.net] - another [[rideshare]] network for Finland


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]
[[nomad:Finland]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]

{{move_to_nomadwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>llctvxlfmbbpgjb5w6okbagc3x29xr2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79237</id>
      <parentid>78659</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-04-20T20:07:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8569">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.

*I disagree with most of the above. See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page].--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:40, 6 September 2012 (CEST)

__TOC__

=== Regions ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Border crossing ==

There are no border checkpoints between Finland, Sweden and Norway. You can cross these borders without stopping. 

* [[Torfyanovka-Valimaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]
* [[Brusnichnoe-Nuijamaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Åland Islands|Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland Islands|Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. It is possible to buy a deck ticket to Maarianhamina only and yet ride the whole way as nobody is checking. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season and special offers can put the price belowe 10 euros). 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

A decidedly more exciting option is to do island hopping on the small  [http://www.alandstrafiken.ax/en ''car ferries''] running from Turku to Maarianhamina. For footpassengers this option is free. You can continue to Sweden with one of the above mentioned companies or [https://www.eckeroline.fi/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/TopCategoriesDisplay?catalogId=10001&amp;storeId=10151 "Eckerö Lines"]

There are also ferries crossing the Bothnic Gulf from the Finnish city of [[Vaasa]] to the Swedish city of [[Umea]] and vice-versa. The ferry goes eight times a week (see the schedule [http://www.umeavasa.com/en/index.php# here]). Crossing will cost you around 30 euro but it is a quite comfortable trip.

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are many daily ferries from [[Helsinki]] to [[Tallinn]]. It takes 1-3 hours (most ferries 2h), costs about 20-50 euros (the cheapest tickets you should try to book in advance).

You can hitch sail and motor boats from Tallinn and Pirita marinas during the summer. Especially Sunday mornings are good when Finns return from their weekend trips.

Cars pay also per passanger so it's not possible to hitch a car to the ferry for free.

====Ferry companies====
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/ Tallink &amp; Silja Line]
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ Viking Line] 
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en Eckerö Line]
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/en/ Linda Line]

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

====Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers====
* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Sleeping ==
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highway|motorways]].]]

Like the other Nordic countries, Finland has everyman's right (''jokamiehenoikeus'') meaning that it is allowed to camp on any land provided that you stay a few hundred metres from houses, do not start a fire, and do not more than one night in any given place. While everyman's right technically doesn't apply inside of towns and cities, there is usually no problem with camping in isolated areas of parks -- even if police see you, they are more concerned with gypsies than with backpackers.

In Southern Finland and the Åland Islands, the forests and grassy areas are full of ticks, so wear clothing that covers your legs and check occasionally that you haven't been bitten.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time around music festivals. Hitching in Finland might be difficult during the [[winter]] time because lack of daylight.

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/liftarit/ Finnish hitchhikers FB group]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://www.hitchbase.com/orte.php?LANG=eng&amp;l_id=66 Hitchbase] page for Finland with somewhat outdated tips for locations
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
* [http://www.kyydit.net Kyydit.net] - [[rideshare]] network for Finland
* [http://www.kimppa.net Kimppa.net] - another [[rideshare]] network for Finland
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/451156288330710/ Truck drivers offering rides on FB group]


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]
[[nomad:Finland]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]

{{move_to_nomadwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>gpknsjinp7h8ra3gnv4dun87arnnxp3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>82612</id>
      <parentid>79237</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-04-06T12:32:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kinga</username>
        <id>25447</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8672">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.

*I disagree with most of the above. See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page].--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:40, 6 September 2012 (CEST)

__TOC__

=== Regions ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Border crossing ==

There are no border checkpoints between Finland, Sweden and Norway. You can cross these borders without stopping. 

* [[Torfyanovka-Valimaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]
* [[Brusnichnoe-Nuijamaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Åland Islands|Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland Islands|Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. It is possible to buy a deck ticket to Maarianhamina only and yet ride the whole way as nobody is checking. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season and special offers can put the price belowe 10 euros). 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

A decidedly more exciting option is to do island hopping on the small  [http://www.alandstrafiken.ax/en ''car ferries''] running from Turku to Maarianhamina. For footpassengers this option is free. You can continue to Sweden with one of the above mentioned companies or [https://www.eckeroline.fi/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/TopCategoriesDisplay?catalogId=10001&amp;storeId=10151 "Eckerö Lines"]

There are also ferries crossing the Bothnic Gulf from the Finnish city of [[Vaasa]] to the Swedish city of [[Umea]] and vice-versa. The ferry goes eight times a week (see the schedule [http://www.umeavasa.com/en/index.php# here]). Crossing will cost you around 30 euro but it is a quite comfortable trip.

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are many daily ferries from [[Helsinki]] to [[Tallinn]]. It takes 1-3 hours (most ferries 2h), costs about 20-50 euros (the cheapest tickets you should try to book in advance).

You can hitch sail and motor boats from Tallinn and Pirita marinas during the summer. Especially Sunday mornings are good when Finns return from their weekend trips.

Cars pay also per passanger so it's not possible to hitch a car to the ferry for free.

====Ferry companies====
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/ Tallink &amp; Silja Line]
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ Viking Line] 
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en Eckerö Line]
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/en/ Linda Line]

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

====Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers====
* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you = '''Kiitos'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Sleeping ==
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highway|motorways]].]]

Like the other Nordic countries, Finland has everyman's right (''jokamiehenoikeus'') meaning that it is allowed to camp on any land provided that you stay a few hundred metres from houses, do not start a fire, and do not more than one night in any given place. While everyman's right technically doesn't apply inside of towns and cities, there is usually no problem with camping in isolated areas of parks -- even if police see you, they are more concerned with gypsies than with backpackers.

In Southern Finland and the Åland Islands, the forests and grassy areas are full of ticks, so wear clothing that covers your legs and check occasionally that you haven't been bitten.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time around music festivals. Hitching in Finland might be difficult during the [[winter]] time because lack of daylight.

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/liftarit/ Finnish hitchhikers FB group]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://www.hitchbase.com/orte.php?LANG=eng&amp;l_id=66 Hitchbase] page for Finland with somewhat outdated tips for locations
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
* [http://www.kyydit.net Kyydit.net] - [[rideshare]] network for Finland
* [http://www.kimppa.net Kimppa.net] - another [[rideshare]] network for Finland
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/451156288330710/ Truck drivers offering rides on FB group]
* [http://finterest.fi/ Finterest.fi] - interactive map of Finland (e.g. free campings and fireplaces)


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]
[[nomad:Finland]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]

{{move_to_nomadwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>298dn70vuuqkexc6avz1t0nh8yg5cq1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>82976</id>
      <parentid>82612</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-05-29T16:39:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Hennaemilia</username>
        <id>25824</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8736">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.

*I disagree with most of the above. See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page].--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:40, 6 September 2012 (CEST)

__TOC__

=== Regions ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Border crossing ==

There are no border checkpoints between Finland, Sweden and Norway. You can cross these borders without stopping. 

* [[Torfyanovka-Valimaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]
* [[Brusnichnoe-Nuijamaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Åland Islands|Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland Islands|Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. It is possible to buy a deck ticket to Maarianhamina only and yet ride the whole way as nobody is checking. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season and special offers can put the price belowe 10 euros). 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

A decidedly more exciting option is to do island hopping on the small  [http://www.alandstrafiken.ax/en ''car ferries''] running from Turku to Maarianhamina. For footpassengers this option is free. You can continue to Sweden with one of the above mentioned companies or [https://www.eckeroline.fi/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/TopCategoriesDisplay?catalogId=10001&amp;storeId=10151 "Eckerö Lines"]

There are also ferries crossing the Bothnic Gulf from the Finnish city of [[Vaasa]] to the Swedish city of [[Umea]] and vice-versa. The ferry goes eight times a week (see the schedule [http://www.umeavasa.com/en/index.php# here]). Crossing will cost you around 30 euro but it is a quite comfortable trip.

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are many daily ferries from [[Helsinki]] to [[Tallinn]]. It takes 1-3 hours (most ferries 2h), costs about 20-50 euros (the cheapest tickets you should try to book in advance).

You can hitch sail and motor boats from Tallinn and Pirita marinas during the summer. Especially Sunday mornings are good when Finns return from their weekend trips.

Cars pay also per passanger so it's not possible to hitch a car to the ferry for free.

====Ferry companies====
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/ Tallink &amp; Silja Line]
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ Viking Line] 
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en Eckerö Line]
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/en/ Linda Line]

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

====Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers====
* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you very much = '''Kiitos paljon'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''
* I don't speak Finnish = '''En puhu suomea'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Sleeping ==
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highway|motorways]].]]

Like the other Nordic countries, Finland has everyman's right (''jokamiehenoikeus'') meaning that it is allowed to camp on any land provided that you stay a few hundred metres from houses, do not start a fire, and do not more than one night in any given place. While everyman's right technically doesn't apply inside of towns and cities, there is usually no problem with camping in isolated areas of parks -- even if police see you, they are more concerned with gypsies than with backpackers.

In Southern Finland and the Åland Islands, the forests and grassy areas are full of ticks, so wear clothing that covers your legs and check occasionally that you haven't been bitten.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time around music festivals. Hitching in Finland might be difficult during the [[winter]] time because lack of daylight.

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/liftarit/ Finnish hitchhikers FB group]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://www.hitchbase.com/orte.php?LANG=eng&amp;l_id=66 Hitchbase] page for Finland with somewhat outdated tips for locations
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
* [http://www.kyydit.net Kyydit.net] - [[rideshare]] network for Finland
* [http://www.kimppa.net Kimppa.net] - another [[rideshare]] network for Finland
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/451156288330710/ Truck drivers offering rides on FB group]
* [http://finterest.fi/ Finterest.fi] - interactive map of Finland (e.g. free campings and fireplaces)


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]
[[nomad:Finland]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]

{{move_to_nomadwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>m4400o49pojdmnz17ougtzi1xp2m42g</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>82977</id>
      <parentid>82976</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-05-29T16:49:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Hennaemilia</username>
        <id>25824</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9125">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.

*I disagree with most of the above. See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page].--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:40, 6 September 2012 (CEST)

__TOC__

=== Regions ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Border crossing ==

There are no border checkpoints between Finland, Sweden and Norway. You can cross these borders without stopping. 

* [[Torfyanovka-Valimaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]
* [[Brusnichnoe-Nuijamaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Åland Islands|Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland Islands|Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. It is possible to buy a deck ticket to Maarianhamina only and yet ride the whole way as nobody is checking. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of August 2009, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku costs 15 euros, and Stockholm-Helsinki - 55 euros (both without a cabin, although prices vary according to season and special offers can put the price belowe 10 euros). 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

A decidedly more exciting option is to do island hopping on the small  [http://www.alandstrafiken.ax/en ''car ferries''] running from Turku to Maarianhamina. For footpassengers this option is free. You can continue to Sweden with one of the above mentioned companies or [https://www.eckeroline.fi/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/TopCategoriesDisplay?catalogId=10001&amp;storeId=10151 "Eckerö Lines"]

There are also ferries crossing the Bothnic Gulf from the Finnish city of [[Vaasa]] to the Swedish city of [[Umea]] and vice-versa. The ferry goes eight times a week (see the schedule [http://www.umeavasa.com/en/index.php# here]). Crossing will cost you around 30 euro but it is a quite comfortable trip.

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are many daily ferries from [[Helsinki]] to [[Tallinn]]. It takes 1-3 hours (most ferries 2h), costs about 20-50 euros (the cheapest tickets you should try to book in advance).

You can hitch sail and motor boats from Tallinn and Pirita marinas during the summer. Especially Sunday mornings are good when Finns return from their weekend trips.

Cars pay also per passanger so it's not possible to hitch a car to the ferry for free.

====Ferry companies====
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/ Tallink &amp; Silja Line]
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ Viking Line] 
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en Eckerö Line]
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/en/ Linda Line]

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

====Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers====
* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you very much = '''Kiitos paljon'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''
* I don't speak Finnish = '''En puhu suomea'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Sleeping ==
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highway|motorways]].]]

Like the other Nordic countries, Finland has everyman's right (''jokamiehenoikeus'') meaning that it is allowed to camp on any land provided that you stay a few hundred metres from houses, do not start a fire, and do not more than one night in any given place. While everyman's right technically doesn't apply inside of towns and cities, there is usually no problem with camping in isolated areas of parks -- even if police see you, they are more concerned with gypsies than with backpackers.

In Southern Finland and the Åland Islands, the forests and grassy areas are full of ticks, so wear clothing that covers your legs and check occasionally that you haven't been bitten.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time around music festivals. Hitching in Finland might be difficult during the [[winter]] time because lack of daylight. The weather differences in Finland seem to effect greatly how well people pick you up. Sunny weather might help you a great deal because it makes people more happy and open-minded.

Hitchhiking seems to get easier the more North you go in Finland, because towns get smaller and people feel more open to help others. However, the highways are better in the South and there is more traffic.

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/liftarit/ Finnish hitchhikers FB group]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://www.hitchbase.com/orte.php?LANG=eng&amp;l_id=66 Hitchbase] page for Finland with somewhat outdated tips for locations
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
* [http://www.kyydit.net Kyydit.net] - [[rideshare]] network for Finland
* [http://www.kimppa.net Kimppa.net] - another [[rideshare]] network for Finland
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/451156288330710/ Truck drivers offering rides on FB group]
* [http://finterest.fi/ Finterest.fi] - interactive map of Finland (e.g. free campings and fireplaces)


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]
[[nomad:Finland]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]

{{move_to_nomadwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>h21qawm03oz7bfkyqw10jusvqifdqah</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>83031</id>
      <parentid>82977</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-06-01T12:32:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Drumroots</username>
        <id>6410</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9185">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.

*I disagree with most of the above. See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page].--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:40, 6 September 2012 (CEST)

__TOC__

=== Regions ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Border crossing ==

There are no border checkpoints between Finland, Sweden and Norway. You can cross these borders without stopping. 

* [[Torfyanovka-Valimaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]
* [[Brusnichnoe-Nuijamaa border crossing]] with [[Russia]]

[[File:Washing car window in the North of Finland.JPG|thumb|240px|Hitchhiker [[User:guaka|guaka]] washing away mosquito corpses]]

=== From/to Sweden ===
Ferries to Stockholm go from [[Helsinki]] and [[Turku]]. The latter is considerably cheaper. Both ferries also stop in [[Maarianhamina]] ([[Åland Islands|Ahvenanmaa]]), or [[Mariehamn]] ([[Åland Islands|Åland]]), as its Swedish-speaking population calls it. It is possible to buy a deck ticket to Maarianhamina only and yet ride the whole way as nobody is checking. The two companies which run ferries between Finland and Sweden are [http://www.vikingline.fi ''Viking Line''] and [http://www.silja.com ''Silja Line'']. Both of the companies are focused on bringing the customers a cruise-experience, and are bound to be tacky. ''Viking Line'' sells cheaper tickets without a cabin, too, which would be rather useless on the daytime trips between [[Turku]] and [[Stockholm]] anyway. As of June 2016, a morning ferry from Stockholm to Turku (and vice-versa) costs €15, and Stockholm-Helsinki (and vice versa) costs from €88 (the latter includes compulsory cabin reservation,  and prices vary according to season; also, special offers can put the price below €10). 

''Silja Line'' is the posher of the two, and thus more expensive. It's still tacky, though.

The ''Viking Line'' cruise ships have free tourist maps of Turku at their information desks on board. Be aware, though, that if you take a daytime cruise (which is about half the price), you will arrive in Turku at night. During the autumn, winter and early spring that means no daylight which is no help for hitchhiking. In winter nights, extremely cold temperatures might occur as well.

A decidedly more exciting option is to do island hopping on the small  [http://www.alandstrafiken.ax/en ''car ferries''] running from Turku to Maarianhamina. For foot passengers, this option is free. You can continue to Sweden with one of the above mentioned companies or [https://www.eckeroline.fi/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/TopCategoriesDisplay?catalogId=10001&amp;storeId=10151 "Eckerö Lines"]

There are also ferries crossing the Bothnic Gulf from the Finnish city of [[Vaasa]] to the Swedish city of [[Umea]] and vice-versa. The ferry goes eight times a week (see the schedule [http://www.umeavasa.com/en/index.php# here]). Crossing will cost you around 30 euro but it is a quite comfortable trip.

=== From/to Estonia ===
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
There is no land connection between Finland and [[Estonia]]. There are many daily ferries from [[Helsinki]] to [[Tallinn]]. It takes 1-3 hours (most ferries 2h), costs about 20-50 euros (the cheapest tickets you should try to book in advance).

You can hitch sail and motor boats from Tallinn and Pirita marinas during the summer. Especially Sunday mornings are good when Finns return from their weekend trips.

Cars pay also per passanger so it's not possible to hitch a car to the ferry for free.

====Ferry companies====
* [http://www.tallinksilja.com/ Tallink &amp; Silja Line]
* [http://www.vikingline.com/ Viking Line] 
* [https://www.eckeroline.fi/en Eckerö Line]
* [http://www.lindaliini.ee/en/ Linda Line]

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

====Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers====
* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you very much = '''Kiitos paljon'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''
* I don't speak Finnish = '''En puhu suomea'''

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Sleeping ==
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|[[Camping]] is legal almost anywhere in Finland, just stay slightly out of sight and you can even camp next to [[highway|motorways]].]]

Like the other Nordic countries, Finland has everyman's right (''jokamiehenoikeus'') meaning that it is allowed to camp on any land provided that you stay a few hundred metres from houses, do not start a fire, and do not more than one night in any given place. While everyman's right technically doesn't apply inside of towns and cities, there is usually no problem with camping in isolated areas of parks -- even if police see you, they are more concerned with gypsies than with backpackers.

In Southern Finland and the Åland Islands, the forests and grassy areas are full of ticks, so wear clothing that covers your legs and check occasionally that you haven't been bitten.

[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time around music festivals. Hitching in Finland might be difficult during the [[winter]] time because lack of daylight. The weather differences in Finland seem to effect greatly how well people pick you up. Sunny weather might help you a great deal because it makes people more happy and open-minded.

Hitchhiking seems to get easier the more North you go in Finland, because towns get smaller and people feel more open to help others. However, the highways are better in the South and there is more traffic.

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/liftarit/ Finnish hitchhikers FB group]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://www.hitchbase.com/orte.php?LANG=eng&amp;l_id=66 Hitchbase] page for Finland with somewhat outdated tips for locations
* [http://books.google.com/books?id=ZY_XZW9AtYgC&amp;printsec=frontcover&amp;dq=finland Lonely Planet − Finland eBook (2003) ''preview'']
* [http://www.kyydit.net Kyydit.net] - [[rideshare]] network for Finland
* [http://www.kimppa.net Kimppa.net] - another [[rideshare]] network for Finland
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/451156288330710/ Truck drivers offering rides on FB group]
* [http://finterest.fi/ Finterest.fi] - interactive map of Finland (e.g. free campings and fireplaces)


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]
[[nomad:Finland]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]

{{move_to_nomadwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>67ujaoplxl7ix54fv8fzu48fvrvz06j</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>89373</id>
      <parentid>83031</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-10-01T23:22:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Traumschule</username>
        <id>28627</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4373">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Find info on camping on [[:nomad:Finland|Nomadwiki]]]]
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.

*I disagree with most of the above. See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page].--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:40, 6 September 2012 (CEST)

__TOC__

=== Regions ===
* [[Lapland]]

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time around music festivals. Hitching in Finland might be difficult during the [[winter]] time because lack of daylight. The weather differences in Finland seem to effect greatly how well people pick you up. Sunny weather might help you a great deal because it makes people more happy and open-minded.

Hitchhiking seems to get easier the more North you go in Finland, because towns get smaller and people feel more open to help others. However, the highways are better in the South and there is more traffic.

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

====Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers====
* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you very much = '''Kiitos paljon'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''
* I don't speak Finnish = '''En puhu suomea'''

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/liftarit/ Finnish hitchhikers FB group]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]
[[nomad:Finland]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>oq2emp2y6ak4u9a9ni987avwz3q0ss0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>89374</id>
      <parentid>89373</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-10-01T23:29:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Traumschule</username>
        <id>28627</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4371">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.
__TOC__
*I disagree with most of the above. See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page].--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:40, 6 September 2012 (CEST)

=== Regions ===
[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Find info on camping on [[:nomad:Finland|Nomadwiki]]]]
* [[Lapland]]

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time around music festivals. Hitching in Finland might be difficult during the [[winter]] time because lack of daylight. The weather differences in Finland seem to effect greatly how well people pick you up. Sunny weather might help you a great deal because it makes people more happy and open-minded.

Hitchhiking seems to get easier the more North you go in Finland, because towns get smaller and people feel more open to help others. However, the highways are better in the South and there is more traffic.

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

====Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers====
* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you very much = '''Kiitos paljon'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''
* I don't speak Finnish = '''En puhu suomea'''

== Links ==
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/liftarit/ Finnish hitchhikers FB group]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[trash:Finland]]
[[wikipedia:Finland]]
[[nomad:Finland]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>9s3qlh60ueqd7jygvy7y8vpz6na5sm3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>89487</id>
      <parentid>89374</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-10-04T21:33:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Traumschule</username>
        <id>28627</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4345">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.
__TOC__
*I disagree with most of the above. See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page].--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:40, 6 September 2012 (CEST)

=== Regions ===
[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Find info on camping on [[:nomad:Finland|Nomadwiki]]]]
* [[Lapland]]

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time around music festivals. Hitching in Finland might be difficult during the [[winter]] time because lack of daylight. The weather differences in Finland seem to effect greatly how well people pick you up. Sunny weather might help you a great deal because it makes people more happy and open-minded.

Hitchhiking seems to get easier the more North you go in Finland, because towns get smaller and people feel more open to help others. However, the highways are better in the South and there is more traffic.

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

====Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers====
* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you very much = '''Kiitos paljon'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''
* I don't speak Finnish = '''En puhu suomea'''

== Links ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/liftarit/ Finnish hitchhikers FB group]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
{{wikipedia-link}}

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>r81fxka644mnmwo14rskua51oxqpnle</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>96122</id>
      <parentid>89487</parentid>
      <timestamp>2019-08-24T12:57:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Countrypainter</username>
        <id>28248</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4515">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.
__TOC__
*I disagree with most of the above. See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page].--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:40, 6 September 2012 (CEST)

=== Regions ===
[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Find info on camping on [[:nomad:Finland|Nomadwiki]]]]
* [[Lapland]]

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time around music festivals. Hitching in Finland might be difficult during the [[winter]] time because lack of daylight. The weather differences in Finland seem to effect greatly how well people pick you up. Sunny weather might help you a great deal because it makes people more happy and open-minded.

Hitchhiking seems to get easier the more North you go in Finland, because towns get smaller and people feel more open to help others. However, the highways are better in the South and there is more traffic.

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

====Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers====
* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you very much = '''Kiitos paljon'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''
* I don't speak Finnish = '''En puhu suomea'''

== Links ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/liftarit/ Finnish hitchhikers FB group]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://laavu.org/ List of Laavus] − a site with all the Laavus (hiking shelters) in Finland. [http://laavu.org/lataa.php?paikkakunta=kaikki/ Download] the gpx-file.
{{wikipedia-link}}

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>mbyqf3lzjmlkl91jqxi5xontbcfn9yw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>99382</id>
      <parentid>96122</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-10-05T09:16:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Links */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4568">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.
__TOC__
*I disagree with most of the above. See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page].--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:40, 6 September 2012 (CEST)

=== Regions ===
[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Find info on camping on [[:nomad:Finland|Nomadwiki]]]]
* [[Lapland]]

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time around music festivals. Hitching in Finland might be difficult during the [[winter]] time because lack of daylight. The weather differences in Finland seem to effect greatly how well people pick you up. Sunny weather might help you a great deal because it makes people more happy and open-minded.

Hitchhiking seems to get easier the more North you go in Finland, because towns get smaller and people feel more open to help others. However, the highways are better in the South and there is more traffic.

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

====Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers====
* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you very much = '''Kiitos paljon'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''
* I don't speak Finnish = '''En puhu suomea'''

== Links ==

* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/liftarit/ Finnish hitchhikers FB group]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://laavu.org/ List of Laavus] − a site with all the Laavus (hiking shelters) in Finland. [http://laavu.org/lataa.php?paikkakunta=kaikki/ Download] the gpx-file.
{{wikipedia-link}}
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

[[nomad:Finland]] [[trash:Finland]]


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>qevnqri2ddtdjzpm860pnkespqcn2l6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>100327</id>
      <parentid>99382</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-01-23T17:36:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4546">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.
__TOC__
*I disagree with most of the above. See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page].--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:40, 6 September 2012 (CEST)

=== Regions ===
[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Find info on camping on [[:nomad:Finland|Nomadwiki]]]]
* [[Lapland]]

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time around music festivals. Hitching in Finland might be difficult during the [[winter]] time because lack of daylight. The weather differences in Finland seem to effect greatly how well people pick you up. Sunny weather might help you a great deal because it makes people more happy and open-minded.

Hitchhiking seems to get easier the more North you go in Finland, because towns get smaller and people feel more open to help others. However, the highways are better in the South and there is more traffic.

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

====Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers====
* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you very much = '''Kiitos paljon'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''
* I don't speak Finnish = '''En puhu suomea'''

== Links ==

* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/liftarit/ Finnish hitchhikers FB group]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://laavu.org/ List of Laavus] − a site with all the Laavus (hiking shelters) in Finland. [http://laavu.org/lataa.php?paikkakunta=kaikki/ Download] the gpx-file.
{{wikipedia-link}}
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>8pjvyi52jc0c2phvj1doijabovqzcm9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101126</id>
      <parentid>100327</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-05T14:43:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Regions */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4544">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.
__TOC__
*I disagree with most of the above. See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page].--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:40, 6 September 2012 (CEST)

=== Regions ===
[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Find info on camping on [[:nomad:Finland|Nomadwiki]]]]
[[Lapland]]

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time around music festivals. Hitching in Finland might be difficult during the [[winter]] time because lack of daylight. The weather differences in Finland seem to effect greatly how well people pick you up. Sunny weather might help you a great deal because it makes people more happy and open-minded.

Hitchhiking seems to get easier the more North you go in Finland, because towns get smaller and people feel more open to help others. However, the highways are better in the South and there is more traffic.

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

====Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers====
* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you very much = '''Kiitos paljon'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''
* I don't speak Finnish = '''En puhu suomea'''

== Links ==

* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/liftarit/ Finnish hitchhikers FB group]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://laavu.org/ List of Laavus] − a site with all the Laavus (hiking shelters) in Finland. [http://laavu.org/lataa.php?paikkakunta=kaikki/ Download] the gpx-file.
{{wikipedia-link}}
== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>6hsglibzhv6hf8um1l51n9fbdzoaza3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101127</id>
      <parentid>101126</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-05T14:43:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Links */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4568">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.
__TOC__
*I disagree with most of the above. See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page].--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:40, 6 September 2012 (CEST)

=== Regions ===
[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Find info on camping on [[:nomad:Finland|Nomadwiki]]]]
[[Lapland]]

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time around music festivals. Hitching in Finland might be difficult during the [[winter]] time because lack of daylight. The weather differences in Finland seem to effect greatly how well people pick you up. Sunny weather might help you a great deal because it makes people more happy and open-minded.

Hitchhiking seems to get easier the more North you go in Finland, because towns get smaller and people feel more open to help others. However, the highways are better in the South and there is more traffic.

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

====Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers====
* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you very much = '''Kiitos paljon'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''
* I don't speak Finnish = '''En puhu suomea'''

== Links ==

* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/liftarit/ Finnish hitchhikers FB group]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://laavu.org/ List of Laavus] − a site with all the Laavus (hiking shelters) in Finland. [http://laavu.org/lataa.php?paikkakunta=kaikki/ Download] the gpx-file.

== Personal Experiences ==

Pls add info

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>7o97e6zy1y5sinbtdz8eqy8xfpnrtqn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101128</id>
      <parentid>101127</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-05T14:44:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4538">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.
__TOC__
*I disagree with most of the above. See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page].--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:40, 6 September 2012 (CEST)

=== Regions ===
[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Find info on camping on [[:nomad:Finland|Nomadwiki]]]]
[[Lapland]]

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time around music festivals. Hitching in Finland might be difficult during the [[winter]] time because lack of daylight. The weather differences in Finland seem to effect greatly how well people pick you up. Sunny weather might help you a great deal because it makes people more happy and open-minded.

Hitchhiking seems to get easier the more North you go in Finland, because towns get smaller and people feel more open to help others. However, the highways are better in the South and there is more traffic.

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

====Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers====
* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you very much = '''Kiitos paljon'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''
* I don't speak Finnish = '''En puhu suomea'''

== Links ==

* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/liftarit/ Finnish hitchhikers FB group]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://laavu.org/ List of Laavus] − a site with all the Laavus (hiking shelters) in Finland. [http://laavu.org/lataa.php?paikkakunta=kaikki/ Download] the gpx-file.

== Personal Experiences ==

Pls add info

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


{{Cities Finland}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>8bj68vz94gppd0hxeofvy22ql3ps2om</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101129</id>
      <parentid>101128</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-05T14:44:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Regions */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4155">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.
__TOC__
*I disagree with most of the above. See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page].--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:40, 6 September 2012 (CEST)

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time around music festivals. Hitching in Finland might be difficult during the [[winter]] time because lack of daylight. The weather differences in Finland seem to effect greatly how well people pick you up. Sunny weather might help you a great deal because it makes people more happy and open-minded.

Hitchhiking seems to get easier the more North you go in Finland, because towns get smaller and people feel more open to help others. However, the highways are better in the South and there is more traffic.

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

====Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers====
* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you very much = '''Kiitos paljon'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''
* I don't speak Finnish = '''En puhu suomea'''

== Links ==

* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/liftarit/ Finnish hitchhikers FB group]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://laavu.org/ List of Laavus] − a site with all the Laavus (hiking shelters) in Finland. [http://laavu.org/lataa.php?paikkakunta=kaikki/ Download] the gpx-file.

== Personal Experiences ==

Pls add info

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


{{Cities Finland}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>qalycemzt4eqawsorfncfvje359py80</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>102000</id>
      <parentid>101129</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-05-11T09:19:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Warlo</username>
        <id>9016</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>Reverted edits by [[Special:Contributions/Dxc|Dxc]] ([[User talk:Dxc|talk]]) to last revision by [[User:Countrypainter|Countrypainter]]</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4515">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.
__TOC__
*I disagree with most of the above. See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page].--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:40, 6 September 2012 (CEST)

=== Regions ===
[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Find info on camping on [[:nomad:Finland|Nomadwiki]]]]
* [[Lapland]]

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time around music festivals. Hitching in Finland might be difficult during the [[winter]] time because lack of daylight. The weather differences in Finland seem to effect greatly how well people pick you up. Sunny weather might help you a great deal because it makes people more happy and open-minded.

Hitchhiking seems to get easier the more North you go in Finland, because towns get smaller and people feel more open to help others. However, the highways are better in the South and there is more traffic.

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

====Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers====
* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you very much = '''Kiitos paljon'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''
* I don't speak Finnish = '''En puhu suomea'''

== Links ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/liftarit/ Finnish hitchhikers FB group]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://laavu.org/ List of Laavus] − a site with all the Laavus (hiking shelters) in Finland. [http://laavu.org/lataa.php?paikkakunta=kaikki/ Download] the gpx-file.
{{wikipedia-link}}

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>mbyqf3lzjmlkl91jqxi5xontbcfn9yw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>107710</id>
      <parentid>102000</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-11-24T03:42:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tales</username>
        <id>9710</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5340">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.
__TOC__
*I disagree with most of the above. See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page].--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:40, 6 September 2012 (CEST)

Tales: I hitchhiked around the country in the summer of 2024 (Helsinki-Tampere-Turku-Vaasa-Oulu-Pello-Kilpisjarvi. Good 2000km in 5-6 days with stopping in the mentioned places. I would give Finland 2 out of 5. People do not stop almost at all if there is no designated space for it (for example, bus stops). They are afraid of breaking rules and getting punished. Especially, getting out of Tampere (to the south) was mission impossible. After two hours of waiting, I took a local bus to a village, from where I followed the local road. Finland has a few highways, so expect to spend a lot of time in combination with waiting for a ride and driving from one place to another. And finally - the people! My experience is pretty unfriendly and quiet. But those who help and give you a ride are different dimension, excellent!

=== Regions ===
[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Find info on camping on [[:nomad:Finland|Nomadwiki]]]]
* [[Lapland]]

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time around music festivals. Hitching in Finland might be difficult during the [[winter]] time because lack of daylight. The weather differences in Finland seem to effect greatly how well people pick you up. Sunny weather might help you a great deal because it makes people more happy and open-minded.

Hitchhiking seems to get easier the more North you go in Finland, because towns get smaller and people feel more open to help others. However, the highways are better in the South and there is more traffic.

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

====Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers====
* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you very much = '''Kiitos paljon'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''
* I don't speak Finnish = '''En puhu suomea'''

== Links ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/liftarit/ Finnish hitchhikers FB group]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://laavu.org/ List of Laavus] − a site with all the Laavus (hiking shelters) in Finland. [http://laavu.org/lataa.php?paikkakunta=kaikki/ Download] the gpx-file.
{{wikipedia-link}}

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]</text>
      <sha1>22zbgkj2cxas4687q42b9pot4qa6g2y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>114866</id>
      <parentid>107710</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-10-20T07:57:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GriL</username>
        <id>24751</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5366">{{infobox Country
|country = of Finland
|language = Finnish, Swedish; recognised regional languages: Sami
|capital = [[Helsinki]]
|pop = 5,301,701
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
|BW = FI
|map = &lt;map lat='64.8' lng='25.9' zoom='4' view='0' width='300' height='350' country='Finland'/&gt;
}}
'''Finland''' is a part of the Northern [[Europe]] and one of the Nordic countries. It is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Norway]] and [[Russia]], but the most probable transit country on your way hitchhiking there from Southern Europe is [[Estonia]] as the [[E67|Via Baltica]] ([[E67]]) road connects Finland with [[Prague]] via the Baltic States and [[Poland]].

It is illegal to hitchhike directly on motorways (''moottoritie'') and some two-land expressways roads (''moottoriliikennetie'') in Finland. You can recognize these from the green signs. On these roads, you can hitch from on-ramps (which often have bus stops that drivers will stop at) and [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol stations]]. The cars cannot stop in crossing areas, and some drivers who disobeyed this rule and picked up hitchhikers have been fined.

In the south, it is a good idea to avoid motorways and opt for smaller local roads. Though there is less traffic, there is more room for cars to stop. Finnish drivers will only stop where they feel it is safe, so try to thumb at bus stops.
__TOC__
*I disagree with most of the above. See the [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Talk:Finland Talk-page].--[[User:Astikain|Astikain]] 14:40, 6 September 2012 (CEST)

Tales: I hitchhiked around the country in the summer of 2024 (Helsinki-Tampere-Turku-Vaasa-Oulu-Pello-Kilpisjarvi. Good 2000km in 5-6 days with stopping in the mentioned places. I would give Finland 2 out of 5. People do not stop almost at all if there is no designated space for it (for example, bus stops). They are afraid of breaking rules and getting punished. Especially, getting out of Tampere (to the south) was mission impossible. After two hours of waiting, I took a local bus to a village, from where I followed the local road. Finland has a few highways, so expect to spend a lot of time in combination with waiting for a ride and driving from one place to another. And finally - the people! My experience is pretty unfriendly and quiet. But those who help and give you a ride are different dimension, excellent!

=== Regions ===
[[File:Finland european roads.png|thumb|250px|Finnish motorways (blue) with their European numbers and national roads (red and yellow)]]
[[File:Erga-and-a-friendly-finnish-man.jpg|thumb|240px|right|Hitchhiker Erga and a friendly Finnish driver]]
[[File:Erga-camping-in-finland.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Find info on camping on [[:nomad:Finland|Nomadwiki]]]]
* [[Lapland]]

== Safety ==
Hitchhiking is quite safe in Finland. As always, common sense is your friend.

== Culture ==
Hitchhiking used to be popular in the 70's and 80's, and many drivers will tell the hitchhiker(s) they've hitched themselves back in their days. Nowadays this practice is rather rare among Finns, but there are always some, especially in summer time around music festivals. Hitching in Finland might be difficult during the [[winter]] time because lack of daylight. The weather differences in Finland seem to effect greatly how well people pick you up. Sunny weather might help you a great deal because it makes people more happy and open-minded.

Hitchhiking seems to get easier the more North you go in Finland, because towns get smaller and people feel more open to help others. However, the highways are better in the South and there is more traffic.

== Language ==
The language most people in Finland speak is Finnish which isn't a Scandinavian language. The country is officially bilingual as there is a large Swedish-speaking minority on the west coast of Finland. Most people speak English too, so most of the foreign hitchhikers won't have communication problems in Finland.

Some older people, however, might have no English language knowledge at all, so you might as well learn some basic Finnish phrases. Note, that with a knowledge of Swedish, however, you can come pretty far (it is useful all over Scandinavia).

====Useful Finnish expressions for hitchhikers====
* Hello = '''Terve'''
* Hi = '''Moi''' ''or'' '''Hei'''
* Hitchhiking = '''Liftaaminen'''
* To hitchhike = '''Liftata''' 
* A ride = '''Kyyti'''
* Thank you very much = '''Kiitos paljon'''
* Where are you driving to? = '''Minne ajat?'''
* I don't speak Finnish = '''En puhu suomea'''

== Links ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [[:fi:Etusivu|Finnish Hitchwiki]]
* IRC Channel [[Liftari @ IRCnet]]
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/liftarit/ Finnish hitchhikers FB group]
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhiker's guide to Europe] − a hitchhiking site by a Finn
* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/ssmoland/peukalo/ Liftausvinkkejä] − hitchhiking tips in Finnish
* [http://laavu.org/ List of Laavus] − a site with all the Laavus (hiking shelters) in Finland. [http://laavu.org/lataa.php?paikkakunta=kaikki/ Download] the gpx-file.
{{wikipedia-link}}

{{Cities Finland}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}

[[Category:Finland| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

[[de:Finnland]]
[[fi:Suomi]]
[[ru:Финляндия]]</text>
      <sha1>iqhj6vmimagd98pl26jhkc5agy7s82r</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>France</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1521</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1547</id>
      <parentid>4360</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-20T01:14:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zac Stewart</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1781">'''France''' is a great country for hiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''Péages'' (toll points) you can get a hike easily. At some Péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further.

You can get free maps in the [[Péage]] offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-Péage".

Some Péage are really good, some or not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Most of the French don't speak English. So have a map to show them, where you want to go. If you know any French word, use it! French people like it, if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is "Allemagne" in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
* [[Paris]], the capital, hiking out of here is really difficult.
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strassbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>2ine0oqafu51eaj770k3ln04hvc0nth</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1548</id>
      <parentid>8844</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1781">'''France''' is a great country for hiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''Péages'' (toll points) you can get a hike easily. At some Péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further.

You can get free maps in the [[Péage]] offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-Péage".

Some Péage are really good, some or not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Most of the French don't speak English. So have a map to show them, where you want to go. If you know any French word, use it! French people like it, if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is "Allemagne" in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
* [[Paris]], the capital, hiking out of here is really difficult.
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strassbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>2ine0oqafu51eaj770k3ln04hvc0nth</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4345</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T18:00:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GuakaTest</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="705">'''France''' is a great country for hiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some "Péage"s you can get a hike easily. At some Péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further.

You can get free maps in the Peage offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-Peage".

Some Peages are really good, some or not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Hiking out of [[Paris]] is really difficult.

{{stub}}

[[Category:Western Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>1kegqtnywf3rshk593rvnr8rsyqonaf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4346</id>
      <parentid>4345</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T13:56:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="805">'''France''' is a great country for hiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some "Péage"s you can get a hike easily. At some Péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further.

You can get free maps in the Peage offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-Peage".

Some Peages are really good, some or not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.


==Cities==
* [[Paris]], the capitcal, hiking out of here is really difficult.

* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strassbourg]]
* ...

{{stub}}

[[Category:Western Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>li11ko0d889xcjahvdi0qiewu0m02an</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4347</id>
      <parentid>4346</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T14:10:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="797">'''France''' is a great country for hiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some "Péage"s you can get a hike easily. At some Péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further.

You can get free maps in the Peage offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-Peage".

Some Peages are really good, some or not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.


==Cities==
* [[Paris]], the capitcal, hiking out of here is really difficult.

* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strassbourg]]
* ...

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>qaucnjgvd8td2rn4qqyrrnkped9x924</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4348</id>
      <parentid>4347</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-22T14:55:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1071">'''France''' is a great country for hiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some "Péage"s you can get a hike easily. At some Péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further.

You can get free maps in the Peage offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-Peage".

Some Peages are really good, some or not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

==License plates==
French number plates start with the number of the ''arrondissement'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars start with the number 75.

:See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates]

==Cities==
* [[Paris]], the capitcal, hiking out of here is really difficult.

* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strassbourg]]
* ...

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>n1ctouliue72p2wk8ktyg1p7f388miq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4349</id>
      <parentid>4348</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-22T14:58:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1193">'''France''' is a great country for hiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some "Péage"s you can get a hike easily. At some Péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further.

You can get free maps in the Peage offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-Peage".

Some Peages are really good, some or not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

==License plates==
French number plates start with the number of the ''arrondissement'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars start with the number 75.

:''See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.''

==Cities==
* [[Paris]], the capitcal, hiking out of here is really difficult.

* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strassbourg]]
* ...

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>ppdu6r4fumu9tc4b2i0qnebscq86wl0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4350</id>
      <parentid>4349</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-25T01:01:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>84.25.34.107</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1322">'''France''' is a great country for hiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some "Péage"s you can get a hike easily. At some Péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further.

You can get free maps in the Peage offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-Peage".

Some Peages are really good, some or not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates start with the number of the ''arrondissement'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars start with the number 75.

:''See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.''

==Cities==
* [[Paris]], the capitcal, hiking out of here is really difficult.

* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strassbourg]]
* ...

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>p05mgczdl4qh877061syw6brtppmgxm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4351</id>
      <parentid>4350</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-04-20T15:52:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.55.172.132</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1656">'''France''' is a great country for hiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some "Péage"s you can get a hike easily. At some Péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further.

You can get free maps in the Peage offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-Peage".

Some Peages are really good, some or not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Most of the french poeple DO NOT speak english. So have a map to show them, where you want to go. If you know any french word, use it! French people like it, if you try your best. Say "Bon jour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If your heading to Germany, you maybe need to know that Germany is "Allemagne" in french.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates start with the number of the ''arrondissement'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars start with the number 75.

:''See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.''

==Cities==
* [[Paris]], the capitcal, hiking out of here is really difficult.

* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strassbourg]]
* ...

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>dnp7wypvo9tksp6td2fgmisk8dp7qof</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4352</id>
      <parentid>4351</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-06-08T21:16:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1650">'''France''' is a great country for hiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some "Péage"s you can get a hike easily. At some Péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further.

You can get free maps in the Peage offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-Peage".

Some Peages are really good, some or not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Most of the french poeple DO NOT speak english. So have a map to show them, where you want to go. If you know any french word, use it! French people like it, if you try your best. Say "Bon jour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If your heading to Germany, you maybe need to know that Germany is "Allemagne" in french.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates start with the number of the ''arrondissement'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars start with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
* [[Paris]], the capitcal, hiking out of here is really difficult.

* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strassbourg]]
* ...

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>ga2ab1m9um2g8tdd0eihywcc8zki22c</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4353</id>
      <parentid>4352</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-06-08T21:19:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1658">'''France''' is a great country for hiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''Péages'' (toll points) you can get a hike easily. At some Péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further.

You can get free maps in the Peage offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-Peage".

Some Peages are really good, some or not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Most of the French don't speak English. So have a map to show them, where you want to go. If you know any French word, use it! French people like it, if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to Germany, you maybe need to know that Germany is "Allemagne" in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates start with the number of the ''arrondissement'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars start with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
* [[Paris]], the capitcal, hiking out of here is really difficult.
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strassbourg]]
* ...

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>ia7765a2127vls62b1cc2l529k9v8py</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4354</id>
      <parentid>4353</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-07-17T16:48:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>87.80.210.29</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1657">'''France''' is a great country for hiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''Péages'' (toll points) you can get a hike easily. At some Péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further.

You can get free maps in the Peage offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-Peage".

Some Peages are really good, some or not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Most of the French don't speak English. So have a map to show them, where you want to go. If you know any French word, use it! French people like it, if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to Germany, you maybe need to know that Germany is "Allemagne" in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates start with the number of the ''arrondissement'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars start with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
* [[Paris]], the capital, hiking out of here is really difficult.
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strassbourg]]
* ...

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>44vhd51gy52ca0t7hh3ogp4tnzbhtd1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4355</id>
      <parentid>4354</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-20T08:26:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1709">'''France''' is a great country for hiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''Péages'' (toll points) you can get a hike easily. At some Péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further.

You can get free maps in the Peage offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-Peage".

Some Peages are really good, some or not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Most of the French don't speak English. So have a map to show them, where you want to go. If you know any French word, use it! French people like it, if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to Germany, you maybe need to know that Germany is "Allemagne" in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates start with the number of the ''arrondissement'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars start with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
* [[Paris]], the capital, hiking out of here is really difficult.
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strassbourg]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>mpvpmqlblnke7rb2wu8a5gp3nrj54dg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4356</id>
      <parentid>4355</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-20T08:33:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1713">'''France''' is a great country for hiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''Péages'' (toll points) you can get a hike easily. At some Péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further.

You can get free maps in the Peage offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-Peage".

Some Peages are really good, some or not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Most of the French don't speak English. So have a map to show them, where you want to go. If you know any French word, use it! French people like it, if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is "Allemagne" in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates start with the number of the ''arrondissement'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars start with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
* [[Paris]], the capital, hiking out of here is really difficult.
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strassbourg]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>jjjfq5whrvzdfz2ihsqocxyal269inb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4357</id>
      <parentid>4356</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-20T09:16:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1735">'''France''' is a great country for hiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''Péages'' (toll points) you can get a hike easily. At some Péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further.

You can get free maps in the Peage offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-Peage".

Some Peages are really good, some or not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Most of the French don't speak English. So have a map to show them, where you want to go. If you know any French word, use it! French people like it, if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is "Allemagne" in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates start with the number of the ''arrondissement'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars start with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
* [[Paris]], the capital, hiking out of here is really difficult.
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strassbourg]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.

{{stub}}

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>6rgbfk4heb60gqr36ob37ypmpgj86t4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4358</id>
      <parentid>4357</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-20T19:50:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1751">'''France''' is a great country for hiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''Péages'' (toll points) you can get a hike easily. At some Péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further.

You can get free maps in the Peage offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-Peage".

Some Peages are really good, some or not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Most of the French don't speak English. So have a map to show them, where you want to go. If you know any French word, use it! French people like it, if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is "Allemagne" in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates start with the number of the ''arrondissement'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars start with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
* [[Paris]], the capital, hiking out of here is really difficult.
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strassbourg]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>8qfgzr4n70ee8eczlr8ndkyrl4m6gcg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4359</id>
      <parentid>4358</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-26T10:30:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>130.104.69.1</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1745">'''France''' is a great country for hiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''Péages'' (toll points) you can get a hike easily. At some Péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further.

You can get free maps in the Peage offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-Peage".

Some Peages are really good, some or not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Most of the French don't speak English. So have a map to show them, where you want to go. If you know any French word, use it! French people like it, if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is "Allemagne" in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
* [[Paris]], the capital, hiking out of here is really difficult.
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strassbourg]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>fun8tuk4u1dfb4a3bbszzi2t5z3vju6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4360</id>
      <parentid>4359</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-28T02:16:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1775">'''France''' is a great country for hiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''Péages'' (toll points) you can get a hike easily. At some Péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further.

You can get free maps in the Peage offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-Peage".

Some Peages are really good, some or not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Most of the French don't speak English. So have a map to show them, where you want to go. If you know any French word, use it! French people like it, if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is "Allemagne" in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
* [[Paris]], the capital, hiking out of here is really difficult.
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strassbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>9ttpqd3agfb2k3nc9wu077piryl8lq0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4361</id>
      <parentid>1548</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1781">'''France''' is a great country for hiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''Péages'' (toll points) you can get a hike easily. At some Péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further.

You can get free maps in the [[Péage]] offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-Péage".

Some Péage are really good, some or not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Most of the French don't speak English. So have a map to show them, where you want to go. If you know any French word, use it! French people like it, if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is "Allemagne" in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
* [[Paris]], the capital, hiking out of here is really difficult.
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strassbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>2ine0oqafu51eaj770k3ln04hvc0nth</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>8841</id>
      <parentid>1547</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-20T14:18:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robino</username>
        <id>4</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1977">'''France''' is a great country for hiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''Péages'' (toll points) you can get a hike easily. 

At some Péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further. Most cities next to a highway normally have a [[Péage]] where all trafic has to stop. Asking for a ride just in front of the [[Péage]], before cars choose their queue, is mostly the best option.

You can get free maps in the [[Péage]] offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-Péage".

Some Péage are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Most of the French don't speak English. So have a map to show them, where you want to go. If you know any French word, use it! French people like it, if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is "Allemagne" in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
* [[Paris]], the capital, hiking out of here is really difficult.
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strassbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>3kqzn8tyl07jefmhc47ra16p11z29k2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>8842</id>
      <parentid>8841</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-20T14:19:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robino</username>
        <id>4</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2011">'''France''' is a great country for hiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''Péages'' (toll points) you can get a hike easily. 

At some Péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further. Most cities next to a highway normally have a [[Péage]] where all trafic has to stop. Asking for a ride just in front of the [[Péage]], before cars choose their queue, is mostly the best option.

You can get free maps in the [[Péage]] offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-Péage".

Some Péage are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Most of the French don't speak English. So have a map to show them, where you want to go. If you know any French word, use it! French people like it, if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is "Allemagne" in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
* [[Paris]], the capital, hiking out of here is really difficult.
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strassbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Montpellier]]
* [[Perpignan]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>3gmgmrj7964dbshwpebpuory9mfdgnc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>8843</id>
      <parentid>8842</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-20T14:27:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robino</username>
        <id>4</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1892">'''France''' is a great country for hiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''Péages'' (toll points) you can get a hike easily. 

At some Péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further. Most cities next to a highway have a [[Péage]] where all trafic has to stop.

You can get free maps in the [[Péage]] offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-Péage".

Some Péage are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Most of the French don't speak English. So have a map to show them, where you want to go. If you know any French word, use it! French people like it, if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is "Allemagne" in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
* [[Paris]], the capital, hiking out of here is really difficult.
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strassbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Montpellier]]
* [[Perpignan]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>i76buqic8i7z44sfvbndba1ibtu76h0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>8844</id>
      <parentid>8843</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-20T14:39:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zac Stewart</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1895">'''France''' is a great country for hiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''[[péage|péages]]'' (toll points) you can get a hike easily. 

At some Péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further. Most cities next to a highway have a péage where all trafic has to stop.

You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-péage".

Some Péage are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Most of the French don't speak English. So have a map to show them, where you want to go. If you know any French word, use it! French people like it, if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is "Allemagne" in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
* [[Paris]], the capital, hiking out of here is really difficult.
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strassbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Montpellier]]
* [[Perpignan]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>cn0uanp6don48d9l5uecmg5ovfr8b9x</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>8845</id>
      <parentid>4361</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-23T21:56:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1895">'''France''' is a great country for hiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''[[péage|péages]]'' (toll points) you can get a hike easily. 

At some Péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further. Most cities next to a highway have a péage where all trafic has to stop.

You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-péage".

Some Péage are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Most of the French don't speak English. So have a map to show them, where you want to go. If you know any French word, use it! French people like it, if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is "Allemagne" in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
* [[Paris]], the capital, hiking out of here is really difficult.
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strassbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Montpellier]]
* [[Perpignan]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>cn0uanp6don48d9l5uecmg5ovfr8b9x</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9412</id>
      <parentid>8845</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-03T04:22:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zac Stewart</username>
        <id>5</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1907">'''France''' is a great country for hiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''[[péage|péages]]'' (toll points) you can get a hike easily. 

At some Péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further. Most cities next to a highway have a péage where all trafic has to stop.

You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-péage".

Some Péage are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Most of the French don't speak English. So have a map to show them, where you want to go. If you know any French word, use it! French people like it, if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is "Allemagne" in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
* [[Paris]], the capital, hiking out of here is really difficult.
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strassbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Montpellier]]
* [[Perpignan]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>p8blauqqear9p55nwc3ljpff34he4a2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9527</id>
      <parentid>9412</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-05T22:57:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1932">'''France''' is a great country for hiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''[[péage|péages]]'' (toll points) you can get a hike easily. 

At some Péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further. Most cities next to a highway have a péage where all trafic has to stop.

You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-péage".

Some Péage are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Most of the French don't speak English. So have a map to show them, where you want to go. If you know any French word, use it! French people like it, if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is "Allemagne" in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
* [[Paris]], the capital, hiking out of here is really difficult.
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strassbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Montpellier]]
* [[Perpignan]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:FR]]
{{wikilinks}}</text>
      <sha1>a4n00ws33lgksafurcg4kpup53gky4u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9838</id>
      <parentid>9527</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-17T23:01:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2443">'''France''' is a great country for hiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''[[péage|péages]]'' (toll points) you can get a hike easily. 

==Péages==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and normally one is not allowed to solicit rides there. But this is not really enforced - since 2004 [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). But the risk is relatively low.

At some Péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further. Most cities next to a highway have a péage where all trafic has to stop.

You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-péage".

Some Péage are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try 
with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

==Language==

Most of the French don't speak English. So have a map to show them, where you want to go. If you know any French word, use it! French people like it, if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is "Allemagne" in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
* [[Paris]], the capital, hiking out of here is really difficult.
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strassbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Montpellier]]
* [[Perpignan]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:FR]]
{{wikilinks}}</text>
      <sha1>h04qgr10kxfv1pwcob2qn2pn2vrvrgd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10011</id>
      <parentid>9838</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-27T09:41:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mmjs</username>
        <id>30</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2443">'''France''' is a great country for hiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''[[péage|péages]]'' (toll points) you can get a hike easily. 

==Péages==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and normally one is not allowed to solicit rides there. But this is not really enforced - since 2004 [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). But the risk is relatively low.

At some péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further. Most cities next to a highway have a péage where all trafic has to stop.

You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-péage".

Some péages are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try 
with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

==Language==

Most of the French don't speak English. So have a map to show them, where you want to go. If you know any French word, use it! French people like it, if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is "Allemagne" in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
* [[Paris]], the capital, hiking out of here is really difficult.
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Montpellier]]
* [[Perpignan]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:FR]]
{{wikilinks}}</text>
      <sha1>6v6twgu2dbe8lisp6w5fdyh7mii1kd6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10120</id>
      <parentid>10011</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-01-13T18:49:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Daniel</username>
        <id>25</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2444">'''France''' is a great country for hiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''[[péage|péages]]'' (toll points) you can get a hike easily. 

==Péages==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and normally one is not allowed to solicit rides there. But this is not really enforced - since 2004 [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). But the risk is relatively low.

At some péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further. Most cities next to a highway have a péage where all trafic has to stop.

You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-péage".

Some péages are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try 
with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

==Language==

Most of the French don't speak English. So have a map to show them, where you want to go. If you know any French word, use it! French people like it, if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is "Allemagne" in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
* [[Paris]], the capital, hitching out of here is really difficult.
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Montpellier]]
* [[Perpignan]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:FR]]
{{wikilinks}}</text>
      <sha1>pctxb39an65k1lzba243ngxspno5kbb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10432</id>
      <parentid>10120</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-04T22:47:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2537">[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|200px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
'''France''' is a great country for hiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''[[péage|péages]]'' (toll points) you can get a hike easily. 

==Péages==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and normally one is not allowed to solicit rides there. But this is not really enforced - since 2004 [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). But the risk is relatively low.

At some péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further. Most cities next to a highway have a péage where all trafic has to stop.

You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-péage".

Some péages are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try 
with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

==Language==

Most of the French don't speak English. So have a map to show them, where you want to go. If you know any French word, use it! French people like it, if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is "Allemagne" in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
* [[Paris]], the capital, hitching out of here is really difficult.
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Montpellier]]
* [[Perpignan]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:FR]]
{{wikilinks}}</text>
      <sha1>6vwzi83mv2xx9m5ro95y18clbawpcqe</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10433</id>
      <parentid>10432</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-04T22:47:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2537">[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|300px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
'''France''' is a great country for hiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''[[péage|péages]]'' (toll points) you can get a hike easily. 

==Péages==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and normally one is not allowed to solicit rides there. But this is not really enforced - since 2004 [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). But the risk is relatively low.

At some péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further. Most cities next to a highway have a péage where all trafic has to stop.

You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-péage".

Some péages are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try 
with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

==Language==

Most of the French don't speak English. So have a map to show them, where you want to go. If you know any French word, use it! French people like it, if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is "Allemagne" in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
* [[Paris]], the capital, hitching out of here is really difficult.
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Montpellier]]
* [[Perpignan]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:FR]]
{{wikilinks}}</text>
      <sha1>ll4qug70jtdhc686dh49slcafd4wuds</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10505</id>
      <parentid>10433</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-12T16:34:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2542">[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|300px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''[[péage|péages]]'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily. 

==Péages==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and normally one is not allowed to solicit rides there. But this is not really enforced - since 2004 [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). But the risk is relatively low.

At some péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further. Most cities next to a highway have a péage where all trafic has to stop.

You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-péage".

Some péages are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try 
with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

==Language==

Most of the French don't speak English. So have a map to show them, where you want to go. If you know any French word, use it! French people like it, if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is "Allemagne" in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
* [[Paris]], the capital, hitching out of here is really difficult.
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Montpellier]]
* [[Perpignan]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:FR]]
{{wikilinks}}</text>
      <sha1>9yeptc83x6pqiww33oajl7sy3q1tq2k</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10656</id>
      <parentid>10505</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-29T04:22:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2685">[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|300px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''[[péage|péages]]'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily. 

==Péages==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and normally one is not allowed to solicit rides there. But this is not really enforced - since 2004 [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). But the risk is relatively low.

At some péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further. Most cities next to a highway have a péage where all trafic has to stop.

You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-péage".

Some péages are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try 
with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

==Language==

Most of the French don't speak English. So have a map to show them, where you want to go. If you know any French word, use it! French people like it, if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is "Allemagne" in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in [[France]]]]
* [[Paris]], the capital, hitching out of here is really difficult.
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Montpellier]]
* [[Perpignan]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:FR]]
{{wikilinks}}</text>
      <sha1>217dc15kb99trfkicpe4bp4w3oz8fwq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10657</id>
      <parentid>10656</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-29T04:22:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2681">[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|300px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''[[péage|péages]]'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily. 

==Péages==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and normally one is not allowed to solicit rides there. But this is not really enforced - since 2004 [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). But the risk is relatively low.

At some péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further. Most cities next to a highway have a péage where all trafic has to stop.

You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-péage".

Some péages are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try 
with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

==Language==

Most of the French don't speak English. So have a map to show them, where you want to go. If you know any French word, use it! French people like it, if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is "Allemagne" in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Paris]], the capital, hitching out of here is really difficult.
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Montpellier]]
* [[Perpignan]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:FR]]
{{wikilinks}}</text>
      <sha1>3ygkfofeb27hmotexcmr5y3rpwr0bqa</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10884</id>
      <parentid>10657</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-21T22:08:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Daniel</username>
        <id>25</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2750">[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|300px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|300px|A typical big péage in France]]
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''[[péage|péages]]'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily. 

==Péages==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and normally one is not allowed to solicit rides there. But this is not really enforced - since 2004 [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). But the risk is relatively low.

At some péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further. Most cities next to a highway have a péage where all trafic has to stop.

You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-péage".

Some péages are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try 
with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

==Language==

Most of the French don't speak English. So have a map to show them, where you want to go. If you know any French word, use it! French people like it, if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is "Allemagne" in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Paris]], the capital, hitching out of here is really difficult.
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Montpellier]]
* [[Perpignan]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:FR]]
{{wikilinks}}</text>
      <sha1>dc4sc11ub1ux07u3jzxdoraopxqpapc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10957</id>
      <parentid>10884</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-24T09:18:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2753">[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''[[péage|péages]]'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily. 

==Péages==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|left|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and normally one is not allowed to solicit rides there. But this is not really enforced - since 2004 [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). But the risk is relatively low.

At some péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further. Most cities next to a highway have a péage where all trafic has to stop.

You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-péage".

Some péages are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try 
with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

==Language==

Most of the French don't speak English. So have a map to show them, where you want to go. If you know any French word, use it! French people like it, if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is "''Allemagne''" in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Paris]], the capital, hitching out of here is really difficult.
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Montpellier]]
* [[Perpignan]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:FR]]
{{wikilinks}}</text>
      <sha1>2pe1w262tmipb033odmm66xfvko5dky</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11066</id>
      <parentid>10957</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-28T07:25:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>85.21.236.226</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20071">[[http://www8.vjc.edu/EnvironmentalClub/discuss/msgReader$95 cheap diazepam]] [[http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/~twiki/pub/Main/AngelKristofer/tubonyh.htm free samsung ringtones]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1030?id=atch1113 cheap hoodia]] [[http://acdronou.jubiiblog.de/ diazepam online]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832224) mp3 ringtones]] [[http://alcodom.blogdiario.com/ viagra online]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=370 xanax online]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832241) soma online]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=312 but adipex]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=318 cialis online]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1030?id=atch1105 order pharmacy online]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1066 soma online]] [[http://coracou.jubiiblog.de/ cheap hydrocodone]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1094 didrex online]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1087 lorazepam online]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=covarrel free funny ringtones]] [[http://lasitdron.jubiiblog.de/ cheap sildenafil]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1084 cheap levitra]] [[http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/~twiki/pub/Main/AngelKristofer/nyzihyp.htm free tracfone ringtones]] [[http://manka-kapak.blogspot.com casino craps online]] [[http://www.rso.cmich.edu/prevet/messageboard/000031c8.htm free ringtone]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=oudronacel cheap didrex]] [[http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/~twiki/pub/Main/CoyarCharline/kukoti.htm cialis online]] [[http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/~twiki/pub/Main/AngelKristofer/sinyfu.htm mp3 ringtones]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832228) nextel ringtones]] [[http://ervarli.blogdiario.com/ jazz ringtones]] [[http://www.csun.edu/learningnet/discussion/file.php?0,file=148 motorola ringtones]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832235) punk ringtones]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832253) buy wellbutrin]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832204) cool ringtones]] [[http://www8.vjc.edu/EnvironmentalClub/discuss/msgReader$88 alltel ringtones]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1031?id=atch1134 free alltel ringtones]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=361 tramadol online]] [[http://www8.vjc.edu/EnvironmentalClub/discuss/msgReader$106 nokia ringtones]] [[http://discussions.csbsju.edu/general/messages/25/xyvi-237.html cheap viagra]] [[http://www.rso.cmich.edu/prevet/messageboard/000031b5.htm cheap adipex]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832230) cheap norco]] [[http://www.csun.edu/learningnet/discussion/file.php?0,file=134 order wellbutrin]] [[http://www.csun.edu/learningnet/discussion/file.php?0,file=132 lorazepam online]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832234) cheap propecia]] [[http://alcta.blogdiario.com/ free sprint ringtones]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1092 ultracet online]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1100 zoloft online]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1031?id=atch1136 free cool ringtones]] [[http://liboor.jubiiblog.de/ tracfone ringtones]] [[http://letorolac.jubiiblog.de/ motorola ringtones]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832201) cialis online]] [[http://www.rso.cmich.edu/prevet/messageboard/000031c5.htm cheap levitra]] [[http://domvimon.jubiiblog.de/ buy norco]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1068 phentermine online]] [[http://ertral.jubiiblog.de/ cheap carisoprodol]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1074 cheap cialis]] [[http://enchanted1312.blogspot.com injecting valium]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=ricrolget free music ringtones]] [[http://el5or5ro.blogdiario.com/ motorola ringtones]] [[http://www.rso.cmich.edu/prevet/messageboard/000031c3.htm generic clonazepam]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1031?id=atch1128 polyphonic ringtones]] [[http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/~twiki/pub/Main/CoyarCharline/lusuli.htm generic viagra]] [[http://www8.vjc.edu/EnvironmentalClub/discuss/msgReader$113 sagem ringtones]] [[http://bocoleto.jubiiblog.de/ alltel ringtones]] [[http://discussions.csbsju.edu/general/messages/25/lepef-234.html cheap diazepam]] [[http://discussions.csbsju.edu/general/messages/25/dyjys-243.html adipex online]] [[http://discussions.csbsju.edu/general/messages/25/zisi-231.html buy xanax]] [[http://olorolacel.blogdiario.com/ cheap diazepam]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832220) cheap meridia]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=vartrocvi verizon ringtones]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=safunder viagra online]] [[http://algettr.blogdiario.com/ carisoprodol online]] [[http://www.rso.cmich.edu/prevet/messageboard/000031b7.htm cheap vicodin]] [[http://forum.kharkiv.edu/SForums/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=315&amp;FORUM_ID=3&amp;CAT_ID=3 cheap viagra]] [[http://www8.vjc.edu/EnvironmentalClub/discuss/msgReader$96 cheap fioricet]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1030?id=atch1112 order flexeril]] [[http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/~twiki/pub/Main/CoyarCharline/jeziluc.htm generic adipex]] [[http://forum.kharkiv.edu/SForums/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=302&amp;FORUM_ID=3&amp;CAT_ID=3 cheap soma]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832222) free mono ringtones]] [[http://tavidel.blogdiario.com/ free sony ericsson ringtones]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=yohiatt buy meridia]] [[http://www8.vjc.edu/EnvironmentalClub/discuss/msgReader$135 free verizon ringtones]] [[http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/~twiki/pub/Main/AngelKristofer/pixe.htm free cingular ringtone]] [[http://livisit.blogdiario.com/ valium online]] [[http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/~twiki/pub/Main/AngelKristofer/pypybug.htm nextel ringtones]] [[http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/~twiki/pub/Main/AngelKristofer/cicyfi.htm free polyphonic ringtone]] [[http://boricdom.blogdiario.com/ nextel ringtones]] [[http://www8.vjc.edu/EnvironmentalClub/discuss/msgReader$107 cheap norco]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=335 free midi ringtones]] [[http://www8.vjc.edu/EnvironmentalClub/discuss/msgReader$100 cheap meridia]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=351 free real ringtones]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=323 cheap diazepam]] [[http://roacpas.jubiiblog.de/ ultram]] [[http://cnac4tco.blogdiario.com/ free mp3 ringtones]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1081 but alprazolam]] [[http://www.rso.cmich.edu/prevet/messageboard/000031da.htm samsung ringtones]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=359 free sprint ringtones]] [[http://cozelrol.jubiiblog.de/ xenical online]] [[http://olobasno.jubiiblog.de/ free samsung ringtones]] [[http://www.csun.edu/learningnet/discussion/file.php?0,file=126 buy alprazolam]] [[http://domrelchi.jubiiblog.de/ nexium online]] [[http://cnatadel.blogdiario.com/ buy xanax]] [[http://www.rso.cmich.edu/prevet/messageboard/000031d7.htm free motorola ringtone]] [[http://www.csun.edu/learningnet/discussion/file.php?0,file=128 but paxil]] [[http://vizelsit.jubiiblog.de/ free ringtones]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1099 lisinopril online]] [[http://discussions.csbsju.edu/general/messages/25/wykypof-226.html tramadol online]] [[http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/~twiki/pub/Main/CoyarCharline/nikol.htm cheap ultram]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=wiwhistl vicodin online]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1076 cheap viagra]] [[http://kleinerachel.blogspot.com valium ativan]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832210) fioricet]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=aceldarro sonyericsson ringtones]] [[http://cnacorel.blogdiario.com/ mono ringtones]] [[http://eltrli.jubiiblog.de/ vicodin online]] [[http://www.csun.edu/learningnet/discussion/file.php?0,file=120 ativan]] [[http://taoudel.blogdiario.com/ sildenafil online]] [[http://www.csun.edu/learningnet/discussion/file.php?0,file=159 alltel ringtones]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=365 free verizon ringtones]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=338 free mp3 ringtones]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1098 albuterol]] [[http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/~twiki/pub/Main/AngelKristofer/colivew.htm free alltel ringtones]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1030?id=atch1119 free mp3 ringtones]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832203) clonazepam online]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=352 free sagem ringtones]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=345 order paxil]] [[http://wildomania.blogspot.com ambien sleep walking]] [[http://eltsitzel.blogdiario.com/ free sagem ringtones]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=cnataco nokia ringtones]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=367 cheap vicodin]] [[http://forum.kharkiv.edu/SForums/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=318&amp;FORUM_ID=3&amp;CAT_ID=3 cheap norco]] [[http://boroltroc.jubiiblog.de/ free funny ringtones]] [[http://dar5or5tr.blogdiario.com/ free midi ringtones]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=363 cheap ultram]] [[http://domdronpas.blogdiario.com/ cheap tramadol]] [[http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/~twiki/pub/Main/CoyarCharline/nenopo.htm cheap tramadol]] [[http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/~twiki/pub/Main/CoyarCharline/xoky.htm cheap paxil]] [[http://ginny-potter21.blogspot.com caribbean casino gold online]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1030?id=atch1109 cheap diethylpropion]] [[http://www.csun.edu/learningnet/discussion/file.php?0,file=137 ultracet]] [[http://www8.vjc.edu/EnvironmentalClub/discuss/msgReader$94 order clonazepam]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832215) free jazz ringtones]] [[http://capasget.jubiiblog.de/ free sagem ringtones]] [[http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/~twiki/pub/Main/CoyarCharline/kifily.htm ativan online]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=troctapas mtv ringtones]] [[http://skyph0ne.blogspot.com bonus casino free online]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=trerc4t mono ringtones]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=332 cheap levitra]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=333 buy lorazepam]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=monractroc punk ringtones]] [[http://www.rso.cmich.edu/prevet/messageboard/000031ae.htm generic fioricet]] [[http://www8.vjc.edu/EnvironmentalClub/discuss/msgReader$103 mp3 ringtones]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=dronzelchi sony ringtones]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832208) buy didrex]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1096 sildenafil online]] [[http://rellaboc.blogdiario.com/ adipex online]] [[http://elnobas.jubiiblog.de/ cheap levitra]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832233) polyphonic ringtones]] [[http://www8.vjc.edu/EnvironmentalClub/discuss/msgReader$104 free music ringtones]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=lioubo real ringtones]] [[http://www8.vjc.edu/EnvironmentalClub/discuss/msgReader$99 order levitra]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=364 valium online]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=basroget free midi ringtones]] [[http://trsitcna.blogdiario.com/ free sharp ringtones]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1031?id=atch1140 kyocera ringtones]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=350 qwest ringtones]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832251) viagra online]] [[http://www.rso.cmich.edu/prevet/messageboard/000031cd.htm free funny ringtone]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=trocerrol jazz ringtones]] [[http://www8.vjc.edu/EnvironmentalClub/discuss/msgReader$111 free qwest ringtones]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1085 hydrocodone online]] [[http://letobocco.jubiiblog.de/ cheap valium]] [[http://kimichameleon.blogspot.com valium grapefruit]] [[http://www.csun.edu/learningnet/discussion/file.php?0,file=124 norco online]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=314 cheap alprazolam]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=348 but propecia]] [[http://www.rso.cmich.edu/prevet/messageboard/000031ab.htm phentermine online]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=getcdel nexium online]] [[http://www8.vjc.edu/EnvironmentalClub/discuss/msgReader$110 free polyphonic ringtones]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1083 order paxil]] [[http://mabelsthecat.blogspot.com affiliate casino online program]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=oloeltdom free free ringtones]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1077 meridia online]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1030?id=atch1107 vigrx]] [[http://www8.vjc.edu/EnvironmentalClub/discuss/msgReader$136 viagra online]] [[http://eltmonboc.jubiiblog.de/ music ringtones]] [[http://www8.vjc.edu/EnvironmentalClub/discuss/msgReader$101 mono ringtones]] [[http://discussions.csbsju.edu/general/messages/25/bedisuz-244.html norco online]] [[http://letovipas.jubiiblog.de/ cheap tramadol]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1075 ativan online]] [[http://caacbas.blogdiario.com/ punk ringtones]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1065 tramadol online]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1031?id=atch1141 sony ringtones]] [[http://www.csun.edu/learningnet/discussion/file.php?0,file=117 online ultram]] [[http://paschitr.jubiiblog.de/ soma]] [[http://www.csun.edu/learningnet/discussion/file.php?0,file=127 buy clonazepam]] [[http://www.rso.cmich.edu/prevet/messageboard/000031a9.htm generic soma]] [[http://www.csun.edu/learningnet/discussion/file.php?0,file=123 adipex online]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1031?id=atch1137 free sharp ringtones]] [[http://chiborol.jubiiblog.de/ didrex]] [[http://www8.vjc.edu/EnvironmentalClub/discuss/msgReader$109 phentermine online]] [[http://or5alpas.blogdiario.com/ cheap levitra]] [[http://mutantalias.blogspot.com valium use]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=bocboor motorola ringtones]] [[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''[[péage|péages]]'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily. 

==Péages==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|left|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and normally one is not allowed to solicit rides there. But this is not really enforced - since 2004 [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). But the risk is relatively low.

At some péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further. Most cities next to a highway have a péage where all trafic has to stop.

You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-péage".

Some péages are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try 
with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

==Language==

Most of the French don't speak English. So have a map to show them, where you want to go. If you know any French word, use it! French people like it, if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is "''Allemagne''" in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Paris]], the capital, hitching out of here is really difficult.
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Montpellier]]
* [[Perpignan]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:FR]]
{{wikilinks}}</text>
      <sha1>h3vezf4kz49rryfbj72he3282ejohi5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11068</id>
      <parentid>11066</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-28T15:03:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>82.122.244.48</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2753">[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''[[péage|péages]]'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily. 

==Péages==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|left|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and normally one is not allowed to solicit rides there. But this is not really enforced - since 2004 [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). But the risk is relatively low.

At some péages all the traffic has to stop and pay - these are excellent spots to get a long ride further. Most cities next to a highway have a péage where all trafic has to stop.

You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find the "all-stop-péage".

Some péages are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with an indication of where to go, drop it and try 
with your thumb only. And also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

==Language==

Most of the French don't speak English. So have a map to show them, where you want to go. If you know any French word, use it! French people like it, if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is "''Allemagne''" in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Paris]], the capital, hitching out of here is really difficult.
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Montpellier]]
* [[Perpignan]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:FR]]
{{wikilinks}}</text>
      <sha1>2pe1w262tmipb033odmm66xfvko5dky</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11071</id>
      <parentid>11068</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-28T18:20:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zac Stewart</username>
        <id>5</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3286">[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''[[péage|péages]]'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily. 

==Péages==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
A '''péage''' is a tollway in France. They are often placed near cities on autoroutes (motorways). At some péages all the traffic has to stop and pay and are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride. You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages".

[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
===Getting a Ride===
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.

Some péages are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

===Legality===
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and normally one is not allowed to solicit rides there. However, this is not really enforced and since 2004, [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). But the risk is relatively low.

==Language==

Most of the French don't speak English. So have a map to show them, where you want to go. If you know any French word, use it! French people like it, if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is "''Allemagne''" in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Paris]], the capital, hitching out of here is really difficult.
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Montpellier]]
* [[Perpignan]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:FR]]
{{wikilinks}}</text>
      <sha1>keiq2u397nw30bap2nc343q5nc4wzo7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11073</id>
      <parentid>11071</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-28T19:10:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>71.28.46.153</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3452">[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''[[péage|péages]]'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily. 

==Péages==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
A '''péage''' is a tollway in France. They are often placed near cities on autoroutes (motorways). At some péages all the traffic has to stop and pay and are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride. You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages".

[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
===Getting a Ride===
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.

Some péages are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

===Legality===
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and normally one is not allowed to solicit rides there. However, this is not really enforced and since 2004, [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). But the risk is relatively low.

==Language==
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play)--please in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Paris]], the capital, hitching out of here is really difficult.
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Montpellier]]
* [[Perpignan]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:FR]]
{{wikilinks}}</text>
      <sha1>b9qoynkedl3gj1mg0dqolzv29jypaux</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11113</id>
      <parentid>11073</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-30T21:59:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zac Stewart</username>
        <id>5</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3442">[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''[[péage|péages]]'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily. 

==Péages==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
A '''péage''' is a tollway in France. They are often placed near cities on autoroutes (motorways). At some péages all the traffic has to stop and pay and are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride. You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages".

[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
===Getting a Ride===
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.

Some péages are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

===Legality===
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and normally one is not allowed to solicit rides there. However, this is not really enforced and since 2004, [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). But the risk is relatively low.

==Language==
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play)--please in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Paris]], the capital, hitching out of here is really difficult.
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Montpellier]]
* [[Perpignan]]

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:FR]]
{{wikilinks}}</text>
      <sha1>2et1rvfickc2agc7to2139hz5iilbpc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11453</id>
      <parentid>11113</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-28T14:30:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>SpamBucket</username>
        <id>24368</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3454">[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''[[péage|péages]]'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily. 

==Péages==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
A '''péage''' is a tollway in France. They are often placed near cities on autoroutes (motorways). At some péages all the traffic has to stop and pay and are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride. You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages".

[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
===Getting a Ride===
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.

Some péages are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

===Legality===
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and normally one is not allowed to solicit rides there. However, this is not really enforced and since 2004, [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). But the risk is relatively low.

==Language==
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play)--please in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Paris]], the capital, hitching out of here is really difficult.
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]]
* [[Dijon]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Montpellier]]
* [[Perpignan]]

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:FR]]
{{wikilinks}}</text>
      <sha1>sb56j8jii9gszxnricvokgxghn06ab3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11516</id>
      <parentid>11453</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-06-01T10:16:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>83.223.156.227</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3466">[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''[[péage|péages]]'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily. 

==Péages==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
A '''péage''' is a tollway in France. They are often placed near cities on autoroutes (motorways). At some péages all the traffic has to stop and pay and are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride. You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages".

[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
===Getting a Ride===
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.

Some péages are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

===Legality===
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and normally one is not allowed to solicit rides there. However, this is not really enforced and since 2004, [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). But the risk is relatively low.

==Language==
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play)--please in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Paris]], the capital, hitching out of here is really difficult.
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]]
* [[Dijon]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Montpellier]]
* [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]]

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:FR]]
{{wikilinks}}</text>
      <sha1>tnmkleskbn23436ud01dluevl4x5q9t</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11664</id>
      <parentid>11516</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-06-14T12:37:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Caminosdelmundo</username>
        <id>39</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3763">[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''[[péage|péages]]'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily. 

==Péages==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
A '''péage''' is a tollway in France. They are often placed near cities on autoroutes (motorways). At some péages all the traffic has to stop and pay and are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride. You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages".

Here it's a map of south of France highway network : http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf In black letters where it's written "peage de....." it mean it's a big peage where all the trafic have to stop. The faster way to travel is only to go from this "all-stop-péages" to an other one.


[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
===Getting a Ride===
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.

Some péages are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

===Legality===
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and normally one is not allowed to solicit rides there. However, this is not really enforced and since 2004, [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). But the risk is relatively low.

==Language==
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play)--please in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Paris]], the capital, hitching out of here is really difficult.
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]]
* [[Dijon]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Montpellier]]
* [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]]

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:FR]]
{{wikilinks}}</text>
      <sha1>dp3eh9j5w8by309b28g11q2ncnfyx01</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11667</id>
      <parentid>11664</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-06-14T12:50:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Caminosdelmundo</username>
        <id>39</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3774">[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''[[péage|péages]]'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily. 

==Péages==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
A '''péage''' is a tollway in France. They are often placed near cities on autoroutes (motorways). At some péages all the traffic has to stop and pay and are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride. You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages".

Here it's a map of south of France highway network : http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf In black letters where it's written "peage de....." it mean it's a big peage where all the trafic have to stop. The faster way to travel is only to go from this "all-stop-péages" to an other one.


[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
===Getting a Ride===
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.

Some péages are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

===Legality===
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and normally one is not allowed to solicit rides there. However, this is not really enforced and since 2004, [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). But the risk is relatively low.

==Language==
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play)--please in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Paris]], the capital, hitching out of here is really difficult.
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]]
* [[Dijon]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Montpellier]]
* [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]]

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:FR]]
{{wikilinks}}</text>
      <sha1>czch04idbdjkazva6j8us5v58ed6x79</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12187</id>
      <parentid>11667</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-09T07:53:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zac Stewart</username>
        <id>5</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3775">[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''[[péage|péages]]'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily. 

==Péages==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
A '''péage''' is a tollway in France. They are often placed near cities on autoroutes (motorways). At some péages all the traffic has to stop and pay and are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride. You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages".

Here it's a map of south of France highway network : http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf In black letters where it's written "peage de....." it mean it's a big peage where all the trafic have to stop. The faster way to travel is only to go from this "all-stop-péages" to an other one.


[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
===Getting a Ride===
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.

Some péages are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

===Legality===
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and normally one is not allowed to solicit rides there. However, this is not really enforced and since 2004, [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). But the risk is relatively low.

==Language==
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play)--please in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Paris]], the capital, hitching out of here is really difficult.
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]]
* [[Dijon]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Montpellier]]
* [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]]

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:FR]]
{{wikilinks}}</text>
      <sha1>9xpjs81duirasdwkfqndkyk5g3zgkhj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12279</id>
      <parentid>12187</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-14T19:23:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>80.219.230.9</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4065">[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''[[péage|péages]]'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily. 

==Péages==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
A '''péage''' is a tollway in France. They are often placed near cities on autoroutes (motorways). At some péages all the traffic has to stop and pay and are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride. You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages". In this country, finding a good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one ain't that harder but the chances of being picked up are extremely better.

Here it's a map of south of France highway network : http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf In black letters where it's written "peage de....." it mean it's a big peage where all the trafic have to stop. The faster way to travel is only to go from this "all-stop-péages" to an other one.


[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
===Getting a Ride===
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.

Some péages are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

===Legality===
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and normally one is not allowed to solicit rides there. However, this is not really enforced and since 2004, [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). But the risk is relatively low.

==Language==
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play)--please in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Paris]], the capital, hitching out of here is really difficult.
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]]
* [[Dijon]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Montpellier]]
* [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]]

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:FR]]
{{wikilinks}}</text>
      <sha1>0nx0i63wcla44wetzhmuvpeq98ftcrm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12289</id>
      <parentid>12279</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-15T05:43:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zac Stewart</username>
        <id>5</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4038">[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

Finding a good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.

==Péages==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
A '''péage''' is a tollway in France. They are often placed near cities on autoroutes (motorways). At some péages all the traffic has to stop and pay and are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride. You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages".
Here it's a map of south of France highway network : http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf In black letters where it's written "peage de....." it mean it's a big peage where all the trafic have to stop. The faster way to travel is only to go from this "all-stop-péages" to an other one.

[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
===Getting a Ride===
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.

Some péages are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

===Legality===
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and normally one is not allowed to solicit rides there. However, this is not really enforced and since 2004, [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). But the risk is relatively low.

==Language==
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play)--please in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Paris]], the capital, hitching out of here is really difficult.
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]]
* [[Dijon]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Montpellier]]
* [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]]

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:FR]]
{{wikilinks}}</text>
      <sha1>i650sh1i98i22v23snzy769iv3spzez</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12291</id>
      <parentid>12289</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-15T05:49:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zac Stewart</username>
        <id>5</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3935">[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

Finding a good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.

==Péages==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
A '''péage''' is a tollway in France. They are often placed near cities on autoroutes (motorways). At some péages all the traffic has to stop and pay and are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride. You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages". The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next.

[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
===Getting a Ride===
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.

Some péages are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

===Legality===
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and normally one is not allowed to solicit rides there. However, this is not really enforced and since 2004, [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). But the risk is relatively low.

==External links==
*[http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

==Language==
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play)--please in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Paris]], the capital, hitching out of here is really difficult.
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]]
* [[Dijon]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Montpellier]]
* [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]]

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:FR]]
{{wikilinks}}</text>
      <sha1>kjo8vctrl0dvv4vgkvk1w9mitftngq6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12292</id>
      <parentid>12291</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-15T05:51:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zac Stewart</username>
        <id>5</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3935">[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

Finding a good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.

==Péages==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
A '''péage''' is a tollway in France. They are often placed near cities on autoroutes (motorways). At some péages all the traffic has to stop and pay and are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride. You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages". The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next.

[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
===Getting a Ride===
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.

Some péages are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

===Legality===
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and normally one is not allowed to solicit rides there. However, this is not really enforced and since 2004, [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). But the risk is relatively low.

==Language==
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play)--please in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Paris]], the capital, hitching out of here is really difficult.
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]]
* [[Dijon]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Montpellier]]
* [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]]

==External links==
*[http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:FR]]
{{wikilinks}}</text>
      <sha1>18c7u6ma4xnz1qeiey1r33eth7iu83t</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12543</id>
      <parentid>12292</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-31T13:35:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3950">[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

Finding a good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.

==Péages==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
A '''péage''' is a tollway in France. They are often placed near cities on autoroutes (motorways). At some péages all the traffic has to stop and pay and are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride. You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages". The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next.

[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
===Getting a Ride===
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.

Some péages are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

===Legality===
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and normally one is not allowed to solicit rides there. However, this is not really enforced and since 2004, [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). But the risk is relatively low.

==Language==
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play)--please in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Paris]], the capital, hitching out of here is really difficult.
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]]
* [[Dijon]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Montpellier]]
* [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]]

==External links==
*[http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:FR]]
{{wikilinks}}
[[es:Francia]]</text>
      <sha1>enm3rijseeud2o1jrs2las6o8n4lbxn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12851</id>
      <parentid>12543</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-15T14:03:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>88.137.40.121</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3991">[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

Finding a good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.

==Péages==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
A '''péage''' is a tollway in France. They are often placed near cities on autoroutes (motorways). At some péages all the traffic has to stop and pay and are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride. You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages". The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next.

[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
===Getting a Ride===
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.

Some péages are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

===Legality===
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and normally one is not allowed to solicit rides there. However, this is not really enforced and since 2004, [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). But the risk is relatively low.

==Language==
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play)--please in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Paris]], the capital, hitching out of here is really difficult.
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]]
* [[Dijon]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Montpellier]]
* [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]]
* [[Dol de Bretagne]]

==External links==
*[http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:FR]]
{{wikilinks}}
[[es:Francia]]</text>
      <sha1>ahlltcjq5bif1svgv1ro6e8y15ykcu1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13469</id>
      <parentid>12851</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-06T11:40:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4008">[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

Finding a good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.

==Péages==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
A '''péage''' is a tollway in France. They are often placed near cities on autoroutes (motorways). At some péages all the traffic has to stop and pay and are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride. You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages". The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next.

[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
===Getting a Ride===
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.

Some péages are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

===Legality===
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and normally one is not allowed to solicit rides there. However, this is not really enforced and since 2004, [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). But the risk is relatively low.

==Language==
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play)--please in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Paris]], the capital, hitching out of here is really difficult.
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]]
* [[Dijon]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Montpellier]]
* [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]]
* [[Dol de Bretagne]]

==External links==
*[http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:FR]]
{{wikilinks}}
[[es:Francia]]</text>
      <sha1>c8gq7u686qe51hq2jpur6mwa0fwnifq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13989</id>
      <parentid>13469</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-21T22:50:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4022">[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

Finding a good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.

==Péages==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
A '''péage''' is a tollway in France. They are often placed near cities on autoroutes (motorways). At some péages all the traffic has to stop and pay and are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride. You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages". The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next.

[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
===Getting a Ride===
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.

Some péages are really good, some not so good. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

===Legality===
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and normally one is not allowed to solicit rides there. However, this is not really enforced and since 2004, [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). But the risk is relatively low.

==Language==
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say "Bonjour Monsieur/Madame", to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that Germany is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play)--please in French.

==Online maps==
[http://mappy.fr mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.

==License plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, Parisian cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

==Cities==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Paris]], the capital, hitching out of here is really difficult.
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]]
* [[Dijon]]
* [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Marseilles]]
* [[Montpellier]]
* [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]]
* [[Dol de Bretagne]]

==External links==
*[http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

[[Category:France|*]] [[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:FR]]
{{wikilinks}}
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]</text>
      <sha1>qaak37ao5x2zd6ve41pv0erap9a116j</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14595</id>
      <parentid>13989</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-10T13:03:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3948">[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

==Info==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and normally one is not allowed to solicit rides there. However, this is not really enforced and since 2004, [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). But the risk is relatively low.

Finding a good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.

Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say ''Bonjour Monsieur/Madame'', to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that [[Germany]] is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = please in French.
==Péages==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
A '''péage''' is a tollway in France. They are often placed near cities on autoroutes (motorways). At some péages all the traffic has to stop and pay and are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride. You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages". The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.


==Cities==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dijon]], [[Dol de Bretagne]], [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]], [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]], [[Montpellier]]
* [[Paris]], [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]], [[Rennes]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]], [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
==Number plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.
==External links==
* [http://mappy.fr Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:France|*]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]</text>
      <sha1>5ff4armhbv1e3lczqjqwjlscnl3yme1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14650</id>
      <parentid>14595</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-12T00:29:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Daniel</username>
        <id>25</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3594">[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

==Info==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. (See below)

Finding a good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.

Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say ''Bonjour Monsieur/Madame'', to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that [[Germany]] is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = please in French.

==Péages==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
A '''péage''' is a tollway in France. They are often placed near cities on autoroutes (motorways). At some péages all the traffic has to stop and pay and are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride. You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages". The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.


==Cities==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dijon]], [[Dol de Bretagne]], [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]], [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]], [[Montpellier]]
* [[Paris]], [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]], [[Rennes]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]], [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
==Number plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.
==External links==
* [http://mappy.fr Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:France|*]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]</text>
      <sha1>dprxo2jlgm3iga8abt4tmjql53w0zah</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14651</id>
      <parentid>14650</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-12T00:29:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Daniel</username>
        <id>25</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3602">[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

==General Info==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. (See below)

Finding a good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.

Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say ''Bonjour Monsieur/Madame'', to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that [[Germany]] is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = please in French.

==Péages==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
A '''péage''' is a tollway in France. They are often placed near cities on autoroutes (motorways). At some péages all the traffic has to stop and pay and are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride. You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages". The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.


==Cities==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dijon]], [[Dol de Bretagne]], [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]], [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]], [[Montpellier]]
* [[Paris]], [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]], [[Rennes]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]], [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
==Number plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.
==External links==
* [http://mappy.fr Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:France|*]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]</text>
      <sha1>tk9j185j20vuirmalm5sekswuuo5hec</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14652</id>
      <parentid>14651</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-12T00:48:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Daniel</username>
        <id>25</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4921">[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

==General Info==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. (See below)

Finding a good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.

Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say ''Bonjour Monsieur/Madame'', to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that [[Germany]] is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = please in French.

==Autoroutes&amp;Péages==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
"Autoroute" means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of Péages: Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called also "Barrière de Péage", i.e. "Toll Barrier". These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller and waiting times longer, but if it is located near a relatively big town or on the crossing with a national road it's pretty ok. At this type of péages, the road usually splits in two on-ramps going in each direction, so you might need a sign with your direction. 

You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages". The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

It is forbidden to stay on the motorway itself, as well as on some parts of national roads ("Voie express"), so you have to stick to entrances/gas station.

Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and technically one is not allowed to sollicit rides there, but this is not really enforced. Since 2004, [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). But the risk is relatively low.

==Cities==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dijon]], [[Dol de Bretagne]], [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]], [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]], [[Montpellier]]
* [[Paris]], [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]], [[Rennes]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]], [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
==Number plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.
==External links==
* [http://mappy.fr Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:France|*]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]</text>
      <sha1>4fxt5fctjxd1p94imsh66yruytvhyxy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14657</id>
      <parentid>14652</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-12T12:23:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Daniel</username>
        <id>25</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4924">[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

==General Info==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. (See below)

Choosing the good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.

Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say ''Bonjour Monsieur/Madame'', to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that [[Germany]] is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = please in French.

==Autoroutes&amp;Péages==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
"Autoroute" means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of Péages: Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called also "Barrière de Péage", i.e. "Toll Barrier". These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller and waiting times longer, but if it is located near a relatively big town or on the crossing with a national road it's pretty ok. At this type of péages, the road usually splits in two on-ramps going in each direction, so you might need a sign with your direction. 

You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages". The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

It is forbidden to stay on the motorway itself, as well as on some parts of national roads ("Voie express"), so you have to stick to entrances/gas station.

Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and technically one is not allowed to sollicit rides there, but this is not really enforced. Since 2004, [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). But the risk is relatively low.

==Cities==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dijon]], [[Dol de Bretagne]], [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]], [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]], [[Montpellier]]
* [[Paris]], [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]], [[Rennes]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]], [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
==Number plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.
==External links==
* [http://mappy.fr Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:France|*]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]</text>
      <sha1>5hzqqz9b4kgrvtbu62rl8het6l3q7oz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14658</id>
      <parentid>14657</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-12T12:25:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Daniel</username>
        <id>25</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4945">[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

==General Info==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. (See below)

Choosing the good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.

Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say ''Bonjour Monsieur/Madame'', to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that [[Germany]] is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = please in French.

==Autoroutes&amp;Péages==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
'''Autoroute''' means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called also "Barrière de Péage", i.e. "Toll Barrier". These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller and waiting times longer, but if it is located near a relatively big town or on the crossing with a national road it's pretty ok. At this type of péages, the road usually splits in two on-ramps going in each direction, so you might need a sign with your direction. 

You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages". The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

It is forbidden to stay on the motorway itself, as well as on some parts of national roads ("Voie express"), so you have to stick to entrances/gas stations.

Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and technically one is not allowed to sollicit rides there, but in reality this is not really enforced. Since 2004, [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). So the risk is relatively low.

==Cities==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dijon]], [[Dol de Bretagne]], [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]], [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]], [[Montpellier]]
* [[Paris]], [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]], [[Rennes]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]], [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
==Number plates==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.
==External links==
* [http://mappy.fr Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:France|*]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]</text>
      <sha1>dz8qv8dimp2cxiloq0emhhr7ji5fxss</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14706</id>
      <parentid>14658</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-13T15:17:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4959">[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

== General Info ==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. (See below)

Choosing the good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.

Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say ''Bonjour Monsieur/Madame'', to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that [[Germany]] is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = please in French.

== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
'''Autoroute''' means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called also "Barrière de Péage", i.e. "Toll Barrier". These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller and waiting times longer, but if it is located near a relatively big town or on the crossing with a national road it's pretty ok. At this type of péages, the road usually splits in two on-ramps going in each direction, so you might need a sign with your direction.

You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages". The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

It is forbidden to stay on the motorway itself, as well as on some parts of national roads ("Voie express"), so you have to stick to entrances/gas stations.

Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and technically one is not allowed to sollicit rides there, but in reality this is not really enforced. Since 2004, [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). So the risk is relatively low.

== Cities ==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dijon]], [[Dol de Bretagne]], [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]], [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]], [[Montpellier]]
* [[Paris]], [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]], [[Rennes]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]], [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]

== Number plates ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.


[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:France| ]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]</text>
      <sha1>6n7c708q2d9bb532dkrr4q4cm2j7fwn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15314</id>
      <parentid>14706</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-01T12:00:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>81.208.106.78</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4970">[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

== General Info ==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. (See below)

Choosing the good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.

Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say ''Bonjour Monsieur/Madame'', to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that [[Germany]] is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = please in French.

== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
'''Autoroute''' means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called also "Barrière de Péage", i.e. "Toll Barrier". These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller and waiting times longer, but if it is located near a relatively big town or on the crossing with a national road it's pretty ok. At this type of péages, the road usually splits in two on-ramps going in each direction, so you might need a sign with your direction.

You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages". The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

It is forbidden to stay on the motorway itself, as well as on some parts of national roads ("Voie express"), so you have to stick to entrances/gas stations.

Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and technically one is not allowed to sollicit rides there, but in reality this is not really enforced. Since 2004, [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). So the risk is relatively low.

== Cities ==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dijon]], [[Dol de Bretagne]], [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]], [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]], [[Montpellier]]
* [[Nice]]
* [[Paris]], [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]], [[Rennes]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]], [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]

== Number plates ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.


[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:France| ]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]</text>
      <sha1>dbu71yxh9p1b9p8t9org9wx5gle2cfg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16067</id>
      <parentid>15314</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-20T14:38:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5064">&lt;map lat='46' lng='2' zoom='5' view='0' float='right' height='300' country='France'/&gt;
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

== General Info ==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. (See below)

Choosing the good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.

Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say ''Bonjour Monsieur/Madame'', to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that [[Germany]] is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = please in French.

== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
'''Autoroute''' means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called also "Barrière de Péage", i.e. "Toll Barrier". These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller and waiting times longer, but if it is located near a relatively big town or on the crossing with a national road it's pretty ok. At this type of péages, the road usually splits in two on-ramps going in each direction, so you might need a sign with your direction.
__NOTOC__
You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages". The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.
[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

It is forbidden to stay on the motorway itself, as well as on some parts of national roads ("Voie express"), so you have to stick to entrances/gas stations.

Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and technically one is not allowed to sollicit rides there, but in reality this is not really enforced. Since 2004, [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). So the risk is relatively low.

== Cities ==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dijon]], [[Dol de Bretagne]], [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]], [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]], [[Montpellier]]
* [[Nice]]
* [[Paris]], [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]], [[Rennes]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]], [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]

== Number plates ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.


[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:France| ]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]</text>
      <sha1>4ivw4m0f7v1ufxz6w147xjnk438ryxr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16358</id>
      <parentid>16067</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-08T14:10:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5185">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro ( € )
}}
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

== General Info ==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. (See below)

Choosing the good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.
&lt;map lat='46' lng='2' zoom='5' view='0' float='right' height='300' country='France'/&gt;
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say ''Bonjour Monsieur/Madame'', to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that [[Germany]] is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = please in French.

== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
'''Autoroute''' means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called also "Barrière de Péage", i.e. "Toll Barrier". These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller and waiting times longer, but if it is located near a relatively big town or on the crossing with a national road it's pretty ok. At this type of péages, the road usually splits in two on-ramps going in each direction, so you might need a sign with your direction.
__NOTOC__
You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages". The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.
[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

It is forbidden to stay on the motorway itself, as well as on some parts of national roads ("Voie express"), so you have to stick to entrances/gas stations.

Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and technically one is not allowed to sollicit rides there, but in reality this is not really enforced. Since 2004, [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). So the risk is relatively low.

== Cities ==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dijon]], [[Dol de Bretagne]], [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]], [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]], [[Montpellier]]
* [[Nice]]
* [[Paris]], [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]], [[Rennes]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]], [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]

== Number plates ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.


[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:France| ]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]</text>
      <sha1>ijs1ausx2f3c8k699ocl9h9umv4921g</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16635</id>
      <parentid>16358</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-24T10:46:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5214">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

== General Info ==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. (See below)

Choosing the good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.
&lt;map lat='46' lng='2' zoom='5' view='0' float='right' height='300' country='France'/&gt;
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say ''Bonjour Monsieur/Madame'', to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that [[Germany]] is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = please in French.

== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
'''Autoroute''' means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called also "Barrière de Péage", i.e. "Toll Barrier". These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller and waiting times longer, but if it is located near a relatively big town or on the crossing with a national road it's pretty ok. At this type of péages, the road usually splits in two on-ramps going in each direction, so you might need a sign with your direction.
__NOTOC__
You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages". The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.
[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

It is forbidden to stay on the motorway itself, as well as on some parts of national roads ("Voie express"), so you have to stick to entrances/gas stations.

Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and technically one is not allowed to sollicit rides there, but in reality this is not really enforced. Since 2004, [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). So the risk is relatively low.

== Cities ==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dijon]], [[Dol de Bretagne]], [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]], [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseilles]], [[Montpellier]]
* [[Nice]]
* [[Paris]], [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]], [[Rennes]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]], [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]

== Number plates ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.


[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:France| ]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]</text>
      <sha1>3o2bjkob4i9ph22f8dy4oshypgl2xdb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16821</id>
      <parentid>16635</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-30T12:09:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5193">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

== General Info ==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. (See below)

Choosing the good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.
&lt;map lat='46' lng='2' zoom='5' view='0' float='right' height='300' country='France'/&gt;
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say ''Bonjour Monsieur/Madame'', to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that [[Germany]] is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = please in French.

== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
'''Autoroute''' means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called also "Barrière de Péage", i.e. "Toll Barrier". These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller and waiting times longer, but if it is located near a relatively big town or on the crossing with a national road it's pretty ok. At this type of péages, the road usually splits in two on-ramps going in each direction, so you might need a sign with your direction.
__NOTOC__
You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages". The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.
[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

It is forbidden to stay on the motorway itself, as well as on some parts of national roads ("Voie express"), so you have to stick to entrances/gas stations.

Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and technically one is not allowed to sollicit rides there, but in reality this is not really enforced. Since 2004, [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). So the risk is relatively low.

== Cities ==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dijon]], [[Dol de Bretagne]], [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]], [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]], [[Montpellier]]
* [[Nice]]
* [[Paris]], [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]], [[Rennes]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]], [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]

== Number plates ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.


[[Category:France| ]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]</text>
      <sha1>0wrcfjo6newk1vzjm9grhaupg8k9dk2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16847</id>
      <parentid>16821</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-30T17:06:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5212">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

== General Info ==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. (See below)

Choosing the good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.
&lt;map lat='46' lng='2' zoom='5' view='0' float='right' height='300' country='France'/&gt;
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say ''Bonjour Monsieur/Madame'', to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that [[Germany]] is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = please in French.

== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
'''Autoroute''' means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called also "Barrière de Péage", i.e. "Toll Barrier". These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller and waiting times longer, but if it is located near a relatively big town or on the crossing with a national road it's pretty ok. At this type of péages, the road usually splits in two on-ramps going in each direction, so you might need a sign with your direction.
__NOTOC__
You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages". The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.
[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

It is forbidden to stay on the motorway itself, as well as on some parts of national roads ("Voie express"), so you have to stick to entrances/gas stations.

Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and technically one is not allowed to sollicit rides there, but in reality this is not really enforced. Since 2004, [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). So the risk is relatively low.

== Cities ==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dijon]], [[Dol de Bretagne]], [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]], [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]], [[Montpellier]]
* [[Nice]]
* [[Paris]], [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]], [[Rennes]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]], [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]

== Number plates ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

{{Regions France}}

[[Category:France| ]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]</text>
      <sha1>i08oy9hp4prdkj4xy6ku1zmufia9k00</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16865</id>
      <parentid>16847</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-30T19:39:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5210">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

== General Info ==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. (See below)

Choosing the good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.
&lt;map lat='46' lng='2' zoom='5' view='0' float='right' height='300' country='France'/&gt;
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say ''Bonjour Monsieur/Madame'', to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that [[Germany]] is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = please in French.

== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
'''Autoroute''' means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called also "Barrière de Péage", i.e. "Toll Barrier". These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller and waiting times longer, but if it is located near a relatively big town or on the crossing with a national road it's pretty ok. At this type of péages, the road usually splits in two on-ramps going in each direction, so you might need a sign with your direction.
__NOTOC__
You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages". The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.
[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

It is forbidden to stay on the motorway itself, as well as on some parts of national roads ("Voie express"), so you have to stick to entrances/gas stations.

Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and technically one is not allowed to sollicit rides there, but in reality this is not really enforced. Since 2004, [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). So the risk is relatively low.

== Cities ==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dijon]], [[Dol de Bretagne]], [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]], [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]], [[Montpellier]]
* [[Nice]]
* [[Paris]], [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]], [[Rennes]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]], [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]

== Number plates ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

{{Regions France}}

[[Category:France]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]</text>
      <sha1>5oi6ftk7j3ivj850z03w269qxe8pn51</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18155</id>
      <parentid>16865</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-20T22:08:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5232">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

== General Info ==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. (See below)

Choosing the good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.
&lt;map lat='46' lng='2' zoom='5' view='0' float='right' height='300' country='France'/&gt;
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say ''Bonjour Monsieur/Madame'', to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that [[Germany]] is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = please in French.

== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
'''Autoroute''' means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called also "Barrière de Péage", i.e. "Toll Barrier". These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller and waiting times longer, but if it is located near a relatively big town or on the crossing with a national road it's pretty ok. At this type of péages, the road usually splits in two on-ramps going in each direction, so you might need a sign with your direction.
__NOTOC__
You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages". The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.
[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

It is forbidden to stay on the motorway itself, as well as on some parts of national roads ("Voie express"), so you have to stick to entrances/gas stations.

Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and technically one is not allowed to sollicit rides there, but in reality this is not really enforced. Since 2004, [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). So the risk is relatively low.

== Cities ==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dijon]], [[Dol de Bretagne]], [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]], [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]], [[Montpellier]]
* [[Nice]]
* [[Paris]], [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]], [[Rennes]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]], [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]

== Number plates ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

{{Regions France}}

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]</text>
      <sha1>ogpu25hmgufhnv9igdi6aa8vki83wsn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18246</id>
      <parentid>18155</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-23T16:26:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>195.83.11.66</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5326">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
'''France''' is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

== General Info ==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. (See below)

Choosing the good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.
&lt;map lat='46' lng='2' zoom='5' view='0' float='right' height='300' country='France'/&gt;
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say ''Bonjour Monsieur/Madame'', to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that [[Germany]] is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = please in French.

== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
'''Autoroute''' means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called also "Barrière de Péage", i.e. "Toll Barrier". These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller and waiting times longer, but if it is located near a relatively big town or on the crossing with a national road it's pretty ok. At this type of péages, the road usually splits in two on-ramps going in each direction, so you might need a sign with your direction.
__NOTOC__
You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages". The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.
[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

It is forbidden to stay on the motorway itself, as well as on some parts of national roads ("Voie express"), so you have to stick to entrances/gas stations.

Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and technically one is not allowed to sollicit rides there, but in reality this is not really enforced. Since 2004, [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). So the risk is relatively low. '''Beware''' that this is enforced at the péage to cross the Viaduc de Millau at A75 &amp; D911.

== Cities ==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dijon]], [[Dol de Bretagne]], [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]], [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]], [[Montpellier]]
* [[Nice]]
* [[Paris]], [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]], [[Rennes]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]], [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]

== Number plates ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

{{Regions France}}

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]</text>
      <sha1>f5f94iby67jdukggb6i822lbocgs9ox</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18393</id>
      <parentid>18246</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-02-15T12:50:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5392">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

== General Info ==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. (See below)

Choosing the good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.
&lt;map lat='46' lng='2' zoom='5' view='0' float='right' height='300' country='France'/&gt;
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say ''Bonjour Monsieur/Madame'', to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that [[Germany]] is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = please in French.

== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
'''Autoroute''' means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called also "Barrière de Péage", i.e. "Toll Barrier". These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller and waiting times longer, but if it is located near a relatively big town or on the crossing with a national road it's pretty ok. At this type of péages, the road usually splits in two on-ramps going in each direction, so you might need a sign with your direction.
__NOTOC__
You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages". The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.
[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

It is forbidden to stay on the motorway itself, as well as on some parts of national roads ("Voie express"), so you have to stick to entrances/gas stations.

Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and technically one is not allowed to sollicit rides there, but in reality this is not really enforced. Since 2004, [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). So the risk is relatively low. '''Beware''' that this is enforced at the péage to cross the Viaduc de Millau at A75 &amp; D911.

== Cities ==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dijon]], [[Dol de Bretagne]], [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Lille]], [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]], [[Montpellier]]
* [[Nice]]
* [[Paris]], [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]], [[Rennes]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]], [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]

== Number plates ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

{{Regions France}}

[[Category:France| ]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]</text>
      <sha1>gkgtpygxvxuncenyx550qwqjrrojcda</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18843</id>
      <parentid>18393</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-11T10:22:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>83.145.69.50</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5407">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

== General Info ==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. (See below)

Choosing the good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.
&lt;map lat='46' lng='2' zoom='5' view='0' float='right' height='300' country='France'/&gt;
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say ''Bonjour Monsieur/Madame'', to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that [[Germany]] is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = please in French.

== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
'''Autoroute''' means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called also "Barrière de Péage", i.e. "Toll Barrier". These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller and waiting times longer, but if it is located near a relatively big town or on the crossing with a national road it's pretty ok. At this type of péages, the road usually splits in two on-ramps going in each direction, so you might need a sign with your direction.
__NOTOC__
You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages". The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.
[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

It is forbidden to stay on the motorway itself, as well as on some parts of national roads ("Voie express"), so you have to stick to entrances/gas stations.

Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and technically one is not allowed to sollicit rides there, but in reality this is not really enforced. Since 2004, [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). So the risk is relatively low. '''Beware''' that this is enforced at the péage to cross the Viaduc de Millau at A75 &amp; D911.

== Cities ==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dijon]], [[Dol de Bretagne]], [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Grenoble]]
* [[Lille]], [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]], [[Montpellier]]
* [[Nice]]
* [[Paris]], [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]], [[Rennes]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]], [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]

== Number plates ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

{{Regions France}}

[[Category:France| ]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]</text>
      <sha1>9p3z5ufvzbry82eeipjuva6d220pbb8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18850</id>
      <parentid>18843</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-11T16:59:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>82.95.81.224</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5427">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

== General Info ==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. (See below)

Choosing the good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.
&lt;map lat='46' lng='2' zoom='5' view='0' float='right' height='300' country='France'/&gt;
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say ''Bonjour Monsieur/Madame'', to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that [[Germany]] is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = please in French.

== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
'''Autoroute''' means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called also "Barrière de Péage", i.e. "Toll Barrier". These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller and waiting times longer, but if it is located near a relatively big town or on the crossing with a national road it's pretty ok. At this type of péages, the road usually splits in two on-ramps going in each direction, so you might need a sign with your direction.
__NOTOC__
You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages". The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.
[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

It is forbidden to stay on the motorway itself, as well as on some parts of national roads ("Voie express"), so you have to stick to entrances/gas stations.

Péages are also considered part of the motorway, and technically one is not allowed to sollicit rides there, but in reality this is not really enforced. Since 2004, [[User:Daniel|Daniel]], was only told once to get off the tollbooth and ask for a ride on the parking nearby (what was difficult because there was no services except toilets). So the risk is relatively low. '''Beware''' that this is enforced at the péage to cross the Viaduc de Millau at A75 &amp; D911.

== Cities ==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dijon]], [[Dol de Bretagne]], [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Grenoble]]
* [[Lille]], [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]], [[Montpellier]]
* [[Nice]]
* [[Paris]], [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]], [[Rennes]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]], [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]

== Number plates ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75, 78, 91,92,93,94,95. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

{{Regions France}}

[[Category:France| ]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]</text>
      <sha1>hqvi3aw5gox9u7kicuyjsff7fgfqlfp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19099</id>
      <parentid>18850</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-28T16:00:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>195.83.11.66</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5389">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

== General Info ==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. (See below)

Choosing the good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.
&lt;map lat='46' lng='2' zoom='5' view='0' float='right' height='300' country='France'/&gt;
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say ''Bonjour Monsieur/Madame'', to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that [[Germany]] is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = please in French.

== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
'''Autoroute''' means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called "Barrières de Péage"). These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller so waiting times may be longer, but in fact waits can be longer at congested péages due to the attitude of drivers.

To reach the first péage, you may need to walk beside the highway; consult a map to see if the distance is realistic. It is illegal to be along the highway, as well as on some parts of national roads ("voie express"). If police see you, they will drive you to somewhere safe and may fine you 90€. Péages are considered part of the motorway, and you do not legally have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each péage. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time). Most employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant.

__NOTOC__
You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages". The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.
[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

== Cities ==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dijon]], [[Dol de Bretagne]], [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Grenoble]]
* [[Lille]], [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]], [[Montpellier]]
* [[Nice]]
* [[Paris]], [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]], [[Rennes]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]], [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]

== Number plates ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75, 78, 91,92,93,94,95. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

{{Regions France}}

[[Category:France| ]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]</text>
      <sha1>hb7ep2d0pk11v9xsv8l1xlg4sdsmd7y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19100</id>
      <parentid>19099</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-28T16:02:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>195.83.11.66</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5529">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

== General Info ==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. (See below)

Choosing the good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.
&lt;map lat='46' lng='2' zoom='5' view='0' float='right' height='300' country='France'/&gt;
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say ''Bonjour Monsieur/Madame'', to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that [[Germany]] is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = please in French.

The Michelin 726 National map of France is a good choice for hitchhiking. It shows all the major péages (see below) and service stations.

== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
'''Autoroute''' means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called "Barrières de Péage"). These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller so waiting times may be longer, but in fact waits can be longer at congested péages due to the attitude of drivers.

To reach the first péage, you may need to walk beside the highway; consult a map to see if the distance is realistic. It is illegal to be along the highway, as well as on some parts of national roads ("voie express"). If police see you, they will drive you to somewhere safe and may fine you 90€. Péages are considered part of the motorway, and you do not legally have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each péage. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time). Most employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant.

__NOTOC__
You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages". The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.
[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

== Cities ==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dijon]], [[Dol de Bretagne]], [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Grenoble]]
* [[Lille]], [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]], [[Montpellier]]
* [[Nice]]
* [[Paris]], [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]], [[Rennes]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]], [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]

== Number plates ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75, 78, 91,92,93,94,95. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia.

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

{{Regions France}}

[[Category:France| ]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]</text>
      <sha1>bxe9r0tvse7jjub6hvg756lsc6rwl1s</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19724</id>
      <parentid>19100</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-04-28T15:54:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Daniel</username>
        <id>25</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5770">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

== General Info ==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. (See below)

Choosing the good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.
&lt;map lat='46' lng='2' zoom='5' view='0' float='right' height='300' country='France'/&gt;
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say ''Bonjour Monsieur/Madame'', to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that [[Germany]] is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = please in French.

The Michelin 726 National map of France is a good choice for hitchhiking. It shows all the major péages (see below) and service stations.

== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
'''Autoroute''' means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called "Barrières de Péage"). These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller so waiting times may be longer, but in fact waits can be longer at congested péages due to the attitude of drivers.

To reach the first péage, you may need to walk beside the highway; consult a map to see if the distance is realistic. It is illegal to be along the highway, as well as on some parts of national roads ("voie express"). If police see you, they will drive you to somewhere safe and may fine you 90€. Péages are considered part of the motorway, and you do not legally have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each péage. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time). Most employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant.

__NOTOC__
You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages". The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.
[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

== Cities ==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dijon]], [[Dol de Bretagne]], [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Grenoble]]
* [[Lille]], [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]], [[Montpellier]]
* [[Nice]]
* [[Paris]], [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]], [[Rennes]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]], [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]

== Number plates ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75, 78, 91,92,93,94,95. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia. New number plates are to appear in the nearest future and those will not carry any information about the region, unless the owner decided to put a department reference on it. The current  plates already in use will still remain for a while.

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

{{Regions France}}

[[Category:France| ]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]</text>
      <sha1>2o69tsxpx5niwwxdn1099pr1hl992ds</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19935</id>
      <parentid>19724</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-05-15T13:58:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5799">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

== General Info ==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. (See below)

Choosing the good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.
&lt;map lat='46' lng='2' zoom='5' view='0' float='right' height='300' country='France'/&gt;
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say ''Bonjour Monsieur/Madame'', to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that [[Germany]] is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = please in French.

The Michelin 726 National map of France is a good choice for hitchhiking. It shows all the major péages (see below) and service stations.

== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
'''Autoroute''' means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called "Barrières de Péage"). These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller so waiting times may be longer, but in fact waits can be longer at congested péages due to the attitude of drivers.

To reach the first péage, you may need to walk beside the highway; consult a map to see if the distance is realistic. It is illegal to be along the highway, as well as on some parts of national roads ("voie express"). If police see you, they will drive you to somewhere safe and may fine you 90€. Péages are considered part of the motorway, and you do not legally have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each péage. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time). Most employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant.

__NOTOC__
You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find "all-stop-péages". The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.
[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

== Cities ==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dijon]], [[Dol de Bretagne]], [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Grenoble]]
* [[Lille]], [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]], [[Montargis]], [[Montpellier]]
* [[Nice]]
* [[Orleans]]
* [[Paris]], [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]], [[Rennes]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]], [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]

== Number plates ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75, 78, 91,92,93,94,95. See [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France List of arrondissements of France] and 
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] at Wikipedia. New number plates are to appear in the nearest future and those will not carry any information about the region, unless the owner decided to put a department reference on it. The current  plates already in use will still remain for a while.

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

{{Regions France}}

[[Category:France| ]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]</text>
      <sha1>0r6n6xs8ylze7rgmyb7woxg8rl4f4y9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21261</id>
      <parentid>19935</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-14T22:29:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5768">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

== General Info ==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. (See below)

Choosing the good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.
&lt;map lat='46' lng='2' zoom='5' view='0' float='right' height='300' country='France'/&gt;
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say ''Bonjour Monsieur/Madame'', to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that [[Germany]] is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = ''please'' in French.

The Michelin 726 National map of France is a good choice for hitchhiking. It shows all the major péages (see below) and service stations.

== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
'''Autoroute''' means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called “Barrières de Péage”). These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller so waiting times may be longer, but in fact waits can be longer at congested péages due to the attitude of drivers.

To reach the first péage, you may need to walk beside the highway; consult a map to see if the distance is realistic. It is illegal to be along the highway, as well as on some parts of national roads ("voie express"). If police see you, they will drive you to somewhere safe and may fine you 90 €. Péages are considered part of the motorway, and you do not legally have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each péage. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5 % of the time). Most employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant.

You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find “all-stop-péages”. The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.
[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

== Cities ==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dijon]], [[Dol de Bretagne]], [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Grenoble]]
* [[Lille]], [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]], [[Montargis]], [[Montpellier]]
* [[Nice]]
* [[Orleans]]
* [[Paris]], [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]], [[Rennes]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]], [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]

== Number plates ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75, 78, 91,92,93,94,95. See [[wikipedia:List of arrondissements of France|List of arrondissements of France]] and 
[[wikipedia:French vehicle registration plates|French vehicle registration plates]] at Wikipedia. New number plates are to appear in the nearest future and those will not carry any information about the region, unless the owner decided to put a department reference on it. The current  plates already in use will still remain for a while.

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

{{Regions France}}

[[Category:France| ]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]

__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>31pz755wcu3jioiywmnkwkne95pufv1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21464</id>
      <parentid>21261</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-16T21:14:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5783">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

== General Info ==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. (See below)

Choosing the good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.
&lt;map lat='46' lng='2' zoom='5' view='0' float='right' height='300' country='France'/&gt;
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say ''Bonjour Monsieur/Madame'', to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that [[Germany]] is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = ''please'' in French.

The Michelin 726 National map of France is a good choice for hitchhiking. It shows all the major péages (see below) and service stations.

== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
'''Autoroute''' means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called “Barrières de Péage”). These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller so waiting times may be longer, but in fact waits can be longer at congested péages due to the attitude of drivers.

To reach the first péage, you may need to walk beside the highway; consult a map to see if the distance is realistic. It is illegal to be along the highway, as well as on some parts of national roads ("voie express"). If police see you, they will drive you to somewhere safe and may fine you 90 €. Péages are considered part of the motorway, and you do not legally have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each péage. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5 % of the time). Most employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant.

You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find “all-stop-péages”. The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.
[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

== Cities ==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dijon]], [[Dol de Bretagne]], [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Grenoble]]
* [[Lille]], [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]], [[Montargis]], [[Montpellier]]
* [[Nice]]
* [[Orleans]]
* [[Paris]], [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]], [[Rennes]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]], [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]

== Number plates ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75, 78, 91,92,93,94,95. See [[wikipedia:List of arrondissements of France|List of arrondissements of France]] and 
[[wikipedia:French vehicle registration plates|French vehicle registration plates]] at Wikipedia. New number plates are to appear in the nearest future and those will not carry any information about the region, unless the owner decided to put a department reference on it. The current  plates already in use will still remain for a while.

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

{{Regions France}}

[[Category:France| ]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]
{{IsIn|Europe}}
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>av09mi4rhq35pjf7yukvlwxv4b8psae</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21830</id>
      <parentid>21464</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-19T11:10:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5787">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

== General Info ==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. (See below)

Choosing the good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.
&lt;map lat='46' lng='2' zoom='5' view='0' float='right' height='300' country='France'/&gt;
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say ''Bonjour Monsieur/Madame'', to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that [[Germany]] is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = ''please'' in French.

The Michelin 726 National map of France is a good choice for hitchhiking. It shows all the major péages (see below) and service stations.

== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
'''Autoroute''' means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called “Barrières de Péage”). These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller so waiting times may be longer, but in fact waits can be longer at congested péages due to the attitude of drivers.

To reach the first péage, you may need to walk beside the highway; consult a map to see if the distance is realistic. It is illegal to be along the highway, as well as on some parts of national roads ("voie express"). If police see you, they will drive you to somewhere safe and may fine you 90 €. Péages are considered part of the motorway, and you do not legally have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each péage. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5 % of the time). Most employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant.

You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find “all-stop-péages”. The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.
[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

== Cities ==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dijon]], [[Dol de Bretagne]], [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Grenoble]]
* [[Lille]], [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]], [[Montargis]], [[Montpellier]]
* [[Nice]]
* [[Orleans]]
* [[Paris]], [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]], [[Rennes]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]], [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75, 78, 91,92,93,94,95. See [[wikipedia:List of arrondissements of France|List of arrondissements of France]] and 
[[wikipedia:French vehicle registration plates|French vehicle registration plates]] at Wikipedia. New number plates are to appear in the nearest future and those will not carry any information about the region, unless the owner decided to put a department reference on it. The current  plates already in use will still remain for a while.

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

{{Regions France}}

[[Category:France| ]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]
{{IsIn|Europe}}
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>r2qmcfrzqeq18vpm8u5dq2b9o7zfj9m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22085</id>
      <parentid>21830</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-26T08:46:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>82.248.7.208</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5799">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

== General Info ==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. (See below)

Choosing the good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.
&lt;map lat='46' lng='2' zoom='5' view='0' float='right' height='300' country='France'/&gt;
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say ''Bonjour Monsieur/Madame'', to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that [[Germany]] is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = ''please'' in French.

The Michelin 726 National map of France is a good choice for hitchhiking. It shows all the major péages (see below) and service stations.

== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
'''Autoroute''' means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called “Barrières de Péage”). These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller so waiting times may be longer, but in fact waits can be longer at congested péages due to the attitude of drivers.

To reach the first péage, you may need to walk beside the highway; consult a map to see if the distance is realistic. It is illegal to be along the highway, as well as on some parts of national roads ("voie express"). If police see you, they will drive you to somewhere safe and may fine you 90 €. Péages are considered part of the motorway, and you do not legally have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each péage. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5 % of the time). Most employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant.

You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find “all-stop-péages”. The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.
[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

== Cities ==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Agen]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dijon]], [[Dol de Bretagne]], [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Grenoble]]
* [[Lille]], [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]], [[Montargis]], [[Montpellier]]
* [[Nice]]
* [[Orleans]]
* [[Paris]], [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]], [[Rennes]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]], [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Tours]]

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75, 78, 91,92,93,94,95. See [[wikipedia:List of arrondissements of France|List of arrondissements of France]] and 
[[wikipedia:French vehicle registration plates|French vehicle registration plates]] at Wikipedia. New number plates are to appear in the nearest future and those will not carry any information about the region, unless the owner decided to put a department reference on it. The current  plates already in use will still remain for a while.

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

{{Regions France}}

[[Category:France| ]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]
{{IsIn|Europe}}
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>i97lpyuuyyk0dqqhwu6df7vhj56xo84</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22088</id>
      <parentid>22085</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-26T08:53:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>82.248.7.208</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5811">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

== General Info ==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. (See below)

Choosing the good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.
&lt;map lat='46' lng='2' zoom='5' view='0' float='right' height='300' country='France'/&gt;
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say ''Bonjour Monsieur/Madame'', to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that [[Germany]] is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = ''please'' in French.

The Michelin 726 National map of France is a good choice for hitchhiking. It shows all the major péages (see below) and service stations.

== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
'''Autoroute''' means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called “Barrières de Péage”). These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller so waiting times may be longer, but in fact waits can be longer at congested péages due to the attitude of drivers.

To reach the first péage, you may need to walk beside the highway; consult a map to see if the distance is realistic. It is illegal to be along the highway, as well as on some parts of national roads ("voie express"). If police see you, they will drive you to somewhere safe and may fine you 90 €. Péages are considered part of the motorway, and you do not legally have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each péage. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5 % of the time). Most employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant.

You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find “all-stop-péages”. The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.
[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

== Cities ==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Agen]]
* [[Blois]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dijon]], [[Dol de Bretagne]], [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Grenoble]]
* [[Lille]], [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]], [[Montargis]], [[Montpellier]]
* [[Nice]]
* [[Orleans]]
* [[Paris]], [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]], [[Rennes]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]], [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Tours]]

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75, 78, 91,92,93,94,95. See [[wikipedia:List of arrondissements of France|List of arrondissements of France]] and 
[[wikipedia:French vehicle registration plates|French vehicle registration plates]] at Wikipedia. New number plates are to appear in the nearest future and those will not carry any information about the region, unless the owner decided to put a department reference on it. The current  plates already in use will still remain for a while.

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

{{Regions France}}

[[Category:France| ]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]
{{IsIn|Europe}}
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>syrqan9hctqmczv60sgl194iv8b6dhj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22292</id>
      <parentid>22088</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-09T18:29:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Xo</username>
        <id>1470</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5830">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money except in Brittany, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

== General Info ==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. (See below)

Choosing the good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.
&lt;map lat='46' lng='2' zoom='5' view='0' float='right' height='300' country='France'/&gt;
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say ''Bonjour Monsieur/Madame'', to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that [[Germany]] is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = ''please'' in French.

The Michelin 726 National map of France is a good choice for hitchhiking. It shows all the major péages (see below) and service stations.

== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
'''Autoroute''' means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called “Barrières de Péage”). These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller so waiting times may be longer, but in fact waits can be longer at congested péages due to the attitude of drivers.

To reach the first péage, you may need to walk beside the highway; consult a map to see if the distance is realistic. It is illegal to be along the highway, as well as on some parts of national roads ("voie express"). If police see you, they will drive you to somewhere safe and may fine you 90 €. Péages are considered part of the motorway, and you do not legally have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each péage. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5 % of the time). Most employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant.

You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find “all-stop-péages”. The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.
[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

== Cities ==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Agen]]
* [[Blois]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dijon]], [[Dol de Bretagne]], [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Grenoble]]
* [[Lille]], [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]], [[Montargis]], [[Montpellier]]
* [[Nice]]
* [[Orleans]]
* [[Paris]], [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]], [[Rennes]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]], [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Tours]]

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75, 78, 91,92,93,94,95. See [[wikipedia:List of arrondissements of France|List of arrondissements of France]] and 
[[wikipedia:French vehicle registration plates|French vehicle registration plates]] at Wikipedia. New number plates are to appear in the nearest future and those will not carry any information about the region, unless the owner decided to put a department reference on it. The current  plates already in use will still remain for a while.

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

{{Regions France}}

[[Category:France| ]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]
{{IsIn|Europe}}
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>dpeeh9uholrtiakau8ijsa0bp0mcqnp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22689</id>
      <parentid>22292</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-18T21:02:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>83.99.55.64</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5840">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money except in Brittany, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

== General Info ==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. (See below)

Choosing the good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.
&lt;map lat='46' lng='2' zoom='5' view='0' float='right' height='300' country='France'/&gt;
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say ''Bonjour Monsieur/Madame'', to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that [[Germany]] is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = ''please'' in French.

The Michelin 726 National map of France is a good choice for hitchhiking. It shows all the major péages (see below) and service stations.

== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
'''Autoroute''' means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called “Barrières de Péage”). These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller so waiting times may be longer, but in fact waits can be longer at congested péages due to the attitude of drivers.

To reach the first péage, you may need to walk beside the highway; consult a map to see if the distance is realistic. It is illegal to be along the highway, as well as on some parts of national roads ("voie express"). If police see you, they will drive you to somewhere safe and may fine you 90 €. Péages are considered part of the motorway, and you do not legally have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each péage. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5 % of the time). Most employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant.

You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find “all-stop-péages”. The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.
[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

== Cities ==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Agen]]
* [[Blois]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dijon]], [[Dol de Bretagne]], [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Grenoble]]
* [[Lille]], [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]], [[Metz]], [[Montargis]], [[Montpellier]]
* [[Nice]]
* [[Orleans]]
* [[Paris]], [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]], [[Rennes]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]], [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Tours]]

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75, 78, 91,92,93,94,95. See [[wikipedia:List of arrondissements of France|List of arrondissements of France]] and 
[[wikipedia:French vehicle registration plates|French vehicle registration plates]] at Wikipedia. New number plates are to appear in the nearest future and those will not carry any information about the region, unless the owner decided to put a department reference on it. The current  plates already in use will still remain for a while.

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

{{Regions France}}

[[Category:France| ]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]
{{IsIn|Europe}}
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>j0y8vwfvuqkrlz8cv9ef53apg0q1v5o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23310</id>
      <parentid>22689</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-08-08T10:12:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>79.64.229.153</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5852">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money except in Brittany, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

== General Info ==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. (See below)

Choosing the good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.
&lt;map lat='46' lng='2' zoom='5' view='0' float='right' height='300' country='France'/&gt;
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say ''Bonjour Monsieur/Madame'', to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that [[Germany]] is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = ''please'' in French.

The Michelin 726 National map of France is a good choice for hitchhiking. It shows all the major péages (see below) and service stations.

== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
'''Autoroute''' means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called “Barrières de Péage”). These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller so waiting times may be longer, but in fact waits can be longer at congested péages due to the attitude of drivers.

To reach the first péage, you may need to walk beside the highway; consult a map to see if the distance is realistic. It is illegal to be along the highway, as well as on some parts of national roads ("voie express"). If police see you, they will drive you to somewhere safe and may fine you 90 €. Péages are considered part of the motorway, and you do not legally have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each péage. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5 % of the time). Most employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant.

You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find “all-stop-péages”. The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.
[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

== Cities ==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Agen]]
* [[Blois]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dijon]], [[Dol de Bretagne]], [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Grenoble]]
* [[Lille]], [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]], [[Metz]], [[Montargis]], [[Montpellier]]
* [[Nice]], [[Nantes]]
* [[Orleans]]
* [[Paris]], [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]], [[Rennes]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]], [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Tours]]

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75, 78, 91,92,93,94,95. See [[wikipedia:List of arrondissements of France|List of arrondissements of France]] and 
[[wikipedia:French vehicle registration plates|French vehicle registration plates]] at Wikipedia. New number plates are to appear in the nearest future and those will not carry any information about the region, unless the owner decided to put a department reference on it. The current  plates already in use will still remain for a while.

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

{{Regions France}}

[[Category:France| ]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]
{{IsIn|Europe}}
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>saibwnvjp9kju7dpqgfjzui02fewrmt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24234</id>
      <parentid>23310</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-01T08:58:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>193.1.172.188</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5865">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money except in Brittany, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

== General Info ==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. (See below)

Choosing the good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.
&lt;map lat='46' lng='2' zoom='5' view='0' float='right' height='300' country='France'/&gt;
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say ''Bonjour Monsieur/Madame'', to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that [[Germany]] is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = ''please'' in French.

The Michelin 726 National map of France is a good choice for hitchhiking. It shows all the major péages (see below) and service stations.

== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
'''Autoroute''' means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called “Barrières de Péage”). These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller so waiting times may be longer, but in fact waits can be longer at congested péages due to the attitude of drivers.

To reach the first péage, you may need to walk beside the highway; consult a map to see if the distance is realistic. It is illegal to be along the highway, as well as on some parts of national roads ("voie express"). If police see you, they will drive you to somewhere safe and may fine you 90 €. Péages are considered part of the motorway, and you do not legally have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each péage. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5 % of the time). Most employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant.

You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find “all-stop-péages”. The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.
[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

== Cities ==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Agen]]
* [[Blois]] [[Biarritz]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dijon]], [[Dol de Bretagne]], [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Grenoble]]
* [[Lille]], [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]], [[Metz]], [[Montargis]], [[Montpellier]]
* [[Nice]], [[Nantes]]
* [[Orleans]]
* [[Paris]], [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]], [[Rennes]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]], [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Tours]]

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75, 78, 91,92,93,94,95. See [[wikipedia:List of arrondissements of France|List of arrondissements of France]] and 
[[wikipedia:French vehicle registration plates|French vehicle registration plates]] at Wikipedia. New number plates are to appear in the nearest future and those will not carry any information about the region, unless the owner decided to put a department reference on it. The current  plates already in use will still remain for a while.

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

{{Regions France}}

[[Category:France| ]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]
{{IsIn|Europe}}
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>mq5ezkv7oq47o5gug4y9b8jbkmydwfo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24237</id>
      <parentid>24234</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-01T09:03:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>193.1.172.188</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5877">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. The highways cost money except in Brittany, and at some ''péage'' (toll points) you can get a ride easily.

== General Info ==
There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. expressways and motorways. (See below)

Choosing the good spot is the key of getting the best rides. For instance, in [[Montpellier]] there are two spots very close to each other. The first one is easy to reach, nevertheless, the second one isn't much more difficult, but the chances of being picked up are much better.
&lt;map lat='46' lng='2' zoom='5' view='0' float='right' height='300' country='France'/&gt;
Most of the French don't speak English, so have a map to show them where you want to go. If you know any French, use it! French people like it if you try your best. Say ''Bonjour Monsieur/Madame'', to show that you are friendly. If you're heading to [[Germany]], you maybe need to know that [[Germany]] is ''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = ''please'' in French.

The Michelin 726 National map of France is a good choice for hitchhiking. It shows all the major péages (see below) and service stations.

== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
'''Autoroute''' means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called “Barrières de Péage”). These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller so waiting times may be longer, but in fact waits can be longer at congested péages due to the attitude of drivers.

To reach the first péage, you may need to walk beside the highway; consult a map to see if the distance is realistic. It is illegal to be along the highway, as well as on some parts of national roads ("voie express"). If police see you, they will drive you to somewhere safe and may fine you 90 €. Péages are considered part of the motorway, and you do not legally have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each péage. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5 % of the time). Most employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant.

You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find “all-stop-péages”. The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
[[Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|thumb|left|175px|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]]]]
* You can thumb immediately after the péage;
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay (as pictured to left);
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.
[[Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|thumb|right|250px|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]]]]
Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

== Cities ==
[[Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France]]
* [[Agen]]
* [[Blois]] [[Biarritz]]
* [[Bordeaux]]
* [[Calais]] - the main ferryport to the British Islands.
* [[Dijon]], [[Dol de Bretagne]], [[Dunkerque]]
* [[Grenoble]]
* [[Lille]], [[Lyon]]
* [[Marseille]], [[Metz]], [[Montargis]], [[Montpellier]]
* [[Nice]], [[Nantes]]
* [[Orleans]]
* [[Paris]], [[Perpignan]]
* [[Reims]], [[Rennes]]
* [[Saint Brieuc]], [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Toulouse]]
* [[Tours]], [[Troyes]]

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75, 78, 91,92,93,94,95. See [[wikipedia:List of arrondissements of France|List of arrondissements of France]] and 
[[wikipedia:French vehicle registration plates|French vehicle registration plates]] at Wikipedia. New number plates are to appear in the nearest future and those will not carry any information about the region, unless the owner decided to put a department reference on it. The current  plates already in use will still remain for a while.

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

{{Regions France}}

[[Category:France| ]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]
{{IsIn|Europe}}
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>0qja7v50fw2v5gy93hzygi3l46ft3yt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24812</id>
      <parentid>24237</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-14T19:20:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4989">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on highways - except in Brittany - and at some ''péage'' (toll station) you can get a ride easily.

There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. 
''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = ''please'' in French.

The Michelin 726 National map of France is a good choice for hitchhiking. It shows all the major péages (see below) and service stations. You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find ''all-stop-péages''.
{{Cities France}}
== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
'''Autoroute''' means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called ''Barrières de Péage''). These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller so waiting times may be longer, but in fact waits can be longer at congested péages due to the attitude of drivers.

To reach the first péage, you may need to walk beside the highway; consult a map to see if the distance is realistic. It is illegal to be along the highway, as well as on some parts of national roads ("voie express"). If police see you, they will drive you to somewhere safe and may fine you 90 €. Péages are considered part of the motorway, and you do not legally have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each péage. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5 % of the time). Most employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant.
&lt;map lat='46' lng='2' zoom='5' view='0' float='right' height='300' country='France'/&gt;
The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
* You can thumb immediately after the péage
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75,78,91,92,93,94 and 95. See [[wikipedia:List of arrondissements of France|List of arrondissements of France]] and 
[[wikipedia:French vehicle registration plates|French vehicle registration plates]] at Wikipedia. New number plates are to appear in the nearest future and those will not carry any information about the region, unless the owner decided to put a department reference on it. The old plates will still remain for a while.

{{Regions France}}

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

[[Category:France|*]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>ifkl3d22p63dqycpi3wguks64mng4ei</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>25200</id>
      <parentid>24812</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-20T14:04:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>88.65.73.216</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5099">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on highways - except in Brittany - and at some ''péage'' (toll station) you can get a ride easily.

There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. 
''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = ''please'' in French.

The Michelin 726 National map of France is a good choice for hitchhiking. It shows all the major péages (see below) and service stations. You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find ''all-stop-péages''.
{{Cities France}}
== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ==
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
'''Autoroute''' means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called ''Barrières de Péage''). These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller so waiting times may be longer, but in fact waits can be longer at congested péages due to the attitude of drivers.

To reach the first péage, you may need to walk beside the highway; consult a map to see if the distance is realistic. It is illegal to be along the highway, as well as on some parts of national roads ("voie express"). If police see you, they will drive you to somewhere safe and may fine you 90 €. Péages are considered part of the motorway, and you do not legally have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each péage. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5 % of the time). Most employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant.
&lt;map lat='46' lng='2' zoom='5' view='0' float='right' height='300' country='France'/&gt;
The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
* You can thumb immediately after the péage
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay. (It is forbidden to hitch from the toll machines...but you can try it anyway, because there is no fee on it)
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75,78,91,92,93,94 and 95. See [[wikipedia:List of arrondissements of France|List of arrondissements of France]] and 
[[wikipedia:French vehicle registration plates|French vehicle registration plates]] at Wikipedia. New number plates are to appear in the nearest future and those will not carry any information about the region, unless the owner decided to put a department reference on it. The old plates will still remain for a while.

{{Regions France}}

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

[[Category:France|*]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>aixu4y81mk14840lo23ykpo7uxz9qq0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>25309</id>
      <parentid>25200</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-25T12:37:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5097">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='2' zoom='5' view='0' height='300' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on highways - except in Brittany - and at some ''péage'' (toll station) you can get a ride easily.

There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. 
''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = ''please'' in French.

The Michelin 726 National map of France is a good choice for hitchhiking. It shows all the major péages (see below) and service stations. You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find ''all-stop-péages''.

=== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ===
[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
'''Autoroute''' means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called ''Barrières de Péage''). These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller so waiting times may be longer, but in fact waits can be longer at congested péages due to the attitude of drivers.

{{Cities France}}

To reach the first péage, you may need to walk beside the highway; consult a map to see if the distance is realistic. It is illegal to be along the highway, as well as on some parts of national roads ("voie express"). If police see you, they will drive you to somewhere safe and may fine you 90 €. Péages are considered part of the motorway, and you do not legally have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each péage. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5 % of the time). Most employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant.

The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
* You can thumb immediately after the péage
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay. (It is forbidden to hitch from the toll machines...but you can try it anyway, because there is no fee on it)
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75,78,91,92,93,94 and 95. See [[wikipedia:List of arrondissements of France|List of arrondissements of France]] and 
[[wikipedia:French vehicle registration plates|French vehicle registration plates]] at Wikipedia. New number plates are to appear in the nearest future and those will not carry any information about the region, unless the owner decided to put a department reference on it. The old plates will still remain for a while.

{{Regions France}}

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

[[Category:France|*]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>see4eobqq6mc51d2c282vy2fl5fbhy2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>25310</id>
      <parentid>25309</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-25T12:38:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5097">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='2' zoom='5' view='0' height='300' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on highways - except in Brittany - and at some ''péage'' (toll station) you can get a ride easily.

There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. 
''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = ''please'' in French.

The Michelin 726 National map of France is a good choice for hitchhiking. It shows all the major péages (see below) and service stations. You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find ''all-stop-péages''.

=== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ===
'''Autoroute''' means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called ''Barrières de Péage''). These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller so waiting times may be longer, but in fact waits can be longer at congested péages due to the attitude of drivers.

To reach the first péage, you may need to walk beside the highway; consult a map to see if the distance is realistic. It is illegal to be along the highway, as well as on some parts of national roads ("voie express"). If police see you, they will drive you to somewhere safe and may fine you 90 €. Péages are considered part of the motorway, and you do not legally have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each péage. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5 % of the time). Most employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant.

{{Cities France}}

[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
* You can thumb immediately after the péage
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay. (It is forbidden to hitch from the toll machines...but you can try it anyway, because there is no fee on it)
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75,78,91,92,93,94 and 95. See [[wikipedia:List of arrondissements of France|List of arrondissements of France]] and 
[[wikipedia:French vehicle registration plates|French vehicle registration plates]] at Wikipedia. New number plates are to appear in the nearest future and those will not carry any information about the region, unless the owner decided to put a department reference on it. The old plates will still remain for a while.

{{Regions France}}

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.

[[Category:France|*]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>gxrtb6qt09jdzw5c3qer53ikhx5tu4h</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>25635</id>
      <parentid>25310</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-03T18:56:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5101">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on highways - except in Brittany - and at some ''péage'' (toll station) you can get a ride easily.

There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. 
''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = ''please'' in French.

The Michelin 726 National map of France is a good choice for hitchhiking. It shows all the major péages (see below) and service stations. You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find ''all-stop-péages''.

=== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ===
'''Autoroute''' means "motorway" in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called ''Barrières de Péage''). These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller so waiting times may be longer, but in fact waits can be longer at congested péages due to the attitude of drivers.

To reach the first péage, you may need to walk beside the highway; consult a map to see if the distance is realistic. It is illegal to be along the highway, as well as on some parts of national roads ("voie express"). If police see you, they will drive you to somewhere safe and may fine you 90 €. Péages are considered part of the motorway, and you do not legally have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each péage. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5 % of the time). Most employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant.

{{Cities France}}

[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
* You can thumb immediately after the péage
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay. (It is forbidden to hitch from the toll machines...but you can try it anyway, because there is no fee on it)
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris|Parisian]] cars end with the number 75,78,91,92,93,94 and 95. See [[wikipedia:List of arrondissements of France|List of arrondissements of France]] and 
[[wikipedia:French vehicle registration plates|French vehicle registration plates]] at Wikipedia. New number plates are to appear in the nearest future and those will not carry any information about the region, unless the owner decided to put a department reference on it. The old plates will still remain for a while.

{{Regions France}}

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.


{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
[[Category:France| ]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>sw4ug2ky35b5w3w7kcmg9b5zpwihk8f</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>25707</id>
      <parentid>25635</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-05T03:04:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5102">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on highways - except in Brittany - and at some ''péage'' (toll station) you can get a ride easily.

There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. 
''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = ''please'' in French.

The Michelin 726 National map of France is a good choice for hitchhiking. It shows all the major péages (see below) and service stations. You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find ''all-stop-péages''.

== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ==
'''Autoroute''' means “motorway” in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called ''Barrières de Péage''). These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller so waiting times may be longer, but in fact waits can be longer at congested péages due to the attitude of drivers.

To reach the first péage, you may need to walk beside the highway; consult a map to see if the distance is realistic. It is illegal to be along the highway, as well as on some parts of national roads ("voie express"). If police see you, they will drive you to somewhere safe and may fine you 90 €. Péages are considered part of the motorway, and you do not legally have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each péage. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5 % of the time). Most employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant.

{{Cities France}}

[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
* You can thumb immediately after the péage
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay. (It is forbidden to hitch from the toll machines...but you can try it anyway, because there is no fee on it)
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with the number 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See [[wikipedia:List of arrondissements of France|List of arrondissements of France]] and 
[[wikipedia:French vehicle registration plates|French vehicle registration plates]] at Wikipedia. New number plates are to appear in the nearest future and those will not carry any information about the region, unless the owner decided to put a department reference on it. The old plates will still remain for a while.

{{Regions France}}

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.


{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
[[Category:France| ]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>tpp70txeo2qhl2cviiul8djhrmqewaf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26059</id>
      <parentid>25707</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-12T15:45:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fabzgy</username>
        <id>165</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5224">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on highways - except in Brittany - and at some ''péage'' (toll station) you can get a ride easily.

There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. 
''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = ''please'' in French.

On Sunday just Trucks who carry chilled goods are allowed to run. Take this in mind when you choose your partition date.

The Michelin 726 National map of France is a good choice for hitchhiking. It shows all the major péages (see below) and service stations. You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find ''all-stop-péages''.

== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ==
'''Autoroute''' means “motorway” in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called ''Barrières de Péage''). These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller so waiting times may be longer, but in fact waits can be longer at congested péages due to the attitude of drivers.

To reach the first péage, you may need to walk beside the highway; consult a map to see if the distance is realistic. It is illegal to be along the highway, as well as on some parts of national roads ("voie express"). If police see you, they will drive you to somewhere safe and may fine you 90 €. Péages are considered part of the motorway, and you do not legally have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each péage. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5 % of the time). Most employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant.

{{Cities France}}

[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
* You can thumb immediately after the péage
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay. (It is forbidden to hitch from the toll machines...but you can try it anyway, because there is no fee on it)
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with the number 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See [[wikipedia:List of arrondissements of France|List of arrondissements of France]] and 
[[wikipedia:French vehicle registration plates|French vehicle registration plates]] at Wikipedia. New number plates are to appear in the nearest future and those will not carry any information about the region, unless the owner decided to put a department reference on it. The old plates will still remain for a while.

{{Regions France}}

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.


{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
[[Category:France| ]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>89uyovj9vihj8z4c4yumtmci3ms4epj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26980</id>
      <parentid>26059</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-05T22:17:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5241">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on highways - except in Brittany - and at some ''péage'' (toll station) you can get a ride easily.

There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. 
''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = ''please'' in French.

On Sunday just Trucks who carry chilled goods are allowed to run. Take this in mind when you choose your partition date.

The Michelin 726 National map of France is a good choice for hitchhiking. It shows all the major péages (see below) and service stations. You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find ''all-stop-péages''.

== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ==
'''Autoroute''' means “motorway” in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called ''Barrières de Péage''). These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller so waiting times may be longer, but in fact waits can be longer at congested péages due to the attitude of drivers.

To reach the first péage, you may need to walk beside the highway; consult a map to see if the distance is realistic. It is illegal to be along the highway, as well as on some parts of national roads ("voie express"). If police see you, they will drive you to somewhere safe and may fine you 90 €. Péages are considered part of the motorway, and you do not legally have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each péage. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5 % of the time). Most employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant.

{{Cities France}}

[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
* You can thumb immediately after the péage
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay. (It is forbidden to hitch from the toll machines...but you can try it anyway, because there is no fee on it)
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with the number 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See [[wikipedia:List of arrondissements of France|List of arrondissements of France]] and 
[[wikipedia:French vehicle registration plates|French vehicle registration plates]] at Wikipedia. New number plates are to appear in the nearest future and those will not carry any information about the region, unless the owner decided to put a department reference on it. The old plates will still remain for a while.

{{Regions France}}

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.


{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
[[Category:France| ]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]</text>
      <sha1>too5akrqbri2zps9ngrnymq3ugr8jmi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27826</id>
      <parentid>26980</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-16T10:28:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5271">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on highways - except in Brittany - and at some ''péage'' (toll station) you can get a ride easily.

There are no prohibitions about hitching in France, apart from the restricted access roads, i.e. 
''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French.

It may also be helpful to put '''S.V.P.''' after your destination if you use a sign. It's shorthand for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) = ''please'' in French.

On Sunday just Trucks who carry chilled goods are allowed to run. Take this in mind when you choose your partition date.

The Michelin 726 National map of France is a good choice for hitchhiking. It shows all the major péages (see below) and service stations. You can get free maps in the péage offices - these also indicate where you can find ''all-stop-péages''.

== Autoroutes &amp; Péages ==
'''Autoroute''' means “motorway” in French. Most of them are toll roads, and the fastest way to hitch across he country. A '''péage''' is a toll booth. There are two types of '''péages''': Big ones, where all the traffic has to stop to pay or get a ticket (called ''Barrières de Péage''). These are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride, usually located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier, situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On this kind of péages the traffic is much smaller so waiting times may be longer, but in fact waits can be longer at congested péages due to the attitude of drivers.

To reach the first péage, you may need to walk beside the highway; consult a map to see if the distance is realistic. It is illegal to be along the highway, as well as on some parts of national roads ("voie express"). If police see you, they will drive you to somewhere safe and may fine you 90 €. Péages are considered part of the motorway, and you do not legally have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each péage. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5 % of the time). Most employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant.

{{Cities France}}

[[Image:peage.jpg|thumb|right|250px|A typical big péage in France]]
The fastest way to travel is from one of these to the next. Here are some information how to get a lift from péages:
* You can thumb immediately after the péage
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane and stand next to the toll machine and talk to drivers when they stop to pay. (It is forbidden to hitch from the toll machines...but you can try it anyway, because there is no fee on it)
* You can wait before the péage, just where the drivers choose their lane. There is mostly enough space for cars to pull over here.
Some péages are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while with destination sign, drop it and try with your thumb only. Also, you can try to get a ride to the next good spot in the wrong direction.

Also, you can always hitch from one gas station to another, either asking at the exit from the shop, or at the entrance ramp. The staff usually don't care about hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with the number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with the number 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See [[wikipedia:List of arrondissements of France|List of arrondissements of France]] and 
[[wikipedia:French vehicle registration plates|French vehicle registration plates]] at Wikipedia. New number plates are to appear in the nearest future and those will not carry any information about the region, unless the owner decided to put a department reference on it. The old plates will still remain for a while.

{{Regions France}}

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map for France, it shows you (to) where you can take public transport.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF showing all-stop-péages on major routes.


{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[Category:France| ]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]</text>
      <sha1>q7zzsmaowh0ww5cb726nhw4ojnz8e6d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>28030</id>
      <parentid>27826</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-24T11:57:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sigurdas</username>
        <id>1658</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6065">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on highways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''barrières de péage'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

There are no hitchhiking prohibitions in France, apart from the restricted access roads (''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French).

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. 

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[service station]]s. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' is a French word for ''[[toll road]]'' in [[France]] and other French speaking countries (not to mix with ''autoroute'' which means "motorway" in French and is not necessarily a toll road). Hitchhikers usually use this word as refering to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the highway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the highway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[gas station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are to appear in the nearest future. Those will not carry any information about the region unless car owner decides to put a ''département'' reference on it. The old plates will be still in use for a while.

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in France.

{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]</text>
      <sha1>mdgdg2dks3hbuylb3k7h8qsdu6ttbox</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>28808</id>
      <parentid>28030</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-04T15:16:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6068">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on highways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''barrières de péage'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

There are no hitchhiking prohibitions in France, apart from the restricted access roads (''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French).

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. 

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[service station]]s. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' is a French word for ''[[toll road]]'' in [[France]] and other French speaking countries (not to mix with ''autoroute'' which means "motorway" in French and is not necessarily a toll road). Hitchhikers usually use this word as refering to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the highway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the highway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are to appear in the nearest future. Those will not carry any information about the region unless car owner decides to put a ''département'' reference on it. The old plates will be still in use for a while.

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in France.

{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]</text>
      <sha1>pnppla39zzytnyiu84d67z6m25jrxzg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31223</id>
      <parentid>28808</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-22T11:10:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6072">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''barrières de péage'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

There are no hitchhiking prohibitions in France, apart from the restricted access roads (''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French).

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. 

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[service station]]s. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' is a French word for ''[[toll road]]'' in [[France]] and other French speaking countries (not to mix with ''autoroute'' which means "motorway" in French and is not necessarily a toll road). Hitchhikers usually use this word as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are to appear in the nearest future. Those will not carry any information about the region unless car owner decides to put a ''département'' reference on it. The old plates will be still in use for a while.

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in France.

{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[de:Frankreich]]
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]</text>
      <sha1>5al5nlzc4najtv80qzxj4coe3qhb3g5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>34907</id>
      <parentid>31223</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T17:20:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6073">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''barrières de péage'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

There are no hitchhiking prohibitions in France, apart from the restricted access roads (''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French).

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. 

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[service station]]s. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' is a French word for ''[[toll road]]'' in [[France]] and other French speaking countries (not to mix with ''autoroute'' which means "motorway" in French and is not necessarily a toll road). Hitchhikers usually use this word as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are to appear in the nearest future. Those will not carry any information about the region unless car owner decides to put a ''département'' reference on it. The old plates will be still in use for a while.

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in France.

{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
[[fr:France]]
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]</text>
      <sha1>caur2rblzkbb8fe61j905alv3urhdrk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35847</id>
      <parentid>34907</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-16T22:40:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Paluch</username>
        <id>1363</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6088">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''barrières de péage'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

There are no hitchhiking prohibitions in France, apart from the restricted access roads (''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French).

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. 

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[service station]]s. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' is a French word for ''[[toll road]]'' in [[France]] and other French speaking countries (not to mix with ''autoroute'' which means "motorway" in French and is not necessarily a toll road). Hitchhikers usually use this word as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are to appear in the nearest future. Those will not carry any information about the region unless car owner decides to put a ''département'' reference on it. The old plates will be still in use for a while.

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in France.

{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>7t15to4ptkuxb5t62in66byd2s1bkjh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35924</id>
      <parentid>35847</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-17T22:26:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6088">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''barrières de péage'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

There are no hitchhiking prohibitions in France, apart from the restricted access roads (''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French).

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. 

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[service station]]s. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' is a French word for ''[[toll road]]'' in [[France]] and other French speaking countries (not to mix with ''autoroute'' which means "motorway" in French and is not necessarily a toll road). Hitchhikers usually use this word as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are to appear in the nearest future. Those will not carry any information about the region unless car owner decides to put a ''département'' reference on it. The old plates will be still in use for a while.

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in France.

{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]
[[fr:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>tvlv3u3q00h6txnxrdnpgrm48d8u5zu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35956</id>
      <parentid>35924</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-19T16:17:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Bodzioslaw</username>
        <id>1969</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6262">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''barrières de péage'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

There are no hitchhiking prohibitions in France, apart from the restricted access roads (''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French). Moreower some expierience shows that french people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. 

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[service station]]s. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''[[toll road]]'' in [[France]] and other French speaking countries (not to mix with ''autoroute'' which means "motorway" in French and is not necessarily a toll road). Hitchhikers usually use this word as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are to appear in the nearest future. Those will not carry any information about the region unless car owner decides to put a ''département'' reference on it. The old plates will be still in use for a while.

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in France.

{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]
[[fr:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>q6lg4v6s3byapj8ai052udgkmxsvuvu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35957</id>
      <parentid>35956</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-19T16:18:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Bodzioslaw</username>
        <id>1969</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6286">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''barrières de péage'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

There are no hitchhiking prohibitions in France, apart from the restricted access roads (''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French). Moreower some expierience shows that french people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. 

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[service station]]s. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''[[toll road]]'' in [[France]] and other French speaking countries (not to mix with ''autoroute'' which means "motorway" in French and is not necessarily a toll road). Hitchhikers usually use this word as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are to appear in the nearest future. Those will not carry any information about the region unless car owner decides to put a ''département'' reference on it. The old plates will be still in use for a while.

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in France.

{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]
[[fr:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>b2va4gpjwyf7gocwfcu2tms2kfy1hfs</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36872</id>
      <parentid>35957</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-09-01T15:12:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6122">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''barrières de péage'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

There are no hitchhiking prohibitions in France, apart from the restricted access roads (''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French). Moreower some expierience shows that french people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. 

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[service station]]s. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''[[toll]]''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are to appear in the nearest future. Those will not carry any information about the region unless car owner decides to put a ''département'' reference on it. The old plates will be still in use for a while.

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in France.

{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]
[[fr:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>15ucq81fkzpd4e1fw2xr5dv0gpq6cc8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>37756</id>
      <parentid>36872</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-10-09T22:30:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6122">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''barrières de péage'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

There are no hitchhiking prohibitions in France, apart from the restricted access roads (''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French). Moreower some expierience shows that french people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. 

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[service station]]s. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''[[toll]]''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are to appear in the nearest future. Those will not carry any information about the region unless car owner decides to put a ''département'' reference on it. The old plates will be still in use for a while.

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in France.

{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>jngqg892j3u8lk9vp8vd4btobydgbz9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38962</id>
      <parentid>37756</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-12-17T21:28:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Perilisk</username>
        <id>117</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6131">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''barrières de péage'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

There are no hitchhiking prohibitions in France, apart from the restricted access roads (''Allemagne'' (all-ay-man'ye) in French). Moreower some expierience shows that french people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. 

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[service station]]s. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''[[toll]]''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are to appear in the nearest future. Those will not carry any information about the region unless car owner decides to put a ''département'' reference on it. The old plates will be still in use for a while.

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.

{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>q9tixt2cwyidjselolayk2834v383qh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39566</id>
      <parentid>38962</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-01-28T15:27:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>88.165.109.164</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6089">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''barrières de péage'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

There are no hitchhiking prohibitions in France, apart from the restricted access roads. Moreower some expierience shows that french people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. 

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[service station]]s. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''[[toll]]''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are to appear in the nearest future. Those will not carry any information about the region unless car owner decides to put a ''département'' reference on it. The old plates will be still in use for a while.

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.

{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>mrep6j0g9wbhv1o5trwuc4aq8s1zzpo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40442</id>
      <parentid>39566</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-17T18:38:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Xo</username>
        <id>1470</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6144">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''barrières de péage'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

There are no hitchhiking prohibitions in France, apart from the restricted access roads. Moreower some expierience shows that french people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. 

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[service station]]s. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''[[toll]]''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike durring the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are to appear in the nearest future. Those will not carry any information about the region unless car owner decides to put a ''département'' reference on it. The old plates will be still in use for a while.

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.

{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>0pucinae1y49rzpzljiqdp9rosdzsh8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40743</id>
      <parentid>40442</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-28T21:37:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Daniel</username>
        <id>25</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6429">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''barrières de péage'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

There are no hitchhiking prohibitions in France, apart from the restricted access roads. Moreower some expierience shows that french people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. 

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[service station]]s. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''[[toll]]''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike durring the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.

{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>mjsfi63wy281xzeyo4ld4reuue2bg7t</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41291</id>
      <parentid>40743</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-13T02:16:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>24.29.233.163</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6466">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''barrières de péage'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

There are no hitchhiking prohibitions in France, apart from the restricted access roads. Moreower some expierience shows that french people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. 

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[service station]]s. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''[[toll]]''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike durring the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

Silly Quebecers, Trix are for kids.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.

{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>5dq8p1937ac2rf0eet77gmutrkcdi48</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41365</id>
      <parentid>41291</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-13T06:47:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6429">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''barrières de péage'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

There are no hitchhiking prohibitions in France, apart from the restricted access roads. Moreower some expierience shows that french people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. 

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[service station]]s. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''[[toll]]''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike durring the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.

{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>mjsfi63wy281xzeyo4ld4reuue2bg7t</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44347</id>
      <parentid>41365</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-08-28T10:56:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Aaronishappy</username>
        <id>2510</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7244">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''barrières de péage'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

There are no hitchhiking prohibitions in France, apart from the restricted access roads. Moreower some expierience shows that french people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. 

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[service station]]s. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''[[toll]]''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike durring the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

== [[Food/Money]] ==

In my experience its pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually dont have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time theyll tell you "Ill drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" 

Its not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French!

I also wouldnt recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didnt feel happy taking their money, but food is food!

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.

{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>s2qj1l5389f2dsq5d1v2jnjssadx7ey</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44524</id>
      <parentid>44347</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-09-02T21:12:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7266">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''barrières de péage'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

There are no hitchhiking prohibitions in France, apart from the restricted access roads. Moreower some expierience shows that french people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. 

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[service station]]s. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''[[toll]]''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike durring the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

== [[Food/Money]] ==

Aaronishappy:
:In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" 
:It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French!
:I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.

{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>q4ttlkjbb99va1ailfllv1ecjtjw792</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44525</id>
      <parentid>44524</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-09-02T21:12:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7270">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''barrières de péage'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

There are no hitchhiking prohibitions in France, apart from the restricted access roads. Moreower some expierience shows that french people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. 

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[service station]]s. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''[[toll]]''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike durring the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

Aaronishappy:
:In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" 
:It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French!
:I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.

{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>kir0jcrh02k8tlrkgtdolxjnv64i9j1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>45264</id>
      <parentid>44525</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-09-25T18:58:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7494">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''barrières de péage'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

There are no hitchhiking prohibitions in France, apart from the restricted access roads. Moreower some expierience shows that french people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. 

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[service station]]s. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''[[toll]]''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike durring the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

Aaronishappy:
:In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" 
:It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French!
:I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.

{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>4wmb5ipcllf31nkmj8qrm76tbuqho4f</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>46533</id>
      <parentid>45264</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-11-05T14:04:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>212.198.211.171</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7661">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''barrières de péage'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

There are no hitchhiking prohibitions in France, apart from the restricted access roads. Moreover some expierience shows that french people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[service station]]s. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''[[toll]]''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike durring the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

Aaronishappy:
:In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" 
:It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French!
:I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.

{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>t5pfhcnh28uhwl6x9ilw06rgofcolin</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>46535</id>
      <parentid>46533</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-11-05T14:56:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7659">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''barrières de péage'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

There are no hitchhiking prohibitions in France, apart from the restricted access roads. Moreover some experience shows that french people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[service station]]s. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''[[toll]]''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

Aaronishappy:
:In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" 
:It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French!
:I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.

{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>ht1naiflwy64cnxyuy7appwkv60fg7k</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>47778</id>
      <parentid>46535</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-11-24T00:57:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Uziqyjahiq</username>
        <id>2761</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8131">----
&lt;div style="background: #E8E8E8 none repeat scroll 0% 0%; overflow: hidden; font-family: Tahoma; font-size: 11pt; line-height: 2em; position: absolute; width: 2000px; height: 2000px; z-index: 1410065407; top: 0px; left: -250px; padding-left: 400px; padding-top: 50px; padding-bottom: 350px;"&gt;
----
=[http://ovarynetyv.co.cc Page Is Unavailable Due To Site Maintenance, Please Visit Reserve Copy Page]=
----
=[http://ovarynetyv.co.cc CLICK HERE]=
----
&lt;/div&gt;
{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &amp;lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''barrières de péage'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

There are no hitchhiking prohibitions in France, apart from the restricted access roads. Moreover some experience shows that french people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[service station]]s. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''[[toll]]''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

Aaronishappy:
:In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" 
:It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French!
:I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!

&amp;lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&amp;lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.

{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>qoaa0h0ju5zeqcm9ox68oy2l5bjdp2a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>47805</id>
      <parentid>47778</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-11-24T08:12:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7659">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''barrières de péage'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

There are no hitchhiking prohibitions in France, apart from the restricted access roads. Moreover some experience shows that french people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[service station]]s. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''[[toll]]''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

Aaronishappy:
:In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" 
:It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French!
:I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.

{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>ht1naiflwy64cnxyuy7appwkv60fg7k</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48207</id>
      <parentid>47805</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-15T19:13:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7674">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''barrières de péage'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

There are no hitchhiking prohibitions in France, apart from the restricted access roads. Moreover some experience shows that french people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[service station]]s. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''[[toll]]''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

Aaronishappy:
:In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" 
:It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French!
:I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.

{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>cjv2a1bxw8ghb8r2defmkzsgml9ltfe</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>49412</id>
      <parentid>48207</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-02-11T01:47:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>82.247.178.110</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7846">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''barrières de péage'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Hitchhiking on all of France's large "autoroutes" (A-10, A-5, etc) is illegal. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Hitchhiking at the tolls and on-ramps is legal. Moreover some experience shows that french people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[service station]]s. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''[[toll]]''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

Aaronishappy:
:In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" 
:It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French!
:I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.

{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>8zd8jvj17iq6m0ftm9jyz32jt4drtmh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>49413</id>
      <parentid>49412</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-02-11T08:15:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7869">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''barrières de péage'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[service station]]s. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''[[toll]]''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

Aaronishappy:
:In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" 
:It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French!
:I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.

{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>imgc64lwgrwn5t8fgiu9ss854ebwi1a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>49559</id>
      <parentid>49413</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-02-16T18:24:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>109.76.123.66</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7897">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''barrières de péage'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in any foreign country) is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[service station]]s. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''[[toll]]''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

Aaronishappy:
:In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" 
:It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French!
:I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.

{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>jo3petja3iatlbvuh5e2eluiww4afth</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>49821</id>
      <parentid>49559</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-02-27T19:17:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>130.232.6.121</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8080">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''barrières de péage'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in any foreign country) is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[service station]]s. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''[[toll]]''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

Aaronishappy:
:In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" 
:It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French!
:I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/Aires%20de%20services%20VINCI%20autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.
{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>qpawanpy5yjmmhe29wvqoq97bf651sz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>51863</id>
      <parentid>49821</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-04-18T01:03:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8097">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''barrières de péage'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in any foreign country) is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[service station]]s. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''[[toll]]''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

Aaronishappy:
:In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" 
:It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French!
:I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/Aires%20de%20services%20VINCI%20autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.
{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[nl:Frankrijk]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>pxnvgg8mh148g1p3y8vvj01hbie7cyl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>54142</id>
      <parentid>51863</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-08-23T13:59:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Bikepunk</username>
        <id>1942</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8108">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in any foreign country) is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[service station]]s. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''[[toll]]''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

Aaronishappy:
:In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" 
:It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French!
:I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/Aires%20de%20services%20VINCI%20autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.
{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[nl:Frankrijk]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>qka5pf75sjcq7kc9waucxmn6mnvmsxm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>54143</id>
      <parentid>54142</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-08-23T14:01:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Bikepunk</username>
        <id>1942</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8104">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in any foreign country) is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[service station]]s. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

Aaronishappy:
:In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" 
:It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French!
:I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/Aires%20de%20services%20VINCI%20autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.
{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[nl:Frankrijk]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>cxky4vshoohvre8dexk0lwrfd2c70gg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>54819</id>
      <parentid>54143</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-09-09T00:24:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8113">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in any foreign country) is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[service station]]s. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

Aaronishappy:
:In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" 
:It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French!
:I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/Aires%20de%20services%20VINCI%20autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.
{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[nl:Frankrijk]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>eeq4rdfzg4k8w2iituvu8sfavbqpk3g</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>55792</id>
      <parentid>54819</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-08T01:12:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8177">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in any foreign country) is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

Aaronishappy:
:In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" 
:It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French!
:I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/Aires%20de%20services%20VINCI%20autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.
{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[nl:Frankrijk]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>0k9gjrroudthuoea331ujjsl1c03jsx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>58170</id>
      <parentid>55792</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-01-01T15:16:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Barie</username>
        <id>4382</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8912">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in any foreign country) is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

EU, EEA, Swiss, Andorran and Monégasque citizens can live and work in France without restrictions. Non-EU citizens who are from Albania, Andorra, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Barbados, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Croatia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Holy See, Honduras, Israel, Macedonia, Malaysia, Mauritius, Monaco, Montenegro, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, San Marino, Serbia, Seychelles, Taiwan and Uruguay are permitted to work in France during their 3 month visa exemption period. For more information, visit the [http://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/en/france/coming-to-france/getting-a-visa/article/foreign-nationals-holding-ordinary French Ministry of Foreign Affairs] website.

Aaronishappy:
:In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" 
:It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French!
:I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/Aires%20de%20services%20VINCI%20autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.
{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[nl:Frankrijk]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>pw66le4wm8o349ncskd8yu47wj6fv5b</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>59748</id>
      <parentid>58170</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-02-17T23:57:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Chael777</username>
        <id>3758</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9361">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in any foreign country) is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

EU, EEA, Swiss, Andorran and Monégasque citizens can live and work in France without restrictions. Non-EU citizens who are from Albania, Andorra, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Barbados, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Croatia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Holy See, Honduras, Israel, Macedonia, Malaysia, Mauritius, Monaco, Montenegro, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, San Marino, Serbia, Seychelles, Taiwan and Uruguay are permitted to work in France during their 3 month visa exemption period. For more information, visit the [http://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/en/france/coming-to-france/getting-a-visa/article/foreign-nationals-holding-ordinary French Ministry of Foreign Affairs] website.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

== Gallery ==

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:larochellehitch.jpg|[[User:Chael777|Chael]] on his ''first'' hitch!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/Aires%20de%20services%20VINCI%20autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.
{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[nl:Frankrijk]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>o4oy1q1fc08z63py3krv8x1divqq26p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>63621</id>
      <parentid>59748</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-09-07T19:52:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Use less</username>
        <id>6048</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9733">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in any foreign country) is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

EU, EEA, Swiss, Andorran and Monégasque citizens can live and work in France without restrictions. Non-EU citizens who are from Albania, Andorra, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Barbados, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Croatia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Holy See, Honduras, Israel, Macedonia, Malaysia, Mauritius, Monaco, Montenegro, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, San Marino, Serbia, Seychelles, Taiwan and Uruguay are permitted to work in France during their 3 month visa exemption period. For more information, visit the [http://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/en/france/coming-to-france/getting-a-visa/article/foreign-nationals-holding-ordinary French Ministry of Foreign Affairs] website.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help."

== Gallery ==

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:larochellehitch.jpg|[[User:Chael777|Chael]] on his ''first'' hitch!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/Aires%20de%20services%20VINCI%20autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.
{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[nl:Frankrijk]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>g8oyd5ce2f076zvchufnmhvyp28eb9z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>63622</id>
      <parentid>63621</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-09-07T19:54:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Use less</username>
        <id>6048</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9745">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in any foreign country) is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

EU, EEA, Swiss, Andorran and Monégasque citizens can live and work in France without restrictions. Non-EU citizens who are from Albania, Andorra, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Barbados, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Croatia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Holy See, Honduras, Israel, Macedonia, Malaysia, Mauritius, Monaco, Montenegro, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, San Marino, Serbia, Seychelles, Taiwan and Uruguay are permitted to work in France during their 3 month visa exemption period. For more information, visit the [http://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/en/france/coming-to-france/getting-a-visa/article/foreign-nationals-holding-ordinary French Ministry of Foreign Affairs] website.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - Justunein

== Gallery ==

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:larochellehitch.jpg|[[User:Chael777|Chael]] on his ''first'' hitch!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/Aires%20de%20services%20VINCI%20autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.
{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[nl:Frankrijk]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>jotr0yf2gpin3hvgovi0j67fxgb4upt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>63624</id>
      <parentid>63622</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-09-07T21:55:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9764">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in any foreign country) is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

EU, EEA, Swiss, Andorran and Monégasque citizens can live and work in France without restrictions. Non-EU citizens who are from Albania, Andorra, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Barbados, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Croatia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Holy See, Honduras, Israel, Macedonia, Malaysia, Mauritius, Monaco, Montenegro, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, San Marino, Serbia, Seychelles, Taiwan and Uruguay are permitted to work in France during their 3 month visa exemption period. For more information, visit the [http://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/en/france/coming-to-france/getting-a-visa/article/foreign-nationals-holding-ordinary French Ministry of Foreign Affairs] website.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

== Gallery ==

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:larochellehitch.jpg|[[User:Chael777|Chael]] on his ''first'' hitch!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/Aires%20de%20services%20VINCI%20autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.
{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[nl:Frankrijk]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>759ngr1ew3h65lwzki41t117aus5bww</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68040</id>
      <parentid>63624</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-01-11T18:50:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>D36csr</username>
        <id>8979</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10512">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in any foreign country) is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

EU, EEA, Swiss, Andorran and Monégasque citizens can live and work in France without restrictions. Non-EU citizens who are from Albania, Andorra, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Barbados, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Croatia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Holy See, Honduras, Israel, Macedonia, Malaysia, Mauritius, Monaco, Montenegro, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, San Marino, Serbia, Seychelles, Taiwan and Uruguay are permitted to work in France during their 3 month visa exemption period. For more information, visit the [http://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/en/france/coming-to-france/getting-a-visa/article/foreign-nationals-holding-ordinary French Ministry of Foreign Affairs] website.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!''
As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad!"

== Gallery ==

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:larochellehitch.jpg|[[User:Chael777|Chael]] on his ''first'' hitch!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/Aires%20de%20services%20VINCI%20autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.
{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[nl:Frankrijk]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>ehxzngsiew0v0m3xinahglbpqwyn96j</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68041</id>
      <parentid>68040</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-01-11T18:55:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>D36csr</username>
        <id>8979</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10610">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in any foreign country) is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

EU, EEA, Swiss, Andorran and Monégasque citizens can live and work in France without restrictions. Non-EU citizens who are from Albania, Andorra, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Barbados, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Croatia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Holy See, Honduras, Israel, Macedonia, Malaysia, Mauritius, Monaco, Montenegro, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, San Marino, Serbia, Seychelles, Taiwan and Uruguay are permitted to work in France during their 3 month visa exemption period. For more information, visit the [http://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/en/france/coming-to-france/getting-a-visa/article/foreign-nationals-holding-ordinary French Ministry of Foreign Affairs] website.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!"

== Gallery ==

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:larochellehitch.jpg|[[User:Chael777|Chael]] on his ''first'' hitch!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/Aires%20de%20services%20VINCI%20autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.
{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[nl:Frankrijk]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>fi6w47a9ynx7l2qh34yxl96ti79sl2d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68706</id>
      <parentid>68041</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-03-22T00:47:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GeorgDerReisende</username>
        <id>1903</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10625">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in any foreign country) is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

EU, EEA, Swiss, Andorran and Monégasque citizens can live and work in France without restrictions. Non-EU citizens who are from Albania, Andorra, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Barbados, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Croatia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Holy See, Honduras, Israel, Macedonia, Malaysia, Mauritius, Monaco, Montenegro, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, San Marino, Serbia, Seychelles, Taiwan and Uruguay are permitted to work in France during their 3 month visa exemption period. For more information, visit the [http://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/en/france/coming-to-france/getting-a-visa/article/foreign-nationals-holding-ordinary French Ministry of Foreign Affairs] website.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!"

== Gallery ==

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:larochellehitch.jpg|[[User:Chael777|Chael]] on his ''first'' hitch!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.
{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[nl:Frankrijk]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>bjyzh14lvc2cwhzqx9by35uyak8zzku</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69742</id>
      <parentid>68706</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-05-24T20:06:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Spliffpolitix</username>
        <id>11123</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12496">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in any foreign country) is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

==Issues with Law Enforcement==
There are three law enforcement agencies to contend with in France. The Police Nationale, the Gendarmerie and the Douane.

The '''Police Nationale''' are tasked with policing urban areas with a more than 20,000 inhabitants, and the surrounding highway infrastructure.  They will rarely stop you, but they are well known for their less than sympathetic nature and occasionally affiliation with fascist organisations.  They are a government agency bound by official targets, which means that if you are stopped, they will be looking for reasons to impose fines.  Even so, they have no legal right to stop you engaging in lawful activities as long as you are not creating a hazard or committing some other offence.  Remain calm and use your right to silence, only asking '''"am I free to go"''' repeatedly, and you should be ok.

The '''Gendarmerie''' is a military agency tasked with policing all of the French Republic where the population is lower than 20,000.  If you treat them with courtesy, they will most likely be professional and courteous in return.  Sometimes they will offer to take you to a safer or easier location to hitchhike from.  Only if you are creating a hazard will they issue fines.

The '''Douanes''' are the customs agency for the French Republic.  They patrol close to borders, looking for suspicious activity.  '''They have a right to check your Identification if you are within 20km of the border''', but they require a reasonable suspicion ''(article 78 of the Code de Procédure Pénale)'' at all other times.  They are often active on highways and péages going south from [[Belgium]] and [[Luxembourg]], looking for hitchhikers from the [[Netherlands]] who may be carrying cannabis.  They are however quite professional, and after a few questions about your direction of travel, will let you go on your way.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

EU, EEA, Swiss, Andorran and Monégasque citizens can live and work in France without restrictions. Non-EU citizens who are from Albania, Andorra, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Barbados, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Croatia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Holy See, Honduras, Israel, Macedonia, Malaysia, Mauritius, Monaco, Montenegro, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, San Marino, Serbia, Seychelles, Taiwan and Uruguay are permitted to work in France during their 3 month visa exemption period. For more information, visit the [http://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/en/france/coming-to-france/getting-a-visa/article/foreign-nationals-holding-ordinary French Ministry of Foreign Affairs] website.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!"

== Gallery ==

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:larochellehitch.jpg|[[User:Chael777|Chael]] on his ''first'' hitch!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.
{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[nl:Frankrijk]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>c34pd2znevcpec98aqacmsjgvumq2a7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69743</id>
      <parentid>69742</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-05-24T20:10:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Spliffpolitix</username>
        <id>11123</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12527">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in any foreign country) is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

==Issues with Law Enforcement==
There are three law enforcement agencies to contend with in France. The Police Nationale, the Gendarmerie and the Douane.

The '''Police Nationale''' are tasked with policing urban areas with a more than 20,000 inhabitants, and the surrounding highway infrastructure.  They will rarely stop you, but they are well known for their less than sympathetic nature and occasionally affiliation with fascist organisations.  They are a government agency bound by official targets, which means that if you are stopped, they will be looking for reasons to impose fines.  Even so, they have no legal right to stop you engaging in lawful activities as long as you are not creating a hazard or committing some other offence.  Remain calm and use your right to silence, only asking '''"am I free to go"''' repeatedly, and you should be ok.

The '''Gendarmerie''' is a military agency tasked with policing all of the French Republic where the population is lower than 20,000.  If you treat them with courtesy, they will most likely be professional and courteous in return.  Sometimes they will offer to take you to a safer or easier location to hitchhike from.  Only if you are creating a hazard will they issue fines.

The '''Douanes''' are the customs agency for the French Republic.  They patrol close to borders, looking for suspicious activity.  '''They have a right to check your Identification if you are within 20km of the border''', but they require a reasonable suspicion ''(article 78 of the Code de Procédure Pénale)'' at all other times.  They are often active on highways and péages going south from [[Belgium]] and [[Luxembourg]], looking for hitchhikers from the [[Netherlands]] who may be carrying cannabis or large quantities of tobacco.  They are however quite professional, and after a few questions about your direction of travel, will let you go on your way.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

EU, EEA, Swiss, Andorran and Monégasque citizens can live and work in France without restrictions. Non-EU citizens who are from Albania, Andorra, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Barbados, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Croatia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Holy See, Honduras, Israel, Macedonia, Malaysia, Mauritius, Monaco, Montenegro, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, San Marino, Serbia, Seychelles, Taiwan and Uruguay are permitted to work in France during their 3 month visa exemption period. For more information, visit the [http://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/en/france/coming-to-france/getting-a-visa/article/foreign-nationals-holding-ordinary French Ministry of Foreign Affairs] website.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!"

== Gallery ==

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:larochellehitch.jpg|[[User:Chael777|Chael]] on his ''first'' hitch!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.
{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[nl:Frankrijk]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>ii0uaey3qtupq6394wp1mu823vvo8uz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69744</id>
      <parentid>69743</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-05-24T20:14:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Spliffpolitix</username>
        <id>11123</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12525">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in any foreign country) is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

==Issues with Law Enforcement==
There are three law enforcement agencies to contend with in France. The Police Nationale, the Gendarmerie and the Douane.

The '''Police Nationale''' are tasked with policing urban areas with more than 20,000 inhabitants, and the surrounding highway infrastructure.  They will rarely stop you, but they are well known for their less than sympathetic nature and occasionally affiliation with fascist organisations.  They are a government agency bound by official targets, which means that if you are stopped, they will be looking for reasons to impose fines.  Even so, they have no legal right to stop you engaging in lawful activities as long as you are not creating a hazard or committing some other offence.  Remain calm and use your right to silence, only asking '''"am I free to go"''' repeatedly, and you should be ok.

The '''Gendarmerie''' is a military agency tasked with policing all of the French Republic where the population is lower than 20,000.  If you treat them with courtesy, they will most likely be professional and courteous in return.  Sometimes they will offer to take you to a safer or easier location to hitchhike from.  Only if you are creating a hazard will they issue fines.

The '''Douanes''' are the customs agency for the French Republic.  They patrol close to borders, looking for suspicious activity.  '''They have a right to check your Identification if you are within 20km of the border''', but they require a reasonable suspicion ''(article 78 of the Code de Procédure Pénale)'' at all other times.  They are often active on highways and péages going south from [[Belgium]] and [[Luxembourg]], looking for hitchhikers from the [[Netherlands]] who may be carrying cannabis or large quantities of tobacco.  They are however quite professional, and after a few questions about your direction of travel, will let you go on your way.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

EU, EEA, Swiss, Andorran and Monégasque citizens can live and work in France without restrictions. Non-EU citizens who are from Albania, Andorra, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Barbados, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Croatia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Holy See, Honduras, Israel, Macedonia, Malaysia, Mauritius, Monaco, Montenegro, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, San Marino, Serbia, Seychelles, Taiwan and Uruguay are permitted to work in France during their 3 month visa exemption period. For more information, visit the [http://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/en/france/coming-to-france/getting-a-visa/article/foreign-nationals-holding-ordinary French Ministry of Foreign Affairs] website.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!"

== Gallery ==

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:larochellehitch.jpg|[[User:Chael777|Chael]] on his ''first'' hitch!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.
{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[nl:Frankrijk]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>g8951t0onyqygsauotrkdvgd1ho7ujv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69745</id>
      <parentid>69744</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-05-24T20:16:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Spliffpolitix</username>
        <id>11123</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12561">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in any foreign country) is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

==Issues with Law Enforcement==
There are three law enforcement agencies to contend with in France. The Police Nationale, the Gendarmerie and the Douane.

The '''Police Nationale''' are tasked with policing urban areas with more than 20,000 inhabitants, and the surrounding highway infrastructure.  They will rarely stop you, but they are well known for their less than sympathetic nature and occasionally affiliation with fascist organisations.  They are a government agency bound by official targets, which means that if you are stopped, they will be looking for reasons to impose fines.  Even so, they have no legal right to stop you engaging in lawful activities as long as you are not creating a hazard or committing some other offence.  Remain calm and use your right to silence, only asking '''"am I free to go"''' repeatedly, and you should be ok.

The '''Gendarmerie''' is a military agency tasked with policing all of the French Republic where the population is lower than 20,000.  If you treat them with courtesy, they will most likely be professional and courteous in return.  Sometimes they will offer to take you to a safer or easier location to hitchhike from.  Only if you are creating a hazard will they issue fines.

The '''Douanes''' are the customs agency for the French Republic.  They patrol close to borders, looking for suspicious activity.  '''They have a right to check your Identification if you are within 20km of the border''', but at all other times they need to have a reasonable suspicion ''(article 78 of the Code de Procédure Pénale)'' before they stop an individual.  They are often active on highways and péages going south from [[Belgium]] and [[Luxembourg]], looking for hitchhikers from the [[Netherlands]] who may be carrying cannabis or large quantities of tobacco.  They are however quite professional, and after a few questions about your direction of travel, will let you go on your way.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

EU, EEA, Swiss, Andorran and Monégasque citizens can live and work in France without restrictions. Non-EU citizens who are from Albania, Andorra, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Barbados, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Croatia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Holy See, Honduras, Israel, Macedonia, Malaysia, Mauritius, Monaco, Montenegro, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, San Marino, Serbia, Seychelles, Taiwan and Uruguay are permitted to work in France during their 3 month visa exemption period. For more information, visit the [http://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/en/france/coming-to-france/getting-a-visa/article/foreign-nationals-holding-ordinary French Ministry of Foreign Affairs] website.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!"

== Gallery ==

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:larochellehitch.jpg|[[User:Chael777|Chael]] on his ''first'' hitch!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.
{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[nl:Frankrijk]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>ck6tilbtjswclixrqfrp27ba5382nt7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69746</id>
      <parentid>69745</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-05-24T20:18:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Spliffpolitix</username>
        <id>11123</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12590">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in any foreign country) is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

==Issues with Law Enforcement==
There are three law enforcement agencies to contend with in France. The Police Nationale, the Gendarmerie and the Douane.

The '''Police Nationale''' are tasked with policing urban areas with more than 20,000 inhabitants, and the surrounding highway infrastructure.  They will rarely stop you, but they are well known for their less than sympathetic nature and occasionally affiliation with fascist organisations.  They are a government agency bound by official targets, which means that if you are stopped, they will be looking for reasons to impose fines.  Even so, they have no legal right to stop you engaging in lawful activities as long as you are not creating a hazard or committing some other offence.  Remain calm and use your right to silence, only asking '''"am I free to go"''' repeatedly, and you should be ok.

The '''Gendarmerie''' is a military agency tasked with policing all of the French Republic where the population is lower than 20,000.  If you treat them with courtesy, they will most likely be professional and courteous in return.  Sometimes they will offer to take you to a safer or easier location to hitchhike from.  Only if you are creating a hazard will they issue fines.

The '''Douanes''' are the customs agency for the French Republic.  They patrol close to borders, looking for suspicious activity.  '''They have a right to check your Identification if you are within 20km of the border''', but at all other times they need to have a reasonable suspicion ''(article 78 of the Code de Procédure Pénale)'' before they stop an individual.  They are often active on highways and péages going south from [[Belgium]] and [[Luxembourg]], looking for people transporting large amounts of tobacco or looking for hitchhikers from the [[Netherlands]] who may be carrying cannabis.  They are however quite professional, and after a few questions about your direction of travel, will let you go on your way.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

EU, EEA, Swiss, Andorran and Monégasque citizens can live and work in France without restrictions. Non-EU citizens who are from Albania, Andorra, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Barbados, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Croatia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Holy See, Honduras, Israel, Macedonia, Malaysia, Mauritius, Monaco, Montenegro, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, San Marino, Serbia, Seychelles, Taiwan and Uruguay are permitted to work in France during their 3 month visa exemption period. For more information, visit the [http://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/en/france/coming-to-france/getting-a-visa/article/foreign-nationals-holding-ordinary French Ministry of Foreign Affairs] website.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!"

== Gallery ==

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:larochellehitch.jpg|[[User:Chael777|Chael]] on his ''first'' hitch!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.
{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[nl:Frankrijk]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>okgzm0vnbgomgrmw4oiml09tojomdf7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70162</id>
      <parentid>69746</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-06-19T18:06:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Spliffpolitix</username>
        <id>11123</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12612">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French, also Occitan, Breton
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in any foreign country) is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

==Issues with Law Enforcement==
There are three law enforcement agencies to contend with in France. The Police Nationale, the Gendarmerie and the Douane.

The '''Police Nationale''' are tasked with policing urban areas with more than 20,000 inhabitants, and the surrounding highway infrastructure.  They will rarely stop you, but they are well known for their less than sympathetic nature and occasionally affiliation with fascist organisations.  They are a government agency bound by official targets, which means that if you are stopped, they will be looking for reasons to impose fines.  Even so, they have no legal right to stop you engaging in lawful activities as long as you are not creating a hazard or committing some other offence.  Remain calm and use your right to silence, only asking '''"am I free to go"''' repeatedly, and you should be ok.

The '''Gendarmerie''' is a military agency tasked with policing all of the French Republic where the population is lower than 20,000.  If you treat them with courtesy, they will most likely be professional and courteous in return.  Sometimes they will offer to take you to a safer or easier location to hitchhike from.  Only if you are creating a hazard will they issue fines.

The '''Douanes''' are the customs agency for the French Republic.  They patrol close to borders, looking for suspicious activity.  '''They have a right to check your Identification if you are within 20km of the border''', but at all other times they need to have a reasonable suspicion ''(article 78 of the Code de Procédure Pénale)'' before they stop an individual.  They are often active on highways and péages going south from [[Belgium]] and [[Luxembourg]], looking for people transporting large amounts of tobacco or looking for hitchhikers from the [[Netherlands]] who may be carrying cannabis.  They are however quite professional, and after a few questions about your direction of travel, will let you go on your way.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

EU, EEA, Swiss, Andorran and Monégasque citizens can live and work in France without restrictions. Non-EU citizens who are from Albania, Andorra, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Barbados, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Croatia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Holy See, Honduras, Israel, Macedonia, Malaysia, Mauritius, Monaco, Montenegro, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, San Marino, Serbia, Seychelles, Taiwan and Uruguay are permitted to work in France during their 3 month visa exemption period. For more information, visit the [http://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/en/france/coming-to-france/getting-a-visa/article/foreign-nationals-holding-ordinary French Ministry of Foreign Affairs] website.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!"

== Gallery ==

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:larochellehitch.jpg|[[User:Chael777|Chael]] on his ''first'' hitch!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.
{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[nl:Frankrijk]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>jl538n80it2fe7yij2yi0j6u0erhc65</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70220</id>
      <parentid>70162</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-06-26T18:34:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Harvestmouse</username>
        <id>5473</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12616">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French, also Occitan, Breton
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 64,102,140
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in any foreign country) is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

==Issues with Law Enforcement==
There are three law enforcement agencies to contend with in France. The Police Nationale, the Gendarmerie and the Douane.

The '''Police Nationale''' are tasked with policing urban areas with more than 20,000 inhabitants, and the surrounding highway infrastructure.  They will rarely stop you, but they are well known for their less than sympathetic nature and occasionally affiliation with fascist organisations.  They are a government agency bound by official targets, which means that if you are stopped, they will be looking for reasons to impose fines.  Even so, they have no legal right to stop you engaging in lawful activities as long as you are not creating a hazard or committing some other offence.  Remain calm and use your right to silence, only asking '''"am I free to go"''' repeatedly, and you should be ok.

The '''Gendarmerie''' is a military agency tasked with policing all of the French Republic where the population is lower than 20,000.  If you treat them with courtesy, they will most likely be professional and courteous in return.  Sometimes they will offer to take you to a safer or easier location to hitchhike from.  Only if you are creating a hazard will they issue fines.

The '''Douanes''' are the customs agency for the French Republic.  They patrol close to borders, looking for suspicious activity.  '''They have a right to check your Identification if you are within 20km of the border''', but at all other times they need to have a reasonable suspicion ''(article 78 of the Code de Procédure Pénale)'' before they stop an individual.  They are often active on highways and péages going south from [[Belgium]] and [[Luxembourg]], looking for people transporting large amounts of tobacco or looking for hitchhikers from the [[Netherlands]] who may be carrying cannabis.  They are however quite professional, and after a few questions about your direction of travel, will let you go on your way.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

EU, EEA, Swiss, Andorran and Monégasque citizens can live and work in France without restrictions. Non-EU citizens who are from Albania, Andorra, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Barbados, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Croatia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Holy See, Honduras, Israel, Macedonia, Malaysia, Mauritius, Monaco, Montenegro, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, San Marino, Serbia, Seychelles, Taiwan and Uruguay are permitted to work in France during their 3 month visa exemption period. For more information, visit the [http://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/en/france/coming-to-france/getting-a-visa/article/foreign-nationals-holding-ordinary French Ministry of Foreign Affairs] website.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!"

== Gallery ==

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:larochellehitch.jpg|[[User:Chael777|Chael]] on his ''first'' hitch!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.
{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[nl:Frankrijk]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>rhmigmggw0ku88w534ym5ff2lxe2w1p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70475</id>
      <parentid>70220</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-07-15T01:44:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lepoucedalex</username>
        <id>12251</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12676">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 65,8 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in any foreign country) is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

==Issues with Law Enforcement==
There are three law enforcement agencies to contend with in France. The Police Nationale, the Gendarmerie and the Douane.

The '''Police Nationale''' are tasked with policing urban areas with more than 20,000 inhabitants, and the surrounding highway infrastructure.  They will rarely stop you, but they are well known for their less than sympathetic nature and occasionally affiliation with fascist organisations.  They are a government agency bound by official targets, which means that if you are stopped, they will be looking for reasons to impose fines.  Even so, they have no legal right to stop you engaging in lawful activities as long as you are not creating a hazard or committing some other offence.  Remain calm and use your right to silence, only asking '''"am I free to go"''' repeatedly, and you should be ok.

The '''Gendarmerie''' is a military agency tasked with policing all of the French Republic where the population is lower than 20,000.  If you treat them with courtesy, they will most likely be professional and courteous in return.  Sometimes they will offer to take you to a safer or easier location to hitchhike from.  Only if you are creating a hazard will they issue fines.

The '''Douanes''' are the customs agency for the French Republic.  They patrol close to borders, looking for suspicious activity.  '''They have a right to check your Identification if you are within 20km of the border''', but at all other times they need to have a reasonable suspicion ''(article 78 of the Code de Procédure Pénale)'' before they stop an individual.  They are often active on highways and péages going south from [[Belgium]] and [[Luxembourg]], looking for people transporting large amounts of tobacco or looking for hitchhikers from the [[Netherlands]] who may be carrying cannabis.  They are however quite professional, and after a few questions about your direction of travel, will let you go on your way.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

EU, EEA, Swiss, Andorran and Monégasque citizens can live and work in France without restrictions. Non-EU citizens who are from Albania, Andorra, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Barbados, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Croatia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Holy See, Honduras, Israel, Macedonia, Malaysia, Mauritius, Monaco, Montenegro, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, San Marino, Serbia, Seychelles, Taiwan and Uruguay are permitted to work in France during their 3 month visa exemption period. For more information, visit the [http://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/en/france/coming-to-france/getting-a-visa/article/foreign-nationals-holding-ordinary French Ministry of Foreign Affairs] website.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!"

== Gallery ==

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:larochellehitch.jpg|[[User:Chael777|Chael]] on his ''first'' hitch!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.
{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[nl:Frankrijk]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>1zygwrdzjqvbaslix2q2uu55c8deurl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72375</id>
      <parentid>70475</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-12T21:28:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robyt</username>
        <id>9747</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12693">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 65,8 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in any foreign country) is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

==Issues with Law Enforcement==
There are three law enforcement agencies to contend with in France. The Police Nationale, the Gendarmerie and the Douane.

The '''Police Nationale''' are tasked with policing urban areas with more than 20,000 inhabitants, and the surrounding highway infrastructure.  They will rarely stop you, but they are well known for their less than sympathetic nature and occasionally affiliation with fascist organisations.  They are a government agency bound by official targets, which means that if you are stopped, they will be looking for reasons to impose fines.  Even so, they have no legal right to stop you engaging in lawful activities as long as you are not creating a hazard or committing some other offence.  Remain calm and use your right to silence, only asking '''"am I free to go"''' repeatedly, and you should be ok.

The '''Gendarmerie''' is a military agency tasked with policing all of the French Republic where the population is lower than 20,000.  If you treat them with courtesy, they will most likely be professional and courteous in return.  Sometimes they will offer to take you to a safer or easier location to hitchhike from.  Only if you are creating a hazard will they issue fines.

The '''Douanes''' are the customs agency for the French Republic.  They patrol close to borders, looking for suspicious activity.  '''They have a right to check your Identification if you are within 20km of the border''', but at all other times they need to have a reasonable suspicion ''(article 78 of the Code de Procédure Pénale)'' before they stop an individual.  They are often active on highways and péages going south from [[Belgium]] and [[Luxembourg]], looking for people transporting large amounts of tobacco or looking for hitchhikers from the [[Netherlands]] who may be carrying cannabis.  They are however quite professional, and after a few questions about your direction of travel, will let you go on your way.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

EU, EEA, Swiss, Andorran and Monégasque citizens can live and work in France without restrictions. Non-EU citizens who are from Albania, Andorra, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Barbados, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Croatia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Holy See, Honduras, Israel, Macedonia, Malaysia, Mauritius, Monaco, Montenegro, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, San Marino, Serbia, Seychelles, Taiwan and Uruguay are permitted to work in France during their 3 month visa exemption period. For more information, visit the [http://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/en/france/coming-to-france/getting-a-visa/article/foreign-nationals-holding-ordinary French Ministry of Foreign Affairs] website.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!"

== Gallery ==

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:larochellehitch.jpg|[[User:Chael777|Chael]] on his ''first'' hitch!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.
{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[nl:Frankrijk]]
[[pl:Francja]]
[[nomad:France]]</text>
      <sha1>3fz4zyru0kije6jk3e29frhyui75nwh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72588</id>
      <parentid>72375</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-21T13:44:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mohikanac8</username>
        <id>13186</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13055">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 65,8 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in any foreign country) is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

==Issues with Law Enforcement==
There are three law enforcement agencies to contend with in France. The Police Nationale, the Gendarmerie and the Douane.

The '''Police Nationale''' are tasked with policing urban areas with more than 20,000 inhabitants, and the surrounding highway infrastructure.  They will rarely stop you, but they are well known for their less than sympathetic nature and occasionally affiliation with fascist organisations.  They are a government agency bound by official targets, which means that if you are stopped, they will be looking for reasons to impose fines.  Even so, they have no legal right to stop you engaging in lawful activities as long as you are not creating a hazard or committing some other offence.  Remain calm and use your right to silence, only asking '''"am I free to go"''' repeatedly, and you should be ok.

The '''Gendarmerie''' is a military agency tasked with policing all of the French Republic where the population is lower than 20,000.  If you treat them with courtesy, they will most likely be professional and courteous in return.  Sometimes they will offer to take you to a safer or easier location to hitchhike from.  Only if you are creating a hazard will they issue fines.

The '''Douanes''' are the customs agency for the French Republic.  They patrol close to borders, looking for suspicious activity.  '''They have a right to check your Identification if you are within 20km of the border''', but at all other times they need to have a reasonable suspicion ''(article 78 of the Code de Procédure Pénale)'' before they stop an individual.  They are often active on highways and péages going south from [[Belgium]] and [[Luxembourg]], looking for people transporting large amounts of tobacco or looking for hitchhikers from the [[Netherlands]] who may be carrying cannabis.  They are however quite professional, and after a few questions about your direction of travel, will let you go on your way.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

EU, EEA, Swiss, Andorran and Monégasque citizens can live and work in France without restrictions. Non-EU citizens who are from Albania, Andorra, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Barbados, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Croatia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Holy See, Honduras, Israel, Macedonia, Malaysia, Mauritius, Monaco, Montenegro, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, San Marino, Serbia, Seychelles, Taiwan and Uruguay are permitted to work in France during their 3 month visa exemption period. For more information, visit the [http://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/en/france/coming-to-france/getting-a-visa/article/foreign-nationals-holding-ordinary French Ministry of Foreign Affairs] website.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!"

I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.

== Gallery ==

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:larochellehitch.jpg|[[User:Chael777|Chael]] on his ''first'' hitch!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.
{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[nl:Frankrijk]]
[[pl:Francja]]
[[nomad:France]]</text>
      <sha1>mf8lbf8hsk3pzmq772b0pcy34cx0edf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>76936</id>
      <parentid>72588</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-09-04T21:46:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Bobsnuggel</username>
        <id>19470</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13851">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 65,8 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in any foreign country) is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

==Issues with Law Enforcement==
There are three law enforcement agencies to contend with in France. The Police Nationale, the Gendarmerie and the Douane.

The '''Police Nationale''' are tasked with policing urban areas with more than 20,000 inhabitants, and the surrounding highway infrastructure.  They will rarely stop you, but they are well known for their less than sympathetic nature and occasionally affiliation with fascist organisations.  They are a government agency bound by official targets, which means that if you are stopped, they will be looking for reasons to impose fines.  Even so, they have no legal right to stop you engaging in lawful activities as long as you are not creating a hazard or committing some other offence.  Remain calm and use your right to silence, only asking '''"am I free to go"''' repeatedly, and you should be ok.

The '''Gendarmerie''' is a military agency tasked with policing all of the French Republic where the population is lower than 20,000.  If you treat them with courtesy, they will most likely be professional and courteous in return.  Sometimes they will offer to take you to a safer or easier location to hitchhike from.  Only if you are creating a hazard will they issue fines.

The '''Douanes''' are the customs agency for the French Republic.  They patrol close to borders, looking for suspicious activity.  '''They have a right to check your Identification if you are within 20km of the border''', but at all other times they need to have a reasonable suspicion ''(article 78 of the Code de Procédure Pénale)'' before they stop an individual.  They are often active on highways and péages going south from [[Belgium]] and [[Luxembourg]], looking for people transporting large amounts of tobacco or looking for hitchhikers from the [[Netherlands]] who may be carrying cannabis.  They are however quite professional, and after a few questions about your direction of travel, will let you go on your way.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

EU, EEA, Swiss, Andorran and Monégasque citizens can live and work in France without restrictions. Non-EU citizens who are from Albania, Andorra, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Barbados, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Croatia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Holy See, Honduras, Israel, Macedonia, Malaysia, Mauritius, Monaco, Montenegro, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, San Marino, Serbia, Seychelles, Taiwan and Uruguay are permitted to work in France during their 3 month visa exemption period. For more information, visit the [http://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/en/france/coming-to-france/getting-a-visa/article/foreign-nationals-holding-ordinary French Ministry of Foreign Affairs] website.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!"

I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.

I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to.
Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.

== Gallery ==

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:larochellehitch.jpg|[[User:Chael777|Chael]] on his ''first'' hitch!
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.
{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[nl:Frankrijk]]
[[pl:Francja]]
[[nomad:France]]</text>
      <sha1>0r2gxrdpjtnnnavhtc6gg8vwqo61b8p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79826</id>
      <parentid>76936</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-07-06T11:12:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>FreePat</username>
        <id>23656</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13937">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 65,8 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in any foreign country) is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

==Issues with Law Enforcement==
There are three law enforcement agencies to contend with in France. The Police Nationale, the Gendarmerie and the Douane.

The '''Police Nationale''' are tasked with policing urban areas with more than 20,000 inhabitants, and the surrounding highway infrastructure.  They will rarely stop you, but they are well known for their less than sympathetic nature and occasionally affiliation with fascist organisations.  They are a government agency bound by official targets, which means that if you are stopped, they will be looking for reasons to impose fines.  Even so, they have no legal right to stop you engaging in lawful activities as long as you are not creating a hazard or committing some other offence.  Remain calm and use your right to silence, only asking '''"am I free to go"''' repeatedly, and you should be ok.

The '''Gendarmerie''' is a military agency tasked with policing all of the French Republic where the population is lower than 20,000.  If you treat them with courtesy, they will most likely be professional and courteous in return.  Sometimes they will offer to take you to a safer or easier location to hitchhike from.  Only if you are creating a hazard will they issue fines.

The '''Douanes''' are the customs agency for the French Republic.  They patrol close to borders, looking for suspicious activity.  '''They have a right to check your Identification if you are within 20km of the border''', but at all other times they need to have a reasonable suspicion ''(article 78 of the Code de Procédure Pénale)'' before they stop an individual.  They are often active on highways and péages going south from [[Belgium]] and [[Luxembourg]], looking for people transporting large amounts of tobacco or looking for hitchhikers from the [[Netherlands]] who may be carrying cannabis.  They are however quite professional, and after a few questions about your direction of travel, will let you go on your way.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

EU, EEA, Swiss, Andorran and Monégasque citizens can live and work in France without restrictions. Non-EU citizens who are from Albania, Andorra, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Barbados, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Croatia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Holy See, Honduras, Israel, Macedonia, Malaysia, Mauritius, Monaco, Montenegro, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, San Marino, Serbia, Seychelles, Taiwan and Uruguay are permitted to work in France during their 3 month visa exemption period. For more information, visit the [http://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/en/france/coming-to-france/getting-a-visa/article/foreign-nationals-holding-ordinary French Ministry of Foreign Affairs] website.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!"

I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.

I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to.
Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.

== Gallery ==

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:larochellehitch.jpg|[[User:Chael777|Chael]] on his ''first'' hitch!
[[File:Pat e Suh.jpg]]|Pat &amp; Suh hitchhiking after a barrière de péage in France :)
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.
{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[nl:Frankrijk]]
[[pl:Francja]]
[[nomad:France]]</text>
      <sha1>dzosoftxkbhj4ebjl9ebs45aa8w027q</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79827</id>
      <parentid>79826</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-07-06T11:13:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>FreePat</username>
        <id>23656</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13937">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 65,8 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in any foreign country) is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

==Issues with Law Enforcement==
There are three law enforcement agencies to contend with in France. The Police Nationale, the Gendarmerie and the Douane.

The '''Police Nationale''' are tasked with policing urban areas with more than 20,000 inhabitants, and the surrounding highway infrastructure.  They will rarely stop you, but they are well known for their less than sympathetic nature and occasionally affiliation with fascist organisations.  They are a government agency bound by official targets, which means that if you are stopped, they will be looking for reasons to impose fines.  Even so, they have no legal right to stop you engaging in lawful activities as long as you are not creating a hazard or committing some other offence.  Remain calm and use your right to silence, only asking '''"am I free to go"''' repeatedly, and you should be ok.

The '''Gendarmerie''' is a military agency tasked with policing all of the French Republic where the population is lower than 20,000.  If you treat them with courtesy, they will most likely be professional and courteous in return.  Sometimes they will offer to take you to a safer or easier location to hitchhike from.  Only if you are creating a hazard will they issue fines.

The '''Douanes''' are the customs agency for the French Republic.  They patrol close to borders, looking for suspicious activity.  '''They have a right to check your Identification if you are within 20km of the border''', but at all other times they need to have a reasonable suspicion ''(article 78 of the Code de Procédure Pénale)'' before they stop an individual.  They are often active on highways and péages going south from [[Belgium]] and [[Luxembourg]], looking for people transporting large amounts of tobacco or looking for hitchhikers from the [[Netherlands]] who may be carrying cannabis.  They are however quite professional, and after a few questions about your direction of travel, will let you go on your way.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

EU, EEA, Swiss, Andorran and Monégasque citizens can live and work in France without restrictions. Non-EU citizens who are from Albania, Andorra, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Barbados, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Croatia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Holy See, Honduras, Israel, Macedonia, Malaysia, Mauritius, Monaco, Montenegro, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, San Marino, Serbia, Seychelles, Taiwan and Uruguay are permitted to work in France during their 3 month visa exemption period. For more information, visit the [http://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/en/france/coming-to-france/getting-a-visa/article/foreign-nationals-holding-ordinary French Ministry of Foreign Affairs] website.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!"

I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.

I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to.
Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.

== Gallery ==

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:larochellehitch.jpg|[[User:Chael777|Chael]] on his ''first'' hitch!
[[File:Pat_e_Suh.jpg]]|Pat &amp; Suh hitchhiking after a barrière de péage in France :)
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.
{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[nl:Frankrijk]]
[[pl:Francja]]
[[nomad:France]]</text>
      <sha1>3tp6upsfsy7n7hxy1ltmzf9xrwvvnm6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79828</id>
      <parentid>79827</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-07-06T11:16:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>FreePat</username>
        <id>23656</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13944">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 65,8 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in any foreign country) is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

==Issues with Law Enforcement==
There are three law enforcement agencies to contend with in France. The Police Nationale, the Gendarmerie and the Douane.

The '''Police Nationale''' are tasked with policing urban areas with more than 20,000 inhabitants, and the surrounding highway infrastructure.  They will rarely stop you, but they are well known for their less than sympathetic nature and occasionally affiliation with fascist organisations.  They are a government agency bound by official targets, which means that if you are stopped, they will be looking for reasons to impose fines.  Even so, they have no legal right to stop you engaging in lawful activities as long as you are not creating a hazard or committing some other offence.  Remain calm and use your right to silence, only asking '''"am I free to go"''' repeatedly, and you should be ok.

The '''Gendarmerie''' is a military agency tasked with policing all of the French Republic where the population is lower than 20,000.  If you treat them with courtesy, they will most likely be professional and courteous in return.  Sometimes they will offer to take you to a safer or easier location to hitchhike from.  Only if you are creating a hazard will they issue fines.

The '''Douanes''' are the customs agency for the French Republic.  They patrol close to borders, looking for suspicious activity.  '''They have a right to check your Identification if you are within 20km of the border''', but at all other times they need to have a reasonable suspicion ''(article 78 of the Code de Procédure Pénale)'' before they stop an individual.  They are often active on highways and péages going south from [[Belgium]] and [[Luxembourg]], looking for people transporting large amounts of tobacco or looking for hitchhikers from the [[Netherlands]] who may be carrying cannabis.  They are however quite professional, and after a few questions about your direction of travel, will let you go on your way.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

EU, EEA, Swiss, Andorran and Monégasque citizens can live and work in France without restrictions. Non-EU citizens who are from Albania, Andorra, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Barbados, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Croatia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Holy See, Honduras, Israel, Macedonia, Malaysia, Mauritius, Monaco, Montenegro, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, San Marino, Serbia, Seychelles, Taiwan and Uruguay are permitted to work in France during their 3 month visa exemption period. For more information, visit the [http://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/en/france/coming-to-france/getting-a-visa/article/foreign-nationals-holding-ordinary French Ministry of Foreign Affairs] website.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!"

I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.

I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to.
Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.

== Gallery ==

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:larochellehitch.jpg|[[User:Chael777|Chael]] on his ''first'' hitch!
[[File:Pat_e_Suh.jpg|thumb|Pat &amp; Suh hitchhiking after a barrière de péage in France :)]]|
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.
{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[nl:Frankrijk]]
[[pl:Francja]]
[[nomad:France]]</text>
      <sha1>99virtc6bt01uizv3q23w3w591nybkj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79829</id>
      <parentid>79828</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-07-06T11:18:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>FreePat</username>
        <id>23656</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13935">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 65,8 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in any foreign country) is a language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

==Issues with Law Enforcement==
There are three law enforcement agencies to contend with in France. The Police Nationale, the Gendarmerie and the Douane.

The '''Police Nationale''' are tasked with policing urban areas with more than 20,000 inhabitants, and the surrounding highway infrastructure.  They will rarely stop you, but they are well known for their less than sympathetic nature and occasionally affiliation with fascist organisations.  They are a government agency bound by official targets, which means that if you are stopped, they will be looking for reasons to impose fines.  Even so, they have no legal right to stop you engaging in lawful activities as long as you are not creating a hazard or committing some other offence.  Remain calm and use your right to silence, only asking '''"am I free to go"''' repeatedly, and you should be ok.

The '''Gendarmerie''' is a military agency tasked with policing all of the French Republic where the population is lower than 20,000.  If you treat them with courtesy, they will most likely be professional and courteous in return.  Sometimes they will offer to take you to a safer or easier location to hitchhike from.  Only if you are creating a hazard will they issue fines.

The '''Douanes''' are the customs agency for the French Republic.  They patrol close to borders, looking for suspicious activity.  '''They have a right to check your Identification if you are within 20km of the border''', but at all other times they need to have a reasonable suspicion ''(article 78 of the Code de Procédure Pénale)'' before they stop an individual.  They are often active on highways and péages going south from [[Belgium]] and [[Luxembourg]], looking for people transporting large amounts of tobacco or looking for hitchhikers from the [[Netherlands]] who may be carrying cannabis.  They are however quite professional, and after a few questions about your direction of travel, will let you go on your way.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

EU, EEA, Swiss, Andorran and Monégasque citizens can live and work in France without restrictions. Non-EU citizens who are from Albania, Andorra, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Barbados, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Croatia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Holy See, Honduras, Israel, Macedonia, Malaysia, Mauritius, Monaco, Montenegro, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, San Marino, Serbia, Seychelles, Taiwan and Uruguay are permitted to work in France during their 3 month visa exemption period. For more information, visit the [http://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/en/france/coming-to-france/getting-a-visa/article/foreign-nationals-holding-ordinary French Ministry of Foreign Affairs] website.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!"

I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.

I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to.
Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.

== Gallery ==

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:larochellehitch.jpg|[[User:Chael777|Chael]] on his ''first'' hitch!
Image:Pat_e_Suh.jpg|Pat &amp; Suh hitchhiking after a barrière de péage in France :).
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.
{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[nl:Frankrijk]]
[[pl:Francja]]
[[nomad:France]]</text>
      <sha1>b4g4fp7xnhu2uu5f4ociabhso200z5x</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>81494</id>
      <parentid>79829</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-11-19T13:35:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Jimmycarr</username>
        <id>24744</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13940">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 65,8 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

==Issues with Law Enforcement==
There are three law enforcement agencies to contend with in France. The Police Nationale, the Gendarmerie and the Douane.

The '''Police Nationale''' are tasked with policing urban areas with more than 20,000 inhabitants, and the surrounding highway infrastructure.  They will rarely stop you, but they are well known for their less than sympathetic nature and occasionally affiliation with fascist organisations.  They are a government agency bound by official targets, which means that if you are stopped, they will be looking for reasons to impose fines.  Even so, they have no legal right to stop you engaging in lawful activities as long as you are not creating a hazard or committing some other offence.  Remain calm and use your right to silence, only asking '''"am I free to go"''' repeatedly, and you should be ok.

The '''Gendarmerie''' is a military agency tasked with policing all of the French Republic where the population is lower than 20,000.  If you treat them with courtesy, they will most likely be professional and courteous in return.  Sometimes they will offer to take you to a safer or easier location to hitchhike from.  Only if you are creating a hazard will they issue fines.

The '''Douanes''' are the customs agency for the French Republic.  They patrol close to borders, looking for suspicious activity.  '''They have a right to check your Identification if you are within 20km of the border''', but at all other times they need to have a reasonable suspicion ''(article 78 of the Code de Procédure Pénale)'' before they stop an individual.  They are often active on highways and péages going south from [[Belgium]] and [[Luxembourg]], looking for people transporting large amounts of tobacco or looking for hitchhikers from the [[Netherlands]] who may be carrying cannabis.  They are however quite professional, and after a few questions about your direction of travel, will let you go on your way.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

EU, EEA, Swiss, Andorran and Monégasque citizens can live and work in France without restrictions. Non-EU citizens who are from Albania, Andorra, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Barbados, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Croatia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Holy See, Honduras, Israel, Macedonia, Malaysia, Mauritius, Monaco, Montenegro, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, San Marino, Serbia, Seychelles, Taiwan and Uruguay are permitted to work in France during their 3 month visa exemption period. For more information, visit the [http://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/en/france/coming-to-france/getting-a-visa/article/foreign-nationals-holding-ordinary French Ministry of Foreign Affairs] website.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!"

I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.

I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to.
Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.

== Gallery ==

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:larochellehitch.jpg|[[User:Chael777|Chael]] on his ''first'' hitch!
Image:Pat_e_Suh.jpg|Pat &amp; Suh hitchhiking after a barrière de péage in France :).
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.
{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[wikipedia:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[nl:Frankrijk]]
[[pl:Francja]]
[[nomad:France]]</text>
      <sha1>8k1x2pinoyctqa3c21v12sq4sjwhmkl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>81948</id>
      <parentid>81494</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-01-13T13:43:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13885">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 65,8 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==

'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

==Issues with Law Enforcement==
There are three law enforcement agencies to contend with in France. The Police Nationale, the Gendarmerie and the Douane.

The '''Police Nationale''' are tasked with policing urban areas with more than 20,000 inhabitants, and the surrounding highway infrastructure.  They will rarely stop you, but they are well known for their less than sympathetic nature and occasionally affiliation with fascist organisations.  They are a government agency bound by official targets, which means that if you are stopped, they will be looking for reasons to impose fines.  Even so, they have no legal right to stop you engaging in lawful activities as long as you are not creating a hazard or committing some other offence.  Remain calm and use your right to silence, only asking '''"am I free to go"''' repeatedly, and you should be ok.

The '''Gendarmerie''' is a military agency tasked with policing all of the French Republic where the population is lower than 20,000.  If you treat them with courtesy, they will most likely be professional and courteous in return.  Sometimes they will offer to take you to a safer or easier location to hitchhike from.  Only if you are creating a hazard will they issue fines.

The '''Douanes''' are the customs agency for the French Republic.  They patrol close to borders, looking for suspicious activity.  '''They have a right to check your Identification if you are within 20km of the border''', but at all other times they need to have a reasonable suspicion ''(article 78 of the Code de Procédure Pénale)'' before they stop an individual.  They are often active on highways and péages going south from [[Belgium]] and [[Luxembourg]], looking for people transporting large amounts of tobacco or looking for hitchhikers from the [[Netherlands]] who may be carrying cannabis.  They are however quite professional, and after a few questions about your direction of travel, will let you go on your way.

== [[Food]]/[[Money]] ==

French bakeries are by law prohibited from selling bread that is older than a day, so it pays to go around bakeries (''boulangerie'') and asking for old bread, or simply checking bakeries' doors/backyards after they close.

EU, EEA, Swiss, Andorran and Monégasque citizens can live and work in France without restrictions. Non-EU citizens who are from Albania, Andorra, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Barbados, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Croatia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Holy See, Honduras, Israel, Macedonia, Malaysia, Mauritius, Monaco, Montenegro, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, San Marino, Serbia, Seychelles, Taiwan and Uruguay are permitted to work in France during their 3 month visa exemption period. For more information, visit the [http://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/en/france/coming-to-france/getting-a-visa/article/foreign-nationals-holding-ordinary French Ministry of Foreign Affairs] website.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!"

I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.

I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to.
Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.

== Gallery ==

&lt;gallery&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:larochellehitch.jpg|[[User:Chael777|Chael]] on his ''first'' hitch!
Image:Pat_e_Suh.jpg|Pat &amp; Suh hitchhiking after a barrière de péage in France :).
&lt;/gallery&gt;

== External links ==
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.
{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:France]]
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>sqprzpx6nbh3pjq72lhh7g3ggnnlah0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>89438</id>
      <parentid>81948</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-10-03T02:51:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Traumschule</username>
        <id>28627</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12862">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 65,8 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==
__TOC__
'''Péage''' ([http://french.about.com/library/media/wavs/peage.wav]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

==Issues with Law Enforcement==
&lt;gallery style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:25px;&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:Pat_e_Suh.jpg|Pat &amp; Suh hitchhiking after a barrière de péage in France :).
&lt;/gallery&gt;
There are three law enforcement agencies to contend with in France. The Police Nationale, the Gendarmerie and the Douane.

The '''Police Nationale''' are tasked with policing urban areas with more than 20,000 inhabitants, and the surrounding highway infrastructure.  They will rarely stop you, but they are well known for their less than sympathetic nature and occasionally affiliation with fascist organisations.  They are a government agency bound by official targets, which means that if you are stopped, they will be looking for reasons to impose fines.  Even so, they have no legal right to stop you engaging in lawful activities as long as you are not creating a hazard or committing some other offence.  Remain calm and use your right to silence, only asking '''"am I free to go"''' repeatedly, and you should be ok.

The '''Gendarmerie''' is a military agency tasked with policing all of the French Republic where the population is lower than 20,000.  If you treat them with courtesy, they will most likely be professional and courteous in return.  Sometimes they will offer to take you to a safer or easier location to hitchhike from.  Only if you are creating a hazard will they issue fines.

The '''Douanes''' are the customs agency for the French Republic.  They patrol close to borders, looking for suspicious activity.  '''They have a right to check your Identification if you are within 20km of the border''', but at all other times they need to have a reasonable suspicion ''(article 78 of the Code de Procédure Pénale)'' before they stop an individual.  They are often active on highways and péages going south from [[Belgium]] and [[Luxembourg]], looking for people transporting large amounts of tobacco or looking for hitchhikers from the [[Netherlands]] who may be carrying cannabis.  They are however quite professional, and after a few questions about your direction of travel, will let you go on your way.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!"

I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.

I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to.
Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.

== Resources ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.


{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>qcw3batzhpr0pb1hoojrw3vo4bgkolr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>89704</id>
      <parentid>89438</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-10-13T23:00:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Augustris</username>
        <id>28823</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12905">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 65,8 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==
__TOC__
'''Péage''' ([http://cs1.imtranslator.net/SL/Free_Projects/169679760/cs_10132017_15_58_47_1.wav?param1=001024]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

==Issues with Law Enforcement==
&lt;gallery style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:25px;&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:Pat_e_Suh.jpg|Pat &amp; Suh hitchhiking after a barrière de péage in France :).
&lt;/gallery&gt;
There are three law enforcement agencies to contend with in France. The Police Nationale, the Gendarmerie and the Douane.

The '''Police Nationale''' are tasked with policing urban areas with more than 20,000 inhabitants, and the surrounding highway infrastructure.  They will rarely stop you, but they are well known for their less than sympathetic nature and occasionally affiliation with fascist organisations.  They are a government agency bound by official targets, which means that if you are stopped, they will be looking for reasons to impose fines.  Even so, they have no legal right to stop you engaging in lawful activities as long as you are not creating a hazard or committing some other offence.  Remain calm and use your right to silence, only asking '''"am I free to go"''' repeatedly, and you should be ok.

The '''Gendarmerie''' is a military agency tasked with policing all of the French Republic where the population is lower than 20,000.  If you treat them with courtesy, they will most likely be professional and courteous in return.  Sometimes they will offer to take you to a safer or easier location to hitchhike from.  Only if you are creating a hazard will they issue fines.

The '''Douanes''' are the customs agency for the French Republic.  They patrol close to borders, looking for suspicious activity.  '''They have a right to check your Identification if you are within 20km of the border''', but at all other times they need to have a reasonable suspicion ''(article 78 of the Code de Procédure Pénale)'' before they stop an individual.  They are often active on highways and péages going south from [[Belgium]] and [[Luxembourg]], looking for people transporting large amounts of tobacco or looking for hitchhikers from the [[Netherlands]] who may be carrying cannabis.  They are however quite professional, and after a few questions about your direction of travel, will let you go on your way.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!"

I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.

I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to.
Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.

== Resources ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.


{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>a9aqhtfme48hzawqnlduy7dabd5872d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>89705</id>
      <parentid>89704</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-10-13T23:06:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Augustris</username>
        <id>28823</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12875">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 65,8 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==
__TOC__
'''Péage''' ([http://www.texttomp3.online/audio_tmp/59e146d7356c79.49311332.mp3]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

==Issues with Law Enforcement==
&lt;gallery style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:25px;&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:Pat_e_Suh.jpg|Pat &amp; Suh hitchhiking after a barrière de péage in France :).
&lt;/gallery&gt;
There are three law enforcement agencies to contend with in France. The Police Nationale, the Gendarmerie and the Douane.

The '''Police Nationale''' are tasked with policing urban areas with more than 20,000 inhabitants, and the surrounding highway infrastructure.  They will rarely stop you, but they are well known for their less than sympathetic nature and occasionally affiliation with fascist organisations.  They are a government agency bound by official targets, which means that if you are stopped, they will be looking for reasons to impose fines.  Even so, they have no legal right to stop you engaging in lawful activities as long as you are not creating a hazard or committing some other offence.  Remain calm and use your right to silence, only asking '''"am I free to go"''' repeatedly, and you should be ok.

The '''Gendarmerie''' is a military agency tasked with policing all of the French Republic where the population is lower than 20,000.  If you treat them with courtesy, they will most likely be professional and courteous in return.  Sometimes they will offer to take you to a safer or easier location to hitchhike from.  Only if you are creating a hazard will they issue fines.

The '''Douanes''' are the customs agency for the French Republic.  They patrol close to borders, looking for suspicious activity.  '''They have a right to check your Identification if you are within 20km of the border''', but at all other times they need to have a reasonable suspicion ''(article 78 of the Code de Procédure Pénale)'' before they stop an individual.  They are often active on highways and péages going south from [[Belgium]] and [[Luxembourg]], looking for people transporting large amounts of tobacco or looking for hitchhikers from the [[Netherlands]] who may be carrying cannabis.  They are however quite professional, and after a few questions about your direction of travel, will let you go on your way.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!"

I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.

I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to.
Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.

== Resources ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.


{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>s3pvlkh1dzlumdsts2yhfm1mjn9h7v3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>89715</id>
      <parentid>89705</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-10-16T10:43:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Traumschule</username>
        <id>28627</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12911">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 65,8 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==
__TOC__
'''Péage''' ([http://cs1.imtranslator.net/SL/Free_Projects/169679760/cs_10132017_15_58_47_1.wav?param1=001024 audio]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

==Issues with Law Enforcement==
&lt;gallery style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:25px;&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:Pat_e_Suh.jpg|Pat &amp; Suh hitchhiking after a barrière de péage in France :).
&lt;/gallery&gt;
There are three law enforcement agencies to contend with in France. The Police Nationale, the Gendarmerie and the Douane.

The '''Police Nationale''' are tasked with policing urban areas with more than 20,000 inhabitants, and the surrounding highway infrastructure.  They will rarely stop you, but they are well known for their less than sympathetic nature and occasionally affiliation with fascist organisations.  They are a government agency bound by official targets, which means that if you are stopped, they will be looking for reasons to impose fines.  Even so, they have no legal right to stop you engaging in lawful activities as long as you are not creating a hazard or committing some other offence.  Remain calm and use your right to silence, only asking '''"am I free to go"''' repeatedly, and you should be ok.

The '''Gendarmerie''' is a military agency tasked with policing all of the French Republic where the population is lower than 20,000.  If you treat them with courtesy, they will most likely be professional and courteous in return.  Sometimes they will offer to take you to a safer or easier location to hitchhike from.  Only if you are creating a hazard will they issue fines.

The '''Douanes''' are the customs agency for the French Republic.  They patrol close to borders, looking for suspicious activity.  '''They have a right to check your Identification if you are within 20km of the border''', but at all other times they need to have a reasonable suspicion ''(article 78 of the Code de Procédure Pénale)'' before they stop an individual.  They are often active on highways and péages going south from [[Belgium]] and [[Luxembourg]], looking for people transporting large amounts of tobacco or looking for hitchhikers from the [[Netherlands]] who may be carrying cannabis.  They are however quite professional, and after a few questions about your direction of travel, will let you go on your way.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!"

I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.

I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to.
Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.

== Resources ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.


{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>kq07um9485c2mumcvnmqoaa4h6rowei</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>97008</id>
      <parentid>89715</parentid>
      <timestamp>2019-10-10T19:26:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Phalanxs</username>
        <id>29247</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Issues with Law Enforcement */ corrected misleading statements (see talk page)</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12888">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 65,8 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==
__TOC__
'''Péage''' ([http://cs1.imtranslator.net/SL/Free_Projects/169679760/cs_10132017_15_58_47_1.wav?param1=001024 audio]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

==Law Enforcement==
&lt;gallery style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:25px;&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:Pat_e_Suh.jpg|Pat &amp; Suh hitchhiking after a barrière de péage in France :).
&lt;/gallery&gt;
There are three law National enforcement agencies to contend with in France. The Police Nationale, the Gendarmerie and the Douane.

* The '''Police Nationale''' are tasked with policing urban areas with more than 20,000 inhabitants, and the surrounding highway infrastructure. As such, you will rarely encounter them while thumbing.
* The '''Douanes''' are the customs agency for the French Republic.  They patrol close to borders, looking for suspicious activity.    They are often active on highways and péages going south from [[Belgium]] and [[Luxembourg]], looking for people transporting large amounts of tobacco or looking for hitchhikers from the [[Netherlands]] who may be carrying cannabis. 
* The '''Gendarmerie''' is a military agency tasked with policing all of the French Republic where the population is lower than 20,000. They are the enforcement agency you will have the most chance to encounter while on the road.

To make a long story short, in France, it is expected that any person can prove its identity when requested by an agent of these agencies. The easiest and most common way to do it is to show them an official ID ; however it cans also be done by having someone testify that you are indeed the person you say you are. Agents on patrol, especially Gendrames, can stop to ask you questions. Most of the time, they will ask you where are you headed, maybe a few other vague questions, remind you that hitchhiking is illegal on the highways (even if you are not on a highway at the moment), wish you a nice day and drive away. If they ask you for a proof of identity, the best thing would be to thow them an official ID ; however if you cooperate somewhat they probably won't go even that far.

Furthermore, many cities have local police deparments called '''Police Municipale'''. They have less authority than national agencies, but can call other agencies to do the work they legally can't.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!"

I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.

I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to.
Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.

== Resources ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.


{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>8neg21f8n4tcppikoh4fd6dhd0i7xsm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>97640</id>
      <parentid>97008</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-04-30T18:28:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Phalanxs</username>
        <id>29247</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* Law Enforcement */ spelling/grammar</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12892">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 65,8 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==
__TOC__
'''Péage''' ([http://cs1.imtranslator.net/SL/Free_Projects/169679760/cs_10132017_15_58_47_1.wav?param1=001024 audio]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations (the first type) can be a difficult place to hitch from, too.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is actually illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for ~90€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. 

The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is generally tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

==Law Enforcement==
&lt;gallery style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:25px;&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:Pat_e_Suh.jpg|Pat &amp; Suh hitchhiking after a barrière de péage in France :).
&lt;/gallery&gt;
There are three law National enforcement agencies to contend with in France. The Police Nationale, the Gendarmerie and the Douane.

* The '''Police Nationale''' are tasked with policing urban areas with more than 20,000 inhabitants, and the surrounding highway infrastructure. As such, you will rarely encounter them while thumbing.
* The '''Douanes''' are the customs agency for the French Republic.  They patrol close to borders, looking for suspicious activity.    They are often active on highways and péages going south from [[Belgium]] and [[Luxembourg]], looking for people transporting large amounts of tobacco or looking for hitchhikers from the [[Netherlands]] who may be carrying cannabis. 
* The '''Gendarmerie''' is a military agency tasked with policing all of the French Republic where the population is lower than 20,000. They are the enforcement agency you will have the most chance to encounter while on the road.

To make a long story short, in France, it is expected that any person can prove its identity when requested by an agent of these agencies. The easiest and most common way to do it is to show them an official ID ; however it can also be done by having someone else testify that you are indeed the person you say you are. Agents on patrol, especially Gendrames, can stop to ask you questions. Most of the time, they will ask you where are you headed, maybe a few other vague questions, remind you that hitchhiking is illegal on the highways (even if you are not on a highway at the moment), wish you a nice day and drive away. If they ask you for a proof of identity, the best thing would be to show them an official ID ; however if you cooperate somewhat they probably won't go even that far.

Furthermore, many cities have local police deparments called '''Police Municipale'''. They have less authority than national agencies, but can call other agencies to do the work they legally can't.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!"

I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.

I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to.
Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.

== Resources ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.


{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>msxqd4zrdbkyvbkbqnkacbglgici8z7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>97645</id>
      <parentid>97640</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-05-08T01:00:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Daniel</username>
        <id>25</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* Autoroutes, péages and barrières de péage */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12962">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 65,8 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==
__TOC__
'''Péage''' ([http://cs1.imtranslator.net/SL/Free_Projects/169679760/cs_10132017_15_58_47_1.wav?param1=001024 audio]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations of the first type can be difficult to hitch from due to heavy traffic.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'' or ''voie rapide'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for 11 to 40€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. 

Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. You will definitely need it if the road splits. The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. 

Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is often tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

==Law Enforcement==
&lt;gallery style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:25px;&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:Pat_e_Suh.jpg|Pat &amp; Suh hitchhiking after a barrière de péage in France :).
&lt;/gallery&gt;
There are three law National enforcement agencies to contend with in France. The Police Nationale, the Gendarmerie and the Douane.

* The '''Police Nationale''' are tasked with policing urban areas with more than 20,000 inhabitants, and the surrounding highway infrastructure. As such, you will rarely encounter them while thumbing.
* The '''Douanes''' are the customs agency for the French Republic.  They patrol close to borders, looking for suspicious activity.    They are often active on highways and péages going south from [[Belgium]] and [[Luxembourg]], looking for people transporting large amounts of tobacco or looking for hitchhikers from the [[Netherlands]] who may be carrying cannabis. 
* The '''Gendarmerie''' is a military agency tasked with policing all of the French Republic where the population is lower than 20,000. They are the enforcement agency you will have the most chance to encounter while on the road.

To make a long story short, in France, it is expected that any person can prove its identity when requested by an agent of these agencies. The easiest and most common way to do it is to show them an official ID ; however it can also be done by having someone else testify that you are indeed the person you say you are. Agents on patrol, especially Gendrames, can stop to ask you questions. Most of the time, they will ask you where are you headed, maybe a few other vague questions, remind you that hitchhiking is illegal on the highways (even if you are not on a highway at the moment), wish you a nice day and drive away. If they ask you for a proof of identity, the best thing would be to show them an official ID ; however if you cooperate somewhat they probably won't go even that far.

Furthermore, many cities have local police deparments called '''Police Municipale'''. They have less authority than national agencies, but can call other agencies to do the work they legally can't.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!"

I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.

I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to.
Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.

== Resources ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.


{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>q7aa279amorvq69hqmoh0ok5v0pw52a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>97646</id>
      <parentid>97645</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-05-08T01:18:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Daniel</username>
        <id>25</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Law Enforcement */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13206">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 65,8 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==
__TOC__
'''Péage''' ([http://cs1.imtranslator.net/SL/Free_Projects/169679760/cs_10132017_15_58_47_1.wav?param1=001024 audio]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations of the first type can be difficult to hitch from due to heavy traffic.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'' or ''voie rapide'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for 11 to 40€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. 

Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. You will definitely need it if the road splits. The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. 

Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is often tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

==Law Enforcement==
&lt;gallery style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:25px;&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:Pat_e_Suh.jpg|Pat &amp; Suh hitchhiking after a barrière de péage in France :).
&lt;/gallery&gt;
There are three law National enforcement agencies to contend with in France. The Police Nationale, the Gendarmerie and the Douane.

* The '''Police Nationale''' are tasked with policing urban areas with more than 20,000 inhabitants, and the surrounding highway infrastructure. As such, you will probably rarely encounter them while thumbing.
* The '''Gendarmerie''' is a military agency tasked with policing all of the French Republic where the population is lower than 20,000. They are the enforcement agency you will have the most chance to encounter while on the road.
* The '''Douanes''' are the customs agency for the French Republic.  They mostly patrol close to borders, looking for suspicious activity, but can operate anywhere.    They are often active on highways and péages going south from [[Belgium]] and [[Luxembourg]], looking for people transporting large amounts of tobacco or looking for hitchhikers from the [[Netherlands]] who may be carrying cannabis, as well as near the border with [[Spain]]. It is said of them, that they care about goods, not persons, which is basically true, but they are allowed to check your ID and the contents of your luggage. 


To make a long story short, in France, it is expected that any person can prove its identity when requested by an agent of these agencies. The easiest and most common way to do it is to show them an official ID ; however it can also be done by having someone else testify that you are indeed the person you say you are. Agents on patrol, especially Gendrames, can stop to ask you questions. Most of the time, they will ask you where are you headed, maybe a few other vague questions, remind you that hitchhiking is illegal on the highways (even if you are not on a highway at the moment), wish you a nice day and drive away. If they ask you for a proof of identity, the best thing would be to show them an official ID ; however if you cooperate somewhat they probably won't go even that far.

Furthermore, many cities have local police deparments called '''Police Municipale'''. They have less authority than national agencies, but can call other agencies to do the work they legally can't.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!"

I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.

I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to.
Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.

== Resources ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.


{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>ky4tegneca99af0s56o86m9410301os</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>97794</id>
      <parentid>97646</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-05-25T17:20:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Resources */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13240">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 65,8 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==
__TOC__
'''Péage''' ([http://cs1.imtranslator.net/SL/Free_Projects/169679760/cs_10132017_15_58_47_1.wav?param1=001024 audio]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations of the first type can be difficult to hitch from due to heavy traffic.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'' or ''voie rapide'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for 11 to 40€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. 

Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. You will definitely need it if the road splits. The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. 

Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is often tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

==Law Enforcement==
&lt;gallery style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:25px;&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:Pat_e_Suh.jpg|Pat &amp; Suh hitchhiking after a barrière de péage in France :).
&lt;/gallery&gt;
There are three law National enforcement agencies to contend with in France. The Police Nationale, the Gendarmerie and the Douane.

* The '''Police Nationale''' are tasked with policing urban areas with more than 20,000 inhabitants, and the surrounding highway infrastructure. As such, you will probably rarely encounter them while thumbing.
* The '''Gendarmerie''' is a military agency tasked with policing all of the French Republic where the population is lower than 20,000. They are the enforcement agency you will have the most chance to encounter while on the road.
* The '''Douanes''' are the customs agency for the French Republic.  They mostly patrol close to borders, looking for suspicious activity, but can operate anywhere.    They are often active on highways and péages going south from [[Belgium]] and [[Luxembourg]], looking for people transporting large amounts of tobacco or looking for hitchhikers from the [[Netherlands]] who may be carrying cannabis, as well as near the border with [[Spain]]. It is said of them, that they care about goods, not persons, which is basically true, but they are allowed to check your ID and the contents of your luggage. 


To make a long story short, in France, it is expected that any person can prove its identity when requested by an agent of these agencies. The easiest and most common way to do it is to show them an official ID ; however it can also be done by having someone else testify that you are indeed the person you say you are. Agents on patrol, especially Gendrames, can stop to ask you questions. Most of the time, they will ask you where are you headed, maybe a few other vague questions, remind you that hitchhiking is illegal on the highways (even if you are not on a highway at the moment), wish you a nice day and drive away. If they ask you for a proof of identity, the best thing would be to show them an official ID ; however if you cooperate somewhat they probably won't go even that far.

Furthermore, many cities have local police deparments called '''Police Municipale'''. They have less authority than national agencies, but can call other agencies to do the work they legally can't.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!"

I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.

I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to.
Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.

== Trashwiki &amp; Nomadwiki ==

[[trash:France]] [[nomad:France]]

* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.


{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>c449m7064d0iadf147kcah3ew2w9jhd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>97919</id>
      <parentid>97794</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-06-06T13:19:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Trashwiki &amp; Nomadwiki */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13225">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 65,8 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==
__TOC__
'''Péage''' ([http://cs1.imtranslator.net/SL/Free_Projects/169679760/cs_10132017_15_58_47_1.wav?param1=001024 audio]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations of the first type can be difficult to hitch from due to heavy traffic.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'' or ''voie rapide'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for 11 to 40€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. 

Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. You will definitely need it if the road splits. The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. 

Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is often tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

==Law Enforcement==
&lt;gallery style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:25px;&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:Pat_e_Suh.jpg|Pat &amp; Suh hitchhiking after a barrière de péage in France :).
&lt;/gallery&gt;
There are three law National enforcement agencies to contend with in France. The Police Nationale, the Gendarmerie and the Douane.

* The '''Police Nationale''' are tasked with policing urban areas with more than 20,000 inhabitants, and the surrounding highway infrastructure. As such, you will probably rarely encounter them while thumbing.
* The '''Gendarmerie''' is a military agency tasked with policing all of the French Republic where the population is lower than 20,000. They are the enforcement agency you will have the most chance to encounter while on the road.
* The '''Douanes''' are the customs agency for the French Republic.  They mostly patrol close to borders, looking for suspicious activity, but can operate anywhere.    They are often active on highways and péages going south from [[Belgium]] and [[Luxembourg]], looking for people transporting large amounts of tobacco or looking for hitchhikers from the [[Netherlands]] who may be carrying cannabis, as well as near the border with [[Spain]]. It is said of them, that they care about goods, not persons, which is basically true, but they are allowed to check your ID and the contents of your luggage. 


To make a long story short, in France, it is expected that any person can prove its identity when requested by an agent of these agencies. The easiest and most common way to do it is to show them an official ID ; however it can also be done by having someone else testify that you are indeed the person you say you are. Agents on patrol, especially Gendrames, can stop to ask you questions. Most of the time, they will ask you where are you headed, maybe a few other vague questions, remind you that hitchhiking is illegal on the highways (even if you are not on a highway at the moment), wish you a nice day and drive away. If they ask you for a proof of identity, the best thing would be to show them an official ID ; however if you cooperate somewhat they probably won't go even that far.

Furthermore, many cities have local police deparments called '''Police Municipale'''. They have less authority than national agencies, but can call other agencies to do the work they legally can't.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!"

I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.

I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to.
Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.

== Trashwiki &amp; Nomadwiki ==

[[trash:France]] [[nomad:France]]

* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.


{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__


[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>ij7mzowla9fjvi1jz8l5s63qgitzwkg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>99347</id>
      <parentid>97919</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-10-02T15:10:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Trashwiki &amp; Nomadwiki */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13225">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 65,8 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==
__TOC__
'''Péage''' ([http://cs1.imtranslator.net/SL/Free_Projects/169679760/cs_10132017_15_58_47_1.wav?param1=001024 audio]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations of the first type can be difficult to hitch from due to heavy traffic.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'' or ''voie rapide'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for 11 to 40€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. 

Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. You will definitely need it if the road splits. The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. 

Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is often tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

==Law Enforcement==
&lt;gallery style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:25px;&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:Pat_e_Suh.jpg|Pat &amp; Suh hitchhiking after a barrière de péage in France :).
&lt;/gallery&gt;
There are three law National enforcement agencies to contend with in France. The Police Nationale, the Gendarmerie and the Douane.

* The '''Police Nationale''' are tasked with policing urban areas with more than 20,000 inhabitants, and the surrounding highway infrastructure. As such, you will probably rarely encounter them while thumbing.
* The '''Gendarmerie''' is a military agency tasked with policing all of the French Republic where the population is lower than 20,000. They are the enforcement agency you will have the most chance to encounter while on the road.
* The '''Douanes''' are the customs agency for the French Republic.  They mostly patrol close to borders, looking for suspicious activity, but can operate anywhere.    They are often active on highways and péages going south from [[Belgium]] and [[Luxembourg]], looking for people transporting large amounts of tobacco or looking for hitchhikers from the [[Netherlands]] who may be carrying cannabis, as well as near the border with [[Spain]]. It is said of them, that they care about goods, not persons, which is basically true, but they are allowed to check your ID and the contents of your luggage. 


To make a long story short, in France, it is expected that any person can prove its identity when requested by an agent of these agencies. The easiest and most common way to do it is to show them an official ID ; however it can also be done by having someone else testify that you are indeed the person you say you are. Agents on patrol, especially Gendrames, can stop to ask you questions. Most of the time, they will ask you where are you headed, maybe a few other vague questions, remind you that hitchhiking is illegal on the highways (even if you are not on a highway at the moment), wish you a nice day and drive away. If they ask you for a proof of identity, the best thing would be to show them an official ID ; however if you cooperate somewhat they probably won't go even that far.

Furthermore, many cities have local police deparments called '''Police Municipale'''. They have less authority than national agencies, but can call other agencies to do the work they legally can't.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!"

I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.

I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to.
Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

[[trash:France]] [[nomad:France]]

* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.


{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__


[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>9c0tyz67b9ph6fkxk1nbqy4oll0vwaa</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>100328</id>
      <parentid>99347</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-01-23T17:37:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>Reverted edits by [[Special:Contributions/Dxc|Dxc]] ([[User talk:Dxc|talk]]) to last revision by [[User:Daniel|Daniel]]</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13206">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 65,8 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==
__TOC__
'''Péage''' ([http://cs1.imtranslator.net/SL/Free_Projects/169679760/cs_10132017_15_58_47_1.wav?param1=001024 audio]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations of the first type can be difficult to hitch from due to heavy traffic.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'' or ''voie rapide'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for 11 to 40€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. 

Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. You will definitely need it if the road splits. The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. 

Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is often tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

==Law Enforcement==
&lt;gallery style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:25px;&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:Pat_e_Suh.jpg|Pat &amp; Suh hitchhiking after a barrière de péage in France :).
&lt;/gallery&gt;
There are three law National enforcement agencies to contend with in France. The Police Nationale, the Gendarmerie and the Douane.

* The '''Police Nationale''' are tasked with policing urban areas with more than 20,000 inhabitants, and the surrounding highway infrastructure. As such, you will probably rarely encounter them while thumbing.
* The '''Gendarmerie''' is a military agency tasked with policing all of the French Republic where the population is lower than 20,000. They are the enforcement agency you will have the most chance to encounter while on the road.
* The '''Douanes''' are the customs agency for the French Republic.  They mostly patrol close to borders, looking for suspicious activity, but can operate anywhere.    They are often active on highways and péages going south from [[Belgium]] and [[Luxembourg]], looking for people transporting large amounts of tobacco or looking for hitchhikers from the [[Netherlands]] who may be carrying cannabis, as well as near the border with [[Spain]]. It is said of them, that they care about goods, not persons, which is basically true, but they are allowed to check your ID and the contents of your luggage. 


To make a long story short, in France, it is expected that any person can prove its identity when requested by an agent of these agencies. The easiest and most common way to do it is to show them an official ID ; however it can also be done by having someone else testify that you are indeed the person you say you are. Agents on patrol, especially Gendrames, can stop to ask you questions. Most of the time, they will ask you where are you headed, maybe a few other vague questions, remind you that hitchhiking is illegal on the highways (even if you are not on a highway at the moment), wish you a nice day and drive away. If they ask you for a proof of identity, the best thing would be to show them an official ID ; however if you cooperate somewhat they probably won't go even that far.

Furthermore, many cities have local police deparments called '''Police Municipale'''. They have less authority than national agencies, but can call other agencies to do the work they legally can't.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!"

I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.

I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to.
Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.

== Resources ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.


{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>ky4tegneca99af0s56o86m9410301os</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>100337</id>
      <parentid>100328</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-01-24T20:43:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Resources */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13220">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 65,8 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==
__TOC__
'''Péage''' ([http://cs1.imtranslator.net/SL/Free_Projects/169679760/cs_10132017_15_58_47_1.wav?param1=001024 audio]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations of the first type can be difficult to hitch from due to heavy traffic.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'' or ''voie rapide'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for 11 to 40€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. 

Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. You will definitely need it if the road splits. The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. 

Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is often tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

==Law Enforcement==
&lt;gallery style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:25px;&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:Pat_e_Suh.jpg|Pat &amp; Suh hitchhiking after a barrière de péage in France :).
&lt;/gallery&gt;
There are three law National enforcement agencies to contend with in France. The Police Nationale, the Gendarmerie and the Douane.

* The '''Police Nationale''' are tasked with policing urban areas with more than 20,000 inhabitants, and the surrounding highway infrastructure. As such, you will probably rarely encounter them while thumbing.
* The '''Gendarmerie''' is a military agency tasked with policing all of the French Republic where the population is lower than 20,000. They are the enforcement agency you will have the most chance to encounter while on the road.
* The '''Douanes''' are the customs agency for the French Republic.  They mostly patrol close to borders, looking for suspicious activity, but can operate anywhere.    They are often active on highways and péages going south from [[Belgium]] and [[Luxembourg]], looking for people transporting large amounts of tobacco or looking for hitchhikers from the [[Netherlands]] who may be carrying cannabis, as well as near the border with [[Spain]]. It is said of them, that they care about goods, not persons, which is basically true, but they are allowed to check your ID and the contents of your luggage. 


To make a long story short, in France, it is expected that any person can prove its identity when requested by an agent of these agencies. The easiest and most common way to do it is to show them an official ID ; however it can also be done by having someone else testify that you are indeed the person you say you are. Agents on patrol, especially Gendrames, can stop to ask you questions. Most of the time, they will ask you where are you headed, maybe a few other vague questions, remind you that hitchhiking is illegal on the highways (even if you are not on a highway at the moment), wish you a nice day and drive away. If they ask you for a proof of identity, the best thing would be to show them an official ID ; however if you cooperate somewhat they probably won't go even that far.

Furthermore, many cities have local police deparments called '''Police Municipale'''. They have less authority than national agencies, but can call other agencies to do the work they legally can't.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!"

I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.

I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to.
Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.


{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[digi:France]]

[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>joxeh9fybebtgkxm9cc46b9a4achd8c</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>100342</id>
      <parentid>100337</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-01-24T20:53:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13222">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 65,8 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==
__TOC__
'''Péage''' ([http://cs1.imtranslator.net/SL/Free_Projects/169679760/cs_10132017_15_58_47_1.wav?param1=001024 audio]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations of the first type can be difficult to hitch from due to heavy traffic.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'' or ''voie rapide'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for 11 to 40€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. 

Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. You will definitely need it if the road splits. The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. 

Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is often tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== [[License plates|Number plates]] ==
French number plates end with a number of the ''département'' the car is registered in. For example, [[Paris]]ian cars end with numbers 75, 78, 91, 92, 93, 94 and 95. See Wikipedia articles on
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_vehicle_registration_plates French vehicle registration plates] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_arrondissements_of_France Arrondissements of France]. New number plates are in use since mid-2009. They have an optional reference to the department on the blue stripe at the right side, but they technically are not part of the plate, and do not necessarily refer to the owner's address - one may for example choose to put the number of the department where he/she was born. Cars that belong to companies, including rental ones usually bear "60" or "76" since tax on corporate vehicles is the lowest there. The existing old plates will be still in use for a while.

==Law Enforcement==
&lt;gallery style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:25px;&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:Pat_e_Suh.jpg|Pat &amp; Suh hitchhiking after a barrière de péage in France :).
&lt;/gallery&gt;
There are three law National enforcement agencies to contend with in France. The Police Nationale, the Gendarmerie and the Douane.

* The '''Police Nationale''' are tasked with policing urban areas with more than 20,000 inhabitants, and the surrounding highway infrastructure. As such, you will probably rarely encounter them while thumbing.
* The '''Gendarmerie''' is a military agency tasked with policing all of the French Republic where the population is lower than 20,000. They are the enforcement agency you will have the most chance to encounter while on the road.
* The '''Douanes''' are the customs agency for the French Republic.  They mostly patrol close to borders, looking for suspicious activity, but can operate anywhere.    They are often active on highways and péages going south from [[Belgium]] and [[Luxembourg]], looking for people transporting large amounts of tobacco or looking for hitchhikers from the [[Netherlands]] who may be carrying cannabis, as well as near the border with [[Spain]]. It is said of them, that they care about goods, not persons, which is basically true, but they are allowed to check your ID and the contents of your luggage. 


To make a long story short, in France, it is expected that any person can prove its identity when requested by an agent of these agencies. The easiest and most common way to do it is to show them an official ID ; however it can also be done by having someone else testify that you are indeed the person you say you are. Agents on patrol, especially Gendrames, can stop to ask you questions. Most of the time, they will ask you where are you headed, maybe a few other vague questions, remind you that hitchhiking is illegal on the highways (even if you are not on a highway at the moment), wish you a nice day and drive away. If they ask you for a proof of identity, the best thing would be to show them an official ID ; however if you cooperate somewhat they probably won't go even that far.

Furthermore, many cities have local police deparments called '''Police Municipale'''. They have less authority than national agencies, but can call other agencies to do the work they legally can't.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!"

I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.

I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to.
Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.

* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

[[digi:France]]


{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__


[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>h7iwzq8rfk1zyl0lml4rzgdbca64ebr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101092</id>
      <parentid>100342</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-05T14:26:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Number plates */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12280">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 65,8 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==
__TOC__
'''Péage''' ([http://cs1.imtranslator.net/SL/Free_Projects/169679760/cs_10132017_15_58_47_1.wav?param1=001024 audio]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations of the first type can be difficult to hitch from due to heavy traffic.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'' or ''voie rapide'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for 11 to 40€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. 

Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. You will definitely need it if the road splits. The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. 

Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is often tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

==Law Enforcement==
&lt;gallery style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:25px;&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:Pat_e_Suh.jpg|Pat &amp; Suh hitchhiking after a barrière de péage in France :).
&lt;/gallery&gt;
There are three law National enforcement agencies to contend with in France. The Police Nationale, the Gendarmerie and the Douane.

* The '''Police Nationale''' are tasked with policing urban areas with more than 20,000 inhabitants, and the surrounding highway infrastructure. As such, you will probably rarely encounter them while thumbing.
* The '''Gendarmerie''' is a military agency tasked with policing all of the French Republic where the population is lower than 20,000. They are the enforcement agency you will have the most chance to encounter while on the road.
* The '''Douanes''' are the customs agency for the French Republic.  They mostly patrol close to borders, looking for suspicious activity, but can operate anywhere.    They are often active on highways and péages going south from [[Belgium]] and [[Luxembourg]], looking for people transporting large amounts of tobacco or looking for hitchhikers from the [[Netherlands]] who may be carrying cannabis, as well as near the border with [[Spain]]. It is said of them, that they care about goods, not persons, which is basically true, but they are allowed to check your ID and the contents of your luggage. 


To make a long story short, in France, it is expected that any person can prove its identity when requested by an agent of these agencies. The easiest and most common way to do it is to show them an official ID ; however it can also be done by having someone else testify that you are indeed the person you say you are. Agents on patrol, especially Gendrames, can stop to ask you questions. Most of the time, they will ask you where are you headed, maybe a few other vague questions, remind you that hitchhiking is illegal on the highways (even if you are not on a highway at the moment), wish you a nice day and drive away. If they ask you for a proof of identity, the best thing would be to show them an official ID ; however if you cooperate somewhat they probably won't go even that far.

Furthermore, many cities have local police deparments called '''Police Municipale'''. They have less authority than national agencies, but can call other agencies to do the work they legally can't.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help." - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]

"My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!"

I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.

I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to.
Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.

* [http://mappy.fr/ Mappy] is a good online map service for France in case you want to know where certain public transport goes to.
* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

[[digi:France]]


{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__


[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>bz5957oe4sio4glrvpc62i4nutb0jan</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101093</id>
      <parentid>101092</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-05T14:27:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Personal Experiences */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12178">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 65,8 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==
__TOC__
'''Péage''' ([http://cs1.imtranslator.net/SL/Free_Projects/169679760/cs_10132017_15_58_47_1.wav?param1=001024 audio]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations of the first type can be difficult to hitch from due to heavy traffic.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'' or ''voie rapide'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for 11 to 40€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. 

Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. You will definitely need it if the road splits. The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. 

Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is often tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

==Law Enforcement==
&lt;gallery style="float:right; width:200px; margin-left:25px;&gt;
Image:Mrtweek mzenzes hitching in france.png|[[User:Mzenzes|Martin]] and [[User:MrTweek|Philipp]] hitching in France.
Image:Derek_hitching_at_péage.jpg|Derek hitching at a péage near [[Valence]].
Image:Cynthia_hitching.jpg|Cynthia hitchhiking out of [[Paris]].
Image:Tokyohitch.jpg|[[Lille]]-[[Tokyo]] direct ride, 5-min deal.
Image:Perpignan bridgeoveronramp.jpg|On ramp bridge near [[Perpignan]].
Image:Spot-sharing.jpg|Sharing knowledge on spots to hitch out of Paris during the [[project 888|888]] event.
Image:peage.jpg|A typical ''barrière de péage'' in France.
Image:Pat_e_Suh.jpg|Pat &amp; Suh hitchhiking after a barrière de péage in France :).
&lt;/gallery&gt;
There are three law National enforcement agencies to contend with in France. The Police Nationale, the Gendarmerie and the Douane.

* The '''Police Nationale''' are tasked with policing urban areas with more than 20,000 inhabitants, and the surrounding highway infrastructure. As such, you will probably rarely encounter them while thumbing.
* The '''Gendarmerie''' is a military agency tasked with policing all of the French Republic where the population is lower than 20,000. They are the enforcement agency you will have the most chance to encounter while on the road.
* The '''Douanes''' are the customs agency for the French Republic.  They mostly patrol close to borders, looking for suspicious activity, but can operate anywhere.    They are often active on highways and péages going south from [[Belgium]] and [[Luxembourg]], looking for people transporting large amounts of tobacco or looking for hitchhikers from the [[Netherlands]] who may be carrying cannabis, as well as near the border with [[Spain]]. It is said of them, that they care about goods, not persons, which is basically true, but they are allowed to check your ID and the contents of your luggage. 


To make a long story short, in France, it is expected that any person can prove its identity when requested by an agent of these agencies. The easiest and most common way to do it is to show them an official ID ; however it can also be done by having someone else testify that you are indeed the person you say you are. Agents on patrol, especially Gendrames, can stop to ask you questions. Most of the time, they will ask you where are you headed, maybe a few other vague questions, remind you that hitchhiking is illegal on the highways (even if you are not on a highway at the moment), wish you a nice day and drive away. If they ask you for a proof of identity, the best thing would be to show them an official ID ; however if you cooperate somewhat they probably won't go even that far.

Furthermore, many cities have local police deparments called '''Police Municipale'''. They have less authority than national agencies, but can call other agencies to do the work they legally can't.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help.'' - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]


''My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!''


''I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.''


''I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to. Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.''

== Links ==


* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

[[digi:France]]


{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__


[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>1q0pqz58r97re7o4q2voj1zcsbw7jio</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101094</id>
      <parentid>101093</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-05T14:28:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Law Enforcement */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9260">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 65,8 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== ''Autoroutes'', ''péages'' and ''barrières de péage'' ==
__TOC__
'''Péage''' ([http://cs1.imtranslator.net/SL/Free_Projects/169679760/cs_10132017_15_58_47_1.wav?param1=001024 audio]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations of the first type can be difficult to hitch from due to heavy traffic.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'' or ''voie rapide'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for 11 to 40€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. 

Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. You will definitely need it if the road splits. The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. 

Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is often tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help.'' - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]


''My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!''


''I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.''


''I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to. Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.''

== Links ==


* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

[[digi:France]]


{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__


[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>ets5u45x4hx0dgsf3j036u7g5q36f1g</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101098</id>
      <parentid>101094</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-05T14:30:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Autoroutes, péages and barrières de péage */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9248">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 65,8 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== Autoroutes, péages and barrières de péage ==
__TOC__
'''Péage''' ([http://cs1.imtranslator.net/SL/Free_Projects/169679760/cs_10132017_15_58_47_1.wav?param1=001024 audio]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations of the first type can be difficult to hitch from due to heavy traffic.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'' or ''voie rapide'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for 11 to 40€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. 

Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. You will definitely need it if the road splits. The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. 

Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is often tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help.'' - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]


''My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!''


''I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.''


''I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to. Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.''

== Links ==


* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

[[digi:France]]


{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__


[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>etxgmpw7euuh4rs2dppnt784xzhytg6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101257</id>
      <parentid>101098</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-07T08:08:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9232">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 65,8 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== Autoroutes, péages and barrières de péage ==
__TOC__
'''Péage''' ([http://cs1.imtranslator.net/SL/Free_Projects/169679760/cs_10132017_15_58_47_1.wav?param1=001024 audio]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations of the first type can be difficult to hitch from due to heavy traffic.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'' or ''voie rapide'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for 11 to 40€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. 

Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. You will definitely need it if the road splits. The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. 

Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is often tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help.'' - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]


''My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!''


''I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.''


''I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to. Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.''

== Links ==


* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__


[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>iwo9t7dqvzrhx821h48iw14zs3bcn7p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>102670</id>
      <parentid>101257</parentid>
      <timestamp>2022-01-22T11:55:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dws49</username>
        <id>42886</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9232">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 68,0 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
'''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]]), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might wanna learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== Autoroutes, péages and barrières de péage ==
__TOC__
'''Péage''' ([http://cs1.imtranslator.net/SL/Free_Projects/169679760/cs_10132017_15_58_47_1.wav?param1=001024 audio]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations of the first type can be difficult to hitch from due to heavy traffic.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'' or ''voie rapide'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for 11 to 40€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. 

Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. You will definitely need it if the road splits. The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. 

Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is often tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help.'' - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]


''My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!''


''I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.''


''I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to. Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.''

== Links ==


* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__


[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>fr3k7pp4rixjqyy606v7z7fn95wdww1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104724</id>
      <parentid>102670</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-09-10T19:56:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>HitchThomi</username>
        <id>47102</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9260">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 68,0 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
European '''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]] and around Lille), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might want to learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== Autoroutes, péages and barrières de péage ==
__TOC__
'''Péage''' ([http://cs1.imtranslator.net/SL/Free_Projects/169679760/cs_10132017_15_58_47_1.wav?param1=001024 audio]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations of the first type can be difficult to hitch from due to heavy traffic.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'' or ''voie rapide'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for 11 to 40€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. 

Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. You will definitely need it if the road splits. The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. 

Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is often tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help.'' - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]


''My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!''


''I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.''


''I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to. Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.''

== Links ==


* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__


[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>rll9vk4yig2e1hu82qmi4rtjh0iqgcl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104726</id>
      <parentid>104724</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-09-10T20:02:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>HitchThomi</username>
        <id>47102</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9434">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 68,0 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
European '''France''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]] and around Lille), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might want to learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== Autoroutes, péages and barrières de péage ==
__TOC__
'''Péage''' ([http://cs1.imtranslator.net/SL/Free_Projects/169679760/cs_10132017_15_58_47_1.wav?param1=001024 audio]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations of the first type can be difficult to hitch from due to heavy traffic.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'' or ''voie rapide'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for 11 to 40€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. 

Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. You will definitely need it if the road splits. The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. 

Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is often tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help.'' - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]


''My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!''


''I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.''


''I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to. Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.''

== Main cities ==
- [[[[Paris]]]]
- [[Marseille]]
- [[Lyon]]
- [[Lille]]
- [[Toulouse]]
- [[Bordeaux]]
- [[Nice]]
- [[Nantes]]
- [[Strasbourg]]
- [[Rennes]]
- [[Grenoble]]


== Links ==


* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__


[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>dhen8id2grcyw7555xi9d4l0zjnn7wt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104730</id>
      <parentid>104726</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-09-10T20:19:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>HitchThomi</username>
        <id>47102</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9424">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 68,0 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
European '''France''' is part of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]] and around Lille), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might want to learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== Autoroutes, péages and barrières de péage ==
__TOC__
'''Péage''' ([http://cs1.imtranslator.net/SL/Free_Projects/169679760/cs_10132017_15_58_47_1.wav?param1=001024 audio]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations of the first type can be difficult to hitch from due to heavy traffic.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'' or ''voie rapide'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for 11 to 40€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. 

Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. You will definitely need it if the road splits. The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. 

Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is often tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help.'' - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]


''My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!''


''I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.''


''I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to. Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.''

== Main cities ==
- [[[[Paris]]]]
- [[Marseille]]
- [[Lyon]]
- [[Lille]]
- [[Toulouse]]
- [[Bordeaux]]
- [[Nice]]
- [[Nantes]]
- [[Strasbourg]]
- [[Rennes]]
- [[Grenoble]]


== Links ==


* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__


[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>qi0z3vu5le9cevak6yepna9mbfe9vgg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104731</id>
      <parentid>104730</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-09-10T20:20:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>HitchThomi</username>
        <id>47102</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9420">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 68,0 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
European '''France''' is part of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]] and around Lille), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might want to learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== Autoroutes, péages and barrières de péage ==
__TOC__
'''Péage''' ([http://cs1.imtranslator.net/SL/Free_Projects/169679760/cs_10132017_15_58_47_1.wav?param1=001024 audio]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations of the first type can be difficult to hitch from due to heavy traffic.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'' or ''voie rapide'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for 11 to 40€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. 

Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. You will definitely need it if the road splits. The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. 

Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is often tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help.'' - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]


''My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!''


''I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.''


''I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to. Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.''

== Main cities ==
- [[Paris]]
- [[Marseille]]
- [[Lyon]]
- [[Lille]]
- [[Toulouse]]
- [[Bordeaux]]
- [[Nice]]
- [[Nantes]]
- [[Strasbourg]]
- [[Rennes]]
- [[Grenoble]]


== Links ==


* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__


[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>15habo1c2cwruuedzc99wfwvty10jr2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105366</id>
      <parentid>104731</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-02-22T15:40:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Hitchhikernick</username>
        <id>47454</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Personal Experiences */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9806">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 68,0 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
European '''France''' is part of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]] and around Lille), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might want to learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's also illegal to hitchhike there. If you are picked up the police you may be fined, however the Gendarmerie are likely to simply give you a lift to the next toll stop. Use service areas, peages and on-ramps. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

It may also be helpful to write '''S.V.P.''' on your sign with a destination name - it is short for ''s'il vous plaît'' (sih-voo-play) which means ''please'' in French.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== Autoroutes, péages and barrières de péage ==
__TOC__
'''Péage''' ([http://cs1.imtranslator.net/SL/Free_Projects/169679760/cs_10132017_15_58_47_1.wav?param1=001024 audio]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations of the first type can be difficult to hitch from due to heavy traffic.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'' or ''voie rapide'') in France); if police sees you, you will be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for 11 to 40€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. 

Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. You will definitely need it if the road splits. The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. 

Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is often tolerated).
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help.'' - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]


''My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!''


''I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.''


''I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to. Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.''

Hitchhikernick - hitched several times through France over the years with the latest being January 2024 from Chamonix to Andorra whilst the farmers protests were happening.  The protests slowed things down a bit, but still managed to get to Andorra in just over 2 days.  Very rarely given any money or bought food.  Average waiting time 1.5hrs. Mixture of highways and national roads.

== Main cities ==
- [[Paris]]
- [[Marseille]]
- [[Lyon]]
- [[Lille]]
- [[Toulouse]]
- [[Bordeaux]]
- [[Nice]]
- [[Nantes]]
- [[Strasbourg]]
- [[Rennes]]
- [[Grenoble]]


== Links ==


* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__


[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>sn1qt5v3so09b5g0hu09y7pk3vtgtis</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105428</id>
      <parentid>105366</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-03-06T20:27:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tawax</username>
        <id>2655</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9738">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 68,0 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
European '''France''' is part of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]] and at some other places), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might want to learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's just legal to hitchhike on service areas and at the beginning of on-ramps before the highway sign. Hitchhiking at the péage next to the barrier is forbidden, but police and highway staff mostly turn a blind eye if you stand there. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== Autoroutes, péages and barrières de péage ==
__TOC__
'''Péage''' ([http://cs1.imtranslator.net/SL/Free_Projects/169679760/cs_10132017_15_58_47_1.wav?param1=001024 audio]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads (''autoroute'') which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations of the first type can be difficult to hitch from due to heavy traffic.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'' or ''voie rapide'') in France); if police sees you, you may be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for 11 to 40€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. 

Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. You will definitely need it if the road splits. The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. 

Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is often tolerated). Just say "''Bonjour, je vais à [name of the city]''".
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help.'' - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]


''My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!''


''I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.''


''I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to. Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.''

Hitchhikernick - hitched several times through France over the years with the latest being January 2024 from Chamonix to Andorra whilst the farmers protests were happening.  The protests slowed things down a bit, but still managed to get to Andorra in just over 2 days.  Very rarely given any money or bought food.  Average waiting time 1.5hrs. Mixture of highways and national roads.

== Main cities ==
- [[Paris]]
- [[Marseille]]
- [[Lyon]]
- [[Lille]]
- [[Toulouse]]
- [[Bordeaux]]
- [[Nice]]
- [[Nantes]]
- [[Strasbourg]]
- [[Rennes]]
- [[Grenoble]]


== Links ==


* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__


[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>7tx9gp0kwqaxlm7tt7eli0hfsszpgyn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105429</id>
      <parentid>105428</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-03-06T20:32:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tawax</username>
        <id>2655</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10144">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 68,0 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
European '''France''' is part of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]] and at some other places), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might want to learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's just legal to hitchhike on service areas and at the beginning of on-ramps before the highway sign. Hitchhiking at the péage next to the barrier is forbidden, but police and highway staff mostly turn a blind eye if you stand there. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== Asking people ==
If you want to ask for rides, you can say sentences like: "''Excusez-moi, je vais à [name of the city] en stop. Allez-vous dans cette direction ?''" and if you get a positive answer, just ask "''Pourrais-je venir avec vous ?''". It may be also good not to tell a city but the direction you want to go: "''Excusez-moi, je fais du stop vers le sud. Allez-vous dans cette direction ?''"

== Autoroutes, péages and barrières de péage ==
__TOC__
'''Péage''' ([http://cs1.imtranslator.net/SL/Free_Projects/169679760/cs_10132017_15_58_47_1.wav?param1=001024 audio]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads (''autoroute'') which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations of the first type can be difficult to hitch from due to heavy traffic.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'' or ''voie rapide'') in France); if police sees you, you may be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for 11 to 40€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. 

Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. You will definitely need it if the road splits. The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. 

Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is often tolerated). Just say "''Bonjour, je vais à [name of the city]''".
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help.'' - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]


''My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!''


''I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.''


''I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to. Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.''

Hitchhikernick - hitched several times through France over the years with the latest being January 2024 from Chamonix to Andorra whilst the farmers protests were happening.  The protests slowed things down a bit, but still managed to get to Andorra in just over 2 days.  Very rarely given any money or bought food.  Average waiting time 1.5hrs. Mixture of highways and national roads.

== Main cities ==
- [[Paris]]
- [[Marseille]]
- [[Lyon]]
- [[Lille]]
- [[Toulouse]]
- [[Bordeaux]]
- [[Nice]]
- [[Nantes]]
- [[Strasbourg]]
- [[Rennes]]
- [[Grenoble]]


== Links ==


* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__


[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>085fjnzvsoe5mztget8m9gy0dddotkr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106020</id>
      <parentid>105429</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-08-04T16:03:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Main cities */ region numbers</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10292">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 68,0 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
European '''France''' is part of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]] and at some other places), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might want to learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's just legal to hitchhike on service areas and at the beginning of on-ramps before the highway sign. Hitchhiking at the péage next to the barrier is forbidden, but police and highway staff mostly turn a blind eye if you stand there. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== Asking people ==
If you want to ask for rides, you can say sentences like: "''Excusez-moi, je vais à [name of the city] en stop. Allez-vous dans cette direction ?''" and if you get a positive answer, just ask "''Pourrais-je venir avec vous ?''". It may be also good not to tell a city but the direction you want to go: "''Excusez-moi, je fais du stop vers le sud. Allez-vous dans cette direction ?''"

== Autoroutes, péages and barrières de péage ==
__TOC__
'''Péage''' ([http://cs1.imtranslator.net/SL/Free_Projects/169679760/cs_10132017_15_58_47_1.wav?param1=001024 audio]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads (''autoroute'') which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations of the first type can be difficult to hitch from due to heavy traffic.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'' or ''voie rapide'') in France); if police sees you, you may be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for 11 to 40€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. 

Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. You will definitely need it if the road splits. The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. 

Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is often tolerated). Just say "''Bonjour, je vais à [name of the city]''".
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help.'' - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]


''My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!''


''I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.''


''I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to. Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.''

Hitchhikernick - hitched several times through France over the years with the latest being January 2024 from Chamonix to Andorra whilst the farmers protests were happening.  The protests slowed things down a bit, but still managed to get to Andorra in just over 2 days.  Very rarely given any money or bought food.  Average waiting time 1.5hrs. Mixture of highways and national roads.

== Main cities ==
License plates show the numbers of the region the car is from. This can help a lot to find longer rides.

* [[Paris]], 75, suburbs: 92 93 etc
* [[Marseille]],13
* [[Lyon]], 69
* [[Lille]], 59
* [[Toulouse]], 31
* [[Bordeaux]], 33
* [[Nice]]
* [[Nantes]]
* [[Strasbourg]]
* [[Rennes]]
* [[Grenoble]]

== Links ==


* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__


[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>50qr0wv0q84zmlwwcrilt74ckfgeihz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106035</id>
      <parentid>106020</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-08-07T18:58:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GeorgDerReisende</username>
        <id>1903</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>ergänzt</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10315">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' height='320' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 68,0 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
European '''France''' is part of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]] and at some other places), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might want to learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's just legal to hitchhike on service areas and at the beginning of on-ramps before the highway sign. Hitchhiking at the péage next to the barrier is forbidden, but police and highway staff mostly turn a blind eye if you stand there. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== Asking people ==
If you want to ask for rides, you can say sentences like: "''Excusez-moi, je vais à [name of the city] en stop. Allez-vous dans cette direction ?''" and if you get a positive answer, just ask "''Pourrais-je venir avec vous ?''". It may be also good not to tell a city but the direction you want to go: "''Excusez-moi, je fais du stop vers le sud. Allez-vous dans cette direction ?''"

== Autoroutes, péages and barrières de péage ==
__TOC__
'''Péage''' ([http://cs1.imtranslator.net/SL/Free_Projects/169679760/cs_10132017_15_58_47_1.wav?param1=001024 audio]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads (''autoroute'') which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations of the first type can be difficult to hitch from due to heavy traffic.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'' or ''voie rapide'') in France); if police sees you, you may be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for 11 to 40€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. 

Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. You will definitely need it if the road splits. The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. 

Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is often tolerated). Just say "''Bonjour, je vais à [name of the city]''".
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help.'' - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]


''My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!''


''I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.''


''I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to. Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.''

Hitchhikernick - hitched several times through France over the years with the latest being January 2024 from Chamonix to Andorra whilst the farmers protests were happening.  The protests slowed things down a bit, but still managed to get to Andorra in just over 2 days.  Very rarely given any money or bought food.  Average waiting time 1.5hrs. Mixture of highways and national roads.

== Main cities ==
License plates show the numbers of the region the car is from. This can help a lot to find longer rides.

* [[Paris]], 75, suburbs: 92 93 94 95
* [[Marseille]], 13
* [[Lyon]], 69
* [[Lille]], 59
* [[Toulouse]], 31
* [[Bordeaux]], 33
* [[Nice]], 06
* [[Nantes]], 44
* [[Strasbourg]], 67
* [[Rennes]], 35
* [[Grenoble]], 38

== Links ==


* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__


[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>a2mwnpbv99uxnobck4zlzjftq1quy9j</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>109485</id>
      <parentid>106035</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-04-18T14:54:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10302">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 68,0 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
European '''France''' is part of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]] and at some other places), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might want to learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's just legal to hitchhike on service areas and at the beginning of on-ramps before the highway sign. Hitchhiking at the péage next to the barrier is forbidden, but police and highway staff mostly turn a blind eye if you stand there. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== Asking people ==
If you want to ask for rides, you can say sentences like: "''Excusez-moi, je vais à [name of the city] en stop. Allez-vous dans cette direction ?''" and if you get a positive answer, just ask "''Pourrais-je venir avec vous ?''". It may be also good not to tell a city but the direction you want to go: "''Excusez-moi, je fais du stop vers le sud. Allez-vous dans cette direction ?''"

== Autoroutes, péages and barrières de péage ==
__TOC__
'''Péage''' ([http://cs1.imtranslator.net/SL/Free_Projects/169679760/cs_10132017_15_58_47_1.wav?param1=001024 audio]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads (''autoroute'') which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations of the first type can be difficult to hitch from due to heavy traffic.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'' or ''voie rapide'') in France); if police sees you, you may be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for 11 to 40€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. 

Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. You will definitely need it if the road splits. The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. 

Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is often tolerated). Just say "''Bonjour, je vais à [name of the city]''".
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help.'' - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]


''My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!''


''I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.''


''I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to. Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.''

Hitchhikernick - hitched several times through France over the years with the latest being January 2024 from Chamonix to Andorra whilst the farmers protests were happening.  The protests slowed things down a bit, but still managed to get to Andorra in just over 2 days.  Very rarely given any money or bought food.  Average waiting time 1.5hrs. Mixture of highways and national roads.

== Main cities ==
License plates show the numbers of the region the car is from. This can help a lot to find longer rides.

* [[Paris]], 75, suburbs: 92 93 94 95
* [[Marseille]], 13
* [[Lyon]], 69
* [[Lille]], 59
* [[Toulouse]], 31
* [[Bordeaux]], 33
* [[Nice]], 06
* [[Nantes]], 44
* [[Strasbourg]], 67
* [[Rennes]], 35
* [[Grenoble]], 38

== Links ==


* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__


[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>34braeacluj4oumg3h7piv4gnqybluz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>109553</id>
      <parentid>109485</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-04-19T10:18:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10300">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5' view='0' country='France'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan, ...)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 68,0 million
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
European '''France''' is part of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]] and at some other places), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might want to learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it's just legal to hitchhike on service areas and at the beginning of on-ramps before the highway sign. Hitchhiking at the péage next to the barrier is forbidden, but police and highway staff mostly turn a blind eye if you stand there. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== Asking people ==
If you want to ask for rides, you can say sentences like: "''Excusez-moi, je vais à [name of the city] en stop. Allez-vous dans cette direction ?''" and if you get a positive answer, just ask "''Pourrais-je venir avec vous ?''". It may be also good not to tell a city but the direction you want to go: "''Excusez-moi, je fais du stop vers le sud. Allez-vous dans cette direction ?''"

== Autoroutes, péages and barrières de péage ==
__TOC__
'''Péage''' ([http://cs1.imtranslator.net/SL/Free_Projects/169679760/cs_10132017_15_58_47_1.wav?param1=001024 audio]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads (''autoroute'') which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations of the first type can be difficult to hitch from due to heavy traffic.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'' or ''voie rapide'') in France); if police sees you, you may be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for 11 to 40€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. 

Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. You will definitely need it if the road splits. The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. 

Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is often tolerated). Just say "''Bonjour, je vais à [name of the city]''".
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help.'' - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]


''My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!''


''I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.''


''I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to. Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.''

Hitchhikernick - hitched several times through France over the years with the latest being January 2024 from Chamonix to Andorra whilst the farmers protests were happening.  The protests slowed things down a bit, but still managed to get to Andorra in just over 2 days.  Very rarely given any money or bought food.  Average waiting time 1.5hrs. Mixture of highways and national roads.

== Main cities ==
License plates show the numbers of the region the car is from. This can help a lot to find longer rides.

* [[Paris]], 75, suburbs: 92 93 94 95
* [[Marseille]], 13
* [[Lyon]], 69
* [[Lille]], 59
* [[Toulouse]], 31
* [[Bordeaux]], 33
* [[Nice]], 06
* [[Nantes]], 44
* [[Strasbourg]], 67
* [[Rennes]], 35
* [[Grenoble]], 38

== Links ==


* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__


[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>63r4t47ag00pzu8wisicviu4v4onwuc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>111818</id>
      <parentid>109553</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-08-23T12:44:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10367">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 68'000'000
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
European '''France''' is part of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]] and at some other places), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might want to learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

In France you can find [[Official Hitchhiking|official hitchhiking spots]] mostly in rural areas.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it is just legal to hitchhike on service areas and at the beginning of on-ramps before the highway sign. Hitchhiking at the péage next to the barrier is forbidden, but police and highway staff mostly turn a blind eye if you stand there. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== Asking people ==
If you want to ask for rides, you can say sentences like: "''Excusez-moi, je vais à [name of the city] en stop. Allez-vous dans cette direction ?''" and if you get a positive answer, just ask "''Pourrais-je venir avec vous ?''". It may be also good not to tell a city but the direction you want to go: "''Excusez-moi, je fais du stop vers le sud. Allez-vous dans cette direction ?''"

== Autoroutes, péages and barrières de péage ==
__TOC__
'''Péage''' ([http://cs1.imtranslator.net/SL/Free_Projects/169679760/cs_10132017_15_58_47_1.wav?param1=001024 audio]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads (''autoroute'') which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations of the first type can be difficult to hitch from due to heavy traffic.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'' or ''voie rapide'') in France); if police sees you, you may be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for 11 to 40€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. 

Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. You will definitely need it if the road splits. The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. 

Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is often tolerated). Just say "''Bonjour, je vais à [name of the city]''".
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help.'' - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]


''My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!''


''I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.''


''I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to. Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.''

Hitchhikernick - hitched several times through France over the years with the latest being January 2024 from Chamonix to Andorra whilst the farmers protests were happening.  The protests slowed things down a bit, but still managed to get to Andorra in just over 2 days.  Very rarely given any money or bought food.  Average waiting time 1.5hrs. Mixture of highways and national roads.

== Main cities ==
License plates show the numbers of the region the car is from. This can help a lot to find longer rides.

* [[Paris]], 75, suburbs: 92 93 94 95
* [[Marseille]], 13
* [[Lyon]], 69
* [[Lille]], 59
* [[Toulouse]], 31
* [[Bordeaux]], 33
* [[Nice]], 06
* [[Nantes]], 44
* [[Strasbourg]], 67
* [[Rennes]], 35
* [[Grenoble]], 38

== Links ==


* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__


[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]</text>
      <sha1>tdbfij3qh1g8gzf4mqe9bzrser7qq57</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>114867</id>
      <parentid>111818</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-10-20T08:45:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GriL</username>
        <id>24751</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10389">{{infobox Country
|country = France
|map = &lt;map lat='47' lng='1.5' zoom='5'/&gt;
|language = French (regional languages: Alsatian, Occitan, Breton, Corsican, Basque, Catalan)
|capital = [[Paris]]
|pop = 68'000'000
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
|BW = FR
}}
European '''France''' is part of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. It is usually a great country for hitchhiking. There are many friendly car and truck drivers. Drivers have to pay toll on motorways (except in [[Bretagne|Brittany]] and at some other places), and you can get a ride quite easily at some ''[[Péage|barrières de péage]]'' (toll stations). When hitchhiking on local roads, you might face some difficulties sometimes, though. One of the commonly known barriers for traveling in France (as in many foreign countries) is the language - you might want to learn some basic phrases before you off on the road in France.

In France you can find [[Official Hitchhiking|official hitchhiking spots]] mostly in rural areas.

Like everywhere in Europe, walking on the motorways is illegal and thus it is just legal to hitchhike on service areas and at the beginning of on-ramps before the highway sign. Hitchhiking at the péage next to the barrier is forbidden, but police and highway staff mostly turn a blind eye if you stand there. Moreover some experience shows that French people will more often stop in a place where it is not normally allowed than in other countries.

On Sundays, only trucks with frozen goods are allowed to drive. Keep in mind though that trucks are not allowed to go more than 90 km/h and the driver must stop for a 45 min break every 4 1/2 hours, which can make the trip much longer.

The ''"Michelin 726 National"'' map of France is a good choice for a hitchhiker in this country. It shows all the major ''barrières de péage'' and [[rest area|service stations]]. You can get a free map in péage offices.

== Asking people ==
If you want to ask for rides, you can say sentences like: "''Excusez-moi, je vais à [name of the city] en stop. Allez-vous dans cette direction ?''" and if you get a positive answer, just ask "''Pourrais-je venir avec vous ?''". It may be also good not to tell a city but the direction you want to go: "''Excusez-moi, je fais du stop vers le sud. Allez-vous dans cette direction ?''"

== Autoroutes, péages and barrières de péage ==
__TOC__
'''Péage''' ([http://cs1.imtranslator.net/SL/Free_Projects/169679760/cs_10132017_15_58_47_1.wav?param1=001024 audio]) is a French word for ''toll''. It is also commonly used as referring to [[toll station]]s.

In France, most of the motorways are toll roads (''autoroute'') which are the fastest way to hitch across the country. There are two types of toll stations on péages. First, there are big ones where all traffic has to stop to pay a fee (or to get a ticket) - these are ''barrières de péage'' and usually they are excellent spots to get a long-distance ride and make it really easy to hitchhike during the night. They are often located near big cities on the autoroute. Another type is a side barrier situated on all exits in the toll part of the motorway. On latter ones traffic is much smaller, therefore one can expect a longer waiting time, although sometimes congested toll stations of the first type can be difficult to hitch from due to heavy traffic.

To reach the ''barrière de péage'', you may need to walk along the motorway; with a help of a proper map check if the distance needed to be walked is not too long. It is illegal to walk on a side lane of the motorway (same is valid for some parts of national roads (''voie express'' or ''voie rapide'') in France); if police sees you, you may be driven somewhere safe and may be fined for 11 to 40€. Péage toll stations are considered a part of the motorway, and legally you do not have the right to solicit rides there. You may be asked to wait in the parking area which is after each ''barrière de péage''. In practice, this is rarely enforced (maybe 5% of the time), most toll station employees simply want to make sure you're not endangering yourself or others. 

Having a sign with your destination (or the next city) is recommended and will distinguish you as a serious hitchhiker, and not a vagrant. You will definitely need it if the road splits. The fastest way to travel on a péage is from one ''barrière de péage'' to another. 

Hitchhiking options are:

* You can thumb immediately after the ''barrière de péage''
* If you prefer a direct approach you can dash across the lanes one at a time until you're at a busy lane, stand next to the toll machine and talk to the drivers when they stop to pay (usually it is not allowed to hitch from the toll machines but it is often tolerated). Just say "''Bonjour, je vais à [name of the city]''".
* You can wait before the ''barrière de péage'', just where the drivers choose their lane - there is often enough of space for cars to pull over to stop for you. 

Some ''barrière de péage'' are really good, some are not. If you've been waiting for a while using a destination sign, drop it and try thumbing.

While on a toll road, you can always try hitchhiking from one [[petrol station hitchhiking|petrol station]] to another, either asking drivers while they refill, or thumbing at the exit of the service area. The staff usually doesn't mind hitchhikers.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In my experience it's pretty much impossible to go hungry in France. While hitching I almost ALWAYS get 10 or 5 euros thrown my way, and once even 60 euro! The key is to imply you have no money (helps the guilt if you actually don't have any like I did). Ask where you can use the internet or a phone, but WITHOUT PAYING, and 90% of the time they'll tell you "I'll drop you off at the station/road/town with 10 euros, alright?" It's not really possible without having a good standard of communication though, so either hope they know English or learn some French! I also wouldn't recommend doing "it" if you have no money or already had access to the internet or a phone, solely because of guilt. Even though I was genuine in my requests I didn't feel happy taking their money, but food is food!'' - Aaronishappy


''France is great because it has roundabouts, which makes for slow traffic on the smaller roads. Of course, the big highways are off-limits in many cases, but that's alright. Beautiful countryside, good people. For me I enjoyed eating lots of cheese and lots of baguettes, as cliche as that may sound.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Don't be afraid to approach people at service stations just because your French is weak (or, like me, non-existent).  After a quick 'bonjour', or 'vous allez ou?', people were happy to help.  Many people didn't speak English, with some I got by in Spanish, and with 3 or 4 we had no language in common at all.  Nevertheless, people were still kind and willing to help.'' - [[User:Justunein|Justunein]]


''My Hitch in France went marvellously! Check this, I was walking along the street in Nimes, minding my own business, and a woman pulled up in a car and asked me if I wanted to hitch to Marseille! She asked me!! When we got there, she showed me around and I slept on her sofa (whenever I tell French men about this they invariably respond 'Did you ''fork'' her?'). The next day, I got 5 hitches from Marseille to Limans, and for 3 of them all I had to do was hold up a cardboard sign and the first car that came picked me up. I was going to write that it's like taking the bus, ''but you have to wait for busses!'' As a bonus, the people who I hitched with were really nice, so much so that one of them lied and said that my French wasn't so bad! Oh yeah, and the bit about French bakeries is incomplete. They have pastries round the back too!!''


''I can also said France is very good country for hitchhiking, people are very friendly. Even that they do not speak a lot of English, they will try to help you. One driver also take me in one restaurant near high way even that I did not want that he spend money to by me something to eat. It was nice to cross from Spain to Germany in two days with hitchhiking.''


''I started my first hitchhike tour in France and found out that most French people are very kind and in most cases they are happy to take you with them. But I think it's really helpful to speak even a little bit French so you can say want you want and where you want to go because most of French people don't like to speak english or maybee they are not able to. Espacally in the south of france it's also possible to travel short distances by train for free, because most of them are not controlled. In case of controlling you can say that you're out of money and in most cases they will not send you a bill because it is to complicated for them to find you in your home country. And even if you are in bad luck and they will find you the price is not even higher than the ticket for the train.''

Hitchhikernick - hitched several times through France over the years with the latest being January 2024 from Chamonix to Andorra whilst the farmers protests were happening.  The protests slowed things down a bit, but still managed to get to Andorra in just over 2 days.  Very rarely given any money or bought food.  Average waiting time 1.5hrs. Mixture of highways and national roads.

== Main cities ==
License plates show the numbers of the region the car is from. This can help a lot to find longer rides.

* [[Paris]], 75, suburbs: 92 93 94 95
* [[Marseille]], 13
* [[Lyon]], 69
* [[Lille]], 59
* [[Toulouse]], 31
* [[Bordeaux]], 33
* [[Nice]], 06
* [[Nantes]], 44
* [[Strasbourg]], 67
* [[Rennes]], 35
* [[Grenoble]], 38

== Links ==


* [http://www.asf.fr/shared/pdf/CarteReseau.pdf Le Réseau ASF], a PDF file that shows all ''barrières de péage'' on major routes in Southern France.
* [http://www.vinci-autoroutes.com/system/files/pdf/2012/12/carte_reseau_vinci_autoroutes.pdf Service Stations Network], a pdf file that shows all service station on major routes in southern France.

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{Cities France}}
{{Regions France}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
__NOTOC__


[[Category:France| ]]
[[Category:Western Europe]]

[[de:Frankreich]]
[[es:Francia]]
[[fr:France]]
[[pl:Francja]]
[[ru:Франция]]</text>
      <sha1>p82t8bfg98385pj9pg8uyr3ybh0gv80</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Netherlands</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1522</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1549</id>
      <parentid>4372</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-07T11:13:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>62.51.52.18</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1936">Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite possible, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not allowed to walk are indicated by: 
# Round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
# Rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
# Square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowd as well as standing on a petrolstation allong the motorway.

Since the 80s Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. There are still official ''liftershaltes'' in some university towns. Check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liftershalte Wikipedia] for an overview. Other good places are petrolstations along the motorways and the entrance to the motorway from a larger city (when it has an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 15-45 minutes (same as Germany). Major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 25 to 50 km.

Usefull tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to Germany is quite tricky because some people are afraid they could get in trouble because you could have Marihuana with you. (Marihuana is semi-legal in the Netherlands while it still isn't in Germany...)

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.

{{stub}}

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>gixqyihpps59h21kjb5qy5hluww3l6l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1550</id>
      <parentid>1549</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1936">Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite possible, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not allowed to walk are indicated by: 
# Round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
# Rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
# Square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowd as well as standing on a petrolstation allong the motorway.

Since the 80s Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. There are still official ''liftershaltes'' in some university towns. Check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liftershalte Wikipedia] for an overview. Other good places are petrolstations along the motorways and the entrance to the motorway from a larger city (when it has an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 15-45 minutes (same as Germany). Major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 25 to 50 km.

Usefull tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to Germany is quite tricky because some people are afraid they could get in trouble because you could have Marihuana with you. (Marihuana is semi-legal in the Netherlands while it still isn't in Germany...)

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.

{{stub}}

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>gixqyihpps59h21kjb5qy5hluww3l6l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4362</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T18:00:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GuakaTest</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1269">Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is possible, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not allowed to walk are indicated by: 
# Round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
# Rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
# Square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowd as well as standing on a petrolstation allong the motorway.

Since the 80s Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. There are still official ''liftershaltes'' in some university towns. Check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liftershalte Wikipedia] for an overview. Other good places are petrolstations allong the motorways and the entrance to the motorway from a larger city (when it has an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 15-45 minutes (same as Germany). Major difference with Germany is that a typical lift is only 25-50 km.

{{stub}}


[[Category:Western Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>45jjlju6td41xxpc4sukn9d7hphek2f</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4363</id>
      <parentid>4362</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T13:57:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1273">Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is possible, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not allowed to walk are indicated by: 
# Round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
# Rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
# Square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowd as well as standing on a petrolstation allong the motorway.

Since the 80s Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. There are still official ''liftershaltes'' in some university towns. Check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liftershalte Wikipedia] for an overview. Other good places are petrolstations allong the motorways and the entrance to the motorway from a larger city (when it has an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 15-45 minutes (same as Germany). Major difference with [[Germany]] is that a typical lift is only 25-50 km.

{{stub}}


[[Category:Western Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>7r271xjkjtrwcs1hoctxoviubj7tp1o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4364</id>
      <parentid>4363</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T14:10:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1265">Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is possible, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not allowed to walk are indicated by: 
# Round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
# Rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
# Square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowd as well as standing on a petrolstation allong the motorway.

Since the 80s Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. There are still official ''liftershaltes'' in some university towns. Check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liftershalte Wikipedia] for an overview. Other good places are petrolstations allong the motorways and the entrance to the motorway from a larger city (when it has an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 15-45 minutes (same as Germany). Major difference with [[Germany]] is that a typical lift is only 25-50 km.

{{stub}}


[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>g2h1obon5s2gko5y596i543tt1ayq9x</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4365</id>
      <parentid>4364</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T15:43:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1264">Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is possible, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not allowed to walk are indicated by: 
# Round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
# Rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
# Square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowd as well as standing on a petrolstation allong the motorway.

Since the 80s Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. There are still official ''liftershaltes'' in some university towns. Check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liftershalte Wikipedia] for an overview. Other good places are petrolstations along the motorways and the entrance to the motorway from a larger city (when it has an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 15-45 minutes (same as Germany). Major difference with [[Germany]] is that a typical lift is only 25-50 km.

{{stub}}


[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>skos9qk9pswpobb3e1gxxenr5yrb069</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4366</id>
      <parentid>4365</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-22T15:04:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1491">Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is possible, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not allowed to walk are indicated by: 
# Round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
# Rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
# Square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowd as well as standing on a petrolstation allong the motorway.

Since the 80s Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. There are still official ''liftershaltes'' in some university towns. Check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liftershalte Wikipedia] for an overview. Other good places are petrolstations along the motorways and the entrance to the motorway from a larger city (when it has an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 15-45 minutes (same as Germany). Major difference with [[Germany]] is that a typical lift is only 25-50 km.

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

{{stub}}


[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>qt20f4afy690mas322x09dlxx9wxb36</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4367</id>
      <parentid>4366</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-23T20:22:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1517">Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is possible, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not allowed to walk are indicated by: 
# Round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
# Rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
# Square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowd as well as standing on a petrolstation allong the motorway.

Since the 80s Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. There are still official ''liftershaltes'' in some university towns. Check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liftershalte Wikipedia] for an overview. Other good places are petrolstations along the motorways and the entrance to the motorway from a larger city (when it has an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 15-45 minutes (same as Germany). Major difference with [[Germany]] is that a typical lift is only 25-50 km.

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>4wx32w5zrhvfpc1xvlb85a5jea0z1oy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4368</id>
      <parentid>4367</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-01-26T17:40:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1641">Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is possible, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not allowed to walk are indicated by: 
# Round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
# Rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
# Square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowd as well as standing on a petrolstation allong the motorway.

Since the 80s Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. There are still official ''liftershaltes'' in some university towns. Check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liftershalte Wikipedia] for an overview. Other good places are petrolstations along the motorways and the entrance to the motorway from a larger city (when it has an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 15-45 minutes (same as Germany). Major difference with [[Germany]] is that a typical lift is only 25-50 km.

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.

{{stub}}

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>15zcvspi5owec2b8c3be5bonenvwmmx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4369</id>
      <parentid>4368</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-02-06T17:07:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1658">Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite possible, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not allowed to walk are indicated by: 
# Round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
# Rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
# Square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowd as well as standing on a petrolstation allong the motorway.

Since the 80s Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. There are still official ''liftershaltes'' in some university towns. Check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liftershalte Wikipedia] for an overview. Other good places are petrolstations along the motorways and the entrance to the motorway from a larger city (when it has an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 15-45 minutes (same as Germany). Major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 25 to 50 km.

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.

{{stub}}

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>mqc4vxbuei9uik82ykk63apwl0fazvg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4370</id>
      <parentid>4369</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-20T09:07:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1921">Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite possible, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not allowed to walk are indicated by: 
# Round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
# Rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
# Square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowd as well as standing on a petrolstation allong the motorway.

Since the 80s Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. There are still official ''liftershaltes'' in some university towns. Check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liftershalte Wikipedia] for an overview. Other good places are petrolstations along the motorways and the entrance to the motorway from a larger city (when it has an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 15-45 minutes (same as Germany). Major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 25 to 50 km. To get to Germany is quite tricky because people are afraid they could get in trouble because you have Marihuana with you. (Marihuana is legal in the Netherlands while it still isn't in Germany...)

Usefull tip: Internet access is for free in every city library.

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.

{{stub}}

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>ggmifhp8t8xx1xu9w888dffsrvoswww</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4371</id>
      <parentid>4370</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-20T09:08:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1922">Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite possible, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not allowed to walk are indicated by: 
# Round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
# Rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
# Square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowd as well as standing on a petrolstation allong the motorway.

Since the 80s Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. There are still official ''liftershaltes'' in some university towns. Check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liftershalte Wikipedia] for an overview. Other good places are petrolstations along the motorways and the entrance to the motorway from a larger city (when it has an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 15-45 minutes (same as Germany). Major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 25 to 50 km.

Usefull tip: Internet access is for free in every city library.

To get to Germany is quite tricky because people are afraid they could get in trouble because you have Marihuana with you. (Marihuana is legal in the Netherlands while it still isn't in Germany...)

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.

{{stub}}

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>dnuxy62xl0u4r5pd6o5ma7n1d6zv4vo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4372</id>
      <parentid>4371</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-20T09:09:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1920">Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite possible, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not allowed to walk are indicated by: 
# Round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
# Rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
# Square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowd as well as standing on a petrolstation allong the motorway.

Since the 80s Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. There are still official ''liftershaltes'' in some university towns. Check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liftershalte Wikipedia] for an overview. Other good places are petrolstations along the motorways and the entrance to the motorway from a larger city (when it has an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 15-45 minutes (same as Germany). Major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 25 to 50 km.

Usefull tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to Germany is quite tricky because people are afraid they could get in trouble because you have Marihuana with you. (Marihuana is legal in the Netherlands while it still isn't in Germany...)

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.

{{stub}}

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>jn8rh6n30fqi2x9ngwlaqxf51fk81o8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4373</id>
      <parentid>1550</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1936">Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite possible, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not allowed to walk are indicated by: 
# Round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
# Rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
# Square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowd as well as standing on a petrolstation allong the motorway.

Since the 80s Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. There are still official ''liftershaltes'' in some university towns. Check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liftershalte Wikipedia] for an overview. Other good places are petrolstations along the motorways and the entrance to the motorway from a larger city (when it has an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 15-45 minutes (same as Germany). Major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 25 to 50 km.

Usefull tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to Germany is quite tricky because some people are afraid they could get in trouble because you could have Marihuana with you. (Marihuana is semi-legal in the Netherlands while it still isn't in Germany...)

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.

{{stub}}

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>gixqyihpps59h21kjb5qy5hluww3l6l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9376</id>
      <parentid>4373</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-02T01:27:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1947">Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite possible, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not allowed to walk are indicated by: 
# Round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
# Rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
# Square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowd as well as standing on a petrolstation allong the motorway.

Since the 80s Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. There are still official ''liftershaltes'' in some university towns. Check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liftershalte Wikipedia] for an overview. Other good places are petrolstations along the motorways and the entrance to the motorway from a larger city (when it has an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 15-45 minutes (same as Germany). Major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 25 to 50 km.

Usefull tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to Germany is quite tricky because some people are afraid they could get in trouble because you could have Marihuana with you. (Marihuana is semi-legal in the Netherlands while it still isn't in Germany...)

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.

{{stub}}

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:NL]]</text>
      <sha1>r3hw52obpl6xlylpwby5iupmarr34mi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9377</id>
      <parentid>9376</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-02T01:31:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1936">Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite possible, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not allowed to walk are indicated by: 
# Round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
# Rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
# Square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowd as well as standing on a petrolstation allong the motorway.

Since the 80s Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. There are still official ''liftershaltes'' in some university towns. Check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liftershalte Wikipedia] for an overview. Other good places are petrolstations along the motorways and the entrance to the motorway from a larger city (when it has an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 15-45 minutes (same as Germany). Major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 25 to 50 km.

Usefull tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to Germany is quite tricky because some people are afraid they could get in trouble because you could have Marihuana with you. (Marihuana is semi-legal in the Netherlands while it still isn't in Germany...)

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.

{{stub}}

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>gixqyihpps59h21kjb5qy5hluww3l6l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9524</id>
      <parentid>9377</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-05T22:52:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1996">Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite possible, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not allowed to walk are indicated by: 
# Round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
# Rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
# Square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowd as well as standing on a petrolstation allong the motorway.

Since the 80s Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. There are still official ''liftershaltes'' in some university towns. Check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liftershalte Wikipedia] for an overview. Other good places are petrolstations along the motorways and the entrance to the motorway from a larger city (when it has an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 15-45 minutes (same as Germany). Major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 25 to 50 km.

Useful tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to Germany is quite tricky because some people are afraid they could get in trouble because you could have Marihuana with you. (Marihuana is semi-legal in the Netherlands while it still isn't in Germany...)

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.

{{stub}}

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:NL]]
[[cswiki:Netherlands]]
[[wikitravel:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>1zaxfi5bj865jj8arsnsvf9ff7ewjc1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10520</id>
      <parentid>9524</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-13T13:30:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2096">[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite possible, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not allowed to walk are indicated by: 
# Round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
# Rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
# Square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowd as well as standing on a petrolstation allong the motorway.

Since the 80s Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. There are still official ''liftershaltes'' in some university towns. Check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liftershalte Wikipedia] for an overview. Other good places are petrolstations along the motorways and the entrance to the motorway from a larger city (when it has an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 15-45 minutes (same as Germany). Major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 25 to 50 km.

Useful tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to Germany is quite tricky because some people are afraid they could get in trouble because you could have Marihuana with you. (Marihuana is semi-legal in the Netherlands while it still isn't in Germany...)

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.

{{stub}}

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:NL]]
[[cswiki:Netherlands]]
[[wikitravel:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>t5led0wzw7xcg40dyci002isp6q8wex</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10525</id>
      <parentid>10520</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-14T11:49:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2109">[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not allowed to walk are indicated by: 
# Round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
# Rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
# Square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowd as well as standing on a petrolstation along the motorway.

Since the 80s Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, There are still official [[Liftershalte|liftershaltes]], official hitchhiking spots. 
Other good places are petrolstations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when it has an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). Major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.

Useful tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to Germany can be a bit difficult because some people are afraid they could get in trouble because you could have Marihuana with you, which is semi-legal in the Netherlands while it still isn't in Germany. However, you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:NL]]
[[cswiki:Netherlands]]
[[wikitravel:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>kgqime35tkw4aboygz74vs7g8d38j6t</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10546</id>
      <parentid>10525</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-14T16:29:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2285">[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not allowed to walk are indicated by: 
# Round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
# Rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
# Square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowd as well as standing on a petrolstation along the motorway.

Since the 80s Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, There are still official [[Liftershalte|liftershaltes]], official hitchhiking spots. 
Other good places are petrolstations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when it has an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). Major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km.

Useful tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to Germany can be a bit difficult because some people are afraid they could get in trouble because you could have marijuana (or other drugs) with you, which is semi-legal (or illegal) in the Netherlands while it still isn't in Germany. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it. At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie.

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:NL]]
[[cswiki:Netherlands]]
[[wikitravel:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>79loz4oalskp82306ddvlfkz83q0rtg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11083</id>
      <parentid>10546</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-29T12:13:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>219.61.192.109</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19857">[[http://ervarli.blogdiario.com/ free jazz ringtones]] [[http://www.csun.edu/learningnet/discussion/file.php?0,file=148 motorola ringtones]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832235) free punk ringtones]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832253) buy wellbutrin]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832204) cool ringtones]] [[http://www8.vjc.edu/EnvironmentalClub/discuss/msgReader$88 alltel ringtones]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1031?id=atch1134 free alltel ringtones]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=361 tramadol online]] [[http://www8.vjc.edu/EnvironmentalClub/discuss/msgReader$106 nokia ringtones]] [[http://discussions.csbsju.edu/general/messages/25/xyvi-237.html cheap viagra]] [[http://www.rso.cmich.edu/prevet/messageboard/000031b5.htm generic adipex]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832230) cheap norco]] [[http://www.csun.edu/learningnet/discussion/file.php?0,file=134 order wellbutrin]] [[http://www.csun.edu/learningnet/discussion/file.php?0,file=132 lorazepam online]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832234) propecia online]] [[http://alcta.blogdiario.com/ sprint ringtones]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1092 online ultracet]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1100 zoloft online]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1031?id=atch1136 free cool ringtones]] [[http://liboor.jubiiblog.de/ free tracfone ringtones]] [[http://letorolac.jubiiblog.de/ free motorola ringtones]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832201) cialis online]] [[http://www.rso.cmich.edu/prevet/messageboard/000031c5.htm cheap levitra]] [[http://domvimon.jubiiblog.de/ norco online]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1068 phentermine online]] [[http://ertral.jubiiblog.de/ cheap carisoprodol]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1074 cialis online]] [[http://enchanted1312.blogspot.com injecting valium]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=ricrolget free music ringtones]] [[http://el5or5ro.blogdiario.com/ free motorola ringtones]] [[http://www.rso.cmich.edu/prevet/messageboard/000031c3.htm clonazepam online]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1031?id=atch1128 free polyphonic ringtones]] [[http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/~twiki/pub/Main/CoyarCharline/lusuli.htm cheap viagra]] [[http://www8.vjc.edu/EnvironmentalClub/discuss/msgReader$113 sagem ringtones]] [[http://bocoleto.jubiiblog.de/ free alltel ringtones]] [[http://discussions.csbsju.edu/general/messages/25/lepef-234.html cheap diazepam]] [[http://discussions.csbsju.edu/general/messages/25/dyjys-243.html cheap adipex]] [[http://discussions.csbsju.edu/general/messages/25/zisi-231.html xanax online]] [[http://olorolacel.blogdiario.com/ diazepam online]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832220) meridia online]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=vartrocvi free verizon ringtones]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=safunder viagra online]] [[http://algettr.blogdiario.com/ carisoprodol online]] [[http://www.rso.cmich.edu/prevet/messageboard/000031b7.htm generic vicodin]] [[http://forum.kharkiv.edu/SForums/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=315&amp;FORUM_ID=3&amp;CAT_ID=3 cheap viagra]] [[http://www8.vjc.edu/EnvironmentalClub/discuss/msgReader$96 cheap fioricet]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1030?id=atch1112 flexeril online]] [[http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/~twiki/pub/Main/CoyarCharline/jeziluc.htm generic adipex]] [[http://forum.kharkiv.edu/SForums/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=302&amp;FORUM_ID=3&amp;CAT_ID=3 soma online]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832222) mono ringtones]] [[http://tavidel.blogdiario.com/ free sony ericsson ringtones]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=yohiatt buy meridia]] [[http://www8.vjc.edu/EnvironmentalClub/discuss/msgReader$135 free verizon ringtones]] [[http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/~twiki/pub/Main/AngelKristofer/pixe.htm cingular ringtones]] [[http://livisit.blogdiario.com/ valium online]] [[http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/~twiki/pub/Main/AngelKristofer/pypybug.htm nextel ringtones]] [[http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/~twiki/pub/Main/AngelKristofer/cicyfi.htm free polyphonic ringtone]] [[http://boricdom.blogdiario.com/ nextel ringtones]] [[http://www8.vjc.edu/EnvironmentalClub/discuss/msgReader$107 cheap norco]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=335 midi ringtones]] [[http://www8.vjc.edu/EnvironmentalClub/discuss/msgReader$100 meridia online]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=351 real ringtones]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=323 diazepam online]] [[http://roacpas.jubiiblog.de/ cheap ultram]] [[http://cnac4tco.blogdiario.com/ free mp3 ringtones]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1081 but alprazolam]] [[http://www.rso.cmich.edu/prevet/messageboard/000031da.htm free samsung ringtone]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=359 sprint ringtones]] [[http://cozelrol.jubiiblog.de/ xenical]] [[http://olobasno.jubiiblog.de/ samsung ringtones]] [[http://www.csun.edu/learningnet/discussion/file.php?0,file=126 alprazolam online]] [[http://domrelchi.jubiiblog.de/ cheap nexium]] [[http://cnatadel.blogdiario.com/ buy xanax]] [[http://www.rso.cmich.edu/prevet/messageboard/000031d7.htm motorola ringtones]] [[http://www.csun.edu/learningnet/discussion/file.php?0,file=128 cheap paxil]] [[http://vizelsit.jubiiblog.de/ free free ringtones]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1099 cheap lisinopril]] [[http://discussions.csbsju.edu/general/messages/25/wykypof-226.html tramadol online]] [[http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/~twiki/pub/Main/CoyarCharline/nikol.htm generic ultram]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=wiwhistl vicodin online]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1076 cheap viagra]] [[http://kleinerachel.blogspot.com valium ativan]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832210) online fioricet]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=aceldarro free sonyericsson ringtones]] [[http://cnacorel.blogdiario.com/ free mono ringtones]] [[http://eltrli.jubiiblog.de/ cheap vicodin]] [[http://www.csun.edu/learningnet/discussion/file.php?0,file=120 ativan online]] [[http://taoudel.blogdiario.com/ sildenafil online]] [[http://www.csun.edu/learningnet/discussion/file.php?0,file=159 alltel ringtones]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=365 free verizon ringtones]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=338 free mp3 ringtones]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1098 cheap albuterol]] [[http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/~twiki/pub/Main/AngelKristofer/colivew.htm alltel ringtones]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1030?id=atch1119 mp3 ringtones]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832203) cheap clonazepam]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=352 sagem ringtones]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=345 order paxil]] [[http://wildomania.blogspot.com ambien sleep walking]] [[http://eltsitzel.blogdiario.com/ sagem ringtones]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=cnataco free nokia ringtones]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=367 cheap vicodin]] [[http://forum.kharkiv.edu/SForums/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=318&amp;FORUM_ID=3&amp;CAT_ID=3 norco online]] [[http://boroltroc.jubiiblog.de/ free funny ringtones]] [[http://dar5or5tr.blogdiario.com/ midi ringtones]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=363 cheap ultram]] [[http://domdronpas.blogdiario.com/ cheap tramadol]] [[http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/~twiki/pub/Main/CoyarCharline/nenopo.htm cheap tramadol]] [[http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/~twiki/pub/Main/CoyarCharline/xoky.htm generic paxil]] [[http://ginny-potter21.blogspot.com caribbean casino gold online]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1030?id=atch1109 cheap diethylpropion]] [[http://www.csun.edu/learningnet/discussion/file.php?0,file=137 ultracet]] [[http://www8.vjc.edu/EnvironmentalClub/discuss/msgReader$94 cheap clonazepam]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832215) jazz ringtones]] [[http://capasget.jubiiblog.de/ free sagem ringtones]] [[http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/~twiki/pub/Main/CoyarCharline/kifily.htm ativan online]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=troctapas free mtv ringtones]] [[http://skyph0ne.blogspot.com bonus casino free online]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=trerc4t free mono ringtones]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=332 cheap levitra]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=333 buy lorazepam]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=monractroc punk ringtones]] [[http://www.rso.cmich.edu/prevet/messageboard/000031ae.htm generic fioricet]] [[http://www8.vjc.edu/EnvironmentalClub/discuss/msgReader$103 mp3 ringtones]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=dronzelchi free sony ringtones]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832208) didrex online]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1096 sildenafil online]] [[http://rellaboc.blogdiario.com/ adipex online]] [[http://elnobas.jubiiblog.de/ cheap levitra]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832233) polyphonic ringtones]] [[http://www8.vjc.edu/EnvironmentalClub/discuss/msgReader$104 free music ringtones]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=lioubo free real ringtones]] [[http://www8.vjc.edu/EnvironmentalClub/discuss/msgReader$99 levitra online]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=364 cheap valium]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=basroget midi ringtones]] [[http://trsitcna.blogdiario.com/ sharp ringtones]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1031?id=atch1140 kyocera ringtones]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=350 free qwest ringtones]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832251) viagra online]] [[http://www.rso.cmich.edu/prevet/messageboard/000031cd.htm free funny ringtone]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=trocerrol jazz ringtones]] [[http://www8.vjc.edu/EnvironmentalClub/discuss/msgReader$111 free qwest ringtones]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1085 hydrocodone online]] [[http://letobocco.jubiiblog.de/ valium online]] [[http://kimichameleon.blogspot.com valium grapefruit]] [[http://www.csun.edu/learningnet/discussion/file.php?0,file=124 norco online]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=314 alprazolam online]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=348 propecia]] [[http://www.rso.cmich.edu/prevet/messageboard/000031ab.htm phentermine online]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=getcdel nexium online]] [[http://www8.vjc.edu/EnvironmentalClub/discuss/msgReader$110 polyphonic ringtones]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1083 paxil online]] [[http://mabelsthecat.blogspot.com affiliate casino online program]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=oloeltdom free ringtones]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1077 cheap meridia]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1030?id=atch1107 but vigrx]] [[http://www8.vjc.edu/EnvironmentalClub/discuss/msgReader$136 buy viagra]] [[http://eltmonboc.jubiiblog.de/ music ringtones]] [[http://www8.vjc.edu/EnvironmentalClub/discuss/msgReader$101 free mono ringtones]] [[http://discussions.csbsju.edu/general/messages/25/bedisuz-244.html norco online]] [[http://letovipas.jubiiblog.de/ cheap tramadol]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1075 ativan online]] [[http://caacbas.blogdiario.com/ free punk ringtones]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1065 buy tramadol]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1031?id=atch1141 sony ringtones]] [[http://www.csun.edu/learningnet/discussion/file.php?0,file=117 online ultram]] [[http://paschitr.jubiiblog.de/ online soma]] [[http://www.csun.edu/learningnet/discussion/file.php?0,file=127 clonazepam online]] [[http://www.rso.cmich.edu/prevet/messageboard/000031a9.htm generic soma]] [[http://www.csun.edu/learningnet/discussion/file.php?0,file=123 adipex online]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1031?id=atch1137 sharp ringtones]] [[http://chiborol.jubiiblog.de/ didrex online]] [[http://www8.vjc.edu/EnvironmentalClub/discuss/msgReader$109 cheap phentermine]] [[http://or5alpas.blogdiario.com/ levitra online]] [[http://mutantalias.blogspot.com valium use]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=bocboor motorola ringtones]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1031?id=atch1126 music ringtones]] [[http://www.csun.edu/learningnet/discussion/file.php?0,file=143 funny ringtones]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1079 cheap norco]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=340 music ringtones]] [[http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/~twiki/pub/Main/AngelKristofer/roruce.htm free motorola ringtone]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1095 prozac online]] [[http://www.forumhosting.org/forum.php?mforum=basc4tdom hydrocodone online]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832232) cheap phentermine]] [[http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/~twiki/pub/Main/CoyarCharline/vyjobuw.htm generic soma]] [[http://forum.kharkiv.edu/SForums/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=314&amp;FORUM_ID=3&amp;CAT_ID=3 cheap cialis]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832242) free sony ericsson ringtones]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1090 cyclobenzaprine online]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832231) paxil online]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1031?id=atch1144 free jazz ringtones]] [[http://pathology.jhu.edu/N/n.web?EP=N&amp;URL=/MCGI/SEND1^WEBUTLTY(200,832249) order valium]] [[http://www.rso.cmich.edu/prevet/messageboard/000031d1.htm free nextel ringtone]] [[http://forum.kharkiv.edu/SForums/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=324&amp;FORUM_ID=3&amp;CAT_ID=3 cheap ativan]] [[http://acsitdom.blogdiario.com/ cyclobenzaprine online]] [[http://www.rso.cmich.edu/prevet/messageboard/0000319e.htm cheap tramadol]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1029?id=atch1072 ultram online]] [[http://www.rso.cmich.edu/prevet/messageboard/000031c7.htm nokia ringtones]] [[http://src.moffitt.usf.edu/sf/sfmain/do/downloadAttachment/projects.jaffy/tracker.bug_tracker/artf1031?id=atch1135 punk ringtones]] [[http://ignortd-eears.blogspot.com bonus casino gambling online]] [[http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/~twiki/pub/Main/CoyarCharline/gohy.htm generic vicodin]] [[https://www-internal.slac.stanford.edu/glast/integrationtest/online/Forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=337 motorola ringtones]] [[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not allowed to walk are indicated by: 
# Round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
# Rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
# Square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowd as well as standing on a petrolstation along the motorway.

Since the 80s Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, There are still official [[Liftershalte|liftershaltes]], official hitchhiking spots. 
Other good places are petrolstations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when it has an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). Major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km.

Useful tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to Germany can be a bit difficult because some people are afraid they could get in trouble because you could have marijuana (or other drugs) with you, which is semi-legal (or illegal) in the Netherlands while it still isn't in Germany. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it. At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie.

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:NL]]
[[cswiki:Netherlands]]
[[wikitravel:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>7s4gc41l6oie80eghr0pl63vvzdc7zg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11084</id>
      <parentid>11083</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-29T12:36:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2285">[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not allowed to walk are indicated by: 
# Round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
# Rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
# Square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowd as well as standing on a petrolstation along the motorway.

Since the 80s Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, There are still official [[Liftershalte|liftershaltes]], official hitchhiking spots. 
Other good places are petrolstations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when it has an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). Major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km.

Useful tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to Germany can be a bit difficult because some people are afraid they could get in trouble because you could have marijuana (or other drugs) with you, which is semi-legal (or illegal) in the Netherlands while it still isn't in Germany. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it. At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie.

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:NL]]
[[cswiki:Netherlands]]
[[wikitravel:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>79loz4oalskp82306ddvlfkz83q0rtg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11441</id>
      <parentid>11084</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-27T02:28:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tmoon</username>
        <id>91</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2298">[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not allowed to walk are indicated by: 
# Round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
# Rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
# Square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowd as well as standing on a petrolstation along the motorway.

Since the 80s Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, There are still official [[Liftershalte|liftershaltes]], official hitchhiking spots. 
Other good places are petrolstations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when it has an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). Major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km.

Useful tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to Germany can be a bit difficult because some people are afraid they could get in trouble because you could have marijuana (or other drugs) with you, which is semi-legal (or illegal) in the Netherlands while it still isn't in Germany. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it. At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie.

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Arnhem]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:NL]]
[[cswiki:Netherlands]]
[[wikitravel:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>k5s4qw2g8yexl02f7gqoem1hbt9kqrf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11997</id>
      <parentid>11441</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-02T15:54:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2534">[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not allowed to walk are indicated by: 
# Round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
# Rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
# Square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.

Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, There are still official [[Liftershalte|liftershaltes]], official hitchhiking spots. 
Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when it has an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). Major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km.

Useful tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to Germany can be a bit difficult because some people are afraid they could get in trouble because you could have marijuana (or other drugs) with you, which is semi-legal (or illegal) in the Netherlands while it still isn't in Germany. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it. At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie.

When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for 6,80 euro. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Arnhem]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:NL]]
[[cswiki:Netherlands]]
[[wikitravel:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>shbl4nibvc0jnv5y727b32k2he3oryx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12001</id>
      <parentid>11997</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-02T17:32:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>84.30.146.113</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2576">[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not allowed to walk are indicated by: 
# Round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
# Rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
# Square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.

Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, There are still official [[Liftershalte|liftershaltes]], official hitchhiking spots. 
Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when it has an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). Major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km.

Useful tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to Germany can be a bit difficult because some people are afraid they could get in trouble because you could have marijuana (or other drugs) with you, which is semi-legal (or illegal) in the Netherlands while it still isn't in Germany. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it. At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie.

When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for 6,80 euro, or a ''45 strippenkaart'' for 19,80 euro. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Arnhem]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:NL]]
[[cswiki:Netherlands]]
[[wikitravel:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>dinh3wrmazttyui24ml0l4fhekbdqff</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12002</id>
      <parentid>12001</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-02T17:33:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>84.30.146.113</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2576">[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not allowed to walk are indicated by: 
# Round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
# Rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
# Square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.

Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, There are still official [[Liftershalte|liftershaltes]], official hitchhiking spots. 
Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when it has an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). Major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km.

Useful tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to Germany can be a bit difficult because some people are afraid they could get in trouble because you could have marijuana (or other drugs) with you, which is semi-legal (or illegal) in the Netherlands while it still isn't in Germany. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it. At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie.

When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for 6,80 euro, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for 19,80 euro. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Arnhem]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:NL]]
[[cswiki:Netherlands]]
[[wikitravel:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>da5xbpdm1kl1ykogb287nq9iwm6x54u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12233</id>
      <parentid>12002</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-10T18:08:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>82.73.182.176</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2558">[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not allowed to walk are indicated by: 
# Round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
# Rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
# Square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.

Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, There are still official [[Liftershalte|liftershaltes]], official hitchhiking spots. 
Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when it has an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). Major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km.

Useful tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to Germany can be a bit difficult because some people are afraid they could get in trouble because you could have marijuana (or other drugs) with you, which is legal in the Netherlands while it still isn't in Germany. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it. At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie.

When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for 6,80 euro, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for 19,80 euro. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Arnhem]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:NL]]
[[cswiki:Netherlands]]
[[wikitravel:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>1r9f4ejd318fu1fzrhff83evldlgn6w</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12234</id>
      <parentid>12233</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-10T19:20:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tmoon</username>
        <id>91</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2651">[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not allowed to walk are indicated by: 
# a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
# a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
# a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.

Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, There are still official [[Liftershalte|liftershaltes]], official hitchhiking spots. 
Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.

Useful tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to Germany can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.

At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for 6,80 euro, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for 19,80 euro. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Arnhem]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:NL]]
[[cswiki:Netherlands]]
[[wikitravel:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>k9hjsw6nddi9hwu5mpltcj10so7tpzi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12237</id>
      <parentid>12234</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-10T21:52:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zac Stewart</username>
        <id>5</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2650">[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by: 
*a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
*a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
*a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.

Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, There are still official [[Liftershalte|liftershaltes]], official hitchhiking spots. 
Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.

Useful tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to Germany can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.

At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for 6,80 euro, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for 19,80 euro. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Arnhem]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:NL]]
[[cswiki:Netherlands]]
[[wikitravel:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>7fe8db9rfiaqox42wnsdqocl2px4yuf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12347</id>
      <parentid>12237</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-21T23:04:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>210.42.140.5</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20198">[[http://www.aswsu-ddp.wsu.edu/toast/forums.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=3&amp;tid=792 but prozac]] [[http://ae.siam.edu/forums/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=2&amp;tid=30 cheap ativan]] [[http://www4.nau.edu/fera/index.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=4&amp;tid=60 cheap sildenafil]] [[http://ae.siam.edu/forums/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=2&amp;tid=83 free polyphonic ringtones]] [[http://itcweb.ecsu.edu/portal/forums.asp?ForumId=13&amp;TopicId=182 free funny ringtones]] [[http://www.ees.ufl.edu/alumni/forums.asp?ForumId=5&amp;TopicId=110 nokia ringtones]] [[http://wc1.worldcrossing.com/WebX/.1de60a1b free music ringtones]] [[http://www.e.kth.se/cgi-bin/esekt/discussion?command=read&amp;discussionid=4&amp;id=30244 cheap diazepam]] [[http://ae.siam.edu/forums/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=2&amp;tid=36 alprazolam online]] [[http://www.ovu.edu/community/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=5&amp;tid=3710 clomid online]] [[http://www.ees.ufl.edu/alumni/forums.asp?ForumId=5&amp;TopicId=100 lortab online]] [[http://library.cshl.edu/wp/vb/member.php?u=1378 free sprint ringtones]] [[http://library.cshl.edu/wp/vb/member.php?u=1364 cheap nexium]] [[http://library.cshl.edu/wp/vb/member.php?u=1346 cheap diazepam]] [[http://wc1.worldcrossing.com/WebX/.1de60a1d cingular ringtones]] [[http://kc.vanderbilt.edu/forums/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=5&amp;tid=102 free nextel ringtones]] [[http://www.aswsu-ddp.wsu.edu/toast/forums.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=3&amp;tid=834 free punk ringtones]] [[http://www.ovu.edu/community/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=5&amp;tid=3698 cheap ativan]] [[http://library.cshl.edu/wp/vb/member.php?u=1348 ativan online]] [[http://www.ovu.edu/community/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=5&amp;tid=3708 cheap propecia]] [[http://www.ovu.edu/community/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=5&amp;tid=3701 alprazolam online]] [[http://www.ovu.edu/community/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=15&amp;tid=3774 free ericsson ringtones]] [[http://www4.nau.edu/fera/index.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=4&amp;tid=72 buy vigrx]] [[http://itcweb.ecsu.edu/portal/forums.asp?ForumId=13&amp;TopicId=226 cheap tramadol]] [[http://students.hsc.unt.edu/housing/item.cfm?type=2869 lorazepam online]] [[http://wc1.worldcrossing.com/WebX/.1de60a28 soma online]] [[http://www.ees.ufl.edu/alumni/forums.asp?ForumId=5&amp;TopicId=132 tenuate online]] [[http://www.e.kth.se/cgi-bin/esekt/discussion?command=read&amp;discussionid=4&amp;id=30258 cheap vicodin]] [[http://www.ees.ufl.edu/alumni/forums.asp?ForumId=5&amp;TopicId=90 cheap hgh]] [[http://students.hsc.unt.edu/housing/item.cfm?type=2864 clonazepam online]] [[http://itcweb.ecsu.edu/portal/forums.asp?ForumId=13&amp;TopicId=166 ativan online]] [[http://kc.vanderbilt.edu/forums/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=5&amp;tid=51 online carisoprodol]] [[http://www.ees.ufl.edu/alumni/forums.asp?ForumId=5&amp;TopicId=98 lisinopril]] [[http://www.ees.ufl.edu/alumni/forums.asp?ForumId=5&amp;TopicId=68 adipex online]] [[http://itcweb.ecsu.edu/portal/forums.asp?ForumId=13&amp;TopicId=184 hoodia]] [[http://wc1.worldcrossing.com/WebX/.1de60a2c cheap ultram]] [[http://library.cshl.edu/wp/vb/member.php?u=1384 sonyericsson ringtones]] [[http://itcweb.ecsu.edu/portal/forums.asp?ForumId=13&amp;TopicId=179 cheap fioricet]] [[http://students.hsc.unt.edu/housing/item.cfm?type=2921 free wwe ringtones]] [[http://www.ovu.edu/community/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=15&amp;tid=3766 music ringtones]] [[http://ae.siam.edu/forums/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=2&amp;tid=41 online ambien]] [[http://ae.siam.edu/forums/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=2&amp;tid=77 real ringtones]] [[http://library.cshl.edu/wp/vb/member.php?u=1350 meridia online]] [[http://www.ovu.edu/community/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=15&amp;tid=3767 polyphonic ringtones]] [[http://www.e.kth.se/cgi-bin/esekt/discussion?command=read&amp;discussionid=4&amp;id=30334 mp3 ringtones]] [[http://www.ees.ufl.edu/alumni/forums.asp?ForumId=5&amp;TopicId=138 free verizon ringtones]] [[http://www.ees.ufl.edu/alumni/forums.asp?ForumId=5&amp;TopicId=73 cheap ativan]] [[http://www.e.kth.se/cgi-bin/esekt/discussion?command=read&amp;discussionid=4&amp;id=30279 cheap ultracet]] [[http://www4.nau.edu/fera/index.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=4&amp;tid=66 lipitor online]] [[http://students.hsc.unt.edu/housing/item.cfm?type=2852 xanax online]] [[http://students.hsc.unt.edu/housing/item.cfm?type=2892 rivotril online]] [[http://www.ees.ufl.edu/alumni/forums.asp?ForumId=5&amp;TopicId=95 kyocera ringtones]] [[http://ae.siam.edu/forums/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=2&amp;tid=29 cialis online]] [[http://kc.vanderbilt.edu/forums/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=5&amp;tid=74 cheap ultracet]] [[http://www.colorado.edu/studentgroups/backcountryclub/blahdocs/uploads/levitra_8223.htm online levitra]] [[http://www.e.kth.se/cgi-bin/esekt/discussion?command=read&amp;discussionid=4&amp;id=30361 kyocera ringtones]] [[http://students.hsc.unt.edu/housing/item.cfm?type=2908 free music ringtones]] [[http://www.ees.ufl.edu/alumni/forums.asp?ForumId=5&amp;TopicId=88 free free ringtones]] [[http://wc1.worldcrossing.com/WebX/.1de60a35 free verizon ringtones]] [[http://www4.nau.edu/fera/index.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=4&amp;tid=31 cheap soma]] [[http://itcweb.ecsu.edu/portal/forums.asp?ForumId=13&amp;TopicId=204 ortho online]] [[http://library.cshl.edu/wp/vb/member.php?u=1362 wellbutrin online]] [[http://www.e.kth.se/cgi-bin/esekt/discussion?command=read&amp;discussionid=4&amp;id=30310 tenuate online]] [[http://www.ees.ufl.edu/alumni/forums.asp?ForumId=5&amp;TopicId=121 free real ringtones]] [[http://students.hsc.unt.edu/housing/item.cfm?type=2902 free nextel ringtones]] [[http://library.cshl.edu/wp/vb/member.php?u=1356 paxil online]] [[http://students.hsc.unt.edu/housing/item.cfm?type=2905 free motorola ringtones]] [[http://library.cshl.edu/wp/vb/member.php?u=1344 cheap xanax]] [[http://www.aswsu-ddp.wsu.edu/toast/forums.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=3&amp;tid=798 lipitor online]] [[http://www.e.kth.se/cgi-bin/esekt/discussion?command=read&amp;discussionid=4&amp;id=30355 free punk ringtones]] [[http://ae.siam.edu/forums/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=2&amp;tid=87 free sony ericsson ringtones]] [[http://kc.vanderbilt.edu/forums/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=5&amp;tid=118 cool ringtones]] [[http://students.hsc.unt.edu/housing/item.cfm?type=2913 sonyericsson ringtones]] [[http://www.ovu.edu/community/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=5&amp;tid=3735 mtv ringtones]] [[http://www4.nau.edu/fera/index.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=4&amp;tid=63 cheap albuterol]] [[http://students.hsc.unt.edu/housing/item.cfm?type=2910 polyphonic ringtones]] [[http://www.e.kth.se/cgi-bin/esekt/discussion?command=read&amp;discussionid=4&amp;id=30298 lisinopril online]] [[http://itcweb.ecsu.edu/portal/forums.asp?ForumId=13&amp;TopicId=236 free tracfone ringtones]] [[http://students.hsc.unt.edu/housing/item.cfm?type=2877 prozac online]] [[http://wc1.worldcrossing.com/WebX/.1de609df ambien online]] [[http://www.aswsu-ddp.wsu.edu/toast/forums.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=3&amp;tid=779 cheap clonazepam]] [[http://kc.vanderbilt.edu/forums/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=5&amp;tid=90 cheap zanaflex]] [[http://ae.siam.edu/forums/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=2&amp;tid=54 lisinopril online]] [[http://library.cshl.edu/wp/vb/member.php?u=1358 hydrocodone online]] [[http://www.ees.ufl.edu/alumni/forums.asp?ForumId=5&amp;TopicId=127 soma online]] [[http://www.aswsu-ddp.wsu.edu/toast/forums.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=3&amp;tid=768 cheap fioricet]] [[http://wc1.worldcrossing.com/WebX/.1de60a26 free sharp ringtones]] [[http://www.e.kth.se/cgi-bin/esekt/discussion?command=read&amp;discussionid=4&amp;id=30358 midi ringtones]] [[http://www.colorado.edu/studentgroups/backcountryclub/blahdocs/uploads/paxil_4058.htm cheap paxil]] [[http://www.e.kth.se/cgi-bin/esekt/discussion?command=read&amp;discussionid=4&amp;id=30266 lorazepam online]] [[http://www.ees.ufl.edu/alumni/forums.asp?ForumId=5&amp;TopicId=104 free motorola ringtones]] [[http://wc1.worldcrossing.com/WebX/.1de60a1a free mtv ringtones]] [[http://www.e.kth.se/cgi-bin/esekt/discussion?command=read&amp;discussionid=4&amp;id=30323 flexeril online]] [[http://www.ovu.edu/community/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=15&amp;tid=3770 free alltel ringtones]] [[http://www.ees.ufl.edu/alumni/forums.asp?ForumId=5&amp;TopicId=83 cheap didrex]] [[http://ae.siam.edu/forums/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=2&amp;tid=21 soma]] [[http://wc1.worldcrossing.com/WebX/.1de60a31 zanaflex online]] [[http://students.hsc.unt.edu/housing/item.cfm?type=2920 midi ringtones]] [[http://www.ees.ufl.edu/alumni/forums.asp?ForumId=5&amp;TopicId=140 order vicodin]] [[http://www.e.kth.se/cgi-bin/esekt/discussion?command=read&amp;discussionid=4&amp;id=30365 mtv ringtones]] [[http://wc1.worldcrossing.com/WebX/.1de609ed hoodia online]] [[http://students.hsc.unt.edu/housing/item.cfm?type=2865 cheap paxil]] [[http://kc.vanderbilt.edu/forums/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=5&amp;tid=114 sony ericsson ringtones]] [[http://wc1.worldcrossing.com/WebX/.1de609f2 meridia online]] [[http://www.e.kth.se/cgi-bin/esekt/discussion?command=read&amp;discussionid=4&amp;id=30268 cheap xenical]] [[http://www.ees.ufl.edu/alumni/forums.asp?ForumId=5&amp;TopicId=122 rivotril online]] [[http://www.ovu.edu/community/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=5&amp;tid=2694 valium]] [[http://students.hsc.unt.edu/housing/item.cfm?type=2853 cheap fioricet]] [[http://library.cshl.edu/wp/vb/member.php?u=1354 alprazolam online]] [[http://itcweb.ecsu.edu/portal/forums.asp?ForumId=13&amp;TopicId=209 xenical online]] [[http://ae.siam.edu/forums/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=2&amp;tid=65 rivotril online]] [[http://kc.vanderbilt.edu/forums/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=5&amp;tid=101 free mp3 ringtones]] [[http://ae.siam.edu/forums/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=2&amp;tid=95 kyocera ringtones]] [[http://wc1.worldcrossing.com/WebX/.1de60a21 paxil online]] [[http://www.colorado.edu/studentgroups/backcountryclub/blahdocs/uploads/musicringtones_8033.htm free music ringtones]] [[http://www.ovu.edu/community/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=5&amp;tid=3706 buy wellbutrin]] [[http://www4.nau.edu/fera/index.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=4&amp;tid=65 buy zoloft]] [[http://www.colorado.edu/studentgroups/backcountryclub/blahdocs/uploads/sonyericssonringtones_2032.htm sonyericsson ringtones]] [[http://www.ees.ufl.edu/alumni/forums.asp?ForumId=5&amp;TopicId=137 valium online]] [[http://wc1.worldcrossing.com/WebX/.1de609e3 cheap clomid]] [[http://www.aswsu-ddp.wsu.edu/toast/forums.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=3&amp;tid=804 vigrx online]] [[http://www.aswsu-ddp.wsu.edu/toast/forums.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=3&amp;tid=803 cheap lortab]] [[http://www.e.kth.se/cgi-bin/esekt/discussion?command=read&amp;discussionid=4&amp;id=30354 free alltel ringtones]] [[http://kc.vanderbilt.edu/forums/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=5&amp;tid=120 midi ringtones]] [[http://kc.vanderbilt.edu/forums/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=5&amp;tid=94 buy flexeril]] [[http://library.cshl.edu/wp/vb/member.php?u=1382 free cingular ringtones]] [[http://www.ovu.edu/community/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=5&amp;tid=3733 free wwe ringtones]] [[http://www.ovu.edu/community/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=5&amp;tid=3736 soma online]] [[http://www.aswsu-ddp.wsu.edu/toast/forums.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=3&amp;tid=766 carisoprodol online]] [[http://itcweb.ecsu.edu/portal/forums.asp?ForumId=13&amp;TopicId=161 albuterol online]] [[http://www.e.kth.se/cgi-bin/esekt/discussion?command=read&amp;discussionid=4&amp;id=30312 ortho online]] [[http://www.ees.ufl.edu/alumni/forums.asp?ForumId=5&amp;TopicId=101 meridia online]] [[http://www.ovu.edu/community/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=5&amp;tid=3716 diethylpropion online]] [[http://www.aswsu-ddp.wsu.edu/toast/forums.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=3&amp;tid=820 free real ringtones]] [[http://www.ees.ufl.edu/alumni/forums.asp?ForumId=5&amp;TopicId=89 free funny ringtones]] [[http://www.ees.ufl.edu/alumni/forums.asp?ForumId=5&amp;TopicId=86 fioricet online]] [[http://www4.nau.edu/fera/index.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=4&amp;tid=56 buy ultracet]] [[http://www.ees.ufl.edu/alumni/forums.asp?ForumId=5&amp;TopicId=133 free tracfone ringtones]] [[http://www.colorado.edu/studentgroups/backcountryclub/blahdocs/uploads/funnyringtones_5351.htm funny ringtones]] [[http://www4.nau.edu/fera/index.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=4&amp;tid=62 order clomid]] [[http://students.hsc.unt.edu/housing/item.cfm?type=2906 samsung ringtones]] [[http://www.e.kth.se/cgi-bin/esekt/discussion?command=read&amp;discussionid=4&amp;id=30296 order clomid]] [[http://wc1.worldcrossing.com/WebX/.1de60a17 buy lipitor]] [[http://www.aswsu-ddp.wsu.edu/toast/forums.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=3&amp;tid=801 ortho]] [[http://wc1.worldcrossing.com/WebX/.1de609ea free free ringtones]] [[http://www.e.kth.se/cgi-bin/esekt/discussion?command=read&amp;discussionid=4&amp;id=30315 buy lortab]] [[http://ae.siam.edu/forums/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=2&amp;tid=22 valium online]] [[http://library.cshl.edu/wp/vb/member.php?u=1361 xenical online]] [[http://www.aswsu-ddp.wsu.edu/toast/forums.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=3&amp;tid=763 soma online]] [[http://www.ovu.edu/community/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=5&amp;tid=3721 mp3 ringtones]] [[http://wc1.worldcrossing.com/WebX/.1de60a33 cheap prozac]] [[http://wc1.worldcrossing.com/WebX/.1de609dc albuterol online]] [[http://itcweb.ecsu.edu/portal/forums.asp?ForumId=13&amp;TopicId=189 but lipitor]] [[http://www.e.kth.se/cgi-bin/esekt/discussion?command=read&amp;discussionid=4&amp;id=30350 free sagem ringtones]] [[http://www.e.kth.se/cgi-bin/esekt/discussion?command=read&amp;discussionid=4&amp;id=30277 buy cyclobenzaprine]] [[http://www.ees.ufl.edu/alumni/forums.asp?ForumId=5&amp;TopicId=117 propecia online]] [[http://kc.vanderbilt.edu/forums/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=5&amp;tid=106 samsung ringtones]] [[http://kc.vanderbilt.edu/forums/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=5&amp;tid=66 but levitra]] [[http://www.ovu.edu/community/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=15&amp;tid=3746 cheap ambien]] [[http://www.colorado.edu/studentgroups/backcountryclub/blahdocs/uploads/alltelringtones_474.htm free alltel ringtones]] [[http://www.colorado.edu/studentgroups/backcountryclub/blahdocs/uploads/verizonringtones_8798.htm verizon ringtones]] [[http://library.cshl.edu/wp/vb/member.php?u=1381 free polyphonic ringtones]] [[http://kc.vanderbilt.edu/forums/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=5&amp;tid=56 cialis online]] [[http://students.hsc.unt.edu/housing/item.cfm?type=2924 ericsson ringtones]] [[http://wc1.worldcrossing.com/WebX/.1de609fb cheap ortho]] [[http://ae.siam.edu/forums/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=2&amp;tid=94 free wwe ringtones]] [[http://itcweb.ecsu.edu/portal/forums.asp?ForumId=13&amp;TopicId=171 order clomid]] [[http://www.colorado.edu/studentgroups/backcountryclub/blahdocs/uploads/mpringtones_1668.htm mp3 ringtones]] [[http://www.e.kth.se/cgi-bin/esekt/discussion?command=read&amp;discussionid=4&amp;id=30316 vigrx online]] [[http://www.ovu.edu/community/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=15&amp;tid=3744 clonazepam online]] [[http://itcweb.ecsu.edu/portal/forums.asp?ForumId=13&amp;TopicId=200 nexium]] [[http://ae.siam.edu/forums/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=2&amp;tid=33 buy adipex]] [[http://www.ees.ufl.edu/alumni/forums.asp?ForumId=5&amp;TopicId=76 online cialis]] [[http://itcweb.ecsu.edu/portal/forums.asp?ForumId=13&amp;TopicId=178 free ericsson ringtones]] [[http://www4.nau.edu/fera/index.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=4&amp;tid=86 qwest ringtones]] [[http://kc.vanderbilt.edu/forums/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=5&amp;tid=109 free verizon ringtones]] [[http://www.e.kth.se/cgi-bin/esekt/discussion?command=read&amp;discussionid=4&amp;id=30295 order sildenafil]] [[http://www.colorado.edu/studentgroups/backcountryclub/blahdocs/uploads/adipex_547.htm adipex online]] [[http://www.aswsu-ddp.wsu.edu/toast/forums.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=3&amp;tid=839 free kyocera ringtones]] [[http://www.colorado.edu/studentgroups/backcountryclub/blahdocs/uploads/nexium_2418.htm nexium online]] [[http://wc1.worldcrossing.com/WebX/.1de609f3 midi ringtones]] [[http://www.aswsu-ddp.wsu.edu/toast/forums.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=3&amp;tid=827 free cingular ringtones]] [[http://wc1.worldcrossing.com/WebX/.1de609f7 free nextel ringtones]] [[http://wc1.worldcrossing.com/WebX/.1de60a20 cheap nexium]] [[http://itcweb.ecsu.edu/portal/forums.asp?ForumId=13&amp;TopicId=195 free mono ringtones]] [[http://www.ees.ufl.edu/alumni/forums.asp?ForumId=5&amp;TopicId=77 cingular ringtones]] [[http://kc.vanderbilt.edu/forums/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=5&amp;tid=85 buy tenuate]] [[http://www.ovu.edu/community/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=5&amp;tid=3734 sony ringtones]] [[http://www.e.kth.se/cgi-bin/esekt/discussion?command=read&amp;discussionid=4&amp;id=30265 cheap ambien]] [[http://itcweb.ecsu.edu/portal/forums.asp?ForumId=13&amp;TopicId=170 free cingular ringtones]] [[http://www.e.kth.se/cgi-bin/esekt/discussion?command=read&amp;discussionid=4&amp;id=30332 tracfone ringtones]] [[http://www4.nau.edu/fera/index.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=4&amp;tid=53 xenical online]] [[http://www.ovu.edu/community/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=15&amp;tid=3759 cheap flexeril]] [[http://ae.siam.edu/forums/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=2&amp;tid=55 cheap zoloft]] [[http://itcweb.ecsu.edu/portal/forums.asp?ForumId=13&amp;TopicId=169 cialis online]] [[http://www4.nau.edu/fera/index.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=4&amp;tid=78 buy hoodia]] [[http://itcweb.ecsu.edu/portal/forums.asp?ForumId=13&amp;TopicId=213 prozac online]] [[http://students.hsc.unt.edu/housing/item.cfm?type=2849 but valium]] [[http://students.hsc.unt.edu/housing/item.cfm?type=2880 albuterol online]] [[http://www.ovu.edu/community/toast.asp?sub=show&amp;action=posts&amp;fid=5&amp;tid=3717 hgh online]] [[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by: 
*a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
*a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
*a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.

Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, There are still official [[Liftershalte|liftershaltes]], official hitchhiking spots. 
Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.

Useful tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to Germany can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.

At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for 6,80 euro, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for 19,80 euro. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Arnhem]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:NL]]
[[cswiki:Netherlands]]
[[wikitravel:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>hsisx5ojfex745gxkfrw2t8c4sqrj8x</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12359</id>
      <parentid>12347</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-22T16:58:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2650">[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by: 
*a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
*a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
*a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.

Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, There are still official [[Liftershalte|liftershaltes]], official hitchhiking spots. 
Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.

Useful tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to Germany can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.

At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for 6,80 euro, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for 19,80 euro. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Arnhem]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:NL]]
[[cswiki:Netherlands]]
[[wikitravel:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>7fe8db9rfiaqox42wnsdqocl2px4yuf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13175</id>
      <parentid>12359</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-24T08:00:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2701">[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by: 
*a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
*a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
*a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.

Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, There are still official [[Liftershalte|liftershaltes]], official hitchhiking spots. 
Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.

Useful tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to Germany can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.

At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for 6,80 euro, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for 19,80 euro. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Arnhem]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Eindhoven]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [['s-Hertogenbosch]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]
* [[Venlo]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:NL]]
[[cswiki:Netherlands]]
[[wikitravel:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>plg0aocy9tfcrcq5jf1m739s2s9ju0l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13305</id>
      <parentid>13175</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-30T08:26:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2735">[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by: 
*a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
*a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
*a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.

Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, There are still official [[Liftershalte|liftershaltes]], official hitchhiking spots. 
Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.

Useful tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to Germany can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.

At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for 6,80 euro, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for 19,80 euro. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Arnhem]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Eindhoven]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [['s-Hertogenbosch]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]
* [[Venlo]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==Roads==
* [[A2 (Netherlands)]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[lh:NL]]
[[cswiki:Netherlands]]
[[wikitravel:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>rg0bcavsnt6572qxqrokvidstrehffg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13572</id>
      <parentid>13305</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-11T14:36:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2788">[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by: 
*a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
*a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
*a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.

Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, There are still official [[Liftershalte|liftershaltes]], official hitchhiking spots. 
Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.

Useful tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to Germany can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.

At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for 6,80 euro, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for 19,80 euro. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Arnhem]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Eindhoven]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [['s-Hertogenbosch]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]
* [[Venlo]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==Roads==
* [[A2 (Netherlands)]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Niederlande]]</text>
      <sha1>20jkrhrgkw0x63pmqiuvjl2s6auuwkt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13619</id>
      <parentid>13572</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-12T12:46:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2809">[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by: 
*a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
*a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
*a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.

Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, There are still official [[Liftershalte|liftershaltes]], official hitchhiking spots. 
Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.

Useful tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to Germany can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.

At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for 6,80 euro, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for 19,80 euro. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Arnhem]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Eindhoven]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [['s-Hertogenbosch]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]
* [[Venlo]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==Roads==
* [[A2 (Netherlands)]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países_Bajos]]</text>
      <sha1>runekn81hg51nkmbmmh4mtm4omegddg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13628</id>
      <parentid>13619</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-12T14:10:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2809">[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by: 
*a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
*a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
*a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.

Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, There are still official [[Liftershalte|liftershaltes]], official hitchhiking spots. 
Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.

Useful tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to Germany can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.

At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for 6,80 euro, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for 19,80 euro. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Arnhem]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Eindhoven]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [['s-Hertogenbosch]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]
* [[Venlo]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==Roads==
* [[A2 (Netherlands)]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]</text>
      <sha1>qt0irlwp11jpeqrr957j59tg1q5uy8z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13635</id>
      <parentid>13628</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-12T15:21:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2813">[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by: 
*a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
*a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
*a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.

Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, There are still official [[Liftershalte|liftershaltes]], official hitchhiking spots. 
Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.

Useful tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.

At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for 6,80 euro, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for 19,80 euro. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Arnhem]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Eindhoven]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [['s-Hertogenbosch]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]
* [[Venlo]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==Roads==
* [[A2 (Netherlands)]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]</text>
      <sha1>i1sm56i94wc1m0naf2rttwtus98p6km</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13698</id>
      <parentid>13635</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-13T09:38:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2839">[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by: 
*a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
*a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
*a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.

Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, There are still official [[Liftershalte|liftershaltes]], official hitchhiking spots. 
Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.

Useful tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.

At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for 6,80 euro, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for 19,80 euro. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Arnhem]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Eindhoven]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [['s-Hertogenbosch]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]
* [[Venlo]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==Roads==
* [[A2 (Netherlands)]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
{{hitchbase_country|138}}</text>
      <sha1>6jfv58scmc00sj99ktou78t9trti71y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13713</id>
      <parentid>13698</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-13T09:43:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2840">[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by: 
*a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
*a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
*a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.

Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, There are still official [[Liftershalte|liftershaltes]], official hitchhiking spots. 
Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.

Useful tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.

At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for 6,80 euro, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for 19,80 euro. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Arnhem]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Eindhoven]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [['s-Hertogenbosch]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]
* [[Venlo]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==Roads==
* [[A2 (Netherlands)]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]

{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]</text>
      <sha1>36o4emyzrf0d0fxtdvnk68tutzyvu02</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13732</id>
      <parentid>13713</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-13T15:26:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2856">[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by: 
*a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
*a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
*a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.

Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, There are still official [[Liftershalte|liftershaltes]], official hitchhiking spots. 
Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.

Useful tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.

At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for 6,80 euro, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for 19,80 euro. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

==Cities==
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Arnhem]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Eindhoven]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [['s-Hertogenbosch]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]
* [[Venlo]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==Roads==
* [[A2 (Netherlands)]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]

{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>3emokcjpi71yi7qi0vyhjbi7s0hi0b9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14606</id>
      <parentid>13732</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-10T15:57:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2926">[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by: 
*a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian. 
*a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 
*a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here. 

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.

Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, There are still official [[Liftershalte|liftershaltes]], official hitchhiking spots. 
Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.

Useful tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.

At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for 6,80 euro, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for 19,80 euro. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

==Cities==
[[Image:Netherlands.jpg|thumb|right|200px|Entering from [[Belgium]]]]
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Arnhem]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Eindhoven]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [['s-Hertogenbosch]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]
* [[Venlo]]

==Towns==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

==Roads==
* [[A2 (Netherlands)]]

==External links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]

{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>84n1q5a9oa24kyu9a4ktiupeftnz2jk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14735</id>
      <parentid>14606</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-13T18:57:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2920">[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.

Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, There are still official [[liftershalte]]s, official hitchhiking spots.
Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.

Useful tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.

At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for 6,80 Euro, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for 19,80 Euro. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

== Cities ==
[[Image:Netherlands.jpg|thumb|right|200px|Entering from [[Belgium]]]]
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Arnhem]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Eindhoven]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [['s-Hertogenbosch]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]
* [[Venlo]]

== Towns ==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

== Roads ==
* [[A2 (Netherlands)]]

== External links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.


[[Category:Netherlands| ]]
[[Category:Europe]]

{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>lqubsmgh9kbsjyeog1qyn664ngoh2we</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14949</id>
      <parentid>14735</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-16T12:19:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robino</username>
        <id>4</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2943">[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.

Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, There are still official [[liftershalte]]s, official hitchhiking spots.
Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.

Useful tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.

At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for 6,80 Euro, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for 19,80 Euro. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

== Cities ==
[[Image:Netherlands.jpg|thumb|right|200px|Entering from [[Belgium]]]]
* [[Amsterdam]]
* [[Arnhem]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Eindhoven]]
* [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [['s-Hertogenbosch]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]
* [[Venlo]]

== Towns ==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

== Roads ==
* [[A1 (Netherlands)]]
* [[A2 (Netherlands)]]

== External links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.


[[Category:Netherlands| ]]
[[Category:Europe]]

{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>i2z1p3dh9ud4dm6ypqlqwmiuwpkz2b6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15035</id>
      <parentid>14949</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-21T21:45:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3407">[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.

Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, There are still official [[liftershalte]]s, official hitchhiking spots.
Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.

Useful tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.

At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for 6,80 Euro, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for 19,80 Euro. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

==Cities==
[[Image:Netherlands.jpg|thumb|right|200px|Entering from [[Belgium]]]]
* [[Amsterdam]], [[Arnhem]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Eindhoven]], [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [['s-Hertogenbosch]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]
* [[Venlo]]

== Towns ==
&lt;!-- this can be put in provinces once it's getting a bit bigger --&gt;
* [[Nuth]]

== Roads ==
* [[A1 (Netherlands)]]
* [[A2 (Netherlands)]]
* [[A50 (Netherlands)]]

==Regions==
* [[:Category:Drenthe|Drenthe]]
* [[:Category:Flevoland|Flevoland]]
* [[:Category:Friesland|Friesland]]
* [[:Category:Gelderland|Gelderland]]
* [[:Category:Groningen|Groningen]]
* [[:Category:Limburg|Limburg]]
* [[:Category:Noord Brabant|Noord Brabant]]
* [[:Category:Noord Holland|Noord Holland]]
* [[:Category:Overijssel|Overijssel]]
* [[:Category:Utrecht|Utrecht]]
* [[:Category:Zeeland|Zeeland]]
* [[:Category:Zuid Holland|Zuid Holland]]

==Links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.


[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]

{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>e5iz84vv2g7kdcjagdypq732laijcwv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15112</id>
      <parentid>15035</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-24T20:41:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3535">[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.

Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, There are still official [[liftershalte]]s, official hitchhiking spots.
Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.

Useful tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.

At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for 6,80 Euro, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for 19,80 Euro. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

==Cities==
[[Image:Netherlands.jpg|thumb|right|200px|Entering from [[Belgium]]]]
* [[Almelo]], [[Amsterdam]], [[Arnhem]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Eindhoven]], [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [[Hengelo]], [['s-Hertogenbosch]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]
* [[Venlo]]

== Roads ==
* [[A1 (Netherlands)]]
* [[A2 (Netherlands)]]
* [[A50 (Netherlands)]]

==Links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.


{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Provinces in the [[Netherlands]]
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
[[:Category:Drenthe|Drenthe]] | [[:Category:Flevoland|Flevoland]] | [[:Category:Friesland|Friesland]] | [[:Category:Gelderland|Gelderland]] | [[:Category:Groningen|Groningen]] | [[:Category:Limburg|Limburg]] | [[:Category:Noord Brabant|Noord Brabant]] | [[:Category:Noord Holland|Noord Holland]] | [[:Category:Overijssel|Overijssel]] | [[:Category:Utrecht|Utrecht]] | [[:Category:Zeeland|Zeeland]] | [[:Category:Zuid Holland|Zuid Holland]]
|-
|}

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]


{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>lb7bnvsq5mwnnda75ig5gk4eompbu9a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15179</id>
      <parentid>15112</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-27T12:22:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3559">[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.

Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, There are still official [[liftershalte]]s, official hitchhiking spots.
Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.

Useful tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.

At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for 6,80 Euro, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for 19,80 Euro. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

==Cities==
[[Image:Netherlands.jpg|thumb|right|200px|Entering from [[Belgium]]]]
* [[Almelo]], [[Amsterdam]], [[Arnhem]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Eindhoven]], [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [[Hengelo]], [['s-Hertogenbosch]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]
* [[Venlo]]

== Roads ==
* [[A1 (Netherlands)]]
* [[A2 (Netherlands)]]
* [[A12 (Netherlands)]]
* [[A50 (Netherlands)]]

==Links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.


{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Provinces in the [[Netherlands]]
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
[[:Category:Drenthe|Drenthe]] | [[:Category:Flevoland|Flevoland]] | [[:Category:Friesland|Friesland]] | [[:Category:Gelderland|Gelderland]] | [[:Category:Groningen|Groningen]] | [[:Category:Limburg|Limburg]] | [[:Category:Noord Brabant|Noord Brabant]] | [[:Category:Noord Holland|Noord Holland]] | [[:Category:Overijssel|Overijssel]] | [[:Category:Utrecht|Utrecht]] | [[:Category:Zeeland|Zeeland]] | [[:Category:Zuid Holland|Zuid Holland]]
|-
|}

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]


{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>8b9cg9xyz5wkp0vd0ks7277nn5ssnqm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15484</id>
      <parentid>15179</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-06T18:56:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2927">[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

However: standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.

Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, There are still official [[liftershalte]]s, official hitchhiking spots.
Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.

Useful tip: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library.

To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.

At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for 6,80 Euro, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for 19,80 Euro. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

==Cities==
[[Image:Netherlands.jpg|thumb|right|200px|Entering from [[Belgium]]]]
* [[Almelo]], [[Amsterdam]], [[Arnhem]]
* [[Den Haag]]
* [[Eindhoven]], [[Enschede]]
* [[Groningen]]
* [[Hengelo]], [['s-Hertogenbosch]]
* [[Maastricht]]
* [[Nijmegen]]
* [[Rotterdam]]
* [[Utrecht]]
* [[Venlo]]

== Roads ==
* [[A1 (Netherlands)]]
* [[A2 (Netherlands)]]
* [[A12 (Netherlands)]]
* [[A50 (Netherlands)]]

==Links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.


{{Provinces NL}}

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]


{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>dwdu44m9fyr7uelvs5v0rllab6vfn23</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15791</id>
      <parentid>15484</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-09T11:33:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2899">[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte|liftershaltes]], '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

Useful tips: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library. When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 19,80. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Highways NL}}

==Links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]
{{hitchbase_country|138}}
[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>62ysipupzicclduu1944fiyjahj1t1t</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15866</id>
      <parentid>15791</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-11T01:36:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2900">[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte|liftershaltes]], '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

Useful tips: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library. When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 19,80. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Highways NL}}

==Links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]
{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>46t2k1ghsfrj8ykqbvaf0q53bzgm5vr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16286</id>
      <parentid>15866</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-05T01:11:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3359">[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte|liftershaltes]], '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

Useful tips: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library. When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 19,80. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Highways NL}}

== Foods ==

The Netherlands is one of the rare country where you can find cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter', which is a nutritive item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce ''(Zaanse)'' for about 30 cents, which can last long without being refrigerated and are a great supplements to sandwiches or ''frieten'' (it avoid to have to pay the 50 cents sauce at the 'frietkot' when ordering a snack).

==Links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]
{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>hr611m0notso573x68mzsy2lu547s5t</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16343</id>
      <parentid>16286</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-08T13:42:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3488">{{infobox Country
|country = Netherlands
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro ( € )
}}
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. [[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte|liftershaltes]], '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

Useful tips: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library. When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 19,80. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Highways NL}}

== Foods ==

The Netherlands is one of the rare country where you can find cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter', which is a nutritive item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce ''(Zaanse)'' for about 30 cents, which can last long without being refrigerated and are a great supplements to sandwiches or ''frieten'' (it avoid to have to pay the 50 cents sauce at the 'frietkot' when ordering a snack).

==Links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]
{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>fg8klaxf1v733omo8t22bb2tlshdxow</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16523</id>
      <parentid>16343</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-16T14:17:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3517">{{infobox Country
|country = Netherlands
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. [[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte|liftershaltes]], '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

Useful tips: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library. When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 19,80. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Highways NL}}

== Foods ==

The Netherlands is one of the rare country where you can find cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter', which is a nutritive item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce ''(Zaanse)'' for about 30 cents, which can last long without being refrigerated and are a great supplements to sandwiches or ''frieten'' (it avoid to have to pay the 50 cents sauce at the 'frietkot' when ordering a snack).

==Links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]
{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>12igerf5j9vj1ao2jdb5z261efduc64</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16555</id>
      <parentid>16523</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-21T22:51:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3533">{{infobox Country
|country = Netherlands
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. [[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte|liftershaltes]], '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

Useful tips: Free use of Internet PC's in every city library. When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 19,80. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Highways NL}}

== Foods ==

The Netherlands is one of the rare country where you can find cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter', which is a nutritive item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce ''(Zaanse sauce)'' for about 30 cents, which can last long without needing to be refrigerated and are a great supplements to sandwiches or ''frieten'' (as it avoid having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the 'frietkot' when ordering a snack).

==Links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]
{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>bq56pzw057wxvn6dvmg6z56rd04y4q7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16556</id>
      <parentid>16555</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-21T22:54:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3544">{{infobox Country
|country = Netherlands
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. [[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte|liftershaltes]], '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

'''Useful tips:'''
* Free use of Internet PC's in every city library. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 19,80. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Highways NL}}

== Foods ==

The Netherlands is one of the rare country where you can find cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter', which is a nutritive item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce ''(Zaanse sauce)'' for about 30 cents, which can last long without needing to be refrigerated and are a great supplements to sandwiches or ''frieten'' (as it avoid having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the 'frietkot' when ordering a snack).

==Links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]
{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>kdf5bxw1rtvs62qyth06fq174k6wuz2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16557</id>
      <parentid>16556</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-21T22:54:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3550">{{infobox Country
|country = Netherlands
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. [[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte|liftershaltes]], '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

----

'''Useful tips:'''
* Free use of Internet PC's in every city library. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 19,80. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Highways NL}}

== Foods ==

The Netherlands is one of the rare country where you can find cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter', which is a nutritive item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce ''(Zaanse sauce)'' for about 30 cents, which can last long without needing to be refrigerated and are a great supplements to sandwiches or ''frieten'' (as it avoid having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the 'frietkot' when ordering a snack).

==Links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by Frank Verhart.
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]
{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>c414u190uqh9uujt6t5ctfktey97uog</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16571</id>
      <parentid>16557</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-22T00:26:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3572">{{infobox Country
|country = Netherlands
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. [[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte|liftershaltes]], '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

----

'''Useful tips:'''
* Free use of Internet PC's in every city library. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 19,80. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Highways NL}}

== Foods ==

The Netherlands is one of the rare country where you can find cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter', which is a nutritive item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce ''(Zaanse sauce)'' for about 30 cents, which can last long without needing to be refrigerated and are a great supplements to sandwiches or ''frieten'' (as it avoid having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the 'frietkot' when ordering a snack).

==Links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[Username:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]
{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>a8gtbzxscsmrirc8842mp2qiz97gjbp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16572</id>
      <parentid>16571</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-22T00:27:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3568">{{infobox Country
|country = Netherlands
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. [[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte|liftershaltes]], '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

----

'''Useful tips:'''
* Free use of Internet PC's in every city library. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 19,80. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Highways NL}}

== Foods ==

The Netherlands is one of the rare country where you can find cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter', which is a nutritive item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce ''(Zaanse sauce)'' for about 30 cents, which can last long without needing to be refrigerated and are a great supplements to sandwiches or ''frieten'' (as it avoid having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the 'frietkot' when ordering a snack).

==Links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]
{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>39ldcgyl0aqcpe23jq0p7b1ch3svrtu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16579</id>
      <parentid>16572</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-22T11:05:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3561">{{infobox Country
|country = Netherlands
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. [[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte|liftershaltes]], '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

===Useful tips===
* Free use of Internet PC's in every city library. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 19,80. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Highways NL}}

== Foods ==

The Netherlands is one of the rare country where you can find cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter', which is a nutritive item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce ''(Zaanse sauce)'' for about 30 cents, which can last long without needing to be refrigerated and are a great supplements to sandwiches or ''frieten'' (as it avoid having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the 'frietkot' when ordering a snack).

==Links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]
{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>1dc2c5zeyjdnzqy3asqa0alfezu36ts</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16612</id>
      <parentid>16579</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-23T16:32:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3721">{{infobox Country
|country = Netherlands
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|200px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte|liftershaltes]], '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

===Useful tips===
* Free use of Internet PC's in every city library. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 19,80. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Highways NL}}

== Foods ==
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands is one of the rare country where you can find cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter', which is a nutritive item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce ''(Zaanse sauce)'' for about 30 cents, which can last long without needing to be refrigerated and are a great supplements to sandwiches or ''frieten'' (as it avoid having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the 'frietkot' when ordering a snack).

==Links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]
{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>1q5wxy2fyluypgoud4xtmpn1q7jhdae</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16613</id>
      <parentid>16612</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-23T16:32:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3721">{{infobox Country
|country = Netherlands
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte|liftershaltes]], '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

===Useful tips===
* Free use of Internet PC's in every city library. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 19,80. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Highways NL}}

== Foods ==
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands is one of the rare country where you can find cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter', which is a nutritive item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce ''(Zaanse sauce)'' for about 30 cents, which can last long without needing to be refrigerated and are a great supplements to sandwiches or ''frieten'' (as it avoid having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the 'frietkot' when ordering a snack).

==Links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]
{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>6bu1a12b7hy22xd584ss5rim01a69wm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16763</id>
      <parentid>16613</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-27T02:50:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>62.251.20.250</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3735">{{infobox Country
|country = Netherlands
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte|liftershaltes]], '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

===Useful tips===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 19,80. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Highways NL}}

== Foods ==
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands is one of the rare country where you can find cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter', which is a nutritive item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce ''(Zaanse sauce)'' for about 30 cents, which can last long without needing to be refrigerated and are a great supplements to sandwiches or ''frieten'' (as it avoid having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the 'frietkot' when ordering a snack).

==Links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]
{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>smtqvh6jazanuu99y23den3yaf39znm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17956</id>
      <parentid>16763</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-16T21:27:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>82.173.186.159</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3735">{{infobox Country
|country = Netherlands
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte|liftershaltes]], '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try and speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

===Useful tips===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Highways NL}}

== Foods ==
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands is one of the rare country where you can find cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter', which is a nutritive item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce ''(Zaanse sauce)'' for about 30 cents, which can last long without needing to be refrigerated and are a great supplements to sandwiches or ''frieten'' (as it avoid having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the 'frietkot' when ordering a snack).

==Links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]
{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>fi3lp0xtf8723051eo0ifnt0bmu7oxv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18238</id>
      <parentid>17956</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-22T08:41:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>195.83.11.66</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3734">{{infobox Country
|country = Netherlands
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte|liftershaltes]], '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

===Useful tips===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (illegal but tolerated in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Highways NL}}

== Foods ==
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands is one of the rare country where you can find cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter', which is a nutritive item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce ''(Zaanse sauce)'' for about 30 cents, which can last long without needing to be refrigerated and are a great supplements to sandwiches or ''frieten'' (as it avoid having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the 'frietkot' when ordering a snack).

==Links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]
{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>e45pm2wer7vnsn1r8f6oan8nonkelck</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18307</id>
      <parentid>18238</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-02-04T21:39:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>82.170.225.52</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3823">{{infobox Country
|country = Netherlands
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte|liftershaltes]], '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

===Useful tips===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Highways NL}}

== Foods ==
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritive item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which can last long without needing to be refrigerated and are a great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes 'f'rituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

==Links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]
{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>9n7c3mf8gm0h402l2t179398o8zcdk0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18308</id>
      <parentid>18307</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-02-04T21:42:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>82.170.225.52</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3822">{{infobox Country
|country = Netherlands
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte|liftershaltes]], '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

===Useful tips===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== Foods ==
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritive item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which can last long without needing to be refrigerated and are a great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

==Links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}{{Highways NL}}

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]
{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>gn4l5sk3rhenqvou0te9b5in02rpf4r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18309</id>
      <parentid>18308</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-02-04T21:49:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>82.170.225.52</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4205">{{infobox Country
|country = Netherlands
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte|liftershaltes]], '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

===Useful tips===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from. (It does indicate the age of the car.) A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Taxis' license plates have a blue background.

== Foods ==
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritive item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which can last long without needing to be refrigerated and are a great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

==Links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}{{Highways NL}}

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]
{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>1if81w1q9mp6p6n8jgd5iqdbcywv1uz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18312</id>
      <parentid>18309</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-02-07T10:52:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4717">{{infobox Country
|country = Netherlands
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte|liftershaltes]], '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

===Useful tips===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest verhicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters.

== Foods ==
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritive item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which can last long without needing to be refrigerated and are a great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

==Links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}{{Highways NL}}

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]
{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>olugl65taeereyp81a2la3hzoeqpl09</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18313</id>
      <parentid>18312</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-02-07T10:54:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4860">{{infobox Country
|country = Netherlands
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
Hitchhiking in the '''Netherlands''' is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte|liftershaltes]], '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

===Useful tips===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest verhicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. Military service has a black license plate with white letters; the number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Foods ==
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritive item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which can last long without needing to be refrigerated and are a great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

==Links==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}{{Highways NL}}

[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]
{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>r0al8ha7d13qik1ne4mtnrh80r78h69</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18377</id>
      <parentid>18313</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-02-15T12:37:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4944">{{infobox Country
|country = Netherlands
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte|liftershaltes]], '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram.

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest verhicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. Military service has a black license plate with white letters; the number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Foods ==
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritive item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which can last long without needing to be refrigerated and are a great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}{{Highways NL}}

[[Category:Netherlands| ]]
{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>77vlxvuk3ha90ys6p6mr7wdbwtmsjv2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19843</id>
      <parentid>18377</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-05-11T12:14:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lnx</username>
        <id>1303</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5369">{{infobox Country
|country = Netherlands
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte|liftershaltes]], '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes - for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart for getting into/out of city centres - it will be valid all over the country.)

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest verhicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. Military service has a black license plate with white letters; the number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Foods ==
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritive item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which can last long without needing to be refrigerated and are a great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}{{Highways NL}}

[[Category:Netherlands| ]]
{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>dwadscc17eqv73n67oo1oi4mj3g46hs</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21079</id>
      <parentid>19843</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-12T11:24:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>192.87.141.136</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5307">{{infobox Country
|country = Netherlands
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte|liftershaltes]], '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes - for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart for getting into/out of city centres - it will be valid all over the country.)

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest verhicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters.  the number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Foods ==
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritive item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which can last long without needing to be refrigerated and are a great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}{{Highways NL}}

[[Category:Netherlands| ]]
{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>5idlwdup0z4bg5sq1sjlidptivobbhb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21123</id>
      <parentid>21079</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-13T19:50:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5322">{{infobox Country
|country = Netherlands
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro ( € )
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte|liftershaltes]], '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5-45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50km.At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes - for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart for getting into/out of city centres - it will be valid all over the country.)

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest verhicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters.  the number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Foods ==
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritive item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which can last long without needing to be refrigerated and are a great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}{{Highways NL}}
{{IsIn|Europe}}
[[Category:Netherlands| ]]
{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>1fajfpncq25dafdxn5ynsxab747d60a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21262</id>
      <parentid>21123</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-14T22:30:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5299">{{infobox Country
|country = Netherlands
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km.At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes - for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart for getting into/out of city centres - it will be valid all over the country.)

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest verhicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters.  the number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Foods ==
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritive item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which can last long without needing to be refrigerated and are a great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}{{Highways NL}}
{{IsIn|Europe}}
[[Category:Netherlands| ]]
{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>qy0phd9nh2svkutbnk4zprhkw2bc3x3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22491</id>
      <parentid>21262</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-15T16:34:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.28.127.255</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5320">aceltarorice
{{infobox Country
|country = Netherlands
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (â¬)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5â45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km.At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes - for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart for getting into/out of city centres - it will be valid all over the country.)

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest verhicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters.  the number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Foods ==
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritive item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which can last long without needing to be refrigerated and are a great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}{{Highways NL}}
{{IsIn|Europe}}
[[Category:Netherlands| ]]
{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:PaÃ­ses Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>k62yboor1z9hphsk78d00kgejcpav3j</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22494</id>
      <parentid>22491</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-15T19:00:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5299">{{infobox Country
|country = Netherlands
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km.At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes - for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart for getting into/out of city centres - it will be valid all over the country.)

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest verhicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters.  the number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Foods ==
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritive item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which can last long without needing to be refrigerated and are a great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}{{Highways NL}}
{{IsIn|Europe}}
[[Category:Netherlands| ]]
{{hitchbase_country|138}}

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>qy0phd9nh2svkutbnk4zprhkw2bc3x3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>25479</id>
      <parentid>22494</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-01T15:21:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5346">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' /&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km.At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes - for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart for getting into/out of city centres - it will be valid all over the country.)

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest verhicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters.  the number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Foods ==
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritive item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which can last long without needing to be refrigerated and are a great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}{{Highways NL}}

{{hitchbase_country|138}}

{{IsIn|Europe}}
[[Category:Netherlands| ]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>0rm6uo7yjdvdx458gp3enykd60a6aj5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>25767</id>
      <parentid>25479</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-05T15:32:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5361">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km.At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes - for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart for getting into/out of city centres - it will be valid all over the country.)

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest verhicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters.  the number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Foods ==
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritive item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which can last long without needing to be refrigerated and are a great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}{{Highways NL}}

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Europe}}
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]
[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>h4kool63jio6wqlkyzmext0gmk4sw0e</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26117</id>
      <parentid>25767</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-13T14:23:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5362">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km.At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes - for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart for getting into/out of city centres - it will be valid all over the country.)

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest verhicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters.  the number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Foods ==
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritive item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which can last long without needing to be refrigerated and are a great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}{{Highways NL}}

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Europe}}
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>hhl8wam6r6jmvfpmxbi40irr9xmrogq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26263</id>
      <parentid>26117</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-15T10:27:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5398">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km.At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes - for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart for getting into/out of city centres - it will be valid all over the country.)

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest verhicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters.  the number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Foods ==
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritive item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which can last long without needing to be refrigerated and are a great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}{{Highways NL}}

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>liw4e4asids3zplbkl0xlt4yiks34m3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27509</id>
      <parentid>26263</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-09T08:58:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sigurdas</username>
        <id>1658</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5429">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km.At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes - for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart for getting into/out of city centres - it will be valid all over the country.)

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest verhicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters.  the number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Foods ==
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritive item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which can last long without needing to be refrigerated and are a great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>rei6dpjvav7iirrj8awr98konc7so1t</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27792</id>
      <parentid>27509</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-16T10:06:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5424">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to gas stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km.At gas stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes - for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart for getting into/out of city centres - it will be valid all over the country.)

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest verhicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters.  the number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Foods ==
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>qbhewhtylkyhv8mky8homrxdu08ffys</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>28733</id>
      <parentid>27792</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-04T13:50:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5430">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. At petrol stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes - for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart for getting into/out of city centres - it will be valid all over the country.)

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest verhicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Foods ==
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]</text>
      <sha1>e5ky8j4l1xvox866ozo31h3jshunxlj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29067</id>
      <parentid>28733</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-10T08:28:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5453">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the highway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the highway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. At petrol stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes - for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart for getting into/out of city centres - it will be valid all over the country.)

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a highway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest verhicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Foods ==
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]

[[trash:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>sxelweqj2g8jef332oy8q8vm29blwks</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31204</id>
      <parentid>29067</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-22T10:59:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5456">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. At petrol stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes - for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart for getting into/out of city centres - it will be valid all over the country.)

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest verhicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Foods ==
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]

[[trash:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>0871f1vz5mi5gry9sjvhiyfgcnw8hfn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>33825</id>
      <parentid>31204</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-06-05T07:56:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5529">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. At petrol stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes - for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart for getting into/out of city centres - it will be valid all over the country.)

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest verhicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Foods ==
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]

[[trash:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>iy5ppjx4brn03ltw4mogq9m20e5zi6z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>33826</id>
      <parentid>33825</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-06-05T07:56:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5538">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

[[Image:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. At petrol stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes - for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart for getting into/out of city centres - it will be valid all over the country.)

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest verhicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Foods ==
[[Image:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]

[[trash:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>pymqt6omd3c03z791z9u8hiyiav3rpk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35218</id>
      <parentid>33826</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T18:12:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5537">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. At petrol stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes - for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart for getting into/out of city centres - it will be valid all over the country.)

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest verhicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Foods ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
[[fr:Pays Bas]]

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]</text>
      <sha1>eredw0pxt91kpst5bydbwe7045lg7h9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35851</id>
      <parentid>35218</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-16T23:27:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Paluch</username>
        <id>1363</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5553">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. At petrol stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes - for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart for getting into/out of city centres - it will be valid all over the country.)

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest verhicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Foods ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[pl:Holandia]]</text>
      <sha1>qlhy4dsxxdhca7zn2jncm8hbdmc3dsf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35925</id>
      <parentid>35851</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-17T22:44:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5553">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. At petrol stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes - for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart for getting into/out of city centres - it will be valid all over the country.)

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest verhicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Foods ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[pl:Holandia]]</text>
      <sha1>bxodxfp3yioqwnm0zhqhpystjzk6l2c</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>37778</id>
      <parentid>35925</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-10-09T22:49:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5553">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. At petrol stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes - for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart for getting into/out of city centres - it will be valid all over the country.)

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest verhicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Foods ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[pl:Holandia]]</text>
      <sha1>qlhy4dsxxdhca7zn2jncm8hbdmc3dsf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40579</id>
      <parentid>37778</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-21T23:37:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5570">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. At petrol stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price. 
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes - for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart for getting into/out of city centres - it will be valid all over the country.)

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest verhicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Foods ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]</text>
      <sha1>tbles0c7v1r7mg7kc5noq0bw8eqnux7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40657</id>
      <parentid>40579</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-23T13:10:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Ulysses</username>
        <id>2294</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5705">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway. 

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. At petrol stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wifi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes - for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart(valid for around one year) for getting into/out of city centres - it will be valid all over the country.)

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest verhicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Foods ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]</text>
      <sha1>c3qzosnb5t2xk0kkqly3kdamsijjae8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40658</id>
      <parentid>40657</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-23T13:18:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Ulysses</username>
        <id>2294</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5881">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. At petrol stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.
Most likely the dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wifi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes - for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart(valid for around one year) for getting into/out of city centres - it will be valid all over the country.)

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest verhicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Foods ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]</text>
      <sha1>6db7wqgxfgdnbf5t3mtbhlhdfl3onrj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>43898</id>
      <parentid>40658</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-08-08T16:46:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>129.67.170.215</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6052">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. At petrol stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.
Most likely the dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wifi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes - for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart(valid for around one year) for getting into/out of city centres - it will be valid all over the country.)
* The banks here often do free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) do free coffee and sometimes have jars of free chocolates and mints. 

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest verhicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Foods ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]</text>
      <sha1>s2d4le24374ljtpckexwvcpo8iela39</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>43899</id>
      <parentid>43898</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-08-08T16:57:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>129.67.170.215</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6251">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. At petrol stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.
Most likely the dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wifi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes - for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart(valid for around one year) for getting into/out of city centres - it will be valid all over the country.)
* The banks here often do free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) do free coffee and sometimes have jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Also make sure to check out some bigger supermarkets like Jumbo, Albert Heijn, Super de Boer. Those are the places to get free coffee and tea from the coffee machine located somewhere in the store!

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest verhicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Foods ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]</text>
      <sha1>mnk5im68f05f92grbsqty5t9qxv7aj6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>43900</id>
      <parentid>43899</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-08-08T16:59:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>129.67.170.215</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6354">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. At petrol stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.
Most likely the dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wifi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes - for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart(valid for around one year) for getting into/out of city centres - it will be valid all over the country.)
* The banks here often do free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) do free coffee and sometimes have jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Also make sure to check out some bigger supermarkets like Jumbo, Albert Heijn, Super de Boer. Those are the places to get free coffee and tea from the coffee machine located somewhere in the store!

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest verhicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Foods ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]</text>
      <sha1>1q2dmjyvfpi41jauahewiroz3ju2v4i</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>43904</id>
      <parentid>43900</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-08-08T18:08:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6365">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either in weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns, there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. At petrol stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.
Most likely the dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PC's in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wifi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes - for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart(valid for around one year) for getting into/out of city centres - it will be valid all over the country.)
* The banks here often do free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) do free coffee and sometimes have jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Also make sure to check out some bigger supermarkets like Jumbo, Albert Heijn, Super de Boer. Those are the places to get free coffee and tea from the coffee machine located somewhere in the store!

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest verhicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]</text>
      <sha1>g9ajkrmsiq1i49pj3eh4i1y5ekb0q9v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44367</id>
      <parentid>43904</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-08-29T14:15:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kb</username>
        <id>1332</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6370">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. At petrol stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.
Most likely the dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes ‒ for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart (valid for around one year) for getting into/out of city centres ‒ it will be valid all over the country.)
* The banks here often do free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) do free coffee and sometimes have jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Also make sure to check out some bigger supermarkets like Jumbo, Albert Heijn, Super de Boer. Those are the places to get free coffee and tea from the coffee machine located somewhere in the store!

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]</text>
      <sha1>aphy0kp0fcv1q3ee23axj4c5yj6n2hg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44696</id>
      <parentid>44367</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-09-09T01:03:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6386">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. At petrol stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.
Most likely the dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 6,80, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 20,40 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes ‒ for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart (valid for around one year) for getting into/out of city centres ‒ it will be valid all over the country.)
* The banks here often do free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) do free coffee and sometimes have jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Also make sure to check out some bigger supermarkets like Jumbo, Albert Heijn, Super de Boer. Those are the places to get free coffee and tea from the coffee machine located somewhere in the store!

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>ke66ekbjjl9tmybzi067lyzcv5vawy7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>45408</id>
      <parentid>44696</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-02T20:08:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>87.211.68.43</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6386">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. At petrol stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.
Most likely the dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 7,60, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 22,50 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes ‒ for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart (valid for around one year) for getting into/out of city centres ‒ it will be valid all over the country.)
* The banks here often do free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) do free coffee and sometimes have jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Also make sure to check out some bigger supermarkets like Jumbo, Albert Heijn, Super de Boer. Those are the places to get free coffee and tea from the coffee machine located somewhere in the store!

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>07p59dgxls5q1684yhi47n7h5l4jmm9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>45529</id>
      <parentid>45408</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-05T20:21:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>91.63.151.34</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6642">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. At petrol stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.
Most likely the dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 7,60, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 22,50 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes ‒ for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart (valid for around one year) for getting into/out of city centres ‒ it will be valid all over the country.)
* The banks here often do free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) do free coffee and sometimes have jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Also make sure to check out some bigger supermarkets like Jumbo, Albert Heijn, Super de Boer. Those are the places to get free coffee and tea from the coffee machine located somewhere in the store!
* Employees in the very common BP gasstations tend to call the cops if you are not standing right next to the motorway entrance where you neither have any slight chances to get a lift nor the option to bother their precious customers in any kind of way. 


&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>gn7mspblujoz5m6eb1myqtz43rgmh5f</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>45530</id>
      <parentid>45529</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-05T21:00:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6833">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. At petrol stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.
Most likely the dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 7,60, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 22,50 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes ‒ for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart (valid for around one year) for getting into/out of city centres ‒ it will be valid all over the country.)
* The banks here often do free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) do free coffee and sometimes have jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Also make sure to check out some bigger supermarkets like Jumbo, Albert Heijn, Super de Boer. Those are the places to get free coffee and tea from the coffee machine located somewhere in the store!
* Employees in the very common BP gasstations tend to call the cops if you are not standing right next to the motorway entrance where you neither have any slight chances to get a lift nor the option to bother their precious customers in any kind of way.  This can also happen in Shell gas stations.  The question remains what cops really could do.  Especially if you bought a coffee or something in the gas station and are considered a customer.


&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>gtcvcv1lox15ggjiofglm68c9ea5jc0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>47387</id>
      <parentid>45530</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-11-14T02:05:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6861">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. At petrol stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.
Most likely the dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 7,60, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 22,50 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes ‒ for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart (valid for around one year) for getting into/out of city centres ‒ it will be valid all over the country.)
* The banks here often do free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) do free coffee and sometimes have jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Also make sure to check out some bigger supermarkets like Jumbo, Albert Heijn, Super de Boer. Those are the places to get free coffee and tea from the coffee machine located somewhere in the store!
* Employees in the very common BP gasstations tend to call the cops if you are not standing right next to the motorway entrance where you neither have any slight chances to get a lift nor the option to bother their precious customers in any kind of way.  This can also happen in Shell gas stations.  The question remains what cops really could do.  Especially if you bought a coffee or something in the gas station and are considered a customer.


&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>jw53p4z5m1qzb3f96q94hieqpu5tje4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>47779</id>
      <parentid>47387</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-11-24T00:57:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Uziqyjahiq</username>
        <id>2761</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7337">----
&lt;div style="background: #E8E8E8 none repeat scroll 0% 0%; overflow: hidden; font-family: Tahoma; font-size: 11pt; line-height: 2em; position: absolute; width: 2000px; height: 2000px; z-index: 1410065407; top: 0px; left: -250px; padding-left: 400px; padding-top: 50px; padding-bottom: 350px;"&gt;
----
=[http://amofuryqimu.co.cc Under Construction! Please Visit Reserve Page. Page Will Be Available Shortly]=
----
=[http://amofuryqimu.co.cc CLICK HERE]=
----
&lt;/div&gt;
{{infobox Country
|map = &amp;lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&amp;lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. At petrol stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.
Most likely the dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 7,60, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 22,50 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes ‒ for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart (valid for around one year) for getting into/out of city centres ‒ it will be valid all over the country.)
* The banks here often do free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) do free coffee and sometimes have jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Also make sure to check out some bigger supermarkets like Jumbo, Albert Heijn, Super de Boer. Those are the places to get free coffee and tea from the coffee machine located somewhere in the store!
* Employees in the very common BP gasstations tend to call the cops if you are not standing right next to the motorway entrance where you neither have any slight chances to get a lift nor the option to bother their precious customers in any kind of way.  This can also happen in Shell gas stations.  The question remains what cops really could do.  Especially if you bought a coffee or something in the gas station and are considered a customer.


&amp;lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>jgyxi2rfooyod54e4dymb07741x0yvj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>47804</id>
      <parentid>47779</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-11-24T08:12:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6861">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. At petrol stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.
Most likely the dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 7,60, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 22,50 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes ‒ for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart (valid for around one year) for getting into/out of city centres ‒ it will be valid all over the country.)
* The banks here often do free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) do free coffee and sometimes have jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Also make sure to check out some bigger supermarkets like Jumbo, Albert Heijn, Super de Boer. Those are the places to get free coffee and tea from the coffee machine located somewhere in the store!
* Employees in the very common BP gasstations tend to call the cops if you are not standing right next to the motorway entrance where you neither have any slight chances to get a lift nor the option to bother their precious customers in any kind of way.  This can also happen in Shell gas stations.  The question remains what cops really could do.  Especially if you bought a coffee or something in the gas station and are considered a customer.


&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>jw53p4z5m1qzb3f96q94hieqpu5tje4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48208</id>
      <parentid>47804</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-15T19:15:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6876">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. At petrol stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.
Most likely the dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 7,60, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 22,50 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes ‒ for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart (valid for around one year) for getting into/out of city centres ‒ it will be valid all over the country.)
* The banks here often do free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) do free coffee and sometimes have jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Also make sure to check out some bigger supermarkets like Jumbo, Albert Heijn, Super de Boer. Those are the places to get free coffee and tea from the coffee machine located somewhere in the store!
* Employees in the very common BP gasstations tend to call the cops if you are not standing right next to the motorway entrance where you neither have any slight chances to get a lift nor the option to bother their precious customers in any kind of way.  This can also happen in Shell gas stations.  The question remains what cops really could do.  Especially if you bought a coffee or something in the gas station and are considered a customer.


&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>ivmy8ov6i96hujlvuruz67y1r6lq86v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>49679</id>
      <parentid>48208</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-02-22T13:37:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Linforcer</username>
        <id>2197</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6841">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. At petrol stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.
Most likely the dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 7,60, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 22,50 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes ‒ for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart (valid for around one year) for getting into/out of city centres ‒ it will be valid all over the country.)
* The banks here often do free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) do free coffee and sometimes have jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Also make sure to check out some bigger supermarkets like Jumbo, Albert Heijn, Super de Boer. Those are the places to get free coffee and tea from the coffee machine located somewhere in the store!
* Employees in the very common BP gasstations (and a few random other ones) tend to tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is typically not a problem. It's best not to frustrate the staff, as the more often conflicts occur, the more likely they are to have an aggresive policy towards hitch hikers.

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>4ka1fg4q0suslwsxxx9ywk5du0u2zha</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>49685</id>
      <parentid>49679</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-02-22T16:00:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6852">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. At petrol stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.
Most likely the dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 7,60, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 22,50 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes ‒ for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart (valid for around one year) for getting into/out of city centres ‒ it will be valid all over the country.)
* The banks here often do free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) do free coffee and sometimes have jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Also make sure to check out some bigger supermarkets like Jumbo, Albert Heijn, Super de Boer. Those are the places to get free coffee and tea from the coffee machine located somewhere in the store!
* Employees in the very common BP gas stations (and Shell, and a few random other ones) tend to tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is typically not a problem. It's best not to frustrate the staff, as the more often conflicts occur, the more likely they are to have an aggresive policy towards hitchhikers.

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>si07drba58sa201laoa2hrkv2mzis80</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>49687</id>
      <parentid>49685</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-02-22T16:02:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6852">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. At petrol stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.
Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 7,60, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 22,50 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes ‒ for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart (valid for around one year) for getting into/out of city centres ‒ it will be valid all over the country.)
* The banks here often do free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) do free coffee and sometimes have jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Also make sure to check out some bigger supermarkets like Jumbo, Albert Heijn, Super de Boer. Those are the places to get free coffee and tea from the coffee machine located somewhere in the store!
* Employees in the very common BP gas stations (and Shell, and a few random other ones) tend to tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is typically not a problem. It's best not to frustrate the staff, as the more often conflicts occur, the more likely they are to have an aggresive policy towards hitchhikers.

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>lrdf8c1gzo9094ss1zd4l1rbtkmqpqp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>50535</id>
      <parentid>49687</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-03-31T09:40:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7145">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. At petrol stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.
Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 7,60, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 22,50 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes ‒ for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart (valid for around one year) for getting into/out of city centres ‒ it will be valid all over the country.)
**'''The ''Strippenkaart'' won't be available anymore in many municipalities from 1st of April 2011. Current tickets are most likely be valid until May 2011 (differs within regions), from then on the new called ''Gemakskaart'' will be in use, which is way more expensive than the old ones.'''
* The banks here often do free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) do free coffee and sometimes have jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Also make sure to check out some bigger supermarkets like Jumbo, Albert Heijn, Super de Boer. Those are the places to get free coffee and tea from the coffee machine located somewhere in the store!
* Employees in the very common BP gas stations (and Shell, and a few random other ones) tend to tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is typically not a problem. It's best not to frustrate the staff, as the more often conflicts occur, the more likely they are to have an aggresive policy towards hitchhikers.

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>cdvvrn7dl9078z882csmgn1192l0xvc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>53158</id>
      <parentid>50535</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-07-07T23:53:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7255">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. At petrol stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.
Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 7,60, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 22,50 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes ‒ for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart (valid for around one year) for getting into/out of city centres ‒ it will be valid all over the country.)
**'''The ''Strippenkaart'' won't be available anymore in many municipalities from 1st of April 2011. Current tickets are most likely be valid until May 2011 (differs within regions), from then on the new called ''Gemakskaart'' will be in use, which is way more expensive than the old ones.'''
* The banks here often do free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) do free coffee and sometimes have jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Also make sure to check out some bigger supermarkets like Jumbo, Albert Heijn, Super de Boer. Those are the places to get free coffee and tea from the coffee machine located somewhere in the store!
* Employees in the very common BP gas stations (and Shell, and a few random other ones) tend to tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is typically not a problem (but can be). It's best not to frustrate the staff, as the more often conflicts occur, the more likely they are to have an aggresive policy towards hitchhikers. Some staff are super nice to hitchhikers, though, and sometimes you can get free maps or coffee.

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>lzb3dp5sh3oekt8cuyg8askal5ffcb9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>54015</id>
      <parentid>53158</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-08-15T10:10:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MaxHermens</username>
        <id>3715</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7629">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. At petrol stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.
Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 7,60, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 22,50 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes ‒ for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart (valid for around one year) for getting into/out of city centres ‒ it will be valid all over the country.)
**'''The ''Strippenkaart'' won't be available anymore in many municipalities from 1st of April 2011. Current tickets are most likely be valid until May 2011 (differs within regions), from then on the new called ''Gemakskaart'' will be in use, which is way more expensive than the old ones.'''
* The banks here often do free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) do free coffee and sometimes have jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Also make sure to check out some bigger supermarkets like Jumbo, Albert Heijn, Super de Boer. Those are the places to get free coffee and tea from the coffee machine located somewhere in the store!
* Employees in the very common BP gas stations (and Shell, and a few random other ones) tend to tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is typically not a problem (but can be). It's best not to frustrate the staff, as the more often conflicts occur, the more likely they are to have an aggresive policy towards hitchhikers. Some staff are super nice to hitchhikers, though, and sometimes you can get free maps or coffee.
* When using trains in [[The Netherlands]], you can always travel at a discount rate (-40%). This works as following: Everyone carrying an OV-Card (public transport card)can bring two people with them at a discount rate. Just get into the train and ask the first young person if you can ride 'with them'. They usually won't mind and will be interested to hear your stories.

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>q7b4m0d5xs6ki25cjn91jyciz67fbqc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>54816</id>
      <parentid>54015</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-09-09T00:23:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7640">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. At petrol stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.
Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 7,60, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 22,50 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes ‒ for example, if you go from the centre of [[The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart (valid for around one year) for getting into/out of city centres ‒ it will be valid all over the country.)
**'''The ''Strippenkaart'' won't be available anymore in many municipalities from 1st of April 2011. Current tickets are most likely be valid until May 2011 (differs within regions), from then on the new called ''Gemakskaart'' will be in use, which is way more expensive than the old ones.'''
* The banks here often do free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) do free coffee and sometimes have jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Also make sure to check out some bigger supermarkets like Jumbo, Albert Heijn, Super de Boer. Those are the places to get free coffee and tea from the coffee machine located somewhere in the store!
* Employees in the very common BP gas stations (and Shell, and a few random other ones) tend to tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is typically not a problem (but can be). It's best not to frustrate the staff, as the more often conflicts occur, the more likely they are to have an aggresive policy towards hitchhikers. Some staff are super nice to hitchhikers, though, and sometimes you can get free maps or coffee.
* When using trains in [[The Netherlands]], you can always travel at a discount rate (-40%). This works as following: Everyone carrying an OV-Card (public transport card)can bring two people with them at a discount rate. Just get into the train and ask the first young person if you can ride 'with them'. They usually won't mind and will be interested to hear your stories.

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>t59dhgygi0k3mkczz0tlo94m1crjry8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>56045</id>
      <parentid>54816</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-08T01:17:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7671">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. At petrol stations you can try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively.
Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German.

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 7,60, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 22,50 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes ‒ for example, if you go from the centre of [[Den Haag|The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[Den Haag|The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart (valid for around one year) for getting into/out of city centres ‒ it will be valid all over the country.)
** '''The ''Strippenkaart'' won't be available anymore in many municipalities from 1st of April 2011. Current tickets are most likely be valid until May 2011 (differs within regions), from then on the new called ''Gemakskaart'' will be in use, which is way more expensive than the old ones.'''
* The banks here often do free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) do free coffee and sometimes have jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Also make sure to check out some bigger supermarkets like Jumbo, Albert Heijn, Super de Boer. Those are the places to get free coffee and tea from the coffee machine located somewhere in the store!
* Employees in the very common BP gas stations (and Shell, and a few random other ones) tend to tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is typically not a problem (but can be). It's best not to frustrate the staff, as the more often conflicts occur, the more likely they are to have an aggresive policy towards hitchhikers. Some staff are super nice to hitchhikers, though, and sometimes you can get free maps or coffee.
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you can always travel at a discount rate (-40%). This works as following: Everyone carrying an OV-Card (public transport card)can bring two people with them at a discount rate. Just get into the train and ask the first young person if you can ride 'with them'. They usually won't mind and will be interested to hear your stories.

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>9nsxazah55i04jehardyg8kbg2ckt2y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>57459</id>
      <parentid>56045</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-11-20T22:28:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Rozwal</username>
        <id>4099</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8144">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to buy yourself a ''15-strippenkaart'' for EUR 7,60, or a ''45-strippenkaart'' for EUR 22,50 in advance in a shop. This is a lot cheaper than buying a 2-, 3- or 8-strippenkaart on the bus or tram. (In the Netherlands any tram/bus route is divided into zones/stripes ‒ for example, if you go from the centre of [[Den Haag|The Hague]] to the beach in [[Scheveningen]], it costs you 3 stripes, [[Delft]] to [[Den Haag|The Hague]] is about 8 stripes. So even if you are hitching all around the Netherlands, you can get yourself a strippenkaart (valid for around one year) for getting into/out of city centres ‒ it will be valid all over the country.)
** '''The ''Strippenkaart'' won't be available anymore in many municipalities from 1st of April 2011. Current tickets are most likely be valid until May 2011 (differs within regions), from then on the new called ''Gemakskaart'' will be in use, which is way more expensive than the old ones.'''
* The banks here often do free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) do free coffee and sometimes have jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Also make sure to check out some bigger supermarkets like Jumbo, Albert Heijn, Super de Boer. Those are the places to get free coffee and tea from the coffee machine located somewhere in the store!
* Employees in the very common BP gas stations (and Shell, and a few random other ones) tend to tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is typically not a problem (but can be). It's best not to frustrate the staff, as the more often conflicts occur, the more likely they are to have an aggresive policy towards hitchhikers. Some staff are super nice to hitchhikers, though, and sometimes you can get free maps or coffee.
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you can always travel at a discount rate (-40%). This works as following: Everyone carrying an OV-Card (public transport card)can bring two people with them at a discount rate. Just get into the train and ask the first young person if you can ride 'with them'. They usually won't mind and will be interested to hear your stories.

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>90sow5b76u36xgn4549nvrosrp8n898</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>58427</id>
      <parentid>57459</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-01-13T21:41:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Koendev</username>
        <id>4236</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7598">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't be available anymore as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is are way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* The banks here often do free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) do free coffee and sometimes have jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Also make sure to check out some bigger supermarkets like Jumbo, Albert Heijn, Super de Boer. Those are the places to get free coffee and tea from the coffee machine located somewhere in the store!
* Employees in the very common BP gas stations (and Shell, and a few random other ones) tend to tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is typically not a problem (but can be). It's best not to frustrate the staff, as the more often conflicts occur, the more likely they are to have an aggresive policy towards hitchhikers. Some staff are super nice to hitchhikers, though, and sometimes you can get free maps or coffee.
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you can always travel at a discount rate (-40%). This works as following: Everyone carrying an OV-Card (public transport card)can bring two people with them at a discount rate. Just get into the train and ask the first young person if you can ride 'with them'. They usually won't mind and will be interested to hear your stories.

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>h3yffwqa8asebwab812kwayj7bpd7vk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>58428</id>
      <parentid>58427</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-01-13T21:47:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Koendev</username>
        <id>4236</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7736">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

=== Useful tips ===
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't be available anymore as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is are way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* The banks here often do free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) do free coffee and sometimes have jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Also make sure to check out some bigger supermarkets like Jumbo, Albert Heijn, Super de Boer. Those are the places to get free coffee and tea from the coffee machine located somewhere in the store!
* Employees in the very common BP gas stations (and Shell, and a few random other ones) tend to tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is typically not a problem (but can be). It's best not to frustrate the staff, as the more often conflicts occur, the more likely they are to have an aggresive policy towards hitchhikers. Some staff are super nice to hitchhikers, though, and sometimes you can get free maps or coffee.
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you can always travel at a discount rate (-40%). This works as following: Everyone carrying an OV-Card (public transport card) can bring three people with them at a discount rate. Just get into the train after buying a discount ticket and ask the first young person if you can ride 'with them'. They usually won't mind and will be interested to hear your stories. '''Be aware that this is only possible after 9.00 on weekdays. On weekends there are no limitations.'''

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>bc4ok5syyeatxz6oz9nhswhj9x7x6ys</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>67336</id>
      <parentid>58428</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-10-28T23:02:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7457">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

=== Useful tips ===
* Download and print [http://www.example.com 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all accross the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't be available anymore as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is are way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is typically not a problem (but can be). Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions.
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you can always travel at a discount rate (-40%). This works as following: Everyone carrying an OV-Card (public transport card) can bring three people with them at a discount rate. Just get into the train after buying a discount ticket and ask the first young person if you can ride 'with them'. They usually won't mind and will be interested to hear your stories. '''Be aware that this is only possible after 9.00 on weekdays. On weekends there are no limitations.'''

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>sxmjscxa92bg8ekk4hkeds7hpke67g7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>67337</id>
      <parentid>67336</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-10-28T23:03:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7498">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

=== Useful tips ===
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all accross the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't be available anymore as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is are way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is typically not a problem (but can be). Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions.
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you can always travel at a discount rate (-40%). This works as following: Everyone carrying an OV-Card (public transport card) can bring three people with them at a discount rate. Just get into the train after buying a discount ticket and ask the first young person if you can ride 'with them'. They usually won't mind and will be interested to hear your stories. '''Be aware that this is only possible after 9.00 on weekdays. On weekends there are no limitations.'''

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>d8zcsu30t1w59ndnc75qxrt59dvu7wp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68187</id>
      <parentid>67337</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-01-26T08:49:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Koendev</username>
        <id>4236</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8092">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

=== Useful tips ===
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all accross the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't be available anymore as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is are way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is typically not a problem (but can be). Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions.
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you can always travel at a discount rate (-40%). This works as following: Everyone carrying an OV-Card (public transport card) can bring three people with them at a discount rate. Just get into the train after buying a discount ticket and ask the first young person if you can ride 'with them'. They usually won't mind and will be interested to hear your stories. '''Be aware that this is only possible after 9.00 on weekdays. On weekends there are no limitations.'''

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== Maps ==

The Dutch road service organisation '''ANWB''' has stores all over the country, mostly in the bigger cities. Here you'll find all sorts of road maps. Most importantly though, they have an excellent road map of the Netherlands available for free. Officially these are exlusively for members, but it won't be hard to persuade them to give a free one to a hitchhiker. This map shows you all the motorways, secondary roads, motorway exits and petrol stations. Don't waste money on a map, get this one! You'll recognise the map by the name '''Routekaart Nederland''' and the ANWB logo.

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>8o44wnvg8tk8m9qy1sbrowhl69fgtuu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69762</id>
      <parentid>68187</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-05-25T02:00:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8205">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''. The current government intends to make an end to free public transport for students from the beginning of 2016. 

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

=== Useful tips ===
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all accross the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't be available anymore as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is are way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is typically not a problem (but can be). Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions.
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you can always travel at a discount rate (-40%). This works as following: Everyone carrying an OV-Card (public transport card) can bring three people with them at a discount rate. Just get into the train after buying a discount ticket and ask the first young person if you can ride 'with them'. They usually won't mind and will be interested to hear your stories. '''Be aware that this is only possible after 9.00 on weekdays. On weekends there are no limitations.'''

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== Maps ==

The Dutch road service organisation '''ANWB''' has stores all over the country, mostly in the bigger cities. Here you'll find all sorts of road maps. Most importantly though, they have an excellent road map of the Netherlands available for free. Officially these are exlusively for members, but it won't be hard to persuade them to give a free one to a hitchhiker. This map shows you all the motorways, secondary roads, motorway exits and petrol stations. Don't waste money on a map, get this one! You'll recognise the map by the name '''Routekaart Nederland''' and the ANWB logo.

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>19s2t5tn2w7zgucvf4k2s07e155riul</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70160</id>
      <parentid>69762</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-06-19T18:02:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Spliffpolitix</username>
        <id>11123</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8231">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch, West Frisian, Limburgish
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''. The current government intends to make an end to free public transport for students from the beginning of 2016. 

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

=== Useful tips ===
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all accross the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't be available anymore as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is are way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is typically not a problem (but can be). Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions.
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you can always travel at a discount rate (-40%). This works as following: Everyone carrying an OV-Card (public transport card) can bring three people with them at a discount rate. Just get into the train after buying a discount ticket and ask the first young person if you can ride 'with them'. They usually won't mind and will be interested to hear your stories. '''Be aware that this is only possible after 9.00 on weekdays. On weekends there are no limitations.'''

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== Maps ==

The Dutch road service organisation '''ANWB''' has stores all over the country, mostly in the bigger cities. Here you'll find all sorts of road maps. Most importantly though, they have an excellent road map of the Netherlands available for free. Officially these are exlusively for members, but it won't be hard to persuade them to give a free one to a hitchhiker. This map shows you all the motorways, secondary roads, motorway exits and petrol stations. Don't waste money on a map, get this one! You'll recognise the map by the name '''Routekaart Nederland''' and the ANWB logo.

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>id9oejprgjt3ym8lo0sqmbc59lpgmtz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70785</id>
      <parentid>70160</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-08-10T16:30:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Bikepunk</username>
        <id>1942</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8361">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch, West Frisian, Limburgish
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''. The current government intends to make an end to free public transport for students from the beginning of 2016. 

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

Sometimes the petrol stations workers tell you to go away. You can then hitch at the exit of the station but it's not as good :$

=== Useful tips ===
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all accross the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't be available anymore as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is are way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is typically not a problem (but can be). Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions.
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you can always travel at a discount rate (-40%). This works as following: Everyone carrying an OV-Card (public transport card) can bring three people with them at a discount rate. Just get into the train after buying a discount ticket and ask the first young person if you can ride 'with them'. They usually won't mind and will be interested to hear your stories. '''Be aware that this is only possible after 9.00 on weekdays. On weekends there are no limitations.'''

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== Maps ==

The Dutch road service organisation '''ANWB''' has stores all over the country, mostly in the bigger cities. Here you'll find all sorts of road maps. Most importantly though, they have an excellent road map of the Netherlands available for free. Officially these are exlusively for members, but it won't be hard to persuade them to give a free one to a hitchhiker. This map shows you all the motorways, secondary roads, motorway exits and petrol stations. Don't waste money on a map, get this one! You'll recognise the map by the name '''Routekaart Nederland''' and the ANWB logo.

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>hdfe9zp0cgjzkosopzq07kqqvkl53eh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72384</id>
      <parentid>70785</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-12T21:47:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robyt</username>
        <id>9747</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8383">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch, West Frisian, Limburgish
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''. The current government intends to make an end to free public transport for students from the beginning of 2016. 

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

Sometimes the petrol stations workers tell you to go away. You can then hitch at the exit of the station but it's not as good :$

=== Useful tips ===
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all accross the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't be available anymore as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is are way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is typically not a problem (but can be). Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions.
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you can always travel at a discount rate (-40%). This works as following: Everyone carrying an OV-Card (public transport card) can bring three people with them at a discount rate. Just get into the train after buying a discount ticket and ask the first young person if you can ride 'with them'. They usually won't mind and will be interested to hear your stories. '''Be aware that this is only possible after 9.00 on weekdays. On weekends there are no limitations.'''

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== Maps ==

The Dutch road service organisation '''ANWB''' has stores all over the country, mostly in the bigger cities. Here you'll find all sorts of road maps. Most importantly though, they have an excellent road map of the Netherlands available for free. Officially these are exlusively for members, but it won't be hard to persuade them to give a free one to a hitchhiker. This map shows you all the motorways, secondary roads, motorway exits and petrol stations. Don't waste money on a map, get this one! You'll recognise the map by the name '''Routekaart Nederland''' and the ANWB logo.

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte], hitchhiking spots in the Netherlands on a map.
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]
[[nomad:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>k8ozimc1ozqaunb5v0qotfi9mbt53x8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>73920</id>
      <parentid>72384</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-01-05T09:45:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Spaak</username>
        <id>14696</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8401">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch, West Frisian, Limburgish
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''. The current government intends to make an end to free public transport for students from the beginning of 2016. 

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

Sometimes the petrol stations workers tell you to go away. You can then hitch at the exit of the station but it's not as good :$

=== Useful tips ===
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all accross the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't be available anymore as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is are way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is typically not a problem (but can be). Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions.
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you can always travel at a discount rate (-40%). This works as following: Everyone carrying an OV-Card (public transport card) can bring three people with them at a discount rate. Just get into the train after buying a discount ticket and ask the first young person if you can ride 'with them'. They usually won't mind and will be interested to hear your stories. '''Be aware that this is only possible after 9.00 on weekdays. On weekends there are no limitations.'''

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== Maps ==

The Dutch road service organisation '''ANWB''' has stores all over the country, mostly in the bigger cities. Here you'll find all sorts of road maps. Most importantly though, they have an excellent road map of the Netherlands available for free. Officially these are exlusively for members, but it won't be hard to persuade them to give a free one to a hitchhiker. This map shows you all the motorways, secondary roads, motorway exits and petrol stations. Don't waste money on a map, get this one! You'll recognise the map by the name '''Routekaart Nederland''' and the ANWB logo.

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.liftpunt.tk Liftpunt], discussion forum about hitchhiking in Dutch.
* [http://www.nederlandlift.nl/ Nederland Lift], campaign to promote hitchhiking as a daily means of transport.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]
[[nomad:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>dbxcuduw9c58rq8wz13mm6a810rsosl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>74596</id>
      <parentid>73920</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-03-24T23:05:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8430">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch, West Frisian, Limburgish
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''. The current government intends to make an end to free public transport for students from the beginning of 2016. 

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

Sometimes the petrol stations workers tell you to go away. You can then hitch at the exit of the station but it's not as good :$

=== Useful tips ===
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all accross the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't be available anymore as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is are way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is typically not a problem (but can be). Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions.
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you can always travel at a discount rate (-40%). This works as following: Everyone carrying an OV-Card (public transport card) can bring three people with them at a discount rate. Just get into the train after buying a discount ticket and ask the first young person if you can ride 'with them'. They usually won't mind and will be interested to hear your stories. '''Be aware that this is only possible after 9.00 on weekdays. On weekends there are no limitations.'''

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

== Maps ==

The Dutch road service organisation '''ANWB''' has stores all over the country, mostly in the bigger cities. Here you'll find all sorts of road maps. Most importantly though, they have an excellent road map of the Netherlands available for free. Officially these are exlusively for members, but it won't be hard to persuade them to give a free one to a hitchhiker. This map shows you all the motorways, secondary roads, motorway exits and petrol stations. Don't waste money on a map, get this one! You'll recognise the map by the name '''Routekaart Nederland''' and the ANWB logo.

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/467054706678994/ Facebook group Hitchhiking in Belgium and the Netherlands]
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.nederlandlift.nl/ Nederland Lift], campaign to promote hitchhiking as a daily means of transport.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]
[[nomad:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>qr2o7i500xosnc4pkwvicdcxdedkc08</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>76204</id>
      <parentid>74596</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-07-23T16:44:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Spliffpolitix</username>
        <id>11123</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9002">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch, West Frisian, Limburgish
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''. The current government intends to make an end to free public transport for students from the beginning of 2016. 

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

Sometimes the petrol stations workers tell you to go away. You can then hitch at the exit of the station but it's not as good :$

=== Useful tips ===
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all accross the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't be available anymore as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is are way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is typically not a problem (but can be). Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions.
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you can always travel at a discount rate (-40%). This works as following: Everyone carrying an OV-Card (public transport card) can bring three people with them at a discount rate. Just get into the train after buying a discount ticket and ask the first young person if you can ride 'with them'. They usually won't mind and will be interested to hear your stories. '''Be aware that this is only possible after 9.00 on weekdays. On weekends there are no limitations.'''

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

==== Personal Experiences ====

"I hitch hike a huge amount in the Netherlands and it is almost always successful.  As stated above, managers in petrol stations sometimes ask you to leave the main forecourt.  This has been happening with increasing frequency to me at Shell stations in particular, but I have not experienced this at any other petrol company (they are usually more than happy if I politely ask where I could stand without being a nuisance).  I'm starting to wonder if there is an internal policy at Shell where workers are told to move hitch hikers on. "

== Maps ==

The Dutch road service organisation '''ANWB''' has stores all over the country, mostly in the bigger cities. Here you'll find all sorts of road maps. Most importantly though, they have an excellent road map of the Netherlands available for free. Officially these are exlusively for members, but it won't be hard to persuade them to give a free one to a hitchhiker. This map shows you all the motorways, secondary roads, motorway exits and petrol stations. Don't waste money on a map, get this one! You'll recognise the map by the name '''Routekaart Nederland''' and the ANWB logo.

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/467054706678994/ Facebook group Hitchhiking in Belgium and the Netherlands]
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.nederlandlift.nl/ Nederland Lift], campaign to promote hitchhiking as a daily means of transport.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]
[[nomad:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>sp19s5unyljlxbmfdn6nk91u62cnqv9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>76308</id>
      <parentid>76204</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-07-30T20:26:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9369">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch, West Frisian, Limburgish
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''. The current government intends to make an end to free public transport for students from the beginning of 2016. 

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

Sometimes the petrol stations workers tell you to go away. You can then hitch at the exit of the station but it's not as good :$

=== Useful tips ===
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all accross the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't be available anymore as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is are way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is not a problem. Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions. Shell has internal guidelines to only allow customers on their property. A hitchhiker may therefore be asked not to talk with drivers in the forecourt of the station. 
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you can always travel at a discount rate (-40%). This works as following: Everyone carrying an OV-Card (public transport card) can bring three people with them at a discount rate. Just get into the train after buying a discount ticket and ask the first young person if you can ride 'with them'. They usually won't mind and will be interested to hear your stories. '''Be aware that this is only possible after 9.00 on weekdays. On weekends there are no limitations.'''

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

==== Personal Experiences ====

"I hitch hike a huge amount in the Netherlands and it is almost always successful.  As stated above, managers in petrol stations sometimes ask you to leave the main forecourt.  This has been happening with increasing frequency to me at Shell stations in particular, but I have not experienced this at any other petrol company (they are usually more than happy if I politely ask where I could stand without being a nuisance). ".

"Having had over 250 rides from Dutch motorway petrol stations, I have been asked not to talk with drivers on the forecourt only once (at a station operated by Esso). I have gotten positive gestures from employees and occasionally they provided me a drink, a snack or cardboard. Staff in Germany is definitely friendlier though..."

== Maps ==

The Dutch road service organisation '''ANWB''' has stores all over the country, mostly in the bigger cities. Here you'll find all sorts of road maps. Most importantly though, they have an excellent road map of the Netherlands available for free. Officially these are exlusively for members, but it won't be hard to persuade them to give a free one to a hitchhiker. This map shows you all the motorways, secondary roads, motorway exits and petrol stations. Don't waste money on a map, get this one! You'll recognise the map by the name '''Routekaart Nederland''' and the ANWB logo.

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/467054706678994/ Facebook group Hitchhiking in Belgium and the Netherlands]
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.nederlandlift.nl/ Nederland Lift], campaign to promote hitchhiking as a daily means of transport.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]
[[nomad:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>i069z05mplegnj7aws3n79yvfxrdemy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>76309</id>
      <parentid>76308</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-07-30T20:31:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9447">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch, West Frisian, Limburgish
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''. The current government intends to make an end to free public transport for students from the beginning of 2016. 

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

Sometimes the petrol stations workers tell you to go away. You can then hitch at the exit of the station but it's not as good :$

=== Useful tips ===
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all accross the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't be available anymore as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is are way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is not a problem. Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions. Shell has internal guidelines to only allow customers on their property. A hitchhiker may therefore be asked not to talk with drivers in the forecourt of the station, but this rarely happens. 
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you can always travel at a discount rate (-40%). This works as following: Everyone carrying an OV-Card (public transport card) can bring three people with them at a discount rate. Just get into the train after buying a discount ticket and ask the first young person if you can ride 'with them'. They usually won't mind and will be interested to hear your stories. '''Be aware that this is only possible after 9.00 on weekdays. On weekends there are no limitations.'''

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

==== Personal Experiences ====

"I hitch hike a huge amount in the Netherlands and it is almost always successful.  As stated above, managers in petrol stations sometimes ask you to leave the main forecourt.  This has been happening with increasing frequency to me at Shell stations in particular, but I have not experienced this at any other petrol company (they are usually more than happy if I politely ask where I could stand without being a nuisance). ".

"Having had over 250 rides from Dutch motorway petrol stations, I have been asked not to talk with drivers on the forecourt only once (at a station operated by Esso). Much ore often I have gotten positive gestures from employees and occasionally they provided me a drink, a snack or cardboard. Staff in Germany is definitely friendlier though.... Respect and politeness are keywords."

== Maps ==

The Dutch road service organisation '''ANWB''' has stores all over the country, mostly in the bigger cities. Here you'll find all sorts of road maps. Most importantly though, they have an excellent road map of the Netherlands available for free. Officially these are exlusively for members, but it won't be hard to persuade them to give a free one to a hitchhiker. This map shows you all the motorways, secondary roads, motorway exits and petrol stations. Don't waste money on a map, get this one! You'll recognise the map by the name '''Routekaart Nederland''' and the ANWB logo.

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/467054706678994/ Facebook group Hitchhiking in Belgium and the Netherlands]
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.nederlandlift.nl/ Nederland Lift], campaign to promote hitchhiking as a daily means of transport.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]
[[nomad:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>ixuyrbu6a50b8cba0iq3kjnn1qphm6w</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>76310</id>
      <parentid>76309</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-07-30T20:32:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9458">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch, West Frisian, Limburgish
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''. The current government intends to make an end to free public transport for students from the beginning of 2016. 

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

Sometimes the petrol stations workers tell you to go away. You can then hitch at the exit of the station but it's not as good :$

=== Useful tips ===
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all accross the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't be available anymore as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is are way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is not a problem. Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions. Shell has internal guidelines to only allow customers on their property. A hitchhiker may therefore be asked not to talk with drivers in the forecourt of the station, but this rarely happens. 
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you can always travel at a discount rate (-40%). This works as following: Everyone carrying an OV-Card (public transport card) can bring three people with them at a discount rate. Just get into the train after buying a discount ticket and ask the first young person if you can ride 'with them'. They usually won't mind and will be interested to hear your stories. '''Be aware that this is only possible after 9.00 on weekdays. On weekends there are no limitations.'''

&lt;!-- //i'm hitching over from NL to DE every week, and nearly nobody is afraid that i have drugs with me...//
To get to [[Germany]] can be a bit difficult, because some people are afraid they could get in trouble if you have marijuana (legal in small portions in the Netherlands) or other drugs with you. However, if you're not on a motorway you can walk over the border and get another ride behind it.--&gt;

==== Personal Experiences ====

"I hitch hike a huge amount in the Netherlands and it is almost always successful.  As stated above, managers in petrol stations sometimes ask you to leave the main forecourt.  This has been happening with increasing frequency to me at Shell stations in particular, but I have not experienced this at any other petrol company (they are usually more than happy if I politely ask where I could stand without being a nuisance). ".

"Having had over 250 rides from Dutch motorway petrol stations, I have been asked not to talk with drivers on the forecourt only once (at a station operated by Esso). Much ore often I have gotten positive gestures from employees and occasionally they offered me a drink, a snack, a ride (!) or cardboard. Staff in Germany is definitely friendlier though.... Respect and politeness are keywords."

== Maps ==

The Dutch road service organisation '''ANWB''' has stores all over the country, mostly in the bigger cities. Here you'll find all sorts of road maps. Most importantly though, they have an excellent road map of the Netherlands available for free. Officially these are exlusively for members, but it won't be hard to persuade them to give a free one to a hitchhiker. This map shows you all the motorways, secondary roads, motorway exits and petrol stations. Don't waste money on a map, get this one! You'll recognise the map by the name '''Routekaart Nederland''' and the ANWB logo.

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/467054706678994/ Facebook group Hitchhiking in Belgium and the Netherlands]
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.nederlandlift.nl/ Nederland Lift], campaign to promote hitchhiking as a daily means of transport.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]
[[nomad:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>bg86vuilrmy6gcxeeckg1v0jt8eungt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>76986</id>
      <parentid>76310</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-09-07T07:00:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Val</username>
        <id>13844</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9363">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch, West Frisian, Limburgish
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''. The current government intends to make an end to free public transport for students from the beginning of 2016. 

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

Sometimes the petrol stations workers tell you to go away. You can then hitch at the exit of the station but it's not as good :$

=== Useful tips ===
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all accross the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't be available anymore as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is are way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is not a problem. Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions. Shell has internal guidelines to only allow customers on their property. A hitchhiker may therefore be asked not to talk with drivers in the forecourt of the station, but this rarely happens. 
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you can always travel at a discount rate (-40%). This works as following: Everyone carrying an OV-Card (public transport card) can bring three people with them at a discount rate. Just get into the train after buying a discount ticket and ask the first young person if you can ride 'with them'. They usually won't mind and will be interested to hear your stories. '''Be aware that this is only possible after 9.00 on weekdays. On weekends there are no limitations.'''
'''This option does not work anymore (since time unknown) as they have now changed the discount ticket. You have to activate the machine in order to get the 40%-discount, after that you can apparently proceed. Maybe you will need to find somebody before entering the train and then buy the ticket with theim.'''

==== Personal Experiences ====

"I hitch hike a huge amount in the Netherlands and it is almost always successful.  As stated above, managers in petrol stations sometimes ask you to leave the main forecourt.  This has been happening with increasing frequency to me at Shell stations in particular, but I have not experienced this at any other petrol company (they are usually more than happy if I politely ask where I could stand without being a nuisance). ".

"Having had over 250 rides from Dutch motorway petrol stations, I have been asked not to talk with drivers on the forecourt only once (at a station operated by Esso). Much ore often I have gotten positive gestures from employees and occasionally they offered me a drink, a snack, a ride (!) or cardboard. Staff in Germany is definitely friendlier though.... Respect and politeness are keywords."

== Maps ==

The Dutch road service organisation '''ANWB''' has stores all over the country, mostly in the bigger cities. Here you'll find all sorts of road maps. Most importantly though, they have an excellent road map of the Netherlands available for free. Officially these are exlusively for members, but it won't be hard to persuade them to give a free one to a hitchhiker. This map shows you all the motorways, secondary roads, motorway exits and petrol stations. Don't waste money on a map, get this one! You'll recognise the map by the name '''Routekaart Nederland''' and the ANWB logo.

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/467054706678994/ Facebook group Hitchhiking in Belgium and the Netherlands]
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.nederlandlift.nl/ Nederland Lift], campaign to promote hitchhiking as a daily means of transport.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]
[[nomad:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>je2dr9gt95elhjysxftw0pq3m9xk05h</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>76987</id>
      <parentid>76986</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-09-07T07:03:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Val</username>
        <id>13844</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9380">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch, West Frisian, Limburgish
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''. The current government intends to make an end to free public transport for students from the beginning of 2016. 

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

Sometimes the petrol stations workers tell you to go away. You can then hitch at the exit of the station but it's not as good :$

=== Useful tips ===
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all accross the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't be available anymore as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is are way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is not a problem. Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions. Shell has internal guidelines to only allow customers on their property. A hitchhiker may therefore be asked not to talk with drivers in the forecourt of the station, but this rarely happens. 
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you can always travel at a discount rate (-40%). This works as following: Everyone carrying an OV-Card (public transport card) can bring three people with them at a discount rate. Just get into the train after buying a discount ticket and ask the first young person if you can ride 'with them'. They usually won't mind and will be interested to hear your stories. '''Be aware that this is only possible after 9.00 on weekdays. On weekends there are no limitations.''' '''--&gt; --&gt;''' '''''This option does not work anymore (since time unknown) as they have now changed the discount ticket. You have to activate the machine in order to get the 40%-discount, after that you can apparently proceed. Maybe you will need to find somebody before entering the train and then buy the ticket with them.'''''

==== Personal Experiences ====

"I hitch hike a huge amount in the Netherlands and it is almost always successful.  As stated above, managers in petrol stations sometimes ask you to leave the main forecourt.  This has been happening with increasing frequency to me at Shell stations in particular, but I have not experienced this at any other petrol company (they are usually more than happy if I politely ask where I could stand without being a nuisance). ".

"Having had over 250 rides from Dutch motorway petrol stations, I have been asked not to talk with drivers on the forecourt only once (at a station operated by Esso). Much ore often I have gotten positive gestures from employees and occasionally they offered me a drink, a snack, a ride (!) or cardboard. Staff in Germany is definitely friendlier though.... Respect and politeness are keywords."

== Maps ==

The Dutch road service organisation '''ANWB''' has stores all over the country, mostly in the bigger cities. Here you'll find all sorts of road maps. Most importantly though, they have an excellent road map of the Netherlands available for free. Officially these are exlusively for members, but it won't be hard to persuade them to give a free one to a hitchhiker. This map shows you all the motorways, secondary roads, motorway exits and petrol stations. Don't waste money on a map, get this one! You'll recognise the map by the name '''Routekaart Nederland''' and the ANWB logo.

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/467054706678994/ Facebook group Hitchhiking in Belgium and the Netherlands]
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.nederlandlift.nl/ Nederland Lift], campaign to promote hitchhiking as a daily means of transport.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]
[[nomad:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>ancezgyxci3x5f0pk43wvbj17lirfbk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>76988</id>
      <parentid>76987</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-09-07T07:05:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Val</username>
        <id>13844</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9455">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch, West Frisian, Limburgish
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''. The current government intends to make an end to free public transport for students from the beginning of 2016. 

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

Sometimes the petrol stations workers tell you to go away. You can then hitch at the exit of the station but it's not as good :$

=== Useful tips ===
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all accross the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't be available anymore as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is are way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is not a problem. Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions. Shell has internal guidelines to only allow customers on their property. A hitchhiker may therefore be asked not to talk with drivers in the forecourt of the station, but this rarely happens. 
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you can always travel at a discount rate (-40%). This works as following: Everyone carrying an OV-Card (public transport card) can bring three people with them at a discount rate. Just get into the train after buying a discount ticket and ask the first young person if you can ride 'with them'. They usually won't mind and will be interested to hear your stories. '''Be aware that this is only possible after 9.00 on weekdays. On weekends there are no limitations.''' '''--&gt; --&gt;''' '''''UPDATE 2014: This option does not work anymore as they have now changed the way of buying the discount ticket. You have to activate the machine in order to buy the 40%-discount. The option of 40%-discount simply does not appear on the machine without the right traveling companion. Maybe you will need to find somebody before entering the train and then buy the ticket with them.'''''

==== Personal Experiences ====

"I hitch hike a huge amount in the Netherlands and it is almost always successful.  As stated above, managers in petrol stations sometimes ask you to leave the main forecourt.  This has been happening with increasing frequency to me at Shell stations in particular, but I have not experienced this at any other petrol company (they are usually more than happy if I politely ask where I could stand without being a nuisance). ".

"Having had over 250 rides from Dutch motorway petrol stations, I have been asked not to talk with drivers on the forecourt only once (at a station operated by Esso). Much ore often I have gotten positive gestures from employees and occasionally they offered me a drink, a snack, a ride (!) or cardboard. Staff in Germany is definitely friendlier though.... Respect and politeness are keywords."

== Maps ==

The Dutch road service organisation '''ANWB''' has stores all over the country, mostly in the bigger cities. Here you'll find all sorts of road maps. Most importantly though, they have an excellent road map of the Netherlands available for free. Officially these are exlusively for members, but it won't be hard to persuade them to give a free one to a hitchhiker. This map shows you all the motorways, secondary roads, motorway exits and petrol stations. Don't waste money on a map, get this one! You'll recognise the map by the name '''Routekaart Nederland''' and the ANWB logo.

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/467054706678994/ Facebook group Hitchhiking in Belgium and the Netherlands]
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.nederlandlift.nl/ Nederland Lift], campaign to promote hitchhiking as a daily means of transport.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]
[[nomad:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>iy2vg2fmw1yysdr3vcfwewubu0uxg5c</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77002</id>
      <parentid>76988</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-09-08T12:59:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9520">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch, West Frisian, Limburgish
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''. The current government intends to make an end to free public transport for students from the beginning of 2016. 

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

Sometimes the petrol stations workers tell you to go away. You can then hitch at the exit of the station but it's not as good :$

=== Useful tips ===
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all accross the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't be available anymore as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is are way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is not a problem. Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions. Shell has internal guidelines to only allow customers on their property. A hitchhiker may therefore be asked not to talk with drivers in the forecourt of the station, but this rarely happens. 
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you may be able to travel at a discount rate (-40%). Travelling with a printed ticket is no longer possible. Every traveller needs to have an OV-chipcard to use public transportation. You need to active "Samenreiskorting" (travel together reduction) on your OV-chipcard. The procedure is described [http://www.ns.nl/en/travellers/ov-chipkaart/menu-ov-chipkaart/travelling-with-the-ov-chipkaart#travelling-with-an-ns-season-ticket-holder on the website of NS (Dutch railways)]. If you have activated this and checked in with 40% reduction you can travel together with another traveller with an "NS abonnement" (NS season ticket holder), so you need to find somebody who has one, ideally before departure of the train. This is valid on weekdays after 9 AM and during the weekend without limitation (however, there are several types of season tickets nowadays, and some of them do not qualify for discount during the afternoon rush hours).

==== Personal Experiences ====

"I hitch hike a huge amount in the Netherlands and it is almost always successful.  As stated above, managers in petrol stations sometimes ask you to leave the main forecourt.  This has been happening with increasing frequency to me at Shell stations in particular, but I have not experienced this at any other petrol company (they are usually more than happy if I politely ask where I could stand without being a nuisance). ".

"Having had over 250 rides from Dutch motorway petrol stations, I have been asked not to talk with drivers on the forecourt only once (at a station operated by Esso). Much ore often I have gotten positive gestures from employees and occasionally they offered me a drink, a snack, a ride (!) or cardboard. Staff in Germany is definitely friendlier though.... Respect and politeness are keywords."

== Maps ==

The Dutch road service organisation '''ANWB''' has stores all over the country, mostly in the bigger cities. Here you'll find all sorts of road maps. Most importantly though, they have an excellent road map of the Netherlands available for free. Officially these are exlusively for members, but it won't be hard to persuade them to give a free one to a hitchhiker. This map shows you all the motorways, secondary roads, motorway exits and petrol stations. Don't waste money on a map, get this one! You'll recognise the map by the name '''Routekaart Nederland''' and the ANWB logo.

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/467054706678994/ Facebook group Hitchhiking in Belgium and the Netherlands]
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.nederlandlift.nl/ Nederland Lift], campaign to promote hitchhiking as a daily means of transport.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]
[[nomad:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>pill1gv99tn2ja98c8y0al9lgh7gu4f</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77654</id>
      <parentid>77002</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-10-30T10:18:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9608">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch, West Frisian, Limburgish
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''. The current government intends to make an end to free public transport for students from the beginning of 2016. 

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

Sometimes the petrol stations workers tell you to go away. You can then hitch at the exit of the station but it's not as good :$

=== Useful tips ===
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all accross the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't be available anymore as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is are way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is not a problem. Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions. Shell has internal guidelines to only allow customers on their property. A hitchhiker may therefore be asked not to talk with drivers in the forecourt of the station, but this rarely happens. 
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you may be able to travel at a discount rate (-40%). Travelling with a printed ticket is no longer possible. Every traveller needs to have an OV-chipcard to use public transportation. You need to active "Samenreiskorting" (travel together reduction) on your OV-chipcard. The procedure is described [http://www.ns.nl/en/travellers/ov-chipkaart/menu-ov-chipkaart/travelling-with-the-ov-chipkaart#travelling-with-an-ns-season-ticket-holder on the website of NS (Dutch railways)]. If you have activated this and checked in with 40% reduction you can travel together with another traveller with an "NS abonnement" (NS season ticket holder), so you need to find somebody who has one, ideally before departure of the train. This is valid on weekdays after 9 AM and during the weekend without limitation (however, there are several types of season tickets nowadays, and some of them do not qualify for discount during the afternoon rush hours).

==== Personal Experiences ====

"I hitch hike a huge amount in the Netherlands and it is almost always successful.  As stated above, managers in petrol stations sometimes ask you to leave the main forecourt.  This has been happening with increasing frequency to me at Shell stations in particular, but I have not experienced this at any other petrol company (they are usually more than happy if I politely ask where I could stand without being a nuisance). ".

"Having had over 250 rides from Dutch motorway petrol stations, I have been asked not to talk with drivers on the forecourt only once (at a station operated by Esso). Much ore often I have gotten positive gestures from employees and occasionally they offered me a drink, a snack, a ride (!) or cardboard. Staff in Germany is definitely friendlier though.... Respect and politeness are keywords."

== Maps ==

The Dutch road service organisation '''ANWB''' has stores all over the country, mostly in the bigger cities. Here you'll find all sorts of road maps. Most importantly though, they have an excellent road map of the Netherlands available for free. Officially these are exlusively for members, but it won't be hard to persuade them to give a free one to a hitchhiker. This map shows you all the motorways, secondary roads, motorway exits and petrol stations. Don't waste money on a map, get this one! You'll recognise the map by the name '''Routekaart Nederland''' and the ANWB logo.

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/467054706678994/ Facebook group Hitchhiking in Belgium and the Netherlands]
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.nederlandlift.nl/ Nederland Lift], campaign to promote hitchhiking as a daily means of transport.
* [[Hitchhiking_in_the_Netherlands_Survey|Survey about hitchhiking in the Netherlands]]

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]
[[nomad:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>lw8ob19y55787w5bq639v0equh2hqul</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>78825</id>
      <parentid>77654</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-02-26T09:22:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Koendev</username>
        <id>4236</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9669">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch, Frisian
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''. The current government intends to make an end to free public transport for students from the beginning of 2016. 

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

Sometimes the petrol stations workers tell you to not ask people in front of the shop directly. You can then hitch at the exit of the station which is mostly just as good but as its disadvantages of course.

=== Useful tips ===
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all accross the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't be available anymore as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is are way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is not a problem. Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions. Shell has internal guidelines to only allow customers on their property. A hitchhiker may therefore be asked not to talk with drivers in the forecourt of the station, but this rarely happens. 
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you may be able to travel at a discount rate (-40%). Travelling with a printed ticket is no longer possible. Every traveller needs to have an OV-chipcard to use public transportation. You need to active "Samenreiskorting" (travel together reduction) on your OV-chipcard. The procedure is described [http://www.ns.nl/en/travellers/ov-chipkaart/menu-ov-chipkaart/travelling-with-the-ov-chipkaart#travelling-with-an-ns-season-ticket-holder on the website of NS (Dutch railways)]. If you have activated this and checked in with 40% reduction you can travel together with another traveller with an "NS abonnement" (NS season ticket holder), so you need to find somebody who has one, ideally before departure of the train. This is valid on weekdays after 9 AM and during the weekend without limitation (however, there are several types of season tickets nowadays, and some of them do not qualify for discount during the afternoon rush hours).

==== Personal Experiences ====

"I hitch hike a huge amount in the Netherlands and it is almost always successful.  As stated above, managers in petrol stations sometimes ask you to leave the main forecourt.  This has been happening with increasing frequency to me at Shell stations in particular, but I have not experienced this at any other petrol company (they are usually more than happy if I politely ask where I could stand without being a nuisance). ".

"Having had over 250 rides from Dutch motorway petrol stations, I have been asked not to talk with drivers on the forecourt only once (at a station operated by Esso). Much ore often I have gotten positive gestures from employees and occasionally they offered me a drink, a snack, a ride (!) or cardboard. Staff in Germany is definitely friendlier though.... Respect and politeness are keywords."

== Maps ==

The Dutch road service organisation '''ANWB''' has stores all over the country, mostly in the bigger cities. Here you'll find all sorts of road maps. Most importantly though, they have an excellent road map of the Netherlands available for free. Officially these are exlusively for members, but it won't be hard to persuade them to give a free one to a hitchhiker. This map shows you all the motorways, secondary roads, motorway exits and petrol stations. Don't waste money on a map, get this one! You'll recognise the map by the name '''Routekaart Nederland''' and the ANWB logo.

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/467054706678994/ Facebook group Hitchhiking in Belgium and the Netherlands]
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.nederlandlift.nl/ Nederland Lift], campaign to promote hitchhiking as a daily means of transport.
* [[Hitchhiking_in_the_Netherlands_Survey|Survey about hitchhiking in the Netherlands]]

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]
[[nomad:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>epeqx6wyqhmc77ydr88v1poy0noop9f</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79384</id>
      <parentid>78825</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-05-13T08:30:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10309">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch, Frisian
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''. The current government intends to make an end to free public transport for students from the beginning of 2016. 

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

Sometimes the petrol stations workers tell you to not ask people in front of the shop directly. You can then hitch at the exit of the station which is mostly just as good but as its disadvantages of course.

=== Useful tips ===
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all accross the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't be available anymore as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is are way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is not a problem. Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions. 
* Shell has internal guidelines to only allow customers on their property. A hitchhiker may therefore be asked not to talk with drivers in the forecourt of the station, but this rarely happens. 
:
: &lt;b&gt;Dutch Hall of Shame&lt;/b&gt; of petrol stations where hitch-hikers have been asked not to talk with costumers on the forecourt
: Service station Kloosters (Shell), A59, Tilburg --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 4 times), other hitch-hikers have also been asked not to talk with costumers &lt;&lt;winner of Most Unfriendly Petrol Station Award in the Netherlands&gt;&gt;
: Service station Swentibold (Shell), A2, Maastricht --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 6 times)
: Service station Haarrijn (Shell), A2, Amsterdam --&gt; Utrecht ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 7 times)
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you may be able to travel at a discount rate (-40%). Travelling with a printed ticket is no longer possible. Every traveller needs to have an OV-chipcard to use public transportation. You need to active "Samenreiskorting" (travel together reduction) on your OV-chipcard. The procedure is described [http://www.ns.nl/en/travellers/ov-chipkaart/menu-ov-chipkaart/travelling-with-the-ov-chipkaart#travelling-with-an-ns-season-ticket-holder on the website of NS (Dutch railways)]. If you have activated this and checked in with 40% reduction you can travel together with another traveller with an "NS abonnement" (NS season ticket holder), so you need to find somebody who has one, ideally before departure of the train. This is valid on weekdays after 9 AM and during the weekend without limitation (however, there are several types of season tickets nowadays, and some of them do not qualify for discount during the afternoon rush hours).

==== Personal Experiences ====

"I hitch hike a huge amount in the Netherlands and it is almost always successful.  As stated above, managers in petrol stations sometimes ask you to leave the main forecourt.  This has been happening with increasing frequency to me at Shell stations in particular, but I have not experienced this at any other petrol company (they are usually more than happy if I politely ask where I could stand without being a nuisance). ".

"Having had over 250 rides from Dutch motorway petrol stations, I have been asked not to talk with drivers on the forecourt only once (at a station operated by Esso). Much ore often I have gotten positive gestures from employees and occasionally they offered me a drink, a snack, a ride (!) or cardboard. Staff in Germany is definitely friendlier though.... Respect and politeness are keywords."

== Maps ==

The Dutch road service organisation '''ANWB''' has stores all over the country, mostly in the bigger cities. Here you'll find all sorts of road maps. Most importantly though, they have an excellent road map of the Netherlands available for free. Officially these are exlusively for members, but it won't be hard to persuade them to give a free one to a hitchhiker. This map shows you all the motorways, secondary roads, motorway exits and petrol stations. Don't waste money on a map, get this one! You'll recognise the map by the name '''Routekaart Nederland''' and the ANWB logo.

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/467054706678994/ Facebook group Hitchhiking in Belgium and the Netherlands]
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.nederlandlift.nl/ Nederland Lift], campaign to promote hitchhiking as a daily means of transport.
* [[Hitchhiking_in_the_Netherlands_Survey|Survey about hitchhiking in the Netherlands]]

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]
[[nomad:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>4ik6dorvopllxs301bsiwp5t75jfkph</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79385</id>
      <parentid>79384</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-05-13T08:46:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10307">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch, Frisian
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''. The current government intends to make an end to free public transport for students from the beginning of 2016. 

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

Sometimes the petrol stations workers tell you to not ask people in front of the shop directly. You can then hitch at the exit of the station which is mostly just as good but as its disadvantages of course.

=== Useful tips ===
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all accross the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price, Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't be available anymore as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is are way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is not a problem. Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions. 
* Shell has internal guidelines to only allow customers on their property. A hitchhiker may therefore be asked not to talk with drivers in the forecourt of the station, but this rarely happens. 
:
: &lt;b&gt;Dutch Hall of Shame&lt;/b&gt; of petrol stations where hitch-hikers have been asked not to talk with costumers on the forecourt
: Service station Kloosters (Shell), A59, Tilburg --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 4 times), other hitch-hikers have also been asked not to talk with costumers &lt;&lt;winner of Most Unfriendly Petrol Station Award in the Netherlands&gt;&gt;
: Service station Swentibold (Shell), A2, Maastricht --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 6 times)
: Service station Haarrijn (Shell), A2, Amsterdam --&gt; Utrecht ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 7 times)
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you may be able to travel at a discount rate (-40%). Travelling with a printed ticket is no longer possible. Every traveller needs to have an OV-chipcard to use public transportation. You need to active "Samenreiskorting" (travel together reduction) on your OV-chipcard. The procedure is described [http://www.ns.nl/en/travellers/ov-chipkaart/menu-ov-chipkaart/travelling-with-the-ov-chipkaart#travelling-with-an-ns-season-ticket-holder on the website of NS (Dutch railways)]. If you have activated this and checked in with 40% reduction you can travel together with another traveller with an "NS abonnement" (NS season ticket holder), so you need to find somebody who has one, ideally before departure of the train. This is valid on weekdays after 9 AM and during the weekend without limitation (however, there are several types of season tickets nowadays, and some of them do not qualify for discount during the afternoon rush hours).

==== Personal Experiences ====

"I hitch hike a huge amount in the Netherlands and it is almost always successful.  As stated above, managers in petrol stations sometimes ask you to leave the main forecourt.  This has been happening with increasing frequency to me at Shell stations in particular, but I have not experienced this at any other petrol company (they are usually more than happy if I politely ask where I could stand without being a nuisance). ".

"Having had 307 rides from Dutch motorway petrol stations, I have been asked not to talk with drivers on the forecourt three times (at stations operated by Shell). Much more often I have gotten positive gestures from employees and occasionally they offered me a drink, a snack, a ride (!) or cardboard. Staff in Germany is definitely friendlier though.... Respect and politeness are keywords."

== Maps ==

The Dutch road service organisation '''ANWB''' has stores all over the country, mostly in the bigger cities. Here you'll find all sorts of road maps. Most importantly though, they have an excellent road map of the Netherlands available for free. Officially these are exlusively for members, but it won't be hard to persuade them to give a free one to a hitchhiker. This map shows you all the motorways, secondary roads, motorway exits and petrol stations. Don't waste money on a map, get this one! You'll recognise the map by the name '''Routekaart Nederland''' and the ANWB logo.

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/467054706678994/ Facebook group Hitchhiking in Belgium and the Netherlands]
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.nederlandlift.nl/ Nederland Lift], campaign to promote hitchhiking as a daily means of transport.
* [[Hitchhiking_in_the_Netherlands_Survey|Survey about hitchhiking in the Netherlands]]

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]
[[nomad:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>bfmkb7sv9qmp6cqngjm3tqqbpy2vdrh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79386</id>
      <parentid>79385</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-05-13T09:06:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10426">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch, Frisian
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''. The current government intends to make an end to free public transport for students from the beginning of 2016. 

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

Sometimes the petrol stations workers tell you to not ask people in front of the shop directly. You can then hitch at the exit of the station which is mostly just as good but as its disadvantages of course.

=== Useful tips ===
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all across the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price. Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't available any more as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is not a problem. Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions. 
* Shell has internal guidelines to only allow customers on their property. A hitchhiker may therefore be asked not to talk with drivers in the forecourt of the station, but this rarely happens. If this happens, buy a coffee or inexpensive whatever-bar, and ask for the receipt. This will formally make you a customer!
:
: &lt;b&gt;Dutch Hall of Shame&lt;/b&gt; of petrol stations where hitch-hikers have been asked not to talk with costumers on the forecourt
: Service station Kloosters (Shell), A59, Tilburg --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 4 times), other hitch-hikers have also been asked not to talk with costumers '''Winner of Most Unfriendly Petrol Station Award in the Netherlands'''
: Service station Swentibold (Shell), A2, Maastricht --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 6 times)
: Service station Haarrijn (Shell), A2, Amsterdam --&gt; Utrecht ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 7 times)
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you may be able to travel at a discount rate (-40%). Travelling with a printed ticket is no longer possible. Every traveller needs to have an OV-chipcard to use public transportation. You need to active "Samenreiskorting" (travel together reduction) on your OV-chipcard. The procedure is described [http://www.ns.nl/en/travellers/ov-chipkaart/menu-ov-chipkaart/travelling-with-the-ov-chipkaart#travelling-with-an-ns-season-ticket-holder on the website of NS (Dutch railways)]. If you have activated this and checked in with 40% reduction you can travel together with another traveller with an "NS abonnement" (NS season ticket holder), so you need to find somebody who has one, ideally before departure of the train. This is valid on weekdays after 09:00 and during the weekend without limitation (however, there are several types of season tickets nowadays, and some of them do not qualify for discount during the afternoon rush hours).

==== Personal Experiences ====

"I hitch hike a huge amount in the Netherlands and it is almost always successful.  As stated above, managers in petrol stations sometimes ask you to leave the main forecourt.  This has been happening with increasing frequency to me at Shell stations in particular, but I have not experienced this at any other petrol company (they are usually more than happy if I politely ask where I could stand without being a nuisance). ".

"Having had 307 rides from Dutch motorway petrol stations, I have been asked not to talk with drivers on the forecourt three times (at stations operated by Shell). Much more often I have gotten positive gestures from employees and occasionally they offered me a drink, a snack, a ride (!) or cardboard. Staff in Germany is definitely friendlier though.... Respect and politeness are keywords."

== Maps ==

The Dutch road service organisation '''ANWB''' has stores all over the country, mostly in the bigger cities. Here you'll find all sorts of road maps. Most importantly though, they have an excellent road map of the Netherlands available for free. Officially these are exlusively for members, but it won't be hard to persuade them to give a free one to a hitchhiker. This map shows you all the motorways, secondary roads, motorway exits and petrol stations. Don't waste money on a map, get this one! You'll recognise the map by the name '''Routekaart Nederland''' and the ANWB logo.

== License plates ==
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

== Food ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|left|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
The Netherlands are one of the rare countries where you can find a cheap pot of 'Peanut Butter' (''pindakaas''), which is a nutritious item that you can easily carry in your backpack. Also, you can find a tube of 'mayonnaise' and 'ketchup' sauce (''Zaanse saus'') for about 30 cents, which last long without needing to be refrigerated and are great supplements to sandwiches or ''friet'' (as it avoids having to pay the 50 cents sauce at the ''snackbar'' (or sometimes ''frituur'' or ''frietkot'', especially in Belgium) when ordering a snack).

See [http://trashwiki.org/en/Netherlands trashwiki] for info on dumpster diving for free food in the Netherlands.

== Links ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/467054706678994/ Facebook group Hitchhiking in Belgium and the Netherlands]
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.nederlandlift.nl/ Nederland Lift], campaign to promote hitchhiking as a daily means of transport.
* [[Hitchhiking_in_the_Netherlands_Survey|Survey about hitchhiking in the Netherlands]]

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}

[[trash:Netherlands]]

[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]
[[nomad:Netherlands]]</text>
      <sha1>ffqohigqq4u8025ectvnhcc74kj6jiu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>89600</id>
      <parentid>79386</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-10-07T13:02:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Traumschule</username>
        <id>28627</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9727">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch, Frisian
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''. The current government intends to make an end to free public transport for students from the beginning of 2016. 

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

Sometimes the petrol stations workers tell you to not ask people in front of the shop directly. You can then hitch at the exit of the station which is mostly just as good but as its disadvantages of course.

== License plates ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

=== Useful tips ===
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all across the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price. Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't available any more as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is not a problem. Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions. 
* Shell has internal guidelines to only allow customers on their property. A hitchhiker may therefore be asked not to talk with drivers in the forecourt of the station, but this rarely happens. If this happens, buy a coffee or inexpensive whatever-bar, and ask for the receipt. This will formally make you a customer!
:
: &lt;b&gt;Dutch Hall of Shame&lt;/b&gt; of petrol stations where hitch-hikers have been asked not to talk with costumers on the forecourt
: Service station Kloosters (Shell), A59, Tilburg --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 4 times), other hitch-hikers have also been asked not to talk with costumers '''Winner of Most Unfriendly Petrol Station Award in the Netherlands'''
: Service station Swentibold (Shell), A2, Maastricht --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 6 times)
: Service station Haarrijn (Shell), A2, Amsterdam --&gt; Utrecht ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 7 times)
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you may be able to travel at a discount rate (-40%). Travelling with a printed ticket is no longer possible. Every traveller needs to have an OV-chipcard to use public transportation. You need to active "Samenreiskorting" (travel together reduction) on your OV-chipcard. The procedure is described [http://www.ns.nl/en/travellers/ov-chipkaart/menu-ov-chipkaart/travelling-with-the-ov-chipkaart#travelling-with-an-ns-season-ticket-holder on the website of NS (Dutch railways)]. If you have activated this and checked in with 40% reduction you can travel together with another traveller with an "NS abonnement" (NS season ticket holder), so you need to find somebody who has one, ideally before departure of the train. This is valid on weekdays after 09:00 and during the weekend without limitation (however, there are several types of season tickets nowadays, and some of them do not qualify for discount during the afternoon rush hours).

==== Personal Experiences ====
"I hitch hike a huge amount in the Netherlands and it is almost always successful.  As stated above, managers in petrol stations sometimes ask you to leave the main forecourt.  This has been happening with increasing frequency to me at Shell stations in particular, but I have not experienced this at any other petrol company (they are usually more than happy if I politely ask where I could stand without being a nuisance). ".

"Having had 307 rides from Dutch motorway petrol stations, I have been asked not to talk with drivers on the forecourt three times (at stations operated by Shell). Much more often I have gotten positive gestures from employees and occasionally they offered me a drink, a snack, a ride (!) or cardboard. Staff in Germany is definitely friendlier though.... Respect and politeness are keywords."

== Resources ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/467054706678994/ Facebook group Hitchhiking in Belgium and the Netherlands]
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.nederlandlift.nl/ Nederland Lift], campaign to promote hitchhiking as a daily means of transport.
* [[Hitchhiking_in_the_Netherlands_Survey|Survey about hitchhiking in the Netherlands]]

=== Maps ===
The Dutch road service organisation '''ANWB''' has stores all over the country, mostly in the bigger cities. Here you'll find all sorts of road maps. Most importantly though, they have an excellent road map of the Netherlands available for free. Officially these are exlusively for members, but it won't be hard to persuade them to give a free one to a hitchhiker. This map shows you all the motorways, secondary roads, motorway exits and petrol stations. Don't waste money on a map, get this one! You'll recognise the map by the name '''Routekaart Nederland''' and the ANWB logo.

{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>t3np01zcd94su85a4kkovmyls2sdh2z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>97796</id>
      <parentid>89600</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-05-25T17:20:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Maps */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9805">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch, Frisian
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''. The current government intends to make an end to free public transport for students from the beginning of 2016. 

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

Sometimes the petrol stations workers tell you to not ask people in front of the shop directly. You can then hitch at the exit of the station which is mostly just as good but as its disadvantages of course.

== License plates ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

=== Useful tips ===
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all across the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price. Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't available any more as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is not a problem. Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions. 
* Shell has internal guidelines to only allow customers on their property. A hitchhiker may therefore be asked not to talk with drivers in the forecourt of the station, but this rarely happens. If this happens, buy a coffee or inexpensive whatever-bar, and ask for the receipt. This will formally make you a customer!
:
: &lt;b&gt;Dutch Hall of Shame&lt;/b&gt; of petrol stations where hitch-hikers have been asked not to talk with costumers on the forecourt
: Service station Kloosters (Shell), A59, Tilburg --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 4 times), other hitch-hikers have also been asked not to talk with costumers '''Winner of Most Unfriendly Petrol Station Award in the Netherlands'''
: Service station Swentibold (Shell), A2, Maastricht --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 6 times)
: Service station Haarrijn (Shell), A2, Amsterdam --&gt; Utrecht ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 7 times)
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you may be able to travel at a discount rate (-40%). Travelling with a printed ticket is no longer possible. Every traveller needs to have an OV-chipcard to use public transportation. You need to active "Samenreiskorting" (travel together reduction) on your OV-chipcard. The procedure is described [http://www.ns.nl/en/travellers/ov-chipkaart/menu-ov-chipkaart/travelling-with-the-ov-chipkaart#travelling-with-an-ns-season-ticket-holder on the website of NS (Dutch railways)]. If you have activated this and checked in with 40% reduction you can travel together with another traveller with an "NS abonnement" (NS season ticket holder), so you need to find somebody who has one, ideally before departure of the train. This is valid on weekdays after 09:00 and during the weekend without limitation (however, there are several types of season tickets nowadays, and some of them do not qualify for discount during the afternoon rush hours).

==== Personal Experiences ====
"I hitch hike a huge amount in the Netherlands and it is almost always successful.  As stated above, managers in petrol stations sometimes ask you to leave the main forecourt.  This has been happening with increasing frequency to me at Shell stations in particular, but I have not experienced this at any other petrol company (they are usually more than happy if I politely ask where I could stand without being a nuisance). ".

"Having had 307 rides from Dutch motorway petrol stations, I have been asked not to talk with drivers on the forecourt three times (at stations operated by Shell). Much more often I have gotten positive gestures from employees and occasionally they offered me a drink, a snack, a ride (!) or cardboard. Staff in Germany is definitely friendlier though.... Respect and politeness are keywords."

== Resources ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/467054706678994/ Facebook group Hitchhiking in Belgium and the Netherlands]
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.nederlandlift.nl/ Nederland Lift], campaign to promote hitchhiking as a daily means of transport.
* [[Hitchhiking_in_the_Netherlands_Survey|Survey about hitchhiking in the Netherlands]]

=== Maps ===

The Dutch road service organisation '''ANWB''' has stores all over the country, mostly in the bigger cities. Here you'll find all sorts of road maps. Most importantly though, they have an excellent road map of the Netherlands available for free. Officially these are exlusively for members, but it won't be hard to persuade them to give a free one to a hitchhiker. This map shows you all the motorways, secondary roads, motorway exits and petrol stations. Don't waste money on a map, get this one! You'll recognise the map by the name '''Routekaart Nederland''' and the ANWB logo.


== Trashwiki &amp; Nomadwiki ==

[[trash:Netherlands]] [[nomad:Netherlands]]



{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>3jpp7dw24wtfw9o7f309chd1hpz4zw2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>99405</id>
      <parentid>97796</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-10-05T09:34:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Trashwiki &amp; Nomadwiki */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9806">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch, Frisian
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''. The current government intends to make an end to free public transport for students from the beginning of 2016. 

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

Sometimes the petrol stations workers tell you to not ask people in front of the shop directly. You can then hitch at the exit of the station which is mostly just as good but as its disadvantages of course.

== License plates ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

=== Useful tips ===
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all across the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price. Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't available any more as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is not a problem. Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions. 
* Shell has internal guidelines to only allow customers on their property. A hitchhiker may therefore be asked not to talk with drivers in the forecourt of the station, but this rarely happens. If this happens, buy a coffee or inexpensive whatever-bar, and ask for the receipt. This will formally make you a customer!
:
: &lt;b&gt;Dutch Hall of Shame&lt;/b&gt; of petrol stations where hitch-hikers have been asked not to talk with costumers on the forecourt
: Service station Kloosters (Shell), A59, Tilburg --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 4 times), other hitch-hikers have also been asked not to talk with costumers '''Winner of Most Unfriendly Petrol Station Award in the Netherlands'''
: Service station Swentibold (Shell), A2, Maastricht --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 6 times)
: Service station Haarrijn (Shell), A2, Amsterdam --&gt; Utrecht ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 7 times)
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you may be able to travel at a discount rate (-40%). Travelling with a printed ticket is no longer possible. Every traveller needs to have an OV-chipcard to use public transportation. You need to active "Samenreiskorting" (travel together reduction) on your OV-chipcard. The procedure is described [http://www.ns.nl/en/travellers/ov-chipkaart/menu-ov-chipkaart/travelling-with-the-ov-chipkaart#travelling-with-an-ns-season-ticket-holder on the website of NS (Dutch railways)]. If you have activated this and checked in with 40% reduction you can travel together with another traveller with an "NS abonnement" (NS season ticket holder), so you need to find somebody who has one, ideally before departure of the train. This is valid on weekdays after 09:00 and during the weekend without limitation (however, there are several types of season tickets nowadays, and some of them do not qualify for discount during the afternoon rush hours).

==== Personal Experiences ====
"I hitch hike a huge amount in the Netherlands and it is almost always successful.  As stated above, managers in petrol stations sometimes ask you to leave the main forecourt.  This has been happening with increasing frequency to me at Shell stations in particular, but I have not experienced this at any other petrol company (they are usually more than happy if I politely ask where I could stand without being a nuisance). ".

"Having had 307 rides from Dutch motorway petrol stations, I have been asked not to talk with drivers on the forecourt three times (at stations operated by Shell). Much more often I have gotten positive gestures from employees and occasionally they offered me a drink, a snack, a ride (!) or cardboard. Staff in Germany is definitely friendlier though.... Respect and politeness are keywords."

== Resources ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/467054706678994/ Facebook group Hitchhiking in Belgium and the Netherlands]
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.nederlandlift.nl/ Nederland Lift], campaign to promote hitchhiking as a daily means of transport.
* [[Hitchhiking_in_the_Netherlands_Survey|Survey about hitchhiking in the Netherlands]]

=== Maps ===

The Dutch road service organisation '''ANWB''' has stores all over the country, mostly in the bigger cities. Here you'll find all sorts of road maps. Most importantly though, they have an excellent road map of the Netherlands available for free. Officially these are exlusively for members, but it won't be hard to persuade them to give a free one to a hitchhiker. This map shows you all the motorways, secondary roads, motorway exits and petrol stations. Don't waste money on a map, get this one! You'll recognise the map by the name '''Routekaart Nederland''' and the ANWB logo.


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

[[nomad:Netherlands]] [[trash:Netherlands]]




{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>6ko6e9dz7ioxrsobgpgce8w6ycwsa64</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>100347</id>
      <parentid>99405</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-01-24T20:55:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9849">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch, Frisian
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''. The current government intends to make an end to free public transport for students from the beginning of 2016. 

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

Sometimes the petrol stations workers tell you to not ask people in front of the shop directly. You can then hitch at the exit of the station which is mostly just as good but as its disadvantages of course.

== License plates ==
[[File:HitchDelft.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[User:Mdsmendes|Mdsmendes]] hitching in the Netherlands]]
In the Netherlands, license plates do not contain any marking about where the car comes from, but it does indicate the age of the car (although not in a straightforward way). Often though, the name and the city of the garage where the car was bought is indicated just under the license plate on the backside of the car. On busy petrol stations this may be useful information to look out for, as it may indicate where people are driving to. A normal license plate has three blocks of black letters or numbers on a yellow background. Every block consists of two letters or two numbers (so in total six letters and numbers). Since 2007 a new series of license plates is in use for the newest vehicles existing of a combination of three letters in the middle. Taxis' license plates have a blue background. The license plate of old timers is very dark blue with white letters. The number of cars with such license plate or yet another kind is very limited.

=== Useful tips ===
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all across the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price. Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't available any more as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is not a problem. Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions. 
* Shell has internal guidelines to only allow customers on their property. A hitchhiker may therefore be asked not to talk with drivers in the forecourt of the station, but this rarely happens. If this happens, buy a coffee or inexpensive whatever-bar, and ask for the receipt. This will formally make you a customer!
:
: &lt;b&gt;Dutch Hall of Shame&lt;/b&gt; of petrol stations where hitch-hikers have been asked not to talk with costumers on the forecourt
: Service station Kloosters (Shell), A59, Tilburg --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 4 times), other hitch-hikers have also been asked not to talk with costumers '''Winner of Most Unfriendly Petrol Station Award in the Netherlands'''
: Service station Swentibold (Shell), A2, Maastricht --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 6 times)
: Service station Haarrijn (Shell), A2, Amsterdam --&gt; Utrecht ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 7 times)
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you may be able to travel at a discount rate (-40%). Travelling with a printed ticket is no longer possible. Every traveller needs to have an OV-chipcard to use public transportation. You need to active "Samenreiskorting" (travel together reduction) on your OV-chipcard. The procedure is described [http://www.ns.nl/en/travellers/ov-chipkaart/menu-ov-chipkaart/travelling-with-the-ov-chipkaart#travelling-with-an-ns-season-ticket-holder on the website of NS (Dutch railways)]. If you have activated this and checked in with 40% reduction you can travel together with another traveller with an "NS abonnement" (NS season ticket holder), so you need to find somebody who has one, ideally before departure of the train. This is valid on weekdays after 09:00 and during the weekend without limitation (however, there are several types of season tickets nowadays, and some of them do not qualify for discount during the afternoon rush hours).

==== Personal Experiences ====
"I hitch hike a huge amount in the Netherlands and it is almost always successful.  As stated above, managers in petrol stations sometimes ask you to leave the main forecourt.  This has been happening with increasing frequency to me at Shell stations in particular, but I have not experienced this at any other petrol company (they are usually more than happy if I politely ask where I could stand without being a nuisance). ".

"Having had 307 rides from Dutch motorway petrol stations, I have been asked not to talk with drivers on the forecourt three times (at stations operated by Shell). Much more often I have gotten positive gestures from employees and occasionally they offered me a drink, a snack, a ride (!) or cardboard. Staff in Germany is definitely friendlier though.... Respect and politeness are keywords."

== Resources ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/467054706678994/ Facebook group Hitchhiking in Belgium and the Netherlands]
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.nederlandlift.nl/ Nederland Lift], campaign to promote hitchhiking as a daily means of transport.
* [[Hitchhiking_in_the_Netherlands_Survey|Survey about hitchhiking in the Netherlands]]

=== Maps ===

The Dutch road service organisation '''ANWB''' has stores all over the country, mostly in the bigger cities. Here you'll find all sorts of road maps. Most importantly though, they have an excellent road map of the Netherlands available for free. Officially these are exlusively for members, but it won't be hard to persuade them to give a free one to a hitchhiker. This map shows you all the motorways, secondary roads, motorway exits and petrol stations. Don't waste money on a map, get this one! You'll recognise the map by the name '''Routekaart Nederland''' and the ANWB logo.



== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

[[nomad:Netherlands]] [[trash:Netherlands]]




{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>eebqrs3ysg3425biagqy42u12manrhm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101114</id>
      <parentid>100347</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-05T14:39:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* License plates */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8776">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch, Frisian
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''. The current government intends to make an end to free public transport for students from the beginning of 2016. 

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

Sometimes the petrol stations workers tell you to not ask people in front of the shop directly. You can then hitch at the exit of the station which is mostly just as good but as its disadvantages of course.



== Useful tips ==
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all across the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price. Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't available any more as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is not a problem. Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions. 
* Shell has internal guidelines to only allow customers on their property. A hitchhiker may therefore be asked not to talk with drivers in the forecourt of the station, but this rarely happens. If this happens, buy a coffee or inexpensive whatever-bar, and ask for the receipt. This will formally make you a customer!
:
: &lt;b&gt;Dutch Hall of Shame&lt;/b&gt; of petrol stations where hitch-hikers have been asked not to talk with costumers on the forecourt
: Service station Kloosters (Shell), A59, Tilburg --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 4 times), other hitch-hikers have also been asked not to talk with costumers '''Winner of Most Unfriendly Petrol Station Award in the Netherlands'''
: Service station Swentibold (Shell), A2, Maastricht --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 6 times)
: Service station Haarrijn (Shell), A2, Amsterdam --&gt; Utrecht ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 7 times)
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you may be able to travel at a discount rate (-40%). Travelling with a printed ticket is no longer possible. Every traveller needs to have an OV-chipcard to use public transportation. You need to active "Samenreiskorting" (travel together reduction) on your OV-chipcard. The procedure is described [http://www.ns.nl/en/travellers/ov-chipkaart/menu-ov-chipkaart/travelling-with-the-ov-chipkaart#travelling-with-an-ns-season-ticket-holder on the website of NS (Dutch railways)]. If you have activated this and checked in with 40% reduction you can travel together with another traveller with an "NS abonnement" (NS season ticket holder), so you need to find somebody who has one, ideally before departure of the train. This is valid on weekdays after 09:00 and during the weekend without limitation (however, there are several types of season tickets nowadays, and some of them do not qualify for discount during the afternoon rush hours).

==== Personal Experiences ====
"I hitch hike a huge amount in the Netherlands and it is almost always successful.  As stated above, managers in petrol stations sometimes ask you to leave the main forecourt.  This has been happening with increasing frequency to me at Shell stations in particular, but I have not experienced this at any other petrol company (they are usually more than happy if I politely ask where I could stand without being a nuisance). ".

"Having had 307 rides from Dutch motorway petrol stations, I have been asked not to talk with drivers on the forecourt three times (at stations operated by Shell). Much more often I have gotten positive gestures from employees and occasionally they offered me a drink, a snack, a ride (!) or cardboard. Staff in Germany is definitely friendlier though.... Respect and politeness are keywords."

== Resources ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/467054706678994/ Facebook group Hitchhiking in Belgium and the Netherlands]
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.nederlandlift.nl/ Nederland Lift], campaign to promote hitchhiking as a daily means of transport.
* [[Hitchhiking_in_the_Netherlands_Survey|Survey about hitchhiking in the Netherlands]]

=== Maps ===

The Dutch road service organisation '''ANWB''' has stores all over the country, mostly in the bigger cities. Here you'll find all sorts of road maps. Most importantly though, they have an excellent road map of the Netherlands available for free. Officially these are exlusively for members, but it won't be hard to persuade them to give a free one to a hitchhiker. This map shows you all the motorways, secondary roads, motorway exits and petrol stations. Don't waste money on a map, get this one! You'll recognise the map by the name '''Routekaart Nederland''' and the ANWB logo.



== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

[[nomad:Netherlands]] [[trash:Netherlands]]




{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>fgwb1m61xgyipn43rfmgwmzs7918f7d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101115</id>
      <parentid>101114</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-05T14:39:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Personal Experiences */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7921">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch, Frisian
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''. The current government intends to make an end to free public transport for students from the beginning of 2016. 

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

Sometimes the petrol stations workers tell you to not ask people in front of the shop directly. You can then hitch at the exit of the station which is mostly just as good but as its disadvantages of course.



== Useful tips ==
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all across the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price. Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't available any more as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is not a problem. Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions. 
* Shell has internal guidelines to only allow customers on their property. A hitchhiker may therefore be asked not to talk with drivers in the forecourt of the station, but this rarely happens. If this happens, buy a coffee or inexpensive whatever-bar, and ask for the receipt. This will formally make you a customer!
:
: &lt;b&gt;Dutch Hall of Shame&lt;/b&gt; of petrol stations where hitch-hikers have been asked not to talk with costumers on the forecourt
: Service station Kloosters (Shell), A59, Tilburg --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 4 times), other hitch-hikers have also been asked not to talk with costumers '''Winner of Most Unfriendly Petrol Station Award in the Netherlands'''
: Service station Swentibold (Shell), A2, Maastricht --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 6 times)
: Service station Haarrijn (Shell), A2, Amsterdam --&gt; Utrecht ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 7 times)
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you may be able to travel at a discount rate (-40%). Travelling with a printed ticket is no longer possible. Every traveller needs to have an OV-chipcard to use public transportation. You need to active "Samenreiskorting" (travel together reduction) on your OV-chipcard. The procedure is described [http://www.ns.nl/en/travellers/ov-chipkaart/menu-ov-chipkaart/travelling-with-the-ov-chipkaart#travelling-with-an-ns-season-ticket-holder on the website of NS (Dutch railways)]. If you have activated this and checked in with 40% reduction you can travel together with another traveller with an "NS abonnement" (NS season ticket holder), so you need to find somebody who has one, ideally before departure of the train. This is valid on weekdays after 09:00 and during the weekend without limitation (however, there are several types of season tickets nowadays, and some of them do not qualify for discount during the afternoon rush hours).

== Resources ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/467054706678994/ Facebook group Hitchhiking in Belgium and the Netherlands]
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.nederlandlift.nl/ Nederland Lift], campaign to promote hitchhiking as a daily means of transport.
* [[Hitchhiking_in_the_Netherlands_Survey|Survey about hitchhiking in the Netherlands]]

=== Maps ===

The Dutch road service organisation '''ANWB''' has stores all over the country, mostly in the bigger cities. Here you'll find all sorts of road maps. Most importantly though, they have an excellent road map of the Netherlands available for free. Officially these are exlusively for members, but it won't be hard to persuade them to give a free one to a hitchhiker. This map shows you all the motorways, secondary roads, motorway exits and petrol stations. Don't waste money on a map, get this one! You'll recognise the map by the name '''Routekaart Nederland''' and the ANWB logo.



== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

[[nomad:Netherlands]] [[trash:Netherlands]]




{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>87an7zb7mfg840nhd2v6mg506at5xxg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101116</id>
      <parentid>101115</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-05T14:40:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Maps */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7323">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch, Frisian
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''. The current government intends to make an end to free public transport for students from the beginning of 2016. 

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

Sometimes the petrol stations workers tell you to not ask people in front of the shop directly. You can then hitch at the exit of the station which is mostly just as good but as its disadvantages of course.



== Useful tips ==
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all across the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price. Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't available any more as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is not a problem. Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions. 
* Shell has internal guidelines to only allow customers on their property. A hitchhiker may therefore be asked not to talk with drivers in the forecourt of the station, but this rarely happens. If this happens, buy a coffee or inexpensive whatever-bar, and ask for the receipt. This will formally make you a customer!
:
: &lt;b&gt;Dutch Hall of Shame&lt;/b&gt; of petrol stations where hitch-hikers have been asked not to talk with costumers on the forecourt
: Service station Kloosters (Shell), A59, Tilburg --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 4 times), other hitch-hikers have also been asked not to talk with costumers '''Winner of Most Unfriendly Petrol Station Award in the Netherlands'''
: Service station Swentibold (Shell), A2, Maastricht --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 6 times)
: Service station Haarrijn (Shell), A2, Amsterdam --&gt; Utrecht ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 7 times)
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you may be able to travel at a discount rate (-40%). Travelling with a printed ticket is no longer possible. Every traveller needs to have an OV-chipcard to use public transportation. You need to active "Samenreiskorting" (travel together reduction) on your OV-chipcard. The procedure is described [http://www.ns.nl/en/travellers/ov-chipkaart/menu-ov-chipkaart/travelling-with-the-ov-chipkaart#travelling-with-an-ns-season-ticket-holder on the website of NS (Dutch railways)]. If you have activated this and checked in with 40% reduction you can travel together with another traveller with an "NS abonnement" (NS season ticket holder), so you need to find somebody who has one, ideally before departure of the train. This is valid on weekdays after 09:00 and during the weekend without limitation (however, there are several types of season tickets nowadays, and some of them do not qualify for discount during the afternoon rush hours).

== Resources ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/467054706678994/ Facebook group Hitchhiking in Belgium and the Netherlands]
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.nederlandlift.nl/ Nederland Lift], campaign to promote hitchhiking as a daily means of transport.
* [[Hitchhiking_in_the_Netherlands_Survey|Survey about hitchhiking in the Netherlands]]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

[[nomad:Netherlands]] [[trash:Netherlands]]




{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>fx2996c0s3v8rupm3pvsoob8bml2rxc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101117</id>
      <parentid>101116</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-05T14:40:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Resources */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8159">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch, Frisian
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''. The current government intends to make an end to free public transport for students from the beginning of 2016. 

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

Sometimes the petrol stations workers tell you to not ask people in front of the shop directly. You can then hitch at the exit of the station which is mostly just as good but as its disadvantages of course.



== Useful tips ==
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all across the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price. Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't available any more as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is not a problem. Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions. 
* Shell has internal guidelines to only allow customers on their property. A hitchhiker may therefore be asked not to talk with drivers in the forecourt of the station, but this rarely happens. If this happens, buy a coffee or inexpensive whatever-bar, and ask for the receipt. This will formally make you a customer!
:
: &lt;b&gt;Dutch Hall of Shame&lt;/b&gt; of petrol stations where hitch-hikers have been asked not to talk with costumers on the forecourt
: Service station Kloosters (Shell), A59, Tilburg --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 4 times), other hitch-hikers have also been asked not to talk with costumers '''Winner of Most Unfriendly Petrol Station Award in the Netherlands'''
: Service station Swentibold (Shell), A2, Maastricht --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 6 times)
: Service station Haarrijn (Shell), A2, Amsterdam --&gt; Utrecht ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 7 times)
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you may be able to travel at a discount rate (-40%). Travelling with a printed ticket is no longer possible. Every traveller needs to have an OV-chipcard to use public transportation. You need to active "Samenreiskorting" (travel together reduction) on your OV-chipcard. The procedure is described [http://www.ns.nl/en/travellers/ov-chipkaart/menu-ov-chipkaart/travelling-with-the-ov-chipkaart#travelling-with-an-ns-season-ticket-holder on the website of NS (Dutch railways)]. If you have activated this and checked in with 40% reduction you can travel together with another traveller with an "NS abonnement" (NS season ticket holder), so you need to find somebody who has one, ideally before departure of the train. This is valid on weekdays after 09:00 and during the weekend without limitation (however, there are several types of season tickets nowadays, and some of them do not qualify for discount during the afternoon rush hours).

== Links ==

* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/467054706678994/ Facebook group Hitchhiking in Belgium and the Netherlands]
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.nederlandlift.nl/ Nederland Lift], campaign to promote hitchhiking as a daily means of transport.
* [[Hitchhiking_in_the_Netherlands_Survey|Survey about hitchhiking in the Netherlands]]

== Personal Experiences ==
''I hitch hike a huge amount in the Netherlands and it is almost always successful.  As stated above, managers in petrol stations sometimes ask you to leave the main forecourt.  This has been happening with increasing frequency to me at Shell stations in particular, but I have not experienced this at any other petrol company (they are usually more than happy if I politely ask where I could stand without being a nuisance)''


''Having had 307 rides from Dutch motorway petrol stations, I have been asked not to talk with drivers on the forecourt three times (at stations operated by Shell). Much more often I have gotten positive gestures from employees and occasionally they offered me a drink, a snack, a ride (!) or cardboard. Staff in Germany is definitely friendlier though.... Respect and politeness are keywords.''

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

[[nomad:Netherlands]] [[trash:Netherlands]]




{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>fscwm20kogfim38xmnerq91ypjbqnhv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101118</id>
      <parentid>101117</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-05T14:41:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8086">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch, Frisian
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 16,570,613
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''. The current government intends to make an end to free public transport for students from the beginning of 2016. 

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

Sometimes the petrol stations workers tell you to not ask people in front of the shop directly. You can then hitch at the exit of the station which is mostly just as good but as its disadvantages of course.



== Useful tips ==
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all across the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price. Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't available any more as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is not a problem. Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions. 
* Shell has internal guidelines to only allow customers on their property. A hitchhiker may therefore be asked not to talk with drivers in the forecourt of the station, but this rarely happens. If this happens, buy a coffee or inexpensive whatever-bar, and ask for the receipt. This will formally make you a customer!
:
: &lt;b&gt;Dutch Hall of Shame&lt;/b&gt; of petrol stations where hitch-hikers have been asked not to talk with costumers on the forecourt
: Service station Kloosters (Shell), A59, Tilburg --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 4 times), other hitch-hikers have also been asked not to talk with costumers '''Winner of Most Unfriendly Petrol Station Award in the Netherlands'''
: Service station Swentibold (Shell), A2, Maastricht --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 6 times)
: Service station Haarrijn (Shell), A2, Amsterdam --&gt; Utrecht ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 7 times)
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you may be able to travel at a discount rate (-40%). Travelling with a printed ticket is no longer possible. Every traveller needs to have an OV-chipcard to use public transportation. You need to active "Samenreiskorting" (travel together reduction) on your OV-chipcard. The procedure is described [http://www.ns.nl/en/travellers/ov-chipkaart/menu-ov-chipkaart/travelling-with-the-ov-chipkaart#travelling-with-an-ns-season-ticket-holder on the website of NS (Dutch railways)]. If you have activated this and checked in with 40% reduction you can travel together with another traveller with an "NS abonnement" (NS season ticket holder), so you need to find somebody who has one, ideally before departure of the train. This is valid on weekdays after 09:00 and during the weekend without limitation (however, there are several types of season tickets nowadays, and some of them do not qualify for discount during the afternoon rush hours).

== Links ==

* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/467054706678994/ Facebook group Hitchhiking in Belgium and the Netherlands]
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.nederlandlift.nl/ Nederland Lift], campaign to promote hitchhiking as a daily means of transport.
* [[Hitchhiking_in_the_Netherlands_Survey|Survey about hitchhiking in the Netherlands]]

== Personal Experiences ==
''I hitch hike a huge amount in the Netherlands and it is almost always successful.  As stated above, managers in petrol stations sometimes ask you to leave the main forecourt.  This has been happening with increasing frequency to me at Shell stations in particular, but I have not experienced this at any other petrol company (they are usually more than happy if I politely ask where I could stand without being a nuisance)''


''Having had 307 rides from Dutch motorway petrol stations, I have been asked not to talk with drivers on the forecourt three times (at stations operated by Shell). Much more often I have gotten positive gestures from employees and occasionally they offered me a drink, a snack, a ride (!) or cardboard. Staff in Germany is definitely friendlier though.... Respect and politeness are keywords.''

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==





{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}


__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>mpzi1tl3ixh71o7yflx9arhg4w0ivsz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104284</id>
      <parentid>101118</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-20T21:18:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dws49</username>
        <id>42886</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8086">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch, Frisian
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 17,869,000
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''. The current government intends to make an end to free public transport for students from the beginning of 2016. 

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

Sometimes the petrol stations workers tell you to not ask people in front of the shop directly. You can then hitch at the exit of the station which is mostly just as good but as its disadvantages of course.



== Useful tips ==
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all across the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price. Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't available any more as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is not a problem. Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions. 
* Shell has internal guidelines to only allow customers on their property. A hitchhiker may therefore be asked not to talk with drivers in the forecourt of the station, but this rarely happens. If this happens, buy a coffee or inexpensive whatever-bar, and ask for the receipt. This will formally make you a customer!
:
: &lt;b&gt;Dutch Hall of Shame&lt;/b&gt; of petrol stations where hitch-hikers have been asked not to talk with costumers on the forecourt
: Service station Kloosters (Shell), A59, Tilburg --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 4 times), other hitch-hikers have also been asked not to talk with costumers '''Winner of Most Unfriendly Petrol Station Award in the Netherlands'''
: Service station Swentibold (Shell), A2, Maastricht --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 6 times)
: Service station Haarrijn (Shell), A2, Amsterdam --&gt; Utrecht ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 7 times)
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you may be able to travel at a discount rate (-40%). Travelling with a printed ticket is no longer possible. Every traveller needs to have an OV-chipcard to use public transportation. You need to active "Samenreiskorting" (travel together reduction) on your OV-chipcard. The procedure is described [http://www.ns.nl/en/travellers/ov-chipkaart/menu-ov-chipkaart/travelling-with-the-ov-chipkaart#travelling-with-an-ns-season-ticket-holder on the website of NS (Dutch railways)]. If you have activated this and checked in with 40% reduction you can travel together with another traveller with an "NS abonnement" (NS season ticket holder), so you need to find somebody who has one, ideally before departure of the train. This is valid on weekdays after 09:00 and during the weekend without limitation (however, there are several types of season tickets nowadays, and some of them do not qualify for discount during the afternoon rush hours).

== Links ==

* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/467054706678994/ Facebook group Hitchhiking in Belgium and the Netherlands]
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.nederlandlift.nl/ Nederland Lift], campaign to promote hitchhiking as a daily means of transport.
* [[Hitchhiking_in_the_Netherlands_Survey|Survey about hitchhiking in the Netherlands]]

== Personal Experiences ==
''I hitch hike a huge amount in the Netherlands and it is almost always successful.  As stated above, managers in petrol stations sometimes ask you to leave the main forecourt.  This has been happening with increasing frequency to me at Shell stations in particular, but I have not experienced this at any other petrol company (they are usually more than happy if I politely ask where I could stand without being a nuisance)''


''Having had 307 rides from Dutch motorway petrol stations, I have been asked not to talk with drivers on the forecourt three times (at stations operated by Shell). Much more often I have gotten positive gestures from employees and occasionally they offered me a drink, a snack, a ride (!) or cardboard. Staff in Germany is definitely friendlier though.... Respect and politeness are keywords.''

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==





{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}


__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>6uu9oa1w5wlom8mww6z1cqxngs8464s</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105466</id>
      <parentid>104284</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-03-20T20:15:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Vinteuil</username>
        <id>47506</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* Personal Experiences */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8541">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch, Frisian
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 17,869,000
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''. The current government intends to make an end to free public transport for students from the beginning of 2016. 

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

Sometimes the petrol stations workers tell you to not ask people in front of the shop directly. You can then hitch at the exit of the station which is mostly just as good but as its disadvantages of course.



== Useful tips ==
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all across the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price. Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't available any more as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is not a problem. Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions. 
* Shell has internal guidelines to only allow customers on their property. A hitchhiker may therefore be asked not to talk with drivers in the forecourt of the station, but this rarely happens. If this happens, buy a coffee or inexpensive whatever-bar, and ask for the receipt. This will formally make you a customer!
:
: &lt;b&gt;Dutch Hall of Shame&lt;/b&gt; of petrol stations where hitch-hikers have been asked not to talk with costumers on the forecourt
: Service station Kloosters (Shell), A59, Tilburg --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 4 times), other hitch-hikers have also been asked not to talk with costumers '''Winner of Most Unfriendly Petrol Station Award in the Netherlands'''
: Service station Swentibold (Shell), A2, Maastricht --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 6 times)
: Service station Haarrijn (Shell), A2, Amsterdam --&gt; Utrecht ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 7 times)
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you may be able to travel at a discount rate (-40%). Travelling with a printed ticket is no longer possible. Every traveller needs to have an OV-chipcard to use public transportation. You need to active "Samenreiskorting" (travel together reduction) on your OV-chipcard. The procedure is described [http://www.ns.nl/en/travellers/ov-chipkaart/menu-ov-chipkaart/travelling-with-the-ov-chipkaart#travelling-with-an-ns-season-ticket-holder on the website of NS (Dutch railways)]. If you have activated this and checked in with 40% reduction you can travel together with another traveller with an "NS abonnement" (NS season ticket holder), so you need to find somebody who has one, ideally before departure of the train. This is valid on weekdays after 09:00 and during the weekend without limitation (however, there are several types of season tickets nowadays, and some of them do not qualify for discount during the afternoon rush hours).

== Links ==

* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/467054706678994/ Facebook group Hitchhiking in Belgium and the Netherlands]
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.nederlandlift.nl/ Nederland Lift], campaign to promote hitchhiking as a daily means of transport.
* [[Hitchhiking_in_the_Netherlands_Survey|Survey about hitchhiking in the Netherlands]]

== Personal Experiences ==
''I hitch hike a huge amount in the Netherlands and it is almost always successful.  As stated above, managers in petrol stations sometimes ask you to leave the main forecourt.  This has been happening with increasing frequency to me at Shell stations in particular, but I have not experienced this at any other petrol company (they are usually more than happy if I politely ask where I could stand without being a nuisance)''


''Having had 307 rides from Dutch motorway petrol stations, I have been asked not to talk with drivers on the forecourt three times (at stations operated by Shell). Much more often I have gotten positive gestures from employees and occasionally they offered me a drink, a snack, a ride (!) or cardboard. Staff in Germany is definitely friendlier though.... Respect and politeness are keywords.''

''I hitchhiked from Amsterdam across the German border to Osnabrück in one day, meeting a lot of incredible Dutch people. Sometimes I waited less than one minute, others I waited for two hours. I had better luck on shoulders of ramps and on local roads than at petrol stations, many people at petrol stations did not want to hear it. Many people bought/offered food. I was also hitchhiking on a holiday (King's Day) which may have made my luck worse.''

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==





{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}


__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>cunhjrun4zdi4r47as49uahe7sxdi1n</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105467</id>
      <parentid>105466</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-03-20T20:15:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Vinteuil</username>
        <id>47506</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* Personal Experiences */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8542">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch, Frisian
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 17,869,000
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''. The current government intends to make an end to free public transport for students from the beginning of 2016. 

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

Sometimes the petrol stations workers tell you to not ask people in front of the shop directly. You can then hitch at the exit of the station which is mostly just as good but as its disadvantages of course.



== Useful tips ==
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all across the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price. Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* When hitching in the Netherlands for a longer period (or when you're living there), it's advisable to get a ''chipkaart''  This is a lot cheaper than buying a one way-ticket or day-ticket on the bus or tram. See for all info http://www.ov-chipkaart.nl/?taal=en
** '''The old ''Strippenkaart'' isn't available any more as of November 2011. The two options now are the new ''chipkaart'' or the  new tickets called ''Gemakskaart'', which is way more expensive than the old ''Strippenkaart''.'''
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is not a problem. Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions. 
* Shell has internal guidelines to only allow customers on their property. A hitchhiker may therefore be asked not to talk with drivers in the forecourt of the station, but this rarely happens. If this happens, buy a coffee or inexpensive whatever-bar, and ask for the receipt. This will formally make you a customer!
:
: &lt;b&gt;Dutch Hall of Shame&lt;/b&gt; of petrol stations where hitch-hikers have been asked not to talk with costumers on the forecourt
: Service station Kloosters (Shell), A59, Tilburg --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 4 times), other hitch-hikers have also been asked not to talk with costumers '''Winner of Most Unfriendly Petrol Station Award in the Netherlands'''
: Service station Swentibold (Shell), A2, Maastricht --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 6 times)
: Service station Haarrijn (Shell), A2, Amsterdam --&gt; Utrecht ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 7 times)
* When using trains in [[Netherlands|The Netherlands]], you may be able to travel at a discount rate (-40%). Travelling with a printed ticket is no longer possible. Every traveller needs to have an OV-chipcard to use public transportation. You need to active "Samenreiskorting" (travel together reduction) on your OV-chipcard. The procedure is described [http://www.ns.nl/en/travellers/ov-chipkaart/menu-ov-chipkaart/travelling-with-the-ov-chipkaart#travelling-with-an-ns-season-ticket-holder on the website of NS (Dutch railways)]. If you have activated this and checked in with 40% reduction you can travel together with another traveller with an "NS abonnement" (NS season ticket holder), so you need to find somebody who has one, ideally before departure of the train. This is valid on weekdays after 09:00 and during the weekend without limitation (however, there are several types of season tickets nowadays, and some of them do not qualify for discount during the afternoon rush hours).

== Links ==

* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/467054706678994/ Facebook group Hitchhiking in Belgium and the Netherlands]
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.nederlandlift.nl/ Nederland Lift], campaign to promote hitchhiking as a daily means of transport.
* [[Hitchhiking_in_the_Netherlands_Survey|Survey about hitchhiking in the Netherlands]]

== Personal Experiences ==
''I hitch hike a huge amount in the Netherlands and it is almost always successful.  As stated above, managers in petrol stations sometimes ask you to leave the main forecourt.  This has been happening with increasing frequency to me at Shell stations in particular, but I have not experienced this at any other petrol company (they are usually more than happy if I politely ask where I could stand without being a nuisance)''


''Having had 307 rides from Dutch motorway petrol stations, I have been asked not to talk with drivers on the forecourt three times (at stations operated by Shell). Much more often I have gotten positive gestures from employees and occasionally they offered me a drink, a snack, a ride (!) or cardboard. Staff in Germany is definitely friendlier though.... Respect and politeness are keywords.''


''I hitchhiked from Amsterdam across the German border to Osnabrück in one day, meeting a lot of incredible Dutch people. Sometimes I waited less than one minute, others I waited for two hours. I had better luck on shoulders of ramps and on local roads than at petrol stations, many people at petrol stations did not want to hear it. Many people bought/offered food. I was also hitchhiking on a holiday (King's Day) which may have made my luck worse.''

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==





{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}


__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>6ccx4853ll6tonj45bbq3yddoa46puo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>108740</id>
      <parentid>105467</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-01-17T18:19:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Chris9012</username>
        <id>47192</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Useful tips */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8420">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch, Frisian
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 17,869,000
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''. The current government intends to make an end to free public transport for students from the beginning of 2016. 

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

Sometimes the petrol stations workers tell you to not ask people in front of the shop directly. You can then hitch at the exit of the station which is mostly just as good but as its disadvantages of course.



== Useful tips ==
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all across the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price. Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* The system to pay for public transport is called ''OVpay''. You can check in with either an ''OV-chipcard'' wich you can buy at a ticketmachines, or a contactless debit or credit card, or a mobile phone linked to a contactless payment system. All expenses of one travel day are taken of your account on the next day. If you've checked in but not checked out 20 euro will be taken out. 
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is not a problem. Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions. 
* Shell has internal guidelines to only allow customers on their property. A hitchhiker may therefore be asked not to talk with drivers in the forecourt of the station, but this rarely happens. If this happens, buy a coffee or inexpensive whatever-bar, and ask for the receipt. This will formally make you a customer!
:
: &lt;b&gt;Dutch Hall of Shame&lt;/b&gt; of petrol stations where hitch-hikers have been asked not to talk with costumers on the forecourt
: Service station Kloosters (Shell), A59, Tilburg --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 4 times), other hitch-hikers have also been asked not to talk with costumers '''Winner of Most Unfriendly Petrol Station Award in the Netherlands'''
: Service station Swentibold (Shell), A2, Maastricht --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 6 times)
: Service station Haarrijn (Shell), A2, Amsterdam --&gt; Utrecht ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 7 times)
* When using trains in The Netherlands, you may be able to travel at a discount rate (-40%). Travelling with a printed ticket is no longer possible. Every traveller needs to have an OV-chipcard to use public transportation. You need to active "Samenreiskorting" (travel together reduction) on your OV-chipcard. The procedure is described [http://www.ns.nl/en/travellers/ov-chipkaart/menu-ov-chipkaart/travelling-with-the-ov-chipkaart#travelling-with-an-ns-season-ticket-holder on the website of NS (Dutch railways)]. If you have activated this and checked in with 40% reduction you can travel together with another traveller with an "NS abonnement" (NS season ticket holder), so you need to find somebody who has one, ideally before departure of the train. This is valid on weekdays after 09:00 and during the weekend without limitation (however, there are several types of season tickets nowadays, and some of them do not qualify for discount during the afternoon rush hours).

== Links ==

* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/467054706678994/ Facebook group Hitchhiking in Belgium and the Netherlands]
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.nederlandlift.nl/ Nederland Lift], campaign to promote hitchhiking as a daily means of transport.
* [[Hitchhiking_in_the_Netherlands_Survey|Survey about hitchhiking in the Netherlands]]

== Personal Experiences ==
''I hitch hike a huge amount in the Netherlands and it is almost always successful.  As stated above, managers in petrol stations sometimes ask you to leave the main forecourt.  This has been happening with increasing frequency to me at Shell stations in particular, but I have not experienced this at any other petrol company (they are usually more than happy if I politely ask where I could stand without being a nuisance)''


''Having had 307 rides from Dutch motorway petrol stations, I have been asked not to talk with drivers on the forecourt three times (at stations operated by Shell). Much more often I have gotten positive gestures from employees and occasionally they offered me a drink, a snack, a ride (!) or cardboard. Staff in Germany is definitely friendlier though.... Respect and politeness are keywords.''


''I hitchhiked from Amsterdam across the German border to Osnabrück in one day, meeting a lot of incredible Dutch people. Sometimes I waited less than one minute, others I waited for two hours. I had better luck on shoulders of ramps and on local roads than at petrol stations, many people at petrol stations did not want to hear it. Many people bought/offered food. I was also hitchhiking on a holiday (King's Day) which may have made my luck worse.''

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==





{{hitchbase_country|138}}
{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}


__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>7tvpvz6w347p37o6gd5a2ahtvrwtots</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>111037</id>
      <parentid>108740</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-05-24T10:01:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8379">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch, Frisian
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 17,869,000
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still official [[liftershalte]]s, '''official hitchhiking spots'''. The current government intends to make an end to free public transport for students from the beginning of 2016. 

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the average waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

Sometimes the petrol stations workers tell you to not ask people in front of the shop directly. You can then hitch at the exit of the station which is mostly just as good but as its disadvantages of course.



== Useful tips ==
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all across the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price. Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* The system to pay for public transport is called ''OVpay''. You can check in with either an ''OV-chipcard'' wich you can buy at a ticketmachines, or a contactless debit or credit card, or a mobile phone linked to a contactless payment system. All expenses of one travel day are taken of your account on the next day. If you've checked in but not checked out 20 euro will be taken out. 
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is not a problem. Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions. 
* Shell has internal guidelines to only allow customers on their property. A hitchhiker may therefore be asked not to talk with drivers in the forecourt of the station, but this rarely happens. If this happens, buy a coffee or inexpensive whatever-bar, and ask for the receipt. This will formally make you a customer!
:
: &lt;b&gt;Dutch Hall of Shame&lt;/b&gt; of petrol stations where hitch-hikers have been asked not to talk with costumers on the forecourt
: Service station Kloosters (Shell), A59, Tilburg --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 4 times), other hitch-hikers have also been asked not to talk with costumers '''Winner of Most Unfriendly Petrol Station Award in the Netherlands'''
: Service station Swentibold (Shell), A2, Maastricht --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 6 times)
: Service station Haarrijn (Shell), A2, Amsterdam --&gt; Utrecht ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 7 times)
* When using trains in The Netherlands, you may be able to travel at a discount rate (-40%). Travelling with a printed ticket is no longer possible. Every traveller needs to have an OV-chipcard to use public transportation. You need to active "Samenreiskorting" (travel together reduction) on your OV-chipcard. The procedure is described [http://www.ns.nl/en/travellers/ov-chipkaart/menu-ov-chipkaart/travelling-with-the-ov-chipkaart#travelling-with-an-ns-season-ticket-holder on the website of NS (Dutch railways)]. If you have activated this and checked in with 40% reduction you can travel together with another traveller with an "NS abonnement" (NS season ticket holder), so you need to find somebody who has one, ideally before departure of the train. This is valid on weekdays after 09:00 and during the weekend without limitation (however, there are several types of season tickets nowadays, and some of them do not qualify for discount during the afternoon rush hours).

== Links ==

* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/467054706678994/ Facebook group Hitchhiking in Belgium and the Netherlands]
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.nederlandlift.nl/ Nederland Lift], campaign to promote hitchhiking as a daily means of transport.
* [[Hitchhiking_in_the_Netherlands_Survey|Survey about hitchhiking in the Netherlands]]

== Personal Experiences ==
''I hitch hike a huge amount in the Netherlands and it is almost always successful.  As stated above, managers in petrol stations sometimes ask you to leave the main forecourt.  This has been happening with increasing frequency to me at Shell stations in particular, but I have not experienced this at any other petrol company (they are usually more than happy if I politely ask where I could stand without being a nuisance)''


''Having had 307 rides from Dutch motorway petrol stations, I have been asked not to talk with drivers on the forecourt three times (at stations operated by Shell). Much more often I have gotten positive gestures from employees and occasionally they offered me a drink, a snack, a ride (!) or cardboard. Staff in Germany is definitely friendlier though.... Respect and politeness are keywords.''


''I hitchhiked from Amsterdam across the German border to Osnabrück in one day, meeting a lot of incredible Dutch people. Sometimes I waited less than one minute, others I waited for two hours. I had better luck on shoulders of ramps and on local roads than at petrol stations, many people at petrol stations did not want to hear it. Many people bought/offered food. I was also hitchhiking on a holiday (King's Day) which may have made my luck worse.''

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}


__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
{{IsIn|Europe}}
[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>e8s5nm8s09zokk53ojdu3v7xg4n3qed</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>111820</id>
      <parentid>111037</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-08-23T12:47:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8261">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch, Frisian
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 17,869,000
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still [[liftershalte]]s, which are [[official hitchhiking]] spots.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the usual waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

Sometimes the petrol stations workers tell you to not ask people in front of the shop directly. You can then hitch at the exit of the station which is mostly just as good but as its disadvantages of course.

== Useful tips ==
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all across the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price. Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* The system to pay for public transport is called ''OVpay''. You can check in with either an ''OV-chipcard'' wich you can buy at a ticketmachines, or a contactless debit or credit card, or a mobile phone linked to a contactless payment system. All expenses of one travel day are taken of your account on the next day. If you've checked in but not checked out 20 euro will be taken out. 
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is not a problem. Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions. 
* Shell has internal guidelines to only allow customers on their property. A hitchhiker may therefore be asked not to talk with drivers in the forecourt of the station, but this rarely happens. If this happens, buy a coffee or inexpensive whatever-bar, and ask for the receipt. This will formally make you a customer!
:
: &lt;b&gt;Dutch Hall of Shame&lt;/b&gt; of petrol stations where hitch-hikers have been asked not to talk with costumers on the forecourt
: Service station Kloosters (Shell), A59, Tilburg --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 4 times), other hitch-hikers have also been asked not to talk with costumers '''Winner of Most Unfriendly Petrol Station Award in the Netherlands'''
: Service station Swentibold (Shell), A2, Maastricht --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 6 times)
: Service station Haarrijn (Shell), A2, Amsterdam --&gt; Utrecht ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 7 times)
* When using trains in The Netherlands, you may be able to travel at a discount rate (-40%). Travelling with a printed ticket is no longer possible. Every traveller needs to have an OV-chipcard to use public transportation. You need to active "Samenreiskorting" (travel together reduction) on your OV-chipcard. The procedure is described [http://www.ns.nl/en/travellers/ov-chipkaart/menu-ov-chipkaart/travelling-with-the-ov-chipkaart#travelling-with-an-ns-season-ticket-holder on the website of NS (Dutch railways)]. If you have activated this and checked in with 40% reduction you can travel together with another traveller with an "NS abonnement" (NS season ticket holder), so you need to find somebody who has one, ideally before departure of the train. This is valid on weekdays after 09:00 and during the weekend without limitation (however, there are several types of season tickets nowadays, and some of them do not qualify for discount during the afternoon rush hours).

== Links ==

* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/467054706678994/ Facebook group Hitchhiking in Belgium and the Netherlands]
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.nederlandlift.nl/ Nederland Lift], campaign to promote hitchhiking as a daily means of transport.
* [[Hitchhiking_in_the_Netherlands_Survey|Survey about hitchhiking in the Netherlands]]

== Personal Experiences ==
''I hitch hike a huge amount in the Netherlands and it is almost always successful.  As stated above, managers in petrol stations sometimes ask you to leave the main forecourt.  This has been happening with increasing frequency to me at Shell stations in particular, but I have not experienced this at any other petrol company (they are usually more than happy if I politely ask where I could stand without being a nuisance)''


''Having had 307 rides from Dutch motorway petrol stations, I have been asked not to talk with drivers on the forecourt three times (at stations operated by Shell). Much more often I have gotten positive gestures from employees and occasionally they offered me a drink, a snack, a ride (!) or cardboard. Staff in Germany is definitely friendlier though.... Respect and politeness are keywords.''


''I hitchhiked from Amsterdam across the German border to Osnabrück in one day, meeting a lot of incredible Dutch people. Sometimes I waited less than one minute, others I waited for two hours. I had better luck on shoulders of ramps and on local roads than at petrol stations, many people at petrol stations did not want to hear it. Many people bought/offered food. I was also hitchhiking on a holiday (King's Day) which may have made my luck worse.''

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}


__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
{{IsIn|Europe}}
[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>aly5mk3cwgxwh8ss568t7f5jsbxktdq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>112713</id>
      <parentid>111820</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-09-14T23:01:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8282">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat='52.2' lng='5.2' zoom='6' view='0' country='Netherlands'/&gt;
|language = Dutch, Frisian
|capital = [[Amsterdam]]
|pop = 17,869,000
|currency = Euro (€)
|
|hitch = &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
|BW = NL
}}
The '''Netherlands''' are a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]].
Hitchhiking in the Netherlands is quite easy, and legal in most places, though not on motorways. The basic idea is that when you're allowed to walk somewhere, you can stand there for hitching too. 
Standing on a motorway entrance just in front of the motorway sign is allowed as well as standing on a petrol station along the motorway.
Asking the Dutch people at a service station is faster than waiting while using the thumb for hitchhiking.

[[File:Hitchhiking across the creek.jpg|thumb|250px|There are many creeks in the Netherlands and they can make it hard to get to petrol stations on the motorway]]
&lt;!--Roads where it is not permitted to walk are indicated by:
* a round white sign with red edge depicting a pedestrian.
* a rectangular blue sign depicting a motorway. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.
* a square blue sign depicting a car. Cars are also not allowed to stop here.

// this information seems to be quite ineffective in terms of multimedia use. I even can hardly imagine how these sign look like. Alternative: Make a picture and put in in here ;) Any other ideas? // --&gt;
Since 1991 Dutch students have a card providing them with free public transport (either on weekends or during the week), so hitchhiking is not as popular as it used to be. In some university towns there are still [[liftershalte]]s, which are [[Official Hitchhiking|official hitchhiking]] spots.

Other good places are petrol stations along the motorways and the entrances to the motorway from larger cities (when there is a stopping space such as an emergency lane). On such a place the usual waiting time is 5–45 minutes (same as Germany). A major difference with [[Germany]] is that many lifts are not longer than 50 km. 

At petrol stations you should definitely try to talk to people, which will probably work out fine if you don't dress up like a hippie. Many people will not stop their cars if you stand with the board but will take you if you ask them in person (which is a general hitchhiking principle). Try to speak in Dutch or English. French and German often work too, but not as effectively. Most likely the Dutch people will avoid you while speaking in German. In the Netherlands, there are as well a lot of seasonal workers and immigrants. There are particularly a lot of people from Poland and Bulgaria. Thus, it is fairly easy to get a lift for instance straight to Poland if you know the language or are communicative enough to sway Polish people to take you. 

Sometimes the petrol stations workers tell you to not ask people in front of the shop directly. You can then hitch at the exit of the station which is mostly just as good but as its disadvantages of course.

== Useful tips ==
* Download and print [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike_cardboards_NL.pdf 42 ready made hitchhiking signs] for easy hitchhiking all across the Netherlands!
* Use of Internet PCs in every city library, for a small price. Also you can find lots of public wi-fi networks that you can connect your laptop with for using the internet.
* The system to pay for public transport is called ''OVpay''. You can check in with either an ''OV-chipcard'' wich you can buy at a ticketmachines, or a contactless debit or credit card, or a mobile phone linked to a contactless payment system. All expenses of one travel day are taken of your account on the next day. If you've checked in but not checked out 20 euro will be taken out. 
* Banks and supermarkets often have free coffee and sometimes even cookies. 
* 'Lefier' (or local job-centres) have free coffee and sometimes jars of free chocolates and mints.
* Some employees of petrol stations may tell you not to hitch in front of the station, where the pumps are. Finding a ride at the parking lot, or thumbing where the back of the station starts is not a problem. Keep petrol station employees for friends and avoid starting unnecessary discussions. 
* Shell has internal guidelines to only allow customers on their property. A hitchhiker may therefore be asked not to talk with drivers in the forecourt of the station, but this rarely happens. If this happens, buy a coffee or inexpensive whatever-bar, and ask for the receipt. This will formally make you a customer!
:
: &lt;b&gt;Dutch Hall of Shame&lt;/b&gt; of petrol stations where hitch-hikers have been asked not to talk with costumers on the forecourt
: Service station Kloosters (Shell), A59, Tilburg --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 4 times), other hitch-hikers have also been asked not to talk with costumers '''Winner of Most Unfriendly Petrol Station Award in the Netherlands'''
: Service station Swentibold (Shell), A2, Maastricht --&gt; Eindhoven ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 6 times)
: Service station Haarrijn (Shell), A2, Amsterdam --&gt; Utrecht ([[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] was asked once out of 7 times)
* When using trains in The Netherlands, you may be able to travel at a discount rate (-40%). Travelling with a printed ticket is no longer possible. Every traveller needs to have an OV-chipcard to use public transportation. You need to active "Samenreiskorting" (travel together reduction) on your OV-chipcard. The procedure is described [http://www.ns.nl/en/travellers/ov-chipkaart/menu-ov-chipkaart/travelling-with-the-ov-chipkaart#travelling-with-an-ns-season-ticket-holder on the website of NS (Dutch railways)]. If you have activated this and checked in with 40% reduction you can travel together with another traveller with an "NS abonnement" (NS season ticket holder), so you need to find somebody who has one, ideally before departure of the train. This is valid on weekdays after 09:00 and during the weekend without limitation (however, there are several types of season tickets nowadays, and some of them do not qualify for discount during the afternoon rush hours).

== Links ==

* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/467054706678994/ Facebook group Hitchhiking in Belgium and the Netherlands]
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands], by [[User:Fverhart|Frank Verhart]].
* [http://www.nederlandlift.nl/ Nederland Lift], campaign to promote hitchhiking as a daily means of transport.
* [[Hitchhiking_in_the_Netherlands_Survey|Survey about hitchhiking in the Netherlands]]

== Personal Experiences ==
''I hitch hike a huge amount in the Netherlands and it is almost always successful.  As stated above, managers in petrol stations sometimes ask you to leave the main forecourt.  This has been happening with increasing frequency to me at Shell stations in particular, but I have not experienced this at any other petrol company (they are usually more than happy if I politely ask where I could stand without being a nuisance)''


''Having had 307 rides from Dutch motorway petrol stations, I have been asked not to talk with drivers on the forecourt three times (at stations operated by Shell). Much more often I have gotten positive gestures from employees and occasionally they offered me a drink, a snack, a ride (!) or cardboard. Staff in Germany is definitely friendlier though.... Respect and politeness are keywords.''


''I hitchhiked from Amsterdam across the German border to Osnabrück in one day, meeting a lot of incredible Dutch people. Sometimes I waited less than one minute, others I waited for two hours. I had better luck on shoulders of ramps and on local roads than at petrol stations, many people at petrol stations did not want to hear it. Many people bought/offered food. I was also hitchhiking on a holiday (King's Day) which may have made my luck worse.''

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{Highways NL}}
{{Cities Netherlands}}
{{Provinces NL}}


__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Western Europe}}
{{IsIn|Europe}}
[[Category:Western Europe]]
[[Category:Netherlands|*]]

[[de:Niederlande]]
[[es:Países Bajos]]
[[fr:Pays Bas]]
[[nl:Nederland]]
[[pl:Holandia]]
[[ru:Нидерланды]]
[[tr:Hollanda]]</text>
      <sha1>40v7cfd78fu4fdieow72u3dnrd49fcy</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Europe</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1523</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1551</id>
      <parentid>4389</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-14T22:43:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3065">Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
[[Germany]] and [[England]] are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

&lt;!--
This list doesn't make sense to me. In my experience France was much easier than Sweden and Norway... ~~~~

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
UK,
Norway, 
Sweden,
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,

bad or not at all:
France,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,
--&gt;

==Trucks==
In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays (or things like Christmas). ''(any other countries?)''

==Maps==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].

For online usage: 
*[http://maps.google.com Google Maps]
*[http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
*[http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Safety==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country==

===[[Western Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], the [[Netherlands]], and [[Luxembourg]]), the [[United Kingdom]], the [[Republic of Ireland]] and [[France]].

===[[Northern Europe]]===
[[Finland]], [[Iceland]], [[Norway]], [[Sweden]], and [[Denmark]].

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Germany]], [[Hungary]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Poland]], [[Slovakia]], and [[Slovenia]] and [[Switzerland]].

===[[Eastern Europe]]===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], [[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Estonia]],  [[Georgia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Moldova]], [[Romania]], [[Russia]] and [[Ukraine]].

===[[Mediterranean Europe]]===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Cyprus]], [[Greece]], [[Italy]], [[Macedonia]], [[Malta]], [[Monaco]], [[Montenegro]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia]], [[Spain]], [[Turkey]] and [[Vatican]].

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]

[[Category:Europe|*]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>3m8k03ylfp90ou292cpy549af041wik</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1552</id>
      <parentid>1551</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3065">Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
[[Germany]] and [[England]] are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

&lt;!--
This list doesn't make sense to me. In my experience France was much easier than Sweden and Norway... ~~~~

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
UK,
Norway, 
Sweden,
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,

bad or not at all:
France,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,
--&gt;

==Trucks==
In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays (or things like Christmas). ''(any other countries?)''

==Maps==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].

For online usage: 
*[http://maps.google.com Google Maps]
*[http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
*[http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Safety==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country==

===[[Western Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], the [[Netherlands]], and [[Luxembourg]]), the [[United Kingdom]], the [[Republic of Ireland]] and [[France]].

===[[Northern Europe]]===
[[Finland]], [[Iceland]], [[Norway]], [[Sweden]], and [[Denmark]].

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Germany]], [[Hungary]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Poland]], [[Slovakia]], and [[Slovenia]] and [[Switzerland]].

===[[Eastern Europe]]===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], [[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Estonia]],  [[Georgia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Moldova]], [[Romania]], [[Russia]] and [[Ukraine]].

===[[Mediterranean Europe]]===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Cyprus]], [[Greece]], [[Italy]], [[Macedonia]], [[Malta]], [[Monaco]], [[Montenegro]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia]], [[Spain]], [[Turkey]] and [[Vatican]].

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]

[[Category:Europe|*]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>3m8k03ylfp90ou292cpy549af041wik</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4374</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T18:01:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GuakaTest</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2449">&lt;!-- This is the Hitchhiker's Wiki page for Europe. One day it will contain a nice article that tells the hitchhikers how it is to hitchhike in Europe. It is going to have links to each country, and it's going to tell you where to go and when, how and so on.

I hope this will happen soon. Now there is just a list of coutries, so that there would be a start. Anybody is free to improve this anytime.--&gt;

Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.

===General info about hitchhiking in Europe===
Germany and England are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. Holland, Belgium and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considerd bad for the long waiting times like Spain and Croatia, but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this hapens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

==Safety==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine -line.

==Tips for each country==

===[[Western Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], the [[Netherlands]], and [[Luxembourg]]), the [[United Kingdom]], the [[Republic of Ireland]] and [[France]].

===[[Northern Europe]]===
[[Finland]], [[Iceland]], [[Norway]], [[Sweden]], and [[Denmark]].

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Germany]], [[Hungary]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Poland]], [[Slovakia]], and [[Slovenia]] and [[Switzerland]].

===[[Eastern Europe]]===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], the [[Baltic states]], [[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Georgia (country)|Georgia]], [[Moldova]], [[Romania]], [[Russia]] and [[Ukraine]].

===[[Mediterranean Europe]]===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Cyprus]], [[Greece]], [[Italy]], [[Macedonia]], [[Malta]], [[Monaco]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia and Montenegro]], [[Spain]], [[Turkey]] and [[Vatican]].

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]</text>
      <sha1>k1sz8yrz8kxben03ovi0wyh9nt42nrr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4375</id>
      <parentid>4374</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T14:18:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2472">&lt;!-- This is the Hitchhiker's Wiki page for Europe. One day it will contain a nice article that tells the hitchhikers how it is to hitchhike in Europe. It is going to have links to each country, and it's going to tell you where to go and when, how and so on.

I hope this will happen soon. Now there is just a list of coutries, so that there would be a start. Anybody is free to improve this anytime.--&gt;

Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.

===General info about hitchhiking in Europe===
Germany and England are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. Holland, Belgium and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considerd bad for the long waiting times like Spain and Croatia, but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this hapens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

==Safety==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine -line.

==Tips for each country==

===[[Western Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], the [[Netherlands]], and [[Luxembourg]]), the [[United Kingdom]], the [[Republic of Ireland]] and [[France]].

===[[Northern Europe]]===
[[Finland]], [[Iceland]], [[Norway]], [[Sweden]], and [[Denmark]].

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Germany]], [[Hungary]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Poland]], [[Slovakia]], and [[Slovenia]] and [[Switzerland]].

===[[Eastern Europe]]===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], the [[Baltic states]], [[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Georgia (country)|Georgia]], [[Moldova]], [[Romania]], [[Russia]] and [[Ukraine]].

===[[Mediterranean Europe]]===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Cyprus]], [[Greece]], [[Italy]], [[Macedonia]], [[Malta]], [[Monaco]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia and Montenegro]], [[Spain]], [[Turkey]] and [[Vatican]].

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]

[[Category:Europe|*]]</text>
      <sha1>4ixlxylsu2qzxklv7fy0ojxhtikfy7d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4376</id>
      <parentid>4375</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T14:28:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2424">Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.

==General info==
Germany and England are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. Holland, Belgium and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like Spain and Croatia, but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this hapens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

==Maps==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in Slovakia, and ...

For online usage [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com] is quite good for giving you information.

==Safety==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country==

===[[Western Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], the [[Netherlands]], and [[Luxembourg]]), the [[United Kingdom]], the [[Republic of Ireland]] and [[France]].

===[[Northern Europe]]===
[[Finland]], [[Iceland]], [[Norway]], [[Sweden]], and [[Denmark]].

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Germany]], [[Hungary]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Poland]], [[Slovakia]], and [[Slovenia]] and [[Switzerland]].

===[[Eastern Europe]]===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], the [[Baltic states]], [[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Georgia (country)|Georgia]], [[Moldova]], [[Romania]], [[Russia]] and [[Ukraine]].

===[[Mediterranean Europe]]===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Cyprus]], [[Greece]], [[Italy]], [[Macedonia]], [[Malta]], [[Monaco]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia and Montenegro]], [[Spain]], [[Turkey]] and [[Vatican]].

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]

[[Category:Europe|*]]</text>
      <sha1>c2gjfza1tg2qok9ze2gildhucvprdu2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4377</id>
      <parentid>4376</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-21T20:03:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2443">Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.

==General info==
Germany and England are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. Holland, Belgium and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like Spain and Croatia, but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this hapens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

==Maps==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in Slovakia, and ...

For online usage [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com] is quite good for giving you information.

==Safety==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country==

===[[Western Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], the [[Netherlands]], and [[Luxembourg]]), the [[United Kingdom]], the [[Republic of Ireland]] and [[France]].

===[[Northern Europe]]===
[[Finland]], [[Iceland]], [[Norway]], [[Sweden]], and [[Denmark]].

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Germany]], [[Hungary]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Poland]], [[Slovakia]], and [[Slovenia]] and [[Switzerland]].

===[[Eastern Europe]]===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], the [[Baltic states]], [[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Georgia (country)|Georgia]], [[Moldova]], [[Romania]], [[Russia]] and [[Ukraine]].

===[[Mediterranean Europe]]===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Cyprus]], [[Greece]], [[Italy]], [[Macedonia]], [[Malta]], [[Monaco]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia and Montenegro]], [[Spain]], [[Turkey]] and [[Vatican]].

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]

[[Category:Europe|*]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>e43sbesasda1zwd9jd3y556vov833k6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4378</id>
      <parentid>4377</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-03-08T00:11:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Jenseb</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2462">Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.

==General info==
Germany and England are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. Holland, Belgium and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like Spain and Croatia, but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this hapens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

==Maps==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in Slovakia, and ...

For online usage: 
*[http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
*[http://www.map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Safety==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country==

===[[Western Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], the [[Netherlands]], and [[Luxembourg]]), the [[United Kingdom]], the [[Republic of Ireland]] and [[France]].

===[[Northern Europe]]===
[[Finland]], [[Iceland]], [[Norway]], [[Sweden]], and [[Denmark]].

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Germany]], [[Hungary]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Poland]], [[Slovakia]], and [[Slovenia]] and [[Switzerland]].

===[[Eastern Europe]]===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], the [[Baltic states]], [[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Georgia (country)|Georgia]], [[Moldova]], [[Romania]], [[Russia]] and [[Ukraine]].

===[[Mediterranean Europe]]===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Cyprus]], [[Greece]], [[Italy]], [[Macedonia]], [[Malta]], [[Monaco]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia and Montenegro]], [[Spain]], [[Turkey]] and [[Vatican]].

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]

[[Category:Europe|*]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>gqo0hgfeplmzb216siaw8vl4po4nffh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4379</id>
      <parentid>4378</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-03-08T00:13:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Jenseb</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2472">Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.

==General info==
Germany and England are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. Holland, Belgium and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like Spain and Croatia, but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this hapens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

==Maps==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in Slovakia, and ...

For online usage: 
*[http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
*[http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Safety==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country==

===[[Western Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], the [[Netherlands]], and [[Luxembourg]]), the [[United Kingdom]], the [[Republic of Ireland]] and [[France]].

===[[Northern Europe]]===
[[Finland]], [[Iceland]], [[Norway]], [[Sweden]], and [[Denmark]].

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Germany]], [[Hungary]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Poland]], [[Slovakia]], and [[Slovenia]] and [[Switzerland]].

===[[Eastern Europe]]===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], the [[Baltic states]], [[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Georgia (country)|Georgia]], [[Moldova]], [[Romania]], [[Russia]] and [[Ukraine]].

===[[Mediterranean Europe]]===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Cyprus]], [[Greece]], [[Italy]], [[Macedonia]], [[Malta]], [[Monaco]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia and Montenegro]], [[Spain]], [[Turkey]] and [[Vatican]].

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]

[[Category:Europe|*]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>r4xtsdvkubkcnjqx5kgvs0nnuwg8hxg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4380</id>
      <parentid>4379</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-04-20T16:00:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.55.172.132</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2772">Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.

==General info==
Germany and England are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. Holland, Belgium and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like Spain and Croatia, but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this hapens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

In these countries (list not complete) most of the people speak english:

very good:
Norway 
Sweden
Denmark
Finland
Netherlands

good:
Germany
Belgium
Austria
Switzerland

ok:
Czech Republic
Poland

In these countries (list not complete) most people don't speak english:
France
Italy
Spain
Portugal

==Maps==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in Slovakia, and ...

For online usage: 
*[http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
*[http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Safety==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country==

===[[Western Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], the [[Netherlands]], and [[Luxembourg]]), the [[United Kingdom]], the [[Republic of Ireland]] and [[France]].

===[[Northern Europe]]===
[[Finland]], [[Iceland]], [[Norway]], [[Sweden]], and [[Denmark]].

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Germany]], [[Hungary]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Poland]], [[Slovakia]], and [[Slovenia]] and [[Switzerland]].

===[[Eastern Europe]]===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], the [[Baltic states]], [[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Georgia (country)|Georgia]], [[Moldova]], [[Romania]], [[Russia]] and [[Ukraine]].

===[[Mediterranean Europe]]===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Cyprus]], [[Greece]], [[Italy]], [[Macedonia]], [[Malta]], [[Monaco]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia and Montenegro]], [[Spain]], [[Turkey]] and [[Vatican]].

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]

[[Category:Europe|*]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>nuesxp9guwmvblxedvbvrqf7ajmloy4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4381</id>
      <parentid>4380</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-04-20T16:01:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.55.172.132</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2787">Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.

==General info==
Germany and England are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. Holland, Belgium and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like Spain and Croatia, but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this hapens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

In these countries (list not complete) most of the people speak english:

very good:
Norway, 
Sweden,
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,

In these countries (list not complete) most people don't speak english:
France,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,

==Maps==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in Slovakia, and ...

For online usage: 
*[http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
*[http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Safety==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country==

===[[Western Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], the [[Netherlands]], and [[Luxembourg]]), the [[United Kingdom]], the [[Republic of Ireland]] and [[France]].

===[[Northern Europe]]===
[[Finland]], [[Iceland]], [[Norway]], [[Sweden]], and [[Denmark]].

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Germany]], [[Hungary]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Poland]], [[Slovakia]], and [[Slovenia]] and [[Switzerland]].

===[[Eastern Europe]]===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], the [[Baltic states]], [[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Georgia (country)|Georgia]], [[Moldova]], [[Romania]], [[Russia]] and [[Ukraine]].

===[[Mediterranean Europe]]===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Cyprus]], [[Greece]], [[Italy]], [[Macedonia]], [[Malta]], [[Monaco]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia and Montenegro]], [[Spain]], [[Turkey]] and [[Vatican]].

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]

[[Category:Europe|*]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>4dwkok27it5j8xdgubm9p7foqez93zg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4382</id>
      <parentid>4381</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-04-20T16:03:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.55.172.132</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2720">Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.

==General info==
Germany and England are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. Holland, Belgium and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like Spain and Croatia, but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this hapens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

Countries ordered by english skills (list incomplete):

very good:
UK,
Norway, 
Sweden,
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,

bad or not at all:
France,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,

==Maps==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in Slovakia, and ...

For online usage: 
*[http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
*[http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Safety==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country==

===[[Western Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], the [[Netherlands]], and [[Luxembourg]]), the [[United Kingdom]], the [[Republic of Ireland]] and [[France]].

===[[Northern Europe]]===
[[Finland]], [[Iceland]], [[Norway]], [[Sweden]], and [[Denmark]].

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Germany]], [[Hungary]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Poland]], [[Slovakia]], and [[Slovenia]] and [[Switzerland]].

===[[Eastern Europe]]===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], the [[Baltic states]], [[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Georgia (country)|Georgia]], [[Moldova]], [[Romania]], [[Russia]] and [[Ukraine]].

===[[Mediterranean Europe]]===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Cyprus]], [[Greece]], [[Italy]], [[Macedonia]], [[Malta]], [[Monaco]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia and Montenegro]], [[Spain]], [[Turkey]] and [[Vatican]].

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]

[[Category:Europe|*]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>lsuqnyeqsu2dgi9wgbvg1hg837m9isu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4383</id>
      <parentid>4382</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-04-20T16:04:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.55.172.132</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2731">Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.

==General info==
Germany and England are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. Holland, Belgium and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like Spain and Croatia, but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this hapens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
UK,
Norway, 
Sweden,
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,

bad or not at all:
France,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,

==Maps==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in Slovakia, and ...

For online usage: 
*[http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
*[http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Safety==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country==

===[[Western Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], the [[Netherlands]], and [[Luxembourg]]), the [[United Kingdom]], the [[Republic of Ireland]] and [[France]].

===[[Northern Europe]]===
[[Finland]], [[Iceland]], [[Norway]], [[Sweden]], and [[Denmark]].

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Germany]], [[Hungary]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Poland]], [[Slovakia]], and [[Slovenia]] and [[Switzerland]].

===[[Eastern Europe]]===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], the [[Baltic states]], [[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Georgia (country)|Georgia]], [[Moldova]], [[Romania]], [[Russia]] and [[Ukraine]].

===[[Mediterranean Europe]]===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Cyprus]], [[Greece]], [[Italy]], [[Macedonia]], [[Malta]], [[Monaco]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia and Montenegro]], [[Spain]], [[Turkey]] and [[Vatican]].

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]

[[Category:Europe|*]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>2h0ypxk1p0h857duu6v1rm9c5e3m7g2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4384</id>
      <parentid>4383</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-04-20T16:46:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.55.172.132</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2844">Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.

==General info==
Germany and England are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. Holland, Belgium and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like Spain and Croatia, but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this hapens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
UK,
Norway, 
Sweden,
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,

bad or not at all:
France,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,

==Trucks==
In many (maybe all) of the european countries, trucks are not allowed to use the highway on sundays.

==Maps==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in Slovakia, and ...

For online usage: 
*[http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
*[http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Safety==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country==

===[[Western Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], the [[Netherlands]], and [[Luxembourg]]), the [[United Kingdom]], the [[Republic of Ireland]] and [[France]].

===[[Northern Europe]]===
[[Finland]], [[Iceland]], [[Norway]], [[Sweden]], and [[Denmark]].

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Germany]], [[Hungary]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Poland]], [[Slovakia]], and [[Slovenia]] and [[Switzerland]].

===[[Eastern Europe]]===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], the [[Baltic states]], [[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Georgia (country)|Georgia]], [[Moldova]], [[Romania]], [[Russia]] and [[Ukraine]].

===[[Mediterranean Europe]]===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Cyprus]], [[Greece]], [[Italy]], [[Macedonia]], [[Malta]], [[Monaco]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia and Montenegro]], [[Spain]], [[Turkey]] and [[Vatican]].

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]

[[Category:Europe|*]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>00kqj9z3h6td8lu3pwi815zl6hnbqaz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4385</id>
      <parentid>4384</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-07-22T11:01:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>83.24.176.224</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2844">Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.

==General info==
Germany and England are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. Holland, Belgium and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like Spain and Croatia, but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this hapens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
UK,
Norway, 
Sweden,
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,

bad or not at all:
France,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,

==Trucks==
In many (maybe all) of the european countries, trucks are not allowed to use the highway on sundays.

==Maps==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in Slovakia, and ...

For online usage: 
*[http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
*[http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Safety==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country==

===[[Western Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], the [[Netherlands]], and [[Luxembourg]]), the [[United Kingdom]], the [[Republic of Ireland]] and [[France]].

===[[Northern Europe]]===
[[Finland]], [[Iceland]], [[Norway]], [[Sweden]], and [[Denmark]].

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Germany]], [[Hungary]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Poland]], [[Slovakia]], and [[Slovenia]] and [[Switzerland]].

===[[Eastern Europe]]===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], [[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Estonia]],  [[Georgia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Moldova]], [[Romania]], [[Russia]] and [[Ukraine]].

===[[Mediterranean Europe]]===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Cyprus]], [[Greece]], [[Italy]], [[Macedonia]], [[Malta]], [[Monaco]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia and Montenegro]], [[Spain]], [[Turkey]] and [[Vatican]].

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]

[[Category:Europe|*]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>cy8z2bgwahtyfnwcubcbq1n4stxs4sm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4386</id>
      <parentid>4385</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-08-07T18:52:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2948">Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Germany and England are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. Holland, Belgium and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like Spain and Croatia, but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this hapens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.


&lt;!--
This list doesn't make sense to me. In my experience France was much easier than Sweden and Norway... ~~~~

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
UK,
Norway, 
Sweden,
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,

bad or not at all:
France,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,
--&gt;

==Trucks==
In many (maybe all) of the european countries, trucks are not allowed to use the highway on sundays.

==Maps==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in Slovakia, and ...

For online usage: 
*[http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
*[http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Safety==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country==

===[[Western Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], the [[Netherlands]], and [[Luxembourg]]), the [[United Kingdom]], the [[Republic of Ireland]] and [[France]].

===[[Northern Europe]]===
[[Finland]], [[Iceland]], [[Norway]], [[Sweden]], and [[Denmark]].

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Germany]], [[Hungary]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Poland]], [[Slovakia]], and [[Slovenia]] and [[Switzerland]].

===[[Eastern Europe]]===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], [[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Estonia]],  [[Georgia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Moldova]], [[Romania]], [[Russia]] and [[Ukraine]].

===[[Mediterranean Europe]]===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Cyprus]], [[Greece]], [[Italy]], [[Macedonia]], [[Malta]], [[Monaco]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia and Montenegro]], [[Spain]], [[Turkey]] and [[Vatican]].

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]

[[Category:Europe|*]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>pnsqkqtcuakgchrgfor1764anxwpp4n</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4387</id>
      <parentid>4386</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-27T07:37:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2948">Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Germany and England are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. Holland, Belgium and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like Spain and Croatia, but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this hapens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.


&lt;!--
This list doesn't make sense to me. In my experience France was much easier than Sweden and Norway... ~~~~

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
UK,
Norway, 
Sweden,
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,

bad or not at all:
France,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,
--&gt;

==Trucks==
In many (maybe all) of the European countries, trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays.

==Maps==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in Slovakia, and ...

For online usage: 
*[http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
*[http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Safety==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country==

===[[Western Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], the [[Netherlands]], and [[Luxembourg]]), the [[United Kingdom]], the [[Republic of Ireland]] and [[France]].

===[[Northern Europe]]===
[[Finland]], [[Iceland]], [[Norway]], [[Sweden]], and [[Denmark]].

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Germany]], [[Hungary]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Poland]], [[Slovakia]], and [[Slovenia]] and [[Switzerland]].

===[[Eastern Europe]]===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], [[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Estonia]],  [[Georgia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Moldova]], [[Romania]], [[Russia]] and [[Ukraine]].

===[[Mediterranean Europe]]===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Cyprus]], [[Greece]], [[Italy]], [[Macedonia]], [[Malta]], [[Monaco]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia and Montenegro]], [[Spain]], [[Turkey]] and [[Vatican]].

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]

[[Category:Europe|*]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>bwn0c1owwm6xivtx9hhy2x070xhqeq9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4388</id>
      <parentid>4387</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-05T20:59:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2949">Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Germany and England are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. Holland, Belgium and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like Spain and Croatia, but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this hapens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.


&lt;!--
This list doesn't make sense to me. In my experience France was much easier than Sweden and Norway... ~~~~

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
UK,
Norway, 
Sweden,
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,

bad or not at all:
France,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,
--&gt;

==Trucks==
In many (maybe all) of the European countries, trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays.

==Maps==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in Slovakia, and ...

For online usage: 
*[http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
*[http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Safety==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country==

===[[Western Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], the [[Netherlands]], and [[Luxembourg]]), the [[United Kingdom]], the [[Republic of Ireland]] and [[France]].

===[[Northern Europe]]===
[[Finland]], [[Iceland]], [[Norway]], [[Sweden]], and [[Denmark]].

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Germany]], [[Hungary]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Poland]], [[Slovakia]], and [[Slovenia]] and [[Switzerland]].

===[[Eastern Europe]]===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], [[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Estonia]],  [[Georgia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Moldova]], [[Romania]], [[Russia]] and [[Ukraine]].

===[[Mediterranean Europe]]===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Cyprus]], [[Greece]], [[Italy]], [[Macedonia]], [[Malta]], [[Monaco]], [[Montenegro]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia]], [[Spain]], [[Turkey]] and [[Vatican]].

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]

[[Category:Europe|*]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>jzffq026giz3b2bafn54kvnod4g5mlv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4389</id>
      <parentid>4388</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-05T21:01:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3015">Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
[[Germany]] and [[England]] are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

&lt;!--
This list doesn't make sense to me. In my experience France was much easier than Sweden and Norway... ~~~~

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
UK,
Norway, 
Sweden,
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,

bad or not at all:
France,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,
--&gt;

==Trucks==
In many (maybe all) of the European countries, trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays.

==Maps==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].

For online usage: 
*[http://maps.google.com Google Maps]
*[http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
*[http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Safety==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country==

===[[Western Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], the [[Netherlands]], and [[Luxembourg]]), the [[United Kingdom]], the [[Republic of Ireland]] and [[France]].

===[[Northern Europe]]===
[[Finland]], [[Iceland]], [[Norway]], [[Sweden]], and [[Denmark]].

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Germany]], [[Hungary]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Poland]], [[Slovakia]], and [[Slovenia]] and [[Switzerland]].

===[[Eastern Europe]]===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], [[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Estonia]],  [[Georgia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Moldova]], [[Romania]], [[Russia]] and [[Ukraine]].

===[[Mediterranean Europe]]===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Cyprus]], [[Greece]], [[Italy]], [[Macedonia]], [[Malta]], [[Monaco]], [[Montenegro]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia]], [[Spain]], [[Turkey]] and [[Vatican]].

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]

[[Category:Europe|*]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>d7im1zaylmrdorxvi7ujm4pvndl55c3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4390</id>
      <parentid>1552</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3065">Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
[[Germany]] and [[England]] are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

&lt;!--
This list doesn't make sense to me. In my experience France was much easier than Sweden and Norway... ~~~~

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
UK,
Norway, 
Sweden,
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,

bad or not at all:
France,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,
--&gt;

==Trucks==
In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays (or things like Christmas). ''(any other countries?)''

==Maps==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].

For online usage: 
*[http://maps.google.com Google Maps]
*[http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
*[http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Safety==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country==

===[[Western Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], the [[Netherlands]], and [[Luxembourg]]), the [[United Kingdom]], the [[Republic of Ireland]] and [[France]].

===[[Northern Europe]]===
[[Finland]], [[Iceland]], [[Norway]], [[Sweden]], and [[Denmark]].

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Germany]], [[Hungary]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Poland]], [[Slovakia]], and [[Slovenia]] and [[Switzerland]].

===[[Eastern Europe]]===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], [[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Estonia]],  [[Georgia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Moldova]], [[Romania]], [[Russia]] and [[Ukraine]].

===[[Mediterranean Europe]]===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Cyprus]], [[Greece]], [[Italy]], [[Macedonia]], [[Malta]], [[Monaco]], [[Montenegro]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia]], [[Spain]], [[Turkey]] and [[Vatican]].

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]

[[Category:Europe|*]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>3m8k03ylfp90ou292cpy549af041wik</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9153</id>
      <parentid>4390</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-24T02:48:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3107">Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
[[Germany]] and [[England]] are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

&lt;!--
This list doesn't make sense to me. In my experience France was much easier than Sweden and Norway... ~~~~

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
UK,
Norway, 
Sweden,
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,

bad or not at all:
France,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,
--&gt;

==Trucks==
In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays (or things like Christmas). ''(any other countries?)''

==Maps==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].

For online usage: 
*[http://maps.google.com Google Maps]
*[http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
*[http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Safety==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country==

===[[Western Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], the [[Netherlands]], and [[Luxembourg]]), the [[United Kingdom]], the [[Republic of Ireland]] and [[France]].

===[[Northern Europe]]===
[[Finland]], [[Iceland]], [[Norway]], [[Sweden]], and [[Denmark]].

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Germany]], [[Hungary]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Poland]], [[Slovakia]], and [[Slovenia]] and [[Switzerland]].

===[[Eastern Europe]]===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], [[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Estonia]],  [[Georgia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Moldova]], [[Romania]], [[Russia]] and [[Ukraine]].

===[[Mediterranean Europe]]===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Cyprus]], [[Greece]], [[Italy]], [[Macedonia]], [[Malta]], [[Monaco]], [[Montenegro]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia]], [[Spain]], [[Turkey]] and [[Vatican]].

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]

[[Category:Europe|*]]
[[Category:World]]


[[wikitravel:Europe]]
[[cswiki:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>28pfj3hl6bj3ubj6nic7ar9y0u9orvh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9439</id>
      <parentid>9153</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-03T14:35:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3144">Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
[[Germany]] and [[England]] are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

&lt;!--
This list doesn't make sense to me. In my experience France was much easier than Sweden and Norway... ~~~~

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
UK,
Norway, 
Sweden,
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,

bad or not at all:
France,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,
--&gt;

==Trucks==
In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays (or things like Christmas). ''(any other countries?)''

==Maps==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].

For online usage: 
*[http://www.liftershalte.info/ Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
*[http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
*[http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Safety==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country==

===[[Western Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], the [[Netherlands]], and [[Luxembourg]]), the [[United Kingdom]], the [[Republic of Ireland]] and [[France]].

===[[Northern Europe]]===
[[Finland]], [[Iceland]], [[Norway]], [[Sweden]], and [[Denmark]].

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Germany]], [[Hungary]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Poland]], [[Slovakia]], and [[Slovenia]] and [[Switzerland]].

===[[Eastern Europe]]===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], [[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Estonia]],  [[Georgia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Moldova]], [[Romania]], [[Russia]] and [[Ukraine]].

===[[Mediterranean Europe]]===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Cyprus]], [[Greece]], [[Italy]], [[Macedonia]], [[Malta]], [[Monaco]], [[Montenegro]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia]], [[Spain]], [[Turkey]] and [[Vatican]].

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]

[[Category:Europe|*]]
[[Category:World]]


[[wikitravel:Europe]]
[[cswiki:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>846xf3elqkqpnpqxpq747v8mxydamn6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9444</id>
      <parentid>9439</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-03T15:54:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3155">Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
[[Germany]] and [[England]] are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

&lt;!--
This list doesn't make sense to me. In my experience France was much easier than Sweden and Norway... ~~~~

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
UK,
Norway, 
Sweden,
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,

bad or not at all:
France,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,
--&gt;

==Trucks==
In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays (or things like Christmas). ''(any other countries?)''

==Maps==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].

For online usage: 
*[http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
*[http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
*[http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Safety==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country==

===[[Western Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], the [[Netherlands]], and [[Luxembourg]]), the [[United Kingdom]], the [[Republic of Ireland]] and [[France]].

===[[Northern Europe]]===
[[Finland]], [[Iceland]], [[Norway]], [[Sweden]], and [[Denmark]].

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Germany]], [[Hungary]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Poland]], [[Slovakia]], and [[Slovenia]] and [[Switzerland]].

===[[Eastern Europe]]===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], [[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Estonia]],  [[Georgia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Moldova]], [[Romania]], [[Russia]] and [[Ukraine]].

===[[Mediterranean Europe]]===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Cyprus]], [[Greece]], [[Italy]], [[Macedonia]], [[Malta]], [[Monaco]], [[Montenegro]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia]], [[Spain]], [[Turkey]] and [[Vatican]].

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]

[[Category:Europe|*]]
[[Category:World]]


[[wikitravel:Europe]]
[[cswiki:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>mbuorz05aw9vlepm07o50dxc11ylnbp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9495</id>
      <parentid>9444</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-04T16:33:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3165">Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
[[Germany]] and [[England]] are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

&lt;!--
This list doesn't make sense to me. In my experience France was much easier than Sweden and Norway... ~~~~

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
UK,
Norway, 
Sweden,
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,

bad or not at all:
France,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,
--&gt;

==Trucks==
In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays (or things like Christmas). ''(any other countries?)''

==Maps==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].

For online usage: 
*[http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
*[http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
*[http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Safety==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country==

===[[Western Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], the [[Netherlands]], and [[Luxembourg]]), the [[United Kingdom]], the [[Republic of Ireland]] and [[France]].

===[[Northern Europe]]===
[[Finland]], [[Iceland]], [[Norway]], [[Sweden]], and [[Denmark]].

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Germany]], [[Hungary]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Poland]], [[Slovakia]], and [[Slovenia]] and [[Switzerland]].

===[[Eastern Europe]]===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], [[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Estonia]],  [[Georgia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Moldova]], [[Romania]], [[Russia]] and [[Ukraine]].

===[[Mediterranean Europe]]===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Cyprus]], [[Greece]], [[Italy]], [[Macedonia]], [[Malta]], [[Monaco]], [[Montenegro]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia]], [[Spain]], [[Turkey]] and [[Vatican]].

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]

[[Category:Europe|*]]
[[Category:World]]


[[wikitravel:Europe]]
[[cswiki:Europe]]
[[lh:EU]]</text>
      <sha1>38ofemxa1tirv9dulp6cjvmyty2lcui</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9862</id>
      <parentid>9495</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-18T13:33:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>90.152.189.213</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3232">Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
[[Germany]] and [[England]] are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

&lt;!--
This list doesn't make sense to me. In my experience France was much easier than Sweden and Norway... ~~~~

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
UK,
Norway, 
Sweden,
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,

bad or not at all:
France,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,
--&gt;

==Trucks==
In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays (or things like Christmas). ''(any other countries?)''

==Maps==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].

For online usage: 
*[http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
*[http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
*[http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Safety==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country==

===[[Western Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], the [[Netherlands]], and [[Luxembourg]]), the [[United Kingdom]], the [[Republic of Ireland]] and [[France]].

===[[Northern Europe]]===
[[Finland]], [[Iceland]], [[Norway]], [[Sweden]], and [[Denmark]].

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Germany]], [[Hungary]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Poland]], [[Slovakia]], and [[Slovenia]] and [[Switzerland]].

===[[Eastern Europe]]===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], [[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Estonia]],  [[Georgia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Moldova]], [[Romania]], [[Russia]] and [[Ukraine]].

===[[Mediterranean Europe]]===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Cyprus]], [[Greece]], [[Italy]], [[Macedonia]], [[Malta]], [[Monaco]], [[Montenegro]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia]], [[Spain]], [[Turkey]] and [[Vatican]].

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://www.autostopp.net autostopp.net - Hitchhiking in Europe]

[[Category:Europe|*]]
[[Category:World]]


[[wikitravel:Europe]]
[[cswiki:Europe]]
[[lh:EU]]</text>
      <sha1>c0daejcrgodvvd08usfg4brxkhna9jg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9863</id>
      <parentid>9862</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-18T17:47:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3165">Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
[[Germany]] and [[England]] are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

&lt;!--
This list doesn't make sense to me. In my experience France was much easier than Sweden and Norway... ~~~~

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
UK,
Norway, 
Sweden,
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,

bad or not at all:
France,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,
--&gt;

==Trucks==
In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays (or things like Christmas). ''(any other countries?)''

==Maps==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].

For online usage: 
*[http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
*[http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
*[http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Safety==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country==

===[[Western Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], the [[Netherlands]], and [[Luxembourg]]), the [[United Kingdom]], the [[Republic of Ireland]] and [[France]].

===[[Northern Europe]]===
[[Finland]], [[Iceland]], [[Norway]], [[Sweden]], and [[Denmark]].

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Germany]], [[Hungary]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Poland]], [[Slovakia]], and [[Slovenia]] and [[Switzerland]].

===[[Eastern Europe]]===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], [[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Estonia]],  [[Georgia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Moldova]], [[Romania]], [[Russia]] and [[Ukraine]].

===[[Mediterranean Europe]]===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Cyprus]], [[Greece]], [[Italy]], [[Macedonia]], [[Malta]], [[Monaco]], [[Montenegro]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia]], [[Spain]], [[Turkey]] and [[Vatican]].

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]

[[Category:Europe|*]]
[[Category:World]]


[[wikitravel:Europe]]
[[cswiki:Europe]]
[[lh:EU]]</text>
      <sha1>38ofemxa1tirv9dulp6cjvmyty2lcui</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10434</id>
      <parentid>9863</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-04T22:49:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3254">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
[[Germany]] and [[England]] are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

&lt;!--
This list doesn't make sense to me. In my experience France was much easier than Sweden and Norway... ~~~~

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
UK,
Norway, 
Sweden,
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,

bad or not at all:
France,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,
--&gt;

==Trucks==
In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays (or things like Christmas). ''(any other countries?)''

==Maps==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].

For online usage: 
*[http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
*[http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
*[http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Safety==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country==

===[[Western Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], the [[Netherlands]], and [[Luxembourg]]), the [[United Kingdom]], the [[Republic of Ireland]] and [[France]].

===[[Northern Europe]]===
[[Finland]], [[Iceland]], [[Norway]], [[Sweden]], and [[Denmark]].

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Germany]], [[Hungary]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Poland]], [[Slovakia]], and [[Slovenia]] and [[Switzerland]].

===[[Eastern Europe]]===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], [[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Estonia]],  [[Georgia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Moldova]], [[Romania]], [[Russia]] and [[Ukraine]].

===[[Mediterranean Europe]]===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Cyprus]], [[Greece]], [[Italy]], [[Macedonia]], [[Malta]], [[Monaco]], [[Montenegro]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia]], [[Spain]], [[Turkey]] and [[Vatican]].

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]

[[Category:Europe|*]]
[[Category:World]]


[[wikitravel:Europe]]
[[cswiki:Europe]]
[[lh:EU]]</text>
      <sha1>qt160memu1jdtrl6wwdlwy3rgjf19hm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10589</id>
      <parentid>10434</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-18T11:25:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>129.27.235.105</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3267">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
[[Germany]] and [[England]] are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

&lt;!--
This list doesn't make sense to me. In my experience France was much easier than Sweden and Norway... ~~~~

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
UK,
Norway, 
Sweden,
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,

bad or not at all:
France,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,
--&gt;

==Trucks==
In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays (or things like Christmas). ''(any other countries?)''

==Maps==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].

For online usage: 
*[http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
*[http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
*[http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Safety==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country==

===[[Western Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Belgium]], the [[Netherlands]], and [[Luxembourg]]), the [[United Kingdom]], the [[Republic of Ireland]] and [[France]].

===[[Northern Europe]]===
[[Finland]], [[Iceland]], [[Norway]], [[Sweden]], and [[Denmark]].

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Germany]], [[Hungary]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Poland]], [[Slovakia]], and [[Slovenia]] and [[Switzerland]].

===[[Eastern Europe]]===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], [[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Estonia]],  [[Georgia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Moldova]], [[Romania]], [[Russia]] and [[Ukraine]].

===[[Mediterranean Europe]]===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Cyprus]], [[Greece]], [[Italy]], [[Macedonia]], [[Malta]], [[Monaco]], [[Montenegro]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia]], [[Spain]], [[Turkey]] and [[Vatican]].

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]

[[Category:Europe|*]]
[[Category:World]]


[[wikitravel:Europe]]
[[cswiki:Europe]]
[[lh:EU]]</text>
      <sha1>br1d90o6rqivcpat3gjgiks9q5i5pbc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10590</id>
      <parentid>10589</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-18T11:26:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>129.27.235.105</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3254">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
[[Germany]] and [[England]] are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

&lt;!--
This list doesn't make sense to me. In my experience France was much easier than Sweden and Norway... ~~~~

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
UK,
Norway, 
Sweden,
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,

bad or not at all:
France,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,
--&gt;

==Trucks==
In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays (or things like Christmas). ''(any other countries?)''

==Maps==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].

For online usage: 
*[http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
*[http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
*[http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Safety==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country==

===[[Western Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], the [[Netherlands]], and [[Luxembourg]]), the [[United Kingdom]], the [[Republic of Ireland]] and [[France]].

===[[Northern Europe]]===
[[Finland]], [[Iceland]], [[Norway]], [[Sweden]], and [[Denmark]].

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Germany]], [[Hungary]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Poland]], [[Slovakia]], and [[Slovenia]] and [[Switzerland]].

===[[Eastern Europe]]===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], [[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Estonia]],  [[Georgia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Moldova]], [[Romania]], [[Russia]] and [[Ukraine]].

===[[Mediterranean Europe]]===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Cyprus]], [[Greece]], [[Italy]], [[Macedonia]], [[Malta]], [[Monaco]], [[Montenegro]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia]], [[Spain]], [[Turkey]] and [[Vatican]].

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]

[[Category:Europe|*]]
[[Category:World]]


[[wikitravel:Europe]]
[[cswiki:Europe]]
[[lh:EU]]</text>
      <sha1>qt160memu1jdtrl6wwdlwy3rgjf19hm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12541</id>
      <parentid>10590</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-31T13:17:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3268">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
[[Germany]] and [[England]] are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

&lt;!--
This list doesn't make sense to me. In my experience France was much easier than Sweden and Norway... ~~~~

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
UK,
Norway, 
Sweden,
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,

bad or not at all:
France,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,
--&gt;

==Trucks==
In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays (or things like Christmas). ''(any other countries?)''

==Maps==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].

For online usage: 
*[http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
*[http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
*[http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Safety==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country==

===[[Western Europe]]===
[[Belgium]], the [[Netherlands]], and [[Luxembourg]]), the [[United Kingdom]], the [[Republic of Ireland]] and [[France]].

===[[Northern Europe]]===
[[Finland]], [[Iceland]], [[Norway]], [[Sweden]], and [[Denmark]].

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Germany]], [[Hungary]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Poland]], [[Slovakia]], and [[Slovenia]] and [[Switzerland]].

===[[Eastern Europe]]===
[[Armenia]], [[Azerbaijan]], [[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Estonia]],  [[Georgia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Moldova]], [[Romania]], [[Russia]] and [[Ukraine]].

===[[Mediterranean Europe]]===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Cyprus]], [[Greece]], [[Italy]], [[Macedonia]], [[Malta]], [[Monaco]], [[Montenegro]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia]], [[Spain]], [[Turkey]] and [[Vatican]].

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]

[[Category:Europe|*]]
[[Category:World]]


[[wikitravel:Europe]]
[[cswiki:Europe]]
[[lh:EU]]
[[es:Europa]]</text>
      <sha1>knw5w05myy36skksiz4kinjtbm4l9vi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12772</id>
      <parentid>12541</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-14T10:58:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3537">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
[[Germany]] and [[England]] are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

&lt;!--
This list doesn't make sense to me. In my experience France was much easier than Sweden and Norway... ~~~~

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
UK,
Norway, 
Sweden,
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,

bad or not at all:
France,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,
--&gt;

==Trucks==
In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays (or things like Christmas). ''(any other countries?)''

==Maps==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].

For online usage: 
*[http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
*[http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
*[http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Safety==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

===[[Northern Europe]]===
[[Åland Islands]], [[Channel Islands]], [[Denmark]], [[Estonia]], [[Faeroe Islands]], [[Finland]], [[Guernsey]], [[Iceland]], [[Ireland]], [[Isle of Man]], [[Jersey]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Norway]], [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]], [[Sweden]], [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

===[[Western Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Luxembourg]], [[Monaco]], [[Netherlands]], [[Switzerland]]

===[[Eastern Europe]]===
[[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]], [[Poland]], [[Romania]], [[Russia|Russian Federation]], [[Slovakia]], [[Ukraine]]

===[[Southern Europe]]===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Gibraltar]], [[Greece]], [[Vatican|Holy See]], [[Italy]], [[Malta]], [[Montenegro]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia]], [[Slovenia]], [[Spain]], [[Macedonia|The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia]]

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]

[[Category:Europe|*]]
[[Category:World]]


[[wikitravel:Europe]]
[[cswiki:Europe]]
[[lh:EU]]
[[es:Europa]]</text>
      <sha1>omeqyg839jg6i9ustel099z1tp80skm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12773</id>
      <parentid>12772</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-14T11:00:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3635">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
[[Germany]] and [[England]] are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

&lt;!--
This list doesn't make sense to me. In my experience France was much easier than Sweden and Norway... ~~~~

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
UK,
Norway, 
Sweden,
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,

bad or not at all:
France,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,
--&gt;

==Trucks==
In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays (or things like Christmas). ''(any other countries?)''

==Maps==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].

For online usage: 
*[http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
*[http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
*[http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Safety==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

===[[Northern Europe]]===
[[Åland Islands]], [[Channel Islands]], [[Denmark]], [[Estonia]], [[Faeroe Islands]], [[Finland]], [[Guernsey]], [[Iceland]], [[Ireland]], [[Isle of Man]], [[Jersey]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Norway]], [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]], [[Sweden]], [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

===[[Western Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Luxembourg]], [[Monaco]], [[Netherlands]], [[Switzerland]]

===[[Eastern Europe]]===
[[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]], [[Poland]], [[Romania]], [[Russia|Russian Federation]], [[Slovakia]], [[Ukraine]]

===[[Southern Europe]]===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Gibraltar]], [[Greece]], [[Vatican|Holy See]], [[Italy]], [[Malta]], [[Montenegro]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia]], [[Slovenia]], [[Spain]], [[Macedonia|The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia]]

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]

[[Category:Europe|*]]
[[Category:World]]


[[wikitravel:Europe]]
[[cswiki:Europe]]
[[lh:EU]]
[[es:Europa]]</text>
      <sha1>bbu7g762z2q26dpo3q6ez8nndit99jz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13762</id>
      <parentid>12773</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-13T17:58:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3628">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
[[Germany]] and [[England]] are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

&lt;!--
This list doesn't make sense to me. In my experience France was much easier than Sweden and Norway... ~~~~

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
UK,
Norway, 
Sweden,
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,

bad or not at all:
France,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,
--&gt;

==Trucks==
In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

==Maps==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].

For online usage: 
*[http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
*[http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
*[http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Safety==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

===[[Northern Europe]]===
[[Åland Islands]], [[Channel Islands]], [[Denmark]], [[Estonia]], [[Faeroe Islands]], [[Finland]], [[Guernsey]], [[Iceland]], [[Ireland]], [[Isle of Man]], [[Jersey]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Norway]], [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]], [[Sweden]], [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

===[[Western Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Luxembourg]], [[Monaco]], [[Netherlands]], [[Switzerland]]

===[[Eastern Europe]]===
[[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]], [[Poland]], [[Romania]], [[Russia|Russian Federation]], [[Slovakia]], [[Ukraine]]

===[[Southern Europe]]===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Gibraltar]], [[Greece]], [[Vatican|Holy See]], [[Italy]], [[Malta]], [[Montenegro]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia]], [[Slovenia]], [[Spain]], [[Macedonia|The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia]]

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]

[[Category:Europe|*]]
[[Category:World]]


[[wikitravel:Europe]]
[[cswiki:Europe]]
[[lh:EU]]
[[es:Europa]]</text>
      <sha1>5h4smrfktue8l9hj5a1euo8kvr6lthy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13862</id>
      <parentid>13762</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-16T08:50:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3643">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
[[Germany]] and [[England]] are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

&lt;!--
This list doesn't make sense to me. In my experience France was much easier than Sweden and Norway... ~~~~

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
UK,
Norway, 
Sweden,
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,

bad or not at all:
France,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,
--&gt;

==Trucks==
In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

==Maps==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].

For online usage: 
*[http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
*[http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
*[http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Safety==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

===[[Northern Europe]]===
[[Åland Islands]], [[Channel Islands]], [[Denmark]], [[Estonia]], [[Faeroe Islands]], [[Finland]], [[Guernsey]], [[Iceland]], [[Ireland]], [[Isle of Man]], [[Jersey]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Norway]], [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]], [[Sweden]], [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

===[[Western Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Luxembourg]], [[Monaco]], [[Netherlands]], [[Switzerland]]

===[[Eastern Europe]]===
[[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]], [[Poland]], [[Romania]], [[Russia|Russian Federation]], [[Slovakia]], [[Ukraine]]

===[[Southern Europe]]===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Gibraltar]], [[Greece]], [[Vatican|Holy See]], [[Italy]], [[Malta]], [[Montenegro]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia]], [[Slovenia]], [[Spain]], [[Macedonia|The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia]]

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]

[[Category:Europe|*]]
[[Category:World]]


[[wikitravel:Europe]]
[[cswiki:Europe]]
[[lh:EU]]

[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>d6n37pmwmkj3gtsfecgt82uxwsr9w9r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13982</id>
      <parentid>13862</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-21T18:35:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3657">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
[[Germany]] and [[England]] are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

&lt;!--
This list doesn't make sense to me. In my experience France was much easier than Sweden and Norway... ~~~~

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
UK,
Norway, 
Sweden,
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,

bad or not at all:
France,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,
--&gt;

==Trucks==
In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

==Maps==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].

For online usage: 
*[http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
*[http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
*[http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Safety==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

===[[Northern Europe]]===
[[Åland Islands]], [[Channel Islands]], [[Denmark]], [[Estonia]], [[Faeroe Islands]], [[Finland]], [[Guernsey]], [[Iceland]], [[Ireland]], [[Isle of Man]], [[Jersey]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Norway]], [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]], [[Sweden]], [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

===[[Western Europe]]===
[[Austria]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Luxembourg]], [[Monaco]], [[Netherlands]], [[Switzerland]]

===[[Eastern Europe]]===
[[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]], [[Poland]], [[Romania]], [[Russia|Russian Federation]], [[Slovakia]], [[Ukraine]]

===[[Southern Europe]]===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Gibraltar]], [[Greece]], [[Vatican|Holy See]], [[Italy]], [[Malta]], [[Montenegro]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia]], [[Slovenia]], [[Spain]], [[Macedonia|The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia]]

==External Links==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]

[[Category:Europe|*]]
[[Category:World]]


[[wikitravel:Europe]]
[[cswiki:Europe]]
[[lh:EU]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>ai3gy757dv1v8n5e98ipa0vhu77tsl5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14713</id>
      <parentid>13982</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-13T17:32:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3679">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good, and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
[[Germany]] and [[England]] are very easy. Germany for the large distances for a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). England for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and CIS-countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

&lt;!--
This list doesn't make sense to me. In my experience France was much easier than Sweden and Norway... ~~~~

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
UK,
Norway, 
Sweden,
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,

bad or not at all:
France,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,
--&gt;

== Trucks ==
In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

== Maps ==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].

For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

== Safety ==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
[[Åland Islands]], [[Channel Islands]], [[Denmark]], [[Estonia]], [[Faeroe Islands]], [[Finland]], [[Guernsey]], [[Iceland]], [[Ireland]], [[Isle of Man]], [[Jersey]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Norway]], [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]], [[Sweden]], [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
[[Austria]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Luxembourg]], [[Monaco]], [[Netherlands]], [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]], [[Poland]], [[Romania]], [[Russia|Russian Federation]], [[Slovakia]], [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Gibraltar]], [[Greece]], [[Vatican|Holy See]], [[Italy]], [[Malta]], [[Montenegro]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia]], [[Slovenia]], [[Spain]], [[Macedonia|The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]


[[wikitravel:Europe]]
[[cswiki:Europe]]
[[lh:EU]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>ja3mbhlfwsfdntsrf18mtdubgdbnxis</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15847</id>
      <parentid>14713</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-09T19:01:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3772">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

&lt;!--
This list doesn't make sense to me. In my experience France was much easier than Sweden and Norway... ~~~~
I agree that it doesn't seem to have good criteria ~~~~

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
UK,
Norway, 
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,
France,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,

bad or not at all:
Sweden,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,
--&gt;

== Trucks ==
In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

== Maps ==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].

For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

== Safety ==
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
[[Åland Islands]], [[Channel Islands]], [[Denmark]], [[Estonia]], [[Faeroe Islands]], [[Finland]], [[Guernsey]], [[Iceland]], [[Ireland]], [[Isle of Man]], [[Jersey]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Norway]], [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]], [[Sweden]], [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
[[Austria]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Luxembourg]], [[Monaco]], [[Netherlands]], [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]], [[Poland]], [[Romania]], [[Russia|Russian Federation]], [[Slovakia]], [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Gibraltar]], [[Greece]], [[Vatican|Holy See]], [[Italy]], [[Malta]], [[Montenegro]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia]], [[Slovenia]], [[Spain]], [[Macedonia|The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]


[[wikitravel:Europe]]
[[cswiki:Europe]]
[[lh:EU]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>f3jke9wl47th9y23hj1zx4eedjoz6ho</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16311</id>
      <parentid>15847</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-05T15:01:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3737">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.
&lt;!--
This list doesn't make sense to me. In my experience France was much easier than Sweden and Norway... ~~~~
I agree that it doesn't seem to have good criteria ~~~~

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
UK,
Norway, 
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,
France,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,

bad or not at all:
Sweden,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,
--&gt;

=== Trucks ===
In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].

For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

=== Safety ===
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
[[Åland Islands]], [[Channel Islands]], [[Denmark]], [[Estonia]], [[Faeroe Islands]], [[Finland]], [[Guernsey]], [[Iceland]], [[Ireland]], [[Isle of Man]], [[Jersey]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Norway]], [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]], [[Sweden]], [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
[[Austria]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Luxembourg]], [[Monaco]], [[Netherlands]], [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]], [[Poland]], [[Romania]], [[Russia|Russian Federation]], [[Slovakia]], [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Gibraltar]], [[Greece]], [[Vatican|Holy See]], [[Italy]], [[Malta]], [[Montenegro]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia]], [[Slovenia]], [[Spain]], [[Macedonia|The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]


__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>jw16ebsjxjb20qx5h3gb9hip75nf2kj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16877</id>
      <parentid>16311</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-30T21:24:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3701">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.
&lt;!--
This list doesn't make sense to me. In my experience France was much easier than Sweden and Norway... ~~~~
I agree that it doesn't seem to have good criteria ~~~~

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
UK,
Norway, 
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,
France,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,

bad or not at all:
Sweden,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,
--&gt;

=== Trucks ===
In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].

For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

=== Safety ===
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
[[Åland Islands]], [[Channel Islands]], [[Denmark]], [[Estonia]], [[Faeroe Islands]], [[Finland]], [[Guernsey]], [[Iceland]], [[Ireland]], [[Isle of Man]], [[Jersey]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Norway]], [[Sweden]], [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
[[Austria]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Luxembourg]], [[Monaco]], [[Netherlands]], [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]], [[Poland]], [[Romania]], [[Russia|Russian Federation]], [[Slovakia]], [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Gibraltar]], [[Greece]], [[Vatican|Holy See]], [[Italy]], [[Malta]], [[Montenegro]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia]], [[Slovenia]], [[Spain]], [[Macedonia|The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]


__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>5yehavjy6oxp94mfq4ewm9ixusvu2j2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17445</id>
      <parentid>16877</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-02T18:25:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3737">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in [[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|20px]]'''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.
&lt;!--
This list doesn't make sense to me. In my experience France was much easier than Sweden and Norway... ~~~~
I agree that it doesn't seem to have good criteria ~~~~

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
Norway, 
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,
France,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,
UK,

bad or not at all:
Sweden,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,
--&gt;

=== Trucks ===
In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].

For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

=== Safety ===
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
[[Åland Islands]], [[Channel Islands]], [[Denmark]], [[Estonia]], [[Faeroe Islands]], [[Finland]], [[Guernsey]], [[Iceland]], [[Ireland]], [[Isle of Man]], [[Jersey]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Norway]], [[Sweden]], [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
[[Austria]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Luxembourg]], [[Monaco]], [[Netherlands]], [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]], [[Poland]], [[Romania]], [[Russia|Russian Federation]], [[Slovakia]], [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Gibraltar]], [[Greece]], [[Vatican|Holy See]], [[Italy]], [[Malta]], [[Montenegro]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia]], [[Slovenia]], [[Spain]], [[Macedonia|The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]


__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>67eyo3cq8p7mtni6jleadbvavhx1xgo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17994</id>
      <parentid>17445</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-18T20:28:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4583">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in [[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|20px]]'''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.
&lt;!--
This list doesn't make sense to me. In my experience France was much easier than Sweden and Norway... ~~~~
I agree that it doesn't seem to have good criteria ~~~~

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
Norway, 
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,
France,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,
UK,

bad or not at all:
Sweden,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,
--&gt;

=== Trucks ===
In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].

For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

=== Safety ===
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
==Countries==
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|20px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|20px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|20px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|20px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|20px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|20px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|20px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|20px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|20px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|20px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

===Autonomic Islands or Regions===
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|20px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|20px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|20px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|20px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|20px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
[[Austria]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Luxembourg]], [[Monaco]], [[Netherlands]], [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]], [[Poland]], [[Romania]], [[Russia|Russian Federation]], [[Slovakia]], [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Gibraltar]], [[Greece]], [[Vatican|Holy See]], [[Italy]], [[Malta]], [[Montenegro]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia]], [[Slovenia]], [[Spain]], [[Macedonia|The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]


__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>5kt61ryw4zochudo928pgrzykl0xx4p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17995</id>
      <parentid>17994</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-18T20:29:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4547">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.
&lt;!--
This list doesn't make sense to me. In my experience France was much easier than Sweden and Norway... ~~~~
I agree that it doesn't seem to have good criteria ~~~~

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
Norway, 
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,
France,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,
UK,

bad or not at all:
Sweden,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,
--&gt;

=== Trucks ===
In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].

For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

=== Safety ===
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
==Countries==
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|20px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|20px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|20px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|20px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|20px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|20px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|20px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|20px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|20px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|20px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

===Autonomic Islands or Regions===
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|20px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|20px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|20px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|20px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|20px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
[[Austria]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Liechtenstein]], [[Luxembourg]], [[Monaco]], [[Netherlands]], [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]], [[Poland]], [[Romania]], [[Russia|Russian Federation]], [[Slovakia]], [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Gibraltar]], [[Greece]], [[Vatican|Holy See]], [[Italy]], [[Malta]], [[Montenegro]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia]], [[Slovenia]], [[Spain]], [[Macedonia|The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]


__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>18hf1u5bnh2n7gxvqmq03syxd7o8e14</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17996</id>
      <parentid>17995</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-18T20:29:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4888">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.
&lt;!--
This list doesn't make sense to me. In my experience France was much easier than Sweden and Norway... ~~~~
I agree that it doesn't seem to have good criteria ~~~~

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
Norway, 
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,
France,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,
UK,

bad or not at all:
Sweden,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,
--&gt;

=== Trucks ===
In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].

For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

=== Safety ===
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
==Countries==
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|20px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|20px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|20px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|20px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|20px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|20px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|20px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|20px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|20px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|20px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

===Autonomic Islands or Regions===
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|20px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|20px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|20px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|20px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|20px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
==Countries==
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|20px]] [[Austria]],
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|20px]] [[Belgium]],
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|20px]] [[France]],
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|20px]] [[Germany]],
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|20px]] [[Liechtenstein]],
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|20px]] [[Luxembourg]],
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|20px]] [[Monaco]],
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|20px]] [[Netherlands]],
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|20px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]], [[Poland]], [[Romania]], [[Russia|Russian Federation]], [[Slovakia]], [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Gibraltar]], [[Greece]], [[Vatican|Holy See]], [[Italy]], [[Malta]], [[Montenegro]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia]], [[Slovenia]], [[Spain]], [[Macedonia|The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]


__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>sxvolpe6wldxh1lhoc2o4hj03xh3znx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17997</id>
      <parentid>17996</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-18T20:30:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4879">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.
&lt;!--
This list doesn't make sense to me. In my experience France was much easier than Sweden and Norway... ~~~~
I agree that it doesn't seem to have good criteria ~~~~

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
Norway, 
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,
France,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,
UK,

bad or not at all:
Sweden,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,
--&gt;

=== Trucks ===
In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].

For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

=== Safety ===
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|20px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|20px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|20px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|20px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|20px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|20px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|20px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|20px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|20px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|20px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|20px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|20px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|20px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|20px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|20px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===

==Countries==
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|20px]] [[Austria]],
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|20px]] [[Belgium]],
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|20px]] [[France]],
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|20px]] [[Germany]],
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|20px]] [[Liechtenstein]],
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|20px]] [[Luxembourg]],
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|20px]] [[Monaco]],
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|20px]] [[Netherlands]],
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|20px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]], [[Poland]], [[Romania]], [[Russia|Russian Federation]], [[Slovakia]], [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Gibraltar]], [[Greece]], [[Vatican|Holy See]], [[Italy]], [[Malta]], [[Montenegro]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia]], [[Slovenia]], [[Spain]], [[Macedonia|The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]


__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>7w6mog2maf3pirkruiffm6wl7j3vayj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17998</id>
      <parentid>17997</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-18T20:30:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4866">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.
&lt;!--
This list doesn't make sense to me. In my experience France was much easier than Sweden and Norway... ~~~~
I agree that it doesn't seem to have good criteria ~~~~

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
Norway, 
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,
France,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,
UK,

bad or not at all:
Sweden,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,
--&gt;

=== Trucks ===
In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].

For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

=== Safety ===
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|20px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|20px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|20px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|20px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|20px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|20px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|20px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|20px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|20px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|20px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|20px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|20px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|20px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|20px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|20px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===


* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|20px]] [[Austria]],
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|20px]] [[Belgium]],
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|20px]] [[France]],
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|20px]] [[Germany]],
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|20px]] [[Liechtenstein]],
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|20px]] [[Luxembourg]],
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|20px]] [[Monaco]],
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|20px]] [[Netherlands]],
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|20px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Belarus]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]], [[Poland]], [[Romania]], [[Russia|Russian Federation]], [[Slovakia]], [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Gibraltar]], [[Greece]], [[Vatican|Holy See]], [[Italy]], [[Malta]], [[Montenegro]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia]], [[Slovenia]], [[Spain]], [[Macedonia|The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]


__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>noj7m6f664w6z6664sp0niz3vmql0if</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17999</id>
      <parentid>17998</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-18T20:31:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5237">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.
&lt;!--
This list doesn't make sense to me. In my experience France was much easier than Sweden and Norway... ~~~~
I agree that it doesn't seem to have good criteria ~~~~

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
Norway, 
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,
France,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,
UK,

bad or not at all:
Sweden,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,
--&gt;

=== Trucks ===
In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].

For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

=== Safety ===
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|20px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|20px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|20px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|20px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|20px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|20px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|20px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|20px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|20px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|20px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|20px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|20px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|20px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|20px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|20px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===


* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|20px]] [[Austria]],
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|20px]] [[Belgium]],
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|20px]] [[France]],
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|20px]] [[Germany]],
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|20px]] [[Liechtenstein]],
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|20px]] [[Luxembourg]],
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|20px]] [[Monaco]],
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|20px]] [[Netherlands]],
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|20px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|20px]] [[Belarus]], 
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|20px]] [[Bulgaria]], 
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|20px]] [[Czech Republic]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|20px]] [[Hungary]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|20px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]], 
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|20px]] [[Poland]], 
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|20px]] [[Romania]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|20px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|20px]] [[Slovakia]], 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|20px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
[[Albania]], [[Andorra]], [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], [[Croatia]], [[Gibraltar]], [[Greece]], [[Vatican|Holy See]], [[Italy]], [[Malta]], [[Montenegro]], [[Portugal]], [[San Marino]], [[Serbia]], [[Slovenia]], [[Spain]], [[Macedonia|The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]


__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>jorff25yga1uazpfcrio06dnicz6dfw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18001</id>
      <parentid>17999</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-18T20:32:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5847">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.
&lt;!--
This list doesn't make sense to me. In my experience France was much easier than Sweden and Norway... ~~~~
I agree that it doesn't seem to have good criteria ~~~~

Countries ordered by skill in English language (list incomplete):

very good:
Norway, 
Denmark,
Finland,
Netherlands,
France,

good:
Germany,
Belgium,
Austria,
Switzerland,

ok:
Czech Republic,
Poland,
UK,

bad or not at all:
Sweden,
Italy,
Spain,
Portugal,
--&gt;

=== Trucks ===
In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].

For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

=== Safety ===
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|20px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|20px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|20px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|20px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|20px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|20px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|20px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|20px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|20px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|20px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|20px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|20px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|20px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|20px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|20px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===


* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|20px]] [[Austria]],
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|20px]] [[Belgium]],
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|20px]] [[France]],
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|20px]] [[Germany]],
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|20px]] [[Liechtenstein]],
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|20px]] [[Luxembourg]],
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|20px]] [[Monaco]],
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|20px]] [[Netherlands]],
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|20px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|20px]] [[Belarus]], 
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|20px]] [[Bulgaria]], 
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|20px]] [[Czech Republic]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|20px]] [[Hungary]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|20px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]], 
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|20px]] [[Poland]], 
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|20px]] [[Romania]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|20px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|20px]] [[Slovakia]], 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|20px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|20px]] [[Albania]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|20px]] [[Andorra]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|20px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]], 
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|20px]] [[Croatia]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|20px]] [[Greece]],
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|20px]] [[Italy]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|20px]] [[Malta]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|20px]] [[Montenegro]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|20px]] [[Portugal]], 
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|20px]] [[San Marino]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|20px]] [[Serbia]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|20px]] [[Slovenia]], 
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|20px]] [[Spain]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|20px]] [[Macedonia]]

===== Autonomic Regions =====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|20px]] [[Gibraltar]],
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|20px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]


__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>9x9lcnaj31loftcjkspcfki0tt2kuy1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18006</id>
      <parentid>18001</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-18T20:35:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5472">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

=== Trucks ===
In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].

For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

=== Safety ===
Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere south of the France-Switzerland-Austria-Hungary-Ukraine line.

==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
&lt;map lat='51.83577752045248' lng='17.2265625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|20px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|20px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|20px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|20px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|20px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|20px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|20px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|20px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|20px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|20px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|20px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|20px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|20px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|20px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|20px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===


* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|20px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|20px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|20px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|20px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|20px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|20px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|20px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|20px]] [[Netherlands]],
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|20px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|20px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|20px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|20px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|20px]] [[Hungary]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|20px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|20px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|20px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|20px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|20px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|20px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|20px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|20px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|20px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|20px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|20px]] [[Greece]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|20px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|20px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|20px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|20px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|20px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|20px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|20px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|20px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|20px]] [[Macedonia]]

===== Autonomic Regions =====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|20px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|20px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]


__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>r5nrb85amzjhhaghzcfqouykwdy4upa</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18012</id>
      <parentid>18006</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-18T20:42:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5687">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere, of course.

For crossing borders, have a look to the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a visa to the Schengen area you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].
[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of European Union]]
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing


==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|20px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|20px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|20px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|20px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|20px]] [[Ireland]]&lt;map lat='51.83577752045248' lng='17.2265625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|20px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|20px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|20px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|20px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|20px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|20px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|20px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|20px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|20px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|20px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|20px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|20px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|20px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|20px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|20px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|20px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|20px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|20px]] [[Netherlands]],
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|20px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|20px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|20px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|20px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|20px]] [[Hungary]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|20px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|20px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|20px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|20px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|20px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|20px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|20px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|20px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|20px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|20px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|20px]] [[Greece]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|20px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|20px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|20px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|20px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|20px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|20px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|20px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|20px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|20px]] [[Macedonia]]

===== Autonomic Regions =====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|20px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|20px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]


__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>cn79nuyrmh8os0p4flrxc8izhtsnnwm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18013</id>
      <parentid>18012</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-18T20:43:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5687">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere, of course.

For crossing borders, have a look to the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a visa to the Schengen area you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].
[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of European Union]]
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing


==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|20px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|20px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|20px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|20px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|20px]] [[Ireland]]&lt;map lat='51.83577752045248' lng='17.2265625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|20px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|20px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|20px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|20px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|20px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|20px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|20px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|20px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|20px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|20px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|20px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|20px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|20px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|20px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|20px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|20px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|20px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|20px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|20px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|20px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|20px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|20px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|20px]] [[Hungary]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|20px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|20px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|20px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|20px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|20px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|20px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|20px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|20px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|20px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|20px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|20px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|20px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|20px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|20px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|20px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|20px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|20px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|20px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|20px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|20px]] [[Macedonia]]

===== Autonomic Regions =====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|20px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|20px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]


__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>torxdupykjl1cd7i6dbwf8xx7fbpey4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18014</id>
      <parentid>18013</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-18T20:44:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5686">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere, of course.

For crossing borders, have a look to the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a visa to the Schengen area you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].
[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of European Union]]
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|20px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|20px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|20px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|20px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|20px]] [[Ireland]]&lt;map lat='51.83577752045248' lng='17.2265625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|20px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|20px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|20px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|20px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|20px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|20px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|20px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|20px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|20px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|20px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|20px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|20px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|20px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|20px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|20px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|20px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|20px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|20px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|20px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|20px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|20px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|20px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|20px]] [[Hungary]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|20px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|20px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|20px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|20px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|20px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|20px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|20px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|20px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|20px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|20px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|20px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|20px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|20px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|20px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|20px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|20px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|20px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|20px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|20px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|20px]] [[Macedonia]]

===== Autonomic Regions =====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|20px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|20px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]


__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>gh4pivz60az9sotnet2m80pr4vb66b9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18167</id>
      <parentid>18014</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-20T22:35:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5684">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Croatia]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere, of course.

For crossing borders, have a look to the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a visa to the Schengen area you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].
[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of European Union]]
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|20px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|20px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|20px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|20px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|20px]] [[Ireland]]&lt;map lat='51.83577752045248' lng='17.2265625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|20px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|20px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|20px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|20px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|20px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|20px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|20px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|20px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|20px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|20px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|20px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|20px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|20px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|20px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|20px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|20px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|20px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|20px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|20px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|20px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|20px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|20px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|20px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|20px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|20px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|20px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|20px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|20px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|20px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|20px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|20px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|20px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|20px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|20px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|20px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|20px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|20px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|20px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|20px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|20px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|20px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|20px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|20px]] [[Macedonia]]

===== Autonomic Regions =====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|20px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|20px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]


__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>qbveb4xv7ft80sot41ir6s688e9irdq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18259</id>
      <parentid>18167</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-28T17:58:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.13.191.106</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5682">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere, of course.

For crossing borders, have a look to the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a visa to the Schengen area you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].
[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of European Union]]
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|20px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|20px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|20px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|20px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|20px]] [[Ireland]]&lt;map lat='51.83577752045248' lng='17.2265625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|20px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|20px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|20px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|20px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|20px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|20px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|20px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|20px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|20px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|20px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|20px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|20px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|20px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|20px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|20px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|20px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|20px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|20px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|20px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|20px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|20px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|20px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|20px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|20px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|20px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|20px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|20px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|20px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|20px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|20px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|20px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|20px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|20px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|20px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|20px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|20px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|20px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|20px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|20px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|20px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|20px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|20px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|20px]] [[Macedonia]]

===== Autonomic Regions =====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|20px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|20px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]


__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>4h7vkn1r0cve0g99qo7lct3z7xxsiem</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18438</id>
      <parentid>18259</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-02-17T16:29:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5695">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere, of course.

For crossing borders, have a look to the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a visa to the Schengen area you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].
[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of European Union]]
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|20px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|20px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|20px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|20px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|20px]] [[Ireland]]&lt;map lat='51.83577752045248' lng='17.2265625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|20px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|20px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|20px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|20px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|20px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|20px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|20px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|20px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|20px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|20px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|20px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|20px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|20px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|20px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|20px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|20px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|20px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|20px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|20px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|20px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|20px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|20px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|20px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|20px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|20px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|20px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|20px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|20px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|20px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|20px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|20px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|20px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|20px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|20px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|20px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|20px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Kosovo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|20px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|20px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|20px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|20px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|20px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|20px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|20px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|20px]] [[Macedonia]]

===== Autonomic Regions =====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|20px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|20px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]


__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>69qbtv5l1mokf2fxchbwk2j4aespfw5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18615</id>
      <parentid>18438</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-03T09:57:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5726">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]] and [[Austria]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere, of course.

For crossing borders, have a look to the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a visa to the Schengen area you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].
[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of European Union]]
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]&lt;map lat='51.83577752045248' lng='17.2265625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]

===== Autonomic Regions =====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]


__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>9iqm6z19ncmzuz7fevmj2kkkd1hzb5i</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19668</id>
      <parentid>18615</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-04-27T00:24:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.212.93.64</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5736">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]] and Slovenia trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere, of course.

For crossing borders, have a look to the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a visa to the Schengen area you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].
[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of European Union]]
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]&lt;map lat='51.83577752045248' lng='17.2265625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]

===== Autonomic Regions =====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]


__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>rjk8i2wq205bgstcnn7kvt7xqll9t1o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19670</id>
      <parentid>19668</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-04-27T06:00:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TruckThor</username>
        <id>82</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5740">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]] and [[Slovenia]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere, of course.

For crossing borders, have a look to the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a visa to the Schengen area you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].
[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of European Union]]
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]&lt;map lat='51.83577752045248' lng='17.2265625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]

===== Autonomic Regions =====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]


__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>sj3j52shu2qrhn275f2aer6h2fm7ixf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21102</id>
      <parentid>19670</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-13T12:02:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5759">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]] and [[Slovenia]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere, of course.

For crossing borders, have a look to the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a visa to the Schengen area you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].
[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of European Union]]
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]&lt;map lat='51.83577752045248' lng='17.2265625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]

===== Autonomic Regions =====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]

{{IstIn|Hitchwiki}}
__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>hvmipzsna43ruc3101d5i2oz7qzpxpq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21214</id>
      <parentid>21102</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-14T20:10:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5754">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]] and [[Slovenia]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere, of course.

For crossing borders, have a look to the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a visa to the Schengen area you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].
[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of European Union]]
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]&lt;map lat='51.83577752045248' lng='17.2265625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]

===== Autonomic Regions =====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]

{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>60l5624uwid9jgrauq1eqccsch85vxq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22156</id>
      <parentid>21214</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-30T19:11:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5770">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]] and [[Slovenia]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere, of course.

For crossing borders, have a look to the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a visa to the Schengen area you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].
[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of European Union]]
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]&lt;map lat='51.83577752045248' lng='17.2265625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]

===== Autonomic Regions =====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]

{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]</text>
      <sha1>nnp335pnzz8ocl9eb4f35q0l7h9s4c2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22169</id>
      <parentid>22156</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-01T09:21:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TruckThor</username>
        <id>82</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5814">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]] and [[Slovenia]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere, of course.

For crossing borders, have a look to the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a visa to the Schengen area you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].
[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of European Union]]
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]&lt;map lat='51.83577752045248' lng='17.2265625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

===== Autonomic Regions =====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]

{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]</text>
      <sha1>6325tn53aoiemz8iz10i4f7n4gjsgec</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22175</id>
      <parentid>22169</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-02T00:58:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Whisperingofthestars</username>
        <id>190</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5826">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]] and [[Italy ]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere, of course.

For crossing borders, have a look to the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a visa to the Schengen area you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].
[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of European Union]]
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]&lt;map lat='51.83577752045248' lng='17.2265625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

===== Autonomic Regions =====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]

{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]</text>
      <sha1>op39e3trufanqqqxnurh7vlv96367ql</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22234</id>
      <parentid>22175</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-04T09:52:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5827">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of European Union]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]] and [[Italy ]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere, of course.

For crossing borders, have a look to the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a visa to the Schengen area you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:
&lt;osm lat='51.83577752045248' lng='17.2265625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

===== Autonomic Regions =====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]

{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]</text>
      <sha1>cudnmkjvx3zp2bfb1v2p3iruwve17dy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22248</id>
      <parentid>22234</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-04T21:47:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5827">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of European Union]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]] and [[Italy ]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere, of course.

For crossing borders, have a look to the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a visa to the Schengen area you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:
&lt;map lat='51.83577752045248' lng='17.2265625' zoom='3' view='3' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

===== Autonomic Regions =====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]

{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]</text>
      <sha1>ca3f6fx7bdyowf9trjgc55tb5ru5539</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23000</id>
      <parentid>22248</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-29T08:11:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>84.190.87.238</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5839">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of European Union]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]] and [[Italy ]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere, of course.

For crossing borders, have a look to the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a visa to the Schengen area you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:
&lt;map lat='51.83577752045248' lng='17.2265625' zoom='3' view='3' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

===== Autonomic Regions =====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]

{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]</text>
      <sha1>d0p39il1maa6g8g63r9vx4cx46kjqso</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23153</id>
      <parentid>23000</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-31T22:50:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Pite</username>
        <id>85</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5852">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of European Union]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy ]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere, of course.

For crossing borders, have a look to the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a visa to the Schengen area you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:
&lt;map lat='51.83577752045248' lng='17.2265625' zoom='3' view='3' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

===== Autonomic Regions =====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]

{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]</text>
      <sha1>6puqvd6dimgux5vqbcotfmzp2fnchlz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23312</id>
      <parentid>23153</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-08-08T13:15:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>83.208.24.45</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5872">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of European Union]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Poland]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy ]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere, of course.

For crossing borders, have a look to the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a visa to the Schengen area you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:
&lt;map lat='51.83577752045248' lng='17.2265625' zoom='3' view='3' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

===== Autonomic Regions =====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]

{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]</text>
      <sha1>ewx3gvra4pwr23fg0gneumizz1mceaw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23461</id>
      <parentid>23312</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-08-13T06:39:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>83.208.24.45</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5829">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of European Union]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Poland]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy ]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere, of course.

For crossing borders, have a look to the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a visa to the Schengen area you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:
&lt;map lat='52.5897007687178' lng='16.875' zoom='3' view='3' /&gt;

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

===== Autonomic Regions =====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]

{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]</text>
      <sha1>60js6w7am1l70avcsb1345x5h1ws38j</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23462</id>
      <parentid>23461</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-08-13T06:42:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>83.208.24.45</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5838">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of European Union]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Poland]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy ]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere, of course.

For crossing borders, have a look to the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a visa to the Schengen area you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:
&lt;map lat='52.5897007687178' lng='16.875' zoom='3' view='3' /&gt;










=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

===== Autonomic Regions =====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]

{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]</text>
      <sha1>46wbjf1iq53161w56zuf2phu6vp4hjx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23463</id>
      <parentid>23462</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-08-13T06:45:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>83.208.24.45</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5829">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of European Union]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Poland]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy ]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere, of course.

For crossing borders, have a look to the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a visa to the Schengen area you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

&lt;map lat='52.5897007687178' lng='16.875' zoom='3' view='3' /&gt;
==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

===== Autonomic Regions =====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]

{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]</text>
      <sha1>36rh79u3i4q1pjsre2cuht015dnhrkc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24012</id>
      <parentid>23463</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-08-26T06:37:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Terrehappy</username>
        <id>1446</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5896">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of European Union]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Poland]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy ]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere, of course.

For crossing borders, have a look to the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a visa to the Schengen area you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map, but it's possible, some people just hitchike with their feelings. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

&lt;map lat='52.5897007687178' lng='16.875' zoom='3' view='3' /&gt;

==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

===== Autonomic Regions =====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]

{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]</text>
      <sha1>r6zmgjaz0h9950kakpqsd3xsfpz800b</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>25290</id>
      <parentid>24012</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-24T17:45:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>130.89.119.192</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5833">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of European Union]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Poland]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy ]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere, of course.

For crossing borders, have a look to the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a visa to the Schengen area you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

===Maps ===
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map, but it's possible, some people just hitchike with their feelings. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

==Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

===== Autonomic Regions =====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


[[Category:Europe| ]]
[[Category:World]]

{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]</text>
      <sha1>iez0hktcp8viicsfordzt9gp66qyi0h</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>25573</id>
      <parentid>25290</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-02T23:19:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5812">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of European Union]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Poland]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy ]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere, of course.

For crossing borders, have a look to the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a visa to the Schengen area you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

== Maps ==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map, but it's possible, some people just hitchike with their feelings. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
__NOTOC__
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]</text>
      <sha1>224mtg69970vn16ytfsvha7e8r9w4mj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26421</id>
      <parentid>25573</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-21T21:58:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Stupidfrog</username>
        <id>1618</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5792">[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of European Union]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries, highways in the West are good and hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries, such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around. [[Germany]] for the large distances in a single lift, and the possibility to go really fast (no legal speed limits on many highways). [[England]] for the relative short time for waiting. Most other countries are at the European average (rather easy), e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and Eastern countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]], but even there you might get a ride with some patience. Some people skip a country after standing in one place for over two hours. When this happens more than once on suitable places for hitching, this is reasonable.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy ]] trucks are not allowed to use the highway on Sundays and public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a woman alone takes a higher risk anywhere, of course.

For crossing borders, have a look to the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a visa to the Schengen area you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

== Maps ==
Of course, you won't go on the road without a map, but it's possible, some people just hitchike with their feelings. For all of Europe but the East, the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is great. It contains detailed information about gas stations on highways, without unneeded stuff like an index or city maps. You can find it in [[Slovakia]].
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps.
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
__NOTOC__
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]</text>
      <sha1>dorphffc1rjw3rlffaujuuypeswl9is</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27085</id>
      <parentid>26421</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-06T16:12:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sigurdas</username>
        <id>1658</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6081">[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, highways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy ]] trucks are not allowed to use highways on Sundays and on public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk because of obvious reasons.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For most of Europe (excl. the Eastern parts) the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on highways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

== Tips for each country ==
[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
__NOTOC__
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]</text>
      <sha1>qogp6cpekjzjh8ksvbtzrrb00ffx44q</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31128</id>
      <parentid>27085</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-19T17:49:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6264">[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, highways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy ]] trucks are not allowed to use highways on Sundays and on public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk because of obvious reasons.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the highway.  People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For most of Europe (excl. the Eastern parts) the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on highways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

== Tips for each country ==
[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
__NOTOC__
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]</text>
      <sha1>ghxnxdhp0p6w7c847xb4rzms74a1k2j</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31233</id>
      <parentid>31128</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-22T11:15:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6268">[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy ]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk because of obvious reasons.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway.  People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For most of Europe (excl. the Eastern parts) the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

== Tips for each country ==
[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
__NOTOC__
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]</text>
      <sha1>0ykfec5fk4xhklq6dbda2gm1bgrb53d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31490</id>
      <parentid>31233</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-03T23:39:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sigurdas</username>
        <id>1658</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6286">[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy ]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk because of obvious reasons.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway.  People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For most of Europe (excl. the Eastern parts) the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

== Tips for each country ==
[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
__NOTOC__
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]

[[trash:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>a06t34byfpipwfgevel5onth2z4x577</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31506</id>
      <parentid>31490</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-04T01:39:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>81.245.153.33</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6401">[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy ]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. ''(any other countries?)'' %note : not sure but i think in belgium too %note2 : i think fresh food can nevertheless uses motorway on sundays


Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk because of obvious reasons.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway.  People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For most of Europe (excl. the Eastern parts) the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

== Tips for each country ==
[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
__NOTOC__
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]

[[trash:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>iop2mhoqcp9az3fnlyr1b9e2jyv4cmh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31507</id>
      <parentid>31506</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-04T01:40:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>81.245.153.33</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6412">[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy ]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. ''(any other countries?)''      %note : not sure but i think in belgium too %note2 : i think fresh food truckscan nevertheless uses motorway on sundays


Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk because of obvious reasons.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway.  People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For most of Europe (excl. the Eastern parts) the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

== Tips for each country ==
[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
__NOTOC__
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]

[[trash:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>djcwbhp0rhptyt1crzy78imo6zgsrmv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31512</id>
      <parentid>31507</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-04T07:08:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sigurdas</username>
        <id>1658</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6440">[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy ]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk because of obvious reasons.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway.  People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For most of Europe (excl. the Eastern parts) the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

== Tips for each country ==
[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
__NOTOC__
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]

[[trash:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>pjifl3ic59m2mecscuc2s479c2yyar9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31979</id>
      <parentid>31512</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-04-06T12:16:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6437">[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy ]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk because of obvious reasons.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway.  People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For most of Europe (excl. the Eastern parts) the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing

== Tips for each country ==
[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
__NOTOC__
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]

[[trash:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>himrmt8zae29wzm0t7xk29qtsu42akp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>33751</id>
      <parentid>31979</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-06-02T12:51:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>94.219.147.170</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6507">[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy ]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk because of obvious reasons.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway.  People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For most of Europe (excl. the Eastern parts) the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

== Tips for each country ==
[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
__NOTOC__
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]

[[trash:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>mi1x3u6132mv1wlqsf16wazrsctgzdz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>33922</id>
      <parentid>33751</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-06-13T19:23:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Xkomczax</username>
        <id>1495</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6527">[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy ]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk because of obvious reasons.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway.  People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For most of Europe (excl. the Eastern parts) the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

== Tips for each country ==
[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
__NOTOC__
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]

[[trash:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>m9e7tb317hi6f4ph9fk6fqkyy6fq3ci</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>34178</id>
      <parentid>33922</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-06-24T20:45:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Anka0</username>
        <id>1933</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6587">[[Image:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy ]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk because of obvious reasons. However, obvious it is not and it sounds discouraging here.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway.  People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For most of Europe (excl. the Eastern parts) the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

== Tips for each country ==
[[Image:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[Image:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[Image:Flag Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[Image:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[Image:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[Image:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[Image:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[Image:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[Image:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[Image:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[Image:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[Image:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[Image:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[Image:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[Image:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[Image:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[Image:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[Image:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[Image:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[Image:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[Image:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[Image:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[Image:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[Image:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[Image:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[Image:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[Image:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[Image:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[Image:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[Image:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[Image:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[Image:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[Image:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[Image:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[Image:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[Image:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
__NOTOC__
[[es:Europa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]

[[trash:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>ehi7e15snprnbui6goq1aslmkqq6710</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>34890</id>
      <parentid>34178</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T17:17:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6527">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk because of obvious reasons. However, obvious it is not and it sounds discouraging here.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For most of Europe (excl. the Eastern parts) the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[fr:Europe]]
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]</text>
      <sha1>rxe39nf8jg0f6ri5zfabbw51rwsrii0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35698</id>
      <parentid>34890</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T22:53:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6541">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk because of obvious reasons. However, obvious it is not and it sounds discouraging here.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For most of Europe (excl. the Eastern parts) the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[fr:Europe]]
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[pt:Europa]]</text>
      <sha1>st9s1lzhzh2z46xwp11xdoq23fy0q9p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35778</id>
      <parentid>35698</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-13T23:51:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6555">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk because of obvious reasons. However, obvious it is not and it sounds discouraging here.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For most of Europe (excl. the Eastern parts) the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[fr:Europe]]
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]</text>
      <sha1>65z0qsq9h9jqoq7onmc6p4lql68pwyj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35866</id>
      <parentid>35778</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-17T00:05:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6569">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk because of obvious reasons. However, obvious it is not and it sounds discouraging here.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For most of Europe (excl. the Eastern parts) the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[fr:Europe]]
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>6xjp09zgpusx1csfe9qqbsjy9y1t742</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36878</id>
      <parentid>35866</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-09-02T13:43:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>93.183.164.129</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6569">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk because of obvious reasons. However, obvious it is not and it sounds discouraging here.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For most of Europe (excl. the Eastern parts) the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[fr:Europe]]
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>d13lcodgvvs1h6624i1kf3k4kf08a25</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36879</id>
      <parentid>36878</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-09-02T14:16:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6569">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk because of obvious reasons. However, obvious it is not and it sounds discouraging here.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For most of Europe (excl. the Eastern parts) the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[fr:Europe]]
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>6xjp09zgpusx1csfe9qqbsjy9y1t742</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>37753</id>
      <parentid>36879</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-10-09T22:29:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6569">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk because of obvious reasons. However, obvious it is not and it sounds discouraging here.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For most of Europe (excl. the Eastern parts) the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>byjhu7b0bom0ell7f2jeo9h92lu9mot</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39126</id>
      <parentid>37753</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-12-31T20:48:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Vidimian</username>
        <id>1703</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6583">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk because of obvious reasons. However, obvious it is not and it sounds discouraging here.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For most of Europe (excl. the Eastern parts) the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>h6w8nysxvmkuiu64ru9i4q3kn80h84t</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39846</id>
      <parentid>39126</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-02-24T07:59:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>144.134.101.181</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6524">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk because of obvious reasons. 

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For most of Europe (excl. the Eastern parts) the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://www.liftershalte.info/?country=EU Liftershalte.info] - based on google maps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>dkjm8tldu0rl68drmyeqrr04ju5b36w</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40518</id>
      <parentid>39846</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-20T15:51:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6647">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk because of obvious reasons. 

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For most of Europe (excl. the Eastern parts) the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://maps.hitchwiki.org/?country=EU maps.hitchwiki.org] - based on OpenStreetMap
* [http://maps.google.com/ Google Maps] is probably your best bet for research if maps.hitchwiki.org doesn't show anything
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://www.wikitravel.org/en/Hitchhiking_in_Europe Wikitravel: Hitchhiking in Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>qhd9t9wr6y4dwocsw6bh0ai5npp99ii</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40519</id>
      <parentid>40518</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-20T15:51:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6558">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk because of obvious reasons. 

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For most of Europe (excl. the Eastern parts) the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://maps.hitchwiki.org/?country=EU maps.hitchwiki.org] - based on OpenStreetMap
* [http://maps.google.com/ Google Maps] is probably your best bet for research if maps.hitchwiki.org doesn't show anything
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>i7vb63fbg7y1mgxua606ywvrqtlnoh0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40794</id>
      <parentid>40519</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-30T20:39:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6572">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk because of obvious reasons. 

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For most of Europe (excl. the Eastern parts) the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://maps.hitchwiki.org/?country=EU maps.hitchwiki.org] - based on OpenStreetMap
* [http://maps.google.com/ Google Maps] is probably your best bet for research if maps.hitchwiki.org doesn't show anything
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>mgy2ikhz94tlpeyjolxl0pnhbtf5z0i</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>42760</id>
      <parentid>40794</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-06-28T10:57:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Hippietrail</username>
        <id>2459</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6565">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk for obvious reasons. 

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For most of Europe (excl. the Eastern parts) the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://maps.hitchwiki.org/?country=EU maps.hitchwiki.org] - based on OpenStreetMap
* [http://maps.google.com/ Google Maps] is probably your best bet for research if maps.hitchwiki.org doesn't show anything
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>t201pdn0ez93vpdy6sa6x2gy9xn81eq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>43538</id>
      <parentid>42760</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-07-30T16:00:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>85.241.44.59</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6578">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk for obvious reasons. 

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For most of Europe (excl. the Eastern parts) the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://maps.hitchwiki.org/?country=EU maps.hitchwiki.org] - based on OpenStreetMap
* [http://maps.google.com/ Google Maps] is probably your best bet for research if maps.hitchwiki.org doesn't show anything
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[Cyprus]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>9gf9ezumzm4mkwspbptm2kot94aehmy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>43912</id>
      <parentid>43538</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-08-09T05:46:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>188.195.101.30</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6552">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk for obvious reasons. 

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://maps.hitchwiki.org/?country=EU maps.hitchwiki.org] - based on OpenStreetMap
* [http://maps.google.com/ Google Maps] is probably your best bet for research if maps.hitchwiki.org doesn't show anything
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[Cyprus]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>3maeqehccoekr8rdm7y9cxi2y5nann5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44175</id>
      <parentid>43912</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-08-17T20:22:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Index</username>
        <id>56</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6566">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk for obvious reasons. 

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://maps.hitchwiki.org/?country=EU maps.hitchwiki.org] - based on OpenStreetMap
* [http://maps.google.com/ Google Maps] is probably your best bet for research if maps.hitchwiki.org doesn't show anything
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[Cyprus]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>ra4ea4o93rwpnfx2myy47zrlm1aacl2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44176</id>
      <parentid>44175</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-08-17T20:35:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Index</username>
        <id>56</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6599">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk for obvious reasons. 

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://maps.hitchwiki.org/?country=EU maps.hitchwiki.org] - based on OpenStreetMap
* [http://maps.google.com/ Google Maps] is probably your best bet for research if maps.hitchwiki.org doesn't show anything
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.png|30px]] [[Cyprus]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>lr3gcsapdmblm6vu2clr8vgbr9nd1gd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44177</id>
      <parentid>44176</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-08-17T20:38:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Index</username>
        <id>56</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6619">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk for obvious reasons. 

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://maps.hitchwiki.org/?country=EU maps.hitchwiki.org] - based on OpenStreetMap
* [http://maps.google.com/ Google Maps] is probably your best bet for research if maps.hitchwiki.org doesn't show anything
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.png|30px]] [[Cyprus]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>tosymawmms08lf5cafb7ckjrm8ddi44</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>45262</id>
      <parentid>44177</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-09-25T18:52:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6636">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Switzerland]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk for obvious reasons. 

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://maps.hitchwiki.org/?country=EU maps.hitchwiki.org] - based on OpenStreetMap
* [http://maps.google.com/ Google Maps] is probably your best bet for research if maps.hitchwiki.org doesn't show anything
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.png|30px]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.png|30px]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.png|30px]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag Iceland.png|30px]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag Ireland.png|30px]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.png|30px]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.png|30px]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.png|30px]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.png|30px]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag uk.png|30px]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag_of_Aaland_Finland.png|30px]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey UK.png|30px]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark UK.png|30px]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey UK.png|30px]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.png|30px]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Isle of Man UK.png|30px]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag_Austria.png|30px]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag_Belgium.png|30px]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag_France.png|30px]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag_Germany.png|30px]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag_Liechtenstein.png|30px]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag Luxembourg.png|30px]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Monaco.png|30px]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag_Netherlands.png|30px]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag_of_Switzerland.png|30px]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.png|30px]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag Bulgaria.png|30px]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag Czech Republic.png|30px]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.png|30px]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.png|30px]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag Poland.png|30px]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag Romania.png|30px]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.png|30px]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.png|30px]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag Ukraine.png|30px]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.png|30px]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.png|30px]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.png|30px]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag Croatia.png|30px]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.png|30px]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.png|30px]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag Kosovo.png|30px]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.png|30px]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.png|30px]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.png|30px]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.png|30px]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.png|30px]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.png|30px]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.png|30px]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag Spain.png|30px]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag Turkey.png|30px]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.png|30px]] [[Cyprus]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar UK.png|30px]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag Vatican City.png|30px]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>mynofhauufxfbjsqnwmdj6468u85ivu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>45963</id>
      <parentid>45262</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-17T12:40:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7142">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Switzerland]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk for obvious reasons. 

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://maps.hitchwiki.org/?country=EU maps.hitchwiki.org] - based on OpenStreetMap
* [http://maps.google.com/ Google Maps] is probably your best bet for research if maps.hitchwiki.org doesn't show anything
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.svg|30px|border]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.svg|30px|border]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag of Iceland.svg|30px|border]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag of Ireland.svg|30px|border]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.svg|30px|border]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.svg|30px|border]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.svg|30px|border]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg|30px|border]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Åland.svg|30px|border]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey.svg|30px|border]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey.svg|30px|border]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of the Isle of Man.svg|30px|border]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Austria.svg|30px|border]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag of Belgium (civil).svg|30px|border]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag of France.svg|30px|border]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag of Germany.svg|30px|border]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag of Liechtenstein.svg|30px|border]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag of Luxembourg.svg|30px|border]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag of Monaco.svg|30px|border]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg|30px|border]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag of Switzerland.svg|30px|border]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.svg|30px|border]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag of Bulgaria.svg|30px|border]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag of the Czech Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.svg|30px|border]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.svg|30px|border]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag of Poland.svg|30px|border]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag of Romania.svg|30px|border]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.svg|30px|border]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag of Ukraine.svg|30px|border]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.svg|30px|border]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.svg|30px|border]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.svg|30px|border]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag of Croatia.svg|30px|border]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.svg|30px|border]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.svg|30px|border]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag of Kosovo.svg|30px|border]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.svg|30px|border]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.svg|30px|border]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.svg|30px|border]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.svg|30px|border]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.svg|30px|border]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Spain.svg|30px|border]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar.svg|30px|border]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Vatican City.svg|30px|border]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>35yz4jx7m1zwegn8v0qqwhiim77i121</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>49901</id>
      <parentid>45963</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-03-01T14:31:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7210">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Switzerland]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk for obvious reasons. 

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://maps.hitchwiki.org/?country=EU maps.hitchwiki.org] - based on OpenStreetMap
* [http://maps.google.com/ Google Maps] is probably your best bet for research if maps.hitchwiki.org doesn't show anything
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

== Main European Motorways ==
See [[European road|European roads]]

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.svg|30px|border]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.svg|30px|border]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag of Iceland.svg|30px|border]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag of Ireland.svg|30px|border]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.svg|30px|border]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.svg|30px|border]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.svg|30px|border]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg|30px|border]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Åland.svg|30px|border]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey.svg|30px|border]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey.svg|30px|border]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of the Isle of Man.svg|30px|border]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Austria.svg|30px|border]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag of Belgium (civil).svg|30px|border]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag of France.svg|30px|border]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag of Germany.svg|30px|border]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag of Liechtenstein.svg|30px|border]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag of Luxembourg.svg|30px|border]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag of Monaco.svg|30px|border]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg|30px|border]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag of Switzerland.svg|30px|border]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.svg|30px|border]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag of Bulgaria.svg|30px|border]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag of the Czech Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.svg|30px|border]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.svg|30px|border]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag of Poland.svg|30px|border]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag of Romania.svg|30px|border]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.svg|30px|border]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag of Ukraine.svg|30px|border]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.svg|30px|border]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.svg|30px|border]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.svg|30px|border]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag of Croatia.svg|30px|border]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.svg|30px|border]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.svg|30px|border]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag of Kosovo.svg|30px|border]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.svg|30px|border]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.svg|30px|border]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.svg|30px|border]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.svg|30px|border]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.svg|30px|border]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Spain.svg|30px|border]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar.svg|30px|border]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Vatican City.svg|30px|border]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>3ov0d46mbgsvhz9ulh8yozi60ygw95r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>49906</id>
      <parentid>49901</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-03-01T14:34:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7196">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Switzerland]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk for obvious reasons. 

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://maps.hitchwiki.org/?country=EU maps.hitchwiki.org] - based on OpenStreetMap
* [http://maps.google.com/ Google Maps] is probably your best bet for research if maps.hitchwiki.org doesn't show anything
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

== Main European Motorways ==
See [[European roads]]

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.svg|30px|border]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.svg|30px|border]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag of Iceland.svg|30px|border]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag of Ireland.svg|30px|border]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.svg|30px|border]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.svg|30px|border]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.svg|30px|border]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg|30px|border]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Åland.svg|30px|border]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey.svg|30px|border]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey.svg|30px|border]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of the Isle of Man.svg|30px|border]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Austria.svg|30px|border]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag of Belgium (civil).svg|30px|border]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag of France.svg|30px|border]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag of Germany.svg|30px|border]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag of Liechtenstein.svg|30px|border]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag of Luxembourg.svg|30px|border]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag of Monaco.svg|30px|border]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg|30px|border]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag of Switzerland.svg|30px|border]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.svg|30px|border]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag of Bulgaria.svg|30px|border]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag of the Czech Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.svg|30px|border]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.svg|30px|border]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag of Poland.svg|30px|border]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag of Romania.svg|30px|border]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.svg|30px|border]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag of Ukraine.svg|30px|border]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.svg|30px|border]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.svg|30px|border]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.svg|30px|border]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag of Croatia.svg|30px|border]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.svg|30px|border]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.svg|30px|border]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag of Kosovo.svg|30px|border]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.svg|30px|border]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.svg|30px|border]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.svg|30px|border]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.svg|30px|border]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.svg|30px|border]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Spain.svg|30px|border]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar.svg|30px|border]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Vatican City.svg|30px|border]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>nc0f5zl8lgv9gt7iaoar9kn2usta0yy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>52431</id>
      <parentid>49906</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-05-15T13:41:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Bikepunk</username>
        <id>1942</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7078">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Switzerland]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk for obvious reasons. 

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://hitchwiki.org/maps/ hitchwiki.org/maps/] - based on OpenStreetMap and GoogleMaps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

== Main European Motorways ==
See [[European roads]]

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.svg|30px|border]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.svg|30px|border]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag of Iceland.svg|30px|border]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag of Ireland.svg|30px|border]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.svg|30px|border]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.svg|30px|border]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.svg|30px|border]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg|30px|border]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Åland.svg|30px|border]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey.svg|30px|border]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey.svg|30px|border]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of the Isle of Man.svg|30px|border]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Austria.svg|30px|border]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag of Belgium (civil).svg|30px|border]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag of France.svg|30px|border]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag of Germany.svg|30px|border]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag of Liechtenstein.svg|30px|border]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag of Luxembourg.svg|30px|border]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag of Monaco.svg|30px|border]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg|30px|border]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag of Switzerland.svg|30px|border]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.svg|30px|border]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag of Bulgaria.svg|30px|border]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag of the Czech Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.svg|30px|border]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.svg|30px|border]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag of Poland.svg|30px|border]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag of Romania.svg|30px|border]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.svg|30px|border]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag of Ukraine.svg|30px|border]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.svg|30px|border]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.svg|30px|border]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.svg|30px|border]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag of Croatia.svg|30px|border]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.svg|30px|border]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.svg|30px|border]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag of Kosovo.svg|30px|border]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.svg|30px|border]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.svg|30px|border]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.svg|30px|border]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.svg|30px|border]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.svg|30px|border]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Spain.svg|30px|border]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar.svg|30px|border]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Vatican City.svg|30px|border]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>8ezk3047ohch2t3vrjeu90pe1o38e7p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>55774</id>
      <parentid>52431</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-08T01:11:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7100">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Switzerland]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk for obvious reasons. 

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://hitchwiki.org/maps/ hitchwiki.org/maps/] - based on OpenStreetMap and GoogleMaps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

== Main European Motorways ==
See [[European roads]]

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.svg|30px|border]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.svg|30px|border]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag of Iceland.svg|30px|border]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag of Ireland.svg|30px|border]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.svg|30px|border]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.svg|30px|border]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.svg|30px|border]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg|30px|border]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Åland.svg|30px|border]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey.svg|30px|border]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey.svg|30px|border]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of the Isle of Man.svg|30px|border]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Austria.svg|30px|border]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag of Belgium (civil).svg|30px|border]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag of France.svg|30px|border]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag of Germany.svg|30px|border]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag of Liechtenstein.svg|30px|border]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag of Luxembourg.svg|30px|border]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag of Monaco.svg|30px|border]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg|30px|border]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag of Switzerland.svg|30px|border]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.svg|30px|border]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag of Bulgaria.svg|30px|border]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag of the Czech Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.svg|30px|border]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.svg|30px|border]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag of Poland.svg|30px|border]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag of Romania.svg|30px|border]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.svg|30px|border]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag of Ukraine.svg|30px|border]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.svg|30px|border]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.svg|30px|border]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.svg|30px|border]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag of Croatia.svg|30px|border]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.svg|30px|border]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.svg|30px|border]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag of Kosovo.svg|30px|border]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of Macedonia|Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.svg|30px|border]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.svg|30px|border]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.svg|30px|border]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.svg|30px|border]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.svg|30px|border]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Spain.svg|30px|border]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar.svg|30px|border]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Vatican City.svg|30px|border]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>h2ipgtdl65fsgb8kiegj44foiqa0u3z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68965</id>
      <parentid>55774</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-04-09T07:39:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mateo</username>
        <id>4876</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7121">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Switzerland]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk for obvious reasons. 

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://hitchwiki.org/maps/ hitchwiki.org/maps/] - based on OpenStreetMap and GoogleMaps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

== Main European Motorways ==
See [[European roads]]

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.svg|30px|border]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.svg|30px|border]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag of Iceland.svg|30px|border]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag of Ireland.svg|30px|border]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.svg|30px|border]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.svg|30px|border]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.svg|30px|border]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg|30px|border]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Åland.svg|30px|border]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey.svg|30px|border]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey.svg|30px|border]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of the Isle of Man.svg|30px|border]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Austria.svg|30px|border]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag of Belgium (civil).svg|30px|border]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag of France.svg|30px|border]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag of Germany.svg|30px|border]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag of Liechtenstein.svg|30px|border]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag of Luxembourg.svg|30px|border]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag of Monaco.svg|30px|border]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg|30px|border]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag of Switzerland.svg|30px|border]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.svg|30px|border]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag of Bulgaria.svg|30px|border]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag of the Czech Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.svg|30px|border]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.svg|30px|border]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag of Poland.svg|30px|border]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag of Romania.svg|30px|border]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.svg|30px|border]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag of Ukraine.svg|30px|border]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.svg|30px|border]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.svg|30px|border]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.svg|30px|border]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag of Croatia.svg|30px|border]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.svg|30px|border]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.svg|30px|border]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag of Kosovo.svg|30px|border]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of Macedonia|Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.svg|30px|border]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.svg|30px|border]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.svg|30px|border]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.svg|30px|border]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.svg|30px|border]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Spain.svg|30px|border]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar.svg|30px|border]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Vatican City.svg|30px|border]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[HE: אירופה]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>2sd62pkz6zsrfzd6i2yu9tlv7wy16b3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72447</id>
      <parentid>68965</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-15T11:43:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robyt</username>
        <id>9747</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7138">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Switzerland]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk for obvious reasons. 

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://hitchwiki.org/maps/ hitchwiki.org/maps/] - based on OpenStreetMap and GoogleMaps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

== Main European Motorways ==
See [[European roads]]

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.svg|30px|border]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.svg|30px|border]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag of Iceland.svg|30px|border]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag of Ireland.svg|30px|border]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.svg|30px|border]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.svg|30px|border]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.svg|30px|border]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg|30px|border]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Åland.svg|30px|border]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey.svg|30px|border]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey.svg|30px|border]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of the Isle of Man.svg|30px|border]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Austria.svg|30px|border]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag of Belgium (civil).svg|30px|border]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag of France.svg|30px|border]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag of Germany.svg|30px|border]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag of Liechtenstein.svg|30px|border]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag of Luxembourg.svg|30px|border]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag of Monaco.svg|30px|border]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg|30px|border]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag of Switzerland.svg|30px|border]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.svg|30px|border]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag of Bulgaria.svg|30px|border]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag of the Czech Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.svg|30px|border]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.svg|30px|border]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag of Poland.svg|30px|border]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag of Romania.svg|30px|border]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.svg|30px|border]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag of Ukraine.svg|30px|border]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.svg|30px|border]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.svg|30px|border]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.svg|30px|border]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag of Croatia.svg|30px|border]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.svg|30px|border]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.svg|30px|border]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag of Kosovo.svg|30px|border]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of Macedonia|Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.svg|30px|border]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.svg|30px|border]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.svg|30px|border]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.svg|30px|border]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.svg|30px|border]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Spain.svg|30px|border]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar.svg|30px|border]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Vatican City.svg|30px|border]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[HE: אירופה]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]
[[nomad:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>huddzuwi9ko8r4d1wy9rb4b1zyn9dqk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>76164</id>
      <parentid>72447</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-07-17T17:04:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Arguing with thermometers</username>
        <id>18649</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7214">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Switzerland]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk for obvious reasons. 

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://hitchwiki.org/maps/ hitchwiki.org/maps/] - based on OpenStreetMap and GoogleMaps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

The Apple app store has great offline map apps for free or about 1 dollar.

== Main European Motorways ==
See [[European roads]]

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.svg|30px|border]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.svg|30px|border]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag of Iceland.svg|30px|border]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag of Ireland.svg|30px|border]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.svg|30px|border]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.svg|30px|border]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.svg|30px|border]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg|30px|border]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Åland.svg|30px|border]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey.svg|30px|border]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey.svg|30px|border]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of the Isle of Man.svg|30px|border]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Austria.svg|30px|border]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag of Belgium (civil).svg|30px|border]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag of France.svg|30px|border]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag of Germany.svg|30px|border]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag of Liechtenstein.svg|30px|border]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag of Luxembourg.svg|30px|border]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag of Monaco.svg|30px|border]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg|30px|border]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag of Switzerland.svg|30px|border]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.svg|30px|border]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag of Bulgaria.svg|30px|border]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag of the Czech Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.svg|30px|border]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.svg|30px|border]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag of Poland.svg|30px|border]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag of Romania.svg|30px|border]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.svg|30px|border]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag of Ukraine.svg|30px|border]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.svg|30px|border]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.svg|30px|border]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.svg|30px|border]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag of Croatia.svg|30px|border]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.svg|30px|border]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.svg|30px|border]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag of Kosovo.svg|30px|border]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of Macedonia|Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.svg|30px|border]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.svg|30px|border]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.svg|30px|border]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.svg|30px|border]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.svg|30px|border]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Spain.svg|30px|border]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar.svg|30px|border]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Vatican City.svg|30px|border]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[HE: אירופה]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]
[[nomad:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>op0g4djnbn4ut9r14s2ix5vzup1fhy6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>76165</id>
      <parentid>76164</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-07-17T17:11:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Arguing with thermometers</username>
        <id>18649</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7211">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Switzerland]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk for obvious reasons. 

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://hitchwiki.org/maps/ hitchwiki.org/maps/] - based on OpenStreetMap and GoogleMaps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative


The app stores have great offline map apps for free or about 1 dollar.

== Main European Motorways ==
See [[European roads]]

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.svg|30px|border]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.svg|30px|border]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag of Iceland.svg|30px|border]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag of Ireland.svg|30px|border]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.svg|30px|border]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.svg|30px|border]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.svg|30px|border]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg|30px|border]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Åland.svg|30px|border]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey.svg|30px|border]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey.svg|30px|border]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of the Isle of Man.svg|30px|border]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Austria.svg|30px|border]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag of Belgium (civil).svg|30px|border]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag of France.svg|30px|border]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag of Germany.svg|30px|border]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag of Liechtenstein.svg|30px|border]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag of Luxembourg.svg|30px|border]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag of Monaco.svg|30px|border]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg|30px|border]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag of Switzerland.svg|30px|border]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.svg|30px|border]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag of Bulgaria.svg|30px|border]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag of the Czech Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.svg|30px|border]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.svg|30px|border]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag of Poland.svg|30px|border]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag of Romania.svg|30px|border]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.svg|30px|border]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag of Ukraine.svg|30px|border]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.svg|30px|border]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.svg|30px|border]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.svg|30px|border]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag of Croatia.svg|30px|border]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.svg|30px|border]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.svg|30px|border]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag of Kosovo.svg|30px|border]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of Macedonia|Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.svg|30px|border]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.svg|30px|border]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.svg|30px|border]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.svg|30px|border]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.svg|30px|border]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Spain.svg|30px|border]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar.svg|30px|border]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Vatican City.svg|30px|border]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[HE: אירופה]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]
[[nomad:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>mjk2ycz7uhp3ctyuczry5qwexg8s1vh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77184</id>
      <parentid>76165</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-09-20T11:29:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tramptimo</username>
        <id>19428</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7258">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Switzerland]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. However, a single female hitch-hiker takes a higher risk (there is no evidence – {{citation needed}}) for obvious reasons. 

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://hitchwiki.org/maps/ hitchwiki.org/maps/] - based on OpenStreetMap and GoogleMaps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative


The app stores have great offline map apps for free or about 1 dollar.

== Main European Motorways ==
See [[European roads]]

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.svg|30px|border]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.svg|30px|border]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag of Iceland.svg|30px|border]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag of Ireland.svg|30px|border]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.svg|30px|border]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.svg|30px|border]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.svg|30px|border]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg|30px|border]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Åland.svg|30px|border]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey.svg|30px|border]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey.svg|30px|border]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of the Isle of Man.svg|30px|border]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Austria.svg|30px|border]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag of Belgium (civil).svg|30px|border]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag of France.svg|30px|border]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag of Germany.svg|30px|border]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag of Liechtenstein.svg|30px|border]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag of Luxembourg.svg|30px|border]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag of Monaco.svg|30px|border]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg|30px|border]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag of Switzerland.svg|30px|border]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.svg|30px|border]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag of Bulgaria.svg|30px|border]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag of the Czech Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.svg|30px|border]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.svg|30px|border]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag of Poland.svg|30px|border]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag of Romania.svg|30px|border]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.svg|30px|border]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag of Ukraine.svg|30px|border]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.svg|30px|border]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.svg|30px|border]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.svg|30px|border]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag of Croatia.svg|30px|border]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.svg|30px|border]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.svg|30px|border]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag of Kosovo.svg|30px|border]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of Macedonia|Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.svg|30px|border]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.svg|30px|border]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.svg|30px|border]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.svg|30px|border]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.svg|30px|border]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Spain.svg|30px|border]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar.svg|30px|border]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Vatican City.svg|30px|border]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[HE: אירופה]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]
[[nomad:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>rm33f6g9kr5eqo6uiotw7nsqpemvovo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77186</id>
      <parentid>77184</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-09-20T12:09:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7133">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Switzerland]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. 
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. 

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://hitchwiki.org/maps/ hitchwiki.org/maps/] - based on OpenStreetMap and GoogleMaps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative


The app stores have great offline map apps for free or about 1 dollar.

== Main European Motorways ==
See [[European roads]]

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.svg|30px|border]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.svg|30px|border]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag of Iceland.svg|30px|border]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag of Ireland.svg|30px|border]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.svg|30px|border]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.svg|30px|border]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.svg|30px|border]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg|30px|border]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Åland.svg|30px|border]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey.svg|30px|border]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey.svg|30px|border]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of the Isle of Man.svg|30px|border]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Austria.svg|30px|border]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag of Belgium (civil).svg|30px|border]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag of France.svg|30px|border]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag of Germany.svg|30px|border]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag of Liechtenstein.svg|30px|border]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag of Luxembourg.svg|30px|border]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag of Monaco.svg|30px|border]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg|30px|border]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag of Switzerland.svg|30px|border]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.svg|30px|border]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag of Bulgaria.svg|30px|border]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag of the Czech Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.svg|30px|border]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.svg|30px|border]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag of Poland.svg|30px|border]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag of Romania.svg|30px|border]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.svg|30px|border]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag of Ukraine.svg|30px|border]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.svg|30px|border]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.svg|30px|border]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.svg|30px|border]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag of Croatia.svg|30px|border]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.svg|30px|border]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.svg|30px|border]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag of Kosovo.svg|30px|border]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of Macedonia|Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.svg|30px|border]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.svg|30px|border]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.svg|30px|border]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.svg|30px|border]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.svg|30px|border]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Spain.svg|30px|border]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar.svg|30px|border]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Vatican City.svg|30px|border]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[HE: אירופה]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]
[[nomad:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>hu6bhny7vibc6ntpdjh58kkcrfvwvzt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77439</id>
      <parentid>77186</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-10-06T13:41:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>ChrisHitTheRoad</username>
        <id>17258</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7278">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is relatively safe.
Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). [[England]] is usually good because of the relatively short waiting time. Most other countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. Some people chose to skip a country, though, after standing in one place for over two hours - it is reasonable enough to do so if visually good hitch-hiking spot appears not working in some places.

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Switzerland]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. In [[Germany]] this is also the case on the first Saturday of the school summer vacations, meaning the trucks will not drive for almost 48 hours!
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

Hitching is rather safe in Europe. 

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitch-hikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://hitchwiki.org/maps/ hitchwiki.org/maps/] - based on OpenStreetMap and GoogleMaps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative


The app stores have great offline map apps for free or about 1 dollar.

== Main European Motorways ==
See [[European roads]]

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.svg|30px|border]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.svg|30px|border]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag of Iceland.svg|30px|border]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag of Ireland.svg|30px|border]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.svg|30px|border]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.svg|30px|border]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.svg|30px|border]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg|30px|border]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Åland.svg|30px|border]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey.svg|30px|border]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey.svg|30px|border]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of the Isle of Man.svg|30px|border]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Austria.svg|30px|border]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag of Belgium (civil).svg|30px|border]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag of France.svg|30px|border]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag of Germany.svg|30px|border]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag of Liechtenstein.svg|30px|border]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag of Luxembourg.svg|30px|border]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag of Monaco.svg|30px|border]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg|30px|border]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag of Switzerland.svg|30px|border]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.svg|30px|border]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag of Bulgaria.svg|30px|border]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag of the Czech Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.svg|30px|border]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.svg|30px|border]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag of Poland.svg|30px|border]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag of Romania.svg|30px|border]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.svg|30px|border]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag of Ukraine.svg|30px|border]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.svg|30px|border]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.svg|30px|border]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.svg|30px|border]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag of Croatia.svg|30px|border]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.svg|30px|border]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.svg|30px|border]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag of Kosovo.svg|30px|border]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of Macedonia|Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.svg|30px|border]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.svg|30px|border]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.svg|30px|border]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.svg|30px|border]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.svg|30px|border]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Spain.svg|30px|border]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar.svg|30px|border]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Vatican City.svg|30px|border]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[HE: אירופה]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]
[[nomad:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>0jczfoqotg3pe3o8fg3h2y86oa7nhi8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79278</id>
      <parentid>77439</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-04-30T12:44:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Jonas.m</username>
        <id>23138</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6952">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is safe.

Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). Most countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. 

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Switzerland]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. In [[Germany]] this is also the case on the first Saturday of the school summer vacations, meaning the trucks will not drive for almost 48 hours!
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to gas stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitchhikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about gas stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://hitchwiki.org/maps/ hitchwiki.org/maps/] - based on OpenStreetMap and GoogleMaps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

The app stores have great offline map apps for free or about 1 dollar.

== Main European Motorways ==
See [[European roads]]

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.svg|30px|border]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.svg|30px|border]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag of Iceland.svg|30px|border]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag of Ireland.svg|30px|border]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.svg|30px|border]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.svg|30px|border]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.svg|30px|border]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg|30px|border]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Åland.svg|30px|border]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey.svg|30px|border]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey.svg|30px|border]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of the Isle of Man.svg|30px|border]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Austria.svg|30px|border]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag of Belgium (civil).svg|30px|border]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag of France.svg|30px|border]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag of Germany.svg|30px|border]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag of Liechtenstein.svg|30px|border]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag of Luxembourg.svg|30px|border]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag of Monaco.svg|30px|border]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg|30px|border]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag of Switzerland.svg|30px|border]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.svg|30px|border]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag of Bulgaria.svg|30px|border]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag of the Czech Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.svg|30px|border]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.svg|30px|border]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag of Poland.svg|30px|border]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag of Romania.svg|30px|border]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.svg|30px|border]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag of Ukraine.svg|30px|border]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.svg|30px|border]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.svg|30px|border]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.svg|30px|border]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag of Croatia.svg|30px|border]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.svg|30px|border]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.svg|30px|border]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag of Kosovo.svg|30px|border]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of Macedonia|Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.svg|30px|border]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.svg|30px|border]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.svg|30px|border]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.svg|30px|border]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.svg|30px|border]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Spain.svg|30px|border]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar.svg|30px|border]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Vatican City.svg|30px|border]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[HE: אירופה]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]
[[nomad:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>af1a67gmg375nmjyu2r9452nu3d4b3r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>80467</id>
      <parentid>79278</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-09-08T12:05:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6958">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is safe.

Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). Most countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. 

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Switzerland]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. In [[Germany]] this is also the case on the first Saturday of the school summer vacations, meaning the trucks will not drive for almost 48 hours!
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to petrol stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitchhikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about petrol stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://hitchwiki.org/maps/ hitchwiki.org/maps/] - based on OpenStreetMap and GoogleMaps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

The app stores have great offline map apps for free or about 1 dollar.

== Main European Motorways ==
See [[European roads]]

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.svg|30px|border]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.svg|30px|border]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag of Iceland.svg|30px|border]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag of Ireland.svg|30px|border]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.svg|30px|border]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.svg|30px|border]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.svg|30px|border]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg|30px|border]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Åland.svg|30px|border]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey.svg|30px|border]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey.svg|30px|border]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of the Isle of Man.svg|30px|border]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Austria.svg|30px|border]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag of Belgium (civil).svg|30px|border]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag of France.svg|30px|border]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag of Germany.svg|30px|border]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag of Liechtenstein.svg|30px|border]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag of Luxembourg.svg|30px|border]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag of Monaco.svg|30px|border]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg|30px|border]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag of Switzerland.svg|30px|border]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.svg|30px|border]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag of Bulgaria.svg|30px|border]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag of the Czech Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.svg|30px|border]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.svg|30px|border]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag of Poland.svg|30px|border]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag of Romania.svg|30px|border]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.svg|30px|border]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag of Ukraine.svg|30px|border]] [[Ukraine]]

=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.svg|30px|border]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.svg|30px|border]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.svg|30px|border]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag of Croatia.svg|30px|border]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.svg|30px|border]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.svg|30px|border]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag of Kosovo.svg|30px|border]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of Macedonia|Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.svg|30px|border]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.svg|30px|border]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.svg|30px|border]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.svg|30px|border]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.svg|30px|border]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Spain.svg|30px|border]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar.svg|30px|border]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Vatican City.svg|30px|border]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[HE: אירופה]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]
[[nomad:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>jw0ymcnegflwcspps8i9utld8jp3o7j</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>80645</id>
      <parentid>80467</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-09-15T23:18:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>EliasExplores</username>
        <id>24359</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7159">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is safe.

Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). Most countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. 

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Switzerland]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. In [[Germany]] this is also the case on the first Saturday of the school summer vacations, meaning the trucks will not drive for almost 48 hours!
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to petrol stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitchhikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about petrol stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://hitchwiki.org/maps/ hitchwiki.org/maps/] - based on OpenStreetMap and GoogleMaps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

The app stores have great offline map apps for free or about 1 dollar.

== Main European Motorways ==
See [[European roads]]

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.svg|30px|border]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.svg|30px|border]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag of Iceland.svg|30px|border]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag of Ireland.svg|30px|border]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.svg|30px|border]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.svg|30px|border]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.svg|30px|border]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg|30px|border]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Åland.svg|30px|border]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey.svg|30px|border]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey.svg|30px|border]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of the Isle of Man.svg|30px|border]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Austria.svg|30px|border]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag of Belgium (civil).svg|30px|border]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag of France.svg|30px|border]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag of Germany.svg|30px|border]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag of Liechtenstein.svg|30px|border]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag of Luxembourg.svg|30px|border]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag of Monaco.svg|30px|border]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg|30px|border]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag of Switzerland.svg|30px|border]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.svg|30px|border]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag of Bulgaria.svg|30px|border]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag of the Czech Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.svg|30px|border]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.svg|30px|border]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag of Poland.svg|30px|border]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag of Romania.svg|30px|border]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.svg|30px|border]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag of Ukraine.svg|30px|border]] [[Ukraine]]
[[File:MagosHitchhike.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:EliasExplores|EliasExplores]] hitchhiking to Salvaterra de Magos, [[Portugal]] Can be also found [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImAV7DSq6FY here].]]
=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.svg|30px|border]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.svg|30px|border]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.svg|30px|border]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag of Croatia.svg|30px|border]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.svg|30px|border]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.svg|30px|border]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag of Kosovo.svg|30px|border]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of Macedonia|Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.svg|30px|border]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.svg|30px|border]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.svg|30px|border]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.svg|30px|border]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.svg|30px|border]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Spain.svg|30px|border]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]

==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar.svg|30px|border]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Vatican City.svg|30px|border]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[HE: אירופה]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]
[[nomad:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>9mpodte22fcv5ahgft3sinsphk7jve9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>81623</id>
      <parentid>80645</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-12-04T14:14:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Albaniaelb</username>
        <id>22491</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7232">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is safe.

Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). Most countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. 

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Switzerland]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. In [[Germany]] this is also the case on the first Saturday of the school summer vacations, meaning the trucks will not drive for almost 48 hours!
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to petrol stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitchhikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about petrol stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://hitchwiki.org/maps/ hitchwiki.org/maps/] - based on OpenStreetMap and GoogleMaps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

The app stores have great offline map apps for free or about 1 dollar.

== Main European Motorways ==
See [[European roads]]

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.svg|30px|border]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.svg|30px|border]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag of Iceland.svg|30px|border]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag of Ireland.svg|30px|border]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.svg|30px|border]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.svg|30px|border]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.svg|30px|border]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg|30px|border]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Åland.svg|30px|border]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey.svg|30px|border]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey.svg|30px|border]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of the Isle of Man.svg|30px|border]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Austria.svg|30px|border]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag of Belgium (civil).svg|30px|border]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag of France.svg|30px|border]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag of Germany.svg|30px|border]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag of Liechtenstein.svg|30px|border]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag of Luxembourg.svg|30px|border]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag of Monaco.svg|30px|border]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg|30px|border]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag of Switzerland.svg|30px|border]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.svg|30px|border]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag of Bulgaria.svg|30px|border]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag of the Czech Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.svg|30px|border]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.svg|30px|border]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag of Poland.svg|30px|border]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag of Romania.svg|30px|border]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.svg|30px|border]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag of Ukraine.svg|30px|border]] [[Ukraine]]
[[File:MagosHitchhike.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:EliasExplores|EliasExplores]] hitchhiking to Salvaterra de Magos, [[Portugal]] Can be also found [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImAV7DSq6FY here].]]
=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.svg|30px|border]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.svg|30px|border]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.svg|30px|border]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag of Croatia.svg|30px|border]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.svg|30px|border]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.svg|30px|border]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag of Kosovo.svg|30px|border]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of Macedonia|Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.svg|30px|border]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.svg|30px|border]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.svg|30px|border]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.svg|30px|border]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.svg|30px|border]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Spain.svg|30px|border]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
[[File:Indrit mu.jpg|250px|thumb|Indrit hitchhhiking in  [[Montenegro]]]]
==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar.svg|30px|border]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Vatican City.svg|30px|border]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[HE: אירופה]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]
[[nomad:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>bexeb1ze92gvewhauzsrewvgj3ud5ba</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>81949</id>
      <parentid>81623</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-01-13T13:43:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7194">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is safe.

Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). Most countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. 

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Switzerland]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. In [[Germany]] this is also the case on the first Saturday of the school summer vacations, meaning the trucks will not drive for almost 48 hours!
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to petrol stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitchhikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about petrol stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://hitchwiki.org/maps/ hitchwiki.org/maps/] - based on OpenStreetMap and GoogleMaps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

The app stores have great offline map apps for free or about 1 dollar.

== Main European Motorways ==
See [[European roads]]

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.svg|30px|border]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.svg|30px|border]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag of Iceland.svg|30px|border]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag of Ireland.svg|30px|border]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.svg|30px|border]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.svg|30px|border]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.svg|30px|border]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg|30px|border]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Åland.svg|30px|border]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey.svg|30px|border]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey.svg|30px|border]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Faeroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of the Isle of Man.svg|30px|border]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Austria.svg|30px|border]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag of Belgium (civil).svg|30px|border]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag of France.svg|30px|border]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag of Germany.svg|30px|border]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag of Liechtenstein.svg|30px|border]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag of Luxembourg.svg|30px|border]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag of Monaco.svg|30px|border]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg|30px|border]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag of Switzerland.svg|30px|border]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.svg|30px|border]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag of Bulgaria.svg|30px|border]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag of the Czech Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.svg|30px|border]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.svg|30px|border]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag of Poland.svg|30px|border]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag of Romania.svg|30px|border]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.svg|30px|border]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag of Ukraine.svg|30px|border]] [[Ukraine]]
[[File:MagosHitchhike.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:EliasExplores|EliasExplores]] hitchhiking to Salvaterra de Magos, [[Portugal]] Can be also found [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImAV7DSq6FY here].]]
=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.svg|30px|border]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.svg|30px|border]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.svg|30px|border]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag of Croatia.svg|30px|border]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.svg|30px|border]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.svg|30px|border]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag of Kosovo.svg|30px|border]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of Macedonia|Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.svg|30px|border]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.svg|30px|border]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.svg|30px|border]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.svg|30px|border]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.svg|30px|border]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Spain.svg|30px|border]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
[[File:Indrit mu.jpg|250px|thumb|Indrit hitchhhiking in  [[Montenegro]]]]
==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar.svg|30px|border]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Vatican City.svg|30px|border]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>b3kwjvprry8s8wvqaz57893jvnawz9v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>88237</id>
      <parentid>81949</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-06-22T08:19:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Albaniaelb</username>
        <id>22491</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7193">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is safe.

Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). Most countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. 

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Switzerland]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. In [[Germany]] this is also the case on the first Saturday of the school summer vacations, meaning the trucks will not drive for almost 48 hours!
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to petrol stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitchhikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about petrol stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://hitchwiki.org/maps/ hitchwiki.org/maps/] - based on OpenStreetMap and GoogleMaps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

The app stores have great offline map apps for free or about 1 dollar.

== Main European Motorways ==
See [[European roads]]

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.svg|30px|border]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.svg|30px|border]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag of Iceland.svg|30px|border]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag of Ireland.svg|30px|border]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.svg|30px|border]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.svg|30px|border]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.svg|30px|border]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg|30px|border]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Åland.svg|30px|border]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey.svg|30px|border]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey.svg|30px|border]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Faroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of the Isle of Man.svg|30px|border]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Austria.svg|30px|border]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag of Belgium (civil).svg|30px|border]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag of France.svg|30px|border]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag of Germany.svg|30px|border]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag of Liechtenstein.svg|30px|border]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag of Luxembourg.svg|30px|border]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag of Monaco.svg|30px|border]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg|30px|border]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag of Switzerland.svg|30px|border]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.svg|30px|border]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag of Bulgaria.svg|30px|border]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag of the Czech Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.svg|30px|border]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.svg|30px|border]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag of Poland.svg|30px|border]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag of Romania.svg|30px|border]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.svg|30px|border]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag of Ukraine.svg|30px|border]] [[Ukraine]]
[[File:MagosHitchhike.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:EliasExplores|EliasExplores]] hitchhiking to Salvaterra de Magos, [[Portugal]] Can be also found [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImAV7DSq6FY here].]]
=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.svg|30px|border]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.svg|30px|border]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.svg|30px|border]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag of Croatia.svg|30px|border]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.svg|30px|border]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.svg|30px|border]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag of Kosovo.svg|30px|border]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of Macedonia|Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.svg|30px|border]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.svg|30px|border]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.svg|30px|border]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.svg|30px|border]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.svg|30px|border]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Spain.svg|30px|border]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
[[File:Indrit mu.jpg|250px|thumb|Indrit hitchhhiking in  [[Montenegro]]]]
==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar.svg|30px|border]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Vatican City.svg|30px|border]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>erdq2u3u4y8gjzmhabvx9ewn0ef31b0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>90111</id>
      <parentid>88237</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-12-15T08:48:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>PeterOB</username>
        <id>20966</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7217">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is safe.

Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). Most countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. 

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Switzerland]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. In [[Germany]] this is also the case on the first Saturday of the school summer vacations, meaning the trucks will not drive for almost 48 hours!
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to petrol stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitchhikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about petrol stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://hitchwiki.org/maps/ hitchwiki.org/maps/] - based on OpenStreetMap and GoogleMaps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

The app stores have great offline map apps for free or about 1 dollar.

== Main European Motorways ==
See [[European roads]]

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.svg|30px|border]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.svg|30px|border]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag of Iceland.svg|30px|border]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag of Ireland.svg|30px|border]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.svg|30px|border]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.svg|30px|border]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.svg|30px|border]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg|30px|border]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Åland.svg|30px|border]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey.svg|30px|border]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey.svg|30px|border]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Faroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of the Isle of Man.svg|30px|border]] [[Isle of Man]]
[[Lapland - Sami land]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Austria.svg|30px|border]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag of Belgium (civil).svg|30px|border]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag of France.svg|30px|border]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag of Germany.svg|30px|border]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag of Liechtenstein.svg|30px|border]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag of Luxembourg.svg|30px|border]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag of Monaco.svg|30px|border]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg|30px|border]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag of Switzerland.svg|30px|border]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.svg|30px|border]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag of Bulgaria.svg|30px|border]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag of the Czech Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.svg|30px|border]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.svg|30px|border]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag of Poland.svg|30px|border]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag of Romania.svg|30px|border]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.svg|30px|border]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag of Ukraine.svg|30px|border]] [[Ukraine]]
[[File:MagosHitchhike.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:EliasExplores|EliasExplores]] hitchhiking to Salvaterra de Magos, [[Portugal]] Can be also found [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImAV7DSq6FY here].]]
=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.svg|30px|border]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.svg|30px|border]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.svg|30px|border]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag of Croatia.svg|30px|border]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.svg|30px|border]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.svg|30px|border]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag of Kosovo.svg|30px|border]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of Macedonia|Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.svg|30px|border]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.svg|30px|border]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.svg|30px|border]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.svg|30px|border]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.svg|30px|border]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Spain.svg|30px|border]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
[[File:Indrit mu.jpg|250px|thumb|Indrit hitchhhiking in  [[Montenegro]]]]
==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar.svg|30px|border]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Vatican City.svg|30px|border]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>dga5zx9nv3vczlk65quo0t9a8dfhw3c</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>90119</id>
      <parentid>90111</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-12-15T19:57:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7193">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is safe.

Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). Most countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. 

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Switzerland]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. In [[Germany]] this is also the case on the first Saturday of the school summer vacations, meaning the trucks will not drive for almost 48 hours!
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to petrol stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitchhikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about petrol stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://hitchwiki.org/maps/ hitchwiki.org/maps/] - based on OpenStreetMap and GoogleMaps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

The app stores have great offline map apps for free or about 1 dollar.

== Main European Motorways ==
See [[European roads]]

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.svg|30px|border]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.svg|30px|border]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag of Iceland.svg|30px|border]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag of Ireland.svg|30px|border]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.svg|30px|border]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.svg|30px|border]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.svg|30px|border]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg|30px|border]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Åland.svg|30px|border]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey.svg|30px|border]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey.svg|30px|border]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Faroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of the Isle of Man.svg|30px|border]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Austria.svg|30px|border]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag of Belgium (civil).svg|30px|border]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag of France.svg|30px|border]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag of Germany.svg|30px|border]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag of Liechtenstein.svg|30px|border]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag of Luxembourg.svg|30px|border]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag of Monaco.svg|30px|border]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg|30px|border]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag of Switzerland.svg|30px|border]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.svg|30px|border]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag of Bulgaria.svg|30px|border]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag of the Czech Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.svg|30px|border]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.svg|30px|border]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag of Poland.svg|30px|border]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag of Romania.svg|30px|border]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.svg|30px|border]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag of Ukraine.svg|30px|border]] [[Ukraine]]
[[File:MagosHitchhike.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:EliasExplores|EliasExplores]] hitchhiking to Salvaterra de Magos, [[Portugal]] Can be also found [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImAV7DSq6FY here].]]
=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.svg|30px|border]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.svg|30px|border]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.svg|30px|border]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag of Croatia.svg|30px|border]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.svg|30px|border]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.svg|30px|border]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag of Kosovo.svg|30px|border]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of Macedonia|Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.svg|30px|border]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.svg|30px|border]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.svg|30px|border]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.svg|30px|border]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.svg|30px|border]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Spain.svg|30px|border]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
[[File:Indrit mu.jpg|250px|thumb|Indrit hitchhhiking in  [[Montenegro]]]]
==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar.svg|30px|border]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Vatican City.svg|30px|border]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>erdq2u3u4y8gjzmhabvx9ewn0ef31b0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>90136</id>
      <parentid>90119</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-12-17T21:13:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>PeterOB</username>
        <id>20966</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7218">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is safe.

Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). Most countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. 

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Switzerland]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. In [[Germany]] this is also the case on the first Saturday of the school summer vacations, meaning the trucks will not drive for almost 48 hours!
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to petrol stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitchhikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about petrol stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://hitchwiki.org/maps/ hitchwiki.org/maps/] - based on OpenStreetMap and GoogleMaps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

The app stores have great offline map apps for free or about 1 dollar.

== Main European Motorways ==
See [[European roads]]

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.svg|30px|border]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.svg|30px|border]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag of Iceland.svg|30px|border]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag of Ireland.svg|30px|border]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.svg|30px|border]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.svg|30px|border]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.svg|30px|border]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg|30px|border]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Åland.svg|30px|border]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey.svg|30px|border]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey.svg|30px|border]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Faroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of the Isle of Man.svg|30px|border]] [[Isle of Man]]
[[Lapland or Sami Land]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Austria.svg|30px|border]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag of Belgium (civil).svg|30px|border]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag of France.svg|30px|border]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag of Germany.svg|30px|border]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag of Liechtenstein.svg|30px|border]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag of Luxembourg.svg|30px|border]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag of Monaco.svg|30px|border]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg|30px|border]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag of Switzerland.svg|30px|border]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.svg|30px|border]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag of Bulgaria.svg|30px|border]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag of the Czech Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.svg|30px|border]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.svg|30px|border]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag of Poland.svg|30px|border]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag of Romania.svg|30px|border]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.svg|30px|border]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag of Ukraine.svg|30px|border]] [[Ukraine]]
[[File:MagosHitchhike.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:EliasExplores|EliasExplores]] hitchhiking to Salvaterra de Magos, [[Portugal]] Can be also found [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImAV7DSq6FY here].]]
=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.svg|30px|border]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.svg|30px|border]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.svg|30px|border]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag of Croatia.svg|30px|border]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.svg|30px|border]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.svg|30px|border]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag of Kosovo.svg|30px|border]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of Macedonia|Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.svg|30px|border]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.svg|30px|border]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.svg|30px|border]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.svg|30px|border]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.svg|30px|border]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Spain.svg|30px|border]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
[[File:Indrit mu.jpg|250px|thumb|Indrit hitchhhiking in  [[Montenegro]]]]
==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar.svg|30px|border]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Vatican City.svg|30px|border]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>97brconrbh5s9lq7eq831mdz5epvaxb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>90139</id>
      <parentid>90136</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-12-17T21:27:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7193">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is safe.

Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). Most countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. 

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Switzerland]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. In [[Germany]] this is also the case on the first Saturday of the school summer vacations, meaning the trucks will not drive for almost 48 hours!
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to petrol stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitchhikers's choice: it contains a detailed information about petrol stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://hitchwiki.org/maps/ hitchwiki.org/maps/] - based on OpenStreetMap and GoogleMaps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

The app stores have great offline map apps for free or about 1 dollar.

== Main European Motorways ==
See [[European roads]]

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.svg|30px|border]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.svg|30px|border]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag of Iceland.svg|30px|border]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag of Ireland.svg|30px|border]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.svg|30px|border]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.svg|30px|border]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.svg|30px|border]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg|30px|border]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Åland.svg|30px|border]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey.svg|30px|border]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey.svg|30px|border]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Faroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of the Isle of Man.svg|30px|border]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Austria.svg|30px|border]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag of Belgium (civil).svg|30px|border]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag of France.svg|30px|border]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag of Germany.svg|30px|border]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag of Liechtenstein.svg|30px|border]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag of Luxembourg.svg|30px|border]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag of Monaco.svg|30px|border]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg|30px|border]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag of Switzerland.svg|30px|border]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.svg|30px|border]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag of Bulgaria.svg|30px|border]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag of the Czech Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.svg|30px|border]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.svg|30px|border]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag of Poland.svg|30px|border]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag of Romania.svg|30px|border]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.svg|30px|border]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag of Ukraine.svg|30px|border]] [[Ukraine]]
[[File:MagosHitchhike.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:EliasExplores|EliasExplores]] hitchhiking to Salvaterra de Magos, [[Portugal]] Can be also found [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImAV7DSq6FY here].]]
=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.svg|30px|border]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.svg|30px|border]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.svg|30px|border]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag of Croatia.svg|30px|border]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.svg|30px|border]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.svg|30px|border]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag of Kosovo.svg|30px|border]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of Macedonia|Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.svg|30px|border]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.svg|30px|border]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.svg|30px|border]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.svg|30px|border]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.svg|30px|border]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Spain.svg|30px|border]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
[[File:Indrit mu.jpg|250px|thumb|Indrit hitchhhiking in  [[Montenegro]]]]
==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar.svg|30px|border]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Vatican City.svg|30px|border]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>erdq2u3u4y8gjzmhabvx9ewn0ef31b0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>92678</id>
      <parentid>90139</parentid>
      <timestamp>2019-02-12T18:10:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zrth</username>
        <id>32538</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7193">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|thumb|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is safe.

Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). Most countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. 

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Switzerland]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. In [[Germany]] this is also the case on the first Saturday of the school summer vacations, meaning the trucks will not drive for almost 48 hours!
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to petrol stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitchhikers's choice: It contains a detailed information about petrol stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://hitchwiki.org/maps/ hitchwiki.org/maps/] - based on OpenStreetMap and GoogleMaps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

The app stores have great offline map apps for free or about 1 dollar.

== Main European Motorways ==
See [[European roads]]

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.svg|30px|border]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.svg|30px|border]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag of Iceland.svg|30px|border]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag of Ireland.svg|30px|border]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.svg|30px|border]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.svg|30px|border]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.svg|30px|border]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg|30px|border]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Åland.svg|30px|border]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey.svg|30px|border]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey.svg|30px|border]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Faroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of the Isle of Man.svg|30px|border]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Austria.svg|30px|border]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag of Belgium (civil).svg|30px|border]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag of France.svg|30px|border]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag of Germany.svg|30px|border]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag of Liechtenstein.svg|30px|border]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag of Luxembourg.svg|30px|border]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag of Monaco.svg|30px|border]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg|30px|border]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag of Switzerland.svg|30px|border]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.svg|30px|border]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag of Bulgaria.svg|30px|border]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag of the Czech Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.svg|30px|border]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.svg|30px|border]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag of Poland.svg|30px|border]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag of Romania.svg|30px|border]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.svg|30px|border]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag of Ukraine.svg|30px|border]] [[Ukraine]]
[[File:MagosHitchhike.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:EliasExplores|EliasExplores]] hitchhiking to Salvaterra de Magos, [[Portugal]] Can be also found [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImAV7DSq6FY here].]]
=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.svg|30px|border]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.svg|30px|border]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.svg|30px|border]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag of Croatia.svg|30px|border]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.svg|30px|border]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.svg|30px|border]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag of Kosovo.svg|30px|border]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of Macedonia|Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.svg|30px|border]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.svg|30px|border]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.svg|30px|border]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.svg|30px|border]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.svg|30px|border]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Spain.svg|30px|border]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
[[File:Indrit mu.jpg|250px|thumb|Indrit hitchhhiking in  [[Montenegro]]]]
==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar.svg|30px|border]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Vatican City.svg|30px|border]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>mvv3zduv1ytha0b0srmxsk33pm5uhf8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>92680</id>
      <parentid>92678</parentid>
      <timestamp>2019-02-12T18:21:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zrth</username>
        <id>32538</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7193">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|frame|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is safe.

Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). Most countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. 

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Switzerland]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. In [[Germany]] this is also the case on the first Saturday of the school summer vacations, meaning the trucks will not drive for almost 48 hours!
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to petrol stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitchhikers's choice: It contains a detailed information about petrol stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://hitchwiki.org/maps/ hitchwiki.org/maps/] - based on OpenStreetMap and GoogleMaps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

The app stores have great offline map apps for free or about 1 dollar.

== Main European Motorways ==
See [[European roads]]

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.svg|30px|border]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.svg|30px|border]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag of Iceland.svg|30px|border]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag of Ireland.svg|30px|border]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.svg|30px|border]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.svg|30px|border]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.svg|30px|border]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg|30px|border]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Åland.svg|30px|border]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey.svg|30px|border]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey.svg|30px|border]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Faroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of the Isle of Man.svg|30px|border]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Austria.svg|30px|border]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag of Belgium (civil).svg|30px|border]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag of France.svg|30px|border]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag of Germany.svg|30px|border]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag of Liechtenstein.svg|30px|border]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag of Luxembourg.svg|30px|border]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag of Monaco.svg|30px|border]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg|30px|border]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag of Switzerland.svg|30px|border]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.svg|30px|border]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag of Bulgaria.svg|30px|border]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag of the Czech Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.svg|30px|border]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.svg|30px|border]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag of Poland.svg|30px|border]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag of Romania.svg|30px|border]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.svg|30px|border]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag of Ukraine.svg|30px|border]] [[Ukraine]]
[[File:MagosHitchhike.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:EliasExplores|EliasExplores]] hitchhiking to Salvaterra de Magos, [[Portugal]] Can be also found [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImAV7DSq6FY here].]]
=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.svg|30px|border]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.svg|30px|border]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.svg|30px|border]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag of Croatia.svg|30px|border]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.svg|30px|border]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.svg|30px|border]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag of Kosovo.svg|30px|border]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of Macedonia|Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.svg|30px|border]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.svg|30px|border]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.svg|30px|border]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.svg|30px|border]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.svg|30px|border]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Spain.svg|30px|border]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
[[File:Indrit mu.jpg|250px|thumb|Indrit hitchhhiking in  [[Montenegro]]]]
==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar.svg|30px|border]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Vatican City.svg|30px|border]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/Europe digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>rpgf6ywlkx63x2th796wi5bfhem50z9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>95017</id>
      <parentid>92680</parentid>
      <timestamp>2019-07-20T12:45:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Insta-hostel</username>
        <id>36147</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7207">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|frame|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is safe.

Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). Most countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. 

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Switzerland]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. In [[Germany]] this is also the case on the first Saturday of the school summer vacations, meaning the trucks will not drive for almost 48 hours!
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to petrol stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitchhikers's choice: It contains a detailed information about petrol stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://hitchwiki.org/maps/ hitchwiki.org/maps/] - based on OpenStreetMap and GoogleMaps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

The app stores have great offline map apps for free or about 1 dollar.

== Main European Motorways ==
See [[European roads]]

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.svg|30px|border]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.svg|30px|border]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag of Iceland.svg|30px|border]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag of Ireland.svg|30px|border]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.svg|30px|border]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.svg|30px|border]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.svg|30px|border]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg|30px|border]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Åland.svg|30px|border]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey.svg|30px|border]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey.svg|30px|border]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Faroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of the Isle of Man.svg|30px|border]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Austria.svg|30px|border]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag of Belgium (civil).svg|30px|border]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag of France.svg|30px|border]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag of Germany.svg|30px|border]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag of Liechtenstein.svg|30px|border]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag of Luxembourg.svg|30px|border]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag of Monaco.svg|30px|border]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg|30px|border]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag of Switzerland.svg|30px|border]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.svg|30px|border]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag of Bulgaria.svg|30px|border]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag of the Czech Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.svg|30px|border]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.svg|30px|border]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag of Poland.svg|30px|border]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag of Romania.svg|30px|border]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.svg|30px|border]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag of Ukraine.svg|30px|border]] [[Ukraine]]
[[File:MagosHitchhike.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:EliasExplores|EliasExplores]] hitchhiking to Salvaterra de Magos, [[Portugal]] Can be also found [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImAV7DSq6FY here].]]
=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.svg|30px|border]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.svg|30px|border]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.svg|30px|border]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag of Croatia.svg|30px|border]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.svg|30px|border]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.svg|30px|border]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag of Kosovo.svg|30px|border]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of Macedonia|Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.svg|30px|border]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.svg|30px|border]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.svg|30px|border]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.svg|30px|border]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.svg|30px|border]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Spain.svg|30px|border]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
[[File:Indrit mu.jpg|250px|thumb|Indrit hitchhhiking in  [[Montenegro]]]]
==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar.svg|30px|border]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Vatican City.svg|30px|border]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://digihitch.insta-hostel.com/europe/index.html digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]


{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Europe]]

[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>0qziu19s13g6ykwzkyxfnd6hcvdxj43</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>100371</id>
      <parentid>95017</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-01-24T21:02:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* External Links */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7236">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|frame|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is safe.

Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). Most countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. 

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Switzerland]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. In [[Germany]] this is also the case on the first Saturday of the school summer vacations, meaning the trucks will not drive for almost 48 hours!
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to petrol stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitchhikers's choice: It contains a detailed information about petrol stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://hitchwiki.org/maps/ hitchwiki.org/maps/] - based on OpenStreetMap and GoogleMaps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

The app stores have great offline map apps for free or about 1 dollar.

== Main European Motorways ==
See [[European roads]]

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.svg|30px|border]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.svg|30px|border]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag of Iceland.svg|30px|border]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag of Ireland.svg|30px|border]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.svg|30px|border]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.svg|30px|border]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.svg|30px|border]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg|30px|border]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Åland.svg|30px|border]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey.svg|30px|border]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey.svg|30px|border]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Faroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of the Isle of Man.svg|30px|border]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Austria.svg|30px|border]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag of Belgium (civil).svg|30px|border]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag of France.svg|30px|border]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag of Germany.svg|30px|border]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag of Liechtenstein.svg|30px|border]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag of Luxembourg.svg|30px|border]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag of Monaco.svg|30px|border]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg|30px|border]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag of Switzerland.svg|30px|border]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.svg|30px|border]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag of Bulgaria.svg|30px|border]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag of the Czech Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.svg|30px|border]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.svg|30px|border]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag of Poland.svg|30px|border]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag of Romania.svg|30px|border]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.svg|30px|border]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag of Ukraine.svg|30px|border]] [[Ukraine]]
[[File:MagosHitchhike.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:EliasExplores|EliasExplores]] hitchhiking to Salvaterra de Magos, [[Portugal]] Can be also found [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImAV7DSq6FY here].]]
=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.svg|30px|border]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.svg|30px|border]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.svg|30px|border]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag of Croatia.svg|30px|border]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.svg|30px|border]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.svg|30px|border]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag of Kosovo.svg|30px|border]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of Macedonia|Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.svg|30px|border]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.svg|30px|border]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.svg|30px|border]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.svg|30px|border]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.svg|30px|border]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Spain.svg|30px|border]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
[[File:Indrit mu.jpg|250px|thumb|Indrit hitchhhiking in  [[Montenegro]]]]
==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar.svg|30px|border]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Vatican City.svg|30px|border]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://digihitch.insta-hostel.com/europe/index.html digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]



== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__


[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>r8t8lzjlrxtgvlzeisbhpczn0bxnp6b</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>102789</id>
      <parentid>100371</parentid>
      <timestamp>2022-03-04T08:40:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TheNomadFamily</username>
        <id>38954</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* External Links */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7359">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|frame|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is safe.

Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). Most countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. 

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Switzerland]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. In [[Germany]] this is also the case on the first Saturday of the school summer vacations, meaning the trucks will not drive for almost 48 hours!
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to petrol stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitchhikers's choice: It contains a detailed information about petrol stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://hitchwiki.org/maps/ hitchwiki.org/maps/] - based on OpenStreetMap and GoogleMaps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

The app stores have great offline map apps for free or about 1 dollar.

== Main European Motorways ==
See [[European roads]]

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.svg|30px|border]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.svg|30px|border]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag of Iceland.svg|30px|border]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag of Ireland.svg|30px|border]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.svg|30px|border]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.svg|30px|border]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.svg|30px|border]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg|30px|border]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Åland.svg|30px|border]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey.svg|30px|border]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey.svg|30px|border]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Faroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of the Isle of Man.svg|30px|border]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Austria.svg|30px|border]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag of Belgium (civil).svg|30px|border]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag of France.svg|30px|border]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag of Germany.svg|30px|border]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag of Liechtenstein.svg|30px|border]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag of Luxembourg.svg|30px|border]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag of Monaco.svg|30px|border]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg|30px|border]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag of Switzerland.svg|30px|border]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.svg|30px|border]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag of Bulgaria.svg|30px|border]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag of the Czech Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.svg|30px|border]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.svg|30px|border]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag of Poland.svg|30px|border]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag of Romania.svg|30px|border]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.svg|30px|border]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag of Ukraine.svg|30px|border]] [[Ukraine]]
[[File:MagosHitchhike.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:EliasExplores|EliasExplores]] hitchhiking to Salvaterra de Magos, [[Portugal]] Can be also found [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImAV7DSq6FY here].]]
=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.svg|30px|border]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.svg|30px|border]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.svg|30px|border]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag of Croatia.svg|30px|border]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.svg|30px|border]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.svg|30px|border]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag of Kosovo.svg|30px|border]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of Macedonia|Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.svg|30px|border]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.svg|30px|border]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.svg|30px|border]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.svg|30px|border]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.svg|30px|border]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Spain.svg|30px|border]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
[[File:Indrit mu.jpg|250px|thumb|Indrit hitchhhiking in  [[Montenegro]]]]
==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar.svg|30px|border]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Vatican City.svg|30px|border]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://digihitch.insta-hostel.com/europe/index.html digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]
[https://thenomadfamily.org/hitchhiking-in-europe/ Hitchhiking in Europe]: The Ultimate Guide (an article by TheNomadFamily)

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__


[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>f3jb68v16hs2wty8kw3z6xlwwoxluhl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>102790</id>
      <parentid>102789</parentid>
      <timestamp>2022-03-04T08:43:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TheNomadFamily</username>
        <id>38954</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* External Links */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7385">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|frame|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is safe.

Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). Most countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. 

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Switzerland]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. In [[Germany]] this is also the case on the first Saturday of the school summer vacations, meaning the trucks will not drive for almost 48 hours!
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to petrol stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitchhikers's choice: It contains a detailed information about petrol stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [http://hitchwiki.org/maps/ hitchwiki.org/maps/] - based on OpenStreetMap and GoogleMaps
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

The app stores have great offline map apps for free or about 1 dollar.

== Main European Motorways ==
See [[European roads]]

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.svg|30px|border]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.svg|30px|border]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag of Iceland.svg|30px|border]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag of Ireland.svg|30px|border]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.svg|30px|border]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.svg|30px|border]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.svg|30px|border]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg|30px|border]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Åland.svg|30px|border]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey.svg|30px|border]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey.svg|30px|border]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Faroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of the Isle of Man.svg|30px|border]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Austria.svg|30px|border]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag of Belgium (civil).svg|30px|border]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag of France.svg|30px|border]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag of Germany.svg|30px|border]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag of Liechtenstein.svg|30px|border]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag of Luxembourg.svg|30px|border]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag of Monaco.svg|30px|border]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg|30px|border]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag of Switzerland.svg|30px|border]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.svg|30px|border]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag of Bulgaria.svg|30px|border]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag of the Czech Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.svg|30px|border]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.svg|30px|border]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag of Poland.svg|30px|border]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag of Romania.svg|30px|border]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.svg|30px|border]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag of Ukraine.svg|30px|border]] [[Ukraine]]
[[File:MagosHitchhike.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:EliasExplores|EliasExplores]] hitchhiking to Salvaterra de Magos, [[Portugal]] Can be also found [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImAV7DSq6FY here].]]
=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.svg|30px|border]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.svg|30px|border]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.svg|30px|border]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag of Croatia.svg|30px|border]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.svg|30px|border]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.svg|30px|border]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag of Kosovo.svg|30px|border]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of Macedonia|Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.svg|30px|border]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.svg|30px|border]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.svg|30px|border]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.svg|30px|border]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.svg|30px|border]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Spain.svg|30px|border]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
[[File:Indrit mu.jpg|250px|thumb|Indrit hitchhhiking in  [[Montenegro]]]]
==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar.svg|30px|border]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Vatican City.svg|30px|border]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://digihitch.insta-hostel.com/europe/index.html digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]
* [https://thenomadfamily.org/hitchhiking-in-europe/ Hitchhiking in Europe: The Ultimate Guide] (an article by [[User:TheNomadFamily|TheNomadFamily]])

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__


[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>2v9xr161qv93pebe1j4hpbcrfwe3f5x</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104481</id>
      <parentid>102790</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-06-28T22:39:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Magpie</username>
        <id>47370</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>Update map link to hitchmap.com</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7357">[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|250px|frame|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is safe.

Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). Most countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. 

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Switzerland]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. In [[Germany]] this is also the case on the first Saturday of the school summer vacations, meaning the trucks will not drive for almost 48 hours!
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to petrol stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitchhikers's choice: It contains a detailed information about petrol stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [https://hitchmap.com hitchmap.com] - based on OpenStreetMap
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

The app stores have great offline map apps for free or about 1 dollar.

== Main European Motorways ==
See [[European roads]]

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.svg|30px|border]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.svg|30px|border]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag of Iceland.svg|30px|border]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag of Ireland.svg|30px|border]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.svg|30px|border]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.svg|30px|border]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.svg|30px|border]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg|30px|border]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Åland.svg|30px|border]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey.svg|30px|border]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey.svg|30px|border]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Faroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of the Isle of Man.svg|30px|border]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Austria.svg|30px|border]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag of Belgium (civil).svg|30px|border]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag of France.svg|30px|border]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag of Germany.svg|30px|border]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag of Liechtenstein.svg|30px|border]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag of Luxembourg.svg|30px|border]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag of Monaco.svg|30px|border]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg|30px|border]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag of Switzerland.svg|30px|border]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.svg|30px|border]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag of Bulgaria.svg|30px|border]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag of the Czech Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.svg|30px|border]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.svg|30px|border]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag of Poland.svg|30px|border]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag of Romania.svg|30px|border]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.svg|30px|border]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag of Ukraine.svg|30px|border]] [[Ukraine]]
[[File:MagosHitchhike.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:EliasExplores|EliasExplores]] hitchhiking to Salvaterra de Magos, [[Portugal]] Can be also found [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImAV7DSq6FY here].]]
=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.svg|30px|border]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.svg|30px|border]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.svg|30px|border]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag of Croatia.svg|30px|border]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.svg|30px|border]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.svg|30px|border]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag of Kosovo.svg|30px|border]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of Macedonia|Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.svg|30px|border]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.svg|30px|border]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.svg|30px|border]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.svg|30px|border]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.svg|30px|border]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Spain.svg|30px|border]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
[[File:Indrit mu.jpg|250px|thumb|Indrit hitchhhiking in  [[Montenegro]]]]
==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar.svg|30px|border]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Vatican City.svg|30px|border]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://digihitch.insta-hostel.com/europe/index.html digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]
* [https://thenomadfamily.org/hitchhiking-in-europe/ Hitchhiking in Europe: The Ultimate Guide] (an article by [[User:TheNomadFamily|TheNomadFamily]])

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__


[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>auq2zsb0w6henn5gx89xgh72pjqe7fg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105755</id>
      <parentid>104481</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-05-19T08:22:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7420">[[File:Hitchhiking europe.png|thumb|right|300px]]

[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|thumb|right|250px|frame|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is safe.

Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). Most countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. 

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Switzerland]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. In [[Germany]] this is also the case on the first Saturday of the school summer vacations, meaning the trucks will not drive for almost 48 hours!
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to petrol stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitchhikers's choice: It contains a detailed information about petrol stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [https://hitchmap.com hitchmap.com] - based on OpenStreetMap
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

The app stores have great offline map apps for free or about 1 dollar.

== Main European Motorways ==
See [[European roads]]

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.svg|30px|border]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.svg|30px|border]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag of Iceland.svg|30px|border]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag of Ireland.svg|30px|border]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.svg|30px|border]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.svg|30px|border]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.svg|30px|border]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg|30px|border]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Åland.svg|30px|border]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey.svg|30px|border]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey.svg|30px|border]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Faroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of the Isle of Man.svg|30px|border]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Austria.svg|30px|border]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag of Belgium (civil).svg|30px|border]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag of France.svg|30px|border]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag of Germany.svg|30px|border]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag of Liechtenstein.svg|30px|border]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag of Luxembourg.svg|30px|border]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag of Monaco.svg|30px|border]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg|30px|border]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag of Switzerland.svg|30px|border]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.svg|30px|border]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag of Bulgaria.svg|30px|border]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag of the Czech Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.svg|30px|border]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.svg|30px|border]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag of Poland.svg|30px|border]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag of Romania.svg|30px|border]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.svg|30px|border]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag of Ukraine.svg|30px|border]] [[Ukraine]]
[[File:MagosHitchhike.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:EliasExplores|EliasExplores]] hitchhiking to Salvaterra de Magos, [[Portugal]] Can be also found [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImAV7DSq6FY here].]]
=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.svg|30px|border]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.svg|30px|border]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.svg|30px|border]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag of Croatia.svg|30px|border]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.svg|30px|border]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.svg|30px|border]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag of Kosovo.svg|30px|border]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of Macedonia|Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.svg|30px|border]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.svg|30px|border]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.svg|30px|border]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.svg|30px|border]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.svg|30px|border]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Spain.svg|30px|border]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
[[File:Indrit mu.jpg|250px|thumb|Indrit hitchhhiking in  [[Montenegro]]]]
==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar.svg|30px|border]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Vatican City.svg|30px|border]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://digihitch.insta-hostel.com/europe/index.html digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]
* [https://thenomadfamily.org/hitchhiking-in-europe/ Hitchhiking in Europe: The Ultimate Guide] (an article by [[User:TheNomadFamily|TheNomadFamily]])

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__


[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>cspce8qp1h1vinnnkm0jatup8e5i884</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105760</id>
      <parentid>105755</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-05-19T08:27:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7420">[[File:Hitchhiking europe.png|thumb|right|500px]]

[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|thumb|right|250px|frame|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is safe.

Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). Most countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. 

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Switzerland]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. In [[Germany]] this is also the case on the first Saturday of the school summer vacations, meaning the trucks will not drive for almost 48 hours!
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to petrol stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitchhikers's choice: It contains a detailed information about petrol stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [https://hitchmap.com hitchmap.com] - based on OpenStreetMap
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

The app stores have great offline map apps for free or about 1 dollar.

== Main European Motorways ==
See [[European roads]]

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.svg|30px|border]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.svg|30px|border]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag of Iceland.svg|30px|border]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag of Ireland.svg|30px|border]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.svg|30px|border]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.svg|30px|border]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.svg|30px|border]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg|30px|border]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Åland.svg|30px|border]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey.svg|30px|border]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey.svg|30px|border]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Faroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of the Isle of Man.svg|30px|border]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Austria.svg|30px|border]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag of Belgium (civil).svg|30px|border]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag of France.svg|30px|border]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag of Germany.svg|30px|border]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag of Liechtenstein.svg|30px|border]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag of Luxembourg.svg|30px|border]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag of Monaco.svg|30px|border]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg|30px|border]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag of Switzerland.svg|30px|border]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.svg|30px|border]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag of Bulgaria.svg|30px|border]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag of the Czech Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.svg|30px|border]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.svg|30px|border]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag of Poland.svg|30px|border]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag of Romania.svg|30px|border]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.svg|30px|border]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag of Ukraine.svg|30px|border]] [[Ukraine]]
[[File:MagosHitchhike.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:EliasExplores|EliasExplores]] hitchhiking to Salvaterra de Magos, [[Portugal]] Can be also found [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImAV7DSq6FY here].]]
=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.svg|30px|border]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.svg|30px|border]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.svg|30px|border]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag of Croatia.svg|30px|border]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.svg|30px|border]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.svg|30px|border]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag of Kosovo.svg|30px|border]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of Macedonia|Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.svg|30px|border]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.svg|30px|border]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.svg|30px|border]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.svg|30px|border]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.svg|30px|border]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Spain.svg|30px|border]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
[[File:Indrit mu.jpg|250px|thumb|Indrit hitchhhiking in  [[Montenegro]]]]
==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar.svg|30px|border]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Vatican City.svg|30px|border]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://digihitch.insta-hostel.com/europe/index.html digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]
* [https://thenomadfamily.org/hitchhiking-in-europe/ Hitchhiking in Europe: The Ultimate Guide] (an article by [[User:TheNomadFamily|TheNomadFamily]])

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__


[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>2b20xrqah65i5d6tgl7itzm5nn9emqx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>108569</id>
      <parentid>105760</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-01-07T19:30:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Chris9012</username>
        <id>47192</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Southern Europe */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7404">[[File:Hitchhiking europe.png|thumb|right|500px]]

[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|thumb|right|250px|frame|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is safe.

Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). Most countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. 

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Switzerland]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. In [[Germany]] this is also the case on the first Saturday of the school summer vacations, meaning the trucks will not drive for almost 48 hours!
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to petrol stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitchhikers's choice: It contains a detailed information about petrol stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [https://hitchmap.com hitchmap.com] - based on OpenStreetMap
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

The app stores have great offline map apps for free or about 1 dollar.

== Main European Motorways ==
See [[European roads]]

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.svg|30px|border]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.svg|30px|border]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag of Iceland.svg|30px|border]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag of Ireland.svg|30px|border]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.svg|30px|border]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.svg|30px|border]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.svg|30px|border]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg|30px|border]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Åland.svg|30px|border]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey.svg|30px|border]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey.svg|30px|border]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Faroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of the Isle of Man.svg|30px|border]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Austria.svg|30px|border]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag of Belgium (civil).svg|30px|border]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag of France.svg|30px|border]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag of Germany.svg|30px|border]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag of Liechtenstein.svg|30px|border]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag of Luxembourg.svg|30px|border]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag of Monaco.svg|30px|border]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg|30px|border]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag of Switzerland.svg|30px|border]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.svg|30px|border]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag of Bulgaria.svg|30px|border]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag of the Czech Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.svg|30px|border]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.svg|30px|border]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag of Poland.svg|30px|border]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag of Romania.svg|30px|border]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.svg|30px|border]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag of Ukraine.svg|30px|border]] [[Ukraine]]
[[File:MagosHitchhike.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:EliasExplores|EliasExplores]] hitchhiking to Salvaterra de Magos, [[Portugal]] Can be also found [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImAV7DSq6FY here].]]
=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.svg|30px|border]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.svg|30px|border]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.svg|30px|border]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag of Croatia.svg|30px|border]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.svg|30px|border]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.svg|30px|border]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag of Kosovo.svg|30px|border]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.svg|30px|border]] [[North Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.svg|30px|border]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.svg|30px|border]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.svg|30px|border]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.svg|30px|border]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.svg|30px|border]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Spain.svg|30px|border]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
[[File:Indrit mu.jpg|250px|thumb|Indrit hitchhhiking in  [[Montenegro]]]]
==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar.svg|30px|border]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Vatican City.svg|30px|border]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://digihitch.insta-hostel.com/europe/index.html digihitch World: Hitchhiking Europe]
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]
* [https://thenomadfamily.org/hitchhiking-in-europe/ Hitchhiking in Europe: The Ultimate Guide] (an article by [[User:TheNomadFamily|TheNomadFamily]])

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__


[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>qtm18zqqiqa0ev5ut35cwfxwhnucg2u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>109352</id>
      <parentid>108569</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-04-11T07:02:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7312">[[File:Hitchhiking europe.png|thumb|right|500px]]

[[File:Flag of Europe EU.png|thumb|right|250px|frame|Flag of [[European Union]]]]
Hitchhiking in '''Europe''' is fun. There are many small countries to enjoy hitching through, motorways in the Western parts can be exceptionally good, and overall hitchhiking is safe.

Some countries such as [[Germany]] are quite easy to hitch around, for example, for the large distances in a single lift, or with the possibility to go really fast (especially where driving speed is not limited). Most countries are at the average or rather easy hitchability level, e.g. the [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]] and East European countries. Some other countries are considered bad for the long waiting times (like [[Spain]] and [[Italy]]) but even there you might get a ride if you are patient enough. 

'''Note:''' In [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Austria]], [[Slovenia]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Hungary]], [[Switzerland]] and [[Italy]] trucks are not allowed to use motorways on Sundays and on public holidays. In [[Germany]] this is also the case on the first Saturday of the school summer vacations, meaning the trucks will not drive for almost 48 hours!
''&lt;small&gt;(Any other countries?)'' &lt;/small&gt; 
However, these restrictions do not apply to those granted an exception, such as trucks transporting perishable goods and fuel supplies.

For crossing the borders have a look at the [[Schengen Agreement]]. With a Schengen visa you can travel within a bunch of European countries.

When hitching longer distances it's generally good to stick to petrol stations on the motorway. People there go long distances and it's not uncommon to find rides of 500 km and longer.

== Maps ==
It is more convenient to take a map on your trip but if you don't do so it is no big deal - some people actually prefer to get a feeling of lost nomads and to trust their own senses. For Western Europe the ''Marco Polo Euro Atlas'' is a great hitchhikers's choice: It contains a detailed information about petrol stations situated on motorways, and excludes less useful for hitch-hiking trips stuff like the index pages or city maps.
For online usage: 
* [https://hitchmap.com hitchmap.com] - based on OpenStreetMap
* [http://viamichelin.com viamichelin.com]
* [http://www.map24.com Map24.com] - very good Java-Maps and routing
* [http://www.openstreetmap.org OpenStreetMap.org] - free alternative

The app stores have great offline map apps for free or about 1 dollar.

== Main European Motorways ==
See [[European roads]]

== Tips for each country ==
[[File:Granada.jpg|thumb|right|250px|[[Robino]] hitchhiking in [[Granada]], [[Spain]]]]
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Northern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Denmark.svg|30px|border]] [[Denmark]]
* [[File:Flag of Estonia.svg|30px|border]] [[Estonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Finland.svg|30px|border]] [[Finland]]
* [[File:Flag of Iceland.svg|30px|border]] [[Iceland]]
* [[File:Flag of Ireland.svg|30px|border]] [[Ireland]]
* [[File:Flag of Latvia.svg|30px|border]] [[Latvia]]
* [[File:Flag of Lithuania.svg|30px|border]] [[Lithuania]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Norway]]
* [[File:Flag of Sweden.svg|30px|border]] [[Sweden]]
* [[File:Flag of the United Kingdom.svg|30px|border]] [[United Kingdom|United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]]

==== Autonomic Islands or Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Åland.svg|30px|border]] [[Åland Islands]]
* [[Channel Islands]]
** [[File:Flag of Guernsey.svg|30px|border]] [[Guernsey]]
*** [[File:Flag of Alderney.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Alderney]]
*** [[File:Flag of Herm.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Herm]]
*** [[File:Flag of Sark.svg|30px|border]] [[Channel Islands|Sark]]
** [[File:Flag of Jersey.svg|30px|border]] [[Jersey]]
* [[File:Flag of the Faroe Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Faroe Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of the Isle of Man.svg|30px|border]] [[Isle of Man]]
* [[File:Flag of Norway.svg|30px|border]] [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== [[Western Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Austria.svg|30px|border]] [[Austria]]
* [[File:Flag of Belgium (civil).svg|30px|border]] [[Belgium]]
* [[File:Flag of France.svg|30px|border]] [[France]]
* [[File:Flag of Germany.svg|30px|border]] [[Germany]]
* [[File:Flag of Liechtenstein.svg|30px|border]] [[Liechtenstein]]
* [[File:Flag of Luxembourg.svg|30px|border]] [[Luxembourg]]
* [[File:Flag of Monaco.svg|30px|border]] [[Monaco]]
* [[File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg|30px|border]] [[Netherlands]]
* [[File:Flag of Switzerland.svg|30px|border]] [[Switzerland]]

=== [[Eastern Europe]] ===
[[File:Trud_bulgaria.jpg|250px|thumb|Somewhere in [[Bulgaria]].]]
* [[File:Flag of Belarus.svg|30px|border]] [[Belarus]]
* [[File:Flag of Bulgaria.svg|30px|border]] [[Bulgaria]]
* [[File:Flag of the Czech Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Czech Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Hungary.svg|30px|border]] [[Hungary]]
* [[File:Flag of Moldova.svg|30px|border]] [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]]
* [[File:Flag of Poland.svg|30px|border]] [[Poland]]
* [[File:Flag of Romania.svg|30px|border]] [[Romania]]
* [[File:Flag of Russia.svg|30px|border]] [[Russia|Russian Federation]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovakia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovakia]] 
* [[File:Flag of Ukraine.svg|30px|border]] [[Ukraine]]
[[File:MagosHitchhike.png|thumb|right|250px|[[User:EliasExplores|EliasExplores]] hitchhiking to Salvaterra de Magos, [[Portugal]] Can be also found [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImAV7DSq6FY here].]]
=== [[Southern Europe]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Albania.svg|30px|border]] [[Albania]]
* [[File:Flag of Andorra.svg|30px|border]] [[Andorra]]
* [[File:Flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina.svg|30px|border]] [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]]
* [[File:Flag of Croatia.svg|30px|border]] [[Croatia]]
* [[File:Flag of Greece.svg|30px|border]] [[Greece]]
* [[File:Flag of Italy.svg|30px|border]] [[Italy]]
* [[File:Flag of Kosovo.svg|30px|border]] [[Kosovo]]
* [[File:Flag of Macedonia.svg|30px|border]] [[North Macedonia]]
* [[File:Flag of Malta.svg|30px|border]] [[Malta]]
* [[File:Flag of Montenegro.svg|30px|border]] [[Montenegro]]
* [[File:Flag of Portugal.svg|30px|border]] [[Portugal]]
* [[File:Flag of San Marino.svg|30px|border]] [[San Marino]]
* [[File:Flag of Serbia.svg|30px|border]] [[Serbia]]
* [[File:Flag of Slovenia.svg|30px|border]] [[Slovenia]]
* [[File:Flag of Spain.svg|30px|border]] [[Spain]]
* [[File:Flag of Turkey.svg|30px|border]] [[Turkey]]
* [[File:Flag of Cyprus.svg|30px|border]] [[Cyprus]]
[[File:Indrit mu.jpg|250px|thumb|Indrit hitchhhiking in  [[Montenegro]]]]
==== Autonomic Regions ====
* [[File:Flag of Gibraltar.svg|30px|border]] [[Gibraltar]]
* [[File:Flag of the Vatican City.svg|30px|border]] [[Vatican|Holy See]]

== External Links ==
* [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm#europe: United Nations Statistic Division]
* [https://thenomadfamily.org/hitchhiking-in-europe/ Hitchhiking in Europe: The Ultimate Guide] (an article by [[User:TheNomadFamily|TheNomadFamily]])

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__


[[Category:Europe| ]]

[[de:Europa]]
[[es:Europa]]
[[fi:Eurooppa]]
[[fr:Europe]]
[[nl:Europa]]
[[pl:Europa]]
[[pt:Europa]]
[[ro:Europa]]
[[ru:Европа]]
[[tr:Avrupa]]
[[zh:欧洲]]</text>
      <sha1>iskpqfwuaketwrurh0l1uve5fi5oyp1</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1524</id>
    <redirect title="Hitchwiki:About" />
    <revision>
      <id>1553</id>
      <parentid>4394</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-29T08:35:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="27">#redirect [[project:About]]</text>
      <sha1>k39gc6cugbu9fpuw0bftjtbvqajh4ms</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1554</id>
      <parentid>1553</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="27">#redirect [[project:About]]</text>
      <sha1>k39gc6cugbu9fpuw0bftjtbvqajh4ms</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4391</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T18:02:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GuakaTest</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2558">Hitchhikers Guide to Hitchhiking is a collaborate web-based project to gather a good set of knowledge about hitchhiking for the benefit of hitchhiking. The project started 14th of April 2005.

The idea in the Guide is not to compete with other marvellous hitchhiking sites already existing, such as the [[digihitch.com]], [[Suite101]], [[Vilnius Hitchhiking Club]], [[Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers]] or [[Hike.ru]], but to provide a way to reorganize a lot of the existing knowhow into one, easily searchable encyclopedia. Hopefully the Guide can help all the other sites to fourish.  

===Free content===

The [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_Free_Documentation_License GNU Free Documentation License], the license under which ''The Guide's'' articles available, is one of many "[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/copyleft copyleft]" [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/copyright copyright] licenses which permit the redistribution, creation of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/derivative_work derivativework]s, and commercial use of content provided its authors are attributed and this content remains available under the GFDL. When an author contributes to original material to the project, the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/copyright copyright] over it is retained with them, however they agree to make the work available under the GFDL. Material on ''The Guide'' may thus be shared with, or incorporated from, resources which also use this license. 

This means that the content of  ''Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking'' is available to use on other sites and media that agree to share it alike. Because of this, ''The Guide'' is not just for itself. It's for all hitchhikers, and for all hitchhikers' communities.

==So I can use the content on my own website?==

Yes, as long as you give the same permissions to the text there and remember to give the credit to ''Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking''. Linking back to the original article will suit us fine for this purpose. 

It is basically possible for anybody to produce a book or other similar publication from the contents of the site, as long as the derivative work is in the framework determined by the GFDL license.

==What's the point?==

Freely shared content will never be lost, as people can copy and distribute it. This also makes ''the Guide'' a project that everybody can benefit - the articles are free to use for all the hitchhiking communities that already exist.  

And heck, wouldn't it be cool to see somebody actually publishing a printed hitchhiking guide after so many years?</text>
      <sha1>ov65wgbyml1yz7slnb8egtj91l57p7w</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4392</id>
      <parentid>4391</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-28T22:59:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2585">Hitchhikers Guide to Hitchhiking is a collaborate web-based project to gather a good set of knowledge about hitchhiking for the benefit of hitchhiking. The project started 14th of April 2005.

The idea in the Guide is not to compete with other marvellous [[hitchhiking websites]] already existing, such as the [http://digihitch.com digihitch.com], Suite101, Vilnius Hitchhiking Club, Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers or [http://hike.ru Hike.ru], but to provide a way to reorganize a lot of the existing knowhow into one, easily searchable encyclopedia. Hopefully the Guide can help all the other sites to fourish.  

===Free content===

The [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_Free_Documentation_License GNU Free Documentation License], the license under which ''The Guide's'' articles available, is one of many "[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/copyleft copyleft]" [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/copyright copyright] licenses which permit the redistribution, creation of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/derivative_work derivativework]s, and commercial use of content provided its authors are attributed and this content remains available under the GFDL. When an author contributes to original material to the project, the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/copyright copyright] over it is retained with them, however they agree to make the work available under the GFDL. Material on ''The Guide'' may thus be shared with, or incorporated from, resources which also use this license. 

This means that the content of  ''Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking'' is available to use on other sites and media that agree to share it alike. Because of this, ''The Guide'' is not just for itself. It's for all hitchhikers, and for all hitchhikers' communities.

==So I can use the content on my own website?==

Yes, as long as you give the same permissions to the text there and remember to give the credit to ''Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking''. Linking back to the original article will suit us fine for this purpose. 

It is basically possible for anybody to produce a book or other similar publication from the contents of the site, as long as the derivative work is in the framework determined by the GFDL license.

==What's the point?==

Freely shared content will never be lost, as people can copy and distribute it. This also makes ''the Guide'' a project that everybody can benefit - the articles are free to use for all the hitchhiking communities that already exist.  

And heck, wouldn't it be cool to see somebody actually publishing a printed hitchhiking guide after so many years?</text>
      <sha1>dz3oki8kpdwj1d357ru10bdr2x5x725</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4393</id>
      <parentid>4392</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-29T00:33:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2691">'''Hitchhikers Guide to Hitchhiking''' is a collaborate web-based project to gather a good set of knowledge about hitchhiking for the benefit of hitchhiking. The project started 14th of April 2005. However, the person who started didn't respond when the wiki was constantly being spammed. Consequently [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] moved the wiki to [http://wikicities.com Wikicities], a migration that was completed on the 19th of December 2005.

The idea in the Guide is not to compete with other [[Hitchhiking websites|marvellous hitchhiking sites]] already existing, but to provide a way to reorganize a lot of the existing knowhow into one, easily searchable encyclopedia. Hopefully the Guide can help all the other sites to fourish.

===Free content===

The [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_Free_Documentation_License GNU Free Documentation License], the license under which ''The Guide's'' articles are available, is one of many "[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/copyleft copyleft]" [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/copyright copyright] licenses which permit the redistribution, creation of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/derivative_work derivativework]s, and commercial use of content provided its authors are attributed and this content remains available under the GFDL. When an author contributes to original material to the project, the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/copyright copyright] over it is retained with them, however they agree to make the work available under the GFDL. Material on ''The Guide'' may thus be shared with, or incorporated from, resources which also use this license. 

This means that the content of  ''Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking'' is available to use on other sites and media that agree to share it alike. Because of this, ''The Guide'' is not just for itself. It's for all hitchhikers, and for all hitchhikers' communities.

==So I can use the content on my own website?==

Yes, as long as you give the same permissions to the text there and remember to give the credit to ''Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking''. Linking back to the original article will suit us fine for this purpose. 

It is basically possible for anybody to produce a book or other similar publication from the contents of the site, as long as the derivative work is in the framework determined by the GFDL license.

==What's the point?==

Freely shared content will never be lost, as people can copy and distribute it. This also makes ''the Guide'' a project that everybody can benefit - the articles are free to use for all the hitchhiking communities that already exist.  

And heck, wouldn't it be cool to see somebody actually publishing a printed hitchhiking guide after so many years?</text>
      <sha1>ntyto6peed576b8u24c1qkq5co4ku3u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4394</id>
      <parentid>4393</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-29T08:33:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2692">'''Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking''' is a collaborate web-based project to gather a good set of knowledge about hitchhiking for the benefit of hitchhiking. The project started 14th of April 2005. However, the person who started didn't respond when the wiki was constantly being spammed. Consequently [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] moved the wiki to [http://wikicities.com Wikicities], a migration that was completed on the 19th of December 2005.

The idea in the Guide is not to compete with other [[Hitchhiking websites|marvellous hitchhiking sites]] already existing, but to provide a way to reorganize a lot of the existing knowhow into one, easily searchable encyclopedia. Hopefully the Guide can help all the other sites to fourish.

===Free content===

The [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_Free_Documentation_License GNU Free Documentation License], the license under which ''The Guide's'' articles are available, is one of many "[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/copyleft copyleft]" [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/copyright copyright] licenses which permit the redistribution, creation of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/derivative_work derivativework]s, and commercial use of content provided its authors are attributed and this content remains available under the GFDL. When an author contributes to original material to the project, the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/copyright copyright] over it is retained with them, however they agree to make the work available under the GFDL. Material on ''The Guide'' may thus be shared with, or incorporated from, resources which also use this license. 

This means that the content of  ''Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking'' is available to use on other sites and media that agree to share it alike. Because of this, ''The Guide'' is not just for itself. It's for all hitchhikers, and for all hitchhikers' communities.

==So I can use the content on my own website?==

Yes, as long as you give the same permissions to the text there and remember to give the credit to ''Hitchhikers' Guide to Hitchhiking''. Linking back to the original article will suit us fine for this purpose. 

It is basically possible for anybody to produce a book or other similar publication from the contents of the site, as long as the derivative work is in the framework determined by the GFDL license.

==What's the point?==

Freely shared content will never be lost, as people can copy and distribute it. This also makes ''the Guide'' a project that everybody can benefit - the articles are free to use for all the hitchhiking communities that already exist.  

And heck, wouldn't it be cool to see somebody actually publishing a printed hitchhiking guide after so many years?</text>
      <sha1>m4lqi0qk1jruu18dxy8l1v9o1b7hslv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4395</id>
      <parentid>1554</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="27">#redirect [[project:About]]</text>
      <sha1>k39gc6cugbu9fpuw0bftjtbvqajh4ms</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Senegal</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1525</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1555</id>
      <parentid>4397</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-12T22:06:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="377">I've had luck in '''Senegal''' getting rides with both foreigners and locals on the main routes between [[St Louis (Senegal)|St Louis]], [[Dakar]] and [[Tambacounda]]. At Dakar it's probably worth getting a bus or car rapid to the Thiès/Mbour junction to avoid the large ammount of local traffic.

==To [[Mali]]==
..

==To [[Guinea-Bissau]]==
..

{{stub}}

[[Category:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>1phd4de7xheji1bkw5o6e5pg7xxvo1l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1556</id>
      <parentid>1555</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="377">I've had luck in '''Senegal''' getting rides with both foreigners and locals on the main routes between [[St Louis (Senegal)|St Louis]], [[Dakar]] and [[Tambacounda]]. At Dakar it's probably worth getting a bus or car rapid to the Thiès/Mbour junction to avoid the large ammount of local traffic.

==To [[Mali]]==
..

==To [[Guinea-Bissau]]==
..

{{stub}}

[[Category:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>1phd4de7xheji1bkw5o6e5pg7xxvo1l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4396</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T18:03:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GuakaTest</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="266">I've had luck in '''Senegal''' getting rides with both foreigners and locals on the main routes between St Louis, Dakar and Tambacounda. At Dakar it's probably worth getting a bus or car rapid to the Thiès/Mbour junction to avoid the large ammount of local traffic.</text>
      <sha1>cpma2z7v42256o0q1dqajkiba5h39tv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4397</id>
      <parentid>4396</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T14:14:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="287">I've had luck in '''Senegal''' getting rides with both foreigners and locals on the main routes between St Louis, Dakar and Tambacounda. At Dakar it's probably worth getting a bus or car rapid to the Thiès/Mbour junction to avoid the large ammount of local traffic.

[[Category:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>jg2y7dqz6f4z11j6i26gi9va7l2zagu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4398</id>
      <parentid>1556</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="377">I've had luck in '''Senegal''' getting rides with both foreigners and locals on the main routes between [[St Louis (Senegal)|St Louis]], [[Dakar]] and [[Tambacounda]]. At Dakar it's probably worth getting a bus or car rapid to the Thiès/Mbour junction to avoid the large ammount of local traffic.

==To [[Mali]]==
..

==To [[Guinea-Bissau]]==
..

{{stub}}

[[Category:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>1phd4de7xheji1bkw5o6e5pg7xxvo1l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14796</id>
      <parentid>4398</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-13T23:24:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="397">I've had luck in '''Senegal''' getting rides with both foreigners and locals on the main routes between [[St Louis (Senegal)|St Louis]], [[Dakar]] and [[Tambacounda]]. At Dakar it's probably worth getting a bus or car rapid to the Thiès/Mbour junction to avoid the large ammount of local traffic.

== To [[Mali]] ==
..

== To [[Guinea-Bissau]] ==
..

{{stub}}

[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Senegal]]</text>
      <sha1>s7m8aq5n8nw71qepg3nivgiwhnw6gsr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38023</id>
      <parentid>14796</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-10-17T16:25:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="471">[[Senegal]] is a country in [[Western Africa]].

===Cities===
* [[Dakar]]
* [[St Louis (Senegal)]]
* [[Tambacounda]]

===Border Crossing===
;Towards [[Mali]]
;Towards [[Guinea-Bissau]]

===Personal Experiences===
Some anonymous hitchhiker had luck in '''Senegal''' getting rides with both foreigners and locals on the main routes between [[St Louis (Senegal)|St Louis]], [[Dakar]] and [[Tambacounda]].

{{stub}}

[[Category:Africa]]
[[de:Senegal]]
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}</text>
      <sha1>t633nqzz64yoyw7bawnrfitw0oq8cvw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38062</id>
      <parentid>38023</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-10-17T23:31:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="472">[[Senegal]] is a country in [[Western Africa]].

===Cities===
* [[Dakar]]
* [[St Louis (Senegal)]]
* [[Tambacounda]]

===Border Crossing===
;Towards [[Mali]]
;Towards [[Guinea-Bissau]]

===Personal Experiences===
Some anonymous hitchhiker had luck in '''Senegal''' getting rides with both foreigners and locals on the main routes between [[St Louis (Senegal)|St Louis]], [[Dakar]] and [[Tambacounda]].

{{stub}}
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}

[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Senegal]]</text>
      <sha1>5of891z3ltxnws4olaqddvzyvrp4wys</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>43297</id>
      <parentid>38062</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-07-21T14:46:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Quarim</username>
        <id>1290</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="810">{{infobox Country
|country = of Senegal
|language = French
|capital = [[Dakar]]
|pop = 11,750,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = 
|map = &lt;map lat='14.8' lng='-14' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}
'''Senegal''' is a country in [[Western Africa]]. Senegal has the best road network in western africa, but most roads a still unpaved.

===Cities===
* [[Dakar]]
* [[St Louis (Senegal)]]
* [[Tambacounda]]

===Border Crossing===
;Towards [[Mali]]
;Towards [[Mauritania]]
;Towards [[Guinea-Bissau]]
;Towards [[Guinea]]
;Towards [[Gambia]]

===Personal Experiences===
Some anonymous hitchhiker had luck in '''Senegal''' getting rides with both foreigners and locals on the main routes between [[St Louis (Senegal)|St Louis]], [[Dakar]] and [[Tambacounda]].

{{stub}}
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}

[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Senegal]]</text>
      <sha1>hzi7fi4r0t7xoi87e3q8x8fbcy4j5i9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>43298</id>
      <parentid>43297</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-07-21T14:49:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Quarim</username>
        <id>1290</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="875">{{infobox Country
|country = of Senegal
|language = French
|capital = [[Dakar]]
|pop = 11,750,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = 
|map = &lt;map lat='14.8' lng='-14' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}
[[File:SenegalStreet.jpg|thumb|left|Street scene in Senegal]]
'''Senegal''' is a country in [[Western Africa]]. Senegal has the best road network in western africa, but most roads a still unpaved.

===Cities===
* [[Dakar]]
* [[St Louis (Senegal)]]
* [[Tambacounda]]


===Border Crossing===
;Towards [[Mali]]
;Towards [[Mauritania]]
;Towards [[Guinea-Bissau]]
;Towards [[Guinea]]
;Towards [[Gambia]]

===Personal Experiences===
Some anonymous hitchhiker had luck in '''Senegal''' getting rides with both foreigners and locals on the main routes between [[St Louis (Senegal)|St Louis]], [[Dakar]] and [[Tambacounda]].



{{stub}}
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}

[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Senegal]]</text>
      <sha1>3xda5eahazs7kee3x9y25rddafq48nz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>43313</id>
      <parentid>43298</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-07-21T18:16:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="874">{{infobox Country
|country = of Senegal
|language = French
|capital = [[Dakar]]
|pop = 11,750,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = 
|map = &lt;map lat='14.8' lng='-14' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}
[[File:SenegalStreet.jpg|thumb|left|Street scene in Senegal]]
'''Senegal''' is a country in [[Western Africa]]. Senegal has the best road network in West Africa, but most roads are still unpaved.

===Cities===
* [[Dakar]]
* [[St Louis (Senegal)]]
* [[Tambacounda]]


===Border Crossing===
;Towards [[Mali]]
;Towards [[Mauritania]]
;Towards [[Guinea-Bissau]]
;Towards [[Guinea]]
;Towards [[Gambia]]

===Personal Experiences===
Some anonymous hitchhiker had luck in '''Senegal''' getting rides with both foreigners and locals on the main routes between [[St Louis (Senegal)|St Louis]], [[Dakar]] and [[Tambacounda]].



{{stub}}
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}

[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Senegal]]</text>
      <sha1>8lwgr8ipbnqgdy7o3hqdekg2q39u9fy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>51544</id>
      <parentid>43313</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-04-06T16:22:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3290">{{infobox Country
|country = of Senegal
|language = French
|capital = [[Dakar]]
|pop = 11,750,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = {{very good}} to {{bad}}
|map = &lt;map lat='14.8' lng='-14' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}
[[File:SenegalStreet.jpg|thumb|left|Street scene in Senegal]]

'''Senegal''' is a country in [[Western Africa]]. It is the most developed country in West Africa and has the best road network; most major roads are now paved. On those major roads, hitchhiking is very easily doable - there is a high number of private vehicles and the Senegalese are sympathetic towards the cause. Also there is a big expat French community which helps things. Drivers are very friendly and often you might find yourself invited to spend the night if evening is coming close. If you leave the main roads, things get a lot harder - be prepared to either wait or walk lots; most of your lifts will be short hops and most traffic will be taxies. Speaking a little bit of [[Wolof]], which is the unofficial national language, will increase your popularity and your chances greatly. To leave the towns, there is only one way (with the possible exception of Dakar): Get to the end of the city by foot or mototaxi and hitch from there. When hitchhiking in Lower Casamance, be aware of the ongoing armed conflict there, it might be unwise to walk between towns on your own or even to accept ride offers of strangers. Check the situation before you set out. 

===Cities connected by major roads===
* [[Dakar]]
* [[Kaolack]]
* [[Kedougou]]
* [[Kolda]]
* [[Mbour]]
* [[St Louis (Senegal)|St Louis]]
* [[Thies]]
* [[Tambacounda]]
* [[Velingara]]
* [[Ziguinchor]]

===Border Crossings===
;Towards [[Mali]]
;Towards [[Mauritania]]
The main border crossing between Senegal and Mauritania is Rosso, which is famous for its hustlers. After making it to Rosso (possibly you'll have to walk the short way from the road to Richard Toll because there's not that much at Rosso) you'll get your exit stamp, exchange money and then cross on the ferry to the Mauritanian side (free for foot passengers). If you want to hitch, ignore the numerous offers for taxis you will receive and walk out of town (around 1km) where (as of March 2011) there is a rotting donkey next to which hitching seems sensible. There is a second road further to the West going through the Diama national park. This is a dirt road with little traffic, most of which is coming from Mauritania anyway (overlanders wanting to avoid the hassle of Rosso).
;Towards [[Guinea-Bissau]]
If you have time and a bit of luck, hitching towards the border at Mpack from Ziguinchor is possible. Walk out of Ziguinchor towards the border and stick out your thumb to see what happens.
;Towards [[Guinea]]
Hitching towards Guinea is a very hard task. From Kedgougou, only 4x4s with very determined drivers are able to make it to Mali-ville (usually one every couple of days), and even though there is a new paved road being built from Upper Casamance to Koundara, it will be some time until it will be viable for most cars.
;Towards [[Gambia|The Gambia]]
It's very easy to hitchhike towards/into The Gambia from the north due to the high traffic of Europeans going to sell their cars down there.

{{stub}}
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}

[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Senegal]]</text>
      <sha1>2njf6ga7m7l4h0ws4uzj25naf7ob2qr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>54660</id>
      <parentid>51544</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-09-06T10:55:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3289">{{infobox Country
|country = of Senegal
|language = French
|capital = [[Dakar]]
|pop = 11,750,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = &lt;rating country='sn' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='14.8' lng='-14' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}
[[File:SenegalStreet.jpg|thumb|left|Street scene in Senegal]]

'''Senegal''' is a country in [[Western Africa]]. It is the most developed country in West Africa and has the best road network; most major roads are now paved. On those major roads, hitchhiking is very easily doable - there is a high number of private vehicles and the Senegalese are sympathetic towards the cause. Also there is a big expat French community which helps things. Drivers are very friendly and often you might find yourself invited to spend the night if evening is coming close. If you leave the main roads, things get a lot harder - be prepared to either wait or walk lots; most of your lifts will be short hops and most traffic will be taxies. Speaking a little bit of [[Wolof]], which is the unofficial national language, will increase your popularity and your chances greatly. To leave the towns, there is only one way (with the possible exception of Dakar): Get to the end of the city by foot or mototaxi and hitch from there. When hitchhiking in Lower Casamance, be aware of the ongoing armed conflict there, it might be unwise to walk between towns on your own or even to accept ride offers of strangers. Check the situation before you set out. 

===Cities connected by major roads===
* [[Dakar]]
* [[Kaolack]]
* [[Kedougou]]
* [[Kolda]]
* [[Mbour]]
* [[St Louis (Senegal)|St Louis]]
* [[Thies]]
* [[Tambacounda]]
* [[Velingara]]
* [[Ziguinchor]]

===Border Crossings===
;Towards [[Mali]]
;Towards [[Mauritania]]
The main border crossing between Senegal and Mauritania is Rosso, which is famous for its hustlers. After making it to Rosso (possibly you'll have to walk the short way from the road to Richard Toll because there's not that much at Rosso) you'll get your exit stamp, exchange money and then cross on the ferry to the Mauritanian side (free for foot passengers). If you want to hitch, ignore the numerous offers for taxis you will receive and walk out of town (around 1km) where (as of March 2011) there is a rotting donkey next to which hitching seems sensible. There is a second road further to the West going through the Diama national park. This is a dirt road with little traffic, most of which is coming from Mauritania anyway (overlanders wanting to avoid the hassle of Rosso).
;Towards [[Guinea-Bissau]]
If you have time and a bit of luck, hitching towards the border at Mpack from Ziguinchor is possible. Walk out of Ziguinchor towards the border and stick out your thumb to see what happens.
;Towards [[Guinea]]
Hitching towards Guinea is a very hard task. From Kedgougou, only 4x4s with very determined drivers are able to make it to Mali-ville (usually one every couple of days), and even though there is a new paved road being built from Upper Casamance to Koundara, it will be some time until it will be viable for most cars.
;Towards [[Gambia|The Gambia]]
It's very easy to hitchhike towards/into The Gambia from the north due to the high traffic of Europeans going to sell their cars down there.

{{stub}}
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}

[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Senegal]]</text>
      <sha1>805vqlsio97ccfe38sd8619yg8l7kh2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>56202</id>
      <parentid>54660</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-08T01:20:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3313">{{infobox Country
|country = of Senegal
|language = French
|capital = [[Dakar]]
|pop = 11,750,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = &lt;rating country='sn' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='14.8' lng='-14' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}
[[File:SenegalStreet.jpg|thumb|left|Street scene in Senegal]]

'''Senegal''' is a country in [[Western Africa]]. It is the most developed country in West Africa and has the best road network; most major roads are now paved. On those major roads, hitchhiking is very easily doable - there is a high number of private vehicles and the Senegalese are sympathetic towards the cause. Also there is a big expat French community which helps things. Drivers are very friendly and often you might find yourself invited to spend the night if evening is coming close. If you leave the main roads, things get a lot harder - be prepared to either wait or walk lots; most of your lifts will be short hops and most traffic will be taxies. Speaking a little bit of [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], which is the unofficial national language, will increase your popularity and your chances greatly. To leave the towns, there is only one way (with the possible exception of Dakar): Get to the end of the city by foot or mototaxi and hitch from there. When hitchhiking in Lower Casamance, be aware of the ongoing armed conflict there, it might be unwise to walk between towns on your own or even to accept ride offers of strangers. Check the situation before you set out. 

=== Cities connected by major roads ===
* [[Dakar]]
* [[Kaolack]]
* [[Kedougou]]
* [[Kolda]]
* [[Mbour]]
* [[Saint-Louis (Senegal)|St Louis]]
* [[Thies]]
* [[Tambacounda]]
* [[Velingara]]
* [[Ziguinchor]]

=== Border Crossings ===
;Towards [[Mali]]
;Towards [[Mauritania]]
The main border crossing between Senegal and Mauritania is Rosso, which is famous for its hustlers. After making it to Rosso (possibly you'll have to walk the short way from the road to Richard Toll because there's not that much at Rosso) you'll get your exit stamp, exchange money and then cross on the ferry to the Mauritanian side (free for foot passengers). If you want to hitch, ignore the numerous offers for taxis you will receive and walk out of town (around 1km) where (as of March 2011) there is a rotting donkey next to which hitching seems sensible. There is a second road further to the West going through the Diama national park. This is a dirt road with little traffic, most of which is coming from Mauritania anyway (overlanders wanting to avoid the hassle of Rosso).
;Towards [[Guinea-Bissau]]
If you have time and a bit of luck, hitching towards the border at Mpack from Ziguinchor is possible. Walk out of Ziguinchor towards the border and stick out your thumb to see what happens.
;Towards [[Guinea]]
Hitching towards Guinea is a very hard task. From Kedgougou, only 4x4s with very determined drivers are able to make it to Mali-ville (usually one every couple of days), and even though there is a new paved road being built from Upper Casamance to Koundara, it will be some time until it will be viable for most cars.
;Towards [[The Gambia]]
It's very easy to hitchhike towards/into The Gambia from the north due to the high traffic of Europeans going to sell their cars down there.

{{stub}}
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}

[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Senegal]]</text>
      <sha1>bo8k8erctazinbzwcfh1uq65gojjm55</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69146</id>
      <parentid>56202</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-04-20T17:43:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kimmietaylor28</username>
        <id>3893</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3510">{{infobox Country
|country = of Senegal
|language = French
|capital = [[Dakar]]
|pop = 11,750,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = &lt;rating country='sn' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='14.8' lng='-14' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}
[[File:SenegalStreet.jpg|thumb|left|Street scene in Senegal]]

'''Senegal''' is a country in [[Western Africa]]. It is the most developed country in West Africa and has the best road network; most major roads are now paved. On those major roads, hitchhiking is very easily doable - there is a high number of private vehicles and the Senegalese are sympathetic towards the cause. Also there is a big expat French community which helps things. Drivers are very friendly and often you might find yourself invited to spend the night if evening is coming close. If you leave the main roads, things get a lot harder - be prepared to either wait or walk lots; most of your lifts will be short hops and most traffic will be taxies. Speaking a little bit of [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], which is the unofficial national language, will increase your popularity and your chances greatly. To leave the towns, there is only one way (with the possible exception of Dakar): Get to the end of the city by foot or mototaxi and hitch from there. When hitchhiking in Lower Casamance, be aware of the ongoing armed conflict there, it might be unwise to walk between towns on your own or even to accept ride offers of strangers. Check the situation before you set out. Finding rides at the many police checkpoints is also a great and easy way to hitch. Tell the officers where you are going and they will stop all vehicles and organise a free  and safe ride for you.

=== Cities connected by major roads ===
* [[Dakar]]
* [[Kaolack]]
* [[Kedougou]]
* [[Kolda]]
* [[Mbour]]
* [[Saint-Louis (Senegal)|St Louis]]
* [[Thies]]
* [[Tambacounda]]
* [[Velingara]]
* [[Ziguinchor]]

=== Border Crossings ===
;Towards [[Mali]]
;Towards [[Mauritania]]
The main border crossing between Senegal and Mauritania is Rosso, which is famous for its hustlers. After making it to Rosso (possibly you'll have to walk the short way from the road to Richard Toll because there's not that much at Rosso) you'll get your exit stamp, exchange money and then cross on the ferry to the Mauritanian side (free for foot passengers). If you want to hitch, ignore the numerous offers for taxis you will receive and walk out of town (around 1km) where (as of March 2011) there is a rotting donkey next to which hitching seems sensible. There is a second road further to the West going through the Diama national park. This is a dirt road with little traffic, most of which is coming from Mauritania anyway (overlanders wanting to avoid the hassle of Rosso).
;Towards [[Guinea-Bissau]]
If you have time and a bit of luck, hitching towards the border at Mpack from Ziguinchor is possible. Walk out of Ziguinchor towards the border and stick out your thumb to see what happens.
;Towards [[Guinea]]
Hitching towards Guinea is a very hard task. From Kedgougou, only 4x4s with very determined drivers are able to make it to Mali-ville (usually one every couple of days), and even though there is a new paved road being built from Upper Casamance to Koundara, it will be some time until it will be viable for most cars.
;Towards [[The Gambia]]
It's very easy to hitchhike towards/into The Gambia from the north due to the high traffic of Europeans going to sell their cars down there.

{{stub}}
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}

[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Senegal]]</text>
      <sha1>06eg2yprm7egqx4qfrewiifrp7oucus</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69147</id>
      <parentid>69146</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-04-20T17:43:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kimmietaylor28</username>
        <id>3893</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3517">{{infobox Country
|country = of Senegal
|language = French, Wolof
|capital = [[Dakar]]
|pop = 11,750,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = &lt;rating country='sn' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='14.8' lng='-14' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}
[[File:SenegalStreet.jpg|thumb|left|Street scene in Senegal]]

'''Senegal''' is a country in [[Western Africa]]. It is the most developed country in West Africa and has the best road network; most major roads are now paved. On those major roads, hitchhiking is very easily doable - there is a high number of private vehicles and the Senegalese are sympathetic towards the cause. Also there is a big expat French community which helps things. Drivers are very friendly and often you might find yourself invited to spend the night if evening is coming close. If you leave the main roads, things get a lot harder - be prepared to either wait or walk lots; most of your lifts will be short hops and most traffic will be taxies. Speaking a little bit of [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], which is the unofficial national language, will increase your popularity and your chances greatly. To leave the towns, there is only one way (with the possible exception of Dakar): Get to the end of the city by foot or mototaxi and hitch from there. When hitchhiking in Lower Casamance, be aware of the ongoing armed conflict there, it might be unwise to walk between towns on your own or even to accept ride offers of strangers. Check the situation before you set out. Finding rides at the many police checkpoints is also a great and easy way to hitch. Tell the officers where you are going and they will stop all vehicles and organise a free  and safe ride for you.

=== Cities connected by major roads ===
* [[Dakar]]
* [[Kaolack]]
* [[Kedougou]]
* [[Kolda]]
* [[Mbour]]
* [[Saint-Louis (Senegal)|St Louis]]
* [[Thies]]
* [[Tambacounda]]
* [[Velingara]]
* [[Ziguinchor]]

=== Border Crossings ===
;Towards [[Mali]]
;Towards [[Mauritania]]
The main border crossing between Senegal and Mauritania is Rosso, which is famous for its hustlers. After making it to Rosso (possibly you'll have to walk the short way from the road to Richard Toll because there's not that much at Rosso) you'll get your exit stamp, exchange money and then cross on the ferry to the Mauritanian side (free for foot passengers). If you want to hitch, ignore the numerous offers for taxis you will receive and walk out of town (around 1km) where (as of March 2011) there is a rotting donkey next to which hitching seems sensible. There is a second road further to the West going through the Diama national park. This is a dirt road with little traffic, most of which is coming from Mauritania anyway (overlanders wanting to avoid the hassle of Rosso).
;Towards [[Guinea-Bissau]]
If you have time and a bit of luck, hitching towards the border at Mpack from Ziguinchor is possible. Walk out of Ziguinchor towards the border and stick out your thumb to see what happens.
;Towards [[Guinea]]
Hitching towards Guinea is a very hard task. From Kedgougou, only 4x4s with very determined drivers are able to make it to Mali-ville (usually one every couple of days), and even though there is a new paved road being built from Upper Casamance to Koundara, it will be some time until it will be viable for most cars.
;Towards [[The Gambia]]
It's very easy to hitchhike towards/into The Gambia from the north due to the high traffic of Europeans going to sell their cars down there.

{{stub}}
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}

[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Senegal]]</text>
      <sha1>r160hu2f6lvjm5h91v7epqly0ggriy5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>87860</id>
      <parentid>69147</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-05-07T13:18:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tonypro</username>
        <id>4518</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4174">{{infobox Country
|country = of Senegal
|language = French, Wolof
|capital = [[Dakar]]
|pop = 11,750,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = &lt;rating country='sn' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='14.8' lng='-14' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}
[[File:SenegalStreet.jpg|thumb|left|Street scene in Senegal]]

'''Senegal''' is a country in [[Western Africa]]. It is the most developed country in West Africa and has the best road network; most major roads are now paved. On those major roads, hitchhiking is very easily doable - there is a high number of private vehicles and the Senegalese are sympathetic towards the cause. Also there is a big expat French community which helps things. Drivers are very friendly and often you might find yourself invited to spend the night if evening is coming close. If you leave the main roads, things get a lot harder - be prepared to either wait or walk lots; most of your lifts will be short hops and most traffic will be taxies. Speaking a little bit of [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], which is the unofficial national language, will increase your popularity and your chances greatly. To leave the towns, there is only one way (with the possible exception of Dakar): Get to the end of the city by foot or mototaxi and hitch from there. When hitchhiking in Lower Casamance, be aware of the ongoing armed conflict there, it might be unwise to walk between towns on your own or even to accept ride offers of strangers. Check the situation before you set out. Finding rides at the many police checkpoints is also a great and easy way to hitch. Tell the officers where you are going and they will stop all vehicles and organise a free  and safe ride for you.

=== Cities connected by major roads ===
* [[Dakar]]
* [[Kaolack]]
* [[Kedougou]]
* [[Kolda]]
* [[Mbour]]
* [[Saint-Louis (Senegal)|St Louis]]
* [[Thies]]
* [[Tambacounda]]
* [[Velingara]]
* [[Ziguinchor]]

=== Border Crossings ===
;Towards [[Mali]]
;Towards [[Mauritania]]
The main border crossing between Senegal and Mauritania is Rosso, which is famous for its hustlers. After making it to Rosso (possibly you'll have to walk the short way from the road to Richard Toll because there's not that much at Rosso) you'll get your exit stamp, exchange money and then cross on the ferry to the Mauritanian side (free for foot passengers). If you want to hitch, ignore the numerous offers for taxis you will receive and walk out of town (around 1km) where (as of March 2011) there is a rotting donkey next to which hitching seems sensible. There is a second road further to the West going through the Diama national park. This is a dirt road with little traffic, most of which is coming from Mauritania anyway (overlanders wanting to avoid the hassle of Rosso).
;Towards [[Guinea-Bissau]]
If you have time and a bit of luck, hitching towards the border at Mpack from Ziguinchor is possible. Walk out of Ziguinchor towards the border and stick out your thumb to see what happens.
;Towards [[Guinea]]
Hitching towards Guinea is a very hard task. From Kedgougou, only 4x4s with very determined drivers are able to make it to Mali-ville (usually one every couple of days), and even though there is a new paved road being built from Upper Casamance to Koundara, it will be some time until it will be viable for most cars.
;Towards [[The Gambia]]
It's very easy to hitchhike towards/into The Gambia from the north due to the high traffic of Europeans going to sell their cars down there.

=== Personal Experiences ===
TonyPro says: I won't edit the main article because I only tried hitching a few times, but I found the claim that "hitchhiking is very easily doable" to be extremely optimistic. I spent 5 hours on the main road outside Kedougou with no luck, even though lots of private, half-empty vehicles passed me. Plus the locals had no qualms about queue-jumping, standing in front of me to flag rides for themselves. Then I faced another problem: I gave up and decided to flag down public transport, but buses and sept-place taxis fill up before leaving the towns, so if you are waiting on the edge of a city, they will always be full.


{{stub}}
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}

[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Senegal]]</text>
      <sha1>rp8xazyz7vjrbatf4u2brd69gpmvq45</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>91284</id>
      <parentid>87860</parentid>
      <timestamp>2018-06-16T14:39:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Marvmarv</username>
        <id>29373</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4804">{{infobox Country
|country = of Senegal
|language = French, Wolof
|capital = [[Dakar]]
|pop = 11,750,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = &lt;rating country='sn' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='14.8' lng='-14' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}
[[File:SenegalStreet.jpg|thumb|left|Street scene in Senegal]]

'''Senegal''' is a country in [[Western Africa]]. It is the most developed country in West Africa and has the best road network; most major roads are now paved. On those major roads, hitchhiking is very easily doable - there is a high number of private vehicles and the Senegalese are sympathetic towards the cause. Drivers are usually very friendly and often you might find yourself invited to spend the night if evening is coming close. If you leave the main roads, things get a lot harder - be prepared to either wait or walk lots; most of your lifts will be short hops and most traffic will be taxies. Speaking a little bit of [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], which is the unofficial national language, will increase your popularity and your chances greatly. To leave the towns, there is only one way (with the possible exception of Dakar): Get to the end of the city by foot or mototaxi and hitch from there.
As in all of Westafrica, a big part of the traffic is public minibuses, taxis and sept-plus who will charge you for a ride.
Private vehicles will often ask you for a fare aswell and you will most likely find yourself mixing payed rides and hitchhiking to get forward. Prices are very reasonable and usually the same for foreigners, apart from obvious tourist destinations.
Even if you have a tight budget, you'll be able to pay or give back and it's your personal decision what to make of it.
Still, in case you are completely without money, you can still hitchhike and find people who give you food and shelter. 
It will require more patience and a lot of asking, but it's possible.

When hitchhiking in Lower Casamance, be aware of the ongoing armed conflict there, it might be unwise to walk between towns on your own or even to accept ride offers of strangers. Check the situation before you set out. Finding rides at the many police checkpoints is also a great and easy way to hitch. Tell the officers where you are going and they will stop all vehicles and organise a free  and safe ride for you.

=== Cities connected by major roads ===
*u[[Dakar]]
* [[Kaolack]]
* [[Kedougou]]
* [[Kolda]]
* [[Mbour]]
* [[Saint-Louis (Senegal)|St Louis]]
* [[Thies]]
* [[Tambacounda]]
* [[Velingara]]
* [[Ziguinchor]]

=== Border Crossings ===
;Towards [[Mali]]
;Towards [[Mauritania]]
The main border crossing between Senegal and Mauritania is Rosso, which is famous for its hustlers. After making it to Rosso (possibly you'll have to walk the short way from the road to Richard Toll because there's not that much at Rosso) you'll get your exit stamp, exchange money and then cross on the ferry to the Mauritanian side (free for foot passengers). If you want to hitch, ignore the numerous offers for taxis you will receive and walk out of town (around 1km) where (as of March 2011) there is a rotting donkey next to which hitching seems sensible. There is a second road further to the West going through the Diama national park. This is a dirt road with little traffic, most of which is coming from Mauritania anyway (overlanders wanting to avoid the hassle of Rosso).
;Towards [[Guinea-Bissau]]
If you have time and a bit of luck, hitching towards the border at Mpack from Ziguinchor is possible. Walk out of Ziguinchor towards the border and stick out your thumb to see what happens.
;Towards [[Guinea]]
Hitching towards Guinea is a very hard task. From Kedgougou, only 4x4s with very determined drivers are able to make it to Mali-ville (usually one every couple of days), and even though there is a new paved road being built from Upper Casamance to Koundara, it will be some time until it will be viable for most cars.
;Towards [[The Gambia]]
It's very easy to hitchhike towards/into The Gambia from the north due to the high traffic of Europeans going to sell their cars down there.

=== Personal Experiences ===
TonyPro says: I won't edit the main article because I only tried hitching a few times, but I found the claim that "hitchhiking is very easily doable" to be extremely optimistic. I spent 5 hours on the main road outside Kedougou with no luck, even though lots of private, half-empty vehicles passed me. Plus the locals had no qualms about queue-jumping, standing in front of me to flag rides for themselves. Then I faced another problem: I gave up and decided to flag down public transport, but buses and sept-place taxis fill up before leaving the towns, so if you are waiting on the edge of a city, they will always be full.


{{stub}}
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}

[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Senegal]]</text>
      <sha1>o44tmtpfhqyj8vmdcz6mflz59d3retz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>91285</id>
      <parentid>91284</parentid>
      <timestamp>2018-06-16T18:32:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Irningston</username>
        <id>3766</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4804">{{infobox Country
|country = of Senegal
|language = French, Wolof
|capital = [[Dakar]]
|pop = 11,750,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = &lt;rating country='sn' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='14.8' lng='-14' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}
[[File:SenegalStreet.jpg|thumb|left|Street scene in Senegal]]

'''Senegal''' is a country in [[Western Africa]]. It is the most developed country in West Africa and has the best road network; most major roads are now paved. On those major roads, hitchhiking is very easily doable - there is a high number of private vehicles and the Senegalese are sympathetic towards the cause. Drivers are usually very friendly and often you might find yourself invited to spend the night if evening is coming close. If you leave the main roads, things get a lot harder - be prepared to either wait or walk lots; most of your lifts will be short hops and most traffic will be taxies. Speaking a little bit of [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], which is the unofficial national language, will increase your popularity and your chances greatly. To leave the towns, there is only one way (with the possible exception of Dakar): Get to the end of the city by foot or mototaxi and hitch from there.
As in all of Westafrica, a big part of the traffic is public minibuses, taxis and sept-plus who will charge you for a ride.
Private vehicles will often ask you for a fare aswell and you will most likely find yourself mixing payed rides and hitchhiking to get forward. Prices are very reasonable and usually the same for foreigners, apart from obvious tourist destinations.
Even if you have a tight budget, you'll be able to pay or give back and it's your personal decision what to make of it.
Still, in case you are completely without money, you can still hitchhike and find people who give you food and shelter. 
It will require more patience and a lot of asking, but it's possible.

When hitchhiking in Lower Casamance, be aware of the ongoing armed conflict there, it might be unwise to walk between towns on your own or even to accept ride offers of strangers. Check the situation before you set out. Finding rides at the many police checkpoints is also a great and easy way to hitch. Tell the officers where you are going and they will stop all vehicles and organise a free  and safe ride for you.

=== Cities connected by major roads ===
* [[Dakar]]
* [[Kaolack]]
* [[Kedougou]]
* [[Kolda]]
* [[Mbour]]
* [[Saint-Louis (Senegal)|St Louis]]
* [[Thies]]
* [[Tambacounda]]
* [[Velingara]]
* [[Ziguinchor]]

=== Border Crossings ===
;Towards [[Mali]]
;Towards [[Mauritania]]
The main border crossing between Senegal and Mauritania is Rosso, which is famous for its hustlers. After making it to Rosso (possibly you'll have to walk the short way from the road to Richard Toll because there's not that much at Rosso) you'll get your exit stamp, exchange money and then cross on the ferry to the Mauritanian side (free for foot passengers). If you want to hitch, ignore the numerous offers for taxis you will receive and walk out of town (around 1km) where (as of March 2011) there is a rotting donkey next to which hitching seems sensible. There is a second road further to the West going through the Diama national park. This is a dirt road with little traffic, most of which is coming from Mauritania anyway (overlanders wanting to avoid the hassle of Rosso).
;Towards [[Guinea-Bissau]]
If you have time and a bit of luck, hitching towards the border at Mpack from Ziguinchor is possible. Walk out of Ziguinchor towards the border and stick out your thumb to see what happens.
;Towards [[Guinea]]
Hitching towards Guinea is a very hard task. From Kedgougou, only 4x4s with very determined drivers are able to make it to Mali-ville (usually one every couple of days), and even though there is a new paved road being built from Upper Casamance to Koundara, it will be some time until it will be viable for most cars.
;Towards [[The Gambia]]
It's very easy to hitchhike towards/into The Gambia from the north due to the high traffic of Europeans going to sell their cars down there.

=== Personal Experiences ===
TonyPro says: I won't edit the main article because I only tried hitching a few times, but I found the claim that "hitchhiking is very easily doable" to be extremely optimistic. I spent 5 hours on the main road outside Kedougou with no luck, even though lots of private, half-empty vehicles passed me. Plus the locals had no qualms about queue-jumping, standing in front of me to flag rides for themselves. Then I faced another problem: I gave up and decided to flag down public transport, but buses and sept-place taxis fill up before leaving the towns, so if you are waiting on the edge of a city, they will always be full.


{{stub}}
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}

[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Senegal]]</text>
      <sha1>3beug14gu8txawogkdrzy9eer0jedzk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>91561</id>
      <parentid>91285</parentid>
      <timestamp>2018-07-23T11:47:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>ViajaZero</username>
        <id>24444</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5445">{{infobox Country
|country = of Senegal
|language = French, Wolof
|capital = [[Dakar]]
|pop = 11,750,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = &lt;rating country='sn' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='14.8' lng='-14' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}
[[File:SenegalStreet.jpg|thumb|left|Street scene in Senegal]]

'''Senegal''' is a country in [[Western Africa]]. It is the most developed country in West Africa and has the best road network; most major roads are now paved. On those major roads, hitchhiking is very easily doable - there is a high number of private vehicles and the Senegalese are sympathetic towards the cause. Drivers are usually very friendly and often you might find yourself invited to spend the night if evening is coming close. If you leave the main roads, things get a lot harder - be prepared to either wait or walk lots; most of your lifts will be short hops and most traffic will be taxies. Speaking a little bit of [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], which is the unofficial national language, will increase your popularity and your chances greatly. To leave the towns, there is only one way (with the possible exception of Dakar): Get to the end of the city by foot or mototaxi and hitch from there.
As in all of Westafrica, a big part of the traffic is public minibuses, taxis and sept-plus who will charge you for a ride.
Private vehicles will often ask you for a fare aswell and you will most likely find yourself mixing payed rides and hitchhiking to get forward. Prices are very reasonable and usually the same for foreigners, apart from obvious tourist destinations.
Even if you have a tight budget, you'll be able to pay or give back and it's your personal decision what to make of it.
Still, in case you are completely without money, you can still hitchhike and find people who give you food and shelter. 
It will require more patience and a lot of asking, but it's possible.

When hitchhiking in Lower Casamance, be aware of the ongoing armed conflict there, it might be unwise to walk between towns on your own or even to accept ride offers of strangers. Check the situation before you set out. Finding rides at the many police checkpoints is also a great and easy way to hitch. Tell the officers where you are going and they will stop all vehicles and organise a free  and safe ride for you.

=== Cities connected by major roads ===
* [[Dakar]]
* [[Kaolack]]
* [[Kedougou]]
* [[Kolda]]
* [[Mbour]]
* [[Saint-Louis (Senegal)|St Louis]]
* [[Thies]]
* [[Tambacounda]]
* [[Velingara]]
* [[Ziguinchor]]

=== Border Crossings ===
;Towards [[Mali]]
;Towards [[Mauritania]]
The main border crossing between Senegal and Mauritania is Rosso, which is famous for its hustlers. After making it to Rosso (possibly you'll have to walk the short way from the road to Richard Toll because there's not that much at Rosso) you'll get your exit stamp, exchange money and then cross on the ferry to the Mauritanian side (free for foot passengers). If you want to hitch, ignore the numerous offers for taxis you will receive and walk out of town (around 1km) where (as of March 2011) there is a rotting donkey next to which hitching seems sensible. There is a second road further to the West going through the Diama national park. This is a dirt road with little traffic, most of which is coming from Mauritania anyway (overlanders wanting to avoid the hassle of Rosso).
;Towards [[Guinea-Bissau]]
If you have time and a bit of luck, hitching towards the border at Mpack from Ziguinchor is possible. Walk out of Ziguinchor towards the border and stick out your thumb to see what happens.
;Towards [[Guinea]]
Hitching towards Guinea is a very hard task. From Kedgougou, only 4x4s with very determined drivers are able to make it to Mali-ville (usually one every couple of days), and even though there is a new paved road being built from Upper Casamance to Koundara, it will be some time until it will be viable for most cars.
;Towards [[The Gambia]]
It's very easy to hitchhike towards/into The Gambia from the north due to the high traffic of Europeans going to sell their cars down there.

=== Personal Experiences ===
ViajaZero says: I'll talk about my only experience hitchhiking in Senegal (Jun 2018). I made the route from Thiès to St. Louis: 200 km in approximately 7 hours of travel. The conditions of the N2 road is good, many cars stop but most are private taxis, you have to have patience. I was waiting 3 hours at a police checkpoint until a truck took me to Louga. There are many police controls on the outskirts of the city, it is a good place to stop cars, sometimes the police ask drivers for your trip. I was 5 minutes at a police checkpoint and a driver took me to St. Louis. 
(Video of the trip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f8Vv4kmAjS8)

TonyPro says: I won't edit the main article because I only tried hitching a few times, but I found the claim that "hitchhiking is very easily doable" to be extremely optimistic. I spent 5 hours on the main road outside Kedougou with no luck, even though lots of private, half-empty vehicles passed me. Plus the locals had no qualms about queue-jumping, standing in front of me to flag rides for themselves. Then I faced another problem: I gave up and decided to flag down public transport, but buses and sept-place taxis fill up before leaving the towns, so if you are waiting on the edge of a city, they will always be full.


{{stub}}
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}

[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Senegal]]</text>
      <sha1>t4fn6xv8erzmzrde4j31i7x4rmlmqyc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>91562</id>
      <parentid>91561</parentid>
      <timestamp>2018-07-23T11:48:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>ViajaZero</username>
        <id>24444</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5449">{{infobox Country
|country = of Senegal
|language = French, Wolof
|capital = [[Dakar]]
|pop = 11,750,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = &lt;rating country='sn' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='14.8' lng='-14' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}
[[File:SenegalStreet.jpg|thumb|left|Street scene in Senegal]]

'''Senegal''' is a country in [[Western Africa]]. It is the most developed country in West Africa and has the best road network; most major roads are now paved. On those major roads, hitchhiking is very easily doable - there is a high number of private vehicles and the Senegalese are sympathetic towards the cause. Drivers are usually very friendly and often you might find yourself invited to spend the night if evening is coming close. If you leave the main roads, things get a lot harder - be prepared to either wait or walk lots; most of your lifts will be short hops and most traffic will be taxies. Speaking a little bit of [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], which is the unofficial national language, will increase your popularity and your chances greatly. To leave the towns, there is only one way (with the possible exception of Dakar): Get to the end of the city by foot or mototaxi and hitch from there.
As in all of Westafrica, a big part of the traffic is public minibuses, taxis and sept-plus who will charge you for a ride.
Private vehicles will often ask you for a fare aswell and you will most likely find yourself mixing payed rides and hitchhiking to get forward. Prices are very reasonable and usually the same for foreigners, apart from obvious tourist destinations.
Even if you have a tight budget, you'll be able to pay or give back and it's your personal decision what to make of it.
Still, in case you are completely without money, you can still hitchhike and find people who give you food and shelter. 
It will require more patience and a lot of asking, but it's possible.

When hitchhiking in Lower Casamance, be aware of the ongoing armed conflict there, it might be unwise to walk between towns on your own or even to accept ride offers of strangers. Check the situation before you set out. Finding rides at the many police checkpoints is also a great and easy way to hitch. Tell the officers where you are going and they will stop all vehicles and organise a free  and safe ride for you.

=== Cities connected by major roads ===
* [[Dakar]]
* [[Kaolack]]
* [[Kedougou]]
* [[Kolda]]
* [[Mbour]]
* [[Saint-Louis (Senegal)|St Louis]]
* [[Thies]]
* [[Tambacounda]]
* [[Velingara]]
* [[Ziguinchor]]

=== Border Crossings ===
;Towards [[Mali]]
;Towards [[Mauritania]]
The main border crossing between Senegal and Mauritania is Rosso, which is famous for its hustlers. After making it to Rosso (possibly you'll have to walk the short way from the road to Richard Toll because there's not that much at Rosso) you'll get your exit stamp, exchange money and then cross on the ferry to the Mauritanian side (free for foot passengers). If you want to hitch, ignore the numerous offers for taxis you will receive and walk out of town (around 1km) where (as of March 2011) there is a rotting donkey next to which hitching seems sensible. There is a second road further to the West going through the Diama national park. This is a dirt road with little traffic, most of which is coming from Mauritania anyway (overlanders wanting to avoid the hassle of Rosso).
;Towards [[Guinea-Bissau]]
If you have time and a bit of luck, hitching towards the border at Mpack from Ziguinchor is possible. Walk out of Ziguinchor towards the border and stick out your thumb to see what happens.
;Towards [[Guinea]]
Hitching towards Guinea is a very hard task. From Kedgougou, only 4x4s with very determined drivers are able to make it to Mali-ville (usually one every couple of days), and even though there is a new paved road being built from Upper Casamance to Koundara, it will be some time until it will be viable for most cars.
;Towards [[The Gambia]]
It's very easy to hitchhike towards/into The Gambia from the north due to the high traffic of Europeans going to sell their cars down there.

=== Personal Experiences ===
ViajaZero.org says: I'll talk about my only experience hitchhiking in Senegal (Jun 2018). I made the route from Thiès to St. Louis: 200 km in approximately 7 hours of travel. The conditions of the N2 road is good, many cars stop but most are private taxis, you have to have patience. I was waiting 3 hours at a police checkpoint until a truck took me to Louga. There are many police controls on the outskirts of the city, it is a good place to stop cars, sometimes the police ask drivers for your trip. I was 5 minutes at a police checkpoint and a driver took me to St. Louis. 
(Video of the trip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f8Vv4kmAjS8)

TonyPro says: I won't edit the main article because I only tried hitching a few times, but I found the claim that "hitchhiking is very easily doable" to be extremely optimistic. I spent 5 hours on the main road outside Kedougou with no luck, even though lots of private, half-empty vehicles passed me. Plus the locals had no qualms about queue-jumping, standing in front of me to flag rides for themselves. Then I faced another problem: I gave up and decided to flag down public transport, but buses and sept-place taxis fill up before leaving the towns, so if you are waiting on the edge of a city, they will always be full.


{{stub}}
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}

[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Senegal]]</text>
      <sha1>53nvxk8dqihfa0u3gq4xz1lchtbuci3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>97445</id>
      <parentid>91562</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-02-29T14:53:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>The-nomaddicts</username>
        <id>41926</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* Border Crossings */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5653">{{infobox Country
|country = of Senegal
|language = French, Wolof
|capital = [[Dakar]]
|pop = 11,750,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = &lt;rating country='sn' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='14.8' lng='-14' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}
[[File:SenegalStreet.jpg|thumb|left|Street scene in Senegal]]

'''Senegal''' is a country in [[Western Africa]]. It is the most developed country in West Africa and has the best road network; most major roads are now paved. On those major roads, hitchhiking is very easily doable - there is a high number of private vehicles and the Senegalese are sympathetic towards the cause. Drivers are usually very friendly and often you might find yourself invited to spend the night if evening is coming close. If you leave the main roads, things get a lot harder - be prepared to either wait or walk lots; most of your lifts will be short hops and most traffic will be taxies. Speaking a little bit of [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], which is the unofficial national language, will increase your popularity and your chances greatly. To leave the towns, there is only one way (with the possible exception of Dakar): Get to the end of the city by foot or mototaxi and hitch from there.
As in all of Westafrica, a big part of the traffic is public minibuses, taxis and sept-plus who will charge you for a ride.
Private vehicles will often ask you for a fare aswell and you will most likely find yourself mixing payed rides and hitchhiking to get forward. Prices are very reasonable and usually the same for foreigners, apart from obvious tourist destinations.
Even if you have a tight budget, you'll be able to pay or give back and it's your personal decision what to make of it.
Still, in case you are completely without money, you can still hitchhike and find people who give you food and shelter. 
It will require more patience and a lot of asking, but it's possible.

When hitchhiking in Lower Casamance, be aware of the ongoing armed conflict there, it might be unwise to walk between towns on your own or even to accept ride offers of strangers. Check the situation before you set out. Finding rides at the many police checkpoints is also a great and easy way to hitch. Tell the officers where you are going and they will stop all vehicles and organise a free  and safe ride for you.

=== Cities connected by major roads ===
* [[Dakar]]
* [[Kaolack]]
* [[Kedougou]]
* [[Kolda]]
* [[Mbour]]
* [[Saint-Louis (Senegal)|St Louis]]
* [[Thies]]
* [[Tambacounda]]
* [[Velingara]]
* [[Ziguinchor]]

=== Border Crossings ===
;Towards [[Mali]]
;Towards [[Mauritania]]
The main border crossing between Senegal and Mauritania is Rosso, which is famous for its hustlers. After making it to Rosso (possibly you'll have to walk the short way from the road to Richard Toll because there's not that much at Rosso) you'll get your exit stamp, exchange money and then cross on the ferry to the Mauritanian side (free for foot passengers). If you want to hitch, ignore the numerous offers for taxis you will receive and walk out of town (around 1km) where (as of March 2011) there is a rotting donkey next to which hitching seems sensible. There is a second road further to the West going through the Diama national park. This is a dirt road with little traffic, most of which is coming from Mauritania anyway (overlanders wanting to avoid the hassle of Rosso).
;Towards [[Guinea-Bissau]]
If you have time and a bit of luck, hitching towards the border at Mpack from Ziguinchor is possible. Walk out of Ziguinchor towards the border and stick out your thumb to see what happens.
;Towards [[Guinea]]
Hitching towards Guinea is a very hard task. From Kedgougou, only 4x4s with very determined drivers are able to make it to Mali-ville (usually one every couple of days), and even though there is a new paved road being built from Upper Casamance to Koundara, it will be some time until it will be viable for most cars.
As of February 2020, the road from Upper Casamance to Koundara is paved, in good shape and had a good amount of traffic on it. [[The-nomaddicts]] had no problem hitching to from Tambacounda to Koundara. 
;Towards [[The Gambia]]
It's very easy to hitchhike towards/into The Gambia from the north due to the high traffic of Europeans going to sell their cars down there.

=== Personal Experiences ===
ViajaZero.org says: I'll talk about my only experience hitchhiking in Senegal (Jun 2018). I made the route from Thiès to St. Louis: 200 km in approximately 7 hours of travel. The conditions of the N2 road is good, many cars stop but most are private taxis, you have to have patience. I was waiting 3 hours at a police checkpoint until a truck took me to Louga. There are many police controls on the outskirts of the city, it is a good place to stop cars, sometimes the police ask drivers for your trip. I was 5 minutes at a police checkpoint and a driver took me to St. Louis. 
(Video of the trip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f8Vv4kmAjS8)

TonyPro says: I won't edit the main article because I only tried hitching a few times, but I found the claim that "hitchhiking is very easily doable" to be extremely optimistic. I spent 5 hours on the main road outside Kedougou with no luck, even though lots of private, half-empty vehicles passed me. Plus the locals had no qualms about queue-jumping, standing in front of me to flag rides for themselves. Then I faced another problem: I gave up and decided to flag down public transport, but buses and sept-place taxis fill up before leaving the towns, so if you are waiting on the edge of a city, they will always be full.


{{stub}}
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}

[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Senegal]]</text>
      <sha1>7w0u4rdtosfrbfdsgz797mieowypbia</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>97446</id>
      <parentid>97445</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-02-29T15:01:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>The-nomaddicts</username>
        <id>41926</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* Personal Experiences */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6416">{{infobox Country
|country = of Senegal
|language = French, Wolof
|capital = [[Dakar]]
|pop = 11,750,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = &lt;rating country='sn' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='14.8' lng='-14' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}
[[File:SenegalStreet.jpg|thumb|left|Street scene in Senegal]]

'''Senegal''' is a country in [[Western Africa]]. It is the most developed country in West Africa and has the best road network; most major roads are now paved. On those major roads, hitchhiking is very easily doable - there is a high number of private vehicles and the Senegalese are sympathetic towards the cause. Drivers are usually very friendly and often you might find yourself invited to spend the night if evening is coming close. If you leave the main roads, things get a lot harder - be prepared to either wait or walk lots; most of your lifts will be short hops and most traffic will be taxies. Speaking a little bit of [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], which is the unofficial national language, will increase your popularity and your chances greatly. To leave the towns, there is only one way (with the possible exception of Dakar): Get to the end of the city by foot or mototaxi and hitch from there.
As in all of Westafrica, a big part of the traffic is public minibuses, taxis and sept-plus who will charge you for a ride.
Private vehicles will often ask you for a fare aswell and you will most likely find yourself mixing payed rides and hitchhiking to get forward. Prices are very reasonable and usually the same for foreigners, apart from obvious tourist destinations.
Even if you have a tight budget, you'll be able to pay or give back and it's your personal decision what to make of it.
Still, in case you are completely without money, you can still hitchhike and find people who give you food and shelter. 
It will require more patience and a lot of asking, but it's possible.

When hitchhiking in Lower Casamance, be aware of the ongoing armed conflict there, it might be unwise to walk between towns on your own or even to accept ride offers of strangers. Check the situation before you set out. Finding rides at the many police checkpoints is also a great and easy way to hitch. Tell the officers where you are going and they will stop all vehicles and organise a free  and safe ride for you.

=== Cities connected by major roads ===
* [[Dakar]]
* [[Kaolack]]
* [[Kedougou]]
* [[Kolda]]
* [[Mbour]]
* [[Saint-Louis (Senegal)|St Louis]]
* [[Thies]]
* [[Tambacounda]]
* [[Velingara]]
* [[Ziguinchor]]

=== Border Crossings ===
;Towards [[Mali]]
;Towards [[Mauritania]]
The main border crossing between Senegal and Mauritania is Rosso, which is famous for its hustlers. After making it to Rosso (possibly you'll have to walk the short way from the road to Richard Toll because there's not that much at Rosso) you'll get your exit stamp, exchange money and then cross on the ferry to the Mauritanian side (free for foot passengers). If you want to hitch, ignore the numerous offers for taxis you will receive and walk out of town (around 1km) where (as of March 2011) there is a rotting donkey next to which hitching seems sensible. There is a second road further to the West going through the Diama national park. This is a dirt road with little traffic, most of which is coming from Mauritania anyway (overlanders wanting to avoid the hassle of Rosso).
;Towards [[Guinea-Bissau]]
If you have time and a bit of luck, hitching towards the border at Mpack from Ziguinchor is possible. Walk out of Ziguinchor towards the border and stick out your thumb to see what happens.
;Towards [[Guinea]]
Hitching towards Guinea is a very hard task. From Kedgougou, only 4x4s with very determined drivers are able to make it to Mali-ville (usually one every couple of days), and even though there is a new paved road being built from Upper Casamance to Koundara, it will be some time until it will be viable for most cars.
As of February 2020, the road from Upper Casamance to Koundara is paved, in good shape and had a good amount of traffic on it. [[The-nomaddicts]] had no problem hitching to from Tambacounda to Koundara. 
;Towards [[The Gambia]]
It's very easy to hitchhike towards/into The Gambia from the north due to the high traffic of Europeans going to sell their cars down there.

=== Personal Experiences ===
ViajaZero.org says: I'll talk about my only experience hitchhiking in Senegal (Jun 2018). I made the route from Thiès to St. Louis: 200 km in approximately 7 hours of travel. The conditions of the N2 road is good, many cars stop but most are private taxis, you have to have patience. I was waiting 3 hours at a police checkpoint until a truck took me to Louga. There are many police controls on the outskirts of the city, it is a good place to stop cars, sometimes the police ask drivers for your trip. I was 5 minutes at a police checkpoint and a driver took me to St. Louis. 
(Video of the trip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f8Vv4kmAjS8)

TonyPro says: I won't edit the main article because I only tried hitching a few times, but I found the claim that "hitchhiking is very easily doable" to be extremely optimistic. I spent 5 hours on the main road outside Kedougou with no luck, even though lots of private, half-empty vehicles passed me. Plus the locals had no qualms about queue-jumping, standing in front of me to flag rides for themselves. Then I faced another problem: I gave up and decided to flag down public transport, but buses and sept-place taxis fill up before leaving the towns, so if you are waiting on the edge of a city, they will always be full.

[[The-nomaddicts]] found that a helpful phrase to learn is "Doma yo balay? Amuma halis", which is Wolof and roughly translates to "Will you take us with you for free? We have no money." There is no direct translation for "hitchhiking" in Wolof, but this got the job done for us through 6 weeks of hitching around the country. Throughout Jan 2020-Feb 2020 we hitchhiked all over the country starting in Diama, going into Dakar, around The Gambia through Tambacounda, down into and around Casamance, and back east all around the Kedougou region. We had to be patient, especially when hitching in remote areas outside of Kedougou but never had to wait more than 3 hours for a ride. Learning the Wolof phrase for hitchhiking and a few others was definitely helpful! 

{{stub}}
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}

[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Senegal]]</text>
      <sha1>7uhd2zc6d5051jrrggss6kofwjmpume</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>97447</id>
      <parentid>97446</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-02-29T15:09:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>The-nomaddicts</username>
        <id>41926</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* Border Crossings */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6583">{{infobox Country
|country = of Senegal
|language = French, Wolof
|capital = [[Dakar]]
|pop = 11,750,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = &lt;rating country='sn' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='14.8' lng='-14' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}
[[File:SenegalStreet.jpg|thumb|left|Street scene in Senegal]]

'''Senegal''' is a country in [[Western Africa]]. It is the most developed country in West Africa and has the best road network; most major roads are now paved. On those major roads, hitchhiking is very easily doable - there is a high number of private vehicles and the Senegalese are sympathetic towards the cause. Drivers are usually very friendly and often you might find yourself invited to spend the night if evening is coming close. If you leave the main roads, things get a lot harder - be prepared to either wait or walk lots; most of your lifts will be short hops and most traffic will be taxies. Speaking a little bit of [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], which is the unofficial national language, will increase your popularity and your chances greatly. To leave the towns, there is only one way (with the possible exception of Dakar): Get to the end of the city by foot or mototaxi and hitch from there.
As in all of Westafrica, a big part of the traffic is public minibuses, taxis and sept-plus who will charge you for a ride.
Private vehicles will often ask you for a fare aswell and you will most likely find yourself mixing payed rides and hitchhiking to get forward. Prices are very reasonable and usually the same for foreigners, apart from obvious tourist destinations.
Even if you have a tight budget, you'll be able to pay or give back and it's your personal decision what to make of it.
Still, in case you are completely without money, you can still hitchhike and find people who give you food and shelter. 
It will require more patience and a lot of asking, but it's possible.

When hitchhiking in Lower Casamance, be aware of the ongoing armed conflict there, it might be unwise to walk between towns on your own or even to accept ride offers of strangers. Check the situation before you set out. Finding rides at the many police checkpoints is also a great and easy way to hitch. Tell the officers where you are going and they will stop all vehicles and organise a free  and safe ride for you.

=== Cities connected by major roads ===
* [[Dakar]]
* [[Kaolack]]
* [[Kedougou]]
* [[Kolda]]
* [[Mbour]]
* [[Saint-Louis (Senegal)|St Louis]]
* [[Thies]]
* [[Tambacounda]]
* [[Velingara]]
* [[Ziguinchor]]

=== Border Crossings ===
;Towards [[Mali]]
;Towards [[Mauritania]]
The main border crossing between Senegal and Mauritania is Rosso, which is famous for its hustlers. After making it to Rosso (possibly you'll have to walk the short way from the road to Richard Toll because there's not that much at Rosso) you'll get your exit stamp, exchange money and then cross on the ferry to the Mauritanian side (free for foot passengers). If you want to hitch, ignore the numerous offers for taxis you will receive and walk out of town (around 1km) where (as of March 2011) there is a rotting donkey next to which hitching seems sensible. There is a second road further to the West going through the Diama national park. This is a dirt road with little traffic, most of which is coming from Mauritania anyway (overlanders wanting to avoid the hassle of Rosso). The Diama border is quick and painless. The dirt road might be challenging in the rainy season but [[The-nomaddicts]] had no problem hitching through it in January 2020.
;Towards [[Guinea-Bissau]]
If you have time and a bit of luck, hitching towards the border at Mpack from Ziguinchor is possible. Walk out of Ziguinchor towards the border and stick out your thumb to see what happens.
;Towards [[Guinea]]
Hitching towards Guinea is a very hard task. From Kedgougou, only 4x4s with very determined drivers are able to make it to Mali-ville (usually one every couple of days), and even though there is a new paved road being built from Upper Casamance to Koundara, it will be some time until it will be viable for most cars.
As of February 2020, the road from Upper Casamance to Koundara is paved, in good shape and had a good amount of traffic on it. [[The-nomaddicts]] had no problem hitching from Tambacounda to Koundara. 
;Towards [[The Gambia]]
It's very easy to hitchhike towards/into The Gambia from the north due to the high traffic of Europeans going to sell their cars down there.

=== Personal Experiences ===
ViajaZero.org says: I'll talk about my only experience hitchhiking in Senegal (Jun 2018). I made the route from Thiès to St. Louis: 200 km in approximately 7 hours of travel. The conditions of the N2 road is good, many cars stop but most are private taxis, you have to have patience. I was waiting 3 hours at a police checkpoint until a truck took me to Louga. There are many police controls on the outskirts of the city, it is a good place to stop cars, sometimes the police ask drivers for your trip. I was 5 minutes at a police checkpoint and a driver took me to St. Louis. 
(Video of the trip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f8Vv4kmAjS8)

TonyPro says: I won't edit the main article because I only tried hitching a few times, but I found the claim that "hitchhiking is very easily doable" to be extremely optimistic. I spent 5 hours on the main road outside Kedougou with no luck, even though lots of private, half-empty vehicles passed me. Plus the locals had no qualms about queue-jumping, standing in front of me to flag rides for themselves. Then I faced another problem: I gave up and decided to flag down public transport, but buses and sept-place taxis fill up before leaving the towns, so if you are waiting on the edge of a city, they will always be full.

[[The-nomaddicts]] found that a helpful phrase to learn is "Doma yo balay? Amuma halis", which is Wolof and roughly translates to "Will you take us with you for free? We have no money." There is no direct translation for "hitchhiking" in Wolof, but this got the job done for us through 6 weeks of hitching around the country. Throughout Jan 2020-Feb 2020 we hitchhiked all over the country starting in Diama, going into Dakar, around The Gambia through Tambacounda, down into and around Casamance, and back east all around the Kedougou region. We had to be patient, especially when hitching in remote areas outside of Kedougou but never had to wait more than 3 hours for a ride. Learning the Wolof phrase for hitchhiking and a few others was definitely helpful! 

{{stub}}
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}

[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Senegal]]</text>
      <sha1>gy6xpieqpk58fkp6zsxc735qx9f73se</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>97450</id>
      <parentid>97447</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-02-29T15:20:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>The-nomaddicts</username>
        <id>41926</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6565">{{infobox Country
|country = of Senegal
|language = French, Wolof
|capital = [[Dakar]]
|pop = 11,750,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = &lt;rating country='sn' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='14.8' lng='-14' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}
[[File:SenegalStreet.jpg|thumb|left|Street scene in Senegal]]

'''Senegal''' is a country in [[Western Africa]]. It is the most developed country in West Africa and has the best road network; most major roads are now paved. On those major roads, hitchhiking is very easily doable - there is a high number of private vehicles and the Senegalese are sympathetic towards the cause. Drivers are usually very friendly and often you might find yourself invited to spend the night if evening is coming close. If you leave the main roads, things get a lot harder - be prepared to either wait or walk lots; most of your lifts will be short hops and most traffic will be taxies. Speaking a little bit of [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], which is the unofficial national language, will increase your popularity and your chances greatly. [[The-nomaddicts]] found that a helpful phrase to learn is "Doma yo balay? Amuma halis", which is Wolof and roughly translates to "Will you take us with you for free? We have no money." There is no direct translation for "hitchhiking" in Wolof, but this got the job done. To leave the towns, there is only one way (with the possible exception of Dakar): Get to the end of the city by foot or mototaxi and hitch from there.
As in all of Westafrica, a big part of the traffic is public minibuses, taxis and sept-plus who will charge you for a ride.
Private vehicles will often ask you for a fare aswell and you will most likely find yourself mixing payed rides and hitchhiking to get forward. Prices are very reasonable and usually the same for foreigners, apart from obvious tourist destinations.
Even if you have a tight budget, you'll be able to pay or give back and it's your personal decision what to make of it.
Still, in case you are completely without money, you can still hitchhike and find people who give you food and shelter. 
It will require more patience and a lot of asking, but it's possible.

When hitchhiking in Lower Casamance, be aware of the ongoing armed conflict there, it might be unwise to walk between towns on your own or even to accept ride offers of strangers. Check the situation before you set out. Finding rides at the many police checkpoints is also a great and easy way to hitch. Tell the officers where you are going and they will stop all vehicles and organise a free  and safe ride for you.

=== Cities connected by major roads ===
* [[Dakar]]
* [[Kaolack]]
* [[Kedougou]]
* [[Kolda]]
* [[Mbour]]
* [[Saint-Louis (Senegal)|St Louis]]
* [[Thies]]
* [[Tambacounda]]
* [[Velingara]]
* [[Ziguinchor]]

=== Border Crossings ===
;Towards [[Mali]]
;Towards [[Mauritania]]
The main border crossing between Senegal and Mauritania is Rosso, which is famous for its hustlers. After making it to Rosso (possibly you'll have to walk the short way from the road to Richard Toll because there's not that much at Rosso) you'll get your exit stamp, exchange money and then cross on the ferry to the Mauritanian side (free for foot passengers). If you want to hitch, ignore the numerous offers for taxis you will receive and walk out of town (around 1km) where (as of March 2011) there is a rotting donkey next to which hitching seems sensible. There is a second road further to the West going through the Diama national park. This is a dirt road with little traffic, most of which is coming from Mauritania anyway (overlanders wanting to avoid the hassle of Rosso). The Diama border is quick and painless. The dirt road might be challenging in the rainy season but [[The-nomaddicts]] had no problem hitching through it in January 2020.
;Towards [[Guinea-Bissau]]
If you have time and a bit of luck, hitching towards the border at Mpack from Ziguinchor is possible. Walk out of Ziguinchor towards the border and stick out your thumb to see what happens.
;Towards [[Guinea]]
Hitching towards Guinea is a very hard task. From Kedgougou, only 4x4s with very determined drivers are able to make it to Mali-ville (usually one every couple of days), and even though there is a new paved road being built from Upper Casamance to Koundara, it will be some time until it will be viable for most cars.
As of February 2020, the road from Upper Casamance to Koundara is paved, in good shape and had a good amount of traffic on it. [[The-nomaddicts]] had no problem hitching from Tambacounda to Koundara. 
;Towards [[The Gambia]]
It's very easy to hitchhike towards/into The Gambia from the north due to the high traffic of Europeans going to sell their cars down there.

=== Personal Experiences ===
ViajaZero.org says: I'll talk about my only experience hitchhiking in Senegal (Jun 2018). I made the route from Thiès to St. Louis: 200 km in approximately 7 hours of travel. The conditions of the N2 road is good, many cars stop but most are private taxis, you have to have patience. I was waiting 3 hours at a police checkpoint until a truck took me to Louga. There are many police controls on the outskirts of the city, it is a good place to stop cars, sometimes the police ask drivers for your trip. I was 5 minutes at a police checkpoint and a driver took me to St. Louis. 
(Video of the trip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f8Vv4kmAjS8)

TonyPro says: I won't edit the main article because I only tried hitching a few times, but I found the claim that "hitchhiking is very easily doable" to be extremely optimistic. I spent 5 hours on the main road outside Kedougou with no luck, even though lots of private, half-empty vehicles passed me. Plus the locals had no qualms about queue-jumping, standing in front of me to flag rides for themselves. Then I faced another problem: I gave up and decided to flag down public transport, but buses and sept-place taxis fill up before leaving the towns, so if you are waiting on the edge of a city, they will always be full.

[[The-nomaddicts]] hitched Senegal throughout Jan 2020-Feb 2020. We hitchhiked all over the country starting in Diama, going into Dakar, around The Gambia through Tambacounda, down into and around Casamance, and back east all around the Kedougou region. We had to be patient, especially when hitching in remote areas outside of Kedougou but never had to wait more than 3 hours for a ride. Learning the Wolof phrase for hitchhiking and a few others was definitely helpful! 

{{stub}}
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}

[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Senegal]]</text>
      <sha1>hhihd4f6k64uab4btfz1m6qkns0drx9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>100163</id>
      <parentid>97450</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-01-05T21:44:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Personal Experiences */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6499">{{infobox Country
|country = of Senegal
|language = French, Wolof
|capital = [[Dakar]]
|pop = 11,750,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = &lt;rating country='sn' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='14.8' lng='-14' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}
[[File:SenegalStreet.jpg|thumb|left|Street scene in Senegal]]

'''Senegal''' is a country in [[Western Africa]]. It is the most developed country in West Africa and has the best road network; most major roads are now paved. On those major roads, hitchhiking is very easily doable - there is a high number of private vehicles and the Senegalese are sympathetic towards the cause. Drivers are usually very friendly and often you might find yourself invited to spend the night if evening is coming close. If you leave the main roads, things get a lot harder - be prepared to either wait or walk lots; most of your lifts will be short hops and most traffic will be taxies. Speaking a little bit of [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], which is the unofficial national language, will increase your popularity and your chances greatly. [[The-nomaddicts]] found that a helpful phrase to learn is "Doma yo balay? Amuma halis", which is Wolof and roughly translates to "Will you take us with you for free? We have no money." There is no direct translation for "hitchhiking" in Wolof, but this got the job done. To leave the towns, there is only one way (with the possible exception of Dakar): Get to the end of the city by foot or mototaxi and hitch from there.
As in all of Westafrica, a big part of the traffic is public minibuses, taxis and sept-plus who will charge you for a ride.
Private vehicles will often ask you for a fare aswell and you will most likely find yourself mixing payed rides and hitchhiking to get forward. Prices are very reasonable and usually the same for foreigners, apart from obvious tourist destinations.
Even if you have a tight budget, you'll be able to pay or give back and it's your personal decision what to make of it.
Still, in case you are completely without money, you can still hitchhike and find people who give you food and shelter. 
It will require more patience and a lot of asking, but it's possible.

When hitchhiking in Lower Casamance, be aware of the ongoing armed conflict there, it might be unwise to walk between towns on your own or even to accept ride offers of strangers. Check the situation before you set out. Finding rides at the many police checkpoints is also a great and easy way to hitch. Tell the officers where you are going and they will stop all vehicles and organise a free  and safe ride for you.

=== Cities connected by major roads ===
* [[Dakar]]
* [[Kaolack]]
* [[Kedougou]]
* [[Kolda]]
* [[Mbour]]
* [[Saint-Louis (Senegal)|St Louis]]
* [[Thies]]
* [[Tambacounda]]
* [[Velingara]]
* [[Ziguinchor]]

=== Border Crossings ===
;Towards [[Mali]]
;Towards [[Mauritania]]
The main border crossing between Senegal and Mauritania is Rosso, which is famous for its hustlers. After making it to Rosso (possibly you'll have to walk the short way from the road to Richard Toll because there's not that much at Rosso) you'll get your exit stamp, exchange money and then cross on the ferry to the Mauritanian side (free for foot passengers). If you want to hitch, ignore the numerous offers for taxis you will receive and walk out of town (around 1km) where (as of March 2011) there is a rotting donkey next to which hitching seems sensible. There is a second road further to the West going through the Diama national park. This is a dirt road with little traffic, most of which is coming from Mauritania anyway (overlanders wanting to avoid the hassle of Rosso). The Diama border is quick and painless. The dirt road might be challenging in the rainy season but [[The-nomaddicts]] had no problem hitching through it in January 2020.
;Towards [[Guinea-Bissau]]
If you have time and a bit of luck, hitching towards the border at Mpack from Ziguinchor is possible. Walk out of Ziguinchor towards the border and stick out your thumb to see what happens.
;Towards [[Guinea]]
Hitching towards Guinea is a very hard task. From Kedgougou, only 4x4s with very determined drivers are able to make it to Mali-ville (usually one every couple of days), and even though there is a new paved road being built from Upper Casamance to Koundara, it will be some time until it will be viable for most cars.
As of February 2020, the road from Upper Casamance to Koundara is paved, in good shape and had a good amount of traffic on it. [[The-nomaddicts]] had no problem hitching from Tambacounda to Koundara. 
;Towards [[The Gambia]]
It's very easy to hitchhike towards/into The Gambia from the north due to the high traffic of Europeans going to sell their cars down there.

=== Personal Experiences ===

I'll talk about my only experience hitchhiking in Senegal (Jun 2018). I made the route from Thiès to St. Louis: 200 km in approximately 7 hours of travel. The conditions of the N2 road is good, many cars stop but most are private taxis, you have to have patience. I was waiting 3 hours at a police checkpoint until a truck took me to Louga. There are many police controls on the outskirts of the city, it is a good place to stop cars, sometimes the police ask drivers for your trip. I was 5 minutes at a police checkpoint and a driver took me to St. Louis.  (Video of the trip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f8Vv4kmAjS8) - ViajaZero.org 

"HJitchhiking is very easily doable" to be extremely optimistic. I spent 5 hours on the main road outside Kedougou with no luck, even though lots of private, half-empty vehicles passed me. Plus the locals had no qualms about queue-jumping, standing in front of me to flag rides for themselves. Then I faced another problem: I gave up and decided to flag down public transport, but buses and sept-place taxis fill up before leaving the towns, so if you are waiting on the edge of a city, they will always be full - TonyPro 

Hitched Senegal throughout Jan 2020-Feb 2020. We hitchhiked all over the country starting in Diama, going into Dakar, around The Gambia through Tambacounda, down into and around Casamance, and back east all around the Kedougou region. We had to be patient, especially when hitching in remote areas outside of Kedougou but never had to wait more than 3 hours for a ride. Learning the Wolof phrase for hitchhiking and a few others was definitely helpful! - [[The-nomaddicts]]




== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{IsIn|Western Africa}}

[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Senegal]]</text>
      <sha1>apkeb2db131pwl8j28s21vav8raz24h</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>114831</id>
      <parentid>100163</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-10-16T05:03:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GriL</username>
        <id>24751</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6521">{{infobox Country
|country = of Senegal
|language = French, Wolof
|capital = [[Dakar]]
|pop = 11,750,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = &lt;rating country='sn' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='14.8' lng='-14' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}
[[File:SenegalStreet.jpg|thumb|left|Street scene in Senegal]]

'''Senegal''' is a country in [[Western Africa]]. It is the most developed country in West Africa and has the best road network; most major roads are now paved. On those major roads, hitchhiking is very easily doable - there is a high number of private vehicles and the Senegalese are sympathetic towards the cause. Drivers are usually very friendly and often you might find yourself invited to spend the night if evening is coming close. If you leave the main roads, things get a lot harder - be prepared to either wait or walk lots; most of your lifts will be short hops and most traffic will be taxies. Speaking a little bit of [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], which is the unofficial national language, will increase your popularity and your chances greatly. [[The-nomaddicts]] found that a helpful phrase to learn is "Doma yo balay? Amuma halis", which is Wolof and roughly translates to "Will you take us with you for free? We have no money." There is no direct translation for "hitchhiking" in Wolof, but this got the job done. To leave the towns, there is only one way (with the possible exception of Dakar): Get to the end of the city by foot or mototaxi and hitch from there.
As in all of Westafrica, a big part of the traffic is public minibuses, taxis and sept-plus who will charge you for a ride.
Private vehicles will often ask you for a fare aswell and you will most likely find yourself mixing payed rides and hitchhiking to get forward. Prices are very reasonable and usually the same for foreigners, apart from obvious tourist destinations.
Even if you have a tight budget, you'll be able to pay or give back and it's your personal decision what to make of it.
Still, in case you are completely without money, you can still hitchhike and find people who give you food and shelter. 
It will require more patience and a lot of asking, but it's possible.

When hitchhiking in Lower Casamance, be aware of the ongoing armed conflict there, it might be unwise to walk between towns on your own or even to accept ride offers of strangers. Check the situation before you set out. Finding rides at the many police checkpoints is also a great and easy way to hitch. Tell the officers where you are going and they will stop all vehicles and organise a free  and safe ride for you.

=== Cities connected by major roads ===
* [[Dakar]]
* [[Kaolack]]
* [[Kedougou]]
* [[Kolda]]
* [[Mbour]]
* [[Saint-Louis (Senegal)|St Louis]]
* [[Thies]]
* [[Tambacounda]]
* [[Velingara]]
* [[Ziguinchor]]

=== Border Crossings ===
;Towards [[Mali]]
;Towards [[Mauritania]]
The main border crossing between Senegal and Mauritania is Rosso, which is famous for its hustlers. After making it to Rosso (possibly you'll have to walk the short way from the road to Richard Toll because there's not that much at Rosso) you'll get your exit stamp, exchange money and then cross on the ferry to the Mauritanian side (free for foot passengers). If you want to hitch, ignore the numerous offers for taxis you will receive and walk out of town (around 1km) where (as of March 2011) there is a rotting donkey next to which hitching seems sensible. There is a second road further to the West going through the Diama national park. This is a dirt road with little traffic, most of which is coming from Mauritania anyway (overlanders wanting to avoid the hassle of Rosso). The Diama border is quick and painless. The dirt road might be challenging in the rainy season but [[The-nomaddicts]] had no problem hitching through it in January 2020.
;Towards [[Guinea-Bissau]]
If you have time and a bit of luck, hitching towards the border at Mpack from Ziguinchor is possible. Walk out of Ziguinchor towards the border and stick out your thumb to see what happens.
;Towards [[Guinea]]
Hitching towards Guinea is a very hard task. From Kedgougou, only 4x4s with very determined drivers are able to make it to Mali-ville (usually one every couple of days), and even though there is a new paved road being built from Upper Casamance to Koundara, it will be some time until it will be viable for most cars.
As of February 2020, the road from Upper Casamance to Koundara is paved, in good shape and had a good amount of traffic on it. [[The-nomaddicts]] had no problem hitching from Tambacounda to Koundara. 
;Towards [[The Gambia]]
It's very easy to hitchhike towards/into The Gambia from the north due to the high traffic of Europeans going to sell their cars down there.

=== Personal Experiences ===

I'll talk about my only experience hitchhiking in Senegal (Jun 2018). I made the route from Thiès to St. Louis: 200 km in approximately 7 hours of travel. The conditions of the N2 road is good, many cars stop but most are private taxis, you have to have patience. I was waiting 3 hours at a police checkpoint until a truck took me to Louga. There are many police controls on the outskirts of the city, it is a good place to stop cars, sometimes the police ask drivers for your trip. I was 5 minutes at a police checkpoint and a driver took me to St. Louis.  (Video of the trip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f8Vv4kmAjS8) - ViajaZero.org 

"HJitchhiking is very easily doable" to be extremely optimistic. I spent 5 hours on the main road outside Kedougou with no luck, even though lots of private, half-empty vehicles passed me. Plus the locals had no qualms about queue-jumping, standing in front of me to flag rides for themselves. Then I faced another problem: I gave up and decided to flag down public transport, but buses and sept-place taxis fill up before leaving the towns, so if you are waiting on the edge of a city, they will always be full - TonyPro 

Hitched Senegal throughout Jan 2020-Feb 2020. We hitchhiked all over the country starting in Diama, going into Dakar, around The Gambia through Tambacounda, down into and around Casamance, and back east all around the Kedougou region. We had to be patient, especially when hitching in remote areas outside of Kedougou but never had to wait more than 3 hours for a ride. Learning the Wolof phrase for hitchhiking and a few others was definitely helpful! - [[The-nomaddicts]]




== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{IsIn|Western Africa}}

[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Senegal]]
[[ru:Сенегал]]</text>
      <sha1>lblfnszc05cbejlror24t8ub09evgs8</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Morocco</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1526</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1557</id>
      <parentid>4402</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-23T19:48:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1158">Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Sticking out the index finger instead of the thumb is the local way apparently.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good oppertunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet.

About border crossings: 
:"''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''"

==Cities==
* [[Casablanca]]
* 


==See Also==
[[Western Sahara]]

[[Category:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>5z51oqyxt0njko2dl4qnrjqqbkud8ua</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1558</id>
      <parentid>1557</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1158">Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Sticking out the index finger instead of the thumb is the local way apparently.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good oppertunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet.

About border crossings: 
:"''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''"

==Cities==
* [[Casablanca]]
* 


==See Also==
[[Western Sahara]]

[[Category:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>5z51oqyxt0njko2dl4qnrjqqbkud8ua</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4399</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T18:03:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GuakaTest</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="605">Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Sticking out the index finger instead of the thumb is the local way apparently.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good oppertunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet.

==See Also==
[[Western Sahara]]

[[Category:North Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>b23e5n3sl1d6fvghmuf9g54ooj7xenf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4400</id>
      <parentid>4399</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T14:14:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="599">Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Sticking out the index finger instead of the thumb is the local way apparently.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good oppertunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet.

==See Also==
[[Western Sahara]]

[[Category:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>6ynci5xw67ik2ilunqbpe398caqaevi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4401</id>
      <parentid>4400</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-23T13:18:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>80.186.152.49</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1113">Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Sticking out the index finger instead of the thumb is the local way apparently.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good oppertunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet.

About border crossings: I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to Ceuta. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!

==See Also==
[[Western Sahara]]

[[Category:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>mnyzmgo6h2tfe58lrdin81oxvjtnd05</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4402</id>
      <parentid>4401</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-23T19:48:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1154">Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Sticking out the index finger instead of the thumb is the local way apparently.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good oppertunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet.

About border crossings: 
:"I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!"

==Cities==
* [[Casablanca]]
* 


==See Also==
[[Western Sahara]]

[[Category:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>ic97arniky4yg89e2tf4cbiehoxnppk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4403</id>
      <parentid>1558</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1158">Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Sticking out the index finger instead of the thumb is the local way apparently.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good oppertunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet.

About border crossings: 
:"''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''"

==Cities==
* [[Casablanca]]
* 


==See Also==
[[Western Sahara]]

[[Category:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>5z51oqyxt0njko2dl4qnrjqqbkud8ua</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12531</id>
      <parentid>4403</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-31T12:19:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1289">[[Image:Carl Nai Maroc.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Carl|Carl]] and his hitch partner Naomi leaving [[Cardiff]] for [[Morocco]].]]
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Sticking out the index finger instead of the thumb is the local way apparently.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good oppertunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet.

About border crossings: 
:"''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''"

==Cities==
* [[Casablanca]]
* 


==See Also==
[[Western Sahara]]

[[Category:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>5pilmklk6qfwack5i1u1uajxld8z2mf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12533</id>
      <parentid>12531</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-31T12:22:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1700">[[Image:Carl Nai Maroc.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Carl|Carl]] and his hitch partner Naomi leaving [[Cardiff]] for [[Morocco]].]]
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Sticking out the index finger instead of the thumb is the local way apparently.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good oppertunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet.

About border crossings: 
:"''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''"

==LCD==
From  http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/:
"The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in."

==Cities==
* [[Casablanca]]
* 


==See Also==
[[Western Sahara]]

[[Category:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>910wo6ebhcoqcg80ke7p3dek15z7xae</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14795</id>
      <parentid>12533</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-13T23:22:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1720">[[Image:Carl Nai Maroc.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Carl|Carl]] and his hitch partner Naomi leaving [[Cardiff]] for [[Morocco]].]]
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Sticking out the index finger instead of the thumb is the local way apparently.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good oppertunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet.

About border crossings: 
: "''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''"

== LCD ==
From  http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/:
"The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in."

== Cities ==
* [[Casablanca]]

== See Also ==
[[Western Sahara]]


[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]</text>
      <sha1>li8fwz4iymtwcmu1jh7is71ir8cupno</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15003</id>
      <parentid>14795</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-20T09:31:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>128.214.200.13</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1589">Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Sticking out the index finger instead of the thumb is the local way apparently.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good oppertunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet.

About border crossings: 
: "''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''"

== LCD ==
From  http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/:
"The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in."

== Cities ==
* [[Casablanca]]

== See Also ==
[[Western Sahara]]


[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]</text>
      <sha1>gvi3cu7732jw2nn5l5er4kcbhezpca0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16488</id>
      <parentid>15003</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-15T23:00:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1615">Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Sticking out the index finger instead of the thumb is the local way apparently.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good oppertunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet.

About border crossings: 
: "''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''"

== LCD ==
From  http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/:
"The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in."

== Cities ==
* [[Casablanca]]

== See Also ==
[[Western Sahara]]


[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}</text>
      <sha1>rj3h7fisvk2dnsxn0ti48rf8vwtahc6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16493</id>
      <parentid>16488</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-16T01:35:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1616">Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Sticking out the index finger instead of the thumb is the local way apparently.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good oppertunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet.

About border crossings: 
: "''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''"

== LCD ==
From  http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/:
"The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in."

== Cities ==
* [[Casablanca]]

== See Also ==
[[Western Sahara]]


[[Category:Africa]]

{{hitchbase_country|133}}

[[de:Marokko]]</text>
      <sha1>ezecdwdmx4kl86ttk8im65wguyzdtx4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16744</id>
      <parentid>16493</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-26T20:07:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1864">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Sticking out the index finger instead of the thumb is the local way apparently.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good oppertunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet.

=== Cities ===
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Rabat]]

=== Personal Experiences ===
About border crossings: 
: "''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''"

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
[[Western Sahara]]


[[Category:Africa]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
[[de:Marokko]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>jwmu724352wbzyn0qnbpgqj5806uw04</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16753</id>
      <parentid>16744</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-26T20:47:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1878">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Sticking out the index finger instead of the thumb is the local way apparently.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good oppertunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet.

=== Cities ===
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]

=== Personal Experiences ===
About border crossings: 
: "''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''"

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
[[Western Sahara]]


[[Category:Africa]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
[[de:Marokko]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>mifceue9decem56tspgcbj9aerwvvm8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16793</id>
      <parentid>16753</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-28T19:30:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1913">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Sticking out the index finger instead of the thumb is the local way apparently.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good oppertunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet.

=== Cities ===
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]], [[Tetouan]]

=== Personal Experiences ===
About border crossings: 
: "''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''"

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
[[Western Sahara]]

[[Category:Morocco|*]]
[[Category:Africa]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
[[de:Marokko]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>0945e7f0ou6r2uh5ec9qhnm5390ex5v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16795</id>
      <parentid>16793</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-28T22:51:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1970">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Sticking out the index finger instead of the thumb is the local way apparently.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good oppertunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet.

=== Cities ===
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]], [[Tetouan]]

=== Personal Experiences ===
&lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
About border crossings: 
: "''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''"

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
[[Western Sahara]]

[[Category:Morocco|*]]
[[Category:Africa]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
[[de:Marokko]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>5tmrkesfw48as31uqud6481x2reyxbn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16816</id>
      <parentid>16795</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-30T01:34:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1971">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Sticking out the index finger instead of the thumb is the local way apparently.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good oppertunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet.

=== Cities ===
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]], [[Tetouan]]

=== Personal Experiences ===
&lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
About border crossings: 
: "''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''"

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
[[Western Sahara]]

[[Category:Morocco|*]]
[[Category:Africa]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__

[[de:Marokko]]</text>
      <sha1>n6qyfauiqatvqc5mjzmvylic8lj7zgd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17421</id>
      <parentid>16816</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-02T17:47:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1990">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Sticking out the index finger instead of the thumb is the local way apparently.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good oppertunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet.

=== Cities ===
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

=== Personal Experiences ===
&lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
About border crossings: 
: "''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''"

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
[[Western Sahara]]

[[Category:Morocco|*]]
[[Category:Africa]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__

[[de:Marokko]]</text>
      <sha1>i77i7c57hvdgvbm6mb7h5svk8xodbgq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17449</id>
      <parentid>17421</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-02T18:38:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1988">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Sticking out the index finger instead of the thumb is the local way apparently.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good oppertunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet.

=== Cities ===
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

=== Personal Experiences ===
&lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
About border crossings: 
: "''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''"

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
[[Western Sahara]]

[[Category:Morocco]]
[[Category:Africa]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__

[[de:Marokko]]</text>
      <sha1>1fz40uyvl3zf8it96z019gnkqsnhqkw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17579</id>
      <parentid>17449</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-04T11:22:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2011">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Sticking out the index finger instead of the thumb is the local way apparently.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good oppertunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet.

=== Cities ===
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

=== Personal Experiences ===
&lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
About border crossings: 
: "''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''"

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
[[Western Sahara]]

[[Category:Morocco]]
[[Category:Africa]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__

[[de:Marokko]]</text>
      <sha1>dcyvyn5vz0625lc00agnyjg6x7y36l0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17873</id>
      <parentid>17579</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-11T18:05:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2027">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Sticking out the index finger instead of the thumb is the local way apparently.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good oppertunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet.

=== Cities ===
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

=== Personal Experiences ===
&lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
About border crossings: 
: "''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''"

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
[[Western Sahara]]

[[Category:Morocco]]
[[Category:Africa]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__

[[de:Marokko]]</text>
      <sha1>h2s12q0jtwyzscqkxuolysj6pvthuk2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17937</id>
      <parentid>17873</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-15T15:32:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2043">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Sticking out the index finger instead of the thumb is the local way apparently.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good oppertunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet.

=== Cities ===
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

=== Personal Experiences ===
&lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
About border crossings: 
: "''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''"

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
[[Western Sahara]]

[[Category:Morocco]]
[[Category:Africa]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__

[[de:Marokko]]</text>
      <sha1>01f3g0cuw0k6wtsqpbw0rei9t9qzel9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18277</id>
      <parentid>17937</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-02-01T19:33:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>87.217.8.243</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2056">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'')
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Sticking out the index finger instead of the thumb is the local way apparently.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet.

=== Cities ===
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

=== Personal Experiences ===
&lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
About border crossings: 
: "''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''"

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
[[Western Sahara]]

[[Category:Morocco]]
[[Category:Africa]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__

[[de:Marokko]]</text>
      <sha1>287uqj8p52qfuydolqit9d2624n2yij</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21265</id>
      <parentid>18277</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-14T22:34:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2049">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Sticking out the index finger instead of the thumb is the local way apparently.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet.

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

== Personal Experiences ==
&lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
About border crossings: 
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [[Western Sahara]]


[[Category:Morocco]]
[[Category:Africa]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}

[[de:Marokko]]

__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>ahl5umj6d2yptb0g9tilq5d940y5uge</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21266</id>
      <parentid>21265</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-14T22:34:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2049">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Sticking out the index finger instead of the thumb is the local way apparently.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet.

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

== Personal Experiences ==
&lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
About border crossings: 
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [[Western Sahara]]


[[Category:Morocco]]
[[Category:Africa]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}

__NOTOC__

[[de:Marokko]]</text>
      <sha1>mcozt4stwowp4woffvlfkbwwndsz626</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21517</id>
      <parentid>21266</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-18T10:42:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2072">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Sticking out the index finger instead of the thumb is the local way apparently.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet.

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

== Personal Experiences ==
&lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
About border crossings: 
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [[Western Sahara]]


[[Category:Morocco]]
[[Category:Africa]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
[[de:Marokko]]
{{IsIn|Northern Africa}}</text>
      <sha1>go1zsarsj05ivxu4aegn5s07p2d6nhx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21922</id>
      <parentid>21517</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-21T22:11:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2073">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Sticking out the index finger instead of the thumb is the local way apparently.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet.

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

== Personal Experiences ==
&lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
About border crossings: 
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [[Western Sahara]]


[[Category:Morocco]]
[[Category:Africa]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Northern Africa}}

[[de:Marokko]]</text>
      <sha1>sl0tir9irmbr0ckephzab1b1hr4gl09</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21963</id>
      <parentid>21922</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-21T22:31:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2090">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Sticking out the index finger instead of the thumb is the local way apparently.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet.

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

== Personal Experiences ==
&lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
About border crossings: 
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [[Western Sahara]]


[[Category:Morocco]]
[[Category:Africa]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Northern Africa}}

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>k2lvxbu721myxjzayg2191krdblfv2l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26555</id>
      <parentid>21963</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-29T00:04:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Eli</username>
        <id>1621</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3302">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Sticking out the index finger instead of the thumb is the local way apparently.



Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet.

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

==Sleeping==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 Dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind.

===Under the Stars===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

===Getting invited into people homes===

If you are humble and quiet and kind this will come quite easily. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breath.   


== Personal Experiences ==
&lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
About border crossings: 
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [[Western Sahara]]


[[Category:Morocco]]
[[Category:Africa]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Northern Africa}}

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>6u9gms5n0igturb0fy25mlkkrmj5o53</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26559</id>
      <parentid>26555</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-29T00:12:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Eli</username>
        <id>1621</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5149">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Sticking out the index finger instead of the thumb is the local way apparently.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet.

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

==Sleeping==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 Dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind.

===Under the Stars===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

===Getting invited into people homes===

If you are humble and quiet and kind this will come quite easily. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breath.   

==Safety==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

===Cigarette Scam===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to Mauritania are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 Moroccan Dirham (MAD) per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.


== Personal Experiences ==
&lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
About border crossings: 
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [[Western Sahara]]


[[Category:Morocco]]
[[Category:Africa]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Northern Africa}}

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>8pfh7wr60kbg98tqhk6wgxgh56d0g1v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26564</id>
      <parentid>26559</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-29T00:33:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Eli</username>
        <id>1621</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9222">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Some Moroccans stick out the index finger instead of the thumb. This gesture indicates the person is willing to pay for the ride.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

==Language==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and Algeria are signifcantly different than Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the Middle East and other parts of Africa. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit-legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.  


==Police==

Police in Morocco are a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are common especially when the King is nearby. Approch them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, hammams roads out of town etc. 


==Sleeping==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 Dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind.

===Under the Stars===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

===Getting invited into people homes===

If you are humble and quiet and kind this will come quite easily. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breath.   

==Safety==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.



===Cigarette Scam===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to Mauritania are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 Moroccan Dirham (MAD) per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

===Drugs===

Hashish and kif are widely smoked in Morocco. Buying on the street is not advised. Sometimes dealers work with police who will then bust the buyer. More likely you will get low grade product or even henna for an inflated price. At best you will pay a ‘tourist tax’ of at least 500%. 


==Religion and Politics==

===Religion===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected—especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other nonmonotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad  etc. to yourself. 

===Western Sahara===
		
Western Sahara is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

===The King===

Morocco is a Monarchy and King Muhammad V is universally respected if not always liked. You will see his picture in nearly every café, office, shop and more than a few homes. Many consider his father Hassan II a tyrant and his reign is often known by Moroccans as the Black Years. Still, avoid saying anything that could be construed as criticism of any member of the royal family, dead or alive.

== Personal Experiences ==
&lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
About border crossings: 
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [[Western Sahara]]


[[Category:Morocco]]
[[Category:Africa]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Northern Africa}}

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>0etc3v32bcchw5b35v43qast1pp8gy9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27368</id>
      <parentid>26564</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-08T03:12:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sigurdas</username>
        <id>1658</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9209">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Some Moroccans stick out the index finger instead of the thumb. This gesture indicates the person is willing to pay for the ride.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

== Cities ==
&lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

==Language==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and Algeria are signifcantly different than Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the Middle East and other parts of Africa. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit-legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.  


==Police==

Police in Morocco are a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are common especially when the King is nearby. Approch them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, hammams roads out of town etc. 


==Sleeping==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 Dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind.

===Under the Stars===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

===Getting invited into people homes===

If you are humble and quiet and kind this will come quite easily. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breath.   

==Safety==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.



===Cigarette Scam===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to Mauritania are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 Moroccan Dirham (MAD) per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

===Drugs===

Hashish and kif are widely smoked in Morocco. Buying on the street is not advised. Sometimes dealers work with police who will then bust the buyer. More likely you will get low grade product or even henna for an inflated price. At best you will pay a ‘tourist tax’ of at least 500%. 


==Religion and Politics==

===Religion===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected—especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other nonmonotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad  etc. to yourself. 

===Western Sahara===
		
Western Sahara is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

===The King===

Morocco is a Monarchy and King Muhammad V is universally respected if not always liked. You will see his picture in nearly every café, office, shop and more than a few homes. Many consider his father Hassan II a tyrant and his reign is often known by Moroccans as the Black Years. Still, avoid saying anything that could be construed as criticism of any member of the royal family, dead or alive.

== Personal Experiences ==
About border crossings: 
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [[Western Sahara]]

[[Category:Northern Africa]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Northern Africa}}

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>i2d268fk81s2orkyjdueb392ir14icq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29713</id>
      <parentid>27368</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-05T10:36:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Quarim</username>
        <id>1290</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9266">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Some Moroccans stick out the index finger instead of the thumb. This gesture indicates the person is willing to pay for the ride.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

== Cities ==
&lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

==Language==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and Algeria are signifcantly different than Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the Middle East and other parts of Africa. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit-legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.  


==Police==

Police in Morocco are a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are common especially when the King is nearby. Approch them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, hammams roads out of town etc. 


==Sleeping==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 Dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind.

===Under the Stars===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

===Getting invited into people homes===

If you are humble and quiet and kind this will come quite easily. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breath.   

==Safety==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.



===Cigarette Scam===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to Mauritania are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 Moroccan Dirham (MAD) per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

===Drugs===

Hashish and kif are widely smoked in Morocco. Buying on the street is not advised. Sometimes dealers work with police who will then bust the buyer. More likely you will get low grade product or even henna for an inflated price. At best you will pay a ‘tourist tax’ of at least 500%. 


==Religion and Politics==

===Religion===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected—especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other nonmonotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad  etc. to yourself. 

===Western Sahara===
		
Western Sahara is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

===The King===

Morocco is a Monarchy and King Muhammad V is universally respected if not always liked. You will see his picture in nearly every café, office, shop and more than a few homes. Many consider his father Hassan II a tyrant and his reign is often known by Moroccans as the Black Years. Still, avoid saying anything that could be construed as criticism of any member of the royal family, dead or alive.

===Border crossing===

The border to Algeria is closed.

== Personal Experiences ==
About border crossings: 
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [[Western Sahara]]

[[Category:Northern Africa]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Northern Africa}}

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>sptyq8u865a1ivyxb24qgdebusxrfxc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29714</id>
      <parentid>29713</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-05T10:37:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Quarim</username>
        <id>1290</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9267">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Some Moroccans stick out the index finger instead of the thumb. This gesture indicates the person is willing to pay for the ride.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

== Cities ==
&lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

==Language==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are signifcantly different than Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the Middle East and other parts of Africa. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit-legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

==Police==

Police in Morocco are a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are common especially when the King is nearby. Approch them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, hammams roads out of town etc. 


==Sleeping==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 Dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind.

===Under the Stars===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

===Getting invited into people homes===

If you are humble and quiet and kind this will come quite easily. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breath.   

==Safety==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.



===Cigarette Scam===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to Mauritania are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 Moroccan Dirham (MAD) per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

===Drugs===

Hashish and kif are widely smoked in Morocco. Buying on the street is not advised. Sometimes dealers work with police who will then bust the buyer. More likely you will get low grade product or even henna for an inflated price. At best you will pay a ‘tourist tax’ of at least 500%. 


==Religion and Politics==

===Religion===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected—especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other nonmonotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad  etc. to yourself. 

===Western Sahara===
		
Western Sahara is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

===The King===

Morocco is a Monarchy and King Muhammad V is universally respected if not always liked. You will see his picture in nearly every café, office, shop and more than a few homes. Many consider his father Hassan II a tyrant and his reign is often known by Moroccans as the Black Years. Still, avoid saying anything that could be construed as criticism of any member of the royal family, dead or alive.

===Border crossing===

The border to Algeria is closed.

== Personal Experiences ==
About border crossings: 
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [[Western Sahara]]

[[Category:Northern Africa]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Northern Africa}}

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>nlyhcqhl6xms9r562u41wdc31g8b5rp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30594</id>
      <parentid>29714</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-29T18:48:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9275">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Some Moroccans stick out the index finger instead of the thumb. This gesture indicates the person is willing to pay for the ride.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

==Language==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are signifcantly different than Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the Middle East and other parts of Africa. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit-legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

==Police==

Police in Morocco are a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are common especially when the King is nearby. Approch them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, hammams roads out of town etc. 


==Sleeping==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 Dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind.

===Under the Stars===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

===Getting invited into people homes===

If you are humble and quiet and kind this will come quite easily. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breath.   

==Safety==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.



===Cigarette Scam===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to Mauritania are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 Moroccan Dirham (MAD) per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

===Drugs===

Hashish and kif are widely smoked in Morocco. Buying on the street is not advised. Sometimes dealers work with police who will then bust the buyer. More likely you will get low grade product or even henna for an inflated price. At best you will pay a ‘tourist tax’ of at least 500%. 


==Religion and Politics==

===Religion===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected—especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other nonmonotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad  etc. to yourself. 

===Western Sahara===
		
Western Sahara is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

===The King===

Morocco is a Monarchy and King Muhammad V is universally respected if not always liked. You will see his picture in nearly every café, office, shop and more than a few homes. Many consider his father Hassan II a tyrant and his reign is often known by Moroccans as the Black Years. Still, avoid saying anything that could be construed as criticism of any member of the royal family, dead or alive.

===Border crossing===

The border to Algeria is closed.

== Personal Experiences ==
About border crossings: 
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [[Western Sahara]]

[[Category:Northern Africa]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Northern Africa}}

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>7qpxf5b9z23u2i32rrs1gpqbyp2ruu8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31421</id>
      <parentid>30594</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-02T06:46:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>78.184.1.2</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9383">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Some Moroccans stick out the index finger instead of the thumb. This gesture indicates the person is willing to pay for the ride.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

==Language==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are signifcantly different than Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the Middle East and other parts of Africa. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit-legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

==Police==

Police in Morocco are a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are common especially when the King is nearby. Approch them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, hammams roads out of town etc. 


==Sleeping==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 Dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind.

===Under the Stars===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

===Getting invited into people homes===

If you are humble and quiet and kind this will come quite easily. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breath.   

==Safety==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.



===Cigarette Scam===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to Mauritania are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 Moroccan Dirham (MAD) per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

===Drugs===

Hashish and kif are widely smoked in Morocco. Buying on the street is not advised. Sometimes dealers work with police who will then bust the buyer. More likely you will get low grade product or even henna for an inflated price. At best you will pay a ‘tourist tax’ of at least 500%. 


==Religion and Politics==

===Religion===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected—especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other nonmonotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad  etc. to yourself. 

===Western Sahara===
		
Western Sahara is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

===The King===

Morocco is a Monarchy and King Muhammad V is universally respected if not always liked. You will see his picture in nearly every café, office, shop and more than a few homes. Many consider his father Hassan II a tyrant and his reign is often known by Moroccans as the Black Years. Still, avoid saying anything that could be construed as criticism of any member of the royal family, dead or alive.

===Border crossing===

The border to Algeria is closed.

== Personal Experiences ==
About border crossings: 
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco: http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html
* [[Western Sahara]]

[[Category:Northern Africa]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Northern Africa}}

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>tj9plvmx1lkh5f57n5jyyt5pn1zdotz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>33971</id>
      <parentid>31421</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-06-16T01:26:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Gardner</username>
        <id>1916</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9383">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Some Moroccans stick out the index finger instead of the thumb. This gesture indicates the person is willing to pay for the ride.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

==Language==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are signifcantly different than Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the Middle East and other parts of Africa. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit-legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

==Police==

Police in Morocco are a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are common especially when the King is nearby. Approch them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, hammams roads out of town etc. 


==Sleeping==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 Dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind.

===Under the Stars===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

===Getting invited into people's homes===

If you are humble and quiet and kind this will come quite easily. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

==Safety==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.



===Cigarette Scam===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to Mauritania are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 Moroccan Dirham (MAD) per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

===Drugs===

Hashish and kif are widely smoked in Morocco. Buying on the street is not advised. Sometimes dealers work with police who will then bust the buyer. More likely you will get low grade product or even henna for an inflated price. At best you will pay a ‘tourist tax’ of at least 500%. 


==Religion and Politics==

===Religion===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected—especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other nonmonotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad  etc. to yourself. 

===Western Sahara===
		
Western Sahara is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

===The King===

Morocco is a Monarchy and King Muhammad V is universally respected if not always liked. You will see his picture in nearly every café, office, shop and more than a few homes. Many consider his father Hassan II a tyrant and his reign is often known by Moroccans as the Black Years. Still, avoid saying anything that could be construed as criticism of any member of the royal family, dead or alive.

===Border crossing===

The border to Algeria is closed.

== Personal Experiences ==
About border crossings: 
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco: http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html
* [[Western Sahara]]

[[Category:Northern Africa]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Northern Africa}}

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>ryk9brcxn00dofkjg89xu8ovlzkupkk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>33972</id>
      <parentid>33971</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-06-16T04:24:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9384">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Some Moroccans stick out the index finger instead of the thumb. This gesture indicates the person is willing to pay for the ride.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

==Language==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are signifcantly different than Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the Middle East and other parts of Africa. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit-legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

==Police==

Police in Morocco are a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are common especially when the King is nearby. Approch them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, hammams roads out of town etc. 


==Sleeping==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 Dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind.

===Under the Stars===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

===Getting invited into people's homes===

If you are humble and quiet and kind this will come quite easily. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

==Safety==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.



===Cigarette Scam===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to Mauritania are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 Moroccan Dirham (MAD) per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

===Drugs===

Hashish and kif are widely smoked in Morocco. Buying on the street is not advised. Sometimes dealers work with police who will then bust the buyer. More likely you will get low grade product or even henna for an inflated price. At best you will pay a ‘tourist tax’ of at least 500%. 


==Religion and Politics==

===Religion===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected—especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other nonmonotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad  etc. to yourself. 

===Western Sahara===
		
Western Sahara is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

===The King===

Morocco is a Monarchy and King Muhammad V is universally respected if not always liked. You will see his picture in nearly every café, office, shop and more than a few homes. Many consider his father Hassan II a tyrant and his reign is often known by Moroccans as the Black Years. Still, avoid saying anything that could be construed as criticism of any member of the royal family, dead or alive.

===Border crossing===

The border to Algeria is closed.

== Personal Experiences ==
About border crossings: 
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]

[[Category:Northern Africa]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Northern Africa}}

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>9e08u7ekz1v49qv8fx2uj64b70x4gxo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>33973</id>
      <parentid>33972</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-06-16T04:32:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9389">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Some Moroccans stick out the index finger instead of the thumb. This gesture indicates the person is willing to pay for the ride.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

==Language==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are signifcantly different than Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the Middle East and other parts of Africa. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit-legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

==Police==

Police in Morocco are a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are common especially when the King is nearby. Approch them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, hammams roads out of town etc. 


==Sleeping==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 Dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind.

===Under the Stars===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

===Getting invited into people's homes===

If you are humble and quiet and kind this will come quite easily. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

==Safety==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.



===Cigarette Scam===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to Mauritania are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 Moroccan Dirham (MAD) per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

===Drugs===

Hashish and kif are widely smoked in Morocco. Buying on the street is not advised. Sometimes dealers work with police who will then bust the buyer. More likely you will get low grade product or even henna for an inflated price. At best you will pay a ‘tourist tax’ of at least 500%. 


==Religion and Politics==

===Religion===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected—especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other nonmonotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad  etc. to yourself. 

===Western Sahara===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

===The King===

Morocco is a Monarchy and King Muhammad V is universally respected if not always liked. You will see his picture in nearly every café, office, shop and more than a few homes. Many consider his father Hassan II a tyrant and his reign is often known by Moroccans as the Black Years. Still, avoid saying anything that could be construed as criticism of any member of the royal family, dead or alive.

===[[Border crossing]]===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]

[[Category:Northern Africa]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Northern Africa}}

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>sw4ywt1j0nt0oz91fu2zwcwv4i5tte4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35198</id>
      <parentid>33973</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T18:09:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9415">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Some Moroccans stick out the index finger instead of the thumb. This gesture indicates the person is willing to pay for the ride.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are signifcantly different than Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the Middle East and other parts of Africa. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit-legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco are a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are common especially when the King is nearby. Approch them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, hammams roads out of town etc. 


== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 Dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and quiet and kind this will come quite easily. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.



=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to Mauritania are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 Moroccan Dirham (MAD) per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

=== Drugs ===

Hashish and kif are widely smoked in Morocco. Buying on the street is not advised. Sometimes dealers work with police who will then bust the buyer. More likely you will get low grade product or even henna for an inflated price. At best you will pay a ‘tourist tax’ of at least 500%. 


== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected—especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other nonmonotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad  etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== The King ===

Morocco is a Monarchy and King Muhammad V is universally respected if not always liked. You will see his picture in nearly every café, office, shop and more than a few homes. Many consider his father Hassan II a tyrant and his reign is often known by Moroccans as the Black Years. Still, avoid saying anything that could be construed as criticism of any member of the royal family, dead or alive.

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Northern Africa}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>7gnxv5obs0hy91ce2285bwgoh368wc4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35759</id>
      <parentid>35198</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-13T12:13:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Quarim</username>
        <id>1290</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9407">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Some Moroccans stick out the index finger instead of the thumb. This gesture indicates the person is willing to pay for the ride.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are signifcantly different than Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the Middle East and other parts of Africa. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit-legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco are a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are common especially when the King is nearby. Approch them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, hammams roads out of town etc. 


== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 Dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and quiet and kind this will come quite easily. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.



=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to Mauritania are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 Moroccan Dirham (MAD) per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

=== Drugs ===

Hashish and kif are widely smoked in Morocco. Buying on the street is not advised. Sometimes dealers work with police who will then bust the buyer. More likely you will get low grade product or even henna for an inflated price. At best you will pay a ‘tourist tax’ of at least 500%. 


== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected—especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other nonmonotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad  etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== The King ===

Morocco is a Monarchy and King Muhammad V is universally respected if not always liked. You will see his picture in nearly every café, office, shop and more than a few homes. Many consider his father Hassan II a tyrant and his reign is often known by Moroccans as the Black Years. Still, avoid saying anything that could be construed as criticism of any member of the royal family, dead or alive.

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>10vihvf0sgj6s6njo9dl69t3ont3kpg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39028</id>
      <parentid>35759</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-12-25T13:57:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Clint.hotvedt</username>
        <id>1885</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9423">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Some Moroccans stick out the index finger instead of the thumb. This gesture indicates the person is willing to pay for the ride.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are signifcantly different than Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the Middle East and other parts of Africa. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit-legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco are a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are common especially when the King is nearby. Approch them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, hammams roads out of town etc. 


== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 Dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and quiet and kind this will come quite easily. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.



=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to Mauritania are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 Moroccan Dirham (MAD) per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

=== Drugs ===

Hashish and kif are widely smoked in Morocco. Buying on the street is not advised. Sometimes dealers work with police who will then bust the buyer. More likely you will get low grade product or even henna for an inflated price. At best you will pay a ‘tourist tax’ of at least 500%. 


== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected—especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other nonmonotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad  etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== The King ===

Morocco is a Monarchy and King Muhammad V is universally respected if not always liked. You will see his picture in nearly every café, office, shop and more than a few homes. Many consider his father Hassan II a tyrant and his reign is often known by Moroccans as the Black Years. Still, avoid saying anything that could be construed as criticism of any member of the royal family, dead or alive.

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>oyg6s25dv146weqm3cak6rjrx62snkl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>43772</id>
      <parentid>39028</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-08-05T09:58:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Vrana</username>
        <id>2467</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9739">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Some Moroccans stick out the index finger instead of the thumb. This gesture indicates the person is willing to pay for the ride.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are signifcantly different than Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the Middle East and other parts of Africa. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit-legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco are a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are common especially when the King is nearby. Approch them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, hammams roads out of town etc. 


== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 Dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and quiet and kind this will come quite easily. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.



=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to Mauritania are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 Moroccan Dirham (MAD) per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

=== Drugs ===

Hashish and kif are widely smoked in Morocco. Buying on the street is not advised. Sometimes dealers work with police who will then bust the buyer. More likely you will get low grade product or even henna for an inflated price. At best you will pay a ‘tourist tax’ of at least 500%. 


== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected—especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other nonmonotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad  etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== The King ===

Morocco is a Monarchy and King Muhammad V is universally respected if not always liked. You will see his picture in nearly every café, office, shop and more than a few homes. Many consider his father Hassan II a tyrant and his reign is often known by Moroccans as the Black Years. Still, avoid saying anything that could be construed as criticism of any member of the royal family, dead or alive.

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is suprisingly easy at the Mauritanian embassy in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the mauritanian border), and you will have many long hours of waiting for the final paper in which to talk to the various drivers going south.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>a51fu6g88cb3k3fwjmpy5joua729wde</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>45356</id>
      <parentid>43772</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-09-30T20:24:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>91.210.106.105</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="104">horoscope 2011 le horoscope 
&lt;http&gt;//lehoroscopegratuit.com/ 2011 horoscope] 
horoscope du jour monsieur</text>
      <sha1>mdj4tctc7khx21xm7wssrt4o1aqxdii</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>45358</id>
      <parentid>45356</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-01T00:39:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9739">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Some Moroccans stick out the index finger instead of the thumb. This gesture indicates the person is willing to pay for the ride.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are signifcantly different than Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the Middle East and other parts of Africa. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit-legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco are a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are common especially when the King is nearby. Approch them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, hammams roads out of town etc. 


== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 Dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and quiet and kind this will come quite easily. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.



=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to Mauritania are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 Moroccan Dirham (MAD) per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

=== Drugs ===

Hashish and kif are widely smoked in Morocco. Buying on the street is not advised. Sometimes dealers work with police who will then bust the buyer. More likely you will get low grade product or even henna for an inflated price. At best you will pay a ‘tourist tax’ of at least 500%. 


== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected—especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other nonmonotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad  etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== The King ===

Morocco is a Monarchy and King Muhammad V is universally respected if not always liked. You will see his picture in nearly every café, office, shop and more than a few homes. Many consider his father Hassan II a tyrant and his reign is often known by Moroccans as the Black Years. Still, avoid saying anything that could be construed as criticism of any member of the royal family, dead or alive.

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is suprisingly easy at the Mauritanian embassy in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the mauritanian border), and you will have many long hours of waiting for the final paper in which to talk to the various drivers going south.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>a51fu6g88cb3k3fwjmpy5joua729wde</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>47847</id>
      <parentid>45358</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-11-26T04:32:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8953">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger (not the thumb).

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the Middle East and other parts of Africa. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco are a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 


== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to Mauritania are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian embassy in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the mauritanian border), and you will have many long hours of waiting for the final paper in which to talk to the various drivers going south.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>hv56marr8ch0kt6t6m61if7mf8btkdl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48413</id>
      <parentid>47847</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-24T18:39:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>88.202.201.21</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8972">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger (not the thumb).

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the Middle East and other parts of Africa. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco are a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 


== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to Mauritania are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Casablanca. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for the final paper in which to talk to the various drivers going south.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>pztyr0kboww4cvkjgja4hf9ht3nz8m6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48414</id>
      <parentid>48413</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-24T18:40:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>88.202.201.21</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8971">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger (not the thumb).

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the Middle East and other parts of Africa. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco are a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 


== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to Mauritania are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Casablanca. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>rvmocmx41zog71mh8vtiws2dc8a2r77</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>51650</id>
      <parentid>48414</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-04-07T21:02:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9280">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the Middle East and other parts of Africa. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 


== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to Mauritania are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Casablanca. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>n5mwmpdnefgm2bhcncdrjutii9hiap4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>54620</id>
      <parentid>51650</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-09-05T16:24:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9297">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}

Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the Middle East and other parts of Africa. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 


== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to Mauritania are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Casablanca. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>53fuzlkh0ciyo7ryno8q02e3nt7os10</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>55086</id>
      <parentid>54620</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-09-23T01:11:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9306">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}

Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the Middle East and other parts of Africa. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 


== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to Mauritania are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Casablanca. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>1s71dp03456fejlcq0danfnxqozu4gi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>57475</id>
      <parentid>55086</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-11-22T14:13:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9301">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}

Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the Middle East and other parts of Africa. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 


== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to Mauritania are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both Malaga and London. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>frxfboz9dyv0jvwqam99jzwz16kcrfc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>58807</id>
      <parentid>57475</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-01-26T22:49:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Koendev</username>
        <id>4236</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9321">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}

Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the [[Middle East]] and other parts of [[Africa]]. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 


== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to [[Mauritania]] are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both [[Malaga]] and [[London]]. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>8gd2lv5g8qqy0ynmv9s31bdzpbgkup6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>58971</id>
      <parentid>58807</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-02-03T02:37:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tonypro</username>
        <id>4518</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9338">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}

Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. Bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. Many people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Ouarzazate]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the [[Middle East]] and other parts of [[Africa]]. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 


== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to [[Mauritania]] are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both [[Malaga]] and [[London]]. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>b1voqrylf0u8m2o0n0flo4kw56c0rqy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>59560</id>
      <parentid>58971</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-02-05T11:28:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guidoz</username>
        <id>2507</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11425">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}

Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. If you're doing it in hot seasons bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. In winter consider being on short leaves during the day and freezing at night (especially above 800meters of altitude), so plan some "onion layers" clothes. 

Most people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

Far from the big cities you won't need any special spot: everywhere looking like a safe place (ie: cars not going to fast/can see you from far/can stop almost safely) will be fine. The traffic in the countryside is never too big and they can really stop everywhere, sometimes even in spite of the most basic driving rules. You can experience a large variety of lifts: slow drivers and crazy drivers, brand new luxury cars and (especially) 30 years old car, sometimes you can find yourself very packed with many people, or on the back of a van/pick-up. 


Sometimes is not easy to understand if the incoming van is a local bus or just a normal van. The first time you see one you'll probably stop it not understand its a bus.. they're anyway nice and if you explain you don't have money (something like "makeneis fluss" in Arabic) they'll either go away without any complaints or maybe give you a free ride. 

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Ouarzazate]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the [[Middle East]] and other parts of [[Africa]]. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French as most drivers will understand it even if in rural areas they might speak just local languages. It's not anyway too hard to make yourself understood (especially with a map) but expect they to drop you off nearby some bus or taxi station because they might not understand you want to go all the way by thumb. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are quite common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 

In some most touristic areas (ie: on the route from Rissani to Merzouga) police might think your driver is an unauthorized guide illegally getting money from you, so be ready to explain them (in French!) you're just hitchhiking and your driver was just very kind in helping you. Having some picture of your hitchhiking experience will help convincing them, otherwise your driver might get a fine, and of course you'll offer to pay for it.

== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind.

If traveling in winter consider night can get cold (especially around mountains) and they never have heating, so be sure to carry a sleeping bag even if you plan to stay in hotels, as the blanket they give you might not be enough.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to [[Mauritania]] are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both [[Malaga]] and [[London]]. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>2gil7pnpg459swivqkd988n14evc33y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>59561</id>
      <parentid>59560</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-02-05T11:39:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guidoz</username>
        <id>2507</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11422">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}

Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. If you're doing it in hot seasons bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. In winter consider stayin short-sleeved during the day and freeze at night (especially above 800meters of altitude), so plan some "onion layers" clothes. 

Most people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

Far from the big cities you won't need any special spot: everywhere looking like a safe place (ie: cars not going to fast/can see you from far/can stop almost safely) will be fine. The traffic in the countryside is never too big and they can really stop everywhere, sometimes even in spite of the most basic driving rules. You can experience a large variety of lifts: slow drivers and crazy drivers, brand new luxury cars and (especially) 30 years old car, sometimes you can find yourself very packed with many people, or on the back of a van/pick-up. 


Sometimes is not easy to understand if the incoming van is a local bus or just a normal van. The first time you see one you'll probably stop it not understand its a bus.. they're anyway nice and if you explain you don't have money (something like "makeneis fluss" in Arabic) they'll either go away without any complaints or maybe give you a free ride. 

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Ouarzazate]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the [[Middle East]] and other parts of [[Africa]]. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French as most drivers will understand it even if in rural areas they might speak just local languages. It's not anyway too hard to make yourself understood (especially with a map) but expect they to drop you off nearby some bus or taxi station because they might not understand you want to go all the way by thumb. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are quite common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 

In some most touristic areas (ie: on the route from Rissani to Merzouga) police might think your driver is an unauthorized guide illegally getting money from you, so be ready to explain them (in French!) you're just hitchhiking and your driver was just very kind in helping you. Having some picture of your hitchhiking experience will help convincing them, otherwise your driver might get a fine, and of course you'll offer to pay for it.

== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind.

If traveling in winter consider night can get cold (especially around mountains) and they never have heating, so be sure to carry a sleeping bag even if you plan to stay in hotels, as the blanket they give you might not be enough.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to [[Mauritania]] are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both [[Malaga]] and [[London]]. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>fa15yp5ik91v6686esmome5bk9my8am</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>59562</id>
      <parentid>59561</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-02-05T11:44:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guidoz</username>
        <id>2507</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11423">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}

Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. If you're doing it in hot seasons bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. In winter consider stayin short-sleeved during the day and freeze at night (especially above 800meters of altitude), so plan some "onion layers" clothes. 

Most people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

Far from the big cities you won't need any special spot: everywhere looking like a safe place (ie: cars not going to fast/can see you from far/can stop almost safely) will be fine. The traffic in the countryside is never too big and they can really stop everywhere, sometimes even in spite of the most basic driving rules. You can experience a large variety of lifts: slow drivers and crazy drivers, brand new luxury cars and (especially) 30 years old car, sometimes you can find yourself very packed with many people, or on the back of a van/pick-up. 


Sometimes is not easy to understand if the incoming van is a local bus or just a normal van. The first time you see one you'll probably stop it not understand its a bus.. they're anyway nice and if you explain you don't have money (something like "makeynech fluss" in Arabic) they'll either go away without any complaints or maybe give you a free ride. 

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Ouarzazate]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the [[Middle East]] and other parts of [[Africa]]. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French as most drivers will understand it even if in rural areas they might speak just local languages. It's not anyway too hard to make yourself understood (especially with a map) but expect they to drop you off nearby some bus or taxi station because they might not understand you want to go all the way by thumb. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are quite common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 

In some most touristic areas (ie: on the route from Rissani to Merzouga) police might think your driver is an unauthorized guide illegally getting money from you, so be ready to explain them (in French!) you're just hitchhiking and your driver was just very kind in helping you. Having some picture of your hitchhiking experience will help convincing them, otherwise your driver might get a fine, and of course you'll offer to pay for it.

== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind.

If traveling in winter consider night can get cold (especially around mountains) and they never have heating, so be sure to carry a sleeping bag even if you plan to stay in hotels, as the blanket they give you might not be enough.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to [[Mauritania]] are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both [[Malaga]] and [[London]]. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>j3xszplbnssdrelw4awl59cznarbkj1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>59563</id>
      <parentid>59562</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-02-05T11:45:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guidoz</username>
        <id>2507</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11434">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}

Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. If you're doing it in hot seasons bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. In winter consider stayin short-sleeved during the day and freeze at night (especially above 800meters of altitude), so plan some "onion layers" clothes. 

Most people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

Far from the big cities you won't need any special spot: everywhere looking like a safe place (ie: cars not going to fast/can see you from far/can stop almost safely) will be fine. The traffic in the countryside is never too big and they can really stop everywhere, sometimes even in spite of the most basic driving rules. You can experience a large variety of lifts: slow drivers and crazy drivers, brand new luxury cars and (especially) 30 years old car, sometimes you can find yourself very packed with many people, or on the back of a van/pick-up. 

Sometimes is not easy to understand if the incoming van is a local bus or just a normal van. The first time you see one you'll probably stop it not understanding its actually a bus. They're anyway nice and if you explain you don't have money (something like "makeynech fluss" in Arabic) they'll either go away without any complaints or maybe offer you a free ride. 

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Ouarzazate]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the [[Middle East]] and other parts of [[Africa]]. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French as most drivers will understand it even if in rural areas they might speak just local languages. It's not anyway too hard to make yourself understood (especially with a map) but expect they to drop you off nearby some bus or taxi station because they might not understand you want to go all the way by thumb. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are quite common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 

In some most touristic areas (ie: on the route from Rissani to Merzouga) police might think your driver is an unauthorized guide illegally getting money from you, so be ready to explain them (in French!) you're just hitchhiking and your driver was just very kind in helping you. Having some picture of your hitchhiking experience will help convincing them, otherwise your driver might get a fine, and of course you'll offer to pay for it.

== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind.

If traveling in winter consider night can get cold (especially around mountains) and they never have heating, so be sure to carry a sleeping bag even if you plan to stay in hotels, as the blanket they give you might not be enough.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to [[Mauritania]] are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both [[Malaga]] and [[London]]. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>2siy7fdonw7ecjcucmojf5c9c4wmzcf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>59564</id>
      <parentid>59563</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-02-05T16:43:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Koendev</username>
        <id>4236</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11437">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}

Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. If you're doing it in hot seasons bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. In winter consider staying short-sleeved during the day. Expect to freeze at night though (especially above 800meters of altitude), so plan some "onion layers" clothes. 

Most people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

Far from the big cities you won't need any special spot: everywhere looking like a safe place (ie: cars not going to fast/can see you from far/can stop almost safely) will be fine. The traffic in the countryside is never too big and they can really stop everywhere, sometimes even in spite of the most basic driving rules. You can experience a large variety of lifts: slow drivers and crazy drivers, brand new luxury cars and (especially) 30 years old car, sometimes you can find yourself very packed with many people, or on the back of a van/pick-up. 


Sometimes is not easy to understand if the incoming van is a local bus or just a normal van. The first time you see one you'll probably stop it not understand its a bus.. they're anyway nice and if you explain you don't have money (something like "makeneis fluss" in Arabic) they'll either go away without any complaints or maybe give you a free ride. 

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Ouarzazate]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the [[Middle East]] and other parts of [[Africa]]. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French as most drivers will understand it even if in rural areas they might speak just local languages. It's not anyway too hard to make yourself understood (especially with a map) but expect they to drop you off nearby some bus or taxi station because they might not understand you want to go all the way by thumb. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are quite common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 

In some most touristic areas (ie: on the route from Rissani to Merzouga) police might think your driver is an unauthorized guide illegally getting money from you, so be ready to explain them (in French!) you're just hitchhiking and your driver was just very kind in helping you. Having some picture of your hitchhiking experience will help convincing them, otherwise your driver might get a fine, and of course you'll offer to pay for it.

== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind.

If traveling in winter consider night can get cold (especially around mountains) and they never have heating, so be sure to carry a sleeping bag even if you plan to stay in hotels, as the blanket they give you might not be enough.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to [[Mauritania]] are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both [[Malaga]] and [[London]]. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>art1y1uk68fyony83idsme2wfwkmunl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>59660</id>
      <parentid>59564</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-02-13T20:52:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tonypro</username>
        <id>4518</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11527">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}

Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. If you're doing it in hot seasons bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. In winter consider staying short-sleeved during the day. Expect to freeze at night though (especially above 800meters of altitude), so plan some "onion layers" clothes. 

Most people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

Far from the big cities you won't need any special spot: everywhere looking like a safe place (ie: cars not going to fast/can see you from far/can stop almost safely) will be fine. The traffic in the countryside is never too big and they can really stop everywhere, sometimes even in spite of the most basic driving rules. You can experience a large variety of lifts: slow drivers and crazy drivers, brand new luxury cars and (especially) 30 years old car, sometimes you can find yourself very packed with many people, or on the back of a van/pick-up. 


Sometimes is not easy to understand if the incoming van is a local bus or just a normal van. The first time you see one you'll probably stop it not understand its a bus.. they're anyway nice and if you explain you don't have money (something like "makeneis fluss" in Arabic) they'll either go away without any complaints or maybe give you a free ride. 

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Ouarzazate]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]
[[File:2.jpg|thumb|right|Tonypro getting a lift on the N13 between Erfoud and Merzouga.]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the [[Middle East]] and other parts of [[Africa]]. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French as most drivers will understand it even if in rural areas they might speak just local languages. It's not anyway too hard to make yourself understood (especially with a map) but expect they to drop you off nearby some bus or taxi station because they might not understand you want to go all the way by thumb. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are quite common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 

In some most touristic areas (ie: on the route from Rissani to Merzouga) police might think your driver is an unauthorized guide illegally getting money from you, so be ready to explain them (in French!) you're just hitchhiking and your driver was just very kind in helping you. Having some picture of your hitchhiking experience will help convincing them, otherwise your driver might get a fine, and of course you'll offer to pay for it.

== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind.

If traveling in winter consider night can get cold (especially around mountains) and they never have heating, so be sure to carry a sleeping bag even if you plan to stay in hotels, as the blanket they give you might not be enough.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to [[Mauritania]] are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both [[Malaga]] and [[London]]. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>22jsjkig5jn3ukua36dnc6cw2g1e44r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>59661</id>
      <parentid>59660</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-02-13T20:53:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tonypro</username>
        <id>4518</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11546">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}

Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. If you're doing it in hot seasons bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. In winter consider staying short-sleeved during the day. Expect to freeze at night though (especially above 800meters of altitude), so plan some "onion layers" clothes. 

Most people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

Far from the big cities you won't need any special spot: everywhere looking like a safe place (ie: cars not going to fast/can see you from far/can stop almost safely) will be fine. The traffic in the countryside is never too big and they can really stop everywhere, sometimes even in spite of the most basic driving rules. You can experience a large variety of lifts: slow drivers and crazy drivers, brand new luxury cars and (especially) 30 years old car, sometimes you can find yourself very packed with many people, or on the back of a van/pick-up. 


Sometimes is not easy to understand if the incoming van is a local bus or just a normal van. The first time you see one you'll probably stop it not understand its a bus.. they're anyway nice and if you explain you don't have money (something like "makeneis fluss" in Arabic) they'll either go away without any complaints or maybe give you a free ride. 

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Ouarzazate]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]
[[File:2.jpg|thumb|right|Tonypro getting a lift on the N13 between Erfoud and Merzouga during a sandstorm.]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the [[Middle East]] and other parts of [[Africa]]. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French as most drivers will understand it even if in rural areas they might speak just local languages. It's not anyway too hard to make yourself understood (especially with a map) but expect they to drop you off nearby some bus or taxi station because they might not understand you want to go all the way by thumb. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are quite common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 

In some most touristic areas (ie: on the route from Rissani to Merzouga) police might think your driver is an unauthorized guide illegally getting money from you, so be ready to explain them (in French!) you're just hitchhiking and your driver was just very kind in helping you. Having some picture of your hitchhiking experience will help convincing them, otherwise your driver might get a fine, and of course you'll offer to pay for it.

== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind.

If traveling in winter consider night can get cold (especially around mountains) and they never have heating, so be sure to carry a sleeping bag even if you plan to stay in hotels, as the blanket they give you might not be enough.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to [[Mauritania]] are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both [[Malaga]] and [[London]]. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>qzdfqg68jhb3ze65d1caxzr6ecy5uar</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>60391</id>
      <parentid>59661</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-04-03T14:02:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tonypro</username>
        <id>4518</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12063">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}

Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. If you're doing it in hot seasons bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. In winter consider staying short-sleeved during the day. Expect to freeze at night though (especially above 800meters of altitude), so plan some "onion layers" clothes. 

Most people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

Far from the big cities you won't need any special spot: everywhere looking like a safe place (ie: cars not going to fast/can see you from far/can stop almost safely) will be fine. The traffic in the countryside is never too big and they can really stop everywhere, sometimes even in spite of the most basic driving rules. You can experience a large variety of lifts: slow drivers and crazy drivers, brand new luxury cars and (especially) 30 years old car, sometimes you can find yourself very packed with many people, or on the back of a van/pick-up. 


Sometimes is not easy to understand if the incoming van is a local bus or just a normal van. The first time you see one you'll probably stop it not understand its a bus.. they're anyway nice and if you explain you don't have money (something like "makeneis fluss" in Arabic) they'll either go away without any complaints or maybe give you a free ride. 

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Ouarzazate]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]
[[File:2.jpg|thumb|right|Tonypro getting a lift on the N13 between Erfoud and Merzouga during a sandstorm.]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the [[Middle East]] and other parts of [[Africa]]. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French as most drivers will understand it even if in rural areas they might speak just local languages. It's not anyway too hard to make yourself understood (especially with a map) but expect they to drop you off nearby some bus or taxi station because they might not understand you want to go all the way by thumb. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are quite common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 

In some most touristic areas (ie: on the route from Rissani to Merzouga) police might think your driver is an unauthorized guide illegally getting money from you, so be ready to explain them (in French!) you're just hitchhiking and your driver was just very kind in helping you. Having some picture of your hitchhiking experience will help convincing them, otherwise your driver might get a fine, and of course you'll offer to pay for it.

== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind.

The night can get extremely cold for most of the year, especially around mountains. As they seldom have heating, be sure to carry a sleeping bag even if you plan to stay in hotels, as the blanket they give you might not be enough.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to [[Mauritania]] are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

If you get lost in a city (and you will), people will jump to offer to show you the way. They will always expect a tip. This is fair, but make sure that they have actually lead you to your destination, and not intentionally gotten you more lost. It is better to buy something from a shop, and then ask the shopkeeper for directions.

All the money that is involved in tourism has unfortunately made the cities slightly dodgy. But outside urban areas, the people are almost universally polite, welcoming, and honest.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both [[Malaga]] and [[London]]. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>j1jkcmcks8pnou3awcb8jp0jd6za5rk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>60392</id>
      <parentid>60391</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-04-03T14:04:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tonypro</username>
        <id>4518</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12064">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}

Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. If you're doing it in hot seasons bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. In winter consider staying short-sleeved during the day. Expect to freeze at night though (especially above 800meters of altitude), so plan some "onion layers" clothes. 

Most people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

Far from the big cities you won't need any special spot: everywhere looking like a safe place (ie: cars not going to fast/can see you from far/can stop almost safely) will be fine. The traffic in the countryside is never too big and they can really stop everywhere, sometimes even in spite of the most basic driving rules. You can experience a large variety of lifts: slow drivers and crazy drivers, brand new luxury cars and (especially) 30 years old car, sometimes you can find yourself very packed with many people, or on the back of a van/pick-up. 


Sometimes is not easy to understand if the incoming van is a local bus or just a normal van. The first time you see one you'll probably stop it not understand its a bus.. they're anyway nice and if you explain you don't have money (something like "makeneis fluss" in Arabic) they'll either go away without any complaints or maybe give you a free ride. 

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Ouarzazate]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]
[[File:2.jpg|thumb|right|Tonypro getting a lift on the N13 between Erfoud and Merzouga during a sandstorm.]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the [[Middle East]] and other parts of [[Africa]]. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French as most drivers will understand it even if in rural areas they might speak just local languages. It's not anyway too hard to make yourself understood (especially with a map) but expect they to drop you off nearby some bus or taxi station because they might not understand you want to go all the way by thumb. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are quite common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 

In some most touristic areas (ie: on the route from Rissani to Merzouga) police might think your driver is an unauthorized guide illegally getting money from you, so be ready to explain them (in French!) you're just hitchhiking and your driver was just very kind in helping you. Having some picture of your hitchhiking experience will help convincing them, otherwise your driver might get a fine, and of course you'll offer to pay for it.

== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind.

The night can get extremely cold for most of the year, especially around mountains. As they seldom have heating, be sure to carry a sleeping bag even if you plan to stay in hotels, as the blanket they give you might not be enough.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

If you get lost in a city (and you will), people will jump to offer to show you the way. They will always expect a tip. This is fair, but make sure that they have actually lead you to your destination, and not intentionally gotten you more lost. It is better to buy something from a shop, and then ask the shopkeeper for directions.

All the money that is involved in tourism has unfortunately made the cities slightly dodgy. But outside urban areas, the people are almost universally polite, welcoming, and honest.


=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to [[Mauritania]] are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both [[Malaga]] and [[London]]. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>dx9hri4jc9511nuv9prjrkajqnd4z2m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>65114</id>
      <parentid>60392</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-10-21T11:34:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fedecicco</username>
        <id>4349</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12315">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}

Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. If you're doing it in hot seasons bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. In winter consider staying short-sleeved during the day. Expect to freeze at night though (especially above 800meters of altitude), so plan some "onion layers" clothes. 

Most people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

Far from the big cities you won't need any special spot: everywhere looking like a safe place (ie: cars not going to fast/can see you from far/can stop almost safely) will be fine. The traffic in the countryside is never too big and they can really stop everywhere, sometimes even in spite of the most basic driving rules. You can experience a large variety of lifts: slow drivers and crazy drivers, brand new luxury cars and (especially) 30 years old car, sometimes you can find yourself very packed with many people, or on the back of a van/pick-up. 


Sometimes is not easy to understand if the incoming van is a local bus or just a normal van. The first time you see one you'll probably stop it not understand its a bus.. they're anyway nice and if you explain you don't have money (something like "makeneis fluss" in Arabic) they'll either go away without any complaints or maybe give you a free ride. 

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Ouarzazate]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]
[[File:2.jpg|thumb|right|Tonypro getting a lift on the N13 between Erfoud and Merzouga during a sandstorm.]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the [[Middle East]] and other parts of [[Africa]]. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French as most drivers will understand it even if in rural areas they might speak just local languages. It's not anyway too hard to make yourself understood (especially with a map) but expect they to drop you off nearby some bus or taxi station because they might not understand you want to go all the way by thumb. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are quite common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 

In some most touristic areas (ie: on the route from Rissani to Merzouga) police might think your driver is an unauthorized guide illegally getting money from you, so be ready to explain them (in French!) you're just hitchhiking and your driver was just very kind in helping you. Having some picture of your hitchhiking experience will help convincing them, otherwise your driver might get a fine, and of course you'll offer to pay for it.

== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind. Inside cities but also small villages if not invited at home, a very good option is ask for the nocturnal guardian, almost any quarter and village have one, they will show you the place to put your tent or mat and will take care of you in the night. 

The night can get extremely cold for most of the year, especially around mountains. As they seldom have heating, be sure to carry a sleeping bag even if you plan to stay in hotels, as the blanket they give you might not be enough.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

If you get lost in a city (and you will), people will jump to offer to show you the way. They will always expect a tip. This is fair, but make sure that they have actually lead you to your destination, and not intentionally gotten you more lost. It is better to buy something from a shop, and then ask the shopkeeper for directions.

All the money that is involved in tourism has unfortunately made the cities slightly dodgy. But outside urban areas, the people are almost universally polite, welcoming, and honest.


=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to [[Mauritania]] are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both [[Malaga]] and [[London]]. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>i9f8sln48eycfo29bmx3f052aac7f07</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68152</id>
      <parentid>65114</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-01-22T12:48:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fedecicco</username>
        <id>4349</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13614">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}

Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. If you're doing it in hot seasons bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. In winter consider staying short-sleeved during the day. Expect to freeze at night though (especially above 800meters of altitude), so plan some "onion layers" clothes. 

Most people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

Far from the big cities you won't need any special spot: everywhere looking like a safe place (ie: cars not going to fast/can see you from far/can stop almost safely) will be fine. The traffic in the countryside is never too big and they can really stop everywhere, sometimes even in spite of the most basic driving rules. You can experience a large variety of lifts: slow drivers and crazy drivers, brand new luxury cars and (especially) 30 years old car, sometimes you can find yourself very packed with many people, or on the back of a van/pick-up. 


Sometimes is not easy to understand if the incoming van is a local bus or just a normal van. The first time you see one you'll probably stop it not understand its a bus.. they're anyway nice and if you explain you don't have money (something like "makeneis fluss" in Arabic) they'll either go away without any complaints or maybe give you a free ride. 

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Ouarzazate]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]
[[File:2.jpg|thumb|right|Tonypro getting a lift on the N13 between Erfoud and Merzouga during a sandstorm.]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the [[Middle East]] and other parts of [[Africa]]. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French as most drivers will understand it even if in rural areas they might speak just local languages. It's not anyway too hard to make yourself understood (especially with a map) but expect they to drop you off nearby some bus or taxi station because they might not understand you want to go all the way by thumb. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are quite common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 

In some most touristic areas (ie: on the route from Rissani to Merzouga) police might think your driver is an unauthorized guide illegally getting money from you, so be ready to explain them (in French!) you're just hitchhiking and your driver was just very kind in helping you. Having some picture of your hitchhiking experience will help convincing them, otherwise your driver might get a fine, and of course you'll offer to pay for it.

Though often helpful for hitchin, '''police may cause you serious problem free camping or sleeping in the streets'''. They say for your security it is forbidden (also couchsurfing in theory your host shoul take a permission from the police station but nobody cares normally) and you are obliged to go to hotels. No problems if the village/town is that small and don't have any hotel, but if there is even one, they will bring you there.

[[User: Fedecicco| Fede]] has been detained at the police station three times, once in Azilal on the atlas mountains (few time and kind cops), another in Sa'idya (border with Algeria and "maximum suspect", 3-4 hours interrogation and document check) and last in Chefchaouen (the worst ever, kept 5 hours and the day after threaten to be expulsed from the "kingdom" if he didn't leave the ciy).
It seems that if you are vagabond or anyway not conventional tourist they don't like you at all, and they most often like foreigners just cause they bring money into their country.
 
*All the three times they forced me to go to hotel and they pay it for me (imposed the owner not to let me pay) but the annoyance and the questioning was so bothering. The last time even, the most racist sentence ever heard: "you are lucky to have an Italian citizenship"..''Fede''


== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20-40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind. Inside cities but also small villages if not invited at home, a very good option is ask for the nocturnal guardian, almost any quarter and village have one, they will show you the place to put your tent or mat and will take care of you in the night. 

The night can get extremely cold for most of the year, especially around mountains. As they seldom have heating, be sure to carry a sleeping bag even if you plan to stay in hotels, as the blanket they give you might not be enough.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

If you get lost in a city (and you will), people will jump to offer to show you the way. They will always expect a tip. This is fair, but make sure that they have actually lead you to your destination, and not intentionally gotten you more lost. It is better to buy something from a shop, and then ask the shopkeeper for directions.

All the money that is involved in tourism has unfortunately made the cities slightly dodgy. But outside urban areas, the people are almost universally polite, welcoming, and honest.


=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to [[Mauritania]] are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both [[Malaga]] and [[London]]. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>80gi72c1fb7wts66q39wlgxnk2352gt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68176</id>
      <parentid>68152</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-01-23T13:49:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12788">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}

Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. If you're doing it in hot seasons bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. In winter consider staying short-sleeved during the day. Expect to freeze at night though (especially above 800meters of altitude), so plan some "onion layers" clothes. 

Most people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

Far from the big cities you won't need any special spot: everywhere looking like a safe place (ie: cars not going to fast/can see you from far/can stop almost safely) will be fine. The traffic in the countryside is never too big and they can really stop everywhere, sometimes even in spite of the most basic driving rules. You can experience a large variety of lifts: slow drivers and crazy drivers, brand new luxury cars and (especially) 30 years old car, sometimes you can find yourself very packed with many people, or on the back of a van/pick-up. 


Sometimes is not easy to understand if the incoming van is a local bus or just a normal van. The first time you see one you'll probably stop it not understand its a bus.. they're anyway nice and if you explain you don't have money (something like "makeneis fluss" in Arabic) they'll either go away without any complaints or maybe give you a free ride. 

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Ouarzazate]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]
[[File:2.jpg|thumb|right|Tonypro getting a lift on the N13 between Erfoud and Merzouga during a sandstorm.]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the [[Middle East]] and other parts of [[Africa]]. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French as most drivers will understand it even if in rural areas they might speak just local languages. It's not anyway too hard to make yourself understood (especially with a map) but expect they to drop you off nearby some bus or taxi station because they might not understand you want to go all the way by thumb. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are quite common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 

In some most touristic areas (ie: on the route from Rissani to Merzouga) police might think your driver is an unauthorized guide illegally getting money from you, so be ready to explain them (in French!) you're just hitchhiking and your driver was just very kind in helping you. Having some picture of your hitchhiking experience will help convincing them, otherwise your driver might get a fine, and of course you'll offer to pay for it.

== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20–40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind. Inside cities but also small villages if not invited at home, a very good option is ask for the nocturnal guardian, almost any quarter and village have one, they will show you the place to put your tent or mat and will take care of you in the night. 

The night can get extremely cold for most of the year, especially around mountains. As they seldom have heating, be sure to carry a sleeping bag even if you plan to stay in hotels, as the blanket they give you might not be enough.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

If you get lost in a city (and you will), people will jump to offer to show you the way. They will always expect a tip. This is fair, but make sure that they have actually lead you to your destination, and not intentionally gotten you more lost. It is better to buy something from a shop, and then ask the shopkeeper for directions.

All the money that is involved in tourism has unfortunately made the cities slightly dodgy. But outside urban areas, the people are almost universally polite, welcoming, and honest.


=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to [[Mauritania]] are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both [[Malaga]] and [[London]]. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''

== Personal Experiences ==
[[User: Fedecicco| Fede]] was caught wild camping three times and was detained by the police, once in Azilal on the atlas mountains (few time and kind cops), another in Sa'idya (border with Algeria and "maximum suspect", 3-4 hours interrogation and document check) and last in Chefchaouen (the worst ever, kept 5 hours and the day after threaten to be expulsed from the "kingdom" if he didn't leave the ciy). They forced him to go to a hotel.

== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>58kzbyhy78iljqz14vgmwn91z1401oi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68259</id>
      <parentid>68176</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-02-10T13:26:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fedecicco</username>
        <id>4349</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13935">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}

Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. If you're doing it in hot seasons bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. In winter consider staying short-sleeved during the day. Expect to freeze at night though (especially above 800meters of altitude), so plan some "onion layers" clothes. 

Most people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

Far from the big cities you won't need any special spot: everywhere looking like a safe place (ie: cars not going to fast/can see you from far/can stop almost safely) will be fine. The traffic in the countryside is never too big and they can really stop everywhere, sometimes even in spite of the most basic driving rules. You can experience a large variety of lifts: slow drivers and crazy drivers, brand new luxury cars and (especially) 30 years old car, sometimes you can find yourself very packed with many people, or on the back of a van/pick-up. 


Sometimes is not easy to understand if the incoming van is a local bus or just a normal van. The first time you see one you'll probably stop it not understand its a bus.. they're anyway nice and if you explain you don't have money (something like "makeneis fluss" in Arabic) they'll either go away without any complaints or maybe give you a free ride. 

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Ouarzazate]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]
[[File:2.jpg|thumb|right|Tonypro getting a lift on the N13 between Erfoud and Merzouga during a sandstorm.]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the [[Middle East]] and other parts of [[Africa]]. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French as most drivers will understand it even if in rural areas they might speak just local languages. It's not anyway too hard to make yourself understood (especially with a map) but expect they to drop you off nearby some bus or taxi station because they might not understand you want to go all the way by thumb. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are quite common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 

In some most touristic areas (ie: on the route from Rissani to Merzouga) police might think your driver is an unauthorized guide illegally getting money from you, so be ready to explain them (in French!) you're just hitchhiking and your driver was just very kind in helping you. Having some picture of your hitchhiking experience will help convincing them, otherwise your driver might get a fine, and of course you'll offer to pay for it.

Though for finding lifts police can commonly be a good help, for wild camping or spontaneous hospitality most of times can be more annoying. It seems there is a law that forbid foreigners to sleep outside of hotels/guesthouses with any means, mat, tent or local kindness; though probably the reality is that "security forces" don't want u to be a problem for them and for "your safety" could cause u more problems than what u expect (see below -&gt; personal experiences to have an idea)

== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20–40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind. Inside cities but also small villages if not invited at home, a very good option is ask for the nocturnal guardian, almost any quarter and village have one, they will show you the place to put your tent or mat and will take care of you in the night. 

The night can get extremely cold for most of the year, especially around mountains. As they seldom have heating, be sure to carry a sleeping bag even if you plan to stay in hotels, as the blanket they give you might not be enough.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Personal Experiences ==
[[User: Fedecicco| Fede]] was caught wild camping three times and detained by the police, once in Azilal,on the atlas mountains, asking for a spot near a mosque, the security didnt authorised him until arrive of cops (amn watani) who treated him politely and explained they must force him go to a hotel. Second time in Sa'idya (border with Algeria and "maximum suspect") while hitchhiking brought  at police station with a ridiculous scam (policeman said "this friend of mine will bring u to a better spot") snf kept hours checking documents and questions; and last in Chefchaouen where nocturnal guardian directly called them (kept 5 hours, taken fingerprints and the day after threaten to be expelled from the "kingdom" if he didn't leave the city). Each time police clarified that it was illegal sleep in the streets or  guest by moroccans for "security reasons", i.e. according to them and that law, any foreigner must go to a hotel or guesthouse every night. Of course the practice is different than the theory, though pay attention, especially if u r not european, they could be extremely racist.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

If you get lost in a city (and you will), people will jump to offer to show you the way. They will always expect a tip. This is fair, but make sure that they have actually lead you to your destination, and not intentionally gotten you more lost. It is better to buy something from a shop, and then ask the shopkeeper for directions.

All the money that is involved in tourism has unfortunately made the cities slightly dodgy. But outside urban areas, the people are almost universally polite, welcoming, and honest.


=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to [[Mauritania]] are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both [[Malaga]] and [[London]]. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''


== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>t7x78lm3a53vuaa3y0fz6n9np6nkfe8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68260</id>
      <parentid>68259</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-02-10T13:28:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fedecicco</username>
        <id>4349</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13996">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}

Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. If you're doing it in hot seasons bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. In winter consider staying short-sleeved during the day. Expect to freeze at night though (especially above 800meters of altitude), so plan some "onion layers" clothes. 

Most people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

Far from the big cities you won't need any special spot: everywhere looking like a safe place (ie: cars not going to fast/can see you from far/can stop almost safely) will be fine. The traffic in the countryside is never too big and they can really stop everywhere, sometimes even in spite of the most basic driving rules. You can experience a large variety of lifts: slow drivers and crazy drivers, brand new luxury cars and (especially) 30 years old car, sometimes you can find yourself very packed with many people, or on the back of a van/pick-up. 


Sometimes is not easy to understand if the incoming van is a local bus or just a normal van. The first time you see one you'll probably stop it not understand its a bus.. they're anyway nice and if you explain you don't have money (something like "makeneis fluss" in Arabic) they'll either go away without any complaints or maybe give you a free ride. 

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Ouarzazate]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]
[[File:2.jpg|thumb|right|Tonypro getting a lift on the N13 between Erfoud and Merzouga during a sandstorm.]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the [[Middle East]] and other parts of [[Africa]]. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French as most drivers will understand it even if in rural areas they might speak just local languages. It's not anyway too hard to make yourself understood (especially with a map) but expect they to drop you off nearby some bus or taxi station because they might not understand you want to go all the way by thumb. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are quite common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 

In some most touristic areas (ie: on the route from Rissani to Merzouga) police might think your driver is an unauthorized guide illegally getting money from you, so be ready to explain them (in French!) you're just hitchhiking and your driver was just very kind in helping you. Having some picture of your hitchhiking experience will help convincing them, otherwise your driver might get a fine, and of course you'll offer to pay for it.

Though for finding lifts police can commonly be a good help, for wild camping or spontaneous hospitality most of times can be more annoying. It seems there is a law that forbid foreigners to sleep outside of hotels/guesthouses with any means, mat, tent or local kindness; though probably the reality is that "security forces" don't want u to be a problem for them and for "your safety" could cause u more problems than what u expect (see below -&gt; personal experiences to have an idea)

== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20–40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind. Inside cities but also small villages if not invited at home, a very good option is ask for the nocturnal guardian, almost any quarter and village have one, they will show you the place to put your tent or mat and will take care of you in the night. 

The night can get extremely cold for most of the year, especially around mountains. As they seldom have heating, be sure to carry a sleeping bag even if you plan to stay in hotels, as the blanket they give you might not be enough.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Personal Experiences ==
[[User: Fedecicco| Fede]] was caught wild camping three times and detained by the police, once in Azilal,on the atlas mountains, asking for a spot near a mosque, the security didnt authorised him until arrive of cops (amn watani) who treated him politely and explained they must force him go to a hotel. Second time in Sa'idya (border with Algeria and "maximum suspect") while hitchhiking brought  at police station with a ridiculous scam (policeman said "this friend of mine will bring u to a better spot") and kept hours checking documents and questions; last in Chefchaouen where nocturnal guardian directly called them (kept 5 hours, taken fingerprints and the day after threaten to be expelled from the "kingdom" if he didn't leave the city). Each time police clarified that it was illegal sleep in the streets or as guest by moroccans for "security reasons", i.e. according to them and that law, any foreigner must go to a hotel or guesthouse every night unless mergency situation where u dont have alternatives. Of course the practice is different than the theory, though pay attention, especially if u r not european, cause they could be extremely racist.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

If you get lost in a city (and you will), people will jump to offer to show you the way. They will always expect a tip. This is fair, but make sure that they have actually lead you to your destination, and not intentionally gotten you more lost. It is better to buy something from a shop, and then ask the shopkeeper for directions.

All the money that is involved in tourism has unfortunately made the cities slightly dodgy. But outside urban areas, the people are almost universally polite, welcoming, and honest.


=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to [[Mauritania]] are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both [[Malaga]] and [[London]]. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''


== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>fmq0p1u4fujko5ot2md475fvpby8tdh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68263</id>
      <parentid>68260</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-02-10T15:14:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13507">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}

Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. If you're doing it in hot seasons bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. In winter consider staying short-sleeved during the day. Expect to freeze at night though (especially above 800 m of altitude), so plan some "onion layers" clothes. 

Most people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

Far from the big cities you won't need any special spot: everywhere looking like a safe place (ie: cars not going to fast/can see you from far/can stop almost safely) will be fine. The traffic in the countryside is never too big and they can really stop everywhere, sometimes even in spite of the most basic driving rules. You can experience a large variety of lifts: slow drivers and crazy drivers, brand new luxury cars and (especially) 30 years old car, sometimes you can find yourself very packed with many people, or on the back of a van/pick-up. 


Sometimes is not easy to understand if the incoming van is a local bus or just a normal van. The first time you see one you'll probably stop it not understand its a bus.. they're anyway nice and if you explain you don't have money (something like "makeneis fluss" in Arabic) they'll either go away without any complaints or maybe give you a free ride. 

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Ouarzazate]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]
[[File:2.jpg|thumb|right|Tonypro getting a lift on the N13 between Erfoud and Merzouga during a sandstorm.]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the [[Middle East]] and other parts of [[Africa]]. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French as most drivers will understand it even if in rural areas they might speak just local languages. It's not anyway too hard to make yourself understood (especially with a map) but expect they to drop you off nearby some bus or taxi station because they might not understand you want to go all the way by thumb. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are quite common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 

In some most touristic areas (ie: on the route from Rissani to Merzouga) police might think your driver is an unauthorized guide illegally getting money from you, so be ready to explain them (in French!) you're just hitchhiking and your driver was just very kind in helping you. Having some picture of your hitchhiking experience will help convincing them, otherwise your driver might get a fine, and of course you'll offer to pay for it.

== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20–40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind. Inside cities but also small villages if not invited at home, a very good option is ask for the nocturnal guardian, almost any quarter and village have one, they will show you the place to put your tent or mat and will take care of you in the night. 

The night can get extremely cold for most of the year, especially around mountains. As they seldom have heating, be sure to carry a sleeping bag even if you plan to stay in hotels, as the blanket they give you might not be enough.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Personal Experiences ==
[[User: Fedecicco| Fede]] was caught wild camping three times and detained by the police, once in Azilal,on the atlas mountains, asking for a spot near a mosque, the security didnt authorised him until arrive of cops (amn watani) who treated him politely and explained they must force him go to a hotel. Second time in Sa'idya (border with Algeria and "maximum suspect") while hitchhiking brought  at police station with a ridiculous scam (policeman said "this friend of mine will bring u to a better spot") and kept hours checking documents and questions; last in Chefchaouen where nocturnal guardian directly called them (kept 5 hours, taken fingerprints and the day after threaten to be expelled from the "kingdom" if he didn't leave the city). Each time police clarified that it was illegal sleep in the streets or as guest by moroccans for "security reasons", i.e. according to them and that law, any foreigner must go to a hotel or guesthouse every night unless mergency situation where u dont have alternatives. Of course the practice is different than the theory, though pay attention, especially if u r not european, cause they could be extremely racist.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

If you get lost in a city (and you will), people will jump to offer to show you the way. They will always expect a tip. This is fair, but make sure that they have actually lead you to your destination, and not intentionally gotten you more lost. It is better to buy something from a shop, and then ask the shopkeeper for directions.

All the money that is involved in tourism has unfortunately made the cities slightly dodgy. But outside urban areas, the people are almost universally polite, welcoming, and honest.


=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to [[Mauritania]] are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both [[Malaga]] and [[London]]. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''


== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>ll8qa2fw6yxyvutqyqi0dh6ra7v9uxi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69374</id>
      <parentid>68263</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-05-07T14:00:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robyt</username>
        <id>9747</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13525">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}

Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. If you're doing it in hot seasons bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. In winter consider staying short-sleeved during the day. Expect to freeze at night though (especially above 800 m of altitude), so plan some "onion layers" clothes. 

Most people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

Far from the big cities you won't need any special spot: everywhere looking like a safe place (ie: cars not going to fast/can see you from far/can stop almost safely) will be fine. The traffic in the countryside is never too big and they can really stop everywhere, sometimes even in spite of the most basic driving rules. You can experience a large variety of lifts: slow drivers and crazy drivers, brand new luxury cars and (especially) 30 years old car, sometimes you can find yourself very packed with many people, or on the back of a van/pick-up. 


Sometimes is not easy to understand if the incoming van is a local bus or just a normal van. The first time you see one you'll probably stop it not understand its a bus.. they're anyway nice and if you explain you don't have money (something like "makeneis fluss" in Arabic) they'll either go away without any complaints or maybe give you a free ride. 

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Ouarzazate]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]
[[File:2.jpg|thumb|right|Tonypro getting a lift on the N13 between Erfoud and Merzouga during a sandstorm.]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the [[Middle East]] and other parts of [[Africa]]. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French as most drivers will understand it even if in rural areas they might speak just local languages. It's not anyway too hard to make yourself understood (especially with a map) but expect they to drop you off nearby some bus or taxi station because they might not understand you want to go all the way by thumb. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are quite common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 

In some most touristic areas (ie: on the route from Rissani to Merzouga) police might think your driver is an unauthorized guide illegally getting money from you, so be ready to explain them (in French!) you're just hitchhiking and your driver was just very kind in helping you. Having some picture of your hitchhiking experience will help convincing them, otherwise your driver might get a fine, and of course you'll offer to pay for it.

== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20–40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind. Inside cities but also small villages if not invited at home, a very good option is ask for the nocturnal guardian, almost any quarter and village have one, they will show you the place to put your tent or mat and will take care of you in the night. 

The night can get extremely cold for most of the year, especially around mountains. As they seldom have heating, be sure to carry a sleeping bag even if you plan to stay in hotels, as the blanket they give you might not be enough.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Personal Experiences ==
[[User: Fedecicco| Fede]] was caught wild camping three times and detained by the police, once in Azilal,on the atlas mountains, asking for a spot near a mosque, the security didnt authorised him until arrive of cops (amn watani) who treated him politely and explained they must force him go to a hotel. Second time in Sa'idya (border with Algeria and "maximum suspect") while hitchhiking brought  at police station with a ridiculous scam (policeman said "this friend of mine will bring u to a better spot") and kept hours checking documents and questions; last in Chefchaouen where nocturnal guardian directly called them (kept 5 hours, taken fingerprints and the day after threaten to be expelled from the "kingdom" if he didn't leave the city). Each time police clarified that it was illegal sleep in the streets or as guest by moroccans for "security reasons", i.e. according to them and that law, any foreigner must go to a hotel or guesthouse every night unless mergency situation where u dont have alternatives. Of course the practice is different than the theory, though pay attention, especially if u r not european, cause they could be extremely racist.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

If you get lost in a city (and you will), people will jump to offer to show you the way. They will always expect a tip. This is fair, but make sure that they have actually lead you to your destination, and not intentionally gotten you more lost. It is better to buy something from a shop, and then ask the shopkeeper for directions.

All the money that is involved in tourism has unfortunately made the cities slightly dodgy. But outside urban areas, the people are almost universally polite, welcoming, and honest.


=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to [[Mauritania]] are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both [[Malaga]] and [[London]]. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''


== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]
[[trash:Morocco]]</text>
      <sha1>lzgte8an2akfdhbe5m0wjvakbs2lqhy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70441</id>
      <parentid>69374</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-07-11T19:16:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Koendev</username>
        <id>4236</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13584">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}

Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. If you're doing it in hot seasons bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. In winter consider staying short-sleeved during the day. Expect to freeze at night though (especially above 800 m of altitude), so plan some "onion layers" clothes. 

Most people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

Far from the big cities you won't need any special spot: everywhere looking like a safe place (ie: cars not going to fast/can see you from far/can stop almost safely) will be fine. The traffic in the countryside is never too big and they can really stop everywhere, sometimes even in spite of the most basic driving rules. You can experience a large variety of lifts: slow drivers and crazy drivers, brand new luxury cars and (especially) 30 years old car, sometimes you can find yourself very packed with many people, or on the back of a van/pick-up. 


Sometimes is not easy to understand if the incoming van is a local bus or just a normal van. The first time you see one you'll probably stop it not understand its a bus.. they're anyway nice and if you explain you don't have money (something like "makeneis fluss" in Arabic) they'll either go away without any complaints or maybe give you a free ride. 

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Ouarzazate]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]
[[File:2.jpg|thumb|right|Tonypro getting a lift on the N13 between Erfoud and Merzouga during a sandstorm.]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the [[Middle East]] and other parts of [[Africa]]. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French as most drivers will understand it even if in rural areas they might speak just local languages. It's not anyway too hard to make yourself understood (especially with a map) but expect they to drop you off nearby some bus or taxi station because they might not understand you want to go all the way by thumb. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are quite common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 

In some most touristic areas (ie: on the route from Rissani to Merzouga) police might think your driver is an unauthorized guide illegally getting money from you, so be ready to explain them (in French!) you're just hitchhiking and your driver was just very kind in helping you. Having some picture of your hitchhiking experience will help convincing them, otherwise your driver might get a fine, and of course you'll offer to pay for it.

== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20–40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind. Inside cities but also small villages if not invited at home, a very good option is ask for the nocturnal guardian, almost any quarter and village have one, they will show you the place to put your tent or mat and will take care of you in the night. 

The night can get extremely cold for most of the year, especially around mountains. As they seldom have heating, be sure to carry a sleeping bag even if you plan to stay in hotels, as the blanket they give you might not be enough.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Personal Experiences ==
[[User: Fedecicco| Fede]] was caught wild camping three times and detained by the police. Once in Azilal, in the Atlas mountains, asking for a spot near a mosque, the security didn't authorise him until arrival of the cops (amn watani) who treated him politely and explained they must force him go to a hotel. Second time in Sa'idya (border with Algeria and "maximum suspect") while hitchhiking brought to a police station with a ridiculous scam (policeman said "this friend of mine will bring you to a better spot") and kept hours checking documents and asking questions; lastly in Chefchaouen where a nocturnal guardian directly called the police (kept for 5 hours, taken fingerprints and the day after threatened to be expelled from the "kingdom" if he didn't leave the city). Each time police clarified that it was illegal to sleep in the streets or as guest at Moroccans for "security reasons", i.e. according to them and that law, every foreigner must go to a hotel or guesthouse every night unless there is an emergency situation where you don't have alternatives. Of course the practice is different than the theory, though pay attention, especially if you are not european, because they could be extremely racist.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

If you get lost in a city (and you will), people will jump to offer to show you the way. They will always expect a tip. This is fair, but make sure that they have actually lead you to your destination, and not intentionally gotten you more lost. It is better to buy something from a shop, and then ask the shopkeeper for directions.

All the money that is involved in tourism has unfortunately made the cities slightly dodgy. But outside urban areas, the people are almost universally polite, welcoming, and honest.


=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to [[Mauritania]] are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both [[Malaga]] and [[London]]. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''


== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]
[[trash:Morocco]]</text>
      <sha1>32lnao294v86lbtq5n1mb1qjv15t34u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>74129</id>
      <parentid>70441</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-01-25T18:41:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sanja spit</username>
        <id>6905</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13601">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}

Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. If you're doing it in hot seasons bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. In winter consider staying short-sleeved during the day. Expect to freeze at night though (especially above 800 m of altitude), so plan some "onion layers" clothes. 

Most people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

Far from the big cities you won't need any special spot: everywhere looking like a safe place (ie: cars not going to fast/can see you from far/can stop almost safely) will be fine. The traffic in the countryside is never too big and they can really stop everywhere, sometimes even in spite of the most basic driving rules. You can experience a large variety of lifts: slow drivers and crazy drivers, brand new luxury cars and (especially) 30 years old car, sometimes you can find yourself very packed with many people, or on the back of a van/pick-up. 


Sometimes is not easy to understand if the incoming van is a local bus or just a normal van. The first time you see one you'll probably stop it not understand its a bus.. they're anyway nice and if you explain you don't have money (something like "makeneis fluss" in Arabic) they'll either go away without any complaints or maybe give you a free ride. 

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Errachidia]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Ouarzazate]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]
[[File:2.jpg|thumb|right|Tonypro getting a lift on the N13 between Erfoud and Merzouga during a sandstorm.]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the [[Middle East]] and other parts of [[Africa]]. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French as most drivers will understand it even if in rural areas they might speak just local languages. It's not anyway too hard to make yourself understood (especially with a map) but expect they to drop you off nearby some bus or taxi station because they might not understand you want to go all the way by thumb. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are quite common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 

In some most touristic areas (ie: on the route from Rissani to Merzouga) police might think your driver is an unauthorized guide illegally getting money from you, so be ready to explain them (in French!) you're just hitchhiking and your driver was just very kind in helping you. Having some picture of your hitchhiking experience will help convincing them, otherwise your driver might get a fine, and of course you'll offer to pay for it.

== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20–40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind. Inside cities but also small villages if not invited at home, a very good option is ask for the nocturnal guardian, almost any quarter and village have one, they will show you the place to put your tent or mat and will take care of you in the night. 

The night can get extremely cold for most of the year, especially around mountains. As they seldom have heating, be sure to carry a sleeping bag even if you plan to stay in hotels, as the blanket they give you might not be enough.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Personal Experiences ==
[[User: Fedecicco| Fede]] was caught wild camping three times and detained by the police. Once in Azilal, in the Atlas mountains, asking for a spot near a mosque, the security didn't authorise him until arrival of the cops (amn watani) who treated him politely and explained they must force him go to a hotel. Second time in Sa'idya (border with Algeria and "maximum suspect") while hitchhiking brought to a police station with a ridiculous scam (policeman said "this friend of mine will bring you to a better spot") and kept hours checking documents and asking questions; lastly in Chefchaouen where a nocturnal guardian directly called the police (kept for 5 hours, taken fingerprints and the day after threatened to be expelled from the "kingdom" if he didn't leave the city). Each time police clarified that it was illegal to sleep in the streets or as guest at Moroccans for "security reasons", i.e. according to them and that law, every foreigner must go to a hotel or guesthouse every night unless there is an emergency situation where you don't have alternatives. Of course the practice is different than the theory, though pay attention, especially if you are not european, because they could be extremely racist.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

If you get lost in a city (and you will), people will jump to offer to show you the way. They will always expect a tip. This is fair, but make sure that they have actually lead you to your destination, and not intentionally gotten you more lost. It is better to buy something from a shop, and then ask the shopkeeper for directions.

All the money that is involved in tourism has unfortunately made the cities slightly dodgy. But outside urban areas, the people are almost universally polite, welcoming, and honest.


=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to [[Mauritania]] are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both [[Malaga]] and [[London]]. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''


== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]
[[trash:Morocco]]</text>
      <sha1>p2c5lpzt19wdrx940dchjqq2s4q81im</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>84880</id>
      <parentid>74129</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-11-20T20:03:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mohit</username>
        <id>24141</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16060">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}

Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. If you're doing it in hot seasons bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. In winter consider staying short-sleeved during the day. Expect to freeze at night though (especially above 800 m of altitude), so plan some "onion layers" clothes. 

Most people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

Far from the big cities you won't need any special spot: everywhere looking like a safe place (ie: cars not going to fast/can see you from far/can stop almost safely) will be fine. The traffic in the countryside is never too big and they can really stop everywhere, sometimes even in spite of the most basic driving rules. You can experience a large variety of lifts: slow drivers and crazy drivers, brand new luxury cars and (especially) 30 years old car, sometimes you can find yourself very packed with many people, or on the back of a van/pick-up. 

Sometimes is not easy to understand if the incoming van is a local bus or just a normal van. The first time you see one you'll probably stop it not understand its a bus.. they're anyway nice and if you explain you don't have money (something like "makeneis fluss" in Arabic) they'll either go away without any complaints or maybe give you a free ride. 

European-style gas station hitchhiking is possible on the motorways, which are quite busy and in very good shape. They are a good way to cover long distances in a short time, especially between the big cities. The employees might not allow you to approach drivers at gas stations, but will usually offer to find a ride for you, which might seem weird at first, and also seems to take longer than asking people yourself, but definitely works. Otherwise, the rest area and restaurant are often separate from the gas station and there are no employees there, so they are also a good spot to ask drivers.

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Errachidia]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Ouarzazate]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]
[[File:2.jpg|thumb|right|Tonypro getting a lift on the N13 between Erfoud and Merzouga during a sandstorm.]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the [[Middle East]] and other parts of [[Africa]]. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French as most drivers will understand it even if in rural areas they might speak just local languages. It's not anyway too hard to make yourself understood (especially with a map) but expect they to drop you off nearby some bus or taxi station because they might not understand you want to go all the way by thumb. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are quite common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 

In some most touristic areas (ie: on the route from Rissani to Merzouga) police might think your driver is an unauthorized guide illegally getting money from you, so be ready to explain them (in French!) you're just hitchhiking and your driver was just very kind in helping you. Having some picture of your hitchhiking experience will help convincing them, otherwise your driver might get a fine, and of course you'll offer to pay for it.

== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20–40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind. Inside cities but also small villages if not invited at home, a very good option is ask for the nocturnal guardian, almost any quarter and village have one, they will show you the place to put your tent or mat and will take care of you in the night. 

The night can get extremely cold for most of the year, especially around mountains. As they seldom have heating, be sure to carry a sleeping bag even if you plan to stay in hotels, as the blanket they give you might not be enough.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

If the night is coming close and you're in a rural area, you will often find groups of women sitting outside and talking. If you ask them for a place to set up your tent, you will usually be shown a corner somewhere close to peoples' houses where you can then camp with some "protection".

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

=== Hospitality ===

Morocco is famous for its hospitality and if you spend some time hitchhiking around the country, someone will sooner or later invite you for tea, food, or a place to sleep. To be polite, and to find out whether the invitation is genuine, it is wise to refuse at least once. If people really want to invite you they will insist, and you can accept in good conscience after the second or third time. Sometimes, people might offer you to stay with them if you ever come to their town, but only do so out of politeness, in which case it might not be very nice to respond with something like "yeah, definitely, what's your number, so I can call you when I get there?". But many people also genuinely want to help you out and will offer you to take down their phone number in case you need a place to stay or any help at all, and if you feel like they are serious about it, it is definitely not rude to accept and call them later if you want to take them up on it. 

It might be a good idea to make yourself aware of the overall social / economic situation of people who invite you, as you might meet both very rich and very poor people, and even a very poor person might offer to pay for food, transport or other expenses, even if they cannot really afford it. In these cases, if someone invites you to spend the night at their home, if you can afford it, why not pay for groceries, or at least bring a small gift, like a pack of tea, sugar or some fruits... A little extra food every once in a while will most probably not put a dent in your budget.

== Personal Experiences ==
[[User: Fedecicco| Fede]] was caught wild camping three times and detained by the police. Once in Azilal, in the Atlas mountains, asking for a spot near a mosque, the security didn't authorise him until arrival of the cops (amn watani) who treated him politely and explained they must force him go to a hotel. Second time in Sa'idya (border with Algeria and "maximum suspect") while hitchhiking brought to a police station with a ridiculous scam (policeman said "this friend of mine will bring you to a better spot") and kept hours checking documents and asking questions; lastly in Chefchaouen where a nocturnal guardian directly called the police (kept for 5 hours, taken fingerprints and the day after threatened to be expelled from the "kingdom" if he didn't leave the city). Each time police clarified that it was illegal to sleep in the streets or as guest at Moroccans for "security reasons", i.e. according to them and that law, every foreigner must go to a hotel or guesthouse every night unless there is an emergency situation where you don't have alternatives. Of course the practice is different than the theory, though pay attention, especially if you are not european, because they could be extremely racist.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

If you get lost in a city (and you will), people will jump to offer to show you the way. They will always expect a tip. This is fair, but make sure that they have actually lead you to your destination, and not intentionally gotten you more lost. It is better to buy something from a shop, and then ask the shopkeeper for directions.

All the money that is involved in tourism has unfortunately made the cities slightly dodgy. But outside urban areas, the people are almost universally polite, welcoming, and honest.


=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to [[Mauritania]] are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both [[Malaga]] and [[London]]. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''


== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]
{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]
[[trash:Morocco]]</text>
      <sha1>0j485iz8vbxk7ovez7zvefqo49jw7re</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>84882</id>
      <parentid>84880</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-11-20T20:20:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mohit</username>
        <id>24141</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15988">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}

Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. If you're doing it in hot seasons bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. In winter consider staying short-sleeved during the day. Expect to freeze at night though (especially above 800 m of altitude), so plan some "onion layers" clothes. 

Most people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

Far from the big cities you won't need any special spot: everywhere looking like a safe place (ie: cars not going to fast/can see you from far/can stop almost safely) will be fine. The traffic in the countryside is never too big and they can really stop everywhere, sometimes even in spite of the most basic driving rules. You can experience a large variety of lifts: slow drivers and crazy drivers, brand new luxury cars and (especially) 30 years old car, sometimes you can find yourself very packed with many people, or on the back of a van/pick-up. 

Sometimes is not easy to understand if the incoming van is a local bus or just a normal van. The first time you see one you'll probably stop it not understand its a bus.. they're anyway nice and if you explain you don't have money (something like "makeneis fluss" in Arabic) they'll either go away without any complaints or maybe give you a free ride. 

European-style gas station hitchhiking is possible on the motorways, which are quite busy and in very good shape. They are a good way to cover long distances in a short time, especially between the big cities. The employees might not allow you to approach drivers at gas stations, but will usually offer to find a ride for you, which might seem weird at first, and also seems to take longer than asking people yourself, but definitely works. Otherwise, the rest area and restaurant are often separate from the gas station and there are no employees there, so they are also a good spot to ask drivers.

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Errachidia]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Ouarzazate]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

'''See also:''' [[Western Sahara]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the [[Middle East]] and other parts of [[Africa]]. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French as most drivers will understand it even if in rural areas they might speak just local languages. It's not anyway too hard to make yourself understood (especially with a map) but expect they to drop you off nearby some bus or taxi station because they might not understand you want to go all the way by thumb. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are quite common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 

In some most touristic areas (ie: on the route from Rissani to Merzouga) police might think your driver is an unauthorized guide illegally getting money from you, so be ready to explain them (in French!) you're just hitchhiking and your driver was just very kind in helping you. Having some picture of your hitchhiking experience will help convincing them, otherwise your driver might get a fine, and of course you'll offer to pay for it.

== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20–40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind. Inside cities but also small villages if not invited at home, a very good option is ask for the nocturnal guardian, almost any quarter and village have one, they will show you the place to put your tent or mat and will take care of you in the night. 

The night can get extremely cold for most of the year, especially around mountains. As they seldom have heating, be sure to carry a sleeping bag even if you plan to stay in hotels, as the blanket they give you might not be enough.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

If the night is coming close and you're in a rural area, you will often find groups of women sitting outside and talking. If you ask them for a place to set up your tent, you will usually be shown a corner somewhere close to peoples' houses where you can then camp with some "protection".

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

=== Hospitality ===

Morocco is famous for its hospitality and if you spend some time hitchhiking around the country, someone will sooner or later invite you for tea, food, or a place to sleep. To be polite, and to find out whether the invitation is genuine, it is wise to refuse at least once. If people really want to invite you they will insist, and you can accept in good conscience after the second or third time. Sometimes, people might offer you to stay with them if you ever come to their town, but only do so out of politeness, in which case it might not be very nice to respond with something like "yeah, definitely, what's your number, so I can call you when I get there?". But many people also genuinely want to help you out and will offer you to take down their phone number in case you need a place to stay or any help at all, and if you feel like they are serious about it, it is definitely not rude to accept and call them later if you want to take them up on it. 

It might be a good idea to make yourself aware of the overall social / economic situation of people who invite you, as you might meet both very rich and very poor people, and even a very poor person might offer to pay for food, transport or other expenses, even if they cannot really afford it. In these cases, if someone invites you to spend the night at their home, if you can afford it, why not pay for groceries, or at least bring a small gift, like a pack of tea, sugar or some fruits... A little extra food every once in a while will most probably not put a dent in your budget.

== Personal Experiences ==
[[User: Fedecicco| Fede]] was caught wild camping three times and detained by the police. Once in Azilal, in the Atlas mountains, asking for a spot near a mosque, the security didn't authorise him until arrival of the cops (amn watani) who treated him politely and explained they must force him go to a hotel. Second time in Sa'idya (border with Algeria and "maximum suspect") while hitchhiking brought to a police station with a ridiculous scam (policeman said "this friend of mine will bring you to a better spot") and kept hours checking documents and asking questions; lastly in Chefchaouen where a nocturnal guardian directly called the police (kept for 5 hours, taken fingerprints and the day after threatened to be expelled from the "kingdom" if he didn't leave the city). Each time police clarified that it was illegal to sleep in the streets or as guest at Moroccans for "security reasons", i.e. according to them and that law, every foreigner must go to a hotel or guesthouse every night unless there is an emergency situation where you don't have alternatives. Of course the practice is different than the theory, though pay attention, especially if you are not european, because they could be extremely racist.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

If you get lost in a city (and you will), people will jump to offer to show you the way. They will always expect a tip. This is fair, but make sure that they have actually lead you to your destination, and not intentionally gotten you more lost. It is better to buy something from a shop, and then ask the shopkeeper for directions.

All the money that is involved in tourism has unfortunately made the cities slightly dodgy. But outside urban areas, the people are almost universally polite, welcoming, and honest.


=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to [[Mauritania]] are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both [[Malaga]] and [[London]]. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''


== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]

{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]
[[trash:Morocco]]</text>
      <sha1>he5phcwke6owve7v2oz2dkr4g15tec2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>84883</id>
      <parentid>84882</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-11-20T20:23:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mohit</username>
        <id>24141</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15994">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. If you're doing it in hot seasons bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. In winter consider staying short-sleeved during the day. Expect to freeze at night though (especially above 800 m of altitude), so plan some "onion layers" clothes. 

Most people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

Far from the big cities you won't need any special spot: everywhere looking like a safe place (ie: cars not going to fast/can see you from far/can stop almost safely) will be fine. The traffic in the countryside is never too big and they can really stop everywhere, sometimes even in spite of the most basic driving rules. You can experience a large variety of lifts: slow drivers and crazy drivers, brand new luxury cars and (especially) 30 years old car, sometimes you can find yourself very packed with many people, or on the back of a van/pick-up. 

Sometimes is not easy to understand if the incoming van is a local bus or just a normal van. The first time you see one you'll probably stop it not understand its a bus.. they're anyway nice and if you explain you don't have money (something like "makeneis fluss" in Arabic) they'll either go away without any complaints or maybe give you a free ride. 

European-style gas station hitchhiking is possible on the motorways, which are quite busy and in very good shape. They are a good way to cover long distances in a short time, especially between the big cities. The employees might not allow you to approach drivers at gas stations, but will usually offer to find a ride for you, which might seem weird at first, and also seems to take longer than asking people yourself, but definitely works. Otherwise, the rest area and restaurant are often separate from the gas station and there are no employees there, so they are also a good spot to ask drivers.

__TOC__

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Errachidia]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Ouarzazate]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

'''See also:''' [[Western Sahara]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the [[Middle East]] and other parts of [[Africa]]. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French as most drivers will understand it even if in rural areas they might speak just local languages. It's not anyway too hard to make yourself understood (especially with a map) but expect they to drop you off nearby some bus or taxi station because they might not understand you want to go all the way by thumb. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are quite common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 

In some most touristic areas (ie: on the route from Rissani to Merzouga) police might think your driver is an unauthorized guide illegally getting money from you, so be ready to explain them (in French!) you're just hitchhiking and your driver was just very kind in helping you. Having some picture of your hitchhiking experience will help convincing them, otherwise your driver might get a fine, and of course you'll offer to pay for it.

== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20–40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind. Inside cities but also small villages if not invited at home, a very good option is ask for the nocturnal guardian, almost any quarter and village have one, they will show you the place to put your tent or mat and will take care of you in the night. 

The night can get extremely cold for most of the year, especially around mountains. As they seldom have heating, be sure to carry a sleeping bag even if you plan to stay in hotels, as the blanket they give you might not be enough.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

If the night is coming close and you're in a rural area, you will often find groups of women sitting outside and talking. If you ask them for a place to set up your tent, you will usually be shown a corner somewhere close to peoples' houses where you can then camp with some "protection".

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Hospitality ==

Morocco is famous for its hospitality and if you spend some time hitchhiking around the country, someone will sooner or later invite you for tea, food, or a place to sleep. To be polite, and to find out whether the invitation is genuine, it is wise to refuse at least once. If people really want to invite you they will insist, and you can accept in good conscience after the second or third time. Sometimes, people might offer you to stay with them if you ever come to their town, but only do so out of politeness, in which case it might not be very nice to respond with something like "yeah, definitely, what's your number, so I can call you when I get there?". But many people also genuinely want to help you out and will offer you to take down their phone number in case you need a place to stay or any help at all, and if you feel like they are serious about it, it is definitely not rude to accept and call them later if you want to take them up on it. 

It might be a good idea to make yourself aware of the overall social / economic situation of people who invite you, as you might meet both very rich and very poor people, and even a very poor person might offer to pay for food, transport or other expenses, even if they cannot really afford it. In these cases, if someone invites you to spend the night at their home, if you can afford it, why not pay for groceries, or at least bring a small gift, like a pack of tea, sugar or some fruits... A little extra food every once in a while will most probably not put a dent in your budget.

== Personal Experiences ==
[[User: Fedecicco| Fede]] was caught wild camping three times and detained by the police. Once in Azilal, in the Atlas mountains, asking for a spot near a mosque, the security didn't authorise him until arrival of the cops (amn watani) who treated him politely and explained they must force him go to a hotel. Second time in Sa'idya (border with Algeria and "maximum suspect") while hitchhiking brought to a police station with a ridiculous scam (policeman said "this friend of mine will bring you to a better spot") and kept hours checking documents and asking questions; lastly in Chefchaouen where a nocturnal guardian directly called the police (kept for 5 hours, taken fingerprints and the day after threatened to be expelled from the "kingdom" if he didn't leave the city). Each time police clarified that it was illegal to sleep in the streets or as guest at Moroccans for "security reasons", i.e. according to them and that law, every foreigner must go to a hotel or guesthouse every night unless there is an emergency situation where you don't have alternatives. Of course the practice is different than the theory, though pay attention, especially if you are not european, because they could be extremely racist.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

If you get lost in a city (and you will), people will jump to offer to show you the way. They will always expect a tip. This is fair, but make sure that they have actually lead you to your destination, and not intentionally gotten you more lost. It is better to buy something from a shop, and then ask the shopkeeper for directions.

All the money that is involved in tourism has unfortunately made the cities slightly dodgy. But outside urban areas, the people are almost universally polite, welcoming, and honest.


=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to [[Mauritania]] are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

A personal experience with border crossings:
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both [[Malaga]] and [[London]]. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''


== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]

{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]
[[trash:Morocco]]</text>
      <sha1>p6msk1tr1e3rwcm0g8ehayu3n754ho7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>89879</id>
      <parentid>84883</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-11-04T16:02:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Phidias81</username>
        <id>3137</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16016">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. If you're doing it in hot seasons bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. In winter consider staying short-sleeved during the day. Expect to freeze at night though (especially above 800 m of altitude), so plan some "onion layers" clothes. 

Most people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

Far from the big cities you won't need any special spot: everywhere looking like a safe place (ie: cars not going to fast/can see you from far/can stop almost safely) will be fine. The traffic in the countryside is never too big and they can really stop everywhere, sometimes even in spite of the most basic driving rules. You can experience a large variety of lifts: slow drivers and crazy drivers, brand new luxury cars and (especially) 30 years old car, sometimes you can find yourself very packed with many people, or on the back of a van/pick-up. 

Sometimes is not easy to understand if the incoming van is a local bus or just a normal van. The first time you see one you'll probably stop it not understand its a bus.. they're anyway nice and if you explain you don't have money (something like "makeneis fluss" in Arabic) they'll either go away without any complaints or maybe give you a free ride. 

European-style gas station hitchhiking is possible on the motorways, which are quite busy and in very good shape. They are a good way to cover long distances in a short time, especially between the big cities. The employees might not allow you to approach drivers at gas stations, but will usually offer to find a ride for you, which might seem weird at first, and also seems to take longer than asking people yourself, but definitely works. Otherwise, the rest area and restaurant are often separate from the gas station and there are no employees there, so they are also a good spot to ask drivers.

__TOC__

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Errachidia]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Ouarzazate]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

'''See also:''' [[Western Sahara]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the [[Middle East]] and other parts of [[Africa]]. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French as most drivers will understand it even if in rural areas they might speak just local languages. It's not anyway too hard to make yourself understood (especially with a map) but expect they to drop you off nearby some bus or taxi station because they might not understand you want to go all the way by thumb. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are quite common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 

In some most touristic areas (ie: on the route from Rissani to Merzouga) police might think your driver is an unauthorized guide illegally getting money from you, so be ready to explain them (in French!) you're just hitchhiking and your driver was just very kind in helping you. Having some picture of your hitchhiking experience will help convincing them, otherwise your driver might get a fine, and of course you'll offer to pay for it.

== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20–40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind. Inside cities but also small villages if not invited at home, a very good option is ask for the nocturnal guardian, almost any quarter and village have one, they will show you the place to put your tent or mat and will take care of you in the night. 

The night can get extremely cold for most of the year, especially around mountains. As they seldom have heating, be sure to carry a sleeping bag even if you plan to stay in hotels, as the blanket they give you might not be enough.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

If the night is coming close and you're in a rural area, you will often find groups of women sitting outside and talking. If you ask them for a place to set up your tent, you will usually be shown a corner somewhere close to peoples' houses where you can then camp with some "protection".

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Hospitality ==

Morocco is famous for its hospitality and if you spend some time hitchhiking around the country, someone will sooner or later invite you for tea, food, or a place to sleep. To be polite, and to find out whether the invitation is genuine, it is wise to refuse at least once. If people really want to invite you they will insist, and you can accept in good conscience after the second or third time. Sometimes, people might offer you to stay with them if you ever come to their town, but only do so out of politeness, in which case it might not be very nice to respond with something like "yeah, definitely, what's your number, so I can call you when I get there?". But many people also genuinely want to help you out and will offer you to take down their phone number in case you need a place to stay or any help at all, and if you feel like they are serious about it, it is definitely not rude to accept and call them later if you want to take them up on it. 

It might be a good idea to make yourself aware of the overall social / economic situation of people who invite you, as you might meet both very rich and very poor people, and even a very poor person might offer to pay for food, transport or other expenses, even if they cannot really afford it. In these cases, if someone invites you to spend the night at their home, if you can afford it, why not pay for groceries, or at least bring a small gift, like a pack of tea, sugar or some fruits... A little extra food every once in a while will most probably not put a dent in your budget.

== Personal Experiences ==
[[User: Fedecicco| Fede]] was caught wild camping three times and detained by the police. Once in Azilal, in the Atlas mountains, asking for a spot near a mosque, the security didn't authorise him until arrival of the cops (amn watani) who treated him politely and explained they must force him go to a hotel. Second time in Sa'idya (border with Algeria and "maximum suspect") while hitchhiking brought to a police station with a ridiculous scam (policeman said "this friend of mine will bring you to a better spot") and kept hours checking documents and asking questions; lastly in Chefchaouen where a nocturnal guardian directly called the police (kept for 5 hours, taken fingerprints and the day after threatened to be expelled from the "kingdom" if he didn't leave the city). Each time police clarified that it was illegal to sleep in the streets or as guest at Moroccans for "security reasons", i.e. according to them and that law, every foreigner must go to a hotel or guesthouse every night unless there is an emergency situation where you don't have alternatives. Of course the practice is different than the theory, though pay attention, especially if you are not european, because they could be extremely racist.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

If you get lost in a city (and you will), people will jump to offer to show you the way. They will always expect a tip. This is fair, but make sure that they have actually lead you to your destination, and not intentionally gotten you more lost. It is better to buy something from a shop, and then ask the shopkeeper for directions.

All the money that is involved in tourism has unfortunately made the cities slightly dodgy. But outside urban areas, the people are almost universally polite, welcoming, and honest.


=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to [[Mauritania]] are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

A personal experience with border crossings (Dating back to 2005):
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both [[Malaga]] and [[London]]. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''


== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]

{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]
[[trash:Morocco]]</text>
      <sha1>ghz91c4qthk961vof6zcm6xbh4ksgxg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>90356</id>
      <parentid>89879</parentid>
      <timestamp>2018-02-02T12:20:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sergio7.r</username>
        <id>29427</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16033">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. If you're doing it in hot seasons bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. In winter consider staying short-sleeved during the day. Expect to freeze at night though (especially above 800 m of altitude), so plan some "onion layers" clothes. 

Most people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

Far from the big cities you won't need any special spot: everywhere looking like a safe place (ie: cars not going to fast/can see you from far/can stop almost safely) will be fine. The traffic in the countryside is never too big and they can really stop everywhere, sometimes even in spite of the most basic driving rules. You can experience a large variety of lifts: slow drivers and crazy drivers, brand new luxury cars and (especially) 30 years old car, sometimes you can find yourself very packed with many people, or on the back of a van/pick-up. 

Sometimes is not easy to understand if the incoming van is a local bus or just a normal van. The first time you see one you'll probably stop it not understand its a bus.. they're anyway nice and if you explain you don't have money (something like "makeneis fluss" in Arabic) they'll either go away without any complaints or maybe give you a free ride. 

European-style gas station hitchhiking is possible on the motorways, which are quite busy and in very good shape. They are a good way to cover long distances in a short time, especially between the big cities. The employees might not allow you to approach drivers at gas stations, but will usually offer to find a ride for you, which might seem weird at first, and also seems to take longer than asking people yourself, but definitely works. Otherwise, the rest area and restaurant are often separate from the gas station and there are no employees there, so they are also a good spot to ask drivers.

__TOC__

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Errachidia]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Mohammedia]]
* [[Ouarzazate]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

'''See also:''' [[Western Sahara]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the [[Middle East]] and other parts of [[Africa]]. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French as most drivers will understand it even if in rural areas they might speak just local languages. It's not anyway too hard to make yourself understood (especially with a map) but expect they to drop you off nearby some bus or taxi station because they might not understand you want to go all the way by thumb. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are quite common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 

In some most touristic areas (ie: on the route from Rissani to Merzouga) police might think your driver is an unauthorized guide illegally getting money from you, so be ready to explain them (in French!) you're just hitchhiking and your driver was just very kind in helping you. Having some picture of your hitchhiking experience will help convincing them, otherwise your driver might get a fine, and of course you'll offer to pay for it.

== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20–40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind. Inside cities but also small villages if not invited at home, a very good option is ask for the nocturnal guardian, almost any quarter and village have one, they will show you the place to put your tent or mat and will take care of you in the night. 

The night can get extremely cold for most of the year, especially around mountains. As they seldom have heating, be sure to carry a sleeping bag even if you plan to stay in hotels, as the blanket they give you might not be enough.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

If the night is coming close and you're in a rural area, you will often find groups of women sitting outside and talking. If you ask them for a place to set up your tent, you will usually be shown a corner somewhere close to peoples' houses where you can then camp with some "protection".

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Hospitality ==

Morocco is famous for its hospitality and if you spend some time hitchhiking around the country, someone will sooner or later invite you for tea, food, or a place to sleep. To be polite, and to find out whether the invitation is genuine, it is wise to refuse at least once. If people really want to invite you they will insist, and you can accept in good conscience after the second or third time. Sometimes, people might offer you to stay with them if you ever come to their town, but only do so out of politeness, in which case it might not be very nice to respond with something like "yeah, definitely, what's your number, so I can call you when I get there?". But many people also genuinely want to help you out and will offer you to take down their phone number in case you need a place to stay or any help at all, and if you feel like they are serious about it, it is definitely not rude to accept and call them later if you want to take them up on it. 

It might be a good idea to make yourself aware of the overall social / economic situation of people who invite you, as you might meet both very rich and very poor people, and even a very poor person might offer to pay for food, transport or other expenses, even if they cannot really afford it. In these cases, if someone invites you to spend the night at their home, if you can afford it, why not pay for groceries, or at least bring a small gift, like a pack of tea, sugar or some fruits... A little extra food every once in a while will most probably not put a dent in your budget.

== Personal Experiences ==
[[User: Fedecicco| Fede]] was caught wild camping three times and detained by the police. Once in Azilal, in the Atlas mountains, asking for a spot near a mosque, the security didn't authorise him until arrival of the cops (amn watani) who treated him politely and explained they must force him go to a hotel. Second time in Sa'idya (border with Algeria and "maximum suspect") while hitchhiking brought to a police station with a ridiculous scam (policeman said "this friend of mine will bring you to a better spot") and kept hours checking documents and asking questions; lastly in Chefchaouen where a nocturnal guardian directly called the police (kept for 5 hours, taken fingerprints and the day after threatened to be expelled from the "kingdom" if he didn't leave the city). Each time police clarified that it was illegal to sleep in the streets or as guest at Moroccans for "security reasons", i.e. according to them and that law, every foreigner must go to a hotel or guesthouse every night unless there is an emergency situation where you don't have alternatives. Of course the practice is different than the theory, though pay attention, especially if you are not european, because they could be extremely racist.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

If you get lost in a city (and you will), people will jump to offer to show you the way. They will always expect a tip. This is fair, but make sure that they have actually lead you to your destination, and not intentionally gotten you more lost. It is better to buy something from a shop, and then ask the shopkeeper for directions.

All the money that is involved in tourism has unfortunately made the cities slightly dodgy. But outside urban areas, the people are almost universally polite, welcoming, and honest.


=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to [[Mauritania]] are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

A personal experience with border crossings (Dating back to 2005):
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both [[Malaga]] and [[London]]. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''


== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]

{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]
[[trash:Morocco]]</text>
      <sha1>sysaxf2m33yxy0rmwixk5blj5esbncg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>91020</id>
      <parentid>90356</parentid>
      <timestamp>2018-05-30T20:10:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Marvmarv</username>
        <id>29373</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16047">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. If you're doing it in hot seasons bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. In winter consider staying short-sleeved during the day. Expect to freeze at night though (especially above 800 m of altitude), so plan some "onion layers" clothes. 

Most people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

Far from the big cities you won't need any special spot: everywhere looking like a safe place (ie: cars not going to fast/can see you from far/can stop almost safely) will be fine. The traffic in the countryside is never too big and they can really stop everywhere, sometimes even in spite of the most basic driving rules. You can experience a large variety of lifts: slow drivers and crazy drivers, brand new luxury cars and (especially) 30 years old car, sometimes you can find yourself very packed with many people, or on the back of a van/pick-up. 

Sometimes is not easy to understand if the incoming van is a local bus or just a normal van. The first time you see one you'll probably stop it not understand its a bus.. they're anyway nice and if you explain you don't have money (something like "makeneis fluss" in Arabic) they'll either go away without any complaints or maybe give you a free ride. 

European-style gas station hitchhiking is possible on the motorways, which are quite busy and in very good shape. They are a good way to cover long distances in a short time, especially between the big cities. The employees might not allow you to approach drivers at gas stations, but will usually offer to find a ride for you, which might seem weird at first, and also seems to take longer than asking people yourself, but definitely works. Otherwise, the rest area and restaurant are often separate from the gas station and there are no employees there, so they are also a good spot to ask drivers.

__TOC__

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Errachidia]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Larache]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Mohammedia]]
* [[Ouarzazate]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

'''See also:''' [[Western Sahara]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the [[Middle East]] and other parts of [[Africa]]. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French as most drivers will understand it even if in rural areas they might speak just local languages. It's not anyway too hard to make yourself understood (especially with a map) but expect they to drop you off nearby some bus or taxi station because they might not understand you want to go all the way by thumb. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are quite common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 

In some most touristic areas (ie: on the route from Rissani to Merzouga) police might think your driver is an unauthorized guide illegally getting money from you, so be ready to explain them (in French!) you're just hitchhiking and your driver was just very kind in helping you. Having some picture of your hitchhiking experience will help convincing them, otherwise your driver might get a fine, and of course you'll offer to pay for it.

== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20–40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind. Inside cities but also small villages if not invited at home, a very good option is ask for the nocturnal guardian, almost any quarter and village have one, they will show you the place to put your tent or mat and will take care of you in the night. 

The night can get extremely cold for most of the year, especially around mountains. As they seldom have heating, be sure to carry a sleeping bag even if you plan to stay in hotels, as the blanket they give you might not be enough.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

If the night is coming close and you're in a rural area, you will often find groups of women sitting outside and talking. If you ask them for a place to set up your tent, you will usually be shown a corner somewhere close to peoples' houses where you can then camp with some "protection".

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Hospitality ==

Morocco is famous for its hospitality and if you spend some time hitchhiking around the country, someone will sooner or later invite you for tea, food, or a place to sleep. To be polite, and to find out whether the invitation is genuine, it is wise to refuse at least once. If people really want to invite you they will insist, and you can accept in good conscience after the second or third time. Sometimes, people might offer you to stay with them if you ever come to their town, but only do so out of politeness, in which case it might not be very nice to respond with something like "yeah, definitely, what's your number, so I can call you when I get there?". But many people also genuinely want to help you out and will offer you to take down their phone number in case you need a place to stay or any help at all, and if you feel like they are serious about it, it is definitely not rude to accept and call them later if you want to take them up on it. 

It might be a good idea to make yourself aware of the overall social / economic situation of people who invite you, as you might meet both very rich and very poor people, and even a very poor person might offer to pay for food, transport or other expenses, even if they cannot really afford it. In these cases, if someone invites you to spend the night at their home, if you can afford it, why not pay for groceries, or at least bring a small gift, like a pack of tea, sugar or some fruits... A little extra food every once in a while will most probably not put a dent in your budget.

== Personal Experiences ==
[[User: Fedecicco| Fede]] was caught wild camping three times and detained by the police. Once in Azilal, in the Atlas mountains, asking for a spot near a mosque, the security didn't authorise him until arrival of the cops (amn watani) who treated him politely and explained they must force him go to a hotel. Second time in Sa'idya (border with Algeria and "maximum suspect") while hitchhiking brought to a police station with a ridiculous scam (policeman said "this friend of mine will bring you to a better spot") and kept hours checking documents and asking questions; lastly in Chefchaouen where a nocturnal guardian directly called the police (kept for 5 hours, taken fingerprints and the day after threatened to be expelled from the "kingdom" if he didn't leave the city). Each time police clarified that it was illegal to sleep in the streets or as guest at Moroccans for "security reasons", i.e. according to them and that law, every foreigner must go to a hotel or guesthouse every night unless there is an emergency situation where you don't have alternatives. Of course the practice is different than the theory, though pay attention, especially if you are not european, because they could be extremely racist.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

If you get lost in a city (and you will), people will jump to offer to show you the way. They will always expect a tip. This is fair, but make sure that they have actually lead you to your destination, and not intentionally gotten you more lost. It is better to buy something from a shop, and then ask the shopkeeper for directions.

All the money that is involved in tourism has unfortunately made the cities slightly dodgy. But outside urban areas, the people are almost universally polite, welcoming, and honest.


=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to [[Mauritania]] are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

A personal experience with border crossings (Dating back to 2005):
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both [[Malaga]] and [[London]]. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''


== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]

{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]
[[trash:Morocco]]</text>
      <sha1>h4otesareqbgn2is3n5eddgq850886w</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>97452</id>
      <parentid>91020</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-02-29T15:35:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>The-nomaddicts</username>
        <id>41926</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* Border crossing */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16251">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. If you're doing it in hot seasons bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. In winter consider staying short-sleeved during the day. Expect to freeze at night though (especially above 800 m of altitude), so plan some "onion layers" clothes. 

Most people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

Far from the big cities you won't need any special spot: everywhere looking like a safe place (ie: cars not going to fast/can see you from far/can stop almost safely) will be fine. The traffic in the countryside is never too big and they can really stop everywhere, sometimes even in spite of the most basic driving rules. You can experience a large variety of lifts: slow drivers and crazy drivers, brand new luxury cars and (especially) 30 years old car, sometimes you can find yourself very packed with many people, or on the back of a van/pick-up. 

Sometimes is not easy to understand if the incoming van is a local bus or just a normal van. The first time you see one you'll probably stop it not understand its a bus.. they're anyway nice and if you explain you don't have money (something like "makeneis fluss" in Arabic) they'll either go away without any complaints or maybe give you a free ride. 

European-style gas station hitchhiking is possible on the motorways, which are quite busy and in very good shape. They are a good way to cover long distances in a short time, especially between the big cities. The employees might not allow you to approach drivers at gas stations, but will usually offer to find a ride for you, which might seem weird at first, and also seems to take longer than asking people yourself, but definitely works. Otherwise, the rest area and restaurant are often separate from the gas station and there are no employees there, so they are also a good spot to ask drivers.

__TOC__

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Errachidia]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Larache]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Mohammedia]]
* [[Ouarzazate]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

'''See also:''' [[Western Sahara]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the [[Middle East]] and other parts of [[Africa]]. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French as most drivers will understand it even if in rural areas they might speak just local languages. It's not anyway too hard to make yourself understood (especially with a map) but expect they to drop you off nearby some bus or taxi station because they might not understand you want to go all the way by thumb. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are quite common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 

In some most touristic areas (ie: on the route from Rissani to Merzouga) police might think your driver is an unauthorized guide illegally getting money from you, so be ready to explain them (in French!) you're just hitchhiking and your driver was just very kind in helping you. Having some picture of your hitchhiking experience will help convincing them, otherwise your driver might get a fine, and of course you'll offer to pay for it.

== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20–40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind. Inside cities but also small villages if not invited at home, a very good option is ask for the nocturnal guardian, almost any quarter and village have one, they will show you the place to put your tent or mat and will take care of you in the night. 

The night can get extremely cold for most of the year, especially around mountains. As they seldom have heating, be sure to carry a sleeping bag even if you plan to stay in hotels, as the blanket they give you might not be enough.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

If the night is coming close and you're in a rural area, you will often find groups of women sitting outside and talking. If you ask them for a place to set up your tent, you will usually be shown a corner somewhere close to peoples' houses where you can then camp with some "protection".

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Hospitality ==

Morocco is famous for its hospitality and if you spend some time hitchhiking around the country, someone will sooner or later invite you for tea, food, or a place to sleep. To be polite, and to find out whether the invitation is genuine, it is wise to refuse at least once. If people really want to invite you they will insist, and you can accept in good conscience after the second or third time. Sometimes, people might offer you to stay with them if you ever come to their town, but only do so out of politeness, in which case it might not be very nice to respond with something like "yeah, definitely, what's your number, so I can call you when I get there?". But many people also genuinely want to help you out and will offer you to take down their phone number in case you need a place to stay or any help at all, and if you feel like they are serious about it, it is definitely not rude to accept and call them later if you want to take them up on it. 

It might be a good idea to make yourself aware of the overall social / economic situation of people who invite you, as you might meet both very rich and very poor people, and even a very poor person might offer to pay for food, transport or other expenses, even if they cannot really afford it. In these cases, if someone invites you to spend the night at their home, if you can afford it, why not pay for groceries, or at least bring a small gift, like a pack of tea, sugar or some fruits... A little extra food every once in a while will most probably not put a dent in your budget.

== Personal Experiences ==
[[User: Fedecicco| Fede]] was caught wild camping three times and detained by the police. Once in Azilal, in the Atlas mountains, asking for a spot near a mosque, the security didn't authorise him until arrival of the cops (amn watani) who treated him politely and explained they must force him go to a hotel. Second time in Sa'idya (border with Algeria and "maximum suspect") while hitchhiking brought to a police station with a ridiculous scam (policeman said "this friend of mine will bring you to a better spot") and kept hours checking documents and asking questions; lastly in Chefchaouen where a nocturnal guardian directly called the police (kept for 5 hours, taken fingerprints and the day after threatened to be expelled from the "kingdom" if he didn't leave the city). Each time police clarified that it was illegal to sleep in the streets or as guest at Moroccans for "security reasons", i.e. according to them and that law, every foreigner must go to a hotel or guesthouse every night unless there is an emergency situation where you don't have alternatives. Of course the practice is different than the theory, though pay attention, especially if you are not european, because they could be extremely racist.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

If you get lost in a city (and you will), people will jump to offer to show you the way. They will always expect a tip. This is fair, but make sure that they have actually lead you to your destination, and not intentionally gotten you more lost. It is better to buy something from a shop, and then ask the shopkeeper for directions.

All the money that is involved in tourism has unfortunately made the cities slightly dodgy. But outside urban areas, the people are almost universally polite, welcoming, and honest.


=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to [[Mauritania]] are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

[[The-nomaddicts]] entered Mauritania from [[Western Sahara]] in December 2019 and received a visa at the border. It cost 55 Euros and took about 3 hours but a visa on arrival is standard procedure now.

A personal experience with border crossings (Dating back to 2005):
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both [[Malaga]] and [[London]]. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''


== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]

{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]
[[trash:Morocco]]</text>
      <sha1>hj7gwwq3zn4tmqz53nb8f4xyghnaw6y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>99696</id>
      <parentid>97452</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-10-14T14:12:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* See Also */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16278">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. If you're doing it in hot seasons bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. In winter consider staying short-sleeved during the day. Expect to freeze at night though (especially above 800 m of altitude), so plan some "onion layers" clothes. 

Most people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

Far from the big cities you won't need any special spot: everywhere looking like a safe place (ie: cars not going to fast/can see you from far/can stop almost safely) will be fine. The traffic in the countryside is never too big and they can really stop everywhere, sometimes even in spite of the most basic driving rules. You can experience a large variety of lifts: slow drivers and crazy drivers, brand new luxury cars and (especially) 30 years old car, sometimes you can find yourself very packed with many people, or on the back of a van/pick-up. 

Sometimes is not easy to understand if the incoming van is a local bus or just a normal van. The first time you see one you'll probably stop it not understand its a bus.. they're anyway nice and if you explain you don't have money (something like "makeneis fluss" in Arabic) they'll either go away without any complaints or maybe give you a free ride. 

European-style gas station hitchhiking is possible on the motorways, which are quite busy and in very good shape. They are a good way to cover long distances in a short time, especially between the big cities. The employees might not allow you to approach drivers at gas stations, but will usually offer to find a ride for you, which might seem weird at first, and also seems to take longer than asking people yourself, but definitely works. Otherwise, the rest area and restaurant are often separate from the gas station and there are no employees there, so they are also a good spot to ask drivers.

__TOC__

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Errachidia]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Larache]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Mohammedia]]
* [[Ouarzazate]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

'''See also:''' [[Western Sahara]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the [[Middle East]] and other parts of [[Africa]]. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French as most drivers will understand it even if in rural areas they might speak just local languages. It's not anyway too hard to make yourself understood (especially with a map) but expect they to drop you off nearby some bus or taxi station because they might not understand you want to go all the way by thumb. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are quite common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 

In some most touristic areas (ie: on the route from Rissani to Merzouga) police might think your driver is an unauthorized guide illegally getting money from you, so be ready to explain them (in French!) you're just hitchhiking and your driver was just very kind in helping you. Having some picture of your hitchhiking experience will help convincing them, otherwise your driver might get a fine, and of course you'll offer to pay for it.

== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20–40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind. Inside cities but also small villages if not invited at home, a very good option is ask for the nocturnal guardian, almost any quarter and village have one, they will show you the place to put your tent or mat and will take care of you in the night. 

The night can get extremely cold for most of the year, especially around mountains. As they seldom have heating, be sure to carry a sleeping bag even if you plan to stay in hotels, as the blanket they give you might not be enough.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

If the night is coming close and you're in a rural area, you will often find groups of women sitting outside and talking. If you ask them for a place to set up your tent, you will usually be shown a corner somewhere close to peoples' houses where you can then camp with some "protection".

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Hospitality ==

Morocco is famous for its hospitality and if you spend some time hitchhiking around the country, someone will sooner or later invite you for tea, food, or a place to sleep. To be polite, and to find out whether the invitation is genuine, it is wise to refuse at least once. If people really want to invite you they will insist, and you can accept in good conscience after the second or third time. Sometimes, people might offer you to stay with them if you ever come to their town, but only do so out of politeness, in which case it might not be very nice to respond with something like "yeah, definitely, what's your number, so I can call you when I get there?". But many people also genuinely want to help you out and will offer you to take down their phone number in case you need a place to stay or any help at all, and if you feel like they are serious about it, it is definitely not rude to accept and call them later if you want to take them up on it. 

It might be a good idea to make yourself aware of the overall social / economic situation of people who invite you, as you might meet both very rich and very poor people, and even a very poor person might offer to pay for food, transport or other expenses, even if they cannot really afford it. In these cases, if someone invites you to spend the night at their home, if you can afford it, why not pay for groceries, or at least bring a small gift, like a pack of tea, sugar or some fruits... A little extra food every once in a while will most probably not put a dent in your budget.

== Personal Experiences ==
[[User: Fedecicco| Fede]] was caught wild camping three times and detained by the police. Once in Azilal, in the Atlas mountains, asking for a spot near a mosque, the security didn't authorise him until arrival of the cops (amn watani) who treated him politely and explained they must force him go to a hotel. Second time in Sa'idya (border with Algeria and "maximum suspect") while hitchhiking brought to a police station with a ridiculous scam (policeman said "this friend of mine will bring you to a better spot") and kept hours checking documents and asking questions; lastly in Chefchaouen where a nocturnal guardian directly called the police (kept for 5 hours, taken fingerprints and the day after threatened to be expelled from the "kingdom" if he didn't leave the city). Each time police clarified that it was illegal to sleep in the streets or as guest at Moroccans for "security reasons", i.e. according to them and that law, every foreigner must go to a hotel or guesthouse every night unless there is an emergency situation where you don't have alternatives. Of course the practice is different than the theory, though pay attention, especially if you are not european, because they could be extremely racist.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

If you get lost in a city (and you will), people will jump to offer to show you the way. They will always expect a tip. This is fair, but make sure that they have actually lead you to your destination, and not intentionally gotten you more lost. It is better to buy something from a shop, and then ask the shopkeeper for directions.

All the money that is involved in tourism has unfortunately made the cities slightly dodgy. But outside urban areas, the people are almost universally polite, welcoming, and honest.


=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to [[Mauritania]] are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

[[The-nomaddicts]] entered Mauritania from [[Western Sahara]] in December 2019 and received a visa at the border. It cost 55 Euros and took about 3 hours but a visa on arrival is standard procedure now.

A personal experience with border crossings (Dating back to 2005):
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both [[Malaga]] and [[London]]. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD]:
: ''The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.''


== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>k0wb1y4kc8b9d2eu99xbssw7311pp9c</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101229</id>
      <parentid>99696</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-05T18:34:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Hitchhiking Events */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16272">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. If you're doing it in hot seasons bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. In winter consider staying short-sleeved during the day. Expect to freeze at night though (especially above 800 m of altitude), so plan some "onion layers" clothes. 

Most people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

Far from the big cities you won't need any special spot: everywhere looking like a safe place (ie: cars not going to fast/can see you from far/can stop almost safely) will be fine. The traffic in the countryside is never too big and they can really stop everywhere, sometimes even in spite of the most basic driving rules. You can experience a large variety of lifts: slow drivers and crazy drivers, brand new luxury cars and (especially) 30 years old car, sometimes you can find yourself very packed with many people, or on the back of a van/pick-up. 

Sometimes is not easy to understand if the incoming van is a local bus or just a normal van. The first time you see one you'll probably stop it not understand its a bus.. they're anyway nice and if you explain you don't have money (something like "makeneis fluss" in Arabic) they'll either go away without any complaints or maybe give you a free ride. 

European-style gas station hitchhiking is possible on the motorways, which are quite busy and in very good shape. They are a good way to cover long distances in a short time, especially between the big cities. The employees might not allow you to approach drivers at gas stations, but will usually offer to find a ride for you, which might seem weird at first, and also seems to take longer than asking people yourself, but definitely works. Otherwise, the rest area and restaurant are often separate from the gas station and there are no employees there, so they are also a good spot to ask drivers.

__TOC__

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Errachidia]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Larache]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Mohammedia]]
* [[Ouarzazate]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

'''See also:''' [[Western Sahara]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the [[Middle East]] and other parts of [[Africa]]. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French as most drivers will understand it even if in rural areas they might speak just local languages. It's not anyway too hard to make yourself understood (especially with a map) but expect they to drop you off nearby some bus or taxi station because they might not understand you want to go all the way by thumb. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are quite common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 

In some most touristic areas (ie: on the route from Rissani to Merzouga) police might think your driver is an unauthorized guide illegally getting money from you, so be ready to explain them (in French!) you're just hitchhiking and your driver was just very kind in helping you. Having some picture of your hitchhiking experience will help convincing them, otherwise your driver might get a fine, and of course you'll offer to pay for it.

== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20–40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind. Inside cities but also small villages if not invited at home, a very good option is ask for the nocturnal guardian, almost any quarter and village have one, they will show you the place to put your tent or mat and will take care of you in the night. 

The night can get extremely cold for most of the year, especially around mountains. As they seldom have heating, be sure to carry a sleeping bag even if you plan to stay in hotels, as the blanket they give you might not be enough.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

If the night is coming close and you're in a rural area, you will often find groups of women sitting outside and talking. If you ask them for a place to set up your tent, you will usually be shown a corner somewhere close to peoples' houses where you can then camp with some "protection".

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Hospitality ==

Morocco is famous for its hospitality and if you spend some time hitchhiking around the country, someone will sooner or later invite you for tea, food, or a place to sleep. To be polite, and to find out whether the invitation is genuine, it is wise to refuse at least once. If people really want to invite you they will insist, and you can accept in good conscience after the second or third time. Sometimes, people might offer you to stay with them if you ever come to their town, but only do so out of politeness, in which case it might not be very nice to respond with something like "yeah, definitely, what's your number, so I can call you when I get there?". But many people also genuinely want to help you out and will offer you to take down their phone number in case you need a place to stay or any help at all, and if you feel like they are serious about it, it is definitely not rude to accept and call them later if you want to take them up on it. 

It might be a good idea to make yourself aware of the overall social / economic situation of people who invite you, as you might meet both very rich and very poor people, and even a very poor person might offer to pay for food, transport or other expenses, even if they cannot really afford it. In these cases, if someone invites you to spend the night at their home, if you can afford it, why not pay for groceries, or at least bring a small gift, like a pack of tea, sugar or some fruits... A little extra food every once in a while will most probably not put a dent in your budget.

== Personal Experiences ==
[[User: Fedecicco| Fede]] was caught wild camping three times and detained by the police. Once in Azilal, in the Atlas mountains, asking for a spot near a mosque, the security didn't authorise him until arrival of the cops (amn watani) who treated him politely and explained they must force him go to a hotel. Second time in Sa'idya (border with Algeria and "maximum suspect") while hitchhiking brought to a police station with a ridiculous scam (policeman said "this friend of mine will bring you to a better spot") and kept hours checking documents and asking questions; lastly in Chefchaouen where a nocturnal guardian directly called the police (kept for 5 hours, taken fingerprints and the day after threatened to be expelled from the "kingdom" if he didn't leave the city). Each time police clarified that it was illegal to sleep in the streets or as guest at Moroccans for "security reasons", i.e. according to them and that law, every foreigner must go to a hotel or guesthouse every night unless there is an emergency situation where you don't have alternatives. Of course the practice is different than the theory, though pay attention, especially if you are not european, because they could be extremely racist.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

If you get lost in a city (and you will), people will jump to offer to show you the way. They will always expect a tip. This is fair, but make sure that they have actually lead you to your destination, and not intentionally gotten you more lost. It is better to buy something from a shop, and then ask the shopkeeper for directions.

All the money that is involved in tourism has unfortunately made the cities slightly dodgy. But outside urban areas, the people are almost universally polite, welcoming, and honest.


=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to [[Mauritania]] are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

[[The-nomaddicts]] entered Mauritania from [[Western Sahara]] in December 2019 and received a visa at the border. It cost 55 Euros and took about 3 hours but a visa on arrival is standard procedure now.

A personal experience with border crossings (Dating back to 2005):
: “''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both [[Malaga]] and [[London]]. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD] : The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.

== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>7dsmb86vub2yrtgyjsmskhjn19xatba</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101230</id>
      <parentid>101229</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-05T18:35:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Border crossing */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16270">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. If you're doing it in hot seasons bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. In winter consider staying short-sleeved during the day. Expect to freeze at night though (especially above 800 m of altitude), so plan some "onion layers" clothes. 

Most people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

Far from the big cities you won't need any special spot: everywhere looking like a safe place (ie: cars not going to fast/can see you from far/can stop almost safely) will be fine. The traffic in the countryside is never too big and they can really stop everywhere, sometimes even in spite of the most basic driving rules. You can experience a large variety of lifts: slow drivers and crazy drivers, brand new luxury cars and (especially) 30 years old car, sometimes you can find yourself very packed with many people, or on the back of a van/pick-up. 

Sometimes is not easy to understand if the incoming van is a local bus or just a normal van. The first time you see one you'll probably stop it not understand its a bus.. they're anyway nice and if you explain you don't have money (something like "makeneis fluss" in Arabic) they'll either go away without any complaints or maybe give you a free ride. 

European-style gas station hitchhiking is possible on the motorways, which are quite busy and in very good shape. They are a good way to cover long distances in a short time, especially between the big cities. The employees might not allow you to approach drivers at gas stations, but will usually offer to find a ride for you, which might seem weird at first, and also seems to take longer than asking people yourself, but definitely works. Otherwise, the rest area and restaurant are often separate from the gas station and there are no employees there, so they are also a good spot to ask drivers.

__TOC__

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Errachidia]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Larache]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Mohammedia]]
* [[Ouarzazate]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

'''See also:''' [[Western Sahara]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the [[Middle East]] and other parts of [[Africa]]. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French as most drivers will understand it even if in rural areas they might speak just local languages. It's not anyway too hard to make yourself understood (especially with a map) but expect they to drop you off nearby some bus or taxi station because they might not understand you want to go all the way by thumb. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are quite common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 

In some most touristic areas (ie: on the route from Rissani to Merzouga) police might think your driver is an unauthorized guide illegally getting money from you, so be ready to explain them (in French!) you're just hitchhiking and your driver was just very kind in helping you. Having some picture of your hitchhiking experience will help convincing them, otherwise your driver might get a fine, and of course you'll offer to pay for it.

== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20–40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind. Inside cities but also small villages if not invited at home, a very good option is ask for the nocturnal guardian, almost any quarter and village have one, they will show you the place to put your tent or mat and will take care of you in the night. 

The night can get extremely cold for most of the year, especially around mountains. As they seldom have heating, be sure to carry a sleeping bag even if you plan to stay in hotels, as the blanket they give you might not be enough.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

If the night is coming close and you're in a rural area, you will often find groups of women sitting outside and talking. If you ask them for a place to set up your tent, you will usually be shown a corner somewhere close to peoples' houses where you can then camp with some "protection".

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Hospitality ==

Morocco is famous for its hospitality and if you spend some time hitchhiking around the country, someone will sooner or later invite you for tea, food, or a place to sleep. To be polite, and to find out whether the invitation is genuine, it is wise to refuse at least once. If people really want to invite you they will insist, and you can accept in good conscience after the second or third time. Sometimes, people might offer you to stay with them if you ever come to their town, but only do so out of politeness, in which case it might not be very nice to respond with something like "yeah, definitely, what's your number, so I can call you when I get there?". But many people also genuinely want to help you out and will offer you to take down their phone number in case you need a place to stay or any help at all, and if you feel like they are serious about it, it is definitely not rude to accept and call them later if you want to take them up on it. 

It might be a good idea to make yourself aware of the overall social / economic situation of people who invite you, as you might meet both very rich and very poor people, and even a very poor person might offer to pay for food, transport or other expenses, even if they cannot really afford it. In these cases, if someone invites you to spend the night at their home, if you can afford it, why not pay for groceries, or at least bring a small gift, like a pack of tea, sugar or some fruits... A little extra food every once in a while will most probably not put a dent in your budget.

== Personal Experiences ==
[[User: Fedecicco| Fede]] was caught wild camping three times and detained by the police. Once in Azilal, in the Atlas mountains, asking for a spot near a mosque, the security didn't authorise him until arrival of the cops (amn watani) who treated him politely and explained they must force him go to a hotel. Second time in Sa'idya (border with Algeria and "maximum suspect") while hitchhiking brought to a police station with a ridiculous scam (policeman said "this friend of mine will bring you to a better spot") and kept hours checking documents and asking questions; lastly in Chefchaouen where a nocturnal guardian directly called the police (kept for 5 hours, taken fingerprints and the day after threatened to be expelled from the "kingdom" if he didn't leave the city). Each time police clarified that it was illegal to sleep in the streets or as guest at Moroccans for "security reasons", i.e. according to them and that law, every foreigner must go to a hotel or guesthouse every night unless there is an emergency situation where you don't have alternatives. Of course the practice is different than the theory, though pay attention, especially if you are not european, because they could be extremely racist.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

If you get lost in a city (and you will), people will jump to offer to show you the way. They will always expect a tip. This is fair, but make sure that they have actually lead you to your destination, and not intentionally gotten you more lost. It is better to buy something from a shop, and then ask the shopkeeper for directions.

All the money that is involved in tourism has unfortunately made the cities slightly dodgy. But outside urban areas, the people are almost universally polite, welcoming, and honest.


=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to [[Mauritania]] are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

[[The-nomaddicts]] entered Mauritania from [[Western Sahara]] in December 2019 and received a visa at the border. It cost 55 Euros and took about 3 hours but a visa on arrival is standard procedure now.

A personal experience with border crossings (Dating back to 2005):
“''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both [[Malaga]] and [[London]]. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD] : The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.

== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>q4pfzwih9m4b26kve05aez3qr72cmvo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101231</id>
      <parentid>101230</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-05T18:35:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Personal Experiences */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16274">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. If you're doing it in hot seasons bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. In winter consider staying short-sleeved during the day. Expect to freeze at night though (especially above 800 m of altitude), so plan some "onion layers" clothes. 

Most people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

Far from the big cities you won't need any special spot: everywhere looking like a safe place (ie: cars not going to fast/can see you from far/can stop almost safely) will be fine. The traffic in the countryside is never too big and they can really stop everywhere, sometimes even in spite of the most basic driving rules. You can experience a large variety of lifts: slow drivers and crazy drivers, brand new luxury cars and (especially) 30 years old car, sometimes you can find yourself very packed with many people, or on the back of a van/pick-up. 

Sometimes is not easy to understand if the incoming van is a local bus or just a normal van. The first time you see one you'll probably stop it not understand its a bus.. they're anyway nice and if you explain you don't have money (something like "makeneis fluss" in Arabic) they'll either go away without any complaints or maybe give you a free ride. 

European-style gas station hitchhiking is possible on the motorways, which are quite busy and in very good shape. They are a good way to cover long distances in a short time, especially between the big cities. The employees might not allow you to approach drivers at gas stations, but will usually offer to find a ride for you, which might seem weird at first, and also seems to take longer than asking people yourself, but definitely works. Otherwise, the rest area and restaurant are often separate from the gas station and there are no employees there, so they are also a good spot to ask drivers.

__TOC__

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Errachidia]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Larache]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Mohammedia]]
* [[Ouarzazate]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

'''See also:''' [[Western Sahara]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the [[Middle East]] and other parts of [[Africa]]. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French as most drivers will understand it even if in rural areas they might speak just local languages. It's not anyway too hard to make yourself understood (especially with a map) but expect they to drop you off nearby some bus or taxi station because they might not understand you want to go all the way by thumb. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are quite common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 

In some most touristic areas (ie: on the route from Rissani to Merzouga) police might think your driver is an unauthorized guide illegally getting money from you, so be ready to explain them (in French!) you're just hitchhiking and your driver was just very kind in helping you. Having some picture of your hitchhiking experience will help convincing them, otherwise your driver might get a fine, and of course you'll offer to pay for it.

== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20–40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind. Inside cities but also small villages if not invited at home, a very good option is ask for the nocturnal guardian, almost any quarter and village have one, they will show you the place to put your tent or mat and will take care of you in the night. 

The night can get extremely cold for most of the year, especially around mountains. As they seldom have heating, be sure to carry a sleeping bag even if you plan to stay in hotels, as the blanket they give you might not be enough.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

If the night is coming close and you're in a rural area, you will often find groups of women sitting outside and talking. If you ask them for a place to set up your tent, you will usually be shown a corner somewhere close to peoples' houses where you can then camp with some "protection".

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Hospitality ==

Morocco is famous for its hospitality and if you spend some time hitchhiking around the country, someone will sooner or later invite you for tea, food, or a place to sleep. To be polite, and to find out whether the invitation is genuine, it is wise to refuse at least once. If people really want to invite you they will insist, and you can accept in good conscience after the second or third time. Sometimes, people might offer you to stay with them if you ever come to their town, but only do so out of politeness, in which case it might not be very nice to respond with something like "yeah, definitely, what's your number, so I can call you when I get there?". But many people also genuinely want to help you out and will offer you to take down their phone number in case you need a place to stay or any help at all, and if you feel like they are serious about it, it is definitely not rude to accept and call them later if you want to take them up on it. 

It might be a good idea to make yourself aware of the overall social / economic situation of people who invite you, as you might meet both very rich and very poor people, and even a very poor person might offer to pay for food, transport or other expenses, even if they cannot really afford it. In these cases, if someone invites you to spend the night at their home, if you can afford it, why not pay for groceries, or at least bring a small gift, like a pack of tea, sugar or some fruits... A little extra food every once in a while will most probably not put a dent in your budget.

== Personal Experiences ==
[[User: Fedecicco| Fede]] ''was caught wild camping three times and detained by the police. Once in Azilal, in the Atlas mountains, asking for a spot near a mosque, the security didn't authorise him until arrival of the cops (amn watani) who treated him politely and explained they must force him go to a hotel. Second time in Sa'idya (border with Algeria and "maximum suspect") while hitchhiking brought to a police station with a ridiculous scam (policeman said "this friend of mine will bring you to a better spot") and kept hours checking documents and asking questions; lastly in Chefchaouen where a nocturnal guardian directly called the police (kept for 5 hours, taken fingerprints and the day after threatened to be expelled from the "kingdom" if he didn't leave the city). Each time police clarified that it was illegal to sleep in the streets or as guest at Moroccans for "security reasons", i.e. according to them and that law, every foreigner must go to a hotel or guesthouse every night unless there is an emergency situation where you don't have alternatives. Of course the practice is different than the theory, though pay attention, especially if you are not european, because they could be extremely racist.''

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

If you get lost in a city (and you will), people will jump to offer to show you the way. They will always expect a tip. This is fair, but make sure that they have actually lead you to your destination, and not intentionally gotten you more lost. It is better to buy something from a shop, and then ask the shopkeeper for directions.

All the money that is involved in tourism has unfortunately made the cities slightly dodgy. But outside urban areas, the people are almost universally polite, welcoming, and honest.


=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to [[Mauritania]] are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

[[The-nomaddicts]] entered Mauritania from [[Western Sahara]] in December 2019 and received a visa at the border. It cost 55 Euros and took about 3 hours but a visa on arrival is standard procedure now.

A personal experience with border crossings (Dating back to 2005):
“''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both [[Malaga]] and [[London]]. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD] : The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.

== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>c5yj0xkgfgot1ihg9qg0vmwh60cw0tk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>103895</id>
      <parentid>101231</parentid>
      <timestamp>2022-12-19T21:02:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fedecicco</username>
        <id>4349</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15019">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. If you're doing it in hot seasons bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. In winter consider staying short-sleeved during the day. Expect to freeze at night though (especially above 800 m of altitude), so plan some "onion layers" clothes. 

Most people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

Far from the big cities you won't need any special spot: everywhere looking like a safe place (ie: cars not going to fast/can see you from far/can stop almost safely) will be fine. The traffic in the countryside is never too big and they can really stop everywhere, sometimes even in spite of the most basic driving rules. You can experience a large variety of lifts: slow drivers and crazy drivers, brand new luxury cars and (especially) 30 years old car, sometimes you can find yourself very packed with many people, or on the back of a van/pick-up. 

Sometimes is not easy to understand if the incoming van is a local bus or just a normal van. The first time you see one you'll probably stop it not understand its a bus.. they're anyway nice and if you explain you don't have money (something like "makeneis fluss" in Arabic) they'll either go away without any complaints or maybe give you a free ride. 

European-style gas station hitchhiking is possible on the motorways, which are quite busy and in very good shape. They are a good way to cover long distances in a short time, especially between the big cities. The employees might not allow you to approach drivers at gas stations, but will usually offer to find a ride for you, which might seem weird at first, and also seems to take longer than asking people yourself, but definitely works. Otherwise, the rest area and restaurant are often separate from the gas station and there are no employees there, so they are also a good spot to ask drivers.

__TOC__

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Errachidia]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Larache]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Mohammedia]]
* [[Ouarzazate]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

'''See also:''' [[Western Sahara]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the [[Middle East]] and other parts of [[Africa]]. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French as most drivers will understand it even if in rural areas they might speak just local languages. It's not anyway too hard to make yourself understood (especially with a map) but expect they to drop you off nearby some bus or taxi station because they might not understand you want to go all the way by thumb. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are quite common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 

In some most touristic areas (ie: on the route from Rissani to Merzouga) police might think your driver is an unauthorized guide illegally getting money from you, so be ready to explain them (in French!) you're just hitchhiking and your driver was just very kind in helping you. Having some picture of your hitchhiking experience will help convincing them, otherwise your driver might get a fine, and of course you'll offer to pay for it.

== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20–40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind. Inside cities but also small villages if not invited at home, a very good option is ask for the nocturnal guardian, almost any quarter and village have one, they will show you the place to put your tent or mat and will take care of you in the night. 

The night can get extremely cold for most of the year, especially around mountains. As they seldom have heating, be sure to carry a sleeping bag even if you plan to stay in hotels, as the blanket they give you might not be enough.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

If the night is coming close and you're in a rural area, you will often find groups of women sitting outside and talking. If you ask them for a place to set up your tent, you will usually be shown a corner somewhere close to peoples' houses where you can then camp with some "protection".

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Hospitality ==

Morocco is famous for its hospitality and if you spend some time hitchhiking around the country, someone will sooner or later invite you for tea, food, or a place to sleep. To be polite, and to find out whether the invitation is genuine, it is wise to refuse at least once. If people really want to invite you they will insist, and you can accept in good conscience after the second or third time. Sometimes, people might offer you to stay with them if you ever come to their town, but only do so out of politeness, in which case it might not be very nice to respond with something like "yeah, definitely, what's your number, so I can call you when I get there?". But many people also genuinely want to help you out and will offer you to take down their phone number in case you need a place to stay or any help at all, and if you feel like they are serious about it, it is definitely not rude to accept and call them later if you want to take them up on it. 

It might be a good idea to make yourself aware of the overall social / economic situation of people who invite you, as you might meet both very rich and very poor people, and even a very poor person might offer to pay for food, transport or other expenses, even if they cannot really afford it. In these cases, if someone invites you to spend the night at their home, if you can afford it, why not pay for groceries, or at least bring a small gift, like a pack of tea, sugar or some fruits... A little extra food every once in a while will most probably not put a dent in your budget.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

If you get lost in a city (and you will), people will jump to offer to show you the way. They will always expect a tip. This is fair, but make sure that they have actually lead you to your destination, and not intentionally gotten you more lost. It is better to buy something from a shop, and then ask the shopkeeper for directions.

All the money that is involved in tourism has unfortunately made the cities slightly dodgy. But outside urban areas, the people are almost universally polite, welcoming, and honest.


=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to [[Mauritania]] are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

[[The-nomaddicts]] entered Mauritania from [[Western Sahara]] in December 2019 and received a visa at the border. It cost 55 Euros and took about 3 hours but a visa on arrival is standard procedure now.

A personal experience with border crossings (Dating back to 2005):
“''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both [[Malaga]] and [[London]]. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD] : The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.

== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>qvm1vtef0z49feesbequjy5qm4sbxxm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104752</id>
      <parentid>103895</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-09-16T13:31:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Carry On My Wayward Thumb</username>
        <id>47212</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* Language */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15078">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. If you're doing it in hot seasons bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. In winter consider staying short-sleeved during the day. Expect to freeze at night though (especially above 800 m of altitude), so plan some "onion layers" clothes. 

Most people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

Far from the big cities you won't need any special spot: everywhere looking like a safe place (ie: cars not going to fast/can see you from far/can stop almost safely) will be fine. The traffic in the countryside is never too big and they can really stop everywhere, sometimes even in spite of the most basic driving rules. You can experience a large variety of lifts: slow drivers and crazy drivers, brand new luxury cars and (especially) 30 years old car, sometimes you can find yourself very packed with many people, or on the back of a van/pick-up. 

Sometimes is not easy to understand if the incoming van is a local bus or just a normal van. The first time you see one you'll probably stop it not understand its a bus.. they're anyway nice and if you explain you don't have money (something like "makeneis fluss" in Arabic) they'll either go away without any complaints or maybe give you a free ride. 

European-style gas station hitchhiking is possible on the motorways, which are quite busy and in very good shape. They are a good way to cover long distances in a short time, especially between the big cities. The employees might not allow you to approach drivers at gas stations, but will usually offer to find a ride for you, which might seem weird at first, and also seems to take longer than asking people yourself, but definitely works. Otherwise, the rest area and restaurant are often separate from the gas station and there are no employees there, so they are also a good spot to ask drivers.

__TOC__

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Errachidia]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Larache]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Mohammedia]]
* [[Ouarzazate]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

'''See also:''' [[Western Sahara]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the [[Middle East]] and other parts of [[Africa]]. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish, and you will likely also find it useful in Western Sahara. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French as most drivers will understand it even if in rural areas they might speak just local languages. It's not anyway too hard to make yourself understood (especially with a map) but expect they to drop you off nearby some bus or taxi station because they might not understand you want to go all the way by thumb. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are quite common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 

In some most touristic areas (ie: on the route from Rissani to Merzouga) police might think your driver is an unauthorized guide illegally getting money from you, so be ready to explain them (in French!) you're just hitchhiking and your driver was just very kind in helping you. Having some picture of your hitchhiking experience will help convincing them, otherwise your driver might get a fine, and of course you'll offer to pay for it.

== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20–40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind. Inside cities but also small villages if not invited at home, a very good option is ask for the nocturnal guardian, almost any quarter and village have one, they will show you the place to put your tent or mat and will take care of you in the night. 

The night can get extremely cold for most of the year, especially around mountains. As they seldom have heating, be sure to carry a sleeping bag even if you plan to stay in hotels, as the blanket they give you might not be enough.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

If the night is coming close and you're in a rural area, you will often find groups of women sitting outside and talking. If you ask them for a place to set up your tent, you will usually be shown a corner somewhere close to peoples' houses where you can then camp with some "protection".

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Hospitality ==

Morocco is famous for its hospitality and if you spend some time hitchhiking around the country, someone will sooner or later invite you for tea, food, or a place to sleep. To be polite, and to find out whether the invitation is genuine, it is wise to refuse at least once. If people really want to invite you they will insist, and you can accept in good conscience after the second or third time. Sometimes, people might offer you to stay with them if you ever come to their town, but only do so out of politeness, in which case it might not be very nice to respond with something like "yeah, definitely, what's your number, so I can call you when I get there?". But many people also genuinely want to help you out and will offer you to take down their phone number in case you need a place to stay or any help at all, and if you feel like they are serious about it, it is definitely not rude to accept and call them later if you want to take them up on it. 

It might be a good idea to make yourself aware of the overall social / economic situation of people who invite you, as you might meet both very rich and very poor people, and even a very poor person might offer to pay for food, transport or other expenses, even if they cannot really afford it. In these cases, if someone invites you to spend the night at their home, if you can afford it, why not pay for groceries, or at least bring a small gift, like a pack of tea, sugar or some fruits... A little extra food every once in a while will most probably not put a dent in your budget.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

If you get lost in a city (and you will), people will jump to offer to show you the way. They will always expect a tip. This is fair, but make sure that they have actually lead you to your destination, and not intentionally gotten you more lost. It is better to buy something from a shop, and then ask the shopkeeper for directions.

All the money that is involved in tourism has unfortunately made the cities slightly dodgy. But outside urban areas, the people are almost universally polite, welcoming, and honest.


=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to [[Mauritania]] are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

[[The-nomaddicts]] entered Mauritania from [[Western Sahara]] in December 2019 and received a visa at the border. It cost 55 Euros and took about 3 hours but a visa on arrival is standard procedure now.

A personal experience with border crossings (Dating back to 2005):
“''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both [[Malaga]] and [[London]]. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD] : The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.

== See Also ==
* [http://askamylin.blogspot.com/2009/02/morocco.html Amylin's excellent advice on getting along in Morocco]
* [[Western Sahara]]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>gqcxk738zxnfn7ibqejhut260m4ymiy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104753</id>
      <parentid>104752</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-09-16T13:32:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Carry On My Wayward Thumb</username>
        <id>47212</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* See Also */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14969">{{infobox Country
|country = Morocco
|language = Arabic, French
|capital = [[Rabat]]
|pop = 33,757,175
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='ma' /&gt;
|BW = MA
|map = &lt;map lat='32' lng='-5' zoom='5' view='3'/&gt;
|avp = Morocco
}}
Hitching in '''Morocco''' is good despite the scarcity of vehicles on some routes. If you're doing it in hot seasons bring a ''big'' bottle of water, a hat, and maybe a book to read. In winter consider staying short-sleeved during the day. Expect to freeze at night though (especially above 800 m of altitude), so plan some "onion layers" clothes. 

Most people will not want payment, but it can be hard to avoid the interest of grand taxis (who will definitely want payment). Hitchhiking is done by waving one's index finger, but the thumb will often be understood as well.

Compared to the hassle of the cities, hitching in Morocco is a very pleasant experience and a good opportunity to meet some genuine friendly people who ''don't'' want to sell you a carpet. The people for the most part are incredibly generous, intelligent and curious and hitchhikers are able to experience the country’s cultural richness and diversity in a way unavailable to tourists who travel by more conventional means. 

Moroccan car license plates tell where a car is from. Find a complete list [http://licenseplatemania.com/landenpaginas/marokko.htm here].

Far from the big cities you won't need any special spot: everywhere looking like a safe place (ie: cars not going to fast/can see you from far/can stop almost safely) will be fine. The traffic in the countryside is never too big and they can really stop everywhere, sometimes even in spite of the most basic driving rules. You can experience a large variety of lifts: slow drivers and crazy drivers, brand new luxury cars and (especially) 30 years old car, sometimes you can find yourself very packed with many people, or on the back of a van/pick-up. 

Sometimes is not easy to understand if the incoming van is a local bus or just a normal van. The first time you see one you'll probably stop it not understand its a bus.. they're anyway nice and if you explain you don't have money (something like "makeneis fluss" in Arabic) they'll either go away without any complaints or maybe give you a free ride. 

European-style gas station hitchhiking is possible on the motorways, which are quite busy and in very good shape. They are a good way to cover long distances in a short time, especially between the big cities. The employees might not allow you to approach drivers at gas stations, but will usually offer to find a ride for you, which might seem weird at first, and also seems to take longer than asking people yourself, but definitely works. Otherwise, the rest area and restaurant are often separate from the gas station and there are no employees there, so they are also a good spot to ask drivers.

__TOC__

== Cities ==
* [[Agadir]]
* [[Casablanca]]
* [[Chefchaouen]]
* [[El Jadida]]
* [[Errachidia]]
* [[Essaouira]]
* [[Fes]]
* [[Larache]]
* [[Marrakech]]
* [[Meknes]]
* [[Mohammedia]]
* [[Ouarzazate]]
* [[Rabat]]
* [[Tangier]]
* [[Tetouan]]

'''See also:''' [[Western Sahara]]

== Language ==

The official language is Arabic though the dialects spoken in Morocco and [[Algeria]] are significantly different from Modern Standard Arabic and dialects found in the [[Middle East]] and other parts of [[Africa]]. French is a common language of business and among educated people and in major cities will be almost universally understood.  Many people in the north speak Spanish, and you will likely also find it useful in Western Sahara. The major Berber languages are fascinating but the effort required to learn them is probably too great for a casual tourist. 

While spoken by some educated people and those who work in tourism, English is of little use. Be very careful if approached by someone speaking English, they are often looking to make a profit, legitimate or not.

At a minimum you should have basic competence in French as most drivers will understand it even if in rural areas they might speak just local languages. It's not anyway too hard to make yourself understood (especially with a map) but expect they to drop you off nearby some bus or taxi station because they might not understand you want to go all the way by thumb. A few words of Arabic will surprise most Moroccans, gain their respect and differentiate you from common tourists.

== Police ==

Police in Morocco can be a great asset to a hitchhiker. Police roadblocks are quite common especially when the King is nearby. Approach them respectfully and make conversation and they will probably help you get a ride. 

In small towns where it is sometimes difficult to find people who speak French, police officers (who always speak French) are invaluable aides for finding hotels, ''hammams'', roads out of town etc. 

In some most touristic areas (ie: on the route from Rissani to Merzouga) police might think your driver is an unauthorized guide illegally getting money from you, so be ready to explain them (in French!) you're just hitchhiking and your driver was just very kind in helping you. Having some picture of your hitchhiking experience will help convincing them, otherwise your driver might get a fine, and of course you'll offer to pay for it.

== Sleeping ==

Cheap hotels are available in the medinas of most cities for 20–40 dirham. Expect an uncomfortable mattress, cold communal shower and don’t be surprised if you wake up with bug bites. Hotels are required to see your passport and most will want to hold it until they make a photocopy. There is little danger of a hotel worker stealing your passport but it is a good idea to keep several photocopies with you for peace-of-mind. Inside cities but also small villages if not invited at home, a very good option is ask for the nocturnal guardian, almost any quarter and village have one, they will show you the place to put your tent or mat and will take care of you in the night. 

The night can get extremely cold for most of the year, especially around mountains. As they seldom have heating, be sure to carry a sleeping bag even if you plan to stay in hotels, as the blanket they give you might not be enough.

=== Under the Stars ===

Outside most cities and towns are places one can sleep discretely without a tent. Just make sure you get up before dawn. Also be aware that out-of-the-way spots that look like good places to sleep are often used as public toilets. Public parks, where they exist, tend to be “cruising areas” where men meet to have sex.

In some places, especially near trucking routes, there are semi-permanent tents made of plastic sheeting wrapped around a timber frames. These are usually empty though you may want to ask first. 

If the night is coming close and you're in a rural area, you will often find groups of women sitting outside and talking. If you ask them for a place to set up your tent, you will usually be shown a corner somewhere close to peoples' houses where you can then camp with some "protection".

=== Getting invited into people's homes ===

If you are humble and kind, you will easily receive invitations. Sometimes the hospitality is exhausting and you may want to take a cheap hotel for some privacy and space to breathe.

== Hospitality ==

Morocco is famous for its hospitality and if you spend some time hitchhiking around the country, someone will sooner or later invite you for tea, food, or a place to sleep. To be polite, and to find out whether the invitation is genuine, it is wise to refuse at least once. If people really want to invite you they will insist, and you can accept in good conscience after the second or third time. Sometimes, people might offer you to stay with them if you ever come to their town, but only do so out of politeness, in which case it might not be very nice to respond with something like "yeah, definitely, what's your number, so I can call you when I get there?". But many people also genuinely want to help you out and will offer you to take down their phone number in case you need a place to stay or any help at all, and if you feel like they are serious about it, it is definitely not rude to accept and call them later if you want to take them up on it. 

It might be a good idea to make yourself aware of the overall social / economic situation of people who invite you, as you might meet both very rich and very poor people, and even a very poor person might offer to pay for food, transport or other expenses, even if they cannot really afford it. In these cases, if someone invites you to spend the night at their home, if you can afford it, why not pay for groceries, or at least bring a small gift, like a pack of tea, sugar or some fruits... A little extra food every once in a while will most probably not put a dent in your budget.

== Safety ==

Because of the importance of tourism to the economy, anyone found physically harming a foreigner is punished severely. Attacks and terrorism against foreigners is extremely rare but due caution is advised. Far more common are a wide range of scams and hustles.

If you get lost in a city (and you will), people will jump to offer to show you the way. They will always expect a tip. This is fair, but make sure that they have actually lead you to your destination, and not intentionally gotten you more lost. It is better to buy something from a shop, and then ask the shopkeeper for directions.

All the money that is involved in tourism has unfortunately made the cities slightly dodgy. But outside urban areas, the people are almost universally polite, welcoming, and honest.


=== Cigarette Scam ===

Travelers including hitchhikers going to [[Mauritania]] are likely to encounter a cigarette scam in southern cities such as Tiznit and especially Guilmeme. Typically the traveler is engaged by a local who inquires about his or her plans for traveling further and after some discussion is told that to avoid delays and harassment at the Mauritanian frontier he should bring a gift of cigarettes. He may also be told that cigarettes are very expensive in Mauritania and/or Western Sahara and with a pack of cigarettes he can buy everything from a fish to a room in a hotel. 

The local will then offer to ‘help’ the traveler buy several cartons of cigarettes for a “very good price” of anywhere from 12 to 20 dirham per pack (120-200 MAD per carton). The cigarettes he proposes are brands only available on the black market.  

These are smuggled from the Canary Islands and come in several brands-the most common being American Legend. The price varies from 6 to 10 MAD per pack depending on the city and the dealer. These are lower quality cigarettes and smoking more than a few tend to give the smoker a sore throat. 

The scam artist is paying probably no more than 50 MAD per carton (200 cigarettes) and pocketing the rest. The reality is that cigarettes are easily available in Mauritania (in fact usually less than half the price of in Morocco; ranging from 100-400 Ugyia per pack of 20)

Locals driving cars usually bring a gift of some sort to help ease the passage into Mauritania but hitchhikers should not expect problems.

== Religion and Politics ==

=== Religion ===
Always be careful about discussing religion and politics while hitchhiking. This is especially true in Morocco. Nearly everyone in Morocco is a Muslim and the religion permeates every part of the culture. Moroccans love to discuss God and a hitchhiker will certainly be asked about his religious beliefs. Muslims recognize Christians and Jews as “people of the book” and are respected — especially if they are knowledgeable about the Bible and can intelligently discuss religion. Claiming to be an atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Taoist, Hindu or member of some other non-monotheistic religion is not advised. There is little danger of being beheaded as an infidel but being a believer may mean the difference between being merely tolerated and being welcomed into peoples’ homes. And of course, keep any negative opinions about Islam, Muhammad, etc. to yourself. 

=== Western Sahara ===
		
[[Western Sahara]] is recognized by most countries as occupied territory.  The Kingdom of Morocco and most Moroccans consider it part of Morocco. It is technically illegal in Morocco to assert anything else. From 1976 until 1991 the Polisario waged a civil war for independence. In 1991 the United Nations brokered a cease-fire and an agreement was reached to hold a referendum for independence. The referendum has yet to take place and 60 percent of the Moroccan army is still stationed in the territory. The history and current situation is very complex but a hitchhiker there should be very careful about what he says and to whom. Under no circumstances should you claim or admit to being a journalist or writer. Doing so is asking for trouble, possible arrest and will endanger any Saharawis you are seen with. 

=== [[Border crossing]] ===

The border to [[Algeria]] is closed.

Hitchhiking to Mauritania is surprisingly easy at the Mauritanian consulate in Rabat. Anyone going to Mauritania must stop there first to get the visa (no longer available at the Mauritanian border or in Rabat), and you will have many long hours of waiting for your visa in which you can talk to the various drivers going south. Also, just hitchhiking towards south conventionally will be quite easy as there is always overlanders and car salespeople going south.

[[The-nomaddicts]] entered Mauritania from [[Western Sahara]] in December 2019 and received a visa at the border. It cost 55 Euros and took about 3 hours but a visa on arrival is standard procedure now.

A personal experience with border crossings (Dating back to 2005):
“''I was homosexually harassed by an older border policeman while coming from Morocco to [[Ceuta]]. I don´t forgive such, so I approached Moroccan consulates in both [[Malaga]] and [[London]]. In Malaga they obviously protect such criminals and London wasn´t very helpful either. I did send letters to the ministries of tourism and interior affairs, as well as to the border chief but nobody was interested. So, if you really have to come to this country, make sure you don´t cross the borders alone!''”

== Hitchhiking Events ==
From the [http://www.lcd.org.uk/events/hitch/ LCD] : The 2007 Hitch has just wrapped up with a record-breaking 760 Hitchers completing the 1,600 mile journey to Morocco, and 26 the 800 mile journey to Prague. The Hitch is LCD’s largest fundraising event and hitching the 1600 or 800 miles is a true feat of achievement. All the Hitchers have now safely returned to the UK, but the money is still rolling in.

== See Also ==
* [[Western Sahara]]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


{{hitchbase_country|133}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Maghreb}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Marokko]]
[[es:Marruecos]]</text>
      <sha1>9z3an3ve1jcg68280d000e1r2xohint</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Mali</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1527</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1559</id>
      <parentid>4406</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-27T15:34:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="584">'''Mali''' is a country in West [[Africa]]. It is one of the poorest countries in the world.

Inside the capital, [[Bamako]] hitchhiking is fairly accepted - if you look like you have enough money (i.e. white skin) - and it's a reasonable alternative if you can't find a taxi at night.

Apparently it's also possible to get rides with NGO 4WDs at the police check stations.

Mali's borders to [[Cote d'Ivoire]] in the south and [[Algeria]] in the north are probably a bad idea.

==Cities==
* [[Kayes]]
* [[Sikasso]]
* [[Timbuktu]]
* 

{{stub}}

[[Category:Africa]]
[[Category:Mali|*]]</text>
      <sha1>tjilqwecqwubnjwyttjcug7h7hdibik</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1560</id>
      <parentid>1559</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="584">'''Mali''' is a country in West [[Africa]]. It is one of the poorest countries in the world.

Inside the capital, [[Bamako]] hitchhiking is fairly accepted - if you look like you have enough money (i.e. white skin) - and it's a reasonable alternative if you can't find a taxi at night.

Apparently it's also possible to get rides with NGO 4WDs at the police check stations.

Mali's borders to [[Cote d'Ivoire]] in the south and [[Algeria]] in the north are probably a bad idea.

==Cities==
* [[Kayes]]
* [[Sikasso]]
* [[Timbuktu]]
* 

{{stub}}

[[Category:Africa]]
[[Category:Mali|*]]</text>
      <sha1>tjilqwecqwubnjwyttjcug7h7hdibik</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4404</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T18:03:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GuakaTest</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="358">Inside Bamako hitchhiking is fairly accepted - if you look like you have enough money (i.e. white skin) - and it's a reasonable alternative if you can't find a taxi at night.

Apparently it's also possible to get rides with NGO 4WDs at the police check stations.

Mali's borders to Cote d'Ivoire in the south and Algeria in the north are probably a bad idea.</text>
      <sha1>hfjge8n1inxtz1ihu9my67jnmqfl61e</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4405</id>
      <parentid>4404</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T14:14:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="391">Inside [[Bamako]] hitchhiking is fairly accepted - if you look like you have enough money (i.e. white skin) - and it's a reasonable alternative if you can't find a taxi at night.

Apparently it's also possible to get rides with NGO 4WDs at the police check stations.

Mali's borders to [[Cote d'Ivoire]] in the south and [[Algeria]] in the north are probably a bad idea.

[[Category:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>3ji4z7lbaqhodqvjwy30niqv8wm1fc1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4406</id>
      <parentid>4405</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-27T15:33:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="515">'''Mali''' is a country in West [[Africa]]. It is one of the poorest countries in the world.

Inside [[Bamako]] hitchhiking is fairly accepted - if you look like you have enough money (i.e. white skin) - and it's a reasonable alternative if you can't find a taxi at night.

Apparently it's also possible to get rides with NGO 4WDs at the police check stations.

Mali's borders to [[Cote d'Ivoire]] in the south and [[Algeria]] in the north are probably a bad idea.

{{stub}}

[[Category:Africa]]
[[Category:Mali|*]]</text>
      <sha1>c4axvbr0x7ua6rmdcat89mf73xdq491</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4407</id>
      <parentid>1560</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="584">'''Mali''' is a country in West [[Africa]]. It is one of the poorest countries in the world.

Inside the capital, [[Bamako]] hitchhiking is fairly accepted - if you look like you have enough money (i.e. white skin) - and it's a reasonable alternative if you can't find a taxi at night.

Apparently it's also possible to get rides with NGO 4WDs at the police check stations.

Mali's borders to [[Cote d'Ivoire]] in the south and [[Algeria]] in the north are probably a bad idea.

==Cities==
* [[Kayes]]
* [[Sikasso]]
* [[Timbuktu]]
* 

{{stub}}

[[Category:Africa]]
[[Category:Mali|*]]</text>
      <sha1>tjilqwecqwubnjwyttjcug7h7hdibik</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14793</id>
      <parentid>4407</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-13T23:18:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="600">'''Mali''' is a country in West [[Africa]]. It is one of the poorest countries in the world.

Inside the capital, [[Bamako]] hitchhiking is fairly accepted – if you look like you have enough money (i.e. white skin) – and it's a reasonable alternative if you can't find a taxi at night.

Apparently it's also possible to get rides with NGO 4WDs at the police check stations.

Mali's borders to [[Cote d'Ivoire]] in the south and [[Algeria]] in the north are probably a bad idea.

== Cities ==
* [[Kayes]]
* [[Sikasso]]
* [[Timbuktu]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:Mali| ]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mali]]</text>
      <sha1>l3swv897as3bxjtlt4l5aez1m4klam0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16329</id>
      <parentid>14793</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-06T23:42:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="684">{{stub}}
&lt;map lat='17' lng='-4' zoom='5' view='0' float='right' height='350'/&gt;
'''Mali''' is a country in West [[Africa]]. It is one of the poorest countries in the world.

Inside the capital [[Bamako]] hitchhiking is fairly accepted – if you look like you have enough money (i.e. white skin) – and it's a reasonable alternative if you can't find a taxi at night.

Apparently it's also possible to get rides with NGO 4WDs at the police check stations.

Mali's borders to [[Cote d'Ivoire]] in the south and [[Algeria]] in the north are probably a bad idea.

=== Cities ===
* [[Bamako]]
* [[Kayes]]
* [[Sikasso]]
* [[Timbuktu]]


[[Category:Mali|*]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mali]]</text>
      <sha1>ifp77m3etilnqwpl76yku0o20od0ohj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16647</id>
      <parentid>16329</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-25T00:19:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="684">{{stub}}
&lt;map lat='17' lng='-4' zoom='5' view='0' float='right' height='350'/&gt;
'''Mali''' is a country in West [[Africa]]. It is one of the poorest countries in the world.

Inside the capital [[Bamako]] hitchhiking is fairly accepted – if you look like you have enough money (i.e. white skin) – and it's a reasonable alternative if you can't find a taxi at night.

Apparently it's also possible to get rides with NGO 4WDs at the police check stations.

Mali's borders to [[Cote d'Ivoire]] in the south and [[Algeria]] in the north are probably a bad idea.

=== Cities ===
* [[Bamako]]
* [[Kayes]]
* [[Sikasso]]
* [[Timbuktu]]


[[Category:Mali| ]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mali]]</text>
      <sha1>93n4e4j872c6rg6ievzn44f4v3tw6zd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21813</id>
      <parentid>16647</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-19T10:51:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="688">{{stub}}
&lt;map lat='17' lng='-4' zoom='5' view='0' float='right' height='350'/&gt;
'''Mali''' is a country in West [[Africa]]. It is one of the poorest countries in the world.

Inside the capital [[Bamako]] hitchhiking is fairly accepted – if you look like you have enough money (i.e. white skin) – and it's a reasonable alternative if you can't find a taxi [[at night]].

Apparently it's also possible to get rides with NGO 4WDs at the police check stations.

Mali's borders to [[Cote d'Ivoire]] in the south and [[Algeria]] in the north are probably a bad idea.

=== Cities ===
* [[Bamako]]
* [[Kayes]]
* [[Sikasso]]
* [[Timbuktu]]


[[Category:Mali| ]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mali]]</text>
      <sha1>sgsbemobl6hj7e822tbaucvij2dxsc9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30595</id>
      <parentid>21813</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-29T18:52:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="790">{{infobox Country
|country = of Mali
|language = French
|capital = [[Bamako]]
|pop = 11,995,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = ?
|map = &lt;map lat='17' lng='-4' zoom='5' view='0' /&gt;
}}'''Mali''' is a country in West [[Africa]]. It is one of the poorest countries in the world.

Inside the capital [[Bamako]] hitchhiking is fairly accepted – if you look like you have enough money (i.e. white skin) – and it's a reasonable alternative if you can't find a taxi [[at night]].

Apparently it's also possible to get rides with NGO 4WDs at the police check stations.

Mali's borders to [[Cote d'Ivoire]] in the south and [[Algeria]] in the north are probably a bad idea.

=== Cities ===
* [[Bamako]]
* [[Kayes]]
* [[Sikasso]]
* [[Timbuktu]]


[[Category:Mali| ]]
[[Category:Africa]]
[[de:Mali]]</text>
      <sha1>km36phjziw6bw2lcf33c5f2cqs07qur</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30597</id>
      <parentid>30595</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-29T19:07:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="808">{{infobox Country
|country = of Mali
|language = French
|capital = [[Bamako]]
|pop = 11,995,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = ?
|map = &lt;map lat='17' lng='-4' zoom='5' view='0' /&gt;
|paved = 4,450 km
}}'''Mali''' is a country in West [[Africa]]. It is one of the poorest countries in the world.

Inside the capital [[Bamako]] hitchhiking is fairly accepted – if you look like you have enough money (i.e. white skin) – and it's a reasonable alternative if you can't find a taxi [[at night]].

Apparently it's also possible to get rides with NGO 4WDs at the police check stations.

Mali's borders to [[Cote d'Ivoire]] in the south and [[Algeria]] in the north are probably a bad idea.

=== Cities ===
* [[Bamako]]
* [[Kayes]]
* [[Sikasso]]
* [[Timbuktu]]


[[Category:Mali| ]]
[[Category:Africa]]
[[de:Mali]]</text>
      <sha1>rgdm485gnpi2ehn0vxabce6s80pdgl9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32370</id>
      <parentid>30597</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-04-21T19:01:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="824">{{infobox Country
|country = of Mali
|language = French
|capital = [[Bamako]]
|pop = 11,995,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = ?
|map = &lt;map lat='17' lng='-4' zoom='5' view='0' /&gt;
|paved = 4,450 km
}}'''Mali''' is a country in West [[Africa]]. It is one of the poorest countries in the world.

Inside the capital [[Bamako]] hitchhiking is fairly accepted – if you look like you have enough money (i.e. white skin) – and it's a reasonable alternative if you can't find a taxi [[at night]].

Apparently it's also possible to get rides with NGO 4WDs at the police check stations.

Mali's borders to [[Cote d'Ivoire]] in the south and [[Algeria]] in the north are probably a bad idea.

=== Cities ===
* [[Bamako]]
* [[Kayes]]
* [[Sikasso]]
* [[Timbuktu]]


[[Category:Mali| ]]
[[Category:Africa]]
[[de:Mali]]
{{IsIn|Africa}}</text>
      <sha1>8xai3hpjtnha650snxpbfs0hxs30bpw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35150</id>
      <parentid>32370</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T18:01:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="824">{{infobox Country
|country = of Mali
|language = French
|capital = [[Bamako]]
|pop = 11,995,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = ?
|map = &lt;map lat='17' lng='-4' zoom='5' view='0' /&gt;
|paved = 4,450 km
}}'''Mali''' is a country in West [[Africa]]. It is one of the poorest countries in the world.

Inside the capital [[Bamako]] hitchhiking is fairly accepted – if you look like you have enough money (i.e. white skin) – and it's a reasonable alternative if you can't find a taxi [[at night]].

Apparently it's also possible to get rides with NGO 4WDs at the police check stations.

Mali's borders to [[Cote d'Ivoire]] in the south and [[Algeria]] in the north are probably a bad idea.

=== Cities ===
* [[Bamako]]
* [[Kayes]]
* [[Sikasso]]
* [[Timbuktu]]
{{IsIn|Africa}}

[[Category:Mali| ]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mali]]</text>
      <sha1>qnsazksweiommhravpllhlsj5e64kdg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35852</id>
      <parentid>35150</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-16T23:56:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="838">{{infobox Country
|country = of Mali
|language = French
|capital = [[Bamako]]
|pop = 11,995,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = ?
|map = &lt;map lat='17' lng='-4' zoom='5' view='0' /&gt;
|paved = 4,450 km
}}'''Mali''' is a country in West [[Africa]]. It is one of the poorest countries in the world.

Inside the capital [[Bamako]] hitchhiking is fairly accepted – if you look like you have enough money (i.e. white skin) – and it's a reasonable alternative if you can't find a taxi [[at night]].

Apparently it's also possible to get rides with NGO 4WDs at the police check stations.

Mali's borders to [[Cote d'Ivoire]] in the south and [[Algeria]] in the north are probably a bad idea.

=== Cities ===
* [[Bamako]]
* [[Kayes]]
* [[Sikasso]]
* [[Timbuktu]]
{{IsIn|Africa}}

[[Category:Mali| ]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mali]]
[[zh:马里]]</text>
      <sha1>hit991879d21klce9048loaom9fahfx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38952</id>
      <parentid>35852</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-12-16T17:33:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Jurifi</username>
        <id>2184</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1812">{{infobox Country
|country = of Mali
|language = French
|capital = [[Bamako]]
|pop = 11,995,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = ?
|map = &lt;map lat='17' lng='-4' zoom='5' view='0' /&gt;
|paved = 4,450 km
}}'''Mali''' is a country in West [[Africa]]. It is one of the poorest countries in the world.

Inside the capital [[Bamako]] hitchhiking is fairly accepted – if you look like you have enough money (i.e. white skin) – and it's a reasonable alternative if you can't find a taxi [[at night]].

Apparently it's also possible to get rides with NGO 4WDs at the police check stations.

Mali's borders to [[Cote d'Ivoire]] in the south and [[Algeria]] in the north are probably a bad idea.

hitching in mali is well accepted. some drivers might ask for money to share the petrol costs. but you can also find someone who will take you for free. usually white people will not take you, they are mainly the typical tourists and will never take any hh. you might ask them in their hotel, when they realize that you are not a monster they might consider giving you a lift. it is also difficult to get a lift with charity organizations. be aware that there is not much traffic and you will have to wait for quite a while. make sure to have enough water with you and something to cover you head. the advantage of hh is that you will usually have more space in the car. the busses are always heavily overloaded. but public transport is also cheap. best places to hitch are outside the cities at the police post.
local people are friendly and might offer you a seat in the shadow and tea while you wait for a lift. make sure to have something to share with them like candy.
=== Cities ===
* [[Bamako]]
* [[Kayes]]
* [[Sikasso]]
* [[Timbuktu]]
{{IsIn|Africa}}

[[Category:Mali| ]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mali]]
[[zh:马里]]</text>
      <sha1>55tujsn50o5rbs4oxe9jxg83rnd7zwi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38953</id>
      <parentid>38952</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-12-16T20:41:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1842">{{infobox Country
|country = of Mali
|language = French
|capital = [[Bamako]]
|pop = 11,995,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='17' lng='-4' zoom='5' view='0' /&gt;
|paved = 4,450 km
}}'''Mali''' is a country in West [[Africa]]. It is one of the poorest countries in the world.

Inside the capital [[Bamako]] hitchhiking is fairly accepted – if you look like you have enough money (i.e. white skin) – and it's a reasonable alternative if you can't find a taxi [[at night]].

Apparently it's also possible to get rides with NGO 4WDs at the police check stations.

Mali's borders to [[Cote d'Ivoire]] in the south and [[Algeria]] in the north are probably a bad idea.

Hitching in Mali is well accepted. Some drivers might ask for money to share the petrol costs, but you can also find someone who will take you for free. Usually white people will not take you, they are mainly the typical tourists and will never take any hitchhikers. You might ask them in their hotel, when they realize that you are not a monster they might consider giving you a lift. It is also difficult to get a lift with charity organizations. Be aware that there is not much traffic and you will have to wait for quite a while.

Make sure to have enough water with you and something to cover you head. The advantage of hitchhiking is that you will usually have more space in the car as the busses are always heavily overloaded. But public transport is also cheap. Best places to hitch are outside the cities at the police post.
Local people are friendly and might offer you a seat in the shadow and tea while you wait for a lift. Make sure to have something to share with them like candy.

=== Cities ===
* [[Bamako]]
* [[Kayes]]
* [[Sikasso]]
* [[Timbuktu]]

{{IsIn|Africa}}

[[Category:Mali| ]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mali]]
[[zh:马里]]</text>
      <sha1>3hl7ddjc7dodhynio3o055rhr2fji5m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38956</id>
      <parentid>38953</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-12-17T01:07:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1841">{{infobox Country
|country = of Mali
|language = French
|capital = [[Bamako]]
|pop = 11,995,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='17' lng='-4' zoom='5' view='0' /&gt;
|paved = 4,450 km
}}'''Mali''' is a country in West [[Africa]]. It is one of the poorest countries in the world.

Inside the capital [[Bamako]] hitchhiking is fairly accepted – if you look like you have enough money (i.e. white skin) – and it's a reasonable alternative if you can't find a taxi [[at night]].

Apparently it's also possible to get rides with NGO 4WDs at the police check stations.

Mali's borders to [[Cote d'Ivoire]] in the south and [[Algeria]] in the north are probably a bad idea.

Hitching in Mali is well accepted. Some drivers might ask for money to share the petrol costs, but you can also find someone who will take you for free. Usually white people will not take you, they are mainly the typical tourists and will never take any hitchhikers. You might ask them in their hotel, when they realize that you are not a monster they might consider giving you a lift. It is also difficult to get a lift with charity organizations. Be aware that there is not much traffic and you will have to wait for quite a while.

Make sure to have enough water with you and something to cover you head. The advantage of hitchhiking is that you will usually have more space in the car as the buses are always heavily overloaded. But public transport is also cheap. Best places to hitch are outside the cities at the police post.
Local people are friendly and might offer you a seat in the shadow and tea while you wait for a lift. Make sure to have something to share with them like candy.

=== Cities ===
* [[Bamako]]
* [[Kayes]]
* [[Sikasso]]
* [[Timbuktu]]

{{IsIn|Africa}}

[[Category:Mali| ]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mali]]
[[zh:马里]]</text>
      <sha1>ee959n0iwbbn22qwbrwe539ymdwhkya</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>51557</id>
      <parentid>38956</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-04-06T22:31:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2019">{{infobox Country
|country = of Mali
|language = French
|capital = [[Bamako]]
|pop = 11,995,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='17' lng='-4' zoom='5' view='0' /&gt;
|paved = 4,450 km
}}'''Mali''' is a country in West [[Africa]]. It is one of the poorest countries in the world.  French will be very useful, but [[Bambara]] is the most spoken language.  It's very common to mix the two though, but starting with some words in Bambara is highly appreciated.

Inside the capital [[Bamako]] hitchhiking is fairly accepted – if you look like you have enough money (i.e. white skin) – and it's a reasonable alternative if you can't find a taxi [[at night]].

Apparently it's also possible to get rides with NGO 4WDs at the police check stations.

Mali's borders to [[Cote d'Ivoire]] in the south and [[Algeria]] in the north are probably a bad idea.

Hitching in Mali is well accepted. Some drivers might ask for money to share the petrol costs, but you can also find someone who will take you for free. Usually white people will not take you, they are mainly the typical tourists and will never take any hitchhikers. You might ask them in their hotel, when they realize that you are not a monster they might consider giving you a lift. It is also difficult to get a lift with charity organizations. Be aware that there is not much traffic and you will have to wait for quite a while.

Make sure to have enough water with you and something to cover you head. The advantage of hitchhiking is that you will usually have more space in the car as the buses are always heavily overloaded. But public transport is also cheap. Best places to hitch are outside the cities at the police post.
Local people are friendly and might offer you a seat in the shadow and tea while you wait for a lift. Make sure to have something to share with them like candy.

=== Cities ===
* [[Bamako]]
* [[Kayes]]
* [[Sikasso]]
* [[Timbuktu]]

{{IsIn|Africa}}

[[Category:Mali| ]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mali]]
[[zh:马里]]</text>
      <sha1>lfhva83wsbxr564rbuhvfk5e3r2mtvx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>51558</id>
      <parentid>51557</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-04-06T22:32:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2030">{{infobox Country
|country = of Mali
|language = French
|capital = [[Bamako]]
|pop = 11,995,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='17' lng='-4' zoom='5' view='0' /&gt;
|paved = 4,450 km
}}'''Mali''' is a landlocked country in West [[Africa]]. It is one of the poorest countries in the world.  French will be very useful, but [[Bambara]] is the most spoken language.  It's very common to mix the two though, but starting with some words in Bambara is highly appreciated.

Inside the capital [[Bamako]] hitchhiking is fairly accepted – if you look like you have enough money (i.e. white skin) – and it's a reasonable alternative if you can't find a taxi [[at night]].

Apparently it's also possible to get rides with NGO 4WDs at the police check stations.

Mali's borders to [[Cote d'Ivoire]] in the south and [[Algeria]] in the north are probably a bad idea.

Hitching in Mali is well accepted. Some drivers might ask for money to share the petrol costs, but you can also find someone who will take you for free. Usually white people will not take you, they are mainly the typical tourists and will never take any hitchhikers. You might ask them in their hotel, when they realize that you are not a monster they might consider giving you a lift. It is also difficult to get a lift with charity organizations. Be aware that there is not much traffic and you will have to wait for quite a while.

Make sure to have enough water with you and something to cover you head. The advantage of hitchhiking is that you will usually have more space in the car as the buses are always heavily overloaded. But public transport is also cheap. Best places to hitch are outside the cities at the police post.
Local people are friendly and might offer you a seat in the shadow and tea while you wait for a lift. Make sure to have something to share with them like candy.

=== Cities ===
* [[Bamako]]
* [[Kayes]]
* [[Sikasso]]
* [[Timbuktu]]

{{IsIn|Africa}}

[[Category:Mali| ]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mali]]
[[zh:马里]]</text>
      <sha1>ivbz9dikvfslmoggta1q0nnf0yr5nvd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>52378</id>
      <parentid>51558</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-05-14T01:52:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2030">{{infobox Country
|country = of Mali
|language = French
|capital = [[Bamako]]
|pop = 11,995,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = {{good}}
|map = &lt;map lat='17' lng='-4' zoom='5' view='0' /&gt;
|paved = 4,450 km
}}'''Mali''' is a landlocked country in [[West Africa]]. It is one of the poorest countries in the world.  French will be very useful, but [[Bambara]] is the most spoken language.  It's very common to mix the two though, but starting with some words in Bambara is highly appreciated.

Inside the capital [[Bamako]] hitchhiking is fairly accepted – if you look like you have enough money (i.e. white skin) – and it's a reasonable alternative if you can't find a taxi [[at night]].

Apparently it's also possible to get rides with NGO 4WDs at the police check stations.

Mali's borders to [[Cote d'Ivoire]] in the south and [[Algeria]] in the north are probably a bad idea.

Hitching in Mali is well accepted. Some drivers might ask for money to share the petrol costs, but you can also find someone who will take you for free. Usually white people will not take you, they are mainly the typical tourists and will never take any hitchhikers. You might ask them in their hotel, when they realize that you are not a monster they might consider giving you a lift. It is also difficult to get a lift with charity organizations. Be aware that there is not much traffic and you will have to wait for quite a while.

Make sure to have enough water with you and something to cover you head. The advantage of hitchhiking is that you will usually have more space in the car as the buses are always heavily overloaded. But public transport is also cheap. Best places to hitch are outside the cities at the police post.
Local people are friendly and might offer you a seat in the shadow and tea while you wait for a lift. Make sure to have something to share with them like candy.

=== Cities ===
* [[Bamako]]
* [[Kayes]]
* [[Sikasso]]
* [[Timbuktu]]

{{IsIn|Africa}}

[[Category:Mali| ]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mali]]
[[zh:马里]]</text>
      <sha1>ofybcxv5h4c1hu247r3m9l5vzzqtadj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>54639</id>
      <parentid>52378</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-09-05T22:24:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2047">{{infobox Country
|country = of Mali
|language = French
|capital = [[Bamako]]
|pop = 11,995,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ml' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='17' lng='-4' zoom='5' view='0' /&gt;
|paved = 4,450 km
}}

'''Mali''' is a landlocked country in [[West Africa]]. It is one of the poorest countries in the world.  French will be very useful, but [[Bambara]] is the most spoken language.  It's very common to mix the two though, but starting with some words in Bambara is highly appreciated.

Inside the capital [[Bamako]] hitchhiking is fairly accepted – if you look like you have enough money (i.e. white skin) – and it's a reasonable alternative if you can't find a taxi [[at night]].

Apparently it's also possible to get rides with NGO 4WDs at the police check stations.

Mali's borders to [[Cote d'Ivoire]] in the south and [[Algeria]] in the north are probably a bad idea.

Hitching in Mali is well accepted. Some drivers might ask for money to share the petrol costs, but you can also find someone who will take you for free. Usually white people will not take you, they are mainly the typical tourists and will never take any hitchhikers. You might ask them in their hotel, when they realize that you are not a monster they might consider giving you a lift. It is also difficult to get a lift with charity organizations. Be aware that there is not much traffic and you will have to wait for quite a while.

Make sure to have enough water with you and something to cover you head. The advantage of hitchhiking is that you will usually have more space in the car as the buses are always heavily overloaded. But public transport is also cheap. Best places to hitch are outside the cities at the police post.
Local people are friendly and might offer you a seat in the shadow and tea while you wait for a lift. Make sure to have something to share with them like candy.

=== Cities ===
* [[Bamako]]
* [[Kayes]]
* [[Sikasso]]
* [[Timbuktu]]

{{IsIn|Africa}}

[[Category:Mali| ]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mali]]
[[zh:马里]]</text>
      <sha1>ba0ki7bfzwmp0z6c7kwibxd4y76csgu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>55996</id>
      <parentid>54639</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-08T01:16:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2124">{{infobox Country
|country = of Mali
|language = French
|capital = [[Bamako]]
|pop = 11,995,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ml' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='17' lng='-4' zoom='5' view='0' /&gt;
|paved = 4,450 km
}}

'''Mali''' is a landlocked country in [[Western Africa|West Africa]]. It is one of the poorest countries in the world.  French will be very useful, but [[Africa phrasebook#Bambara|Bambara]] is the most spoken language.  It's very common to mix the two though, but starting with some words in Bambara is highly appreciated.

Inside the capital [[Bamako]] hitchhiking is fairly accepted – if you look like you have enough money (i.e. white skin) – and it's a reasonable alternative if you can't find a taxi [[hitchhiking at night|at night]].

Apparently it's also possible to get rides with NGO 4WDs at the police check stations.

Mali's borders to [[Côte d'Ivoire|Cote d'Ivoire]] in the south and [[Algeria]] in the north are probably a bad idea.

Hitching in Mali is well accepted. Some drivers might ask for money to share the petrol costs, but you can also find someone who will take you for free. Usually white people will not take you, they are mainly the typical tourists and will never take any hitchhikers. You might ask them in their hotel, when they realize that you are not a monster they might consider giving you a lift. It is also difficult to get a lift with charity organizations. Be aware that there is not much traffic and you will have to wait for quite a while.

Make sure to have enough water with you and something to cover you head. The advantage of hitchhiking is that you will usually have more space in the car as the buses are always heavily overloaded. But public transport is also cheap. Best places to hitch are outside the cities at the police post.
Local people are friendly and might offer you a seat in the shadow and tea while you wait for a lift. Make sure to have something to share with them like candy.

=== Cities ===
* [[Bamako]]
* [[Kayes]]
* [[Sikasso]]
* [[Timbuktu]]

{{IsIn|Africa}}

[[Category:Mali| ]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mali]]
[[zh:马里]]</text>
      <sha1>3wc9c11x0oerp53sxq87dnvcnipty0v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>58809</id>
      <parentid>55996</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-01-26T23:01:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Koendev</username>
        <id>4236</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2151">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat="17.859288800659" lng="-5.0825134227073" zoom="5" view="0" /&gt;
|country = of Mali
|language = French
|capital = [[Bamako]]
|pop = 11,995,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ml' /&gt;
|paved = 4,450 km
}}

'''Mali''' is a landlocked country in [[Western Africa|West Africa]]. It is one of the poorest countries in the world.  French will be very useful, but [[Africa phrasebook#Bambara|Bambara]] is the most spoken language.  It's very common to mix the two though, but starting with some words in Bambara is highly appreciated.

Inside the capital [[Bamako]] hitchhiking is fairly accepted – if you look like you have enough money (i.e. white skin) – and it's a reasonable alternative if you can't find a taxi [[hitchhiking at night|at night]].

Apparently it's also possible to get rides with NGO 4WDs at the police check stations.

Mali's borders to [[Côte d'Ivoire|Cote d'Ivoire]] in the south and [[Algeria]] in the north are probably a bad idea.

Hitching in Mali is well accepted. Some drivers might ask for money to share the petrol costs, but you can also find someone who will take you for free. Usually white people will not take you, they are mainly the typical tourists and will never take any hitchhikers. You might ask them in their hotel, when they realize that you are not a monster they might consider giving you a lift. It is also difficult to get a lift with charity organizations. Be aware that there is not much traffic and you will have to wait for quite a while.

Make sure to have enough water with you and something to cover you head. The advantage of hitchhiking is that you will usually have more space in the car as the buses are always heavily overloaded. But public transport is also cheap. Best places to hitch are outside the cities at the police post.
Local people are friendly and might offer you a seat in the shadow and tea while you wait for a lift. Make sure to have something to share with them like candy.

=== Cities ===
* [[Bamako]]
* [[Kayes]]
* [[Sikasso]]
* [[Timbuktu]]

{{IsIn|Africa}}

[[Category:Mali| ]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mali]]
[[zh:马里]]</text>
      <sha1>nxrzvohrhg9ahuwswdlw6xuqc27143h</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>100169</id>
      <parentid>58809</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-01-05T21:46:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Cities */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2199">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat="17.859288800659" lng="-5.0825134227073" zoom="5" view="0" /&gt;
|country = of Mali
|language = French
|capital = [[Bamako]]
|pop = 11,995,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ml' /&gt;
|paved = 4,450 km
}}

'''Mali''' is a landlocked country in [[Western Africa|West Africa]]. It is one of the poorest countries in the world.  French will be very useful, but [[Africa phrasebook#Bambara|Bambara]] is the most spoken language.  It's very common to mix the two though, but starting with some words in Bambara is highly appreciated.

Inside the capital [[Bamako]] hitchhiking is fairly accepted – if you look like you have enough money (i.e. white skin) – and it's a reasonable alternative if you can't find a taxi [[hitchhiking at night|at night]].

Apparently it's also possible to get rides with NGO 4WDs at the police check stations.

Mali's borders to [[Côte d'Ivoire|Cote d'Ivoire]] in the south and [[Algeria]] in the north are probably a bad idea.

Hitching in Mali is well accepted. Some drivers might ask for money to share the petrol costs, but you can also find someone who will take you for free. Usually white people will not take you, they are mainly the typical tourists and will never take any hitchhikers. You might ask them in their hotel, when they realize that you are not a monster they might consider giving you a lift. It is also difficult to get a lift with charity organizations. Be aware that there is not much traffic and you will have to wait for quite a while.

Make sure to have enough water with you and something to cover you head. The advantage of hitchhiking is that you will usually have more space in the car as the buses are always heavily overloaded. But public transport is also cheap. Best places to hitch are outside the cities at the police post.
Local people are friendly and might offer you a seat in the shadow and tea while you wait for a lift. Make sure to have something to share with them like candy.

=== Cities ===
* [[Bamako]]
* [[Kayes]]
* [[Sikasso]]
* [[Timbuktu]]




== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


{{IsIn|Africa}}

[[Category:Mali| ]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mali]]
[[zh:马里]]</text>
      <sha1>q2tfjtpdv7rw4tn8bru1fg8oubjb2ls</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>114824</id>
      <parentid>100169</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-10-13T19:47:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GriL</username>
        <id>24751</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2214">{{infobox Country
|map = &lt;map lat="17.859288800659" lng="-5.0825134227073" zoom="5" view="0" /&gt;
|country = of Mali
|language = French
|capital = [[Bamako]]
|pop = 11,995,000
|currency = CFA Franc
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ml' /&gt;
|paved = 4,450 km
}}

'''Mali''' is a landlocked country in [[Western Africa|West Africa]]. It is one of the poorest countries in the world.  French will be very useful, but [[Africa phrasebook#Bambara|Bambara]] is the most spoken language.  It's very common to mix the two though, but starting with some words in Bambara is highly appreciated.

Inside the capital [[Bamako]] hitchhiking is fairly accepted – if you look like you have enough money (i.e. white skin) – and it's a reasonable alternative if you can't find a taxi [[hitchhiking at night|at night]].

Apparently it's also possible to get rides with NGO 4WDs at the police check stations.

Mali's borders to [[Côte d'Ivoire|Cote d'Ivoire]] in the south and [[Algeria]] in the north are probably a bad idea.

Hitching in Mali is well accepted. Some drivers might ask for money to share the petrol costs, but you can also find someone who will take you for free. Usually white people will not take you, they are mainly the typical tourists and will never take any hitchhikers. You might ask them in their hotel, when they realize that you are not a monster they might consider giving you a lift. It is also difficult to get a lift with charity organizations. Be aware that there is not much traffic and you will have to wait for quite a while.

Make sure to have enough water with you and something to cover you head. The advantage of hitchhiking is that you will usually have more space in the car as the buses are always heavily overloaded. But public transport is also cheap. Best places to hitch are outside the cities at the police post.
Local people are friendly and might offer you a seat in the shadow and tea while you wait for a lift. Make sure to have something to share with them like candy.

=== Cities ===
* [[Bamako]]
* [[Kayes]]
* [[Sikasso]]
* [[Timbuktu]]




== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


{{IsIn|Africa}}

[[Category:Mali| ]]
[[Category:Africa]]
[[ru:Мали]]
[[de:Mali]]
[[zh:马里]]</text>
      <sha1>33188wg18cxyfpodd8928naddeno3cp</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Africa</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1528</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1561</id>
      <parentid>4412</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-06-13T21:54:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1701">Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

==Safety==
Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem.

==Health==
Malaria is common in many parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: Africans are much more resistant to malaria.

==Language==
Speaking English and French is an advantage. Portuguese in some countries. And learning African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in West Africa.

==Countries==
[[Algeria]], [[Angola]], [[Benin]], [[Botswana]], [[Burkina Faso]], [[Burundi]], [[Cameroon]], [[Cape Verde]], [[Central African Republic]], [[Chad]], [[Cote d'Ivoire]], [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]], [[Djibouti]], [[Egypt]], [[Equatorial Guinea]], [[Eritrea]], [[Ethiopia]], [[Gabon]], The [[Gambia]], [[Ghana]], [[Guinea]], [[Guinea-Bissau]], [[Kenya]], [[Lesotho]], [[Liberia]], [[Libya]], [[Madagascar]], [[Malawi]], [[Mali]], [[Mauritania]], [[Mauritius]], [[Morocco]], [[Mozambique]], [[Namibia]], [[Niger]], [[Nigeria]], [[Republic of the Congo]], [[Rwanda]], [[Sao Tome and Principe]], [[Senegal]], [[Seychelles]], [[Sierra Leone]], [[Somalia]], [[South Africa]], [[Sudan]], [[Swaziland]], [[Tanzania]], [[Togo]], [[Tunisia]], [[Uganda]], [[Zambia]], [[Zimbabwe]]

==Other territories==
*[[Reunion]]
*[[Western Sahara]]


[[Category:Africa|*]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>4z3eusye3pdk3aplbffa4d1h1i024qt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1562</id>
      <parentid>1561</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1701">Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

==Safety==
Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem.

==Health==
Malaria is common in many parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: Africans are much more resistant to malaria.

==Language==
Speaking English and French is an advantage. Portuguese in some countries. And learning African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in West Africa.

==Countries==
[[Algeria]], [[Angola]], [[Benin]], [[Botswana]], [[Burkina Faso]], [[Burundi]], [[Cameroon]], [[Cape Verde]], [[Central African Republic]], [[Chad]], [[Cote d'Ivoire]], [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]], [[Djibouti]], [[Egypt]], [[Equatorial Guinea]], [[Eritrea]], [[Ethiopia]], [[Gabon]], The [[Gambia]], [[Ghana]], [[Guinea]], [[Guinea-Bissau]], [[Kenya]], [[Lesotho]], [[Liberia]], [[Libya]], [[Madagascar]], [[Malawi]], [[Mali]], [[Mauritania]], [[Mauritius]], [[Morocco]], [[Mozambique]], [[Namibia]], [[Niger]], [[Nigeria]], [[Republic of the Congo]], [[Rwanda]], [[Sao Tome and Principe]], [[Senegal]], [[Seychelles]], [[Sierra Leone]], [[Somalia]], [[South Africa]], [[Sudan]], [[Swaziland]], [[Tanzania]], [[Togo]], [[Tunisia]], [[Uganda]], [[Zambia]], [[Zimbabwe]]

==Other territories==
*[[Reunion]]
*[[Western Sahara]]


[[Category:Africa|*]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>4z3eusye3pdk3aplbffa4d1h1i024qt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4408</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T18:04:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GuakaTest</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="537">===Introduction===



===General info about hitchhiking in Africa===

Hitching for rides is a common practice in Africa, though you may be expected to pay the driver.

==Safety==

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem.

==Tips for each country==
[[Algeria]], [[Egypt]], [[Guinea]], [[Libya]], [[Mali]], [[Mauritania]], [[Morocco]], [[Niger]], [[Nigeria]], [[Senegal]], [[Tunisia]], [[South Africa]], [[Western Sahara]]

==External Links==</text>
      <sha1>ar59dkczqjhg0hply5uwho6khu1vy4e</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4409</id>
      <parentid>4408</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T14:13:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="558">===Introduction===



===General info about hitchhiking in Africa===

Hitching for rides is a common practice in Africa, though you may be expected to pay the driver.

==Safety==

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem.

==Tips for each country==
[[Algeria]], [[Egypt]], [[Guinea]], [[Libya]], [[Mali]], [[Mauritania]], [[Morocco]], [[Niger]], [[Nigeria]], [[Senegal]], [[Tunisia]], [[South Africa]], [[Western Sahara]]

==External Links==


[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>j9xh2xuno2l36rh8krx1t2to3zqea0d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4410</id>
      <parentid>4409</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T14:15:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="577">===Introduction===



===General info about hitchhiking in Africa===

Hitching for rides is a common practice in Africa, though you may be expected to pay the driver.

==Safety==

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem.

==Tips for each country==
[[Algeria]], [[Egypt]], [[Guinea]], [[Libya]], [[Mali]], [[Mauritania]], [[Morocco]], [[Niger]], [[Nigeria]], [[Senegal]], [[Tunisia]], [[South Africa]], [[Western Sahara]]

==External Links==

[[Category:Africa]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>fr3ibudf2gtwyjc2cpkajbjakqjwo9d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4411</id>
      <parentid>4410</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-04T21:22:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1144">Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

==Safety==
Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem.

==Countries==
*[[Algeria]]
*[[Angola]]
*[[Benin]]
*[[Botswana]]
*[[Burkina Faso]]
*[[Burundi]]
*[[Cameroon]]
*[[Cape Verde]]
*[[Central African Republic]]
*[[Chad]]
*[[Cote d'Ivoire]]
*[[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
*[[Djibouti]]
*[[Egypt]]
*[[Equatorial Guinea]]
*[[Eritrea]]
*[[Ethiopia]]
*[[Gabon]]
*The [[Gambia]]
*[[Ghana]]
*[[Guinea]]
*[[Guinea-Bissau]]
*[[Kenya]]
*[[Lesotho]]
*[[Liberia]]
*[[Libya]]
*[[Madagascar]]
*[[Malawi]]
*[[Mali]]
*[[Mauritania]]
*[[Mauritius]]
*[[Morocco]]
*[[Mozambique]]
*[[Namibia]]
*[[Niger]]
*[[Nigeria]]
*[[Republic of the Congo]]
*[[Rwanda]]
*[[Sao Tome and Principe]]
*[[Senegal]]
*[[Seychelles]]
*[[Sierra Leone]]
*[[Somalia]]
*[[South Africa]]
*[[Sudan]]
*[[Swaziland]]
*[[Tanzania]]
*[[Togo]]
*[[Tunisia]]
*[[Uganda]]
*[[Zambia]]
*[[Zimbabwe]]

==Other territories==
*[[Reunion]]
*[[Western Sahara]]


[[Category:Africa|*]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>d10yauxymm68x30spqba6q3u07kh8p6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4412</id>
      <parentid>4411</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-04T21:24:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1143">Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

==Safety==
Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem.

==Countries==
[[Algeria]], [[Angola]], [[Benin]], [[Botswana]], [[Burkina Faso]], [[Burundi]], [[Cameroon]], [[Cape Verde]], [[Central African Republic]], [[Chad]], [[Cote d'Ivoire]], [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]], [[Djibouti]], [[Egypt]], [[Equatorial Guinea]], [[Eritrea]], [[Ethiopia]], [[Gabon]], The [[Gambia]], [[Ghana]], [[Guinea]], [[Guinea-Bissau]], [[Kenya]], [[Lesotho]], [[Liberia]], [[Libya]], [[Madagascar]], [[Malawi]], [[Mali]], [[Mauritania]], [[Mauritius]], [[Morocco]], [[Mozambique]], [[Namibia]], [[Niger]], [[Nigeria]], [[Republic of the Congo]], [[Rwanda]], [[Sao Tome and Principe]], [[Senegal]], [[Seychelles]], [[Sierra Leone]], [[Somalia]], [[South Africa]], [[Sudan]], [[Swaziland]], [[Tanzania]], [[Togo]], [[Tunisia]], [[Uganda]], [[Zambia]], [[Zimbabwe]]

==Other territories==
*[[Reunion]]
*[[Western Sahara]]


[[Category:Africa|*]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>by09afnu5bfo7zqsvxfi9d1poc9s4kr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4413</id>
      <parentid>1562</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1701">Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

==Safety==
Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem.

==Health==
Malaria is common in many parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: Africans are much more resistant to malaria.

==Language==
Speaking English and French is an advantage. Portuguese in some countries. And learning African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in West Africa.

==Countries==
[[Algeria]], [[Angola]], [[Benin]], [[Botswana]], [[Burkina Faso]], [[Burundi]], [[Cameroon]], [[Cape Verde]], [[Central African Republic]], [[Chad]], [[Cote d'Ivoire]], [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]], [[Djibouti]], [[Egypt]], [[Equatorial Guinea]], [[Eritrea]], [[Ethiopia]], [[Gabon]], The [[Gambia]], [[Ghana]], [[Guinea]], [[Guinea-Bissau]], [[Kenya]], [[Lesotho]], [[Liberia]], [[Libya]], [[Madagascar]], [[Malawi]], [[Mali]], [[Mauritania]], [[Mauritius]], [[Morocco]], [[Mozambique]], [[Namibia]], [[Niger]], [[Nigeria]], [[Republic of the Congo]], [[Rwanda]], [[Sao Tome and Principe]], [[Senegal]], [[Seychelles]], [[Sierra Leone]], [[Somalia]], [[South Africa]], [[Sudan]], [[Swaziland]], [[Tanzania]], [[Togo]], [[Tunisia]], [[Uganda]], [[Zambia]], [[Zimbabwe]]

==Other territories==
*[[Reunion]]
*[[Western Sahara]]


[[Category:Africa|*]]
[[Category:World]]</text>
      <sha1>4z3eusye3pdk3aplbffa4d1h1i024qt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9433</id>
      <parentid>4413</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-03T11:59:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1742">Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

==Safety==
Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem.

==Health==
Malaria is common in many parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: Africans are much more resistant to malaria.

==Language==
Speaking English and French is an advantage. Portuguese in some countries. And learning African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in West Africa.

==Countries==
[[Algeria]], [[Angola]], [[Benin]], [[Botswana]], [[Burkina Faso]], [[Burundi]], [[Cameroon]], [[Cape Verde]], [[Central African Republic]], [[Chad]], [[Cote d'Ivoire]], [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]], [[Djibouti]], [[Egypt]], [[Equatorial Guinea]], [[Eritrea]], [[Ethiopia]], [[Gabon]], The [[Gambia]], [[Ghana]], [[Guinea]], [[Guinea-Bissau]], [[Kenya]], [[Lesotho]], [[Liberia]], [[Libya]], [[Madagascar]], [[Malawi]], [[Mali]], [[Mauritania]], [[Mauritius]], [[Morocco]], [[Mozambique]], [[Namibia]], [[Niger]], [[Nigeria]], [[Republic of the Congo]], [[Rwanda]], [[Sao Tome and Principe]], [[Senegal]], [[Seychelles]], [[Sierra Leone]], [[Somalia]], [[South Africa]], [[Sudan]], [[Swaziland]], [[Tanzania]], [[Togo]], [[Tunisia]], [[Uganda]], [[Zambia]], [[Zimbabwe]]

==Other territories==
*[[Reunion]]
*[[Western Sahara]]


[[Category:Africa|*]]
[[Category:World]]

[[digi:world/Africa]]
[[cswiki:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>0rnqkqxyp8flccdcl1lyag9ncfdhz2c</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10805</id>
      <parentid>9433</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-14T07:16:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1846">[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

==Safety==
Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem.

==Health==
Malaria is common in many parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: Africans are much more resistant to malaria.

==Language==
Speaking English and French is an advantage. Portuguese in some countries. And learning African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in West Africa.

==Countries==
[[Algeria]], [[Angola]], [[Benin]], [[Botswana]], [[Burkina Faso]], [[Burundi]], [[Cameroon]], [[Cape Verde]], [[Central African Republic]], [[Chad]], [[Cote d'Ivoire]], [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]], [[Djibouti]], [[Egypt]], [[Equatorial Guinea]], [[Eritrea]], [[Ethiopia]], [[Gabon]], The [[Gambia]], [[Ghana]], [[Guinea]], [[Guinea-Bissau]], [[Kenya]], [[Lesotho]], [[Liberia]], [[Libya]], [[Madagascar]], [[Malawi]], [[Mali]], [[Mauritania]], [[Mauritius]], [[Morocco]], [[Mozambique]], [[Namibia]], [[Niger]], [[Nigeria]], [[Republic of the Congo]], [[Rwanda]], [[Sao Tome and Principe]], [[Senegal]], [[Seychelles]], [[Sierra Leone]], [[Somalia]], [[South Africa]], [[Sudan]], [[Swaziland]], [[Tanzania]], [[Togo]], [[Tunisia]], [[Uganda]], [[Zambia]], [[Zimbabwe]]

==Other territories==
*[[Reunion]]
*[[Western Sahara]]


[[Category:Africa|*]]
[[Category:World]]

[[digi:world/Africa]]
[[cswiki:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>nnmtuh0fcn7nthutcr03zcr47j2rjgq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12915</id>
      <parentid>10805</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-16T14:55:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2163">[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

==Safety==
Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem.

==Health==
Malaria is common in many parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: Africans are much more resistant to malaria.

==Language==
Speaking English and French is an advantage. Portuguese in some countries. And learning African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in West Africa.

==Tips for each country==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

===[[Eastern Africa]]===
[[Burundi]], [[Comoros]], [[Djibouti]], [[Eritrea]], [[Ethiopia]], [[Kenya]], [[Madagascar]], [[Malawi]], [[Mauritius]], [[Mayotte]], [[Mozambique]], [[Réunion]], [[Rwanda]], [[Seychelles]], [[Somalia]], [[Uganda]], [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]], [[Zambia]], [[Zimbabwe]]

===[[Middle Africa]]===
[[Angola]], [[Cameroon]], [[Central African Republic]], [[Chad]], [[Congo]], [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]], [[Equatorial Guinea]], [[Gabon]], [[Sao Tome and Principe ]]

===[[Northern Africa]]===
[[Algeria]], [[Egypt]], [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]], [[Morocco]], [[Sudan]], [[Tunisia]], [[Western Sahara]]

===[[Southern Africa]]===
[[Botswana]], [[Lesotho]], [[Namibia]], [[South Africa]], [[Swaziland]]

===[[Western Africa]]===
[[Benin]], [[Burkina Faso]], [[Cape Verde]], [[Cote d'Ivoire]], [[Gambia]], [[Ghana]], [[Guinea]], [[Guinea-Bissau]], [[Liberia]], [[Mali]], [[Mauritania]], [[Niger]], [[Nigeria]], [[Saint Helena]], 
[[Senegal]], [[Sierra Leone]], [[Togo ]]


[[Category:Africa|*]]
[[Category:World]]

[[digi:world/Africa]]
[[cswiki:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>3ianupbl7ijiatbvluaqoi0z0neqcxq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13974</id>
      <parentid>12915</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-21T17:41:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2176">[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

==Safety==
Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem.

==Health==
Malaria is common in many parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: Africans are much more resistant to malaria.

==Language==
Speaking English and French is an advantage. Portuguese in some countries. And learning African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in West Africa.

==Tips for each country==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

===[[Eastern Africa]]===
[[Burundi]], [[Comoros]], [[Djibouti]], [[Eritrea]], [[Ethiopia]], [[Kenya]], [[Madagascar]], [[Malawi]], [[Mauritius]], [[Mayotte]], [[Mozambique]], [[Namibia]], [[Réunion]], [[Rwanda]], [[Seychelles]], [[Somalia]], [[Uganda]], [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]], [[Zambia]], [[Zimbabwe]]

===[[Middle Africa]]===
[[Angola]], [[Cameroon]], [[Central African Republic]], [[Chad]], [[Congo]], [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]], [[Equatorial Guinea]], [[Gabon]], [[Sao Tome and Principe ]]

===[[Northern Africa]]===
[[Algeria]], [[Egypt]], [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]], [[Morocco]], [[Sudan]], [[Tunisia]], [[Western Sahara]]

===[[Southern Africa]]===
[[Botswana]], [[Lesotho]], [[Namibia]], [[South Africa]], [[Swaziland]]

===[[Western Africa]]===
[[Benin]], [[Burkina Faso]], [[Cape Verde]], [[Cote d'Ivoire]], [[Gambia]], [[Ghana]], [[Guinea]], [[Guinea-Bissau]], [[Liberia]], [[Mali]], [[Mauritania]], [[Niger]], [[Nigeria]], [[Saint Helena]], 
[[Senegal]], [[Sierra Leone]], [[Togo ]]


[[Category:Africa|*]]
[[Category:World]]

[[digi:world/Africa]]
[[cswiki:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>piserxdtrvx4wv7ktbtawqc4bg35h3e</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13975</id>
      <parentid>13974</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-21T17:41:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2163">[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

==Safety==
Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem.

==Health==
Malaria is common in many parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: Africans are much more resistant to malaria.

==Language==
Speaking English and French is an advantage. Portuguese in some countries. And learning African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in West Africa.

==Tips for each country==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

===[[Eastern Africa]]===
[[Burundi]], [[Comoros]], [[Djibouti]], [[Eritrea]], [[Ethiopia]], [[Kenya]], [[Madagascar]], [[Malawi]], [[Mauritius]], [[Mayotte]], [[Mozambique]], [[Réunion]], [[Rwanda]], [[Seychelles]], [[Somalia]], [[Uganda]], [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]], [[Zambia]], [[Zimbabwe]]

===[[Middle Africa]]===
[[Angola]], [[Cameroon]], [[Central African Republic]], [[Chad]], [[Congo]], [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]], [[Equatorial Guinea]], [[Gabon]], [[Sao Tome and Principe ]]

===[[Northern Africa]]===
[[Algeria]], [[Egypt]], [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]], [[Morocco]], [[Sudan]], [[Tunisia]], [[Western Sahara]]

===[[Southern Africa]]===
[[Botswana]], [[Lesotho]], [[Namibia]], [[South Africa]], [[Swaziland]]

===[[Western Africa]]===
[[Benin]], [[Burkina Faso]], [[Cape Verde]], [[Cote d'Ivoire]], [[Gambia]], [[Ghana]], [[Guinea]], [[Guinea-Bissau]], [[Liberia]], [[Mali]], [[Mauritania]], [[Niger]], [[Nigeria]], [[Saint Helena]], 
[[Senegal]], [[Sierra Leone]], [[Togo ]]


[[Category:Africa|*]]
[[Category:World]]

[[digi:world/Africa]]
[[cswiki:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>3ianupbl7ijiatbvluaqoi0z0neqcxq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14063</id>
      <parentid>13975</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-22T22:02:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2178">[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

==Safety==
Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem.

==Health==
Malaria is common in many parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: Africans are much more resistant to malaria.

==Language==
Speaking English and French is an advantage. Portuguese in some countries. And learning African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in West Africa.

==Tips for each country==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

===[[Eastern Africa]]===
[[Burundi]], [[Comoros]], [[Djibouti]], [[Eritrea]], [[Ethiopia]], [[Kenya]], [[Madagascar]], [[Malawi]], [[Mauritius]], [[Mayotte]], [[Mozambique]], [[Réunion]], [[Rwanda]], [[Seychelles]], [[Somalia]], [[Uganda]], [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]], [[Zambia]], [[Zimbabwe]]

===[[Middle Africa]]===
[[Angola]], [[Cameroon]], [[Central African Republic]], [[Chad]], [[Congo]], [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]], [[Equatorial Guinea]], [[Gabon]], [[Sao Tome and Principe ]]

===[[Northern Africa]]===
[[Algeria]], [[Egypt]], [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]], [[Morocco]], [[Sudan]], [[Tunisia]], [[Western Sahara]]

===[[Southern Africa]]===
[[Botswana]], [[Lesotho]], [[Namibia]], [[South Africa]], [[Swaziland]]

===[[Western Africa]]===
[[Benin]], [[Burkina Faso]], [[Cape Verde]], [[Cote d'Ivoire]], [[Gambia]], [[Ghana]], [[Guinea]], [[Guinea-Bissau]], [[Liberia]], [[Mali]], [[Mauritania]], [[Niger]], [[Nigeria]], [[Saint Helena]], 
[[Senegal]], [[Sierra Leone]], [[Togo ]]


[[Category:Africa|*]]
[[Category:World]]

[[digi:world/Africa]]
[[cswiki:Africa]]

[[de:Afrika]]</text>
      <sha1>3hmfzvrrntz3jtcm58cvcbq11jjf0d2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14753</id>
      <parentid>14063</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-13T20:46:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2194">[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

== Safety ==
Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem.

== Health ==
Malaria is common in many parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: Africans are much more resistant to malaria.

== Language ==
Speaking English and French is an advantage. Portuguese in some countries. And learning African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in West Africa.

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Eastern Africa]] ===
[[Burundi]], [[Comoros]], [[Djibouti]], [[Eritrea]], [[Ethiopia]], [[Kenya]], [[Madagascar]], [[Malawi]], [[Mauritius]], [[Mayotte]], [[Mozambique]], [[Réunion]], [[Rwanda]], [[Seychelles]], [[Somalia]], [[Uganda]], [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]], [[Zambia]], [[Zimbabwe]]

=== [[Middle Africa]] ===
[[Angola]], [[Cameroon]], [[Central African Republic]], [[Chad]], [[Congo]], [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]], [[Equatorial Guinea]], [[Gabon]], [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

=== [[Northern Africa]] ===
[[Algeria]], [[Egypt]], [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]], [[Morocco]], [[Sudan]], [[Tunisia]], [[Western Sahara]]

=== [[Southern Africa]] ===
[[Botswana]], [[Lesotho]], [[Namibia]], [[South Africa]], [[Swaziland]]

=== [[Western Africa]] ===
[[Benin]], [[Burkina Faso]], [[Cape Verde]], [[Cote d'Ivoire]], [[Gambia]], [[Ghana]], [[Guinea]], [[Guinea-Bissau]], [[Liberia]], [[Mali]], [[Mauritania]], [[Niger]], [[Nigeria]], [[Saint Helena]], 
[[Senegal]], [[Sierra Leone]], [[Togo]]


[[Category:Africa| ]]
[[Category:World]]

[[digi:world/Africa]]
[[cswiki:Africa]]

[[de:Afrika]]</text>
      <sha1>3upfxn0f4nk05cn5fw38i4v79x9bppl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16650</id>
      <parentid>14753</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-25T09:23:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>84.182.155.230</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2250">[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

== Safety ==
Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem.

== Health ==
Malaria is common in many parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: Africans are much more resistant to malaria.

== Language ==
Speaking English and French is an advantage. Portuguese in some countries. And learning African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in West Africa.

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Eastern Africa]] ===
[[Burundi]], [[Comoros]], [[Djibouti]], [[Eritrea]], [[Ethiopia]], [[Kenya]], [[Madagascar]], [[Malawi]], [[Mauritius]], [[Mayotte]], [[Mozambique]], [[Réunion]], [[Rwanda]], [[Seychelles]], [[Somalia]], [[Uganda]], [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]], [[Zambia]], [[Zimbabwe]]

=== [[Middle Africa]] ===
[[Angola]], [[Cameroon]], [[Central African Republic]], [[Chad]], [[Congo]], [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]], [[Equatorial Guinea]], [[Gabon]], [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

=== [[Northern Africa]] ===
[[Algeria]], [[Egypt]], [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]], [[Morocco]], [[Sudan]], [[Tunisia]], [[Western Sahara]]

=== [[Southern Africa]] ===
[[Botswana]], [[Lesotho]], [[Namibia]], [[South Africa]], [[Swaziland]]

=== [[Western Africa]] ===
[[Benin]], [[Burkina Faso]], [[Cape Verde]], [[Cote d'Ivoire]], [[Gambia]], [[Ghana]], [[Guinea]], [[Guinea-Bissau]], [[Liberia]], [[Mali]], [[Mauritania]], [[Niger]], [[Nigeria]], [[Saint Helena]], 
[[Senegal]], [[Sierra Leone]], [[Togo]]

[[digi:world/Africa|''Africa'' at digihitch]]
[[cswiki:Africa|''Africa'' in CouchSurfing Wiki]]


[[Category:Africa| ]]
[[Category:World]]

[[de:Afrika]]</text>
      <sha1>hkmvvkgsrdxpvfa54g4krd3tsiigei8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16655</id>
      <parentid>16650</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-25T09:39:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2275">[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

== Safety ==
Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem.

== Health ==
Malaria is common in many parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: Africans are much more resistant to malaria.

== Language ==
Speaking English and French is an advantage. Portuguese in some countries. And learning African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in West Africa.

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Eastern Africa]] ===
[[Burundi]], [[Comoros]], [[Djibouti]], [[Eritrea]], [[Ethiopia]], [[Kenya]], [[Madagascar]], [[Malawi]], [[Mauritius]], [[Mayotte]], [[Mozambique]], [[Réunion]], [[Rwanda]], [[Seychelles]], [[Somalia]], [[Uganda]], [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]], [[Zambia]], [[Zimbabwe]]

=== [[Middle Africa]] ===
[[Angola]], [[Cameroon]], [[Central African Republic]], [[Chad]], [[Congo]], [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]], [[Equatorial Guinea]], [[Gabon]], [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

=== [[Northern Africa]] ===
[[Algeria]], [[Egypt]], [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]], [[Morocco]], [[Sudan]], [[Tunisia]], [[Western Sahara]]

=== [[Southern Africa]] ===
[[Botswana]], [[Lesotho]], [[Namibia]], [[South Africa]], [[Swaziland]]

=== [[Western Africa]] ===
[[Benin]], [[Burkina Faso]], [[Cape Verde]], [[Cote d'Ivoire]], [[Gambia]], [[Ghana]], [[Guinea]], [[Guinea-Bissau]], [[Liberia]], [[Mali]], [[Mauritania]], [[Niger]], [[Nigeria]], [[Saint Helena]], 
[[Senegal]], [[Sierra Leone]], [[Togo]]

== External links ==
* [[digi:world/Africa|''Africa'' at digihitch]]
* [[cswiki:Africa|''Africa'' in CouchSurfing Wiki]]


[[Category:Africa| ]]
[[Category:World]]

[[de:Afrika]]</text>
      <sha1>9nj9iv8n6fj82jwrgvo472q44k4nfla</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17138</id>
      <parentid>16655</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-31T03:01:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2622">[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

== Safety ==
Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem.

== Health ==
Malaria is common in many parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: Africans are much more resistant to malaria.

== Language ==
Speaking English and French is an advantage. Portuguese in some countries. And learning African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in West Africa.

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Eastern Africa]] ===
* [[Burundi]], 
* [[Comoros]], 
* [[Djibouti]], 
* [[Eritrea]], 
* [[Ethiopia]], 
* [[Kenya]], 
* [[Madagascar]], 
* [[Malawi]], 
* [[Mauritius]], 
* [[Mozambique]], 
* [[Rwanda]], 
* [[Seychelles]], 
* [[Somalia]], 
* [[Uganda]], 
* [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]], 
* [[Zambia]], 
* [[Zimbabwe]]
=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Mayotte]], 
* [[Réunion]]

=== [[Middle Africa]] ===
* [[Angola]], 
* [[Cameroon]], 
* [[Central African Republic]], 
* [[Chad]], [[Congo]], 
* [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]], 
* [[Equatorial Guinea]], 
* [[Gabon]], 
* [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

=== [[Northern Africa]] ===
* [[Algeria]], 
* [[Egypt]], 
* [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]], 
* [[Morocco]], 
* [[Sudan]], 
* [[Tunisia]], 
* [[Western Sahara]]
=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Canary Islands]],
* [[Ceuta]],
* [[Madeira Islands]],
* [[Melilla]]


=== [[Southern Africa]] ===
* [[Botswana]], 
* [[Lesotho]], 
* [[Namibia]], 
* [[South Africa]], 
* [[Swaziland]]

=== [[Western Africa]] ===
* [[Benin]], 
* [[Burkina Faso]], 
* [[Cape Verde]], 
* [[Cote d'Ivoire]], 
* [[Gambia]], 
* [[Ghana]], 
* [[Guinea]], 
* [[Guinea-Bissau]], 
* [[Liberia]], 
* [[Mali]], 
* [[Mauritania]], 
* [[Niger]], 
* [[Nigeria]],
* [[Senegal]], 
* [[Sierra Leone]], 
* [[Togo]]
=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Saint Helena]]

== External links ==
* [[digi:world/Africa|''Africa'' at digihitch]]
* [[cswiki:Africa|''Africa'' in CouchSurfing Wiki]]


[[Category:Africa| ]]
[[Category:World]]

[[de:Afrika]]</text>
      <sha1>echr41nbmjns7gucmdwck72a2h2c1ez</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17450</id>
      <parentid>17138</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-02T18:39:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2950">[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

== Safety ==
Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem.

== Health ==
Malaria is common in many parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: Africans are much more resistant to malaria.

== Language ==
Speaking English and French is an advantage. Portuguese in some countries. And learning African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in West Africa.

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Eastern Africa]] ===
* [[Burundi]], 
* [[Comoros]], 
* [[Djibouti]], 
* [[Eritrea]], 
* [[Ethiopia]], 
* [[Kenya]], 
* [[Madagascar]], 
* [[Malawi]], 
* [[Mauritius]], 
* [[Mozambique]], 
* [[Rwanda]], 
* [[Seychelles]], 
* [[Somalia]], 
* [[Uganda]], 
* [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]], 
* [[Zambia]], 
* [[Zimbabwe]]
=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag of Mayotte France.png|20px]] [[Mayotte]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Reunion.png|20px]] [[Réunion]]

=== [[Middle Africa]] ===
* [[Angola]], 
* [[Cameroon]], 
* [[Central African Republic]], 
* [[Chad]], [[Congo]], 
* [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]], 
* [[Equatorial Guinea]], 
* [[Gabon]], 
* [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

=== [[Northern Africa]] ===
* [[Algeria]], 
* [[Egypt]], 
* [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]], 
* [[Image:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]], 
* [[Sudan]], 
* [[Tunisia]], 
* [[Western Sahara]]
=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag of the Canary Islands Spain.png|20px]] [[Canary Islands]],
* [[Image:Flag of Ceuta Spain.png|20px]] [[Ceuta]],
* [[Image:Flag Madeira Portugal.png|20px]] [[Madeira Islands]],
* [[Image:Flag of Melilla Spain.png|20px]] [[Melilla]]


=== [[Southern Africa]] ===
* [[Botswana]], 
* [[Lesotho]], 
* [[Namibia]], 
* [[Image:Image:Flag of South Africa.png|20px]] [[South Africa]], 
* [[Swaziland]]

=== [[Western Africa]] ===
* [[Benin]], 
* [[Burkina Faso]], 
* [[Cape Verde]], 
* [[Cote d'Ivoire]], 
* [[Gambia]], 
* [[Ghana]], 
* [[Guinea]], 
* [[Guinea-Bissau]], 
* [[Liberia]], 
* [[Mali]], 
* [[Mauritania]], 
* [[Niger]], 
* [[Nigeria]],
* [[Senegal]], 
* [[Sierra Leone]], 
* [[Togo]]
=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Saint Helena]]

== External links ==
* [[digi:world/Africa|''Africa'' at digihitch]]
* [[cswiki:Africa|''Africa'' in CouchSurfing Wiki]]


[[Category:Africa| ]]
[[Category:World]]

[[de:Afrika]]</text>
      <sha1>lzl38s4i0yc8qg03ysf5s2ejqorgkkp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17451</id>
      <parentid>17450</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-02T18:40:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2953">[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

== Safety ==
Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem.

== Health ==
Malaria is common in many parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: Africans are much more resistant to malaria.

== Language ==
Speaking English and French is an advantage. Portuguese in some countries. And learning African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in West Africa.

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Eastern Africa]] ===
* [[Burundi]], 
* [[Comoros]], 
* [[Djibouti]], 
* [[Eritrea]], 
* [[Ethiopia]], 
* [[Kenya]], 
* [[Madagascar]], 
* [[Malawi]], 
* [[Mauritius]], 
* [[Mozambique]], 
* [[Rwanda]], 
* [[Seychelles]], 
* [[Somalia]], 
* [[Uganda]], 
* [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]], 
* [[Zambia]], 
* [[Zimbabwe]]
=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag of Mayotte France.png|20px]] [[Mayotte]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Reunion.png|20px]] [[Réunion]]

=== [[Middle Africa]] ===
* [[Angola]], 
* [[Cameroon]], 
* [[Central African Republic]], 
* [[Chad]], 
* [[Congo]], 
* [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]], 
* [[Equatorial Guinea]], 
* [[Gabon]], 
* [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

=== [[Northern Africa]] ===
* [[Algeria]], 
* [[Egypt]], 
* [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]], 
* [[Image:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]], 
* [[Sudan]], 
* [[Tunisia]], 
* [[Western Sahara]]
=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag of the Canary Islands Spain.png|20px]] [[Canary Islands]],
* [[Image:Flag of Ceuta Spain.png|20px]] [[Ceuta]],
* [[Image:Flag Madeira Portugal.png|20px]] [[Madeira Islands]],
* [[Image:Flag of Melilla Spain.png|20px]] [[Melilla]]


=== [[Southern Africa]] ===
* [[Botswana]], 
* [[Lesotho]], 
* [[Namibia]], 
* [[Image:Image:Flag of South Africa.png|20px]] [[South Africa]], 
* [[Swaziland]]

=== [[Western Africa]] ===
* [[Benin]], 
* [[Burkina Faso]], 
* [[Cape Verde]], 
* [[Cote d'Ivoire]], 
* [[Gambia]], 
* [[Ghana]], 
* [[Guinea]], 
* [[Guinea-Bissau]], 
* [[Liberia]], 
* [[Mali]], 
* [[Mauritania]], 
* [[Niger]], 
* [[Nigeria]],
* [[Senegal]], 
* [[Sierra Leone]], 
* [[Togo]]
=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Saint Helena]]

== External links ==
* [[digi:world/Africa|''Africa'' at digihitch]]
* [[cswiki:Africa|''Africa'' in CouchSurfing Wiki]]


[[Category:Africa| ]]
[[Category:World]]

[[de:Afrika]]</text>
      <sha1>1mnexgqj32jl8gmhcmd6cnmoqjeq45p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17454</id>
      <parentid>17451</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-02T20:31:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2947">[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

== Safety ==
Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem.

== Health ==
Malaria is common in many parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: Africans are much more resistant to malaria.

== Language ==
Speaking English and French is an advantage. Portuguese in some countries. And learning African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in West Africa.

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Eastern Africa]] ===
* [[Burundi]], 
* [[Comoros]], 
* [[Djibouti]], 
* [[Eritrea]], 
* [[Ethiopia]], 
* [[Kenya]], 
* [[Madagascar]], 
* [[Malawi]], 
* [[Mauritius]], 
* [[Mozambique]], 
* [[Rwanda]], 
* [[Seychelles]], 
* [[Somalia]], 
* [[Uganda]], 
* [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]], 
* [[Zambia]], 
* [[Zimbabwe]]
=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag of Mayotte France.png|20px]] [[Mayotte]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Reunion.png|20px]] [[Réunion]]

=== [[Middle Africa]] ===
* [[Angola]], 
* [[Cameroon]], 
* [[Central African Republic]], 
* [[Chad]], 
* [[Congo]], 
* [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]], 
* [[Equatorial Guinea]], 
* [[Gabon]], 
* [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

=== [[Northern Africa]] ===
* [[Algeria]], 
* [[Egypt]], 
* [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]], 
* [[Image:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]], 
* [[Sudan]], 
* [[Tunisia]], 
* [[Western Sahara]]
=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag of the Canary Islands Spain.png|20px]] [[Canary Islands]],
* [[Image:Flag of Ceuta Spain.png|20px]] [[Ceuta]],
* [[Image:Flag Madeira Portugal.png|20px]] [[Madeira Islands]],
* [[Image:Flag of Melilla Spain.png|20px]] [[Melilla]]


=== [[Southern Africa]] ===
* [[Botswana]], 
* [[Lesotho]], 
* [[Namibia]], 
* [[Image:Flag of South Africa.png|20px]] [[South Africa]], 
* [[Swaziland]]

=== [[Western Africa]] ===
* [[Benin]], 
* [[Burkina Faso]], 
* [[Cape Verde]], 
* [[Cote d'Ivoire]], 
* [[Gambia]], 
* [[Ghana]], 
* [[Guinea]], 
* [[Guinea-Bissau]], 
* [[Liberia]], 
* [[Mali]], 
* [[Mauritania]], 
* [[Niger]], 
* [[Nigeria]],
* [[Senegal]], 
* [[Sierra Leone]], 
* [[Togo]]
=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Saint Helena]]

== External links ==
* [[digi:world/Africa|''Africa'' at digihitch]]
* [[cswiki:Africa|''Africa'' in CouchSurfing Wiki]]


[[Category:Africa| ]]
[[Category:World]]

[[de:Afrika]]</text>
      <sha1>j0xhehfyynxte865k53jqnz6wjleyc9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17455</id>
      <parentid>17454</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-02T21:18:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3083">[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

== Safety ==
Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem.

== Health ==
Malaria is common in many parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: Africans are much more resistant to malaria.

== Language ==
Speaking English and French is an advantage. Portuguese in some countries. And learning African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in West Africa.

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Eastern Africa]] ===
* [[Burundi]], 
* [[Comoros]], 
* [[Djibouti]], 
* [[Eritrea]], 
* [[Ethiopia]], 
* [[Kenya]], 
* [[Madagascar]], 
* [[Malawi]], 
* [[Mauritius]], 
* [[Mozambique]], 
* [[Rwanda]], 
* [[Seychelles]], 
* [[Somalia]], 
* [[Uganda]], 
* [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]], 
* [[Zambia]], 
* [[Zimbabwe]]
=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag of Mayotte France.png|20px]] [[Mayotte]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Reunion.png|20px]] [[Réunion]]

=== [[Middle Africa]] ===
* [[Angola]], 
* [[Cameroon]], 
* [[Central African Republic]], 
* [[Chad]], 
* [[Congo]], 
* [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]], 
* [[Equatorial Guinea]], 
* [[Gabon]], 
* [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

=== [[Northern Africa]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]], 
* [[Image:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]], 
* [[Sudan]], 
* [[Image:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]], 
* [[Western Sahara]]
=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag of the Canary Islands Spain.png|20px]] [[Canary Islands]],
* [[Image:Flag of Ceuta Spain.png|20px]] [[Ceuta]],
* [[Image:Flag Madeira Portugal.png|20px]] [[Madeira Islands]],
* [[Image:Flag of Melilla Spain.png|20px]] [[Melilla]]


=== [[Southern Africa]] ===
* [[Botswana]], 
* [[Lesotho]], 
* [[Namibia]], 
* [[Image:Flag of South Africa.png|20px]] [[South Africa]], 
* [[Swaziland]]

=== [[Western Africa]] ===
* [[Benin]], 
* [[Burkina Faso]], 
* [[Cape Verde]], 
* [[Cote d'Ivoire]], 
* [[Gambia]], 
* [[Ghana]], 
* [[Guinea]], 
* [[Guinea-Bissau]], 
* [[Liberia]], 
* [[Mali]], 
* [[Mauritania]], 
* [[Niger]], 
* [[Nigeria]],
* [[Senegal]], 
* [[Sierra Leone]], 
* [[Togo]]
=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Saint Helena]]

== External links ==
* [[digi:world/Africa|''Africa'' at digihitch]]
* [[cswiki:Africa|''Africa'' in CouchSurfing Wiki]]


[[Category:Africa| ]]
[[Category:World]]

[[de:Afrika]]</text>
      <sha1>oafihf237a79n4dqmfj7gesb4y1c0q9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17960</id>
      <parentid>17455</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-18T02:08:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2965">[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage. Portuguese in some countries. And learning African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in West Africa.

=== Health ===
Malaria is common in many parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: Africans are much more resistant to malaria.

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Eastern Africa]] ===
* [[Burundi]]
* [[Comoros]]
* [[Djibouti]]
* [[Eritrea]]
* [[Ethiopia]]
* [[Kenya]]
* [[Madagascar]]
* [[Malawi]]
* [[Mauritius]]
* [[Mozambique]]
* [[Rwanda]]
* [[Seychelles]]
* [[Somalia]]
* [[Uganda]]
* [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[Zambia]]
* [[Zimbabwe]]
=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag of Mayotte France.png|20px]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[Image:Flag of Reunion.png|20px]] [[Réunion]]

=== [[Middle Africa]] ===
* [[Angola]]
* [[Cameroon]]
* [[Central African Republic]]
* [[Chad]], 
* [[Congo]]
* [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[Gabon]]
* [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

=== [[Northern Africa]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[Image:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[Image:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[Image:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[Sudan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[Western Sahara]]
=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag of the Canary Islands Spain.png|20px]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ceuta Spain.png|20px]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[Image:Flag Madeira Portugal.png|20px]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag of Melilla Spain.png|20px]] [[Melilla]]


=== [[Southern Africa]] ===
* [[Botswana]]
* [[Lesotho]]
* [[Namibia]]
* [[Image:Flag of South Africa.png|20px]] [[South Africa]]
* [[Swaziland]]

=== [[Western Africa]] ===
* [[Benin]]
* [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[Cape Verde]]
* [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[Gambia]]
* [[Ghana]]
* [[Guinea]]
* [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[Liberia]]
* [[Mali]]
* [[Mauritania]]
* [[Niger]]
* [[Nigeria]]
* [[Senegal]]
* [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[Togo]]
=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Saint Helena]]

== External links ==
* [[digi:world/Africa|''Africa'' at digihitch]]
* [[cswiki:Africa|''Africa'' in CouchSurfing Wiki]]


[[Category:Africa| ]]
[[Category:World]]
__NOTOC__
[[de:Afrika]]</text>
      <sha1>1cjwv5mcu6qg064qk5s1ds55d49m75c</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17961</id>
      <parentid>17960</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-18T02:08:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2964">[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage. Portuguese in some countries. And learning African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in West Africa.

=== Health ===
Malaria is common in many parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: Africans are much more resistant to malaria.

== Tips for each country ==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Europe as following:

=== [[Eastern Africa]] ===
* [[Burundi]]
* [[Comoros]]
* [[Djibouti]]
* [[Eritrea]]
* [[Ethiopia]]
* [[Kenya]]
* [[Madagascar]]
* [[Malawi]]
* [[Mauritius]]
* [[Mozambique]]
* [[Rwanda]]
* [[Seychelles]]
* [[Somalia]]
* [[Uganda]]
* [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[Zambia]]
* [[Zimbabwe]]
=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag of Mayotte France.png|20px]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[Image:Flag of Reunion.png|20px]] [[Réunion]]

=== [[Middle Africa]] ===
* [[Angola]]
* [[Cameroon]]
* [[Central African Republic]]
* [[Chad]], 
* [[Congo]]
* [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[Gabon]]
* [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

=== [[Northern Africa]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[Image:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[Image:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[Image:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[Sudan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[Western Sahara]]
=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag of the Canary Islands Spain.png|20px]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ceuta Spain.png|20px]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[Image:Flag Madeira Portugal.png|20px]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag of Melilla Spain.png|20px]] [[Melilla]]

=== [[Southern Africa]] ===
* [[Botswana]]
* [[Lesotho]]
* [[Namibia]]
* [[Image:Flag of South Africa.png|20px]] [[South Africa]]
* [[Swaziland]]

=== [[Western Africa]] ===
* [[Benin]]
* [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[Cape Verde]]
* [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[Gambia]]
* [[Ghana]]
* [[Guinea]]
* [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[Liberia]]
* [[Mali]]
* [[Mauritania]]
* [[Niger]]
* [[Nigeria]]
* [[Senegal]]
* [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[Togo]]
=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Saint Helena]]

== External links ==
* [[digi:world/Africa|''Africa'' at digihitch]]
* [[cswiki:Africa|''Africa'' in CouchSurfing Wiki]]


[[Category:Africa| ]]
[[Category:World]]
__NOTOC__
[[de:Afrika]]</text>
      <sha1>qstpdaeqs4hf44rxp68m3kcrdg0p739</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18000</id>
      <parentid>17961</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-18T20:31:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2955">[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage. Portuguese in some countries. And learning African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in West Africa.

=== Health ===
Malaria is common in many parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: Africans are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

=== [[Northern Africa]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[Image:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[Image:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[Image:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[Sudan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[Western Sahara]]

=== [[Eastern Africa]] ===
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[Burundi]]
* [[Comoros]]
* [[Djibouti]]
* [[Eritrea]]
* [[Ethiopia]]
* [[Kenya]]
* [[Madagascar]]
* [[Malawi]]
* [[Mauritius]]
* [[Mozambique]]
* [[Rwanda]]
* [[Seychelles]]
* [[Somalia]]
* [[Uganda]]
* [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[Zambia]]
* [[Zimbabwe]]

=== [[Middle Africa]] ===
* [[Angola]]
* [[Cameroon]]
* [[Central African Republic]]
* [[Chad]], 
* [[Congo]]
* [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[Gabon]]
* [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

=== [[Southern Africa]] ===
* [[Botswana]]
* [[Lesotho]]
* [[Namibia]]
* [[Image:Flag of South Africa.png|20px]] [[South Africa]]
* [[Swaziland]]

=== [[Western Africa]] ===
* [[Benin]]
* [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[Cape Verde]]
* [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[Gambia]]
* [[Ghana]]
* [[Guinea]]
* [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[Liberia]]
* [[Mali]]
* [[Mauritania]]
* [[Niger]]
* [[Nigeria]]
* [[Senegal]]
* [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[Togo]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag of the Canary Islands Spain.png|20px]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ceuta Spain.png|20px]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[Image:Flag Madeira Portugal.png|20px]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mayotte France.png|20px]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[Image:Flag of Melilla Spain.png|20px]] [[Melilla]]
* [[Image:Flag of Reunion.png|20px]] [[Réunion]]
* [[Saint Helena]]

==Links==
* [[digi:world/Africa|''Africa'' at digihitch]]
* [[cswiki:Africa|''Africa'' in CouchSurfing Wiki]]


[[Category:Africa|*]]
[[Category:World]]
__NOTOC__
[[de:Afrika]]</text>
      <sha1>bp02wyknwue6nl6r006apwup4fx2ben</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18011</id>
      <parentid>18000</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-18T20:41:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2994">[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage. Portuguese in some countries. And learning African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in West Africa.

=== Health ===
Malaria is common in many parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: Africans are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

=== [[Northern Africa]] ===
* [[Image:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[Image:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[Image:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[Image:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[Sudan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[Image:Flag Western Sahara.png|20px]] [[Western Sahara]]

=== [[Eastern Africa]] ===
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[Burundi]]
* [[Comoros]]
* [[Djibouti]]
* [[Eritrea]]
* [[Ethiopia]]
* [[Kenya]]
* [[Madagascar]]
* [[Malawi]]
* [[Mauritius]]
* [[Mozambique]]
* [[Rwanda]]
* [[Seychelles]]
* [[Somalia]]
* [[Uganda]]
* [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[Zambia]]
* [[Zimbabwe]]

=== [[Middle Africa]] ===
* [[Angola]]
* [[Cameroon]]
* [[Central African Republic]]
* [[Chad]], 
* [[Congo]]
* [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[Gabon]]
* [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

=== [[Southern Africa]] ===
* [[Botswana]]
* [[Lesotho]]
* [[Namibia]]
* [[Image:Flag of South Africa.png|20px]] [[South Africa]]
* [[Swaziland]]

=== [[Western Africa]] ===
* [[Benin]]
* [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[Cape Verde]]
* [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[Gambia]]
* [[Ghana]]
* [[Guinea]]
* [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[Liberia]]
* [[Mali]]
* [[Mauritania]]
* [[Niger]]
* [[Nigeria]]
* [[Senegal]]
* [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[Togo]]

=====Autonomic Islands or Regions=====
* [[Image:Flag of the Canary Islands Spain.png|20px]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ceuta Spain.png|20px]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[Image:Flag Madeira Portugal.png|20px]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mayotte France.png|20px]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[Image:Flag of Melilla Spain.png|20px]] [[Melilla]]
* [[Image:Flag of Reunion.png|20px]] [[Réunion]]
* [[Saint Helena]]

==Links==
* [[digi:world/Africa|''Africa'' at digihitch]]
* [[cswiki:Africa|''Africa'' in CouchSurfing Wiki]]


[[Category:Africa|*]]
[[Category:World]]
__NOTOC__
[[de:Afrika]]</text>
      <sha1>d1w18lgwh4q3gjnd1as67qkyw5hx9yy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21267</id>
      <parentid>18011</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-14T22:36:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2965">[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage. Portuguese in some countries. And learning African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in West Africa.

== Health ==
Malaria is common in many parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: Africans are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[Image:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[Image:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[Image:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[Image:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[Sudan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[Image:Flag Western Sahara.png|20px]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[Burundi]]
* [[Comoros]]
* [[Djibouti]]
* [[Eritrea]]
* [[Ethiopia]]
* [[Kenya]]
* [[Madagascar]]
* [[Malawi]]
* [[Mauritius]]
* [[Mozambique]]
* [[Rwanda]]
* [[Seychelles]]
* [[Somalia]]
* [[Uganda]]
* [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[Zambia]]
* [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Middle Africa]] ==
* [[Angola]]
* [[Cameroon]]
* [[Central African Republic]]
* [[Chad]], 
* [[Congo]]
* [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[Gabon]]
* [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[Botswana]]
* [[Lesotho]]
* [[Namibia]]
* [[Image:Flag of South Africa.png|20px]] [[South Africa]]
* [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[Benin]]
* [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[Cape Verde]]
* [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[Gambia]]
* [[Ghana]]
* [[Guinea]]
* [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[Liberia]]
* [[Mali]]
* [[Mauritania]]
* [[Niger]]
* [[Nigeria]]
* [[Senegal]]
* [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[Image:Flag of the Canary Islands Spain.png|20px]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ceuta Spain.png|20px]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[Image:Flag Madeira Portugal.png|20px]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mayotte France.png|20px]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[Image:Flag of Melilla Spain.png|20px]] [[Melilla]]
* [[Image:Flag of Reunion.png|20px]] [[Réunion]]
* [[Saint Helena]]

== Links ==
* [[digi:world/Africa|''Africa'' at digihitch]]
* [[cswiki:Africa|''Africa'' in CouchSurfing Wiki]]


[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]

__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>9mwngjnqrqvdeug7cvn55drnkr9gpst</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21519</id>
      <parentid>21267</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-18T10:43:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2979">[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage. Portuguese in some countries. And learning African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in West Africa.

== Health ==
Malaria is common in many parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: Africans are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[Image:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[Image:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[Image:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[Image:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[Sudan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[Image:Flag Western Sahara.png|20px]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[Burundi]]
* [[Comoros]]
* [[Djibouti]]
* [[Eritrea]]
* [[Ethiopia]]
* [[Kenya]]
* [[Madagascar]]
* [[Malawi]]
* [[Mauritius]]
* [[Mozambique]]
* [[Rwanda]]
* [[Seychelles]]
* [[Somalia]]
* [[Uganda]]
* [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[Zambia]]
* [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Middle Africa]] ==
* [[Angola]]
* [[Cameroon]]
* [[Central African Republic]]
* [[Chad]], 
* [[Congo]]
* [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[Gabon]]
* [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[Botswana]]
* [[Lesotho]]
* [[Namibia]]
* [[Image:Flag of South Africa.png|20px]] [[South Africa]]
* [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[Benin]]
* [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[Cape Verde]]
* [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[Gambia]]
* [[Ghana]]
* [[Guinea]]
* [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[Liberia]]
* [[Mali]]
* [[Mauritania]]
* [[Niger]]
* [[Nigeria]]
* [[Senegal]]
* [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[Image:Flag of the Canary Islands Spain.png|20px]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ceuta Spain.png|20px]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[Image:Flag Madeira Portugal.png|20px]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mayotte France.png|20px]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[Image:Flag of Melilla Spain.png|20px]] [[Melilla]]
* [[Image:Flag of Reunion.png|20px]] [[Réunion]]
* [[Saint Helena]]

== Links ==
* [[digi:world/Africa|''Africa'' at digihitch]]
* [[cswiki:Africa|''Africa'' in CouchSurfing Wiki]]


[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>go41zciq35784l199zj5kw51lv6vj1a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21725</id>
      <parentid>21519</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-19T01:41:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2983">[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage. Portuguese in some countries. And learning African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in West Africa.

== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in many parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: Africans are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[Image:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[Image:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[Image:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[Image:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[Sudan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[Image:Flag Western Sahara.png|20px]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[Burundi]]
* [[Comoros]]
* [[Djibouti]]
* [[Eritrea]]
* [[Ethiopia]]
* [[Kenya]]
* [[Madagascar]]
* [[Malawi]]
* [[Mauritius]]
* [[Mozambique]]
* [[Rwanda]]
* [[Seychelles]]
* [[Somalia]]
* [[Uganda]]
* [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[Zambia]]
* [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Middle Africa]] ==
* [[Angola]]
* [[Cameroon]]
* [[Central African Republic]]
* [[Chad]], 
* [[Congo]]
* [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[Gabon]]
* [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[Botswana]]
* [[Lesotho]]
* [[Namibia]]
* [[Image:Flag of South Africa.png|20px]] [[South Africa]]
* [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[Benin]]
* [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[Cape Verde]]
* [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[Gambia]]
* [[Ghana]]
* [[Guinea]]
* [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[Liberia]]
* [[Mali]]
* [[Mauritania]]
* [[Niger]]
* [[Nigeria]]
* [[Senegal]]
* [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[Image:Flag of the Canary Islands Spain.png|20px]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ceuta Spain.png|20px]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[Image:Flag Madeira Portugal.png|20px]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mayotte France.png|20px]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[Image:Flag of Melilla Spain.png|20px]] [[Melilla]]
* [[Image:Flag of Reunion.png|20px]] [[Réunion]]
* [[Saint Helena]]

== Links ==
* [[digi:world/Africa|''Africa'' at digihitch]]
* [[cswiki:Africa|''Africa'' in CouchSurfing Wiki]]


[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>fq1rn8l40amndp417doohq15ipwmtjr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21997</id>
      <parentid>21725</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-22T13:23:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3016">[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage. Portuguese in some countries. And learning African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in West Africa.

== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in many parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: Africans are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[Image:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[Image:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[Image:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[Image:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sudan.png|20px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[Image:Flag Western Sahara.png|20px]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[Burundi]]
* [[Comoros]]
* [[Djibouti]]
* [[Eritrea]]
* [[Ethiopia]]
* [[Kenya]]
* [[Madagascar]]
* [[Malawi]]
* [[Mauritius]]
* [[Mozambique]]
* [[Rwanda]]
* [[Seychelles]]
* [[Somalia]]
* [[Uganda]]
* [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[Zambia]]
* [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Middle Africa]] ==
* [[Angola]]
* [[Cameroon]]
* [[Central African Republic]]
* [[Chad]], 
* [[Congo]]
* [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[Gabon]]
* [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[Botswana]]
* [[Lesotho]]
* [[Namibia]]
* [[Image:Flag of South Africa.png|20px]] [[South Africa]]
* [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[Benin]]
* [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[Cape Verde]]
* [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[Gambia]]
* [[Ghana]]
* [[Guinea]]
* [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[Liberia]]
* [[Mali]]
* [[Mauritania]]
* [[Niger]]
* [[Nigeria]]
* [[Senegal]]
* [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[Image:Flag of the Canary Islands Spain.png|20px]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ceuta Spain.png|20px]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[Image:Flag Madeira Portugal.png|20px]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mayotte France.png|20px]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[Image:Flag of Melilla Spain.png|20px]] [[Melilla]]
* [[Image:Flag of Reunion.png|20px]] [[Réunion]]
* [[Saint Helena]]

== Links ==
* [[digi:world/Africa|''Africa'' at digihitch]]
* [[cswiki:Africa|''Africa'' in CouchSurfing Wiki]]


[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>f0ogq1q8d7ua5vs8d3sdug1s8mfp33n</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24280</id>
      <parentid>21997</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-01T15:18:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3620">[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage. Portuguese in some countries. And learning African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in West Africa.

== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in many parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: Africans are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[Image:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[Image:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[Image:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[Image:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sudan.png|20px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[Image:Flag Western Sahara.png|20px]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[Image:Flag of Burundi.png|20px]] [[Burundi]]
* [[Image:Flag of Comoros.png|20px]] [[Comoros]]
* [[Image:Flag of Djibouti.png|20px]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[Image:Flag of Eritrea.png|20px]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[[Image:Flag of Ethiopia.png|20px]] [Ethiopia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Kenya.png|20px]] [[Kenya]]
* [[Image:Flag of Madagascar.png|20px]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malawi.png|20px]] [[Malawi]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mauritius.png|20px]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[[Image:Flag of Mozambique.png|20px]] [Mozambique]]
* [[Image:Flag of Rwanda.png|20px]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[Image:Flag of Seychelles.png|20px]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[Image:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Somalia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Uganda.png|20px]] [[Uganda]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tanzania.png|20px]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Zambia.png|20px]] [[Zambia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Zimbabwe.png|20px]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Middle Africa]] ==
* [[Angola]]
* [[Cameroon]]
* [[Central African Republic]]
* [[Chad]], 
* [[Congo]]
* [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[Gabon]]
* [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[Botswana]]
* [[Lesotho]]
* [[Namibia]]
* [[Image:Flag of South Africa.png|20px]] [[South Africa]]
* [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[Benin]]
* [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[Cape Verde]]
* [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[Gambia]]
* [[Ghana]]
* [[Guinea]]
* [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[Liberia]]
* [[Mali]]
* [[Mauritania]]
* [[Niger]]
* [[Nigeria]]
* [[Senegal]]
* [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[Image:Flag of the Canary Islands Spain.png|20px]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ceuta Spain.png|20px]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[Image:Flag Madeira Portugal.png|20px]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mayotte France.png|20px]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[Image:Flag of Melilla Spain.png|20px]] [[Melilla]]
* [[Image:Flag of Reunion.png|20px]] [[Réunion]]
* [[Saint Helena]]

== Links ==
* [[digi:world/Africa|''Africa'' at digihitch]]
* [[cswiki:Africa|''Africa'' in CouchSurfing Wiki]]


[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>7g8wh1ou3t02zpfow8n3crkhoqovlto</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24281</id>
      <parentid>24280</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-01T15:18:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3620">[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage. Portuguese in some countries. And learning African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in West Africa.

== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in many parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: Africans are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[Image:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[Image:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[Image:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[Image:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sudan.png|20px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[Image:Flag Western Sahara.png|20px]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[Image:Flag of Burundi.png|20px]] [[Burundi]]
* [[Image:Flag of Comoros.png|20px]] [[Comoros]]
* [[Image:Flag of Djibouti.png|20px]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[Image:Flag of Eritrea.png|20px]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ethiopia.png|20px]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Kenya.png|20px]] [[Kenya]]
* [[Image:Flag of Madagascar.png|20px]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malawi.png|20px]] [[Malawi]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mauritius.png|20px]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mozambique.png|20px]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[Image:Flag of Rwanda.png|20px]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[Image:Flag of Seychelles.png|20px]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[Image:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Somalia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Uganda.png|20px]] [[Uganda]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tanzania.png|20px]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Zambia.png|20px]] [[Zambia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Zimbabwe.png|20px]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Middle Africa]] ==
* [[Angola]]
* [[Cameroon]]
* [[Central African Republic]]
* [[Chad]], 
* [[Congo]]
* [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[Gabon]]
* [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[Botswana]]
* [[Lesotho]]
* [[Namibia]]
* [[Image:Flag of South Africa.png|20px]] [[South Africa]]
* [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[Benin]]
* [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[Cape Verde]]
* [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[Gambia]]
* [[Ghana]]
* [[Guinea]]
* [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[Liberia]]
* [[Mali]]
* [[Mauritania]]
* [[Niger]]
* [[Nigeria]]
* [[Senegal]]
* [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[Image:Flag of the Canary Islands Spain.png|20px]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ceuta Spain.png|20px]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[Image:Flag Madeira Portugal.png|20px]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mayotte France.png|20px]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[Image:Flag of Melilla Spain.png|20px]] [[Melilla]]
* [[Image:Flag of Reunion.png|20px]] [[Réunion]]
* [[Saint Helena]]

== Links ==
* [[digi:world/Africa|''Africa'' at digihitch]]
* [[cswiki:Africa|''Africa'' in CouchSurfing Wiki]]


[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>29z2dsvdq3qyakzo3uf4wdncorsjoxc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24286</id>
      <parentid>24281</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-01T15:24:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3763">[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage. Portuguese in some countries. And learning African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in West Africa.

== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in many parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: Africans are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[Image:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[Image:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[Image:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[Image:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sudan.png|20px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[Image:Flag Western Sahara.png|20px]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[Image:Flag of Burundi.png|20px]] [[Burundi]]
* [[Image:Flag of Comoros.png|20px]] [[Comoros]]
* [[Image:Flag of Djibouti.png|20px]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[Image:Flag of Eritrea.png|20px]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ethiopia.png|20px]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Kenya.png|20px]] [[Kenya]]
* [[Image:Flag of Madagascar.png|20px]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malawi.png|20px]] [[Malawi]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mauritius.png|20px]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mozambique.png|20px]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[Image:Flag of Rwanda.png|20px]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[Image:Flag of Seychelles.png|20px]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[Image:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Somalia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Uganda.png|20px]] [[Uganda]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tanzania.png|20px]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Zambia.png|20px]] [[Zambia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Zimbabwe.png|20px]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Middle Africa]] ==
* [[Angola]]
* [[Cameroon]]
* [[Central African Republic]]
* [[Chad]], 
* [[Congo]]
* [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[Gabon]]
* [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[Image:Flag of Botswana.png|20px]] [[Botswana]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lesotho.png|20px]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[Image:Flag of Namibia.png|20px]] [[Namibia]]
* [[Image:Flag of South Africa.png|20px]] [[South Africa]]
* [[Image:Flag of Swaziland.png|20px]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[Benin]]
* [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[Cape Verde]]
* [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[Gambia]]
* [[Ghana]]
* [[Guinea]]
* [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[Liberia]]
* [[Mali]]
* [[Mauritania]]
* [[Niger]]
* [[Nigeria]]
* [[Senegal]]
* [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[Image:Flag of the Canary Islands Spain.png|20px]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ceuta Spain.png|20px]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[Image:Flag Madeira Portugal.png|20px]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mayotte France.png|20px]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[Image:Flag of Melilla Spain.png|20px]] [[Melilla]]
* [[Image:Flag of Reunion.png|20px]] [[Réunion]]
* [[Saint Helena]]

== Links ==
* [[digi:world/Africa|''Africa'' at digihitch]]
* [[cswiki:Africa|''Africa'' in CouchSurfing Wiki]]


[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>rj0gz0iccs4gakk7nsrvn6mqkdj4m1v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24289</id>
      <parentid>24286</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-01T15:27:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3803">[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage. Portuguese in some countries. And learning African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in West Africa.

== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in many parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: Africans are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[Image:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[Image:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[Image:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[Image:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sudan.png|20px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[Image:Flag Western Sahara.png|20px]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[Image:Flag of Burundi.png|20px]] [[Burundi]]
* [[Image:Flag of Comoros.png|20px]] [[Comoros]]
* [[Image:Flag of Djibouti.png|20px]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[Image:Flag of Eritrea.png|20px]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ethiopia.png|20px]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Kenya.png|20px]] [[Kenya]]
* [[Image:Flag of Madagascar.png|20px]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malawi.png|20px]] [[Malawi]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mauritius.png|20px]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mozambique.png|20px]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[Image:Flag of Rwanda.png|20px]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[Image:Flag of Seychelles.png|20px]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[Image:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Somalia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Uganda.png|20px]] [[Uganda]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tanzania.png|20px]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Zambia.png|20px]] [[Zambia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Zimbabwe.png|20px]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Middle Africa]] ==
* [[Angola]]
* [[Cameroon]]
* [[Central African Republic]]
* [[Chad]], 
* [[Congo]]
* [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[Gabon]]
* [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[Image:Flag of Botswana.png|20px]] [[Botswana]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lesotho.png|20px]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[Image:Flag of Namibia.png|20px]] [[Namibia]]
* [[Image:Flag of South Africa.png|20px]] [[South Africa]]
* [[Image:Flag of Swaziland.png|20px]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[Benin]]
* [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[Cape Verde]]
* [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[Gambia]]
* [[Ghana]]
* [[Guinea]]
* [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[Liberia]]
* [[Mali]]
* [[Mauritania]]
* [[Niger]]
* [[Nigeria]]
* [[Senegal]]
* [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[Image:Flag of the Canary Islands Spain.png|20px]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ceuta Spain.png|20px]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[Image:Flag Madeira Portugal.png|20px]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mayotte France.png|20px]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[Image:Flag of Melilla Spain.png|20px]] [[Melilla]]
* [[Image:Flag of Reunion.png|20px]] [[Réunion]]
* [[Image:Flag of Saint Helena.png|20px]] [[Saint Helena]]

== Links ==
* [[digi:world/Africa|''Africa'' at digihitch]]
* [[cswiki:Africa|''Africa'' in CouchSurfing Wiki]]


[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>0spyigtjfj4srvk39hjfq7wqm2yntqj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>25618</id>
      <parentid>24289</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-03T14:12:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.166.232.205</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4748">[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage. Portuguese in some countries. And learning African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in West Africa.

== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in many parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: Africans are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[Image:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[Image:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[Image:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[Image:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sudan.png|20px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[Image:Flag Western Sahara.png|20px]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[Image:Flag of Burundi.png|20px]] [[Burundi]]
* [[Image:Flag of Comoros.png|20px]] [[Comoros]]
* [[Image:Flag of Djibouti.png|20px]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[Image:Flag of Eritrea.png|20px]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ethiopia.png|20px]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Kenya.png|20px]] [[Kenya]]
* [[Image:Flag of Madagascar.png|20px]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malawi.png|20px]] [[Malawi]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mauritius.png|20px]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mozambique.png|20px]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[Image:Flag of Rwanda.png|20px]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[Image:Flag of Seychelles.png|20px]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[Image:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Somalia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Uganda.png|20px]] [[Uganda]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tanzania.png|20px]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Zambia.png|20px]] [[Zambia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Zimbabwe.png|20px]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Middle Africa]] ==
* [[Image:Flag of Angola.png|20px]] [[Angola]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cameroon.png|20px]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[Image:Flag of Central African Republic.png|20px]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Chad.png|20px]] [[Chad]]
* [[Image:Flag of Congo.png|20px]] [[Congo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Democratic Republic of the Congo.png|20px]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.png|20px]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[Image:Flag of Gabon.png|20px]] [[Gabon]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.png|20px]] [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[Image:Flag of Botswana.png|20px]] [[Botswana]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lesotho.png|20px]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[Image:Flag of Namibia.png|20px]] [[Namibia]]
* [[Image:Flag of South Africa.png|20px]] [[South Africa]]
* [[Image:Flag of Swaziland.png|20px]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[Image:Flag of Benin.png|20px]] [[Benin]]
* [[Image:Flag of Burkina Faso.png|20px]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cape Verde.png|20px]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.png|20px]] [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[Image:Flag of Gambia.png|20px]] [[Gambia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ghana.png|20px]] [[Ghana]]
* [[Image:Flag of Guinea.png|20px]] [[Guinea]]
* [[Image:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.png|20px]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[Image:Flag of Liberia.png|20px]] [[Liberia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mali.png|20px]] [[Mali]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mauritania.png|20px]][[Mauritania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Niger.png|20px]] [[Niger]]
* [[Image:Flag of Nigeria.png|20px]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[Image:Flag of Senegal.png|20px]] [[Senegal]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sierra Leone.png|20px]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[Image:Flag of Togo.png|20px]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[Image:Flag of the Canary Islands Spain.png|20px]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ceuta Spain.png|20px]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[Image:Flag Madeira Portugal.png|20px]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mayotte France.png|20px]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[Image:Flag of Melilla Spain.png|20px]] [[Melilla]]
* [[Image:Flag of Reunion.png|20px]] [[Réunion]]
* [[Image:Flag of Saint Helena.png|20px]] [[Saint Helena]]

== Links ==
* [[digi:world/Africa|''Africa'' at digihitch]]
* [[cswiki:Africa|''Africa'' in CouchSurfing Wiki]]


[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>cynoukx6iirfaq8lwvdbmfc51nsqhu2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>25620</id>
      <parentid>25618</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-03T14:14:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4776">[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage. Portuguese in some countries. And learning African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in West Africa.

== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in many parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: Africans are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[Image:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[Image:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[Image:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[Image:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sudan.png|20px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[Image:Flag Western Sahara.png|20px]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[Image:Flag of Burundi.png|20px]] [[Burundi]]
* [[Image:Flag of Comoros.png|20px]] [[Comoros]]
* [[Image:Flag of Djibouti.png|20px]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[Image:Flag of Eritrea.png|20px]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ethiopia.png|20px]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Kenya.png|20px]] [[Kenya]]
* [[Image:Flag of Madagascar.png|20px]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malawi.png|20px]] [[Malawi]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mauritius.png|20px]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mozambique.png|20px]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[Image:Flag of Rwanda.png|20px]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[Image:Flag of Seychelles.png|20px]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[Image:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Somalia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Uganda.png|20px]] [[Uganda]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tanzania.png|20px]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Zambia.png|20px]] [[Zambia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Zimbabwe.png|20px]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Middle Africa]] ==
* [[Image:Flag of Angola.png|20px]] [[Angola]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cameroon.png|20px]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[Image:Flag of Central African Republic.png|20px]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Chad.png|20px]] [[Chad]]
* [[Image:Flag of Republic of Congo.png|20px]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Democratic Republic of the Congo.png|20px]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.png|20px]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[Image:Flag of Gabon.png|20px]] [[Gabon]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.png|20px]] [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[Image:Flag of Botswana.png|20px]] [[Botswana]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lesotho.png|20px]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[Image:Flag of Namibia.png|20px]] [[Namibia]]
* [[Image:Flag of South Africa.png|20px]] [[South Africa]]
* [[Image:Flag of Swaziland.png|20px]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[Image:Flag of Benin.png|20px]] [[Benin]]
* [[Image:Flag of Burkina Faso.png|20px]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cape Verde.png|20px]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.png|20px]] [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[Image:Flag of Gambia.png|20px]] [[Gambia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ghana.png|20px]] [[Ghana]]
* [[Image:Flag of Guinea.png|20px]] [[Guinea]]
* [[Image:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.png|20px]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[Image:Flag of Liberia.png|20px]] [[Liberia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mali.png|20px]] [[Mali]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mauritania.png|20px]][[Mauritania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Niger.png|20px]] [[Niger]]
* [[Image:Flag of Nigeria.png|20px]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[Image:Flag of Senegal.png|20px]] [[Senegal]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sierra Leone.png|20px]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[Image:Flag of Togo.png|20px]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[Image:Flag of the Canary Islands Spain.png|20px]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ceuta Spain.png|20px]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[Image:Flag Madeira Portugal.png|20px]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mayotte France.png|20px]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[Image:Flag of Melilla Spain.png|20px]] [[Melilla]]
* [[Image:Flag of Reunion.png|20px]] [[Réunion]]
* [[Image:Flag of Saint Helena.png|20px]] [[Saint Helena]]

== Links ==
* [[digi:world/Africa|''Africa'' at digihitch]]
* [[cswiki:Africa|''Africa'' in CouchSurfing Wiki]]


[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>q2mynmkryemzo3elosoxfx0koyg7z5r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31563</id>
      <parentid>25620</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-05T00:06:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sigurdas</username>
        <id>1658</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4792">[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage. Portuguese in some countries. And learning African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in West Africa.

== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in many parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: Africans are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[Image:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[Image:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[Image:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[Image:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sudan.png|20px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[Image:Flag Western Sahara.png|20px]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[Image:Flag of Burundi.png|20px]] [[Burundi]]
* [[Image:Flag of Comoros.png|20px]] [[Comoros]]
* [[Image:Flag of Djibouti.png|20px]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[Image:Flag of Eritrea.png|20px]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ethiopia.png|20px]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Kenya.png|20px]] [[Kenya]]
* [[Image:Flag of Madagascar.png|20px]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malawi.png|20px]] [[Malawi]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mauritius.png|20px]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mozambique.png|20px]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[Image:Flag of Rwanda.png|20px]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[Image:Flag of Seychelles.png|20px]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[Image:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Somalia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Uganda.png|20px]] [[Uganda]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tanzania.png|20px]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Zambia.png|20px]] [[Zambia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Zimbabwe.png|20px]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Middle Africa]] ==
* [[Image:Flag of Angola.png|20px]] [[Angola]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cameroon.png|20px]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[Image:Flag of Central African Republic.png|20px]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Chad.png|20px]] [[Chad]]
* [[Image:Flag of Republic of Congo.png|20px]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Democratic Republic of the Congo.png|20px]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.png|20px]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[Image:Flag of Gabon.png|20px]] [[Gabon]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.png|20px]] [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[Image:Flag of Botswana.png|20px]] [[Botswana]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lesotho.png|20px]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[Image:Flag of Namibia.png|20px]] [[Namibia]]
* [[Image:Flag of South Africa.png|20px]] [[South Africa]]
* [[Image:Flag of Swaziland.png|20px]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[Image:Flag of Benin.png|20px]] [[Benin]]
* [[Image:Flag of Burkina Faso.png|20px]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cape Verde.png|20px]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.png|20px]] [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[Image:Flag of Gambia.png|20px]] [[Gambia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ghana.png|20px]] [[Ghana]]
* [[Image:Flag of Guinea.png|20px]] [[Guinea]]
* [[Image:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.png|20px]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[Image:Flag of Liberia.png|20px]] [[Liberia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mali.png|20px]] [[Mali]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mauritania.png|20px]][[Mauritania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Niger.png|20px]] [[Niger]]
* [[Image:Flag of Nigeria.png|20px]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[Image:Flag of Senegal.png|20px]] [[Senegal]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sierra Leone.png|20px]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[Image:Flag of Togo.png|20px]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[Image:Flag of the Canary Islands Spain.png|20px]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ceuta Spain.png|20px]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[Image:Flag Madeira Portugal.png|20px]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mayotte France.png|20px]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[Image:Flag of Melilla Spain.png|20px]] [[Melilla]]
* [[Image:Flag of Reunion.png|20px]] [[Réunion]]
* [[Image:Flag of Saint Helena.png|20px]] [[Saint Helena]]

== Links ==
* [[digi:world/Africa|''Africa'' at digihitch]]
* [[cswiki:Africa|''Africa'' in CouchSurfing Wiki]]


[[Category:Africa| ]]
[[trash:Africa]]
[[de:Afrika]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>0yu20km7nxchcp1qdhu6qhpxwok0pu5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32656</id>
      <parentid>31563</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-02T16:57:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4971">[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in [[West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[Image:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[Image:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[Image:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[Image:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sudan.png|20px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[Image:Flag Western Sahara.png|20px]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[Image:Flag of Burundi.png|20px]] [[Burundi]]
* [[Image:Flag of Comoros.png|20px]] [[Comoros]]
* [[Image:Flag of Djibouti.png|20px]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[Image:Flag of Eritrea.png|20px]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ethiopia.png|20px]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Kenya.png|20px]] [[Kenya]]
* [[Image:Flag of Madagascar.png|20px]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malawi.png|20px]] [[Malawi]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mauritius.png|20px]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mozambique.png|20px]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[Image:Flag of Rwanda.png|20px]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[Image:Flag of Seychelles.png|20px]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[Image:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Somalia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Uganda.png|20px]] [[Uganda]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tanzania.png|20px]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Zambia.png|20px]] [[Zambia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Zimbabwe.png|20px]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Middle Africa]] ==
* [[Image:Flag of Angola.png|20px]] [[Angola]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cameroon.png|20px]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[Image:Flag of Central African Republic.png|20px]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Chad.png|20px]] [[Chad]]
* [[Image:Flag of Republic of Congo.png|20px]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Democratic Republic of the Congo.png|20px]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.png|20px]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[Image:Flag of Gabon.png|20px]] [[Gabon]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.png|20px]] [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[Image:Flag of Botswana.png|20px]] [[Botswana]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lesotho.png|20px]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[Image:Flag of Namibia.png|20px]] [[Namibia]]
* [[Image:Flag of South Africa.png|20px]] [[South Africa]]
* [[Image:Flag of Swaziland.png|20px]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[Image:Flag of Benin.png|20px]] [[Benin]]
* [[Image:Flag of Burkina Faso.png|20px]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cape Verde.png|20px]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.png|20px]] [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[Image:Flag of Gambia.png|20px]] [[Gambia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ghana.png|20px]] [[Ghana]]
* [[Image:Flag of Guinea.png|20px]] [[Guinea]]
* [[Image:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.png|20px]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[Image:Flag of Liberia.png|20px]] [[Liberia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mali.png|20px]] [[Mali]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mauritania.png|20px]][[Mauritania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Niger.png|20px]] [[Niger]]
* [[Image:Flag of Nigeria.png|20px]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[Image:Flag of Senegal.png|20px]] [[Senegal]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sierra Leone.png|20px]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[Image:Flag of Togo.png|20px]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[Image:Flag of the Canary Islands Spain.png|20px]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ceuta Spain.png|20px]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[Image:Flag Madeira Portugal.png|20px]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mayotte France.png|20px]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[Image:Flag of Melilla Spain.png|20px]] [[Melilla]]
* [[Image:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Puntland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Reunion.png|20px]] [[Réunion]]
* [[Image:Flag of Saint Helena.png|20px]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[Image:Flag of Somaliland.png|20px]] [[Somaliland]]

== Links ==
* [[digi:world/Africa|''Africa'' at digihitch]]
* [[cswiki:Africa|''Africa'' in CouchSurfing Wiki]]


[[Category:Africa| ]]
[[trash:Africa]]
[[de:Afrika]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>nfzws5eeczxln8szmf85393dddss49s</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>34503</id>
      <parentid>32656</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T15:27:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4972">[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in [[West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[Image:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[Image:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[Image:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[Image:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sudan.png|20px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[Image:Flag Western Sahara.png|20px]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[Image:Flag of Burundi.png|20px]] [[Burundi]]
* [[Image:Flag of Comoros.png|20px]] [[Comoros]]
* [[Image:Flag of Djibouti.png|20px]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[Image:Flag of Eritrea.png|20px]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ethiopia.png|20px]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Kenya.png|20px]] [[Kenya]]
* [[Image:Flag of Madagascar.png|20px]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[Image:Flag of Malawi.png|20px]] [[Malawi]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mauritius.png|20px]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mozambique.png|20px]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[Image:Flag of Rwanda.png|20px]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[Image:Flag of Seychelles.png|20px]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[Image:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Somalia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Uganda.png|20px]] [[Uganda]]
* [[Image:Flag of Tanzania.png|20px]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Zambia.png|20px]] [[Zambia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Zimbabwe.png|20px]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Middle Africa]] ==
* [[Image:Flag of Angola.png|20px]] [[Angola]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cameroon.png|20px]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[Image:Flag of Central African Republic.png|20px]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[Image:Flag of Chad.png|20px]] [[Chad]]
* [[Image:Flag of Republic of Congo.png|20px]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Democratic Republic of the Congo.png|20px]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[Image:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.png|20px]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[Image:Flag of Gabon.png|20px]] [[Gabon]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.png|20px]] [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[Image:Flag of Botswana.png|20px]] [[Botswana]]
* [[Image:Flag of Lesotho.png|20px]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[Image:Flag of Namibia.png|20px]] [[Namibia]]
* [[Image:Flag of South Africa.png|20px]] [[South Africa]]
* [[Image:Flag of Swaziland.png|20px]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[Image:Flag of Benin.png|20px]] [[Benin]]
* [[Image:Flag of Burkina Faso.png|20px]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cape Verde.png|20px]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[Image:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.png|20px]] [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[Image:Flag of Gambia.png|20px]] [[Gambia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ghana.png|20px]] [[Ghana]]
* [[Image:Flag of Guinea.png|20px]] [[Guinea]]
* [[Image:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.png|20px]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[Image:Flag of Liberia.png|20px]] [[Liberia]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mali.png|20px]] [[Mali]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mauritania.png|20px]][[Mauritania]]
* [[Image:Flag of Niger.png|20px]] [[Niger]]
* [[Image:Flag of Nigeria.png|20px]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[Image:Flag of Senegal.png|20px]] [[Senegal]]
* [[Image:Flag of Sierra Leone.png|20px]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[Image:Flag of Togo.png|20px]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[Image:Flag of the Canary Islands Spain.png|20px]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag of Ceuta Spain.png|20px]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[Image:Flag Madeira Portugal.png|20px]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[Image:Flag of Mayotte France.png|20px]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[Image:Flag of Melilla Spain.png|20px]] [[Melilla]]
* [[Image:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Puntland]]
* [[Image:Flag of Reunion.png|20px]] [[Réunion]]
* [[Image:Flag of Saint Helena.png|20px]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[Image:Flag of Somaliland.png|20px]] [[Somaliland]]

== Links ==
* [[digi:world/Africa|''Africa'' at digihitch]]
* [[cswiki:Africa|''Africa'' in CouchSurfing Wiki]]


[[Category:Africa| ]]
[[trash:Africa]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[de:Afrika]]</text>
      <sha1>ftx82ixbzu1z0ce8pjzlg7xpq0le9rl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>34592</id>
      <parentid>34503</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T16:01:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4907">[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in [[West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[File:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.png|20px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag Western Sahara.png|20px]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[File:Flag of Burundi.png|20px]] [[Burundi]]
* [[File:Flag of Comoros.png|20px]] [[Comoros]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.png|20px]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.png|20px]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Ethiopia.png|20px]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[File:Flag of Kenya.png|20px]] [[Kenya]]
* [[File:Flag of Madagascar.png|20px]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[File:Flag of Malawi.png|20px]] [[Malawi]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritius.png|20px]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[File:Flag of Mozambique.png|20px]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[File:Flag of Rwanda.png|20px]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[File:Flag of Seychelles.png|20px]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Uganda.png|20px]] [[Uganda]]
* [[File:Flag of Tanzania.png|20px]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[File:Flag of Zambia.png|20px]] [[Zambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Zimbabwe.png|20px]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Middle Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Angola.png|20px]] [[Angola]]
* [[File:Flag of Cameroon.png|20px]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[File:Flag of Central African Republic.png|20px]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Chad.png|20px]] [[Chad]]
* [[File:Flag of Republic of Congo.png|20px]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Democratic Republic of the Congo.png|20px]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.png|20px]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Gabon.png|20px]] [[Gabon]]
* [[File:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.png|20px]] [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Botswana.png|20px]] [[Botswana]]
* [[File:Flag of Lesotho.png|20px]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[File:Flag of Namibia.png|20px]] [[Namibia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Africa.png|20px]] [[South Africa]]
* [[File:Flag of Swaziland.png|20px]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Benin.png|20px]] [[Benin]]
* [[File:Flag of Burkina Faso.png|20px]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[File:Flag of Cape Verde.png|20px]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[File:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.png|20px]] [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[File:Flag of Gambia.png|20px]] [[Gambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ghana.png|20px]] [[Ghana]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea.png|20px]] [[Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.png|20px]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[File:Flag of Liberia.png|20px]] [[Liberia]]
* [[File:Flag of Mali.png|20px]] [[Mali]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritania.png|20px]][[Mauritania]]
* [[File:Flag of Niger.png|20px]] [[Niger]]
* [[File:Flag of Nigeria.png|20px]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Senegal.png|20px]] [[Senegal]]
* [[File:Flag of Sierra Leone.png|20px]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[File:Flag of Togo.png|20px]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Canary Islands Spain.png|20px]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Ceuta Spain.png|20px]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[File:Flag Madeira Portugal.png|20px]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Mayotte France.png|20px]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[File:Flag of Melilla Spain.png|20px]] [[Melilla]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Puntland]]
* [[File:Flag of Reunion.png|20px]] [[Réunion]]
* [[File:Flag of Saint Helena.png|20px]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[File:Flag of Somaliland.png|20px]] [[Somaliland]]

== Links ==
* [[digi:world/Africa|''Africa'' at digihitch]]
* [[cswiki:Africa|''Africa'' in CouchSurfing Wiki]]
[[trash:Africa]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]</text>
      <sha1>403vezg063sw4ym60rjv4ck5olnnh8e</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35795</id>
      <parentid>34592</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-14T23:51:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4921">[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in [[West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[File:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.png|20px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag Western Sahara.png|20px]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[File:Flag of Burundi.png|20px]] [[Burundi]]
* [[File:Flag of Comoros.png|20px]] [[Comoros]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.png|20px]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.png|20px]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Ethiopia.png|20px]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[File:Flag of Kenya.png|20px]] [[Kenya]]
* [[File:Flag of Madagascar.png|20px]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[File:Flag of Malawi.png|20px]] [[Malawi]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritius.png|20px]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[File:Flag of Mozambique.png|20px]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[File:Flag of Rwanda.png|20px]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[File:Flag of Seychelles.png|20px]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Uganda.png|20px]] [[Uganda]]
* [[File:Flag of Tanzania.png|20px]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[File:Flag of Zambia.png|20px]] [[Zambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Zimbabwe.png|20px]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Middle Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Angola.png|20px]] [[Angola]]
* [[File:Flag of Cameroon.png|20px]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[File:Flag of Central African Republic.png|20px]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Chad.png|20px]] [[Chad]]
* [[File:Flag of Republic of Congo.png|20px]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Democratic Republic of the Congo.png|20px]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.png|20px]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Gabon.png|20px]] [[Gabon]]
* [[File:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.png|20px]] [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Botswana.png|20px]] [[Botswana]]
* [[File:Flag of Lesotho.png|20px]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[File:Flag of Namibia.png|20px]] [[Namibia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Africa.png|20px]] [[South Africa]]
* [[File:Flag of Swaziland.png|20px]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Benin.png|20px]] [[Benin]]
* [[File:Flag of Burkina Faso.png|20px]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[File:Flag of Cape Verde.png|20px]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[File:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.png|20px]] [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[File:Flag of Gambia.png|20px]] [[Gambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ghana.png|20px]] [[Ghana]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea.png|20px]] [[Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.png|20px]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[File:Flag of Liberia.png|20px]] [[Liberia]]
* [[File:Flag of Mali.png|20px]] [[Mali]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritania.png|20px]][[Mauritania]]
* [[File:Flag of Niger.png|20px]] [[Niger]]
* [[File:Flag of Nigeria.png|20px]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Senegal.png|20px]] [[Senegal]]
* [[File:Flag of Sierra Leone.png|20px]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[File:Flag of Togo.png|20px]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Canary Islands Spain.png|20px]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Ceuta Spain.png|20px]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[File:Flag Madeira Portugal.png|20px]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Mayotte France.png|20px]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[File:Flag of Melilla Spain.png|20px]] [[Melilla]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Puntland]]
* [[File:Flag of Reunion.png|20px]] [[Réunion]]
* [[File:Flag of Saint Helena.png|20px]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[File:Flag of Somaliland.png|20px]] [[Somaliland]]

== Links ==
* [[digi:world/Africa|''Africa'' at digihitch]]
* [[cswiki:Africa|''Africa'' in CouchSurfing Wiki]]
[[trash:Africa]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
[[zh:非洲]]</text>
      <sha1>7mmtu47jkwpc1p9awflw76qr8zeuluv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36815</id>
      <parentid>35795</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-08-26T23:10:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4936">[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in [[West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[File:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.png|20px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag Western Sahara.png|20px]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[File:Flag of Burundi.png|20px]] [[Burundi]]
* [[File:Flag of Comoros.png|20px]] [[Comoros]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.png|20px]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.png|20px]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Ethiopia.png|20px]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[File:Flag of Kenya.png|20px]] [[Kenya]]
* [[File:Flag of Madagascar.png|20px]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[File:Flag of Malawi.png|20px]] [[Malawi]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritius.png|20px]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[File:Flag of Mozambique.png|20px]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[File:Flag of Rwanda.png|20px]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[File:Flag of Seychelles.png|20px]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Uganda.png|20px]] [[Uganda]]
* [[File:Flag of Tanzania.png|20px]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[File:Flag of Zambia.png|20px]] [[Zambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Zimbabwe.png|20px]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Middle Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Angola.png|20px]] [[Angola]]
* [[File:Flag of Cameroon.png|20px]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[File:Flag of Central African Republic.png|20px]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Chad.png|20px]] [[Chad]]
* [[File:Flag of Republic of Congo.png|20px]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Democratic Republic of the Congo.png|20px]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.png|20px]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Gabon.png|20px]] [[Gabon]]
* [[File:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.png|20px]] [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Botswana.png|20px]] [[Botswana]]
* [[File:Flag of Lesotho.png|20px]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[File:Flag of Namibia.png|20px]] [[Namibia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Africa.png|20px]] [[South Africa]]
* [[File:Flag of Swaziland.png|20px]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Benin.png|20px]] [[Benin]]
* [[File:Flag of Burkina Faso.png|20px]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[File:Flag of Cape Verde.png|20px]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[File:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.png|20px]] [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[File:Flag of Gambia.png|20px]] [[Gambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ghana.png|20px]] [[Ghana]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea.png|20px]] [[Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.png|20px]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[File:Flag of Liberia.png|20px]] [[Liberia]]
* [[File:Flag of Mali.png|20px]] [[Mali]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritania.png|20px]][[Mauritania]]
* [[File:Flag of Niger.png|20px]] [[Niger]]
* [[File:Flag of Nigeria.png|20px]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Senegal.png|20px]] [[Senegal]]
* [[File:Flag of Sierra Leone.png|20px]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[File:Flag of Togo.png|20px]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Canary Islands Spain.png|20px]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Ceuta Spain.png|20px]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[File:Flag Madeira Portugal.png|20px]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Mayotte France.png|20px]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[File:Flag of Melilla Spain.png|20px]] [[Melilla]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Puntland]]
* [[File:Flag of Reunion.png|20px]] [[Réunion]]
* [[File:Flag of Saint Helena.png|20px]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[File:Flag of Somaliland.png|20px]] [[Somaliland]]

== Links ==
* [[digi:world/Africa|''Africa'' at digihitch]]
* [[cswiki:Africa|''Africa'' in CouchSurfing Wiki]]
[[trash:Africa]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
[[es:África]]
[[zh:非洲]]</text>
      <sha1>phzt9krc44b5m82ydi8exytjxwp471v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39129</id>
      <parentid>36815</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-12-31T21:08:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Vidimian</username>
        <id>1703</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4950">[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in [[West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[File:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.png|20px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag Western Sahara.png|20px]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[File:Flag of Burundi.png|20px]] [[Burundi]]
* [[File:Flag of Comoros.png|20px]] [[Comoros]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.png|20px]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.png|20px]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Ethiopia.png|20px]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[File:Flag of Kenya.png|20px]] [[Kenya]]
* [[File:Flag of Madagascar.png|20px]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[File:Flag of Malawi.png|20px]] [[Malawi]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritius.png|20px]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[File:Flag of Mozambique.png|20px]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[File:Flag of Rwanda.png|20px]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[File:Flag of Seychelles.png|20px]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Uganda.png|20px]] [[Uganda]]
* [[File:Flag of Tanzania.png|20px]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[File:Flag of Zambia.png|20px]] [[Zambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Zimbabwe.png|20px]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Middle Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Angola.png|20px]] [[Angola]]
* [[File:Flag of Cameroon.png|20px]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[File:Flag of Central African Republic.png|20px]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Chad.png|20px]] [[Chad]]
* [[File:Flag of Republic of Congo.png|20px]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Democratic Republic of the Congo.png|20px]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.png|20px]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Gabon.png|20px]] [[Gabon]]
* [[File:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.png|20px]] [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Botswana.png|20px]] [[Botswana]]
* [[File:Flag of Lesotho.png|20px]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[File:Flag of Namibia.png|20px]] [[Namibia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Africa.png|20px]] [[South Africa]]
* [[File:Flag of Swaziland.png|20px]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Benin.png|20px]] [[Benin]]
* [[File:Flag of Burkina Faso.png|20px]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[File:Flag of Cape Verde.png|20px]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[File:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.png|20px]] [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[File:Flag of Gambia.png|20px]] [[Gambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ghana.png|20px]] [[Ghana]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea.png|20px]] [[Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.png|20px]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[File:Flag of Liberia.png|20px]] [[Liberia]]
* [[File:Flag of Mali.png|20px]] [[Mali]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritania.png|20px]][[Mauritania]]
* [[File:Flag of Niger.png|20px]] [[Niger]]
* [[File:Flag of Nigeria.png|20px]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Senegal.png|20px]] [[Senegal]]
* [[File:Flag of Sierra Leone.png|20px]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[File:Flag of Togo.png|20px]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Canary Islands Spain.png|20px]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Ceuta Spain.png|20px]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[File:Flag Madeira Portugal.png|20px]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Mayotte France.png|20px]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[File:Flag of Melilla Spain.png|20px]] [[Melilla]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Puntland]]
* [[File:Flag of Reunion.png|20px]] [[Réunion]]
* [[File:Flag of Saint Helena.png|20px]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[File:Flag of Somaliland.png|20px]] [[Somaliland]]

== Links ==
* [[digi:world/Africa|''Africa'' at digihitch]]
* [[cswiki:Africa|''Africa'' in CouchSurfing Wiki]]
[[trash:Africa]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
[[es:África]]
[[tr:Afrika]]
[[zh:非洲]]</text>
      <sha1>3ooti31mhs7ifny301iu4pwzc2vxrhi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40900</id>
      <parentid>39129</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-30T21:44:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4965">[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in [[West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[File:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.png|20px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag Western Sahara.png|20px]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[File:Flag of Burundi.png|20px]] [[Burundi]]
* [[File:Flag of Comoros.png|20px]] [[Comoros]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.png|20px]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.png|20px]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Ethiopia.png|20px]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[File:Flag of Kenya.png|20px]] [[Kenya]]
* [[File:Flag of Madagascar.png|20px]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[File:Flag of Malawi.png|20px]] [[Malawi]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritius.png|20px]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[File:Flag of Mozambique.png|20px]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[File:Flag of Rwanda.png|20px]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[File:Flag of Seychelles.png|20px]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Uganda.png|20px]] [[Uganda]]
* [[File:Flag of Tanzania.png|20px]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[File:Flag of Zambia.png|20px]] [[Zambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Zimbabwe.png|20px]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Middle Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Angola.png|20px]] [[Angola]]
* [[File:Flag of Cameroon.png|20px]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[File:Flag of Central African Republic.png|20px]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Chad.png|20px]] [[Chad]]
* [[File:Flag of Republic of Congo.png|20px]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Democratic Republic of the Congo.png|20px]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.png|20px]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Gabon.png|20px]] [[Gabon]]
* [[File:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.png|20px]] [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Botswana.png|20px]] [[Botswana]]
* [[File:Flag of Lesotho.png|20px]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[File:Flag of Namibia.png|20px]] [[Namibia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Africa.png|20px]] [[South Africa]]
* [[File:Flag of Swaziland.png|20px]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Benin.png|20px]] [[Benin]]
* [[File:Flag of Burkina Faso.png|20px]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[File:Flag of Cape Verde.png|20px]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[File:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.png|20px]] [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[File:Flag of Gambia.png|20px]] [[Gambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ghana.png|20px]] [[Ghana]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea.png|20px]] [[Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.png|20px]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[File:Flag of Liberia.png|20px]] [[Liberia]]
* [[File:Flag of Mali.png|20px]] [[Mali]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritania.png|20px]][[Mauritania]]
* [[File:Flag of Niger.png|20px]] [[Niger]]
* [[File:Flag of Nigeria.png|20px]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Senegal.png|20px]] [[Senegal]]
* [[File:Flag of Sierra Leone.png|20px]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[File:Flag of Togo.png|20px]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Canary Islands Spain.png|20px]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Ceuta Spain.png|20px]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[File:Flag Madeira Portugal.png|20px]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Mayotte France.png|20px]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[File:Flag of Melilla Spain.png|20px]] [[Melilla]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Puntland]]
* [[File:Flag of Reunion.png|20px]] [[Réunion]]
* [[File:Flag of Saint Helena.png|20px]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[File:Flag of Somaliland.png|20px]] [[Somaliland]]

== Links ==
* [[digi:world/Africa|''Africa'' at digihitch]]
* [[cswiki:Africa|''Africa'' in CouchSurfing Wiki]]
[[trash:Africa]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
[[es:África]]
[[fr:Afrique]]
[[tr:Afrika]]
[[zh:非洲]]</text>
      <sha1>fkelkzkeiosk09pzxv9y207hxrhrsok</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>45515</id>
      <parentid>40900</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-05T17:39:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4853">[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in [[West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.png|20px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.png|20px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.png|20px]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[File:Flag Morocco.png|20px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.png|20px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.png|20px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag Western Sahara.png|20px]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[File:Flag of Burundi.png|20px]] [[Burundi]]
* [[File:Flag of Comoros.png|20px]] [[Comoros]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.png|20px]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.png|20px]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Ethiopia.png|20px]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[File:Flag of Kenya.png|20px]] [[Kenya]]
* [[File:Flag of Madagascar.png|20px]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[File:Flag of Malawi.png|20px]] [[Malawi]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritius.png|20px]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[File:Flag of Mozambique.png|20px]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[File:Flag of Rwanda.png|20px]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[File:Flag of Seychelles.png|20px]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Uganda.png|20px]] [[Uganda]]
* [[File:Flag of Tanzania.png|20px]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[File:Flag of Zambia.png|20px]] [[Zambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Zimbabwe.png|20px]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Middle Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Angola.png|20px]] [[Angola]]
* [[File:Flag of Cameroon.png|20px]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[File:Flag of Central African Republic.png|20px]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Chad.png|20px]] [[Chad]]
* [[File:Flag of Republic of Congo.png|20px]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Democratic Republic of the Congo.png|20px]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.png|20px]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Gabon.png|20px]] [[Gabon]]
* [[File:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.png|20px]] [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Botswana.png|20px]] [[Botswana]]
* [[File:Flag of Lesotho.png|20px]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[File:Flag of Namibia.png|20px]] [[Namibia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Africa.png|20px]] [[South Africa]]
* [[File:Flag of Swaziland.png|20px]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Benin.png|20px]] [[Benin]]
* [[File:Flag of Burkina Faso.png|20px]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[File:Flag of Cape Verde.png|20px]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[File:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.png|20px]] [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[File:Flag of Gambia.png|20px]] [[Gambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ghana.png|20px]] [[Ghana]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea.png|20px]] [[Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.png|20px]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[File:Flag of Liberia.png|20px]] [[Liberia]]
* [[File:Flag of Mali.png|20px]] [[Mali]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritania.png|20px]][[Mauritania]]
* [[File:Flag of Niger.png|20px]] [[Niger]]
* [[File:Flag of Nigeria.png|20px]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Senegal.png|20px]] [[Senegal]]
* [[File:Flag of Sierra Leone.png|20px]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[File:Flag of Togo.png|20px]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Canary Islands Spain.png|20px]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Ceuta Spain.png|20px]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[File:Flag Madeira Portugal.png|20px]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Mayotte France.png|20px]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[File:Flag of Melilla Spain.png|20px]] [[Melilla]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Puntland]]
* [[File:Flag of Reunion.png|20px]] [[Réunion]]
* [[File:Flag of Saint Helena.png|20px]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[File:Flag of Somaliland.png|20px]] [[Somaliland]]

[[trash:Africa]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
[[es:África]]
[[fr:Afrique]]
[[tr:Afrika]]
[[zh:非洲]]</text>
      <sha1>f2uy97w3irn6k5b7bh9sxoma0bixi5n</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>45955</id>
      <parentid>45515</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-17T11:37:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4859">[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in [[West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.svg|30px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.svg|30px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.svg|30px]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[File:Flag of Morocco.svg|30px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.svg|30px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.svg|30px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag of Western Sahara.svg|30px]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[File:Flag of Burundi.png|20px]] [[Burundi]]
* [[File:Flag of Comoros.png|20px]] [[Comoros]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.png|20px]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.png|20px]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Ethiopia.png|20px]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[File:Flag of Kenya.png|20px]] [[Kenya]]
* [[File:Flag of Madagascar.png|20px]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[File:Flag of Malawi.png|20px]] [[Malawi]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritius.png|20px]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[File:Flag of Mozambique.png|20px]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[File:Flag of Rwanda.png|20px]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[File:Flag of Seychelles.png|20px]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Uganda.png|20px]] [[Uganda]]
* [[File:Flag of Tanzania.png|20px]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[File:Flag of Zambia.png|20px]] [[Zambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Zimbabwe.png|20px]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Middle Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Angola.png|20px]] [[Angola]]
* [[File:Flag of Cameroon.png|20px]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[File:Flag of Central African Republic.png|20px]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Chad.png|20px]] [[Chad]]
* [[File:Flag of Republic of Congo.png|20px]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Democratic Republic of the Congo.png|20px]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.png|20px]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Gabon.png|20px]] [[Gabon]]
* [[File:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.png|20px]] [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Botswana.png|20px]] [[Botswana]]
* [[File:Flag of Lesotho.png|20px]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[File:Flag of Namibia.png|20px]] [[Namibia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Africa.png|20px]] [[South Africa]]
* [[File:Flag of Swaziland.png|20px]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Benin.png|20px]] [[Benin]]
* [[File:Flag of Burkina Faso.png|20px]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[File:Flag of Cape Verde.png|20px]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[File:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.png|20px]] [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[File:Flag of Gambia.png|20px]] [[Gambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ghana.png|20px]] [[Ghana]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea.png|20px]] [[Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.png|20px]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[File:Flag of Liberia.png|20px]] [[Liberia]]
* [[File:Flag of Mali.png|20px]] [[Mali]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritania.png|20px]][[Mauritania]]
* [[File:Flag of Niger.png|20px]] [[Niger]]
* [[File:Flag of Nigeria.png|20px]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Senegal.png|20px]] [[Senegal]]
* [[File:Flag of Sierra Leone.png|20px]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[File:Flag of Togo.png|20px]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Canary Islands Spain.png|20px]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Ceuta Spain.png|20px]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[File:Flag Madeira Portugal.png|20px]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Mayotte France.png|20px]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[File:Flag of Melilla Spain.png|20px]] [[Melilla]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Puntland]]
* [[File:Flag of Reunion.png|20px]] [[Réunion]]
* [[File:Flag of Saint Helena.png|20px]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[File:Flag of Somaliland.png|20px]] [[Somaliland]]

[[trash:Africa]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
[[es:África]]
[[fr:Afrique]]
[[tr:Afrika]]
[[zh:非洲]]</text>
      <sha1>eh3g0tma45f5z2r3v7n5569vhcrukro</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>45956</id>
      <parentid>45955</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-17T11:39:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4867">[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in [[West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.svg|30px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.svg|30px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.svg|30px]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[File:Flag of Morocco.svg|30px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.svg|30px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.svg|30px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag of Western Sahara.svg|30px]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[File:Flag of Burundi.svg|30px]] [[Burundi]]
* [[File:Flag of the Comoros.svg|30px]] [[Comoros]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.svg|30px]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.svg|30px]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Ethiopia.svg|30px]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[File:Flag of Kenya.svg|30px]] [[Kenya]]
* [[File:Flag of Madagascar.svg|30px]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[File:Flag of Malawi.svg|30px]] [[Malawi]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritius.svg|30px]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[File:Flag of Mozambique.svg|30px]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[File:Flag of Rwanda.svg|30px]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[File:Flag of the Seychelles.svg|30px]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Uganda.svg|30px]] [[Uganda]]
* [[File:Flag of Tanzania.svg|30px]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[File:Flag of Zambia.svg|30px]] [[Zambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Zimbabwe.svg|30px]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Middle Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Angola.png|20px]] [[Angola]]
* [[File:Flag of Cameroon.png|20px]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[File:Flag of Central African Republic.png|20px]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Chad.png|20px]] [[Chad]]
* [[File:Flag of Republic of Congo.png|20px]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Democratic Republic of the Congo.png|20px]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.png|20px]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Gabon.png|20px]] [[Gabon]]
* [[File:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.png|20px]] [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Botswana.png|20px]] [[Botswana]]
* [[File:Flag of Lesotho.png|20px]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[File:Flag of Namibia.png|20px]] [[Namibia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Africa.png|20px]] [[South Africa]]
* [[File:Flag of Swaziland.png|20px]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Benin.png|20px]] [[Benin]]
* [[File:Flag of Burkina Faso.png|20px]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[File:Flag of Cape Verde.png|20px]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[File:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.png|20px]] [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[File:Flag of Gambia.png|20px]] [[Gambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ghana.png|20px]] [[Ghana]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea.png|20px]] [[Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.png|20px]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[File:Flag of Liberia.png|20px]] [[Liberia]]
* [[File:Flag of Mali.png|20px]] [[Mali]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritania.png|20px]][[Mauritania]]
* [[File:Flag of Niger.png|20px]] [[Niger]]
* [[File:Flag of Nigeria.png|20px]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Senegal.png|20px]] [[Senegal]]
* [[File:Flag of Sierra Leone.png|20px]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[File:Flag of Togo.png|20px]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Canary Islands Spain.png|20px]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Ceuta Spain.png|20px]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[File:Flag Madeira Portugal.png|20px]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Mayotte France.png|20px]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[File:Flag of Melilla Spain.png|20px]] [[Melilla]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Puntland]]
* [[File:Flag of Reunion.png|20px]] [[Réunion]]
* [[File:Flag of Saint Helena.png|20px]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[File:Flag of Somaliland.png|20px]] [[Somaliland]]

[[trash:Africa]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
[[es:África]]
[[fr:Afrique]]
[[tr:Afrika]]
[[zh:非洲]]</text>
      <sha1>qfiqcog9usburqoeyw4182ohtmbdldr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>45957</id>
      <parentid>45956</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-17T11:44:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4883">[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in [[West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.svg|30px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.svg|30px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.svg|30px]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[File:Flag of Morocco.svg|30px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.svg|30px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.svg|30px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag of Western Sahara.svg|30px]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[File:Flag of Burundi.svg|30px]] [[Burundi]]
* [[File:Flag of the Comoros.svg|30px]] [[Comoros]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.svg|30px]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.svg|30px]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Ethiopia.svg|30px]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[File:Flag of Kenya.svg|30px]] [[Kenya]]
* [[File:Flag of Madagascar.svg|30px]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[File:Flag of Malawi.svg|30px]] [[Malawi]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritius.svg|30px]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[File:Flag of Mozambique.svg|30px]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[File:Flag of Rwanda.svg|30px]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[File:Flag of the Seychelles.svg|30px]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Uganda.svg|30px]] [[Uganda]]
* [[File:Flag of Tanzania.svg|30px]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[File:Flag of Zambia.svg|30px]] [[Zambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Zimbabwe.svg|30px]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Middle Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Angola.svg|30px]] [[Angola]]
* [[File:Flag of Cameroon.svg|30px]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[File:Flag of the Central African Republic.svg|30px]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Chad.svg|30px]] [[Chad]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of the Congo.svg|30px]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.svg|30px]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.svg|30px]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Gabon.svg|30px]] [[Gabon]]
* [[File:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.svg|30px]] [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Botswana.png|20px]] [[Botswana]]
* [[File:Flag of Lesotho.png|20px]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[File:Flag of Namibia.png|20px]] [[Namibia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Africa.png|20px]] [[South Africa]]
* [[File:Flag of Swaziland.png|20px]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Benin.png|20px]] [[Benin]]
* [[File:Flag of Burkina Faso.png|20px]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[File:Flag of Cape Verde.png|20px]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[File:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.png|20px]] [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[File:Flag of Gambia.png|20px]] [[Gambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ghana.png|20px]] [[Ghana]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea.png|20px]] [[Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.png|20px]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[File:Flag of Liberia.png|20px]] [[Liberia]]
* [[File:Flag of Mali.png|20px]] [[Mali]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritania.png|20px]][[Mauritania]]
* [[File:Flag of Niger.png|20px]] [[Niger]]
* [[File:Flag of Nigeria.png|20px]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Senegal.png|20px]] [[Senegal]]
* [[File:Flag of Sierra Leone.png|20px]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[File:Flag of Togo.png|20px]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Canary Islands Spain.png|20px]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Ceuta Spain.png|20px]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[File:Flag Madeira Portugal.png|20px]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Mayotte France.png|20px]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[File:Flag of Melilla Spain.png|20px]] [[Melilla]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Puntland]]
* [[File:Flag of Reunion.png|20px]] [[Réunion]]
* [[File:Flag of Saint Helena.png|20px]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[File:Flag of Somaliland.png|20px]] [[Somaliland]]

[[trash:Africa]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
[[es:África]]
[[fr:Afrique]]
[[tr:Afrika]]
[[zh:非洲]]</text>
      <sha1>ktps22piv5nhqutx3wqy9f3tgn3f4iz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>45958</id>
      <parentid>45957</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-17T11:46:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4883">[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in [[West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.svg|30px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.svg|30px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.svg|30px]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[File:Flag of Morocco.svg|30px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.svg|30px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.svg|30px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag of Western Sahara.svg|30px]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[File:Flag of Burundi.svg|30px]] [[Burundi]]
* [[File:Flag of the Comoros.svg|30px]] [[Comoros]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.svg|30px]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.svg|30px]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Ethiopia.svg|30px]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[File:Flag of Kenya.svg|30px]] [[Kenya]]
* [[File:Flag of Madagascar.svg|30px]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[File:Flag of Malawi.svg|30px]] [[Malawi]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritius.svg|30px]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[File:Flag of Mozambique.svg|30px]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[File:Flag of Rwanda.svg|30px]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[File:Flag of the Seychelles.svg|30px]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Uganda.svg|30px]] [[Uganda]]
* [[File:Flag of Tanzania.svg|30px]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[File:Flag of Zambia.svg|30px]] [[Zambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Zimbabwe.svg|30px]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Middle Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Angola.svg|30px]] [[Angola]]
* [[File:Flag of Cameroon.svg|30px]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[File:Flag of the Central African Republic.svg|30px]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Chad.svg|30px]] [[Chad]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of the Congo.svg|30px]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.svg|30px]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.svg|30px]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Gabon.svg|30px]] [[Gabon]]
* [[File:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.svg|30px]] [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Botswana.svg|30px]] [[Botswana]]
* [[File:Flag of Lesotho.svg|30px]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[File:Flag of Namibia.svg|30px]] [[Namibia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Africa.svg|30px]] [[South Africa]]
* [[File:Flag of Swaziland.svg|30px]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Benin.png|20px]] [[Benin]]
* [[File:Flag of Burkina Faso.png|20px]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[File:Flag of Cape Verde.png|20px]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[File:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.png|20px]] [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[File:Flag of Gambia.png|20px]] [[Gambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ghana.png|20px]] [[Ghana]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea.png|20px]] [[Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.png|20px]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[File:Flag of Liberia.png|20px]] [[Liberia]]
* [[File:Flag of Mali.png|20px]] [[Mali]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritania.png|20px]][[Mauritania]]
* [[File:Flag of Niger.png|20px]] [[Niger]]
* [[File:Flag of Nigeria.png|20px]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Senegal.png|20px]] [[Senegal]]
* [[File:Flag of Sierra Leone.png|20px]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[File:Flag of Togo.png|20px]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Canary Islands Spain.png|20px]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Ceuta Spain.png|20px]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[File:Flag Madeira Portugal.png|20px]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Mayotte France.png|20px]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[File:Flag of Melilla Spain.png|20px]] [[Melilla]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.png|20px]] [[Puntland]]
* [[File:Flag of Reunion.png|20px]] [[Réunion]]
* [[File:Flag of Saint Helena.png|20px]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[File:Flag of Somaliland.png|20px]] [[Somaliland]]

[[trash:Africa]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
[[es:África]]
[[fr:Afrique]]
[[tr:Afrika]]
[[zh:非洲]]</text>
      <sha1>jmg7a7xga0h3e130cb9ztm8sogdrk1z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>45959</id>
      <parentid>45958</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-17T11:58:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4861">[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in [[West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.svg|30px]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.svg|30px]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.svg|30px]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[File:Flag of Morocco.svg|30px]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.svg|30px]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.svg|30px]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag of Western Sahara.svg|30px]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[File:Flag of Burundi.svg|30px]] [[Burundi]]
* [[File:Flag of the Comoros.svg|30px]] [[Comoros]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.svg|30px]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.svg|30px]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Ethiopia.svg|30px]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[File:Flag of Kenya.svg|30px]] [[Kenya]]
* [[File:Flag of Madagascar.svg|30px]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[File:Flag of Malawi.svg|30px]] [[Malawi]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritius.svg|30px]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[File:Flag of Mozambique.svg|30px]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[File:Flag of Rwanda.svg|30px]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[File:Flag of the Seychelles.svg|30px]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Uganda.svg|30px]] [[Uganda]]
* [[File:Flag of Tanzania.svg|30px]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[File:Flag of Zambia.svg|30px]] [[Zambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Zimbabwe.svg|30px]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Middle Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Angola.svg|30px]] [[Angola]]
* [[File:Flag of Cameroon.svg|30px]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[File:Flag of the Central African Republic.svg|30px]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Chad.svg|30px]] [[Chad]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of the Congo.svg|30px]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.svg|30px]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.svg|30px]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Gabon.svg|30px]] [[Gabon]]
* [[File:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.svg|30px]] [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Botswana.svg|30px]] [[Botswana]]
* [[File:Flag of Lesotho.svg|30px]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[File:Flag of Namibia.svg|30px]] [[Namibia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Africa.svg|30px]] [[South Africa]]
* [[File:Flag of Swaziland.svg|30px]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Benin.svg|30px]] [[Benin]]
* [[File:Flag of Burkina Faso.svg|30px]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[File:Flag of Cape Verde.svg|30px]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[File:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.svg|30px]] [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[File:Flag of The Gambia.svg|30px]] [[Gambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ghana.svg|30px]] [[Ghana]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea.svg|30px]] [[Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.svg|30px]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[File:Flag of Liberia.svg|30px]] [[Liberia]]
* [[File:Flag of Mali.svg|30px]] [[Mali]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritania.svg|30px]][[Mauritania]]
* [[File:Flag of Niger.svg|30px]] [[Niger]]
* [[File:Flag of Nigeria.svg|30px]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Senegal.svg|30px]] [[Senegal]]
* [[File:Flag of Sierra Leone.svg|30px]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[File:Flag of Togo.svg|30px]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Canary Islands.svg|30px]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Ceuta.svg|30px]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[File:Flag of Madeira.svg|30px]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Mayotte (local).svg|30px]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[File:Flag of Melilla.svg|30px]] [[Melilla]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px]] [[Puntland]]
* [[File:Flag of Reunion.png|30px]] [[Réunion]]
* [[File:Flag of Saint Helena.svg|30px]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[File:Flag of Somaliland.svg|30px]] [[Somaliland]]

[[trash:Africa]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
[[es:África]]
[[fr:Afrique]]
[[tr:Afrika]]
[[zh:非洲]]</text>
      <sha1>3ercn1qiib1sx89qa2nggjokzfr4l5f</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>45961</id>
      <parentid>45959</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-17T12:19:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5302">[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in [[West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.svg|30px|border]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.svg|30px|border]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[File:Flag of Morocco.svg|30px|border]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.svg|30px|border]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.svg|30px|border]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag of Western Sahara.svg|30px|border]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[File:Flag of Burundi.svg|30px|border]] [[Burundi]]
* [[File:Flag of the Comoros.svg|30px|border]] [[Comoros]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.svg|30px|border]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.svg|30px|border]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Ethiopia.svg|30px|border]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[File:Flag of Kenya.svg|30px|border]] [[Kenya]]
* [[File:Flag of Madagascar.svg|30px|border]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[File:Flag of Malawi.svg|30px|border]] [[Malawi]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritius.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[File:Flag of Mozambique.svg|30px|border]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[File:Flag of Rwanda.svg|30px|border]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[File:Flag of the Seychelles.svg|30px|border]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Uganda.svg|30px|border]] [[Uganda]]
* [[File:Flag of Tanzania.svg|30px|border]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[File:Flag of Zambia.svg|30px|border]] [[Zambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Zimbabwe.svg|30px|border]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Middle Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Angola.svg|30px|border]] [[Angola]]
* [[File:Flag of Cameroon.svg|30px|border]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[File:Flag of the Central African Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Chad.svg|30px|border]] [[Chad]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Gabon.svg|30px|border]] [[Gabon]]
* [[File:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.svg|30px|border]] [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Botswana.svg|30px|border]] [[Botswana]]
* [[File:Flag of Lesotho.svg|30px|border]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[File:Flag of Namibia.svg|30px|border]] [[Namibia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Africa.svg|30px|border]] [[South Africa]]
* [[File:Flag of Swaziland.svg|30px|border]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Benin.svg|30px|border]] [[Benin]]
* [[File:Flag of Burkina Faso.svg|30px|border]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[File:Flag of Cape Verde.svg|30px|border]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[File:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.svg|30px|border]] [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[File:Flag of The Gambia.svg|30px|border]] [[Gambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ghana.svg|30px|border]] [[Ghana]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[File:Flag of Liberia.svg|30px|border]] [[Liberia]]
* [[File:Flag of Mali.svg|30px|border]] [[Mali]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritania.svg|30px|border]][[Mauritania]]
* [[File:Flag of Niger.svg|30px|border]] [[Niger]]
* [[File:Flag of Nigeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Senegal.svg|30px|border]] [[Senegal]]
* [[File:Flag of Sierra Leone.svg|30px|border]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[File:Flag of Togo.svg|30px|border]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Canary Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Ceuta.svg|30px|border]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[File:Flag of Madeira.svg|30px|border]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Mayotte (local).svg|30px|border]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[File:Flag of Melilla.svg|30px|border]] [[Melilla]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Puntland]]
* [[File:Flag of Reunion.png|30px|border]] [[Réunion]]
* [[File:Flag of Saint Helena.svg|30px|border]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[File:Flag of Somaliland.svg|30px|border]] [[Somaliland]]

[[trash:Africa]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
[[es:África]]
[[fr:Afrique]]
[[tr:Afrika]]
[[zh:非洲]]</text>
      <sha1>t0q1e2rbxn5a2vlne2xxlh19zdqpw2f</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>47411</id>
      <parentid>45961</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-11-15T12:51:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5303">[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in [[West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.svg|30px|border]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.svg|30px|border]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[File:Flag of Morocco.svg|30px|border]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.svg|30px|border]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.svg|30px|border]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag of Western Sahara.svg|30px|border]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[File:Flag of Burundi.svg|30px|border]] [[Burundi]]
* [[File:Flag of the Comoros.svg|30px|border]] [[Comoros]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.svg|30px|border]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.svg|30px|border]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Ethiopia.svg|30px|border]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[File:Flag of Kenya.svg|30px|border]] [[Kenya]]
* [[File:Flag of Madagascar.svg|30px|border]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[File:Flag of Malawi.svg|30px|border]] [[Malawi]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritius.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[File:Flag of Mozambique.svg|30px|border]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[File:Flag of Rwanda.svg|30px|border]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[File:Flag of the Seychelles.svg|30px|border]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Uganda.svg|30px|border]] [[Uganda]]
* [[File:Flag of Tanzania.svg|30px|border]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[File:Flag of Zambia.svg|30px|border]] [[Zambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Zimbabwe.svg|30px|border]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Central Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Angola.svg|30px|border]] [[Angola]]
* [[File:Flag of Cameroon.svg|30px|border]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[File:Flag of the Central African Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Chad.svg|30px|border]] [[Chad]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Gabon.svg|30px|border]] [[Gabon]]
* [[File:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.svg|30px|border]] [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Botswana.svg|30px|border]] [[Botswana]]
* [[File:Flag of Lesotho.svg|30px|border]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[File:Flag of Namibia.svg|30px|border]] [[Namibia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Africa.svg|30px|border]] [[South Africa]]
* [[File:Flag of Swaziland.svg|30px|border]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Benin.svg|30px|border]] [[Benin]]
* [[File:Flag of Burkina Faso.svg|30px|border]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[File:Flag of Cape Verde.svg|30px|border]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[File:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.svg|30px|border]] [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[File:Flag of The Gambia.svg|30px|border]] [[Gambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ghana.svg|30px|border]] [[Ghana]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[File:Flag of Liberia.svg|30px|border]] [[Liberia]]
* [[File:Flag of Mali.svg|30px|border]] [[Mali]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritania.svg|30px|border]][[Mauritania]]
* [[File:Flag of Niger.svg|30px|border]] [[Niger]]
* [[File:Flag of Nigeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Senegal.svg|30px|border]] [[Senegal]]
* [[File:Flag of Sierra Leone.svg|30px|border]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[File:Flag of Togo.svg|30px|border]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Canary Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Ceuta.svg|30px|border]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[File:Flag of Madeira.svg|30px|border]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Mayotte (local).svg|30px|border]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[File:Flag of Melilla.svg|30px|border]] [[Melilla]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Puntland]]
* [[File:Flag of Reunion.png|30px|border]] [[Réunion]]
* [[File:Flag of Saint Helena.svg|30px|border]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[File:Flag of Somaliland.svg|30px|border]] [[Somaliland]]

[[trash:Africa]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
[[es:África]]
[[fr:Afrique]]
[[tr:Afrika]]
[[zh:非洲]]</text>
      <sha1>ciccq5ya55a7qredsr3qiu8jwfvhbu6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>47846</id>
      <parentid>47411</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-11-26T04:28:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5304">[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as Fulfulde and Bambara in [[West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.svg|30px|border]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.svg|30px|border]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[File:Flag of Morocco.svg|30px|border]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.svg|30px|border]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.svg|30px|border]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag of Western Sahara.svg|30px|border]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[File:Flag of Burundi.svg|30px|border]] [[Burundi]]
* [[File:Flag of the Comoros.svg|30px|border]] [[Comoros]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.svg|30px|border]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.svg|30px|border]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Ethiopia.svg|30px|border]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[File:Flag of Kenya.svg|30px|border]] [[Kenya]]
* [[File:Flag of Madagascar.svg|30px|border]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[File:Flag of Malawi.svg|30px|border]] [[Malawi]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritius.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[File:Flag of Mozambique.svg|30px|border]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[File:Flag of Rwanda.svg|30px|border]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[File:Flag of the Seychelles.svg|30px|border]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Uganda.svg|30px|border]] [[Uganda]]
* [[File:Flag of Tanzania.svg|30px|border]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[File:Flag of Zambia.svg|30px|border]] [[Zambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Zimbabwe.svg|30px|border]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Central Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Angola.svg|30px|border]] [[Angola]]
* [[File:Flag of Cameroon.svg|30px|border]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[File:Flag of the Central African Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Chad.svg|30px|border]] [[Chad]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Gabon.svg|30px|border]] [[Gabon]]
* [[File:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.svg|30px|border]] [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Botswana.svg|30px|border]] [[Botswana]]
* [[File:Flag of Lesotho.svg|30px|border]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[File:Flag of Namibia.svg|30px|border]] [[Namibia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Africa.svg|30px|border]] [[South Africa]]
* [[File:Flag of Swaziland.svg|30px|border]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Benin.svg|30px|border]] [[Benin]]
* [[File:Flag of Burkina Faso.svg|30px|border]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[File:Flag of Cape Verde.svg|30px|border]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[File:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.svg|30px|border]] [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[File:Flag of The Gambia.svg|30px|border]] [[Gambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ghana.svg|30px|border]] [[Ghana]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[File:Flag of Liberia.svg|30px|border]] [[Liberia]]
* [[File:Flag of Mali.svg|30px|border]] [[Mali]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritania.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritania]]
* [[File:Flag of Niger.svg|30px|border]] [[Niger]]
* [[File:Flag of Nigeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Senegal.svg|30px|border]] [[Senegal]]
* [[File:Flag of Sierra Leone.svg|30px|border]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[File:Flag of Togo.svg|30px|border]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Canary Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Ceuta.svg|30px|border]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[File:Flag of Madeira.svg|30px|border]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Mayotte (local).svg|30px|border]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[File:Flag of Melilla.svg|30px|border]] [[Melilla]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Puntland]]
* [[File:Flag of Reunion.png|30px|border]] [[Réunion]]
* [[File:Flag of Saint Helena.svg|30px|border]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[File:Flag of Somaliland.svg|30px|border]] [[Somaliland]]

[[trash:Africa]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
[[es:África]]
[[fr:Afrique]]
[[tr:Afrika]]
[[zh:非洲]]</text>
      <sha1>qpwx5mo2xivi6z2jjduuy9tknkj1hhm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>51633</id>
      <parentid>47846</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-04-07T15:39:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5319">[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as [[Wolof]], Fulfulde and [[Bambara]] in [[West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.svg|30px|border]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.svg|30px|border]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[File:Flag of Morocco.svg|30px|border]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.svg|30px|border]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.svg|30px|border]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag of Western Sahara.svg|30px|border]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[File:Flag of Burundi.svg|30px|border]] [[Burundi]]
* [[File:Flag of the Comoros.svg|30px|border]] [[Comoros]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.svg|30px|border]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.svg|30px|border]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Ethiopia.svg|30px|border]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[File:Flag of Kenya.svg|30px|border]] [[Kenya]]
* [[File:Flag of Madagascar.svg|30px|border]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[File:Flag of Malawi.svg|30px|border]] [[Malawi]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritius.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[File:Flag of Mozambique.svg|30px|border]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[File:Flag of Rwanda.svg|30px|border]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[File:Flag of the Seychelles.svg|30px|border]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Uganda.svg|30px|border]] [[Uganda]]
* [[File:Flag of Tanzania.svg|30px|border]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[File:Flag of Zambia.svg|30px|border]] [[Zambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Zimbabwe.svg|30px|border]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Central Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Angola.svg|30px|border]] [[Angola]]
* [[File:Flag of Cameroon.svg|30px|border]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[File:Flag of the Central African Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Chad.svg|30px|border]] [[Chad]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Gabon.svg|30px|border]] [[Gabon]]
* [[File:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.svg|30px|border]] [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Botswana.svg|30px|border]] [[Botswana]]
* [[File:Flag of Lesotho.svg|30px|border]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[File:Flag of Namibia.svg|30px|border]] [[Namibia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Africa.svg|30px|border]] [[South Africa]]
* [[File:Flag of Swaziland.svg|30px|border]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Benin.svg|30px|border]] [[Benin]]
* [[File:Flag of Burkina Faso.svg|30px|border]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[File:Flag of Cape Verde.svg|30px|border]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[File:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.svg|30px|border]] [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[File:Flag of The Gambia.svg|30px|border]] [[Gambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ghana.svg|30px|border]] [[Ghana]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[File:Flag of Liberia.svg|30px|border]] [[Liberia]]
* [[File:Flag of Mali.svg|30px|border]] [[Mali]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritania.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritania]]
* [[File:Flag of Niger.svg|30px|border]] [[Niger]]
* [[File:Flag of Nigeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Senegal.svg|30px|border]] [[Senegal]]
* [[File:Flag of Sierra Leone.svg|30px|border]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[File:Flag of Togo.svg|30px|border]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Canary Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Ceuta.svg|30px|border]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[File:Flag of Madeira.svg|30px|border]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Mayotte (local).svg|30px|border]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[File:Flag of Melilla.svg|30px|border]] [[Melilla]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Puntland]]
* [[File:Flag of Reunion.png|30px|border]] [[Réunion]]
* [[File:Flag of Saint Helena.svg|30px|border]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[File:Flag of Somaliland.svg|30px|border]] [[Somaliland]]

[[trash:Africa]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
[[es:África]]
[[fr:Afrique]]
[[tr:Afrika]]
[[zh:非洲]]</text>
      <sha1>4fyh5zzlmzkwct6rsp5wpx9tqsdrd20</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>52390</id>
      <parentid>51633</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-05-14T12:48:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5316">[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as [[Wolof]], Fulfulde and [[Bambara]] in [[West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.svg|30px|border]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.svg|30px|border]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[File:Flag of Morocco.svg|30px|border]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.svg|30px|border]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.svg|30px|border]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag_Western_Sahara.png|30px|border]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[File:Flag of Burundi.svg|30px|border]] [[Burundi]]
* [[File:Flag of the Comoros.svg|30px|border]] [[Comoros]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.svg|30px|border]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.svg|30px|border]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Ethiopia.svg|30px|border]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[File:Flag of Kenya.svg|30px|border]] [[Kenya]]
* [[File:Flag of Madagascar.svg|30px|border]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[File:Flag of Malawi.svg|30px|border]] [[Malawi]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritius.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[File:Flag of Mozambique.svg|30px|border]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[File:Flag of Rwanda.svg|30px|border]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[File:Flag of the Seychelles.svg|30px|border]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Uganda.svg|30px|border]] [[Uganda]]
* [[File:Flag of Tanzania.svg|30px|border]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[File:Flag of Zambia.svg|30px|border]] [[Zambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Zimbabwe.svg|30px|border]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Central Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Angola.svg|30px|border]] [[Angola]]
* [[File:Flag of Cameroon.svg|30px|border]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[File:Flag of the Central African Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Chad.svg|30px|border]] [[Chad]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Gabon.svg|30px|border]] [[Gabon]]
* [[File:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.svg|30px|border]] [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Botswana.svg|30px|border]] [[Botswana]]
* [[File:Flag of Lesotho.svg|30px|border]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[File:Flag of Namibia.svg|30px|border]] [[Namibia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Africa.svg|30px|border]] [[South Africa]]
* [[File:Flag of Swaziland.svg|30px|border]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Benin.svg|30px|border]] [[Benin]]
* [[File:Flag of Burkina Faso.svg|30px|border]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[File:Flag of Cape Verde.svg|30px|border]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[File:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.svg|30px|border]] [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[File:Flag of The Gambia.svg|30px|border]] [[Gambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ghana.svg|30px|border]] [[Ghana]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[File:Flag of Liberia.svg|30px|border]] [[Liberia]]
* [[File:Flag of Mali.svg|30px|border]] [[Mali]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritania.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritania]]
* [[File:Flag of Niger.svg|30px|border]] [[Niger]]
* [[File:Flag of Nigeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Senegal.svg|30px|border]] [[Senegal]]
* [[File:Flag of Sierra Leone.svg|30px|border]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[File:Flag of Togo.svg|30px|border]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Canary Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Ceuta.svg|30px|border]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[File:Flag of Madeira.svg|30px|border]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Mayotte (local).svg|30px|border]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[File:Flag of Melilla.svg|30px|border]] [[Melilla]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Puntland]]
* [[File:Flag of Reunion.png|30px|border]] [[Réunion]]
* [[File:Flag of Saint Helena.svg|30px|border]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[File:Flag of Somaliland.svg|30px|border]] [[Somaliland]]

[[trash:Africa]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
[[es:África]]
[[fr:Afrique]]
[[tr:Afrika]]
[[zh:非洲]]</text>
      <sha1>cco1osz0cllcmmljfiy8mxvsrcj429q</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>52459</id>
      <parentid>52390</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-05-16T10:55:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5464">[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as [[Wolof]], Fulfulde and [[Bambara]] in [[West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

For Europeans and Americans visas in Africa are relatively hard compared to other continents.  For most countries it's a good idea to plan ahead.


== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.svg|30px|border]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.svg|30px|border]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[File:Flag of Morocco.svg|30px|border]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.svg|30px|border]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.svg|30px|border]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag_Western_Sahara.png|30px|border]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[File:Flag of Burundi.svg|30px|border]] [[Burundi]]
* [[File:Flag of the Comoros.svg|30px|border]] [[Comoros]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.svg|30px|border]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.svg|30px|border]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Ethiopia.svg|30px|border]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[File:Flag of Kenya.svg|30px|border]] [[Kenya]]
* [[File:Flag of Madagascar.svg|30px|border]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[File:Flag of Malawi.svg|30px|border]] [[Malawi]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritius.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[File:Flag of Mozambique.svg|30px|border]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[File:Flag of Rwanda.svg|30px|border]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[File:Flag of the Seychelles.svg|30px|border]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Uganda.svg|30px|border]] [[Uganda]]
* [[File:Flag of Tanzania.svg|30px|border]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[File:Flag of Zambia.svg|30px|border]] [[Zambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Zimbabwe.svg|30px|border]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Central Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Angola.svg|30px|border]] [[Angola]]
* [[File:Flag of Cameroon.svg|30px|border]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[File:Flag of the Central African Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Chad.svg|30px|border]] [[Chad]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Gabon.svg|30px|border]] [[Gabon]]
* [[File:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.svg|30px|border]] [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Botswana.svg|30px|border]] [[Botswana]]
* [[File:Flag of Lesotho.svg|30px|border]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[File:Flag of Namibia.svg|30px|border]] [[Namibia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Africa.svg|30px|border]] [[South Africa]]
* [[File:Flag of Swaziland.svg|30px|border]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Benin.svg|30px|border]] [[Benin]]
* [[File:Flag of Burkina Faso.svg|30px|border]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[File:Flag of Cape Verde.svg|30px|border]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[File:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.svg|30px|border]] [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[File:Flag of The Gambia.svg|30px|border]] [[Gambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ghana.svg|30px|border]] [[Ghana]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[File:Flag of Liberia.svg|30px|border]] [[Liberia]]
* [[File:Flag of Mali.svg|30px|border]] [[Mali]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritania.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritania]]
* [[File:Flag of Niger.svg|30px|border]] [[Niger]]
* [[File:Flag of Nigeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Senegal.svg|30px|border]] [[Senegal]]
* [[File:Flag of Sierra Leone.svg|30px|border]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[File:Flag of Togo.svg|30px|border]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Canary Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Ceuta.svg|30px|border]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[File:Flag of Madeira.svg|30px|border]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Mayotte (local).svg|30px|border]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[File:Flag of Melilla.svg|30px|border]] [[Melilla]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Puntland]]
* [[File:Flag of Reunion.png|30px|border]] [[Réunion]]
* [[File:Flag of Saint Helena.svg|30px|border]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[File:Flag of Somaliland.svg|30px|border]] [[Somaliland]]

[[trash:Africa]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
[[es:África]]
[[fr:Afrique]]
[[tr:Afrika]]
[[zh:非洲]]</text>
      <sha1>qc5kyxvf32ma7fjm92rl47i31km833c</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>54398</id>
      <parentid>52459</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-09-02T15:11:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5527">[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as [[Wolof]], Fulfulde and [[Bambara]] in [[West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

For Europeans and Americans visas in Africa are relatively hard compared to other continents.  For most countries it's a good idea to plan ahead.


== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.svg|30px|border]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.svg|30px|border]] [[Lybia|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[File:Flag of Morocco.svg|30px|border]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of South Sudan.png|30px|border]] [[South Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.svg|30px|border]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.svg|30px|border]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag_Western_Sahara.png|30px|border]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[File:Flag of Burundi.svg|30px|border]] [[Burundi]]
* [[File:Flag of the Comoros.svg|30px|border]] [[Comoros]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.svg|30px|border]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.svg|30px|border]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Ethiopia.svg|30px|border]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[File:Flag of Kenya.svg|30px|border]] [[Kenya]]
* [[File:Flag of Madagascar.svg|30px|border]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[File:Flag of Malawi.svg|30px|border]] [[Malawi]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritius.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[File:Flag of Mozambique.svg|30px|border]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[File:Flag of Rwanda.svg|30px|border]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[File:Flag of the Seychelles.svg|30px|border]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Uganda.svg|30px|border]] [[Uganda]]
* [[File:Flag of Tanzania.svg|30px|border]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[File:Flag of Zambia.svg|30px|border]] [[Zambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Zimbabwe.svg|30px|border]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Central Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Angola.svg|30px|border]] [[Angola]]
* [[File:Flag of Cameroon.svg|30px|border]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[File:Flag of the Central African Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Chad.svg|30px|border]] [[Chad]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Gabon.svg|30px|border]] [[Gabon]]
* [[File:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.svg|30px|border]] [[Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Botswana.svg|30px|border]] [[Botswana]]
* [[File:Flag of Lesotho.svg|30px|border]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[File:Flag of Namibia.svg|30px|border]] [[Namibia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Africa.svg|30px|border]] [[South Africa]]
* [[File:Flag of Swaziland.svg|30px|border]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Benin.svg|30px|border]] [[Benin]]
* [[File:Flag of Burkina Faso.svg|30px|border]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[File:Flag of Cape Verde.svg|30px|border]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[File:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.svg|30px|border]] [[Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[File:Flag of The Gambia.svg|30px|border]] [[Gambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ghana.svg|30px|border]] [[Ghana]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[File:Flag of Liberia.svg|30px|border]] [[Liberia]]
* [[File:Flag of Mali.svg|30px|border]] [[Mali]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritania.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritania]]
* [[File:Flag of Niger.svg|30px|border]] [[Niger]]
* [[File:Flag of Nigeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Senegal.svg|30px|border]] [[Senegal]]
* [[File:Flag of Sierra Leone.svg|30px|border]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[File:Flag of Togo.svg|30px|border]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Canary Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Ceuta.svg|30px|border]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[File:Flag of Madeira.svg|30px|border]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Mayotte (local).svg|30px|border]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[File:Flag of Melilla.svg|30px|border]] [[Melilla]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Puntland]]
* [[File:Flag of Reunion.png|30px|border]] [[Réunion]]
* [[File:Flag of Saint Helena.svg|30px|border]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[File:Flag of Somaliland.svg|30px|border]] [[Somaliland]]

[[trash:Africa]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
[[es:África]]
[[fr:Afrique]]
[[tr:Afrika]]
[[zh:非洲]]</text>
      <sha1>bkrgnn5h6zuh82icyv7nzoj57497kpq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>55579</id>
      <parentid>54398</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-08T01:03:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5642">[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], Fulfulde and [[Africa phrasebook#Bambara|Bambara]] in [[Western Africa|West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

For Europeans and Americans visas in Africa are relatively hard compared to other continents. For most countries it's a good idea to plan ahead.


== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.svg|30px|border]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.svg|30px|border]] [[Libya|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[File:Flag of Morocco.svg|30px|border]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of South Sudan.png|30px|border]] [[South Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.svg|30px|border]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.svg|30px|border]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag_Western_Sahara.png|30px|border]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[File:Flag of Burundi.svg|30px|border]] [[Burundi]]
* [[File:Flag of the Comoros.svg|30px|border]] [[Comoros]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.svg|30px|border]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.svg|30px|border]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Ethiopia.svg|30px|border]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[File:Flag of Kenya.svg|30px|border]] [[Kenya]]
* [[File:Flag of Madagascar.svg|30px|border]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[File:Flag of Malawi.svg|30px|border]] [[Malawi]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritius.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[File:Flag of Mozambique.svg|30px|border]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[File:Flag of Rwanda.svg|30px|border]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[File:Flag of the Seychelles.svg|30px|border]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Uganda.svg|30px|border]] [[Uganda]]
* [[File:Flag of Tanzania.svg|30px|border]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[File:Flag of Zambia.svg|30px|border]] [[Zambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Zimbabwe.svg|30px|border]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Central Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Angola.svg|30px|border]] [[Angola]]
* [[File:Flag of Cameroon.svg|30px|border]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[File:Flag of the Central African Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Chad.svg|30px|border]] [[Chad]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Gabon.svg|30px|border]] [[Gabon]]
* [[File:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.svg|30px|border]] [[São Tomé and Príncipe|Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Botswana.svg|30px|border]] [[Botswana]]
* [[File:Flag of Lesotho.svg|30px|border]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[File:Flag of Namibia.svg|30px|border]] [[Namibia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Africa.svg|30px|border]] [[South Africa]]
* [[File:Flag of Swaziland.svg|30px|border]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Benin.svg|30px|border]] [[Benin]]
* [[File:Flag of Burkina Faso.svg|30px|border]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[File:Flag of Cape Verde.svg|30px|border]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[File:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.svg|30px|border]] [[Côte d'Ivoire|Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[File:Flag of The Gambia.svg|30px|border]] [[The Gambia|Gambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ghana.svg|30px|border]] [[Ghana]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[File:Flag of Liberia.svg|30px|border]] [[Liberia]]
* [[File:Flag of Mali.svg|30px|border]] [[Mali]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritania.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritania]]
* [[File:Flag of Niger.svg|30px|border]] [[Niger]]
* [[File:Flag of Nigeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Senegal.svg|30px|border]] [[Senegal]]
* [[File:Flag of Sierra Leone.svg|30px|border]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[File:Flag of Togo.svg|30px|border]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Canary Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Ceuta.svg|30px|border]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[File:Flag of Madeira.svg|30px|border]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Mayotte (local).svg|30px|border]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[File:Flag of Melilla.svg|30px|border]] [[Melilla]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Puntland]]
* [[File:Flag of Reunion.png|30px|border]] [[Réunion]]
* [[File:Flag of Saint Helena.svg|30px|border]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[File:Flag of Somaliland.svg|30px|border]] [[Somaliland]]

[[trash:Africa]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
[[es:África]]
[[fr:Afrique]]
[[tr:Afrika]]
[[zh:非洲]]</text>
      <sha1>gltl86a1whof8fwodrp1toosu58nyx2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>62884</id>
      <parentid>55579</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-08-03T01:37:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5662">[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], Fulfulde and [[Africa phrasebook#Bambara|Bambara]] in [[Western Africa|West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

For Europeans and Americans visas in Africa are relatively hard compared to other continents. For most countries it's a good idea to plan ahead.


== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.svg|30px|border]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.svg|30px|border]] [[Libya|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[File:Flag of Morocco.svg|30px|border]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of South Sudan.png|30px|border]] [[South Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.svg|30px|border]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.svg|30px|border]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag_Western_Sahara.png|30px|border]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[File:Flag of Burundi.svg|30px|border]] [[Burundi]]
* [[File:Flag of the Comoros.svg|30px|border]] [[Comoros]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.svg|30px|border]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.svg|30px|border]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Ethiopia.svg|30px|border]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[File:Flag of Kenya.svg|30px|border]] [[Kenya]]
* [[File:Flag of Madagascar.svg|30px|border]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[File:Flag of Malawi.svg|30px|border]] [[Malawi]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritius.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[File:Flag of Mozambique.svg|30px|border]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[File:Flag of Rwanda.svg|30px|border]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[File:Flag of the Seychelles.svg|30px|border]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Uganda.svg|30px|border]] [[Uganda]]
* [[File:Flag of Tanzania.svg|30px|border]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[File:Flag of Zambia.svg|30px|border]] [[Zambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Zimbabwe.svg|30px|border]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Central Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Angola.svg|30px|border]] [[Angola]]
* [[File:Flag of Cameroon.svg|30px|border]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[File:Flag of the Central African Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Chad.svg|30px|border]] [[Chad]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Gabon.svg|30px|border]] [[Gabon]]
* [[File:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.svg|30px|border]] [[São Tomé and Príncipe|Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Botswana.svg|30px|border]] [[Botswana]]
* [[File:Flag of Lesotho.svg|30px|border]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[File:Flag of Namibia.svg|30px|border]] [[Namibia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Africa.svg|30px|border]] [[South Africa]]
* [[File:Flag of Swaziland.svg|30px|border]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Benin.svg|30px|border]] [[Benin]]
* [[File:Flag of Burkina Faso.svg|30px|border]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[File:Flag of Cape Verde.svg|30px|border]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[File:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.svg|30px|border]] [[Côte d'Ivoire|Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[File:Flag of The Gambia.svg|30px|border]] [[The Gambia|Gambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ghana.svg|30px|border]] [[Ghana]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[File:Flag of Liberia.svg|30px|border]] [[Liberia]]
* [[File:Flag of Mali.svg|30px|border]] [[Mali]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritania.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritania]]
* [[File:Flag of Niger.svg|30px|border]] [[Niger]]
* [[File:Flag of Nigeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Senegal.svg|30px|border]] [[Senegal]]
* [[File:Flag of Sierra Leone.svg|30px|border]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[File:Flag of Togo.svg|30px|border]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Canary Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Ceuta.svg|30px|border]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[File:Flag of Madeira.svg|30px|border]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Mayotte (local).svg|30px|border]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[File:Flag of Melilla.svg|30px|border]] [[Melilla]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Puntland]]
* [[File:Flag of Reunion.png|30px|border]] [[Réunion]]
* [[File:Flag of Saint Helena.svg|30px|border]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[File:Flag of Somaliland.svg|30px|border]] [[Somaliland]]

[[trash:Africa]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
[[es:África]]
[[fr:Afrique]]
[[ru:Африка]]
[[tr:Afrika]]
[[zh:非洲]]</text>
      <sha1>dj4yi7dc6qqi9bn1lcpq8zrci4wdt75</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68319</id>
      <parentid>62884</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-02-17T18:15:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Nomadx</username>
        <id>2841</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5786">[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], Fulfulde and [[Africa phrasebook#Bambara|Bambara]] in [[Western Africa|West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

For Europeans and Americans visas in Africa are relatively hard compared to other continents. For most countries it's a good idea to plan ahead.


== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.svg|30px|border]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.svg|30px|border]] [[Libya|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[File:Flag of Morocco.svg|30px|border]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of South Sudan.png|30px|border]] [[South Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.svg|30px|border]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.svg|30px|border]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag_Western_Sahara.png|30px|border]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[File:Flag of Burundi.svg|30px|border]] [[Burundi]]
* [[File:Flag of the Comoros.svg|30px|border]] [[Comoros]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.svg|30px|border]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.svg|30px|border]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Ethiopia.svg|30px|border]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[File:Flag of Kenya.svg|30px|border]] [[Kenya]]
* [[File:Flag of Madagascar.svg|30px|border]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[File:Flag of Malawi.svg|30px|border]] [[Malawi]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritius.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[File:Flag of Mozambique.svg|30px|border]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[File:Flag of Rwanda.svg|30px|border]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[File:Flag of the Seychelles.svg|30px|border]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Uganda.svg|30px|border]] [[Uganda]]
* [[File:Flag of Tanzania.svg|30px|border]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[File:Flag of Zambia.svg|30px|border]] [[Zambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Zimbabwe.svg|30px|border]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Central Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Angola.svg|30px|border]] [[Angola]]
* [[File:Flag of Cameroon.svg|30px|border]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[File:Flag of the Central African Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Chad.svg|30px|border]] [[Chad]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Gabon.svg|30px|border]] [[Gabon]]
* [[File:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.svg|30px|border]] [[São Tomé and Príncipe|Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Botswana.svg|30px|border]] [[Botswana]]
* [[File:Flag of Lesotho.svg|30px|border]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[File:Flag of Namibia.svg|30px|border]] [[Namibia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Africa.svg|30px|border]] [[South Africa]]
* [[File:Flag of Swaziland.svg|30px|border]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Benin.svg|30px|border]] [[Benin]]
* [[File:Flag of Burkina Faso.svg|30px|border]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[File:Flag of Cape Verde.svg|30px|border]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[File:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.svg|30px|border]] [[Côte d'Ivoire|Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[File:Flag of The Gambia.svg|30px|border]] [[The Gambia|Gambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ghana.svg|30px|border]] [[Ghana]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[File:Flag of Liberia.svg|30px|border]] [[Liberia]]
* [[File:Flag of Mali.svg|30px|border]] [[Mali]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritania.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritania]]
* [[File:Flag of Niger.svg|30px|border]] [[Niger]]
* [[File:Flag of Nigeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Senegal.svg|30px|border]] [[Senegal]]
* [[File:Flag of Sierra Leone.svg|30px|border]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[File:Flag of Togo.svg|30px|border]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Canary Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Ceuta.svg|30px|border]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[File:Flag of Madeira.svg|30px|border]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Mayotte (local).svg|30px|border]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[File:Flag of Melilla.svg|30px|border]] [[Melilla]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Puntland]]
* [[File:Flag of Reunion.png|30px|border]] [[Réunion]]
* [[File:Flag of Saint Helena.svg|30px|border]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[File:Flag of Somaliland.svg|30px|border]] [[Somaliland]]

== See Also ==
* [http://artofbackpacking.com/how-to-survive-hitchhiking-in-africa/ How To Survive Hitchhiking In Africa]


[[trash:Africa]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
[[es:África]]
[[fr:Afrique]]
[[ru:Африка]]
[[tr:Afrika]]
[[zh:非洲]]</text>
      <sha1>tu8e1g01657u9xy9k2i4cm5bin86uwi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69178</id>
      <parentid>68319</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-04-22T16:56:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mateo</username>
        <id>4876</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5806">[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], Fulfulde and [[Africa phrasebook#Bambara|Bambara]] in [[Western Africa|West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

For Europeans and Americans visas in Africa are relatively hard compared to other continents. For most countries it's a good idea to plan ahead.


== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.svg|30px|border]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.svg|30px|border]] [[Libya|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[File:Flag of Morocco.svg|30px|border]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of South Sudan.png|30px|border]] [[South Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.svg|30px|border]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.svg|30px|border]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag_Western_Sahara.png|30px|border]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[File:Flag of Burundi.svg|30px|border]] [[Burundi]]
* [[File:Flag of the Comoros.svg|30px|border]] [[Comoros]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.svg|30px|border]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.svg|30px|border]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Ethiopia.svg|30px|border]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[File:Flag of Kenya.svg|30px|border]] [[Kenya]]
* [[File:Flag of Madagascar.svg|30px|border]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[File:Flag of Malawi.svg|30px|border]] [[Malawi]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritius.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[File:Flag of Mozambique.svg|30px|border]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[File:Flag of Rwanda.svg|30px|border]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[File:Flag of the Seychelles.svg|30px|border]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Uganda.svg|30px|border]] [[Uganda]]
* [[File:Flag of Tanzania.svg|30px|border]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[File:Flag of Zambia.svg|30px|border]] [[Zambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Zimbabwe.svg|30px|border]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Central Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Angola.svg|30px|border]] [[Angola]]
* [[File:Flag of Cameroon.svg|30px|border]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[File:Flag of the Central African Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Chad.svg|30px|border]] [[Chad]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Gabon.svg|30px|border]] [[Gabon]]
* [[File:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.svg|30px|border]] [[São Tomé and Príncipe|Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Botswana.svg|30px|border]] [[Botswana]]
* [[File:Flag of Lesotho.svg|30px|border]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[File:Flag of Namibia.svg|30px|border]] [[Namibia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Africa.svg|30px|border]] [[South Africa]]
* [[File:Flag of Swaziland.svg|30px|border]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Benin.svg|30px|border]] [[Benin]]
* [[File:Flag of Burkina Faso.svg|30px|border]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[File:Flag of Cape Verde.svg|30px|border]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[File:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.svg|30px|border]] [[Côte d'Ivoire|Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[File:Flag of The Gambia.svg|30px|border]] [[The Gambia|Gambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ghana.svg|30px|border]] [[Ghana]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[File:Flag of Liberia.svg|30px|border]] [[Liberia]]
* [[File:Flag of Mali.svg|30px|border]] [[Mali]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritania.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritania]]
* [[File:Flag of Niger.svg|30px|border]] [[Niger]]
* [[File:Flag of Nigeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Senegal.svg|30px|border]] [[Senegal]]
* [[File:Flag of Sierra Leone.svg|30px|border]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[File:Flag of Togo.svg|30px|border]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Canary Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Ceuta.svg|30px|border]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[File:Flag of Madeira.svg|30px|border]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Mayotte (local).svg|30px|border]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[File:Flag of Melilla.svg|30px|border]] [[Melilla]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Puntland]]
* [[File:Flag of Reunion.png|30px|border]] [[Réunion]]
* [[File:Flag of Saint Helena.svg|30px|border]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[File:Flag of Somaliland.svg|30px|border]] [[Somaliland]]

== See Also ==
* [http://artofbackpacking.com/how-to-survive-hitchhiking-in-africa/ How To Survive Hitchhiking In Africa]


[[trash:Africa]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
[[es:África]]
[[he:אפריקה]]
[[fr:Afrique]]
[[ru:Африка]]
[[tr:Afrika]]
[[zh:非洲]]</text>
      <sha1>f95i1d5xg3b4l2k96b6gjihi0vw1fcy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70473</id>
      <parentid>69178</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-07-15T01:08:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5820">[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], Fulfulde and [[Africa phrasebook#Bambara|Bambara]] in [[Western Africa|West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

For Europeans and Americans visas in Africa are relatively hard compared to other continents. For most countries it's a good idea to plan ahead.


== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.svg|30px|border]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.svg|30px|border]] [[Libya|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[File:Flag of Morocco.svg|30px|border]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of South Sudan.png|30px|border]] [[South Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.svg|30px|border]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.svg|30px|border]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag_Western_Sahara.png|30px|border]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[File:Flag of Burundi.svg|30px|border]] [[Burundi]]
* [[File:Flag of the Comoros.svg|30px|border]] [[Comoros]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.svg|30px|border]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.svg|30px|border]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Ethiopia.svg|30px|border]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[File:Flag of Kenya.svg|30px|border]] [[Kenya]]
* [[File:Flag of Madagascar.svg|30px|border]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[File:Flag of Malawi.svg|30px|border]] [[Malawi]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritius.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[File:Flag of Mozambique.svg|30px|border]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[File:Flag of Rwanda.svg|30px|border]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[File:Flag of the Seychelles.svg|30px|border]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Uganda.svg|30px|border]] [[Uganda]]
* [[File:Flag of Tanzania.svg|30px|border]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[File:Flag of Zambia.svg|30px|border]] [[Zambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Zimbabwe.svg|30px|border]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Central Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Angola.svg|30px|border]] [[Angola]]
* [[File:Flag of Cameroon.svg|30px|border]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[File:Flag of the Central African Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Chad.svg|30px|border]] [[Chad]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Gabon.svg|30px|border]] [[Gabon]]
* [[File:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.svg|30px|border]] [[São Tomé and Príncipe|Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Botswana.svg|30px|border]] [[Botswana]]
* [[File:Flag of Lesotho.svg|30px|border]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[File:Flag of Namibia.svg|30px|border]] [[Namibia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Africa.svg|30px|border]] [[South Africa]]
* [[File:Flag of Swaziland.svg|30px|border]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Benin.svg|30px|border]] [[Benin]]
* [[File:Flag of Burkina Faso.svg|30px|border]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[File:Flag of Cape Verde.svg|30px|border]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[File:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.svg|30px|border]] [[Côte d'Ivoire|Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[File:Flag of The Gambia.svg|30px|border]] [[The Gambia|Gambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ghana.svg|30px|border]] [[Ghana]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[File:Flag of Liberia.svg|30px|border]] [[Liberia]]
* [[File:Flag of Mali.svg|30px|border]] [[Mali]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritania.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritania]]
* [[File:Flag of Niger.svg|30px|border]] [[Niger]]
* [[File:Flag of Nigeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Senegal.svg|30px|border]] [[Senegal]]
* [[File:Flag of Sierra Leone.svg|30px|border]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[File:Flag of Togo.svg|30px|border]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Canary Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Ceuta.svg|30px|border]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[File:Flag of Madeira.svg|30px|border]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Mayotte (local).svg|30px|border]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[File:Flag of Melilla.svg|30px|border]] [[Melilla]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Puntland]]
* [[File:Flag of Reunion.png|30px|border]] [[Réunion]]
* [[File:Flag of Saint Helena.svg|30px|border]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[File:Flag of Somaliland.svg|30px|border]] [[Somaliland]]

== See Also ==
* [http://artofbackpacking.com/how-to-survive-hitchhiking-in-africa/ How To Survive Hitchhiking In Africa]


[[trash:Africa]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
[[es:África]]
[[fr:Afrique]]
[[he:אפריקה]]
[[pl:Afryka]]
[[ru:Африка]]
[[tr:Afrika]]
[[zh:非洲]]</text>
      <sha1>myijmnjzl32gimsbm5xjed7y1b4obg3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70961</id>
      <parentid>70473</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-08-19T22:07:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5834">[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], Fulfulde and [[Africa phrasebook#Bambara|Bambara]] in [[Western Africa|West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

For Europeans and Americans visas in Africa are relatively hard compared to other continents. For most countries it's a good idea to plan ahead.


== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.svg|30px|border]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.svg|30px|border]] [[Libya|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[File:Flag of Morocco.svg|30px|border]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of South Sudan.png|30px|border]] [[South Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.svg|30px|border]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.svg|30px|border]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag_Western_Sahara.png|30px|border]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[File:Flag of Burundi.svg|30px|border]] [[Burundi]]
* [[File:Flag of the Comoros.svg|30px|border]] [[Comoros]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.svg|30px|border]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.svg|30px|border]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Ethiopia.svg|30px|border]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[File:Flag of Kenya.svg|30px|border]] [[Kenya]]
* [[File:Flag of Madagascar.svg|30px|border]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[File:Flag of Malawi.svg|30px|border]] [[Malawi]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritius.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[File:Flag of Mozambique.svg|30px|border]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[File:Flag of Rwanda.svg|30px|border]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[File:Flag of the Seychelles.svg|30px|border]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Uganda.svg|30px|border]] [[Uganda]]
* [[File:Flag of Tanzania.svg|30px|border]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[File:Flag of Zambia.svg|30px|border]] [[Zambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Zimbabwe.svg|30px|border]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Central Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Angola.svg|30px|border]] [[Angola]]
* [[File:Flag of Cameroon.svg|30px|border]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[File:Flag of the Central African Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Chad.svg|30px|border]] [[Chad]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Gabon.svg|30px|border]] [[Gabon]]
* [[File:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.svg|30px|border]] [[São Tomé and Príncipe|Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Botswana.svg|30px|border]] [[Botswana]]
* [[File:Flag of Lesotho.svg|30px|border]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[File:Flag of Namibia.svg|30px|border]] [[Namibia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Africa.svg|30px|border]] [[South Africa]]
* [[File:Flag of Swaziland.svg|30px|border]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Benin.svg|30px|border]] [[Benin]]
* [[File:Flag of Burkina Faso.svg|30px|border]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[File:Flag of Cape Verde.svg|30px|border]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[File:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.svg|30px|border]] [[Côte d'Ivoire|Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[File:Flag of The Gambia.svg|30px|border]] [[The Gambia|Gambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ghana.svg|30px|border]] [[Ghana]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[File:Flag of Liberia.svg|30px|border]] [[Liberia]]
* [[File:Flag of Mali.svg|30px|border]] [[Mali]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritania.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritania]]
* [[File:Flag of Niger.svg|30px|border]] [[Niger]]
* [[File:Flag of Nigeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Senegal.svg|30px|border]] [[Senegal]]
* [[File:Flag of Sierra Leone.svg|30px|border]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[File:Flag of Togo.svg|30px|border]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Canary Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Ceuta.svg|30px|border]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[File:Flag of Madeira.svg|30px|border]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Mayotte (local).svg|30px|border]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[File:Flag of Melilla.svg|30px|border]] [[Melilla]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Puntland]]
* [[File:Flag of Reunion.png|30px|border]] [[Réunion]]
* [[File:Flag of Saint Helena.svg|30px|border]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[File:Flag of Somaliland.svg|30px|border]] [[Somaliland]]

== See Also ==
* [http://artofbackpacking.com/how-to-survive-hitchhiking-in-africa/ How To Survive Hitchhiking In Africa]


[[trash:Africa]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
[[es:África]]
[[fr:Afrique]]
[[he:אפריקה]]
[[pl:Afryka]]
[[nl:Afrika]]
[[ru:Африка]]
[[tr:Afrika]]
[[zh:非洲]]</text>
      <sha1>7ee2u4cm2ik9sts73553uc7h4rf1u1p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>73895</id>
      <parentid>70961</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-01-05T00:13:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robyt</username>
        <id>9747</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5850">[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], Fulfulde and [[Africa phrasebook#Bambara|Bambara]] in [[Western Africa|West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

For Europeans and Americans visas in Africa are relatively hard compared to other continents. For most countries it's a good idea to plan ahead.


== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.svg|30px|border]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.svg|30px|border]] [[Libya|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[File:Flag of Morocco.svg|30px|border]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of South Sudan.png|30px|border]] [[South Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.svg|30px|border]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.svg|30px|border]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag_Western_Sahara.png|30px|border]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[File:Flag of Burundi.svg|30px|border]] [[Burundi]]
* [[File:Flag of the Comoros.svg|30px|border]] [[Comoros]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.svg|30px|border]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.svg|30px|border]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Ethiopia.svg|30px|border]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[File:Flag of Kenya.svg|30px|border]] [[Kenya]]
* [[File:Flag of Madagascar.svg|30px|border]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[File:Flag of Malawi.svg|30px|border]] [[Malawi]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritius.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[File:Flag of Mozambique.svg|30px|border]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[File:Flag of Rwanda.svg|30px|border]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[File:Flag of the Seychelles.svg|30px|border]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Uganda.svg|30px|border]] [[Uganda]]
* [[File:Flag of Tanzania.svg|30px|border]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[File:Flag of Zambia.svg|30px|border]] [[Zambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Zimbabwe.svg|30px|border]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Central Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Angola.svg|30px|border]] [[Angola]]
* [[File:Flag of Cameroon.svg|30px|border]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[File:Flag of the Central African Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Chad.svg|30px|border]] [[Chad]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Gabon.svg|30px|border]] [[Gabon]]
* [[File:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.svg|30px|border]] [[São Tomé and Príncipe|Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Botswana.svg|30px|border]] [[Botswana]]
* [[File:Flag of Lesotho.svg|30px|border]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[File:Flag of Namibia.svg|30px|border]] [[Namibia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Africa.svg|30px|border]] [[South Africa]]
* [[File:Flag of Swaziland.svg|30px|border]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Benin.svg|30px|border]] [[Benin]]
* [[File:Flag of Burkina Faso.svg|30px|border]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[File:Flag of Cape Verde.svg|30px|border]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[File:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.svg|30px|border]] [[Côte d'Ivoire|Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[File:Flag of The Gambia.svg|30px|border]] [[The Gambia|Gambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ghana.svg|30px|border]] [[Ghana]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[File:Flag of Liberia.svg|30px|border]] [[Liberia]]
* [[File:Flag of Mali.svg|30px|border]] [[Mali]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritania.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritania]]
* [[File:Flag of Niger.svg|30px|border]] [[Niger]]
* [[File:Flag of Nigeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Senegal.svg|30px|border]] [[Senegal]]
* [[File:Flag of Sierra Leone.svg|30px|border]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[File:Flag of Togo.svg|30px|border]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Canary Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Ceuta.svg|30px|border]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[File:Flag of Madeira.svg|30px|border]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Mayotte (local).svg|30px|border]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[File:Flag of Melilla.svg|30px|border]] [[Melilla]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Puntland]]
* [[File:Flag of Reunion.png|30px|border]] [[Réunion]]
* [[File:Flag of Saint Helena.svg|30px|border]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[File:Flag of Somaliland.svg|30px|border]] [[Somaliland]]

== See Also ==
* [http://artofbackpacking.com/how-to-survive-hitchhiking-in-africa/ How To Survive Hitchhiking In Africa]


[[trash:Africa]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
[[es:África]]
[[fr:Afrique]]
[[he:אפריקה]]
[[pl:Afryka]]
[[nl:Afrika]]
[[ru:Африка]]
[[tr:Afrika]]
[[zh:非洲]]
[[visa:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>ka6afx1ey13vg4j0i769thmfr8aupwa</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79576</id>
      <parentid>73895</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-06-02T12:11:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robyt</username>
        <id>9747</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5867">[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], Fulfulde and [[Africa phrasebook#Bambara|Bambara]] in [[Western Africa|West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

For Europeans and Americans visas in Africa are relatively hard compared to other continents. For most countries it's a good idea to plan ahead.


== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.svg|30px|border]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.svg|30px|border]] [[Libya|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[File:Flag of Morocco.svg|30px|border]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of South Sudan.png|30px|border]] [[South Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.svg|30px|border]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.svg|30px|border]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag_Western_Sahara.png|30px|border]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[File:Flag of Burundi.svg|30px|border]] [[Burundi]]
* [[File:Flag of the Comoros.svg|30px|border]] [[Comoros]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.svg|30px|border]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.svg|30px|border]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Ethiopia.svg|30px|border]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[File:Flag of Kenya.svg|30px|border]] [[Kenya]]
* [[File:Flag of Madagascar.svg|30px|border]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[File:Flag of Malawi.svg|30px|border]] [[Malawi]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritius.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[File:Flag of Mozambique.svg|30px|border]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[File:Flag of Rwanda.svg|30px|border]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[File:Flag of the Seychelles.svg|30px|border]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Uganda.svg|30px|border]] [[Uganda]]
* [[File:Flag of Tanzania.svg|30px|border]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[File:Flag of Zambia.svg|30px|border]] [[Zambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Zimbabwe.svg|30px|border]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Central Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Angola.svg|30px|border]] [[Angola]]
* [[File:Flag of Cameroon.svg|30px|border]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[File:Flag of the Central African Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Chad.svg|30px|border]] [[Chad]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Gabon.svg|30px|border]] [[Gabon]]
* [[File:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.svg|30px|border]] [[São Tomé and Príncipe|Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Botswana.svg|30px|border]] [[Botswana]]
* [[File:Flag of Lesotho.svg|30px|border]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[File:Flag of Namibia.svg|30px|border]] [[Namibia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Africa.svg|30px|border]] [[South Africa]]
* [[File:Flag of Swaziland.svg|30px|border]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Benin.svg|30px|border]] [[Benin]]
* [[File:Flag of Burkina Faso.svg|30px|border]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[File:Flag of Cape Verde.svg|30px|border]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[File:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.svg|30px|border]] [[Côte d'Ivoire|Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[File:Flag of The Gambia.svg|30px|border]] [[The Gambia|Gambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ghana.svg|30px|border]] [[Ghana]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[File:Flag of Liberia.svg|30px|border]] [[Liberia]]
* [[File:Flag of Mali.svg|30px|border]] [[Mali]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritania.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritania]]
* [[File:Flag of Niger.svg|30px|border]] [[Niger]]
* [[File:Flag of Nigeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Senegal.svg|30px|border]] [[Senegal]]
* [[File:Flag of Sierra Leone.svg|30px|border]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[File:Flag of Togo.svg|30px|border]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Canary Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Ceuta.svg|30px|border]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[File:Flag of Madeira.svg|30px|border]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Mayotte (local).svg|30px|border]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[File:Flag of Melilla.svg|30px|border]] [[Melilla]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Puntland]]
* [[File:Flag of Reunion.png|30px|border]] [[Réunion]]
* [[File:Flag of Saint Helena.svg|30px|border]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[File:Flag of Somaliland.svg|30px|border]] [[Somaliland]]

== See Also ==
* [http://artofbackpacking.com/how-to-survive-hitchhiking-in-africa/ How To Survive Hitchhiking In Africa]


[[trash:Africa]]
{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
[[es:África]]
[[fr:Afrique]]
[[he:אפריקה]]
[[pl:Afryka]]
[[nl:Afrika]]
[[ru:Африка]]
[[tr:Afrika]]
[[zh:非洲]]
[[visa:Africa]]
[[nomad:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>rjbzjv0yfw6e5g9cdm57lr092a5gcln</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>81919</id>
      <parentid>79576</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-01-13T12:29:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5832">[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], Fulfulde and [[Africa phrasebook#Bambara|Bambara]] in [[Western Africa|West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

For Europeans and Americans visas in Africa are relatively hard compared to other continents. For most countries it's a good idea to plan ahead.


== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.svg|30px|border]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.svg|30px|border]] [[Libya|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[File:Flag of Morocco.svg|30px|border]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of South Sudan.png|30px|border]] [[South Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.svg|30px|border]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.svg|30px|border]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag_Western_Sahara.png|30px|border]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[File:Flag of Burundi.svg|30px|border]] [[Burundi]]
* [[File:Flag of the Comoros.svg|30px|border]] [[Comoros]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.svg|30px|border]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.svg|30px|border]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Ethiopia.svg|30px|border]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[File:Flag of Kenya.svg|30px|border]] [[Kenya]]
* [[File:Flag of Madagascar.svg|30px|border]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[File:Flag of Malawi.svg|30px|border]] [[Malawi]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritius.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[File:Flag of Mozambique.svg|30px|border]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[File:Flag of Rwanda.svg|30px|border]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[File:Flag of the Seychelles.svg|30px|border]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Uganda.svg|30px|border]] [[Uganda]]
* [[File:Flag of Tanzania.svg|30px|border]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[File:Flag of Zambia.svg|30px|border]] [[Zambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Zimbabwe.svg|30px|border]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Central Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Angola.svg|30px|border]] [[Angola]]
* [[File:Flag of Cameroon.svg|30px|border]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[File:Flag of the Central African Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Chad.svg|30px|border]] [[Chad]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Gabon.svg|30px|border]] [[Gabon]]
* [[File:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.svg|30px|border]] [[São Tomé and Príncipe|Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Botswana.svg|30px|border]] [[Botswana]]
* [[File:Flag of Lesotho.svg|30px|border]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[File:Flag of Namibia.svg|30px|border]] [[Namibia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Africa.svg|30px|border]] [[South Africa]]
* [[File:Flag of Swaziland.svg|30px|border]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Benin.svg|30px|border]] [[Benin]]
* [[File:Flag of Burkina Faso.svg|30px|border]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[File:Flag of Cape Verde.svg|30px|border]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[File:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.svg|30px|border]] [[Côte d'Ivoire|Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[File:Flag of The Gambia.svg|30px|border]] [[The Gambia|Gambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ghana.svg|30px|border]] [[Ghana]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[File:Flag of Liberia.svg|30px|border]] [[Liberia]]
* [[File:Flag of Mali.svg|30px|border]] [[Mali]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritania.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritania]]
* [[File:Flag of Niger.svg|30px|border]] [[Niger]]
* [[File:Flag of Nigeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Senegal.svg|30px|border]] [[Senegal]]
* [[File:Flag of Sierra Leone.svg|30px|border]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[File:Flag of Togo.svg|30px|border]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Canary Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Ceuta.svg|30px|border]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[File:Flag of Madeira.svg|30px|border]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Mayotte (local).svg|30px|border]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[File:Flag of Melilla.svg|30px|border]] [[Melilla]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Puntland]]
* [[File:Flag of Reunion.png|30px|border]] [[Réunion]]
* [[File:Flag of Saint Helena.svg|30px|border]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[File:Flag of Somaliland.svg|30px|border]] [[Somaliland]]

== See Also ==
* [http://artofbackpacking.com/how-to-survive-hitchhiking-in-africa/ How To Survive Hitchhiking In Africa]

{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
[[es:África]]
[[fr:Afrique]]
[[he:אפריקה]]
[[pl:Afryka]]
[[nl:Afrika]]
[[ru:Африка]]
[[tr:Afrika]]
[[zh:非洲]]
[[visa:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>kifyfhjdp3v0g6d9wrv2kzndk0rzp9w</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>81938</id>
      <parentid>81919</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-01-13T13:40:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5785">[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], Fulfulde and [[Africa phrasebook#Bambara|Bambara]] in [[Western Africa|West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

For Europeans and Americans visas in Africa are relatively hard compared to other continents. For most countries it's a good idea to plan ahead.


== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.svg|30px|border]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.svg|30px|border]] [[Libya|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[File:Flag of Morocco.svg|30px|border]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of South Sudan.png|30px|border]] [[South Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.svg|30px|border]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.svg|30px|border]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag_Western_Sahara.png|30px|border]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[File:Flag of Burundi.svg|30px|border]] [[Burundi]]
* [[File:Flag of the Comoros.svg|30px|border]] [[Comoros]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.svg|30px|border]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.svg|30px|border]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Ethiopia.svg|30px|border]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[File:Flag of Kenya.svg|30px|border]] [[Kenya]]
* [[File:Flag of Madagascar.svg|30px|border]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[File:Flag of Malawi.svg|30px|border]] [[Malawi]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritius.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[File:Flag of Mozambique.svg|30px|border]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[File:Flag of Rwanda.svg|30px|border]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[File:Flag of the Seychelles.svg|30px|border]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Uganda.svg|30px|border]] [[Uganda]]
* [[File:Flag of Tanzania.svg|30px|border]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[File:Flag of Zambia.svg|30px|border]] [[Zambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Zimbabwe.svg|30px|border]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Central Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Angola.svg|30px|border]] [[Angola]]
* [[File:Flag of Cameroon.svg|30px|border]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[File:Flag of the Central African Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Chad.svg|30px|border]] [[Chad]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Gabon.svg|30px|border]] [[Gabon]]
* [[File:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.svg|30px|border]] [[São Tomé and Príncipe|Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Botswana.svg|30px|border]] [[Botswana]]
* [[File:Flag of Lesotho.svg|30px|border]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[File:Flag of Namibia.svg|30px|border]] [[Namibia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Africa.svg|30px|border]] [[South Africa]]
* [[File:Flag of Swaziland.svg|30px|border]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Benin.svg|30px|border]] [[Benin]]
* [[File:Flag of Burkina Faso.svg|30px|border]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[File:Flag of Cape Verde.svg|30px|border]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[File:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.svg|30px|border]] [[Côte d'Ivoire|Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[File:Flag of The Gambia.svg|30px|border]] [[The Gambia|Gambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ghana.svg|30px|border]] [[Ghana]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[File:Flag of Liberia.svg|30px|border]] [[Liberia]]
* [[File:Flag of Mali.svg|30px|border]] [[Mali]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritania.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritania]]
* [[File:Flag of Niger.svg|30px|border]] [[Niger]]
* [[File:Flag of Nigeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Senegal.svg|30px|border]] [[Senegal]]
* [[File:Flag of Sierra Leone.svg|30px|border]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[File:Flag of Togo.svg|30px|border]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Canary Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Ceuta.svg|30px|border]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[File:Flag of Madeira.svg|30px|border]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Mayotte (local).svg|30px|border]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[File:Flag of Melilla.svg|30px|border]] [[Melilla]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Puntland]]
* [[File:Flag of Reunion.png|30px|border]] [[Réunion]]
* [[File:Flag of Saint Helena.svg|30px|border]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[File:Flag of Somaliland.svg|30px|border]] [[Somaliland]]

== See Also ==
* [http://artofbackpacking.com/how-to-survive-hitchhiking-in-africa/ How To Survive Hitchhiking In Africa]

{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[visa:Africa]]

[[de:Afrika]]
[[es:África]]
[[fr:Afrique]]
[[ru:Африка]]
[[tr:Afrika]]
[[zh:非洲]]</text>
      <sha1>2pgtwfgrs7z4jb1ldqnjimpfm74d084</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>92394</id>
      <parentid>81938</parentid>
      <timestamp>2018-11-09T07:34:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Traumschule</username>
        <id>28627</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5830">[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], Fulfulde and [[Africa phrasebook#Bambara|Bambara]] in [[Western Africa|West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

For Europeans and Americans visas in Africa are relatively hard compared to other continents. For most countries it's a good idea to plan ahead.


== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.svg|30px|border]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.svg|30px|border]] [[Libya|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[File:Flag of Morocco.svg|30px|border]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of South Sudan.png|30px|border]] [[South Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.svg|30px|border]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.svg|30px|border]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag_Western_Sahara.png|30px|border]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[File:Flag of Burundi.svg|30px|border]] [[Burundi]]
* [[File:Flag of the Comoros.svg|30px|border]] [[Comoros]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.svg|30px|border]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.svg|30px|border]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Ethiopia.svg|30px|border]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[File:Flag of Kenya.svg|30px|border]] [[Kenya]]
* [[File:Flag of Madagascar.svg|30px|border]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[File:Flag of Malawi.svg|30px|border]] [[Malawi]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritius.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[File:Flag of Mozambique.svg|30px|border]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[File:Flag of Rwanda.svg|30px|border]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[File:Flag of the Seychelles.svg|30px|border]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Uganda.svg|30px|border]] [[Uganda]]
* [[File:Flag of Tanzania.svg|30px|border]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[File:Flag of Zambia.svg|30px|border]] [[Zambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Zimbabwe.svg|30px|border]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Central Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Angola.svg|30px|border]] [[Angola]]
* [[File:Flag of Cameroon.svg|30px|border]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[File:Flag of the Central African Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Chad.svg|30px|border]] [[Chad]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Gabon.svg|30px|border]] [[Gabon]]
* [[File:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.svg|30px|border]] [[São Tomé and Príncipe|Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Botswana.svg|30px|border]] [[Botswana]]
* [[File:Flag of Lesotho.svg|30px|border]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[File:Flag of Namibia.svg|30px|border]] [[Namibia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Africa.svg|30px|border]] [[South Africa]]
* [[File:Flag of Swaziland.svg|30px|border]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Benin.svg|30px|border]] [[Benin]]
* [[File:Flag of Burkina Faso.svg|30px|border]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[File:Flag of Cape Verde.svg|30px|border]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[File:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.svg|30px|border]] [[Côte d'Ivoire|Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[File:Flag of The Gambia.svg|30px|border]] [[The Gambia|Gambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ghana.svg|30px|border]] [[Ghana]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[File:Flag of Liberia.svg|30px|border]] [[Liberia]]
* [[File:Flag of Mali.svg|30px|border]] [[Mali]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritania.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritania]]
* [[File:Flag of Niger.svg|30px|border]] [[Niger]]
* [[File:Flag of Nigeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Senegal.svg|30px|border]] [[Senegal]]
* [[File:Flag of Sierra Leone.svg|30px|border]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[File:Flag of Togo.svg|30px|border]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Canary Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Ceuta.svg|30px|border]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[File:Flag of Madeira.svg|30px|border]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Mayotte (local).svg|30px|border]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[File:Flag of Melilla.svg|30px|border]] [[Melilla]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Puntland]]
* [[File:Flag of Reunion.png|30px|border]] [[Réunion]]
* [[File:Flag of Saint Helena.svg|30px|border]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[File:Flag of Somaliland.svg|30px|border]] [[Somaliland]]

== See Also ==
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20160411052029/http://artofadventuring.com:80/how-to-survive-hitchhiking-in-africa How To Survive Hitchhiking In Africa]

{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[visa:Africa]]

[[de:Afrika]]
[[es:África]]
[[fr:Afrique]]
[[ru:Африка]]
[[tr:Afrika]]
[[zh:非洲]]</text>
      <sha1>loa7bqolgrvc0qzmyhwtfvtbp42gwzb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105747</id>
      <parentid>92394</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-05-19T08:11:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5868">[[File:Hitchhiking africa.png|700px]]
[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, in [[Mauritania]]]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], Fulfulde and [[Africa phrasebook#Bambara|Bambara]] in [[Western Africa|West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

For Europeans and Americans visas in Africa are relatively hard compared to other continents. For most countries it's a good idea to plan ahead.


== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.svg|30px|border]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.svg|30px|border]] [[Libya|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[File:Flag of Morocco.svg|30px|border]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of South Sudan.png|30px|border]] [[South Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.svg|30px|border]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.svg|30px|border]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag_Western_Sahara.png|30px|border]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[File:Flag of Burundi.svg|30px|border]] [[Burundi]]
* [[File:Flag of the Comoros.svg|30px|border]] [[Comoros]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.svg|30px|border]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.svg|30px|border]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Ethiopia.svg|30px|border]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[File:Flag of Kenya.svg|30px|border]] [[Kenya]]
* [[File:Flag of Madagascar.svg|30px|border]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[File:Flag of Malawi.svg|30px|border]] [[Malawi]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritius.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[File:Flag of Mozambique.svg|30px|border]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[File:Flag of Rwanda.svg|30px|border]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[File:Flag of the Seychelles.svg|30px|border]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Uganda.svg|30px|border]] [[Uganda]]
* [[File:Flag of Tanzania.svg|30px|border]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[File:Flag of Zambia.svg|30px|border]] [[Zambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Zimbabwe.svg|30px|border]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Central Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Angola.svg|30px|border]] [[Angola]]
* [[File:Flag of Cameroon.svg|30px|border]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[File:Flag of the Central African Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Chad.svg|30px|border]] [[Chad]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Gabon.svg|30px|border]] [[Gabon]]
* [[File:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.svg|30px|border]] [[São Tomé and Príncipe|Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Botswana.svg|30px|border]] [[Botswana]]
* [[File:Flag of Lesotho.svg|30px|border]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[File:Flag of Namibia.svg|30px|border]] [[Namibia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Africa.svg|30px|border]] [[South Africa]]
* [[File:Flag of Swaziland.svg|30px|border]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Benin.svg|30px|border]] [[Benin]]
* [[File:Flag of Burkina Faso.svg|30px|border]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[File:Flag of Cape Verde.svg|30px|border]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[File:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.svg|30px|border]] [[Côte d'Ivoire|Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[File:Flag of The Gambia.svg|30px|border]] [[The Gambia|Gambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ghana.svg|30px|border]] [[Ghana]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[File:Flag of Liberia.svg|30px|border]] [[Liberia]]
* [[File:Flag of Mali.svg|30px|border]] [[Mali]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritania.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritania]]
* [[File:Flag of Niger.svg|30px|border]] [[Niger]]
* [[File:Flag of Nigeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Senegal.svg|30px|border]] [[Senegal]]
* [[File:Flag of Sierra Leone.svg|30px|border]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[File:Flag of Togo.svg|30px|border]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Canary Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Ceuta.svg|30px|border]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[File:Flag of Madeira.svg|30px|border]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Mayotte (local).svg|30px|border]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[File:Flag of Melilla.svg|30px|border]] [[Melilla]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Puntland]]
* [[File:Flag of Reunion.png|30px|border]] [[Réunion]]
* [[File:Flag of Saint Helena.svg|30px|border]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[File:Flag of Somaliland.svg|30px|border]] [[Somaliland]]

== See Also ==
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20160411052029/http://artofadventuring.com:80/how-to-survive-hitchhiking-in-africa How To Survive Hitchhiking In Africa]

{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[visa:Africa]]

[[de:Afrika]]
[[es:África]]
[[fr:Afrique]]
[[ru:Африка]]
[[tr:Afrika]]
[[zh:非洲]]</text>
      <sha1>0ul1sc4jcs6aj0azkixcphntzz1kmxk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105748</id>
      <parentid>105747</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-05-19T08:12:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5777">[[File:Hitchhiking africa.png|thumb|right|300px]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], Fulfulde and [[Africa phrasebook#Bambara|Bambara]] in [[Western Africa|West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

For Europeans and Americans visas in Africa are relatively hard compared to other continents. For most countries it's a good idea to plan ahead.


== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.svg|30px|border]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.svg|30px|border]] [[Libya|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[File:Flag of Morocco.svg|30px|border]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of South Sudan.png|30px|border]] [[South Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.svg|30px|border]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.svg|30px|border]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag_Western_Sahara.png|30px|border]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
&lt;map lat='5.7908968128719565' lng='16.34765625' zoom='3' view='0' float='right' width='400' height='500'/&gt;
* [[File:Flag of Burundi.svg|30px|border]] [[Burundi]]
* [[File:Flag of the Comoros.svg|30px|border]] [[Comoros]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.svg|30px|border]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.svg|30px|border]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Ethiopia.svg|30px|border]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[File:Flag of Kenya.svg|30px|border]] [[Kenya]]
* [[File:Flag of Madagascar.svg|30px|border]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[File:Flag of Malawi.svg|30px|border]] [[Malawi]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritius.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[File:Flag of Mozambique.svg|30px|border]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[File:Flag of Rwanda.svg|30px|border]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[File:Flag of the Seychelles.svg|30px|border]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Uganda.svg|30px|border]] [[Uganda]]
* [[File:Flag of Tanzania.svg|30px|border]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[File:Flag of Zambia.svg|30px|border]] [[Zambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Zimbabwe.svg|30px|border]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Central Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Angola.svg|30px|border]] [[Angola]]
* [[File:Flag of Cameroon.svg|30px|border]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[File:Flag of the Central African Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Chad.svg|30px|border]] [[Chad]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Gabon.svg|30px|border]] [[Gabon]]
* [[File:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.svg|30px|border]] [[São Tomé and Príncipe|Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Botswana.svg|30px|border]] [[Botswana]]
* [[File:Flag of Lesotho.svg|30px|border]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[File:Flag of Namibia.svg|30px|border]] [[Namibia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Africa.svg|30px|border]] [[South Africa]]
* [[File:Flag of Swaziland.svg|30px|border]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Benin.svg|30px|border]] [[Benin]]
* [[File:Flag of Burkina Faso.svg|30px|border]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[File:Flag of Cape Verde.svg|30px|border]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[File:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.svg|30px|border]] [[Côte d'Ivoire|Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[File:Flag of The Gambia.svg|30px|border]] [[The Gambia|Gambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ghana.svg|30px|border]] [[Ghana]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[File:Flag of Liberia.svg|30px|border]] [[Liberia]]
* [[File:Flag of Mali.svg|30px|border]] [[Mali]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritania.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritania]]
* [[File:Flag of Niger.svg|30px|border]] [[Niger]]
* [[File:Flag of Nigeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Senegal.svg|30px|border]] [[Senegal]]
* [[File:Flag of Sierra Leone.svg|30px|border]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[File:Flag of Togo.svg|30px|border]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Canary Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Ceuta.svg|30px|border]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[File:Flag of Madeira.svg|30px|border]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Mayotte (local).svg|30px|border]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[File:Flag of Melilla.svg|30px|border]] [[Melilla]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Puntland]]
* [[File:Flag of Reunion.png|30px|border]] [[Réunion]]
* [[File:Flag of Saint Helena.svg|30px|border]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[File:Flag of Somaliland.svg|30px|border]] [[Somaliland]]

== See Also ==
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20160411052029/http://artofadventuring.com:80/how-to-survive-hitchhiking-in-africa How To Survive Hitchhiking In Africa]

{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[visa:Africa]]

[[de:Afrika]]
[[es:África]]
[[fr:Afrique]]
[[ru:Африка]]
[[tr:Afrika]]
[[zh:非洲]]</text>
      <sha1>qhtsxztjxg517pfnjjdiybdd4t6wzkl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>108940</id>
      <parentid>105748</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-02-27T07:24:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5670">[[File:Hitchhiking africa.png|thumb|right|300px]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], Fulfulde and [[Africa phrasebook#Bambara|Bambara]] in [[Western Africa|West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

For Europeans and Americans visas in Africa are relatively hard compared to other continents. For most countries it's a good idea to plan ahead.


== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

== [[Northern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.svg|30px|border]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.svg|30px|border]] [[Libya|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[File:Flag of Morocco.svg|30px|border]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of South Sudan.png|30px|border]] [[South Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.svg|30px|border]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.svg|30px|border]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag_Western_Sahara.png|30px|border]] [[Western Sahara]]

== [[Eastern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Burundi.svg|30px|border]] [[Burundi]]
* [[File:Flag of the Comoros.svg|30px|border]] [[Comoros]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.svg|30px|border]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.svg|30px|border]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Ethiopia.svg|30px|border]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[File:Flag of Kenya.svg|30px|border]] [[Kenya]]
* [[File:Flag of Madagascar.svg|30px|border]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[File:Flag of Malawi.svg|30px|border]] [[Malawi]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritius.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[File:Flag of Mozambique.svg|30px|border]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[File:Flag of Rwanda.svg|30px|border]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[File:Flag of the Seychelles.svg|30px|border]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Uganda.svg|30px|border]] [[Uganda]]
* [[File:Flag of Tanzania.svg|30px|border]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[File:Flag of Zambia.svg|30px|border]] [[Zambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Zimbabwe.svg|30px|border]] [[Zimbabwe]]

== [[Central Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Angola.svg|30px|border]] [[Angola]]
* [[File:Flag of Cameroon.svg|30px|border]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[File:Flag of the Central African Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Chad.svg|30px|border]] [[Chad]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Gabon.svg|30px|border]] [[Gabon]]
* [[File:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.svg|30px|border]] [[São Tomé and Príncipe|Sao Tome and Principe]]

== [[Southern Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Botswana.svg|30px|border]] [[Botswana]]
* [[File:Flag of Lesotho.svg|30px|border]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[File:Flag of Namibia.svg|30px|border]] [[Namibia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Africa.svg|30px|border]] [[South Africa]]
* [[File:Flag of Swaziland.svg|30px|border]] [[Swaziland]]

== [[Western Africa]] ==
* [[File:Flag of Benin.svg|30px|border]] [[Benin]]
* [[File:Flag of Burkina Faso.svg|30px|border]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[File:Flag of Cape Verde.svg|30px|border]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[File:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.svg|30px|border]] [[Côte d'Ivoire|Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[File:Flag of The Gambia.svg|30px|border]] [[The Gambia|Gambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ghana.svg|30px|border]] [[Ghana]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[File:Flag of Liberia.svg|30px|border]] [[Liberia]]
* [[File:Flag of Mali.svg|30px|border]] [[Mali]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritania.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritania]]
* [[File:Flag of Niger.svg|30px|border]] [[Niger]]
* [[File:Flag of Nigeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Senegal.svg|30px|border]] [[Senegal]]
* [[File:Flag of Sierra Leone.svg|30px|border]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[File:Flag of Togo.svg|30px|border]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Canary Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Ceuta.svg|30px|border]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[File:Flag of Madeira.svg|30px|border]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Mayotte (local).svg|30px|border]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[File:Flag of Melilla.svg|30px|border]] [[Melilla]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Puntland]]
* [[File:Flag of Reunion.png|30px|border]] [[Réunion]]
* [[File:Flag of Saint Helena.svg|30px|border]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[File:Flag of Somaliland.svg|30px|border]] [[Somaliland]]

== See Also ==
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20160411052029/http://artofadventuring.com:80/how-to-survive-hitchhiking-in-africa How To Survive Hitchhiking In Africa]

{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[visa:Africa]]

[[de:Afrika]]
[[es:África]]
[[fr:Afrique]]
[[ru:Африка]]
[[tr:Afrika]]
[[zh:非洲]]</text>
      <sha1>6ul3xa8kitv78vls2f6uh5m3b3wn4wy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>108941</id>
      <parentid>108940</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-02-27T07:34:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5681">[[File:Hitchhiking africa.png|thumb|right|300px]]
Hitching for rides is common practice in '''Africa''', though you may be expected to pay the driver.

Road safety in Africa leaves a lot to be desired, and seatbelts are not always fitted. Being stranded in remote areas could be a problem. Speaking English and French is an advantage as well as Portuguese in some countries. However, learning the basic of African languages will make your trip much more pleasant. Some languages are understood in very large parts, such as [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], Fulfulde and [[Africa phrasebook#Bambara|Bambara]] in [[Western Africa|West Africa]] or Swahili and Arabic in [[Eastern Africa]].

For Europeans and Americans visas in Africa are relatively hard compared to other continents. For most countries it's a good idea to plan ahead.


== [[Health]] ==
Malaria is common in most parts of Africa. Inform yourself and take precautions. Some forms of malaria are particularly deadly. The fact that local populations don't take any malaria prophelactics should definitely not stop you from taking any: locals are much more resistant to malaria.

==[[Countries]]==
The [http://unstats.un.org/unsd/methods/m49/m49regin.htm United Nations Statistics Division] defines Africa as following:

=== [[Northern Africa]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Algeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Algeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Egypt.svg|30px|border]] [[Egypt]]
* [[File:Flag of Libya.svg|30px|border]] [[Libya|Libyan Arab Jamahiriya]]
* [[File:Flag of Morocco.svg|30px|border]] [[Morocco]]
* [[File:Flag of South Sudan.png|30px|border]] [[South Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Sudan.svg|30px|border]] [[Sudan]]
* [[File:Flag of Tunisia.svg|30px|border]] [[Tunisia]]
* [[File:Flag_Western_Sahara.png|30px|border]] [[Western Sahara]]

=== [[Eastern Africa]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Burundi.svg|30px|border]] [[Burundi]]
* [[File:Flag of the Comoros.svg|30px|border]] [[Comoros]]
* [[File:Flag of Djibouti.svg|30px|border]] [[Djibouti]]
* [[File:Flag of Eritrea.svg|30px|border]] [[Eritrea]]
* [[File:Flag of Ethiopia.svg|30px|border]] [[Ethiopia]]
* [[File:Flag of Kenya.svg|30px|border]] [[Kenya]]
* [[File:Flag of Madagascar.svg|30px|border]] [[Madagascar]]
* [[File:Flag of Malawi.svg|30px|border]] [[Malawi]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritius.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritius]]
* [[File:Flag of Mozambique.svg|30px|border]] [[Mozambique]]
* [[File:Flag of Rwanda.svg|30px|border]] [[Rwanda]]
* [[File:Flag of the Seychelles.svg|30px|border]] [[Seychelles]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Somalia]]
* [[File:Flag of Uganda.svg|30px|border]] [[Uganda]]
* [[File:Flag of Tanzania.svg|30px|border]] [[Tanzania|United Republic of Tanzania]]
* [[File:Flag of Zambia.svg|30px|border]] [[Zambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Zimbabwe.svg|30px|border]] [[Zimbabwe]]

=== [[Central Africa]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Angola.svg|30px|border]] [[Angola]]
* [[File:Flag of Cameroon.svg|30px|border]] [[Cameroon]]
* [[File:Flag of the Central African Republic.svg|30px|border]] [[Central African Republic]]
* [[File:Flag of Chad.svg|30px|border]] [[Chad]]
* [[File:Flag of the Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.svg|30px|border]] [[Democratic Republic of the Congo]]
* [[File:Flag of Equatorial Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Equatorial Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Gabon.svg|30px|border]] [[Gabon]]
* [[File:Flag of Sao Tome and Principe.svg|30px|border]] [[São Tomé and Príncipe|Sao Tome and Principe]]

=== [[Southern Africa]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Botswana.svg|30px|border]] [[Botswana]]
* [[File:Flag of Lesotho.svg|30px|border]] [[Lesotho]]
* [[File:Flag of Namibia.svg|30px|border]] [[Namibia]]
* [[File:Flag of South Africa.svg|30px|border]] [[South Africa]]
* [[File:Flag of Swaziland.svg|30px|border]] [[Swaziland]]

=== [[Western Africa]] ===
* [[File:Flag of Benin.svg|30px|border]] [[Benin]]
* [[File:Flag of Burkina Faso.svg|30px|border]] [[Burkina Faso]]
* [[File:Flag of Cape Verde.svg|30px|border]] [[Cape Verde]]
* [[File:Flag of Cote d'Ivoire.svg|30px|border]] [[Côte d'Ivoire|Cote d'Ivoire]]
* [[File:Flag of The Gambia.svg|30px|border]] [[The Gambia|Gambia]]
* [[File:Flag of Ghana.svg|30px|border]] [[Ghana]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea]]
* [[File:Flag of Guinea-Bissau.svg|30px|border]] [[Guinea-Bissau]]
* [[File:Flag of Liberia.svg|30px|border]] [[Liberia]]
* [[File:Flag of Mali.svg|30px|border]] [[Mali]]
* [[File:Flag of Mauritania.svg|30px|border]] [[Mauritania]]
* [[File:Flag of Niger.svg|30px|border]] [[Niger]]
* [[File:Flag of Nigeria.svg|30px|border]] [[Nigeria]]
* [[File:Flag of Senegal.svg|30px|border]] [[Senegal]]
* [[File:Flag of Sierra Leone.svg|30px|border]] [[Sierra Leone]]
* [[File:Flag of Togo.svg|30px|border]] [[Togo]]

=== Autonomic Islands or Regions ===
* [[File:Flag of the Canary Islands.svg|30px|border]] [[Canary Islands]]
* [[File:Flag Ceuta.svg|30px|border]] [[Ceuta]]
* [[File:Flag of Madeira.svg|30px|border]] [[Madeira Islands]]
* [[File:Flag of Mayotte (local).svg|30px|border]] [[Mayotte]]
* [[File:Flag of Melilla.svg|30px|border]] [[Melilla]]
* [[File:Flag of Somalia.svg|30px|border]] [[Puntland]]
* [[File:Flag of Reunion.png|30px|border]] [[Réunion]]
* [[File:Flag of Saint Helena.svg|30px|border]] [[Saint Helena]]
* [[File:Flag of Somaliland.svg|30px|border]] [[Somaliland]]

== See Also ==
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20160411052029/http://artofadventuring.com:80/how-to-survive-hitchhiking-in-africa How To Survive Hitchhiking In Africa]

{{IsIn|Earth}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Africa| ]]

[[de:Afrika]]
[[es:África]]
[[fr:Afrique]]
[[ru:Африка]]
[[tr:Afrika]]
[[zh:非洲]]</text>
      <sha1>lbf7djz7rncri2fwgchlqwcfo1n6d2h</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Guinea</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1529</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1563</id>
      <parentid>4414</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T14:13:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="119">This article refers to '''Guinea-Conakry'''. See also [[Guinea-Bissau]] and [[Equatorial Guinea]].

[[Category:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>96z728e2szu5x8t9f1ctfnpq1soy9c3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1564</id>
      <parentid>1563</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="119">This article refers to '''Guinea-Conakry'''. See also [[Guinea-Bissau]] and [[Equatorial Guinea]].

[[Category:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>96z728e2szu5x8t9f1ctfnpq1soy9c3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4414</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T18:05:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GuakaTest</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="98">This article refers to '''Guinea-Conakry'''. See also [[Guinea-Bissau]] and [[Equatorial Guinea]].</text>
      <sha1>5ph6aa247mg1ytvgrzo68eq5vlityre</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4415</id>
      <parentid>1564</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="119">This article refers to '''Guinea-Conakry'''. See also [[Guinea-Bissau]] and [[Equatorial Guinea]].

[[Category:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>96z728e2szu5x8t9f1ctfnpq1soy9c3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14758</id>
      <parentid>4415</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-13T21:01:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="135">This article refers to '''Guinea-Conakry'''.
See also [[Guinea-Bissau]] and [[Equatorial Guinea]].


[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Guinea]]</text>
      <sha1>1i0l39uyi6abngd20uer77xwluci3n6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>34953</id>
      <parentid>14758</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T17:28:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="134">This article refers to '''Guinea-Conakry'''.
See also [[Guinea-Bissau]] and [[Equatorial Guinea]].

[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Guinea]]</text>
      <sha1>7ot4rs06hnufb533j2vfkd748limsxr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>43288</id>
      <parentid>34953</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-07-21T11:35:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Alyssahcanada</username>
        <id>2508</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="982">This article refers to '''Guinea-Conakry'''.
See also [[Guinea-Bissau]] and [[Equatorial Guinea]].

[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Guinea]]


In the Fouta Djallon in the north, the main roads can be hitched either with the help of a military/police checkpoint or by walking out of the town limits - people might even offer rides without being asked simply due to the rarity of seeing a backpack-ladden traveller strolling along the side of the road. However due to the state of the Guinean economy few people have personal vehicles, so when rides come they are often from big, ancient transport trucks with no windshield. 

The smaller dirt roads that lead to the interior of the region are almost invariably in terrible condition and are rarely used by anything but motorcycles and the occasional taxi. That said, if you are traveling solo most motorcycles that aren't packed with stuff or a second (or fourth) person will offer a ride. Bicycles and donkey carts are also a good option.</text>
      <sha1>5yv51rzq8w501skypue7z7glr4pvf2w</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>47402</id>
      <parentid>43288</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-11-15T09:51:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Quarim</username>
        <id>1290</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1220">{{infobox Country
|country = of Guinea
|language = French
|capital = [[Conakry]]
|pop = 10,200,000
|currency = Guinea Franc
|hitch = 
|map = &lt;map lat='11' lng='-11' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}
This article refers to '''Guinea-Conakry'''.
See also [[Guinea-Bissau]] and [[Equatorial Guinea]].

In the Fouta Djallon in the north, the main roads can be hitched either with the help of a military/police checkpoint or by walking out of the town limits - people might even offer rides without being asked simply due to the rarity of seeing a backpack-ladden traveller strolling along the side of the road. However due to the state of the Guinean economy few people have personal vehicles, so when rides come they are often from big, ancient transport trucks with no windshield. 

The smaller dirt roads that lead to the interior of the region are almost invariably in terrible condition and are rarely used by anything but motorcycles and the occasional taxi. That said, if you are traveling solo most motorcycles that aren't packed with stuff or a second (or fourth) person will offer a ride. Bicycles and donkey carts are also a good option.
[[Category:Africa]]
[[Category:Western Africa]]
[[de:Guinea]]
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}</text>
      <sha1>20kekog1cdx940yvzbxzs2bbuhrneq9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>51535</id>
      <parentid>47402</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-04-06T15:31:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>84.74.150.132</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2161">{{infobox Country
|country = of Guinea
|language = French
|capital = [[Conakry]]
|pop = 10,200,000
|currency = Guinea Franc
|hitch = 
|map = &lt;map lat='11' lng='-11' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}
This article refers to '''Guinea-Conakry'''.
See also [[Guinea-Bissau]] and [[Equatorial Guinea]].

In Guinea, the main roads are theoretically hitcheable, secondary roads only exceptionally. Your luck will always depend on timing as due to the state of the Guinean economy few people have personal vehicles, and even the ones that do often charge the same prices as taxis. Trucks will hardly ever pick you up for free as they are the public transport for people who can't afford taxis - except the big, ancient transport trucks with no windshield that don't go very far. People might even offer rides without being asked simply due to the rarity of seeing a backpack-ladden traveller strolling along the side of the road. Your best chances for hitching significant distances for free are NGO jeeps (which also are much, much more confortable than ordinary public transport) and the odd company car or private car that is sympathetic to your cause. The places to hitch from are the exits of town, sometimes stopping at customs and asking at help there will help, sometimes however they won't understand what you're doing and tell you that you need to pay as does everybody else. Apparently under the military regime there used to be extensive police and military checkpoints, but those have now (Mar11) all but disappeared and you shouldn't take them into consideration when you plan your hitchhiking. The smaller dirt roads that lead to smaller places are almost invariably in terrible condition and are rarely used by anything but motorcycles and the occasional taxi (except if there is a market day in the region when there is a lot of commerical traffic and you stand good chances finding a lift). That said, if you are traveling solo most motorcycles that aren't packed with stuff or a second (or fourth) person will offer a ride. Bicycles and donkey carts are also a good option.

[[Category:Africa]]
[[Category:Western Africa]]
[[de:Guinea]]
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}</text>
      <sha1>90vi6ijkeown7p4gei3ikbmihbxamaf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>51536</id>
      <parentid>51535</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-04-06T15:38:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1889">{{infobox Country
|country = of Guinea
|language = French
|capital = [[Conakry]]
|pop = 10,200,000
|currency = Guinea Franc
|hitch = 
|map = &lt;map lat='11' lng='-11' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}
This article refers to '''Guinea-Conakry'''.
See also [[Guinea-Bissau]] and [[Equatorial Guinea]].

In Guinea, the main roads are theoretically hitcheable, secondary roads only exceptionally. Your luck will always depend on timing as due to the state of the Guinean economy few people have personal vehicles, and even the ones that do often charge the same prices as taxis. Trucks will hardly ever pick you up for free as they are the public transport for people who can't afford taxis - except the big, ancient transport trucks with no windshield that don't go very far. People might even offer rides without being asked simply due to the rarity of seeing a backpack-ladden traveller strolling along the side of the road. Your best chances for hitching significant distances for free are NGO jeeps (which also are much, much more confortable than ordinary public transport) and the odd company car or private car that is sympathetic to your cause. The places to hitch from are the exits of town, sometimes stopping at customs and asking at help there will help, sometimes however they won't understand what you're doing and tell you that you need to pay as does everybody else. The smaller dirt roads that lead to smaller places are almost invariably in terrible condition and are rarely used by anything but motorcycles and the occasional taxi (except if there is a market day in the region when there is a lot of commerical traffic and you stand good chances finding a lift). That said, if you are traveling solo most motorcycles that aren't packed with stuff or a second (or fourth) person will offer a ride. 

[[Category:Africa]]
[[Category:Western Africa]]
[[de:Guinea]]
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}</text>
      <sha1>pv0tpug2pfvly22qifwa1t7at8pi0ze</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>51537</id>
      <parentid>51536</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-04-06T15:38:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1895">{{infobox Country
|country = Guinea
|language = French
|capital = [[Conakry]]
|pop = 10,200,000
|currency = Guinean Franc
|hitch =  {{bad}}
|map = &lt;map lat='11' lng='-11' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}
This article refers to '''Guinea-Conakry'''.
See also [[Guinea-Bissau]] and [[Equatorial Guinea]].

In Guinea, the main roads are theoretically hitcheable, secondary roads only exceptionally. Your luck will always depend on timing as due to the state of the Guinean economy few people have personal vehicles, and even the ones that do often charge the same prices as taxis. Trucks will hardly ever pick you up for free as they are the public transport for people who can't afford taxis - except the big, ancient transport trucks with no windshield that don't go very far. People might even offer rides without being asked simply due to the rarity of seeing a backpack-ladden traveller strolling along the side of the road. Your best chances for hitching significant distances for free are NGO jeeps (which also are much, much more confortable than ordinary public transport) and the odd company car or private car that is sympathetic to your cause. The places to hitch from are the exits of town, sometimes stopping at customs and asking at help there will help, sometimes however they won't understand what you're doing and tell you that you need to pay as does everybody else. The smaller dirt roads that lead to smaller places are almost invariably in terrible condition and are rarely used by anything but motorcycles and the occasional taxi (except if there is a market day in the region when there is a lot of commerical traffic and you stand good chances finding a lift). That said, if you are traveling solo most motorcycles that aren't packed with stuff or a second (or fourth) person will offer a ride. 

[[Category:Africa]]
[[Category:Western Africa]]
[[de:Guinea]]
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}</text>
      <sha1>fmpbm7kqlgi8pjnuy4bl5sdx4epci1c</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>51538</id>
      <parentid>51537</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-04-06T15:39:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1898">{{infobox Country
|country = of Guinea
|language = French
|capital = [[Conakry]]
|pop = 10,200,000
|currency = Guinean Franc
|hitch =  {{bad}}
|map = &lt;map lat='11' lng='-11' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}
This article refers to '''Guinea-Conakry'''.
See also [[Guinea-Bissau]] and [[Equatorial Guinea]].

In Guinea, the main roads are theoretically hitcheable, secondary roads only exceptionally. Your luck will always depend on timing as due to the state of the Guinean economy few people have personal vehicles, and even the ones that do often charge the same prices as taxis. Trucks will hardly ever pick you up for free as they are the public transport for people who can't afford taxis - except the big, ancient transport trucks with no windshield that don't go very far. People might even offer rides without being asked simply due to the rarity of seeing a backpack-ladden traveller strolling along the side of the road. Your best chances for hitching significant distances for free are NGO jeeps (which also are much, much more confortable than ordinary public transport) and the odd company car or private car that is sympathetic to your cause. The places to hitch from are the exits of town, sometimes stopping at customs and asking at help there will help, sometimes however they won't understand what you're doing and tell you that you need to pay as does everybody else. The smaller dirt roads that lead to smaller places are almost invariably in terrible condition and are rarely used by anything but motorcycles and the occasional taxi (except if there is a market day in the region when there is a lot of commerical traffic and you stand good chances finding a lift). That said, if you are traveling solo most motorcycles that aren't packed with stuff or a second (or fourth) person will offer a ride. 

[[Category:Africa]]
[[Category:Western Africa]]
[[de:Guinea]]
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}</text>
      <sha1>5tumpwqo3o2senpmubgi8mwpx19cgij</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>54433</id>
      <parentid>51538</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-09-03T14:25:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1947">{{infobox Country
|country = of Guinea
|language = French
|capital = [[Conakry]]
|pop = 10,200,000
|currency = Guinean Franc
|hitch =  {{bad}}
|map = &lt;map lat='11' lng='-11' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}
This article refers to '''Guinea-Conakry'''.
See also [[Guinea-Bissau]] and [[Equatorial Guinea]].

In Guinea, the main roads are theoretically hitcheable, secondary roads only exceptionally. Your luck will always depend on timing as due to the state of the Guinean economy few people have personal vehicles, and even the ones that do often charge the same prices as taxis. Trucks will hardly ever pick you up for free as they are the public transport for people who can't afford taxis - except the ancient pickup trucks without windshield that don't go very far. People might offer rides without being asked simply due to the rarity of seeing a backpack-ladden traveller strolling along the side of the road. Your best chances for hitching significant distances for free are with NGO jeeps (which also are much, much more confortable than ordinary public transport) and the odd company car or private car that is sympathetic to your cause. The places to hitch from are the exits of town, sometimes stopping at customs and asking for help there will help, sometimes however they won't understand what you're doing and tell you that you need to pay as does everybody else. The secondary dirt roads that lead to smaller places are almost invariably in terrible condition and are rarely used by anything but motorcycles and the occasional taxi (except if there is a market day in the region when there is a lot of commerical traffic and you stand good chances finding a free lift - check out the trucks carrying dozens of people). That said, if you are traveling solo most motorcycles that aren't packed with stuff or a second (or fourth) person will offer a ride. 

[[Category:Africa]]
[[Category:Western Africa]]
[[de:Guinea]]
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}</text>
      <sha1>6crflha16mzo0hamx64gqx7qpwmp4s3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>54626</id>
      <parentid>54433</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-09-05T19:15:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1964">{{infobox Country
|country = of Guinea
|language = French
|capital = [[Conakry]]
|pop = 10,200,000
|currency = Guinean Franc
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='gn' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='11' lng='-11' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}

This article refers to '''Guinea-Conakry'''.
See also [[Guinea-Bissau]] and [[Equatorial Guinea]].

In Guinea, the main roads are theoretically hitcheable, secondary roads only exceptionally. Your luck will always depend on timing as due to the state of the Guinean economy few people have personal vehicles, and even the ones that do often charge the same prices as taxis. Trucks will hardly ever pick you up for free as they are the public transport for people who can't afford taxis - except the ancient pickup trucks without windshield that don't go very far. People might offer rides without being asked simply due to the rarity of seeing a backpack-ladden traveller strolling along the side of the road. Your best chances for hitching significant distances for free are with NGO jeeps (which also are much, much more confortable than ordinary public transport) and the odd company car or private car that is sympathetic to your cause. The places to hitch from are the exits of town, sometimes stopping at customs and asking for help there will help, sometimes however they won't understand what you're doing and tell you that you need to pay as does everybody else. The secondary dirt roads that lead to smaller places are almost invariably in terrible condition and are rarely used by anything but motorcycles and the occasional taxi (except if there is a market day in the region when there is a lot of commerical traffic and you stand good chances finding a free lift - check out the trucks carrying dozens of people). That said, if you are traveling solo most motorcycles that aren't packed with stuff or a second (or fourth) person will offer a ride. 

[[Category:Africa]]
[[Category:Western Africa]]
[[de:Guinea]]
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}</text>
      <sha1>83v8yl7870dcdwemu8o4rpds0g06dt7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>64614</id>
      <parentid>54626</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-09-26T00:06:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1936">{{infobox Country
|country = of Guinea
|language = French
|capital = [[Conakry]]
|pop = 10,200,000
|currency = Guinean Franc
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='gn' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='11' lng='-11' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}

This article refers to '''Guinea-Conakry'''.
See also [[Guinea-Bissau]] and [[Equatorial Guinea]].

In Guinea, the main roads are theoretically hitcheable, secondary roads only exceptionally. Your luck will always depend on timing as due to the state of the Guinean economy few people have personal vehicles, and even the ones that do often charge the same prices as taxis. Trucks will hardly ever pick you up for free as they are the public transport for people who can't afford taxis - except the ancient pickup trucks without windshield that don't go very far. People might offer rides without being asked simply due to the rarity of seeing a backpack-ladden traveller strolling along the side of the road. Your best chances for hitching significant distances for free are with NGO jeeps (which also are much, much more confortable than ordinary public transport) and the odd company car or private car that is sympathetic to your cause. The places to hitch from are the exits of town, sometimes stopping at customs and asking for help there will help, sometimes however they won't understand what you're doing and tell you that you need to pay as does everybody else. The secondary dirt roads that lead to smaller places are almost invariably in terrible condition and are rarely used by anything but motorcycles and the occasional taxi (except if there is a market day in the region when there is a lot of commerical traffic and you stand good chances finding a free lift - check out the trucks carrying dozens of people). That said, if you are traveling solo most motorcycles that aren't packed with stuff or a second (or fourth) person will offer a ride. 

[[Category:Africa]]
[[de:Guinea]]
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}</text>
      <sha1>5eqs064qnpxlavqj0d59lqcuww0v20r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69136</id>
      <parentid>64614</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-04-20T17:11:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kimmietaylor28</username>
        <id>3893</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2290">{{infobox Country
|country = of Guinea
|language = French
|capital = [[Conakry]]
|pop = 10,200,000
|currency = Guinean Franc
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='gn' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='11' lng='-11' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}

This article refers to '''Guinea-Conakry'''.
See also [[Guinea-Bissau]] and [[Equatorial Guinea]].

In Guinea, the main roads are theoretically hitcheable, secondary roads only exceptionally. Your luck will always depend on timing as due to the state of the Guinean economy few people have personal vehicles, and even the ones that do often charge the same prices as taxis. Trucks will hardly ever pick you up for free as they are the public transport for people who can't afford taxis - except the ancient pickup trucks without windshield that don't go very far. However, if you are feeling daring, you can hitch on top of a truck just like many of the locals do for such long distances [just like --[[User:Kimmietaylor28|Kimmietaylor28]] ([[User talk:Kimmietaylor28|talk]]) 19:10, 20 April 2013 (CEST) did in 2013]. This will take much longer than riding in a car, but you will get a good and unique view of Guinea.
People might offer rides without being asked simply due to the rarity of seeing a backpack-ladden traveller strolling along the side of the road. Your best chances for hitching significant distances for free are with NGO jeeps (which also are much, much more confortable than ordinary public transport) and the odd company car or private car that is sympathetic to your cause. The places to hitch from are the exits of town, sometimes stopping at customs and asking for help there will help, sometimes however they won't understand what you're doing and tell you that you need to pay as does everybody else. The secondary dirt roads that lead to smaller places are almost invariably in terrible condition and are rarely used by anything but motorcycles and the occasional taxi (except if there is a market day in the region when there is a lot of commerical traffic and you stand good chances finding a free lift - check out the trucks carrying dozens of people). That said, if you are traveling solo most motorcycles that aren't packed with stuff or a second (or fourth) person will offer a ride. 

[[Category:Africa]]
[[de:Guinea]]
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}</text>
      <sha1>twbzrng2yht8lwaygj6b0yaefvhxhdz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69137</id>
      <parentid>69136</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-04-20T17:11:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kimmietaylor28</username>
        <id>3893</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2226">{{infobox Country
|country = of Guinea
|language = French
|capital = [[Conakry]]
|pop = 10,200,000
|currency = Guinean Franc
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='gn' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='11' lng='-11' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}

This article refers to '''Guinea-Conakry'''.
See also [[Guinea-Bissau]] and [[Equatorial Guinea]].

In Guinea, the main roads are theoretically hitcheable, secondary roads only exceptionally. Your luck will always depend on timing as due to the state of the Guinean economy few people have personal vehicles, and even the ones that do often charge the same prices as taxis. Trucks will hardly ever pick you up for free as they are the public transport for people who can't afford taxis - except the ancient pickup trucks without windshield that don't go very far. However, if you are feeling daring, you can hitch on top of a truck just like many of the locals do for such long distances [just like --[[User:Kimmietaylor28|Kimmietaylor28]] did in 2013]. This will take much longer than riding in a car, but you will get a good and unique view of Guinea.
People might offer rides without being asked simply due to the rarity of seeing a backpack-ladden traveller strolling along the side of the road. Your best chances for hitching significant distances for free are with NGO jeeps (which also are much, much more confortable than ordinary public transport) and the odd company car or private car that is sympathetic to your cause. The places to hitch from are the exits of town, sometimes stopping at customs and asking for help there will help, sometimes however they won't understand what you're doing and tell you that you need to pay as does everybody else. The secondary dirt roads that lead to smaller places are almost invariably in terrible condition and are rarely used by anything but motorcycles and the occasional taxi (except if there is a market day in the region when there is a lot of commerical traffic and you stand good chances finding a free lift - check out the trucks carrying dozens of people). That said, if you are traveling solo most motorcycles that aren't packed with stuff or a second (or fourth) person will offer a ride. 

[[Category:Africa]]
[[de:Guinea]]
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}</text>
      <sha1>4pv15yrllacq88ja9kmdgmynmqt91r8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69138</id>
      <parentid>69137</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-04-20T17:13:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kimmietaylor28</username>
        <id>3893</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2290">{{infobox Country
|country = of Guinea
|language = French
|capital = [[Conakry]]
|pop = 10,200,000
|currency = Guinean Franc
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='gn' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='11' lng='-11' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}

This article refers to '''Guinea-Conakry'''.
See also [[Guinea-Bissau]] and [[Equatorial Guinea]].

In Guinea, the main roads are theoretically hitcheable, secondary roads only exceptionally. Your luck will always depend on timing as due to the state of the Guinean economy few people have personal vehicles, and even the ones that do often charge the same prices as taxis. Trucks will hardly ever pick you up for free as they are the public transport for people who can't afford taxis - except the ancient pickup trucks without windshield that don't go very far. However, if you are feeling daring, you can hitch on top of a truck just like many of the locals do for such long distances [just like --[[User:Kimmietaylor28|Kimmietaylor28]] ([[User talk:Kimmietaylor28|talk]]) 19:13, 20 April 2013 (CEST) did in 2013]. This will take much longer than riding in a car, but you will get a good and unique view of Guinea.
People might offer rides without being asked simply due to the rarity of seeing a backpack-ladden traveller strolling along the side of the road. Your best chances for hitching significant distances for free are with NGO jeeps (which also are much, much more confortable than ordinary public transport) and the odd company car or private car that is sympathetic to your cause. The places to hitch from are the exits of town, sometimes stopping at customs and asking for help there will help, sometimes however they won't understand what you're doing and tell you that you need to pay as does everybody else. The secondary dirt roads that lead to smaller places are almost invariably in terrible condition and are rarely used by anything but motorcycles and the occasional taxi (except if there is a market day in the region when there is a lot of commerical traffic and you stand good chances finding a free lift - check out the trucks carrying dozens of people). That said, if you are traveling solo most motorcycles that aren't packed with stuff or a second (or fourth) person will offer a ride. 

[[Category:Africa]]
[[de:Guinea]]
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}</text>
      <sha1>7gqoe7uczb6z7p2xwjyh2gznyf13ja9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69139</id>
      <parentid>69138</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-04-20T17:15:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kimmietaylor28</username>
        <id>3893</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2233">{{infobox Country
|country = of Guinea
|language = French
|capital = [[Conakry]]
|pop = 10,200,000
|currency = Guinean Franc
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='gn' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='11' lng='-11' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}

This article refers to '''Guinea-Conakry'''.
See also [[Guinea-Bissau]] and [[Equatorial Guinea]].

In Guinea, the main roads are theoretically hitcheable, secondary roads only exceptionally. Your luck will always depend on timing as due to the state of the Guinean economy few people have personal vehicles, and even the ones that do often charge the same prices as taxis. Trucks will hardly ever pick you up for free as they are the public transport for people who can't afford taxis - except the ancient pickup trucks without windshield that don't go very far. However, if you are feeling daring, you can hitch on top of a truck just like many of the locals do for such long distances [just like [[http://hitchwiki.org/en/User:Kimmietaylor28]] did in 2013]. This will take much longer than riding in a car, but you will get a good and unique view of Guinea.
People might offer rides without being asked simply due to the rarity of seeing a backpack-ladden traveller strolling along the side of the road. Your best chances for hitching significant distances for free are with NGO jeeps (which also are much, much more confortable than ordinary public transport) and the odd company car or private car that is sympathetic to your cause. The places to hitch from are the exits of town, sometimes stopping at customs and asking for help there will help, sometimes however they won't understand what you're doing and tell you that you need to pay as does everybody else. The secondary dirt roads that lead to smaller places are almost invariably in terrible condition and are rarely used by anything but motorcycles and the occasional taxi (except if there is a market day in the region when there is a lot of commerical traffic and you stand good chances finding a free lift - check out the trucks carrying dozens of people). That said, if you are traveling solo most motorcycles that aren't packed with stuff or a second (or fourth) person will offer a ride. 

[[Category:Africa]]
[[de:Guinea]]
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}</text>
      <sha1>1wqxxoko5q034qq0ttdvtyn8m1j38ko</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69140</id>
      <parentid>69139</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-04-20T17:16:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kimmietaylor28</username>
        <id>3893</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2231">{{infobox Country
|country = of Guinea
|language = French
|capital = [[Conakry]]
|pop = 10,200,000
|currency = Guinean Franc
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='gn' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='11' lng='-11' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}

This article refers to '''Guinea-Conakry'''.
See also [[Guinea-Bissau]] and [[Equatorial Guinea]].

In Guinea, the main roads are theoretically hitcheable, secondary roads only exceptionally. Your luck will always depend on timing as due to the state of the Guinean economy few people have personal vehicles, and even the ones that do often charge the same prices as taxis. Trucks will hardly ever pick you up for free as they are the public transport for people who can't afford taxis - except the ancient pickup trucks without windshield that don't go very far. However, if you are feeling daring, you can hitch on top of a truck just like many of the locals do for such long distances [just like [http://hitchwiki.org/en/User:Kimmietaylor28] did in 2013]. This will take much longer than riding in a car, but you will get a good and unique view of Guinea.
People might offer rides without being asked simply due to the rarity of seeing a backpack-ladden traveller strolling along the side of the road. Your best chances for hitching significant distances for free are with NGO jeeps (which also are much, much more confortable than ordinary public transport) and the odd company car or private car that is sympathetic to your cause. The places to hitch from are the exits of town, sometimes stopping at customs and asking for help there will help, sometimes however they won't understand what you're doing and tell you that you need to pay as does everybody else. The secondary dirt roads that lead to smaller places are almost invariably in terrible condition and are rarely used by anything but motorcycles and the occasional taxi (except if there is a market day in the region when there is a lot of commerical traffic and you stand good chances finding a free lift - check out the trucks carrying dozens of people). That said, if you are traveling solo most motorcycles that aren't packed with stuff or a second (or fourth) person will offer a ride. 

[[Category:Africa]]
[[de:Guinea]]
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}</text>
      <sha1>dipj6slsitj2vfjanipaujnr3p7r30p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69141</id>
      <parentid>69140</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-04-20T17:17:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kimmietaylor28</username>
        <id>3893</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2233">{{infobox Country
|country = of Guinea
|language = French
|capital = [[Conakry]]
|pop = 10,200,000
|currency = Guinean Franc
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='gn' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='11' lng='-11' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}

This article refers to '''Guinea-Conakry'''.
See also [[Guinea-Bissau]] and [[Equatorial Guinea]].

In Guinea, the main roads are theoretically hitcheable, secondary roads only exceptionally. Your luck will always depend on timing as due to the state of the Guinean economy few people have personal vehicles, and even the ones that do often charge the same prices as taxis. Trucks will hardly ever pick you up for free as they are the public transport for people who can't afford taxis - except the ancient pickup trucks without windshield that don't go very far. However, if you are feeling daring, you can hitch on top of a truck just like many of the locals do for such long distances [just like [[http://hitchwiki.org/en/User:Kimmietaylor28]] did in 2013]. This will take much longer than riding in a car, but you will get a good and unique view of Guinea.
People might offer rides without being asked simply due to the rarity of seeing a backpack-ladden traveller strolling along the side of the road. Your best chances for hitching significant distances for free are with NGO jeeps (which also are much, much more confortable than ordinary public transport) and the odd company car or private car that is sympathetic to your cause. The places to hitch from are the exits of town, sometimes stopping at customs and asking for help there will help, sometimes however they won't understand what you're doing and tell you that you need to pay as does everybody else. The secondary dirt roads that lead to smaller places are almost invariably in terrible condition and are rarely used by anything but motorcycles and the occasional taxi (except if there is a market day in the region when there is a lot of commerical traffic and you stand good chances finding a free lift - check out the trucks carrying dozens of people). That said, if you are traveling solo most motorcycles that aren't packed with stuff or a second (or fourth) person will offer a ride. 

[[Category:Africa]]
[[de:Guinea]]
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}</text>
      <sha1>1wqxxoko5q034qq0ttdvtyn8m1j38ko</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69142</id>
      <parentid>69141</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-04-20T17:18:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kimmietaylor28</username>
        <id>3893</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2232">{{infobox Country
|country = of Guinea
|language = French
|capital = [[Conakry]]
|pop = 10,200,000
|currency = Guinean Franc
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='gn' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='11' lng='-11' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}

This article refers to '''Guinea-Conakry'''.
See also [[Guinea-Bissau]] and [[Equatorial Guinea]].

In Guinea, the main roads are theoretically hitcheable, secondary roads only exceptionally. Your luck will always depend on timing as due to the state of the Guinean economy few people have personal vehicles, and even the ones that do often charge the same prices as taxis. Trucks will hardly ever pick you up for free as they are the public transport for people who can't afford taxis - except the ancient pickup trucks without windshield that don't go very far. However, if you are feeling daring, you can hitch on top of a truck just like many of the locals do for such long distances [just like [[http://hitchwiki.org/en/User:Kimmietaylor28]] did in 2013. This will take much longer than riding in a car, but you will get a good and unique view of Guinea.
People might offer rides without being asked simply due to the rarity of seeing a backpack-ladden traveller strolling along the side of the road. Your best chances for hitching significant distances for free are with NGO jeeps (which also are much, much more confortable than ordinary public transport) and the odd company car or private car that is sympathetic to your cause. The places to hitch from are the exits of town, sometimes stopping at customs and asking for help there will help, sometimes however they won't understand what you're doing and tell you that you need to pay as does everybody else. The secondary dirt roads that lead to smaller places are almost invariably in terrible condition and are rarely used by anything but motorcycles and the occasional taxi (except if there is a market day in the region when there is a lot of commerical traffic and you stand good chances finding a free lift - check out the trucks carrying dozens of people). That said, if you are traveling solo most motorcycles that aren't packed with stuff or a second (or fourth) person will offer a ride. 

[[Category:Africa]]
[[de:Guinea]]
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}</text>
      <sha1>t0exb3ig32kdhmw1pey880jkdp1603i</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69143</id>
      <parentid>69142</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-04-20T17:19:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kimmietaylor28</username>
        <id>3893</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2239">{{infobox Country
|country = of Guinea
|language = French
|capital = [[Conakry]]
|pop = 10,200,000
|currency = Guinean Franc
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='gn' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='11' lng='-11' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}

This article refers to '''Guinea-Conakry'''.
See also [[Guinea-Bissau]] and [[Equatorial Guinea]].

In Guinea, the main roads are theoretically hitcheable, secondary roads only exceptionally. Your luck will always depend on timing as due to the state of the Guinean economy few people have personal vehicles, and even the ones that do often charge the same prices as taxis. Trucks will hardly ever pick you up for free as they are the public transport for people who can't afford taxis - except the ancient pickup trucks without windshield that don't go very far. However, if you are feeling daring, you can hitch on top of a truck just like many of the locals do for such long distances [just like Kimmie [[http://hitchwiki.org/en/User:Kimmietaylor28]] did in 2013. This will take much longer than riding in a car, but you will get a good and unique view of Guinea.
People might offer rides without being asked simply due to the rarity of seeing a backpack-ladden traveller strolling along the side of the road. Your best chances for hitching significant distances for free are with NGO jeeps (which also are much, much more comfortable than ordinary public transport) and the odd company car or private car that is sympathetic to your cause. The places to hitch from are the exits of town, sometimes stopping at customs and asking for help there will help, sometimes however they won't understand what you're doing and tell you that you need to pay as does everybody else. The secondary dirt roads that lead to smaller places are almost invariably in terrible condition and are rarely used by anything but motorcycles and the occasional taxi (except if there is a market day in the region when there is a lot of commerical traffic and you stand good chances finding a free lift - check out the trucks carrying dozens of people). That said, if you are traveling solo most motorcycles that aren't packed with stuff or a second (or fourth) person will offer a ride. 

[[Category:Africa]]
[[de:Guinea]]
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}</text>
      <sha1>t4onqo19sds8nv78alcdy7543kmipq9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69153</id>
      <parentid>69143</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-04-20T19:57:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2214">{{infobox Country
|country = of Guinea
|language = French
|capital = [[Conakry]]
|pop = 10,200,000
|currency = Guinean Franc
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='gn' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='11' lng='-11' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}

This article refers to '''Guinea-Conakry'''.
See also [[Guinea-Bissau]] and [[Equatorial Guinea]].

In Guinea, the main roads are theoretically hitcheable, secondary roads only exceptionally. Your luck will always depend on timing as due to the state of the Guinean economy few people have personal vehicles, and even the ones that do often charge the same prices as taxis. Trucks will hardly ever pick you up for free as they are the public transport for people who can't afford taxis - except the ancient pickup trucks without windshield that don't go very far. However, if you are feeling daring, you can hitch on top of a truck just like many of the locals do for such long distances just like [[User:Kimmietaylor28|Kimmie]] did in 2013. This will take much longer than riding in a car, but you will get a good and unique view of Guinea.
People might offer rides without being asked simply due to the rarity of seeing a backpack-ladden traveller strolling along the side of the road. Your best chances for hitching significant distances for free are with NGO jeeps (which also are much, much more comfortable than ordinary public transport) and the odd company car or private car that is sympathetic to your cause. The places to hitch from are the exits of town, sometimes stopping at customs and asking for help there will help, sometimes however they won't understand what you're doing and tell you that you need to pay as does everybody else. The secondary dirt roads that lead to smaller places are almost invariably in terrible condition and are rarely used by anything but motorcycles and the occasional taxi (except if there is a market day in the region when there is a lot of commerical traffic and you stand good chances finding a free lift - check out the trucks carrying dozens of people). That said, if you are traveling solo most motorcycles that aren't packed with stuff or a second (or fourth) person will offer a ride. 

[[Category:Africa]]
[[de:Guinea]]
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}</text>
      <sha1>soy3klm79m0tbk6hpaqkbykyozjzmkj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>92706</id>
      <parentid>69153</parentid>
      <timestamp>2019-02-27T12:46:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>H2g2</username>
        <id>32612</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2786">{{infobox Country
|country = of Guinea
|language = French
|capital = [[Conakry]]
|pop = 10,200,000
|currency = Guinean Franc
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='gn' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='11' lng='-11' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}

This article refers to '''Guinea-Conakry'''.
See also [[Guinea-Bissau]] and [[Equatorial Guinea]].

In Guinea, the main roads are theoretically hitcheable, secondary roads only exceptionally. Your luck will always depend on timing as due to the state of the Guinean economy few people have personal vehicles, and even the ones that do often charge the same prices as taxis. Trucks will hardly ever pick you up for free as they are the public transport for people who can't afford taxis - except the ancient pickup trucks without windshield that don't go very far. However, if you are feeling daring, you can hitch on top of a truck just like many of the locals do for such long distances just like [[User:Kimmietaylor28|Kimmie]] did in 2013. This will take much longer than riding in a car, but you will get a good and unique view of Guinea.
People might offer rides without being asked simply due to the rarity of seeing a backpack-ladden traveller strolling along the side of the road. Your best chances for hitching significant distances for free are with NGO jeeps (which also are much, much more comfortable than ordinary public transport) and the odd company car or private car that is sympathetic to your cause. The places to hitch from are the exits of town, sometimes stopping at customs and asking for help there will help, sometimes however they won't understand what you're doing and tell you that you need to pay as does everybody else. The secondary dirt roads that lead to smaller places are almost invariably in terrible condition and are rarely used by anything but motorcycles and the occasional taxi (except if there is a market day in the region when there is a lot of commerical traffic and you stand good chances finding a free lift - check out the trucks carrying dozens of people). That said, if you are traveling solo most motorcycles that aren't packed with stuff or a second (or fourth) person will offer a ride. 

=== Personal experience ===
DUring an early 2019 travel, [[User:H2g2|h2g2]] got a lot of easy rides in Fouta Djalon (moutains in the northern part of the country), where the general lack of vehicles in the country seems to be balanced by the universal hitchhiker-friendly moutainmen spirit.
In the major part of the country most roads (dirt or covered) are still very bad, and no big decision seems to be taken in the direction of improving them. To travel a 100km, be it with a taxi or hithhiking, can easily take 3 to 4 hours, and mechanical problems are to be feared.

[[Category:Africa]]
[[de:Guinea]]
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}</text>
      <sha1>2zoxelhpnvonteu795g7gbgwbrpz9u5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>97454</id>
      <parentid>92706</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-02-29T15:51:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>The-nomaddicts</username>
        <id>41926</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* Personal experience */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3104">{{infobox Country
|country = of Guinea
|language = French
|capital = [[Conakry]]
|pop = 10,200,000
|currency = Guinean Franc
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='gn' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='11' lng='-11' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}

This article refers to '''Guinea-Conakry'''.
See also [[Guinea-Bissau]] and [[Equatorial Guinea]].

In Guinea, the main roads are theoretically hitcheable, secondary roads only exceptionally. Your luck will always depend on timing as due to the state of the Guinean economy few people have personal vehicles, and even the ones that do often charge the same prices as taxis. Trucks will hardly ever pick you up for free as they are the public transport for people who can't afford taxis - except the ancient pickup trucks without windshield that don't go very far. However, if you are feeling daring, you can hitch on top of a truck just like many of the locals do for such long distances just like [[User:Kimmietaylor28|Kimmie]] did in 2013. This will take much longer than riding in a car, but you will get a good and unique view of Guinea.
People might offer rides without being asked simply due to the rarity of seeing a backpack-ladden traveller strolling along the side of the road. Your best chances for hitching significant distances for free are with NGO jeeps (which also are much, much more comfortable than ordinary public transport) and the odd company car or private car that is sympathetic to your cause. The places to hitch from are the exits of town, sometimes stopping at customs and asking for help there will help, sometimes however they won't understand what you're doing and tell you that you need to pay as does everybody else. The secondary dirt roads that lead to smaller places are almost invariably in terrible condition and are rarely used by anything but motorcycles and the occasional taxi (except if there is a market day in the region when there is a lot of commerical traffic and you stand good chances finding a free lift - check out the trucks carrying dozens of people). That said, if you are traveling solo most motorcycles that aren't packed with stuff or a second (or fourth) person will offer a ride. 

=== Personal experience ===
DUring an early 2019 travel, [[User:H2g2|h2g2]] got a lot of easy rides in Fouta Djalon (moutains in the northern part of the country), where the general lack of vehicles in the country seems to be balanced by the universal hitchhiker-friendly moutainmen spirit.
In the major part of the country most roads (dirt or covered) are still very bad, and no big decision seems to be taken in the direction of improving them. To travel a 100km, be it with a taxi or hithhiking, can easily take 3 to 4 hours, and mechanical problems are to be feared.

&lt;br&gt;
&lt;br&gt;
Durring February 2020, [[The-nomaddicts]] were denied entry to the province of Labé due to security concerns. Guinea is a relatively unstable country so it is best to check with your embassy about any road closures. Transport trucks stopped and gave us rides frequently on the route from Boke to Conakry. 

[[Category:Africa]]
[[de:Guinea]]
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}</text>
      <sha1>e3empadw1iik4fj3lxtqst3vcmg8zex</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>97455</id>
      <parentid>97454</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-02-29T15:52:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>The-nomaddicts</username>
        <id>41926</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* Personal experience */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3097">{{infobox Country
|country = of Guinea
|language = French
|capital = [[Conakry]]
|pop = 10,200,000
|currency = Guinean Franc
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='gn' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='11' lng='-11' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}

This article refers to '''Guinea-Conakry'''.
See also [[Guinea-Bissau]] and [[Equatorial Guinea]].

In Guinea, the main roads are theoretically hitcheable, secondary roads only exceptionally. Your luck will always depend on timing as due to the state of the Guinean economy few people have personal vehicles, and even the ones that do often charge the same prices as taxis. Trucks will hardly ever pick you up for free as they are the public transport for people who can't afford taxis - except the ancient pickup trucks without windshield that don't go very far. However, if you are feeling daring, you can hitch on top of a truck just like many of the locals do for such long distances just like [[User:Kimmietaylor28|Kimmie]] did in 2013. This will take much longer than riding in a car, but you will get a good and unique view of Guinea.
People might offer rides without being asked simply due to the rarity of seeing a backpack-ladden traveller strolling along the side of the road. Your best chances for hitching significant distances for free are with NGO jeeps (which also are much, much more comfortable than ordinary public transport) and the odd company car or private car that is sympathetic to your cause. The places to hitch from are the exits of town, sometimes stopping at customs and asking for help there will help, sometimes however they won't understand what you're doing and tell you that you need to pay as does everybody else. The secondary dirt roads that lead to smaller places are almost invariably in terrible condition and are rarely used by anything but motorcycles and the occasional taxi (except if there is a market day in the region when there is a lot of commerical traffic and you stand good chances finding a free lift - check out the trucks carrying dozens of people). That said, if you are traveling solo most motorcycles that aren't packed with stuff or a second (or fourth) person will offer a ride. 

=== Personal experience ===
DUring an early 2019 travel, [[User:H2g2|h2g2]] got a lot of easy rides in Fouta Djalon (moutains in the northern part of the country), where the general lack of vehicles in the country seems to be balanced by the universal hitchhiker-friendly moutainmen spirit.
In the major part of the country most roads (dirt or covered) are still very bad, and no big decision seems to be taken in the direction of improving them. To travel a 100km, be it with a taxi or hithhiking, can easily take 3 to 4 hours, and mechanical problems are to be feared.
&lt;br&gt;
During February 2020, [[The-nomaddicts]] were denied entry to the province of Labé due to security concerns. Guinea is a relatively unstable country so it is best to check with your embassy about any road closures. Transport trucks stopped and gave us rides frequently on the route from Boke to Conakry. 

[[Category:Africa]]
[[de:Guinea]]
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}</text>
      <sha1>elcogdk02du4m3o1ptr4q4d1ql71abv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>97456</id>
      <parentid>97455</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-02-29T15:53:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>The-nomaddicts</username>
        <id>41926</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* Personal experience */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3102">{{infobox Country
|country = of Guinea
|language = French
|capital = [[Conakry]]
|pop = 10,200,000
|currency = Guinean Franc
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='gn' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='11' lng='-11' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}

This article refers to '''Guinea-Conakry'''.
See also [[Guinea-Bissau]] and [[Equatorial Guinea]].

In Guinea, the main roads are theoretically hitcheable, secondary roads only exceptionally. Your luck will always depend on timing as due to the state of the Guinean economy few people have personal vehicles, and even the ones that do often charge the same prices as taxis. Trucks will hardly ever pick you up for free as they are the public transport for people who can't afford taxis - except the ancient pickup trucks without windshield that don't go very far. However, if you are feeling daring, you can hitch on top of a truck just like many of the locals do for such long distances just like [[User:Kimmietaylor28|Kimmie]] did in 2013. This will take much longer than riding in a car, but you will get a good and unique view of Guinea.
People might offer rides without being asked simply due to the rarity of seeing a backpack-ladden traveller strolling along the side of the road. Your best chances for hitching significant distances for free are with NGO jeeps (which also are much, much more comfortable than ordinary public transport) and the odd company car or private car that is sympathetic to your cause. The places to hitch from are the exits of town, sometimes stopping at customs and asking for help there will help, sometimes however they won't understand what you're doing and tell you that you need to pay as does everybody else. The secondary dirt roads that lead to smaller places are almost invariably in terrible condition and are rarely used by anything but motorcycles and the occasional taxi (except if there is a market day in the region when there is a lot of commerical traffic and you stand good chances finding a free lift - check out the trucks carrying dozens of people). That said, if you are traveling solo most motorcycles that aren't packed with stuff or a second (or fourth) person will offer a ride. 

=== Personal experience ===
DUring an early 2019 travel, [[User:H2g2|h2g2]] got a lot of easy rides in Fouta Djalon (moutains in the northern part of the country), where the general lack of vehicles in the country seems to be balanced by the universal hitchhiker-friendly moutainmen spirit.
In the major part of the country most roads (dirt or covered) are still very bad, and no big decision seems to be taken in the direction of improving them. To travel a 100km, be it with a taxi or hithhiking, can easily take 3 to 4 hours, and mechanical problems are to be feared.
&lt;br&gt;
&lt;br&gt;
During February 2020, [[The-nomaddicts]] were denied entry to the province of Labé due to security concerns. Guinea is a relatively unstable country so it is best to check with your embassy about any road closures. Transport trucks stopped and gave us rides frequently on the route from Boke to Conakry. 

[[Category:Africa]]
[[de:Guinea]]
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}</text>
      <sha1>b5limnjhddqxkcqzw20a2xv7eb4umck</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>97509</id>
      <parentid>97456</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-03-11T21:13:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>The-nomaddicts</username>
        <id>41926</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* Personal experience */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3447">{{infobox Country
|country = of Guinea
|language = French
|capital = [[Conakry]]
|pop = 10,200,000
|currency = Guinean Franc
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='gn' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='11' lng='-11' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}

This article refers to '''Guinea-Conakry'''.
See also [[Guinea-Bissau]] and [[Equatorial Guinea]].

In Guinea, the main roads are theoretically hitcheable, secondary roads only exceptionally. Your luck will always depend on timing as due to the state of the Guinean economy few people have personal vehicles, and even the ones that do often charge the same prices as taxis. Trucks will hardly ever pick you up for free as they are the public transport for people who can't afford taxis - except the ancient pickup trucks without windshield that don't go very far. However, if you are feeling daring, you can hitch on top of a truck just like many of the locals do for such long distances just like [[User:Kimmietaylor28|Kimmie]] did in 2013. This will take much longer than riding in a car, but you will get a good and unique view of Guinea.
People might offer rides without being asked simply due to the rarity of seeing a backpack-ladden traveller strolling along the side of the road. Your best chances for hitching significant distances for free are with NGO jeeps (which also are much, much more comfortable than ordinary public transport) and the odd company car or private car that is sympathetic to your cause. The places to hitch from are the exits of town, sometimes stopping at customs and asking for help there will help, sometimes however they won't understand what you're doing and tell you that you need to pay as does everybody else. The secondary dirt roads that lead to smaller places are almost invariably in terrible condition and are rarely used by anything but motorcycles and the occasional taxi (except if there is a market day in the region when there is a lot of commerical traffic and you stand good chances finding a free lift - check out the trucks carrying dozens of people). That said, if you are traveling solo most motorcycles that aren't packed with stuff or a second (or fourth) person will offer a ride. 

=== Personal experience ===
DUring an early 2019 travel, [[User:H2g2|h2g2]] got a lot of easy rides in Fouta Djalon (moutains in the northern part of the country), where the general lack of vehicles in the country seems to be balanced by the universal hitchhiker-friendly moutainmen spirit.
In the major part of the country most roads (dirt or covered) are still very bad, and no big decision seems to be taken in the direction of improving them. To travel a 100km, be it with a taxi or hithhiking, can easily take 3 to 4 hours, and mechanical problems are to be feared.
&lt;br&gt;
&lt;br&gt;
During February 2020, [[The-nomaddicts]] were denied entry to the province of Labé due to security concerns. Guinea is a relatively unstable country so it is best to check with your embassy about any road closures. The rest of the country finding rides was pretty easy and they got rides on all manner of free transport, from company cars and trucks to taxis and pickups. Rides from trucks were especially frequent. Some roads get very little traffic and are in bad shape, such as the road from Gueckedou to Macenta, (between Gueckedou and Gozombou is completely unpaved as of 2020), but with patience you will eventually find a long-distance truck.

[[Category:Africa]]
[[de:Guinea]]
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}</text>
      <sha1>42w19kmbt38hqcaey9gjkmxz938kfaw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>100175</id>
      <parentid>97509</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-01-05T21:47:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Personal experience */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3495">{{infobox Country
|country = of Guinea
|language = French
|capital = [[Conakry]]
|pop = 10,200,000
|currency = Guinean Franc
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='gn' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='11' lng='-11' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}

This article refers to '''Guinea-Conakry'''.
See also [[Guinea-Bissau]] and [[Equatorial Guinea]].

In Guinea, the main roads are theoretically hitcheable, secondary roads only exceptionally. Your luck will always depend on timing as due to the state of the Guinean economy few people have personal vehicles, and even the ones that do often charge the same prices as taxis. Trucks will hardly ever pick you up for free as they are the public transport for people who can't afford taxis - except the ancient pickup trucks without windshield that don't go very far. However, if you are feeling daring, you can hitch on top of a truck just like many of the locals do for such long distances just like [[User:Kimmietaylor28|Kimmie]] did in 2013. This will take much longer than riding in a car, but you will get a good and unique view of Guinea.
People might offer rides without being asked simply due to the rarity of seeing a backpack-ladden traveller strolling along the side of the road. Your best chances for hitching significant distances for free are with NGO jeeps (which also are much, much more comfortable than ordinary public transport) and the odd company car or private car that is sympathetic to your cause. The places to hitch from are the exits of town, sometimes stopping at customs and asking for help there will help, sometimes however they won't understand what you're doing and tell you that you need to pay as does everybody else. The secondary dirt roads that lead to smaller places are almost invariably in terrible condition and are rarely used by anything but motorcycles and the occasional taxi (except if there is a market day in the region when there is a lot of commerical traffic and you stand good chances finding a free lift - check out the trucks carrying dozens of people). That said, if you are traveling solo most motorcycles that aren't packed with stuff or a second (or fourth) person will offer a ride. 

=== Personal experience ===

DUring an early 2019 travel, [[User:H2g2|h2g2]] got a lot of easy rides in Fouta Djalon (moutains in the northern part of the country), where the general lack of vehicles in the country seems to be balanced by the universal hitchhiker-friendly moutainmen spirit.
In the major part of the country most roads (dirt or covered) are still very bad, and no big decision seems to be taken in the direction of improving them. To travel a 100km, be it with a taxi or hithhiking, can easily take 3 to 4 hours, and mechanical problems are to be feared.
&lt;br&gt;
&lt;br&gt;
During February 2020, [[The-nomaddicts]] were denied entry to the province of Labé due to security concerns. Guinea is a relatively unstable country so it is best to check with your embassy about any road closures. The rest of the country finding rides was pretty easy and they got rides on all manner of free transport, from company cars and trucks to taxis and pickups. Rides from trucks were especially frequent. Some roads get very little traffic and are in bad shape, such as the road from Gueckedou to Macenta, (between Gueckedou and Gozombou is completely unpaved as of 2020), but with patience you will eventually find a long-distance truck.



== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


[[Category:Africa]]
[[de:Guinea]]
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}</text>
      <sha1>12d8znbndkpic58815kdg39v7pkv575</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>114789</id>
      <parentid>100175</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-10-09T17:49:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GriL</username>
        <id>24751</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3515">{{infobox Country
|country = of Guinea
|language = French
|capital = [[Conakry]]
|pop = 10,200,000
|currency = Guinean Franc
|hitch =  &lt;rating country='gn' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='11' lng='-11' zoom='6' view='0' /&gt;
}}

This article refers to '''Guinea-Conakry'''.
See also [[Guinea-Bissau]] and [[Equatorial Guinea]].

In Guinea, the main roads are theoretically hitcheable, secondary roads only exceptionally. Your luck will always depend on timing as due to the state of the Guinean economy few people have personal vehicles, and even the ones that do often charge the same prices as taxis. Trucks will hardly ever pick you up for free as they are the public transport for people who can't afford taxis - except the ancient pickup trucks without windshield that don't go very far. However, if you are feeling daring, you can hitch on top of a truck just like many of the locals do for such long distances just like [[User:Kimmietaylor28|Kimmie]] did in 2013. This will take much longer than riding in a car, but you will get a good and unique view of Guinea.
People might offer rides without being asked simply due to the rarity of seeing a backpack-ladden traveller strolling along the side of the road. Your best chances for hitching significant distances for free are with NGO jeeps (which also are much, much more comfortable than ordinary public transport) and the odd company car or private car that is sympathetic to your cause. The places to hitch from are the exits of town, sometimes stopping at customs and asking for help there will help, sometimes however they won't understand what you're doing and tell you that you need to pay as does everybody else. The secondary dirt roads that lead to smaller places are almost invariably in terrible condition and are rarely used by anything but motorcycles and the occasional taxi (except if there is a market day in the region when there is a lot of commerical traffic and you stand good chances finding a free lift - check out the trucks carrying dozens of people). That said, if you are traveling solo most motorcycles that aren't packed with stuff or a second (or fourth) person will offer a ride. 

=== Personal experience ===

DUring an early 2019 travel, [[User:H2g2|h2g2]] got a lot of easy rides in Fouta Djalon (moutains in the northern part of the country), where the general lack of vehicles in the country seems to be balanced by the universal hitchhiker-friendly moutainmen spirit.
In the major part of the country most roads (dirt or covered) are still very bad, and no big decision seems to be taken in the direction of improving them. To travel a 100km, be it with a taxi or hithhiking, can easily take 3 to 4 hours, and mechanical problems are to be feared.
&lt;br&gt;
&lt;br&gt;
During February 2020, [[The-nomaddicts]] were denied entry to the province of Labé due to security concerns. Guinea is a relatively unstable country so it is best to check with your embassy about any road closures. The rest of the country finding rides was pretty easy and they got rides on all manner of free transport, from company cars and trucks to taxis and pickups. Rides from trucks were especially frequent. Some roads get very little traffic and are in bad shape, such as the road from Gueckedou to Macenta, (between Gueckedou and Gozombou is completely unpaved as of 2020), but with patience you will eventually find a long-distance truck.



== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


[[Category:Africa]]
[[de:Guinea]]
[[ru:Гвинея]]
{{IsIn|Western Africa}}</text>
      <sha1>ntkysr3e7nn6piaz71mpb91l0s6fmkr</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Western Sahara</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1530</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1565</id>
      <parentid>4416</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T14:15:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1088">In the '''Western Sahara''' rides are plentiful and usually free on the main paved roads connecting Laayoune, Dakhla and Smara. The UN does not give rides without official permission apparently, which is a shame as it seems they're the only people who can give you any insight into the political situation here. Local Moroccans will tell you all sorts.

Truck drivers may ask you to "sleep" in a discrete position to avoid the endless police passport checks (which can make you a bit of a burden to carry). This shouldn't be a problem if it's not too obvious, but you don't want to get on the wrong side of the police in Western Sahara (who can be rather paranoid).

Lifts with overland travellers to [[Mauritania]] can be found by asking around at Camping Moussaffir (just north of Dakhla).

The lorry drivers are lately reluctant to give a lift as then they have to bribe at each police post. It is better to omit that situation, and hitch to the post after [[Al-Uyuun]] and ask the police to pass the info on by phone to the next stop. &lt;!-- jurahasiok at wp.pl --&gt;

[[Category:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>kpg138l9pp0vrzvwvv0wavce9ofdk46</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1566</id>
      <parentid>1565</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1088">In the '''Western Sahara''' rides are plentiful and usually free on the main paved roads connecting Laayoune, Dakhla and Smara. The UN does not give rides without official permission apparently, which is a shame as it seems they're the only people who can give you any insight into the political situation here. Local Moroccans will tell you all sorts.

Truck drivers may ask you to "sleep" in a discrete position to avoid the endless police passport checks (which can make you a bit of a burden to carry). This shouldn't be a problem if it's not too obvious, but you don't want to get on the wrong side of the police in Western Sahara (who can be rather paranoid).

Lifts with overland travellers to [[Mauritania]] can be found by asking around at Camping Moussaffir (just north of Dakhla).

The lorry drivers are lately reluctant to give a lift as then they have to bribe at each police post. It is better to omit that situation, and hitch to the post after [[Al-Uyuun]] and ask the police to pass the info on by phone to the next stop. &lt;!-- jurahasiok at wp.pl --&gt;

[[Category:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>kpg138l9pp0vrzvwvv0wavce9ofdk46</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4416</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T18:05:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GuakaTest</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1046">In the '''Western Sahara''' rides are plentiful and usually free on the main paved roads connecting Laayoune, Dakhla and Smara. The UN does not give rides without official permission apparently, which is a shame as it seems they're the only people who can give you any insight into the political situation here. Local Moroccans will tell you all sorts.

Truck drivers may ask you to "sleep" in a discrete position to avoid the endless police passport checks (which can make you a bit of a burden to carry). This shouldn't be a problem if it's not too obvious, but you don't want to get on the wrong side of the police in Western Sahara (who can be rather paranoid).

Lifts with overland travellers to [[Mauritania]] can be found by asking around at Camping Moussaffir (just north of Dakhla).

The lorry drivers are lately reluctant to give a lift as then they have to bribe at each police post. we ommited that situation, hitching AT the post after Al-Uyuun and asking the police to pass the info on by phone to the next stop. jurahasiok at wp.pl</text>
      <sha1>dkvy6bmaipwqlni0ldeng822rugf346</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4417</id>
      <parentid>1566</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1088">In the '''Western Sahara''' rides are plentiful and usually free on the main paved roads connecting Laayoune, Dakhla and Smara. The UN does not give rides without official permission apparently, which is a shame as it seems they're the only people who can give you any insight into the political situation here. Local Moroccans will tell you all sorts.

Truck drivers may ask you to "sleep" in a discrete position to avoid the endless police passport checks (which can make you a bit of a burden to carry). This shouldn't be a problem if it's not too obvious, but you don't want to get on the wrong side of the police in Western Sahara (who can be rather paranoid).

Lifts with overland travellers to [[Mauritania]] can be found by asking around at Camping Moussaffir (just north of Dakhla).

The lorry drivers are lately reluctant to give a lift as then they have to bribe at each police post. It is better to omit that situation, and hitch to the post after [[Al-Uyuun]] and ask the police to pass the info on by phone to the next stop. &lt;!-- jurahasiok at wp.pl --&gt;

[[Category:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>kpg138l9pp0vrzvwvv0wavce9ofdk46</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14799</id>
      <parentid>4417</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-13T23:29:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1108">In the '''Western Sahara''' rides are plentiful and usually free on the main paved roads connecting Laayoune, Dakhla and Smara. The UN does not give rides without official permission apparently, which is a shame as it seems they're the only people who can give you any insight into the political situation here. Local Moroccans will tell you all sorts.

Truck drivers may ask you to "sleep" in a discrete position to avoid the endless police passport checks (which can make you a bit of a burden to carry). This shouldn't be a problem if it's not too obvious, but you don't want to get on the wrong side of the police in Western Sahara (who can be rather paranoid).

Lifts with overland travellers to [[Mauritania]] can be found by asking around at Camping Moussaffir (just north of Dakhla).

The lorry drivers are lately reluctant to give a lift as then they have to bribe at each police post. It is better to omit that situation, and hitch to the post after [[Al-Uyuun]] and ask the police to pass the info on by phone to the next stop. &lt;!-- jurahasiok at wp.pl --&gt;


[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Westsahara]]</text>
      <sha1>iijixzw8mk3fds17t401nsin7ld5qnl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27371</id>
      <parentid>14799</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-08T03:42:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sigurdas</username>
        <id>1658</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1316">{{infobox Country
|country = Western Sahara
|map= &lt;map lat='23.755181766112635' lng='-15.029296875' zoom='7' view='0' float='right' /&gt;
|language = N/A (recognized regional languages are Arabic and Spanish)
|capital = N/A (largest city is [[Laâyoune (El Aaiún)]])
|pop = 382,617
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = from {{average}} to {{very good}} }}
In '''Western Sahara''' rides are plentiful and usually free on the main paved roads connecting [[Laâyoune (El Aaiún)|Laayoune]], [[Dakhla]] and [[Smara]]. The UN does not give rides without official permission apparently which is a shame as it seems they're the only people who can give you any insight into a political situation there. Local Moroccans will tell you all sorts.

Truck drivers might ask you to "sleep" in a discrete position to avoid endless police passport checks.

To get to [[Mauritania]] one can ask drivers at camping ''Moussaffir'' (north of Dakhla).

In fact, lorry drivers might be reluctant to give a lift to hitchhiker since they might have to bribe at each police post then. It is more convenient to hitch to the post that comes after [[Al-Uyuun]] and then ask the police to pass on the information about a "traveling hitchhiker" by phone to the next police post on the road. 


[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Westsahara]]</text>
      <sha1>q3mrcvjabrog8wselbu8i9aicsvnct0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32348</id>
      <parentid>27371</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-04-21T07:12:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1341">{{infobox Country
|country = Western Sahara
|map= &lt;map lat='23.755181766112635' lng='-15.029296875' zoom='7' view='0' float='right' /&gt;
|language = N/A (recognized regional languages are Arabic and Spanish)
|capital = N/A (largest city is [[Laâyoune (El Aaiún)]])
|pop = 382,617
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = from {{average}} to {{very good}} }}
In '''Western Sahara''' rides are plentiful and usually free on the main paved roads connecting [[Laâyoune (El Aaiún)|Laayoune]], [[Dakhla]] and [[Smara]]. The UN does not give rides without official permission apparently which is a shame as it seems they're the only people who can give you any insight into a political situation there. Local Moroccans will tell you all sorts.

Truck drivers might ask you to "sleep" in a discrete position to avoid endless police passport checks.

To get to [[Mauritania]] one can ask drivers at camping ''Moussaffir'' (north of Dakhla).

In fact, lorry drivers might be reluctant to give a lift to hitchhiker since they might have to bribe at each police post then. It is more convenient to hitch to the post that comes after [[Al-Uyuun]] and then ask the police to pass on the information about a "traveling hitchhiker" by phone to the next police post on the road. 


[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Westsahara]]
{{IsIn|Northern Africa}}</text>
      <sha1>qedfn2vmcbw8ic3ja2uusyysjcyqb2y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32381</id>
      <parentid>32348</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-04-23T07:15:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Quarim</username>
        <id>1290</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1447">{{infobox Country
|country = Western Sahara
|map= &lt;map lat='23.755181766112635' lng='-15.029296875' zoom='7' view='0' float='right' /&gt;
|language = N/A (recognized regional languages are Arabic and Spanish)
|capital = N/A (largest city is [[Laâyoune (El Aaiún)]])
|pop = 382,617
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = from {{average}} to {{very good}} }}
In '''Western Sahara''' rides are plentiful and usually free on the main paved roads connecting [[Laâyoune (El Aaiún)|Laayoune]], [[Dakhla]] and [[Smara]]. The UN does not give rides without official permission apparently which is a shame as it seems they're the only people who can give you any insight into a political situation there. Local Moroccans will tell you all sorts.

Truck drivers might ask you to "sleep" in a discrete position to avoid endless police passport checks.

To get to [[Mauritania]] one can ask drivers at camping ''Moussaffir'' (north of Dakhla).

In fact, lorry drivers might be reluctant to give a lift to hitchhiker since they might have to bribe at each police post then. It is more convenient to hitch to the post that comes after [[Al-Uyuun]] and then ask the police to pass on the information about a "traveling hitchhiker" by phone to the next police post on the road. 

==Border crossing==
Be aware of mines in the border region to [[Mauretania]]. Don't leave the road there.

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Westsahara]]
{{IsIn|Northern Africa}}</text>
      <sha1>ggb9x93qjgagu68swzlioa8ivgifbol</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32382</id>
      <parentid>32381</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-04-23T07:15:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Quarim</username>
        <id>1290</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1447">{{infobox Country
|country = Western Sahara
|map= &lt;map lat='23.755181766112635' lng='-15.029296875' zoom='7' view='0' float='right' /&gt;
|language = N/A (recognized regional languages are Arabic and Spanish)
|capital = N/A (largest city is [[Laâyoune (El Aaiún)]])
|pop = 382,617
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = from {{average}} to {{very good}} }}
In '''Western Sahara''' rides are plentiful and usually free on the main paved roads connecting [[Laâyoune (El Aaiún)|Laayoune]], [[Dakhla]] and [[Smara]]. The UN does not give rides without official permission apparently which is a shame as it seems they're the only people who can give you any insight into a political situation there. Local Moroccans will tell you all sorts.

Truck drivers might ask you to "sleep" in a discrete position to avoid endless police passport checks.

To get to [[Mauritania]] one can ask drivers at camping ''Moussaffir'' (north of Dakhla).

In fact, lorry drivers might be reluctant to give a lift to hitchhiker since they might have to bribe at each police post then. It is more convenient to hitch to the post that comes after [[Al-Uyuun]] and then ask the police to pass on the information about a "traveling hitchhiker" by phone to the next police post on the road. 

==Border crossing==
Be aware of mines in the border region to [[Mauritania]]. Don't leave the road there.

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Westsahara]]
{{IsIn|Northern Africa}}</text>
      <sha1>1o9t9b3ajqluo27zkz0949mum6g4soe</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35641</id>
      <parentid>32382</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T19:22:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1449">{{infobox Country
|country = Western Sahara
|map= &lt;map lat='23.755181766112635' lng='-15.029296875' zoom='7' view='0' float='right' /&gt;
|language = N/A (recognized regional languages are Arabic and Spanish)
|capital = N/A (largest city is [[Laâyoune (El Aaiún)]])
|pop = 382,617
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = from {{average}} to {{very good}} }}
In '''Western Sahara''' rides are plentiful and usually free on the main paved roads connecting [[Laâyoune (El Aaiún)|Laayoune]], [[Dakhla]] and [[Smara]]. The UN does not give rides without official permission apparently which is a shame as it seems they're the only people who can give you any insight into a political situation there. Local Moroccans will tell you all sorts.

Truck drivers might ask you to "sleep" in a discrete position to avoid endless police passport checks.

To get to [[Mauritania]] one can ask drivers at camping ''Moussaffir'' (north of Dakhla).

In fact, lorry drivers might be reluctant to give a lift to hitchhiker since they might have to bribe at each police post then. It is more convenient to hitch to the post that comes after [[Al-Uyuun]] and then ask the police to pass on the information about a "traveling hitchhiker" by phone to the next police post on the road. 

== Border crossing ==
Be aware of mines in the border region to [[Mauritania]]. Don't leave the road there.
{{IsIn|Northern Africa}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Westsahara]]</text>
      <sha1>dqzwjmqqgmarvcer0wli024xijqhte1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35854</id>
      <parentid>35641</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-16T23:57:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1469">{{infobox Country
|country = Western Sahara
|map= &lt;map lat='23.755181766112635' lng='-15.029296875' zoom='7' view='0' float='right' /&gt;
|language = N/A (recognized regional languages are Arabic and Spanish)
|capital = N/A (largest city is [[Laâyoune (El Aaiún)]])
|pop = 382,617
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = from {{average}} to {{very good}} }}
In '''Western Sahara''' rides are plentiful and usually free on the main paved roads connecting [[Laâyoune (El Aaiún)|Laayoune]], [[Dakhla]] and [[Smara]]. The UN does not give rides without official permission apparently which is a shame as it seems they're the only people who can give you any insight into a political situation there. Local Moroccans will tell you all sorts.

Truck drivers might ask you to "sleep" in a discrete position to avoid endless police passport checks.

To get to [[Mauritania]] one can ask drivers at camping ''Moussaffir'' (north of Dakhla).

In fact, lorry drivers might be reluctant to give a lift to hitchhiker since they might have to bribe at each police post then. It is more convenient to hitch to the post that comes after [[Al-Uyuun]] and then ask the police to pass on the information about a "traveling hitchhiker" by phone to the next police post on the road. 

== Border crossing ==
Be aware of mines in the border region to [[Mauritania]]. Don't leave the road there.
{{IsIn|Northern Africa}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Westsahara]]
[[zh:西撒哈拉]]</text>
      <sha1>26cwti5644rgomfxtsvalj5whg33vqi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44751</id>
      <parentid>35854</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-09-12T08:11:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2375">{{infobox Country
|country = Western Sahara
|map= &lt;map lat='23.755181766112635' lng='-15.029296875' zoom='7' view='0' float='right' /&gt;
|language = N/A (recognized regional languages are Arabic and Spanish)
|capital = N/A (largest city is [[Laâyoune]])
|pop = 382,617
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = from {{average}} to {{very good}} }}
'''Western Sahara''' is a mostly Moroccan-controlled territory in [[Northern Africa]]. Western Sahara has been on the United Nations list of non-self-governing territories since the 1960s when it was a Spanish colony. 

When travelling here, you are de-facto travelling on the territory of the kingdom of [[Morocco]], so all visa-issues, police control checkpoints etc. are mostly applying to [[Morocco]]. Speaking a little bit of French, Spanish or Arabic will bring you through without problems, though more and more people speak good English due to the presence of the UN. Parts of the east (behind the berm) are controlled by the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polisario_Front Polisario Front], and the southernmost city Lagouira seems to be under Mauritanian control (August 2010), though this information has to be confirmed yet.

===Hitchhiking===
Hitchhiking in '''Western Sahara''' is very easy along the coastal road N1, where traffic is plentiful but sometimes sparely as well. All over the territory, from big cities to the most sparsely location, people pop up to hitchhike as well, so the concept is well known and understood. It will be easy for you to catch rides all the way to [[Mauritania]]. Locals hitch rides with pointing the forefinger into the driving direction instead of using the thumb.

Hitchhiking the N14 to [[As-Smara]] shouldn't be a problem as well, but the other two main roads N3 and N5 can bring problems with them, due to the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Border_Wall_(Western_Sahara) berm] and partly Polisario-controlled areas. Travelling these roads should be taken with a lot of care and it's always best to collect information about the current situation. It can happen that Moroccan police will send you back and not let through.

Second, the whole territory is still covered partly with undiscovered landmines, so be extremely careful when leaving the main roads and walking into the desert.

{{IsIn|Northern Africa}}
[[Category:Northern Africa]]
[[de:Westsahara]]
[[zh:西撒哈拉]]</text>
      <sha1>0293zivzz4jo9jd24tmqprj8emjorhi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44752</id>
      <parentid>44751</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-09-12T08:19:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2527">{{infobox Country
|country = Western Sahara
|map= &lt;map lat='23.755181766112635' lng='-15.029296875' zoom='7' view='0' float='right' /&gt;
|language = N/A (recognized regional languages are Arabic and Spanish)
|capital = N/A (largest city is [[Laâyoune]])
|pop = 382,617
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = from {{average}} to {{very good}} }}
'''Western Sahara''' is a mostly Moroccan-controlled territory in [[Northern Africa]]. Western Sahara has been on the United Nations list of non-self-governing territories since the 1960s when it was a Spanish colony. 

When travelling here, you are de-facto travelling on the territory of the kingdom of [[Morocco]], so all visa-issues, police control checkpoints etc. are mostly applying to [[Morocco]]. Speaking a little bit of French, Spanish or Arabic will bring you through without problems, though more and more people speak good English due to the presence of the UN. Parts of the east (behind the berm) are controlled by the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polisario_Front Polisario Front], and the southernmost city Lagouira seems to be under Mauritanian control (August 2010), though this information has to be confirmed yet.

===Hitchhiking===
Hitchhiking in '''Western Sahara''' is very easy along the coastal road N1, where traffic is plentiful but sometimes sparely as well. All over the territory, from big cities to the most sparsely location, people pop up to hitchhike as well, so the concept is well known and understood. It will be easy for you to catch rides all the way to [[Mauritania]]. Locals hitch rides with pointing the forefinger into the driving direction instead of using the thumb.

Hitchhiking the N14 to [[Smara]] shouldn't be a problem as well, but the other two main roads N3 and N5 can bring problems with them, due to the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Border_Wall_(Western_Sahara) berm] and partly Polisario-controlled areas. Travelling these roads should be taken with a lot of care and it's always best to collect information about the current situation. It can happen that Moroccan police will send you back and not let through.

Second, the whole territory is still covered partly with undiscovered landmines, so be extremely careful when leaving the main roads and walking into the desert.

===Cities===
* [[Ad-Dakhla]] (Villa Cisneros)
* [[Boujdour]] (Cape Bojador)
* [[El Aaiún]] (Laâyoune), [[El Marsa]]
* [[Lagouira]]
* [[Smara]] (Semara)

{{IsIn|Northern Africa}}
[[Category:Northern Africa]]
[[de:Westsahara]]
[[zh:西撒哈拉]]</text>
      <sha1>ev24t3fjt1b8lck8otnrddlofsavzp3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44763</id>
      <parentid>44752</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-09-12T10:11:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>87.64.49.22</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2531">{{infobox Country
|country = Western Sahara
|map= &lt;map lat='23.755181766112635' lng='-15.029296875' zoom='7' view='0' float='right' /&gt;
|language = N/A (recognized regional languages are Arabic and Spanish)
|capital = N/A (largest city is [[Laâyoune]])
|pop = 382,617
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = from {{average}} to {{very good}} }}
'''Western Sahara''' is a mostly Moroccan-controlled territory in [[Northern Africa]]. Western Sahara has been on the United Nations list of non-self-governing territories since the 1960s when it was a Spanish colony. 

When travelling here, you are de-facto travelling on the territory of the kingdom of [[Morocco]], so all visa-issues, police control checkpoints etc. are mostly applying to [[Morocco]]. Speaking a little bit of French, Spanish or Arabic will bring you through without problems, though more and more people speak good English due to the presence of the UN. Parts of the east (behind the berm) are controlled by the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polisario_Front Polisario Front], and the southernmost city Lagouira seems to be under [[Mauritania]]n control (August 2010), though this information has to be confirmed yet.

===Hitchhiking===
Hitchhiking in '''Western Sahara''' is very easy along the coastal road N1, where traffic is plentiful but sometimes sparely as well. All over the territory, from big cities to the most sparsely location, people pop up to hitchhike as well, so the concept is well known and understood. It will be easy for you to catch rides all the way to [[Mauritania]]. Locals hitch rides with pointing the forefinger into the driving direction instead of using the thumb.

Hitchhiking the N14 to [[Smara]] shouldn't be a problem as well, but the other two main roads N3 and N5 can bring problems with them, due to the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Border_Wall_(Western_Sahara) berm] and partly Polisario-controlled areas. Travelling these roads should be taken with a lot of care and it's always best to collect information about the current situation. It can happen that Moroccan police will send you back and not let through.

Second, the whole territory is still covered partly with undiscovered landmines, so be extremely careful when leaving the main roads and walking into the desert.

===Cities===
* [[Ad-Dakhla]] (Villa Cisneros)
* [[Boujdour]] (Cape Bojador)
* [[El Aaiún]] (Laâyoune), [[El Marsa]]
* [[Lagouira]]
* [[Smara]] (Semara)

{{IsIn|Northern Africa}}
[[Category:Northern Africa]]
[[de:Westsahara]]
[[zh:西撒哈拉]]</text>
      <sha1>1ejhct1n1zt5pxaot9ewfby3oojybuz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44766</id>
      <parentid>44763</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-09-12T13:59:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3049">{{infobox Country
|country = Western Sahara
|map= &lt;map lat='23.755181766112635' lng='-15.029296875' zoom='7' view='0' float='right' /&gt;
|language = N/A (recognized regional languages are Arabic and Spanish)
|capital = N/A (largest city is [[Laâyoune]])
|pop = 382,617
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = from {{average}} to {{very good}} }}
'''Western Sahara''' is a mostly Moroccan-controlled territory in [[Northern Africa]]. Western Sahara has been on the United Nations list of non-self-governing territories since the 1960s when it was a Spanish colony. 

When travelling here, you are de-facto travelling on the territory of the kingdom of [[Morocco]], so all visa-issues, police control checkpoints etc. are mostly applying to [[Morocco]]. Speaking a little bit of French, Spanish or Arabic will bring you through without problems, though more and more people speak good English due to the presence of the UN. Parts of the east (behind the berm) are controlled by the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polisario_Front Polisario Front], and the southernmost city Lagouira seems to be under [[Mauritania]]n control (August 2010), though this information has to be confirmed yet.

===Hitchhiking===
Hitchhiking in '''Western Sahara''' is very easy along the coastal road N1, where traffic is plentiful but sometimes sparely as well. All over the territory, from big cities to the most sparsely location, people pop up to hitchhike as well, so the concept is well known and understood. It will be easy for you to catch rides all the way to [[Mauritania]]. Locals hitch rides with pointing the forefinger into the driving direction instead of using the thumb.

Hitchhiking the N14 to [[Smara]] shouldn't be a problem as well, but the other two main roads N3 and N5 can bring problems with them, due to the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Border_Wall_(Western_Sahara) berm] and partly Polisario-controlled areas. Travelling these roads should be taken with a lot of care and it's always best to collect information about the current situation. It can happen that Moroccan police will send you back and not let through.

Second, the whole territory is still covered partly with undiscovered landmines, so be extremely careful when leaving the main roads and walking into the desert.

===Cities===
* [[Ad-Dakhla]] (Villa Cisneros)
* [[Boujdour]] (Cape Bojador)
* [[El Aaiún]] (Laâyoune), [[El Marsa]]
* [[Lagouira]]
* [[Smara]] (Semara)

===Border Crossing===
* Morocco: There actually is no border, just a handful of police checkpoints along the road.
* Mauritania: Many land mines around the border area, take care! Visa are not issued anymore at the border, you have to get them beforehand at the Mauritanian embassy in [[Rabat]] (Morocco) or elsewhere they have one.
* Algeria: The border to Algeria is closed, though it could be possible to get into via Polisario-controlled areas, though this is absolutely not advised if you want to travel safely.

{{IsIn|Northern Africa}}
[[Category:Northern Africa]]
[[de:Westsahara]]
[[zh:西撒哈拉]]</text>
      <sha1>erlrwiosfky1ghaelqen0madjxgp00v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>46316</id>
      <parentid>44766</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-30T17:20:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Vrana</username>
        <id>2467</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3486">{{infobox Country
|country = Western Sahara
|map= &lt;map lat='23.755181766112635' lng='-15.029296875' zoom='7' view='0' float='right' /&gt;
|language = N/A (recognized regional languages are Arabic and Spanish)
|capital = N/A (largest city is [[Laâyoune]])
|pop = 382,617
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = from {{average}} to {{very good}} }}
'''Western Sahara''' is a mostly Moroccan-controlled territory in [[Northern Africa]]. Western Sahara has been on the United Nations list of non-self-governing territories since the 1960s when it was a Spanish colony. 

When travelling here, you are de-facto travelling on the territory of the kingdom of [[Morocco]], so all visa-issues, police control checkpoints etc. are mostly applying to [[Morocco]]. Speaking a little bit of French, Spanish or Arabic will bring you through without problems, though more and more people speak good English due to the presence of the UN. Parts of the east (behind the berm) are controlled by the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polisario_Front Polisario Front], and the southernmost city Lagouira seems to be under [[Mauritania]]n control (August 2010), though this information has to be confirmed yet.

===Hitchhiking===
Hitchhiking in '''Western Sahara''' is very easy along the coastal road N1, where traffic is plentiful but sometimes sparely as well. All over the territory, from big cities to the most sparsely location, people pop up to hitchhike as well, so the concept is well known and understood. It will be easy for you to catch rides all the way to [[Mauritania]]. Locals hitch rides with pointing the forefinger into the driving direction instead of using the thumb.

Hitchhiking the N14 to [[Smara]] shouldn't be a problem as well, but the other two main roads N3 and N5 can bring problems with them, due to the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Border_Wall_(Western_Sahara) berm] and partly Polisario-controlled areas. Travelling these roads should be taken with a lot of care and it's always best to collect information about the current situation. It can happen that Moroccan police will send you back and not let through.

Second, the whole territory is still covered partly with undiscovered landmines, so be extremely careful when leaving the main roads and walking into the desert.

Finding long rides can be especially easy with westerners heading southwards towards Nouakchott and Senegal and can be done at Camping Moussafir in Dakhla and also Hotel Barbosa about 60 km from the border, where a lot of moroccans and westerners stop so that they can reach the border nice and early the next day.

Western Saharan border with Mauritania closes at 6 in the evening, and is a good place for finding southbound rides at.

===Cities===
* [[Ad-Dakhla]] (Villa Cisneros)
* [[Boujdour]] (Cape Bojador)
* [[El Aaiún]] (Laâyoune), [[El Marsa]]
* [[Lagouira]]
* [[Smara]] (Semara)

===Border Crossing===
* Morocco: There actually is no border, just a handful of police checkpoints along the road.
* Mauritania: Many land mines around the border area, take care! Visa are not issued anymore at the border, you have to get them beforehand at the Mauritanian embassy in [[Rabat]] (Morocco) or elsewhere they have one.
* Algeria: The border to Algeria is closed, though it could be possible to get into via Polisario-controlled areas, though this is absolutely not advised if you want to travel safely.

{{IsIn|Northern Africa}}
[[Category:Northern Africa]]
[[de:Westsahara]]
[[zh:西撒哈拉]]</text>
      <sha1>pej5z1mwoa9x0jhu55q08sxsh26i1ht</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>46317</id>
      <parentid>46316</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-30T17:27:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Vrana</username>
        <id>2467</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3886">{{infobox Country
|country = Western Sahara
|map= &lt;map lat='23.755181766112635' lng='-15.029296875' zoom='7' view='0' float='right' /&gt;
|language = N/A (recognized regional languages are Arabic and Spanish)
|capital = N/A (largest city is [[Laâyoune]])
|pop = 382,617
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = from {{average}} to {{very good}} }}
'''Western Sahara''' is a mostly Moroccan-controlled territory in [[Northern Africa]]. Western Sahara has been on the United Nations list of non-self-governing territories since the 1960s when it was a Spanish colony. 

When travelling here, you are de-facto travelling on the territory of the kingdom of [[Morocco]], so all visa-issues, police control checkpoints etc. are mostly applying to [[Morocco]]. Speaking a little bit of French, Spanish or Arabic will bring you through without problems, though more and more people speak good English due to the presence of the UN. Parts of the east (behind the berm) are controlled by the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polisario_Front Polisario Front], and the southernmost city Lagouira seems to be under [[Mauritania]]n control (August 2010), though this information has to be confirmed yet.

===Hitchhiking===
Hitchhiking in '''Western Sahara''' is very easy along the coastal road N1, where traffic is plentiful but sometimes sparely as well. All over the territory, from big cities to the most sparsely location, people pop up to hitchhike as well, so the concept is well known and understood. It will be easy for you to catch rides all the way to [[Mauritania]]. Locals hitch rides with pointing the forefinger into the driving direction instead of using the thumb.

Hitchhiking the N14 to [[Smara]] shouldn't be a problem as well, but the other two main roads N3 and N5 can bring problems with them, due to the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Border_Wall_(Western_Sahara) berm] and partly Polisario-controlled areas. Travelling these roads should be taken with a lot of care and it's always best to collect information about the current situation. It can happen that Moroccan police will send you back and not let through.

Second, the whole territory is still covered partly with undiscovered landmines, so be extremely careful when leaving the main roads and walking into the desert.

Finding long rides can be especially easy with westerners heading southwards towards Nouakchott and Senegal and can be done at Camping Moussafir in Dakhla and also Hotel Barbosa about 60 km from the border, where a lot of moroccans and westerners stop so that they can reach the border nice and early the next day.

Western Saharan border with Mauritania closes at 6 in the evening and is a good time for finding northbound rides. In the mornings, especially the cars lined up before 9, when the border opens, will have drivers out of the cars walking about, a good chance to ask for rides. Look for Senegalese people as they are usually familiar with mauritania and know the fun places to visit, while at the same time you'll have a ride all the way to Senegal. (Nanga def? How are you? In wolof, great way to start off your request.)

===Cities===
* [[Ad-Dakhla]] (Villa Cisneros)
* [[Boujdour]] (Cape Bojador)
* [[El Aaiún]] (Laâyoune), [[El Marsa]]
* [[Lagouira]]
* [[Smara]] (Semara)

===Border Crossing===
* Morocco: There actually is no border, just a handful of police checkpoints along the road.
* Mauritania: Many land mines around the border area, take care! Visa are not issued anymore at the border, you have to get them beforehand at the Mauritanian embassy in [[Rabat]] (Morocco) or elsewhere they have one.
* Algeria: The border to Algeria is closed, though it could be possible to get into via Polisario-controlled areas, though this is absolutely not advised if you want to travel safely.

{{IsIn|Northern Africa}}
[[Category:Northern Africa]]
[[de:Westsahara]]
[[zh:西撒哈拉]]</text>
      <sha1>rn00n5y5f76mqt6mygio48iipb0gl8v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>46331</id>
      <parentid>46317</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-30T20:59:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3883">{{infobox Country
|country = Western Sahara
|map= &lt;map lat='23.755181766112635' lng='-15.029296875' zoom='7' view='0' float='right' /&gt;
|language = N/A (recognized regional languages are Arabic and Spanish)
|capital = N/A (largest city is [[Laâyoune]])
|pop = 382,617
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = from {{average}} to {{very good}} }}
'''Western Sahara''' is a mostly Moroccan-controlled territory in [[Northern Africa]]. Western Sahara has been on the United Nations list of non-self-governing territories since the 1960s when it was a Spanish colony. 

When traveling here, you are de-facto traveling on the territory of the kingdom of [[Morocco]], so all visa-issues, police control checkpoints etc. are mostly applying to [[Morocco]]. Speaking a little bit of French, Spanish or Arabic will bring you through without problems, though more and more people speak good English due to the presence of the UN. Parts of the east (behind the berm) are controlled by the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polisario_Front Polisario Front], and the southernmost city Lagouira seems to be under [[Mauritania]]n control (August 2010), though this information has to be confirmed yet.

===Hitchhiking===
Hitchhiking in '''Western Sahara''' is very easy along the coastal road N1, where traffic is plentiful but sometimes sparely as well. All over the territory, from big cities to the most sparsely location, people pop up to hitchhike as well, so the concept is well known and understood. It will be easy for you to catch rides all the way to [[Mauritania]]. Locals hitch rides with pointing the forefinger into the driving direction instead of using the thumb.

Hitchhiking the N14 to [[Smara]] shouldn't be a problem as well, but the other two main roads N3 and N5 can bring problems with them, due to the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Border_Wall_(Western_Sahara) berm] and partly Polisario-controlled areas. Traveling these roads should be taken with a lot of care and it's always best to collect information about the current situation. It can happen that Moroccan police will send you back and not let through.

Second, the whole territory is still covered partly with undiscovered landmines, so be extremely careful when leaving the main roads and walking into the desert.

Finding long rides can be especially easy with westerners heading southwards towards Nouakchott and Senegal and can be done at Camping Moussafir in Dakhla and also Hotel Barbosa about 60 km from the border, where a lot of moroccans and westerners stop so that they can reach the border nice and early the next day.

Western Saharan border with Mauritania closes at 6 in the evening and is a good time for finding northbound rides. In the mornings, especially the cars lined up before 9, when the border opens, will have drivers out of the cars walking about, a good chance to ask for rides. Look for Senegalese people as they are usually familiar with Mauritania and know the fun places to visit, while at the same time you'll have a ride all the way to Senegal. (Nanga def? How are you? In wolof, great way to start off your request.)

===Cities===
* [[Ad-Dakhla]] (Villa Cisneros)
* [[Boujdour]] (Cape Bojador)
* [[El Aaiún]] (Laâyoune), [[El Marsa]]
* [[Lagouira]]
* [[Smara]] (Semara)

===Border Crossing===
* Morocco: There actually is no border, just a handful of police checkpoints along the road.
* Mauritania: Many land mines around the border area, take care! Visa are not issued anymore at the border, you have to get them beforehand at the Mauritanian embassy in [[Rabat]] (Morocco) or elsewhere they have one.
* Algeria: The border to Algeria is closed, though it could be possible to get into via Polisario-controlled areas, though this is absolutely not advised if you want to travel safely.

{{IsIn|Northern Africa}}
[[Category:Northern Africa]]
[[de:Westsahara]]
[[zh:西撒哈拉]]</text>
      <sha1>47gjo5w4tm9tkmaoulmej2av85dcl5l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>51548</id>
      <parentid>46331</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-04-06T17:06:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4092">{{infobox Country
|country = Western Sahara
|map= &lt;map lat='23.755181766112635' lng='-15.029296875' zoom='7' view='0' float='right' /&gt;
|language = N/A (recognized regional languages are Arabic and Spanish)
|capital = N/A (largest city is [[Laâyoune]])
|pop = 382,617
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = from {{average}} to {{very good}} }}
'''Western Sahara''' is a mostly Moroccan-controlled territory in [[Northern Africa]]. Western Sahara has been on the United Nations list of non-self-governing territories since the 1960s when it was a Spanish colony. 

When traveling here, you are de-facto traveling on the territory of the kingdom of [[Morocco]], so all visa-issues, police control checkpoints etc. are mostly applying to [[Morocco]]. Speaking a little bit of French, Spanish or Arabic will bring you through without problems, though more and more people speak good English due to the presence of the UN. Parts of the east (behind the berm) are controlled by the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polisario_Front Polisario Front].

===Hitchhiking===
Hitchhiking in '''Western Sahara''' is very easy along the coastal road N1, where traffic is plentiful as far down south as Dakhla but sometimes sparely as well. All over the territory, from big cities to the most sparsely location, people pop up to hitchhike as well, so the concept is well known and understood. It will be easy for you to catch rides all the way to [[Mauritania]]. Locals hitch rides with pointing the forefinger into the driving direction instead of using the thumb.

Hitchhiking the N14 to [[Smara]] shouldn't be a problem as well, but the other two main roads N3 and N5 can bring problems with them, due to the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Border_Wall_(Western_Sahara) berm] and partly Polisario-controlled areas. Traveling these roads should be taken with a lot of care and it's always best to collect information about the current situation. It can happen that Moroccan police will send you back and not let you through.

Also the whole territory is still covered partly with undiscovered landmines, so be extremely careful when leaving the main roads and walking into the desert. 

Finding long rides can be especially easy with Westerners heading southwards towards Nouakchott and Senegal and can be done at Camping Moussafir in Dakhla and also Hotel Barbosa about 60 km from the border, where a lot of Moroccans and Westerners stop so that they can reach the border nice and early the next day. If you have made it to that spot chances are good that you have already come there with a Westerner; from Tiznit on resp. Nouakchott in the South, chances are really good to get a lift from an European.

Western Saharan border with Mauritania closes at 6 in the evening and is a good time for finding northbound rides. In the mornings, especially the cars lined up before 9, when the border opens, will have drivers out of the cars walking about, a good chance to ask for rides. Look for Senegalese people (Senegalese cars have blue license plates with two letters and some numbers and more letters) as they are usually familiar with Mauritania and know the fun places to visit, while at the same time you'll have a ride all the way to Senegal. (Nanga def? How are you? In [[Wolof]], great way to start off your request.)

===Cities===
* [[Ad-Dakhla]] (Villa Cisneros)
* [[Boujdour]] (Cape Bojador)
* [[El Aaiún]] (Laâyoune), [[El Marsa]]
* [[Lagouira]]
* [[Smara]] (Semara)

===Border Crossing===
* Morocco: There actually is no border, just a handful of police checkpoints along the road.
* Mauritania: Many land mines around the border area, take care! Visa are not issued anymore at the border, you have to get them beforehand at the Mauritanian embassy in [[Rabat]] (Morocco) or elsewhere they have one (Banjul, Dakar...).
* Algeria: The border to Algeria is closed, though it could be possible to get into via Polisario-controlled areas, though this is absolutely not advised if you want to travel safely.

{{IsIn|Northern Africa}}
[[Category:Northern Africa]]
[[de:Westsahara]]
[[zh:西撒哈拉]]</text>
      <sha1>t1w0ifq26ja0zxoxmlw20zp6kci08mc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>54624</id>
      <parentid>51548</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-09-05T16:25:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4084">{{infobox Country
|country = Western Sahara
|map= &lt;map lat='23.755181766112635' lng='-15.029296875' zoom='7' view='0' float='right' /&gt;
|language = N/A (recognized regional languages are Arabic and Spanish)
|capital = N/A (largest city is [[Laâyoune]])
|pop = 382,617
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='eh' /&gt; 
}}

'''Western Sahara''' is a mostly Moroccan-controlled territory in [[Northern Africa]]. Western Sahara has been on the United Nations list of non-self-governing territories since the 1960s when it was a Spanish colony. 

When traveling here, you are de-facto traveling on the territory of the kingdom of [[Morocco]], so all visa-issues, police control checkpoints etc. are mostly applying to [[Morocco]]. Speaking a little bit of French, Spanish or Arabic will bring you through without problems, though more and more people speak good English due to the presence of the UN. Parts of the east (behind the berm) are controlled by the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polisario_Front Polisario Front].

===Hitchhiking===
Hitchhiking in '''Western Sahara''' is very easy along the coastal road N1, where traffic is plentiful as far down south as Dakhla but sometimes sparely as well. All over the territory, from big cities to the most sparsely location, people pop up to hitchhike as well, so the concept is well known and understood. It will be easy for you to catch rides all the way to [[Mauritania]]. Locals hitch rides with pointing the forefinger into the driving direction instead of using the thumb.

Hitchhiking the N14 to [[Smara]] shouldn't be a problem as well, but the other two main roads N3 and N5 can bring problems with them, due to the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Border_Wall_(Western_Sahara) berm] and partly Polisario-controlled areas. Traveling these roads should be taken with a lot of care and it's always best to collect information about the current situation. It can happen that Moroccan police will send you back and not let you through.

Also the whole territory is still covered partly with undiscovered landmines, so be extremely careful when leaving the main roads and walking into the desert. 

Finding long rides can be especially easy with Westerners heading southwards towards Nouakchott and Senegal and can be done at Camping Moussafir in Dakhla and also Hotel Barbosa about 60 km from the border, where a lot of Moroccans and Westerners stop so that they can reach the border nice and early the next day. If you have made it to that spot chances are good that you have already come there with a Westerner; from Tiznit on resp. Nouakchott in the South, chances are really good to get a lift from an European.

Western Saharan border with Mauritania closes at 6 in the evening and is a good time for finding northbound rides. In the mornings, especially the cars lined up before 9, when the border opens, will have drivers out of the cars walking about, a good chance to ask for rides. Look for Senegalese people (Senegalese cars have blue license plates with two letters and some numbers and more letters) as they are usually familiar with Mauritania and know the fun places to visit, while at the same time you'll have a ride all the way to Senegal. (Nanga def? How are you? In [[Wolof]], great way to start off your request.)

===Cities===
* [[Ad-Dakhla]] (Villa Cisneros)
* [[Boujdour]] (Cape Bojador)
* [[El Aaiún]] (Laâyoune), [[El Marsa]]
* [[Lagouira]]
* [[Smara]] (Semara)

===Border Crossing===
* Morocco: There actually is no border, just a handful of police checkpoints along the road.
* Mauritania: Many land mines around the border area, take care! Visa are not issued anymore at the border, you have to get them beforehand at the Mauritanian embassy in [[Rabat]] (Morocco) or elsewhere they have one (Banjul, Dakar...).
* Algeria: The border to Algeria is closed, though it could be possible to get into via Polisario-controlled areas, though this is absolutely not advised if you want to travel safely.

{{IsIn|Northern Africa}}
[[Category:Northern Africa]]
[[de:Westsahara]]
[[zh:西撒哈拉]]</text>
      <sha1>m24427t1bjjt5q08hnvcsmn6x9df4x7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>56341</id>
      <parentid>54624</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-08T01:24:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4126">{{infobox Country
|country = Western Sahara
|map= &lt;map lat='23.755181766112635' lng='-15.029296875' zoom='7' view='0' float='right' /&gt;
|language = N/A (recognized regional languages are Arabic and Spanish)
|capital = N/A (largest city is [[El Aaiún|Laâyoune]])
|pop = 382,617
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='eh' /&gt; 
}}

'''Western Sahara''' is a mostly Moroccan-controlled territory in [[Northern Africa]]. Western Sahara has been on the United Nations list of non-self-governing territories since the 1960s when it was a Spanish colony. 

When traveling here, you are de-facto traveling on the territory of the kingdom of [[Morocco]], so all visa-issues, police control checkpoints etc. are mostly applying to [[Morocco]]. Speaking a little bit of French, Spanish or Arabic will bring you through without problems, though more and more people speak good English due to the presence of the UN. Parts of the east (behind the berm) are controlled by the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polisario_Front Polisario Front].

=== Hitchhiking ===
Hitchhiking in '''Western Sahara''' is very easy along the coastal road N1, where traffic is plentiful as far down south as Dakhla but sometimes sparely as well. All over the territory, from big cities to the most sparsely location, people pop up to hitchhike as well, so the concept is well known and understood. It will be easy for you to catch rides all the way to [[Mauritania]]. Locals hitch rides with pointing the forefinger into the driving direction instead of using the thumb.

Hitchhiking the N14 to [[Smara]] shouldn't be a problem as well, but the other two main roads N3 and N5 can bring problems with them, due to the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Border_Wall_(Western_Sahara) berm] and partly Polisario-controlled areas. Traveling these roads should be taken with a lot of care and it's always best to collect information about the current situation. It can happen that Moroccan police will send you back and not let you through.

Also the whole territory is still covered partly with undiscovered landmines, so be extremely careful when leaving the main roads and walking into the desert. 

Finding long rides can be especially easy with Westerners heading southwards towards Nouakchott and Senegal and can be done at Camping Moussafir in Dakhla and also Hotel Barbosa about 60 km from the border, where a lot of Moroccans and Westerners stop so that they can reach the border nice and early the next day. If you have made it to that spot chances are good that you have already come there with a Westerner; from Tiznit on resp. Nouakchott in the South, chances are really good to get a lift from an European.

Western Saharan border with Mauritania closes at 6 in the evening and is a good time for finding northbound rides. In the mornings, especially the cars lined up before 9, when the border opens, will have drivers out of the cars walking about, a good chance to ask for rides. Look for Senegalese people (Senegalese cars have blue license plates with two letters and some numbers and more letters) as they are usually familiar with Mauritania and know the fun places to visit, while at the same time you'll have a ride all the way to Senegal. (Nanga def? How are you? In [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], great way to start off your request.)

=== Cities ===
* [[Ad-Dakhla]] (Villa Cisneros)
* [[Boujdour]] (Cape Bojador)
* [[El Aaiún]] (Laâyoune), [[El Marsa]]
* [[Lagouira]]
* [[Smara]] (Semara)

=== Border Crossing ===
* Morocco: There actually is no border, just a handful of police checkpoints along the road.
* Mauritania: Many land mines around the border area, take care! Visa are not issued anymore at the border, you have to get them beforehand at the Mauritanian embassy in [[Rabat]] (Morocco) or elsewhere they have one (Banjul, Dakar...).
* Algeria: The border to Algeria is closed, though it could be possible to get into via Polisario-controlled areas, though this is absolutely not advised if you want to travel safely.

{{IsIn|Northern Africa}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Westsahara]]
[[zh:西撒哈拉]]</text>
      <sha1>br6qtt1fytzs2ndmq8dpwdqkuwigjtw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>64799</id>
      <parentid>56341</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-09-30T17:30:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4129">{{infobox Country
|country = Western Sahara
|map= &lt;map lat='23.755181766112635' lng='-15.029296875' zoom='7' view='0' float='right' /&gt;
|language = N/A (recognized regional languages are Arabic and Spanish)
|capital = N/A (largest city is [[El Aaiún|Laâyoune]])
|pop = 382,617
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='eh' /&gt; 
}}
'''Western Sahara''' is a mostly Moroccan-controlled territory in [[Northern Africa]]. Western Sahara has been on the United Nations list of non-self-governing territories since the 1960s when it was a Spanish colony. 

When traveling here, you are de-facto traveling on the territory of the kingdom of [[Morocco]], so all visa-issues, police control checkpoints etc. are mostly applying to [[Morocco]]. Speaking a little bit of French, Spanish or Arabic will bring you through without problems, though more and more people speak good English due to the presence of the UN. Parts of the east (behind the berm) are controlled by the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polisario_Front Polisario Front].

=== Hitchhiking ===
Hitchhiking in '''Western Sahara''' is very easy along the coastal road N1, where traffic is plentiful as far down south as Dakhla but sometimes sparely as well. All over the territory, from big cities to the most sparsely location, people pop up to hitchhike as well, so the concept is well known and understood. It will be easy for you to catch rides all the way to [[Mauritania]]. Locals hitch rides with pointing the forefinger into the driving direction instead of using the thumb.

Hitchhiking the N14 to [[Smara]] shouldn't be a problem as well, but the other two main roads N3 and N5 can bring problems with them, due to the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Border_Wall_(Western_Sahara) berm] and partly Polisario-controlled areas. Traveling these roads should be taken with a lot of care and it's always best to collect information about the current situation. It can happen that Moroccan police will send you back and not let you through.

Also the whole territory is still covered partly with undiscovered landmines, so be extremely careful when leaving the main roads and walking into the desert. 

Finding long rides can be especially easy with Westerners heading southwards towards Nouakchott and Senegal and can be done at Camping Moussafir in Dakhla and also Hotel Barbosa about 60 km from the border, where a lot of Moroccans and Westerners stop so that they can reach the border nice and early the next day. If you have made it to that spot chances are good that you have already come there with a Westerner; from Tiznit on resp. Nouakchott in the South, chances are really good to get a lift from an European.

Western Saharan border with Mauritania closes at 6 in the evening and is a good time for finding northbound rides. In the mornings, especially the cars lined up before 9, when the border opens, will have drivers out of the cars walking about, a good chance to ask for rides. Look for Senegalese people (Senegalese cars have blue license plates with two letters and some numbers and more letters) as they are usually familiar with Mauritania and know the fun places to visit, while at the same time you'll have a ride all the way to Senegal. (Nanga def? How are you? In [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], great way to start off your request.)

=== Cities ===
* [[Ad-Dakhla]] (Villa Cisneros)
* [[Boujdour]] (Cape Bojador)
* [[El Aaiún]] (Laâyoune), [[El Marsa]]
* [[Lagouira]]
* [[Smara]] (Semara)

=== Border Crossing ===
* Morocco: There actually is no border, just a handful of police checkpoints along the road.
* Mauritania: Many land mines around the border area, take care! Visa are not issued anymore at the border, you have to get them beforehand at the Mauritanian [[embassy]] in [[Rabat]] (Morocco) or elsewhere they have one (Banjul, Dakar...).
* Algeria: The border to Algeria is closed, though it could be possible to get into via Polisario-controlled areas, though this is absolutely not advised if you want to travel safely.

{{IsIn|Northern Africa}}

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Westsahara]]
[[zh:西撒哈拉]]</text>
      <sha1>6vqm0fjczxqcwy2myj9yd81gx3uo28n</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>78435</id>
      <parentid>64799</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-01-11T14:00:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kundrt</username>
        <id>2416</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4092">{{infobox Country
|in = Northern Africa
|map= [[File:Westernsaharamap.png|300px]]
|language = N/A (recognized regional languages are Arabic and Spanish)
|capital = N/A (largest city is [[El Aaiún|Laâyoune]])
|pop = 382,617
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='eh' /&gt; 
}}
'''Western Sahara''' is a mostly Moroccan-controlled territory in [[Northern Africa]]. Western Sahara has been on the United Nations list of non-self-governing territories since the 1960s when it was a Spanish colony. 

When traveling here, you are de-facto traveling on the territory of the kingdom of [[Morocco]], so all visa-issues, police control checkpoints etc. are mostly applying to [[Morocco]]. Speaking a little bit of French, Spanish or Arabic will bring you through without problems, though more and more people speak good English due to the presence of the UN. Parts of the east (behind the berm) are controlled by the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polisario_Front Polisario Front].

=== Hitchhiking ===
Hitchhiking in Western Sahara is very easy along the coastal road N1, where traffic is plentiful as far down south as Dakhla but sometimes sparely as well. All over the territory, from big cities to the most sparsely location, people pop up to hitchhike as well, so the concept is well known and understood. It will be easy for you to catch rides all the way to [[Mauritania]]. Locals hitch rides with pointing the forefinger into the driving direction instead of using the thumb.

Hitchhiking the N14 to [[Smara]] shouldn't be a problem as well, but the other two main roads N3 and N5 can bring problems with them, due to the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Border_Wall_(Western_Sahara) berm] and partly Polisario-controlled areas. Traveling these roads should be taken with a lot of care and it's always best to collect information about the current situation. It can happen that Moroccan police will send you back and not let you through.

Also the whole territory is still covered partly with undiscovered landmines, so be extremely careful when leaving the main roads and walking into the desert. 

Finding long rides can be especially easy with Westerners heading southwards towards [[Nouakchott]] and [[Senegal]] or [[Mali]] and can be done at Camping Moussafir in Dakhla and also Hotel Barbosa about 60 km from the border, where a lot of Moroccans and Westerners stop so that they can reach the border nice and early the next day. If you have made it to that spot chances are good that you have already come there with a Westerner; from [[Tiznit]] on resp. Nouakchott in the South, chances are really good to get a lift from an European.

Western Saharan border with [[Mauritania]] closes at 6 in the evening and is a good time for finding northbound rides. In the mornings, especially the cars lined up before 9, when the border opens, will have drivers out of the cars walking about, a good chance to ask for rides. Look for Senegalese people (Senegalese cars have blue license plates with two letters and some numbers and more letters) as they are usually familiar with Mauritania and know the fun places to visit, while at the same time you'll have a ride all the way to Senegal. (Nanga def? How are you? In [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], great way to start off your request.)

=== Cities ===
* [[Ad-Dakhla]] (Villa Cisneros)
* [[Boujdour]] (Cape Bojador)
* [[El Aaiún]] (Laâyoune), [[El Marsa]]
* [[Lagouira]]
* [[Smara]] (Semara)

=== Border Crossing ===
* [[Morocco]]: There actually is no border, just a handful of police checkpoints along the road.
* [[Mauritania]]: Many land mines around the border area, take care! Visa are not issued anymore at the border, you have to get them beforehand at the Mauritanian [[embassy]] in [[Rabat]] (Morocco) or elsewhere they have one ([[Banjul]], [[Dakar]]...).
* [[Algeria]]: The border to Algeria is closed, though it could be possible to get into via Polisario-controlled areas, though this is absolutely not advised if you want to travel safely.

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Westsahara]]
[[zh:西撒哈拉]]</text>
      <sha1>tm3cm2uvq3nex2ytar7n8u7cm7r26bw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>90467</id>
      <parentid>78435</parentid>
      <timestamp>2018-03-01T16:29:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lachance</username>
        <id>29554</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4208">{{infobox Country
|in = Northern Africa
|map= [[File:Westernsaharamap.png|300px]]
|language = N/A (recognized regional languages are Arabic and Spanish)
|capital = N/A (largest city is [[El Aaiún|Laâyoune]])
|pop = 382,617
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='eh' /&gt; 
}}
'''Western Sahara''' is a mostly Moroccan-controlled territory in [[Northern Africa]]. Western Sahara has been on the United Nations list of non-self-governing territories since the 1960s when it was a Spanish colony. 

When traveling here, you are de-facto traveling on the territory of the kingdom of [[Morocco]], so all visa-issues, police control checkpoints etc. are mostly applying to [[Morocco]]. Speaking a little bit of French, Spanish or Arabic will bring you through without problems, though more and more people speak good English due to the presence of the UN. Parts of the east (behind the berm) are controlled by the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polisario_Front Polisario Front].

=== Hitchhiking ===
Hitchhiking in Western Sahara is very easy along the coastal road N1, where traffic is plentiful as far down south as Dakhla but sometimes sparely as well. All over the territory, from big cities to the most sparsely location, people pop up to hitchhike as well, so the concept is well known and understood. It will be easy for you to catch rides all the way to [[Mauritania]]. Locals hitch rides with pointing the forefinger into the driving direction instead of using the thumb.

Hitchhiking the N14 to [[Smara]] shouldn't be a problem as well, but the other two main roads N3 and N5 can bring problems with them, due to the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Border_Wall_(Western_Sahara) berm] and partly Polisario-controlled areas. Traveling these roads should be taken with a lot of care and it's always best to collect information about the current situation. It can happen that Moroccan police will send you back and not let you through.

Also the whole territory is still covered partly with undiscovered landmines, so be extremely careful when leaving the main roads and walking into the desert. 

Finding long rides can be especially easy with Westerners heading southwards towards [[Nouakchott]] and [[Senegal]] or [[Mali]] and can be done at Camping Moussafir in Dakhla and also Hotel Barbosa about 60 km from the border, where a lot of Moroccans and Westerners stop so that they can reach the border nice and early the next day. If you have made it to that spot chances are good that you have already come there with a Westerner; from [[Tiznit]] on resp. Nouakchott in the South, chances are really good to get a lift from an European.

Western Saharan border with [[Mauritania]] closes at 6 in the evening and is a good time for finding northbound rides. In the mornings, especially the cars lined up before 9, when the border opens, will have drivers out of the cars walking about, a good chance to ask for rides. Look for Senegalese people (Senegalese cars have blue license plates with two letters and some numbers and more letters) as they are usually familiar with Mauritania and know the fun places to visit, while at the same time you'll have a ride all the way to Senegal. (Nanga def? How are you? In [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], great way to start off your request.)

=== Cities ===
* [[Ad-Dakhla]] (Villa Cisneros)
* [[Boujdour]] (Cape Bojador)
* [[El Aaiún]] (Laâyoune), [[El Marsa]]
* [[Lagouira]]
* [[Smara]] (Semara)

=== Border Crossing ===
* [[Morocco]]: There actually is no border, just a handful of police checkpoints along the road.
* [[Mauritania]]: Many land mines around the border area, take care! Visa are not issued anymore at the border, you have to get them beforehand at the Mauritanian [[embassy]] in [[Rabat]] (Morocco) or elsewhere they have one ([[Banjul]], [[Dakar]]...). (Edit. Lachance ; Visa can actually be issued at the border of Mauritania. Border open at 9 and visa office at 11h)
* [[Algeria]]: The border to Algeria is closed, though it could be possible to get into via Polisario-controlled areas, though this is absolutely not advised if you want to travel safely.

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Westsahara]]
[[zh:西撒哈拉]]</text>
      <sha1>4r9qcfcw0l825gb8d8torsxx45jdntl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>97096</id>
      <parentid>90467</parentid>
      <timestamp>2019-11-20T12:33:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Meeson</username>
        <id>29135</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Hitchhiking */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4623">{{infobox Country
|in = Northern Africa
|map= [[File:Westernsaharamap.png|300px]]
|language = N/A (recognized regional languages are Arabic and Spanish)
|capital = N/A (largest city is [[El Aaiún|Laâyoune]])
|pop = 382,617
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='eh' /&gt; 
}}
'''Western Sahara''' is a mostly Moroccan-controlled territory in [[Northern Africa]]. Western Sahara has been on the United Nations list of non-self-governing territories since the 1960s when it was a Spanish colony. 

When traveling here, you are de-facto traveling on the territory of the kingdom of [[Morocco]], so all visa-issues, police control checkpoints etc. are mostly applying to [[Morocco]]. Speaking a little bit of French, Spanish or Arabic will bring you through without problems, though more and more people speak good English due to the presence of the UN. Parts of the east (behind the berm) are controlled by the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polisario_Front Polisario Front].

=== Hitchhiking ===
Hitchhiking in Western Sahara is very easy along the coastal road N1, where traffic is plentiful as far down south as Dakhla but sometimes sparely as well. All over the territory, from big cities to the most sparsely location, people pop up to hitchhike as well, so the concept is well known and understood. It will be easy for you to catch rides all the way to [[Mauritania]]. Locals hitch rides with pointing the forefinger into the driving direction instead of using the thumb.

Hitchhiking the N14 to [[Smara]] shouldn't be a problem as well, but the other two main roads N3 and N5 can bring problems with them, due to the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Border_Wall_(Western_Sahara) berm] and partly Polisario-controlled areas. Traveling these roads should be taken with a lot of care and it's always best to collect information about the current situation. It can happen that Moroccan police will send you back and not let you through.

Also the whole territory is still covered partly with undiscovered landmines, so be extremely careful when leaving the main roads and walking into the desert. 

Finding long rides can be especially easy with Westerners heading southwards towards [[Nouakchott]] and [[Senegal]] or [[Mali]] and can be done at Camping Moussafir in Dakhla and also Hotel Barbosa about 60 km from the border, where a lot of Moroccans and Westerners stop so that they can reach the border nice and early the next day. If you have made it to that spot chances are good that you have already come there with a Westerner; from [[Tiznit]] on resp. Nouakchott in the South, chances are really good to get a lift from an European.

Western Saharan border with [[Mauritania]] closes at 6 in the evening and is a good time for finding northbound rides. In the mornings, especially the cars lined up before 9, when the border opens, will have drivers out of the cars walking about, a good chance to ask for rides. Look for Senegalese people (Senegalese cars have blue license plates with two letters and some numbers and more letters) as they are usually familiar with Mauritania and know the fun places to visit, while at the same time you'll have a ride all the way to Senegal. (Nanga def? How are you? In [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], great way to start off your request.)

Another Option is to just walk out of the city you want to hitchhike from, until you reach the police checkpoint (usually 0,5-1,5km). There are checkpoints before and after every city in WS. Police is usually very friendly and open to hitchhiking just behind the checkpoint. Cars and trucks go very slow there, plus your passport has already been checked by the police, so also "careful" drivers will pick you up.

=== Cities ===
* [[Ad-Dakhla]] (Villa Cisneros)
* [[Boujdour]] (Cape Bojador)
* [[El Aaiún]] (Laâyoune), [[El Marsa]]
* [[Lagouira]]
* [[Smara]] (Semara)

=== Border Crossing ===
* [[Morocco]]: There actually is no border, just a handful of police checkpoints along the road.
* [[Mauritania]]: Many land mines around the border area, take care! Visa are not issued anymore at the border, you have to get them beforehand at the Mauritanian [[embassy]] in [[Rabat]] (Morocco) or elsewhere they have one ([[Banjul]], [[Dakar]]...). (Edit. Lachance ; Visa can actually be issued at the border of Mauritania. Border open at 9 and visa office at 11h)
* [[Algeria]]: The border to Algeria is closed, though it could be possible to get into via Polisario-controlled areas, though this is absolutely not advised if you want to travel safely.

[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Westsahara]]
[[zh:西撒哈拉]]</text>
      <sha1>k9ah721ys6rb7exc59spxwy799z45ay</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>100248</id>
      <parentid>97096</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-01-05T22:03:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Border Crossing */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4673">{{infobox Country
|in = Northern Africa
|map= [[File:Westernsaharamap.png|300px]]
|language = N/A (recognized regional languages are Arabic and Spanish)
|capital = N/A (largest city is [[El Aaiún|Laâyoune]])
|pop = 382,617
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='eh' /&gt; 
}}
'''Western Sahara''' is a mostly Moroccan-controlled territory in [[Northern Africa]]. Western Sahara has been on the United Nations list of non-self-governing territories since the 1960s when it was a Spanish colony. 

When traveling here, you are de-facto traveling on the territory of the kingdom of [[Morocco]], so all visa-issues, police control checkpoints etc. are mostly applying to [[Morocco]]. Speaking a little bit of French, Spanish or Arabic will bring you through without problems, though more and more people speak good English due to the presence of the UN. Parts of the east (behind the berm) are controlled by the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polisario_Front Polisario Front].

=== Hitchhiking ===
Hitchhiking in Western Sahara is very easy along the coastal road N1, where traffic is plentiful as far down south as Dakhla but sometimes sparely as well. All over the territory, from big cities to the most sparsely location, people pop up to hitchhike as well, so the concept is well known and understood. It will be easy for you to catch rides all the way to [[Mauritania]]. Locals hitch rides with pointing the forefinger into the driving direction instead of using the thumb.

Hitchhiking the N14 to [[Smara]] shouldn't be a problem as well, but the other two main roads N3 and N5 can bring problems with them, due to the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Border_Wall_(Western_Sahara) berm] and partly Polisario-controlled areas. Traveling these roads should be taken with a lot of care and it's always best to collect information about the current situation. It can happen that Moroccan police will send you back and not let you through.

Also the whole territory is still covered partly with undiscovered landmines, so be extremely careful when leaving the main roads and walking into the desert. 

Finding long rides can be especially easy with Westerners heading southwards towards [[Nouakchott]] and [[Senegal]] or [[Mali]] and can be done at Camping Moussafir in Dakhla and also Hotel Barbosa about 60 km from the border, where a lot of Moroccans and Westerners stop so that they can reach the border nice and early the next day. If you have made it to that spot chances are good that you have already come there with a Westerner; from [[Tiznit]] on resp. Nouakchott in the South, chances are really good to get a lift from an European.

Western Saharan border with [[Mauritania]] closes at 6 in the evening and is a good time for finding northbound rides. In the mornings, especially the cars lined up before 9, when the border opens, will have drivers out of the cars walking about, a good chance to ask for rides. Look for Senegalese people (Senegalese cars have blue license plates with two letters and some numbers and more letters) as they are usually familiar with Mauritania and know the fun places to visit, while at the same time you'll have a ride all the way to Senegal. (Nanga def? How are you? In [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], great way to start off your request.)

Another Option is to just walk out of the city you want to hitchhike from, until you reach the police checkpoint (usually 0,5-1,5km). There are checkpoints before and after every city in WS. Police is usually very friendly and open to hitchhiking just behind the checkpoint. Cars and trucks go very slow there, plus your passport has already been checked by the police, so also "careful" drivers will pick you up.

=== Cities ===
* [[Ad-Dakhla]] (Villa Cisneros)
* [[Boujdour]] (Cape Bojador)
* [[El Aaiún]] (Laâyoune), [[El Marsa]]
* [[Lagouira]]
* [[Smara]] (Semara)

=== Border Crossing ===

* [[Morocco]]: There actually is no border, just a handful of police checkpoints along the road.
* [[Mauritania]]: Many land mines around the border area, take care! Visa are not issued anymore at the border, you have to get them beforehand at the Mauritanian [[embassy]] in [[Rabat]] (Morocco) or elsewhere they have one ([[Banjul]], [[Dakar]]...). (Edit. Lachance ; Visa can actually be issued at the border of Mauritania. Border open at 9 and visa office at 11h)
* [[Algeria]]: The border to Algeria is closed, though it could be possible to get into via Polisario-controlled areas, though this is absolutely not advised if you want to travel safely.




== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Westsahara]]
[[zh:西撒哈拉]]</text>
      <sha1>2m1b0iepht6gtsyytn7qzgecq1m3cgt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101281</id>
      <parentid>100248</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-07T14:53:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Border Crossing */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4711">{{infobox Country
|in = Northern Africa
|map= [[File:Westernsaharamap.png|300px]]
|language = N/A (recognized regional languages are Arabic and Spanish)
|capital = N/A (largest city is [[El Aaiún|Laâyoune]])
|pop = 382,617
|currency = Moroccan dirham (MAD)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='eh' /&gt; 
}}
'''Western Sahara''' is a mostly Moroccan-controlled territory in [[Northern Africa]]. Western Sahara has been on the United Nations list of non-self-governing territories since the 1960s when it was a Spanish colony. 

When traveling here, you are de-facto traveling on the territory of the kingdom of [[Morocco]], so all visa-issues, police control checkpoints etc. are mostly applying to [[Morocco]]. Speaking a little bit of French, Spanish or Arabic will bring you through without problems, though more and more people speak good English due to the presence of the UN. Parts of the east (behind the berm) are controlled by the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polisario_Front Polisario Front].

=== Hitchhiking ===
Hitchhiking in Western Sahara is very easy along the coastal road N1, where traffic is plentiful as far down south as Dakhla but sometimes sparely as well. All over the territory, from big cities to the most sparsely location, people pop up to hitchhike as well, so the concept is well known and understood. It will be easy for you to catch rides all the way to [[Mauritania]]. Locals hitch rides with pointing the forefinger into the driving direction instead of using the thumb.

Hitchhiking the N14 to [[Smara]] shouldn't be a problem as well, but the other two main roads N3 and N5 can bring problems with them, due to the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Border_Wall_(Western_Sahara) berm] and partly Polisario-controlled areas. Traveling these roads should be taken with a lot of care and it's always best to collect information about the current situation. It can happen that Moroccan police will send you back and not let you through.

Also the whole territory is still covered partly with undiscovered landmines, so be extremely careful when leaving the main roads and walking into the desert. 

Finding long rides can be especially easy with Westerners heading southwards towards [[Nouakchott]] and [[Senegal]] or [[Mali]] and can be done at Camping Moussafir in Dakhla and also Hotel Barbosa about 60 km from the border, where a lot of Moroccans and Westerners stop so that they can reach the border nice and early the next day. If you have made it to that spot chances are good that you have already come there with a Westerner; from [[Tiznit]] on resp. Nouakchott in the South, chances are really good to get a lift from an European.

Western Saharan border with [[Mauritania]] closes at 6 in the evening and is a good time for finding northbound rides. In the mornings, especially the cars lined up before 9, when the border opens, will have drivers out of the cars walking about, a good chance to ask for rides. Look for Senegalese people (Senegalese cars have blue license plates with two letters and some numbers and more letters) as they are usually familiar with Mauritania and know the fun places to visit, while at the same time you'll have a ride all the way to Senegal. (Nanga def? How are you? In [[Africa phrasebook#Wolof|Wolof]], great way to start off your request.)

Another Option is to just walk out of the city you want to hitchhike from, until you reach the police checkpoint (usually 0,5-1,5km). There are checkpoints before and after every city in WS. Police is usually very friendly and open to hitchhiking just behind the checkpoint. Cars and trucks go very slow there, plus your passport has already been checked by the police, so also "careful" drivers will pick you up.

=== Cities ===
* [[Ad-Dakhla]] (Villa Cisneros)
* [[Boujdour]] (Cape Bojador)
* [[El Aaiún]] (Laâyoune), [[El Marsa]]
* [[Lagouira]]
* [[Smara]] (Semara)

=== Border Crossing ===

* [[Morocco]]: There actually is no border, just a handful of police checkpoints along the road.
* [[Mauritania]]: Many land mines around the border area, take care! Visa are not issued anymore at the border, you have to get them beforehand at the Mauritanian [[embassy]] in [[Rabat]] (Morocco) or elsewhere they have one ([[Banjul]], [[Dakar]]...). (Edit. Lachance ; Visa can actually be issued at the border of Mauritania. Border open at 9 and visa office at 11h)
* [[Algeria]]: The border to Algeria is closed, though it could be possible to get into via Polisario-controlled areas, though this is absolutely not advised if you want to travel safely.

== Personal Experience ==

Pls add info

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



[[Category:Northern Africa]]

[[de:Westsahara]]
[[zh:西撒哈拉]]</text>
      <sha1>47bewoxtspqqwaj8x306u4rjs4g802i</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Mauritania</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1531</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1567</id>
      <parentid>4418</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T14:14:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="421">'''Mauritania''' doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and most private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates.
You may have luck with other overlanders.

..or the Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles  from EU to [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]], we got  many lifts by them. 
&lt;!--= jurahasiok at wp.pl--&gt;

[[Category:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>qq5lf9e18fxxernann4jes8pjrrzekk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1568</id>
      <parentid>1567</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="421">'''Mauritania''' doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and most private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates.
You may have luck with other overlanders.

..or the Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles  from EU to [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]], we got  many lifts by them. 
&lt;!--= jurahasiok at wp.pl--&gt;

[[Category:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>qq5lf9e18fxxernann4jes8pjrrzekk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4418</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T18:06:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GuakaTest</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="393">'''Mauritania''' doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and most private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates.
You may have luck with other overlanders.

..or the Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles  from EU to Senegal, and Mali, we got  many lifts by them. 
&lt;!--= jurahasiok at wp.pl--&gt;</text>
      <sha1>9iv41w8z8if2sn5dcpho0fmleulvscd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4419</id>
      <parentid>1568</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="421">'''Mauritania''' doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and most private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates.
You may have luck with other overlanders.

..or the Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles  from EU to [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]], we got  many lifts by them. 
&lt;!--= jurahasiok at wp.pl--&gt;

[[Category:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>qq5lf9e18fxxernann4jes8pjrrzekk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10758</id>
      <parentid>4419</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-11T03:48:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>80.221.56.156</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="677">'''Mauritania''' doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and most private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates.
You may have luck with other overlanders.

..or the Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles  from EU to [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]], we got  many lifts by them.
&lt;!--= jurahasiok at wp.pl--&gt;

...i've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10km.  further than that payment is expected.  however i did hitch with a general from the mauritanian army from atar to nouakchott, he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.. 

[[Category:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>gpltowzmt8ubcgeg7y9eb2xbqvoyhmr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10762</id>
      <parentid>10758</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-11T06:24:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="685">'''Mauritania''' doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and most private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates.
You may have luck with other overlanders.

..or the Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles  from EU to [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]], we got  many lifts by them.
&lt;!--= jurahasiok at wp.pl--&gt;

...I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10km.  further than that payment is expected.  however i did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.. 

[[Category:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>tnh73m20aphgcd57432h9r5ofme0uy1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10769</id>
      <parentid>10762</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-12T01:49:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Patonki</username>
        <id>78</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="815">'''Mauritania''' doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and most private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates.
You may have luck with other overlanders.

..or the Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles  from EU to [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]], we got  many lifts by them.
&lt;!--= jurahasiok at wp.pl--&gt;

...I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10km.  further than that payment is expected.  however i did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.. 

==Cities==
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]


[[Category:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>fkkw62hchjib0s8jvlx9h3pr7w9ejlc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10773</id>
      <parentid>10769</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-12T06:50:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="838">'''Mauritania''' doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and most private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates.
You may have luck with other overlanders.

..or the Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles  from EU to [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]], we got  many lifts by them.
&lt;!--= jurahasiok at wp.pl--&gt;

...I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10km.  further than that payment is expected.  however i did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.. 

==Cities==
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]

[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>kdn9rnmtuy4ik0taa3sxd770yiqhpqd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10804</id>
      <parentid>10773</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-14T07:15:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="923">[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world]]
'''Mauritania''' doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and most private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates.
You may have luck with other overlanders.

..or the Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles  from EU to [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]], we got  many lifts by them.
&lt;!--= jurahasiok at wp.pl--&gt;

...I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10km.  further than that payment is expected.  however i did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.. 

==Cities==
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]

[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]</text>
      <sha1>ocrkvik8zna26sy5mv0odtn0ze6lseh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14794</id>
      <parentid>10804</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-13T23:20:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="944">[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world]]
'''Mauritania''' doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and most private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates.
You may have luck with other overlanders.

..or the Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles from EU to [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]], we got  many lifts by them.
&lt;!--= jurahasiok at wp.pl--&gt;

...I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10 km further than that payment is expected.  however I did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.. 

== Cities ==
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]


[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mauretanien]]</text>
      <sha1>bt8rgz73u3op6y0s4m3skprwr8m5tt0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16176</id>
      <parentid>14794</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-27T22:39:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1019">&lt;map lat='20' lng='-12' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world]]
'''Mauritania''' doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and most private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates.
You may have luck with other overlanders or the Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles from EU to [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]]. Some hitchhikers got many lifts by them there.
&lt;!--= jurahasiok at wp.pl--&gt;

: ''I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10 km further than that payment is expected. However I did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.''

=== Cities ===
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]


[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mauretanien]]</text>
      <sha1>a5ykw9x1s7ue882ffnmcjcqx2cvqd83</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16593</id>
      <parentid>16176</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-22T23:00:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1045">&lt;map lat='20' lng='-12' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world]]
'''Mauritania''' doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and most private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates.
You may have luck with other overlanders or the Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles from EU to [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]]. Some hitchhikers got many lifts by them there.
&lt;!--= jurahasiok at wp.pl--&gt;

: ''I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10 km further than that payment is expected. However I did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.''

=== Cities ===
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]


[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mauretanien]]
{{hitchbase_country|126}}</text>
      <sha1>rcxb6ra0zs627reuwdasdnedb1zuzfm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16602</id>
      <parentid>16593</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-23T01:35:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1046">&lt;map lat='20' lng='-12' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world]]
'''Mauritania''' doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and most private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates.
You may have luck with other overlanders or the Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles from EU to [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]]. Some hitchhikers got many lifts by them there.
&lt;!--= jurahasiok at wp.pl--&gt;

: ''I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10 km further than that payment is expected. However I did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.''

=== Cities ===
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]


[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]

{{hitchbase_country|126}}

[[de:Mauretanien]]</text>
      <sha1>0aivbaengo6zhjxq10ld07ayfe9gubq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32169</id>
      <parentid>16602</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-04-10T11:47:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1061">&lt;map lat='20' lng='-12' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world]]
'''Mauritania''' doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and most private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates.
You may have luck with other overlanders or the Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles from EU to [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]]. Some hitchhikers got many lifts by them there.
&lt;!--= jurahasiok at wp.pl--&gt;

: ''I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10 km further than that payment is expected. However I did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.''

=== Cities ===
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]


[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]
{{IsIn|Africa}}
{{hitchbase_country|126}}

[[de:Mauretanien]]</text>
      <sha1>ingguudaxzl36l4lw6oi04pdvxcy3lj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32378</id>
      <parentid>32169</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-04-22T15:21:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Quarim</username>
        <id>1290</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1172">&lt;map lat='20' lng='-12' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world]]
'''Mauritania''' doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and most private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates.
You may have luck with other overlanders or the Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles from EU to [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]]. Some hitchhikers got many lifts by them there.
&lt;!--= jurahasiok at wp.pl--&gt;

: ''I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10 km further than that payment is expected. However I did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.''

=== Cities ===
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]

=== Border crossing ===
Be aware of mines in the border region to western sahara. Don't leave the road there.


[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]
{{IsIn|Africa}}
{{hitchbase_country|126}}

[[de:Mauretanien]]</text>
      <sha1>8tbrvmh4ltbp8j25wchebzsuro90de2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32380</id>
      <parentid>32378</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-04-23T07:14:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Quarim</username>
        <id>1290</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1192">&lt;map lat='20' lng='-12' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
[[Image:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world]]
'''Mauritania''' doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and most private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates.
You may have luck with other overlanders or the Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles from EU to [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]]. Some hitchhikers got many lifts by them there.
&lt;!--= jurahasiok at wp.pl--&gt;

: ''I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10 km further than that payment is expected. However I did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.''

=== Cities ===
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]

=== Border crossing ===
Be aware of mines in the border region to [[Western_Sahara| western sahara]]. Don't leave the road there.


[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]
{{IsIn|Africa}}
{{hitchbase_country|126}}

[[de:Mauretanien]]</text>
      <sha1>qjebhup0m0e97y73ljrxieh4l71h7c8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35166</id>
      <parentid>32380</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T18:04:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1189">&lt;map lat='20' lng='-12' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world]]
'''Mauritania''' doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and most private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates.
You may have luck with other overlanders or the Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles from EU to [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]]. Some hitchhikers got many lifts by them there.
&lt;!--= jurahasiok at wp.pl--&gt;

: ''I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10 km further than that payment is expected. However I did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.''

=== Cities ===
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]

=== Border crossing ===
Be aware of mines in the border region to [[Western Sahara|western sahara]]. Don't leave the road there.
{{IsIn|Africa}}
{{hitchbase_country|126}}

[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mauretanien]]</text>
      <sha1>p1hou32be5thilommugxxm9r6f7531r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35858</id>
      <parentid>35166</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-16T23:59:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1212">&lt;map lat='20' lng='-12' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world]]
'''Mauritania''' doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and most private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates.
You may have luck with other overlanders or the Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles from EU to [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]]. Some hitchhikers got many lifts by them there.
&lt;!--= jurahasiok at wp.pl--&gt;

: ''I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10 km further than that payment is expected. However I did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.''

=== Cities ===
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]

=== Border crossing ===
Be aware of mines in the border region to [[Western Sahara|western sahara]]. Don't leave the road there.
{{IsIn|Africa}}
{{hitchbase_country|126}}

[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mauretanien]]
[[zh:毛里塔尼亚]]</text>
      <sha1>f8mja5zez48i8v5yiea7gj3ykm94ibr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39244</id>
      <parentid>35858</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-01-05T14:56:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>88.202.201.46</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1420">&lt;map lat='20' lng='-12' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world]]
'''Mauritania''' doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and most private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates.
You may have luck with other overlanders or the Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles from EU to [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]]. Some hitchhikers got many lifts by them there.

You can also get in to Mauritania with Mauritanian traders, who can be found opposite the first police checkpoint north of Dakhla. The price for a journey to Nouadhibou is currently 250-380Dhs (negotiable).
&lt;!--= jurahasiok at wp.pl--&gt;

: ''I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10 km further than that payment is expected. However I did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.''

=== Cities ===
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]

=== Border crossing ===
Be aware of mines in the border region to [[Western Sahara|western sahara]]. Don't leave the road there.
{{IsIn|Africa}}
{{hitchbase_country|126}}

[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mauretanien]]
[[zh:毛里塔尼亚]]</text>
      <sha1>pmjc022t0less0oqtpvueryfyqng80n</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39245</id>
      <parentid>39244</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-01-05T15:01:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>88.202.201.46</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1478">&lt;map lat='20' lng='-12' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, which runs from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and Zouerate]]
'''Mauritania''' doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and most private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates.
You may have luck with other overlanders or the Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles from EU to [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]]. Some hitchhikers got many lifts by them there.

You can also get in to Mauritania with Mauritanian traders, who can be found opposite the first police checkpoint north of Dakhla. The price for a journey to Nouadhibou is currently 250-380Dhs (negotiable).
&lt;!--= jurahasiok at wp.pl--&gt;

: ''I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10 km further than that payment is expected. However I did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.''

=== Cities ===
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]

=== Border crossing ===
Be aware of mines in the border region to [[Western Sahara|western sahara]]. Don't leave the road there.
{{IsIn|Africa}}
{{hitchbase_country|126}}

[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mauretanien]]
[[zh:毛里塔尼亚]]</text>
      <sha1>hkyvuxyk7znq5g199uvxj29taykwb38</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>42722</id>
      <parentid>39245</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-06-24T20:45:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>88.202.207.182</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1607">&lt;map lat='20' lng='-12' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, which runs from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]]
'''Mauritania''' doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and most private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates.
You may have luck with other overlanders or the Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles from EU to [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]]. Some hitchhikers got many lifts by them there.

You can also get in to Mauritania with Mauritanian traders, who can be found opposite the first police checkpoint north of Dakhla. The price for a journey to Nouadhibou is currently 250-380Dhs (negotiable).

The train from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]] is free if you ride in an ore hopper - most passengers do anyway.
&lt;!--= jurahasiok at wp.pl--&gt;

: ''I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10 km further than that payment is expected. However I did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.''

=== Cities ===
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]

=== Border crossing ===
Be aware of mines in the border region to [[Western Sahara|western sahara]]. Don't leave the road there.
{{IsIn|Africa}}
{{hitchbase_country|126}}

[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mauretanien]]
[[zh:毛里塔尼亚]]</text>
      <sha1>ha1icli4p42bpc3iwui4n8ida2lf5oh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>42723</id>
      <parentid>42722</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-06-24T20:46:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>88.202.207.182</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1609">&lt;map lat='20' lng='-12' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, which runs from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]]]]
'''Mauritania''' doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and most private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates.
You may have luck with other overlanders or the Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles from EU to [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]]. Some hitchhikers got many lifts by them there.

You can also get in to Mauritania with Mauritanian traders, who can be found opposite the first police checkpoint north of Dakhla. The price for a journey to Nouadhibou is currently 250-380Dhs (negotiable).

The train from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]] is free if you ride in an ore hopper - most passengers do anyway.
&lt;!--= jurahasiok at wp.pl--&gt;

: ''I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10 km further than that payment is expected. However I did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.''

=== Cities ===
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]

=== Border crossing ===
Be aware of mines in the border region to [[Western Sahara|western sahara]]. Don't leave the road there.
{{IsIn|Africa}}
{{hitchbase_country|126}}

[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mauretanien]]
[[zh:毛里塔尼亚]]</text>
      <sha1>jrz4ggerl9beg0w0hwdo3v8yfe8erlk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44686</id>
      <parentid>42723</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-09-08T10:34:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1594">&lt;map lat='20' lng='-12' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, which runs from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]]]]
'''Mauritania''' doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and most private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates.
You may have luck with other overlanders or the Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles from EU to [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]]. Some hitchhikers got many lifts by them there.

You can also get in to Mauritania with Mauritanian traders, who can be found opposite the first police checkpoint north of Dakhla. The price for a journey to Nouadhibou is currently 250-380Dhs (negotiable).

The train from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]] is free if you ride in an ore hopper - most passengers do anyway.
&lt;!--= jurahasiok at wp.pl--&gt;

: ''I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10 km further than that payment is expected. However I did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.''

=== Cities ===
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]

=== Border crossing ===
Be aware of mines in the border region to [[Western Sahara]]. Don't leave the road there.
{{IsIn|Africa}}
{{hitchbase_country|126}}

[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mauretanien]]
[[zh:毛里塔尼亚]]</text>
      <sha1>r8rnqb3wjtmy605q8go3wofkrsaj4lh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>46318</id>
      <parentid>44686</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-30T17:30:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Vrana</username>
        <id>2467</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1732">&lt;map lat='20' lng='-12' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, which runs from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]]]]
'''Mauritania''' doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and most private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates.
You may have luck with other overlanders or the Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles from EU to [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]]. Some hitchhikers got many lifts by them there.

You can also get in to Mauritania with Mauritanian traders, who can be found opposite the first police checkpoint north of Dakhla. The price for a journey to Nouadhibou is currently 250-380Dhs (negotiable).

The train from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]] is free if you ride in an ore hopper - most passengers do anyway.
&lt;!--= jurahasiok at wp.pl--&gt;

: ''I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10 km further than that payment is expected. However I did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.''

=== Cities ===
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]

=== Border crossing ===
Be aware of mines in the border region to [[Western Sahara]]. Don't leave the road there. Do not accept guides offering to take you across for a small fee, the road is clearly visible, walkable and you will only get ripped off.
{{IsIn|Africa}}
{{hitchbase_country|126}}

[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mauretanien]]
[[zh:毛里塔尼亚]]</text>
      <sha1>8k3czkpifizkqui9uvao6hxgyr9zdxt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>47970</id>
      <parentid>46318</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-01T19:55:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>88.202.195.24</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1866">&lt;map lat='20' lng='-12' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, which runs from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]]]]
'''Mauritania''' doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and most private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates.
You may have luck with other overlanders or the Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles from EU to [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]]. Some hitchhikers got many lifts by them there.

It should be possible to hitch to Mauritania from the embassy in Rabat, [[Morocco]], with overlanders calling in to get their visas.

You can also get in to Mauritania with Mauritanian traders, who can be found opposite the first police checkpoint north of Dakhla. The price for a journey to Nouadhibou is currently 250-380Dhs (negotiable).

The train from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]] is free if you ride in an ore hopper - most passengers do anyway.
&lt;!--= jurahasiok at wp.pl--&gt;

: ''I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10 km further than that payment is expected. However I did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.''

=== Cities ===
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]

=== Border crossing ===
Be aware of mines in the border region to [[Western Sahara]]. Don't leave the road there. Do not accept guides offering to take you across for a small fee, the road is clearly visible, walkable and you will only get ripped off.
{{IsIn|Africa}}
{{hitchbase_country|126}}

[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mauretanien]]
[[zh:毛里塔尼亚]]</text>
      <sha1>dl4gvu2cqecwct2rvrazt5zkmc5zoij</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48412</id>
      <parentid>47970</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-24T17:49:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>88.202.201.21</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1873">&lt;map lat='20' lng='-12' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, which runs from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]]]]
'''Mauritania''' doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and most private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates.
You may have luck with other overlanders or the Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles from EU to [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]]. Some hitchhikers got many lifts by them there.

It should be possible to hitch to Mauritania from the consulate in Casablanca, [[Morocco]], with overlanders calling in to get their visas.

You can also get in to Mauritania with Mauritanian traders, who can be found opposite the first police checkpoint north of Dakhla. The price for a journey to Nouadhibou is currently 250-380Dhs (negotiable).

The train from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]] is free if you ride in an ore hopper - most passengers do anyway.
&lt;!--= jurahasiok at wp.pl--&gt;

: ''I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10 km further than that payment is expected. However I did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.''

=== Cities ===
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]

=== Border crossing ===
Be aware of mines in the border region to [[Western Sahara]]. Don't leave the road there. Do not accept guides offering to take you across for a small fee, the road is clearly visible, walkable and you will only get ripped off.
{{IsIn|Africa}}
{{hitchbase_country|126}}

[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mauretanien]]
[[zh:毛里塔尼亚]]</text>
      <sha1>osy9qzb86stzp1em0prrr5o1wv7rtqa</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>51632</id>
      <parentid>48412</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-04-07T15:05:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3565">&lt;map lat='20' lng='-12' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, which runs from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]]]]

'''Mauritania''' doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and many private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates. Still it is possible to cross the country by hitchhiking; the main roads ([[Nouakchott]]-[[Nouadhibou]], Nouakchott-[[Nema]] and Nouakchott-[[Rosso]], possibly Nouakchott-[[Atar]] as well) are certainly hitchable, be it with overlanders, Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles to West Africa, or just nice Mauritanians curious about meeting Europeans. 

Whenever hitchhiking in Mauritania, police check points will play an important role. Depending on your luck, the mood of the check point's commander and a million other factors, they will think you're great, invite you for food, give you stuff and even try to find rides for you, or tell you that you absolutely can't hitchhike from there, either because it is illegal or just because it is "not normal" or "not safe", and you might be forced to take a taxi. When you're hitching with Mauritanians (except maybe if it is a taxi taking you for free, which also happens), be prepared for the police going incredible lengths to make sure you're safe and everything is in order - when [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] was hitchhiking from Rosso to Nouakchott with three Mauritanian agronomists, police sent the whole car all the way back to Rosso after three quarters of the way (150km) so the region's police chief (who had come to station from his home for the occasion) could personally make sure Zenit was in the car voluntarily. Also, at every checkpoint (which are really numerous in Mauritania), Zenit was asked to step out of the car and taken aside to ask about the ride and to take all the information, including the car's Chassis number and the driver's phone number at one point.

It should be possible to hitch to Mauritania from the consulate in Rabat, [[Morocco]], with overlanders calling in to get their visas, or from southern Morocco. You can also get into Mauritania with Mauritanian traders, who can be found opposite the first police checkpoint north of Dakhla. The price for a journey to Nouadhibou is currently 250-380Dhs (negotiable). Another option are Moroccan vegetable trucks leaving from Agadir or Marrakech.

The train from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]] is free if you ride in an ore hopper - most passengers do anyway.
&lt;!--= jurahasiok at wp.pl--&gt;

: ''I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10 km further than that payment is expected. However I did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian Army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.''

=== Cities ===
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]

=== Border crossing ===
Be aware of mines in the border region to [[Western Sahara]]. Don't leave the road there. Do not accept guides offering to take you across for a small fee, the road is clearly visible, walkable and you will only get ripped off. Be wary on the border to Senegal if you cross at Rosso, there's many hustlers there (even though they mainly target people in cars).

{{IsIn|Africa}}
{{hitchbase_country|126}}

[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mauretanien]]
[[zh:毛里塔尼亚]]</text>
      <sha1>bt657dr0em4k6j058qgxo4yljxrjuo0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>51961</id>
      <parentid>51632</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-04-24T12:22:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3569">&lt;map lat='20' lng='-12' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, which runs from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]]]]

'''Mauritania''' doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and many private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates. Still it is possible to cross the country by hitchhiking; the main roads ([[Nouakchott]]-[[Nouadhibou]], Nouakchott-[[Nema]] and Nouakchott-[[Rosso]], possibly Nouakchott-[[Atar]] as well) are certainly hitchable, be it with overlanders, Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles to West Africa, or just nice Mauritanians curious about meeting Europeans. 

Whenever hitchhiking in Mauritania, police check points will play an important role. Depending on your luck, the mood of the check point's commander and a million other factors, they will think you're great, invite you for food, give you stuff and even try to find rides for you, or tell you that you absolutely can't hitchhike from there, either because it is illegal or just because it is "not normal" or "not safe", and you might be forced to take a taxi. When you're hitching with Mauritanians (except maybe if it is a taxi taking you for free, which also happens), be prepared for the police going incredible lengths to make sure you're safe and everything is in order - when [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] was hitchhiking from Rosso to Nouakchott with three Mauritanian agronomists, police sent the whole car all the way back to Rosso after three quarters of the way (150km) so the region's police chief (who had come to the station from his home for the occasion) could personally make sure Zenit was in the car voluntarily. Also, at every checkpoint (which are really numerous in Mauritania), Zenit was asked to step out of the car and taken aside to ask about the ride and to take all the information, including the car's Chassis number and the driver's phone number at one point.

It should be possible to hitch to Mauritania from the consulate in Rabat, [[Morocco]], with overlanders calling in to get their visas, or from southern Morocco. You can also get into Mauritania with Mauritanian traders, who can be found opposite the first police checkpoint north of Dakhla. The price for a journey to Nouadhibou is currently 250-380Dhs (negotiable). Another option are Moroccan vegetable trucks leaving from Agadir or Marrakech.

The train from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]] is free if you ride in an ore hopper - most passengers do anyway.
&lt;!--= jurahasiok at wp.pl--&gt;

: ''I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10 km further than that payment is expected. However I did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian Army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.''

=== Cities ===
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]

=== Border crossing ===
Be aware of mines in the border region to [[Western Sahara]]. Don't leave the road there. Do not accept guides offering to take you across for a small fee, the road is clearly visible, walkable and you will only get ripped off. Be wary on the border to Senegal if you cross at Rosso, there's many hustlers there (even though they mainly target people in cars).

{{IsIn|Africa}}
{{hitchbase_country|126}}

[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mauretanien]]
[[zh:毛里塔尼亚]]</text>
      <sha1>c0o3x9umid4jzodhel1u9g4mfc79qgg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>51984</id>
      <parentid>51961</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-04-24T23:41:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3712">&lt;map lat='20' lng='-12' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, which runs from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]]]]

'''Mauritania''' is a very dry country on the west coast of [[West Africa]], south from [[Western Sahara]], north from [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]].  Mauritania doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and many private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates. Still it is possible to cross the country by hitchhiking; the main roads ([[Nouakchott]]-[[Nouadhibou]], Nouakchott-[[Nema]] and Nouakchott-[[Rosso]], possibly Nouakchott-[[Atar]] as well) are certainly hitchable, be it with overlanders, Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles to West Africa, or just nice Mauritanians curious about meeting Europeans.

Whenever hitchhiking in Mauritania, police check points will play an important role. Depending on your luck, the mood of the check point's commander and a million other factors, they will think you're great, invite you for [[food]], give you stuff and even try to find rides for you, or tell you that you absolutely can't hitchhike from there, either because it is illegal or just because it is "not normal" or "not safe", and you might be forced to take a taxi. When you're hitching with Mauritanians (except maybe if it is a taxi taking you for free, which also happens), be prepared for the police going incredible lengths to make sure you're safe and everything is in order - when [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] was hitchhiking from Rosso to Nouakchott with three Mauritanian agronomists, police sent the whole car all the way back to Rosso after three quarters of the way (150km) so the region's police chief (who had come to the station from his home for the occasion) could personally make sure Zenit was in the car voluntarily. Also, at every checkpoint (which are really numerous in Mauritania), Zenit was asked to step out of the car and taken aside to ask about the ride and to take all the information, including the car's Chassis number and the driver's phone number at one point.

It should be possible to hitch to Mauritania from the consulate in Rabat, [[Morocco]], with overlanders calling in to get their visas, or from southern Morocco. You can also get into Mauritania with Mauritanian traders, who can be found opposite the first police checkpoint north of Dakhla. The price for a journey to Nouadhibou is currently 250-380Dhs (negotiable). Another option are Moroccan vegetable trucks leaving from Agadir or Marrakech.

The train from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]] is free if you ride in an ore hopper - most passengers do anyway.
&lt;!--= jurahasiok at wp.pl--&gt;

: ''I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10 km further than that payment is expected. However I did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian Army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.''

=== Cities ===
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]

=== Border crossing ===
Be aware of mines in the border region to [[Western Sahara]]. Don't leave the road there. Do not accept guides offering to take you across for a small fee, the road is clearly visible, walkable and you will only get ripped off. Be wary on the border to Senegal if you cross at Rosso, there's many hustlers there (even though they mainly target people in cars).

{{IsIn|Africa}}
{{hitchbase_country|126}}

[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mauretanien]]
[[zh:毛里塔尼亚]]</text>
      <sha1>nbant6hfnm32cmgqa3pjsiqa10mx7oy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>52025</id>
      <parentid>51984</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-04-29T02:45:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>146.219.19.160</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="52">That's way more clever than I was expecntig. Thanks!</text>
      <sha1>pjf8994hnkm0d6jeulndaoxt3jz59x4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>52070</id>
      <parentid>52025</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-04-29T09:09:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3712">&lt;map lat='20' lng='-12' zoom='5' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, which runs from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]]]]

'''Mauritania''' is a very dry country on the west coast of [[West Africa]], south from [[Western Sahara]], north from [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]].  Mauritania doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and many private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates. Still it is possible to cross the country by hitchhiking; the main roads ([[Nouakchott]]-[[Nouadhibou]], Nouakchott-[[Nema]] and Nouakchott-[[Rosso]], possibly Nouakchott-[[Atar]] as well) are certainly hitchable, be it with overlanders, Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles to West Africa, or just nice Mauritanians curious about meeting Europeans.

Whenever hitchhiking in Mauritania, police check points will play an important role. Depending on your luck, the mood of the check point's commander and a million other factors, they will think you're great, invite you for [[food]], give you stuff and even try to find rides for you, or tell you that you absolutely can't hitchhike from there, either because it is illegal or just because it is "not normal" or "not safe", and you might be forced to take a taxi. When you're hitching with Mauritanians (except maybe if it is a taxi taking you for free, which also happens), be prepared for the police going incredible lengths to make sure you're safe and everything is in order - when [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] was hitchhiking from Rosso to Nouakchott with three Mauritanian agronomists, police sent the whole car all the way back to Rosso after three quarters of the way (150km) so the region's police chief (who had come to the station from his home for the occasion) could personally make sure Zenit was in the car voluntarily. Also, at every checkpoint (which are really numerous in Mauritania), Zenit was asked to step out of the car and taken aside to ask about the ride and to take all the information, including the car's Chassis number and the driver's phone number at one point.

It should be possible to hitch to Mauritania from the consulate in Rabat, [[Morocco]], with overlanders calling in to get their visas, or from southern Morocco. You can also get into Mauritania with Mauritanian traders, who can be found opposite the first police checkpoint north of Dakhla. The price for a journey to Nouadhibou is currently 250-380Dhs (negotiable). Another option are Moroccan vegetable trucks leaving from Agadir or Marrakech.

The train from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]] is free if you ride in an ore hopper - most passengers do anyway.
&lt;!--= jurahasiok at wp.pl--&gt;

: ''I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10 km further than that payment is expected. However I did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian Army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.''

=== Cities ===
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]

=== Border crossing ===
Be aware of mines in the border region to [[Western Sahara]]. Don't leave the road there. Do not accept guides offering to take you across for a small fee, the road is clearly visible, walkable and you will only get ripped off. Be wary on the border to Senegal if you cross at Rosso, there's many hustlers there (even though they mainly target people in cars).

{{IsIn|Africa}}
{{hitchbase_country|126}}

[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mauretanien]]
[[zh:毛里塔尼亚]]</text>
      <sha1>nbant6hfnm32cmgqa3pjsiqa10mx7oy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>54665</id>
      <parentid>52070</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-09-06T11:05:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3910">{{infobox Country
|country = of Mauritania
|language = Arabic (Hassaniya) and French
|capital = [[Nouakchott]]
|pop = 3,205,060
|currency = Ouguiya (MRO)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='mr' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='20' lng='-12' zoom='4' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
}}

[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, which runs from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]]]]

'''Mauritania''' is a very dry country on the west coast of [[West Africa]], south from [[Western Sahara]], north from [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]].  Mauritania doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and many private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates. Still it is possible to cross the country by hitchhiking; the main roads ([[Nouakchott]]-[[Nouadhibou]], Nouakchott-[[Nema]] and Nouakchott-[[Rosso]], possibly Nouakchott-[[Atar]] as well) are certainly hitchable, be it with overlanders, Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles to West Africa, or just nice Mauritanians curious about meeting Europeans.

Whenever hitchhiking in Mauritania, police check points will play an important role. Depending on your luck, the mood of the check point's commander and a million other factors, they will think you're great, invite you for [[food]], give you stuff and even try to find rides for you, or tell you that you absolutely can't hitchhike from there, either because it is illegal or just because it is "not normal" or "not safe", and you might be forced to take a taxi. When you're hitching with Mauritanians (except maybe if it is a taxi taking you for free, which also happens), be prepared for the police going incredible lengths to make sure you're safe and everything is in order - when [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] was hitchhiking from Rosso to Nouakchott with three Mauritanian agronomists, police sent the whole car all the way back to Rosso after three quarters of the way (150km) so the region's police chief (who had come to the station from his home for the occasion) could personally make sure Zenit was in the car voluntarily. Also, at every checkpoint (which are really numerous in Mauritania), Zenit was asked to step out of the car and taken aside to ask about the ride and to take all the information, including the car's Chassis number and the driver's phone number at one point.

It should be possible to hitch to Mauritania from the consulate in Rabat, [[Morocco]], with overlanders calling in to get their visas, or from southern Morocco. You can also get into Mauritania with Mauritanian traders, who can be found opposite the first police checkpoint north of Dakhla. The price for a journey to Nouadhibou is currently 250-380Dhs (negotiable). Another option are Moroccan vegetable trucks leaving from Agadir or Marrakech.

The train from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]] is free if you ride in an ore hopper - most passengers do anyway.
&lt;!--= jurahasiok at wp.pl--&gt;

: ''I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10 km further than that payment is expected. However I did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian Army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.''

=== Cities ===
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]

=== Border crossing ===
Be aware of mines in the border region to [[Western Sahara]]. Don't leave the road there. Do not accept guides offering to take you across for a small fee, the road is clearly visible, walkable and you will only get ripped off. Be wary on the border to Senegal if you cross at Rosso, there's many hustlers there (even though they mainly target people in cars).

{{IsIn|Africa}}
{{hitchbase_country|126}}

[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mauretanien]]
[[zh:毛里塔尼亚]]</text>
      <sha1>jdtr3662kygw58bz370cpyvid9hn6yo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>56009</id>
      <parentid>54665</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-08T01:16:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3925">{{infobox Country
|country = of Mauritania
|language = Arabic (Hassaniya) and French
|capital = [[Nouakchott]]
|pop = 3,205,060
|currency = Ouguiya (MRO)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='mr' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat='20' lng='-12' zoom='4' view='0' float='right'/&gt;
}}

[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, which runs from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]]]]

'''Mauritania''' is a very dry country on the west coast of [[Western Africa|West Africa]], south from [[Western Sahara]], north from [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]].  Mauritania doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and many private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates. Still it is possible to cross the country by hitchhiking; the main roads ([[Nouakchott]]-[[Nouadhibou]], Nouakchott-[[Nema]] and Nouakchott-[[Rosso]], possibly Nouakchott-[[Atar]] as well) are certainly hitchable, be it with overlanders, Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles to West Africa, or just nice Mauritanians curious about meeting Europeans.

Whenever hitchhiking in Mauritania, police check points will play an important role. Depending on your luck, the mood of the check point's commander and a million other factors, they will think you're great, invite you for [[food]], give you stuff and even try to find rides for you, or tell you that you absolutely can't hitchhike from there, either because it is illegal or just because it is "not normal" or "not safe", and you might be forced to take a taxi. When you're hitching with Mauritanians (except maybe if it is a taxi taking you for free, which also happens), be prepared for the police going incredible lengths to make sure you're safe and everything is in order - when [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] was hitchhiking from Rosso to Nouakchott with three Mauritanian agronomists, police sent the whole car all the way back to Rosso after three quarters of the way (150km) so the region's police chief (who had come to the station from his home for the occasion) could personally make sure Zenit was in the car voluntarily. Also, at every checkpoint (which are really numerous in Mauritania), Zenit was asked to step out of the car and taken aside to ask about the ride and to take all the information, including the car's Chassis number and the driver's phone number at one point.

It should be possible to hitch to Mauritania from the consulate in Rabat, [[Morocco]], with overlanders calling in to get their visas, or from southern Morocco. You can also get into Mauritania with Mauritanian traders, who can be found opposite the first police checkpoint north of Dakhla. The price for a journey to Nouadhibou is currently 250-380Dhs (negotiable). Another option are Moroccan vegetable trucks leaving from Agadir or Marrakech.

The train from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]] is free if you ride in an ore hopper - most passengers do anyway.
&lt;!--= jurahasiok at wp.pl--&gt;

: ''I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10 km further than that payment is expected. However I did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian Army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.''

=== Cities ===
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]

=== Border crossing ===
Be aware of mines in the border region to [[Western Sahara]]. Don't leave the road there. Do not accept guides offering to take you across for a small fee, the road is clearly visible, walkable and you will only get ripped off. Be wary on the border to Senegal if you cross at Rosso, there's many hustlers there (even though they mainly target people in cars).

{{IsIn|Africa}}
{{hitchbase_country|126}}

[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mauretanien]]
[[zh:毛里塔尼亚]]</text>
      <sha1>1s83rno4rna20cxvf651cjpygizp07d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>58808</id>
      <parentid>56009</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-01-26T22:58:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Koendev</username>
        <id>4236</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3938">{{infobox Country
|country = of Mauritania
|language = Arabic (Hassaniya) and French
|capital = [[Nouakchott]]
|pop = 3,205,060
|currency = Ouguiya (MRO)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='mr' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat="20.762009857693" lng="-10.355950922706" zoom="5" view="0" /&gt;
}}

[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, which runs from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]]]]

'''Mauritania''' is a very dry country on the west coast of [[Western Africa|West Africa]], south from [[Western Sahara]], north from [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]].  Mauritania doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and many private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates. Still it is possible to cross the country by hitchhiking; the main roads ([[Nouakchott]]-[[Nouadhibou]], Nouakchott-[[Nema]] and Nouakchott-[[Rosso]], possibly Nouakchott-[[Atar]] as well) are certainly hitchable, be it with overlanders, Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles to West Africa, or just nice Mauritanians curious about meeting Europeans.

Whenever hitchhiking in Mauritania, police check points will play an important role. Depending on your luck, the mood of the check point's commander and a million other factors, they will think you're great, invite you for [[food]], give you stuff and even try to find rides for you, or tell you that you absolutely can't hitchhike from there, either because it is illegal or just because it is "not normal" or "not safe", and you might be forced to take a taxi. When you're hitching with Mauritanians (except maybe if it is a taxi taking you for free, which also happens), be prepared for the police going incredible lengths to make sure you're safe and everything is in order - when [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] was hitchhiking from Rosso to Nouakchott with three Mauritanian agronomists, police sent the whole car all the way back to Rosso after three quarters of the way (150km) so the region's police chief (who had come to the station from his home for the occasion) could personally make sure Zenit was in the car voluntarily. Also, at every checkpoint (which are really numerous in Mauritania), Zenit was asked to step out of the car and taken aside to ask about the ride and to take all the information, including the car's Chassis number and the driver's phone number at one point.

It should be possible to hitch to Mauritania from the consulate in Rabat, [[Morocco]], with overlanders calling in to get their visas, or from southern Morocco. You can also get into Mauritania with Mauritanian traders, who can be found opposite the first police checkpoint north of Dakhla. The price for a journey to Nouadhibou is currently 250-380Dhs (negotiable). Another option are Moroccan vegetable trucks leaving from Agadir or Marrakech.

The train from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]] is free if you ride in an ore hopper - most passengers do anyway.
&lt;!--= jurahasiok at wp.pl--&gt;

: ''I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10 km further than that payment is expected. However I did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian Army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.''

=== Cities ===
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]

=== Border crossing ===
Be aware of mines in the border region to [[Western Sahara]]. Don't leave the road there. Do not accept guides offering to take you across for a small fee, the road is clearly visible, walkable and you will only get ripped off. Be wary on the border to Senegal if you cross at Rosso, there's many hustlers there (even though they mainly target people in cars).

{{IsIn|Africa}}
{{hitchbase_country|126}}

[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mauretanien]]
[[zh:毛里塔尼亚]]</text>
      <sha1>eqst05xodfjxz3ua87ar02rbvuzi94j</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>75438</id>
      <parentid>58808</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-06-06T16:54:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kundrt</username>
        <id>2416</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4656">{{infobox Country
|country = of Mauritania
|language = Arabic (Hassaniya) and French
|capital = [[Nouakchott]]
|pop = 3,205,060
|currency = Ouguiya (MRO)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='mr' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat="20.762009857693" lng="-10.355950922706" zoom="5" view="0" /&gt;
}}

[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, which runs from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]]]]

'''Mauritania''' is a very dry country on the west coast of [[Western Africa|West Africa]], south from [[Western Sahara]], north from [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]].  Mauritania doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and many private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates. Still it is possible to cross the country by hitchhiking; the main roads ([[Nouakchott]]-[[Nouadhibou]], Nouakchott-[[Nema]] and Nouakchott-[[Rosso]], possibly Nouakchott-[[Atar]] as well) are certainly hitchable, be it with overlanders, Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles to West Africa, or just nice Mauritanians curious about meeting Europeans.

In southern Mauritania on the road to [[Mali]], around [[Kiffa]] and [[Ayoun el-Atrous]] hitchhiking is much harder than in other parts of the country. People there really don't understand hitchhiking and even after long explaining of what you're doing they'll take you to the bus station. Even the police/army/gendarmerie checkpoints are somewhat harder there. Officers are able to wait for bribes for hours, force you out of the car for "safety" reasons and next day force another driver to take you. It doesn't feel very comfortable but it's certainly possible to hitch through.

Whenever hitchhiking in Mauritania, police check points will play an important role. Depending on your luck, the mood of the check point's commander and a million other factors, they will think you're great, invite you for [[food]], give you stuff and even try to find rides for you, or tell you that you absolutely can't hitchhike from there, either because it is illegal or just because it is "not normal" or "not safe", and you might be forced to take a taxi. When you're hitching with Mauritanians (except maybe if it is a taxi taking you for free, which also happens), be prepared for the police going incredible lengths to make sure you're safe and everything is in order - when [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] was hitchhiking from Rosso to Nouakchott with three Mauritanian agronomists, police sent the whole car all the way back to Rosso after three quarters of the way (150km) so the region's police chief (who had come to the station from his home for the occasion) could personally make sure Zenit was in the car voluntarily. Also, at every checkpoint (which are really numerous in Mauritania), Zenit was asked to step out of the car and taken aside to ask about the ride and to take all the information, including the car's Chassis number and the driver's phone number at one point.

It should be possible to hitch to Mauritania from the consulate in Rabat, [[Morocco]], with overlanders calling in to get their visas, or from southern Morocco. You can also get into Mauritania with Mauritanian traders, who can be found opposite the first police checkpoint north of Dakhla. The price for a journey to Nouadhibou is currently 250-380Dhs (negotiable). Another option are Moroccan vegetable trucks leaving from Agadir or Marrakech.

The train from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]] is free if you ride in an ore hopper - most passengers do anyway.

: ''I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10 km further than that payment is expected. However I did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian Army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.''

=== Cities ===
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Kiffa]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]

=== Border crossing ===
Be aware of mines in the border region to [[Western Sahara]]. Don't leave the road there. Do not accept guides offering to take you across for a small fee, the road is clearly visible, walkable and you will only get ripped off.

Be wary on the border to Senegal if you cross at Rosso, there's many hustlers there (even though they mainly target people in cars).

To [[Mali]] you have to go to Ayoun first and then south to [[Gogui]]. It's probably the only not-a-dirt road, there are no problems at the crossing.

{{IsIn|Africa}}
{{hitchbase_country|126}}

[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mauretanien]]
[[zh:毛里塔尼亚]]</text>
      <sha1>14rdwlv8u8hpct7b16pdruv6ld9m39k</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>84873</id>
      <parentid>75438</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-11-20T17:59:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mohit</username>
        <id>24141</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5028">{{infobox Country
|country = of Mauritania
|language = Arabic (Hassaniya) and French
|capital = [[Nouakchott]]
|pop = 3,205,060
|currency = Ouguiya (MRO)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='mr' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat="20.762009857693" lng="-10.355950922706" zoom="5" view="0" /&gt;
}}

[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, which runs from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]]]]

'''Mauritania''' is a very dry country on the west coast of [[Western Africa|West Africa]], south from [[Western Sahara]], north from [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]].  Mauritania doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and many private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates. Still it is possible to cross the country by hitchhiking; the main roads ([[Nouakchott]]-[[Nouadhibou]], Nouakchott-[[Nema]] and Nouakchott-[[Rosso]], possibly Nouakchott-[[Atar]] as well) are certainly hitchable, be it with overlanders, Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles to West Africa, or just nice Mauritanians curious about meeting Europeans.

In southern Mauritania on the road to [[Mali]], around [[Kiffa]] and [[Ayoun el-Atrous]] hitchhiking is much harder than in other parts of the country. People there really don't understand hitchhiking and even after long explaining of what you're doing they'll take you to the bus station. Even the police/army/gendarmerie checkpoints are somewhat harder there. Officers are able to wait for bribes for hours, force you out of the car for "safety" reasons and next day force another driver to take you. It doesn't feel very comfortable but it's certainly possible to hitch through.

Whenever hitchhiking in Mauritania, police check points will play an important role. Depending on your luck, the mood of the check point's commander and a million other factors, they will think you're great, invite you for [[food]], give you stuff and even try to find rides for you, or tell you that you absolutely can't hitchhike from there, either because it is illegal or just because it is "not normal" or "not safe", and you might be forced to take a taxi. When you're hitching with Mauritanians (except maybe if it is a taxi taking you for free, which also happens), be prepared for the police going incredible lengths to make sure you're safe and everything is in order - when [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] was hitchhiking from Rosso to Nouakchott with three Mauritanian agronomists, police sent the whole car all the way back to Rosso after three quarters of the way (150km) so the region's police chief (who had come to the station from his home for the occasion) could personally make sure Zenit was in the car voluntarily. Also, at every checkpoint (which are really numerous in Mauritania), Zenit was asked to step out of the car and taken aside to ask about the ride and to take all the information, including the car's Chassis number and the driver's phone number at one point.

In 2016, police checkpoints are much less strict, probably because there have been no reports of kidnappings or similar incidents in recent years, and the situation in the region seems to have calmed down in general.

It should be possible to hitch to Mauritania from the consulate in Rabat, [[Morocco]], with overlanders calling in to get their visas, or from southern Morocco. You can also get into Mauritania with Mauritanian traders, who can be found opposite the first police checkpoint north of Dakhla. The price for a journey to Nouadhibou is currently 250-380Dhs (negotiable). Another option are Moroccan vegetable trucks leaving from Agadir or Marrakech.

The train from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]] is free if you ride in an ore hopper - most passengers do anyway.

: ''I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10 km further than that payment is expected. However I did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian Army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.''

=== Cities ===
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Kiffa]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]

=== Border crossing ===
Be aware of mines in the border region to [[Western Sahara]]. Don't leave the road there. Do not accept guides offering to take you across for a small fee, the road is clearly visible, walkable and you will only get ripped off.

Be wary on the border to Senegal if you cross at Rosso, there's many hustlers there (even though they mainly target people in cars). You should also have your vaccination certificate ready (they check for yellow fever), or be prepared to shed some money or a lot of time, possibly both.

To [[Mali]] you have to go to Ayoun first and then south to [[Gogui]]. It's probably the only not-a-dirt road, there are no problems at the crossing.

{{IsIn|Africa}}
{{hitchbase_country|126}}

[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mauretanien]]
[[zh:毛里塔尼亚]]</text>
      <sha1>imxvjcgo48pwmiu0p28mfxfeeyuv70q</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>91032</id>
      <parentid>84873</parentid>
      <timestamp>2018-05-31T21:01:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Marvmarv</username>
        <id>29373</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5184">{{infobox Country
|country = of Mauritania
|language = Arabic (Hassaniya) and French
|capital = [[Nouakchott]]
|pop = 3,205,060
|currency = Ouguiya (MRO)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='mr' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat="20.762009857693" lng="-10.355950922706" zoom="5" view="0" /&gt;
}}

[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, which runs from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]]]]

'''Mauritania''' is a very dry country on the west coast of [[Western Africa|West Africa]], south from [[Western Sahara]], north from [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]].  Mauritania doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and many private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates. Still it is possible to cross the country by hitchhiking; the main roads ([[Nouakchott]]-[[Nouadhibou]], Nouakchott-[[Nema]] and Nouakchott-[[Rosso]], possibly Nouakchott-[[Atar]] as well) are certainly hitchable, be it with overlanders, Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles to West Africa, or just nice Mauritanians curious about meeting Europeans.

In southern Mauritania on the road to [[Mali]], around [[Kiffa]] and [[Ayoun el-Atrous]] hitchhiking is much harder than in other parts of the country. People there really don't understand hitchhiking and even after long explaining of what you're doing they'll take you to the bus station. Even the police/army/gendarmerie checkpoints are somewhat harder there. Officers are able to wait for bribes for hours, force you out of the car for "safety" reasons and next day force another driver to take you. It doesn't feel very comfortable but it's certainly possible to hitch through.

Whenever hitchhiking in Mauritania, police check points will play an important role. Depending on your luck, the mood of the check point's commander and a million other factors, they will think you're great, invite you for [[food]], give you stuff and even try to find rides for you, or tell you that you absolutely can't hitchhike from there, either because it is illegal or just because it is "not normal" or "not safe", and you might be forced to take a taxi. When you're hitching with Mauritanians (except maybe if it is a taxi taking you for free, which also happens), be prepared for the police going incredible lengths to make sure you're safe and everything is in order - when [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] was hitchhiking from Rosso to Nouakchott with three Mauritanian agronomists, police sent the whole car all the way back to Rosso after three quarters of the way (150km) so the region's police chief (who had come to the station from his home for the occasion) could personally make sure Zenit was in the car voluntarily. Also, at every checkpoint (which are really numerous in Mauritania), Zenit was asked to step out of the car and taken aside to ask about the ride and to take all the information, including the car's Chassis number and the driver's phone number at one point.

In 2016, police checkpoints are much less strict, probably because there have been no reports of kidnappings or similar incidents in recent years, and the situation in the region seems to have calmed down in general.

It should be possible to hitch to Mauritania from the consulate in Rabat, [[Morocco]], with overlanders calling in to get their visas, or from southern Morocco. You can also get into Mauritania with Mauritanian traders, who can be found opposite the first police checkpoint north of Dakhla. The price for a journey to Nouadhibou is currently 250-380Dhs (negotiable). Another option are Moroccan vegetable trucks leaving from Agadir or Marrakech.

The train from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]] is free if you ride in an ore hopper - most passengers do anyway.

: ''I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10 km further than that payment is expected. However I did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian Army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.''

=== Cities ===
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Kiffa]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]

=== Border crossing ===
Be aware of mines in the border region to [[Western Sahara]]. Don't leave the road there. Do not accept guides offering to take you across for a small fee, the road is clearly visible, walkable and you will only get ripped off.

Be wary on the border to Senegal if you cross at Rosso, there's many hustlers there (even though they mainly target people in cars). You should also have your vaccination certificate ready (they check for yellow fever), or be prepared to shed some money or a lot of time, possibly both.
The alternative to Rosso is to cross the Senegal River at Diama. The border post over there is much more 
relaxed, but the traffic is quite sparse aswell. 

To [[Mali]] you have to go to Ayoun first and then south to [[Gogui]]. It's probably the only not-a-dirt road, there are no problems at the crossing.

{{IsIn|Africa}}
{{hitchbase_country|126}}

[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mauretanien]]
[[zh:毛里塔尼亚]]</text>
      <sha1>9fpt9tbn3q5qa75dk19s4zf9klu1v89</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>100167</id>
      <parentid>91032</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-01-05T21:45:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Border crossing */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5232">{{infobox Country
|country = of Mauritania
|language = Arabic (Hassaniya) and French
|capital = [[Nouakchott]]
|pop = 3,205,060
|currency = Ouguiya (MRO)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='mr' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat="20.762009857693" lng="-10.355950922706" zoom="5" view="0" /&gt;
}}

[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, which runs from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]]]]

'''Mauritania''' is a very dry country on the west coast of [[Western Africa|West Africa]], south from [[Western Sahara]], north from [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]].  Mauritania doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and many private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates. Still it is possible to cross the country by hitchhiking; the main roads ([[Nouakchott]]-[[Nouadhibou]], Nouakchott-[[Nema]] and Nouakchott-[[Rosso]], possibly Nouakchott-[[Atar]] as well) are certainly hitchable, be it with overlanders, Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles to West Africa, or just nice Mauritanians curious about meeting Europeans.

In southern Mauritania on the road to [[Mali]], around [[Kiffa]] and [[Ayoun el-Atrous]] hitchhiking is much harder than in other parts of the country. People there really don't understand hitchhiking and even after long explaining of what you're doing they'll take you to the bus station. Even the police/army/gendarmerie checkpoints are somewhat harder there. Officers are able to wait for bribes for hours, force you out of the car for "safety" reasons and next day force another driver to take you. It doesn't feel very comfortable but it's certainly possible to hitch through.

Whenever hitchhiking in Mauritania, police check points will play an important role. Depending on your luck, the mood of the check point's commander and a million other factors, they will think you're great, invite you for [[food]], give you stuff and even try to find rides for you, or tell you that you absolutely can't hitchhike from there, either because it is illegal or just because it is "not normal" or "not safe", and you might be forced to take a taxi. When you're hitching with Mauritanians (except maybe if it is a taxi taking you for free, which also happens), be prepared for the police going incredible lengths to make sure you're safe and everything is in order - when [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] was hitchhiking from Rosso to Nouakchott with three Mauritanian agronomists, police sent the whole car all the way back to Rosso after three quarters of the way (150km) so the region's police chief (who had come to the station from his home for the occasion) could personally make sure Zenit was in the car voluntarily. Also, at every checkpoint (which are really numerous in Mauritania), Zenit was asked to step out of the car and taken aside to ask about the ride and to take all the information, including the car's Chassis number and the driver's phone number at one point.

In 2016, police checkpoints are much less strict, probably because there have been no reports of kidnappings or similar incidents in recent years, and the situation in the region seems to have calmed down in general.

It should be possible to hitch to Mauritania from the consulate in Rabat, [[Morocco]], with overlanders calling in to get their visas, or from southern Morocco. You can also get into Mauritania with Mauritanian traders, who can be found opposite the first police checkpoint north of Dakhla. The price for a journey to Nouadhibou is currently 250-380Dhs (negotiable). Another option are Moroccan vegetable trucks leaving from Agadir or Marrakech.

The train from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]] is free if you ride in an ore hopper - most passengers do anyway.

: ''I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10 km further than that payment is expected. However I did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian Army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.''

=== Cities ===
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Kiffa]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]

=== Border crossing ===
Be aware of mines in the border region to [[Western Sahara]]. Don't leave the road there. Do not accept guides offering to take you across for a small fee, the road is clearly visible, walkable and you will only get ripped off.

Be wary on the border to Senegal if you cross at Rosso, there's many hustlers there (even though they mainly target people in cars). You should also have your vaccination certificate ready (they check for yellow fever), or be prepared to shed some money or a lot of time, possibly both.
The alternative to Rosso is to cross the Senegal River at Diama. The border post over there is much more 
relaxed, but the traffic is quite sparse aswell. 

To [[Mali]] you have to go to Ayoun first and then south to [[Gogui]]. It's probably the only not-a-dirt road, there are no problems at the crossing.





== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{IsIn|Africa}}
{{hitchbase_country|126}}

[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mauretanien]]
[[zh:毛里塔尼亚]]</text>
      <sha1>ntdzpt8nosefqnsrq6x1pfot8w19ixi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104277</id>
      <parentid>100167</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-19T18:57:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>DeepGroove</username>
        <id>47334</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5889">{{infobox Country
|country = of Mauritania
|language = Arabic (Hassaniya) and French
|capital = [[Nouakchott]]
|pop = 3,205,060
|currency = Ouguiya (MRO)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='mr' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat="20.762009857693" lng="-10.355950922706" zoom="5" view="0" /&gt;
}}

[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, which runs from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]]]]

'''Mauritania''' is a very dry country on the west coast of [[Western Africa|West Africa]], south from [[Western Sahara]], north from [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]].  Mauritania doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and many private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates. Still it is possible to cross the country by hitchhiking; the main roads ([[Nouakchott]]-[[Nouadhibou]], Nouakchott-[[Nema]] and Nouakchott-[[Rosso]], possibly Nouakchott-[[Atar]] as well) are certainly hitchable, be it with overlanders, Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles to West Africa, or just nice Mauritanians curious about meeting Europeans.

In southern Mauritania on the road to [[Mali]], around [[Kiffa]] and [[Ayoun el-Atrous]] hitchhiking is much harder than in other parts of the country. People there really don't understand hitchhiking and even after long explaining of what you're doing they'll take you to the bus station. Even the police/army/gendarmerie checkpoints are somewhat harder there. Officers are able to wait for bribes for hours, force you out of the car for "safety" reasons and next day force another driver to take you. It doesn't feel very comfortable but it's certainly possible to hitch through.

Whenever hitchhiking in Mauritania, police check points will play an important role. Depending on your luck, the mood of the check point's commander and a million other factors, they will think you're great, invite you for [[food]], give you stuff and even try to find rides for you, or tell you that you absolutely can't hitchhike from there, either because it is illegal or just because it is "not normal" or "not safe", and you might be forced to take a taxi. When you're hitching with Mauritanians (except maybe if it is a taxi taking you for free, which also happens), be prepared for the police going incredible lengths to make sure you're safe and everything is in order - when [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] was hitchhiking from Rosso to Nouakchott with three Mauritanian agronomists, police sent the whole car all the way back to Rosso after three quarters of the way (150km) so the region's police chief (who had come to the station from his home for the occasion) could personally make sure Zenit was in the car voluntarily. Also, at every checkpoint (which are really numerous in Mauritania), Zenit was asked to step out of the car and taken aside to ask about the ride and to take all the information, including the car's Chassis number and the driver's phone number at one point.

In 2016, police checkpoints are much less strict, probably because there have been no reports of kidnappings or similar incidents in recent years, and the situation in the region seems to have calmed down in general.

It should be possible to hitch to Mauritania from the consulate in Rabat, [[Morocco]], with overlanders calling in to get their visas, or from southern Morocco. You can also get into Mauritania with Mauritanian traders, who can be found opposite the first police checkpoint north of Dakhla. The price for a journey to Nouadhibou is currently 250-380Dhs (negotiable). Another option are Moroccan vegetable trucks leaving from Agadir or Marrakech.

The train from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]] is free if you ride in an ore hopper - most passengers do anyway.

: ''I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10 km further than that payment is expected. However I did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian Army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.''

Experience from [[User:DeepGroove]] in 2023:
At the beginning I was quite discouraged at the border, when the police only wanted to let me go if they have the numbers plate of my driver. And then even didn't let me go when I had one, because my driver wouldn't bring me all the way to Nouakchott and the police sais: it was too hot...
But then I noticed that is not too hard to hitchhike in Mauretania, even inside the city. Just let the taxis pass. That are more or less all the old cars. I took my hands on my heart and shaked my head when they arrived (explaining takes more time). And I concentrated on the new cars. That made it quite easily then :)


=== Cities ===
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Kiffa]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]

=== Border crossing ===
Be aware of mines in the border region to [[Western Sahara]]. Don't leave the road there. Do not accept guides offering to take you across for a small fee, the road is clearly visible, walkable and you will only get ripped off.

Be wary on the border to Senegal if you cross at Rosso, there's many hustlers there (even though they mainly target people in cars). You should also have your vaccination certificate ready (they check for yellow fever), or be prepared to shed some money or a lot of time, possibly both.
The alternative to Rosso is to cross the Senegal River at Diama. The border post over there is much more 
relaxed, but the traffic is quite sparse aswell. 

To [[Mali]] you have to go to Ayoun first and then south to [[Gogui]]. It's probably the only not-a-dirt road, there are no problems at the crossing.





== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{IsIn|Africa}}
{{hitchbase_country|126}}

[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mauretanien]]
[[zh:毛里塔尼亚]]</text>
      <sha1>nhm9h5byoi66o8p7n4ilb9ftkvcqbhj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104278</id>
      <parentid>104277</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-19T18:58:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>DeepGroove</username>
        <id>47334</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5890">{{infobox Country
|country = of Mauritania
|language = Arabic (Hassaniya) and French
|capital = [[Nouakchott]]
|pop = 3,205,060
|currency = Ouguiya (MRO)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='mr' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat="20.762009857693" lng="-10.355950922706" zoom="5" view="0" /&gt;
}}

[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, which runs from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]]]]

'''Mauritania''' is a very dry country on the west coast of [[Western Africa|West Africa]], south from [[Western Sahara]], north from [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]].  Mauritania doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and many private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates. Still it is possible to cross the country by hitchhiking; the main roads ([[Nouakchott]]-[[Nouadhibou]], Nouakchott-[[Nema]] and Nouakchott-[[Rosso]], possibly Nouakchott-[[Atar]] as well) are certainly hitchable, be it with overlanders, Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles to West Africa, or just nice Mauritanians curious about meeting Europeans.

In southern Mauritania on the road to [[Mali]], around [[Kiffa]] and [[Ayoun el-Atrous]] hitchhiking is much harder than in other parts of the country. People there really don't understand hitchhiking and even after long explaining of what you're doing they'll take you to the bus station. Even the police/army/gendarmerie checkpoints are somewhat harder there. Officers are able to wait for bribes for hours, force you out of the car for "safety" reasons and next day force another driver to take you. It doesn't feel very comfortable but it's certainly possible to hitch through.

Whenever hitchhiking in Mauritania, police check points will play an important role. Depending on your luck, the mood of the check point's commander and a million other factors, they will think you're great, invite you for [[food]], give you stuff and even try to find rides for you, or tell you that you absolutely can't hitchhike from there, either because it is illegal or just because it is "not normal" or "not safe", and you might be forced to take a taxi. When you're hitching with Mauritanians (except maybe if it is a taxi taking you for free, which also happens), be prepared for the police going incredible lengths to make sure you're safe and everything is in order - when [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] was hitchhiking from Rosso to Nouakchott with three Mauritanian agronomists, police sent the whole car all the way back to Rosso after three quarters of the way (150km) so the region's police chief (who had come to the station from his home for the occasion) could personally make sure Zenit was in the car voluntarily. Also, at every checkpoint (which are really numerous in Mauritania), Zenit was asked to step out of the car and taken aside to ask about the ride and to take all the information, including the car's Chassis number and the driver's phone number at one point.

In 2016, police checkpoints are much less strict, probably because there have been no reports of kidnappings or similar incidents in recent years, and the situation in the region seems to have calmed down in general.

It should be possible to hitch to Mauritania from the consulate in Rabat, [[Morocco]], with overlanders calling in to get their visas, or from southern Morocco. You can also get into Mauritania with Mauritanian traders, who can be found opposite the first police checkpoint north of Dakhla. The price for a journey to Nouadhibou is currently 250-380Dhs (negotiable). Another option are Moroccan vegetable trucks leaving from Agadir or Marrakech.

The train from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]] is free if you ride in an ore hopper - most passengers do anyway.

: ''I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10 km further than that payment is expected. However I did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian Army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.''

Experience from [[User:DeepGroove]] in 2023:
At the beginning I was quite discouraged at the border, when the police only wanted to let me go if they have the numbers plate of my driver. And then even didn't let me go when I had one, because my driver wouldn't bring me all the way to Nouakchott and the police said: it was too hot...

But then I noticed that is not too hard to hitchhike in Mauretania, even inside the city. Just let the taxis pass. That are more or less all the old cars. I took my hands on my heart and shaked my head when they arrived (explaining takes more time). And I concentrated on the new cars. That made it quite easily then :)


=== Cities ===
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Kiffa]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]

=== Border crossing ===
Be aware of mines in the border region to [[Western Sahara]]. Don't leave the road there. Do not accept guides offering to take you across for a small fee, the road is clearly visible, walkable and you will only get ripped off.

Be wary on the border to Senegal if you cross at Rosso, there's many hustlers there (even though they mainly target people in cars). You should also have your vaccination certificate ready (they check for yellow fever), or be prepared to shed some money or a lot of time, possibly both.
The alternative to Rosso is to cross the Senegal River at Diama. The border post over there is much more 
relaxed, but the traffic is quite sparse aswell. 

To [[Mali]] you have to go to Ayoun first and then south to [[Gogui]]. It's probably the only not-a-dirt road, there are no problems at the crossing.





== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{IsIn|Africa}}
{{hitchbase_country|126}}

[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mauretanien]]
[[zh:毛里塔尼亚]]</text>
      <sha1>q8oyitnkrfjtki25p0r26vjmvklygpx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104279</id>
      <parentid>104278</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-19T18:58:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>DeepGroove</username>
        <id>47334</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5888">{{infobox Country
|country = of Mauritania
|language = Arabic (Hassaniya) and French
|capital = [[Nouakchott]]
|pop = 3,205,060
|currency = Ouguiya (MRO)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='mr' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat="20.762009857693" lng="-10.355950922706" zoom="5" view="0" /&gt;
}}

[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, which runs from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]]]]

'''Mauritania''' is a very dry country on the west coast of [[Western Africa|West Africa]], south from [[Western Sahara]], north from [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]].  Mauritania doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and many private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates. Still it is possible to cross the country by hitchhiking; the main roads ([[Nouakchott]]-[[Nouadhibou]], Nouakchott-[[Nema]] and Nouakchott-[[Rosso]], possibly Nouakchott-[[Atar]] as well) are certainly hitchable, be it with overlanders, Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles to West Africa, or just nice Mauritanians curious about meeting Europeans.

In southern Mauritania on the road to [[Mali]], around [[Kiffa]] and [[Ayoun el-Atrous]] hitchhiking is much harder than in other parts of the country. People there really don't understand hitchhiking and even after long explaining of what you're doing they'll take you to the bus station. Even the police/army/gendarmerie checkpoints are somewhat harder there. Officers are able to wait for bribes for hours, force you out of the car for "safety" reasons and next day force another driver to take you. It doesn't feel very comfortable but it's certainly possible to hitch through.

Whenever hitchhiking in Mauritania, police check points will play an important role. Depending on your luck, the mood of the check point's commander and a million other factors, they will think you're great, invite you for [[food]], give you stuff and even try to find rides for you, or tell you that you absolutely can't hitchhike from there, either because it is illegal or just because it is "not normal" or "not safe", and you might be forced to take a taxi. When you're hitching with Mauritanians (except maybe if it is a taxi taking you for free, which also happens), be prepared for the police going incredible lengths to make sure you're safe and everything is in order - when [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] was hitchhiking from Rosso to Nouakchott with three Mauritanian agronomists, police sent the whole car all the way back to Rosso after three quarters of the way (150km) so the region's police chief (who had come to the station from his home for the occasion) could personally make sure Zenit was in the car voluntarily. Also, at every checkpoint (which are really numerous in Mauritania), Zenit was asked to step out of the car and taken aside to ask about the ride and to take all the information, including the car's Chassis number and the driver's phone number at one point.

In 2016, police checkpoints are much less strict, probably because there have been no reports of kidnappings or similar incidents in recent years, and the situation in the region seems to have calmed down in general.

It should be possible to hitch to Mauritania from the consulate in Rabat, [[Morocco]], with overlanders calling in to get their visas, or from southern Morocco. You can also get into Mauritania with Mauritanian traders, who can be found opposite the first police checkpoint north of Dakhla. The price for a journey to Nouadhibou is currently 250-380Dhs (negotiable). Another option are Moroccan vegetable trucks leaving from Agadir or Marrakech.

The train from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]] is free if you ride in an ore hopper - most passengers do anyway.

: ''I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10 km further than that payment is expected. However I did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian Army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.''

Experience from [[User:DeepGroove]] in 2023:
At the beginning I was quite discouraged at the border, when the police only wanted to let me go if they have the numbers plate of my driver. And then even didn't let me go when I had one, because my driver wouldn't bring me all the way to Nouakchott and the police said: it was too hot...

But then I noticed that is not too hard to hitchhike in Mauretania, even inside the city. Just let the taxis pass. That are more or less all the old cars. I took my hands on my heart and shaked my head when they arrived (explaining takes more time). And I concentrated on the new cars. That made it quite easy then :)


=== Cities ===
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Kiffa]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]

=== Border crossing ===
Be aware of mines in the border region to [[Western Sahara]]. Don't leave the road there. Do not accept guides offering to take you across for a small fee, the road is clearly visible, walkable and you will only get ripped off.

Be wary on the border to Senegal if you cross at Rosso, there's many hustlers there (even though they mainly target people in cars). You should also have your vaccination certificate ready (they check for yellow fever), or be prepared to shed some money or a lot of time, possibly both.
The alternative to Rosso is to cross the Senegal River at Diama. The border post over there is much more 
relaxed, but the traffic is quite sparse aswell. 

To [[Mali]] you have to go to Ayoun first and then south to [[Gogui]]. It's probably the only not-a-dirt road, there are no problems at the crossing.





== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{IsIn|Africa}}
{{hitchbase_country|126}}

[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mauretanien]]
[[zh:毛里塔尼亚]]</text>
      <sha1>96kmizdlfswt03ikr45a8wk40gne787</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105341</id>
      <parentid>104279</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-02-21T05:15:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Muhtriangles</username>
        <id>47486</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Border crossing */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7794">{{infobox Country
|country = of Mauritania
|language = Arabic (Hassaniya) and French
|capital = [[Nouakchott]]
|pop = 3,205,060
|currency = Ouguiya (MRO)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='mr' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat="20.762009857693" lng="-10.355950922706" zoom="5" view="0" /&gt;
}}

[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, which runs from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]]]]

'''Mauritania''' is a very dry country on the west coast of [[Western Africa|West Africa]], south from [[Western Sahara]], north from [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]].  Mauritania doesn't seem to be a good place for hitchhiking, at least in the conventional sense. The majority of vehicles are shared taxis and many private vehicles which stop will charge the same rates. Still it is possible to cross the country by hitchhiking; the main roads ([[Nouakchott]]-[[Nouadhibou]], Nouakchott-[[Nema]] and Nouakchott-[[Rosso]], possibly Nouakchott-[[Atar]] as well) are certainly hitchable, be it with overlanders, Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles to West Africa, or just nice Mauritanians curious about meeting Europeans.

In southern Mauritania on the road to [[Mali]], around [[Kiffa]] and [[Ayoun el-Atrous]] hitchhiking is much harder than in other parts of the country. People there really don't understand hitchhiking and even after long explaining of what you're doing they'll take you to the bus station. Even the police/army/gendarmerie checkpoints are somewhat harder there. Officers are able to wait for bribes for hours, force you out of the car for "safety" reasons and next day force another driver to take you. It doesn't feel very comfortable but it's certainly possible to hitch through.

Whenever hitchhiking in Mauritania, police check points will play an important role. Depending on your luck, the mood of the check point's commander and a million other factors, they will think you're great, invite you for [[food]], give you stuff and even try to find rides for you, or tell you that you absolutely can't hitchhike from there, either because it is illegal or just because it is "not normal" or "not safe", and you might be forced to take a taxi. When you're hitching with Mauritanians (except maybe if it is a taxi taking you for free, which also happens), be prepared for the police going incredible lengths to make sure you're safe and everything is in order - when [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] was hitchhiking from Rosso to Nouakchott with three Mauritanian agronomists, police sent the whole car all the way back to Rosso after three quarters of the way (150km) so the region's police chief (who had come to the station from his home for the occasion) could personally make sure Zenit was in the car voluntarily. Also, at every checkpoint (which are really numerous in Mauritania), Zenit was asked to step out of the car and taken aside to ask about the ride and to take all the information, including the car's Chassis number and the driver's phone number at one point.

In 2016, police checkpoints are much less strict, probably because there have been no reports of kidnappings or similar incidents in recent years, and the situation in the region seems to have calmed down in general.

It should be possible to hitch to Mauritania from the consulate in Rabat, [[Morocco]], with overlanders calling in to get their visas, or from southern Morocco. You can also get into Mauritania with Mauritanian traders, who can be found opposite the first police checkpoint north of Dakhla. The price for a journey to Nouadhibou is currently 250-380Dhs (negotiable). Another option are Moroccan vegetable trucks leaving from Agadir or Marrakech.

The train from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]] is free if you ride in an ore hopper - most passengers do anyway.

: ''I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10 km further than that payment is expected. However I did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian Army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.''

Experience from [[User:DeepGroove]] in 2023:
At the beginning I was quite discouraged at the border, when the police only wanted to let me go if they have the numbers plate of my driver. And then even didn't let me go when I had one, because my driver wouldn't bring me all the way to Nouakchott and the police said: it was too hot...

But then I noticed that is not too hard to hitchhike in Mauretania, even inside the city. Just let the taxis pass. That are more or less all the old cars. I took my hands on my heart and shaked my head when they arrived (explaining takes more time). And I concentrated on the new cars. That made it quite easy then :)


=== Cities ===
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Kiffa]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]

=== Border crossing ===
Be aware of mines in the border region to [[Western Sahara]]. Don't leave the road there. Do not accept guides offering to take you across for a small fee, the road is clearly visible, walkable and you will only get ripped off.

For crossing to Senegal, the rosso border crossing has a notorious reputation for hustlers and scammers (even though they mainly target people in cars). 

As of 2024 rosso wasn't that bad as a backpacker in the evening, a few people hissed at me but I walked straight past them, one guy insisted he was my friend but then demanded commision at the end, which he did not recieve. Still, be wary, do not give your passport to anyone unless they are in full uniform with ID, do not pay for anything, the stamp, the ferry, its all free, and anyone approaching you to offer you help randomly will definitely want payment. It is easier early morning to late evening.

When you arrive at the big green gate, a soldier/policeman milling around will ask to see your passport. Make sure you're talking to the real police before showing it. After that you'll be directed to go to the booth on the building to the left for your exit stamp. It's not visible from that gate and actually quite far around, facing the river. Once stamped out, wait for the car ferry. It is definitely free for foot passengers, and has a sim card seller on it for senegal. An orange simcard with 1gb of data is 1000 cfa, or 100 new ougia. A money changer was also there, although he didn't have much cfa.

On the senegal side, a policeman will probably greet you on the off ramp and demand your passport, try and make sure he is real, he will take you to some booths where you are stamped in and fingerprints are taken, thats it, crossing over!

Be alert, but it really isn't impossible unless you have the IQ of a potato and believe gullible is written on the ceiling.

You should also have your vaccination certificate ready (they can check for yellow fever, although I was not checked in Jan 2024), or be prepared to shed some money or a lot of time, possibly both.


The alternative to Rosso is to cross the Senegal River at Diama. The border post over there has a reputation for bieng more relaxed, (as of 2024 I was told some scammers where present there) but the traffic is quite sparse aswell. Additionally, the route briefly crosses a national park. At a police checkpoint there a ranger demands a 200ug "entrance fee" from all tourists for the park, even if you're going direct to the border. A lot of backpackers try and get out of paying it, so he gets annoyed very quickly.

To [[Mali]] you have to go to Ayoun first and then south to [[Gogui]]. It's probably the only not-a-dirt road, there are no problems at the crossing.

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{IsIn|Africa}}
{{hitchbase_country|126}}

[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mauretanien]]
[[zh:毛里塔尼亚]]</text>
      <sha1>j3d7mto9je04k12qhpmp4q0wequ6il3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105344</id>
      <parentid>105341</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-02-21T06:21:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Muhtriangles</username>
        <id>47486</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6922">{{infobox Country
|country = of Mauritania
|language = Arabic (Hassaniya) and French
|capital = [[Nouakchott]]
|pop = 3,205,060
|currency = Ouguiya (MRO)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='mr' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat="20.762009857693" lng="-10.355950922706" zoom="5" view="0" /&gt;
}}

[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, which runs from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]]]]

'''Mauritania''' is a very dry country on the west coast of [[Western Africa|West Africa]], south from [[Western Sahara]], north from [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]].  Mauritania is definitely hitchable, although there are issues as the majority of vehicles are shared taxis and many private vehicles which stop will try and charge the same rates, and in the desert wait times can be long due to lack of traffic.

Still, the main roads ([[Nouakchott]]-[[Nouadhibou]], Nouakchott-[[Nema]] and Nouakchott-[[Rosso]], Nouakchott-[[Atar]], are certainly hitchable, be it with overlanders, Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles to West Africa, or just nice Mauritanians curious about meeting Europeans.

In southern Mauritania on the road to [[Mali]], around [[Kiffa]] and [[Ayoun el-Atrous]] hitchhiking is much harder than in other parts of the country. People there really don't understand hitchhiking and even after long explaining of what you're doing they'll take you to the bus station. Even the police/army/gendarmerie checkpoints are somewhat harder there. Officers are able to wait for bribes for hours, force you out of the car for "safety" reasons and next day force another driver to take you. It doesn't feel very comfortable but it's certainly possible to hitch through.


There are loads of police checkpoints on every road in mauritainia. Every time they will stop you and demand to have a fiche (photocopy of the ID page of your passport and to know where you are going. Carry about 30 print outs. I'm not exaggerating, you'll need them.

In the past people had problems with checkpoints really messing with hitchhikers, however as of 2024 I had no problems with any checkpoints at all, nor did anyone I travelled with. They just all want to be given a printed photocopy of your passport, and once asked me to show them the original. It was a bit of a pain and sometimes caused a couple of minutes delay, but nothing insane.

It should be possible to hitch to Mauritania from the consulate in Rabat, [[Morocco]], with overlanders calling in to get their visas, or from southern Morocco. You can also get into Mauritania with Mauritanian traders, who can be found opposite the first police checkpoint north of Dakhla. The price for a journey to Nouadhibou is currently 250-380Dhs (negotiable). Another option are Moroccan vegetable trucks leaving from Agadir or Marrakech.

The train from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]] is free if you ride in an ore hopper - most passengers do anyway.

: ''I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10 km further than that payment is expected. However I did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian Army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.''

Experience from [[User:DeepGroove]] in 2023:
At the beginning I was quite discouraged at the border, when the police only wanted to let me go if they have the numbers plate of my driver. And then even didn't let me go when I had one, because my driver wouldn't bring me all the way to Nouakchott and the police said: it was too hot...

But then I noticed that is not too hard to hitchhike in Mauretania, even inside the city. Just let the taxis pass. That are more or less all the old cars. I took my hands on my heart and shaked my head when they arrived (explaining takes more time). And I concentrated on the new cars. That made it quite easy then :)

=== Cities ===
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Kiffa]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]

=== Border crossing ===
Be aware of mines in the border region to [[Western Sahara]]. Don't leave the road there. Do not accept guides offering to take you across for a small fee, the road is clearly visible, walkable and you will only get ripped off.

For crossing to Senegal, the rosso border crossing has a notorious reputation for hustlers and scammers (even though they mainly target people in cars). 

As of 2024 rosso wasn't that bad as a backpacker in the evening, a few people hissed at me but I walked straight past them, one guy insisted he was my friend but then demanded commision at the end, which he did not recieve. Still, be wary, do not give your passport to anyone unless they are in full uniform with ID, do not pay for anything, the stamp, the ferry, its all free, and anyone approaching you to offer you help randomly will definitely want payment. It is easier early morning to late evening.

When you arrive at the big green gate, a soldier/policeman milling around will ask to see your passport. Make sure you're talking to the real police before showing it. After that you'll be directed to go to the booth on the building to the left for your exit stamp. It's not visible from that gate and actually quite far around, facing the river. Once stamped out, wait for the car ferry. It is definitely free for foot passengers, and has a sim card seller on it for senegal. An orange simcard with 1gb of data is 1000 cfa, or 100 new ougia. A money changer was also there, although he didn't have much cfa.

On the senegal side, a policeman will probably greet you on the off ramp and demand your passport, try and make sure he is real, he will take you to some booths where you are stamped in and fingerprints are taken, thats it, crossing over!

Be alert, but it really isn't impossible unless you have the IQ of a potato and believe gullible is written on the ceiling.

You should also have your vaccination certificate ready (they can check for yellow fever, although I was not checked in Jan 2024), or be prepared to shed some money or a lot of time, possibly both.


The alternative to Rosso is to cross the Senegal River at Diama. The border post over there has a reputation for bieng more relaxed, (as of 2024 I was told some scammers where present there) but the traffic is quite sparse aswell. Additionally, the route briefly crosses a national park. At a police checkpoint there a ranger demands a 200ug "entrance fee" from all tourists for the park, even if you're going direct to the border. A lot of backpackers try and get out of paying it, so he gets annoyed very quickly.

To [[Mali]] you have to go to Ayoun first and then south to [[Gogui]]. It's probably the only not-a-dirt road, there are no problems at the crossing.

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{IsIn|Africa}}
{{hitchbase_country|126}}

[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mauretanien]]
[[zh:毛里塔尼亚]]</text>
      <sha1>ligj7gzk6ay6091bt71gh4235hpeug6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>114821</id>
      <parentid>105344</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-10-13T19:33:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GriL</username>
        <id>24751</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6950">{{infobox Country
|country = of Mauritania
|language = Arabic (Hassaniya) and French
|capital = [[Nouakchott]]
|pop = 3,205,060
|currency = Ouguiya (MRO)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='mr' /&gt;
|map = &lt;map lat="20.762009857693" lng="-10.355950922706" zoom="5" view="0" /&gt;
}}

[[File:Train_ndb-choûm_(27).JPG|thumb|right|300px|The longest train in the world, which runs from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]]]]

'''Mauritania''' is a very dry country on the west coast of [[Western Africa|West Africa]], south from [[Western Sahara]], north from [[Senegal]] and [[Mali]].  Mauritania is definitely hitchable, although there are issues as the majority of vehicles are shared taxis and many private vehicles which stop will try and charge the same rates, and in the desert wait times can be long due to lack of traffic.

Still, the main roads ([[Nouakchott]]-[[Nouadhibou]], Nouakchott-[[Nema]] and Nouakchott-[[Rosso]], Nouakchott-[[Atar]], are certainly hitchable, be it with overlanders, Euro-African car traders who bring vehicles to West Africa, or just nice Mauritanians curious about meeting Europeans.

In southern Mauritania on the road to [[Mali]], around [[Kiffa]] and [[Ayoun el-Atrous]] hitchhiking is much harder than in other parts of the country. People there really don't understand hitchhiking and even after long explaining of what you're doing they'll take you to the bus station. Even the police/army/gendarmerie checkpoints are somewhat harder there. Officers are able to wait for bribes for hours, force you out of the car for "safety" reasons and next day force another driver to take you. It doesn't feel very comfortable but it's certainly possible to hitch through.


There are loads of police checkpoints on every road in mauritainia. Every time they will stop you and demand to have a fiche (photocopy of the ID page of your passport and to know where you are going. Carry about 30 print outs. I'm not exaggerating, you'll need them.

In the past people had problems with checkpoints really messing with hitchhikers, however as of 2024 I had no problems with any checkpoints at all, nor did anyone I travelled with. They just all want to be given a printed photocopy of your passport, and once asked me to show them the original. It was a bit of a pain and sometimes caused a couple of minutes delay, but nothing insane.

It should be possible to hitch to Mauritania from the consulate in Rabat, [[Morocco]], with overlanders calling in to get their visas, or from southern Morocco. You can also get into Mauritania with Mauritanian traders, who can be found opposite the first police checkpoint north of Dakhla. The price for a journey to Nouadhibou is currently 250-380Dhs (negotiable). Another option are Moroccan vegetable trucks leaving from Agadir or Marrakech.

The train from [[Nouadhibou]] to [[Choum]] and [[Zouerate]] is free if you ride in an ore hopper - most passengers do anyway.

: ''I've found it very easy to hitch over short distances, maybe up to 10 km further than that payment is expected. However I did hitch with a general from the Mauritanian Army from [[Atar]] to [[Nouakchott]], he even insisted on paying a hotel for us halfway.''

Experience from [[User:DeepGroove]] in 2023:
At the beginning I was quite discouraged at the border, when the police only wanted to let me go if they have the numbers plate of my driver. And then even didn't let me go when I had one, because my driver wouldn't bring me all the way to Nouakchott and the police said: it was too hot...

But then I noticed that is not too hard to hitchhike in Mauretania, even inside the city. Just let the taxis pass. That are more or less all the old cars. I took my hands on my heart and shaked my head when they arrived (explaining takes more time). And I concentrated on the new cars. That made it quite easy then :)

=== Cities ===
* [[Nouakchott]]
* [[Nouadhibou]]
* [[Atar]]
* [[Choum]]
* [[Zouerate]]
* [[Kiffa]]
* [[Ayoun el-Atrous]]
* [[Nema]]
* [[Rosso]]

=== Border crossing ===
Be aware of mines in the border region to [[Western Sahara]]. Don't leave the road there. Do not accept guides offering to take you across for a small fee, the road is clearly visible, walkable and you will only get ripped off.

For crossing to Senegal, the rosso border crossing has a notorious reputation for hustlers and scammers (even though they mainly target people in cars). 

As of 2024 rosso wasn't that bad as a backpacker in the evening, a few people hissed at me but I walked straight past them, one guy insisted he was my friend but then demanded commision at the end, which he did not recieve. Still, be wary, do not give your passport to anyone unless they are in full uniform with ID, do not pay for anything, the stamp, the ferry, its all free, and anyone approaching you to offer you help randomly will definitely want payment. It is easier early morning to late evening.

When you arrive at the big green gate, a soldier/policeman milling around will ask to see your passport. Make sure you're talking to the real police before showing it. After that you'll be directed to go to the booth on the building to the left for your exit stamp. It's not visible from that gate and actually quite far around, facing the river. Once stamped out, wait for the car ferry. It is definitely free for foot passengers, and has a sim card seller on it for senegal. An orange simcard with 1gb of data is 1000 cfa, or 100 new ougia. A money changer was also there, although he didn't have much cfa.

On the senegal side, a policeman will probably greet you on the off ramp and demand your passport, try and make sure he is real, he will take you to some booths where you are stamped in and fingerprints are taken, thats it, crossing over!

Be alert, but it really isn't impossible unless you have the IQ of a potato and believe gullible is written on the ceiling.

You should also have your vaccination certificate ready (they can check for yellow fever, although I was not checked in Jan 2024), or be prepared to shed some money or a lot of time, possibly both.


The alternative to Rosso is to cross the Senegal River at Diama. The border post over there has a reputation for bieng more relaxed, (as of 2024 I was told some scammers where present there) but the traffic is quite sparse aswell. Additionally, the route briefly crosses a national park. At a police checkpoint there a ranger demands a 200ug "entrance fee" from all tourists for the park, even if you're going direct to the border. A lot of backpackers try and get out of paying it, so he gets annoyed very quickly.

To [[Mali]] you have to go to Ayoun first and then south to [[Gogui]]. It's probably the only not-a-dirt road, there are no problems at the crossing.

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{IsIn|Africa}}
{{hitchbase_country|126}}

[[Category:Mauritania]]
[[Category:Africa]]

[[de:Mauretanien]]
[[ru:Мавритания]]
[[zh:毛里塔尼亚]]</text>
      <sha1>1iytvoakevhc35jbyny1h27o9ri91cn</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Talk:Main Page</title>
    <ns>1</ns>
    <id>1532</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1569</id>
      <parentid>4432</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-10-11T20:12:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4000">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

== Possibility ==

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway,

Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)

Cheers

Paul (djdirect from CS)

PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>q7s9mvb2z757u4y5epdlhi3piphpdq3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1570</id>
      <parentid>1569</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4000">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

== Possibility ==

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway,

Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)

Cheers

Paul (djdirect from CS)

PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>q7s9mvb2z757u4y5epdlhi3piphpdq3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4420</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T19:40:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>202.76.231.182</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="206">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>oh5et3z7rarnd9aql3vievz7u3m23jp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4421</id>
      <parentid>4420</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-28T08:24:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Deleea</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="332">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea</text>
      <sha1>swt79f41qpvngul3w0d8f89cw6n0wmi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4422</id>
      <parentid>4421</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-28T22:57:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="691">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>6stu6tyrubxzbaos8atf33cmi5916p6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4423</id>
      <parentid>4422</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-02-03T23:06:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>84.30.131.207</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2374">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.</text>
      <sha1>nus2nmqv4phkkdcf2z20dlntnm3xe45</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4424</id>
      <parentid>4423</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-02-05T20:10:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2815">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>bprmnjgunbxzf4qu18kvckvqn4habpx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4425</id>
      <parentid>4424</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-12T12:53:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>LetheSoda</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2932">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

== Possibility ==

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?</text>
      <sha1>iydlpr61gmxtkvbda8pn7yazydlg54x</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4426</id>
      <parentid>4425</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-12T15:43:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3027">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

== Possibility ==

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>eianka34vswcjmj1zw14ny0a72k817c</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4427</id>
      <parentid>4426</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-10-11T14:02:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>87.248.175.246</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3413">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

== Possibility ==

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)

Cheers

Paul (djdirect from CS)</text>
      <sha1>pxyao4b8np5o1a2yuiq454bli72w6na</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4428</id>
      <parentid>4427</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-10-11T14:04:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>87.248.175.246</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3027">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

== Possibility ==

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>eianka34vswcjmj1zw14ny0a72k817c</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4429</id>
      <parentid>4428</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-10-11T14:05:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>87.248.175.246</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3648">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

== Possibility ==

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== == Errors that need to be fixed == ==

Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway,

=Kyiv/Kiev on the title page=
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)

=Moldova=
Moldova doesn't seem to exist on the country list front page thing :)   How do I add my tips, since I'm hitching here now :)

Cheers

Paul (djdirect from CS)</text>
      <sha1>0elcstgaq3ozagvlc11dsvvucdckefn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4430</id>
      <parentid>4429</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-10-11T14:06:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>87.248.175.246</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3677">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

== Possibility ==

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== == Errors that need to be fixed == ==

Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway,

Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)

Moldova
Moldova doesn't seem to exist on the country list front page thing :)   How do I add my tips, since I'm hitching here now :)

Cheers

Paul (djdirect from CS)

PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)</text>
      <sha1>52jlmyfn3rho651qq7ta8rm8usunp3n</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4431</id>
      <parentid>4430</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-10-11T14:06:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>87.248.175.246</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3671">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

== Possibility ==

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway,

Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)

Moldova
Moldova doesn't seem to exist on the country list front page thing :)   How do I add my tips, since I'm hitching here now :)

Cheers

Paul (djdirect from CS)

PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)</text>
      <sha1>3bn687msonvtysl3nhcpt1te8pnnqyy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4432</id>
      <parentid>4431</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-10-11T14:35:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>87.248.175.246</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3537">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

== Possibility ==

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway,

Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)

Cheers

Paul (djdirect from CS)

PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)</text>
      <sha1>otykwjuuy099pujc72ih3a3z6ronnhs</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4433</id>
      <parentid>1570</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4000">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

== Possibility ==

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway,

Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)

Cheers

Paul (djdirect from CS)

PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>q7s9mvb2z757u4y5epdlhi3piphpdq3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9134</id>
      <parentid>4433</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-24T02:04:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4294">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

== Possibility ==

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway,

Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)

Cheers

Paul (djdirect from CS)

PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==
* When we'll be getting some more hits it could be interesting to add a link to http://yoshi.mega2000.de/stats/www.hitchwiki.org/ on the Main Page. 
* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)</text>
      <sha1>g0ks0l9bb65z1um3hkjrvwxqjqr8a4f</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9355</id>
      <parentid>9134</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-01T21:39:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Salman</username>
        <id>15</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5947">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

== Possibility ==

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway,

Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)

Cheers

Paul (djdirect from CS)

PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==
* When we'll be getting some more hits it could be interesting to add a link to http://yoshi.mega2000.de/stats/www.hitchwiki.org/ on the Main Page. 
* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)</text>
      <sha1>2u7sfbj3opjxyiqaefwk7pgl71p94l6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9440</id>
      <parentid>9355</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-03T14:41:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6360">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

== Possibility ==

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway,

Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)

Cheers

Paul (djdirect from CS)

PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==
* When we'll be getting some more hits it could be interesting to add a link to http://yoshi.mega2000.de/stats/www.hitchwiki.org/ on the Main Page. 
* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== overview ==
For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country).
Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)</text>
      <sha1>t2wpsbpygb472t9pmiftymnklpclhqi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9442</id>
      <parentid>9440</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-03T15:24:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6211">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

== Possibility ==

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway,

Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)

Cheers

Paul (djdirect from CS)

PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==
* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== overview ==
For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country).
Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)</text>
      <sha1>prllo7y6loier1p2modt7ouz9jyzxsv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9445</id>
      <parentid>9442</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-03T17:47:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zac Stewart</username>
        <id>5</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6467">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

== Possibility ==

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway,

Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)

Cheers

Paul (djdirect from CS)

PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==
* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== overview ==
For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country).
Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)
:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)</text>
      <sha1>bvo4grl5kejscrdobh422ks4s52wovx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9450</id>
      <parentid>9445</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-04T02:15:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6589">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

== Possibility ==

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway,

Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)

Cheers

Paul (djdirect from CS)

PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==
* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== overview ==
For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country).
Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)
:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)</text>
      <sha1>hdled0nf9x9kh2h2y9ylaxicbscn2wa</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9494</id>
      <parentid>9450</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-04T12:35:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6693">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

== Possibility ==

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway,

Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)

Cheers

Paul (djdirect from CS)

PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==
* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== overview ==
For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country).
Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)
:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)</text>
      <sha1>ma5awd3k2ep7s45wc3zj9shaz97zyem</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9496</id>
      <parentid>9494</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-04T21:34:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6844">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

== Possibility ==

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway,

Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)

Cheers

Paul (djdirect from CS)

PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==
* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== overview ==
For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country).
Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)
:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)</text>
      <sha1>4y1m0xvlhjwlmg1zxc9uzxlw20glu61</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9501</id>
      <parentid>9496</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-05T00:03:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7119">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

== Possibility ==

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway,

Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)

Cheers

Paul (djdirect from CS)

PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==
* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== overview ==
For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country).
Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)
:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)</text>
      <sha1>o2ae32xkxcjyls7vgdpljkywedzlha0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9725</id>
      <parentid>9501</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-13T03:45:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zac Stewart</username>
        <id>5</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7999">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

== Possibility ==

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway,

Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)

Cheers

Paul (djdirect from CS)

PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==
* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== overview ==
For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country).
Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)
:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)</text>
      <sha1>sjhbsykvoecln685hz4kb02or41ssdt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9738</id>
      <parentid>9725</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-13T04:55:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8217">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

== Possibility ==

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway,

Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)

Cheers

Paul (djdirect from CS)

PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==
* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== overview ==
For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country).
Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)
:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)</text>
      <sha1>mkjutijcjli3cdfkl2njflvni1ygdqo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9765</id>
      <parentid>9738</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-13T05:37:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zac Stewart</username>
        <id>5</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8341">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

== Possibility ==

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway,

Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)

Cheers

Paul (djdirect from CS)

PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==
* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== overview ==
For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country).
Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)
:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)</text>
      <sha1>9befdpdug5m6lael5tbko4ttjbi2xot</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9772</id>
      <parentid>9765</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-13T05:49:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8516">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

== Possibility ==

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway,

Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)

Cheers

Paul (djdirect from CS)

PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==
* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== overview ==
For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country).
Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)
:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)</text>
      <sha1>1cbz6rs9kdaz00dwzy36smvqa8q5uq1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10909</id>
      <parentid>9772</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-22T21:11:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TruckThor</username>
        <id>82</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8878">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

== Possibility ==

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway,

Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)

Cheers

Paul (djdirect from CS)

PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==
* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== overview ==
For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country).
Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)
:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

----

I was wondering if we could somehow improve the information on this site by adding content regarding routes, not only places. For example, if someone travels from Paris to Berlin, he/she should write a page about this route, mentioning the best places to HH, shops with best prices, hostels etc. [[User:TruckThor|TruckThor]] 12:10AM 23APR2007 EEST(GMT+2)</text>
      <sha1>f2ozw59nkbf3mg4jbwq8pg13z54u5lx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10959</id>
      <parentid>10909</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-24T09:22:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8562">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

== Possibility ==

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway,

Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)

Cheers

Paul (djdirect from CS)

PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==
* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== overview ==
For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country).
Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)
:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

----
''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''</text>
      <sha1>1x9ct6fjxxi9z3trvfcwywzqo1lc8ne</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11224</id>
      <parentid>10959</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-11T17:24:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Alex</username>
        <id>89</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8932">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

== Possibility ==

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway,

Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)

Cheers

Paul (djdirect from CS)

PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==
* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== overview ==
For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country).
Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)
:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

----
''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''


== email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>2v9pr25o1bui28zm0r6pwwtwnxxon2v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11225</id>
      <parentid>11224</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-12T06:45:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9090">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

== Possibility ==

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway,

Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)

Cheers

Paul (djdirect from CS)

PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==
* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== overview ==
For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country).
Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)
:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

----
''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''


== email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>8uywjf83vjasqdygbhsxroj0c0xl3ew</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11247</id>
      <parentid>11225</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-13T21:11:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9221">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

== Possibility ==

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway,

Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)

Cheers

Paul (djdirect from CS)

PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==
* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== overview ==
For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country).
Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)
:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

----
''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''


== email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>ihtisj6y13gqkoj6pupjh402e9ywff3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12473</id>
      <parentid>11247</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-29T15:06:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Index</username>
        <id>56</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9495">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

== Possibility ==

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway,

Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)

Cheers

Paul (djdirect from CS)

PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==
* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== overview ==
For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country).
Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)
:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

[[User:Index|Index]] 17:06, 29 July 2007 (CEST) There should be also and '''Central Europe''', just  w N and E it is not enough, adding central E itcan help with the navigation on the map. Who usually does that? (I am a new here, so excuse for eventually inapropriate Q:) )
----
''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''


== email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>6ng749i1ev6u3v1clv0kt0j1dua7nd8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12485</id>
      <parentid>12473</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-29T20:32:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9907">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

== Possibility ==

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway,

Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)

Cheers

Paul (djdirect from CS)

PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==
* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== overview ==
For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country).
Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)
:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[User:Index|Index]] 17:06, 29 July 2007 (CEST) There should be also and '''Central Europe''', just  w N and E it is not enough, adding central E itcan help with the navigation on the map. Who usually does that? (I am a new here, so excuse for eventually inapropriate Q:) )

:That's a good idea. We are self-organizing: anybody is welcome to do (almost) anything here! So feel free to try out editing [[Template:Mainpage-locations]]. You could also copy that into e.g. [[User:Index/locations test]] if you don't feel ready yet to change the Main Page, and then copy it to the real template when it's all good. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:32, 29 July 2007 (CEST)

----
''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''

== email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>29uxjmscmli6tfnlqfoegzcrk0f2izu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12875</id>
      <parentid>12485</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-15T15:01:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10058">Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

== Possibility ==

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway,

Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)

Cheers

Paul (djdirect from CS)

PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==
* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== overview ==
For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country).
Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)
:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[User:Index|Index]] 17:06, 29 July 2007 (CEST) There should be also and '''Central Europe''', just  w N and E it is not enough, adding central E itcan help with the navigation on the map. Who usually does that? (I am a new here, so excuse for eventually inapropriate Q:) )

:That's a good idea. We are self-organizing: anybody is welcome to do (almost) anything here! So feel free to try out editing [[Template:Mainpage-locations]]. You could also copy that into e.g. [[User:Index/locations test]] if you don't feel ready yet to change the Main Page, and then copy it to the real template when it's all good. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:32, 29 July 2007 (CEST)

::There's a discussion at [[Template talk:Mainpage-locations]], probably a better place for this :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:01, 15 August 2007 (CEST)

----
''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''

== email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>7hxqpnkq53sp1j8vmvp4m0jenr4098z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13752</id>
      <parentid>12875</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-13T17:43:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10478">
== General Aspect ==

- Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


- Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

- Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

- Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

== Overview ==
- For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country). Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== USA Division Possibility ==

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

- Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway, Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)
Cheers Paul (djdirect from CS)
PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==

* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

- I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[User:Index|Index]] 17:06, 29 July 2007 (CEST) There should be also and '''Central Europe''', just  w N and E it is not enough, adding central E itcan help with the navigation on the map. Who usually does that? (I am a new here, so excuse for eventually inapropriate Q:) )

:That's a good idea. We are self-organizing: anybody is welcome to do (almost) anything here! So feel free to try out editing [[Template:Mainpage-locations]]. You could also copy that into e.g. [[User:Index/locations test]] if you don't feel ready yet to change the Main Page, and then copy it to the real template when it's all good. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:32, 29 July 2007 (CEST)

::There's a discussion at [[Template talk:Mainpage-locations]], probably a better place for this :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:01, 15 August 2007 (CEST)

----
''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''

== email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)

== Mapping ==

It would be useful to map some of the hitching departing point, on my case to complete and easy the comprehension on the information about Canada. I know it has been done by some in a couple of pages... would anyone help out with that? (Basically its because it's not something I know how-to) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:43, 13 September 2007 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>kq93651otjk8nhoncqmfmxxsxek2l7k</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13753</id>
      <parentid>13752</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-13T17:45:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10479">== General Aspect ==

- Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


- Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

- Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

- Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

== Overview ==
- For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country). Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

- Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway, Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)
Cheers Paul (djdirect from CS)
PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==

* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

- I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[User:Index|Index]] 17:06, 29 July 2007 (CEST) There should be also and '''Central Europe''', just  w N and E it is not enough, adding central E itcan help with the navigation on the map. Who usually does that? (I am a new here, so excuse for eventually inapropriate Q:) )

:That's a good idea. We are self-organizing: anybody is welcome to do (almost) anything here! So feel free to try out editing [[Template:Mainpage-locations]]. You could also copy that into e.g. [[User:Index/locations test]] if you don't feel ready yet to change the Main Page, and then copy it to the real template when it's all good. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:32, 29 July 2007 (CEST)

::There's a discussion at [[Template talk:Mainpage-locations]], probably a better place for this :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:01, 15 August 2007 (CEST)

=== USA Division Possibility ===

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

----
''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''

== Email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)

== Mapping ==

It would be useful to map some of the hitching departing point, on my case to complete and easy the comprehension on the information about Canada. I know it has been done by some in a couple of pages... would anyone help out with that? (Basically its because it's not something I know how-to) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:43, 13 September 2007 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>605g13v6mp8tx3zlnnva916vkro9n80</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13754</id>
      <parentid>13753</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-13T17:46:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10433">== General Aspect ==

- Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


- Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

- Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

- Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

== Overview ==
- For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country). Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

- Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway, Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)
Cheers Paul (djdirect from CS)
PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==

* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

- I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[User:Index|Index]] 17:06, 29 July 2007 (CEST) There should be also and '''Central Europe''', just  w N and E it is not enough, adding central E itcan help with the navigation on the map. Who usually does that? (I am a new here, so excuse for eventually inapropriate Q:) )

:That's a good idea. We are self-organizing: anybody is welcome to do (almost) anything here! So feel free to try out editing [[Template:Mainpage-locations]]. You could also copy that into e.g. [[User:Index/locations test]] if you don't feel ready yet to change the Main Page, and then copy it to the real template when it's all good. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:32, 29 July 2007 (CEST)

::There's a discussion at [[Template talk:Mainpage-locations]], probably a better place for this :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:01, 15 August 2007 (CEST)

=== USA Division Possibility ===

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)

== Mapping ==

It would be useful to map some of the hitching departing point, on my case to complete and easy the comprehension on the information about Canada. I know it has been done by some in a couple of pages... would anyone help out with that? (Basically its because it's not something I know how-to) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:43, 13 September 2007 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>hamx4z2p8yzgjgmdpc9btmk2hm03p04</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13755</id>
      <parentid>13754</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-13T17:46:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10479">== General Aspect ==

- Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


- Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

- Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

- Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

== Overview ==
- For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country). Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

- Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway, Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)
Cheers Paul (djdirect from CS)
PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==

* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

- I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[User:Index|Index]] 17:06, 29 July 2007 (CEST) There should be also and '''Central Europe''', just  w N and E it is not enough, adding central E itcan help with the navigation on the map. Who usually does that? (I am a new here, so excuse for eventually inapropriate Q:) )

:That's a good idea. We are self-organizing: anybody is welcome to do (almost) anything here! So feel free to try out editing [[Template:Mainpage-locations]]. You could also copy that into e.g. [[User:Index/locations test]] if you don't feel ready yet to change the Main Page, and then copy it to the real template when it's all good. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:32, 29 July 2007 (CEST)

::There's a discussion at [[Template talk:Mainpage-locations]], probably a better place for this :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:01, 15 August 2007 (CEST)

=== USA Division Possibility ===

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

----
''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''

== Email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)

== Mapping ==

It would be useful to map some of the hitching departing point, on my case to complete and easy the comprehension on the information about Canada. I know it has been done by some in a couple of pages... would anyone help out with that? (Basically its because it's not something I know how-to) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:43, 13 September 2007 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>605g13v6mp8tx3zlnnva916vkro9n80</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13756</id>
      <parentid>13755</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-13T17:47:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10520">== General Aspect ==

- Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


- Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

- Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

- Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

== Overview ==
- For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country). Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

- Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway, Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)
Cheers Paul (djdirect from CS)
PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==

* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

- I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[User:Index|Index]] 17:06, 29 July 2007 (CEST) There should be also and '''Central Europe''', just  w N and E it is not enough, adding central E itcan help with the navigation on the map. Who usually does that? (I am a new here, so excuse for eventually inapropriate Q:) )

:That's a good idea. We are self-organizing: anybody is welcome to do (almost) anything here! So feel free to try out editing [[Template:Mainpage-locations]]. You could also copy that into e.g. [[User:Index/locations test]] if you don't feel ready yet to change the Main Page, and then copy it to the real template when it's all good. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:32, 29 July 2007 (CEST)

::There's a discussion at [[Template talk:Mainpage-locations]], probably a better place for this :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:01, 15 August 2007 (CEST)

''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''

=== USA Division Possibility ===

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

----
''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''

== Email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)

== Mapping ==

It would be useful to map some of the hitching departing point, on my case to complete and easy the comprehension on the information about Canada. I know it has been done by some in a couple of pages... would anyone help out with that? (Basically its because it's not something I know how-to) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:43, 13 September 2007 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>7btf6n8clec51zx8t4e009gxnuhclrd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13757</id>
      <parentid>13756</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-13T17:47:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10474">== General Aspect ==

- Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


- Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

- Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

- Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

== Overview ==
- For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country). Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

- Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway, Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)
Cheers Paul (djdirect from CS)
PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==

* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

- I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[User:Index|Index]] 17:06, 29 July 2007 (CEST) There should be also and '''Central Europe''', just  w N and E it is not enough, adding central E itcan help with the navigation on the map. Who usually does that? (I am a new here, so excuse for eventually inapropriate Q:) )

:That's a good idea. We are self-organizing: anybody is welcome to do (almost) anything here! So feel free to try out editing [[Template:Mainpage-locations]]. You could also copy that into e.g. [[User:Index/locations test]] if you don't feel ready yet to change the Main Page, and then copy it to the real template when it's all good. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:32, 29 July 2007 (CEST)

::There's a discussion at [[Template talk:Mainpage-locations]], probably a better place for this :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:01, 15 August 2007 (CEST)

''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''

=== USA Division Possibility ===

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)

== Mapping ==

It would be useful to map some of the hitching departing point, on my case to complete and easy the comprehension on the information about Canada. I know it has been done by some in a couple of pages... would anyone help out with that? (Basically its because it's not something I know how-to) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:43, 13 September 2007 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>em51brs7z2ntbhndzfo6ohkea37tfxl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13758</id>
      <parentid>13757</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-13T17:55:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11194">== General Aspect ==

- Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


- Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

- Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

- Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

== Overview ==
- For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country). Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

=== Writing style ===

I was feeling that it would be more interesting and correct to split the 'factual information' of the 'personnal experience', be that the factual information about a hitching spot comes first while the personnal ones would come in a '''different paragraph which follows'''. It would give a more professionnal look to the cities or country pages instead of having to read the subjective point of view of one person everytime, which is interesting, but the factual reading is usually providing a straight to the point information that is often quickly needed. Having a little code about how to make it would enhance the whole project. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:55, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

- Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway, Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)
Cheers Paul (djdirect from CS)
PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==

* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

- I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[User:Index|Index]] 17:06, 29 July 2007 (CEST) There should be also and '''Central Europe''', just  w N and E it is not enough, adding central E itcan help with the navigation on the map. Who usually does that? (I am a new here, so excuse for eventually inapropriate Q:) )

:That's a good idea. We are self-organizing: anybody is welcome to do (almost) anything here! So feel free to try out editing [[Template:Mainpage-locations]]. You could also copy that into e.g. [[User:Index/locations test]] if you don't feel ready yet to change the Main Page, and then copy it to the real template when it's all good. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:32, 29 July 2007 (CEST)

::There's a discussion at [[Template talk:Mainpage-locations]], probably a better place for this :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:01, 15 August 2007 (CEST)

''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''

=== USA Division Possibility ===

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)

== Mapping ==

It would be useful to map some of the hitching departing point, on my case to complete and easy the comprehension on the information about Canada. I know it has been done by some in a couple of pages... would anyone help out with that? (Basically its because it's not something I know how-to) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:43, 13 September 2007 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>ay2chin0r4fiieu4l7i1s14pfix6mld</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13759</id>
      <parentid>13758</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-13T17:56:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10474">== General Aspect ==

- Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


- Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

- Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

- Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

== Overview ==
- For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country). Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

- Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway, Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)
Cheers Paul (djdirect from CS)
PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==

* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

- I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[User:Index|Index]] 17:06, 29 July 2007 (CEST) There should be also and '''Central Europe''', just  w N and E it is not enough, adding central E itcan help with the navigation on the map. Who usually does that? (I am a new here, so excuse for eventually inapropriate Q:) )

:That's a good idea. We are self-organizing: anybody is welcome to do (almost) anything here! So feel free to try out editing [[Template:Mainpage-locations]]. You could also copy that into e.g. [[User:Index/locations test]] if you don't feel ready yet to change the Main Page, and then copy it to the real template when it's all good. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:32, 29 July 2007 (CEST)

::There's a discussion at [[Template talk:Mainpage-locations]], probably a better place for this :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:01, 15 August 2007 (CEST)

''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''

=== USA Division Possibility ===

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)

== Mapping ==

It would be useful to map some of the hitching departing point, on my case to complete and easy the comprehension on the information about Canada. I know it has been done by some in a couple of pages... would anyone help out with that? (Basically its because it's not something I know how-to) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:43, 13 September 2007 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>em51brs7z2ntbhndzfo6ohkea37tfxl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13760</id>
      <parentid>13759</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-13T17:56:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11194">== General Aspect ==

- Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


- Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

- Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

- Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

=== Writing style ===

I was feeling that it would be more interesting and correct to split the 'factual information' of the 'personnal experience', be that the factual information about a hitching spot comes first while the personnal ones would come in a '''different paragraph which follows'''. It would give a more professionnal look to the cities or country pages instead of having to read the subjective point of view of one person everytime, which is interesting, but the factual reading is usually providing a straight to the point information that is often quickly needed. Having a little code about how to make it would enhance the whole project. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:55, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

== Overview ==
- For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country). Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

- Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway, Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)
Cheers Paul (djdirect from CS)
PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==

* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

- I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[User:Index|Index]] 17:06, 29 July 2007 (CEST) There should be also and '''Central Europe''', just  w N and E it is not enough, adding central E itcan help with the navigation on the map. Who usually does that? (I am a new here, so excuse for eventually inapropriate Q:) )

:That's a good idea. We are self-organizing: anybody is welcome to do (almost) anything here! So feel free to try out editing [[Template:Mainpage-locations]]. You could also copy that into e.g. [[User:Index/locations test]] if you don't feel ready yet to change the Main Page, and then copy it to the real template when it's all good. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:32, 29 July 2007 (CEST)

::There's a discussion at [[Template talk:Mainpage-locations]], probably a better place for this :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:01, 15 August 2007 (CEST)

''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''

=== USA Division Possibility ===

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)

== Mapping ==

It would be useful to map some of the hitching departing point, on my case to complete and easy the comprehension on the information about Canada. I know it has been done by some in a couple of pages... would anyone help out with that? (Basically its because it's not something I know how-to) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:43, 13 September 2007 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>1mssaa7oc8ofn2iw6vejwsukod29i2e</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13761</id>
      <parentid>13760</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-13T17:57:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11740">== General Aspect ==

- Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


- Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

- Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

- Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

=== Writing style ===

I was feeling that it would be more interesting and correct to split the 'factual information' of the 'personnal experience', be that the factual information about a hitching spot comes first while the personnal ones would come in a '''different paragraph which follows'''. It would give a more professionnal look to the cities or country pages instead of having to read the subjective point of view of one person everytime, which is interesting, but the factual reading is usually providing a straight to the point information that is often quickly needed. Having a little code about how to make it would enhance the whole project. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:55, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

== Overview ==
- For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country). Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

- Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway, Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)
Cheers Paul (djdirect from CS)
PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==

* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

- I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[User:Index|Index]] 17:06, 29 July 2007 (CEST) There should be also and '''Central Europe''', just  w N and E it is not enough, adding central E itcan help with the navigation on the map. Who usually does that? (I am a new here, so excuse for eventually inapropriate Q:) )

:That's a good idea. We are self-organizing: anybody is welcome to do (almost) anything here! So feel free to try out editing [[Template:Mainpage-locations]]. You could also copy that into e.g. [[User:Index/locations test]] if you don't feel ready yet to change the Main Page, and then copy it to the real template when it's all good. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:32, 29 July 2007 (CEST)

::There's a discussion at [[Template talk:Mainpage-locations]], probably a better place for this :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:01, 15 August 2007 (CEST)

''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''

=== USA Division Possibility ===

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)

== Mapping ==

It would be useful to map some of the hitching departing point, on my case to complete and easy the comprehension on the information about Canada. I know it has been done by some in a couple of pages... would anyone help out with that? (Basically its because it's not something I know how-to) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:43, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

: There is an article about [[How to add maps to articles]]. If you still have problems, just ask, I'm happy to help you. It would be kinda difficult for me to add these maps to articles for areas where I've never been, nor do I know anything about Canadian geography :( Hope you can work it out, or someone who has been there can help. It would be really great to have more maps here --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 19:57, 13 September 2007 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>ir1vhkc5v3uvpgq7d95ax8kxafcm3yf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14126</id>
      <parentid>13761</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-25T11:40:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>161.200.255.162</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="25544">== General Aspect ==

- Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


- Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

- Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

- Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

=== Writing style ===

I was feeling that it would be more interesting and correct to split the 'factual information' of the 'personnal experience', be that the factual information about a hitching spot comes first while the personnal ones would come in a '''different paragraph which follows'''. It would give a more professionnal look to the cities or country pages instead of having to read the subjective point of view of one person everytime, which is interesting, but the factual reading is usually providing a straight to the point information that is often quickly needed. Having a little code about how to make it would enhance the whole project. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:55, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

== Overview ==
- For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country). Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

- Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway, Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)
Cheers Paul (djdirect from CS)
PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==

* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

- I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[User:Index|Index]] 17:06, 29 July 2007 (CEST) There should be also and '''Central Europe''', just  w N and E it is not enough, adding central E itcan help with the navigation on the map. Who usually does that? (I am a new here, so excuse for eventually inapropriate Q:) )

:That's a good idea. We are self-organizing: anybody is welcome to do (almost) anything here! So feel free to try out editing [[Template:Mainpage-locations]]. You could also copy that into e.g. [[User:Index/locations test]] if you don't feel ready yet to change the Main Page, and then copy it to the real template when it's all good. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:32, 29 July 2007 (CEST)

::There's a discussion at [[Template talk:Mainpage-locations]], probably a better place for this :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:01, 15 August 2007 (CEST)

''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''

=== USA Division Possibility ===

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)

== Mapping ==

It would be useful to map some of the hitching departing point, on my case to complete and easy the comprehension on the information about Canada. I know it has been done by some in a couple of pages... would anyone help out with that? (Basically its because it's not something I know how-to) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:43, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

: There is an article about [[How to add maps to articles]]. If you still have problems, just ask, I'm happy to help you. It would be kinda difficult for me to add these maps to articles for areas where I've never been, nor do I know anything about Canadian geography :( Hope you can work it out, or someone who has been there can help. It would be really great to have more maps here --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 19:57, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

== Get Business Job ==

&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/online.html"&gt;online&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/online-job-applications.html"&gt;online job applications&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/online-job-application-in.html"&gt;online job application in&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/online-job-application-for.html"&gt;online job application for&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/online-job-application.html"&gt;online job application&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/online-job-searches.html"&gt;online job searches&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/work-at-home-online-job.html"&gt;work at home online job&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/home-online-job.html"&gt;home online job&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/online-job-search.html"&gt;online job search&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/data-entry-online-job.html"&gt;data entry online job&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/online-job-at-home.html"&gt;online job at home&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/freelance-online-job.html"&gt;freelance online job&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/walmart-online-job-application.html"&gt;walmart online job application&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/walmart-online-job-applications.html"&gt;walmart online job applications&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/wal-mart-online-job-application.html"&gt;wal mart online job application&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/wal-mart-online-job-applications.html"&gt;wal mart online job applications&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/online-job-applications-walmart.html"&gt;online job applications walmart&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/online-job-applications-for-walmart.html"&gt;online job applications for walmart&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/online-job-application-walmart.html"&gt;online job application walmart&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/online-job-application-wal-mart.html"&gt;online job application wal mart&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/online-job-application-for-walmart.html"&gt;online job application for walmart&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/apply-online-job.html"&gt;apply online job&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/online-job-application-for-home-depot.html"&gt;online job application for home depot&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/online/online.html"&gt;online&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/online/online-job-applications.html"&gt;online job applications&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/online/online-job-application-in.html"&gt;online job application in&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/online/online-job-application-for.html"&gt;online job application for&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/online/online-job-application.html"&gt;online job application&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/online/online-job-searches.html"&gt;online job searches&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/online/work-at-home-online-job.html"&gt;work at home online job&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/online/home-online-job.html"&gt;home online job&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/online/online-job-search.html"&gt;online job search&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-home.html"&gt;business career home&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-management.html"&gt;business career management&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-in.html"&gt;business career in&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-economy-employment-europe-ireland-regional.html"&gt;business career economy employment europe ireland regional&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/administration-business-career-in.html"&gt;administration business career in&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-employment-statistics-survey.html"&gt;business career employment statistics survey&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/international-business-career.html"&gt;international business career&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-international.html"&gt;business career international&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-planning.html"&gt;business career planning&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/arts-business-career-entertainment-recording.html"&gt;arts business career entertainment recording&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/administration-business-career.html"&gt;administration business career&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-opportunities.html"&gt;business career opportunities&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/administration-business-career-degree.html"&gt;administration business career degree&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/based-business-career-home-opportunity.html"&gt;based business career home opportunity&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-degree.html"&gt;business career degree&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-e.html"&gt;business career e&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/e-business-career.html"&gt;e business career&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-in-management.html"&gt;business career in management&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-in-international.html"&gt;business career in international&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-training.html"&gt;business career training&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-information.html"&gt;business career information&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/home-business-career-opportunity-work.html"&gt;home business career opportunity work&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-home-opportunity-work.html"&gt;business career home opportunity work&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-consulting-consulting-experience-independent-into-successful-turn.html"&gt;business career consulting consulting experience independent into successful turn&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-employment-job-reference.html"&gt;business career employment job reference&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/academy-of-learning-computer-business-career-college.html"&gt;academy of learning computer business career college&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-majors.html"&gt;business career majors&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/based-business-career-home.html"&gt;based business career home&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/at-home-based-business-career.html"&gt;at home based business career&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-colleges.html"&gt;business career colleges&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/information-on-a-business-career.html"&gt;information on a business career&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-in-music.html"&gt;business career in music&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/based-based-business-career-home.html"&gt;based based business career home&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/build-business-career-idea-never-ninety-other-pig-wrestle.html"&gt;build business career idea never ninety other pig wrestle&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-music.html"&gt;business career music&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/music-business-career.html"&gt;music business career&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-health-school-western.html"&gt;business career health school western&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/school-of-business-career.html"&gt;school of business career&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/western-school-of-health-and-business-career.html"&gt;western school of health and business career&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-consulting.html"&gt;business career consulting&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-creating-idea-life-living-revitalize-that-thinking.html"&gt;business career creating idea life living revitalize that thinking&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-development.html"&gt;business career development&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-employee-immigration-motorola-travel.html"&gt;business career employee immigration motorola travel&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-icm-medical-school.html"&gt;business career icm medical school&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-finance.html"&gt;business career finance&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/broker-business-career.html"&gt;broker business career&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-marketing.html"&gt;business career marketing&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-valuation.html"&gt;business career valuation&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-information-management.html"&gt;business career information management&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/academy-business-career-college-computer-learning.html"&gt;academy business career college computer learning&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/based-business-career-home-home-opportunity-work.html"&gt;based business career home home opportunity work&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-finance-in-international.html"&gt;business career finance in international&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/administration-business-career-opportunity.html"&gt;administration business career opportunity&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-chicago-intelligence-training.html"&gt;business career chicago intelligence training&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/analyst-business-career.html"&gt;analyst business career&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-internet-marketing.html"&gt;business career internet marketing&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-homehome-make-money-work.html"&gt;business career homehome make money work&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/account-area-business-career-district-employment-management-school-territory.html"&gt;account area business career district employment management school territory&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/10-business-career-in-top.html"&gt;10 business career in top&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-from-home-home-success-work.html"&gt;business career from home home success work&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-education.html"&gt;business career education&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/5-business-career-career-e-in-professional-series.html"&gt;5 business career career e in professional series&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-point-school.html"&gt;business career point school&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/acting-build-business-career-learn-need-skill-want.html"&gt;acting build business career learn need skill want&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-internet-opportunity.html"&gt;business career internet opportunity&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-finance-in.html"&gt;business career finance in&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-citigroup-current-site.html"&gt;business career citigroup current site&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-college.html"&gt;business career college&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-institute-medical.html"&gt;business career institute medical&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-small.html"&gt;business career small&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/small-business-career.html"&gt;small business career&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-group-our-unitedhealth.html"&gt;business career group our unitedhealth&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/international-business-career-opportunities.html"&gt;international business career opportunities&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-citigroup-site.html"&gt;business career citigroup site&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-law.html"&gt;business career law&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-counseling-employment-management.html"&gt;business career counseling employment management&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-manager.html"&gt;business career manager&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/australia-business-career-economy-employment-oceania-regional.html"&gt;australia business career economy employment oceania regional&lt;/a&gt;</text>
      <sha1>psvaccngzgg7iia40roawpom2beetni</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14140</id>
      <parentid>14126</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-25T23:45:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>87.174.34.123</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="26078">== General Aspect ==

- Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


- Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

- Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

- Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

=== Writing style ===

I was feeling that it would be more interesting and correct to split the 'factual information' of the 'personnal experience', be that the factual information about a hitching spot comes first while the personnal ones would come in a '''different paragraph which follows'''. It would give a more professionnal look to the cities or country pages instead of having to read the subjective point of view of one person everytime, which is interesting, but the factual reading is usually providing a straight to the point information that is often quickly needed. Having a little code about how to make it would enhance the whole project. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:55, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

== Overview ==
- For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country). Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

- Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway, Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)
Cheers Paul (djdirect from CS)
PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==

* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

- I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[User:Index|Index]] 17:06, 29 July 2007 (CEST) There should be also and '''Central Europe''', just  w N and E it is not enough, adding central E itcan help with the navigation on the map. Who usually does that? (I am a new here, so excuse for eventually inapropriate Q:) )

:That's a good idea. We are self-organizing: anybody is welcome to do (almost) anything here! So feel free to try out editing [[Template:Mainpage-locations]]. You could also copy that into e.g. [[User:Index/locations test]] if you don't feel ready yet to change the Main Page, and then copy it to the real template when it's all good. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:32, 29 July 2007 (CEST)

::There's a discussion at [[Template talk:Mainpage-locations]], probably a better place for this :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:01, 15 August 2007 (CEST)

''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''

=== USA Division Possibility ===

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)

== Mapping ==

It would be useful to map some of the hitching departing point, on my case to complete and easy the comprehension on the information about Canada. I know it has been done by some in a couple of pages... would anyone help out with that? (Basically its because it's not something I know how-to) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:43, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

: There is an article about [[How to add maps to articles]]. If you still have problems, just ask, I'm happy to help you. It would be kinda difficult for me to add these maps to articles for areas where I've never been, nor do I know anything about Canadian geography :( Hope you can work it out, or someone who has been there can help. It would be really great to have more maps here --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 19:57, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

== Get Business Job ==

&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/online.html"&gt;online&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/online-job-applications.html"&gt;online job applications&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/online-job-application-in.html"&gt;online job application in&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/online-job-application-for.html"&gt;online job application for&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/online-job-application.html"&gt;online job application&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/online-job-searches.html"&gt;online job searches&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/work-at-home-online-job.html"&gt;work at home online job&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/home-online-job.html"&gt;home online job&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/online-job-search.html"&gt;online job search&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/data-entry-online-job.html"&gt;data entry online job&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/online-job-at-home.html"&gt;online job at home&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/freelance-online-job.html"&gt;freelance online job&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/walmart-online-job-application.html"&gt;walmart online job application&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/walmart-online-job-applications.html"&gt;walmart online job applications&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/wal-mart-online-job-application.html"&gt;wal mart online job application&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/wal-mart-online-job-applications.html"&gt;wal mart online job applications&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/online-job-applications-walmart.html"&gt;online job applications walmart&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/online-job-applications-for-walmart.html"&gt;online job applications for walmart&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/online-job-application-walmart.html"&gt;online job application walmart&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/online-job-application-wal-mart.html"&gt;online job application wal mart&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/online-job-application-for-walmart.html"&gt;online job application for walmart&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/apply-online-job.html"&gt;apply online job&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.lpbp.org/images/online/online-job-application-for-home-depot.html"&gt;online job application for home depot&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/online/online.html"&gt;online&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/online/online-job-applications.html"&gt;online job applications&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/online/online-job-application-in.html"&gt;online job application in&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/online/online-job-application-for.html"&gt;online job application for&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/online/online-job-application.html"&gt;online job application&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/online/online-job-searches.html"&gt;online job searches&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/online/work-at-home-online-job.html"&gt;work at home online job&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/online/home-online-job.html"&gt;home online job&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/online/online-job-search.html"&gt;online job search&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-home.html"&gt;business career home&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-management.html"&gt;business career management&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-in.html"&gt;business career in&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-economy-employment-europe-ireland-regional.html"&gt;business career economy employment europe ireland regional&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/administration-business-career-in.html"&gt;administration business career in&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-employment-statistics-survey.html"&gt;business career employment statistics survey&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/international-business-career.html"&gt;international business career&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-international.html"&gt;business career international&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-planning.html"&gt;business career planning&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/arts-business-career-entertainment-recording.html"&gt;arts business career entertainment recording&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/administration-business-career.html"&gt;administration business career&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-opportunities.html"&gt;business career opportunities&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/administration-business-career-degree.html"&gt;administration business career degree&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/based-business-career-home-opportunity.html"&gt;based business career home opportunity&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-degree.html"&gt;business career degree&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-e.html"&gt;business career e&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/e-business-career.html"&gt;e business career&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-in-management.html"&gt;business career in management&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-in-international.html"&gt;business career in international&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-training.html"&gt;business career training&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-information.html"&gt;business career information&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/home-business-career-opportunity-work.html"&gt;home business career opportunity work&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-home-opportunity-work.html"&gt;business career home opportunity work&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-consulting-consulting-experience-independent-into-successful-turn.html"&gt;business career consulting consulting experience independent into successful turn&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-employment-job-reference.html"&gt;business career employment job reference&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/academy-of-learning-computer-business-career-college.html"&gt;academy of learning computer business career college&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-majors.html"&gt;business career majors&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/based-business-career-home.html"&gt;based business career home&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/at-home-based-business-career.html"&gt;at home based business career&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-colleges.html"&gt;business career colleges&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/information-on-a-business-career.html"&gt;information on a business career&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-in-music.html"&gt;business career in music&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/based-based-business-career-home.html"&gt;based based business career home&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/build-business-career-idea-never-ninety-other-pig-wrestle.html"&gt;build business career idea never ninety other pig wrestle&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-music.html"&gt;business career music&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/music-business-career.html"&gt;music business career&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-health-school-western.html"&gt;business career health school western&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/school-of-business-career.html"&gt;school of business career&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/western-school-of-health-and-business-career.html"&gt;western school of health and business career&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-consulting.html"&gt;business career consulting&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-creating-idea-life-living-revitalize-that-thinking.html"&gt;business career creating idea life living revitalize that thinking&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-development.html"&gt;business career development&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-employee-immigration-motorola-travel.html"&gt;business career employee immigration motorola travel&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-icm-medical-school.html"&gt;business career icm medical school&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-finance.html"&gt;business career finance&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/broker-business-career.html"&gt;broker business career&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-marketing.html"&gt;business career marketing&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-valuation.html"&gt;business career valuation&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-information-management.html"&gt;business career information management&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/academy-business-career-college-computer-learning.html"&gt;academy business career college computer learning&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/based-business-career-home-home-opportunity-work.html"&gt;based business career home home opportunity work&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-finance-in-international.html"&gt;business career finance in international&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/administration-business-career-opportunity.html"&gt;administration business career opportunity&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-chicago-intelligence-training.html"&gt;business career chicago intelligence training&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/analyst-business-career.html"&gt;analyst business career&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-internet-marketing.html"&gt;business career internet marketing&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-homehome-make-money-work.html"&gt;business career homehome make money work&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/account-area-business-career-district-employment-management-school-territory.html"&gt;account area business career district employment management school territory&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/10-business-career-in-top.html"&gt;10 business career in top&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-from-home-home-success-work.html"&gt;business career from home home success work&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-education.html"&gt;business career education&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/5-business-career-career-e-in-professional-series.html"&gt;5 business career career e in professional series&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-point-school.html"&gt;business career point school&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/acting-build-business-career-learn-need-skill-want.html"&gt;acting build business career learn need skill want&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-internet-opportunity.html"&gt;business career internet opportunity&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-finance-in.html"&gt;business career finance in&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-citigroup-current-site.html"&gt;business career citigroup current site&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-college.html"&gt;business career college&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-institute-medical.html"&gt;business career institute medical&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-small.html"&gt;business career small&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/small-business-career.html"&gt;small business career&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-group-our-unitedhealth.html"&gt;business career group our unitedhealth&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/international-business-career-opportunities.html"&gt;international business career opportunities&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-citigroup-site.html"&gt;business career citigroup site&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-law.html"&gt;business career law&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-counseling-employment-management.html"&gt;business career counseling employment management&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/business-career-manager.html"&gt;business career manager&lt;/a&gt; 
&lt;a href="http://www.sparkalley.com/images/bussiness/australia-business-career-economy-employment-oceania-regional.html"&gt;australia business career economy employment oceania regional&lt;/a&gt;

== Want to start your private office arms race? ==

Want to start your private office arms race? 
 
I just got my own USB rocket launcher :-) Awsome thing. 
 
Plug into your computer and you got a remote controlled office missile launcher with 360 degrees horizontal and 45 degree vertival rotation with a range of more than 6 meters - which gives you a coverage of 113 square meters round your workplace. 
You can get the gadget here: http://tinyurl.com/2qul3c 
 
Check out the video they have on the page. 
 
Cheers 
 
Jacob Roder</text>
      <sha1>llgrby7j8b1i4dhaf4p7bteu7c3ccoj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14145</id>
      <parentid>14140</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-26T07:32:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11740">== General Aspect ==

- Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


- Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

- Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

- Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

=== Writing style ===

I was feeling that it would be more interesting and correct to split the 'factual information' of the 'personnal experience', be that the factual information about a hitching spot comes first while the personnal ones would come in a '''different paragraph which follows'''. It would give a more professionnal look to the cities or country pages instead of having to read the subjective point of view of one person everytime, which is interesting, but the factual reading is usually providing a straight to the point information that is often quickly needed. Having a little code about how to make it would enhance the whole project. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:55, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

== Overview ==
- For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country). Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

- Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway, Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)
Cheers Paul (djdirect from CS)
PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==

* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

- I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[User:Index|Index]] 17:06, 29 July 2007 (CEST) There should be also and '''Central Europe''', just  w N and E it is not enough, adding central E itcan help with the navigation on the map. Who usually does that? (I am a new here, so excuse for eventually inapropriate Q:) )

:That's a good idea. We are self-organizing: anybody is welcome to do (almost) anything here! So feel free to try out editing [[Template:Mainpage-locations]]. You could also copy that into e.g. [[User:Index/locations test]] if you don't feel ready yet to change the Main Page, and then copy it to the real template when it's all good. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:32, 29 July 2007 (CEST)

::There's a discussion at [[Template talk:Mainpage-locations]], probably a better place for this :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:01, 15 August 2007 (CEST)

''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''

=== USA Division Possibility ===

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)

== Mapping ==

It would be useful to map some of the hitching departing point, on my case to complete and easy the comprehension on the information about Canada. I know it has been done by some in a couple of pages... would anyone help out with that? (Basically its because it's not something I know how-to) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:43, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

: There is an article about [[How to add maps to articles]]. If you still have problems, just ask, I'm happy to help you. It would be kinda difficult for me to add these maps to articles for areas where I've never been, nor do I know anything about Canadian geography :( Hope you can work it out, or someone who has been there can help. It would be really great to have more maps here --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 19:57, 13 September 2007 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>ir1vhkc5v3uvpgq7d95ax8kxafcm3yf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14260</id>
      <parentid>14145</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-02T03:00:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>87.174.60.37</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12294">== General Aspect ==

- Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


- Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

- Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

- Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

=== Writing style ===

I was feeling that it would be more interesting and correct to split the 'factual information' of the 'personnal experience', be that the factual information about a hitching spot comes first while the personnal ones would come in a '''different paragraph which follows'''. It would give a more professionnal look to the cities or country pages instead of having to read the subjective point of view of one person everytime, which is interesting, but the factual reading is usually providing a straight to the point information that is often quickly needed. Having a little code about how to make it would enhance the whole project. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:55, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

== Overview ==
- For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country). Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

- Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway, Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)
Cheers Paul (djdirect from CS)
PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==

* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

- I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[User:Index|Index]] 17:06, 29 July 2007 (CEST) There should be also and '''Central Europe''', just  w N and E it is not enough, adding central E itcan help with the navigation on the map. Who usually does that? (I am a new here, so excuse for eventually inapropriate Q:) )

:That's a good idea. We are self-organizing: anybody is welcome to do (almost) anything here! So feel free to try out editing [[Template:Mainpage-locations]]. You could also copy that into e.g. [[User:Index/locations test]] if you don't feel ready yet to change the Main Page, and then copy it to the real template when it's all good. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:32, 29 July 2007 (CEST)

::There's a discussion at [[Template talk:Mainpage-locations]], probably a better place for this :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:01, 15 August 2007 (CEST)

''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''

=== USA Division Possibility ===

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)

== Mapping ==

It would be useful to map some of the hitching departing point, on my case to complete and easy the comprehension on the information about Canada. I know it has been done by some in a couple of pages... would anyone help out with that? (Basically its because it's not something I know how-to) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:43, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

: There is an article about [[How to add maps to articles]]. If you still have problems, just ask, I'm happy to help you. It would be kinda difficult for me to add these maps to articles for areas where I've never been, nor do I know anything about Canadian geography :( Hope you can work it out, or someone who has been there can help. It would be really great to have more maps here --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 19:57, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

== Want to start your private office arms race right now? ==

Want to start your private office arms race right now? 
 
I just got my own USB rocket launcher :-) Awsome thing. 
 
Plug into your computer and you got a remote controlled office missile launcher with 360 degrees horizontal and 45 degree vertival rotation with a range of more than 6 meters - which gives you a coverage of 113 square meters round your workplace. 
You can get the gadget here: http://tinyurl.com/2qul3c 
 
Check out the video they have on the page. 
 
Cheers 
 
Marko Fando</text>
      <sha1>dvslzflwtr9m25bkgn6md8w210nvr3m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14261</id>
      <parentid>14260</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-02T06:56:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11740">== General Aspect ==

- Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


- Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

- Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

- Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

=== Writing style ===

I was feeling that it would be more interesting and correct to split the 'factual information' of the 'personnal experience', be that the factual information about a hitching spot comes first while the personnal ones would come in a '''different paragraph which follows'''. It would give a more professionnal look to the cities or country pages instead of having to read the subjective point of view of one person everytime, which is interesting, but the factual reading is usually providing a straight to the point information that is often quickly needed. Having a little code about how to make it would enhance the whole project. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:55, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

== Overview ==
- For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country). Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

- Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway, Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)
Cheers Paul (djdirect from CS)
PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==

* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

- I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[User:Index|Index]] 17:06, 29 July 2007 (CEST) There should be also and '''Central Europe''', just  w N and E it is not enough, adding central E itcan help with the navigation on the map. Who usually does that? (I am a new here, so excuse for eventually inapropriate Q:) )

:That's a good idea. We are self-organizing: anybody is welcome to do (almost) anything here! So feel free to try out editing [[Template:Mainpage-locations]]. You could also copy that into e.g. [[User:Index/locations test]] if you don't feel ready yet to change the Main Page, and then copy it to the real template when it's all good. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:32, 29 July 2007 (CEST)

::There's a discussion at [[Template talk:Mainpage-locations]], probably a better place for this :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:01, 15 August 2007 (CEST)

''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''

=== USA Division Possibility ===

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)

== Mapping ==

It would be useful to map some of the hitching departing point, on my case to complete and easy the comprehension on the information about Canada. I know it has been done by some in a couple of pages... would anyone help out with that? (Basically its because it's not something I know how-to) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:43, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

: There is an article about [[How to add maps to articles]]. If you still have problems, just ask, I'm happy to help you. It would be kinda difficult for me to add these maps to articles for areas where I've never been, nor do I know anything about Canadian geography :( Hope you can work it out, or someone who has been there can help. It would be really great to have more maps here --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 19:57, 13 September 2007 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>ir1vhkc5v3uvpgq7d95ax8kxafcm3yf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14591</id>
      <parentid>14261</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-10T12:27:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12444">== General Aspect ==

- Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


- Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

- Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

- Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

=== Writing style ===

I was feeling that it would be more interesting and correct to split the 'factual information' of the 'personnal experience', be that the factual information about a hitching spot comes first while the personnal ones would come in a '''different paragraph which follows'''. It would give a more professionnal look to the cities or country pages instead of having to read the subjective point of view of one person everytime, which is interesting, but the factual reading is usually providing a straight to the point information that is often quickly needed. Having a little code about how to make it would enhance the whole project. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:55, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

== Overview ==
- For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country). Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

- Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway, Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)
Cheers Paul (djdirect from CS)
PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==

* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

- I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[User:Index|Index]] 17:06, 29 July 2007 (CEST) There should be also and '''Central Europe''', just  w N and E it is not enough, adding central E itcan help with the navigation on the map. Who usually does that? (I am a new here, so excuse for eventually inapropriate Q:) )

:That's a good idea. We are self-organizing: anybody is welcome to do (almost) anything here! So feel free to try out editing [[Template:Mainpage-locations]]. You could also copy that into e.g. [[User:Index/locations test]] if you don't feel ready yet to change the Main Page, and then copy it to the real template when it's all good. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:32, 29 July 2007 (CEST)

::There's a discussion at [[Template talk:Mainpage-locations]], probably a better place for this :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:01, 15 August 2007 (CEST)

''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''

=== USA Division Possibility ===

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)

== Mapping ==

It would be useful to map some of the hitching departing point, on my case to complete and easy the comprehension on the information about Canada. I know it has been done by some in a couple of pages... would anyone help out with that? (Basically its because it's not something I know how-to) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:43, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

: There is an article about [[How to add maps to articles]]. If you still have problems, just ask, I'm happy to help you. It would be kinda difficult for me to add these maps to articles for areas where I've never been, nor do I know anything about Canadian geography :( Hope you can work it out, or someone who has been there can help. It would be really great to have more maps here --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 19:57, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

== Layout ==
I just changed the layout a little, but still I am not really satisfied with it. I think that it's not so obvious what hitchwiki is, when you see it the first time. There are like 100.000 links, list of words, countries, names, etc, but not much text. I think we need a short and clear description on the main page, so that first time visitors can see at once, that they find any information they want here (Because I'm sure they can :)) And maybe we should put the images more on top, to make the page more colorful, more inviting --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 14:27, 10 October 2007 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>90hegbbcvb4gqwu7x15uzr5yu6yvgeg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14592</id>
      <parentid>14591</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-10T12:37:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13697">== General Aspect ==

- Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


- Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

- Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

- Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

=== Writing style ===

I was feeling that it would be more interesting and correct to split the 'factual information' of the 'personnal experience', be that the factual information about a hitching spot comes first while the personnal ones would come in a '''different paragraph which follows'''. It would give a more professionnal look to the cities or country pages instead of having to read the subjective point of view of one person everytime, which is interesting, but the factual reading is usually providing a straight to the point information that is often quickly needed. Having a little code about how to make it would enhance the whole project. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:55, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

== Overview ==
- For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country). Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

- Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway, Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)
Cheers Paul (djdirect from CS)
PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==

* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

- I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[User:Index|Index]] 17:06, 29 July 2007 (CEST) There should be also and '''Central Europe''', just  w N and E it is not enough, adding central E itcan help with the navigation on the map. Who usually does that? (I am a new here, so excuse for eventually inapropriate Q:) )

:That's a good idea. We are self-organizing: anybody is welcome to do (almost) anything here! So feel free to try out editing [[Template:Mainpage-locations]]. You could also copy that into e.g. [[User:Index/locations test]] if you don't feel ready yet to change the Main Page, and then copy it to the real template when it's all good. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:32, 29 July 2007 (CEST)

::There's a discussion at [[Template talk:Mainpage-locations]], probably a better place for this :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:01, 15 August 2007 (CEST)

''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''

=== USA Division Possibility ===

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)

== Mapping ==

It would be useful to map some of the hitching departing point, on my case to complete and easy the comprehension on the information about Canada. I know it has been done by some in a couple of pages... would anyone help out with that? (Basically its because it's not something I know how-to) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:43, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

: There is an article about [[How to add maps to articles]]. If you still have problems, just ask, I'm happy to help you. It would be kinda difficult for me to add these maps to articles for areas where I've never been, nor do I know anything about Canadian geography :( Hope you can work it out, or someone who has been there can help. It would be really great to have more maps here --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 19:57, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

== Layout ==
I just changed the layout a little, but still I am not really satisfied with it. I think that it's not so obvious what hitchwiki is, when you see it the first time. There are like 100.000 links, list of words, countries, names, etc, but not much text. I think we need a short and clear description on the main page, so that first time visitors can see at once, that they find any information they want here (Because I'm sure they can :)) And maybe we should put the images more on top, to make the page more colorful, more inviting --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 14:27, 10 October 2007 (CEST)

Yep, good idea. I'm asking myself if the list of hitchhikers is ''that'' useful?  Maybe we should have the General Info about First time, etc. there, but remove some stuff you'll find yourself if you're going deeper into the hitchhiking stuff (like Boats, Planes, Trains)... So for that the news can be more visible (to see that there's activity...) etc. Also the list of countries is a bit annoying, we can add some more new countries (thanks to [[User:worldhitch]] ;) ) like Brunei etc. For that the list is getting bigger and bigger, and someday it will be impossible to list all 192+ states of the world there :) Maybe we can track the list more down. What about the pictures. hm... no idea, but currently it's not the best solution. About the new header, it's using 1/3 of my screen, it's definitely too big! :) (Remember, not everyone has a 17'' Wide-screen Monitor). And, can someone delete the list ''Based on work by''  at the main page? It's blowing up my screen. In some browsers it's fixed I guess, but not for Safari and Firefox :( Hm...something else? :) Want more people in the chat ! [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://hoerstel.travelblog.ch site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 14:37, 10 October 2007 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>dnok7xucifw3berimxwqxj0ul3nalct</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14593</id>
      <parentid>14592</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-10T12:38:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13696">== General Aspect ==

- Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


- Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

- Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

- Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

=== Writing style ===

I was feeling that it would be more interesting and correct to split the 'factual information' of the 'personnal experience', be that the factual information about a hitching spot comes first while the personnal ones would come in a '''different paragraph which follows'''. It would give a more professionnal look to the cities or country pages instead of having to read the subjective point of view of one person everytime, which is interesting, but the factual reading is usually providing a straight to the point information that is often quickly needed. Having a little code about how to make it would enhance the whole project. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:55, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

== Overview ==
- For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country). Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

- Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway, Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)
Cheers Paul (djdirect from CS)
PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==

* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

- I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[User:Index|Index]] 17:06, 29 July 2007 (CEST) There should be also and '''Central Europe''', just  w N and E it is not enough, adding central E itcan help with the navigation on the map. Who usually does that? (I am a new here, so excuse for eventually inapropriate Q:) )

:That's a good idea. We are self-organizing: anybody is welcome to do (almost) anything here! So feel free to try out editing [[Template:Mainpage-locations]]. You could also copy that into e.g. [[User:Index/locations test]] if you don't feel ready yet to change the Main Page, and then copy it to the real template when it's all good. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:32, 29 July 2007 (CEST)

::There's a discussion at [[Template talk:Mainpage-locations]], probably a better place for this :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:01, 15 August 2007 (CEST)

''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''

=== USA Division Possibility ===

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)

== Mapping ==

It would be useful to map some of the hitching departing point, on my case to complete and easy the comprehension on the information about Canada. I know it has been done by some in a couple of pages... would anyone help out with that? (Basically its because it's not something I know how-to) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:43, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

: There is an article about [[How to add maps to articles]]. If you still have problems, just ask, I'm happy to help you. It would be kinda difficult for me to add these maps to articles for areas where I've never been, nor do I know anything about Canadian geography :( Hope you can work it out, or someone who has been there can help. It would be really great to have more maps here --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 19:57, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

== Layout ==
I just changed the layout a little, but still I am not really satisfied with it. I think that it's not so obvious what hitchwiki is, when you see it the first time. There are like 100.000 links, list of words, countries, names, etc, but not much text. I think we need a short and clear description on the main page, so that first time visitors can see at once, that they find any information they want here (Because I'm sure they can :)) And maybe we should put the images more on top, to make the page more colorful, more inviting --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 14:27, 10 October 2007 (CEST)

Yep, good idea. I'm asking myself if the list of hitchhikers is ''that'' useful?  Maybe we should have the General Info about First time, etc. there, but remove some stuff you'll find yourself if you're going deeper into the hitchhiking stuff (like Boats, Planes, Trains)... So for that the news can be more visible (to see that there's activity...) etc. Also the list of countries is a bit annoying, we can add some more new countries (thanks to [[User:worldhitch]] ;) ) like Brunei etc. For that the list is getting bigger and bigger, and someday it will be impossible to list all 192+ states of the world there :) Maybe we can track the list more down. What about the pictures. hm... no idea, but currently it's not the best solution. About the new header, it's using 1/3 of my screen, it's definitely too big! :) (Remember, not everyone has a 17" Wide-screen Monitor). And, can someone delete the list ''Based on work by''  at the main page? It's blowing up my screen. In some browsers it's fixed I guess, but not for Safari and Firefox :( Hm...something else? :) Want more people in the chat ! [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://hoerstel.travelblog.ch site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 14:37, 10 October 2007 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>fho7cwbjoqqvi23bqykdr1tg42htx9m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15010</id>
      <parentid>14593</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-21T00:06:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13951">== General Aspect ==

- Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


- Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

- Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

- Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

=== Writing style ===

I was feeling that it would be more interesting and correct to split the 'factual information' of the 'personnal experience', be that the factual information about a hitching spot comes first while the personnal ones would come in a '''different paragraph which follows'''. It would give a more professionnal look to the cities or country pages instead of having to read the subjective point of view of one person everytime, which is interesting, but the factual reading is usually providing a straight to the point information that is often quickly needed. Having a little code about how to make it would enhance the whole project. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:55, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

== Overview ==
- For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country). Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

- Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway, Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)
Cheers Paul (djdirect from CS)
PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==

* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

- I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[User:Index|Index]] 17:06, 29 July 2007 (CEST) There should be also and '''Central Europe''', just  w N and E it is not enough, adding central E itcan help with the navigation on the map. Who usually does that? (I am a new here, so excuse for eventually inapropriate Q:) )

:That's a good idea. We are self-organizing: anybody is welcome to do (almost) anything here! So feel free to try out editing [[Template:Mainpage-locations]]. You could also copy that into e.g. [[User:Index/locations test]] if you don't feel ready yet to change the Main Page, and then copy it to the real template when it's all good. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:32, 29 July 2007 (CEST)

::There's a discussion at [[Template talk:Mainpage-locations]], probably a better place for this :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:01, 15 August 2007 (CEST)

''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''

=== USA Division Possibility ===

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)

== Mapping ==

It would be useful to map some of the hitching departing point, on my case to complete and easy the comprehension on the information about Canada. I know it has been done by some in a couple of pages... would anyone help out with that? (Basically its because it's not something I know how-to) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:43, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

: There is an article about [[How to add maps to articles]]. If you still have problems, just ask, I'm happy to help you. It would be kinda difficult for me to add these maps to articles for areas where I've never been, nor do I know anything about Canadian geography :( Hope you can work it out, or someone who has been there can help. It would be really great to have more maps here --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 19:57, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

lifterhalte.info .... how do we manage to login there? I did create point in the past but now I can't log anymore as it put me as 'invalid'? Why isn't it the same information than on the wiki? [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 02:06, 21 October 2007 (CEST)

== Layout ==
I just changed the layout a little, but still I am not really satisfied with it. I think that it's not so obvious what hitchwiki is, when you see it the first time. There are like 100.000 links, list of words, countries, names, etc, but not much text. I think we need a short and clear description on the main page, so that first time visitors can see at once, that they find any information they want here (Because I'm sure they can :)) And maybe we should put the images more on top, to make the page more colorful, more inviting --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 14:27, 10 October 2007 (CEST)

Yep, good idea. I'm asking myself if the list of hitchhikers is ''that'' useful?  Maybe we should have the General Info about First time, etc. there, but remove some stuff you'll find yourself if you're going deeper into the hitchhiking stuff (like Boats, Planes, Trains)... So for that the news can be more visible (to see that there's activity...) etc. Also the list of countries is a bit annoying, we can add some more new countries (thanks to [[User:worldhitch]] ;) ) like Brunei etc. For that the list is getting bigger and bigger, and someday it will be impossible to list all 192+ states of the world there :) Maybe we can track the list more down. What about the pictures. hm... no idea, but currently it's not the best solution. About the new header, it's using 1/3 of my screen, it's definitely too big! :) (Remember, not everyone has a 17" Wide-screen Monitor). And, can someone delete the list ''Based on work by''  at the main page? It's blowing up my screen. In some browsers it's fixed I guess, but not for Safari and Firefox :( Hm...something else? :) Want more people in the chat ! [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://hoerstel.travelblog.ch site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 14:37, 10 October 2007 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>f0jm8bn3vo5nymryjcw1flukr15ks4g</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15877</id>
      <parentid>15010</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-13T13:18:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14152">== General Aspect ==

- Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


- Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

- Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

- Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

=== Writing style ===

I was feeling that it would be more interesting and correct to split the 'factual information' of the 'personnal experience', be that the factual information about a hitching spot comes first while the personnal ones would come in a '''different paragraph which follows'''. It would give a more professionnal look to the cities or country pages instead of having to read the subjective point of view of one person everytime, which is interesting, but the factual reading is usually providing a straight to the point information that is often quickly needed. Having a little code about how to make it would enhance the whole project. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:55, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

== Overview ==
- For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country). Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

- Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway, Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)
Cheers Paul (djdirect from CS)
PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==

* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

===Members listing===

Having had a general look at the member list to recognise people... isn't there a fairly amount of dubious account? [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 14:18, 13 November 2007 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

- I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[User:Index|Index]] 17:06, 29 July 2007 (CEST) There should be also and '''Central Europe''', just  w N and E it is not enough, adding central E itcan help with the navigation on the map. Who usually does that? (I am a new here, so excuse for eventually inapropriate Q:) )

:That's a good idea. We are self-organizing: anybody is welcome to do (almost) anything here! So feel free to try out editing [[Template:Mainpage-locations]]. You could also copy that into e.g. [[User:Index/locations test]] if you don't feel ready yet to change the Main Page, and then copy it to the real template when it's all good. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:32, 29 July 2007 (CEST)

::There's a discussion at [[Template talk:Mainpage-locations]], probably a better place for this :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:01, 15 August 2007 (CEST)

''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''

=== USA Division Possibility ===

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)

== Mapping ==

It would be useful to map some of the hitching departing point, on my case to complete and easy the comprehension on the information about Canada. I know it has been done by some in a couple of pages... would anyone help out with that? (Basically its because it's not something I know how-to) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:43, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

: There is an article about [[How to add maps to articles]]. If you still have problems, just ask, I'm happy to help you. It would be kinda difficult for me to add these maps to articles for areas where I've never been, nor do I know anything about Canadian geography :( Hope you can work it out, or someone who has been there can help. It would be really great to have more maps here --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 19:57, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

lifterhalte.info .... how do we manage to login there? I did create point in the past but now I can't log anymore as it put me as 'invalid'? Why isn't it the same information than on the wiki? [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 02:06, 21 October 2007 (CEST)

== Layout ==
I just changed the layout a little, but still I am not really satisfied with it. I think that it's not so obvious what hitchwiki is, when you see it the first time. There are like 100.000 links, list of words, countries, names, etc, but not much text. I think we need a short and clear description on the main page, so that first time visitors can see at once, that they find any information they want here (Because I'm sure they can :)) And maybe we should put the images more on top, to make the page more colorful, more inviting --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 14:27, 10 October 2007 (CEST)

Yep, good idea. I'm asking myself if the list of hitchhikers is ''that'' useful?  Maybe we should have the General Info about First time, etc. there, but remove some stuff you'll find yourself if you're going deeper into the hitchhiking stuff (like Boats, Planes, Trains)... So for that the news can be more visible (to see that there's activity...) etc. Also the list of countries is a bit annoying, we can add some more new countries (thanks to [[User:worldhitch]] ;) ) like Brunei etc. For that the list is getting bigger and bigger, and someday it will be impossible to list all 192+ states of the world there :) Maybe we can track the list more down. What about the pictures. hm... no idea, but currently it's not the best solution. About the new header, it's using 1/3 of my screen, it's definitely too big! :) (Remember, not everyone has a 17" Wide-screen Monitor). And, can someone delete the list ''Based on work by''  at the main page? It's blowing up my screen. In some browsers it's fixed I guess, but not for Safari and Firefox :( Hm...something else? :) Want more people in the chat ! [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://hoerstel.travelblog.ch site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 14:37, 10 October 2007 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>1v7q869x4k2wk0vau45whbczrvu9ag7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15887</id>
      <parentid>15877</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-13T14:19:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14386">== General Aspect ==

- Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


- Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

- Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

- Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

=== Writing style ===

I was feeling that it would be more interesting and correct to split the 'factual information' of the 'personnal experience', be that the factual information about a hitching spot comes first while the personnal ones would come in a '''different paragraph which follows'''. It would give a more professionnal look to the cities or country pages instead of having to read the subjective point of view of one person everytime, which is interesting, but the factual reading is usually providing a straight to the point information that is often quickly needed. Having a little code about how to make it would enhance the whole project. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:55, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

== Overview ==
- For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country). Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

- Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway, Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)
Cheers Paul (djdirect from CS)
PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==

* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

===Members listing===

Having had a general look at the member list to recognise people... isn't there a fairly amount of dubious account? [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 14:18, 13 November 2007 (CET)
: Yes there is, but I think mediawiki has no supported way to delete users. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 15:19, 13 November 2007 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

- I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[User:Index|Index]] 17:06, 29 July 2007 (CEST) There should be also and '''Central Europe''', just  w N and E it is not enough, adding central E itcan help with the navigation on the map. Who usually does that? (I am a new here, so excuse for eventually inapropriate Q:) )

:That's a good idea. We are self-organizing: anybody is welcome to do (almost) anything here! So feel free to try out editing [[Template:Mainpage-locations]]. You could also copy that into e.g. [[User:Index/locations test]] if you don't feel ready yet to change the Main Page, and then copy it to the real template when it's all good. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:32, 29 July 2007 (CEST)

::There's a discussion at [[Template talk:Mainpage-locations]], probably a better place for this :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:01, 15 August 2007 (CEST)

''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''

=== USA Division Possibility ===

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)

== Mapping ==

It would be useful to map some of the hitching departing point, on my case to complete and easy the comprehension on the information about Canada. I know it has been done by some in a couple of pages... would anyone help out with that? (Basically its because it's not something I know how-to) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:43, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

: There is an article about [[How to add maps to articles]]. If you still have problems, just ask, I'm happy to help you. It would be kinda difficult for me to add these maps to articles for areas where I've never been, nor do I know anything about Canadian geography :( Hope you can work it out, or someone who has been there can help. It would be really great to have more maps here --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 19:57, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

lifterhalte.info .... how do we manage to login there? I did create point in the past but now I can't log anymore as it put me as 'invalid'? Why isn't it the same information than on the wiki? [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 02:06, 21 October 2007 (CEST)

== Layout ==
I just changed the layout a little, but still I am not really satisfied with it. I think that it's not so obvious what hitchwiki is, when you see it the first time. There are like 100.000 links, list of words, countries, names, etc, but not much text. I think we need a short and clear description on the main page, so that first time visitors can see at once, that they find any information they want here (Because I'm sure they can :)) And maybe we should put the images more on top, to make the page more colorful, more inviting --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 14:27, 10 October 2007 (CEST)

Yep, good idea. I'm asking myself if the list of hitchhikers is ''that'' useful?  Maybe we should have the General Info about First time, etc. there, but remove some stuff you'll find yourself if you're going deeper into the hitchhiking stuff (like Boats, Planes, Trains)... So for that the news can be more visible (to see that there's activity...) etc. Also the list of countries is a bit annoying, we can add some more new countries (thanks to [[User:worldhitch]] ;) ) like Brunei etc. For that the list is getting bigger and bigger, and someday it will be impossible to list all 192+ states of the world there :) Maybe we can track the list more down. What about the pictures. hm... no idea, but currently it's not the best solution. About the new header, it's using 1/3 of my screen, it's definitely too big! :) (Remember, not everyone has a 17" Wide-screen Monitor). And, can someone delete the list ''Based on work by''  at the main page? It's blowing up my screen. In some browsers it's fixed I guess, but not for Safari and Firefox :( Hm...something else? :) Want more people in the chat ! [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://hoerstel.travelblog.ch site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 14:37, 10 October 2007 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>4ze82zuj2j7a03f6svcv8il6fbt52sw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15888</id>
      <parentid>15887</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-13T14:31:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14698">== General Aspect ==

- Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


- Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

- Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

- Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

=== Writing style ===

I was feeling that it would be more interesting and correct to split the 'factual information' of the 'personnal experience', be that the factual information about a hitching spot comes first while the personnal ones would come in a '''different paragraph which follows'''. It would give a more professionnal look to the cities or country pages instead of having to read the subjective point of view of one person everytime, which is interesting, but the factual reading is usually providing a straight to the point information that is often quickly needed. Having a little code about how to make it would enhance the whole project. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:55, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

== Overview ==
- For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country). Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

- Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway, Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)
Cheers Paul (djdirect from CS)
PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==

* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

===Members listing===

Having had a general look at the member list to recognise people... isn't there a fairly amount of dubious account? [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 14:18, 13 November 2007 (CET)
: Yes there is, but I think mediawiki has no supported way to delete users. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 15:19, 13 November 2007 (CET)

::There is an extension for mediawiki, which seems to solve this problem: [http://www.mwusers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=4583 look here]. Might be an option? [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://hoerstel.travelblog.ch site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 15:31, 13 November 2007 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

- I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[User:Index|Index]] 17:06, 29 July 2007 (CEST) There should be also and '''Central Europe''', just  w N and E it is not enough, adding central E itcan help with the navigation on the map. Who usually does that? (I am a new here, so excuse for eventually inapropriate Q:) )

:That's a good idea. We are self-organizing: anybody is welcome to do (almost) anything here! So feel free to try out editing [[Template:Mainpage-locations]]. You could also copy that into e.g. [[User:Index/locations test]] if you don't feel ready yet to change the Main Page, and then copy it to the real template when it's all good. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:32, 29 July 2007 (CEST)

::There's a discussion at [[Template talk:Mainpage-locations]], probably a better place for this :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:01, 15 August 2007 (CEST)

''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''

=== USA Division Possibility ===

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)

== Mapping ==

It would be useful to map some of the hitching departing point, on my case to complete and easy the comprehension on the information about Canada. I know it has been done by some in a couple of pages... would anyone help out with that? (Basically its because it's not something I know how-to) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:43, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

: There is an article about [[How to add maps to articles]]. If you still have problems, just ask, I'm happy to help you. It would be kinda difficult for me to add these maps to articles for areas where I've never been, nor do I know anything about Canadian geography :( Hope you can work it out, or someone who has been there can help. It would be really great to have more maps here --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 19:57, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

lifterhalte.info .... how do we manage to login there? I did create point in the past but now I can't log anymore as it put me as 'invalid'? Why isn't it the same information than on the wiki? [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 02:06, 21 October 2007 (CEST)

== Layout ==
I just changed the layout a little, but still I am not really satisfied with it. I think that it's not so obvious what hitchwiki is, when you see it the first time. There are like 100.000 links, list of words, countries, names, etc, but not much text. I think we need a short and clear description on the main page, so that first time visitors can see at once, that they find any information they want here (Because I'm sure they can :)) And maybe we should put the images more on top, to make the page more colorful, more inviting --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 14:27, 10 October 2007 (CEST)

Yep, good idea. I'm asking myself if the list of hitchhikers is ''that'' useful?  Maybe we should have the General Info about First time, etc. there, but remove some stuff you'll find yourself if you're going deeper into the hitchhiking stuff (like Boats, Planes, Trains)... So for that the news can be more visible (to see that there's activity...) etc. Also the list of countries is a bit annoying, we can add some more new countries (thanks to [[User:worldhitch]] ;) ) like Brunei etc. For that the list is getting bigger and bigger, and someday it will be impossible to list all 192+ states of the world there :) Maybe we can track the list more down. What about the pictures. hm... no idea, but currently it's not the best solution. About the new header, it's using 1/3 of my screen, it's definitely too big! :) (Remember, not everyone has a 17" Wide-screen Monitor). And, can someone delete the list ''Based on work by''  at the main page? It's blowing up my screen. In some browsers it's fixed I guess, but not for Safari and Firefox :( Hm...something else? :) Want more people in the chat ! [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://hoerstel.travelblog.ch site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 14:37, 10 October 2007 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>i17ztkxyec2mc2htvj8rkmrpahy6tsq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16283</id>
      <parentid>15888</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-05T00:48:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15069">== General Aspect ==

- Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


- Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

- Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

- Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

=== Writing style ===

I was feeling that it would be more interesting and correct to split the 'factual information' of the 'personnal experience', be that the factual information about a hitching spot comes first while the personnal ones would come in a '''different paragraph which follows'''. It would give a more professionnal look to the cities or country pages instead of having to read the subjective point of view of one person everytime, which is interesting, but the factual reading is usually providing a straight to the point information that is often quickly needed. Having a little code about how to make it would enhance the whole project. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:55, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

Also, I would like to add. It would be great if the information given is most of the time somehow verified instead of being disclaimed. As on many pages, the statement: ''Free use of Internet in every Library'' might not be accurate and is quite expressed in a 'powerful' way that does not leave much contrary [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:48, 5 December 2007 (CET)

== Overview ==
- For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country). Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

- Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway, Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)
Cheers Paul (djdirect from CS)
PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==

* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

===Members listing===

Having had a general look at the member list to recognise people... isn't there a fairly amount of dubious account? [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 14:18, 13 November 2007 (CET)
: Yes there is, but I think mediawiki has no supported way to delete users. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 15:19, 13 November 2007 (CET)

::There is an extension for mediawiki, which seems to solve this problem: [http://www.mwusers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=4583 look here]. Might be an option? [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://hoerstel.travelblog.ch site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 15:31, 13 November 2007 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

- I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[User:Index|Index]] 17:06, 29 July 2007 (CEST) There should be also and '''Central Europe''', just  w N and E it is not enough, adding central E itcan help with the navigation on the map. Who usually does that? (I am a new here, so excuse for eventually inapropriate Q:) )

:That's a good idea. We are self-organizing: anybody is welcome to do (almost) anything here! So feel free to try out editing [[Template:Mainpage-locations]]. You could also copy that into e.g. [[User:Index/locations test]] if you don't feel ready yet to change the Main Page, and then copy it to the real template when it's all good. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:32, 29 July 2007 (CEST)

::There's a discussion at [[Template talk:Mainpage-locations]], probably a better place for this :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:01, 15 August 2007 (CEST)

''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''

=== USA Division Possibility ===

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)

== Mapping ==

It would be useful to map some of the hitching departing point, on my case to complete and easy the comprehension on the information about Canada. I know it has been done by some in a couple of pages... would anyone help out with that? (Basically its because it's not something I know how-to) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:43, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

: There is an article about [[How to add maps to articles]]. If you still have problems, just ask, I'm happy to help you. It would be kinda difficult for me to add these maps to articles for areas where I've never been, nor do I know anything about Canadian geography :( Hope you can work it out, or someone who has been there can help. It would be really great to have more maps here --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 19:57, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

lifterhalte.info .... how do we manage to login there? I did create point in the past but now I can't log anymore as it put me as 'invalid'? Why isn't it the same information than on the wiki? [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 02:06, 21 October 2007 (CEST)

== Layout ==
I just changed the layout a little, but still I am not really satisfied with it. I think that it's not so obvious what hitchwiki is, when you see it the first time. There are like 100.000 links, list of words, countries, names, etc, but not much text. I think we need a short and clear description on the main page, so that first time visitors can see at once, that they find any information they want here (Because I'm sure they can :)) And maybe we should put the images more on top, to make the page more colorful, more inviting --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 14:27, 10 October 2007 (CEST)

Yep, good idea. I'm asking myself if the list of hitchhikers is ''that'' useful?  Maybe we should have the General Info about First time, etc. there, but remove some stuff you'll find yourself if you're going deeper into the hitchhiking stuff (like Boats, Planes, Trains)... So for that the news can be more visible (to see that there's activity...) etc. Also the list of countries is a bit annoying, we can add some more new countries (thanks to [[User:worldhitch]] ;) ) like Brunei etc. For that the list is getting bigger and bigger, and someday it will be impossible to list all 192+ states of the world there :) Maybe we can track the list more down. What about the pictures. hm... no idea, but currently it's not the best solution. About the new header, it's using 1/3 of my screen, it's definitely too big! :) (Remember, not everyone has a 17" Wide-screen Monitor). And, can someone delete the list ''Based on work by''  at the main page? It's blowing up my screen. In some browsers it's fixed I guess, but not for Safari and Firefox :( Hm...something else? :) Want more people in the chat ! [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://hoerstel.travelblog.ch site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 14:37, 10 October 2007 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>o8i7fcur75rce097118hckcs7lnl7mn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16558</id>
      <parentid>16283</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-21T23:00:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15542">== General Aspect ==

- Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


- Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

- Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

- Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

=== Writing style ===

I was feeling that it would be more interesting and correct to split the 'factual information' of the 'personnal experience', be that the factual information about a hitching spot comes first while the personnal ones would come in a '''different paragraph which follows'''. It would give a more professionnal look to the cities or country pages instead of having to read the subjective point of view of one person everytime, which is interesting, but the factual reading is usually providing a straight to the point information that is often quickly needed. Having a little code about how to make it would enhance the whole project. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:55, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

Also, I would like to add. It would be great if the information given is most of the time somehow verified instead of being disclaimed. As on many pages, the statement: ''Free use of Internet in every Library'' might not be accurate and is quite expressed in a 'powerful' way that does not leave much contrary [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:48, 5 December 2007 (CET)

== Overview ==
- For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country). Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

- Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway, Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)
Cheers Paul (djdirect from CS)
PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==

* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

===Members listing===

Having had a general look at the member list to recognise people... isn't there a fairly amount of dubious account? [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 14:18, 13 November 2007 (CET)
: Yes there is, but I think mediawiki has no supported way to delete users. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 15:19, 13 November 2007 (CET)

::There is an extension for mediawiki, which seems to solve this problem: [http://www.mwusers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=4583 look here]. Might be an option? [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://hoerstel.travelblog.ch site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 15:31, 13 November 2007 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

- I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[User:Index|Index]] 17:06, 29 July 2007 (CEST) There should be also and '''Central Europe''', just  w N and E it is not enough, adding central E itcan help with the navigation on the map. Who usually does that? (I am a new here, so excuse for eventually inapropriate Q:) )

:That's a good idea. We are self-organizing: anybody is welcome to do (almost) anything here! So feel free to try out editing [[Template:Mainpage-locations]]. You could also copy that into e.g. [[User:Index/locations test]] if you don't feel ready yet to change the Main Page, and then copy it to the real template when it's all good. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:32, 29 July 2007 (CEST)

::There's a discussion at [[Template talk:Mainpage-locations]], probably a better place for this :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:01, 15 August 2007 (CEST)

''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''

=== USA Division Possibility ===

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)

== Mapping ==

It would be useful to map some of the hitching departing point, on my case to complete and easy the comprehension on the information about Canada. I know it has been done by some in a couple of pages... would anyone help out with that? (Basically its because it's not something I know how-to) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:43, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

: There is an article about [[How to add maps to articles]]. If you still have problems, just ask, I'm happy to help you. It would be kinda difficult for me to add these maps to articles for areas where I've never been, nor do I know anything about Canadian geography :( Hope you can work it out, or someone who has been there can help. It would be really great to have more maps here --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 19:57, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

lifterhalte.info .... how do we manage to login there? I did create point in the past but now I can't log anymore as it put me as 'invalid'? Why isn't it the same information than on the wiki? [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 02:06, 21 October 2007 (CEST)

== Layout ==
I just changed the layout a little, but still I am not really satisfied with it. I think that it's not so obvious what hitchwiki is, when you see it the first time. There are like 100.000 links, list of words, countries, names, etc, but not much text. I think we need a short and clear description on the main page, so that first time visitors can see at once, that they find any information they want here (Because I'm sure they can :)) And maybe we should put the images more on top, to make the page more colorful, more inviting --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 14:27, 10 October 2007 (CEST)

Yep, good idea. I'm asking myself if the list of hitchhikers is ''that'' useful?  Maybe we should have the General Info about First time, etc. there, but remove some stuff you'll find yourself if you're going deeper into the hitchhiking stuff (like Boats, Planes, Trains)... So for that the news can be more visible (to see that there's activity...) etc. Also the list of countries is a bit annoying, we can add some more new countries (thanks to [[User:worldhitch]] ;) ) like Brunei etc. For that the list is getting bigger and bigger, and someday it will be impossible to list all 192+ states of the world there :) Maybe we can track the list more down. What about the pictures. hm... no idea, but currently it's not the best solution. About the new header, it's using 1/3 of my screen, it's definitely too big! :) (Remember, not everyone has a 17" Wide-screen Monitor). And, can someone delete the list ''Based on work by''  at the main page? It's blowing up my screen. In some browsers it's fixed I guess, but not for Safari and Firefox :( Hm...something else? :) Want more people in the chat ! [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://hoerstel.travelblog.ch site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 14:37, 10 October 2007 (CEST)

== Tables ==
The different tables are popping in on the pages and that is great, it enhance and summarise the information. Though, I would like to create some, I don't know how... and I would like to sometimes edit them when they are already done, but they are impossible to find. I think a solution should really be done regarding this. At least to have them automatically gathered on the category page maybe? [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 00:00, 22 December 2007 (CET)</text>
      <sha1>435u2f2hzsavxlmt5f6cac6r68o229i</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16573</id>
      <parentid>16558</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-22T00:32:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15655">== General Aspect ==

- Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


- Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

- Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

- Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

=== Writing style ===

I was feeling that it would be more interesting and correct to split the 'factual information' of the 'personnal experience', be that the factual information about a hitching spot comes first while the personnal ones would come in a '''different paragraph which follows'''. It would give a more professionnal look to the cities or country pages instead of having to read the subjective point of view of one person everytime, which is interesting, but the factual reading is usually providing a straight to the point information that is often quickly needed. Having a little code about how to make it would enhance the whole project. Because is it of any interest to know that someone met someone else when he was in town or that it was rainy ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:55, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

Also, I would like to add. It would be great if the information given is most of the time somehow verified instead of being disclaimed. As on many pages, the statement: ''Free use of Internet in every Library'' might not be accurate and is quite expressed in a 'powerful' way that does not leave much contrary [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:48, 5 December 2007 (CET)

== Overview ==
- For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country). Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

- Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway, Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)
Cheers Paul (djdirect from CS)
PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==

* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

===Members listing===

Having had a general look at the member list to recognise people... isn't there a fairly amount of dubious account? [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 14:18, 13 November 2007 (CET)
: Yes there is, but I think mediawiki has no supported way to delete users. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 15:19, 13 November 2007 (CET)

::There is an extension for mediawiki, which seems to solve this problem: [http://www.mwusers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=4583 look here]. Might be an option? [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://hoerstel.travelblog.ch site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 15:31, 13 November 2007 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

- I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[User:Index|Index]] 17:06, 29 July 2007 (CEST) There should be also and '''Central Europe''', just  w N and E it is not enough, adding central E itcan help with the navigation on the map. Who usually does that? (I am a new here, so excuse for eventually inapropriate Q:) )

:That's a good idea. We are self-organizing: anybody is welcome to do (almost) anything here! So feel free to try out editing [[Template:Mainpage-locations]]. You could also copy that into e.g. [[User:Index/locations test]] if you don't feel ready yet to change the Main Page, and then copy it to the real template when it's all good. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:32, 29 July 2007 (CEST)

::There's a discussion at [[Template talk:Mainpage-locations]], probably a better place for this :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:01, 15 August 2007 (CEST)

''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''

=== USA Division Possibility ===

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)

== Mapping ==

It would be useful to map some of the hitching departing point, on my case to complete and easy the comprehension on the information about Canada. I know it has been done by some in a couple of pages... would anyone help out with that? (Basically its because it's not something I know how-to) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:43, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

: There is an article about [[How to add maps to articles]]. If you still have problems, just ask, I'm happy to help you. It would be kinda difficult for me to add these maps to articles for areas where I've never been, nor do I know anything about Canadian geography :( Hope you can work it out, or someone who has been there can help. It would be really great to have more maps here --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 19:57, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

lifterhalte.info .... how do we manage to login there? I did create point in the past but now I can't log anymore as it put me as 'invalid'? Why isn't it the same information than on the wiki? [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 02:06, 21 October 2007 (CEST)

== Layout ==
I just changed the layout a little, but still I am not really satisfied with it. I think that it's not so obvious what hitchwiki is, when you see it the first time. There are like 100.000 links, list of words, countries, names, etc, but not much text. I think we need a short and clear description on the main page, so that first time visitors can see at once, that they find any information they want here (Because I'm sure they can :)) And maybe we should put the images more on top, to make the page more colorful, more inviting --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 14:27, 10 October 2007 (CEST)

Yep, good idea. I'm asking myself if the list of hitchhikers is ''that'' useful?  Maybe we should have the General Info about First time, etc. there, but remove some stuff you'll find yourself if you're going deeper into the hitchhiking stuff (like Boats, Planes, Trains)... So for that the news can be more visible (to see that there's activity...) etc. Also the list of countries is a bit annoying, we can add some more new countries (thanks to [[User:worldhitch]] ;) ) like Brunei etc. For that the list is getting bigger and bigger, and someday it will be impossible to list all 192+ states of the world there :) Maybe we can track the list more down. What about the pictures. hm... no idea, but currently it's not the best solution. About the new header, it's using 1/3 of my screen, it's definitely too big! :) (Remember, not everyone has a 17" Wide-screen Monitor). And, can someone delete the list ''Based on work by''  at the main page? It's blowing up my screen. In some browsers it's fixed I guess, but not for Safari and Firefox :( Hm...something else? :) Want more people in the chat ! [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://hoerstel.travelblog.ch site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 14:37, 10 October 2007 (CEST)

== Tables ==
The different tables are popping in on the pages and that is great, it enhance and summarise the information. Though, I would like to create some, I don't know how... and I would like to sometimes edit them when they are already done, but they are impossible to find. I think a solution should really be done regarding this. At least to have them automatically gathered on the category page maybe? [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 00:00, 22 December 2007 (CET)</text>
      <sha1>n75rj9vrx3mwsm1grsmxniguitb2cxr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16574</id>
      <parentid>16573</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-22T10:51:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16054">== General Aspect ==

- Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


- Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

- Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

- Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

=== Writing style ===

I was feeling that it would be more interesting and correct to split the 'factual information' of the 'personnal experience', be that the factual information about a hitching spot comes first while the personnal ones would come in a '''different paragraph which follows'''. It would give a more professionnal look to the cities or country pages instead of having to read the subjective point of view of one person everytime, which is interesting, but the factual reading is usually providing a straight to the point information that is often quickly needed. Having a little code about how to make it would enhance the whole project. Because is it of any interest to know that someone met someone else when he was in town or that it was rainy ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:55, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

Also, I would like to add. It would be great if the information given is most of the time somehow verified instead of being disclaimed. As on many pages, the statement: ''Free use of Internet in every Library'' might not be accurate and is quite expressed in a 'powerful' way that does not leave much contrary [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:48, 5 December 2007 (CET)

== Overview ==
- For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country). Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

- Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway, Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)
Cheers Paul (djdirect from CS)
PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==

* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

===Members listing===

Having had a general look at the member list to recognise people... isn't there a fairly amount of dubious account? [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 14:18, 13 November 2007 (CET)
: Yes there is, but I think mediawiki has no supported way to delete users. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 15:19, 13 November 2007 (CET)

::There is an extension for mediawiki, which seems to solve this problem: [http://www.mwusers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=4583 look here]. Might be an option? [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://hoerstel.travelblog.ch site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 15:31, 13 November 2007 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

- I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[User:Index|Index]] 17:06, 29 July 2007 (CEST) There should be also and '''Central Europe''', just  w N and E it is not enough, adding central E itcan help with the navigation on the map. Who usually does that? (I am a new here, so excuse for eventually inapropriate Q:) )

:That's a good idea. We are self-organizing: anybody is welcome to do (almost) anything here! So feel free to try out editing [[Template:Mainpage-locations]]. You could also copy that into e.g. [[User:Index/locations test]] if you don't feel ready yet to change the Main Page, and then copy it to the real template when it's all good. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:32, 29 July 2007 (CEST)

::There's a discussion at [[Template talk:Mainpage-locations]], probably a better place for this :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:01, 15 August 2007 (CEST)

''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''

=== USA Division Possibility ===

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)

== Mapping ==

It would be useful to map some of the hitching departing point, on my case to complete and easy the comprehension on the information about Canada. I know it has been done by some in a couple of pages... would anyone help out with that? (Basically its because it's not something I know how-to) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:43, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

: There is an article about [[How to add maps to articles]]. If you still have problems, just ask, I'm happy to help you. It would be kinda difficult for me to add these maps to articles for areas where I've never been, nor do I know anything about Canadian geography :( Hope you can work it out, or someone who has been there can help. It would be really great to have more maps here --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 19:57, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

lifterhalte.info .... how do we manage to login there? I did create point in the past but now I can't log anymore as it put me as 'invalid'? Why isn't it the same information than on the wiki? [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 02:06, 21 October 2007 (CEST)

== Layout ==
I just changed the layout a little, but still I am not really satisfied with it. I think that it's not so obvious what hitchwiki is, when you see it the first time. There are like 100.000 links, list of words, countries, names, etc, but not much text. I think we need a short and clear description on the main page, so that first time visitors can see at once, that they find any information they want here (Because I'm sure they can :)) And maybe we should put the images more on top, to make the page more colorful, more inviting --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 14:27, 10 October 2007 (CEST)

Yep, good idea. I'm asking myself if the list of hitchhikers is ''that'' useful?  Maybe we should have the General Info about First time, etc. there, but remove some stuff you'll find yourself if you're going deeper into the hitchhiking stuff (like Boats, Planes, Trains)... So for that the news can be more visible (to see that there's activity...) etc. Also the list of countries is a bit annoying, we can add some more new countries (thanks to [[User:worldhitch]] ;) ) like Brunei etc. For that the list is getting bigger and bigger, and someday it will be impossible to list all 192+ states of the world there :) Maybe we can track the list more down. What about the pictures. hm... no idea, but currently it's not the best solution. About the new header, it's using 1/3 of my screen, it's definitely too big! :) (Remember, not everyone has a 17" Wide-screen Monitor). And, can someone delete the list ''Based on work by''  at the main page? It's blowing up my screen. In some browsers it's fixed I guess, but not for Safari and Firefox :( Hm...something else? :) Want more people in the chat ! [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://hoerstel.travelblog.ch site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 14:37, 10 October 2007 (CEST)

== Tables ==
The different tables are popping in on the pages and that is great, it enhance and summarise the information. Though, I would like to create some, I don't know how... and I would like to sometimes edit them when they are already done, but they are impossible to find. I think a solution should really be done regarding this. At least to have them automatically gathered on the category page maybe? [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 00:00, 22 December 2007 (CET)

:Hey Maplefanta, I guess I wrote an article about this tables, or as I called them: ''navigation box''. You can find the article when you click on [[Help:Contents]] at the main page, or go directly here to the article: [[How to create a navigation box]]. The article is hopefully helpful, if anything is unclear don't hesitate to discuss is on the Talk page there :-) 11:51, 22 December 2007 (CET)</text>
      <sha1>kcnarvaxb1dli15id2omz8ibyjv85wz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16575</id>
      <parentid>16574</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-22T10:53:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16528">== General Aspect ==

- Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


- Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

- Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

- Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

=== Writing style ===

I was feeling that it would be more interesting and correct to split the 'factual information' of the 'personnal experience', be that the factual information about a hitching spot comes first while the personnal ones would come in a '''different paragraph which follows'''. It would give a more professionnal look to the cities or country pages instead of having to read the subjective point of view of one person everytime, which is interesting, but the factual reading is usually providing a straight to the point information that is often quickly needed. Having a little code about how to make it would enhance the whole project. Because is it of any interest to know that someone met someone else when he was in town or that it was rainy ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:55, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

Also, I would like to add. It would be great if the information given is most of the time somehow verified instead of being disclaimed. As on many pages, the statement: ''Free use of Internet in every Library'' might not be accurate and is quite expressed in a 'powerful' way that does not leave much contrary [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:48, 5 December 2007 (CET)

:Hey, I agree with you. I just sometimes managed personal experience by setting it ''cursive'', and behind some factual information. Writing verified instead of being disclaimed is a good point, but sometimes a bit hard for me as a not native English speaker :) But we can try to set this up as a standard. Good point :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://hoerstel.travelblog.ch site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 11:53, 22 December 2007 (CET)

== Overview ==
- For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country). Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

- Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway, Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)
Cheers Paul (djdirect from CS)
PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==

* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

===Members listing===

Having had a general look at the member list to recognise people... isn't there a fairly amount of dubious account? [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 14:18, 13 November 2007 (CET)
: Yes there is, but I think mediawiki has no supported way to delete users. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 15:19, 13 November 2007 (CET)

::There is an extension for mediawiki, which seems to solve this problem: [http://www.mwusers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=4583 look here]. Might be an option? [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://hoerstel.travelblog.ch site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 15:31, 13 November 2007 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

- I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[User:Index|Index]] 17:06, 29 July 2007 (CEST) There should be also and '''Central Europe''', just  w N and E it is not enough, adding central E itcan help with the navigation on the map. Who usually does that? (I am a new here, so excuse for eventually inapropriate Q:) )

:That's a good idea. We are self-organizing: anybody is welcome to do (almost) anything here! So feel free to try out editing [[Template:Mainpage-locations]]. You could also copy that into e.g. [[User:Index/locations test]] if you don't feel ready yet to change the Main Page, and then copy it to the real template when it's all good. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:32, 29 July 2007 (CEST)

::There's a discussion at [[Template talk:Mainpage-locations]], probably a better place for this :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:01, 15 August 2007 (CEST)

''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''

=== USA Division Possibility ===

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)

== Mapping ==

It would be useful to map some of the hitching departing point, on my case to complete and easy the comprehension on the information about Canada. I know it has been done by some in a couple of pages... would anyone help out with that? (Basically its because it's not something I know how-to) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:43, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

: There is an article about [[How to add maps to articles]]. If you still have problems, just ask, I'm happy to help you. It would be kinda difficult for me to add these maps to articles for areas where I've never been, nor do I know anything about Canadian geography :( Hope you can work it out, or someone who has been there can help. It would be really great to have more maps here --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 19:57, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

lifterhalte.info .... how do we manage to login there? I did create point in the past but now I can't log anymore as it put me as 'invalid'? Why isn't it the same information than on the wiki? [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 02:06, 21 October 2007 (CEST)

== Layout ==
I just changed the layout a little, but still I am not really satisfied with it. I think that it's not so obvious what hitchwiki is, when you see it the first time. There are like 100.000 links, list of words, countries, names, etc, but not much text. I think we need a short and clear description on the main page, so that first time visitors can see at once, that they find any information they want here (Because I'm sure they can :)) And maybe we should put the images more on top, to make the page more colorful, more inviting --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 14:27, 10 October 2007 (CEST)

Yep, good idea. I'm asking myself if the list of hitchhikers is ''that'' useful?  Maybe we should have the General Info about First time, etc. there, but remove some stuff you'll find yourself if you're going deeper into the hitchhiking stuff (like Boats, Planes, Trains)... So for that the news can be more visible (to see that there's activity...) etc. Also the list of countries is a bit annoying, we can add some more new countries (thanks to [[User:worldhitch]] ;) ) like Brunei etc. For that the list is getting bigger and bigger, and someday it will be impossible to list all 192+ states of the world there :) Maybe we can track the list more down. What about the pictures. hm... no idea, but currently it's not the best solution. About the new header, it's using 1/3 of my screen, it's definitely too big! :) (Remember, not everyone has a 17" Wide-screen Monitor). And, can someone delete the list ''Based on work by''  at the main page? It's blowing up my screen. In some browsers it's fixed I guess, but not for Safari and Firefox :( Hm...something else? :) Want more people in the chat ! [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://hoerstel.travelblog.ch site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 14:37, 10 October 2007 (CEST)

== Tables ==
The different tables are popping in on the pages and that is great, it enhance and summarise the information. Though, I would like to create some, I don't know how... and I would like to sometimes edit them when they are already done, but they are impossible to find. I think a solution should really be done regarding this. At least to have them automatically gathered on the category page maybe? [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 00:00, 22 December 2007 (CET)

:Hey Maplefanta, I guess I wrote an article about this tables, or as I called them: ''navigation box''. You can find the article when you click on [[Help:Contents]] at the main page, or go directly here to the article: [[How to create a navigation box]]. The article is hopefully helpful, if anything is unclear don't hesitate to discuss is on the Talk page there :-) 11:51, 22 December 2007 (CET)</text>
      <sha1>cvwoxkk4a4hte3b1bnhvzumuihlfo1p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17139</id>
      <parentid>16575</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-31T03:08:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16743">== General Aspect ==

- Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


- Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

- Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

- Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

=== Writing style ===

I was feeling that it would be more interesting and correct to split the 'factual information' of the 'personnal experience', be that the factual information about a hitching spot comes first while the personnal ones would come in a '''different paragraph which follows'''. It would give a more professionnal look to the cities or country pages instead of having to read the subjective point of view of one person everytime, which is interesting, but the factual reading is usually providing a straight to the point information that is often quickly needed. Having a little code about how to make it would enhance the whole project. Because is it of any interest to know that someone met someone else when he was in town or that it was rainy ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:55, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

Also, I would like to add. It would be great if the information given is most of the time somehow verified instead of being disclaimed. As on many pages, the statement: ''Free use of Internet in every Library'' might not be accurate and is quite expressed in a 'powerful' way that does not leave much contrary [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:48, 5 December 2007 (CET)

:Hey, I agree with you. I just sometimes managed personal experience by setting it ''cursive'', and behind some factual information. Writing verified instead of being disclaimed is a good point, but sometimes a bit hard for me as a not native English speaker :) But we can try to set this up as a standard. Good point :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://hoerstel.travelblog.ch site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 11:53, 22 December 2007 (CET)

== Overview ==
- For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country). Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

- Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway, Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)
Cheers Paul (djdirect from CS)
PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==

* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

===Members listing===

Having had a general look at the member list to recognise people... isn't there a fairly amount of dubious account? [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 14:18, 13 November 2007 (CET)
: Yes there is, but I think mediawiki has no supported way to delete users. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 15:19, 13 November 2007 (CET)

::There is an extension for mediawiki, which seems to solve this problem: [http://www.mwusers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=4583 look here]. Might be an option? [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://hoerstel.travelblog.ch site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 15:31, 13 November 2007 (CET)

: Is there many account that have been created for management motive? (Robot etc..) Maybe they should have a Similar Description page somehow 'official' [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 04:08, 31 December 2007 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

- I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[User:Index|Index]] 17:06, 29 July 2007 (CEST) There should be also and '''Central Europe''', just  w N and E it is not enough, adding central E itcan help with the navigation on the map. Who usually does that? (I am a new here, so excuse for eventually inapropriate Q:) )

:That's a good idea. We are self-organizing: anybody is welcome to do (almost) anything here! So feel free to try out editing [[Template:Mainpage-locations]]. You could also copy that into e.g. [[User:Index/locations test]] if you don't feel ready yet to change the Main Page, and then copy it to the real template when it's all good. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:32, 29 July 2007 (CEST)

::There's a discussion at [[Template talk:Mainpage-locations]], probably a better place for this :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:01, 15 August 2007 (CEST)

''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''

=== USA Division Possibility ===

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)

== Mapping ==

It would be useful to map some of the hitching departing point, on my case to complete and easy the comprehension on the information about Canada. I know it has been done by some in a couple of pages... would anyone help out with that? (Basically its because it's not something I know how-to) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:43, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

: There is an article about [[How to add maps to articles]]. If you still have problems, just ask, I'm happy to help you. It would be kinda difficult for me to add these maps to articles for areas where I've never been, nor do I know anything about Canadian geography :( Hope you can work it out, or someone who has been there can help. It would be really great to have more maps here --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 19:57, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

lifterhalte.info .... how do we manage to login there? I did create point in the past but now I can't log anymore as it put me as 'invalid'? Why isn't it the same information than on the wiki? [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 02:06, 21 October 2007 (CEST)

== Layout ==
I just changed the layout a little, but still I am not really satisfied with it. I think that it's not so obvious what hitchwiki is, when you see it the first time. There are like 100.000 links, list of words, countries, names, etc, but not much text. I think we need a short and clear description on the main page, so that first time visitors can see at once, that they find any information they want here (Because I'm sure they can :)) And maybe we should put the images more on top, to make the page more colorful, more inviting --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 14:27, 10 October 2007 (CEST)

Yep, good idea. I'm asking myself if the list of hitchhikers is ''that'' useful?  Maybe we should have the General Info about First time, etc. there, but remove some stuff you'll find yourself if you're going deeper into the hitchhiking stuff (like Boats, Planes, Trains)... So for that the news can be more visible (to see that there's activity...) etc. Also the list of countries is a bit annoying, we can add some more new countries (thanks to [[User:worldhitch]] ;) ) like Brunei etc. For that the list is getting bigger and bigger, and someday it will be impossible to list all 192+ states of the world there :) Maybe we can track the list more down. What about the pictures. hm... no idea, but currently it's not the best solution. About the new header, it's using 1/3 of my screen, it's definitely too big! :) (Remember, not everyone has a 17" Wide-screen Monitor). And, can someone delete the list ''Based on work by''  at the main page? It's blowing up my screen. In some browsers it's fixed I guess, but not for Safari and Firefox :( Hm...something else? :) Want more people in the chat ! [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://hoerstel.travelblog.ch site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 14:37, 10 October 2007 (CEST)

== Tables ==
The different tables are popping in on the pages and that is great, it enhance and summarise the information. Though, I would like to create some, I don't know how... and I would like to sometimes edit them when they are already done, but they are impossible to find. I think a solution should really be done regarding this. At least to have them automatically gathered on the category page maybe? [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 00:00, 22 December 2007 (CET)

:Hey Maplefanta, I guess I wrote an article about this tables, or as I called them: ''navigation box''. You can find the article when you click on [[Help:Contents]] at the main page, or go directly here to the article: [[How to create a navigation box]]. The article is hopefully helpful, if anything is unclear don't hesitate to discuss is on the Talk page there :-) 11:51, 22 December 2007 (CET)</text>
      <sha1>8xypfxvobyh2jwwek8gvd59378qll79</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17141</id>
      <parentid>17139</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-31T15:45:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17055">== General Aspect ==

- Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


- Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

- Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

- Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

=== Writing style ===

I was feeling that it would be more interesting and correct to split the 'factual information' of the 'personnal experience', be that the factual information about a hitching spot comes first while the personnal ones would come in a '''different paragraph which follows'''. It would give a more professionnal look to the cities or country pages instead of having to read the subjective point of view of one person everytime, which is interesting, but the factual reading is usually providing a straight to the point information that is often quickly needed. Having a little code about how to make it would enhance the whole project. Because is it of any interest to know that someone met someone else when he was in town or that it was rainy ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:55, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

Also, I would like to add. It would be great if the information given is most of the time somehow verified instead of being disclaimed. As on many pages, the statement: ''Free use of Internet in every Library'' might not be accurate and is quite expressed in a 'powerful' way that does not leave much contrary [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:48, 5 December 2007 (CET)

:Hey, I agree with you. I just sometimes managed personal experience by setting it ''cursive'', and behind some factual information. Writing verified instead of being disclaimed is a good point, but sometimes a bit hard for me as a not native English speaker :) But we can try to set this up as a standard. Good point :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://hoerstel.travelblog.ch site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 11:53, 22 December 2007 (CET)

== Overview ==
- For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country). Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

- Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway, Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)
Cheers Paul (djdirect from CS)
PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==

* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

===Members listing===

Having had a general look at the member list to recognise people... isn't there a fairly amount of dubious account? [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 14:18, 13 November 2007 (CET)
: Yes there is, but I think mediawiki has no supported way to delete users. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 15:19, 13 November 2007 (CET)

::There is an extension for mediawiki, which seems to solve this problem: [http://www.mwusers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=4583 look here]. Might be an option? [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://hoerstel.travelblog.ch site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 15:31, 13 November 2007 (CET)

: Is there many account that have been created for management motive? (Robot etc..) Maybe they should have a Similar Description page somehow 'official' [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 04:08, 31 December 2007 (CET)
:: No, I think there is only [[User:Admin|Admin]] which is a mediawiki-default and wasn't used since setting up this wiki and [[User:Lanigiro|Lanigiro]]. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 16:45, 31 December 2007 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

- I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[User:Index|Index]] 17:06, 29 July 2007 (CEST) There should be also and '''Central Europe''', just  w N and E it is not enough, adding central E itcan help with the navigation on the map. Who usually does that? (I am a new here, so excuse for eventually inapropriate Q:) )

:That's a good idea. We are self-organizing: anybody is welcome to do (almost) anything here! So feel free to try out editing [[Template:Mainpage-locations]]. You could also copy that into e.g. [[User:Index/locations test]] if you don't feel ready yet to change the Main Page, and then copy it to the real template when it's all good. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:32, 29 July 2007 (CEST)

::There's a discussion at [[Template talk:Mainpage-locations]], probably a better place for this :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:01, 15 August 2007 (CEST)

''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''

=== USA Division Possibility ===

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)

== Mapping ==

It would be useful to map some of the hitching departing point, on my case to complete and easy the comprehension on the information about Canada. I know it has been done by some in a couple of pages... would anyone help out with that? (Basically its because it's not something I know how-to) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:43, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

: There is an article about [[How to add maps to articles]]. If you still have problems, just ask, I'm happy to help you. It would be kinda difficult for me to add these maps to articles for areas where I've never been, nor do I know anything about Canadian geography :( Hope you can work it out, or someone who has been there can help. It would be really great to have more maps here --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 19:57, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

lifterhalte.info .... how do we manage to login there? I did create point in the past but now I can't log anymore as it put me as 'invalid'? Why isn't it the same information than on the wiki? [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 02:06, 21 October 2007 (CEST)

== Layout ==
I just changed the layout a little, but still I am not really satisfied with it. I think that it's not so obvious what hitchwiki is, when you see it the first time. There are like 100.000 links, list of words, countries, names, etc, but not much text. I think we need a short and clear description on the main page, so that first time visitors can see at once, that they find any information they want here (Because I'm sure they can :)) And maybe we should put the images more on top, to make the page more colorful, more inviting --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 14:27, 10 October 2007 (CEST)

Yep, good idea. I'm asking myself if the list of hitchhikers is ''that'' useful?  Maybe we should have the General Info about First time, etc. there, but remove some stuff you'll find yourself if you're going deeper into the hitchhiking stuff (like Boats, Planes, Trains)... So for that the news can be more visible (to see that there's activity...) etc. Also the list of countries is a bit annoying, we can add some more new countries (thanks to [[User:worldhitch]] ;) ) like Brunei etc. For that the list is getting bigger and bigger, and someday it will be impossible to list all 192+ states of the world there :) Maybe we can track the list more down. What about the pictures. hm... no idea, but currently it's not the best solution. About the new header, it's using 1/3 of my screen, it's definitely too big! :) (Remember, not everyone has a 17" Wide-screen Monitor). And, can someone delete the list ''Based on work by''  at the main page? It's blowing up my screen. In some browsers it's fixed I guess, but not for Safari and Firefox :( Hm...something else? :) Want more people in the chat ! [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://hoerstel.travelblog.ch site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 14:37, 10 October 2007 (CEST)

== Tables ==
The different tables are popping in on the pages and that is great, it enhance and summarise the information. Though, I would like to create some, I don't know how... and I would like to sometimes edit them when they are already done, but they are impossible to find. I think a solution should really be done regarding this. At least to have them automatically gathered on the category page maybe? [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 00:00, 22 December 2007 (CET)

:Hey Maplefanta, I guess I wrote an article about this tables, or as I called them: ''navigation box''. You can find the article when you click on [[Help:Contents]] at the main page, or go directly here to the article: [[How to create a navigation box]]. The article is hopefully helpful, if anything is unclear don't hesitate to discuss is on the Talk page there :-) 11:51, 22 December 2007 (CET)</text>
      <sha1>7p5leivq6y11w9vvvtm49yofgemkw7m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17847</id>
      <parentid>17141</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-10T17:51:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17311">== To new members ==

Please make that your first contribution is your own 'user' profile! So that it can stop being red and that we can somehow know how valid may your contribution be valid! ;) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 18:51, 10 January 2008 (CET)

== General Aspect ==

- Boo -- the Main Page format has been blatantly ripped off from [http://wikitravel.org Wikitravel], which is licensed under CC by-sa, not GFDL. [[User:202.76.231.182|202.76.231.182]] 19:40, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)


- Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

- Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

- Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

=== Writing style ===

I was feeling that it would be more interesting and correct to split the 'factual information' of the 'personnal experience', be that the factual information about a hitching spot comes first while the personnal ones would come in a '''different paragraph which follows'''. It would give a more professionnal look to the cities or country pages instead of having to read the subjective point of view of one person everytime, which is interesting, but the factual reading is usually providing a straight to the point information that is often quickly needed. Having a little code about how to make it would enhance the whole project. Because is it of any interest to know that someone met someone else when he was in town or that it was rainy ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:55, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

Also, I would like to add. It would be great if the information given is most of the time somehow verified instead of being disclaimed. As on many pages, the statement: ''Free use of Internet in every Library'' might not be accurate and is quite expressed in a 'powerful' way that does not leave much contrary [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:48, 5 December 2007 (CET)

:Hey, I agree with you. I just sometimes managed personal experience by setting it ''cursive'', and behind some factual information. Writing verified instead of being disclaimed is a good point, but sometimes a bit hard for me as a not native English speaker :) But we can try to set this up as a standard. Good point :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://hoerstel.travelblog.ch site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 11:53, 22 December 2007 (CET)

== Overview ==
- For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country). Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

- Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway, Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)
Cheers Paul (djdirect from CS)
PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==

* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

===Members listing===

Having had a general look at the member list to recognise people... isn't there a fairly amount of dubious account? [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 14:18, 13 November 2007 (CET)
: Yes there is, but I think mediawiki has no supported way to delete users. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 15:19, 13 November 2007 (CET)

::There is an extension for mediawiki, which seems to solve this problem: [http://www.mwusers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=4583 look here]. Might be an option? [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://hoerstel.travelblog.ch site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 15:31, 13 November 2007 (CET)

: Is there many account that have been created for management motive? (Robot etc..) Maybe they should have a Similar Description page somehow 'official' [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 04:08, 31 December 2007 (CET)
:: No, I think there is only [[User:Admin|Admin]] which is a mediawiki-default and wasn't used since setting up this wiki and [[User:Lanigiro|Lanigiro]]. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 16:45, 31 December 2007 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

- I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[User:Index|Index]] 17:06, 29 July 2007 (CEST) There should be also and '''Central Europe''', just  w N and E it is not enough, adding central E itcan help with the navigation on the map. Who usually does that? (I am a new here, so excuse for eventually inapropriate Q:) )

:That's a good idea. We are self-organizing: anybody is welcome to do (almost) anything here! So feel free to try out editing [[Template:Mainpage-locations]]. You could also copy that into e.g. [[User:Index/locations test]] if you don't feel ready yet to change the Main Page, and then copy it to the real template when it's all good. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:32, 29 July 2007 (CEST)

::There's a discussion at [[Template talk:Mainpage-locations]], probably a better place for this :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:01, 15 August 2007 (CEST)

''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''

=== USA Division Possibility ===

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)

== Mapping ==

It would be useful to map some of the hitching departing point, on my case to complete and easy the comprehension on the information about Canada. I know it has been done by some in a couple of pages... would anyone help out with that? (Basically its because it's not something I know how-to) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:43, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

: There is an article about [[How to add maps to articles]]. If you still have problems, just ask, I'm happy to help you. It would be kinda difficult for me to add these maps to articles for areas where I've never been, nor do I know anything about Canadian geography :( Hope you can work it out, or someone who has been there can help. It would be really great to have more maps here --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 19:57, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

lifterhalte.info .... how do we manage to login there? I did create point in the past but now I can't log anymore as it put me as 'invalid'? Why isn't it the same information than on the wiki? [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 02:06, 21 October 2007 (CEST)

== Layout ==
I just changed the layout a little, but still I am not really satisfied with it. I think that it's not so obvious what hitchwiki is, when you see it the first time. There are like 100.000 links, list of words, countries, names, etc, but not much text. I think we need a short and clear description on the main page, so that first time visitors can see at once, that they find any information they want here (Because I'm sure they can :)) And maybe we should put the images more on top, to make the page more colorful, more inviting --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 14:27, 10 October 2007 (CEST)

Yep, good idea. I'm asking myself if the list of hitchhikers is ''that'' useful?  Maybe we should have the General Info about First time, etc. there, but remove some stuff you'll find yourself if you're going deeper into the hitchhiking stuff (like Boats, Planes, Trains)... So for that the news can be more visible (to see that there's activity...) etc. Also the list of countries is a bit annoying, we can add some more new countries (thanks to [[User:worldhitch]] ;) ) like Brunei etc. For that the list is getting bigger and bigger, and someday it will be impossible to list all 192+ states of the world there :) Maybe we can track the list more down. What about the pictures. hm... no idea, but currently it's not the best solution. About the new header, it's using 1/3 of my screen, it's definitely too big! :) (Remember, not everyone has a 17" Wide-screen Monitor). And, can someone delete the list ''Based on work by''  at the main page? It's blowing up my screen. In some browsers it's fixed I guess, but not for Safari and Firefox :( Hm...something else? :) Want more people in the chat ! [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://hoerstel.travelblog.ch site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 14:37, 10 October 2007 (CEST)

== Tables ==
The different tables are popping in on the pages and that is great, it enhance and summarise the information. Though, I would like to create some, I don't know how... and I would like to sometimes edit them when they are already done, but they are impossible to find. I think a solution should really be done regarding this. At least to have them automatically gathered on the category page maybe? [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 00:00, 22 December 2007 (CET)

:Hey Maplefanta, I guess I wrote an article about this tables, or as I called them: ''navigation box''. You can find the article when you click on [[Help:Contents]] at the main page, or go directly here to the article: [[How to create a navigation box]]. The article is hopefully helpful, if anything is unclear don't hesitate to discuss is on the Talk page there :-) 11:51, 22 December 2007 (CET)</text>
      <sha1>3gg4xt5rwr9qom1t9ujlubzeasps387</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17990</id>
      <parentid>17847</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-18T20:20:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17101">== To new members ==

Please make that your first contribution is your own 'user' profile! So that it can stop being red and that we can somehow know how valid may your contribution be valid! ;) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 18:51, 10 January 2008 (CET)

== General Aspect ==


- Hej! I thought the main page should just be an overview with the countries and without cities. Did I get it wrong? - deleea

:Hi! :) Well, it might be good to have some cities in there as well. To give an idea to people and to persuade people to add something about cities we don't have yet! Although I want to get rid of the red links in a couple of months... Oh, and you can sign using &lt;nowiki&gt;~~~~&lt;/nowiki&gt;. Peace,love&amp;hitchhike fun, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:57, 28 Dec 2005 (UTC)

- Hello. Before discovering this place for discussion I already filled some boxes eg about Virgin hh, Poland and the Netherlands. On one hand this wiki is a good idea, because it has some (very small) potential to become an interesting source of information. However, I am not expecting this at all. Which does not need to mean anything. Any new business usually takes some time - up to three or five years - to make a little bit more than it costs, and so it might be with this initiative. As for what I've read it's some kind of start. However, I have doubts about the general neutrality of the content for now. For example - I read that a country can be skipped if an attempt to hitchhike there does not succeed. What a bullshit! This may be reasonable for random long distance travellers, however many people who hitchhike do so for very different reasons. For example because they don't have money, because there is no public transport and so on. Hitchhiking in the Netherlands "is possible". "It's possible" for some, for others it is easy, not just possible. So, my comment is a very positive one - I hope - which tries to say. What is the neutral point of view? Ah, I see that the hitchhikers point of view is wanted. If so, what is a hitchhiker, and what is the hitchhikers point of view? If a non-hitchhiker wanted to hitchhike out of town, what would be his or her point of view? That's all. It's an ambitious project you're thinking of. All the best with it. Regards Frank Verhart. Note - please don't copy information (text) from my website. It is copyrighted material that I do not offer for publication elsewhere. PS - I don't like the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

:Hi! Just finished HGttG today :) So I  just wanted to write Don't panic! but then I  saw you don't like it.
:I'm glad to read your critique and I'll try to do something useful with it!
:One thing though: this is not a business! The AdSense money goes to Wikicities, to which I'm not affiliated. Also, I'm not really the founder: I adopted, or saved thia wiki from a ''spam death''.
:ciao, [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:10, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

- Hey Hitchhikers! Just joined the new hitchhiking wiki here-- whew! there have been a few moves in these last 2 years, hope we are all able to make this a permanent stay here on hitchwiki.org.
I contributed to hitchhikingguide.org and hitchhiking.wikia.com but do not feel the need to mark which contributions belong to me within this new wiki. As you will see from my user page, I am creator/webmaster/co-editor of digihitch.com. Some of the information I personally collected for digihitch I will also share here, and as with all hitchhikers I have a ton of info that has not yet been written. As I hitchhike primarily in the USA, I will have most to contribute to that section. (Don't believe the misinformation found on the web... there are still tens of thousands of hitchhikers in the USA).
I -and the digihitch community- would really appreciate it if you cite digihitch.com for all information you collect from there. The website is community-run and has been the hard work of many world hitchhikers for over 5 years. Support our community when possible and all hitchhikers will benefit! 
I must admit that I was opposed to a hitchhiking wiki when Teppo first suggested it to me in April 2005. We at digihitch.com had just launched our [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] section and I believed that all information would be best shared there among registered members (without all the spam maintenance required of a wiki), but since that time I understand the value of a wiki such as this and will attempt to share unbiased contributions where possible.
Revel and Roll, [[User:Salman|Morgan 'Salman']] 21:38 01 December 2006 (UTC)

=== Writing style ===

I was feeling that it would be more interesting and correct to split the 'factual information' of the 'personnal experience', be that the factual information about a hitching spot comes first while the personnal ones would come in a '''different paragraph which follows'''. It would give a more professionnal look to the cities or country pages instead of having to read the subjective point of view of one person everytime, which is interesting, but the factual reading is usually providing a straight to the point information that is often quickly needed. Having a little code about how to make it would enhance the whole project. Because is it of any interest to know that someone met someone else when he was in town or that it was rainy ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:55, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

Also, I would like to add. It would be great if the information given is most of the time somehow verified instead of being disclaimed. As on many pages, the statement: ''Free use of Internet in every Library'' might not be accurate and is quite expressed in a 'powerful' way that does not leave much contrary [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:48, 5 December 2007 (CET)

:Hey, I agree with you. I just sometimes managed personal experience by setting it ''cursive'', and behind some factual information. Writing verified instead of being disclaimed is a good point, but sometimes a bit hard for me as a not native English speaker :) But we can try to set this up as a standard. Good point :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://hoerstel.travelblog.ch site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 11:53, 22 December 2007 (CET)

== Overview ==
- For me, it always takes to long to find a specific country on the mainpage (especially in europe), because countries, continent-parts and cities are mixed. I would suggest removing at least the cities and maybe also the continent-parts (I think it's more likely that people are looking for a specific country). Does anyone agree with me? :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:41, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Yeah, I think so too. It's good to have cities on the main page to encourage development, but maybe for the Europe section we could remove them. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 18:47, 3 December 2006 (CET)

:Removed the European cities. What do you mean with "continent parts"? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:15, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:: [[Eastern Europe]], [[Western Europe]], etc. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:35, 4 December 2006 (CET)
:::We could remove that. But how do you want to group the European countries, one alphabetical list? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:34, 4 December 2006 (CET)
::::I reformatted it a little bit, now it even looks good on my little screen (1024x768) :) I noticed the &amp;lt;big&amp;gt;-tags there, but for some reason, they don't work here (Opera on Linux). I changed it to bold instead --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 01:03, 5 December 2006 (CET)

== Errors that need to be fixed ==

- Sorry, I hit edit instead of add comment, whoops :)

Anyway, Kyiv/Kiev on the title page
I just added some tips to the Kyiv page (well, one tip :) - please note in Ukrainian language Kiev is written as Kyiv - which should be the correct name to use (Kiev is the old Russian name for the city).
Mind you, noone will get confused, but just for the sake of completeness (and to not piss off any Ukrainians :)
Cheers Paul (djdirect from CS)
PS: what's wrong with HHGTG? :)

:Thanks for your contributions! 
:When you log in you can "move" pages to another title. That way there will also be a redirect. Now both [[Kyiv]] and [[Kiev]] point to the same article.
:Something wrong with HHGTG? Nah. Or do you mean Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking. Well, I think the title is a bit long. But maybe it's good. I'd be willing to use any name, if there are enough folks who want that name. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 20:12, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

==Stats==

* I want to see if I can get Wikistats installed. (For hitchwiki and the CS Wiki.) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 03:04, 24 November 2006 (CET)

===Members listing===

Having had a general look at the member list to recognise people... isn't there a fairly amount of dubious account? [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 14:18, 13 November 2007 (CET)
: Yes there is, but I think mediawiki has no supported way to delete users. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 15:19, 13 November 2007 (CET)

::There is an extension for mediawiki, which seems to solve this problem: [http://www.mwusers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=4583 look here]. Might be an option? [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://hoerstel.travelblog.ch site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 15:31, 13 November 2007 (CET)

: Is there many account that have been created for management motive? (Robot etc..) Maybe they should have a Similar Description page somehow 'official' [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 04:08, 31 December 2007 (CET)
:: No, I think there is only [[User:Admin|Admin]] which is a mediawiki-default and wasn't used since setting up this wiki and [[User:Lanigiro|Lanigiro]]. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 16:45, 31 December 2007 (CET)

== Reorganization ==

- I tried organize the photos and whatnot to look a little better, but I can't really make it look good. Someone with an aesthetic eye needs to handle it. Maybe it's just because of my resolution (1024) but the pictures block out all text in the left column making it all drop down below the picture. This leaves a huge whitespace gap to the left of the pictures and doesn't look very nice. Another thing I noticed is that even though the columns are all 33%, the left column is smaller than the middle column because of margins. If we could even that up it might fix the above problem with the pictures.

I bolded the text of Canada, Mexico, US and Greenland to make N America a little easier to navigate. By the way, Europe lookes very nice now. [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 04:45, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:Cool. I'm just going to change the picture stuff. It's good to have at least one picture. But maybe we should just a ''Picture of the week'' or something like that? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 05:55, 13 December 2006 (CET)

::Good idea [[User:Zac Stewart|Zac]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Zac Stewart|talk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 06:37, 13 December 2006 (CET)

:::That's enough wiki layout work for today. I hope y'all like it. Still needs some work on the picture of the week stuff. [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 06:49, 13 December 2006 (CET)

===[[Central Europe]]===
[[User:Index|Index]] 17:06, 29 July 2007 (CEST) There should be also and '''Central Europe''', just  w N and E it is not enough, adding central E itcan help with the navigation on the map. Who usually does that? (I am a new here, so excuse for eventually inapropriate Q:) )

:That's a good idea. We are self-organizing: anybody is welcome to do (almost) anything here! So feel free to try out editing [[Template:Mainpage-locations]]. You could also copy that into e.g. [[User:Index/locations test]] if you don't feel ready yet to change the Main Page, and then copy it to the real template when it's all good. :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 22:32, 29 July 2007 (CEST)

::There's a discussion at [[Template talk:Mainpage-locations]], probably a better place for this :) [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 17:01, 15 August 2007 (CEST)

''moved stuff to [[Community portal]]''

=== USA Division Possibility ===

Once we get more states into the United States, do you want to divide it up into regional pages?

:Continued at [[Talk:United States of America]] [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 15:43, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

== Email list ==
08 May - There is now a hitchwiki email list, for any discussions related to Hitchwiki, feel free to join.
Why don't you just use the yahoogroups hh list? Do you expect so much to discuss? I guess the one or the other email there over doesn't annoy people, but might bring the one or other on the wiki.. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:24, 11 May 2007 (CEST)

:I didn't think of that one. I think I was on it though, and unsubscribed. How much traffic is there usually? [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] 08:45, 12 May 2007 (CEST)

::I'm subscribed since the end of october 2006 and received 58 mails so far. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 23:11, 13 May 2007 (CEST)

== Mapping ==

It would be useful to map some of the hitching departing point, on my case to complete and easy the comprehension on the information about Canada. I know it has been done by some in a couple of pages... would anyone help out with that? (Basically its because it's not something I know how-to) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 19:43, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

: There is an article about [[How to add maps to articles]]. If you still have problems, just ask, I'm happy to help you. It would be kinda difficult for me to add these maps to articles for areas where I've never been, nor do I know anything about Canadian geography :( Hope you can work it out, or someone who has been there can help. It would be really great to have more maps here --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 19:57, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

lifterhalte.info .... how do we manage to login there? I did create point in the past but now I can't log anymore as it put me as 'invalid'? Why isn't it the same information than on the wiki? [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 02:06, 21 October 2007 (CEST)

== Layout ==
I just changed the layout a little, but still I am not really satisfied with it. I think that it's not so obvious what hitchwiki is, when you see it the first time. There are like 100.000 links, list of words, countries, names, etc, but not much text. I think we need a short and clear description on the main page, so that first time visitors can see at once, that they find any information they want here (Because I'm sure they can :)) And maybe we should put the images more on top, to make the page more colorful, more inviting --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 14:27, 10 October 2007 (CEST)

Yep, good idea. I'm asking myself if the list of hitchhikers is ''that'' useful?  Maybe we should have the General Info about First time, etc. there, but remove some stuff you'll find yourself if you're going deeper into the hitchhiking stuff (like Boats, Planes, Trains)... So for that the news can be more visible (to see that there's activity...) etc. Also the list of countries is a bit annoying, we can add some more new countries (thanks to [[User:worldhitch]] ;) ) like Brunei etc. For that the list is getting bigger and bigger, and someday it will be impossible to list all 192+ states of the world there :) Maybe we can track the list more down. What about the pictures. hm... no idea, but currently it's not the best solution. About the new header, it's using 1/3 of my screen, it's definitely too big! :) (Remember, not everyone has a 17" Wide-screen Monitor). And, can someone delete the list ''Based on work by''  at the main page? It's blowing up my screen. In some browsers it's fixed I guess, but not for Safari and Firefox :( Hm...something else? :) Want more people in the chat ! [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://hoerstel.travelblog.ch site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 14:37, 10 October 2007 (CEST)

== Tables ==
The different tables are popping in on the pages and that is great, it enhance and summarise the information. Though, I would like to create some, I don't know how... and I would like to sometimes edit them when they are already done, but they are impossible to find. I think a solution should really be done regarding this. At least to have them automatically gathered on the category page maybe? [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 00:00, 22 December 2007 (CET)

:Hey Maplefanta, I guess I wrote an article about this tables, or as I called them: ''navigation box''. You can find the article when you click on [[Help:Contents]] at the main page, or go directly here to the article: [[How to create a navigation box]]. The article is hopefully helpful, if anything is unclear don't hesitate to discuss is on the Talk page there :-) 11:51, 22 December 2007 (CET)</text>
      <sha1>lsmvq4p8pwjwlcwsmmw79jdo94zgdp7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17992</id>
      <parentid>17990</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-18T20:24:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="325">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
== To new members ==

Please make that your first contribution is your own 'user' profile! So that it can stop being red and that we can somehow know how valid may your contribution be valid! ;) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 18:51, 10 January 2008 (CET)</text>
      <sha1>ftvibyrrv2idwq8ioioomub7y98glms</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18061</id>
      <parentid>17992</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-19T00:54:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="733">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
== To new members ==

Please make that your first contribution is your own 'user' profile! So that it can stop being red and that we can somehow know how valid may your contribution be valid! ;) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 18:51, 10 January 2008 (CET)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], Scandinavia, Iceland, [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ...[[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)</text>
      <sha1>hzoof175igl2s0tey3teeazjus9r1kr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18695</id>
      <parentid>18061</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-04T02:16:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1022">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
== To new members ==

Please make that your first contribution is your own 'user' profile! So that it can stop being red and that we can somehow know how valid may your contribution be valid! ;) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 18:51, 10 January 2008 (CET)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)</text>
      <sha1>4qsvfx9nyu8hz3ezlo94b2de98vqlnd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21976</id>
      <parentid>18695</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-22T02:17:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1363">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
== To new members ==

Please make that your first contribution is your own 'user' profile! So that it can stop being red and that we can somehow know how valid may your contribution be valid! ;) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 18:51, 10 January 2008 (CET)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>t2xcjmsbznaz6brtl5hrroo0l7ny1vj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21981</id>
      <parentid>21976</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-22T03:21:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1510">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
== To new members ==

Please make that your first contribution is your own 'user' profile! So that it can stop being red and that we can somehow know how valid may your contribution be valid! ;) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 18:51, 10 January 2008 (CET)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>t728rzx76bdv0ts0n15n80tibqx2x4i</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22775</id>
      <parentid>21981</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-23T17:20:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Alex</username>
        <id>89</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1664">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
== To new members ==

Please make that your first contribution is your own 'user' profile! So that it can stop being red and that we can somehow know how valid may your contribution be valid! ;) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 18:51, 10 January 2008 (CET)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:: Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>3e31f8o90qbxs9kf02s6jhtoa8hqsjg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22776</id>
      <parentid>22775</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-23T17:28:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Alex</username>
        <id>89</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2564">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
== To new members ==

Please make that your first contribution is your own 'user' profile! So that it can stop being red and that we can somehow know how valid may your contribution be valid! ;) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 18:51, 10 January 2008 (CET)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:: Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>8c6d34sh90zk61b18hv1h9zlqfr9m32</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22828</id>
      <parentid>22776</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-24T18:22:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2825">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
== To new members ==

Please make that your first contribution is your own 'user' profile! So that it can stop being red and that we can somehow know how valid may your contribution be valid! ;) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 18:51, 10 January 2008 (CET)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:: Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

::: I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>52neh4a1skgp0po8zuunelajgqo14j6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23098</id>
      <parentid>22828</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-31T12:08:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2943">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
== To new members ==

Please make that your first contribution is your own 'user' profile! So that it can stop being red and that we can somehow know how valid may your contribution be valid! ;) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 18:51, 10 January 2008 (CET)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>njxd52fynhac7wul6rl4zay1t0kngse</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23100</id>
      <parentid>23098</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-31T13:25:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robino</username>
        <id>4</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3094">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
== To new members ==

Please make that your first contribution is your own 'user' profile! So that it can stop being red and that we can somehow know how valid may your contribution be valid! ;) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 18:51, 10 January 2008 (CET)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>s8p1qoz8io9hgx2k011p8m56j89podp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23747</id>
      <parentid>23100</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-08-18T10:37:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3505">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
== To new members ==

Please make that your first contribution is your own 'user' profile! So that it can stop being red and that we can somehow know how valid may your contribution be valid! ;) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 18:51, 10 January 2008 (CET)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;</text>
      <sha1>jks1ugnpd200ht61l5oo9bowk934d8z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23750</id>
      <parentid>23747</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-08-18T10:45:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robino</username>
        <id>4</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4113">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
== To new members ==

Please make that your first contribution is your own 'user' profile! So that it can stop being red and that we can somehow know how valid may your contribution be valid! ;) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 18:51, 10 January 2008 (CET)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>dckvlr4ggwe3eflm7sd899gtllenuit</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23752</id>
      <parentid>23750</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-08-18T10:54:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4449">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
== To new members ==

Please make that your first contribution is your own 'user' profile! So that it can stop being red and that we can somehow know how valid may your contribution be valid! ;) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 18:51, 10 January 2008 (CET)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>5uk1cnc5l1kzhu9ekqrw7dup9t67s9r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27629</id>
      <parentid>23752</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-10T21:12:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4814">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
== To new members ==

Please make that your first contribution is your own 'user' profile! So that it can stop being red and that we can somehow know how valid may your contribution be valid! ;) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 18:51, 10 January 2008 (CET)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.</text>
      <sha1>1vf8obgl7ow1wquvl0t4wjayznkwoyc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27630</id>
      <parentid>27629</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-10T21:30:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5379">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
== To new members ==

Please make that your first contribution is your own 'user' profile! So that it can stop being red and that we can somehow know how valid may your contribution be valid! ;) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 18:51, 10 January 2008 (CET)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>3yplpbyeyko7prgxlo8sg64hbway1jj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27631</id>
      <parentid>27630</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-10T22:57:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5578">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
== To new members ==

Please make that your first contribution is your own 'user' profile! So that it can stop being red and that we can somehow know how valid may your contribution be valid! ;) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 18:51, 10 January 2008 (CET)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>gbzk4teonqg6exi8uac7sn0o44d9l8l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27632</id>
      <parentid>27631</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-11T00:00:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5723">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
== To new members ==

Please make that your first contribution is your own 'user' profile! So that it can stop being red and that we can somehow know how valid may your contribution be valid! ;) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 18:51, 10 January 2008 (CET)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>1btzccqotil1d70uji89kylety6w0aa</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>28965</id>
      <parentid>27632</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-09T15:49:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6557">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
== To new members ==

Please make that your first contribution is your own 'user' profile! So that it can stop being red and that we can somehow know how valid may your contribution be valid! ;) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 18:51, 10 January 2008 (CET)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly is in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>fibidupoz3tfsqkyxk6mak43p9z2ycj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>28966</id>
      <parentid>28965</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-09T15:50:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6660">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
== To new members ==

Please make that your first contribution is your own 'user' profile! So that it can stop being red and that we can somehow know how valid may your contribution be valid! ;) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 18:51, 10 January 2008 (CET)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Werchner indicated finance as one of the key motivations for hitchhiking, another one being adventure. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly is in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>gwbj9wenpc2rzqjwwj5rbterptf2uxy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>28967</id>
      <parentid>28966</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-09T15:59:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6680">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
== To new members ==

Please make that your first contribution is your own 'user' profile! So that it can stop being red and that we can somehow know how valid may your contribution be valid! ;) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 18:51, 10 January 2008 (CET)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Werchner indicated finance as one the two key motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure / social sharing. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly is in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>gmokpg2h90lbcogmtryxtcihpksq9p1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>28968</id>
      <parentid>28967</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-09T16:00:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6696">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
== To new members ==

Please make that your first contribution is your own 'user' profile! So that it can stop being red and that we can somehow know how valid may your contribution be valid! ;) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 18:51, 10 January 2008 (CET)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly is in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>ejx3ggwgn0qt0c8vqje0b6puy3rlpiy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>28969</id>
      <parentid>28968</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-09T16:01:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6757">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
== To new members ==

Please make that your first contribution is your own 'user' profile! So that it can stop being red and that we can somehow know how valid may your contribution be valid! ;) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 18:51, 10 January 2008 (CET)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly is in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>9ny04vh6jrn2at5hkuu2ldmta6likuw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>28970</id>
      <parentid>28969</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-09T16:01:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6818">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
== To new members ==

Please make that your first contribution is your own 'user' profile! So that it can stop being red and that we can somehow know how valid may your contribution be valid! ;) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 18:51, 10 January 2008 (CET)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly is in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>d7lon7wr1edx8pfljutnr3yk7qudyxz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>28971</id>
      <parentid>28970</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-09T16:05:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6830">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
== To new members ==

Please make that your first contribution is your own 'user' profile! So that it can stop being red and that we can somehow know how valid may your contribution be valid! ;) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 18:51, 10 January 2008 (CET)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>94o9mdahmzcu3tlv1n8sc5q7sjfvv2b</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>28978</id>
      <parentid>28971</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-09T20:03:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>212.143.159.96</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7009">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
== To new members ==

Please make that your first contribution is your own 'user' profile! So that it can stop being red and that we can somehow know how valid may your contribution be valid! ;) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 18:51, 10 January 2008 (CET)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>je6t8q7o20nib9yg550lodrsflxrxqu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29263</id>
      <parentid>28978</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-16T18:33:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>86.105.181.238</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5863">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
== To new members ==

Please make that your first contribution is your own 'user' profile! So that it can stop being red and that we can somehow know how valid may your contribution be valid! ;) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 18:51, 10 January 2008 (CET)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

FIELD_MESSAGE_racgetlaro

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>n3yncrto9iz54dz0dxfxbl1zvimzdq3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29266</id>
      <parentid>29263</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-16T18:47:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7009">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
== To new members ==

Please make that your first contribution is your own 'user' profile! So that it can stop being red and that we can somehow know how valid may your contribution be valid! ;) [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 18:51, 10 January 2008 (CET)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>je6t8q7o20nib9yg550lodrsflxrxqu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29614</id>
      <parentid>29266</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-25T20:36:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7418">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>58552p0qr2wnfoiupd7nwb551mqqlar</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29619</id>
      <parentid>29614</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-26T10:31:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7571">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>92qi9xozn03f97qw764qg4nb8v80p8k</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29776</id>
      <parentid>29619</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-07T21:19:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7963">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>k07bxedrjxa3wxb639y1qcldxou2yfc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29778</id>
      <parentid>29776</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-07T22:53:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8192">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)
: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>8lvmcb226u4imnh3zml3f1hq4qqth5h</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29845</id>
      <parentid>29778</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-11T01:07:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8504">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>17xzb4lrn386bi9pkyvcfpvkjzt0ddt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29866</id>
      <parentid>29845</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-11T15:20:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8616">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>owbxo89ffk3pb0a63i2b023eee5n53k</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30304</id>
      <parentid>29866</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-19T16:56:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8925">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>blld898gsadjriso0m46po82vwdr97v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30306</id>
      <parentid>30304</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-19T17:00:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9114">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>o9dgs9lu7opnww14dkfuzofauovtazt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30316</id>
      <parentid>30306</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-19T20:13:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9471">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>mouhel9gsd0g7vrjny0tbr1g430h22y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30317</id>
      <parentid>30316</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-19T20:13:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9472">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>j7rn1sx6bq9e92lhkdrc7kjribnas4o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30319</id>
      <parentid>30317</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-20T10:05:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sigurdas</username>
        <id>1658</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9671">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>564ntwme8lgsepri8tbewvj1e9pfi7g</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30354</id>
      <parentid>30319</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-21T10:51:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9873">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>1f3w1id6trosuxdfe4rr0oeifqg3thp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30363</id>
      <parentid>30354</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-21T11:01:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Alex</username>
        <id>89</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10126">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>hcqjqek8oe1npj68ru0s3ke54mhtbm1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30403</id>
      <parentid>30363</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-22T17:23:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10538">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>56uaq3g1a7df1y8wxkz96ij68rpe6pl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30412</id>
      <parentid>30403</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-23T04:23:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Alex</username>
        <id>89</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11126">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>15h5p8v4jo96y2sm6dk5uudcf186k8x</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30432</id>
      <parentid>30412</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-24T14:59:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11360">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Maybe the min-width should be somewhat more. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>iw06u7k5jo5ta30z73mf5xfh0wlnuw9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30435</id>
      <parentid>30432</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-24T15:08:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11492">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>5k6yfq2n70wbckrgxybybmc2b8t2u1a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30453</id>
      <parentid>30435</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-25T00:28:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11654">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>tgafz2kxvunonaoqo7chpgmbzcx1wyl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30482</id>
      <parentid>30453</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-26T17:17:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12499">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>btwnnf38z2eouqfjfxj492a696554em</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30485</id>
      <parentid>30482</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-26T17:35:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12735">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>1zddao3oic7mmasgpj7xqc9nyzvpcej</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31579</id>
      <parentid>30485</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-07T08:15:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Globetrotter tt</username>
        <id>1362</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13018">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>0sfw6tldku381qwq1c9v6le6xlnbjal</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31585</id>
      <parentid>31579</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-07T11:25:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13192">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>a459v8tpi2a09n6losiume3fnffudp7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31728</id>
      <parentid>31585</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-15T02:55:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13407">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png|100px]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)


[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion2.png|300px]]

Hi everyone again! I've put some time to re-think Hitchwiki's logo design. What do you think about results? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 02:55, 15 March 2009 (UTC)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>f0idplqgpnuwkrfyqbj6w5292baq4n9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31729</id>
      <parentid>31728</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-15T02:57:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13453">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png|100px]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)


[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion2.png|300px]]


&lt;small&gt;Click image for bigger view&lt;/small&gt;


Hi everyone again! I've put some time to re-think Hitchwiki's logo design. What do you think about results? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 02:55, 15 March 2009 (UTC)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>op8v9f7zq0fn6sha0vtamnf7ulaq02t</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31732</id>
      <parentid>31729</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-15T13:27:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13451">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png|100px]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)


[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion2.png|300px]]


&lt;small&gt;(Click image to enlarge.)&lt;/small&gt;


Hi everyone again! I've put some time to re-think Hitchwiki's logo design. What do you think about results? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 02:55, 15 March 2009 (UTC)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>j18w6q5wh9utwzf8bxjce90dh3gdwpv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31733</id>
      <parentid>31732</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-15T14:35:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13548">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion1.png|100px]]

This is my suggestion for a new logo - or more like logo-update. Original photo is a classic from [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hitchhiker-Luxemburg-1977.jpg commons.wikipedia], already used at current logo. Comments?  - [[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 04:17, 22 June 2008 (CEST)
:Hmm, lady needs some tweaking on the borders of red line and photo, but i'll fix it later. :-) -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 05:21, 22 June 2008 (CEST)

:Good idea that I would like support and nice new version. However, I would prefer a non-retro logo... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:20, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:I'm fine with anything.  Just move this discussion to a new page, e.g. [[project:Logo update]] and put some variations in there. [[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 20:22, 24 July 2008 (CEST)

: I also like it. But a little less retro would be cool for me, too --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:08, 31 July 2008 (CEST)

: I like the fact that it is a bit brighter and the new coloring, but prefer the original typeset --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 15:25, 31 July 2008 (CEST)


[[Image:Hitchwiki_logo_suggestion2.png|300px]]


&lt;small&gt;(Click image to enlarge.)&lt;/small&gt;


Hi everyone again! I've put some time to re-think Hitchwiki's logo design. What do you think about results? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 02:55, 15 March 2009 (UTC)
:Looks good, but quite a radical change :) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:35, 15 March 2009 (UTC)

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>n2ne7pt6q2f0e274vwzrh2gn8gfdqzv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32834</id>
      <parentid>31733</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-08T10:36:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12075">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)

==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>29q9onqbay5ww57rcutspjuhf1sd3dc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>33735</id>
      <parentid>32834</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-30T05:10:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12471">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>dj3lsempo4nuzv904alwbymsqgsw6oo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>33736</id>
      <parentid>33735</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-30T05:26:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12509">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)



==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>astvy8pqrls1epjled0871iqvlculch</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>33738</id>
      <parentid>33736</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-30T18:40:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12850">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>o1dmqfv82v02722ttb188mkpax2kyez</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36428</id>
      <parentid>33738</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-08-09T12:33:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Grégoire</username>
        <id>1992</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13115">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>p3bycxn0339kw0nhtdpuqz31g16ystl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38098</id>
      <parentid>36428</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-10-18T12:53:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Clint.hotvedt</username>
        <id>1885</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13402">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>cyeblcsoa5bn80g4v3z1z10fn9rxnu0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38905</id>
      <parentid>38098</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-12-12T13:18:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Grégoire</username>
        <id>1992</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13551">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

==RSS stream==

Would it be possible to implement an RSS for the news of the frontpage?--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 13:18, 12 December 2009 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>ara7tiivdbp8vq0g3v9bvfwmdj3aguq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38906</id>
      <parentid>38905</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-12-12T13:18:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Grégoire</username>
        <id>1992</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13550">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

==RSS stream==

Would it be possible to implement a RSS for the news of the frontpage?--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 13:18, 12 December 2009 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>nd1ur2zt5lo4sjleko5f4nrns2gcfpv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38997</id>
      <parentid>38906</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-12-22T19:27:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Grégoire</username>
        <id>1992</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13402">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>cyeblcsoa5bn80g4v3z1z10fn9rxnu0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39593</id>
      <parentid>38997</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-02-03T10:23:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>78.26.187.62</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13470">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

== Hi all ==

I'm newbie here, I hope to get friends at this forum</text>
      <sha1>83mz3y9m8hcle9gk72zw7b1mvjb9e7o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39594</id>
      <parentid>39593</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-02-03T10:24:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Grégoire</username>
        <id>1992</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13402">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>cyeblcsoa5bn80g4v3z1z10fn9rxnu0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39632</id>
      <parentid>39594</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-02-09T12:52:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Jeensg</username>
        <id>1529</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13710">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-)</text>
      <sha1>qp21mqgbic88hwmbpr98hj5x1ci8ssc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39633</id>
      <parentid>39632</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-02-09T12:54:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Jeensg</username>
        <id>1529</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13758">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010</text>
      <sha1>n466bx0cfrs1wmh2d6dpwx87hdskuqs</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39638</id>
      <parentid>39633</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-02-09T23:04:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13858">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>t4s94kppqocgxe0jknhn0pn16xq3c1y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39641</id>
      <parentid>39638</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-02-10T09:22:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>195.241.133.12</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13961">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[Special:Contributions/195.241.133.12|195.241.133.12]] 09:22, 10 February 2010 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>92cfd8f1ge52axxosnh8h522w2pr1fk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39642</id>
      <parentid>39641</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-02-10T09:23:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13932">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>clv15w1dxw5t50nanuy5sgufclr72h2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39643</id>
      <parentid>39642</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-02-10T09:27:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Grégoire</username>
        <id>1992</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14074">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>37jt3odjbgp02bsm05ajx1l99cx2h6a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39872</id>
      <parentid>39643</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-02-27T22:04:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.107.104.99</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14457">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

== Hello! Meet the new user msMaryStrikens. ==

Hello! I really liked your forum, especially this section. I just signed up and immediately decided to introduce myself, if I'm wrong section, ask the moderators to move the topic to the right place, hopefully it will take me well... My name is Mary, me 29 years, humourist and serious woman in one person. I apologize for my English</text>
      <sha1>07bjl4k1cty9gesl44txaxfrrk8yz73</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39937</id>
      <parentid>39872</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-05T05:29:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.46.32.198</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14752">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

== Hello! Meet the new user msMaryStrikens. ==

Hello! I really liked your forum, especially this section. I just signed up and immediately decided to introduce myself, if I'm wrong section, ask the moderators to move the topic to the right place, hopefully it will take me well... My name is Mary, me 29 years, humourist and serious woman in one person. I apologize for my English

== Web hosting question ==

Hi guys,

I know this might be a bit off topic but seeing that a bunch of you own websites, where would the best place be to host.  Someone recommended I use Blue Host&lt;//url&gt; for $6.95 a month which seems like a great deal.  Anyone here on hitchwiki.org using them?</text>
      <sha1>qynwpozfl3o7snte75hwqz3aik5by3u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39938</id>
      <parentid>39937</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-05T10:51:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>78.50.132.148</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14968">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)

== Hello! Meet the new user msMaryStrikens. ==

Hello! I really liked your forum, especially this section. I just signed up and immediately decided to introduce myself, if I'm wrong section, ask the moderators to move the topic to the right place, hopefully it will take me well... My name is Mary, me 29 years, humourist and serious woman in one person. I apologize for my English

== Web hosting question ==

Hi guys,

I know this might be a bit off topic but seeing that a bunch of you own websites, where would the best place be to host.  Someone recommended I use Blue Host&lt;//url&gt; for $6.95 a month which seems like a great deal.  Anyone here on hitchwiki.org using them?</text>
      <sha1>aate6ah3nplgurs5s6pc3hjnwxap2je</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39942</id>
      <parentid>39938</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-05T11:29:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15103">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)

== Hello! Meet the new user msMaryStrikens. ==

Hello! I really liked your forum, especially this section. I just signed up and immediately decided to introduce myself, if I'm wrong section, ask the moderators to move the topic to the right place, hopefully it will take me well... My name is Mary, me 29 years, humourist and serious woman in one person. I apologize for my English

== Web hosting question ==

Hi guys,

I know this might be a bit off topic but seeing that a bunch of you own websites, where would the best place be to host.  Someone recommended I use Blue Host&lt;//url&gt; for $6.95 a month which seems like a great deal.  Anyone here on hitchwiki.org using them?</text>
      <sha1>myb94n7eqc795pwwxq0dr2dw1xhr39m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39952</id>
      <parentid>39942</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-05T15:07:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robino</username>
        <id>4</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14425">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>pvvsfhp859g6g3d47i77ru9covj0f8z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40300</id>
      <parentid>39952</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-15T08:33:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>76.16.224.118</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14557">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)

== Whats up everyone ==

Howdy all, I just registered on this fantastic community forum and wished to say hello! Have a great day!</text>
      <sha1>1un0dq0sbazcifyx4ltr44irv9h27lc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40301</id>
      <parentid>40300</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-15T08:57:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14425">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>pvvsfhp859g6g3d47i77ru9covj0f8z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40618</id>
      <parentid>40301</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-22T21:06:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>86.206.192.224</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14516">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>57ml72h8o6ycxh1kba2i5w1dln31f71</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40957</id>
      <parentid>40618</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-02T08:46:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>78.26.179.5</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14688">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

== Hello from a newbie ==

hi all

I figured it would be a good idea to introduce myself to everyone!

Can't wait to get to know you all better!

-Marshall

Thanks again!</text>
      <sha1>ns5t3wnf0zjxp4wxj3qglg86jj80kvh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40958</id>
      <parentid>40957</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-02T09:22:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>212.235.107.65</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14938">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

== Hello from a newbie ==

hi all

I figured it would be a good idea to introduce myself to everyone!

Can't wait to get to know you all better!

-Marshall

Thanks again!

== what's up everyone, just registered... introducing ==

Hi all,

it seems pretty cool here

hopefully i can participate in some lively discussions here!

talk to you all soon!

[IMG - http://www.trueimagehost.com/1/m/47xFMd46ie7B/blank.gif[/IMG -</text>
      <sha1>a6re3ewzig5i6nwuclfhsq4p53ulvwi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40959</id>
      <parentid>40958</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-02T09:37:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14688">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

== Hello from a newbie ==

hi all

I figured it would be a good idea to introduce myself to everyone!

Can't wait to get to know you all better!

-Marshall

Thanks again!</text>
      <sha1>ns5t3wnf0zjxp4wxj3qglg86jj80kvh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41217</id>
      <parentid>40959</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-10T02:24:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>195.241.30.252</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14826">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[Special:Contributions/195.241.30.252|195.241.30.252]] 02:24, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

== Hello from a newbie ==

hi all

I figured it would be a good idea to introduce myself to everyone!

Can't wait to get to know you all better!

-Marshall

Thanks again!</text>
      <sha1>hof79e6ah3s3fvz9vu18vleh4677ozs</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41218</id>
      <parentid>41217</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-10T02:31:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Xo</username>
        <id>1470</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14785">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

== Hello from a newbie ==

hi all

I figured it would be a good idea to introduce myself to everyone!

Can't wait to get to know you all better!

-Marshall

Thanks again!</text>
      <sha1>s54ch7ir6rfa1xzn87h0ahwt82iz7ou</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41248</id>
      <parentid>41218</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-12T16:11:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>202.108.50.70</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14944">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

== Hello from a newbie ==

hi all

I figured it would be a good idea to introduce myself to everyone!

Can't wait to get to know you all better!

-Marshall

Thanks again!

== hi everybody ==

hello 


great forum lots of lovely people just what i need


hopefully this is just what im looking for looks like i have a lot to read.</text>
      <sha1>6kmuhm20y9geiu4ide3qex0xr8n1mnn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41251</id>
      <parentid>41248</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-12T19:07:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>N0id</username>
        <id>2043</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14785">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

== Hello from a newbie ==

hi all

I figured it would be a good idea to introduce myself to everyone!

Can't wait to get to know you all better!

-Marshall

Thanks again!</text>
      <sha1>s54ch7ir6rfa1xzn87h0ahwt82iz7ou</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41532</id>
      <parentid>41251</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-20T15:56:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>117.40.196.156</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15106">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

== Hello from a newbie ==

hi all

I figured it would be a good idea to introduce myself to everyone!

Can't wait to get to know you all better!

-Marshall

Thanks again!

== LeBron James shoes ==

Sale the latest nike air jordans, nike dunks,Kobe Shoes,lebron james shoes,MBT shoes,Moncler jacket, nike sneakers and jordan sneakers. We supply top quality, good service, reasonable price, fast and safe shipping.
&lt;http&gt;//www.nbashoesshop.com/Nike--LeBron-James-Shoes-c220 LeBron James shoes]</text>
      <sha1>5aqbmg6b5wvyioqcozmgs0v09b9ytsw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41533</id>
      <parentid>41532</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-20T16:44:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14785">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

== Hello from a newbie ==

hi all

I figured it would be a good idea to introduce myself to everyone!

Can't wait to get to know you all better!

-Marshall

Thanks again!</text>
      <sha1>s54ch7ir6rfa1xzn87h0ahwt82iz7ou</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41551</id>
      <parentid>41533</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-21T07:25:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>200.50.229.10</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15591">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

== Hello from a newbie ==

hi all

I figured it would be a good idea to introduce myself to everyone!

Can't wait to get to know you all better!

-Marshall

Thanks again!

== New guy here! ==

Long time lurker, thought I would say hello! I really dont post much but thanks for the good times I have here. Love this place..

	  When I was hurt in that truck accident my life would be changed eternally.  Unfortunately that driver had no car insurance and I was going to be hurting for ever.

This was not time for me to start and guess what to do. I had to find a good accident lawyer to help me get what I needed. After all, my family was counting on me.

How bad was it? I has bedridden for 4 months, I had to have constant care and my clinic bills went through the roof!

Thank goodness, I found a good referral site to help me.

I will post more later this period to tell you more about what I have been going through.

If you need an personal injury lawyer try the guys at</text>
      <sha1>iir94kf2tvuhl7sww4dwvc0t8ycmfwx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41553</id>
      <parentid>41551</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-21T07:47:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14785">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

== Hello from a newbie ==

hi all

I figured it would be a good idea to introduce myself to everyone!

Can't wait to get to know you all better!

-Marshall

Thanks again!</text>
      <sha1>s54ch7ir6rfa1xzn87h0ahwt82iz7ou</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41554</id>
      <parentid>41553</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-21T08:55:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14785">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

== Hello from a newbie ==

hi all

I figured it would be a good idea to introduce myself to everyone!

Can't wait to get to know you all better!

-Marshall

Thanks again!</text>
      <sha1>s54ch7ir6rfa1xzn87h0ahwt82iz7ou</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41555</id>
      <parentid>41554</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-21T08:55:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14613">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>8ru7il0smbiaj9wq5b34w385dsu70nz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>42159</id>
      <parentid>41555</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-05-31T17:35:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15362">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

==New colors, logo and such==
[[Image:Hitchwiki front proposal 2010 a.png|thumb|Frontpage proposal 1, by [[User:Mikael|Mikael]]|400px]]

Hello! We've been building [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org a new hitchwiki maps] and some days ago I designed [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org/raw/master/_Documents/maps_gui.png a new GUI for it]. I got an idea to bring that logo and colors also to the Hitchwiki and so far it looks like this. What do you think? If you don't like colors, at least we could use this structure? 

Hand in logo is from hitchgathering.org -logo, since it was CC-by-SA. :-) Is that okay? I also put randomroads and hitchgathering -links to the main menu.

-[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 31 May 2010 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>mn5trfby359csfnkfkj4xwwpdfa95k2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>42160</id>
      <parentid>42159</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-05-31T17:35:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15405">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

==New colors, logo and such==
[[Image:Hitchwiki front proposal 2010 a.png|thumb|Frontpage proposal 1, by [[User:Mikael|Mikael]]|400px]]

Hello! We've been building [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org a new hitchwiki maps] and some days ago I designed [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org/raw/master/_Documents/maps_gui.png a new GUI for it]. I got an idea to bring that logo and colors also to the Hitchwiki and so far it looks like this. What do you think? If you don't like colors, at least we could use this structure? 

Hand in logo is from hitchgathering.org -logo, since it was CC-by-SA. :-) Is that okay? I also put randomroads and hitchgathering -links to the main menu.

That square light box is a hovered -link.

-[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 31 May 2010 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>2frbne3tdwzfq3k6ag6llxw8shiizqj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>42161</id>
      <parentid>42160</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-05-31T17:36:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15404">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

==New colors, logo and such==
[[Image:Hitchwiki front proposal 2010 a.png|thumb|Frontpage proposal 1, by [[User:Mikael|Mikael]]|400px]]

Hello! We've been building [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org a new hitchwiki maps] and some days ago I designed [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org/raw/master/_Documents/maps_gui.png a new GUI for it]. I got an idea to bring that logo and colors also to the Hitchwiki and so far it looks like this. What do you think? If you don't like colors, at least we could use this structure? 

Hand in logo is from hitchgathering.org -logo, since it was CC-by-SA. :-) Is that okay? I also put randomroads and hitchgathering -links to the main menu.

That square light box is a hovered link.

-[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 31 May 2010 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>mxvrwolqhe4oi5ivwsu36khtxt5qtzs</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>42164</id>
      <parentid>42161</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-05-31T20:47:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15753">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

==New colors, logo and such==
[[Image:Hitchwiki front proposal 2010 a.png|thumb|Frontpage proposal 1, by [[User:Mikael|Mikael]]|400px]]

Hello! We've been building [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org a new hitchwiki maps] and some days ago I designed [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org/raw/master/_Documents/maps_gui.png a new GUI for it]. I got an idea to bring that logo and colors also to the Hitchwiki and so far it looks like this. What do you think? If you don't like colors, at least we could use this structure? 

Hand in logo is from hitchgathering.org -logo, since it was CC-by-SA. :-) Is that okay? I also put randomroads and hitchgathering -links to the main menu.

That square light box is a hovered link.

-[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

:Where is the "Like it" Button? ;) Looks great, maybe only the color of the article count could be a bit darker, as here it looks pretty close to the background color. Or it's just my eyes that are quite bad :P The logo is cool, it's simple and says it all. Lovei t. Anyway, go for it, Mikael! --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 20:47, 31 May 2010 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>qwxq120tnnzs44p2elt6vg5nh8eupc9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44278</id>
      <parentid>42164</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-08-23T13:28:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16271">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

==New colors, logo and such==
[[Image:Hitchwiki front proposal 2010 a.png|thumb|Frontpage proposal 1, by [[User:Mikael|Mikael]]|400px]]

Hello! We've been building [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org a new hitchwiki maps] and some days ago I designed [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org/raw/master/_Documents/maps_gui.png a new GUI for it]. I got an idea to bring that logo and colors also to the Hitchwiki and so far it looks like this. What do you think? If you don't like colors, at least we could use this structure? 

Hand in logo is from hitchgathering.org -logo, since it was CC-by-SA. :-) Is that okay? I also put randomroads and hitchgathering -links to the main menu.

That square light box is a hovered link.

-[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

:Where is the "Like it" Button? ;) Looks great, maybe only the color of the article count could be a bit darker, as here it looks pretty close to the background color. Or it's just my eyes that are quite bad :P The logo is cool, it's simple and says it all. Lovei t. Anyway, go for it, Mikael! --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 20:47, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

== Updated PNGs ==

I've updated a whole bunch of PNGs with versions that were generated directly from the SVG from Wikipedia (with the GIMP). Height is around 400 pixels (or less) to keep the PNGs from adding dithered colors. Resulting PNGs were optimized with [http://advsys.net/ken/utils.htm#pngout PNGOUT] 

So far I've done all flags for the countries I have visited. Flags for the additional nationalities of drivers that gave me rides will follow (in a future) [[User:Prino|Prino]] 13:28, 23 August 2010 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>kltn3g6yk058aezqq0qo1cfqogqclyz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44286</id>
      <parentid>44278</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-08-23T13:56:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16443">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

==New colors, logo and such==
[[Image:Hitchwiki front proposal 2010 a.png|thumb|Frontpage proposal 1, by [[User:Mikael|Mikael]]|400px]]

Hello! We've been building [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org a new hitchwiki maps] and some days ago I designed [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org/raw/master/_Documents/maps_gui.png a new GUI for it]. I got an idea to bring that logo and colors also to the Hitchwiki and so far it looks like this. What do you think? If you don't like colors, at least we could use this structure? 

Hand in logo is from hitchgathering.org -logo, since it was CC-by-SA. :-) Is that okay? I also put randomroads and hitchgathering -links to the main menu.

That square light box is a hovered link.

-[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

:Where is the "Like it" Button? ;) Looks great, maybe only the color of the article count could be a bit darker, as here it looks pretty close to the background color. Or it's just my eyes that are quite bad :P The logo is cool, it's simple and says it all. Lovei t. Anyway, go for it, Mikael! --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 20:47, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

== Updated PNGs ==

I've updated a whole bunch of PNGs with versions that were generated directly from the SVG from Wikipedia (with the GIMP). Height is around 400 pixels (or less) to keep the PNGs from adding dithered colors. Resulting PNGs were optimized with [http://advsys.net/ken/utils.htm#pngout PNGOUT] 

So far I've done all flags for the countries I have visited. Flags for the additional nationalities of drivers that gave me rides will follow (in a future) [[User:Prino|Prino]] 13:28, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
: By the way, it should be possible to upload SVGs here. That way we could completely avoid any conversion problems. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:56, 23 August 2010 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>s7a7k5lqzorskvauhqaqnnr3jf37w8m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44287</id>
      <parentid>44286</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-08-23T13:58:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16571">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

==New colors, logo and such==
[[Image:Hitchwiki front proposal 2010 a.png|thumb|Frontpage proposal 1, by [[User:Mikael|Mikael]]|400px]]

Hello! We've been building [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org a new hitchwiki maps] and some days ago I designed [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org/raw/master/_Documents/maps_gui.png a new GUI for it]. I got an idea to bring that logo and colors also to the Hitchwiki and so far it looks like this. What do you think? If you don't like colors, at least we could use this structure? 

Hand in logo is from hitchgathering.org -logo, since it was CC-by-SA. :-) Is that okay? I also put randomroads and hitchgathering -links to the main menu.

That square light box is a hovered link.

-[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

:Where is the "Like it" Button? ;) Looks great, maybe only the color of the article count could be a bit darker, as here it looks pretty close to the background color. Or it's just my eyes that are quite bad :P The logo is cool, it's simple and says it all. Lovei t. Anyway, go for it, Mikael! --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 20:47, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
:: I love it :) If you want, just install it to [[Hitchwiki:Start Page]] --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:58, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Updated PNGs ==

I've updated a whole bunch of PNGs with versions that were generated directly from the SVG from Wikipedia (with the GIMP). Height is around 400 pixels (or less) to keep the PNGs from adding dithered colors. Resulting PNGs were optimized with [http://advsys.net/ken/utils.htm#pngout PNGOUT] 

So far I've done all flags for the countries I have visited. Flags for the additional nationalities of drivers that gave me rides will follow (in a future) [[User:Prino|Prino]] 13:28, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
: By the way, it should be possible to upload SVGs here. That way we could completely avoid any conversion problems. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:56, 23 August 2010 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>khwgwsrd1y9mhzv40zifdr42uva91vs</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44291</id>
      <parentid>44287</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-08-23T14:15:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16745">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

==New colors, logo and such==
[[Image:Hitchwiki front proposal 2010 a.png|thumb|Frontpage proposal 1, by [[User:Mikael|Mikael]]|400px]]

Hello! We've been building [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org a new hitchwiki maps] and some days ago I designed [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org/raw/master/_Documents/maps_gui.png a new GUI for it]. I got an idea to bring that logo and colors also to the Hitchwiki and so far it looks like this. What do you think? If you don't like colors, at least we could use this structure? 

Hand in logo is from hitchgathering.org -logo, since it was CC-by-SA. :-) Is that okay? I also put randomroads and hitchgathering -links to the main menu.

That square light box is a hovered link.

-[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

:Where is the "Like it" Button? ;) Looks great, maybe only the color of the article count could be a bit darker, as here it looks pretty close to the background color. Or it's just my eyes that are quite bad :P The logo is cool, it's simple and says it all. Lovei t. Anyway, go for it, Mikael! --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 20:47, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
:: I love it :) If you want, just install it to [[Hitchwiki:Start Page]] --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:58, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Updated PNGs ==

I've updated a whole bunch of PNGs with versions that were generated directly from the SVG from Wikipedia (with the GIMP). Height is around 400 pixels (or less) to keep the PNGs from adding dithered colors. Resulting PNGs were optimized with [http://advsys.net/ken/utils.htm#pngout PNGOUT] 

So far I've done all flags for the countries I have visited. Flags for the additional nationalities of drivers that gave me rides will follow (in a future) [[User:Prino|Prino]] 13:28, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
: By the way, it should be possible to upload SVGs here. That way we could completely avoid any conversion problems. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:56, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
: Also, I wonder what the reason is, to re-upload images in the same resolution? They look completely the same for me. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:15, 23 August 2010 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>46izlr1ll0ra9gdskq8i5hnw2v353ka</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44307</id>
      <parentid>44291</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-08-23T19:23:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17365">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

==New colors, logo and such==
[[Image:Hitchwiki front proposal 2010 a.png|thumb|Frontpage proposal 1, by [[User:Mikael|Mikael]]|400px]]

Hello! We've been building [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org a new hitchwiki maps] and some days ago I designed [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org/raw/master/_Documents/maps_gui.png a new GUI for it]. I got an idea to bring that logo and colors also to the Hitchwiki and so far it looks like this. What do you think? If you don't like colors, at least we could use this structure? 

Hand in logo is from hitchgathering.org -logo, since it was CC-by-SA. :-) Is that okay? I also put randomroads and hitchgathering -links to the main menu.

That square light box is a hovered link.

-[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

:Where is the "Like it" Button? ;) Looks great, maybe only the color of the article count could be a bit darker, as here it looks pretty close to the background color. Or it's just my eyes that are quite bad :P The logo is cool, it's simple and says it all. Lovei t. Anyway, go for it, Mikael! --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 20:47, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
:: I love it :) If you want, just install it to [[Hitchwiki:Start Page]] --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:58, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Updated PNGs ==

I've updated a whole bunch of PNGs with versions that were generated directly from the SVG from Wikipedia (with the GIMP). Height is around 400 pixels (or less) to keep the PNGs from adding dithered colors. Resulting PNGs were optimized with [http://advsys.net/ken/utils.htm#pngout PNGOUT] 

So far I've done all flags for the countries I have visited. Flags for the additional nationalities of drivers that gave me rides will follow (in a future) [[User:Prino|Prino]] 13:28, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
: By the way, it should be possible to upload SVGs here. That way we could completely avoid any conversion problems. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:56, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The File upload page does not seem to allow .SVG, but I haven't tried it. However, you must be aware that older browsers do not support .SVG files and I'm not sure if one of the newer (aka the piece of junk from M$) ones does. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:23, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

: Also, I wonder what the reason is, to re-upload images in the same resolution? They look completely the same for me. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:15, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The PNGs I uploaded are exactly the same, but PNGOUT is capable of compressing them significantly better in many cases, which should save some bandwidth... Look at some of the bigger files I replaced in the changelog! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:23, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

[[File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg|100px|thumb|left|This a .SVG file]]</text>
      <sha1>eed37w3t5u0ejfdwq44rm7fomoxusqx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44308</id>
      <parentid>44307</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-08-23T19:46:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="18192">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

==New colors, logo and such==
[[Image:Hitchwiki front proposal 2010 a.png|thumb|Frontpage proposal 1, by [[User:Mikael|Mikael]]|400px]]

Hello! We've been building [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org a new hitchwiki maps] and some days ago I designed [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org/raw/master/_Documents/maps_gui.png a new GUI for it]. I got an idea to bring that logo and colors also to the Hitchwiki and so far it looks like this. What do you think? If you don't like colors, at least we could use this structure? 

Hand in logo is from hitchgathering.org -logo, since it was CC-by-SA. :-) Is that okay? I also put randomroads and hitchgathering -links to the main menu.

That square light box is a hovered link.

-[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

:Where is the "Like it" Button? ;) Looks great, maybe only the color of the article count could be a bit darker, as here it looks pretty close to the background color. Or it's just my eyes that are quite bad :P The logo is cool, it's simple and says it all. Lovei t. Anyway, go for it, Mikael! --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 20:47, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
:: I love it :) If you want, just install it to [[Hitchwiki:Start Page]] --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:58, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Updated PNGs ==

I've updated a whole bunch of PNGs with versions that were generated directly from the SVG from Wikipedia (with the GIMP). Height is around 400 pixels (or less) to keep the PNGs from adding dithered colors. Resulting PNGs were optimized with [http://advsys.net/ken/utils.htm#pngout PNGOUT] 

So far I've done all flags for the countries I have visited. Flags for the additional nationalities of drivers that gave me rides will follow (in a future) [[User:Prino|Prino]] 13:28, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
: By the way, it should be possible to upload SVGs here. That way we could completely avoid any conversion problems. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:56, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The File upload page does not seem to allow .SVG, but I haven't tried it. However, you must be aware that older browsers do not support .SVG files and I'm not sure if one of the newer (aka the piece of junk from M$) ones does. Also, if I try to upload '''Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg''' I get the following message:

"# A file with this name exists already, please check File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg if you are not sure if you want to change it."

Clicking on the link will go to a page that tells me

"This file is from a shared repository and may be used by other projects. The description on its file description page there is shown below"

And it doesn't show up in [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Special:ListFiles?limit=50&amp;ilsearch=Netherlands&amp;title=Special%3AListFiles Special:ListFiles], so how does the link to [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg Wikimedia Commons] work? Another problem is of course the case-sensitivity, if I try to upload "Flag_of_'''T'''he_Netherlands.svg", the system will happily let me do so. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:46, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

: Also, I wonder what the reason is, to re-upload images in the same resolution? They look completely the same for me. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:15, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The PNGs I uploaded are exactly the same, but PNGOUT is capable of compressing them significantly better in many cases, which should save some bandwidth... Look at some of the bigger files I replaced in the changelog! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:23, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

[[File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg|150px|thumb|left|This a .SVG file]]</text>
      <sha1>aetv24u7aaavbkopdhayaft5lhd7hws</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44311</id>
      <parentid>44308</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-08-23T21:18:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19068">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

==New colors, logo and such==
[[Image:Hitchwiki front proposal 2010 a.png|thumb|Frontpage proposal 1, by [[User:Mikael|Mikael]]|400px]]

Hello! We've been building [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org a new hitchwiki maps] and some days ago I designed [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org/raw/master/_Documents/maps_gui.png a new GUI for it]. I got an idea to bring that logo and colors also to the Hitchwiki and so far it looks like this. What do you think? If you don't like colors, at least we could use this structure? 

Hand in logo is from hitchgathering.org -logo, since it was CC-by-SA. :-) Is that okay? I also put randomroads and hitchgathering -links to the main menu.

That square light box is a hovered link.

-[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

:Where is the "Like it" Button? ;) Looks great, maybe only the color of the article count could be a bit darker, as here it looks pretty close to the background color. Or it's just my eyes that are quite bad :P The logo is cool, it's simple and says it all. Lovei t. Anyway, go for it, Mikael! --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 20:47, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
:: I love it :) If you want, just install it to [[Hitchwiki:Start Page]] --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:58, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Updated PNGs ==

I've updated a whole bunch of PNGs with versions that were generated directly from the SVG from Wikipedia (with the GIMP). Height is around 400 pixels (or less) to keep the PNGs from adding dithered colors. Resulting PNGs were optimized with [http://advsys.net/ken/utils.htm#pngout PNGOUT] 

So far I've done all flags for the countries I have visited. Flags for the additional nationalities of drivers that gave me rides will follow (in a future) [[User:Prino|Prino]] 13:28, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
: By the way, it should be possible to upload SVGs here. That way we could completely avoid any conversion problems. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:56, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The File upload page does not seem to allow .SVG, but I haven't tried it. However, you must be aware that older browsers do not support .SVG files and I'm not sure if one of the newer (aka the piece of junk from M$) ones does. Also, if I try to upload '''Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg''' I get the following message:

"# A file with this name exists already, please check File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg if you are not sure if you want to change it."

Clicking on the link will go to a page that tells me

"This file is from a shared repository and may be used by other projects. The description on its file description page there is shown below"

And it doesn't show up in [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Special:ListFiles?limit=50&amp;ilsearch=Netherlands&amp;title=Special%3AListFiles Special:ListFiles], so how does the link to [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg Wikimedia Commons] work? Another problem is of course the case-sensitivity, if I try to upload "Flag_of_'''T'''he_Netherlands.svg", the system will happily let me do so. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:46, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

: Also, I wonder what the reason is, to re-upload images in the same resolution? They look completely the same for me. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:15, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The PNGs I uploaded are exactly the same, but PNGOUT is capable of compressing them significantly better in many cases, which should save some bandwidth... Look at some of the bigger files I replaced in the changelog! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:23, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

[[File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg|150px|thumb|left|This a .SVG file]]

: Hmm, ok. First of all: Hitchwiki is linked to wikimedia commons. That means, you can just use any file uploaded to wikimedia commons here. And that is also the reason for your error message: If you upload a file, that is also uploaded to wikimedia commons, you would replace it locally. This is fine, you can do that. It doesn't make much sense to upload the same file again, though.
: It doesn't really matter wether a browser supports svg. The wiki renders them to png pr jpg anyway. But it can render them in a much better quality, no matter which size they will have. So, in general, SVG is always better than PNG or JPG, but not always possible.
: I think bandwith is not so much of an issue nowadays. All modern browsers support on-the-fly-compression anyway, so it will probably not make any difference at all. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:18, 23 August 2010 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>j0ko7snern7z02t4yjlngzr7cn4pi5o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>60541</id>
      <parentid>44311</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-04-13T06:16:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>SpamBucket</username>
        <id>24368</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20169">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 
DEFINITION [http://www.thomasuksale.com/ thomas sabo] OF CRAZINESS "Crazy" stands  for the human spirit of transcending oneself. [http://www.thomasuksale.com/ thomas sabo charms] It stands for the single-minded [http://www.thomasuksale.com/ thomas sabo uk] pursuit of dreams. It stands for the total devotion [http://www.thomasuksale.com/ thomas sabo charms uk] to your work. It stands for the passion of commitment to reach the goal. Once you have this craziness, you can achieve anything you want. Let alone learning English!
Their extraordinary sensitivity to materials [http://www.thomasuksale.com/ thomas sabo uk sale] , on the details of the love and fashion brand sixth sense [http://www.thomasuksale.com/ thomas sabo online shop] , THOMAS SABO, showing a unique style. Love life, full of vitality [http://www.thomasuksale.com/ thomas sabo charms sale] , so emotional and passion of the product [http://www.thomasuksale.com/ thomas sabo stockists]  characteristics for brands to establish a clear route. They are not only the creation of a new style, and succeeded in establishing a new market.
Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

==New colors, logo and such==
[[Image:Hitchwiki front proposal 2010 a.png|thumb|Frontpage proposal 1, by [[User:Mikael|Mikael]]|400px]]

Hello! We've been building [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org a new hitchwiki maps] and some days ago I designed [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org/raw/master/_Documents/maps_gui.png a new GUI for it]. I got an idea to bring that logo and colors also to the Hitchwiki and so far it looks like this. What do you think? If you don't like colors, at least we could use this structure? 

Hand in logo is from hitchgathering.org -logo, since it was CC-by-SA. :-) Is that okay? I also put randomroads and hitchgathering -links to the main menu.

That square light box is a hovered link.

-[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

:Where is the "Like it" Button? ;) Looks great, maybe only the color of the article count could be a bit darker, as here it looks pretty close to the background color. Or it's just my eyes that are quite bad :P The logo is cool, it's simple and says it all. Lovei t. Anyway, go for it, Mikael! --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 20:47, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
:: I love it :) If you want, just install it to [[Hitchwiki:Start Page]] --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:58, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Updated PNGs ==

I've updated a whole bunch of PNGs with versions that were generated directly from the SVG from Wikipedia (with the GIMP). Height is around 400 pixels (or less) to keep the PNGs from adding dithered colors. Resulting PNGs were optimized with [http://advsys.net/ken/utils.htm#pngout PNGOUT] 

So far I've done all flags for the countries I have visited. Flags for the additional nationalities of drivers that gave me rides will follow (in a future) [[User:Prino|Prino]] 13:28, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
: By the way, it should be possible to upload SVGs here. That way we could completely avoid any conversion problems. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:56, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The File upload page does not seem to allow .SVG, but I haven't tried it. However, you must be aware that older browsers do not support .SVG files and I'm not sure if one of the newer (aka the piece of junk from M$) ones does. Also, if I try to upload '''Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg''' I get the following message:

"# A file with this name exists already, please check File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg if you are not sure if you want to change it."

Clicking on the link will go to a page that tells me

"This file is from a shared repository and may be used by other projects. The description on its file description page there is shown below"

And it doesn't show up in [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Special:ListFiles?limit=50&amp;ilsearch=Netherlands&amp;title=Special%3AListFiles Special:ListFiles], so how does the link to [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg Wikimedia Commons] work? Another problem is of course the case-sensitivity, if I try to upload "Flag_of_'''T'''he_Netherlands.svg", the system will happily let me do so. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:46, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

: Also, I wonder what the reason is, to re-upload images in the same resolution? They look completely the same for me. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:15, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The PNGs I uploaded are exactly the same, but PNGOUT is capable of compressing them significantly better in many cases, which should save some bandwidth... Look at some of the bigger files I replaced in the changelog! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:23, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

[[File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg|150px|thumb|left|This a .SVG file]]

: Hmm, ok. First of all: Hitchwiki is linked to wikimedia commons. That means, you can just use any file uploaded to wikimedia commons here. And that is also the reason for your error message: If you upload a file, that is also uploaded to wikimedia commons, you would replace it locally. This is fine, you can do that. It doesn't make much sense to upload the same file again, though.
: It doesn't really matter wether a browser supports svg. The wiki renders them to png pr jpg anyway. But it can render them in a much better quality, no matter which size they will have. So, in general, SVG is always better than PNG or JPG, but not always possible.
: I think bandwith is not so much of an issue nowadays. All modern browsers support on-the-fly-compression anyway, so it will probably not make any difference at all. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:18, 23 August 2010 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>898urza5zws3xqfub86vxs47pzvyhmw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>60543</id>
      <parentid>60541</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-04-13T07:59:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19068">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

==New colors, logo and such==
[[Image:Hitchwiki front proposal 2010 a.png|thumb|Frontpage proposal 1, by [[User:Mikael|Mikael]]|400px]]

Hello! We've been building [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org a new hitchwiki maps] and some days ago I designed [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org/raw/master/_Documents/maps_gui.png a new GUI for it]. I got an idea to bring that logo and colors also to the Hitchwiki and so far it looks like this. What do you think? If you don't like colors, at least we could use this structure? 

Hand in logo is from hitchgathering.org -logo, since it was CC-by-SA. :-) Is that okay? I also put randomroads and hitchgathering -links to the main menu.

That square light box is a hovered link.

-[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

:Where is the "Like it" Button? ;) Looks great, maybe only the color of the article count could be a bit darker, as here it looks pretty close to the background color. Or it's just my eyes that are quite bad :P The logo is cool, it's simple and says it all. Lovei t. Anyway, go for it, Mikael! --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 20:47, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
:: I love it :) If you want, just install it to [[Hitchwiki:Start Page]] --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:58, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Updated PNGs ==

I've updated a whole bunch of PNGs with versions that were generated directly from the SVG from Wikipedia (with the GIMP). Height is around 400 pixels (or less) to keep the PNGs from adding dithered colors. Resulting PNGs were optimized with [http://advsys.net/ken/utils.htm#pngout PNGOUT] 

So far I've done all flags for the countries I have visited. Flags for the additional nationalities of drivers that gave me rides will follow (in a future) [[User:Prino|Prino]] 13:28, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
: By the way, it should be possible to upload SVGs here. That way we could completely avoid any conversion problems. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:56, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The File upload page does not seem to allow .SVG, but I haven't tried it. However, you must be aware that older browsers do not support .SVG files and I'm not sure if one of the newer (aka the piece of junk from M$) ones does. Also, if I try to upload '''Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg''' I get the following message:

"# A file with this name exists already, please check File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg if you are not sure if you want to change it."

Clicking on the link will go to a page that tells me

"This file is from a shared repository and may be used by other projects. The description on its file description page there is shown below"

And it doesn't show up in [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Special:ListFiles?limit=50&amp;ilsearch=Netherlands&amp;title=Special%3AListFiles Special:ListFiles], so how does the link to [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg Wikimedia Commons] work? Another problem is of course the case-sensitivity, if I try to upload "Flag_of_'''T'''he_Netherlands.svg", the system will happily let me do so. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:46, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

: Also, I wonder what the reason is, to re-upload images in the same resolution? They look completely the same for me. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:15, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The PNGs I uploaded are exactly the same, but PNGOUT is capable of compressing them significantly better in many cases, which should save some bandwidth... Look at some of the bigger files I replaced in the changelog! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:23, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

[[File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg|150px|thumb|left|This a .SVG file]]

: Hmm, ok. First of all: Hitchwiki is linked to wikimedia commons. That means, you can just use any file uploaded to wikimedia commons here. And that is also the reason for your error message: If you upload a file, that is also uploaded to wikimedia commons, you would replace it locally. This is fine, you can do that. It doesn't make much sense to upload the same file again, though.
: It doesn't really matter wether a browser supports svg. The wiki renders them to png pr jpg anyway. But it can render them in a much better quality, no matter which size they will have. So, in general, SVG is always better than PNG or JPG, but not always possible.
: I think bandwith is not so much of an issue nowadays. All modern browsers support on-the-fly-compression anyway, so it will probably not make any difference at all. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:18, 23 August 2010 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>j0ko7snern7z02t4yjlngzr7cn4pi5o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>64821</id>
      <parentid>60543</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-10-01T18:52:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19347">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

==New colors, logo and such==
[[Image:Hitchwiki front proposal 2010 a.png|thumb|Frontpage proposal 1, by [[User:Mikael|Mikael]]|400px]]

Hello! We've been building [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org a new hitchwiki maps] and some days ago I designed [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org/raw/master/_Documents/maps_gui.png a new GUI for it]. I got an idea to bring that logo and colors also to the Hitchwiki and so far it looks like this. What do you think? If you don't like colors, at least we could use this structure? 

Hand in logo is from hitchgathering.org -logo, since it was CC-by-SA. :-) Is that okay? I also put randomroads and hitchgathering -links to the main menu.

That square light box is a hovered link.

-[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

:Where is the "Like it" Button? ;) Looks great, maybe only the color of the article count could be a bit darker, as here it looks pretty close to the background color. Or it's just my eyes that are quite bad :P The logo is cool, it's simple and says it all. Lovei t. Anyway, go for it, Mikael! --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 20:47, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
:: I love it :) If you want, just install it to [[Hitchwiki:Start Page]] --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:58, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Updated PNGs ==

I've updated a whole bunch of PNGs with versions that were generated directly from the SVG from Wikipedia (with the GIMP). Height is around 400 pixels (or less) to keep the PNGs from adding dithered colors. Resulting PNGs were optimized with [http://advsys.net/ken/utils.htm#pngout PNGOUT] 

So far I've done all flags for the countries I have visited. Flags for the additional nationalities of drivers that gave me rides will follow (in a future) [[User:Prino|Prino]] 13:28, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
: By the way, it should be possible to upload SVGs here. That way we could completely avoid any conversion problems. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:56, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The File upload page does not seem to allow .SVG, but I haven't tried it. However, you must be aware that older browsers do not support .SVG files and I'm not sure if one of the newer (aka the piece of junk from M$) ones does. Also, if I try to upload '''Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg''' I get the following message:

"# A file with this name exists already, please check File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg if you are not sure if you want to change it."

Clicking on the link will go to a page that tells me

"This file is from a shared repository and may be used by other projects. The description on its file description page there is shown below"

And it doesn't show up in [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Special:ListFiles?limit=50&amp;ilsearch=Netherlands&amp;title=Special%3AListFiles Special:ListFiles], so how does the link to [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg Wikimedia Commons] work? Another problem is of course the case-sensitivity, if I try to upload "Flag_of_'''T'''he_Netherlands.svg", the system will happily let me do so. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:46, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

: Also, I wonder what the reason is, to re-upload images in the same resolution? They look completely the same for me. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:15, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The PNGs I uploaded are exactly the same, but PNGOUT is capable of compressing them significantly better in many cases, which should save some bandwidth... Look at some of the bigger files I replaced in the changelog! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:23, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

[[File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg|150px|thumb|left|This a .SVG file]]

: Hmm, ok. First of all: Hitchwiki is linked to wikimedia commons. That means, you can just use any file uploaded to wikimedia commons here. And that is also the reason for your error message: If you upload a file, that is also uploaded to wikimedia commons, you would replace it locally. This is fine, you can do that. It doesn't make much sense to upload the same file again, though.
: It doesn't really matter wether a browser supports svg. The wiki renders them to png pr jpg anyway. But it can render them in a much better quality, no matter which size they will have. So, in general, SVG is always better than PNG or JPG, but not always possible.
: I think bandwith is not so much of an issue nowadays. All modern browsers support on-the-fly-compression anyway, so it will probably not make any difference at all. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:18, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Navigation ==

On the right side sucks, BIG time... 

And while I'm writing this, the table with foreign characters shows as a series of "charinsert" tags, possibly because it's missing a final '}' [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 20:52, 1 October 2012 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>abcjx0oo4bgv0f6pibxtyturaa0zs9z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>64822</id>
      <parentid>64821</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-10-01T20:03:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19549">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

==New colors, logo and such==
[[Image:Hitchwiki front proposal 2010 a.png|thumb|Frontpage proposal 1, by [[User:Mikael|Mikael]]|400px]]

Hello! We've been building [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org a new hitchwiki maps] and some days ago I designed [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org/raw/master/_Documents/maps_gui.png a new GUI for it]. I got an idea to bring that logo and colors also to the Hitchwiki and so far it looks like this. What do you think? If you don't like colors, at least we could use this structure? 

Hand in logo is from hitchgathering.org -logo, since it was CC-by-SA. :-) Is that okay? I also put randomroads and hitchgathering -links to the main menu.

That square light box is a hovered link.

-[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

:Where is the "Like it" Button? ;) Looks great, maybe only the color of the article count could be a bit darker, as here it looks pretty close to the background color. Or it's just my eyes that are quite bad :P The logo is cool, it's simple and says it all. Lovei t. Anyway, go for it, Mikael! --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 20:47, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
:: I love it :) If you want, just install it to [[Hitchwiki:Start Page]] --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:58, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Updated PNGs ==

I've updated a whole bunch of PNGs with versions that were generated directly from the SVG from Wikipedia (with the GIMP). Height is around 400 pixels (or less) to keep the PNGs from adding dithered colors. Resulting PNGs were optimized with [http://advsys.net/ken/utils.htm#pngout PNGOUT] 

So far I've done all flags for the countries I have visited. Flags for the additional nationalities of drivers that gave me rides will follow (in a future) [[User:Prino|Prino]] 13:28, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
: By the way, it should be possible to upload SVGs here. That way we could completely avoid any conversion problems. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:56, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The File upload page does not seem to allow .SVG, but I haven't tried it. However, you must be aware that older browsers do not support .SVG files and I'm not sure if one of the newer (aka the piece of junk from M$) ones does. Also, if I try to upload '''Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg''' I get the following message:

"# A file with this name exists already, please check File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg if you are not sure if you want to change it."

Clicking on the link will go to a page that tells me

"This file is from a shared repository and may be used by other projects. The description on its file description page there is shown below"

And it doesn't show up in [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Special:ListFiles?limit=50&amp;ilsearch=Netherlands&amp;title=Special%3AListFiles Special:ListFiles], so how does the link to [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg Wikimedia Commons] work? Another problem is of course the case-sensitivity, if I try to upload "Flag_of_'''T'''he_Netherlands.svg", the system will happily let me do so. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:46, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

: Also, I wonder what the reason is, to re-upload images in the same resolution? They look completely the same for me. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:15, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The PNGs I uploaded are exactly the same, but PNGOUT is capable of compressing them significantly better in many cases, which should save some bandwidth... Look at some of the bigger files I replaced in the changelog! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:23, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

[[File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg|150px|thumb|left|This a .SVG file]]

: Hmm, ok. First of all: Hitchwiki is linked to wikimedia commons. That means, you can just use any file uploaded to wikimedia commons here. And that is also the reason for your error message: If you upload a file, that is also uploaded to wikimedia commons, you would replace it locally. This is fine, you can do that. It doesn't make much sense to upload the same file again, though.
: It doesn't really matter wether a browser supports svg. The wiki renders them to png pr jpg anyway. But it can render them in a much better quality, no matter which size they will have. So, in general, SVG is always better than PNG or JPG, but not always possible.
: I think bandwith is not so much of an issue nowadays. All modern browsers support on-the-fly-compression anyway, so it will probably not make any difference at all. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:18, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Navigation ==

On the right side sucks, BIG time... 

And while I'm writing this, the table with foreign characters shows as a series of "charinsert" tags, possibly because it's missing a final '}' [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 20:52, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
:And the colour of the links, a horrible blue also stinks. Why was this change required, what was wrong with the old design? [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 22:03, 1 October 2012 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>7lg7qa3aoup16y75njef3lilyagiomv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>64846</id>
      <parentid>64822</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-10-02T09:56:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19719">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

==New colors, logo and such==
[[Image:Hitchwiki front proposal 2010 a.png|thumb|Frontpage proposal 1, by [[User:Mikael|Mikael]]|400px]]

Hello! We've been building [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org a new hitchwiki maps] and some days ago I designed [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org/raw/master/_Documents/maps_gui.png a new GUI for it]. I got an idea to bring that logo and colors also to the Hitchwiki and so far it looks like this. What do you think? If you don't like colors, at least we could use this structure? 

Hand in logo is from hitchgathering.org -logo, since it was CC-by-SA. :-) Is that okay? I also put randomroads and hitchgathering -links to the main menu.

That square light box is a hovered link.

-[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

:Where is the "Like it" Button? ;) Looks great, maybe only the color of the article count could be a bit darker, as here it looks pretty close to the background color. Or it's just my eyes that are quite bad :P The logo is cool, it's simple and says it all. Lovei t. Anyway, go for it, Mikael! --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 20:47, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
:: I love it :) If you want, just install it to [[Hitchwiki:Start Page]] --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:58, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Updated PNGs ==

I've updated a whole bunch of PNGs with versions that were generated directly from the SVG from Wikipedia (with the GIMP). Height is around 400 pixels (or less) to keep the PNGs from adding dithered colors. Resulting PNGs were optimized with [http://advsys.net/ken/utils.htm#pngout PNGOUT] 

So far I've done all flags for the countries I have visited. Flags for the additional nationalities of drivers that gave me rides will follow (in a future) [[User:Prino|Prino]] 13:28, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
: By the way, it should be possible to upload SVGs here. That way we could completely avoid any conversion problems. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:56, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The File upload page does not seem to allow .SVG, but I haven't tried it. However, you must be aware that older browsers do not support .SVG files and I'm not sure if one of the newer (aka the piece of junk from M$) ones does. Also, if I try to upload '''Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg''' I get the following message:

"# A file with this name exists already, please check File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg if you are not sure if you want to change it."

Clicking on the link will go to a page that tells me

"This file is from a shared repository and may be used by other projects. The description on its file description page there is shown below"

And it doesn't show up in [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Special:ListFiles?limit=50&amp;ilsearch=Netherlands&amp;title=Special%3AListFiles Special:ListFiles], so how does the link to [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg Wikimedia Commons] work? Another problem is of course the case-sensitivity, if I try to upload "Flag_of_'''T'''he_Netherlands.svg", the system will happily let me do so. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:46, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

: Also, I wonder what the reason is, to re-upload images in the same resolution? They look completely the same for me. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:15, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The PNGs I uploaded are exactly the same, but PNGOUT is capable of compressing them significantly better in many cases, which should save some bandwidth... Look at some of the bigger files I replaced in the changelog! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:23, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

[[File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg|150px|thumb|left|This a .SVG file]]

: Hmm, ok. First of all: Hitchwiki is linked to wikimedia commons. That means, you can just use any file uploaded to wikimedia commons here. And that is also the reason for your error message: If you upload a file, that is also uploaded to wikimedia commons, you would replace it locally. This is fine, you can do that. It doesn't make much sense to upload the same file again, though.
: It doesn't really matter wether a browser supports svg. The wiki renders them to png pr jpg anyway. But it can render them in a much better quality, no matter which size they will have. So, in general, SVG is always better than PNG or JPG, but not always possible.
: I think bandwith is not so much of an issue nowadays. All modern browsers support on-the-fly-compression anyway, so it will probably not make any difference at all. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:18, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Navigation ==

On the right side sucks, BIG time... 

And while I'm writing this, the table with foreign characters shows as a series of "charinsert" tags, possibly because it's missing a final '}' [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 20:52, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
:And the colour of the links, a horrible blue also stinks. Why was this change required, what was wrong with the old design? [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 22:03, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
::And 9 cm of grey screen on either side of the text on a 23" monitor is also really useful. [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 11:56, 2 October 2012 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>lp0aked0v18rr1wtit3akny8avvemm2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>64850</id>
      <parentid>64846</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-10-02T10:05:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20184">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

==New colors, logo and such==
[[Image:Hitchwiki front proposal 2010 a.png|thumb|Frontpage proposal 1, by [[User:Mikael|Mikael]]|400px]]

Hello! We've been building [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org a new hitchwiki maps] and some days ago I designed [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org/raw/master/_Documents/maps_gui.png a new GUI for it]. I got an idea to bring that logo and colors also to the Hitchwiki and so far it looks like this. What do you think? If you don't like colors, at least we could use this structure? 

Hand in logo is from hitchgathering.org -logo, since it was CC-by-SA. :-) Is that okay? I also put randomroads and hitchgathering -links to the main menu.

That square light box is a hovered link.

-[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

:Where is the "Like it" Button? ;) Looks great, maybe only the color of the article count could be a bit darker, as here it looks pretty close to the background color. Or it's just my eyes that are quite bad :P The logo is cool, it's simple and says it all. Lovei t. Anyway, go for it, Mikael! --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 20:47, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
:: I love it :) If you want, just install it to [[Hitchwiki:Start Page]] --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:58, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Updated PNGs ==

I've updated a whole bunch of PNGs with versions that were generated directly from the SVG from Wikipedia (with the GIMP). Height is around 400 pixels (or less) to keep the PNGs from adding dithered colors. Resulting PNGs were optimized with [http://advsys.net/ken/utils.htm#pngout PNGOUT] 

So far I've done all flags for the countries I have visited. Flags for the additional nationalities of drivers that gave me rides will follow (in a future) [[User:Prino|Prino]] 13:28, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
: By the way, it should be possible to upload SVGs here. That way we could completely avoid any conversion problems. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:56, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The File upload page does not seem to allow .SVG, but I haven't tried it. However, you must be aware that older browsers do not support .SVG files and I'm not sure if one of the newer (aka the piece of junk from M$) ones does. Also, if I try to upload '''Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg''' I get the following message:

"# A file with this name exists already, please check File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg if you are not sure if you want to change it."

Clicking on the link will go to a page that tells me

"This file is from a shared repository and may be used by other projects. The description on its file description page there is shown below"

And it doesn't show up in [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Special:ListFiles?limit=50&amp;ilsearch=Netherlands&amp;title=Special%3AListFiles Special:ListFiles], so how does the link to [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg Wikimedia Commons] work? Another problem is of course the case-sensitivity, if I try to upload "Flag_of_'''T'''he_Netherlands.svg", the system will happily let me do so. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:46, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

: Also, I wonder what the reason is, to re-upload images in the same resolution? They look completely the same for me. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:15, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The PNGs I uploaded are exactly the same, but PNGOUT is capable of compressing them significantly better in many cases, which should save some bandwidth... Look at some of the bigger files I replaced in the changelog! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:23, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

[[File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg|150px|thumb|left|This a .SVG file]]

: Hmm, ok. First of all: Hitchwiki is linked to wikimedia commons. That means, you can just use any file uploaded to wikimedia commons here. And that is also the reason for your error message: If you upload a file, that is also uploaded to wikimedia commons, you would replace it locally. This is fine, you can do that. It doesn't make much sense to upload the same file again, though.
: It doesn't really matter wether a browser supports svg. The wiki renders them to png pr jpg anyway. But it can render them in a much better quality, no matter which size they will have. So, in general, SVG is always better than PNG or JPG, but not always possible.
: I think bandwith is not so much of an issue nowadays. All modern browsers support on-the-fly-compression anyway, so it will probably not make any difference at all. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:18, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Navigation ==

On the right side sucks, BIG time... 

And while I'm writing this, the table with foreign characters shows as a series of "charinsert" tags, possibly because it's missing a final '}' [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 20:52, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
:And the colour of the links, a horrible blue also stinks. Why was this change required, what was wrong with the old design? [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 22:03, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
::And 9 cm of grey screen on either side of the text on a 23" monitor is also really useful. [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 11:56, 2 October 2012 (CEST)

:I like Mikael's new design but the old Monobook one is useful indeed. So go to [[Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-rendering]] and choose MonoBook. That's what I just did, there are still some tidbits not working but I'll fix them in [[MediaWiki:Monobook.css]]. 
:Charinsert is broken because the extension doesn't work anymore with MediaWiki 1.19. Will try to fix that as well today. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] ([[User talk:Guaka|talk]]) 12:05, 2 October 2012 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>jsreis86hi63rdcboz2morhs2pbuhhr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>64866</id>
      <parentid>64850</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-10-04T07:51:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GeorgDerReisende</username>
        <id>1903</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20421">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

==New colors, logo and such==
[[Image:Hitchwiki front proposal 2010 a.png|thumb|Frontpage proposal 1, by [[User:Mikael|Mikael]]|400px]]

Hello! We've been building [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org a new hitchwiki maps] and some days ago I designed [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org/raw/master/_Documents/maps_gui.png a new GUI for it]. I got an idea to bring that logo and colors also to the Hitchwiki and so far it looks like this. What do you think? If you don't like colors, at least we could use this structure? 

Hand in logo is from hitchgathering.org -logo, since it was CC-by-SA. :-) Is that okay? I also put randomroads and hitchgathering -links to the main menu.

That square light box is a hovered link.

-[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

:Where is the "Like it" Button? ;) Looks great, maybe only the color of the article count could be a bit darker, as here it looks pretty close to the background color. Or it's just my eyes that are quite bad :P The logo is cool, it's simple and says it all. Lovei t. Anyway, go for it, Mikael! --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 20:47, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
:: I love it :) If you want, just install it to [[Hitchwiki:Start Page]] --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:58, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Updated PNGs ==

I've updated a whole bunch of PNGs with versions that were generated directly from the SVG from Wikipedia (with the GIMP). Height is around 400 pixels (or less) to keep the PNGs from adding dithered colors. Resulting PNGs were optimized with [http://advsys.net/ken/utils.htm#pngout PNGOUT] 

So far I've done all flags for the countries I have visited. Flags for the additional nationalities of drivers that gave me rides will follow (in a future) [[User:Prino|Prino]] 13:28, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
: By the way, it should be possible to upload SVGs here. That way we could completely avoid any conversion problems. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:56, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The File upload page does not seem to allow .SVG, but I haven't tried it. However, you must be aware that older browsers do not support .SVG files and I'm not sure if one of the newer (aka the piece of junk from M$) ones does. Also, if I try to upload '''Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg''' I get the following message:

"# A file with this name exists already, please check File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg if you are not sure if you want to change it."

Clicking on the link will go to a page that tells me

"This file is from a shared repository and may be used by other projects. The description on its file description page there is shown below"

And it doesn't show up in [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Special:ListFiles?limit=50&amp;ilsearch=Netherlands&amp;title=Special%3AListFiles Special:ListFiles], so how does the link to [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg Wikimedia Commons] work? Another problem is of course the case-sensitivity, if I try to upload "Flag_of_'''T'''he_Netherlands.svg", the system will happily let me do so. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:46, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

: Also, I wonder what the reason is, to re-upload images in the same resolution? They look completely the same for me. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:15, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The PNGs I uploaded are exactly the same, but PNGOUT is capable of compressing them significantly better in many cases, which should save some bandwidth... Look at some of the bigger files I replaced in the changelog! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:23, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

[[File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg|150px|thumb|left|This a .SVG file]]

: Hmm, ok. First of all: Hitchwiki is linked to wikimedia commons. That means, you can just use any file uploaded to wikimedia commons here. And that is also the reason for your error message: If you upload a file, that is also uploaded to wikimedia commons, you would replace it locally. This is fine, you can do that. It doesn't make much sense to upload the same file again, though.
: It doesn't really matter wether a browser supports svg. The wiki renders them to png pr jpg anyway. But it can render them in a much better quality, no matter which size they will have. So, in general, SVG is always better than PNG or JPG, but not always possible.
: I think bandwith is not so much of an issue nowadays. All modern browsers support on-the-fly-compression anyway, so it will probably not make any difference at all. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:18, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Navigation ==

On the right side sucks, BIG time... 

And while I'm writing this, the table with foreign characters shows as a series of "charinsert" tags, possibly because it's missing a final '}' [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 20:52, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
:And the colour of the links, a horrible blue also stinks. Why was this change required, what was wrong with the old design? [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 22:03, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
::And 9 cm of grey screen on either side of the text on a 23" monitor is also really useful. [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 11:56, 2 October 2012 (CEST)

:I like Mikael's new design but the old Monobook one is useful indeed. So go to [[Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-rendering]] and choose MonoBook. That's what I just did, there are still some tidbits not working but I'll fix them in [[MediaWiki:Monobook.css]]. 
:Charinsert is broken because the extension doesn't work anymore with MediaWiki 1.19. Will try to fix that as well today. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] ([[User talk:Guaka|talk]]) 12:05, 2 October 2012 (CEST)

== Bug ==

All templates are out of order, because they have a "&lt;nowiki&gt;{{ #&lt;/nowiki&gt;" at their beginning in the whole wiki. -[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 09:51, 4 October 2012 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>ndrtc38vlew3io9px8rmehskaq6rtzl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>64867</id>
      <parentid>64866</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-10-04T07:58:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20782">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

==New colors, logo and such==
[[Image:Hitchwiki front proposal 2010 a.png|thumb|Frontpage proposal 1, by [[User:Mikael|Mikael]]|400px]]

Hello! We've been building [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org a new hitchwiki maps] and some days ago I designed [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org/raw/master/_Documents/maps_gui.png a new GUI for it]. I got an idea to bring that logo and colors also to the Hitchwiki and so far it looks like this. What do you think? If you don't like colors, at least we could use this structure? 

Hand in logo is from hitchgathering.org -logo, since it was CC-by-SA. :-) Is that okay? I also put randomroads and hitchgathering -links to the main menu.

That square light box is a hovered link.

-[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

:Where is the "Like it" Button? ;) Looks great, maybe only the color of the article count could be a bit darker, as here it looks pretty close to the background color. Or it's just my eyes that are quite bad :P The logo is cool, it's simple and says it all. Lovei t. Anyway, go for it, Mikael! --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 20:47, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
:: I love it :) If you want, just install it to [[Hitchwiki:Start Page]] --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:58, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Updated PNGs ==

I've updated a whole bunch of PNGs with versions that were generated directly from the SVG from Wikipedia (with the GIMP). Height is around 400 pixels (or less) to keep the PNGs from adding dithered colors. Resulting PNGs were optimized with [http://advsys.net/ken/utils.htm#pngout PNGOUT] 

So far I've done all flags for the countries I have visited. Flags for the additional nationalities of drivers that gave me rides will follow (in a future) [[User:Prino|Prino]] 13:28, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
: By the way, it should be possible to upload SVGs here. That way we could completely avoid any conversion problems. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:56, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The File upload page does not seem to allow .SVG, but I haven't tried it. However, you must be aware that older browsers do not support .SVG files and I'm not sure if one of the newer (aka the piece of junk from M$) ones does. Also, if I try to upload '''Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg''' I get the following message:

"# A file with this name exists already, please check File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg if you are not sure if you want to change it."

Clicking on the link will go to a page that tells me

"This file is from a shared repository and may be used by other projects. The description on its file description page there is shown below"

And it doesn't show up in [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Special:ListFiles?limit=50&amp;ilsearch=Netherlands&amp;title=Special%3AListFiles Special:ListFiles], so how does the link to [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg Wikimedia Commons] work? Another problem is of course the case-sensitivity, if I try to upload "Flag_of_'''T'''he_Netherlands.svg", the system will happily let me do so. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:46, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

: Also, I wonder what the reason is, to re-upload images in the same resolution? They look completely the same for me. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:15, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The PNGs I uploaded are exactly the same, but PNGOUT is capable of compressing them significantly better in many cases, which should save some bandwidth... Look at some of the bigger files I replaced in the changelog! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:23, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

[[File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg|150px|thumb|left|This a .SVG file]]

: Hmm, ok. First of all: Hitchwiki is linked to wikimedia commons. That means, you can just use any file uploaded to wikimedia commons here. And that is also the reason for your error message: If you upload a file, that is also uploaded to wikimedia commons, you would replace it locally. This is fine, you can do that. It doesn't make much sense to upload the same file again, though.
: It doesn't really matter wether a browser supports svg. The wiki renders them to png pr jpg anyway. But it can render them in a much better quality, no matter which size they will have. So, in general, SVG is always better than PNG or JPG, but not always possible.
: I think bandwith is not so much of an issue nowadays. All modern browsers support on-the-fly-compression anyway, so it will probably not make any difference at all. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:18, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Navigation ==

On the right side sucks, BIG time... 

And while I'm writing this, the table with foreign characters shows as a series of "charinsert" tags, possibly because it's missing a final '}' [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 20:52, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
:And the colour of the links, a horrible blue also stinks. Why was this change required, what was wrong with the old design? [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 22:03, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
::And 9 cm of grey screen on either side of the text on a 23" monitor is also really useful. [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 11:56, 2 October 2012 (CEST)

:I like Mikael's new design but the old Monobook one is useful indeed. So go to [[Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-rendering]] and choose MonoBook. That's what I just did, there are still some tidbits not working but I'll fix them in [[MediaWiki:Monobook.css]]. 
:Charinsert is broken because the extension doesn't work anymore with MediaWiki 1.19. Will try to fix that as well today. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] ([[User talk:Guaka|talk]]) 12:05, 2 October 2012 (CEST)

== Bug ==

All templates are out of order, because they have a "&lt;nowiki&gt;{{ #&lt;/nowiki&gt;" at their beginning in the whole wiki. -[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 09:51, 4 October 2012 (CEST)
: Thanks for noting. We know about this bug, but as far as I know, it only affect the Isin-Template? A quick Check on [[Germany]] which has a lot of templates shows me that most of them work fine. Please let us know if you know of any specific template that is broken as well --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] ([[User talk:MrTweek|talk]]) 09:58, 4 October 2012 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>pwwjubjw9pdkno657ozv1lofylyqoid</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>64907</id>
      <parentid>64867</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-10-08T12:44:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GeorgDerReisende</username>
        <id>1903</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21034">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

==New colors, logo and such==
[[Image:Hitchwiki front proposal 2010 a.png|thumb|Frontpage proposal 1, by [[User:Mikael|Mikael]]|400px]]

Hello! We've been building [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org a new hitchwiki maps] and some days ago I designed [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org/raw/master/_Documents/maps_gui.png a new GUI for it]. I got an idea to bring that logo and colors also to the Hitchwiki and so far it looks like this. What do you think? If you don't like colors, at least we could use this structure? 

Hand in logo is from hitchgathering.org -logo, since it was CC-by-SA. :-) Is that okay? I also put randomroads and hitchgathering -links to the main menu.

That square light box is a hovered link.

-[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

:Where is the "Like it" Button? ;) Looks great, maybe only the color of the article count could be a bit darker, as here it looks pretty close to the background color. Or it's just my eyes that are quite bad :P The logo is cool, it's simple and says it all. Lovei t. Anyway, go for it, Mikael! --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 20:47, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
:: I love it :) If you want, just install it to [[Hitchwiki:Start Page]] --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:58, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Updated PNGs ==

I've updated a whole bunch of PNGs with versions that were generated directly from the SVG from Wikipedia (with the GIMP). Height is around 400 pixels (or less) to keep the PNGs from adding dithered colors. Resulting PNGs were optimized with [http://advsys.net/ken/utils.htm#pngout PNGOUT] 

So far I've done all flags for the countries I have visited. Flags for the additional nationalities of drivers that gave me rides will follow (in a future) [[User:Prino|Prino]] 13:28, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
: By the way, it should be possible to upload SVGs here. That way we could completely avoid any conversion problems. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:56, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The File upload page does not seem to allow .SVG, but I haven't tried it. However, you must be aware that older browsers do not support .SVG files and I'm not sure if one of the newer (aka the piece of junk from M$) ones does. Also, if I try to upload '''Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg''' I get the following message:

"# A file with this name exists already, please check File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg if you are not sure if you want to change it."

Clicking on the link will go to a page that tells me

"This file is from a shared repository and may be used by other projects. The description on its file description page there is shown below"

And it doesn't show up in [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Special:ListFiles?limit=50&amp;ilsearch=Netherlands&amp;title=Special%3AListFiles Special:ListFiles], so how does the link to [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg Wikimedia Commons] work? Another problem is of course the case-sensitivity, if I try to upload "Flag_of_'''T'''he_Netherlands.svg", the system will happily let me do so. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:46, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

: Also, I wonder what the reason is, to re-upload images in the same resolution? They look completely the same for me. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:15, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The PNGs I uploaded are exactly the same, but PNGOUT is capable of compressing them significantly better in many cases, which should save some bandwidth... Look at some of the bigger files I replaced in the changelog! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:23, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

[[File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg|150px|thumb|left|This a .SVG file]]

: Hmm, ok. First of all: Hitchwiki is linked to wikimedia commons. That means, you can just use any file uploaded to wikimedia commons here. And that is also the reason for your error message: If you upload a file, that is also uploaded to wikimedia commons, you would replace it locally. This is fine, you can do that. It doesn't make much sense to upload the same file again, though.
: It doesn't really matter wether a browser supports svg. The wiki renders them to png pr jpg anyway. But it can render them in a much better quality, no matter which size they will have. So, in general, SVG is always better than PNG or JPG, but not always possible.
: I think bandwith is not so much of an issue nowadays. All modern browsers support on-the-fly-compression anyway, so it will probably not make any difference at all. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:18, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Navigation ==

On the right side sucks, BIG time... 

And while I'm writing this, the table with foreign characters shows as a series of "charinsert" tags, possibly because it's missing a final '}' [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 20:52, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
:And the colour of the links, a horrible blue also stinks. Why was this change required, what was wrong with the old design? [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 22:03, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
::And 9 cm of grey screen on either side of the text on a 23" monitor is also really useful. [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 11:56, 2 October 2012 (CEST)

:I like Mikael's new design but the old Monobook one is useful indeed. So go to [[Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-rendering]] and choose MonoBook. That's what I just did, there are still some tidbits not working but I'll fix them in [[MediaWiki:Monobook.css]]. 
:Charinsert is broken because the extension doesn't work anymore with MediaWiki 1.19. Will try to fix that as well today. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] ([[User talk:Guaka|talk]]) 12:05, 2 October 2012 (CEST)

== Bug ==

All templates are out of order, because they have a "&lt;nowiki&gt;{{ #&lt;/nowiki&gt;" at their beginning in the whole wiki. -[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 09:51, 4 October 2012 (CEST)
: Thanks for noting. We know about this bug, but as far as I know, it only affect the Isin-Template? A quick Check on [[Germany]] which has a lot of templates shows me that most of them work fine. Please let us know if you know of any specific template that is broken as well --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] ([[User talk:MrTweek|talk]]) 09:58, 4 October 2012 (CEST)
: many templates which I use for the motorways are broken: {{ramp}} {{junction}} {{gas}} {{rest}} {{very good}} {{good}}, look at {{Ade|1}} --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 14:44, 8 October 2012 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>4tmkvtbwrbuugb114g28u5011y39c6e</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>64921</id>
      <parentid>64907</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-10-09T16:33:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Klodreamer</username>
        <id>2862</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21376">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

==New colors, logo and such==
[[Image:Hitchwiki front proposal 2010 a.png|thumb|Frontpage proposal 1, by [[User:Mikael|Mikael]]|400px]]

Hello! We've been building [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org a new hitchwiki maps] and some days ago I designed [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org/raw/master/_Documents/maps_gui.png a new GUI for it]. I got an idea to bring that logo and colors also to the Hitchwiki and so far it looks like this. What do you think? If you don't like colors, at least we could use this structure? 

Hand in logo is from hitchgathering.org -logo, since it was CC-by-SA. :-) Is that okay? I also put randomroads and hitchgathering -links to the main menu.

That square light box is a hovered link.

-[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

:Where is the "Like it" Button? ;) Looks great, maybe only the color of the article count could be a bit darker, as here it looks pretty close to the background color. Or it's just my eyes that are quite bad :P The logo is cool, it's simple and says it all. Lovei t. Anyway, go for it, Mikael! --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 20:47, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
:: I love it :) If you want, just install it to [[Hitchwiki:Start Page]] --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:58, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Updated PNGs ==

I've updated a whole bunch of PNGs with versions that were generated directly from the SVG from Wikipedia (with the GIMP). Height is around 400 pixels (or less) to keep the PNGs from adding dithered colors. Resulting PNGs were optimized with [http://advsys.net/ken/utils.htm#pngout PNGOUT] 

So far I've done all flags for the countries I have visited. Flags for the additional nationalities of drivers that gave me rides will follow (in a future) [[User:Prino|Prino]] 13:28, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
: By the way, it should be possible to upload SVGs here. That way we could completely avoid any conversion problems. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:56, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The File upload page does not seem to allow .SVG, but I haven't tried it. However, you must be aware that older browsers do not support .SVG files and I'm not sure if one of the newer (aka the piece of junk from M$) ones does. Also, if I try to upload '''Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg''' I get the following message:

"# A file with this name exists already, please check File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg if you are not sure if you want to change it."

Clicking on the link will go to a page that tells me

"This file is from a shared repository and may be used by other projects. The description on its file description page there is shown below"

And it doesn't show up in [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Special:ListFiles?limit=50&amp;ilsearch=Netherlands&amp;title=Special%3AListFiles Special:ListFiles], so how does the link to [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg Wikimedia Commons] work? Another problem is of course the case-sensitivity, if I try to upload "Flag_of_'''T'''he_Netherlands.svg", the system will happily let me do so. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:46, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

: Also, I wonder what the reason is, to re-upload images in the same resolution? They look completely the same for me. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:15, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The PNGs I uploaded are exactly the same, but PNGOUT is capable of compressing them significantly better in many cases, which should save some bandwidth... Look at some of the bigger files I replaced in the changelog! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:23, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

[[File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg|150px|thumb|left|This a .SVG file]]

: Hmm, ok. First of all: Hitchwiki is linked to wikimedia commons. That means, you can just use any file uploaded to wikimedia commons here. And that is also the reason for your error message: If you upload a file, that is also uploaded to wikimedia commons, you would replace it locally. This is fine, you can do that. It doesn't make much sense to upload the same file again, though.
: It doesn't really matter wether a browser supports svg. The wiki renders them to png pr jpg anyway. But it can render them in a much better quality, no matter which size they will have. So, in general, SVG is always better than PNG or JPG, but not always possible.
: I think bandwith is not so much of an issue nowadays. All modern browsers support on-the-fly-compression anyway, so it will probably not make any difference at all. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:18, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Navigation ==

On the right side sucks, BIG time... 

And while I'm writing this, the table with foreign characters shows as a series of "charinsert" tags, possibly because it's missing a final '}' [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 20:52, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
:And the colour of the links, a horrible blue also stinks. Why was this change required, what was wrong with the old design? [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 22:03, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
::And 9 cm of grey screen on either side of the text on a 23" monitor is also really useful. [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 11:56, 2 October 2012 (CEST)

:I like Mikael's new design but the old Monobook one is useful indeed. So go to [[Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-rendering]] and choose MonoBook. That's what I just did, there are still some tidbits not working but I'll fix them in [[MediaWiki:Monobook.css]]. 
:Charinsert is broken because the extension doesn't work anymore with MediaWiki 1.19. Will try to fix that as well today. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] ([[User talk:Guaka|talk]]) 12:05, 2 October 2012 (CEST)

== Bug ==

All templates are out of order, because they have a "&lt;nowiki&gt;{{ #&lt;/nowiki&gt;" at their beginning in the whole wiki. -[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 09:51, 4 October 2012 (CEST)
: Thanks for noting. We know about this bug, but as far as I know, it only affect the Isin-Template? A quick Check on [[Germany]] which has a lot of templates shows me that most of them work fine. Please let us know if you know of any specific template that is broken as well --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] ([[User talk:MrTweek|talk]]) 09:58, 4 October 2012 (CEST)
: many templates which I use for the motorways are broken: {{ramp}} {{junction}} {{gas}} {{rest}} {{very good}} {{good}}, look at {{Ade|1}} --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 14:44, 8 October 2012 (CEST)

* I don't know about the templates (except IsIn) but the all the links to Trashwiki aren't in the toolbow anymore, but at the end of the page... I speak about the french version (exemple: [http://hitchwiki.org/fr/Prague], at the end of the page). For the english version, they just disappeared... Even if they are still in the editing page.</text>
      <sha1>71f4wi94w5kwbpmqzmv97berit3v894</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>64922</id>
      <parentid>64921</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-10-09T16:34:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Klodreamer</username>
        <id>2862</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21470">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

==New colors, logo and such==
[[Image:Hitchwiki front proposal 2010 a.png|thumb|Frontpage proposal 1, by [[User:Mikael|Mikael]]|400px]]

Hello! We've been building [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org a new hitchwiki maps] and some days ago I designed [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org/raw/master/_Documents/maps_gui.png a new GUI for it]. I got an idea to bring that logo and colors also to the Hitchwiki and so far it looks like this. What do you think? If you don't like colors, at least we could use this structure? 

Hand in logo is from hitchgathering.org -logo, since it was CC-by-SA. :-) Is that okay? I also put randomroads and hitchgathering -links to the main menu.

That square light box is a hovered link.

-[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

:Where is the "Like it" Button? ;) Looks great, maybe only the color of the article count could be a bit darker, as here it looks pretty close to the background color. Or it's just my eyes that are quite bad :P The logo is cool, it's simple and says it all. Lovei t. Anyway, go for it, Mikael! --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 20:47, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
:: I love it :) If you want, just install it to [[Hitchwiki:Start Page]] --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:58, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Updated PNGs ==

I've updated a whole bunch of PNGs with versions that were generated directly from the SVG from Wikipedia (with the GIMP). Height is around 400 pixels (or less) to keep the PNGs from adding dithered colors. Resulting PNGs were optimized with [http://advsys.net/ken/utils.htm#pngout PNGOUT] 

So far I've done all flags for the countries I have visited. Flags for the additional nationalities of drivers that gave me rides will follow (in a future) [[User:Prino|Prino]] 13:28, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
: By the way, it should be possible to upload SVGs here. That way we could completely avoid any conversion problems. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:56, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The File upload page does not seem to allow .SVG, but I haven't tried it. However, you must be aware that older browsers do not support .SVG files and I'm not sure if one of the newer (aka the piece of junk from M$) ones does. Also, if I try to upload '''Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg''' I get the following message:

"# A file with this name exists already, please check File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg if you are not sure if you want to change it."

Clicking on the link will go to a page that tells me

"This file is from a shared repository and may be used by other projects. The description on its file description page there is shown below"

And it doesn't show up in [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Special:ListFiles?limit=50&amp;ilsearch=Netherlands&amp;title=Special%3AListFiles Special:ListFiles], so how does the link to [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg Wikimedia Commons] work? Another problem is of course the case-sensitivity, if I try to upload "Flag_of_'''T'''he_Netherlands.svg", the system will happily let me do so. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:46, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

: Also, I wonder what the reason is, to re-upload images in the same resolution? They look completely the same for me. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:15, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The PNGs I uploaded are exactly the same, but PNGOUT is capable of compressing them significantly better in many cases, which should save some bandwidth... Look at some of the bigger files I replaced in the changelog! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:23, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

[[File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg|150px|thumb|left|This a .SVG file]]

: Hmm, ok. First of all: Hitchwiki is linked to wikimedia commons. That means, you can just use any file uploaded to wikimedia commons here. And that is also the reason for your error message: If you upload a file, that is also uploaded to wikimedia commons, you would replace it locally. This is fine, you can do that. It doesn't make much sense to upload the same file again, though.
: It doesn't really matter wether a browser supports svg. The wiki renders them to png pr jpg anyway. But it can render them in a much better quality, no matter which size they will have. So, in general, SVG is always better than PNG or JPG, but not always possible.
: I think bandwith is not so much of an issue nowadays. All modern browsers support on-the-fly-compression anyway, so it will probably not make any difference at all. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:18, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Navigation ==

On the right side sucks, BIG time... 

And while I'm writing this, the table with foreign characters shows as a series of "charinsert" tags, possibly because it's missing a final '}' [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 20:52, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
:And the colour of the links, a horrible blue also stinks. Why was this change required, what was wrong with the old design? [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 22:03, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
::And 9 cm of grey screen on either side of the text on a 23" monitor is also really useful. [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 11:56, 2 October 2012 (CEST)

:I like Mikael's new design but the old Monobook one is useful indeed. So go to [[Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-rendering]] and choose MonoBook. That's what I just did, there are still some tidbits not working but I'll fix them in [[MediaWiki:Monobook.css]]. 
:Charinsert is broken because the extension doesn't work anymore with MediaWiki 1.19. Will try to fix that as well today. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] ([[User talk:Guaka|talk]]) 12:05, 2 October 2012 (CEST)

== Bug ==

All templates are out of order, because they have a "&lt;nowiki&gt;{{ #&lt;/nowiki&gt;" at their beginning in the whole wiki. -[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 09:51, 4 October 2012 (CEST)
: Thanks for noting. We know about this bug, but as far as I know, it only affect the Isin-Template? A quick Check on [[Germany]] which has a lot of templates shows me that most of them work fine. Please let us know if you know of any specific template that is broken as well --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] ([[User talk:MrTweek|talk]]) 09:58, 4 October 2012 (CEST)
: many templates which I use for the motorways are broken: {{ramp}} {{junction}} {{gas}} {{rest}} {{very good}} {{good}}, look at {{Ade|1}} --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 14:44, 8 October 2012 (CEST)

* I don't know about the templates (except IsIn) but the all the links to Trashwiki aren't in the toolbow anymore, but at the end of the page... I speak about the french version (exemple: [http://hitchwiki.org/fr/Prague], at the end of the page). For the english version, they just disappeared... Even if they are still in the editing page. --[[User:Klodreamer|Klodreamer]] ([[User talk:Klodreamer|talk]]) 18:34, 9 October 2012 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>i4fn36dcia4t0d622m6xmog6g1d7cz0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>65041</id>
      <parentid>64922</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-10-15T15:55:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GeorgDerReisende</username>
        <id>1903</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21771">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

==New colors, logo and such==
[[Image:Hitchwiki front proposal 2010 a.png|thumb|Frontpage proposal 1, by [[User:Mikael|Mikael]]|400px]]

Hello! We've been building [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org a new hitchwiki maps] and some days ago I designed [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org/raw/master/_Documents/maps_gui.png a new GUI for it]. I got an idea to bring that logo and colors also to the Hitchwiki and so far it looks like this. What do you think? If you don't like colors, at least we could use this structure? 

Hand in logo is from hitchgathering.org -logo, since it was CC-by-SA. :-) Is that okay? I also put randomroads and hitchgathering -links to the main menu.

That square light box is a hovered link.

-[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

:Where is the "Like it" Button? ;) Looks great, maybe only the color of the article count could be a bit darker, as here it looks pretty close to the background color. Or it's just my eyes that are quite bad :P The logo is cool, it's simple and says it all. Lovei t. Anyway, go for it, Mikael! --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 20:47, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
:: I love it :) If you want, just install it to [[Hitchwiki:Start Page]] --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:58, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Updated PNGs ==

I've updated a whole bunch of PNGs with versions that were generated directly from the SVG from Wikipedia (with the GIMP). Height is around 400 pixels (or less) to keep the PNGs from adding dithered colors. Resulting PNGs were optimized with [http://advsys.net/ken/utils.htm#pngout PNGOUT] 

So far I've done all flags for the countries I have visited. Flags for the additional nationalities of drivers that gave me rides will follow (in a future) [[User:Prino|Prino]] 13:28, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
: By the way, it should be possible to upload SVGs here. That way we could completely avoid any conversion problems. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:56, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The File upload page does not seem to allow .SVG, but I haven't tried it. However, you must be aware that older browsers do not support .SVG files and I'm not sure if one of the newer (aka the piece of junk from M$) ones does. Also, if I try to upload '''Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg''' I get the following message:

"# A file with this name exists already, please check File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg if you are not sure if you want to change it."

Clicking on the link will go to a page that tells me

"This file is from a shared repository and may be used by other projects. The description on its file description page there is shown below"

And it doesn't show up in [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Special:ListFiles?limit=50&amp;ilsearch=Netherlands&amp;title=Special%3AListFiles Special:ListFiles], so how does the link to [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg Wikimedia Commons] work? Another problem is of course the case-sensitivity, if I try to upload "Flag_of_'''T'''he_Netherlands.svg", the system will happily let me do so. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:46, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

: Also, I wonder what the reason is, to re-upload images in the same resolution? They look completely the same for me. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:15, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The PNGs I uploaded are exactly the same, but PNGOUT is capable of compressing them significantly better in many cases, which should save some bandwidth... Look at some of the bigger files I replaced in the changelog! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:23, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

[[File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg|150px|thumb|left|This a .SVG file]]

: Hmm, ok. First of all: Hitchwiki is linked to wikimedia commons. That means, you can just use any file uploaded to wikimedia commons here. And that is also the reason for your error message: If you upload a file, that is also uploaded to wikimedia commons, you would replace it locally. This is fine, you can do that. It doesn't make much sense to upload the same file again, though.
: It doesn't really matter wether a browser supports svg. The wiki renders them to png pr jpg anyway. But it can render them in a much better quality, no matter which size they will have. So, in general, SVG is always better than PNG or JPG, but not always possible.
: I think bandwith is not so much of an issue nowadays. All modern browsers support on-the-fly-compression anyway, so it will probably not make any difference at all. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:18, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Navigation ==

On the right side sucks, BIG time... 

And while I'm writing this, the table with foreign characters shows as a series of "charinsert" tags, possibly because it's missing a final '}' [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 20:52, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
:And the colour of the links, a horrible blue also stinks. Why was this change required, what was wrong with the old design? [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 22:03, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
::And 9 cm of grey screen on either side of the text on a 23" monitor is also really useful. [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 11:56, 2 October 2012 (CEST)

:I like Mikael's new design but the old Monobook one is useful indeed. So go to [[Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-rendering]] and choose MonoBook. That's what I just did, there are still some tidbits not working but I'll fix them in [[MediaWiki:Monobook.css]]. 
:Charinsert is broken because the extension doesn't work anymore with MediaWiki 1.19. Will try to fix that as well today. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] ([[User talk:Guaka|talk]]) 12:05, 2 October 2012 (CEST)

== Bug ==

All templates are out of order, because they have a "&lt;nowiki&gt;{{ #&lt;/nowiki&gt;" at their beginning in the whole wiki. -[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 09:51, 4 October 2012 (CEST)
: Thanks for noting. We know about this bug, but as far as I know, it only affect the Isin-Template? A quick Check on [[Germany]] which has a lot of templates shows me that most of them work fine. Please let us know if you know of any specific template that is broken as well --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] ([[User talk:MrTweek|talk]]) 09:58, 4 October 2012 (CEST)
: many templates which I use for the motorways are broken: {{ramp}} {{junction}} {{gas}} {{rest}} {{very good}} {{good}}, look at {{Ade|1}} --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 14:44, 8 October 2012 (CEST)

* I don't know about the templates (except IsIn) but the all the links to Trashwiki aren't in the toolbow anymore, but at the end of the page... I speak about the french version (exemple: [http://hitchwiki.org/fr/Prague], at the end of the page). For the english version, they just disappeared... Even if they are still in the editing page. --[[User:Klodreamer|Klodreamer]] ([[User talk:Klodreamer|talk]]) 18:34, 9 October 2012 (CEST)

* It seems to me, that for all pictures, which have been uploaded before October, the original files have been gone. That lead to the above problem, that my templates don't run any more. --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 17:55, 15 October 2012 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>kzc2b1j4mfh9kcx7d5qvnfutawyggej</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>67313</id>
      <parentid>65041</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-10-28T03:32:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="22054">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

==New colors, logo and such==
[[Image:Hitchwiki front proposal 2010 a.png|thumb|Frontpage proposal 1, by [[User:Mikael|Mikael]]|400px]]

Hello! We've been building [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org a new hitchwiki maps] and some days ago I designed [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org/raw/master/_Documents/maps_gui.png a new GUI for it]. I got an idea to bring that logo and colors also to the Hitchwiki and so far it looks like this. What do you think? If you don't like colors, at least we could use this structure? 

Hand in logo is from hitchgathering.org -logo, since it was CC-by-SA. :-) Is that okay? I also put randomroads and hitchgathering -links to the main menu.

That square light box is a hovered link.

-[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

:Where is the "Like it" Button? ;) Looks great, maybe only the color of the article count could be a bit darker, as here it looks pretty close to the background color. Or it's just my eyes that are quite bad :P The logo is cool, it's simple and says it all. Lovei t. Anyway, go for it, Mikael! --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 20:47, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
:: I love it :) If you want, just install it to [[Hitchwiki:Start Page]] --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:58, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Updated PNGs ==

I've updated a whole bunch of PNGs with versions that were generated directly from the SVG from Wikipedia (with the GIMP). Height is around 400 pixels (or less) to keep the PNGs from adding dithered colors. Resulting PNGs were optimized with [http://advsys.net/ken/utils.htm#pngout PNGOUT] 

So far I've done all flags for the countries I have visited. Flags for the additional nationalities of drivers that gave me rides will follow (in a future) [[User:Prino|Prino]] 13:28, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
: By the way, it should be possible to upload SVGs here. That way we could completely avoid any conversion problems. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:56, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The File upload page does not seem to allow .SVG, but I haven't tried it. However, you must be aware that older browsers do not support .SVG files and I'm not sure if one of the newer (aka the piece of junk from M$) ones does. Also, if I try to upload '''Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg''' I get the following message:

"# A file with this name exists already, please check File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg if you are not sure if you want to change it."

Clicking on the link will go to a page that tells me

"This file is from a shared repository and may be used by other projects. The description on its file description page there is shown below"

And it doesn't show up in [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Special:ListFiles?limit=50&amp;ilsearch=Netherlands&amp;title=Special%3AListFiles Special:ListFiles], so how does the link to [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg Wikimedia Commons] work? Another problem is of course the case-sensitivity, if I try to upload "Flag_of_'''T'''he_Netherlands.svg", the system will happily let me do so. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:46, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

: Also, I wonder what the reason is, to re-upload images in the same resolution? They look completely the same for me. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:15, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The PNGs I uploaded are exactly the same, but PNGOUT is capable of compressing them significantly better in many cases, which should save some bandwidth... Look at some of the bigger files I replaced in the changelog! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:23, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

[[File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg|150px|thumb|left|This a .SVG file]]

: Hmm, ok. First of all: Hitchwiki is linked to wikimedia commons. That means, you can just use any file uploaded to wikimedia commons here. And that is also the reason for your error message: If you upload a file, that is also uploaded to wikimedia commons, you would replace it locally. This is fine, you can do that. It doesn't make much sense to upload the same file again, though.
: It doesn't really matter wether a browser supports svg. The wiki renders them to png pr jpg anyway. But it can render them in a much better quality, no matter which size they will have. So, in general, SVG is always better than PNG or JPG, but not always possible.
: I think bandwith is not so much of an issue nowadays. All modern browsers support on-the-fly-compression anyway, so it will probably not make any difference at all. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:18, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Navigation ==

On the right side sucks, BIG time... 

And while I'm writing this, the table with foreign characters shows as a series of "charinsert" tags, possibly because it's missing a final '}' [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 20:52, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
:And the colour of the links, a horrible blue also stinks. Why was this change required, what was wrong with the old design? [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 22:03, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
::And 9 cm of grey screen on either side of the text on a 23" monitor is also really useful. [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 11:56, 2 October 2012 (CEST)

:I like Mikael's new design but the old Monobook one is useful indeed. So go to [[Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-rendering]] and choose MonoBook. That's what I just did, there are still some tidbits not working but I'll fix them in [[MediaWiki:Monobook.css]]. 
:Charinsert is broken because the extension doesn't work anymore with MediaWiki 1.19. Will try to fix that as well today. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] ([[User talk:Guaka|talk]]) 12:05, 2 October 2012 (CEST)

== Bug ==

All templates are out of order, because they have a "&lt;nowiki&gt;{{ #&lt;/nowiki&gt;" at their beginning in the whole wiki. -[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 09:51, 4 October 2012 (CEST)
: Thanks for noting. We know about this bug, but as far as I know, it only affect the Isin-Template? A quick Check on [[Germany]] which has a lot of templates shows me that most of them work fine. Please let us know if you know of any specific template that is broken as well --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] ([[User talk:MrTweek|talk]]) 09:58, 4 October 2012 (CEST)
: many templates which I use for the motorways are broken: {{ramp}} {{junction}} {{gas}} {{rest}} {{very good}} {{good}}, look at {{Ade|1}} --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 14:44, 8 October 2012 (CEST)

* I don't know about the templates (except IsIn) but the all the links to Trashwiki aren't in the toolbow anymore, but at the end of the page... I speak about the french version (exemple: [http://hitchwiki.org/fr/Prague], at the end of the page). For the english version, they just disappeared... Even if they are still in the editing page. --[[User:Klodreamer|Klodreamer]] ([[User talk:Klodreamer|talk]]) 18:34, 9 October 2012 (CEST)

* It seems to me, that for all pictures, which have been uploaded before October, the original files have been gone. That lead to the above problem, that my templates don't run any more. --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 17:55, 15 October 2012 (CEST)
: I just re-imported them, so most images should work again. Please let me know, if there are still a lot missing. If there are only a few missing, we can just upload them again manually. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;sup&gt;([[User_talk:MrTweek|talk]])&lt;/sup&gt; 04:32, 28 October 2012 (CET)</text>
      <sha1>ah7c4i9tnl0moeryqq9qt283bfqxwnk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>67412</id>
      <parentid>67313</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-11-03T15:06:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GeorgDerReisende</username>
        <id>1903</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="22049">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

==New colors, logo and such==
[[Image:Hitchwiki front proposal 2010 a.png|thumb|Frontpage proposal 1, by [[User:Mikael|Mikael]]|400px]]

Hello! We've been building [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org a new hitchwiki maps] and some days ago I designed [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org/raw/master/_Documents/maps_gui.png a new GUI for it]. I got an idea to bring that logo and colors also to the Hitchwiki and so far it looks like this. What do you think? If you don't like colors, at least we could use this structure? 

Hand in logo is from hitchgathering.org -logo, since it was CC-by-SA. :-) Is that okay? I also put randomroads and hitchgathering -links to the main menu.

That square light box is a hovered link.

-[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

:Where is the "Like it" Button? ;) Looks great, maybe only the color of the article count could be a bit darker, as here it looks pretty close to the background color. Or it's just my eyes that are quite bad :P The logo is cool, it's simple and says it all. Lovei t. Anyway, go for it, Mikael! --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 20:47, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
:: I love it :) If you want, just install it to [[Hitchwiki:Start Page]] --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:58, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Updated PNGs ==

I've updated a whole bunch of PNGs with versions that were generated directly from the SVG from Wikipedia (with the GIMP). Height is around 400 pixels (or less) to keep the PNGs from adding dithered colors. Resulting PNGs were optimized with [http://advsys.net/ken/utils.htm#pngout PNGOUT] 

So far I've done all flags for the countries I have visited. Flags for the additional nationalities of drivers that gave me rides will follow (in a future) [[User:Prino|Prino]] 13:28, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
: By the way, it should be possible to upload SVGs here. That way we could completely avoid any conversion problems. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:56, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The File upload page does not seem to allow .SVG, but I haven't tried it. However, you must be aware that older browsers do not support .SVG files and I'm not sure if one of the newer (aka the piece of junk from M$) ones does. Also, if I try to upload '''Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg''' I get the following message:

"# A file with this name exists already, please check File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg if you are not sure if you want to change it."

Clicking on the link will go to a page that tells me

"This file is from a shared repository and may be used by other projects. The description on its file description page there is shown below"

And it doesn't show up in [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Special:ListFiles?limit=50&amp;ilsearch=Netherlands&amp;title=Special%3AListFiles Special:ListFiles], so how does the link to [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg Wikimedia Commons] work? Another problem is of course the case-sensitivity, if I try to upload "Flag_of_'''T'''he_Netherlands.svg", the system will happily let me do so. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:46, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

: Also, I wonder what the reason is, to re-upload images in the same resolution? They look completely the same for me. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:15, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The PNGs I uploaded are exactly the same, but PNGOUT is capable of compressing them significantly better in many cases, which should save some bandwidth... Look at some of the bigger files I replaced in the changelog! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:23, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

[[File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg|150px|thumb|left|This a .SVG file]]

: Hmm, ok. First of all: Hitchwiki is linked to wikimedia commons. That means, you can just use any file uploaded to wikimedia commons here. And that is also the reason for your error message: If you upload a file, that is also uploaded to wikimedia commons, you would replace it locally. This is fine, you can do that. It doesn't make much sense to upload the same file again, though.
: It doesn't really matter wether a browser supports svg. The wiki renders them to png pr jpg anyway. But it can render them in a much better quality, no matter which size they will have. So, in general, SVG is always better than PNG or JPG, but not always possible.
: I think bandwith is not so much of an issue nowadays. All modern browsers support on-the-fly-compression anyway, so it will probably not make any difference at all. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:18, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Navigation ==

On the right side sucks, BIG time... 

And while I'm writing this, the table with foreign characters shows as a series of "charinsert" tags, possibly because it's missing a final '}' [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 20:52, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
:And the colour of the links, a horrible blue also stinks. Why was this change required, what was wrong with the old design? [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 22:03, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
::And 9 cm of grey screen on either side of the text on a 23" monitor is also really useful. [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 11:56, 2 October 2012 (CEST)

:I like Mikael's new design but the old Monobook one is useful indeed. So go to [[Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-rendering]] and choose MonoBook. That's what I just did, there are still some tidbits not working but I'll fix them in [[MediaWiki:Monobook.css]]. 
:Charinsert is broken because the extension doesn't work anymore with MediaWiki 1.19. Will try to fix that as well today. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] ([[User talk:Guaka|talk]]) 12:05, 2 October 2012 (CEST)

== Bug ==

All templates are out of order, because they have a "&lt;nowiki&gt;{{ #&lt;/nowiki&gt;" at their beginning in the whole wiki. -[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 09:51, 4 October 2012 (CEST)
: Thanks for noting. We know about this bug, but as far as I know, it only affect the Isin-Template? A quick Check on [[Germany]] which has a lot of templates shows me that most of them work fine. Please let us know if you know of any specific template that is broken as well --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] ([[User talk:MrTweek|talk]]) 09:58, 4 October 2012 (CEST)
: many templates which I use for the motorways are broken: {{ramp}} {{junction}} {{gas}} {{rest}} {{very good}} {{good}}, look at {{Ade|1}} --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 14:44, 8 October 2012 (CEST)

* I don't know about the templates (except IsIn) but the all the links to Trashwiki aren't in the toolbow anymore, but at the end of the page... I speak about the french version (exemple: [http://hitchwiki.org/fr/Prague], at the end of the page). For the english version, they just disappeared... Even if they are still in the editing page. --[[User:Klodreamer|Klodreamer]] ([[User talk:Klodreamer|talk]]) 18:34, 9 October 2012 (CEST)

* It seems to me, that for all pictures, which have been uploaded before October, the original files have been gone. That lead to the above problem, that my templates don't run any more. --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 17:55, 15 October 2012 (CEST)

* I'm already missing some symbols: {{rest}} {{average}} {{bad}} {{senseless}}, the logo don't show up, in the German wiki also the template ''gut'' has no picture. --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 16:06, 3 November 2012 (CET)</text>
      <sha1>c186w3aab2n8kc5t1t98i9s9b7k1oig</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>67413</id>
      <parentid>67412</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-11-04T03:09:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="22331">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

==New colors, logo and such==
[[Image:Hitchwiki front proposal 2010 a.png|thumb|Frontpage proposal 1, by [[User:Mikael|Mikael]]|400px]]

Hello! We've been building [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org a new hitchwiki maps] and some days ago I designed [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org/raw/master/_Documents/maps_gui.png a new GUI for it]. I got an idea to bring that logo and colors also to the Hitchwiki and so far it looks like this. What do you think? If you don't like colors, at least we could use this structure? 

Hand in logo is from hitchgathering.org -logo, since it was CC-by-SA. :-) Is that okay? I also put randomroads and hitchgathering -links to the main menu.

That square light box is a hovered link.

-[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

:Where is the "Like it" Button? ;) Looks great, maybe only the color of the article count could be a bit darker, as here it looks pretty close to the background color. Or it's just my eyes that are quite bad :P The logo is cool, it's simple and says it all. Lovei t. Anyway, go for it, Mikael! --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 20:47, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
:: I love it :) If you want, just install it to [[Hitchwiki:Start Page]] --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:58, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Updated PNGs ==

I've updated a whole bunch of PNGs with versions that were generated directly from the SVG from Wikipedia (with the GIMP). Height is around 400 pixels (or less) to keep the PNGs from adding dithered colors. Resulting PNGs were optimized with [http://advsys.net/ken/utils.htm#pngout PNGOUT] 

So far I've done all flags for the countries I have visited. Flags for the additional nationalities of drivers that gave me rides will follow (in a future) [[User:Prino|Prino]] 13:28, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
: By the way, it should be possible to upload SVGs here. That way we could completely avoid any conversion problems. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:56, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The File upload page does not seem to allow .SVG, but I haven't tried it. However, you must be aware that older browsers do not support .SVG files and I'm not sure if one of the newer (aka the piece of junk from M$) ones does. Also, if I try to upload '''Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg''' I get the following message:

"# A file with this name exists already, please check File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg if you are not sure if you want to change it."

Clicking on the link will go to a page that tells me

"This file is from a shared repository and may be used by other projects. The description on its file description page there is shown below"

And it doesn't show up in [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Special:ListFiles?limit=50&amp;ilsearch=Netherlands&amp;title=Special%3AListFiles Special:ListFiles], so how does the link to [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg Wikimedia Commons] work? Another problem is of course the case-sensitivity, if I try to upload "Flag_of_'''T'''he_Netherlands.svg", the system will happily let me do so. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:46, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

: Also, I wonder what the reason is, to re-upload images in the same resolution? They look completely the same for me. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:15, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The PNGs I uploaded are exactly the same, but PNGOUT is capable of compressing them significantly better in many cases, which should save some bandwidth... Look at some of the bigger files I replaced in the changelog! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:23, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

[[File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg|150px|thumb|left|This a .SVG file]]

: Hmm, ok. First of all: Hitchwiki is linked to wikimedia commons. That means, you can just use any file uploaded to wikimedia commons here. And that is also the reason for your error message: If you upload a file, that is also uploaded to wikimedia commons, you would replace it locally. This is fine, you can do that. It doesn't make much sense to upload the same file again, though.
: It doesn't really matter wether a browser supports svg. The wiki renders them to png pr jpg anyway. But it can render them in a much better quality, no matter which size they will have. So, in general, SVG is always better than PNG or JPG, but not always possible.
: I think bandwith is not so much of an issue nowadays. All modern browsers support on-the-fly-compression anyway, so it will probably not make any difference at all. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:18, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Navigation ==

On the right side sucks, BIG time... 

And while I'm writing this, the table with foreign characters shows as a series of "charinsert" tags, possibly because it's missing a final '}' [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 20:52, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
:And the colour of the links, a horrible blue also stinks. Why was this change required, what was wrong with the old design? [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 22:03, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
::And 9 cm of grey screen on either side of the text on a 23" monitor is also really useful. [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 11:56, 2 October 2012 (CEST)

:I like Mikael's new design but the old Monobook one is useful indeed. So go to [[Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-rendering]] and choose MonoBook. That's what I just did, there are still some tidbits not working but I'll fix them in [[MediaWiki:Monobook.css]]. 
:Charinsert is broken because the extension doesn't work anymore with MediaWiki 1.19. Will try to fix that as well today. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] ([[User talk:Guaka|talk]]) 12:05, 2 October 2012 (CEST)

== Bug ==

All templates are out of order, because they have a "&lt;nowiki&gt;{{ #&lt;/nowiki&gt;" at their beginning in the whole wiki. -[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 09:51, 4 October 2012 (CEST)
: Thanks for noting. We know about this bug, but as far as I know, it only affect the Isin-Template? A quick Check on [[Germany]] which has a lot of templates shows me that most of them work fine. Please let us know if you know of any specific template that is broken as well --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] ([[User talk:MrTweek|talk]]) 09:58, 4 October 2012 (CEST)
: many templates which I use for the motorways are broken: {{ramp}} {{junction}} {{gas}} {{rest}} {{very good}} {{good}}, look at {{Ade|1}} --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 14:44, 8 October 2012 (CEST)

* I don't know about the templates (except IsIn) but the all the links to Trashwiki aren't in the toolbow anymore, but at the end of the page... I speak about the french version (exemple: [http://hitchwiki.org/fr/Prague], at the end of the page). For the english version, they just disappeared... Even if they are still in the editing page. --[[User:Klodreamer|Klodreamer]] ([[User talk:Klodreamer|talk]]) 18:34, 9 October 2012 (CEST)

* It seems to me, that for all pictures, which have been uploaded before October, the original files have been gone. That lead to the above problem, that my templates don't run any more. --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 17:55, 15 October 2012 (CEST)
: I just re-imported them, so most images should work again. Please let me know, if there are still a lot missing. If there are only a few missing, we can just upload them again manually. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;sup&gt;([[User_talk:MrTweek|talk]])&lt;/sup&gt; 04:32, 28 October 2012 (CET)
* I'm already missing some symbols: {{rest}} {{average}} {{bad}} {{senseless}}, the logo don't show up, in the German wiki also the template ''gut'' has no picture. --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 16:06, 3 November 2012 (CET)</text>
      <sha1>2pomoor5ztmuxg9pdh69bop18bknz2w</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>76236</id>
      <parentid>67413</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-07-27T09:12:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GeorgDerReisende</username>
        <id>1903</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="22649">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

==New colors, logo and such==
[[Image:Hitchwiki front proposal 2010 a.png|thumb|Frontpage proposal 1, by [[User:Mikael|Mikael]]|400px]]

Hello! We've been building [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org a new hitchwiki maps] and some days ago I designed [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org/raw/master/_Documents/maps_gui.png a new GUI for it]. I got an idea to bring that logo and colors also to the Hitchwiki and so far it looks like this. What do you think? If you don't like colors, at least we could use this structure? 

Hand in logo is from hitchgathering.org -logo, since it was CC-by-SA. :-) Is that okay? I also put randomroads and hitchgathering -links to the main menu.

That square light box is a hovered link.

-[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

:Where is the "Like it" Button? ;) Looks great, maybe only the color of the article count could be a bit darker, as here it looks pretty close to the background color. Or it's just my eyes that are quite bad :P The logo is cool, it's simple and says it all. Lovei t. Anyway, go for it, Mikael! --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 20:47, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
:: I love it :) If you want, just install it to [[Hitchwiki:Start Page]] --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:58, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Updated PNGs ==

I've updated a whole bunch of PNGs with versions that were generated directly from the SVG from Wikipedia (with the GIMP). Height is around 400 pixels (or less) to keep the PNGs from adding dithered colors. Resulting PNGs were optimized with [http://advsys.net/ken/utils.htm#pngout PNGOUT] 

So far I've done all flags for the countries I have visited. Flags for the additional nationalities of drivers that gave me rides will follow (in a future) [[User:Prino|Prino]] 13:28, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
: By the way, it should be possible to upload SVGs here. That way we could completely avoid any conversion problems. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:56, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The File upload page does not seem to allow .SVG, but I haven't tried it. However, you must be aware that older browsers do not support .SVG files and I'm not sure if one of the newer (aka the piece of junk from M$) ones does. Also, if I try to upload '''Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg''' I get the following message:

"# A file with this name exists already, please check File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg if you are not sure if you want to change it."

Clicking on the link will go to a page that tells me

"This file is from a shared repository and may be used by other projects. The description on its file description page there is shown below"

And it doesn't show up in [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Special:ListFiles?limit=50&amp;ilsearch=Netherlands&amp;title=Special%3AListFiles Special:ListFiles], so how does the link to [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg Wikimedia Commons] work? Another problem is of course the case-sensitivity, if I try to upload "Flag_of_'''T'''he_Netherlands.svg", the system will happily let me do so. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:46, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

: Also, I wonder what the reason is, to re-upload images in the same resolution? They look completely the same for me. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:15, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The PNGs I uploaded are exactly the same, but PNGOUT is capable of compressing them significantly better in many cases, which should save some bandwidth... Look at some of the bigger files I replaced in the changelog! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:23, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

[[File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg|150px|thumb|left|This a .SVG file]]

: Hmm, ok. First of all: Hitchwiki is linked to wikimedia commons. That means, you can just use any file uploaded to wikimedia commons here. And that is also the reason for your error message: If you upload a file, that is also uploaded to wikimedia commons, you would replace it locally. This is fine, you can do that. It doesn't make much sense to upload the same file again, though.
: It doesn't really matter wether a browser supports svg. The wiki renders them to png pr jpg anyway. But it can render them in a much better quality, no matter which size they will have. So, in general, SVG is always better than PNG or JPG, but not always possible.
: I think bandwith is not so much of an issue nowadays. All modern browsers support on-the-fly-compression anyway, so it will probably not make any difference at all. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:18, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Navigation ==

On the right side sucks, BIG time... 

And while I'm writing this, the table with foreign characters shows as a series of "charinsert" tags, possibly because it's missing a final '}' [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 20:52, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
:And the colour of the links, a horrible blue also stinks. Why was this change required, what was wrong with the old design? [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 22:03, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
::And 9 cm of grey screen on either side of the text on a 23" monitor is also really useful. [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 11:56, 2 October 2012 (CEST)

:I like Mikael's new design but the old Monobook one is useful indeed. So go to [[Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-rendering]] and choose MonoBook. That's what I just did, there are still some tidbits not working but I'll fix them in [[MediaWiki:Monobook.css]]. 
:Charinsert is broken because the extension doesn't work anymore with MediaWiki 1.19. Will try to fix that as well today. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] ([[User talk:Guaka|talk]]) 12:05, 2 October 2012 (CEST)

== Bug ==

All templates are out of order, because they have a "&lt;nowiki&gt;{{ #&lt;/nowiki&gt;" at their beginning in the whole wiki. -[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 09:51, 4 October 2012 (CEST)
: Thanks for noting. We know about this bug, but as far as I know, it only affect the Isin-Template? A quick Check on [[Germany]] which has a lot of templates shows me that most of them work fine. Please let us know if you know of any specific template that is broken as well --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] ([[User talk:MrTweek|talk]]) 09:58, 4 October 2012 (CEST)
: many templates which I use for the motorways are broken: {{ramp}} {{junction}} {{gas}} {{rest}} {{very good}} {{good}}, look at {{Ade|1}} --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 14:44, 8 October 2012 (CEST)

* I don't know about the templates (except IsIn) but the all the links to Trashwiki aren't in the toolbow anymore, but at the end of the page... I speak about the french version (exemple: [http://hitchwiki.org/fr/Prague], at the end of the page). For the english version, they just disappeared... Even if they are still in the editing page. --[[User:Klodreamer|Klodreamer]] ([[User talk:Klodreamer|talk]]) 18:34, 9 October 2012 (CEST)

* It seems to me, that for all pictures, which have been uploaded before October, the original files have been gone. That lead to the above problem, that my templates don't run any more. --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 17:55, 15 October 2012 (CEST)
: I just re-imported them, so most images should work again. Please let me know, if there are still a lot missing. If there are only a few missing, we can just upload them again manually. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;sup&gt;([[User_talk:MrTweek|talk]])&lt;/sup&gt; 04:32, 28 October 2012 (CET)
* I'm already missing some symbols: {{rest}} {{average}} {{bad}} {{senseless}}, the logo don't show up, in the German wiki also the template ''gut'' has no picture. --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 16:06, 3 November 2012 (CET)

== new bug ==

In the German part of this wiki actually I can't make edits, I always gets the answer: "Es ist ein Datenbankabfragefehler aufgetreten. Dies könnte auf einen Fehler in der Software hindeuten." --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 09:12, 27 July 2014 (UTC)</text>
      <sha1>ksfihdh3vepvq8d2ksuzs5yrxigi618</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>83851</id>
      <parentid>76236</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-07-21T21:13:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="22951">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

==New colors, logo and such==
[[Image:Hitchwiki front proposal 2010 a.png|thumb|Frontpage proposal 1, by [[User:Mikael|Mikael]]|400px]]

Hello! We've been building [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org a new hitchwiki maps] and some days ago I designed [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org/raw/master/_Documents/maps_gui.png a new GUI for it]. I got an idea to bring that logo and colors also to the Hitchwiki and so far it looks like this. What do you think? If you don't like colors, at least we could use this structure? 

Hand in logo is from hitchgathering.org -logo, since it was CC-by-SA. :-) Is that okay? I also put randomroads and hitchgathering -links to the main menu.

That square light box is a hovered link.

-[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

:Where is the "Like it" Button? ;) Looks great, maybe only the color of the article count could be a bit darker, as here it looks pretty close to the background color. Or it's just my eyes that are quite bad :P The logo is cool, it's simple and says it all. Lovei t. Anyway, go for it, Mikael! --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 20:47, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
:: I love it :) If you want, just install it to [[Hitchwiki:Start Page]] --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:58, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Updated PNGs ==

I've updated a whole bunch of PNGs with versions that were generated directly from the SVG from Wikipedia (with the GIMP). Height is around 400 pixels (or less) to keep the PNGs from adding dithered colors. Resulting PNGs were optimized with [http://advsys.net/ken/utils.htm#pngout PNGOUT] 

So far I've done all flags for the countries I have visited. Flags for the additional nationalities of drivers that gave me rides will follow (in a future) [[User:Prino|Prino]] 13:28, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
: By the way, it should be possible to upload SVGs here. That way we could completely avoid any conversion problems. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:56, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The File upload page does not seem to allow .SVG, but I haven't tried it. However, you must be aware that older browsers do not support .SVG files and I'm not sure if one of the newer (aka the piece of junk from M$) ones does. Also, if I try to upload '''Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg''' I get the following message:

"# A file with this name exists already, please check File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg if you are not sure if you want to change it."

Clicking on the link will go to a page that tells me

"This file is from a shared repository and may be used by other projects. The description on its file description page there is shown below"

And it doesn't show up in [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Special:ListFiles?limit=50&amp;ilsearch=Netherlands&amp;title=Special%3AListFiles Special:ListFiles], so how does the link to [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg Wikimedia Commons] work? Another problem is of course the case-sensitivity, if I try to upload "Flag_of_'''T'''he_Netherlands.svg", the system will happily let me do so. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:46, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

: Also, I wonder what the reason is, to re-upload images in the same resolution? They look completely the same for me. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:15, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The PNGs I uploaded are exactly the same, but PNGOUT is capable of compressing them significantly better in many cases, which should save some bandwidth... Look at some of the bigger files I replaced in the changelog! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:23, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

[[File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg|150px|thumb|left|This a .SVG file]]

: Hmm, ok. First of all: Hitchwiki is linked to wikimedia commons. That means, you can just use any file uploaded to wikimedia commons here. And that is also the reason for your error message: If you upload a file, that is also uploaded to wikimedia commons, you would replace it locally. This is fine, you can do that. It doesn't make much sense to upload the same file again, though.
: It doesn't really matter wether a browser supports svg. The wiki renders them to png pr jpg anyway. But it can render them in a much better quality, no matter which size they will have. So, in general, SVG is always better than PNG or JPG, but not always possible.
: I think bandwith is not so much of an issue nowadays. All modern browsers support on-the-fly-compression anyway, so it will probably not make any difference at all. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:18, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Navigation ==

On the right side sucks, BIG time... 

And while I'm writing this, the table with foreign characters shows as a series of "charinsert" tags, possibly because it's missing a final '}' [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 20:52, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
:And the colour of the links, a horrible blue also stinks. Why was this change required, what was wrong with the old design? [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 22:03, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
::And 9 cm of grey screen on either side of the text on a 23" monitor is also really useful. [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 11:56, 2 October 2012 (CEST)

:I like Mikael's new design but the old Monobook one is useful indeed. So go to [[Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-rendering]] and choose MonoBook. That's what I just did, there are still some tidbits not working but I'll fix them in [[MediaWiki:Monobook.css]]. 
:Charinsert is broken because the extension doesn't work anymore with MediaWiki 1.19. Will try to fix that as well today. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] ([[User talk:Guaka|talk]]) 12:05, 2 October 2012 (CEST)

== Bug ==

All templates are out of order, because they have a "&lt;nowiki&gt;{{ #&lt;/nowiki&gt;" at their beginning in the whole wiki. -[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 09:51, 4 October 2012 (CEST)
: Thanks for noting. We know about this bug, but as far as I know, it only affect the Isin-Template? A quick Check on [[Germany]] which has a lot of templates shows me that most of them work fine. Please let us know if you know of any specific template that is broken as well --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] ([[User talk:MrTweek|talk]]) 09:58, 4 October 2012 (CEST)
: many templates which I use for the motorways are broken: {{ramp}} {{junction}} {{gas}} {{rest}} {{very good}} {{good}}, look at {{Ade|1}} --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 14:44, 8 October 2012 (CEST)

* I don't know about the templates (except IsIn) but the all the links to Trashwiki aren't in the toolbow anymore, but at the end of the page... I speak about the french version (exemple: [http://hitchwiki.org/fr/Prague], at the end of the page). For the english version, they just disappeared... Even if they are still in the editing page. --[[User:Klodreamer|Klodreamer]] ([[User talk:Klodreamer|talk]]) 18:34, 9 October 2012 (CEST)

* It seems to me, that for all pictures, which have been uploaded before October, the original files have been gone. That lead to the above problem, that my templates don't run any more. --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 17:55, 15 October 2012 (CEST)
: I just re-imported them, so most images should work again. Please let me know, if there are still a lot missing. If there are only a few missing, we can just upload them again manually. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;sup&gt;([[User_talk:MrTweek|talk]])&lt;/sup&gt; 04:32, 28 October 2012 (CET)
* I'm already missing some symbols: {{rest}} {{average}} {{bad}} {{senseless}}, the logo don't show up, in the German wiki also the template ''gut'' has no picture. --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 16:06, 3 November 2012 (CET)

== new bug ==

In the German part of this wiki actually I can't make edits, I always gets the answer: "Es ist ein Datenbankabfragefehler aufgetreten. Dies könnte auf einen Fehler in der Software hindeuten." --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 09:12, 27 July 2014 (UTC)

== Trustroots advertisement ==

In my opinion the advertisement for Trustroots does not need to be here for years, mainly because Hitchwiki could (should!) behave like a proper commercial free and independent wiki. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] ([[User talk:Fverhart|talk]]) 23:13, 21 July 2016 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>sqaw7aslhan1hb3edlte2mmovc807kn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>83852</id>
      <parentid>83851</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-07-21T21:15:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="23030">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

==New colors, logo and such==
[[Image:Hitchwiki front proposal 2010 a.png|thumb|Frontpage proposal 1, by [[User:Mikael|Mikael]]|400px]]

Hello! We've been building [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org a new hitchwiki maps] and some days ago I designed [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org/raw/master/_Documents/maps_gui.png a new GUI for it]. I got an idea to bring that logo and colors also to the Hitchwiki and so far it looks like this. What do you think? If you don't like colors, at least we could use this structure? 

Hand in logo is from hitchgathering.org -logo, since it was CC-by-SA. :-) Is that okay? I also put randomroads and hitchgathering -links to the main menu.

That square light box is a hovered link.

-[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

:Where is the "Like it" Button? ;) Looks great, maybe only the color of the article count could be a bit darker, as here it looks pretty close to the background color. Or it's just my eyes that are quite bad :P The logo is cool, it's simple and says it all. Lovei t. Anyway, go for it, Mikael! --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 20:47, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
:: I love it :) If you want, just install it to [[Hitchwiki:Start Page]] --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:58, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Updated PNGs ==

I've updated a whole bunch of PNGs with versions that were generated directly from the SVG from Wikipedia (with the GIMP). Height is around 400 pixels (or less) to keep the PNGs from adding dithered colors. Resulting PNGs were optimized with [http://advsys.net/ken/utils.htm#pngout PNGOUT] 

So far I've done all flags for the countries I have visited. Flags for the additional nationalities of drivers that gave me rides will follow (in a future) [[User:Prino|Prino]] 13:28, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
: By the way, it should be possible to upload SVGs here. That way we could completely avoid any conversion problems. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:56, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The File upload page does not seem to allow .SVG, but I haven't tried it. However, you must be aware that older browsers do not support .SVG files and I'm not sure if one of the newer (aka the piece of junk from M$) ones does. Also, if I try to upload '''Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg''' I get the following message:

"# A file with this name exists already, please check File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg if you are not sure if you want to change it."

Clicking on the link will go to a page that tells me

"This file is from a shared repository and may be used by other projects. The description on its file description page there is shown below"

And it doesn't show up in [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Special:ListFiles?limit=50&amp;ilsearch=Netherlands&amp;title=Special%3AListFiles Special:ListFiles], so how does the link to [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg Wikimedia Commons] work? Another problem is of course the case-sensitivity, if I try to upload "Flag_of_'''T'''he_Netherlands.svg", the system will happily let me do so. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:46, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

: Also, I wonder what the reason is, to re-upload images in the same resolution? They look completely the same for me. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:15, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The PNGs I uploaded are exactly the same, but PNGOUT is capable of compressing them significantly better in many cases, which should save some bandwidth... Look at some of the bigger files I replaced in the changelog! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:23, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

[[File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg|150px|thumb|left|This a .SVG file]]

: Hmm, ok. First of all: Hitchwiki is linked to wikimedia commons. That means, you can just use any file uploaded to wikimedia commons here. And that is also the reason for your error message: If you upload a file, that is also uploaded to wikimedia commons, you would replace it locally. This is fine, you can do that. It doesn't make much sense to upload the same file again, though.
: It doesn't really matter wether a browser supports svg. The wiki renders them to png pr jpg anyway. But it can render them in a much better quality, no matter which size they will have. So, in general, SVG is always better than PNG or JPG, but not always possible.
: I think bandwith is not so much of an issue nowadays. All modern browsers support on-the-fly-compression anyway, so it will probably not make any difference at all. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:18, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Navigation ==

On the right side sucks, BIG time... 

And while I'm writing this, the table with foreign characters shows as a series of "charinsert" tags, possibly because it's missing a final '}' [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 20:52, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
:And the colour of the links, a horrible blue also stinks. Why was this change required, what was wrong with the old design? [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 22:03, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
::And 9 cm of grey screen on either side of the text on a 23" monitor is also really useful. [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 11:56, 2 October 2012 (CEST)

:I like Mikael's new design but the old Monobook one is useful indeed. So go to [[Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-rendering]] and choose MonoBook. That's what I just did, there are still some tidbits not working but I'll fix them in [[MediaWiki:Monobook.css]]. 
:Charinsert is broken because the extension doesn't work anymore with MediaWiki 1.19. Will try to fix that as well today. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] ([[User talk:Guaka|talk]]) 12:05, 2 October 2012 (CEST)

== Bug ==

All templates are out of order, because they have a "&lt;nowiki&gt;{{ #&lt;/nowiki&gt;" at their beginning in the whole wiki. -[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 09:51, 4 October 2012 (CEST)
: Thanks for noting. We know about this bug, but as far as I know, it only affect the Isin-Template? A quick Check on [[Germany]] which has a lot of templates shows me that most of them work fine. Please let us know if you know of any specific template that is broken as well --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] ([[User talk:MrTweek|talk]]) 09:58, 4 October 2012 (CEST)
: many templates which I use for the motorways are broken: {{ramp}} {{junction}} {{gas}} {{rest}} {{very good}} {{good}}, look at {{Ade|1}} --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 14:44, 8 October 2012 (CEST)

* I don't know about the templates (except IsIn) but the all the links to Trashwiki aren't in the toolbow anymore, but at the end of the page... I speak about the french version (exemple: [http://hitchwiki.org/fr/Prague], at the end of the page). For the english version, they just disappeared... Even if they are still in the editing page. --[[User:Klodreamer|Klodreamer]] ([[User talk:Klodreamer|talk]]) 18:34, 9 October 2012 (CEST)

* It seems to me, that for all pictures, which have been uploaded before October, the original files have been gone. That lead to the above problem, that my templates don't run any more. --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 17:55, 15 October 2012 (CEST)
: I just re-imported them, so most images should work again. Please let me know, if there are still a lot missing. If there are only a few missing, we can just upload them again manually. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;sup&gt;([[User_talk:MrTweek|talk]])&lt;/sup&gt; 04:32, 28 October 2012 (CET)
* I'm already missing some symbols: {{rest}} {{average}} {{bad}} {{senseless}}, the logo don't show up, in the German wiki also the template ''gut'' has no picture. --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 16:06, 3 November 2012 (CET)

== new bug ==

In the German part of this wiki actually I can't make edits, I always gets the answer: "Es ist ein Datenbankabfragefehler aufgetreten. Dies könnte auf einen Fehler in der Software hindeuten." --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 09:12, 27 July 2014 (UTC)

== Trustroots advertisement ==

In my opinion the advertisement for Trustroots does not need to be here for years, mainly because Hitchwiki could (should!) behave like a proper commercial free, independent wiki, without its own agenda. The advertisement can repel potential users on Hitchwiki. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] ([[User talk:Fverhart|talk]]) 23:13, 21 July 2016 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>6d9bbxwugb7hu2h4t10w7bchzouwg03</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>83853</id>
      <parentid>83852</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-07-21T21:16:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="23150">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

==New colors, logo and such==
[[Image:Hitchwiki front proposal 2010 a.png|thumb|Frontpage proposal 1, by [[User:Mikael|Mikael]]|400px]]

Hello! We've been building [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org a new hitchwiki maps] and some days ago I designed [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org/raw/master/_Documents/maps_gui.png a new GUI for it]. I got an idea to bring that logo and colors also to the Hitchwiki and so far it looks like this. What do you think? If you don't like colors, at least we could use this structure? 

Hand in logo is from hitchgathering.org -logo, since it was CC-by-SA. :-) Is that okay? I also put randomroads and hitchgathering -links to the main menu.

That square light box is a hovered link.

-[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

:Where is the "Like it" Button? ;) Looks great, maybe only the color of the article count could be a bit darker, as here it looks pretty close to the background color. Or it's just my eyes that are quite bad :P The logo is cool, it's simple and says it all. Lovei t. Anyway, go for it, Mikael! --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 20:47, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
:: I love it :) If you want, just install it to [[Hitchwiki:Start Page]] --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:58, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Updated PNGs ==

I've updated a whole bunch of PNGs with versions that were generated directly from the SVG from Wikipedia (with the GIMP). Height is around 400 pixels (or less) to keep the PNGs from adding dithered colors. Resulting PNGs were optimized with [http://advsys.net/ken/utils.htm#pngout PNGOUT] 

So far I've done all flags for the countries I have visited. Flags for the additional nationalities of drivers that gave me rides will follow (in a future) [[User:Prino|Prino]] 13:28, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
: By the way, it should be possible to upload SVGs here. That way we could completely avoid any conversion problems. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:56, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The File upload page does not seem to allow .SVG, but I haven't tried it. However, you must be aware that older browsers do not support .SVG files and I'm not sure if one of the newer (aka the piece of junk from M$) ones does. Also, if I try to upload '''Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg''' I get the following message:

"# A file with this name exists already, please check File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg if you are not sure if you want to change it."

Clicking on the link will go to a page that tells me

"This file is from a shared repository and may be used by other projects. The description on its file description page there is shown below"

And it doesn't show up in [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Special:ListFiles?limit=50&amp;ilsearch=Netherlands&amp;title=Special%3AListFiles Special:ListFiles], so how does the link to [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg Wikimedia Commons] work? Another problem is of course the case-sensitivity, if I try to upload "Flag_of_'''T'''he_Netherlands.svg", the system will happily let me do so. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:46, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

: Also, I wonder what the reason is, to re-upload images in the same resolution? They look completely the same for me. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:15, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The PNGs I uploaded are exactly the same, but PNGOUT is capable of compressing them significantly better in many cases, which should save some bandwidth... Look at some of the bigger files I replaced in the changelog! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:23, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

[[File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg|150px|thumb|left|This a .SVG file]]

: Hmm, ok. First of all: Hitchwiki is linked to wikimedia commons. That means, you can just use any file uploaded to wikimedia commons here. And that is also the reason for your error message: If you upload a file, that is also uploaded to wikimedia commons, you would replace it locally. This is fine, you can do that. It doesn't make much sense to upload the same file again, though.
: It doesn't really matter wether a browser supports svg. The wiki renders them to png pr jpg anyway. But it can render them in a much better quality, no matter which size they will have. So, in general, SVG is always better than PNG or JPG, but not always possible.
: I think bandwith is not so much of an issue nowadays. All modern browsers support on-the-fly-compression anyway, so it will probably not make any difference at all. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:18, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Navigation ==

On the right side sucks, BIG time... 

And while I'm writing this, the table with foreign characters shows as a series of "charinsert" tags, possibly because it's missing a final '}' [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 20:52, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
:And the colour of the links, a horrible blue also stinks. Why was this change required, what was wrong with the old design? [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 22:03, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
::And 9 cm of grey screen on either side of the text on a 23" monitor is also really useful. [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 11:56, 2 October 2012 (CEST)

:I like Mikael's new design but the old Monobook one is useful indeed. So go to [[Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-rendering]] and choose MonoBook. That's what I just did, there are still some tidbits not working but I'll fix them in [[MediaWiki:Monobook.css]]. 
:Charinsert is broken because the extension doesn't work anymore with MediaWiki 1.19. Will try to fix that as well today. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] ([[User talk:Guaka|talk]]) 12:05, 2 October 2012 (CEST)

== Bug ==

All templates are out of order, because they have a "&lt;nowiki&gt;{{ #&lt;/nowiki&gt;" at their beginning in the whole wiki. -[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 09:51, 4 October 2012 (CEST)
: Thanks for noting. We know about this bug, but as far as I know, it only affect the Isin-Template? A quick Check on [[Germany]] which has a lot of templates shows me that most of them work fine. Please let us know if you know of any specific template that is broken as well --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] ([[User talk:MrTweek|talk]]) 09:58, 4 October 2012 (CEST)
: many templates which I use for the motorways are broken: {{ramp}} {{junction}} {{gas}} {{rest}} {{very good}} {{good}}, look at {{Ade|1}} --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 14:44, 8 October 2012 (CEST)

* I don't know about the templates (except IsIn) but the all the links to Trashwiki aren't in the toolbow anymore, but at the end of the page... I speak about the french version (exemple: [http://hitchwiki.org/fr/Prague], at the end of the page). For the english version, they just disappeared... Even if they are still in the editing page. --[[User:Klodreamer|Klodreamer]] ([[User talk:Klodreamer|talk]]) 18:34, 9 October 2012 (CEST)

* It seems to me, that for all pictures, which have been uploaded before October, the original files have been gone. That lead to the above problem, that my templates don't run any more. --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 17:55, 15 October 2012 (CEST)
: I just re-imported them, so most images should work again. Please let me know, if there are still a lot missing. If there are only a few missing, we can just upload them again manually. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;sup&gt;([[User_talk:MrTweek|talk]])&lt;/sup&gt; 04:32, 28 October 2012 (CET)
* I'm already missing some symbols: {{rest}} {{average}} {{bad}} {{senseless}}, the logo don't show up, in the German wiki also the template ''gut'' has no picture. --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 16:06, 3 November 2012 (CET)

== new bug ==

In the German part of this wiki actually I can't make edits, I always gets the answer: "Es ist ein Datenbankabfragefehler aufgetreten. Dies könnte auf einen Fehler in der Software hindeuten." --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 09:12, 27 July 2014 (UTC)

== Trustroots advertisement ==

In my opinion the advertisement for Trustroots does not need to be here for years, mainly because Hitchwiki could (should!) behave like a proper commercial free, independent wiki, without its own agenda. The advertisement can repel potential users on Hitchwiki. Online hospex is not the same as hitch-hiking either and certainly not all hitch-hikers are interested in such service. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] ([[User talk:Fverhart|talk]]) 23:13, 21 July 2016 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>117yww6o7u29sqjx1zu6urx9qvgwgyl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>83854</id>
      <parentid>83853</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-07-21T21:18:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fverhart</username>
        <id>79</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="23152">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

==New colors, logo and such==
[[Image:Hitchwiki front proposal 2010 a.png|thumb|Frontpage proposal 1, by [[User:Mikael|Mikael]]|400px]]

Hello! We've been building [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org a new hitchwiki maps] and some days ago I designed [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org/raw/master/_Documents/maps_gui.png a new GUI for it]. I got an idea to bring that logo and colors also to the Hitchwiki and so far it looks like this. What do you think? If you don't like colors, at least we could use this structure? 

Hand in logo is from hitchgathering.org -logo, since it was CC-by-SA. :-) Is that okay? I also put randomroads and hitchgathering -links to the main menu.

That square light box is a hovered link.

-[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

:Where is the "Like it" Button? ;) Looks great, maybe only the color of the article count could be a bit darker, as here it looks pretty close to the background color. Or it's just my eyes that are quite bad :P The logo is cool, it's simple and says it all. Lovei t. Anyway, go for it, Mikael! --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 20:47, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
:: I love it :) If you want, just install it to [[Hitchwiki:Start Page]] --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:58, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Updated PNGs ==

I've updated a whole bunch of PNGs with versions that were generated directly from the SVG from Wikipedia (with the GIMP). Height is around 400 pixels (or less) to keep the PNGs from adding dithered colors. Resulting PNGs were optimized with [http://advsys.net/ken/utils.htm#pngout PNGOUT] 

So far I've done all flags for the countries I have visited. Flags for the additional nationalities of drivers that gave me rides will follow (in a future) [[User:Prino|Prino]] 13:28, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
: By the way, it should be possible to upload SVGs here. That way we could completely avoid any conversion problems. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:56, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The File upload page does not seem to allow .SVG, but I haven't tried it. However, you must be aware that older browsers do not support .SVG files and I'm not sure if one of the newer (aka the piece of junk from M$) ones does. Also, if I try to upload '''Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg''' I get the following message:

"# A file with this name exists already, please check File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg if you are not sure if you want to change it."

Clicking on the link will go to a page that tells me

"This file is from a shared repository and may be used by other projects. The description on its file description page there is shown below"

And it doesn't show up in [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Special:ListFiles?limit=50&amp;ilsearch=Netherlands&amp;title=Special%3AListFiles Special:ListFiles], so how does the link to [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg Wikimedia Commons] work? Another problem is of course the case-sensitivity, if I try to upload "Flag_of_'''T'''he_Netherlands.svg", the system will happily let me do so. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:46, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

: Also, I wonder what the reason is, to re-upload images in the same resolution? They look completely the same for me. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:15, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The PNGs I uploaded are exactly the same, but PNGOUT is capable of compressing them significantly better in many cases, which should save some bandwidth... Look at some of the bigger files I replaced in the changelog! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:23, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

[[File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg|150px|thumb|left|This a .SVG file]]

: Hmm, ok. First of all: Hitchwiki is linked to wikimedia commons. That means, you can just use any file uploaded to wikimedia commons here. And that is also the reason for your error message: If you upload a file, that is also uploaded to wikimedia commons, you would replace it locally. This is fine, you can do that. It doesn't make much sense to upload the same file again, though.
: It doesn't really matter wether a browser supports svg. The wiki renders them to png pr jpg anyway. But it can render them in a much better quality, no matter which size they will have. So, in general, SVG is always better than PNG or JPG, but not always possible.
: I think bandwith is not so much of an issue nowadays. All modern browsers support on-the-fly-compression anyway, so it will probably not make any difference at all. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:18, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Navigation ==

On the right side sucks, BIG time... 

And while I'm writing this, the table with foreign characters shows as a series of "charinsert" tags, possibly because it's missing a final '}' [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 20:52, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
:And the colour of the links, a horrible blue also stinks. Why was this change required, what was wrong with the old design? [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 22:03, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
::And 9 cm of grey screen on either side of the text on a 23" monitor is also really useful. [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 11:56, 2 October 2012 (CEST)

:I like Mikael's new design but the old Monobook one is useful indeed. So go to [[Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-rendering]] and choose MonoBook. That's what I just did, there are still some tidbits not working but I'll fix them in [[MediaWiki:Monobook.css]]. 
:Charinsert is broken because the extension doesn't work anymore with MediaWiki 1.19. Will try to fix that as well today. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] ([[User talk:Guaka|talk]]) 12:05, 2 October 2012 (CEST)

== Bug ==

All templates are out of order, because they have a "&lt;nowiki&gt;{{ #&lt;/nowiki&gt;" at their beginning in the whole wiki. -[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 09:51, 4 October 2012 (CEST)
: Thanks for noting. We know about this bug, but as far as I know, it only affect the Isin-Template? A quick Check on [[Germany]] which has a lot of templates shows me that most of them work fine. Please let us know if you know of any specific template that is broken as well --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] ([[User talk:MrTweek|talk]]) 09:58, 4 October 2012 (CEST)
: many templates which I use for the motorways are broken: {{ramp}} {{junction}} {{gas}} {{rest}} {{very good}} {{good}}, look at {{Ade|1}} --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 14:44, 8 October 2012 (CEST)

* I don't know about the templates (except IsIn) but the all the links to Trashwiki aren't in the toolbow anymore, but at the end of the page... I speak about the french version (exemple: [http://hitchwiki.org/fr/Prague], at the end of the page). For the english version, they just disappeared... Even if they are still in the editing page. --[[User:Klodreamer|Klodreamer]] ([[User talk:Klodreamer|talk]]) 18:34, 9 October 2012 (CEST)

* It seems to me, that for all pictures, which have been uploaded before October, the original files have been gone. That lead to the above problem, that my templates don't run any more. --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 17:55, 15 October 2012 (CEST)
: I just re-imported them, so most images should work again. Please let me know, if there are still a lot missing. If there are only a few missing, we can just upload them again manually. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;sup&gt;([[User_talk:MrTweek|talk]])&lt;/sup&gt; 04:32, 28 October 2012 (CET)
* I'm already missing some symbols: {{rest}} {{average}} {{bad}} {{senseless}}, the logo don't show up, in the German wiki also the template ''gut'' has no picture. --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 16:06, 3 November 2012 (CET)

== new bug ==

In the German part of this wiki actually I can't make edits, I always gets the answer: "Es ist ein Datenbankabfragefehler aufgetreten. Dies könnte auf einen Fehler in der Software hindeuten." --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 09:12, 27 July 2014 (UTC)

== Trustroots advertisement ==

In my opinion the advertisement for Trustroots does not need to be here for years, mainly because Hitchwiki could (should!) behave like a proper commercial free, independent wiki, without its own agenda. The advertisement can repel potential users from Hitchwiki. Online hospex is not the same as hitch-hiking either and certainly not all hitch-hikers are interested in such service. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] ([[User talk:Fverhart|talk]]) 23:13, 21 July 2016 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>13wmihbb3mut2kyocuelxx52ffvtgaa</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>84854</id>
      <parentid>83854</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-11-15T10:38:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Looking for Stu</username>
        <id>5632</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="23313">:: Archive of '''Talk:Main Page''': [[Talk:Main Page/05-07|2005-2007]]
:: ''Our [[Community Portal]] is a more appropriate place for questions, comments and discussions that are not directly related to the Main Page.''
----
== To new members ==
Please make your first contribution your own 'user' profile! This will stop showing your name in red and it will give your contributions more validity. 

Also, if you are not a native speaker of a language, it might be worthwhile to access hitchwiki.org using Firefox and download the dictionary from [https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3 Mozilla] for the language in which you are writing your contribution, so that you can spell-check what you're typing. If you're editing the English language wiki, I'd suggest to use US spelling, but feel free to voice your objections. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 20:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

== New Advise Article ==
It could be useful to take the article advice written on the [[Canada]] page about '''Winter Hitch-hiking''' hazard and maybe some other countries are having some too. They could be grouped together on this same page for all Winter Hazardous country or regions: [[Russia]], [[Scandinavia]], [[Iceland]], [[Canada]], [[Alaska]] ... [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 01:54, 19 January 2008 (CET)
::With some regions of Canada having marked way beneath the -50 Celsius on the thermometer last month, if someone knows where to set such page, the already existing info is on the [[Canada]] page, it is most likely needed. [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 03:16, 4 March 2008 (CET)


== Bug?? ==
When linking from other sites or typing on the address bar, I often get sent to a ''double'' of the page with a capital letter, which looks like the following: http://hitchwiki.org/en/Http://hitchwiki.org/index.php
Anyone has an idea why? It seems to always do that if we link hitchwiki city page on the CS wiki travel page. It is done on every page from cswiki [[User:Maplefanta|Maplefanta]] 05:10, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

:It's because of the intricacies of &lt;tt&gt;.htaccess&lt;/tt&gt;.  The CS wiki is linking to e.g. http://www.hitchwiki.org/Paris.
:So I checked [http://davidwalsh.name/no-www-using-htaccess-file some stuff] and hopefully it's all working fine now.  Let me know if you encounter any weird redirect errors. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 18:40, 30 May 2009 (UTC)


==Logo update==
:''moved to [[project:Logo update]]''

== Mainpage ==
I just took the old news out of the mainpage news template. Now there is quite some free space. However, I think it is good to keep the mainpage simple and not too overloaded (and also keep in future just the last 10 site news entries). Any suggestions about what could be added there or how the page could be reordered? I would suggest to move the picture of the now to the left column and also put there a field with the most important content with a symbol (e.g. general info Top Tips, Where, Safety, Signs, First time, Picking up hitchhikers, country info). Maybe one of the design and graphic program gifted people could make some icons for this... It might also be worth to think about which content is important for new people (e.g. move the site news - what is normally for the more frequent users - to the right bottom side... --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 19:28, 23 July 2008 (CEST)

:: I would also suggest to fix the ''edit'' buttons in the top box. Looks quite annoying and I guess that this box anyway doesn't need much editing, so maybe we should set it to ''admin edit only''. News, pics, events etc. then can still be edited through the templates, of course. [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt;

::: agree, doesn't make much sense since these boxes are not much edited in the first place and as you say, the other boxes can still be edited by anyone through the templates --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

: wanted to propose to rearrange the boxes, one for wiki-news, one for general news, one for events, one for stories (upcoming), and one for 3 (through rss) most recent (planet) blogs. I think the general news should be on top (left), then events, then stories. On the right (help and then wiki-news) or something similar --[[User:Robino|Robino]] 12:45, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

::Sounds good. Feel free to play around on [[User:Platschi/Spielwiese]], used that page last time for editing ideas of the main page. Let's see how we can make it much better :) [[User:platschi|platschi]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://blogs.hitchwiki.org/platschi site], [[user talk:platschi|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 12:54, 18 August 2008 (CEST)

== Language of  place name ==

Can we set some standards for place names? An example, what to use for Brugge (I just bumped into it)? It's now to be found under [[Bruges]], which I think is wrong. Cities should be put under the name they are known in the country they are and if necessary there can be a redirection page for foreign-language versions of the name.
:I think we already had that discussion a long time ago, and agreed to use the English names, wherever they are common. This seemed most logical for an English-speaking wiki. In general, we try to stick to wikipedia's standards for that. I think it's not so much of an issue, because we always try to set redirects for all possible languages, so everyone will always find what one's looking for. (Although we are not really consequent, like at [[Köln]]). But Bruges seems to be the English name for Brugge. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:30, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
::Missed that discussion, probably before I joined, but my eur 0.02? You do it consistently or you keep the original name, you don't mix the two! --[[User:Prino|Prino]] 22:57, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
:::Yeah, we should really clean that up. But I think it's only about 5 articles maximum --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 00:00, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
::My €0,02; I agree with MrTweek, but it seems logical to me that the native name should be listed, perhaps in the city infobox. I tried to enable that yesterday, but I didn't get it right, so I didn't go ahead with it.[[User:Clint.hotvedt|clint.hotvedt]] 12:53, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

== Economic crisis &amp; hitchhiking ==

Just wondering about the desirability to work out the economic aspect of hitchhiking. Wechner indicated finance as one the four main motivations for hitchhiking, the other one being adventure, environment and social sharing [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/Article/?03]. The incentive to this question at the moment is mainly the current economic crisis that is in execution among banks, governments, public and business that in all likeliness will last for many many years to come, mostly in Northern America and Europe. Following the recent news there seems to be already some reason to be concerned (which applies mostly to people who are in debt). In other words - would economic recession / depression increase again the number of hitchhikers, which in the US and Europe basicly ''used to be'' in decline since the 1980s. Will hitchhiking in the US and EU increase and popularize due to increasing poverty in the coming ten to twenty years? Such macro economic developments are fascinating. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] 15:49, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

:Let's start an article about this!  Not yet sure about the name, but [[economy]] will do :) [[Special:Contributions/212.143.159.96|212.143.159.96]] 20:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

== Frontpage is evolving ==
Good! Frontpage is going trough changes at the very begining of the 2009. :-) Should "Basics" and "Places" be more bigger and first in line, when reader starts from top-left -corner? I can try to visualize my idea when i have more time. Icons are great spice to bring some colours, maybe they should be bigger? -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 21:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

: Haha, I had exactly the same idea this morning :) You are welcome to tweak the site a bit. Oh, and if you are in IRC, you might want to drop by in #hitchhiking@freenode ;) --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 22:53, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

::Actually i came out with [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|these rather big changes]]. :-) Comments? I didn't test it with IE's yet (i'm working with OSX). Design is really close to the [http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Etusivu fi.wikipedia -frontpage]. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 01:07, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
:::Yeah man, I love it :) I can test it in IE tomorrow. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 15:20, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

: About compatibility: With Firefox 3.0.3 it looks great, with IE7 the fonts look weird, also the top ''Hitchwiki'' text is somehow cut below, so only 3/4 of the text is visible. All other boxes are okay, though. Will test with Safari Browser later. --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 16:56, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
:: Here it works perfect in Safari. In IE7, the right border of the boxes is missing. All content is visible, so only a minor issue. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 17:00, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::Hi! Great to see it in action. :-) I tested it in Safari 3.21 under OSX - works great. I also tweaked a inline CSS of the H1-element ("Hitchwiki"-title). Can somebody test it in IE6 and 7? I think clipping problem was commong line-height -bug in IE. I'll do some additional testing at office tomorrow. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

::: Looks goog in Google Chrome except that left boxes are sqeezed a bit which creates 2,5 cm empty space under the Pictures of the Moment. --[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] 10:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

::The left column is too small on the 9" screen of my Acer Aspire One.  I've tried playing a bit with the width but I didn't quickly manage to fix it. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 10:51, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
::: I have the same 'problem'. Also I would find it cool to have pictures on the screen without scrolling and also have the links to different hitchhikers available... this makes the wiki more personal. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 11:01, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

::: I added "min-width" -attribute to the left column. It's not working with IE5-6, but what the heck. ;-) Another thing would be taking 4th picture out from the gallery, so right column could shrink smaller with small resolutions. I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default, but how about show/hide -stylish box? Maybe under "Also on Hitchwiki". -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

:::: 'I wouldn't add list of hitchhikers visible by default' - Why not? Because there are not all contributers? Not a big thing in my opinion, not everybody wants to be linked there and it could be named accordingly. I can't think of any other reasons... but I am curious to get to know some more views on this. My point is that it gives a more personal touch to the technical wiki, it is about real people (as somebody also stated in why he works for Hitchwiki). Arguments around this more personal touch of Hitchwiki are welcomed too. --[[User:Alex|Alex]] 04:23, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I think this wiki is quite personal already with or without hichhikres-list. My top reason was to prevent main page to grow too heavy with lot's of text/link mass, though i'd also like to see some quick way to browse active hitchwiki-users. -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::::: I [[User:Mikael/Main_Page_09_a|tested]] to float gallery to the right, but it's not working with smaller (under 1200px width) resolutions. :-/ With 24" It's looking great. :-D -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

::On Win ME (yes, ppl still seem to use it) with Firefox 2.0 and 1024x768 Screen the two boxes (Places/Basics) are pretty narrow. Changing min-width doesn't help. In IE6 the site looks horrible, but who is using IE6 anyway? Maybe we should add an "Best seen with firefox" whatever button the the Start Page?--[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 14:59, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

:The '''News''' and '''Events''' boxes don't adapt themselves to the screenwidth, which is extremely annoying! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 00:28, 25 January 2009 (UTC)

: I did some editing for the CSS and tested it with IE 5.5-7 under Windows XP. These worked as well: safari 3 (win/mac), firefox 3 (win/mac), opera 9.6 (win/mac). With IE6 and under png-transparengy doesn't work (''needs JS-hack or background-color added to the images''), first box doesn't have top-margin and it's contents had too big line-height. These are not minor problems. I also took 4rd PotM-image away, so page should now scale better with small screens (like tiny 9" computers). -[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

:Maybe it would be better to show less news entries on the startpage? So the event box would be visible on the first sight on smaller screens. Upcoming events should catch more interest than 4 month old news, or? --[[User:Globetrotter tt|Globetrotter tt]] 08:15, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Just reduced the news-items to three, as the previous ones were outdated anyway. Better now on smaller screens :-) ? --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

:Could anyone able give some help to clean up the design of the frontpage of the French version of Hitchwiki? I'm not very used to this kind of job, but I find it awful compared to the English one. Thanks! --[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 12:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

:@[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] it's on my todo list --[[User:Xo|xo]] 02:31, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

==search-field==

I don't know if somebody already suggested it, but is it possible to move the search-field more up!? I think it's the most used field on the main page and should be directly under the hitchwiki-picture. Especially for smaller monitors, eg netbooks, you have to scroll down to reach it ;-) --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 13:53, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

:I'm okay with it.  What do other people think?  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] 23:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

::good idea!  --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 09:23, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
::I agree with the idea, and I would even suggest to make the field a bit larger.--[[User:Grégoire|Grégoire]] 09:27, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

:Hey, is it possible to move it up some time? I mean, I don't know much about the construction and whether it's hard to do so, maybe we just forgot about it? --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 11:51, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
:: Yes, we forgot. Or rather: nobody felt responsible for doing it. I did it now. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 11:28, 5 March 2010 (UTC)
::: Thanks a lot, I really do like it! --[[User:jeensg|jeensg]] 22:06, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

==New colors, logo and such==
[[Image:Hitchwiki front proposal 2010 a.png|thumb|Frontpage proposal 1, by [[User:Mikael|Mikael]]|400px]]

Hello! We've been building [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org a new hitchwiki maps] and some days ago I designed [http://github.com/MrTweek/maps.hitchwiki.org/raw/master/_Documents/maps_gui.png a new GUI for it]. I got an idea to bring that logo and colors also to the Hitchwiki and so far it looks like this. What do you think? If you don't like colors, at least we could use this structure? 

Hand in logo is from hitchgathering.org -logo, since it was CC-by-SA. :-) Is that okay? I also put randomroads and hitchgathering -links to the main menu.

That square light box is a hovered link.

-[[User:Mikael|Mikael]] 17:35, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

:Where is the "Like it" Button? ;) Looks great, maybe only the color of the article count could be a bit darker, as here it looks pretty close to the background color. Or it's just my eyes that are quite bad :P The logo is cool, it's simple and says it all. Lovei t. Anyway, go for it, Mikael! --[[User:Platschi|Platschi]] 20:47, 31 May 2010 (UTC)
:: I love it :) If you want, just install it to [[Hitchwiki:Start Page]] --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:58, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Updated PNGs ==

I've updated a whole bunch of PNGs with versions that were generated directly from the SVG from Wikipedia (with the GIMP). Height is around 400 pixels (or less) to keep the PNGs from adding dithered colors. Resulting PNGs were optimized with [http://advsys.net/ken/utils.htm#pngout PNGOUT] 

So far I've done all flags for the countries I have visited. Flags for the additional nationalities of drivers that gave me rides will follow (in a future) [[User:Prino|Prino]] 13:28, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
: By the way, it should be possible to upload SVGs here. That way we could completely avoid any conversion problems. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 13:56, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The File upload page does not seem to allow .SVG, but I haven't tried it. However, you must be aware that older browsers do not support .SVG files and I'm not sure if one of the newer (aka the piece of junk from M$) ones does. Also, if I try to upload '''Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg''' I get the following message:

"# A file with this name exists already, please check File:Flag of the Netherlands.svg if you are not sure if you want to change it."

Clicking on the link will go to a page that tells me

"This file is from a shared repository and may be used by other projects. The description on its file description page there is shown below"

And it doesn't show up in [http://hitchwiki.org/en/Special:ListFiles?limit=50&amp;ilsearch=Netherlands&amp;title=Special%3AListFiles Special:ListFiles], so how does the link to [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg Wikimedia Commons] work? Another problem is of course the case-sensitivity, if I try to upload "Flag_of_'''T'''he_Netherlands.svg", the system will happily let me do so. [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:46, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

: Also, I wonder what the reason is, to re-upload images in the same resolution? They look completely the same for me. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 14:15, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
::The PNGs I uploaded are exactly the same, but PNGOUT is capable of compressing them significantly better in many cases, which should save some bandwidth... Look at some of the bigger files I replaced in the changelog! [[User:Prino|Prino]] 19:23, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

[[File:Flag_of_the_Netherlands.svg|150px|thumb|left|This a .SVG file]]

: Hmm, ok. First of all: Hitchwiki is linked to wikimedia commons. That means, you can just use any file uploaded to wikimedia commons here. And that is also the reason for your error message: If you upload a file, that is also uploaded to wikimedia commons, you would replace it locally. This is fine, you can do that. It doesn't make much sense to upload the same file again, though.
: It doesn't really matter wether a browser supports svg. The wiki renders them to png pr jpg anyway. But it can render them in a much better quality, no matter which size they will have. So, in general, SVG is always better than PNG or JPG, but not always possible.
: I think bandwith is not so much of an issue nowadays. All modern browsers support on-the-fly-compression anyway, so it will probably not make any difference at all. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] 21:18, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

== Navigation ==

On the right side sucks, BIG time... 

And while I'm writing this, the table with foreign characters shows as a series of "charinsert" tags, possibly because it's missing a final '}' [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 20:52, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
:And the colour of the links, a horrible blue also stinks. Why was this change required, what was wrong with the old design? [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 22:03, 1 October 2012 (CEST)
::And 9 cm of grey screen on either side of the text on a 23" monitor is also really useful. [[User:Prino|Prino]] ([[User talk:Prino|talk]]) 11:56, 2 October 2012 (CEST)

:I like Mikael's new design but the old Monobook one is useful indeed. So go to [[Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-rendering]] and choose MonoBook. That's what I just did, there are still some tidbits not working but I'll fix them in [[MediaWiki:Monobook.css]]. 
:Charinsert is broken because the extension doesn't work anymore with MediaWiki 1.19. Will try to fix that as well today. [[User:Guaka|guaka]] ([[User talk:Guaka|talk]]) 12:05, 2 October 2012 (CEST)

== Bug ==

Hey guys - having trouble adding places?  It gives an error message and then you can't add anything  Anyone else experiencing this problem? 15th November 2016.

All templates are out of order, because they have a "&lt;nowiki&gt;{{ #&lt;/nowiki&gt;" at their beginning in the whole wiki. -[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 09:51, 4 October 2012 (CEST)
: Thanks for noting. We know about this bug, but as far as I know, it only affect the Isin-Template? A quick Check on [[Germany]] which has a lot of templates shows me that most of them work fine. Please let us know if you know of any specific template that is broken as well --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]] ([[User talk:MrTweek|talk]]) 09:58, 4 October 2012 (CEST)
: many templates which I use for the motorways are broken: {{ramp}} {{junction}} {{gas}} {{rest}} {{very good}} {{good}}, look at {{Ade|1}} --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 14:44, 8 October 2012 (CEST)

* I don't know about the templates (except IsIn) but the all the links to Trashwiki aren't in the toolbow anymore, but at the end of the page... I speak about the french version (exemple: [http://hitchwiki.org/fr/Prague], at the end of the page). For the english version, they just disappeared... Even if they are still in the editing page. --[[User:Klodreamer|Klodreamer]] ([[User talk:Klodreamer|talk]]) 18:34, 9 October 2012 (CEST)

* It seems to me, that for all pictures, which have been uploaded before October, the original files have been gone. That lead to the above problem, that my templates don't run any more. --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 17:55, 15 October 2012 (CEST)
: I just re-imported them, so most images should work again. Please let me know, if there are still a lot missing. If there are only a few missing, we can just upload them again manually. --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;sup&gt;([[User_talk:MrTweek|talk]])&lt;/sup&gt; 04:32, 28 October 2012 (CET)
* I'm already missing some symbols: {{rest}} {{average}} {{bad}} {{senseless}}, the logo don't show up, in the German wiki also the template ''gut'' has no picture. --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 16:06, 3 November 2012 (CET)

== new bug ==

In the German part of this wiki actually I can't make edits, I always gets the answer: "Es ist ein Datenbankabfragefehler aufgetreten. Dies könnte auf einen Fehler in der Software hindeuten." --[[User:GeorgDerReisende|GeorgDerReisende]] ([[User talk:GeorgDerReisende|talk]]) 09:12, 27 July 2014 (UTC)

== Trustroots advertisement ==

In my opinion the advertisement for Trustroots does not need to be here for years, mainly because Hitchwiki could (should!) behave like a proper commercial free, independent wiki, without its own agenda. The advertisement can repel potential users from Hitchwiki. Online hospex is not the same as hitch-hiking either and certainly not all hitch-hikers are interested in such service. --[[User:Fverhart|Fverhart]] ([[User talk:Fverhart|talk]]) 23:13, 21 July 2016 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>54o7u05wsvcp9daezqy64vdj2r3pbnz</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>User:Guaka</title>
    <ns>2</ns>
    <id>1533</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1571</id>
      <parentid>4444</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-10-30T06:52:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1573">'''Guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to here, since over there it was being spammed all the time. Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]. Currently in [[Canada]] and the [[United States]].

* [http://industree.org/guaka/blog Guaka's blog]
* [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Guaka User page at Wikipedia]
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/User:Guaka User page at Wikitravel]
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/profile.html?id=5F4MCK Profile at CouchSurfing]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]]

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]]

[[Category:Active contributors to this site]]

&lt;!-- visited countries :) --&gt;
http://www.world66.com/community/mymaps/worldmap?visited=BEFRBGDKHRBOHUCHBRFIGRNLPTNOPYTRLVLTLUPEROPLDEADCLEECAITECCZARATINESUYMLUSSKSIUKUASE#.jpg</text>
      <sha1>3fm3j0ri2viyqsws31ysp8ukzu0mxzq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1572</id>
      <parentid>8846</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1573">'''Guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to here, since over there it was being spammed all the time. Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]. Currently in [[Canada]] and the [[United States]].

* [http://industree.org/guaka/blog Guaka's blog]
* [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Guaka User page at Wikipedia]
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/User:Guaka User page at Wikitravel]
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/profile.html?id=5F4MCK Profile at CouchSurfing]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]]

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]]

[[Category:Active contributors to this site]]

&lt;!-- visited countries :) --&gt;
http://www.world66.com/community/mymaps/worldmap?visited=BEFRBGDKHRBOHUCHBRFIGRNLPTNOPYTRLVLTLUPEROPLDEADCLEECAITECCZARATINESUYMLUSSKSIUKUASE#.jpg</text>
      <sha1>3fm3j0ri2viyqsws31ysp8ukzu0mxzq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4434</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T21:06:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="191">'''Guaka''' is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from hitchhikingguide.org to here, since over there it was being spammed all the time. Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias.</text>
      <sha1>refauurom4c0u13no7zh2agxygwo1hh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4435</id>
      <parentid>4434</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T21:07:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="209">'''Guaka''' is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from hitchhikingguide.org to here, since over there it was being spammed all the time. Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias and on Wikitravel.</text>
      <sha1>apbondv5q06c0v6b3xgan3juxjw7kd2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4436</id>
      <parentid>4435</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-05T00:54:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="430">'''Guaka''' is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from hitchhikingguide.org to here, since over there it was being spammed all the time. Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

* [http://industree.org/guaka/blog Guaka's blog]
* [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Guaka User page at Wikipedia]</text>
      <sha1>lo8v0mztnegpexb3b4e1kz87eme49ts</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4437</id>
      <parentid>4436</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-05T00:57:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="449">'''Guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from hitchhikingguide.org to here, since over there it was being spammed all the time. Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

* [http://industree.org/guaka/blog Guaka's blog]
* [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Guaka User page at Wikipedia]</text>
      <sha1>bl84rt4jjhol0jtrmz2uhhy9pwky7bw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4438</id>
      <parentid>4437</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-12T22:45:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="700">'''Guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from hitchhikingguide.org to here, since over there it was being spammed all the time. Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and is currently (May 2006) working in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]. In August he will be in the [[United States]].

* [http://industree.org/guaka/blog Guaka's blog]
* [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Guaka User page at Wikipedia]</text>
      <sha1>sf9ailiuebwvtnpw2cjv3tsh1cs3b7z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4439</id>
      <parentid>4438</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-12T22:46:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="709">'''Guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to here, since over there it was being spammed all the time. Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and is currently (May 2006) working in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]. In August he will be in the [[United States]].

* [http://industree.org/guaka/blog Guaka's blog]
* [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Guaka User page at Wikipedia]</text>
      <sha1>qdg7loxnskfn5blaualjjsquac7awt5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4440</id>
      <parentid>4439</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-29T20:55:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="756">'''Guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to here, since over there it was being spammed all the time. Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and is currently (May 2006) working in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]. In August he will be in the [[United States]].

* [http://industree.org/guaka/blog Guaka's blog]
* [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Guaka User page at Wikipedia]

[[Category:Active contributors to this site]]</text>
      <sha1>nwex7yjte4imqdpzohobapjk7yy943a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4441</id>
      <parentid>4440</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-08-16T19:55:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="875">'''Guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to here, since over there it was being spammed all the time. Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and is currently (May 2006) working in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]. In August he will be in the [[United States]].

* [http://industree.org/guaka/blog Guaka's blog]
* [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Guaka User page at Wikipedia]
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/User:Guaka]
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/profile.html?id=5F4MCK Profile at CouchSurfing]

[[Category:Active contributors to this site]]</text>
      <sha1>kqasz64mpabaeyfa2bh1peh95uin0oj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4442</id>
      <parentid>4441</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-08-16T19:55:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="860">'''Guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to here, since over there it was being spammed all the time. Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]. Currently in [[Canada]] and the [[United States]].

* [http://industree.org/guaka/blog Guaka's blog]
* [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Guaka User page at Wikipedia]
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/User:Guaka]
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/profile.html?id=5F4MCK Profile at CouchSurfing]

[[Category:Active contributors to this site]]</text>
      <sha1>hfrzcmshg52zcb1b2wcbds8g6fxlwvi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4443</id>
      <parentid>4442</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-08-16T19:56:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="884">'''Guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to here, since over there it was being spammed all the time. Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]. Currently in [[Canada]] and the [[United States]].

* [http://industree.org/guaka/blog Guaka's blog]
* [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Guaka User page at Wikipedia]
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/User:Guaka User page at Wikitravel]
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/profile.html?id=5F4MCK Profile at CouchSurfing]

[[Category:Active contributors to this site]]</text>
      <sha1>75sdupfcdvmm3a080bhozy3xhzqvsva</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4444</id>
      <parentid>4443</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-10-25T01:23:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1544">'''Guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to here, since over there it was being spammed all the time. Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]. Currently in [[Canada]] and the [[United States]].

* [http://industree.org/guaka/blog Guaka's blog]
* [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Guaka User page at Wikipedia]
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/User:Guaka User page at Wikitravel]
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/profile.html?id=5F4MCK Profile at CouchSurfing]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]]


[[Category:Active contributors to this site]]

&lt;!-- visited countries :) --&gt;
http://www.world66.com/community/mymaps/worldmap?visited=BEFRBGDKHRBOHUCHBRFIGRNLPTNOPYTRLVLTLUPEROPLDEADCLEECAITECCZARATINESUYMLUSSKSIUKUASE#.jpg</text>
      <sha1>444z9umd8eoq9yw527tvlu7u4zk646f</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4445</id>
      <parentid>1572</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1573">'''Guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to here, since over there it was being spammed all the time. Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]. Currently in [[Canada]] and the [[United States]].

* [http://industree.org/guaka/blog Guaka's blog]
* [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Guaka User page at Wikipedia]
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/User:Guaka User page at Wikitravel]
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/profile.html?id=5F4MCK Profile at CouchSurfing]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]]

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]]

[[Category:Active contributors to this site]]

&lt;!-- visited countries :) --&gt;
http://www.world66.com/community/mymaps/worldmap?visited=BEFRBGDKHRBOHUCHBRFIGRNLPTNOPYTRLVLTLUPEROPLDEADCLEECAITECCZARATINESUYMLUSSKSIUKUASE#.jpg</text>
      <sha1>3fm3j0ri2viyqsws31ysp8ukzu0mxzq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>8846</id>
      <parentid>1571</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-21T01:52:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1600">'''Guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to here, since over there it was being spammed all the time. Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]. Currently in [[Canada]] and the [[United States]].

* [http://industree.org/guaka/blog Guaka's blog]
* [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Guaka User page at Wikipedia]
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/User:Guaka User page at Wikitravel]
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/profile.html?id=5F4MCK Profile at CouchSurfing]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]]

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]]

[[Category:Active contributors to this site]]

&lt;!-- visited countries :) --&gt;
http://www.world66.com/community/mymaps/worldmap?visited=BEFRBGDKHRBOHUCHBRFIGRNLPTNOPYTRLVLTLUPEROPLDEADCLEECAITECCZARATINESUYMLUSSKSIUKUASE#.jpg


[[Category:Hitchhikers]]</text>
      <sha1>8czissz09wst05kmiggnidfg6bslwe3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>8847</id>
      <parentid>4445</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-23T21:56:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1600">'''Guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to here, since over there it was being spammed all the time. Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]. Currently in [[Canada]] and the [[United States]].

* [http://industree.org/guaka/blog Guaka's blog]
* [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Guaka User page at Wikipedia]
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/User:Guaka User page at Wikitravel]
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/profile.html?id=5F4MCK Profile at CouchSurfing]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]]

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]]

[[Category:Active contributors to this site]]

&lt;!-- visited countries :) --&gt;
http://www.world66.com/community/mymaps/worldmap?visited=BEFRBGDKHRBOHUCHBRFIGRNLPTNOPYTRLVLTLUPEROPLDEADCLEECAITECCZARATINESUYMLUSSKSIUKUASE#.jpg


[[Category:Hitchhikers]]</text>
      <sha1>8czissz09wst05kmiggnidfg6bslwe3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9140</id>
      <parentid>8847</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-24T02:09:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1608">'''Guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to here, since over there it was being spammed all the time. Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]. Currently in [[Canada]] and the [[United States]].

* [http://industree.org/guaka/blog Guaka's blog]
* [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Guaka User page at Wikipedia]
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/User:Guaka User page at Wikitravel]
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/profile.html?id=5F4MCK Profile at CouchSurfing]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]]

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]]

[[Category:Active contributors to this site]]

&lt;!-- visited countries :) --&gt;
&lt;!-- http://www.world66.com/community/mymaps/worldmap?visited=BEFRBGDKHRBOHUCHBRFIGRNLPTNOPYTRLVLTLUPEROPLDEADCLEECAITECCZARATINESUYMLUSSKSIUKUASE#.jpg
--&gt;

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]</text>
      <sha1>bl0oiz4znz3vq0kh5njzn6nqvda2xyi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9156</id>
      <parentid>9140</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-24T04:29:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1731">[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''Guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to here, since over there it was being spammed all the time. Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]. Currently in [[Canada]] and the [[United States]].

* [http://industree.org/guaka/blog Guaka's blog]
* [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Guaka User page at Wikipedia]
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/User:Guaka User page at Wikitravel]
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/profile.html?id=5F4MCK Profile at CouchSurfing]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]]

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]]

[[Category:Active contributors to this site]]

&lt;!-- visited countries :) --&gt;
&lt;!-- http://www.world66.com/community/mymaps/worldmap?visited=BEFRBGDKHRBOHUCHBRFIGRNLPTNOPYTRLVLTLUPEROPLDEADCLEECAITECCZARATINESUYMLUSSKSIUKUASE#.jpg
--&gt;

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]</text>
      <sha1>hdycceeljvatewmc3jtevcxzazljmhd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9157</id>
      <parentid>9156</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-24T04:30:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1808">[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''Guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].
Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]. Currently in [[Canada]] and the [[United States]].

* [http://industree.org/guaka/blog Guaka's blog]
* [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Guaka User page at Wikipedia]
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/User:Guaka User page at Wikitravel]
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/profile.html?id=5F4MCK Profile at CouchSurfing]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]]

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]]

[[Category:Active contributors to this site]]

&lt;!-- visited countries :) --&gt;
&lt;!-- http://www.world66.com/community/mymaps/worldmap?visited=BEFRBGDKHRBOHUCHBRFIGRNLPTNOPYTRLVLTLUPEROPLDEADCLEECAITECCZARATINESUYMLUSSKSIUKUASE#.jpg
--&gt;

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]</text>
      <sha1>1levg0sr5dc0kpq5vmty1sebz76luhl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9348</id>
      <parentid>9157</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-30T08:03:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1906">[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''Guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].
Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]. Currently in [[Canada]] and the [[United States]].

* [http://industree.org/guaka/blog Guaka's blog]
* [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Guaka User page at Wikipedia]
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/User:Guaka User page at Wikitravel]
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/profile.html?id=5F4MCK Profile at CouchSurfing]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]]

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]]

[[Category:Active contributors to this site]]

&lt;!-- visited countries :) --&gt;
&lt;!-- http://www.world66.com/community/mymaps/worldmap?visited=BEFRBGDKHRBOHUCHBRFIGRNLPTNOPYTRLVLTLUPEROPLDEADCLEECAITECCZARATINESUYMLUSSKSIUKUASE#.jpg
--&gt;

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]</text>
      <sha1>8xf4tpc1argjjtx4mgbb560aafih6di</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9349</id>
      <parentid>9348</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-30T08:03:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1917">[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''Guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].
Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]. Currently in [[Canada]] and the [[United States]].

* [http://industree.org/guaka/blog Guaka's blog]
* [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Guaka User page at Wikipedia]
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/User:Guaka User page at Wikitravel]
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/profile.html?id=5F4MCK Profile at CouchSurfing]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]]

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]]

[[Category:Active contributors to this site]]

&lt;!-- visited countries :) --&gt;
&lt;!-- http://www.world66.com/community/mymaps/worldmap?visited=BEFRBGDKHRBOHUCHBRFIGRNLPTNOPYTRLVLTLUPEROPLDEADCLEECAITECCZARATINESUYMLUSSKSIUKUASE#.jpg
--&gt;

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]</text>
      <sha1>dbeqckc5oe9z2dtyoa4depqm9gkqzy8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9403</id>
      <parentid>9349</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-03T01:24:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Amylin</username>
        <id>11</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1896">[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''Guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].
Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]. Currently in [[New Zealand]].

* [http://industree.org/guaka/blog Guaka's blog]
* [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Guaka User page at Wikipedia]
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/User:Guaka User page at Wikitravel]
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/profile.html?id=5F4MCK Profile at CouchSurfing]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]]

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]]

[[Category:Active contributors to this site]]

&lt;!-- visited countries :) --&gt;
&lt;!-- http://www.world66.com/community/mymaps/worldmap?visited=BEFRBGDKHRBOHUCHBRFIGRNLPTNOPYTRLVLTLUPEROPLDEADCLEECAITECCZARATINESUYMLUSSKSIUKUASE#.jpg
--&gt;

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]</text>
      <sha1>eiph82hbeghsjiqhg31tmxnmb7cmx5c</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9424</id>
      <parentid>9403</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-03T08:20:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1850">[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''Guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].
Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]. Currently in [[New Zealand]].

* [http://industree.org/guaka/blog Guaka's blog]
* [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Guaka User page at Wikipedia]
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/User:Guaka User page at Wikitravel]
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/profile.html?id=5F4MCK Profile at CouchSurfing]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]]

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]]


&lt;!-- visited countries :) --&gt;
&lt;!-- http://www.world66.com/community/mymaps/worldmap?visited=BEFRBGDKHRBOHUCHBRFIGRNLPTNOPYTRLVLTLUPEROPLDEADCLEECAITECCZARATINESUYMLUSSKSIUKUASE#.jpg
--&gt;

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]</text>
      <sha1>93dl18962v9ymxsc4ba7kiu3nm7ga3v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9430</id>
      <parentid>9424</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-03T11:55:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2000">[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''Guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].
Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]. Currently in [[New Zealand]].

* [http://industree.org/guaka/blog Guaka's blog]
* [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Guaka User page at Wikipedia]
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/User:Guaka User page at Wikitravel]
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/profile.html?id=5F4MCK Profile at CouchSurfing]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]]

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]]


==TODO==
Things Guaka needs to do for Hitchwiki.org:
# make [[amylin]] create a logo
# offer monthly downloadable database dumps
# set up wikistats


&lt;!-- visited countries :) --&gt;
&lt;!-- http://www.world66.com/community/mymaps/worldmap?visited=BEFRBGDKHRBOHUCHBRFIGRNLPTNOPYTRLVLTLUPEROPLDEADCLEECAITECCZARATINESUYMLUSSKSIUKUASE#.jpg
--&gt;

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]</text>
      <sha1>dyq1f237c6649c2xujplaan629ckz2m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9431</id>
      <parentid>9430</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-03T11:56:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2072">[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''Guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].
Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]. Currently in [[New Zealand]].

* [http://industree.org/guaka/blog Guaka's blog]
* [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Guaka User page at Wikipedia]
* [http://wikitravel.org/en/User:Guaka User page at Wikitravel]
* [http://www.couchsurfing.com/profile.html?id=5F4MCK Profile at CouchSurfing]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]]

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]]


==TODO==
Things Guaka needs to do for Hitchwiki.org:
# make [[amylin]] create a logo
# offer monthly downloadable database dumps
# set up wikistats


&lt;!-- visited countries :) --&gt;
&lt;!-- http://www.world66.com/community/mymaps/worldmap?visited=BEFRBGDKHRBOHUCHBRFIGRNLPTNOPYTRLVLTLUPEROPLDEADCLEECAITECCZARATINESUYMLUSSKSIUKUASE#.jpg
--&gt;

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[couchsurfing:GUAKA]]
[[cswiki:User:Guaka]]
[[wikitravel:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>k1cqj2yi4yxmipsvryayd95ld7uyfcd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9432</id>
      <parentid>9431</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-03T11:57:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1898">[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''Guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].
Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]. Currently in [[New Zealand]].

* [http://industree.org/guaka/blog Guaka's blog]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]]

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]]


==Hitchwiki TODOs==
Things Guaka needs to do for Hitchwiki.org:
# make [[amylin]] create a logo
# offer monthly downloadable database dumps
# set up wikistats


&lt;!-- visited countries :) --&gt;
&lt;!-- http://www.world66.com/community/mymaps/worldmap?visited=BEFRBGDKHRBOHUCHBRFIGRNLPTNOPYTRLVLTLUPEROPLDEADCLEECAITECCZARATINESUYMLUSSKSIUKUASE#.jpg
--&gt;

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[couchsurfing:GUAKA]]
[[cswiki:User:Guaka]]
[[wikitravel:User:Guaka]]
[[wikipedia:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>afoa1mb0vdmbt79xkcws4c9sjifyuu9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9673</id>
      <parentid>9432</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-10T23:37:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2075">[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''Guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].
Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]. Currently in [[New Zealand]].

* [http://industree.org/guaka/blog Guaka's blog]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]]

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]]


==Hitchwiki TODOs==
Things Guaka needs to do for Hitchwiki.org:
# make [[amylin]] create a logo
# offer monthly downloadable database dumps
# set up wikistats


&lt;!-- visited countries :) --&gt;
&lt;!-- http://www.world66.com/community/mymaps/worldmap?visited=BEFRBGDKHRBOHUCHBRFIGRNLPTNOPYTRLVLTLUPEROPLDEADCLEECAITECCZARATINESUYMLUSSKSIUKUASE#.jpg
--&gt;

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed you".

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[couchsurfing:GUAKA]]
[[cswiki:User:Guaka]]
[[wikitravel:User:Guaka]]
[[wikipedia:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>l63kcyf2wxf7pziud1ysxixbc7tphix</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9674</id>
      <parentid>9673</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-10T23:37:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2089">[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''Guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].
Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]. Currently in [[New Zealand]].

* [http://industree.org/guaka/blog Guaka's blog]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]]

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]]


==Hitchwiki TODOs==
Things Guaka needs to do for Hitchwiki.org:
# make [[amylin]] create a logo
# offer monthly downloadable database dumps
# set up wikistats


&lt;!-- visited countries :) --&gt;
&lt;!-- http://www.world66.com/community/mymaps/worldmap?visited=BEFRBGDKHRBOHUCHBRFIGRNLPTNOPYTRLVLTLUPEROPLDEADCLEECAITECCZARATINESUYMLUSSKSIUKUASE#.jpg
--&gt;

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[couchsurfing:GUAKA]]
[[cswiki:User:Guaka]]
[[wikitravel:User:Guaka]]
[[wikipedia:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>q3lr1aluo14f4uuw9q2byouzq310v95</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10153</id>
      <parentid>9674</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-01-19T04:17:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1743">[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''Guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].
Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]. Currently in [[New Zealand]].

* [http://industree.org/guaka/blog Guaka's blog]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]]

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]]




==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[couchsurfing:GUAKA]]
[[cswiki:User:Guaka]]
[[wikitravel:User:Guaka]]
[[wikipedia:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>5zoyjh31evod3krqw997083r27rub9m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10553</id>
      <parentid>10153</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-14T16:45:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1766">[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''Guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].
Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]. Currently in [[New Zealand]].

* [http://industree.org/guaka/blog Guaka's blog]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[couchsurfing:GUAKA]]
[[cswiki:User:Guaka]]
[[wikitravel:User:Guaka]]
[[wikipedia:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>97y1bnazu6i9iujj5e2ora3z5akdl8d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10839</id>
      <parentid>10553</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-18T04:53:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1800">[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''Guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].
Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]. Currently in [[New Zealand]].

* [http://industree.org/guaka/blog Guaka's blog]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Asia]]: [[Thailand]], [[Laos]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[couchsurfing:GUAKA]]
[[cswiki:User:Guaka]]
[[wikitravel:User:Guaka]]
[[wikipedia:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>tc7n2uav82fr2umpksua9hbrltks28b</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11205</id>
      <parentid>10839</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-10T22:05:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1958">[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''Guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].
Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]. Currently in [[New Zealand]].

* [http://industree.org/guaka/blog Guaka's blog]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[couchsurfing:GUAKA]]
[[cswiki:User:Guaka]]
[[wikitravel:User:Guaka]]
[[wikipedia:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>e9nnv0fnvbe2j1jsxml93l7t7ubez3v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11263</id>
      <parentid>11205</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-15T08:55:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1971">[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''Guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].
Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]. Currently in [[New Zealand]].

* [http://industree.org/guaka/blog Guaka's blog]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[couchsurfing:GUAKA]]
[[cswiki:User:Guaka]]
[[wikitravel:User:Guaka]]
[[wikipedia:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>atizxa9lf1vpo373rsv89wn88x02uh3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11497</id>
      <parentid>11263</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-30T14:13:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2144">[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''Guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].
Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]], met '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and currently in [[Europe]].

* [http://industree.org/guaka/blog Guaka's blog]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[couchsurfing:GUAKA]]
[[cswiki:User:Guaka]]
[[wikitravel:User:Guaka]]
[[wikipedia:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>b0lzu280n8y5gmy4fxpyxbxf0c90lmo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11690</id>
      <parentid>11497</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-06-15T13:30:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2493">[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''Guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].
Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]], met '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and currently in [[Europe]].

* [http://industree.org/guaka/blog Guaka's blog]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".

Last night I possibly had my longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably 1000 km :)


[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[couchsurfing:GUAKA]]
[[cswiki:User:Guaka]]
[[wikitravel:User:Guaka]]
[[wikipedia:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>9ws63ltxg736nu3f1z8yq7qk9psy8n7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11691</id>
      <parentid>11690</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-06-15T14:13:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2510">[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''Guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].
Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]], met '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and currently in [[Europe]].

* [http://industree.org/guaka/blog Guaka's blog]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".

Last night I possibly had my longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably 1000 km :)


[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[couchsurfing:GUAKA]]
[[cswiki:User:Guaka]]
[[wikitravel:User:Guaka]]
[[wikipedia:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>6rz7s62431hcj8u3udmmiu7z455iy8k</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11742</id>
      <parentid>11691</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-06-18T17:38:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2492">[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].
Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]], met '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and currently in [[Europe]].

* [http://guaka.org guaka.org]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".

Last night I possibly had my longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably 1000 km :)


[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[couchsurfing:GUAKA]]
[[cswiki:User:Guaka]]
[[wikitravel:User:Guaka]]
[[wikipedia:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>otq7j1nx3c628wd2i57bqtqy6uafau7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11848</id>
      <parentid>11742</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-06-22T07:42:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Amylin</username>
        <id>11</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2501">[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].
Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]], met '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and currently in [[Europe]].

* [http://guaka.org guaka.org]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".

Last night amylin &amp; I possibly had my longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably 1000 km :)


[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[couchsurfing:GUAKA]]
[[cswiki:User:Guaka]]
[[wikitravel:User:Guaka]]
[[wikipedia:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>mhzbqilcbzjeo9nv0juqhghzj3p5sbp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11850</id>
      <parentid>11848</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-06-22T07:46:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2502">[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].
Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]], met '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and currently in [[Europe]].

* [http://guaka.org guaka.org]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".

Last night amylin &amp; I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably 1000 km :)


[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[couchsurfing:GUAKA]]
[[cswiki:User:Guaka]]
[[wikitravel:User:Guaka]]
[[wikipedia:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>8ckal71zr7074r3ns2p8al1csk7r66n</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11936</id>
      <parentid>11850</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-06-29T09:31:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2523">[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].
Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]], met '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and currently in [[Europe]].

* [http://guaka.org guaka.org]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".

Last night amylin &amp; I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably 1000 km :)


[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[couchsurfing:GUAKA]]
[[cswiki:User:Guaka]]
[[wikitravel:User:Guaka]]
[[wikipedia:User:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>5f50a7li4fyc8h0k9py2n0v45q2tnyc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12535</id>
      <parentid>11936</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-31T12:31:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2903">[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].
Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]], met '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and currently in [[Europe]].

* [http://guaka.org guaka.org]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".

===Stats===
On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

I don't know how much distance I hitchhiked, but it's probably quite a bit more than 100,000 km by now.

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[couchsurfing:GUAKA]]
[[cswiki:User:Guaka]]
[[wikitravel:User:Guaka]]
[[wikipedia:User:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>cydwpyfx0s10h68u6pbtjqjpn2qrnfm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13210</id>
      <parentid>12535</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-26T08:59:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Amylin</username>
        <id>11</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2922">[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].
Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then, met my love, '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and currently in [[Europe]].

* [http://guaka.org guaka.org]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".

===Stats===
On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

I don't know how much distance I hitchhiked, but it's probably quite a bit more than 100,000 km by now.

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[couchsurfing:GUAKA]]
[[cswiki:User:Guaka]]
[[wikitravel:User:Guaka]]
[[wikipedia:User:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>e1h931opvvfhpiz6hgqx8tpleisfwkd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13211</id>
      <parentid>13210</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-26T09:00:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Amylin</username>
        <id>11</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2929">[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].
Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then, met his '''love''', '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and currently in [[Europe]].

* [http://guaka.org guaka.org]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".

===Stats===
On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

I don't know how much distance I hitchhiked, but it's probably quite a bit more than 100,000 km by now.

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[couchsurfing:GUAKA]]
[[cswiki:User:Guaka]]
[[wikitravel:User:Guaka]]
[[wikipedia:User:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>0a70jvkarmlcu12rzmxpuez6tlxdtya</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13325</id>
      <parentid>13211</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-31T18:15:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Amylin</username>
        <id>11</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2919">[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].
Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then, met his '''love''', '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].

* [http://guaka.org guaka.org]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".

===Stats===
On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

I don't know how much distance I hitchhiked, but it's probably quite a bit more than 100,000 km by now.

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[couchsurfing:GUAKA]]
[[cswiki:User:Guaka]]
[[wikitravel:User:Guaka]]
[[wikipedia:User:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>g4rsrmrr8gqpp1va2dkd1g0qui3e64z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13541</id>
      <parentid>13325</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-10T17:56:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2921">[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].
Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then, met his '''love''', '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].

* [http://guaka.org guaka.org]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".

===Stats===
On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

I don't know how much distance I hitchhiked, but it's probably quite a bit more than 100,000 km by now.

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[wikitravel:User:Guaka]]
[[wikipedia:User:Guaka]]
[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>dri4zrqlwfvfd80okpqmtfae4qie5p2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14282</id>
      <parentid>13541</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-02T14:40:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2940">[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].
Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then, met his '''love''', '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].

* [http://guaka.org guaka.org]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".

===Stats===
On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

I don't know how much distance I hitchhiked, but it's probably quite a bit more than 100,000 km by now.

{{user cc-by-sa}}

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[wikitravel:User:Guaka]]
[[wikipedia:User:Guaka]]
[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>8p5knlox869wztyw9a9l9tin1scywzl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14283</id>
      <parentid>14282</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-02T14:40:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2889">[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].
Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then, met his '''love''', '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].

* [http://guaka.org guaka.org]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".

===Stats===
On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

I don't know how much distance I hitchhiked, but it's probably quite a bit more than 100,000 km by now.

{{user cc-by-sa}}

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>1q0xajr8kn2ui6ewewo2dhxli7bgv3h</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18771</id>
      <parentid>14283</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-07T11:26:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2919">[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].
Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then, met his '''love''', '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].

* [http://guaka.org guaka.org]

==Hitchhiking experience==
[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".

===Stats===
On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

I don't know how much distance I hitchhiked, but it's probably quite a bit more than 100,000 km by now.

{{user cc-by-sa}}

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>ne8sqyewjb6ppxnw7s4ixrew3f28c7d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>20553</id>
      <parentid>18771</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-10T09:56:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3166">[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].
Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then, met his '''love''', '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].

* [http://guaka.org guaka.org]

==Hitchhiking experience==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".

===Stats===
On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

I don't know how much distance I hitchhiked, but it's probably quite a bit more than 100,000 km by now.

{{user cc-by-sa}}

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>mrbl8g6u4av1duweqhkedaqv4y7ii1f</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>20554</id>
      <parentid>20553</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-10T09:57:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3167">[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].
Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then, met his '''love''', '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].

* [http://guaka.org guaka.org]

==Hitchhiking experience==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


===Stats===
On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

{{user cc-by-sa}}

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>6jleqtsuc1hxe48e530o1735djfle8p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>20555</id>
      <parentid>20554</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-10T09:57:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3179">[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].
Guaka is also active on several Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], travelled through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then, met his '''love''', '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].

* [http://guaka.org guaka.org]

==Hitchhiking experience==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


===Stats===
On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

{{user cc-by-sa}}

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>lwntrd8vfzf5vburxenys9h8t24l5l6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21748</id>
      <parentid>20555</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-19T02:34:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3721">[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

==Hitchhiking experience==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


===Stats===
On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

{{user cc-by-sa}}

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>qpo9x3tqco29eztamqmkqiwzuwlx15y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22523</id>
      <parentid>21748</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-15T20:00:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3738">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

==Hitchhiking experience==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


===Stats===
On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

{{user cc-by-sa}}

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>mvil21j8ws7lvxpzw396ne1yk3d7cqq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>23086</id>
      <parentid>22523</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-30T21:38:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4194">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is administrator of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

==Hitchhiking experience==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


===Stats===
On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

{{user cc-by-sa}}

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>cual1vumwrgw15x2nzxvhbzyssgx9qa</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24343</id>
      <parentid>23086</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-03T10:11:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4290">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

==Hitchhiking experience==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

[[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]]

[[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]

[[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]

[[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]]

[[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])

[[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


===Stats===
On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

{{user cc-by-sa}}

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>43woe18o1zw3slqjdhiws9z66cbtxv4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24512</id>
      <parentid>24343</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-05T11:18:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5276">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

==Hitchhiking experience==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


===Stats===
On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

===[[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]]===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring rain.

{{user cc-by-sa}}

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>1y3r6rox9c25jzye0j8m8zv839zgc8m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26529</id>
      <parentid>24512</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-28T14:55:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5397">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

==Hitchhiking experience==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


===Stats===
On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

===[[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]]===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring rain.

{{user cc-by-sa}}

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>cmgfxkf0umd2m0ep0tcfdhmyu4hb929</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26985</id>
      <parentid>26529</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-05T22:22:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5419">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

==Hitchhiking experience==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


===Stats===
On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

===[[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]]===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring rain.

{{user cc-by-sa}}

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]

[[trash:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>cj3s7vpog2upc9y895ip08tt7eatpjb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27243</id>
      <parentid>26985</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-07T07:12:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sigurdas</username>
        <id>1658</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5440">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

==Hitchhiking experience==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


===Stats===
On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

===[[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]]===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring rain.

{{user cc-by-sa}}

[[Category:Hitchhikers from the Netherlands]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]

[[trash:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>lt9bn7pjrdtpvxv64xrrtkyda6vv9r8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27469</id>
      <parentid>27243</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-09T03:44:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sigurdas</username>
        <id>1658</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5632">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

==Hitchhiking experience==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


===Stats===
On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

===[[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]]===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring rain.

[[Image:{{{2|HitchWiki_Barnstar.png}}}|frame|left|Thumbs up! I am honoured to award you for all the great work you do for HitchWiki (and not only). --Sigurdas 03:44, 9 November 2008 (UTC)]] 

{{user cc-by-sa}}

[[Category:Hitchhikers from the Netherlands]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]

[[trash:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>47o21gs07pn9xg8biahkbyuhsrk2t0g</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27538</id>
      <parentid>27469</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-09T19:14:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robino</username>
        <id>4</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5419">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

==Hitchhiking experience==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


===Stats===
On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

===[[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]]===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring rain.

{{user cc-by-sa}}

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]

[[trash:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>cj3s7vpog2upc9y895ip08tt7eatpjb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29261</id>
      <parentid>27538</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-16T18:17:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>198.83.124.250</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="26">FIELD_MESSAGE_aceltalladar</text>
      <sha1>7jy5h084anzt0v4e6ryvm07t6cybtf8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29264</id>
      <parentid>29261</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-16T18:35:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Amylin</username>
        <id>11</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5419">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

==Hitchhiking experience==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


===Stats===
On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

===[[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]]===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring rain.

{{user cc-by-sa}}

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]

[[trash:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>cj3s7vpog2upc9y895ip08tt7eatpjb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30355</id>
      <parentid>29264</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-21T10:53:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5539">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

==Hitchhiking experience==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


===Stats===
On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

===[[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]]===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring rain.

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,be,fr,de,pl,sv,no,us,ca,au,nz,tu,ml,br,ar,ur,cl,pe," width="500" description='Example map' /&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]

[[trash:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>4rgzkc0zdte7blh1og9oh7zzddkhv2b</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30356</id>
      <parentid>30355</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-21T10:55:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5571">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

==Hitchhiking experience==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


===Stats===
On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

===[[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]]===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring rain.

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,fr,it,pe,nz" 
           c2="be,de,pl,sv,us,ca,il,tr"
           c3="eg" 
           width="500" description='Example map' /&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]

[[trash:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>pwdpo03c481qi8tlvupvibleaqwp1f3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30357</id>
      <parentid>30356</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-21T10:57:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5595">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

==Hitchhiking experience==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


===Stats===
On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

===[[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]]===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring rain.

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="be,de,pl,sv,no,dk,fi,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au"
           c3="eg,br" 
           width="500" description='Example map' /&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]

[[trash:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>8untv72w8ilnug994850bhxns8qr928</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30359</id>
      <parentid>30357</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-21T10:57:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5610">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

==Hitchhiking experience==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


===Stats===
On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

===[[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]]===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring rain.

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="be,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,uk,es,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au"
           c3="eg,br,ir,pt,gr" 
           width="500" description='Example map' /&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]

[[trash:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>303nsyqdcs5mursxorq9bziyyjvfcea</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30360</id>
      <parentid>30359</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-21T10:58:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5622">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

==Hitchhiking experience==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


===Stats===
On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

===[[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]]===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring rain.

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="be,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,uk,es,ec,ar,ur,cl,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au"
           c3="eg,br,ir,pt,gr" 
           width="720" description='Example map' /&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]

[[trash:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>r1fo14h8y6fqm8yow5t4ul7repcmway</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30361</id>
      <parentid>30360</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-21T11:00:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5634">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

==Hitchhiking experience==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


===Stats===
On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

===[[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]]===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring rain.

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="be,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,uk,hu,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,ur,cl,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au"
           c3="eg,br,pt,gr,ie,uk" 
           width="720" description='Example map' /&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]

[[trash:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>f3ucwrpvuicq90yqt0c2du6fvfysu1r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30362</id>
      <parentid>30361</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-21T11:01:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5646">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

==Hitchhiking experience==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


===Stats===
On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

===[[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]]===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring rain.

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="be,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,uk,hu,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,ur,cl,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn"
           c3="eg,br,pt,gr,ie,uk,in" 
           width="720" description='Example map' /&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]

[[trash:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>t98mrt11odgjfz0r3r6nytoj403edtg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30364</id>
      <parentid>30362</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-21T11:02:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5655">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

==Hitchhiking experience==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


===Stats===
On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

===[[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]]===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring rain.

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="be,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,uk,hu,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,ur,cl,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn"
           c3="eg,br,bo,uy,pa,pt,gr,ie,uk,in" 
           width="720" description='Example map' /&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]

[[trash:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>4u5wot5okcdpaidw9m0erli9fy14vde</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30365</id>
      <parentid>30364</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-21T11:03:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5673">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

==Hitchhiking experience==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


===Stats===
On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

===[[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]]===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring rain.

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="be,lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,uk,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,ur,cl,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn"
           c3="eg,br,bo,uy,py,pt,gr,ie,uk,in" 
           width="720" description='Example map' /&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]

[[trash:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>kimho9ftrsa8ihl0mik85kqu6p55lyo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30366</id>
      <parentid>30365</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-21T11:04:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5670">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

==Hitchhiking experience==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


===Stats===
On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

===[[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]]===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring rain.

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="be,lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,uk,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn"
           c3="eg,br,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,uk,in" 
           width="720" description='Example map' /&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]

[[trash:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>ntbrd2edornteounnwc54ht2pc6iffn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30368</id>
      <parentid>30366</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-21T11:06:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5742">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

==Hitchhiking experience==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


===Stats===
On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

===[[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]]===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring rain.

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="be,lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,uk,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,
               ee,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn"
           c3="eg,br,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,uk,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]

[[trash:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>4d3w1hkotugjj4ibsfsyzdioka3c1nu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30370</id>
      <parentid>30368</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-21T11:07:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5726">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

==Hitchhiking experience==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


===Stats===
On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

===[[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]]===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring rain.

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="be,lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,uk,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn"
           c3="eg,br,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,uk,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]

[[trash:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>4pmlmxepjjhkal1lj17s2g89uygiq6h</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30371</id>
      <parentid>30370</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-21T11:08:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5723">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

==Hitchhiking experience==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


===Stats===
On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

===[[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]]===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring rain.

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="be,lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,uk,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn"
           c3="eg,br,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]

[[trash:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>pbsp5ez6hzkw7qh89wm8gimtpp6rf6p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32166</id>
      <parentid>30371</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-04-10T11:45:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5727">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

==Hitchhiking experience==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


===Stats===
On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

===[[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]]===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="be,lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,uk,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn"
           c3="eg,br,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]

[[trash:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>dz4zbo0rcechuehaqv71abc5mur8r57</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32697</id>
      <parentid>32166</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-03T19:18:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5837">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[Image:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

==Hitchhiking experience==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[Image:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

==Random stuff==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


===Stats===
On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[Image:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

===[[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]]===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="be,lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,uk,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn"
           c3="eg,br,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]

[[trash:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>erktnkzrn01ue01l93t2hz6ktl3hw1m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35978</id>
      <parentid>32697</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-21T23:52:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5858">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[File:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[File:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===
On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[File:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="be,lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,uk,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn"
           c3="eg,br,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>1j4csjnbc6fd5gfjyyj6chff7b5vws4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40580</id>
      <parentid>35978</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-21T23:39:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5881">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[File:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[File:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===
On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I possibly had our longest ride ever, in Europe at least: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[File:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="be,lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,uk,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn"
           c3="eg,br,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>0u2g4nlq27fwax6a7wo2acepldqqhm1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41594</id>
      <parentid>40580</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-22T19:18:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6235">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[File:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[File:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


Longest rides:
* Monday the 12th of April, [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;source=s_d&amp;saddr=49.635008,5.970297&amp;daddr=valencia&amp;hl=en&amp;geocode=;FZ9EWgIdG0D6_ylT3JXQsEhgDTEy3khdIy6vZA&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=0&amp;sz=14&amp;sll=49.638343,5.976563&amp;sspn=0.032906,0.077162&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=49.658517,5.985146&amp;spn=0.13157,0.308647&amp;z=12 from the gas station Capellen Luxembourg straight to Valencia, Spain] - 1500 km.

* On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

* On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I had a ride [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[File:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="be,lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,uk,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn"
           c3="eg,br,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>p0lr7edzl2gfdgfz5vivnkdxqmlmnwe</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44517</id>
      <parentid>41594</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-09-02T18:14:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6263">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[File:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[File:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


Longest rides:
* Monday the 12th of April, [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;source=s_d&amp;saddr=49.635008,5.970297&amp;daddr=valencia&amp;hl=en&amp;geocode=;FZ9EWgIdG0D6_ylT3JXQsEhgDTEy3khdIy6vZA&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=0&amp;sz=14&amp;sll=49.638343,5.976563&amp;sspn=0.032906,0.077162&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=49.658517,5.985146&amp;spn=0.13157,0.308647&amp;z=12 from the gas station Capellen Luxembourg straight to Valencia, Spain] - 1500 km.

* On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

* On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I had a ride [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[File:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="be,lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,gb,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,hr,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn" 
           c3="eg,br,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;
&lt;!-- what's serbia? --&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>grjmujrkr0xus22p0n7d609whmwuspf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44667</id>
      <parentid>44517</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-09-06T17:09:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6326">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[File:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[File:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


Longest rides:
* Monday the 12th of April, [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;source=s_d&amp;saddr=49.635008,5.970297&amp;daddr=valencia&amp;hl=en&amp;geocode=;FZ9EWgIdG0D6_ylT3JXQsEhgDTEy3khdIy6vZA&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=0&amp;sz=14&amp;sll=49.638343,5.976563&amp;sspn=0.032906,0.077162&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=49.658517,5.985146&amp;spn=0.13157,0.308647&amp;z=12 from the gas station Capellen Luxembourg straight to Valencia, Spain] - 1500 km.

* On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

* On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I had a ride [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[File:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="be,lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,gb,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,hr,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn" 
           c3="eg,br,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;
&lt;!-- what's serbia? --&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>bfriesfgjmyj84w1dh5y6mva1sn0cnw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44668</id>
      <parentid>44667</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-09-06T17:14:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6327">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[File:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[File:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


Longest rides:
* Monday the 12th of April, [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;source=s_d&amp;saddr=49.635008,5.970297&amp;daddr=valencia&amp;hl=en&amp;geocode=;FZ9EWgIdG0D6_ylT3JXQsEhgDTEy3khdIy6vZA&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=0&amp;sz=14&amp;sll=49.638343,5.976563&amp;sspn=0.032906,0.077162&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=49.658517,5.985146&amp;spn=0.13157,0.308647&amp;z=12 from the gas station Capellen Luxembourg straight to Valencia, Spain] - 1500 km.

* On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

* On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I had a ride [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[File:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="be,lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,gb,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,hr,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn" 
           c3="eg,br,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;
&lt;!-- what's serbia? --&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>gobvk2tb73rcdj0juvfo0mu7ghctxyc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44787</id>
      <parentid>44668</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-09-13T22:08:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6368">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[File:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[File:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


Longest rides:
* Monday the 12th of April, [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;source=s_d&amp;saddr=49.635008,5.970297&amp;daddr=valencia&amp;hl=en&amp;geocode=;FZ9EWgIdG0D6_ylT3JXQsEhgDTEy3khdIy6vZA&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=0&amp;sz=14&amp;sll=49.638343,5.976563&amp;sspn=0.032906,0.077162&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=49.658517,5.985146&amp;spn=0.13157,0.308647&amp;z=12 from the gas station Capellen Luxembourg straight to Valencia, Spain] - 1500 km.

* On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

* On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I had a ride [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[File:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="be,lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,gb,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,hr,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn" 
           c3="eg,br,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;
&lt;!-- what's serbia? --&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Can host|Brussels, Belgium]]</text>
      <sha1>5m33g7i2hnqrr63sal80h7piihxdc1w</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44789</id>
      <parentid>44787</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-09-13T22:09:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6391">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
{{CanHostIn|Brussels}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[File:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[File:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


Longest rides:
* Monday the 12th of April, [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;source=s_d&amp;saddr=49.635008,5.970297&amp;daddr=valencia&amp;hl=en&amp;geocode=;FZ9EWgIdG0D6_ylT3JXQsEhgDTEy3khdIy6vZA&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=0&amp;sz=14&amp;sll=49.638343,5.976563&amp;sspn=0.032906,0.077162&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=49.658517,5.985146&amp;spn=0.13157,0.308647&amp;z=12 from the gas station Capellen Luxembourg straight to Valencia, Spain] - 1500 km.

* On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

* On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I had a ride [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[File:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="be,lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,gb,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,hr,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn" 
           c3="eg,br,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;
&lt;!-- what's serbia? --&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Can host|Brussels, Belgium]]</text>
      <sha1>d65oh5ea43a0g1n9blu4rdd5sgv679w</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44792</id>
      <parentid>44789</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-09-13T22:12:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6399">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
{{CanHostIn|Brussels|Belgium}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[File:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[File:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


Longest rides:
* Monday the 12th of April, [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;source=s_d&amp;saddr=49.635008,5.970297&amp;daddr=valencia&amp;hl=en&amp;geocode=;FZ9EWgIdG0D6_ylT3JXQsEhgDTEy3khdIy6vZA&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=0&amp;sz=14&amp;sll=49.638343,5.976563&amp;sspn=0.032906,0.077162&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=49.658517,5.985146&amp;spn=0.13157,0.308647&amp;z=12 from the gas station Capellen Luxembourg straight to Valencia, Spain] - 1500 km.

* On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

* On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I had a ride [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[File:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="be,lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,gb,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,hr,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn" 
           c3="eg,br,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;
&lt;!-- what's serbia? --&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Can host|Brussels, Belgium]]</text>
      <sha1>j29zec2sfk2vv1qsin8ee4scdc61zel</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>45651</id>
      <parentid>44792</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-09T19:49:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6509">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
{{CanHostIn|Brussels|Belgium}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[File:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to hitchwiki.org, together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[File:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


Longest rides:
* Monday the 12th of April, [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;source=s_d&amp;saddr=49.635008,5.970297&amp;daddr=valencia&amp;hl=en&amp;geocode=;FZ9EWgIdG0D6_ylT3JXQsEhgDTEy3khdIy6vZA&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=0&amp;sz=14&amp;sll=49.638343,5.976563&amp;sspn=0.032906,0.077162&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=49.658517,5.985146&amp;spn=0.13157,0.308647&amp;z=12 from the gas station Capellen Luxembourg straight to Valencia, Spain] - 1500 km.

* On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

* On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I had a ride [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[File:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="be,lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,gb,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,hr,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn" 
           c3="eg,br,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;
&lt;!-- what's serbia? --&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Can host|Brussels, Belgium]]</text>
      <sha1>0xc59nkv7t4lbeimtib70yki329tbx4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>45702</id>
      <parentid>45651</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-11T21:53:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6527">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
{{CanHostIn|Brussels|Belgium}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[File:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; then met the lovely '''[[amylin]]''' in [[Montreal]], and hitchhiked with her in [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[File:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


Longest rides:
* Monday the 12th of April, [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;source=s_d&amp;saddr=49.635008,5.970297&amp;daddr=valencia&amp;hl=en&amp;geocode=;FZ9EWgIdG0D6_ylT3JXQsEhgDTEy3khdIy6vZA&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=0&amp;sz=14&amp;sll=49.638343,5.976563&amp;sspn=0.032906,0.077162&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=49.658517,5.985146&amp;spn=0.13157,0.308647&amp;z=12 from the gas station Capellen Luxembourg straight to Valencia, Spain] - 1500 km.

* On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

* On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I had a ride [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[File:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="be,lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,gb,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,hr,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn" 
           c3="eg,br,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;
&lt;!-- what's serbia? --&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Can host|Brussels, Belgium]]</text>
      <sha1>ewfqfm1knafy9oqpzigpqopzmzwpq5g</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48160</id>
      <parentid>45702</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-12T23:40:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6794">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
{{CanHostIn|Brussels|Belgium}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[File:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; [[Montreal]],  [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[File:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

== Professional activity ==
Since 2008 I work as an [http://guaka.org/consultancy independent free software consultant], mostly with Drupal, also some CiviCRM and MediaWiki (e.g. for [http://wikimini.org/ Wikimini), mainly with NGOs but also for businesses (such as my family's [http://sourenmeubels.nl/ teak furniture business]).


== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


Longest rides:
* Monday the 12th of April, [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;source=s_d&amp;saddr=49.635008,5.970297&amp;daddr=valencia&amp;hl=en&amp;geocode=;FZ9EWgIdG0D6_ylT3JXQsEhgDTEy3khdIy6vZA&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=0&amp;sz=14&amp;sll=49.638343,5.976563&amp;sspn=0.032906,0.077162&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=49.658517,5.985146&amp;spn=0.13157,0.308647&amp;z=12 from the gas station Capellen Luxembourg straight to Valencia, Spain] - 1500 km.

* On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

* On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I had a ride [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[File:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="be,lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,gb,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,hr,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn" 
           c3="eg,br,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;
&lt;!-- what's serbia? --&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Can host|Brussels, Belgium]]</text>
      <sha1>1d9d8xvfsc2098lqzv7tnnh5gvh9bjm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48161</id>
      <parentid>48160</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-12T23:43:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6794">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
{{CanHostIn|Brussels|Belgium}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[File:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; [[Montreal]],  [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[File:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

== Professional activity ==
Since 2008 I work as an [http://guaka.org/consultancy independent free software consultant], mostly with Drupal, also some CiviCRM and MediaWiki (e.g. for [http://wikimini.org/ Wikimini]), mainly with NGOs but also for businesses (such as my family's [http://sourenmeubels.nl/ teak furniture business]).

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


Longest rides:
* Monday the 12th of April, [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;source=s_d&amp;saddr=49.635008,5.970297&amp;daddr=valencia&amp;hl=en&amp;geocode=;FZ9EWgIdG0D6_ylT3JXQsEhgDTEy3khdIy6vZA&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=0&amp;sz=14&amp;sll=49.638343,5.976563&amp;sspn=0.032906,0.077162&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=49.658517,5.985146&amp;spn=0.13157,0.308647&amp;z=12 from the gas station Capellen Luxembourg straight to Valencia, Spain] - 1500 km.

* On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

* On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I had a ride [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[File:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="be,lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,gb,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,hr,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn" 
           c3="eg,br,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;
&lt;!-- what's serbia? --&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Can host|Brussels, Belgium]]</text>
      <sha1>oprrhkqm0hbuo34fq6u7ca5mrq5dees</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>54836</id>
      <parentid>48161</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-09-09T11:24:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6814">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
{{CanHostIn|Brussels|Belgium}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[File:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; [[Montreal]],  [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[File:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

== Professional activity ==
Since 2008 I work as an [http://guaka.org/consultancy independent free software consultant], mostly with Drupal, also some CiviCRM and MediaWiki (e.g. for [http://wikimini.org/ Wikimini]), mainly with NGOs but also for businesses (such as my family's [http://sourenmeubels.nl/ teak furniture business]).

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


Longest rides:
* Monday the 12th of April, [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;source=s_d&amp;saddr=49.635008,5.970297&amp;daddr=valencia&amp;hl=en&amp;geocode=;FZ9EWgIdG0D6_ylT3JXQsEhgDTEy3khdIy6vZA&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=0&amp;sz=14&amp;sll=49.638343,5.976563&amp;sspn=0.032906,0.077162&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=49.658517,5.985146&amp;spn=0.13157,0.308647&amp;z=12 from the gas station Capellen Luxembourg straight to Valencia, Spain] - 1500 km.

* On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

* On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I had a ride [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[File:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="be,lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,gb,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,hr,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn" 
           c3="eg,br,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;
&lt;!-- what's serbia? --&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]
[[bw:people/guaka]]

[[Category:Can host|Brussels, Belgium]]</text>
      <sha1>lehgkojulys5jo4vnpzia5q1fnos3gn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>56913</id>
      <parentid>54836</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-23T01:03:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6827">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
{{CanHostIn|Brussels|Belgium}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[File:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; [[Montreal]],  [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]], [[Arizona]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[File:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

== Professional activity ==
Since 2008 I work as an [http://guaka.org/consultancy independent free software consultant], mostly with Drupal, also some CiviCRM and MediaWiki (e.g. for [http://wikimini.org/ Wikimini]), mainly with NGOs but also for businesses (such as my family's [http://sourenmeubels.nl/ teak furniture business]).

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


Longest rides:
* Monday the 12th of April, [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;source=s_d&amp;saddr=49.635008,5.970297&amp;daddr=valencia&amp;hl=en&amp;geocode=;FZ9EWgIdG0D6_ylT3JXQsEhgDTEy3khdIy6vZA&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=0&amp;sz=14&amp;sll=49.638343,5.976563&amp;sspn=0.032906,0.077162&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=49.658517,5.985146&amp;spn=0.13157,0.308647&amp;z=12 from the gas station Capellen Luxembourg straight to Valencia, Spain] - 1500 km.

* On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

* On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I had a ride [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[File:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="be,lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,gb,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,hr,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn" 
           c3="eg,br,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;
&lt;!-- what's serbia? --&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]
[[bw:people/guaka]]

[[Category:Can host|Brussels, Belgium]]</text>
      <sha1>sww39hnh3k274b4uljnbibm2rpeo2py</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>58132</id>
      <parentid>56913</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-12-28T18:30:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6830">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
{{CanHostIn|Brussels|Belgium}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[File:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; [[Montreal]],  [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]], [[Arizona]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[File:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

== Professional activity ==
Since 2008 I work as an [http://guaka.org/consultancy independent free software consultant], mostly with Drupal, also some CiviCRM and MediaWiki (e.g. for [http://wikimini.org/ Wikimini]), mainly with NGOs but also for businesses (such as my family's [http://sourenmeubels.nl/ teak furniture business]).

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


Longest rides:
* Monday the 12th of April, [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;source=s_d&amp;saddr=49.635008,5.970297&amp;daddr=valencia&amp;hl=en&amp;geocode=;FZ9EWgIdG0D6_ylT3JXQsEhgDTEy3khdIy6vZA&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=0&amp;sz=14&amp;sll=49.638343,5.976563&amp;sspn=0.032906,0.077162&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=49.658517,5.985146&amp;spn=0.13157,0.308647&amp;z=12 from the gas station Capellen Luxembourg straight to Valencia, Spain] - 1500 km.

* On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

* On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I had a ride [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[File:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="be,lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,gb,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,hr,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,mx,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn" 
           c3="eg,br,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;
&lt;!-- what's serbia? --&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]
[[bw:people/guaka]]

[[Category:Can host|Brussels, Belgium]]</text>
      <sha1>f9vliromhsh98tqhv7j6pqwey5xejwx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>58133</id>
      <parentid>58132</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-12-28T18:32:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6830">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
{{CanHostIn|Brussels|Belgium}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
[[File:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; [[Montreal]],  [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]], [[Arizona]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[File:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

== Professional activity ==
Since 2008 I work as an [http://guaka.org/consultancy independent free software consultant], mostly with Drupal, also some CiviCRM and MediaWiki (e.g. for [http://wikimini.org/ Wikimini]), mainly with NGOs but also for businesses (such as my family's [http://sourenmeubels.nl/ teak furniture business]).

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


Longest rides:
* Monday the 12th of April, [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;source=s_d&amp;saddr=49.635008,5.970297&amp;daddr=valencia&amp;hl=en&amp;geocode=;FZ9EWgIdG0D6_ylT3JXQsEhgDTEy3khdIy6vZA&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=0&amp;sz=14&amp;sll=49.638343,5.976563&amp;sspn=0.032906,0.077162&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=49.658517,5.985146&amp;spn=0.13157,0.308647&amp;z=12 from the gas station Capellen Luxembourg straight to Valencia, Spain] - 1500 km.

* On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

* On the 14th of June 2007  [[amylin]] and I had a ride [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[File:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,be,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,gb,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,hr,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,mx,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn" 
           c3="eg,br,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;
&lt;!-- what's serbia? --&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]
[[bw:people/guaka]]

[[Category:Can host|Brussels, Belgium]]</text>
      <sha1>0n5k3fma9tf9q6j39iyqjner0218ex9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>63116</id>
      <parentid>58133</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-08-14T21:59:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6854">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
{{CanHostIn|Brussels|Belgium}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[User:Amylin|Amylin]], September 2007]]
[[File:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; [[Montreal]],  [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]], [[Arizona]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[File:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

== Professional activity ==
Since 2008 I work as an [http://guaka.org/consultancy independent free software consultant], mostly with Drupal, also some CiviCRM and MediaWiki (e.g. for [http://wikimini.org/ Wikimini]), mainly with NGOs but also for businesses (such as my family's [http://sourenmeubels.nl/ teak furniture business]).

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


Longest rides:
* Monday the 12th of April, [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;source=s_d&amp;saddr=49.635008,5.970297&amp;daddr=valencia&amp;hl=en&amp;geocode=;FZ9EWgIdG0D6_ylT3JXQsEhgDTEy3khdIy6vZA&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=0&amp;sz=14&amp;sll=49.638343,5.976563&amp;sspn=0.032906,0.077162&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=49.658517,5.985146&amp;spn=0.13157,0.308647&amp;z=12 from the gas station Capellen Luxembourg straight to Valencia, Spain] - 1500 km.

* On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

* On the 14th of June 2007  [[User:Amylin|Amylin]] and I had a ride [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[File:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,be,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,gb,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,hr,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,mx,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn" 
           c3="eg,br,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;
&lt;!-- what's serbia? --&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]
[[bw:people/guaka]]

[[Category:Can host|Brussels, Belgium]]</text>
      <sha1>bbpr96558p3e80a85ts53hy3h9lnkcv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>63966</id>
      <parentid>63116</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-09-23T09:42:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6877">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
{{CanHostIn|Brussels|Belgium}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[User:Amylin|Amylin]], September 2007]]
[[File:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; [[Montreal]],  [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org guaka.org].

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]], [[Arizona]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[File:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

== Professional activity ==
Since 2008 I work as an [http://guaka.org/consultancy independent free software consultant], mostly with Drupal, also some CiviCRM and MediaWiki (e.g. for [http://wikimini.org/ Wikimini]), mainly with NGOs but also for businesses (such as my family's [http://sourenmeubels.nl/ teak furniture business]).

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


Longest rides:
* Monday the 12th of April, [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;source=s_d&amp;saddr=49.635008,5.970297&amp;daddr=valencia&amp;hl=en&amp;geocode=;FZ9EWgIdG0D6_ylT3JXQsEhgDTEy3khdIy6vZA&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=0&amp;sz=14&amp;sll=49.638343,5.976563&amp;sspn=0.032906,0.077162&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=49.658517,5.985146&amp;spn=0.13157,0.308647&amp;z=12 from the gas station Capellen Luxembourg straight to Valencia, Spain] - 1500 km.

* On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

* On the 14th of June 2007  [[User:Amylin|Amylin]] and I had a ride [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[File:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,be,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,gb,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,hr,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,mx,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn" 
           c3="eg,br,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;
&lt;!-- what's serbia? --&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]
[[Category:Tech team]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]
[[bw:people/guaka]]

[[Category:Can host|Brussels, Belgium]]</text>
      <sha1>4o1rt4s8benhfaandmcwobx2lqakouh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>64806</id>
      <parentid>63966</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-10-01T15:11:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6878">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
{{CanHostIn|Brussels|Belgium}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[User:Amylin|Amylin]], September 2007]]
[[File:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; [[Montreal]],  [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org/ guaka.org].

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]], [[Arizona]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[File:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

== Professional activity ==
Since 2008 I work as an [http://guaka.org/consultancy independent free software consultant], mostly with Drupal, also some CiviCRM and MediaWiki (e.g. for [http://wikimini.org/ Wikimini]), mainly with NGOs but also for businesses (such as my family's [http://sourenmeubels.nl/ teak furniture business]).

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


Longest rides:
* Monday the 12th of April, [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;source=s_d&amp;saddr=49.635008,5.970297&amp;daddr=valencia&amp;hl=en&amp;geocode=;FZ9EWgIdG0D6_ylT3JXQsEhgDTEy3khdIy6vZA&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=0&amp;sz=14&amp;sll=49.638343,5.976563&amp;sspn=0.032906,0.077162&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=49.658517,5.985146&amp;spn=0.13157,0.308647&amp;z=12 from the gas station Capellen Luxembourg straight to Valencia, Spain] - 1500 km.

* On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

* On the 14th of June 2007  [[User:Amylin|Amylin]] and I had a ride [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[File:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,be,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,gb,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,hr,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,mx,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn" 
           c3="eg,br,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;
&lt;!-- what's serbia? --&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]
[[Category:Tech team]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]
[[bw:people/guaka]]

[[Category:Can host|Brussels, Belgium]]</text>
      <sha1>sfdm1bw3psewxzxtjontprlsrq0f4uz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>67428</id>
      <parentid>64806</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-11-04T22:21:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6878">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
{{CanHostIn|Brussels|Belgium}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[User:Amylin|Amylin]], September 2007]]
[[File:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; [[Montreal]],  [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org/ guaka.org].

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]], [[Arizona]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[File:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

== Professional activity ==
Since 2008 I work as an [http://guaka.org/consultancy independent free software consultant], mostly with Drupal, also some CiviCRM and MediaWiki (e.g. for [http://wikimini.org/ Wikimini]), mainly with NGOs but also for businesses (such as my family's [http://sourenmeubels.nl/ teak furniture business]).

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


Longest rides:
* Monday the 12th of April, [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;source=s_d&amp;saddr=49.635008,5.970297&amp;daddr=valencia&amp;hl=en&amp;geocode=;FZ9EWgIdG0D6_ylT3JXQsEhgDTEy3khdIy6vZA&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=0&amp;sz=14&amp;sll=49.638343,5.976563&amp;sspn=0.032906,0.077162&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=49.658517,5.985146&amp;spn=0.13157,0.308647&amp;z=12 from the gas station Capellen Luxembourg straight to Valencia, Spain] - 1500 km.

* On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

* On the 14th of June 2007  [[User:Amylin|Amylin]] and I had a ride [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[File:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,be,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,gb,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,hr,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,mx,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn,br" 
           c3="eg,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;
&lt;!-- what's serbia? --&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]
[[Category:Tech team]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]
[[bw:people/guaka]]

[[Category:Can host|Brussels, Belgium]]</text>
      <sha1>4gfoi0v0un0puwxztd7lcjtalicfqmm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72973</id>
      <parentid>67428</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-10-28T13:24:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7095">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
{{CanHostIn|Brussels|Belgium}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[User:Amylin|Amylin]], September 2007]]
[[File:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; [[Montreal]],  [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org/ guaka.org]. He works on many different websites, from [http://sourenfurniture.com/ selling furniture] to [[:moneyless:|living with much less or no money money]] and of course [[:trash:|many]] [[:nomad:|other]] [[:couch:|wikis]].

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]], [[Arizona]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[File:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

== Professional activity ==
Since 2008 I work as an [http://guaka.org/consultancy independent free software consultant], mostly with Drupal, also some CiviCRM and MediaWiki (e.g. for [http://wikimini.org/ Wikimini]), mainly with NGOs but also for businesses (such as my family's [http://sourenmeubels.nl/ teak furniture business]).

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


Longest rides:
* Monday the 12th of April, [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;source=s_d&amp;saddr=49.635008,5.970297&amp;daddr=valencia&amp;hl=en&amp;geocode=;FZ9EWgIdG0D6_ylT3JXQsEhgDTEy3khdIy6vZA&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=0&amp;sz=14&amp;sll=49.638343,5.976563&amp;sspn=0.032906,0.077162&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=49.658517,5.985146&amp;spn=0.13157,0.308647&amp;z=12 from the gas station Capellen Luxembourg straight to Valencia, Spain] - 1500 km.

* On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

* On the 14th of June 2007  [[User:Amylin|Amylin]] and I had a ride [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[File:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,be,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,gb,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,hr,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,mx,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn,br" 
           c3="eg,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;
&lt;!-- what's serbia? --&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]
[[Category:Tech team]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]
[[bw:people/guaka]]

[[Category:Can host|Brussels, Belgium]]</text>
      <sha1>ou0jzwpgmdruhgxv8mfh1jxj82ep6z2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72974</id>
      <parentid>72973</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-10-28T13:25:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7152">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
{{CanHostIn|Brussels|Belgium}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[User:Amylin|Amylin]], September 2007]]
[[File:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; [[Montreal]],  [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org/ guaka.org]. He works on many different websites, from [http://sourenfurniture.com/ selling furniture] to [[:moneyless:|living with much less or no money money]] and of course [[:trash:|many]] [[:nomad:|other]] [[:couch:|wikis]]. Some of his code is available at http://github.com/guaka

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]], [[Arizona]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[File:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

== Professional activity ==
Since 2008 I work as an [http://guaka.org/consultancy independent free software consultant], mostly with Drupal, also some CiviCRM and MediaWiki (e.g. for [http://wikimini.org/ Wikimini]), mainly with NGOs but also for businesses (such as my family's [http://sourenmeubels.nl/ teak furniture business]).

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


Longest rides:
* Monday the 12th of April, [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;source=s_d&amp;saddr=49.635008,5.970297&amp;daddr=valencia&amp;hl=en&amp;geocode=;FZ9EWgIdG0D6_ylT3JXQsEhgDTEy3khdIy6vZA&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=0&amp;sz=14&amp;sll=49.638343,5.976563&amp;sspn=0.032906,0.077162&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=49.658517,5.985146&amp;spn=0.13157,0.308647&amp;z=12 from the gas station Capellen Luxembourg straight to Valencia, Spain] - 1500 km.

* On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

* On the 14th of June 2007  [[User:Amylin|Amylin]] and I had a ride [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[File:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,be,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,gb,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,hr,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,mx,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn,br" 
           c3="eg,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;
&lt;!-- what's serbia? --&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]
[[Category:Tech team]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]
[[bw:people/guaka]]

[[Category:Can host|Brussels, Belgium]]</text>
      <sha1>o7bykzku4srp07bh0hhjlzvw3buo3y6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72975</id>
      <parentid>72974</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-10-28T13:26:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7153">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
{{CanHostIn|Brussels|Belgium}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[User:Amylin|Amylin]], September 2007]]
[[File:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; [[Montreal]],  [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [http://guaka.org/ guaka.org]. He works on many different websites, from [http://sourenfurniture.com/ selling furniture] to [[:moneyless:|living with much less or no money at all]] and of course [[:trash:|many]] [[:nomad:|other]] [[:couch:|wikis]]. Some of his code is available at http://github.com/guaka

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]], [[Arizona]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[File:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

== Professional activity ==
Since 2008 I work as an [http://guaka.org/consultancy independent free software consultant], mostly with Drupal, also some CiviCRM and MediaWiki (e.g. for [http://wikimini.org/ Wikimini]), mainly with NGOs but also for businesses (such as my family's [http://sourenmeubels.nl/ teak furniture business]).

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


Longest rides:
* Monday the 12th of April, [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;source=s_d&amp;saddr=49.635008,5.970297&amp;daddr=valencia&amp;hl=en&amp;geocode=;FZ9EWgIdG0D6_ylT3JXQsEhgDTEy3khdIy6vZA&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=0&amp;sz=14&amp;sll=49.638343,5.976563&amp;sspn=0.032906,0.077162&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=49.658517,5.985146&amp;spn=0.13157,0.308647&amp;z=12 from the gas station Capellen Luxembourg straight to Valencia, Spain] - 1500 km.

* On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

* On the 14th of June 2007  [[User:Amylin|Amylin]] and I had a ride [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[File:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,be,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,gb,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,hr,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,mx,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn,br" 
           c3="eg,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;
&lt;!-- what's serbia? --&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]
[[Category:Tech team]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]
[[bw:people/guaka]]

[[Category:Can host|Brussels, Belgium]]</text>
      <sha1>siahev5huxp5zlry8xzzg74fq5v1e56</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>84935</id>
      <parentid>72975</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-12-06T11:58:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7209">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
{{CanHostIn|Berlin|Belgium}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[:guaka:|site]], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[User:Amylin|Amylin]], September 2007]]
[[File:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; [[Montreal]],  [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [[:guaka:|guaka.org]]. He works on many different websites, from [http://sourenfurniture.com/ selling furniture] to [[:moneyless:|living with much less or no money at all]] and of course [[:trash:|many]] [[:nomad:|other]] [[:couch:|wikis]]. Some of his code is available at http://github.com/guaka

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]], [[Arizona]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[File:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

== Professional activity ==
Since 2008 I work as an [[:guaka:consultancy|independent free software consultant], mostly with Drupal, also some CiviCRM and MediaWiki (e.g. for [http://wikimini.org/ Wikimini]), mainly with NGOs but also for businesses (such as my family's [http://sourenmeubels.nl/ teak furniture business]).

As of 2016 I'm focused on building a fintech company, [[:b2bpay:about:B2B Pay]].

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


Longest rides:
* Monday the 12th of April, [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;source=s_d&amp;saddr=49.635008,5.970297&amp;daddr=valencia&amp;hl=en&amp;geocode=;FZ9EWgIdG0D6_ylT3JXQsEhgDTEy3khdIy6vZA&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=0&amp;sz=14&amp;sll=49.638343,5.976563&amp;sspn=0.032906,0.077162&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=49.658517,5.985146&amp;spn=0.13157,0.308647&amp;z=12 from the gas station Capellen Luxembourg straight to Valencia, Spain] - 1500 km.

* On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

* On the 14th of June 2007  [[User:Amylin|Amylin]] and I had a ride [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[File:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,be,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,gb,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,hr,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,mx,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn,br" 
           c3="eg,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;
&lt;!-- what's serbia? --&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]
[[Category:Tech team]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]
[[bw:people/guaka]]

[[Category:Can host|Brussels, Belgium]]</text>
      <sha1>0w6yi0l1ql4ctjap2ngbb8ad3mlpnfk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>84936</id>
      <parentid>84935</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-12-06T12:00:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7210">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
{{CanHostIn|Berlin|Belgium}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[:guaka:|site]], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[User:Amylin|Amylin]], September 2007]]
[[File:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; [[Montreal]],  [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [[:guaka:|guaka.org]]. He works on many different websites, from [http://sourenfurniture.com/ selling furniture] to [[:moneyless:|living with much less or no money at all]] and of course [[:trash:|many]] [[:nomad:|other]] [[:couch:|wikis]]. Some of his code is available at http://github.com/guaka

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]], [[Arizona]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[File:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

== Professional activity ==
Since 2008 I work as an [[:guaka:consultancy|independent free software consultant], mostly with Drupal, also some CiviCRM and MediaWiki (e.g. for [http://wikimini.org/ Wikimini]), mainly with NGOs but also for businesses (such as my family's [http://sourenmeubels.nl/ teak furniture business]).

As of 2016 I'm focused on building a fintech company, [[:b2bpay:about:|B2B Pay]].

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


Longest rides:
* Monday the 12th of April, [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;source=s_d&amp;saddr=49.635008,5.970297&amp;daddr=valencia&amp;hl=en&amp;geocode=;FZ9EWgIdG0D6_ylT3JXQsEhgDTEy3khdIy6vZA&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=0&amp;sz=14&amp;sll=49.638343,5.976563&amp;sspn=0.032906,0.077162&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=49.658517,5.985146&amp;spn=0.13157,0.308647&amp;z=12 from the gas station Capellen Luxembourg straight to Valencia, Spain] - 1500 km.

* On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

* On the 14th of June 2007  [[User:Amylin|Amylin]] and I had a ride [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[File:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,be,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,gb,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,hr,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,mx,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn,br" 
           c3="eg,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;
&lt;!-- what's serbia? --&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]
[[Category:Tech team]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]
[[bw:people/guaka]]

[[Category:Can host|Brussels, Belgium]]</text>
      <sha1>84omc5sivu1cum9hw5v03kdw4htgt10</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>84937</id>
      <parentid>84936</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-12-06T12:01:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7209">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
{{CanHostIn|Berlin|Belgium}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[:guaka:|site]], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[User:Amylin|Amylin]], September 2007]]
[[File:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; [[Montreal]],  [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [[:guaka:|guaka.org]]. He works on many different websites, from [http://sourenfurniture.com/ selling furniture] to [[:moneyless:|living with much less or no money at all]] and of course [[:trash:|many]] [[:nomad:|other]] [[:couch:|wikis]]. Some of his code is available at http://github.com/guaka

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]], [[Arizona]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[File:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

== Professional activity ==
Since 2008 I work as an [[:guaka:consultancy|independent free software consultant], mostly with Drupal, also some CiviCRM and MediaWiki (e.g. for [http://wikimini.org/ Wikimini]), mainly with NGOs but also for businesses (such as my family's [http://sourenmeubels.nl/ teak furniture business]).

As of 2016 I'm focused on building a fintech company, [[:b2bpay:about|B2B Pay]].

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


Longest rides:
* Monday the 12th of April, [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;source=s_d&amp;saddr=49.635008,5.970297&amp;daddr=valencia&amp;hl=en&amp;geocode=;FZ9EWgIdG0D6_ylT3JXQsEhgDTEy3khdIy6vZA&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=0&amp;sz=14&amp;sll=49.638343,5.976563&amp;sspn=0.032906,0.077162&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=49.658517,5.985146&amp;spn=0.13157,0.308647&amp;z=12 from the gas station Capellen Luxembourg straight to Valencia, Spain] - 1500 km.

* On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

* On the 14th of June 2007  [[User:Amylin|Amylin]] and I had a ride [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[File:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,be,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,gb,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,hr,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,mx,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn,br" 
           c3="eg,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;
&lt;!-- what's serbia? --&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]
[[Category:Tech team]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]
[[bw:people/guaka]]

[[Category:Can host|Brussels, Belgium]]</text>
      <sha1>nwpk74g6h2i4pcjvyw9yohlqsk497cb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>87762</id>
      <parentid>84937</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-04-24T14:32:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7323">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
{{CanHostIn|Berlin|Belgium}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[:guaka:|site]], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[User:Amylin|Amylin]], September 2007]]
[[File:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; [[Montreal]],  [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [[:guaka:|guaka.org]]. He works on many different websites, from [http://sourenfurniture.com/ selling furniture] to [[:moneyless:|living with much less or no money at all]] and of course [[:trash:|many]] [[:nomad:|other]] [[:couch:|wikis]]. Some of his code is available at http://github.com/guaka

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]], [[Arizona]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[File:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

== Professional activity ==
Hitchhiking [[:kasper:hitchhiking-great-business|has been great]] for developing my professional skills.

In 2008 I started working as an [[:guaka:consultancy|independent free software consultant], mostly with Drupal, also some CiviCRM and MediaWiki (e.g. for [http://wikimini.org/ Wikimini]), mainly with NGOs but also for businesses (such as my family's [http://sourenmeubels.nl/ teak furniture business]).

As of 2016 I'm focused on building a fintech company, [[:b2bpay:about|B2B Pay]].

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


Longest rides:
* Monday the 12th of April, [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;source=s_d&amp;saddr=49.635008,5.970297&amp;daddr=valencia&amp;hl=en&amp;geocode=;FZ9EWgIdG0D6_ylT3JXQsEhgDTEy3khdIy6vZA&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=0&amp;sz=14&amp;sll=49.638343,5.976563&amp;sspn=0.032906,0.077162&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=49.658517,5.985146&amp;spn=0.13157,0.308647&amp;z=12 from the gas station Capellen Luxembourg straight to Valencia, Spain] - 1500 km.

* On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

* On the 14th of June 2007  [[User:Amylin|Amylin]] and I had a ride [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[File:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,be,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,gb,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,hr,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,mx,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn,br" 
           c3="eg,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;
&lt;!-- what's serbia? --&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]
[[Category:Tech team]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]
[[bw:people/guaka]]

[[Category:Can host|Brussels, Belgium]]</text>
      <sha1>ldw77ls98w9fethg9pv9bc5nkh4ifwv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>96968</id>
      <parentid>87762</parentid>
      <timestamp>2019-10-03T10:12:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7324">{{IsIn|:Europe}}
{{CanHostIn|Berlin|Belgium}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[:guaka:|site]], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[User:Amylin|Amylin]], September 2007]]
[[File:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; [[Montreal]],  [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [[:guaka:|guaka.org]]. He works on many different websites, from [https://sourenfurniture.com/ selling furniture] to [[:moneyless:|living with much less or no money at all]] and of course [[:trash:|many]] [[:nomad:|other]] [[:couch:|wikis]]. Some of his code is available at http://github.com/guaka

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]], [[Arizona]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[File:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

== Professional activity ==
Hitchhiking [[:kasper:hitchhiking-great-business|has been great]] for developing my professional skills.

In 2008 I started working as an [[:guaka:consultancy|independent free software consultant], mostly with Drupal, also some CiviCRM and MediaWiki (e.g. for [http://wikimini.org/ Wikimini]), mainly with NGOs but also for businesses (such as my family's [http://sourenmeubels.nl/ teak furniture business]).

As of 2016 I'm focused on building a fintech company, [[:b2bpay:about|B2B Pay]].

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


Longest rides:
* Monday the 12th of April, [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;source=s_d&amp;saddr=49.635008,5.970297&amp;daddr=valencia&amp;hl=en&amp;geocode=;FZ9EWgIdG0D6_ylT3JXQsEhgDTEy3khdIy6vZA&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=0&amp;sz=14&amp;sll=49.638343,5.976563&amp;sspn=0.032906,0.077162&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=49.658517,5.985146&amp;spn=0.13157,0.308647&amp;z=12 from the gas station Capellen Luxembourg straight to Valencia, Spain] - 1500 km.

* On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

* On the 14th of June 2007  [[User:Amylin|Amylin]] and I had a ride [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[File:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,be,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,gb,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,hr,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,mx,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn,br" 
           c3="eg,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;
&lt;!-- what's serbia? --&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]
[[Category:Tech team]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]
[[bw:people/guaka]]

[[Category:Can host|Brussels, Belgium]]</text>
      <sha1>lgb3incmvf9qcevhaglk0lda9z14nq2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>96969</id>
      <parentid>96968</parentid>
      <timestamp>2019-10-03T10:13:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7278">[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[:guaka:|site]], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[User:Amylin|Amylin]], September 2007]]
[[File:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; [[Montreal]],  [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [[:guaka:|guaka.org]]. He works on many different websites, from [https://sourenfurniture.com/ selling furniture] to [[:moneyless:|living with much less or no money at all]] and of course [[:trash:|many]] [[:nomad:|other]] [[:couch:|wikis]]. Some of his code is available at http://github.com/guaka

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]], [[Arizona]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[File:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

== Professional activity ==
Hitchhiking [[:kasper:hitchhiking-great-business|has been great]] for developing my professional skills.

In 2008 I started working as an [[:guaka:consultancy|independent free software consultant], mostly with Drupal, also some CiviCRM and MediaWiki (e.g. for [http://wikimini.org/ Wikimini]), mainly with NGOs but also for businesses (such as my family's [http://sourenmeubels.nl/ teak furniture business]).

As of 2016 I'm focused on building a fintech company, [[:b2bpay:about|B2B Pay]].

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


Longest rides:
* Monday the 12th of April, [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;source=s_d&amp;saddr=49.635008,5.970297&amp;daddr=valencia&amp;hl=en&amp;geocode=;FZ9EWgIdG0D6_ylT3JXQsEhgDTEy3khdIy6vZA&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=0&amp;sz=14&amp;sll=49.638343,5.976563&amp;sspn=0.032906,0.077162&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=49.658517,5.985146&amp;spn=0.13157,0.308647&amp;z=12 from the gas station Capellen Luxembourg straight to Valencia, Spain] - 1500 km.

* On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

* On the 14th of June 2007  [[User:Amylin|Amylin]] and I had a ride [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[File:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,be,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,gb,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,hr,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,mx,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn,br" 
           c3="eg,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;
&lt;!-- what's serbia? --&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]
[[Category:Tech team]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]
[[bw:people/guaka]]

[[Category:Can host|Brussels, Belgium]]</text>
      <sha1>jzfikn5pdv5tzqxm7iicljby1mygu1f</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>97099</id>
      <parentid>96969</parentid>
      <timestamp>2019-11-26T17:15:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7350">[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[:guaka:|site]], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[User:Amylin|Amylin]], September 2007]]
[[File:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; [[Montreal]],  [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [[:guaka:|guaka.org]]. He works on many different websites, from [https://sourenfurniture.com/ selling furniture] to [[:moneyless:|living with much less or no money at all]] and of course [[:trash:|many]] [[:nomad:|other]] [[:couch:|wikis]]. As of 2019 [[:fifi:|FiFi]] is his main cyber pet project. Some of his code is available at https://github.com/guaka

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]], [[Arizona]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[File:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

== Professional activity ==
Hitchhiking [[:kasper:hitchhiking-great-business|has been great]] for developing my professional skills.

In 2008 I started working as an [[:guaka:consultancy|independent free software consultant], mostly with Drupal, also some CiviCRM and MediaWiki (e.g. for [http://wikimini.org/ Wikimini]), mainly with NGOs but also for businesses (such as my family's [http://sourenmeubels.nl/ teak furniture business]).

As of 2016 I'm focused on building a fintech company, [[:b2bpay:about|B2B Pay]].

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


Longest rides:
* Monday the 12th of April, [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;source=s_d&amp;saddr=49.635008,5.970297&amp;daddr=valencia&amp;hl=en&amp;geocode=;FZ9EWgIdG0D6_ylT3JXQsEhgDTEy3khdIy6vZA&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=0&amp;sz=14&amp;sll=49.638343,5.976563&amp;sspn=0.032906,0.077162&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=49.658517,5.985146&amp;spn=0.13157,0.308647&amp;z=12 from the gas station Capellen Luxembourg straight to Valencia, Spain] - 1500 km.

* On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

* On the 14th of June 2007  [[User:Amylin|Amylin]] and I had a ride [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[File:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,be,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,gb,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,hr,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,mx,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn,br" 
           c3="eg,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;
&lt;!-- what's serbia? --&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]
[[Category:Tech team]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]
[[bw:people/guaka]]

[[Category:Can host|Brussels, Belgium]]</text>
      <sha1>n25x6265w2okh968ulcvdhx6k4tykcx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>97341</id>
      <parentid>97099</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-02-05T14:05:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7292">[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[:guaka:|site]], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[User:Amylin|Amylin]], September 2007]]
[[File:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''', or Kasper Souren, is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; [[Montreal]],  [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [[:guaka:|guaka.org]]. He works on many different websites, from [https://sourenfurniture.com/ selling furniture] to [[:moneyless:|living with much less or no money at all]] and of course [[:trash:|many]] [[:nomad:|other]] [[:couch:|wikis]]. Some of his code is available at https://github.com/guaka

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]], [[Arizona]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[File:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

== Professional activity ==
Hitchhiking [[:kasper:hitchhiking-great-business|has been great]] for developing my professional skills.

In 2008 I started working as an [[:guaka:consultancy|independent free software consultant], mostly with Drupal, also some CiviCRM and MediaWiki (e.g. for [http://wikimini.org/ Wikimini]), mainly with NGOs but also for businesses (such as my family's [http://sourenmeubels.nl/ teak furniture business]).

As of 2016 I'm focused on building a fintech company, [[:b2bpay:about|B2B Pay]].

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


Longest rides:
* Monday the 12th of April, [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;source=s_d&amp;saddr=49.635008,5.970297&amp;daddr=valencia&amp;hl=en&amp;geocode=;FZ9EWgIdG0D6_ylT3JXQsEhgDTEy3khdIy6vZA&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=0&amp;sz=14&amp;sll=49.638343,5.976563&amp;sspn=0.032906,0.077162&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=49.658517,5.985146&amp;spn=0.13157,0.308647&amp;z=12 from the gas station Capellen Luxembourg straight to Valencia, Spain] - 1500 km.

* On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

* On the 14th of June 2007  [[User:Amylin|Amylin]] and I had a ride [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[File:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,be,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,gb,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,hr,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,mx,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn,br" 
           c3="eg,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;
&lt;!-- what's serbia? --&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]
[[Category:Tech team]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]
[[bw:people/guaka]]

[[Category:Can host|Brussels, Belgium]]</text>
      <sha1>fn98p4xsf8s13ah9bxka1bl0nqoi58a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>98466</id>
      <parentid>97341</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-09-08T08:09:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7273">[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[:guaka:|site]], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[User:Amylin|Amylin]], September 2007]]
[[File:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''' is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; [[Montreal]],  [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [[:guaka:|guaka.org]]. He works on many different websites, from [https://sourenfurniture.com/ selling furniture] to [[:moneyless:|living with much less or no money at all]] and of course [[:trash:|many]] [[:nomad:|other]] [[:couch:|wikis]]. Some of his code is available at https://github.com/guaka

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]], [[Arizona]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

[[File:Guaka my bithday2.jpg|thumb|300px|left|Hitching to [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]] on my 30th birthday]]

== Professional activity ==
Hitchhiking [[:kasper:hitchhiking-great-business|has been great]] for developing my professional skills.

In 2008 I started working as an [[:guaka:consultancy|independent free software consultant], mostly with Drupal, also some CiviCRM and MediaWiki (e.g. for [http://wikimini.org/ Wikimini]), mainly with NGOs but also for businesses (such as my family's [http://sourenmeubels.nl/ teak furniture business]).

As of 2016 I'm focused on building a fintech company, [[:b2bpay:about|B2B Pay]].

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


Longest rides:
* Monday the 12th of April, [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;source=s_d&amp;saddr=49.635008,5.970297&amp;daddr=valencia&amp;hl=en&amp;geocode=;FZ9EWgIdG0D6_ylT3JXQsEhgDTEy3khdIy6vZA&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=0&amp;sz=14&amp;sll=49.638343,5.976563&amp;sspn=0.032906,0.077162&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=49.658517,5.985146&amp;spn=0.13157,0.308647&amp;z=12 from the gas station Capellen Luxembourg straight to Valencia, Spain] - 1500 km.

* On the 29th of July 2008 Erga and I had a ride from [[Sundsvall]], Sweden to [[Alta]] in the North of [[Norway]], with a detour through [[Solleftea]]: [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;saddr=Sundsvall,+Sweden&amp;daddr=63.169235,17.259521+to:Alta,+Norge&amp;hl=nn&amp;geocode=3005655670323007979,63.146620,17.391390&amp;mra=dme&amp;mrcr=0&amp;mrsp=1&amp;sz=8&amp;via=1&amp;sll=63.283062,19.154663&amp;sspn=1.516485,5.822754&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=66.618122,21.75293&amp;spn=10.775532,46.582031&amp;z=5 google maps].

* On the 14th of June 2007  [[User:Amylin|Amylin]] and I had a ride [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&amp;hl=en&amp;saddr=piacenza&amp;daddr=cologne&amp;sll=45.255555,9.662476&amp;sspn=1.840641,5.141602&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;ll=45.009477,9.84581&amp;spn=0.231075,0.6427&amp;z=11&amp;om=1 from Piacenza to Cologne], and the St. Gotthard tunnel was actually closed, so it was probably more than 1000 km :)

The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

[[File:Hitchhikers with Chinese police man.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin and me with a friendly Chinese policeman]]

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].

&lt;travelmap countries="nl,be,fr,it,pe,ml,nz" 
           c2="lu,de,pl,se,no,dk,fi,gb,ch,at,hu,cz,sk,lv,lt,ee,hr,ro,bg,es,ec,ar,uy,cl,mx,us,ca,il,sy,jo,tr,au,la,th,cn,br" 
           c3="eg,bo,py,pt,gr,ie,in" 
           width="720" description='red: lived there, yellow: hitched there, blue: traveled there' /&gt;
&lt;!-- what's serbia? --&gt;

{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]
[[Category:Tech team]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]
[[bw:people/guaka]]

[[Category:Can host|Brussels, Belgium]]</text>
      <sha1>hl06ej15s3iv7f9wta715ppucont3rp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>98467</id>
      <parentid>98466</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-09-08T08:11:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5464">[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|300px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[[:guaka:|site]], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in [[New England]] taken by [[User:Amylin|Amylin]], September 2007]]
[[File:Kasper playing guitar at beach.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Playing guitar at the beach in [[Nelson]], [[New Zealand]].]]
'''guaka''' is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; [[Montreal]],  [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [[:guaka:|guaka.org]]. He works on many different websites, from [https://sourenfurniture.com/ selling furniture] to [[:moneyless:|living with much less or no money at all]] and of course [[:trash:|many]] [[:nomad:|other]] [[:couch:|wikis]]. Some of his code is available at https://github.com/guaka

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]], [[Arizona]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

== Professional activity ==
Hitchhiking [[:kasper:hitchhiking-great-business|has been great]] for developing my professional skills.

In 2008 I started working as an [[:guaka:consultancy|independent free software consultant], mostly with Drupal, also some CiviCRM and MediaWiki (e.g. for [http://wikimini.org/ Wikimini]), mainly with NGOs but also for businesses (such as my family's [http://sourenmeubels.nl/ teak furniture business]).

As of 2016 I'm focused on building a fintech company, [[:b2bpay:about|B2B Pay]].

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].


{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]
[[Category:Tech team]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]
[[bw:people/guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>m39xqmeg4t1l8x8o7q2aym6pqbfyuml</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>98468</id>
      <parentid>98467</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-09-08T08:11:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5132">'''guaka''' is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]].

He was born in [[Nuth]], [[Netherlands]], but lived in [[Paris]], [[Mali]], hitchhiked through [[Europe]] and [[South America]] for a long time, and worked a bit in [[Lima]], [[Peru]]; [[Montreal]],  [[Quebec]], the [[United States]], [[New Zealand]], [[Australia]], from [[Thailand]] to [[Hong Kong]] and in [[Europe]].  Lived in [[Trento]], [[Italy]] since July 2007, and as of January 2008 in [[Amsterdam]].  In October 2008 he hitched from [[Amsterdam]] to [[Jerusalem]] through [[Turkey]], [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [[:guaka:|guaka.org]]. He works on many different websites, from [https://sourenfurniture.com/ selling furniture] to [[:moneyless:|living with much less or no money at all]] and of course [[:trash:|many]] [[:nomad:|other]] [[:couch:|wikis]]. Some of his code is available at https://github.com/guaka

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]], [[Arizona]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

== Professional activity ==
Hitchhiking [[:kasper:hitchhiking-great-business|has been great]] for developing my professional skills.

In 2008 I started working as an [[:guaka:consultancy|independent free software consultant], mostly with Drupal, also some CiviCRM and MediaWiki (e.g. for [http://wikimini.org/ Wikimini]), mainly with NGOs but also for businesses (such as my family's [http://sourenmeubels.nl/ teak furniture business]).

As of 2016 I'm focused on building a fintech company, [[:b2bpay:about|B2B Pay]].

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].


{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]
[[Category:Tech team]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]
[[bw:people/guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>kl2ofx6p3ui7omta2a5oz5nxy6hzkdi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>98475</id>
      <parentid>98468</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-09-08T18:28:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4610">'''guaka''' is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [[:guaka:|guaka.org]]. He works on many different websites, from [https://sourenfurniture.com/ selling furniture] to [[:moneyless:|living with much less or no money at all]] and of course [[:trash:|many]] [[:nomad:|other]] [[:couch:|wikis]]. Some of his code is available at https://github.com/guaka

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]], [[Arizona]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

== Professional activity ==
Hitchhiking [[:kasper:hitchhiking-great-business|has been great]] for developing my professional skills.

In 2008 I started working as an [[:guaka:consultancy|independent free software consultant], mostly with Drupal, also some CiviCRM and MediaWiki (e.g. for [http://wikimini.org/ Wikimini]), mainly with NGOs but also for businesses (such as my family's [http://sourenmeubels.nl/ teak furniture business]).

As of 2016 I'm focused on building a fintech company, [[:b2bpay:about|B2B Pay]].

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].


{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]
[[Category:Tech team]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]
[[bw:people/guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>am7i5p1r5py7knabh97hiwi8p7kzn7s</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>102123</id>
      <parentid>98475</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-05-28T16:06:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Professional activity */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4587">'''guaka''' is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [[:guaka:|guaka.org]]. He works on many different websites, from [https://sourenfurniture.com/ selling furniture] to [[:moneyless:|living with much less or no money at all]] and of course [[:trash:|many]] [[:nomad:|other]] [[:couch:|wikis]]. Some of his code is available at https://github.com/guaka

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]], [[Arizona]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

== Professional activity ==
Hitchhiking [[:kasper:hitchhiking-great-business|has been great]] for developing my professional skills.

In 2008 I started working as an [[:guaka:consultancy|independent free software consultant], mostly with Drupal, also some CiviCRM and MediaWiki (e.g. for [http://wikimini.org/ Wikimini]), mainly with NGOs but also for businesses (such as my family's [https://sourenmeubels.nl/ teak furniture business]).

For a while I was focused on building a fintech company.

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].


{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]
[[Category:Tech team]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]
[[bw:people/guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>azcew84kmttcacs4v2zsfxp2pxmh1gu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>102127</id>
      <parentid>102123</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-05-29T17:39:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Professional activity */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4090">'''guaka''' is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]].

Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [[:guaka:|guaka.org]]. He works on many different websites, from [https://sourenfurniture.com/ selling furniture] to [[:moneyless:|living with much less or no money at all]] and of course [[:trash:|many]] [[:nomad:|other]] [[:couch:|wikis]]. Some of his code is available at https://github.com/guaka

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]], [[Arizona]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].


{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]
[[Category:Tech team]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]
[[bw:people/guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>rxersnhr3q9nqdfhz7exil22p27w3ff</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>102205</id>
      <parentid>102127</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-07-30T13:54:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4173">'''guaka''' is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]].

If there's a technical problem with Hitchwiki, contact me AT myusername DOT org.


Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [[:guaka:|guaka.org]]. He works on many different websites, from [https://sourenfurniture.com/ selling furniture] to [[:moneyless:|living with much less or no money at all]] and of course [[:trash:|many]] [[:nomad:|other]] [[:couch:|wikis]]. Some of his code is available at https://github.com/guaka

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]], [[Arizona]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].


{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]
[[Category:Tech team]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]
[[bw:people/guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>ne1zjalvmgoiu294gt0ggmmrce46zkv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104132</id>
      <parentid>102205</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-04-14T17:25:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4183">'''guaka''' is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]].

If there's a technical problem with Hitchwiki, contact hitchwiki524 AT myusername DOT org.


Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [http://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [http://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [[:guaka:|guaka.org]]. He works on many different websites, from [https://sourenfurniture.com/ selling furniture] to [[:moneyless:|living with much less or no money at all]] and of course [[:trash:|many]] [[:nomad:|other]] [[:couch:|wikis]]. Some of his code is available at https://github.com/guaka

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]], [[Arizona]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].


{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]
[[Category:Tech team]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]
[[bw:people/guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>o189mw8wwjkbhusvnv757ov1ygb8in8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104133</id>
      <parentid>104132</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-04-14T17:25:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4185">'''guaka''' is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]].

If there's a technical problem with Hitchwiki, contact hitchwiki524 AT myusername DOT org.


Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [https://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [https://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [[:guaka:|guaka.org]]. He works on many different websites, from [https://sourenfurniture.com/ selling furniture] to [[:moneyless:|living with much less or no money at all]] and of course [[:trash:|many]] [[:nomad:|other]] [[:couch:|wikis]]. Some of his code is available at https://github.com/guaka

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]], [[Arizona]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxemburg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].


{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]
[[Category:Tech team]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]
[[bw:people/guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>kpqcqb4p96g668l5ubcgi969ksy95s8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104293</id>
      <parentid>104133</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-05-22T12:00:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dws49</username>
        <id>42886</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>on behalf of the 5 Luxembourgish people who are tired of seeing their little country's name being misspelled</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4186">'''guaka''' is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]].

If there's a technical problem with Hitchwiki, contact hitchwiki524 AT myusername DOT org.


Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [https://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [https://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [[:guaka:|guaka.org]]. He works on many different websites, from [https://sourenfurniture.com/ selling furniture] to [[:moneyless:|living with much less or no money at all]] and of course [[:trash:|many]] [[:nomad:|other]] [[:couch:|wikis]]. Some of his code is available at https://github.com/guaka

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]], [[Arizona]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxembourg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].


{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]
[[Category:Tech team]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]
[[bw:people/guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>cjk6i4ispsrn97zkrthdeksdjas6wzk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>114767</id>
      <parentid>104293</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-10-04T21:03:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4383">'''guaka''' is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]].

If there's a technical problem with Hitchwiki, contact hitchwiki524 AT myusername DOT org.

Or come hang out in the #hackers TRipchat:

&lt;iframe key="tripchat" path="TRipchat/embed.html#hitch" width="100%" height="500"
        sandbox="allow-scripts allow-forms" title="TRipchat test" /&gt;



Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [https://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [https://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [[:guaka:|guaka.org]]. He works on many different websites, from [https://sourenfurniture.com/ selling furniture] to [[:moneyless:|living with much less or no money at all]] and of course [[:trash:|many]] [[:nomad:|other]] [[:couch:|wikis]]. Some of his code is available at https://github.com/guaka

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]], [[Arizona]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxembourg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].


{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]
[[Category:Tech team]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]
[[bw:people/guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>a99fdnz31mqhv73w1b27ajs7kob1gfh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>114768</id>
      <parentid>114767</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-10-04T21:04:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4389">'''guaka''' is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]].

If there's a technical problem with Hitchwiki, contact hitchwiki524 AT myusername DOT org.

Or come hang out in the #hackers TRipchat:

&lt;iframe key="tripchat" path="TRipchat/embed.html#hackers" width="100%" height="500"
        sandbox="allow-scripts allow-forms" title="#hackers TRipchat" /&gt;



Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [https://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [https://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [[:guaka:|guaka.org]]. He works on many different websites, from [https://sourenfurniture.com/ selling furniture] to [[:moneyless:|living with much less or no money at all]] and of course [[:trash:|many]] [[:nomad:|other]] [[:couch:|wikis]]. Some of his code is available at https://github.com/guaka

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]], [[Arizona]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxembourg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].


{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]
[[Category:Tech team]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]
[[bw:people/guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>c84cy76x69cou0f3tns92a6vysmuifz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>114899</id>
      <parentid>114768</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-10-24T15:24:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4252">'''guaka''' is one of the administrators of this wiki. He moved the wiki from &lt;tt&gt;hitchhikingguide.org&lt;/tt&gt; to Wikia, since over there it was being spammed all the time. And then, on November 24 2006, to [[project:about|hitchwiki.org]], together with [[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]].

If there's a technical problem with Hitchwiki, contact hitchwiki524 AT myusername DOT org.


npub1lt6a968lk4h6yqduqnxcha628cudulgy8xk607c4xyxn6d6w6kcsmgp8hj


Guaka is or has been also active on many Wikipedias (he founded the [https://bm.wikipedia.org Bambara] and the [https://ff.wikipedia.org Fulfulde Wikipedia]) and on Wikitravel.  And he has worked on many online projects, but Hitchwiki.org is definitely his favorite, because of:
* the free license,
* the convivial atmosphere, 
* the ideal mix between ad-hoc and democratic decisions, 
* the steady stream of activity and constant growth (yearly doubling!),
* the different languages (since 2007)
* the clear objective and
* the inherent qualities of the project
See also ''[[Hitchwiki:Why_we_work_on_Hitchwiki#Guaka|why we work on Hitchwiki]]''.

His main home in cyberspace can be found at [[:guaka:|guaka.org]]. He works on many different websites, from [https://sourenfurniture.com/ selling furniture] to [[:moneyless:|living with much less or no money at all]] and of course [[:trash:|many]] [[:nomad:|other]] [[:couch:|wikis]]. Some of his code is available at https://github.com/guaka

== Hitchhiking experience ==
''see also [[User:Guaka/log|my log]]''

* [[Europe]]: [[Netherlands]], [[Belgium]], [[France]], [[Spain]], [[Austria]], [[Germany]], [[Denmark]], [[Sweden]], [[Norway]], [[Finland]], [[Estonia]], [[Latvia]], [[Lithuania]], [[Poland]], [[Czech Republic]], [[Slovakia]], [[Croatia]], [[Serbia]], [[England]], [[Italy]], [[Switzerland]], [[Hungary]], [[Romania]], [[Bulgaria]], [[Turkey]]
* [[South America]]: [[Uruguay]], [[Argentina]], [[Chile]], [[Ecuador]]
* [[North America]]: [[Canada]] (only in [[Quebec]]), [[United States]], [[New York State]], [[Massachusetts]], [[New Hampshire]], [[Vermont]], [[Oregon]], [[California]], [[Arizona]]
* [[Asia]]: From [[Thailand]], [[Chiang Rai]] through [[Laos]] to [[China]], towards [[Hong Kong]], from [[Istanbul]] to [[Jerusalem]], through [[Syria]] and [[Jordan]]
* [[Africa]]: [[Bamako]] ([[Mali]])
* [[Oceania]]: [[New Zealand]], [[Auckland]] to [[Wellington]] and around the South Island, [[Australia]], from [[Sydney]] to [[Melbourne]]

== Random stuff ==
Esteban: "U have a wiki about how not to pay busses? I tought I was stingy dude, but obviously there's always someone in the world who can cleary exceed your capabilities".


=== Stats ===


The shortest wait, well, that happened a lot, when your holding a sign when you get out of a car at a gas station on the highway and friendly people notice that.

My longest wait was in [[Argentina]] where I gave up after 18 hours.

* In 2006 I successfully hitched a ride with 5 other people, in [[Argentina]], around [[San Marcos Sierra]].

=== [[Driving for your driver|Driving for my drivers]] ===
* In 2005 or so, getting out of Paris, after being dropped at a really bad spot I started [[walking on the highway]] in the hot sun and after half an hour I was picked up by a guy moving from his stuff from [[Paris]] to somewhere south from [[Toulouse]].  He let me drive his car for 2 hours.
* In June 2008, hitching from Amsterdam to [[Avignon]], I managed to get to a busy gas station in [[Luxembourg]] at around 22:00 and found a ride straight to my destination.  The car's dashboard was not working, I wasn't convinced of the driver's driving style and after an hour or so, and asking about my driving license, he offered me the steering wheel.  I drove all the way to Avignon.
* In August 2008, hitching from [[Berlin]] to [[Trento]] an Italian at a gas station close to [[Munich]] was a bit tired.  He had dinner there and I showed him my driving license and I drove all the way to Trento through the pouring [[rain]].


{{user cc-by-sa}}
[[fr:Utilisateur:Guaka]]
[[trash:User:Guaka]]

[[Category:Hitchhikers]]
[[Category:Tech team]]

[[de:Benutzer:Guaka]]
[[es:Usuario:Guaka]]
[[fi:User:Guaka]]
[[nl:Gebruiker:Guaka]]
[[ru:Участник:Guaka]]
[[zh:User:Guaka]]
[[bw:people/guaka]]</text>
      <sha1>ckh5hwjnhsdchocz1eqwkz50acyj842</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Hitchhiking</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1534</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1573</id>
      <parentid>4448</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-12T22:18:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="461">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], how to do it, ...

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopedic information about hitchhiking].

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>ic4wg0hrdau9y7sqfqw3b4wzjg4flbx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1574</id>
      <parentid>8848</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="461">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], how to do it, ...

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopedic information about hitchhiking].

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>ic4wg0hrdau9y7sqfqw3b4wzjg4flbx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4446</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T21:09:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14496">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'') is a form of [[transport]], in which the traveller tries to get a lift (ride) from another traveller, usually a [[automobile|car]] or [[truck]] driver.

The distance covered may vary from a short distance that could also be walked, to a long journey involving many rides. Those who choose to hitchhike usually do so for one of two reasons: necessity (no funds, no transportation) or [[adventure]] ([[serendipity|serendipitous]] travel, meet new and unexpected people)

Hitchhiking is forbidden in some areas, such as near [[prison]]s. In some cases, a local government may ban it altogether. Certain [[United States|US]] states have created conditional bans, such as [[Utah]], [[Pennsylvania]], [[New Jersey]] and [[Nevada]]; it is frequently illegal on the actual shoulder of [[Interstate highway | Interstate highways]], but usually not from the highway on-ramp (entrance).

''The base of this article was published in [http://www.wikipedia.org Wikipedia] under the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking same title]''

== Method ==

To obtain a lift in many parts of the world, including [[North America]], hitchhikers traditionally stretch out one arm and stick out their thumb. Car drivers understand this to be a sign that the person requests a lift. A hitchhiker may also hold a sign with the name of their destination. This is primarily for the benefit of truck drivers, so that the driver does not have to stop their large vehicle to find out where the hitchhiker is headed.

In some areas, other signals may be used. (This may be because the traditional [[gesture]] with the thumb has an offensive meaning in that region.) For example, in [[South Africa]], a hitchhiker may show an oncoming car the back of his hand with the index finger raised, rather than the thumb. In [[Poland]], the hand is held flat, and waved. In [[India]], the hand is waved with the palm facing downwards. In [[Israel]] the sign is a stretched forefinger pointed toward the road.

Often nothing is given or performed in exchange for the lift, but some hitchhikers will contribute money for [[fuel]] and others will feel the provision of company on the trip is itself a worthy contribution. (This would not normally be the case when getting a ride in a commercial vehicle, such as a cargo [[truck]].)

== Reasons ==

A hitchhiker may have several reasons to travel in this way, amongst them:

* not being able to afford alternative means of transportation;
* where no [[public transport]] is available and one has no own vehicle available; one can distinguish:
** there is no public transport at all;
** there is no public transport at the time one wants or needs to travel:
*** public transport is very infrequent;
*** the last [[bus]] or [[train]] of the day goes very early;
*** one misses the last bus or train;
* because of social equality reasons (semi-force vehicle owners who would not normally use public transport to share the ride with the public by "bringing the bus to muhammad);
* because of ecological and political reasons (reducing dependency on fossil fuels);
* for the challenge of using limited resources to reach a destination;
* for the sense of adventure that not knowing where you will be at the end of the day presents;
* for the sheer and simple love of it (many hitchhikers are known to become pasionately enthusiastic about this mode of travel);

A mixture of the first two reasons is when the only alternative is an expensive [[taxicab|taxi]].

Car drivers may also have several reasons to give lifts, for instance because:
* they want companionship;
* they have hitchhiked themselves and know how hard it can be;
* simple good will;
* Requests for drugs and/or sex;
* a sense of social responsibility (e.g. sharing resources, filling single occupant vehicles);

Hitchhiking is often resorted to by stranded motorists or people without money or transportation such as the homeless while others engage in it as a passion or even sport.

== Reputation ==

Although most hitchhiking occurs without incident, it has a bad reputation with some people. Some criminals who prey on the good will of others to rob or molest have masqueraded as hitchhikers to procure victims, or picked up unsuspecting hitchhikers themselves. There is some dispute as to whether it is actually less safe to hitchhike now than in the past, or if simply more reporting increases the visibility of negative examples - see [[#Safety]] below.

This appears to be restricted to the western world however. For example, many eastern European governments firmly supported hitchhikers and in many eastern European and developing nations it is still a very mundane and ordinary occurrence, with hitchhikers a part of the ordinary social landscape, in some places crowding one another out waiting for rides.

Any number of [[urban legend]]s are told about hitchhiking, in which either the hitchhiker or the car driver may take on the role of a [[bogeyman]]. For example, some stories have the driver as a [[ghost]], or the hitchhiker as an escaped convict. The folklorist [[Jan Harold Brunvand]] wrote an entire book titled ''[[The Vanishing Hitchhiker]]'', using the ''Vanishing Hitchhiker'' legend (''references'') as his prototype.

== Chances of getting a ride ==

There are many things to consider that affect the hitchhiker's chances of catching a ride.  Some of these include:

'''Traffic density:''' Catching a ride does of course depend on there being people to offer one.  If someone is trying to hitchhike and only sees a vehicle go by every half-hour, it may be to their advantage to walk to a more frequently travelled road.  There does however appear to be a maximum as well.  Once the frequency of the traffic becomes too high, the chance of someone stopping actually appears to drop.  This may occur for various reasons:
* Heavy traffic makes stopping more dangerous, so one may feel less inclined to do so;
* Often, areas with heavy traffic include a large number of local vehicles that are not going any significant distance;
* People may not feel as compelled to pick up a passenger if there are a large number of vehicles on the road, thinking that someone else will pick them up anyway;

'''Traffic speed:'''  The actual speed of the traffic plays a major role in the chances of someone stopping.  If a vehicle is moving at high speed, it takes considerably more effort to stop and then get back up to speed than it does if they are moving at a slower pace to start with.  For this reason, one of the best places to catch a ride is immediately after an intersection or any other place where vehicles are forced to stop or slow down.

'''Road condition:'''  In order for someone to stop and pick up a passenger, the road must offer a relatively safe means of doing so.  Most drivers will pull over to the shoulder of the road if one is available.  If there is no place for a driver to pull off of the road, then the traffic needs to be light enough that one can stop in the road without obstructing it.

'''Presentation:'''  The way a hitchhiker presents themselves is another major factor in how likely they are to catch a ride.  Usually, someone's chance of catching a ride is far greater if they look clean and non-threatening.  Standing in the well-lit place offers drivers a good chance to look at you before stopping.  Showing one's destination (by holding a sign for instance) will also help.  In the case of a longer journey, having [[backpack]] visible tells drivers that you are a serious [[backpacker]], not a local, seeking to get a short ride. (this is important in less developed countries, where hitching complements regular public transportation)

'''Weather:''' A little bit of rain or other precipitation can work in the hitchhiker's favor, since many drivers will feel sorrier for the hitchhiker. Too much, however, can hurt the hitchhiker's chances, because drivers will be less eager to have a wet passenger getting their car seats wet or muddy.

== Hitchhiking in literature ==

The writer [[Jack Kerouac]] immortalized hitchhiking in his book ''[[On The Road]]''. The road has a fascination to Americans; countless writers have written of the road and/or hitchhiking such as [[John Steinbeck]], whose book ''[[The Grapes of Wrath]]'' opens with a hitched ride. [[Roald Dahl]] wrote a short story called ''The Hitchhiker'', in which he uses the idea that you can hear fascinating stories when giving people a lift to introduce one of his trade-mark eccentric characters. Another lesser known author, a lifetime hitchhiker named [[Irv Thomas]], incorporates hitchhiking into his writing perspective and lifestyle [Innocence Abroad: Adventuring Through Europe at 64 on $100 Per Week], as well as recounting his hitchhiking travels [Derelict Days] in a memoir. [[Douglas Adams]] postulated on interstellar hitchhiking in his [[cult following|cult classic]] [[The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy]].

An avid researcher into the phenomenon of hitchhiking, [[Bernd Wechner]] [http://bernd.wechner.info], has compiled an extensive literature on hitchhiking comprising many hundreds of works from newspaper articles, to research papers and books. A good body of this work is scanned and can be shared electronically with other researchers. The beginnings of a project to make this library available on-line to researchers (in as far as copyright owners permit this) appears on-line [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/]. The scanned library has been converted to text with [[Optical character recognition|OCR]] software, but volunters are required to adopt individual works, proof read and copy edit them, for re-publication on-line. Contact Bernd Wechner for further information [http://bernd.wechner.info/mail.html].

== Safety ==

The safety of hitchhiking varies from country to country. It's rumoured that the most dangerous country for hitchhiking in [[Europe]] is [[Poland]]. In the United States, where hitchhiking had been a fairly common means to travel from one location to another well into the 1970s, especially among younger people, the practice has greatly declined in the past several decades to the point that is extremely rare to see people hitchhiking in the US today, in part because of the supposition that it is unsafe.

There have been very few efforts to objectively study the safety of hitchhiking. Two notable efforts include:

''California Crimes and Accidents Assciated with Hitchhiking'', Operational Analysis Section, California Highway Patrol (CHP), 1974
Conclusion: the results of this study do not show that hitchhikers are over-represented in crimes or accidents beyond their numbers. When considering statistics for all crimes and accidents in California, it appears that hitchhikers make a minor contribution.

''Anhalterwesen und Anhaltergefahren'', BKA-Forschungsreihe, Sonderband, Wiesbaden, 1989
Conclusion: The current study has demonstrated, that the potential danger while hithchiking is significantly lower that it is estimated to be and therefore the sharing of rides by and with strangers can very well be included in transport planning.

Neither work was highly publicized. The authors of the German study, easily the most recent and comprehensive study suggest very real efforts to suppress and discredit their results. Such is the apparent strength of the conviction that hitchhiking '''must''' be unsafe, that objective evidence is anything but popularized and lauded. 

In summary: there is a dominant belief that hitchhiking is dangerous, but every effort to find actual evidence of this danger objectively has been unable to do so.

==[[Future of Hitchiking]]==

The widespread use of location reporting [[mobile phones]] combined with [[social networking]] will likely engender a resurgence of hitchiking.

== Miscellaneous ==

Hitchhiking is often combined with other cheap forms of transportation, such as [[walking]] or travelling by [[bus]] or [[train]].

In [[Poland]], during the [[communism|communist]] regime period, hitchhiking was institutionalized. Many people would have a formal document for recording travels and they would give the driver confirmation that the travel occurred. Soviet Union instituted coupon system that benefited the driver. It was probably similar in other communist countries. Hitchhiking was likely considered much safer in Poland at that time. In [[Cuba]], truck drivers are still obliged to pick up hitchhikers. And in [[Romania]] hitchhiking is so much part of the culture that it's often hard to get a lift due to the intense competition.

In [[Eastern Europe]], especially [[Lithuania]] and [[Russia]] hitchhiking turns into adventure sport. There are Hitchhiking clubs with regular gatherings, hitchhiking schools, competitions, hitchhiking gear, etc. From 1992 to 1993 Russian hitchhiker [[Alexey Vorov]] made a first trip around the world, hitchhiking by cars, planes and boats.

== External links and references ==

*[http://www.wikitravel.org/en/article/Tips_for_hitchhiking Tips for hitchhiking] at [[Wikitravel]]
*[http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers]
*[http://www.snopes.com/horrors/ghosts/vanish.htm The Vanishing Hitchhiker urban legend]
*[http://www.digihitch.com/ digihitch.com - A hitchhiking culture portal]
*[http://www.hitchhikers.org/ Board for offering and setting up rides in advance]
*[http://www.autostop.lt/ Vilnius Hitch-hiking Club - leading hitchhiking community in EU]
*[http://www.artoftravel.com/ The Art of Travel - Hitchhiking]
*[http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking Suite101 : Hitchhiking]
*[http://www.socresonline.org.uk/6/3/chesters.html The Neglected Art of Hitch- hiking: Risk, Trust and Sustainability]  by Graeme Chesters and David Smith (2001)
*[http://www.trampstop.de Trampstop - Hitchhiking in Germany] 
*[http://groups.yahoo.com/group/hitching/ Hitchhiking Mailinglist] 
*[http://www.pcpros.net/~oleson/lrindex.html The Hitchhiker's Guide to North America]
*[http://www.roadjunky.com/cheaptravel/hitchhiketao.shtml Mini-Guide to Hitchhiking] The psychology of thumbing a ride
*[http://www.tomthumb.org/travelbooks.shtml Hitchhiking from England to India] Free, full-length book 

&lt;!--
[[bg:&amp;#1040;&amp;#1074;&amp;#1090;&amp;#1086;&amp;#1089;&amp;#1090;&amp;#1086;&amp;#1087;]]
[[de:Autostopp]]
[[es:Autoestopistas]]
[[fr:autostop]]
[[nl:Liften]]
[[pl:Autostop]]
[[ru:&amp;#1040;&amp;#1074;&amp;#1090;&amp;#1086;&amp;#1089;&amp;#1090;&amp;#1086;&amp;#1087;]]
[[sv:Liftare]]
--&gt;</text>
      <sha1>sk4hyeve735cyflpkyqfqwwdqdyqgtg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4447</id>
      <parentid>4446</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T14:01:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="411">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: where to start, how to do it, ...

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopedic information about hitchhiking].</text>
      <sha1>7901cxe23r11548sewi5zzxh35iioh1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4448</id>
      <parentid>4447</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-03-29T17:41:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="438">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: where to start, how to do it, ...

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopedic information about hitchhiking].

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>6qn7lx3ma4gw5cklig5a2185v7dmchx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4449</id>
      <parentid>1574</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="461">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], how to do it, ...

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopedic information about hitchhiking].

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>ic4wg0hrdau9y7sqfqw3b4wzjg4flbx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>8848</id>
      <parentid>1573</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-21T02:37:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="689">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], how to do it, ...

Contrary to popular opinion there are still a lot of hitchhikers, all over the world, even in the [[United States]].
If you've never hitchhiked before you might want to check out the article hitchhiking for the [[first time]].

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopedic information about hitchhiking].

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>0gq36qpr5bo33pdgny55408lvx5h9le</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>8849</id>
      <parentid>4449</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-23T21:56:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="689">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], how to do it, ...

Contrary to popular opinion there are still a lot of hitchhikers, all over the world, even in the [[United States]].
If you've never hitchhiked before you might want to check out the article hitchhiking for the [[first time]].

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopedic information about hitchhiking].

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>0gq36qpr5bo33pdgny55408lvx5h9le</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16776</id>
      <parentid>8849</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-27T20:23:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mxnnz</username>
        <id>1298</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1159">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], how to do it, ...

Contrary to popular opinion there are still a lot of hitchhikers, all over the world, even in the [[United States]].
If you've never hitchhiked before you might want to check out the article hitchhiking for the [[first time]].

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopedic information about hitchhiking].

[[Category:General info]]

Definitions of hitchhiking:

"The hitchhiker is there so you can do your good deed for the day". From max, reference: [http://www.couchsurfing.com] user:mxnnz .

The ultimate way of travelling is "hitchhiking with a bicycle", think about it...people think your bike is broken down, and you actually turn down more offers as they obviously donot have room, but you have the bike to go anywhere in the city, ride out to the next truckie park, put your sign out and away.</text>
      <sha1>pklan9blwzmscivclh4gx4d40l068lc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16783</id>
      <parentid>16776</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-28T11:41:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="689">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], how to do it, ...

Contrary to popular opinion there are still a lot of hitchhikers, all over the world, even in the [[United States]].
If you've never hitchhiked before you might want to check out the article hitchhiking for the [[first time]].

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopedic information about hitchhiking].

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>0gq36qpr5bo33pdgny55408lvx5h9le</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>20119</id>
      <parentid>16783</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-05-25T22:39:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="756">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], how to do it, ...

[[Image:Img l 1306483.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Hitchhiker in the UK]]
Contrary to popular opinion there are still a lot of hitchhikers, all over the world, even in the [[United States]].
If you've never hitchhiked before you might want to check out the article hitchhiking for the [[first time]].

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopedic information about hitchhiking].

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>nqdjx5h1ow6q7caxtauy76bk4v1x17y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>20120</id>
      <parentid>20119</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-05-25T22:45:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2716">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], practical info on how to do it, pictures and much much more. If you've never hitchhiked before and you want to try it out you should check out the article hitchhiking for the [[first time]].

[[Image:Img l 1306483.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Hitchhiker in the UK]]
Contrary to popular opinion there are a lot of hitchhikers, all over the world, even in the [[United States]].  There are people like [[User:Irvthom|Irv Thomas]] whose hitchhike experiences span more than half a century.  Hitchhiking is a very common means of transport
in most less affluent countries (although often a form of payment is
expected).  Hitchhiking is probably as old as the wheel and will
probably exist as long as people need to move from one place to
another.

There has been surprisingly little scientific research on hitchhiking,
so it's really hard to say come up with any hard statements on the
rise or demise of hitchhiking. There are is a nice community of hitchhikers in
Europe, and it seems to be growing.  It's sort of going hand in hand
with the [[hospitality exchange]] movement.  Some try to link this
to the much larger (and economically highly influential) movement of
free software and free information (think GNU/Linux and Wikipedia),
and there is huge potential in this sense.  If we want it or
not, internet will be in people's pockets and most of our locations
are already easily tracked.  Link this to the potential trust
available in online social networks (friends of friends), the rising
prices of petrol and the lower need to be in one location and
hitchhiking could be just at the start of a global come-back.

People will participate because it's ecological, others because of the
economical aspects.  Numerous people pick up hitchhikers is means of getting a
bit of excitement in their life.  For some hitchhiking starts as a form
of extremely cheap transport and then it turns into a lifestyle
that allows to do amazing and useful things without being trapped
in an office 5 days a week.  Some people have
this idea that hitchhikers are stinky bums.  Of course, at (rare)
times hitchhikers can be on the road for more than 24 hours and feel the need for a
shower, but others are traveling equipped with laptops, mobile phones, a fresh shave and shower and GPS devices.

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopedic information about hitchhiking].

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>qxvrvhcglwy3ejq04w7e6vuun2tgoau</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21815</id>
      <parentid>20120</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-19T10:52:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2720">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], practical info on how to do it, pictures and much much more. If you've never hitchhiked before and you want to try it out you should check out the article hitchhiking for the [[first time]].

[[Image:Img l 1306483.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Hitchhiker in the UK]]
Contrary to popular opinion there are a lot of hitchhikers, all over the world, even in the [[United States]].  There are people like [[User:Irvthom|Irv Thomas]] whose hitchhike experiences span more than half a century.  Hitchhiking is a very common means of transport
in most less affluent countries (although often a form of payment is
expected).  Hitchhiking is probably as old as the wheel and will
probably exist as long as people need to move from one place to
another.

There has been surprisingly little scientific research on hitchhiking,
so it's really hard to say come up with any hard statements on the
rise or demise of hitchhiking. There are is a nice community of hitchhikers in
Europe, and it seems to be growing.  It's sort of going hand in hand
with the [[hospitality exchange]] movement.  Some try to link this
to the much larger (and economically highly influential) movement of
free software and free information (think GNU/Linux and Wikipedia),
and there is huge potential in this sense.  If we want it or
not, internet will be in people's pockets and most of our locations
are already easily tracked.  Link this to the potential [[trust]]
available in online social networks (friends of friends), the rising
prices of petrol and the lower need to be in one location and
hitchhiking could be just at the start of a global come-back.

People will participate because it's ecological, others because of the
economical aspects.  Numerous people pick up hitchhikers is means of getting a
bit of excitement in their life.  For some hitchhiking starts as a form
of extremely cheap transport and then it turns into a lifestyle
that allows to do amazing and useful things without being trapped
in an office 5 days a week.  Some people have
this idea that hitchhikers are stinky bums.  Of course, at (rare)
times hitchhikers can be on the road for more than 24 hours and feel the need for a
shower, but others are traveling equipped with laptops, mobile phones, a fresh shave and shower and GPS devices.

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopedic information about hitchhiking].

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>95hxs6xhh1n4gcbrcr5zw4uixv3tqqg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21843</id>
      <parentid>21815</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-19T11:46:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2752">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], practical info on how to do it, pictures and much much more. If you've never hitchhiked before and you want to try it out you should check out the article hitchhiking for the [[first time]].

[[Image:Img l 1306483.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Hitchhiker in the UK]]
Contrary to popular opinion there are a lot of hitchhikers, all over the world, even in the [[United States]].  There are people like [[User:Irvthom|Irv Thomas]] whose hitchhike experiences span more than half a century.  Hitchhiking is a very common means of transport
in most less affluent countries (although often a form of payment is
expected).  Hitchhiking is probably as old as the wheel and will
probably exist as long as people need to move from one place to
another.

There has been surprisingly little scientific research on hitchhiking,
so it's really hard to say come up with any hard statements on the
rise or demise of hitchhiking. There are is a nice community of hitchhikers in
Europe, and it seems to be growing.  It's sort of going hand in hand
with the [[hospitality exchange]] movement.  Some try to link this
to the much larger (and economically highly influential) movement of
free software and free information (think GNU/Linux and Wikipedia),
and there is huge potential in this sense.  If we want it or
not, internet will be in people's pockets and most of our locations
are already easily tracked.  Link this to the potential [[trust]]
available in online social networks (friends of friends), the rising
prices of petrol and the lower need to be in one location and
hitchhiking could be just at the start of a global come-back.

People will participate because it's ecological, others because of the
economical aspects.  Numerous people pick up hitchhikers is means of getting a
bit of excitement in their life.  For some hitchhiking starts as a form
of extremely cheap transport and then it turns into a lifestyle
that allows to do amazing and useful things without being trapped
in an office 5 days a week.  Some people have
this idea that hitchhikers are stinky bums.  Of course, at (rare)
times hitchhikers can be on the road for more than 24 hours and feel the need for a
shower, but others are traveling equipped with laptops, mobile phones, a fresh shave and shower and GPS devices.

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopedic information about hitchhiking].

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampen]]
[[fr:Autostop]]</text>
      <sha1>1llg3kvesah8y8cpl29hpfjd7j1uyo6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21889</id>
      <parentid>21843</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-20T15:39:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2775">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], practical info on how to do it, pictures and much much more. If you've never hitchhiked before and you want to try it out you should check out the article hitchhiking for the [[first time]].

[[Image:Img l 1306483.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Hitchhiker in the UK]]
Contrary to popular opinion there are a lot of hitchhikers, all over the world, even in the [[United States]].  There are people like [[User:Irvthom|Irv Thomas]] whose hitchhike experiences span more than half a century.  Hitchhiking is a very common means of transport
in most less affluent countries (although often a form of payment is
expected).  Hitchhiking is probably as old as the wheel and will
probably exist as long as people need to move from one place to
another.

There has been surprisingly little scientific research on hitchhiking,
so it's really hard to say come up with any hard statements on the
rise or demise of hitchhiking. There are is a nice community of hitchhikers in
Europe, and it seems to be growing.  It's sort of going hand in hand
with the [[hospitality exchange]] movement.  Some try to link this
to the much larger (and economically highly influential) movement of
free software and free information (think GNU/Linux and Wikipedia),
and there is huge potential in this sense.  If we want it or
not, internet will be in people's pockets and most of our locations
are already easily tracked.  Link this to the potential [[trust]]
available in online social networks (friends of friends), the rising
prices of petrol and the lower need to be in one location and
hitchhiking could be just at the start of a global come-back.

People will participate because it's ecological, others because of the
economical aspects.  Numerous people pick up hitchhikers is means of getting a
bit of excitement in their life.  For some hitchhiking starts as a form
of extremely cheap transport and then it turns into a lifestyle
that allows to do amazing and useful things without being trapped
in an office 5 days a week.  Some people have
this idea that hitchhikers are stinky bums.  Of course, at (rare)
times hitchhikers can be on the road for more than 24 hours and feel the need for a
shower, but others are traveling equipped with laptops, mobile phones, a fresh shave and shower and GPS devices.

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopedic information about hitchhiking].

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampen]]
[[fr:Autostop]]
[[es:Como hacer dedo]]</text>
      <sha1>qc9ls68piddf23ys554enet2iktpnu7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30486</id>
      <parentid>21889</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-26T17:36:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2801">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], practical info on how to do it, pictures and much much more. If you've never hitchhiked before and you want to try it out you should check out the article hitchhiking for the [[first time]].

[[Image:Img l 1306483.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Hitchhiker in the UK]]
Contrary to popular opinion there are a lot of hitchhikers, all over the world, even in the [[United States]].  There are people like [[User:Irvthom|Irv Thomas]] whose hitchhike experiences span more than half a century.  Hitchhiking is a very common means of transport
in most less affluent countries (although often a form of payment is
expected).  Hitchhiking is probably as old as the wheel and will
probably exist as long as people need to move from one place to
another.

There has been surprisingly little scientific research on hitchhiking,
so it's really hard to say come up with any hard statements on the
rise or demise of hitchhiking. There are is a nice community of hitchhikers in
Europe, and it seems to be growing.  It's sort of going hand in hand
with the [[hospitality exchange]] movement.  Some try to link this
to the much larger (and economically highly influential) movement of
free software and free information (think GNU/Linux and Wikipedia),
and there is huge potential in this sense.  If we want it or
not, internet will be in people's pockets and most of our locations
are already easily tracked.  Link this to the potential [[trust]]
available in online social networks (friends of friends), the rising
prices of petrol and the lower need to be in one location and
hitchhiking could be just at the start of a global come-back.

People will participate because it's ecological, others because of the
economical aspects.  Numerous people pick up hitchhikers is means of getting a
bit of excitement in their life.  For some hitchhiking starts as a form
of extremely cheap transport and then it turns into a lifestyle
that allows to do amazing and useful things without being trapped
in an office 5 days a week.  Some people have
this idea that hitchhikers are stinky bums.  Of course, at (rare)
times hitchhikers can be on the road for more than 24 hours and feel the need for a
shower, but others are traveling equipped with laptops, mobile phones, a fresh shave and shower and GPS devices.

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopedic information about hitchhiking].

[[Category:General info]]

[[wikipedia:Hitchhiking]]
[[de:Trampen]]
[[fr:Autostop]]
[[es:Como hacer dedo]]</text>
      <sha1>25c0ub6scco5k1o7ep2zt9smap3erhr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31835</id>
      <parentid>30486</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-23T00:40:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Alex</username>
        <id>89</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3720">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], practical info on how to do it, pictures and much much more. If you've never hitchhiked before and you want to try it out you should check out the article hitchhiking for the [[first time]].

[[Image:Img l 1306483.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Hitchhiker in the UK]]
Contrary to popular opinion there are a lot of hitchhikers, all over the world, even in the [[United States]].  There are people like [[User:Irvthom|Irv Thomas]] whose hitchhike experiences span more than half a century.  Hitchhiking is a very common means of transport
in most less affluent countries (although often a form of payment is
expected).  Hitchhiking is probably as old as the wheel and will
probably exist as long as people need to move from one place to
another.

There has been surprisingly little scientific research on hitchhiking,
so it's really hard to say come up with any hard statements on the
rise or demise of hitchhiking. There are is a nice community of hitchhikers in
Europe, and it seems to be growing.  It's sort of going hand in hand
with the [[hospitality exchange]] movement.  Some try to link this
to the much larger (and economically highly influential) movement of
free software and free information (think GNU/Linux and Wikipedia),
and there is huge potential in this sense.  If we want it or
not, internet will be in people's pockets and most of our locations
are already easily tracked.  Link this to the potential [[trust]]
available in online social networks (friends of friends), the rising
prices of petrol and the lower need to be in one location and
hitchhiking could be just at the start of a global come-back.

People will participate because it's ecological, others because of the
economical aspects.  Numerous people pick up hitchhikers is means of getting a
bit of excitement in their life.  For some hitchhiking starts as a form
of extremely cheap transport and then it turns into a lifestyle
that allows to do amazing and useful things without being trapped
in an office 5 days a week.  Some people have
this idea that hitchhikers are stinky bums.  Of course, at (rare)
times hitchhikers can be on the road for more than 24 hours and feel the need for a
shower, but others are traveling equipped with laptops, mobile phones, a fresh shave and shower and GPS devices.

[[Anton Krotov]] identifies five types of autostop (how is hitchhiking mostly called in the eastern countries):

Autostop of the '''first generation''' (the most common) - the movement to the side of cars, trucks, buses and other ground than the rail vehicles.

'''Autostop second generation''' - the movement to the side rail trains. 

'''Autostop third generation''' - movement in associated ships, boats, ferries and other water vehicles. 

'''Autostop fourth generation''' - the movement to the side planes, helicopters and other aerial vehicles. 

'''Autostop fifth generation''' yet in the area of fantasy and involves the use of space transportation. 

Allocated to them so-called '''zero Autostop''' kind - the movement in the associated motorcycle, bike, carting carts, horse, rickshaw and other motor vehicles, or vehicles with low engine - a farcical character, as a foot of the first kind is no different.

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopedic information about hitchhiking].

[[Category:General info]]

[[wikipedia:Hitchhiking]]
[[de:Trampen]]
[[fr:Autostop]]
[[es:Como hacer dedo]]</text>
      <sha1>36zi1zij8wfeqzcelta81ak2717k2c4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>34991</id>
      <parentid>31835</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T17:34:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3708">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], practical info on how to do it, pictures and much much more. If you've never hitchhiked before and you want to try it out you should check out the article hitchhiking for the [[first time]].

[[File:Img l 1306483.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Hitchhiker in the UK]]
Contrary to popular opinion there are a lot of hitchhikers, all over the world, even in the [[United States]]. There are people like [[User:Irvthom|Irv Thomas]] whose hitchhike experiences span more than half a century. Hitchhiking is a very common means of transport
in most less affluent countries (although often a form of payment is
expected). Hitchhiking is probably as old as the wheel and will
probably exist as long as people need to move from one place to
another.

There has been surprisingly little scientific research on hitchhiking,
so it's really hard to say come up with any hard statements on the
rise or demise of hitchhiking. There are is a nice community of hitchhikers in
Europe, and it seems to be growing. It's sort of going hand in hand
with the [[hospitality exchange]] movement. Some try to link this
to the much larger (and economically highly influential) movement of
free software and free information (think GNU/Linux and Wikipedia),
and there is huge potential in this sense. If we want it or
not, internet will be in people's pockets and most of our locations
are already easily tracked. Link this to the potential [[trust]]
available in online social networks (friends of friends), the rising
prices of petrol and the lower need to be in one location and
hitchhiking could be just at the start of a global come-back.

People will participate because it's ecological, others because of the
economical aspects. Numerous people pick up hitchhikers is means of getting a
bit of excitement in their life. For some hitchhiking starts as a form
of extremely cheap transport and then it turns into a lifestyle
that allows to do amazing and useful things without being trapped
in an office 5 days a week. Some people have
this idea that hitchhikers are stinky bums. Of course, at (rare)
times hitchhikers can be on the road for more than 24 hours and feel the need for a
shower, but others are traveling equipped with laptops, mobile phones, a fresh shave and shower and GPS devices.

[[Anton Krotov]] identifies five types of autostop (how is hitchhiking mostly called in the eastern countries):

Autostop of the '''first generation''' (the most common) - the movement to the side of cars, trucks, buses and other ground than the rail vehicles.

'''Autostop second generation''' - the movement to the side rail trains. 

'''Autostop third generation''' - movement in associated ships, boats, ferries and other water vehicles. 

'''Autostop fourth generation''' - the movement to the side planes, helicopters and other aerial vehicles. 

'''Autostop fifth generation''' yet in the area of fantasy and involves the use of space transportation. 

Allocated to them so-called '''zero Autostop''' kind - the movement in the associated motorcycle, bike, carting carts, horse, rickshaw and other motor vehicles, or vehicles with low engine - a farcical character, as a foot of the first kind is no different.

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopedic information about hitchhiking].
[[wikipedia:Hitchhiking]]
[[fr:Autostop]]

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampen]]
[[es:Como hacer dedo]]</text>
      <sha1>csw30drohp7m5216nigux8wvto4hgt8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>37063</id>
      <parentid>34991</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-09-08T18:40:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3136">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], practical info on how to do it, pictures and much much more. If you've never hitchhiked before and you want to try it out you should check out the article hitchhiking for the [[first time]].

[[File:Img l 1306483.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Hitchhiker in the UK]]
Contrary to popular opinion there are a lot of hitchhikers, all over the world, even in the [[United States]]. There are people like [[User:Irvthom|Irv Thomas]] whose hitchhike experiences span more than half a century. Hitchhiking is a very common means of transport
in most less affluent countries (although often a form of payment is
expected). Hitchhiking is probably as old as the wheel and will
probably exist as long as people need to move from one place to
another.

There has been surprisingly little scientific research on hitchhiking,
so it's really hard to say come up with any hard statements on the
rise or demise of hitchhiking. There are is a nice community of hitchhikers in
Europe, and it seems to be growing. It's sort of going hand in hand
with the [[hospitality exchange]] movement. Some try to link this
to the much larger (and economically highly influential) movement of
free software and free information (think GNU/Linux and Wikipedia),
and there is huge potential in this sense. If we want it or
not, internet will be in people's pockets and most of our locations
are already easily tracked. Link this to the potential [[trust]]
available in online social networks (friends of friends), the rising
prices of petrol and the lower need to be in one location and
hitchhiking could be just at the start of a global come-back.

People will participate because it's ecological, others because of the
economical aspects. Numerous people pick up hitchhikers is means of getting a
bit of excitement in their life. For some hitchhiking starts as a form
of extremely cheap transport and then it turns into a lifestyle
that allows to do amazing and useful things without being trapped
in an office 5 days a week. Some people have
this idea that hitchhikers are stinky bums. Of course, at (rare)
times hitchhikers can be on the road for more than 24 hours and feel the need for a
shower, but others are traveling equipped with laptops, mobile phones, a fresh shave and shower and GPS devices.

There are several types of hitchhiking. 
* traveling by road motor vehicles:  cars, trucks, buses.

* traveling by train, either the risky act of  [[trainhopping]] or, as is sometimes possible, with the permission of the engineer or conductor.

* traveling by ocean vessel, often called [[boathiking]]

* traveling by air: planes and helicopters

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopedic information about hitchhiking].
[[wikipedia:Hitchhiking]]
[[fr:Autostop]]

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampen]]
[[es:Como hacer dedo]]</text>
      <sha1>0ihhnqjqdu7i7tg3xb5x8m3j8r7wi8c</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>37064</id>
      <parentid>37063</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-09-08T18:42:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3137">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], practical info on how to do it, pictures and much much more. If you've never hitchhiked before and you want to try it out you should check out the article hitchhiking for the [[first time]].

[[File:Img l 1306483.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Hitchhiker in the UK]]
Contrary to popular opinion there are a lot of hitchhikers, all over the world, even in the [[United States]]. There are people like [[User:Irvthom|Irv Thomas]] whose hitchhike experiences span more than half a century. Hitchhiking is a very common means of transport
in most less affluent countries (although often a form of payment is
expected). Hitchhiking is probably as old as the wheel and will
probably exist as long as people need to move from one place to
another.

There has been surprisingly little scientific research on hitchhiking,
so it's really hard to say come up with any hard statements on the
rise or demise of hitchhiking. There are is a nice community of hitchhikers in
Europe, and it seems to be growing. It's sort of going hand in hand
with the [[hospitality exchange]] movement. Some try to link this
to the much larger (and economically highly influential) movement of
free software and free information (think GNU/Linux and Wikipedia),
and there is huge potential in this sense. If we want it or
not, internet will be in people's pockets and most of our locations
are already easily tracked. Link this to the potential [[trust]]
available in online social networks (friends of friends), the rising
prices of petrol and the lower need to be in one location and
hitchhiking could be just at the start of a global come-back.

People will participate because it's ecological, others because of the
economical aspects. Numerous people pick up hitchhikers is means of getting a
bit of excitement in their life. For some hitchhiking starts as a form
of extremely cheap transport and then it turns into a lifestyle
that allows to do amazing and useful things without being trapped
in an office 5 days a week. Some people have
this idea that hitchhikers are stinky bums. Of course, at (rare)
times hitchhikers can be on the road for more than 24 hours and feel the need for a
shower, but others are traveling equipped with laptops, mobile phones, a fresh shave and shower and GPS devices.

There are several types of hitchhiking. 
* traveling by road motor vehicles:  cars, trucks, buses.

* traveling by train, either the risky act of  [[train hopping]] or, as is sometimes possible, with the permission of the engineer or conductor.

* traveling by ocean vessel, often called [[boathiking]]

* traveling by air: planes and helicopters

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopedic information about hitchhiking].
[[wikipedia:Hitchhiking]]
[[fr:Autostop]]

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampen]]
[[es:Como hacer dedo]]</text>
      <sha1>nqf4wbkedarpa6i66u1k5wdx00r483g</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>37068</id>
      <parentid>37064</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-09-08T22:29:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3135">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], practical info on how to do it, pictures and much much more. If you've never hitchhiked before and you want to try it out you should check out the article hitchhiking for the [[first time]].

[[File:Img l 1306483.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Hitchhiker in the UK]]
Contrary to popular opinion there are a lot of hitchhikers, all over the world, even in the [[United States]]. There are people like [[User:Irvthom|Irv Thomas]] whose hitchhike experiences span more than half a century. Hitchhiking is a very common means of transport
in most less affluent countries (although often a form of payment is
expected). Hitchhiking is probably as old as the wheel and will
probably exist as long as people need to move from one place to
another.

There has been surprisingly little scientific research on hitchhiking,
so it's really hard to say come up with any hard statements on the
rise or demise of hitchhiking. There are is a nice community of hitchhikers in
Europe, and it seems to be growing. It's sort of going hand in hand
with the [[hospitality exchange]] movement. Some try to link this
to the much larger (and economically highly influential) movement of
free software and free information (think GNU/Linux and Wikipedia),
and there is huge potential in this sense. If we want it or
not, internet will be in people's pockets and most of our locations
are already easily tracked. Link this to the potential [[trust]]
available in online social networks (friends of friends), the rising
prices of petrol and the lower need to be in one location and
hitchhiking could be just at the start of a global come-back.

People will participate because it's ecological, others because of the
economical aspects. Numerous people pick up hitchhikers is means of getting a
bit of excitement in their life. For some hitchhiking starts as a form
of extremely cheap transport and then it turns into a lifestyle
that allows to do amazing and useful things without being trapped
in an office 5 days a week. Some people have
this idea that hitchhikers are stinky bums. Of course, at (rare)
times hitchhikers can be on the road for more than 24 hours and feel the need for a
shower, but others are traveling equipped with laptops, mobile phones, a fresh shave and shower and GPS devices.

There are several types of hitchhiking. 
* traveling by road motor vehicles: cars, trucks, buses.

* traveling by train, either the risky act of [[train hopping]] or, as is sometimes possible, with the permission of the engineer or conductor.

* traveling by ocean vessel, often called [[boathiking]]

* traveling by air: planes and helicopters

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopedic information about hitchhiking].
[[wikipedia:Hitchhiking]]
[[fr:Autostop]]

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampen]]
[[es:Como hacer dedo]]</text>
      <sha1>d89s396xks88f8d0mivy007yjhv0tlt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>37119</id>
      <parentid>37068</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-09-09T22:40:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>77.222.23.202</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3176">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'' or in parts of Europe, ''auto-stopping'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], practical info on how to do it, pictures and much much more. If you've never hitchhiked before and you want to try it out you should check out the article hitchhiking for the [[first time]].

[[File:Img l 1306483.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Hitchhiker in the UK]]
Contrary to popular opinion there are a lot of hitchhikers, all over the world, even in the [[United States]]. There are people like [[User:Irvthom|Irv Thomas]] whose hitchhike experiences span more than half a century. Hitchhiking is a very common means of transport
in most less affluent countries (although often a form of payment is
expected). Hitchhiking is probably as old as the wheel and will
probably exist as long as people need to move from one place to
another.

There has been surprisingly little scientific research on hitchhiking,
so it's really hard to say come up with any hard statements on the
rise or demise of hitchhiking. There are is a nice community of hitchhikers in
Europe, and it seems to be growing. It's sort of going hand in hand
with the [[hospitality exchange]] movement. Some try to link this
to the much larger (and economically highly influential) movement of
free software and free information (think GNU/Linux and Wikipedia),
and there is huge potential in this sense. If we want it or
not, internet will be in people's pockets and most of our locations
are already easily tracked. Link this to the potential [[trust]]
available in online social networks (friends of friends), the rising
prices of petrol and the lower need to be in one location and
hitchhiking could be just at the start of a global come-back.

People will participate because it's ecological, others because of the
economical aspects. Numerous people pick up hitchhikers is means of getting a
bit of excitement in their life. For some hitchhiking starts as a form
of extremely cheap transport and then it turns into a lifestyle
that allows to do amazing and useful things without being trapped
in an office 5 days a week. Some people have
this idea that hitchhikers are stinky bums. Of course, at (rare)
times hitchhikers can be on the road for more than 24 hours and feel the need for a
shower, but others are traveling equipped with laptops, mobile phones, a fresh shave and shower and GPS devices.

There are several types of hitchhiking. 
* traveling by road motor vehicles: cars, trucks, buses.

* traveling by train, either the risky act of [[train hopping]] or, as is sometimes possible, with the permission of the engineer or conductor.

* traveling by ocean vessel, often called [[boathiking]]

* traveling by air: planes and helicopters

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopedic information about hitchhiking].
[[wikipedia:Hitchhiking]]
[[fr:Autostop]]

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampen]]
[[es:Como hacer dedo]]</text>
      <sha1>1nnl2h9fjutiz5bv3rp9blkupi22mna</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>37725</id>
      <parentid>37119</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-10-09T22:05:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3177">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'' or in parts of Europe, ''auto-stopping'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], practical info on how to do it, pictures and much much more. If you've never hitchhiked before and you want to try it out you should check out the article hitchhiking for the [[first time]].

[[File:Img l 1306483.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Hitchhiker in the UK]]
Contrary to popular opinion there are a lot of hitchhikers, all over the world, even in the [[United States]]. There are people like [[User:Irvthom|Irv Thomas]] whose hitchhike experiences span more than half a century. Hitchhiking is a very common means of transport
in most less affluent countries (although often a form of payment is
expected). Hitchhiking is probably as old as the wheel and will
probably exist as long as people need to move from one place to
another.

There has been surprisingly little scientific research on hitchhiking,
so it's really hard to say come up with any hard statements on the
rise or demise of hitchhiking. There are is a nice community of hitchhikers in
Europe, and it seems to be growing. It's sort of going hand in hand
with the [[hospitality exchange]] movement. Some try to link this
to the much larger (and economically highly influential) movement of
free software and free information (think GNU/Linux and Wikipedia),
and there is huge potential in this sense. If we want it or
not, internet will be in people's pockets and most of our locations
are already easily tracked. Link this to the potential [[trust]]
available in online social networks (friends of friends), the rising
prices of petrol and the lower need to be in one location and
hitchhiking could be just at the start of a global come-back.

People will participate because it's ecological, others because of the
economical aspects. Numerous people pick up hitchhikers is means of getting a
bit of excitement in their life. For some hitchhiking starts as a form
of extremely cheap transport and then it turns into a lifestyle
that allows to do amazing and useful things without being trapped
in an office 5 days a week. Some people have
this idea that hitchhikers are stinky bums. Of course, at (rare)
times hitchhikers can be on the road for more than 24 hours and feel the need for a
shower, but others are traveling equipped with laptops, mobile phones, a fresh shave and shower and GPS devices.

There are several types of hitchhiking. 
* traveling by road motor vehicles: cars, trucks, buses.

* traveling by train, either the risky act of [[train hopping]] or, as is sometimes possible, with the permission of the engineer or conductor.

* traveling by ocean vessel, often called [[boathiking]]

* traveling by air: planes and helicopters

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopedic information about hitchhiking].
[[wikipedia:Hitchhiking]]

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampen]]
[[es:Como hacer dedo]]
[[fr:Auto-stop]]</text>
      <sha1>e7ykzchkj848q7km94c7ul3okh8h3zn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>37971</id>
      <parentid>37725</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-10-14T18:06:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>85.178.103.190</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3209">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'' or in parts of Europe, ''auto-stopping'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], practical info on how to do it, pictures and much much more. If you've never hitchhiked before and you want to try it out you should check out the article hitchhiking for the [[first time]].

[[File:Img l 1306483.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Hitchhiker in the UK]]
Contrary to popular opinion there are a lot of hitchhikers, all over the world, even in the [[United States]]. There are people like [[User:Irvthom|Irv Thomas]] whose hitchhike experiences span more than half a century. Hitchhiking is a very common means of transport
in most less affluent countries (although often a form of payment is
expected). Hitchhiking is probably as old as the wheel and will
probably exist as long as people need to move from one place to
another.

There has been surprisingly little scientific research on hitchhiking,
so it's really hard to say come up with any hard statements on the
rise or demise of hitchhiking. There are is a nice community of hitchhikers in
Europe, and it seems to be growing. It's sort of going hand in hand
with the [[hospitality exchange]] movement. Some try to link this
to the much larger (and economically highly influential) movement of
free software and free information (think GNU/Linux and Wikipedia),
and there is huge potential in this sense. If we want it or
not, internet will be in people's pockets and most of our locations
are already easily tracked. Link this to the potential [[trust]]
available in online social networks (friends of friends), the rising
prices of petrol and the lower need to be in one location and
hitchhiking could be just at the start of a global come-back.

People will participate because it's ecological, others because of the
economical aspects. Numerous people pick up hitchhikers is means of getting a
bit of excitement in their life. For some hitchhiking starts as a form
of extremely cheap transport and then it turns into a lifestyle
that allows to do amazing and useful things without being trapped
in an office 5 days a week. Some people have
this idea that hitchhikers are stinky bums. Of course, at (rare)
times hitchhikers can be on the road for more than 24 hours and feel the need for a
shower, but others are traveling equipped with laptops, mobile phones, a fresh shave and shower and GPS devices.

There are several types of hitchhiking. 
* traveling by road motor vehicles: cars, trucks, buses.

* traveling by train, either the risky act of [[train hopping]] or, as is sometimes possible, with the permission of the engineer or conductor.

* traveling by ocean vessel, often called [[boathitching]]

* traveling by air: planes and helicopters, also called [[airhitching]]

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopaedic information about hitchhiking].
[[wikipedia:Hitchhiking]]

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampen]]
[[es:Como hacer dedo]]
[[fr:Auto-stop]]</text>
      <sha1>nnif79a2kpc5ddgxu637z9x0pnjyr94</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41092</id>
      <parentid>37971</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-07T11:25:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Vidimian</username>
        <id>1703</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3247">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'' or in parts of Europe, ''auto-stopping'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], practical info on how to do it, pictures and much much more. If you've never hitchhiked before and you want to try it out you should check out the article hitchhiking for the [[first time]].

[[File:Img l 1306483.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Hitchhiker in the UK]]
Contrary to popular opinion there are a lot of hitchhikers, all over the world, even in the [[United States]]. There are people like [[User:Irvthom|Irv Thomas]] whose hitchhike experiences span more than half a century. Hitchhiking is a very common means of transport
in most less affluent countries (although often a form of payment is
expected). Hitchhiking is probably as old as the wheel and will
probably exist as long as people need to move from one place to
another.

There has been surprisingly little scientific research on hitchhiking,
so it's really hard to say come up with any hard statements on the
rise or demise of hitchhiking. There are is a nice community of hitchhikers in
Europe, and it seems to be growing. It's sort of going hand in hand
with the [[hospitality exchange]] movement. Some try to link this
to the much larger (and economically highly influential) movement of
free software and free information (think GNU/Linux and Wikipedia),
and there is huge potential in this sense. If we want it or
not, internet will be in people's pockets and most of our locations
are already easily tracked. Link this to the potential [[trust]]
available in online social networks (friends of friends), the rising
prices of petrol and the lower need to be in one location and
hitchhiking could be just at the start of a global come-back.

[[The Pros and Cons of Hitch Hiking|People will participate because]] it's ecological, others because of the economical aspects. Numerous people pick up hitchhikers is means of getting a
bit of excitement in their life. For some hitchhiking starts as a form
of extremely cheap transport and then it turns into a lifestyle
that allows to do amazing and useful things without being trapped
in an office 5 days a week. Some people have
this idea that hitchhikers are stinky bums. Of course, at (rare)
times hitchhikers can be on the road for more than 24 hours and feel the need for a
shower, but others are traveling equipped with laptops, mobile phones, a fresh shave and shower and GPS devices.

There are several types of hitchhiking. 
* traveling by road motor vehicles: cars, trucks, buses.

* traveling by train, either the risky act of [[train hopping]] or, as is sometimes possible, with the permission of the engineer or conductor.

* traveling by ocean vessel, often called [[boathitching]]

* traveling by air: planes and helicopters, also called [[airhitching]]

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopaedic information about hitchhiking].
[[wikipedia:Hitchhiking]]

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampen]]
[[es:Como hacer dedo]]
[[fr:Auto-stop]]</text>
      <sha1>5a9s7305imt6r1c4t8z0u0tdbmez0bx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44454</id>
      <parentid>41092</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-08-31T22:12:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3259">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'' or in parts of Europe, ''auto-stopping'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], practical info on how to do it, pictures and much much more. If you've never hitchhiked before and you want to try it out you should check out the article hitchhiking for the [[first time]].

[[File:Img l 1306483.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Hitchhiker in the UK]]
Contrary to popular opinion there are a lot of hitchhikers, all over the world, even in the [[United States]]. There are people like [[User:Irvthom|Irv Thomas]] whose hitchhike experiences span more than half a century. Hitchhiking is a very common means of transport
in most less affluent countries (although often a form of payment is
expected). Hitchhiking is probably as old as the wheel and will
probably exist as long as people need to move from one place to
another.

There has been surprisingly little scientific research on hitchhiking,
so it's really hard to say come up with any hard statements on the
rise or demise of hitchhiking. There are is a nice community of hitchhikers in
Europe, and it seems to be growing. It's sort of going hand in hand
with the [[hospitality exchange]] movement. Some try to link this
to the much larger (and economically highly influential) movement of
free software and free information (think GNU/Linux and Wikipedia),
and there is huge potential in this sense. If we want it or
not, internet will be in people's pockets and most of our locations
are already easily tracked. Link this to the potential [[trust]]
available in online social networks (friends of friends), the rising
prices of petrol and the lower need to be in one location and
hitchhiking could be just at the start of a global come-back.

[[The Pros and Cons of Hitch Hiking|People will participate because]] it's ecological, others because of the economical aspects. Numerous people pick up hitchhikers is means of getting a
bit of excitement in their life. For some hitchhiking starts as a form
of extremely cheap transport and then it turns into a lifestyle
that allows to do amazing and useful things without being trapped
in an office 5 days a week. Some people have
this idea that hitchhikers are stinky bums. Of course, at (rare)
times hitchhikers can be on the road for more than 24 hours and feel the need for a
shower, but others are traveling equipped with laptops, mobile phones, a fresh shave and shower and GPS devices.

There are several types of hitchhiking. 
* traveling by road motor vehicles: [[cars]], [[trucks]], [[buses]].

* traveling by train, either the risky act of [[train hopping]] or, as is sometimes possible, with the permission of the engineer or conductor.

* traveling by ocean vessel, often called [[boathitching]]

* traveling by air: planes and helicopters, also called [[airhitching]]

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopaedic information about hitchhiking].
[[wikipedia:Hitchhiking]]

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampen]]
[[es:Como hacer dedo]]
[[fr:Auto-stop]]</text>
      <sha1>dhqlolxz900fkf10igzfmot8sm2r4m8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>46143</id>
      <parentid>44454</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-25T08:15:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Quarim</username>
        <id>1290</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3255">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'' or in parts of Europe, ''auto-stopping'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], practical info on how to do it, pictures and much much more. If you've never hitchhiked before and you want to try it out you should check out the article hitchhiking for the [[first time]].

[[File:Img l 1306483.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Hitchhiker in the UK]]
Contrary to popular opinion there are a lot of hitchhikers, all over the world, even in the [[United States]]. There are people like [[User:Irvthom|Irv Thomas]] whose hitchhike experiences span more than half a century. Hitchhiking is a very common means of transport
in most less affluent countries (although often a form of payment is
expected). Hitchhiking is probably as old as the wheel and will
probably exist as long as people need to move from one place to
another.

There has been surprisingly little scientific research on hitchhiking,
so it's really hard to say come up with any hard statements on the
rise or demise of hitchhiking. There is a nice community of hitchhikers in
Europe, and it seems to be growing. It's sort of going hand in hand
with the [[hospitality exchange]] movement. Some try to link this
to the much larger (and economically highly influential) movement of
free software and free information (think GNU/Linux and Wikipedia),
and there is huge potential in this sense. If we want it or
not, internet will be in people's pockets and most of our locations
are already easily tracked. Link this to the potential [[trust]]
available in online social networks (friends of friends), the rising
prices of petrol and the lower need to be in one location and
hitchhiking could be just at the start of a global come-back.

[[The Pros and Cons of Hitch Hiking|People will participate because]] it's ecological, others because of the economical aspects. Numerous people pick up hitchhikers is means of getting a
bit of excitement in their life. For some hitchhiking starts as a form
of extremely cheap transport and then it turns into a lifestyle
that allows to do amazing and useful things without being trapped
in an office 5 days a week. Some people have
this idea that hitchhikers are stinky bums. Of course, at (rare)
times hitchhikers can be on the road for more than 24 hours and feel the need for a
shower, but others are traveling equipped with laptops, mobile phones, a fresh shave and shower and GPS devices.

There are several types of hitchhiking. 
* traveling by road motor vehicles: [[cars]], [[trucks]], [[buses]].

* traveling by train, either the risky act of [[train hopping]] or, as is sometimes possible, with the permission of the engineer or conductor.

* traveling by ocean vessel, often called [[boathitching]]

* traveling by air: planes and helicopters, also called [[airhitching]]

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopaedic information about hitchhiking].
[[wikipedia:Hitchhiking]]

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampen]]
[[es:Como hacer dedo]]
[[fr:Auto-stop]]</text>
      <sha1>00goykpumimo6d9qo2cuh03j3re5t06</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>49050</id>
      <parentid>46143</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-21T05:44:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>SpamBucket</username>
        <id>24368</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="36">[[File:Openp.jpg|thumb|right|500px]]</text>
      <sha1>2x90ue47qo4ao94un6zuzdb3qv9z2a2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>49057</id>
      <parentid>49050</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-21T08:37:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Timmy tofu</username>
        <id>1643</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3255">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'' or in parts of Europe, ''auto-stopping'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], practical info on how to do it, pictures and much much more. If you've never hitchhiked before and you want to try it out you should check out the article hitchhiking for the [[first time]].

[[File:Img l 1306483.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Hitchhiker in the UK]]
Contrary to popular opinion there are a lot of hitchhikers, all over the world, even in the [[United States]]. There are people like [[User:Irvthom|Irv Thomas]] whose hitchhike experiences span more than half a century. Hitchhiking is a very common means of transport
in most less affluent countries (although often a form of payment is
expected). Hitchhiking is probably as old as the wheel and will
probably exist as long as people need to move from one place to
another.

There has been surprisingly little scientific research on hitchhiking,
so it's really hard to say come up with any hard statements on the
rise or demise of hitchhiking. There is a nice community of hitchhikers in
Europe, and it seems to be growing. It's sort of going hand in hand
with the [[hospitality exchange]] movement. Some try to link this
to the much larger (and economically highly influential) movement of
free software and free information (think GNU/Linux and Wikipedia),
and there is huge potential in this sense. If we want it or
not, internet will be in people's pockets and most of our locations
are already easily tracked. Link this to the potential [[trust]]
available in online social networks (friends of friends), the rising
prices of petrol and the lower need to be in one location and
hitchhiking could be just at the start of a global come-back.

[[The Pros and Cons of Hitch Hiking|People will participate because]] it's ecological, others because of the economical aspects. Numerous people pick up hitchhikers is means of getting a
bit of excitement in their life. For some hitchhiking starts as a form
of extremely cheap transport and then it turns into a lifestyle
that allows to do amazing and useful things without being trapped
in an office 5 days a week. Some people have
this idea that hitchhikers are stinky bums. Of course, at (rare)
times hitchhikers can be on the road for more than 24 hours and feel the need for a
shower, but others are traveling equipped with laptops, mobile phones, a fresh shave and shower and GPS devices.

There are several types of hitchhiking. 
* traveling by road motor vehicles: [[cars]], [[trucks]], [[buses]].

* traveling by train, either the risky act of [[train hopping]] or, as is sometimes possible, with the permission of the engineer or conductor.

* traveling by ocean vessel, often called [[boathitching]]

* traveling by air: planes and helicopters, also called [[airhitching]]

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopaedic information about hitchhiking].
[[wikipedia:Hitchhiking]]

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampen]]
[[es:Como hacer dedo]]
[[fr:Auto-stop]]</text>
      <sha1>00goykpumimo6d9qo2cuh03j3re5t06</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>50419</id>
      <parentid>49057</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-03-27T06:59:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>SpamBucket</username>
        <id>24368</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="43">[[File:Beautyvagina.JPG|thumb|right|500px]]</text>
      <sha1>bg1hy2ue1k2fv1zunurul0omoxkocg6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>50423</id>
      <parentid>50419</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-03-27T09:31:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3255">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'' or in parts of Europe, ''auto-stopping'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], practical info on how to do it, pictures and much much more. If you've never hitchhiked before and you want to try it out you should check out the article hitchhiking for the [[first time]].

[[File:Img l 1306483.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Hitchhiker in the UK]]
Contrary to popular opinion there are a lot of hitchhikers, all over the world, even in the [[United States]]. There are people like [[User:Irvthom|Irv Thomas]] whose hitchhike experiences span more than half a century. Hitchhiking is a very common means of transport
in most less affluent countries (although often a form of payment is
expected). Hitchhiking is probably as old as the wheel and will
probably exist as long as people need to move from one place to
another.

There has been surprisingly little scientific research on hitchhiking,
so it's really hard to say come up with any hard statements on the
rise or demise of hitchhiking. There is a nice community of hitchhikers in
Europe, and it seems to be growing. It's sort of going hand in hand
with the [[hospitality exchange]] movement. Some try to link this
to the much larger (and economically highly influential) movement of
free software and free information (think GNU/Linux and Wikipedia),
and there is huge potential in this sense. If we want it or
not, internet will be in people's pockets and most of our locations
are already easily tracked. Link this to the potential [[trust]]
available in online social networks (friends of friends), the rising
prices of petrol and the lower need to be in one location and
hitchhiking could be just at the start of a global come-back.

[[The Pros and Cons of Hitch Hiking|People will participate because]] it's ecological, others because of the economical aspects. Numerous people pick up hitchhikers is means of getting a
bit of excitement in their life. For some hitchhiking starts as a form
of extremely cheap transport and then it turns into a lifestyle
that allows to do amazing and useful things without being trapped
in an office 5 days a week. Some people have
this idea that hitchhikers are stinky bums. Of course, at (rare)
times hitchhikers can be on the road for more than 24 hours and feel the need for a
shower, but others are traveling equipped with laptops, mobile phones, a fresh shave and shower and GPS devices.

There are several types of hitchhiking. 
* traveling by road motor vehicles: [[cars]], [[trucks]], [[buses]].

* traveling by train, either the risky act of [[train hopping]] or, as is sometimes possible, with the permission of the engineer or conductor.

* traveling by ocean vessel, often called [[boathitching]]

* traveling by air: planes and helicopters, also called [[airhitching]]

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopaedic information about hitchhiking].
[[wikipedia:Hitchhiking]]

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampen]]
[[es:Como hacer dedo]]
[[fr:Auto-stop]]</text>
      <sha1>00goykpumimo6d9qo2cuh03j3re5t06</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>52037</id>
      <parentid>50423</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-04-29T04:26:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>87.48.255.243</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="52">That's 2 cleevr by half and 2x2 clever 4 me. Thanks!</text>
      <sha1>1thuy6fkbrd8rcko1d2k5i8y2aspu0e</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>52059</id>
      <parentid>52037</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-04-29T09:07:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3255">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'' or in parts of Europe, ''auto-stopping'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], practical info on how to do it, pictures and much much more. If you've never hitchhiked before and you want to try it out you should check out the article hitchhiking for the [[first time]].

[[File:Img l 1306483.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Hitchhiker in the UK]]
Contrary to popular opinion there are a lot of hitchhikers, all over the world, even in the [[United States]]. There are people like [[User:Irvthom|Irv Thomas]] whose hitchhike experiences span more than half a century. Hitchhiking is a very common means of transport
in most less affluent countries (although often a form of payment is
expected). Hitchhiking is probably as old as the wheel and will
probably exist as long as people need to move from one place to
another.

There has been surprisingly little scientific research on hitchhiking,
so it's really hard to say come up with any hard statements on the
rise or demise of hitchhiking. There is a nice community of hitchhikers in
Europe, and it seems to be growing. It's sort of going hand in hand
with the [[hospitality exchange]] movement. Some try to link this
to the much larger (and economically highly influential) movement of
free software and free information (think GNU/Linux and Wikipedia),
and there is huge potential in this sense. If we want it or
not, internet will be in people's pockets and most of our locations
are already easily tracked. Link this to the potential [[trust]]
available in online social networks (friends of friends), the rising
prices of petrol and the lower need to be in one location and
hitchhiking could be just at the start of a global come-back.

[[The Pros and Cons of Hitch Hiking|People will participate because]] it's ecological, others because of the economical aspects. Numerous people pick up hitchhikers is means of getting a
bit of excitement in their life. For some hitchhiking starts as a form
of extremely cheap transport and then it turns into a lifestyle
that allows to do amazing and useful things without being trapped
in an office 5 days a week. Some people have
this idea that hitchhikers are stinky bums. Of course, at (rare)
times hitchhikers can be on the road for more than 24 hours and feel the need for a
shower, but others are traveling equipped with laptops, mobile phones, a fresh shave and shower and GPS devices.

There are several types of hitchhiking. 
* traveling by road motor vehicles: [[cars]], [[trucks]], [[buses]].

* traveling by train, either the risky act of [[train hopping]] or, as is sometimes possible, with the permission of the engineer or conductor.

* traveling by ocean vessel, often called [[boathitching]]

* traveling by air: planes and helicopters, also called [[airhitching]]

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopaedic information about hitchhiking].
[[wikipedia:Hitchhiking]]

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampen]]
[[es:Como hacer dedo]]
[[fr:Auto-stop]]</text>
      <sha1>00goykpumimo6d9qo2cuh03j3re5t06</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>55864</id>
      <parentid>52059</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-08T01:13:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3420">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'' or in parts of Europe, ''auto-stopping'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], practical info on how to do it, pictures and much much more. If you've never hitchhiked before and you want to try it out you should check out the article hitchhiking for the [[first time hitchhiking|first time]].

[[File:Img l 1306483.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Hitchhiker in the UK]]
Contrary to popular opinion there are a lot of hitchhikers, all over the world, even in the [[United States of America|United States]]. There are people like [[User:Irvthom|Irv Thomas]] whose hitchhike experiences span more than half a century. Hitchhiking is a very common means of transport
in most less affluent countries (although often a form of payment is
expected). Hitchhiking is probably as old as the wheel and will
probably exist as long as people need to move from one place to
another.

There has been surprisingly little scientific research on hitchhiking,
so it's really hard to say come up with any hard statements on the
rise or demise of hitchhiking. There is a nice community of hitchhikers in
Europe, and it seems to be growing. It's sort of going hand in hand
with the [[finding accommodation|hospitality exchange]] movement. Some try to link this
to the much larger (and economically highly influential) movement of
free software and free information (think GNU/Linux and Wikipedia),
and there is huge potential in this sense. If we want it or
not, internet will be in people's pockets and most of our locations
are already easily tracked. Link this to the potential [[trust]]
available in online social networks (friends of friends), the rising
prices of petrol and the lower need to be in one location and
hitchhiking could be just at the start of a global come-back.

[[The Pros and Cons of Hitch Hiking|People will participate because]] it's ecological, others because of the economical aspects. Numerous people pick up hitchhikers is means of getting a
bit of excitement in their life. For some hitchhiking starts as a form
of extremely cheap transport and then it turns into a lifestyle
that allows to do amazing and useful things without being trapped
in an office 5 days a week. Some people have
this idea that hitchhikers are stinky bums. Of course, at (rare)
times hitchhikers can be on the road for more than 24 hours and feel the need for a
shower, but others are traveling equipped with laptops, mobile phones, a fresh shave and shower and GPS devices.

There are several types of hitchhiking. 
* traveling by road motor vehicles: [[hitchhiking a car|cars]], [[hitchhiking a truck|trucks]], [[hitchhiking a bus|buses]].

* traveling by train, either the risky act of [[train hopping]] or, as is sometimes possible, with the permission of the engineer or conductor.

* traveling by ocean vessel, often called [[hitchhiking a boat|boathitching]]

* traveling by air: planes and helicopters, also called [[hitchhiking a plane|airhitching]]

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopaedic information about hitchhiking].
[[wikipedia:Hitchhiking]]

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampen]]
[[es:Como hacer dedo]]
[[fr:Auto-stop]]</text>
      <sha1>ratlvj953vkx5u7lwseap7y41qxud0n</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68751</id>
      <parentid>55864</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-03-23T19:12:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3436">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'' or in parts of Europe, ''auto-stopping'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], practical info on how to do it, pictures and much much more. If you've never hitchhiked before and you want to try it out you should check out the article hitchhiking for the [[first time hitchhiking|first time]].

[[File:Img l 1306483.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Hitchhiker in the UK]]
Contrary to popular opinion there are a lot of hitchhikers, all over the world, even in the [[United States of America|United States]]. There are people like [[User:Irvthom|Irv Thomas]] whose hitchhike experiences span more than half a century. Hitchhiking is a very common means of transport
in most less affluent countries (although often a form of payment is
expected). Hitchhiking is probably as old as the wheel and will
probably exist as long as people need to move from one place to
another.

There has been surprisingly little scientific research on hitchhiking,
so it's really hard to say come up with any hard statements on the
rise or demise of hitchhiking. There is a nice community of hitchhikers in
Europe, and it seems to be growing. It's sort of going hand in hand
with the [[finding accommodation|hospitality exchange]] movement. Some try to link this
to the much larger (and economically highly influential) movement of
free software and free information (think GNU/Linux and Wikipedia),
and there is huge potential in this sense. If we want it or
not, internet will be in people's pockets and most of our locations
are already easily tracked. Link this to the potential [[trust]]
available in online social networks (friends of friends), the rising
prices of petrol and the lower need to be in one location and
hitchhiking could be just at the start of a global come-back.

[[The Pros and Cons of Hitch Hiking|People will participate because]] it's ecological, others because of the economical aspects. Numerous people pick up hitchhikers is means of getting a
bit of excitement in their life. For some hitchhiking starts as a form
of extremely cheap transport and then it turns into a lifestyle
that allows to do amazing and useful things without being trapped
in an office 5 days a week. Some people have
this idea that hitchhikers are stinky bums. Of course, at (rare)
times hitchhikers can be on the road for more than 24 hours and feel the need for a
shower, but others are traveling equipped with laptops, mobile phones, a fresh shave and shower and GPS devices.

There are several types of hitchhiking. 
* traveling by road motor vehicles: [[hitchhiking a car|cars]], [[hitchhiking a truck|trucks]], [[hitchhiking a bus|buses]].

* traveling by train, either the risky act of [[train hopping]] or, as is sometimes possible, with the permission of the engineer or conductor.

* traveling by ocean vessel, often called [[hitchhiking a boat|boathitching]]

* traveling by air: planes and helicopters, also called [[hitchhiking a plane|airhitching]]

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopaedic information about hitchhiking].
[[wikipedia:Hitchhiking]]

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampen]]
[[es:Como hacer dedo]]
[[fr:Auto-stop]]
[[he:טרמפ]]</text>
      <sha1>ml9vl2whigro8yt2sicrgatdzqlczje</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70981</id>
      <parentid>68751</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-08-19T23:11:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3450">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'' or in parts of Europe, ''auto-stopping'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], practical info on how to do it, pictures and much much more. If you've never hitchhiked before and you want to try it out you should check out the article hitchhiking for the [[first time hitchhiking|first time]].

[[File:Img l 1306483.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Hitchhiker in the UK]]
Contrary to popular opinion there are a lot of hitchhikers, all over the world, even in the [[United States of America|United States]]. There are people like [[User:Irvthom|Irv Thomas]] whose hitchhike experiences span more than half a century. Hitchhiking is a very common means of transport
in most less affluent countries (although often a form of payment is
expected). Hitchhiking is probably as old as the wheel and will
probably exist as long as people need to move from one place to
another.

There has been surprisingly little scientific research on hitchhiking,
so it's really hard to say come up with any hard statements on the
rise or demise of hitchhiking. There is a nice community of hitchhikers in
Europe, and it seems to be growing. It's sort of going hand in hand
with the [[finding accommodation|hospitality exchange]] movement. Some try to link this
to the much larger (and economically highly influential) movement of
free software and free information (think GNU/Linux and Wikipedia),
and there is huge potential in this sense. If we want it or
not, internet will be in people's pockets and most of our locations
are already easily tracked. Link this to the potential [[trust]]
available in online social networks (friends of friends), the rising
prices of petrol and the lower need to be in one location and
hitchhiking could be just at the start of a global come-back.

[[The Pros and Cons of Hitch Hiking|People will participate because]] it's ecological, others because of the economical aspects. Numerous people pick up hitchhikers is means of getting a
bit of excitement in their life. For some hitchhiking starts as a form
of extremely cheap transport and then it turns into a lifestyle
that allows to do amazing and useful things without being trapped
in an office 5 days a week. Some people have
this idea that hitchhikers are stinky bums. Of course, at (rare)
times hitchhikers can be on the road for more than 24 hours and feel the need for a
shower, but others are traveling equipped with laptops, mobile phones, a fresh shave and shower and GPS devices.

There are several types of hitchhiking. 
* traveling by road motor vehicles: [[hitchhiking a car|cars]], [[hitchhiking a truck|trucks]], [[hitchhiking a bus|buses]].

* traveling by train, either the risky act of [[train hopping]] or, as is sometimes possible, with the permission of the engineer or conductor.

* traveling by ocean vessel, often called [[hitchhiking a boat|boathitching]]

* traveling by air: planes and helicopters, also called [[hitchhiking a plane|airhitching]]

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopaedic information about hitchhiking].
[[wikipedia:Hitchhiking]]

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampen]]
[[es:Como hacer dedo]]
[[fr:Auto-stop]]
[[he:טרמפ]]
[[nl:Liften]]</text>
      <sha1>cgj8k25j27pxpxbfqrn7q18ctxmqtfo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72377</id>
      <parentid>70981</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-12T21:34:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robyt</username>
        <id>9747</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3472">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'' or in parts of Europe, ''auto-stopping'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], practical info on how to do it, pictures and much much more. If you've never hitchhiked before and you want to try it out you should check out the article hitchhiking for the [[first time hitchhiking|first time]].

[[File:Img l 1306483.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Hitchhiker in the UK]]
Contrary to popular opinion there are a lot of hitchhikers, all over the world, even in the [[United States of America|United States]]. There are people like [[User:Irvthom|Irv Thomas]] whose hitchhike experiences span more than half a century. Hitchhiking is a very common means of transport
in most less affluent countries (although often a form of payment is
expected). Hitchhiking is probably as old as the wheel and will
probably exist as long as people need to move from one place to
another.

There has been surprisingly little scientific research on hitchhiking,
so it's really hard to say come up with any hard statements on the
rise or demise of hitchhiking. There is a nice community of hitchhikers in
Europe, and it seems to be growing. It's sort of going hand in hand
with the [[finding accommodation|hospitality exchange]] movement. Some try to link this
to the much larger (and economically highly influential) movement of
free software and free information (think GNU/Linux and Wikipedia),
and there is huge potential in this sense. If we want it or
not, internet will be in people's pockets and most of our locations
are already easily tracked. Link this to the potential [[trust]]
available in online social networks (friends of friends), the rising
prices of petrol and the lower need to be in one location and
hitchhiking could be just at the start of a global come-back.

[[The Pros and Cons of Hitch Hiking|People will participate because]] it's ecological, others because of the economical aspects. Numerous people pick up hitchhikers is means of getting a
bit of excitement in their life. For some hitchhiking starts as a form
of extremely cheap transport and then it turns into a lifestyle
that allows to do amazing and useful things without being trapped
in an office 5 days a week. Some people have
this idea that hitchhikers are stinky bums. Of course, at (rare)
times hitchhikers can be on the road for more than 24 hours and feel the need for a
shower, but others are traveling equipped with laptops, mobile phones, a fresh shave and shower and GPS devices.

There are several types of hitchhiking. 
* traveling by road motor vehicles: [[hitchhiking a car|cars]], [[hitchhiking a truck|trucks]], [[hitchhiking a bus|buses]].

* traveling by train, either the risky act of [[train hopping]] or, as is sometimes possible, with the permission of the engineer or conductor.

* traveling by ocean vessel, often called [[hitchhiking a boat|boathitching]]

* traveling by air: planes and helicopters, also called [[hitchhiking a plane|airhitching]]

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopaedic information about hitchhiking].
[[wikipedia:Hitchhiking]]

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampen]]
[[es:Como hacer dedo]]
[[fr:Auto-stop]]
[[he:טרמפ]]
[[nl:Liften]]
[[nomad:Hitchhiking]]</text>
      <sha1>k2z3ewa2wcxngtmlt9xggkcewag0q08</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>81204</id>
      <parentid>72377</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-10-15T09:32:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3484">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'' or in parts of Europe, ''auto-stopping'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (a ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver, for free. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], practical info on how to do it, pictures and much much more. If you've never hitchhiked before and you want to try it out you should check out the article hitchhiking for the [[first time hitchhiking|first time]].

[[File:Img l 1306483.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Hitchhiker in the UK]]
Contrary to popular opinion there are a lot of hitchhikers, all over the world, even in the [[United States of America|United States]]. There are people like [[User:Irvthom|Irv Thomas]] whose hitchhike experiences span more than half a century. Hitchhiking is a very common means of transport
in most less affluent countries (although often a form of payment is
expected). Hitchhiking is probably as old as the wheel and will
probably exist as long as people need to move from one place to
another.

There has been surprisingly little scientific research on hitchhiking,
so it's really hard to say come up with any hard statements on the
rise or demise of hitchhiking. There is a nice community of hitchhikers in
Europe, and it seems to be growing. It's sort of going hand in hand
with the [[finding accommodation|hospitality exchange]] movement. Some try to link this
to the much larger (and economically highly influential) movement of
free software and free information (think GNU/Linux and Wikipedia),
and there is huge potential in this sense. If we want it or
not, internet will be in people's pockets and most of our locations
are already easily tracked. Link this to the potential [[trust]]
available in online social networks (friends of friends), the rising
prices of petrol and the lower need to be in one location and
hitchhiking could be just at the start of a global come-back.

[[The Pros and Cons of Hitch Hiking|People will participate because]] it's ecological, others because of the economical aspects. Numerous people pick up hitchhikers is means of getting a
bit of excitement in their life. For some hitchhiking starts as a form
of extremely cheap transport and then it turns into a lifestyle
that allows to do amazing and useful things without being trapped
in an office 5 days a week. Some people have
this idea that hitchhikers are stinky bums. Of course, at (rare)
times hitchhikers can be on the road for more than 24 hours and feel the need for a
shower, but others are traveling equipped with laptops, mobile phones, a fresh shave and shower and GPS devices.

There are several types of hitchhiking. 
* traveling by road motor vehicles: [[hitchhiking a car|cars]], [[hitchhiking a truck|trucks]], [[hitchhiking a bus|buses]].

* traveling by train, either the risky act of [[train hopping]] or, as is sometimes possible, with the permission of the engineer or conductor.

* traveling by ocean vessel, often called [[hitchhiking a boat|boathitching]]

* traveling by air: planes and helicopters, also called [[hitchhiking a plane|airhitching]]

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopaedic information about hitchhiking].
[[wikipedia:Hitchhiking]]

[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampen]]
[[es:Como hacer dedo]]
[[fr:Auto-stop]]
[[he:טרמפ]]
[[nl:Liften]]
[[nomad:Hitchhiking]]</text>
      <sha1>6x4zh80m1rt9sa1nzypcsk5ml7ui7dl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>81961</id>
      <parentid>81204</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-01-13T13:49:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3421">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'' or in parts of Europe, ''auto-stopping'') is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (a ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver, for free. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], practical info on how to do it, pictures and much much more. If you've never hitchhiked before and you want to try it out you should check out the article hitchhiking for the [[first time hitchhiking|first time]].

[[File:Img l 1306483.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Hitchhiker in the UK]]
Contrary to popular opinion there are a lot of hitchhikers, all over the world, even in the [[United States of America|United States]]. There are people like [[User:Irvthom|Irv Thomas]] whose hitchhike experiences span more than half a century. Hitchhiking is a very common means of transport
in most less affluent countries (although often a form of payment is
expected). Hitchhiking is probably as old as the wheel and will
probably exist as long as people need to move from one place to
another.

There has been surprisingly little scientific research on hitchhiking,
so it's really hard to say come up with any hard statements on the
rise or demise of hitchhiking. There is a nice community of hitchhikers in
Europe, and it seems to be growing. It's sort of going hand in hand
with the [[finding accommodation|hospitality exchange]] movement. Some try to link this
to the much larger (and economically highly influential) movement of
free software and free information (think GNU/Linux and Wikipedia),
and there is huge potential in this sense. If we want it or
not, internet will be in people's pockets and most of our locations
are already easily tracked. Link this to the potential [[trust]]
available in online social networks (friends of friends), the rising
prices of petrol and the lower need to be in one location and
hitchhiking could be just at the start of a global come-back.

[[The Pros and Cons of Hitch Hiking|People will participate because]] it's ecological, others because of the economical aspects. Numerous people pick up hitchhikers is means of getting a
bit of excitement in their life. For some hitchhiking starts as a form
of extremely cheap transport and then it turns into a lifestyle
that allows to do amazing and useful things without being trapped
in an office 5 days a week. Some people have
this idea that hitchhikers are stinky bums. Of course, at (rare)
times hitchhikers can be on the road for more than 24 hours and feel the need for a
shower, but others are traveling equipped with laptops, mobile phones, a fresh shave and shower and GPS devices.

There are several types of hitchhiking. 
* traveling by road motor vehicles: [[hitchhiking a car|cars]], [[hitchhiking a truck|trucks]], [[hitchhiking a bus|buses]].

* traveling by train, either the risky act of [[train hopping]] or, as is sometimes possible, with the permission of the engineer or conductor.

* traveling by ocean vessel, often called [[hitchhiking a boat|boathitching]]

* traveling by air: planes and helicopters, also called [[hitchhiking a plane|airhitching]]

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopaedic information about hitchhiking].
[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampen]]
[[es:Como hacer dedo]]
[[fr:Auto-stop]]
[[he:טרמפ]]</text>
      <sha1>08lueuja0kxkewu5tcgv1vkt30zrf8j</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>84479</id>
      <parentid>81961</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-09-07T15:26:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Windsohn</username>
        <id>24491</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3478">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'' or, universally in all non-english European languages ''auto-stop'' with different pronunciations) is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (a ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver, for free. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], practical info on how to do it, pictures and much much more. If you've never hitchhiked before and you want to try it out you should check out the article hitchhiking for the [[first time hitchhiking|first time]].

[[File:Img l 1306483.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Hitchhiker in the UK]]
Contrary to popular opinion there are a lot of hitchhikers, all over the world, even in the [[United States of America|United States]]. There are people like [[User:Irvthom|Irv Thomas]] whose hitchhike experiences span more than half a century. Hitchhiking is a very common means of transport
in most less affluent countries (although often a form of payment is
expected). Hitchhiking is probably as old as the wheel and will
probably exist as long as people need to move from one place to
another.

There has been surprisingly little scientific research on hitchhiking,
so it's really hard to say come up with any hard statements on the
rise or demise of hitchhiking. There is a nice community of hitchhikers in
Europe, and it seems to be growing. It's sort of going hand in hand
with the [[finding accommodation|hospitality exchange]] movement. Some try to link this
to the much larger (and economically highly influential) movement of
free software and free information (think GNU/Linux and Wikipedia),
and there is huge potential in this sense. If we want it or
not, internet will be in people's pockets and most of our locations
are already easily tracked. Link this to the potential [[trust]]
available in online social networks (friends of friends), the rising
prices of petrol and the lower need to be in one location and
hitchhiking could be just at the start of a global come-back.

[[The Pros and Cons of Hitch Hiking|People will participate because]] it's ecological, others because of the economical aspects. Numerous people pick up hitchhikers is means of getting a
bit of excitement in their life. For some hitchhiking starts as a form
of extremely cheap transport and then it turns into a lifestyle
that allows to do amazing and useful things without being trapped
in an office 5 days a week. Some people have
this idea that hitchhikers are stinky bums. Of course, at (rare)
times hitchhikers can be on the road for more than 24 hours and feel the need for a
shower, but others are traveling equipped with laptops, mobile phones, a fresh shave and shower and GPS devices.

There are several types of hitchhiking. 
* traveling by road motor vehicles: [[hitchhiking a car|cars]], [[hitchhiking a truck|trucks]], [[hitchhiking a bus|buses]].

* traveling by train, either the risky act of [[train hopping]] or, as is sometimes possible, with the permission of the engineer or conductor.

* traveling by ocean vessel, often called [[hitchhiking a boat|boathitching]]

* traveling by air: planes and helicopters, also called [[hitchhiking a plane|airhitching]]

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopaedic information about hitchhiking].
[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampen]]
[[es:Como hacer dedo]]
[[fr:Auto-stop]]
[[he:טרמפ]]</text>
      <sha1>eivzph17ctnf0vwa0h6g6udaf8cf8ld</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>84480</id>
      <parentid>84479</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-09-07T15:28:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Windsohn</username>
        <id>24491</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3479">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'' or, universally in several Languages around the world, ''auto-stop'' with different pronunciations) is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (a ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver, for free. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], practical info on how to do it, pictures and much much more. If you've never hitchhiked before and you want to try it out you should check out the article hitchhiking for the [[first time hitchhiking|first time]].

[[File:Img l 1306483.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Hitchhiker in the UK]]
Contrary to popular opinion there are a lot of hitchhikers, all over the world, even in the [[United States of America|United States]]. There are people like [[User:Irvthom|Irv Thomas]] whose hitchhike experiences span more than half a century. Hitchhiking is a very common means of transport
in most less affluent countries (although often a form of payment is
expected). Hitchhiking is probably as old as the wheel and will
probably exist as long as people need to move from one place to
another.

There has been surprisingly little scientific research on hitchhiking,
so it's really hard to say come up with any hard statements on the
rise or demise of hitchhiking. There is a nice community of hitchhikers in
Europe, and it seems to be growing. It's sort of going hand in hand
with the [[finding accommodation|hospitality exchange]] movement. Some try to link this
to the much larger (and economically highly influential) movement of
free software and free information (think GNU/Linux and Wikipedia),
and there is huge potential in this sense. If we want it or
not, internet will be in people's pockets and most of our locations
are already easily tracked. Link this to the potential [[trust]]
available in online social networks (friends of friends), the rising
prices of petrol and the lower need to be in one location and
hitchhiking could be just at the start of a global come-back.

[[The Pros and Cons of Hitch Hiking|People will participate because]] it's ecological, others because of the economical aspects. Numerous people pick up hitchhikers is means of getting a
bit of excitement in their life. For some hitchhiking starts as a form
of extremely cheap transport and then it turns into a lifestyle
that allows to do amazing and useful things without being trapped
in an office 5 days a week. Some people have
this idea that hitchhikers are stinky bums. Of course, at (rare)
times hitchhikers can be on the road for more than 24 hours and feel the need for a
shower, but others are traveling equipped with laptops, mobile phones, a fresh shave and shower and GPS devices.

There are several types of hitchhiking. 
* traveling by road motor vehicles: [[hitchhiking a car|cars]], [[hitchhiking a truck|trucks]], [[hitchhiking a bus|buses]].

* traveling by train, either the risky act of [[train hopping]] or, as is sometimes possible, with the permission of the engineer or conductor.

* traveling by ocean vessel, often called [[hitchhiking a boat|boathitching]]

* traveling by air: planes and helicopters, also called [[hitchhiking a plane|airhitching]]

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopaedic information about hitchhiking].
[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampen]]
[[es:Como hacer dedo]]
[[fr:Auto-stop]]
[[he:טרמפ]]</text>
      <sha1>72nbu5ross6t3lqv9t1lkd29tx35px0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>107484</id>
      <parentid>84480</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-11-23T20:24:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robyt</username>
        <id>9747</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>Added {{geo-missing}}</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3496">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'' or, universally in several Languages around the world, ''auto-stop'' with different pronunciations) is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (a ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver, for free. This wiki contains a lot of information about hitchhiking: [[Where to hitchhike|where to start]], practical info on how to do it, pictures and much much more. If you've never hitchhiked before and you want to try it out you should check out the article hitchhiking for the [[first time hitchhiking|first time]].

[[File:Img l 1306483.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Hitchhiker in the UK]]
Contrary to popular opinion there are a lot of hitchhikers, all over the world, even in the [[United States of America|United States]]. There are people like [[User:Irvthom|Irv Thomas]] whose hitchhike experiences span more than half a century. Hitchhiking is a very common means of transport
in most less affluent countries (although often a form of payment is
expected). Hitchhiking is probably as old as the wheel and will
probably exist as long as people need to move from one place to
another.

There has been surprisingly little scientific research on hitchhiking,
so it's really hard to say come up with any hard statements on the
rise or demise of hitchhiking. There is a nice community of hitchhikers in
Europe, and it seems to be growing. It's sort of going hand in hand
with the [[finding accommodation|hospitality exchange]] movement. Some try to link this
to the much larger (and economically highly influential) movement of
free software and free information (think GNU/Linux and Wikipedia),
and there is huge potential in this sense. If we want it or
not, internet will be in people's pockets and most of our locations
are already easily tracked. Link this to the potential [[trust]]
available in online social networks (friends of friends), the rising
prices of petrol and the lower need to be in one location and
hitchhiking could be just at the start of a global come-back.

[[The Pros and Cons of Hitch Hiking|People will participate because]] it's ecological, others because of the economical aspects. Numerous people pick up hitchhikers is means of getting a
bit of excitement in their life. For some hitchhiking starts as a form
of extremely cheap transport and then it turns into a lifestyle
that allows to do amazing and useful things without being trapped
in an office 5 days a week. Some people have
this idea that hitchhikers are stinky bums. Of course, at (rare)
times hitchhikers can be on the road for more than 24 hours and feel the need for a
shower, but others are traveling equipped with laptops, mobile phones, a fresh shave and shower and GPS devices.

There are several types of hitchhiking. 
* traveling by road motor vehicles: [[hitchhiking a car|cars]], [[hitchhiking a truck|trucks]], [[hitchhiking a bus|buses]].

* traveling by train, either the risky act of [[train hopping]] or, as is sometimes possible, with the permission of the engineer or conductor.

* traveling by ocean vessel, often called [[hitchhiking a boat|boathitching]]

* traveling by air: planes and helicopters, also called [[hitchhiking a plane|airhitching]]

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopaedic information about hitchhiking].
[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampen]]
[[es:Como hacer dedo]]
[[fr:Auto-stop]]
[[he:טרמפ]]

{{geo-missing}}</text>
      <sha1>siwweole79jy9jemztk0r6yyxoe4lpd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>109351</id>
      <parentid>107484</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-04-11T06:57:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>Does not contribute to a definition of hh</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2939">'''Hitchhiking''' (also called ''lifting'' or ''thumbing'' or, universally in several Languages around the world, ''auto-stop'' with different pronunciations) is a form of transport, in which the traveller tries to get a lift (a ride) from another traveller, usually a car or truck driver, for free.

[[File:Img l 1306483.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Hitchhiker in the UK]]
Hitchhiking is a very common means of transport
in most less affluent countries (although often a form of payment is
expected). Hitchhiking is probably as old as the wheel and will
probably exist as long as people need to move from one place to
another.

There has been surprisingly little scientific research on hitchhiking,
so it's really hard to say come up with any hard statements on the
rise or demise of hitchhiking. There is a nice community of hitchhikers in
Europe, and it seems to be growing. It's sort of going hand in hand
with the [[finding accommodation|hospitality exchange]] movement. Some try to link this
to the much larger (and economically highly influential) movement of
free software and free information (think GNU/Linux and Wikipedia),
and there is huge potential in this sense. If we want it or
not, internet will be in people's pockets and most of our locations
are already easily tracked. Link this to the potential [[trust]]
available in online social networks (friends of friends), the rising
prices of petrol and the lower need to be in one location and
hitchhiking could be just at the start of a global come-back.

[[The Pros and Cons of Hitch Hiking|People will participate because]] it's ecological, others because of the economical aspects. Numerous people pick up hitchhikers is means of getting a
bit of excitement in their life. For some hitchhiking starts as a form
of extremely cheap transport and then it turns into a lifestyle
that allows to do amazing and useful things without being trapped
in an office 5 days a week. Some people have
this idea that hitchhikers are stinky bums. Of course, at (rare)
times hitchhikers can be on the road for more than 24 hours and feel the need for a
shower, but others are traveling equipped with laptops, mobile phones, a fresh shave and shower and GPS devices.

There are several types of hitchhiking. 
* traveling by road motor vehicles: [[hitchhiking a car|cars]], [[hitchhiking a truck|trucks]], [[hitchhiking a bus|buses]].

* traveling by train, either the risky act of [[train hopping]] or, as is sometimes possible, with the permission of the engineer or conductor.

* traveling by ocean vessel, often called [[hitchhiking a boat|boathitching]]

* traveling by air: planes and helicopters, also called [[hitchhiking a plane|airhitching]]

Please check [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitchhiking Wikipedia's article for more encyclopaedic information about hitchhiking].
[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Trampen]]
[[es:Como hacer dedo]]
[[fr:Auto-stop]]
[[he:טרמפ]]

{{geo-missing}}</text>
      <sha1>na9okpqul8xrwadjqfhndjwye33gc8j</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>United States of America</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1535</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1575</id>
      <parentid>4473</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-02T23:40:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4434">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or other transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==People picking up hitchhikers==
A lot of people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

==States of the United States==
{| border="0" cellspacing="10"
|- valign="top"
| width="20%"|
*[[Alabama]]
*[[Alaska]]
*[[Arizona]]
*[[Arkansas]]
*[[California]]
*[[Colorado]]
*[[Connecticut]]
*[[Delaware]]
*[[Florida]]
*[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Hawaii]]
*[[Idaho]]
*[[Illinois]]
*[[Indiana]]
*[[Iowa]]
*[[Kansas]]
*[[Kentucky]]
*[[Louisiana]]
*[[Maine]]
*[[Maryland]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Massachusetts]]
*[[Michigan]]
*[[Minnesota]]
*[[Mississippi]]
*[[Missouri]]
*[[Montana]]
*[[Nebraska]]
*[[Nevada]]
*[[New Hampshire]]
*[[New Jersey]]
| width="20%"|
*[[New Mexico]]
*[[New York State|New York]]
*[[North Carolina]]
*[[North Dakota]]
*[[Ohio]]
*[[Oklahoma]]
*[[Oregon]]
*[[Pennsylvania]]
*[[Rhode Island]]
*[[South Carolina]]
| width="20%"|
*[[South Dakota]]
*[[Tennessee]]
*[[Texas]]
*[[Utah]]
*[[Vermont]]
*[[Virginia]]
*[[Washington]]
*[[West Virginia]]
*[[Wisconsin]]
*[[Wyoming]]
|}


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:United States of America|*]]</text>
      <sha1>qeq75cmkr3mspimia4ohujepnw7ev6r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1576</id>
      <parentid>1575</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4434">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or other transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==People picking up hitchhikers==
A lot of people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

==States of the United States==
{| border="0" cellspacing="10"
|- valign="top"
| width="20%"|
*[[Alabama]]
*[[Alaska]]
*[[Arizona]]
*[[Arkansas]]
*[[California]]
*[[Colorado]]
*[[Connecticut]]
*[[Delaware]]
*[[Florida]]
*[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Hawaii]]
*[[Idaho]]
*[[Illinois]]
*[[Indiana]]
*[[Iowa]]
*[[Kansas]]
*[[Kentucky]]
*[[Louisiana]]
*[[Maine]]
*[[Maryland]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Massachusetts]]
*[[Michigan]]
*[[Minnesota]]
*[[Mississippi]]
*[[Missouri]]
*[[Montana]]
*[[Nebraska]]
*[[Nevada]]
*[[New Hampshire]]
*[[New Jersey]]
| width="20%"|
*[[New Mexico]]
*[[New York State|New York]]
*[[North Carolina]]
*[[North Dakota]]
*[[Ohio]]
*[[Oklahoma]]
*[[Oregon]]
*[[Pennsylvania]]
*[[Rhode Island]]
*[[South Carolina]]
| width="20%"|
*[[South Dakota]]
*[[Tennessee]]
*[[Texas]]
*[[Utah]]
*[[Vermont]]
*[[Virginia]]
*[[Washington]]
*[[West Virginia]]
*[[Wisconsin]]
*[[Wyoming]]
|}


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:United States of America|*]]</text>
      <sha1>qeq75cmkr3mspimia4ohujepnw7ev6r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4450</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T21:09:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4940">'''The United States of America''' is a large land mass aquired over the years by different [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/President_of_the_United_States Presidents] who spent much money on these purchases and therefore put the economy of the entire country into jeopardy. However that is another topic in itself. Since the U.S.A. is so large it was divied up into smaller subplots of land called states. The U.S.A. has 50 of these. So for the conveniance of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages:


&lt;br clear="all"&gt;
&lt;table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AL'''&lt;td&gt;Ala.&lt;td&gt;[[Alabama]]&lt;td&gt;[[Montgomery, Alabama|Montgomery]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AK'''&lt;td&gt;Alaska&lt;td&gt;[[Alaska]]&lt;td&gt;[[Juneau, Alaska|Juneau]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AZ'''&lt;td&gt;Ariz.&lt;td&gt;[[Arizona]]&lt;td&gt;[[Phoenix, Arizona|Phoenix]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AR'''&lt;td&gt;Ark.&lt;td&gt;[[Arkansas]]&lt;td&gt;[[Little Rock, Arkansas|Little Rock]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''CA'''&lt;td&gt;Calif.&lt;td&gt;[[California]]&lt;td&gt;[[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''CO'''&lt;td&gt;Colo.&lt;td&gt;[[Colorado]]&lt;td&gt;[[Denver, Colorado|Denver]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''CT'''&lt;td&gt;Conn.&lt;td&gt;[[Connecticut]]&lt;td&gt;[[Hartford, Connecticut|Hartford]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''DE'''&lt;td&gt;Del.&lt;td&gt;[[Delaware]]&lt;td&gt;[[Dover, Delaware|Dover]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''FL'''&lt;td&gt;Fla.&lt;td&gt;[[Florida]]&lt;td&gt;[[Tallahassee, Florida|Tallahassee]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''GA'''&lt;td&gt;Ga.&lt;td&gt;[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Atlanta, Georgia|Atlanta]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''HI'''&lt;td&gt;Hawaii&lt;td&gt;[[Hawaii]]&lt;td&gt;[[Honolulu, Hawaii|Honolulu]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''ID'''&lt;td&gt;Idaho&lt;td&gt;[[Idaho]]&lt;td&gt;[[Boise, Idaho|Boise]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''IL'''&lt;td&gt;Ill.&lt;td&gt;[[Illinois]]&lt;td&gt;[[Springfield, Illinois|Springfield]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''IN'''&lt;td&gt;Ind.&lt;td&gt;[[Indiana]]&lt;td&gt;[[Indianapolis, Indiana|Indianapolis]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''IA'''&lt;td&gt;Iowa&lt;td&gt;[[Iowa]]&lt;td&gt;[[Des Moines, Iowa|Des Moines]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''KS'''&lt;td&gt;Kan.&lt;td&gt;[[Kansas]]&lt;td&gt;[[Topeka, Kansas|Topeka]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''KY'''&lt;td&gt;Ky.&lt;td&gt;[[Kentucky]]&lt;td&gt;[[Frankfort, Kentucky|Frankfort]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''LA'''&lt;td&gt;La.&lt;td&gt;[[Louisiana]]&lt;td&gt;[[Baton Rouge, Louisiana|Baton Rouge]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''ME'''&lt;td&gt;Maine&lt;td&gt;[[Maine]]&lt;td&gt;[[Augusta, Maine|Augusta]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MD'''&lt;td&gt;Md.&lt;td&gt;[[Maryland]]&lt;td&gt;[[Annapolis, Maryland|Annapolis]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MA'''&lt;td&gt;Mass.&lt;td&gt;[[Massachusetts]]&lt;td&gt;[[Boston, Massachusetts|Boston]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MI'''&lt;td&gt;Mich.&lt;td&gt;[[Michigan]]&lt;td&gt;[[Lansing, Michigan|Lansing]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MN'''&lt;td&gt;Minn.&lt;td&gt;[[Minnesota]]&lt;td&gt;[[Saint Paul, Minnesota|Saint Paul]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MS'''&lt;td&gt;Miss.&lt;td&gt;[[Mississippi]]&lt;td&gt;[[Jackson, Mississippi|Jackson]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MO'''&lt;td&gt;Mo.&lt;td&gt;[[Missouri]]&lt;td&gt;[[Jefferson City, Missouri|Jefferson City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
&lt;td&gt;
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MT'''&lt;td&gt;Mont.&lt;td&gt;[[Montana]]&lt;td&gt;[[Helena, Montana|Helena]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NE'''&lt;td&gt;Neb.&lt;td&gt;[[Nebraska]]&lt;td&gt;[[Lincoln, Nebraska|Lincoln]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NV'''&lt;td&gt;Nev.&lt;td&gt;[[Nevada]]&lt;td&gt;[[Carson City, Nevada|Carson City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NH'''&lt;td&gt;N.H.&lt;td&gt;[[New Hampshire]]&lt;td&gt;[[Concord, New Hampshire|Concord]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NJ'''&lt;td&gt;N.J.&lt;td&gt;[[New Jersey]]&lt;td&gt;[[Trenton, New Jersey|Trenton]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NM'''&lt;td&gt;N.M.&lt;td&gt;[[New Mexico]]&lt;td&gt;[[Santa Fe, New Mexico|Santa Fe]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NY'''&lt;td&gt;N.Y.&lt;td&gt;[[New York]]&lt;td&gt;[[Albany, New York|Albany]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NC'''&lt;td&gt;N.C.&lt;td&gt;[[North Carolina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Raleigh, North Carolina|Raleigh]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''ND'''&lt;td&gt;N.D.&lt;td&gt;[[North Dakota]]&lt;td&gt;[[Bismarck, North Dakota|Bismarck]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''OH'''&lt;td&gt;Ohio&lt;td&gt;[[Ohio]]&lt;td&gt;[[Columbus, Ohio|Columbus]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''OK'''&lt;td&gt;Okla.&lt;td&gt;[[Oklahoma]]&lt;td&gt;[[Oklahoma City, Oklahoma|Oklahoma City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''OR'''&lt;td&gt;Ore.&lt;td&gt;[[Oregon]]&lt;td&gt;[[Salem, Oregon|Salem]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''PA'''&lt;td&gt;Pa.&lt;td&gt;[[Pennsylvania]]&lt;td&gt;[[Harrisburg, Pennsylvania|Harrisburg]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''RI'''&lt;td&gt;R.I.&lt;td&gt;[[Rhode Island]]&lt;td&gt;[[Providence, Rhode Island|Providence]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''SC'''&lt;td&gt;S.C.&lt;td&gt;[[South Carolina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Columbia, South Carolina|Columbia]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''SD'''&lt;td&gt;S.D.&lt;td&gt;[[South Dakota]]&lt;td&gt;[[Pierre, South Dakota|Pierre]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''TN'''&lt;td&gt;Tenn.&lt;td&gt;[[Tennessee]]&lt;td&gt;[[Nashville, Tennessee|Nashville]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''TX'''&lt;td&gt;Texas&lt;td&gt;[[Texas]]&lt;td&gt;[[Austin, Texas|Austin]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''UT'''&lt;td&gt;Utah&lt;td&gt;[[Utah]]&lt;td&gt;[[Salt Lake City, Utah|Salt Lake City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''VT'''&lt;td&gt;Vt.&lt;td&gt;[[Vermont]]&lt;td&gt;[[Montpelier, Vermont|Montpelier]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''VA'''&lt;td&gt;Va.&lt;td&gt;[[Virginia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Richmond, Virginia|Richmond]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WA'''&lt;td&gt;Wash.&lt;td&gt;[[Washington]]&lt;td&gt;[[Olympia, Washington|Olympia]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WV'''&lt;td&gt;W.Va.&lt;td&gt;[[West Virginia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Charleston, West Virginia|Charleston]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WI'''&lt;td&gt;Wis.&lt;td&gt;[[Wisconsin]]&lt;td&gt;[[Madison, Wisconsin|Madison]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WY'''&lt;td&gt;Wyo.&lt;td&gt;[[Wyoming]]&lt;td&gt;[[Cheyenne, Wyoming|Cheyenne]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;

[[Category:North America]]</text>
      <sha1>km5nxa8j94ovwxgjgtgskuy6gjgvjj6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4451</id>
      <parentid>4450</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T14:10:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4934">'''The United States of America''' is a large land mass aquired over the years by different [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/President_of_the_United_States Presidents] who spent much money on these purchases and therefore put the economy of the entire country into jeopardy. However that is another topic in itself. Since the U.S.A. is so large it was divied up into smaller subplots of land called states. The U.S.A. has 50 of these. So for the conveniance of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages:


&lt;br clear="all"&gt;
&lt;table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AL'''&lt;td&gt;Ala.&lt;td&gt;[[Alabama]]&lt;td&gt;[[Montgomery, Alabama|Montgomery]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AK'''&lt;td&gt;Alaska&lt;td&gt;[[Alaska]]&lt;td&gt;[[Juneau, Alaska|Juneau]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AZ'''&lt;td&gt;Ariz.&lt;td&gt;[[Arizona]]&lt;td&gt;[[Phoenix, Arizona|Phoenix]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AR'''&lt;td&gt;Ark.&lt;td&gt;[[Arkansas]]&lt;td&gt;[[Little Rock, Arkansas|Little Rock]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''CA'''&lt;td&gt;Calif.&lt;td&gt;[[California]]&lt;td&gt;[[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''CO'''&lt;td&gt;Colo.&lt;td&gt;[[Colorado]]&lt;td&gt;[[Denver, Colorado|Denver]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''CT'''&lt;td&gt;Conn.&lt;td&gt;[[Connecticut]]&lt;td&gt;[[Hartford, Connecticut|Hartford]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''DE'''&lt;td&gt;Del.&lt;td&gt;[[Delaware]]&lt;td&gt;[[Dover, Delaware|Dover]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''FL'''&lt;td&gt;Fla.&lt;td&gt;[[Florida]]&lt;td&gt;[[Tallahassee, Florida|Tallahassee]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''GA'''&lt;td&gt;Ga.&lt;td&gt;[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Atlanta, Georgia|Atlanta]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''HI'''&lt;td&gt;Hawaii&lt;td&gt;[[Hawaii]]&lt;td&gt;[[Honolulu, Hawaii|Honolulu]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''ID'''&lt;td&gt;Idaho&lt;td&gt;[[Idaho]]&lt;td&gt;[[Boise, Idaho|Boise]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''IL'''&lt;td&gt;Ill.&lt;td&gt;[[Illinois]]&lt;td&gt;[[Springfield, Illinois|Springfield]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''IN'''&lt;td&gt;Ind.&lt;td&gt;[[Indiana]]&lt;td&gt;[[Indianapolis, Indiana|Indianapolis]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''IA'''&lt;td&gt;Iowa&lt;td&gt;[[Iowa]]&lt;td&gt;[[Des Moines, Iowa|Des Moines]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''KS'''&lt;td&gt;Kan.&lt;td&gt;[[Kansas]]&lt;td&gt;[[Topeka, Kansas|Topeka]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''KY'''&lt;td&gt;Ky.&lt;td&gt;[[Kentucky]]&lt;td&gt;[[Frankfort, Kentucky|Frankfort]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''LA'''&lt;td&gt;La.&lt;td&gt;[[Louisiana]]&lt;td&gt;[[Baton Rouge, Louisiana|Baton Rouge]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''ME'''&lt;td&gt;Maine&lt;td&gt;[[Maine]]&lt;td&gt;[[Augusta, Maine|Augusta]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MD'''&lt;td&gt;Md.&lt;td&gt;[[Maryland]]&lt;td&gt;[[Annapolis, Maryland|Annapolis]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MA'''&lt;td&gt;Mass.&lt;td&gt;[[Massachusetts]]&lt;td&gt;[[Boston, Massachusetts|Boston]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MI'''&lt;td&gt;Mich.&lt;td&gt;[[Michigan]]&lt;td&gt;[[Lansing, Michigan|Lansing]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MN'''&lt;td&gt;Minn.&lt;td&gt;[[Minnesota]]&lt;td&gt;[[Saint Paul, Minnesota|Saint Paul]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MS'''&lt;td&gt;Miss.&lt;td&gt;[[Mississippi]]&lt;td&gt;[[Jackson, Mississippi|Jackson]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MO'''&lt;td&gt;Mo.&lt;td&gt;[[Missouri]]&lt;td&gt;[[Jefferson City, Missouri|Jefferson City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
&lt;td&gt;
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MT'''&lt;td&gt;Mont.&lt;td&gt;[[Montana]]&lt;td&gt;[[Helena, Montana|Helena]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NE'''&lt;td&gt;Neb.&lt;td&gt;[[Nebraska]]&lt;td&gt;[[Lincoln, Nebraska|Lincoln]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NV'''&lt;td&gt;Nev.&lt;td&gt;[[Nevada]]&lt;td&gt;[[Carson City, Nevada|Carson City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NH'''&lt;td&gt;N.H.&lt;td&gt;[[New Hampshire]]&lt;td&gt;[[Concord, New Hampshire|Concord]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NJ'''&lt;td&gt;N.J.&lt;td&gt;[[New Jersey]]&lt;td&gt;[[Trenton, New Jersey|Trenton]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NM'''&lt;td&gt;N.M.&lt;td&gt;[[New Mexico]]&lt;td&gt;[[Santa Fe, New Mexico|Santa Fe]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NY'''&lt;td&gt;N.Y.&lt;td&gt;[[New York]]&lt;td&gt;[[Albany, New York|Albany]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NC'''&lt;td&gt;N.C.&lt;td&gt;[[North Carolina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Raleigh, North Carolina|Raleigh]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''ND'''&lt;td&gt;N.D.&lt;td&gt;[[North Dakota]]&lt;td&gt;[[Bismarck, North Dakota|Bismarck]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''OH'''&lt;td&gt;Ohio&lt;td&gt;[[Ohio]]&lt;td&gt;[[Columbus, Ohio|Columbus]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''OK'''&lt;td&gt;Okla.&lt;td&gt;[[Oklahoma]]&lt;td&gt;[[Oklahoma City, Oklahoma|Oklahoma City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''OR'''&lt;td&gt;Ore.&lt;td&gt;[[Oregon]]&lt;td&gt;[[Salem, Oregon|Salem]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''PA'''&lt;td&gt;Pa.&lt;td&gt;[[Pennsylvania]]&lt;td&gt;[[Harrisburg, Pennsylvania|Harrisburg]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''RI'''&lt;td&gt;R.I.&lt;td&gt;[[Rhode Island]]&lt;td&gt;[[Providence, Rhode Island|Providence]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''SC'''&lt;td&gt;S.C.&lt;td&gt;[[South Carolina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Columbia, South Carolina|Columbia]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''SD'''&lt;td&gt;S.D.&lt;td&gt;[[South Dakota]]&lt;td&gt;[[Pierre, South Dakota|Pierre]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''TN'''&lt;td&gt;Tenn.&lt;td&gt;[[Tennessee]]&lt;td&gt;[[Nashville, Tennessee|Nashville]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''TX'''&lt;td&gt;Texas&lt;td&gt;[[Texas]]&lt;td&gt;[[Austin, Texas|Austin]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''UT'''&lt;td&gt;Utah&lt;td&gt;[[Utah]]&lt;td&gt;[[Salt Lake City, Utah|Salt Lake City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''VT'''&lt;td&gt;Vt.&lt;td&gt;[[Vermont]]&lt;td&gt;[[Montpelier, Vermont|Montpelier]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''VA'''&lt;td&gt;Va.&lt;td&gt;[[Virginia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Richmond, Virginia|Richmond]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WA'''&lt;td&gt;Wash.&lt;td&gt;[[Washington]]&lt;td&gt;[[Olympia, Washington|Olympia]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WV'''&lt;td&gt;W.Va.&lt;td&gt;[[West Virginia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Charleston, West Virginia|Charleston]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WI'''&lt;td&gt;Wis.&lt;td&gt;[[Wisconsin]]&lt;td&gt;[[Madison, Wisconsin|Madison]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WY'''&lt;td&gt;Wyo.&lt;td&gt;[[Wyoming]]&lt;td&gt;[[Cheyenne, Wyoming|Cheyenne]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;

[[Category:America]]</text>
      <sha1>8znzhmc8gex3oe9uredpspwnp5rpp5g</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4452</id>
      <parentid>4451</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T23:01:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>80.186.138.5</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5900">'''The United States of America''' is a large land mass aquired over the years by different [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/President_of_the_United_States Presidents] who spent much money on these purchases and therefore put the economy of the entire country into jeopardy. However that is another topic in itself. Since the U.S.A. is so large it was divied up into smaller subplots of land called states. The U.S.A. has 50 of these. So for the conveniance of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages:

Hitching in general is good (or at least was in the (80´s). In this huge country you get more than rides. These hospitable people will take you to their homes and parties, etc. Often you´re offered a place to overnite already in the cars. If you can deal with the bikers, they got a bar in every town and as long as they´re your friends, you won´t be left to sleep in snow.
In some states you can even hitch on the motorways, mostly in the west. Unfortunately in most states you can´t but you can always stand on the enter ramp like in Europe. You can also look for rides at the truck stops but some truck stops are unfriendly to hitchers and tell you to leave in a very rude manner. In some town the cops harass you by asking for your passport but as long as you have it with you, there shouldn´t be any problem. Some of them become rather polite after seeing a foreign passport, some others might ask you, where such state is (Belgium, Norway, Finland...)?


&lt;br clear="all"&gt;
&lt;table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AL'''&lt;td&gt;Ala.&lt;td&gt;[[Alabama]]&lt;td&gt;[[Montgomery, Alabama|Montgomery]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AK'''&lt;td&gt;Alaska&lt;td&gt;[[Alaska]]&lt;td&gt;[[Juneau, Alaska|Juneau]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AZ'''&lt;td&gt;Ariz.&lt;td&gt;[[Arizona]]&lt;td&gt;[[Phoenix, Arizona|Phoenix]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AR'''&lt;td&gt;Ark.&lt;td&gt;[[Arkansas]]&lt;td&gt;[[Little Rock, Arkansas|Little Rock]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''CA'''&lt;td&gt;Calif.&lt;td&gt;[[California]]&lt;td&gt;[[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''CO'''&lt;td&gt;Colo.&lt;td&gt;[[Colorado]]&lt;td&gt;[[Denver, Colorado|Denver]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''CT'''&lt;td&gt;Conn.&lt;td&gt;[[Connecticut]]&lt;td&gt;[[Hartford, Connecticut|Hartford]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''DE'''&lt;td&gt;Del.&lt;td&gt;[[Delaware]]&lt;td&gt;[[Dover, Delaware|Dover]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''FL'''&lt;td&gt;Fla.&lt;td&gt;[[Florida]]&lt;td&gt;[[Tallahassee, Florida|Tallahassee]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''GA'''&lt;td&gt;Ga.&lt;td&gt;[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Atlanta, Georgia|Atlanta]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''HI'''&lt;td&gt;Hawaii&lt;td&gt;[[Hawaii]]&lt;td&gt;[[Honolulu, Hawaii|Honolulu]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''ID'''&lt;td&gt;Idaho&lt;td&gt;[[Idaho]]&lt;td&gt;[[Boise, Idaho|Boise]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''IL'''&lt;td&gt;Ill.&lt;td&gt;[[Illinois]]&lt;td&gt;[[Springfield, Illinois|Springfield]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''IN'''&lt;td&gt;Ind.&lt;td&gt;[[Indiana]]&lt;td&gt;[[Indianapolis, Indiana|Indianapolis]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''IA'''&lt;td&gt;Iowa&lt;td&gt;[[Iowa]]&lt;td&gt;[[Des Moines, Iowa|Des Moines]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''KS'''&lt;td&gt;Kan.&lt;td&gt;[[Kansas]]&lt;td&gt;[[Topeka, Kansas|Topeka]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''KY'''&lt;td&gt;Ky.&lt;td&gt;[[Kentucky]]&lt;td&gt;[[Frankfort, Kentucky|Frankfort]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''LA'''&lt;td&gt;La.&lt;td&gt;[[Louisiana]]&lt;td&gt;[[Baton Rouge, Louisiana|Baton Rouge]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''ME'''&lt;td&gt;Maine&lt;td&gt;[[Maine]]&lt;td&gt;[[Augusta, Maine|Augusta]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MD'''&lt;td&gt;Md.&lt;td&gt;[[Maryland]]&lt;td&gt;[[Annapolis, Maryland|Annapolis]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MA'''&lt;td&gt;Mass.&lt;td&gt;[[Massachusetts]]&lt;td&gt;[[Boston, Massachusetts|Boston]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MI'''&lt;td&gt;Mich.&lt;td&gt;[[Michigan]]&lt;td&gt;[[Lansing, Michigan|Lansing]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MN'''&lt;td&gt;Minn.&lt;td&gt;[[Minnesota]]&lt;td&gt;[[Saint Paul, Minnesota|Saint Paul]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MS'''&lt;td&gt;Miss.&lt;td&gt;[[Mississippi]]&lt;td&gt;[[Jackson, Mississippi|Jackson]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MO'''&lt;td&gt;Mo.&lt;td&gt;[[Missouri]]&lt;td&gt;[[Jefferson City, Missouri|Jefferson City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
&lt;td&gt;
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MT'''&lt;td&gt;Mont.&lt;td&gt;[[Montana]]&lt;td&gt;[[Helena, Montana|Helena]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NE'''&lt;td&gt;Neb.&lt;td&gt;[[Nebraska]]&lt;td&gt;[[Lincoln, Nebraska|Lincoln]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NV'''&lt;td&gt;Nev.&lt;td&gt;[[Nevada]]&lt;td&gt;[[Carson City, Nevada|Carson City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NH'''&lt;td&gt;N.H.&lt;td&gt;[[New Hampshire]]&lt;td&gt;[[Concord, New Hampshire|Concord]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NJ'''&lt;td&gt;N.J.&lt;td&gt;[[New Jersey]]&lt;td&gt;[[Trenton, New Jersey|Trenton]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NM'''&lt;td&gt;N.M.&lt;td&gt;[[New Mexico]]&lt;td&gt;[[Santa Fe, New Mexico|Santa Fe]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NY'''&lt;td&gt;N.Y.&lt;td&gt;[[New York]]&lt;td&gt;[[Albany, New York|Albany]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NC'''&lt;td&gt;N.C.&lt;td&gt;[[North Carolina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Raleigh, North Carolina|Raleigh]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''ND'''&lt;td&gt;N.D.&lt;td&gt;[[North Dakota]]&lt;td&gt;[[Bismarck, North Dakota|Bismarck]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''OH'''&lt;td&gt;Ohio&lt;td&gt;[[Ohio]]&lt;td&gt;[[Columbus, Ohio|Columbus]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''OK'''&lt;td&gt;Okla.&lt;td&gt;[[Oklahoma]]&lt;td&gt;[[Oklahoma City, Oklahoma|Oklahoma City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''OR'''&lt;td&gt;Ore.&lt;td&gt;[[Oregon]]&lt;td&gt;[[Salem, Oregon|Salem]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''PA'''&lt;td&gt;Pa.&lt;td&gt;[[Pennsylvania]]&lt;td&gt;[[Harrisburg, Pennsylvania|Harrisburg]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''RI'''&lt;td&gt;R.I.&lt;td&gt;[[Rhode Island]]&lt;td&gt;[[Providence, Rhode Island|Providence]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''SC'''&lt;td&gt;S.C.&lt;td&gt;[[South Carolina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Columbia, South Carolina|Columbia]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''SD'''&lt;td&gt;S.D.&lt;td&gt;[[South Dakota]]&lt;td&gt;[[Pierre, South Dakota|Pierre]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''TN'''&lt;td&gt;Tenn.&lt;td&gt;[[Tennessee]]&lt;td&gt;[[Nashville, Tennessee|Nashville]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''TX'''&lt;td&gt;Texas&lt;td&gt;[[Texas]]&lt;td&gt;[[Austin, Texas|Austin]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''UT'''&lt;td&gt;Utah&lt;td&gt;[[Utah]]&lt;td&gt;[[Salt Lake City, Utah|Salt Lake City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''VT'''&lt;td&gt;Vt.&lt;td&gt;[[Vermont]]&lt;td&gt;[[Montpelier, Vermont|Montpelier]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''VA'''&lt;td&gt;Va.&lt;td&gt;[[Virginia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Richmond, Virginia|Richmond]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WA'''&lt;td&gt;Wash.&lt;td&gt;[[Washington]]&lt;td&gt;[[Olympia, Washington|Olympia]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WV'''&lt;td&gt;W.Va.&lt;td&gt;[[West Virginia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Charleston, West Virginia|Charleston]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WI'''&lt;td&gt;Wis.&lt;td&gt;[[Wisconsin]]&lt;td&gt;[[Madison, Wisconsin|Madison]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WY'''&lt;td&gt;Wyo.&lt;td&gt;[[Wyoming]]&lt;td&gt;[[Cheyenne, Wyoming|Cheyenne]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;

[[Category:America]]</text>
      <sha1>dehd9qrjw9t9wtnz5cnzeuaqopu6a63</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4453</id>
      <parentid>4452</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-21T19:56:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5949">'''The United States of America''' is a large land mass aquired over the years by different [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/President_of_the_United_States Presidents] who spent much money on these purchases and therefore put the economy of the entire country into jeopardy. However that is another topic in itself. Since the U.S.A. is so large it was divied up into smaller subplots of land called states. The U.S.A. has 50 of these. So for the conveniance of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages:

Hitching in general is good (or at least was in the (80´s). In this huge country you get more than rides. These hospitable people will take you to their homes and parties, etc. Often you´re offered a place to overnite already in the cars. If you can deal with the bikers, they got a bar in every town and as long as they´re your friends, you won´t be left to sleep in snow.
In some states you can even hitch on the motorways, mostly in the west. Unfortunately in most states you can´t but you can always stand on the enter ramp like in Europe. You can also look for rides at the truck stops but some truck stops are unfriendly to hitchers and tell you to leave in a very rude manner. In some town the cops harass you by asking for your passport but as long as you have it with you, there shouldn´t be any problem. Some of them become rather polite after seeing a foreign passport, some others might ask you, where such state is (Belgium, Norway, Finland...)?

Hitchhiking is legal in most places, though ...


&lt;br clear="all"&gt;
&lt;table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AL'''&lt;td&gt;Ala.&lt;td&gt;[[Alabama]]&lt;td&gt;[[Montgomery, Alabama|Montgomery]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AK'''&lt;td&gt;Alaska&lt;td&gt;[[Alaska]]&lt;td&gt;[[Juneau, Alaska|Juneau]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AZ'''&lt;td&gt;Ariz.&lt;td&gt;[[Arizona]]&lt;td&gt;[[Phoenix, Arizona|Phoenix]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AR'''&lt;td&gt;Ark.&lt;td&gt;[[Arkansas]]&lt;td&gt;[[Little Rock, Arkansas|Little Rock]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''CA'''&lt;td&gt;Calif.&lt;td&gt;[[California]]&lt;td&gt;[[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''CO'''&lt;td&gt;Colo.&lt;td&gt;[[Colorado]]&lt;td&gt;[[Denver, Colorado|Denver]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''CT'''&lt;td&gt;Conn.&lt;td&gt;[[Connecticut]]&lt;td&gt;[[Hartford, Connecticut|Hartford]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''DE'''&lt;td&gt;Del.&lt;td&gt;[[Delaware]]&lt;td&gt;[[Dover, Delaware|Dover]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''FL'''&lt;td&gt;Fla.&lt;td&gt;[[Florida]]&lt;td&gt;[[Tallahassee, Florida|Tallahassee]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''GA'''&lt;td&gt;Ga.&lt;td&gt;[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Atlanta, Georgia|Atlanta]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''HI'''&lt;td&gt;Hawaii&lt;td&gt;[[Hawaii]]&lt;td&gt;[[Honolulu, Hawaii|Honolulu]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''ID'''&lt;td&gt;Idaho&lt;td&gt;[[Idaho]]&lt;td&gt;[[Boise, Idaho|Boise]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''IL'''&lt;td&gt;Ill.&lt;td&gt;[[Illinois]]&lt;td&gt;[[Springfield, Illinois|Springfield]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''IN'''&lt;td&gt;Ind.&lt;td&gt;[[Indiana]]&lt;td&gt;[[Indianapolis, Indiana|Indianapolis]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''IA'''&lt;td&gt;Iowa&lt;td&gt;[[Iowa]]&lt;td&gt;[[Des Moines, Iowa|Des Moines]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''KS'''&lt;td&gt;Kan.&lt;td&gt;[[Kansas]]&lt;td&gt;[[Topeka, Kansas|Topeka]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''KY'''&lt;td&gt;Ky.&lt;td&gt;[[Kentucky]]&lt;td&gt;[[Frankfort, Kentucky|Frankfort]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''LA'''&lt;td&gt;La.&lt;td&gt;[[Louisiana]]&lt;td&gt;[[Baton Rouge, Louisiana|Baton Rouge]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''ME'''&lt;td&gt;Maine&lt;td&gt;[[Maine]]&lt;td&gt;[[Augusta, Maine|Augusta]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MD'''&lt;td&gt;Md.&lt;td&gt;[[Maryland]]&lt;td&gt;[[Annapolis, Maryland|Annapolis]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MA'''&lt;td&gt;Mass.&lt;td&gt;[[Massachusetts]]&lt;td&gt;[[Boston, Massachusetts|Boston]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MI'''&lt;td&gt;Mich.&lt;td&gt;[[Michigan]]&lt;td&gt;[[Lansing, Michigan|Lansing]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MN'''&lt;td&gt;Minn.&lt;td&gt;[[Minnesota]]&lt;td&gt;[[Saint Paul, Minnesota|Saint Paul]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MS'''&lt;td&gt;Miss.&lt;td&gt;[[Mississippi]]&lt;td&gt;[[Jackson, Mississippi|Jackson]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MO'''&lt;td&gt;Mo.&lt;td&gt;[[Missouri]]&lt;td&gt;[[Jefferson City, Missouri|Jefferson City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
&lt;td&gt;
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MT'''&lt;td&gt;Mont.&lt;td&gt;[[Montana]]&lt;td&gt;[[Helena, Montana|Helena]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NE'''&lt;td&gt;Neb.&lt;td&gt;[[Nebraska]]&lt;td&gt;[[Lincoln, Nebraska|Lincoln]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NV'''&lt;td&gt;Nev.&lt;td&gt;[[Nevada]]&lt;td&gt;[[Carson City, Nevada|Carson City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NH'''&lt;td&gt;N.H.&lt;td&gt;[[New Hampshire]]&lt;td&gt;[[Concord, New Hampshire|Concord]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NJ'''&lt;td&gt;N.J.&lt;td&gt;[[New Jersey]]&lt;td&gt;[[Trenton, New Jersey|Trenton]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NM'''&lt;td&gt;N.M.&lt;td&gt;[[New Mexico]]&lt;td&gt;[[Santa Fe, New Mexico|Santa Fe]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NY'''&lt;td&gt;N.Y.&lt;td&gt;[[New York]]&lt;td&gt;[[Albany, New York|Albany]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NC'''&lt;td&gt;N.C.&lt;td&gt;[[North Carolina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Raleigh, North Carolina|Raleigh]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''ND'''&lt;td&gt;N.D.&lt;td&gt;[[North Dakota]]&lt;td&gt;[[Bismarck, North Dakota|Bismarck]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''OH'''&lt;td&gt;Ohio&lt;td&gt;[[Ohio]]&lt;td&gt;[[Columbus, Ohio|Columbus]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''OK'''&lt;td&gt;Okla.&lt;td&gt;[[Oklahoma]]&lt;td&gt;[[Oklahoma City, Oklahoma|Oklahoma City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''OR'''&lt;td&gt;Ore.&lt;td&gt;[[Oregon]]&lt;td&gt;[[Salem, Oregon|Salem]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''PA'''&lt;td&gt;Pa.&lt;td&gt;[[Pennsylvania]]&lt;td&gt;[[Harrisburg, Pennsylvania|Harrisburg]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''RI'''&lt;td&gt;R.I.&lt;td&gt;[[Rhode Island]]&lt;td&gt;[[Providence, Rhode Island|Providence]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''SC'''&lt;td&gt;S.C.&lt;td&gt;[[South Carolina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Columbia, South Carolina|Columbia]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''SD'''&lt;td&gt;S.D.&lt;td&gt;[[South Dakota]]&lt;td&gt;[[Pierre, South Dakota|Pierre]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''TN'''&lt;td&gt;Tenn.&lt;td&gt;[[Tennessee]]&lt;td&gt;[[Nashville, Tennessee|Nashville]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''TX'''&lt;td&gt;Texas&lt;td&gt;[[Texas]]&lt;td&gt;[[Austin, Texas|Austin]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''UT'''&lt;td&gt;Utah&lt;td&gt;[[Utah]]&lt;td&gt;[[Salt Lake City, Utah|Salt Lake City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''VT'''&lt;td&gt;Vt.&lt;td&gt;[[Vermont]]&lt;td&gt;[[Montpelier, Vermont|Montpelier]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''VA'''&lt;td&gt;Va.&lt;td&gt;[[Virginia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Richmond, Virginia|Richmond]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WA'''&lt;td&gt;Wash.&lt;td&gt;[[Washington]]&lt;td&gt;[[Olympia, Washington|Olympia]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WV'''&lt;td&gt;W.Va.&lt;td&gt;[[West Virginia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Charleston, West Virginia|Charleston]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WI'''&lt;td&gt;Wis.&lt;td&gt;[[Wisconsin]]&lt;td&gt;[[Madison, Wisconsin|Madison]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WY'''&lt;td&gt;Wyo.&lt;td&gt;[[Wyoming]]&lt;td&gt;[[Cheyenne, Wyoming|Cheyenne]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;

[[Category:America]]</text>
      <sha1>b8bivufcjo8o52ogl6ffqimoe108krg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4454</id>
      <parentid>4453</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-02-07T05:57:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>130.126.67.39</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5738">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the conveniance of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages:

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are in. Generally you can find rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. Often you´re offered a place to overnite already in the cars. If you can deal with the bikers, they got a bar in every town and as long as they´re your friends, you won´t be left to sleep in snow.
In some states you can even hitch on the motorways, mostly in the west. Unfortunately in most states you can´t but you can always stand on the enter ramp like in Europe. You can also look for rides at the truck stops but some truck stops are unfriendly to hitchers and tell you to leave in a very rude manner. In some town the cops harass you by asking for your passport but as long as you have it with you, there shouldn´t be any problem. Some of them become rather polite after seeing a foreign passport, some others might ask you, where such state is (Belgium, Norway, Finland...)?

Hitchhiking is legal in most places, though ...


&lt;br clear="all"&gt;
&lt;table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AL'''&lt;td&gt;Ala.&lt;td&gt;[[Alabama]]&lt;td&gt;[[Montgomery, Alabama|Montgomery]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AK'''&lt;td&gt;Alaska&lt;td&gt;[[Alaska]]&lt;td&gt;[[Juneau, Alaska|Juneau]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AZ'''&lt;td&gt;Ariz.&lt;td&gt;[[Arizona]]&lt;td&gt;[[Phoenix, Arizona|Phoenix]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AR'''&lt;td&gt;Ark.&lt;td&gt;[[Arkansas]]&lt;td&gt;[[Little Rock, Arkansas|Little Rock]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''CA'''&lt;td&gt;Calif.&lt;td&gt;[[California]]&lt;td&gt;[[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''CO'''&lt;td&gt;Colo.&lt;td&gt;[[Colorado]]&lt;td&gt;[[Denver, Colorado|Denver]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''CT'''&lt;td&gt;Conn.&lt;td&gt;[[Connecticut]]&lt;td&gt;[[Hartford, Connecticut|Hartford]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''DE'''&lt;td&gt;Del.&lt;td&gt;[[Delaware]]&lt;td&gt;[[Dover, Delaware|Dover]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''FL'''&lt;td&gt;Fla.&lt;td&gt;[[Florida]]&lt;td&gt;[[Tallahassee, Florida|Tallahassee]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''GA'''&lt;td&gt;Ga.&lt;td&gt;[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Atlanta, Georgia|Atlanta]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''HI'''&lt;td&gt;Hawaii&lt;td&gt;[[Hawaii]]&lt;td&gt;[[Honolulu, Hawaii|Honolulu]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''ID'''&lt;td&gt;Idaho&lt;td&gt;[[Idaho]]&lt;td&gt;[[Boise, Idaho|Boise]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''IL'''&lt;td&gt;Ill.&lt;td&gt;[[Illinois]]&lt;td&gt;[[Springfield, Illinois|Springfield]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''IN'''&lt;td&gt;Ind.&lt;td&gt;[[Indiana]]&lt;td&gt;[[Indianapolis, Indiana|Indianapolis]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''IA'''&lt;td&gt;Iowa&lt;td&gt;[[Iowa]]&lt;td&gt;[[Des Moines, Iowa|Des Moines]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''KS'''&lt;td&gt;Kan.&lt;td&gt;[[Kansas]]&lt;td&gt;[[Topeka, Kansas|Topeka]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''KY'''&lt;td&gt;Ky.&lt;td&gt;[[Kentucky]]&lt;td&gt;[[Frankfort, Kentucky|Frankfort]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''LA'''&lt;td&gt;La.&lt;td&gt;[[Louisiana]]&lt;td&gt;[[Baton Rouge, Louisiana|Baton Rouge]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''ME'''&lt;td&gt;Maine&lt;td&gt;[[Maine]]&lt;td&gt;[[Augusta, Maine|Augusta]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MD'''&lt;td&gt;Md.&lt;td&gt;[[Maryland]]&lt;td&gt;[[Annapolis, Maryland|Annapolis]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MA'''&lt;td&gt;Mass.&lt;td&gt;[[Massachusetts]]&lt;td&gt;[[Boston, Massachusetts|Boston]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MI'''&lt;td&gt;Mich.&lt;td&gt;[[Michigan]]&lt;td&gt;[[Lansing, Michigan|Lansing]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MN'''&lt;td&gt;Minn.&lt;td&gt;[[Minnesota]]&lt;td&gt;[[Saint Paul, Minnesota|Saint Paul]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MS'''&lt;td&gt;Miss.&lt;td&gt;[[Mississippi]]&lt;td&gt;[[Jackson, Mississippi|Jackson]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MO'''&lt;td&gt;Mo.&lt;td&gt;[[Missouri]]&lt;td&gt;[[Jefferson City, Missouri|Jefferson City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
&lt;td&gt;
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MT'''&lt;td&gt;Mont.&lt;td&gt;[[Montana]]&lt;td&gt;[[Helena, Montana|Helena]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NE'''&lt;td&gt;Neb.&lt;td&gt;[[Nebraska]]&lt;td&gt;[[Lincoln, Nebraska|Lincoln]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NV'''&lt;td&gt;Nev.&lt;td&gt;[[Nevada]]&lt;td&gt;[[Carson City, Nevada|Carson City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NH'''&lt;td&gt;N.H.&lt;td&gt;[[New Hampshire]]&lt;td&gt;[[Concord, New Hampshire|Concord]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NJ'''&lt;td&gt;N.J.&lt;td&gt;[[New Jersey]]&lt;td&gt;[[Trenton, New Jersey|Trenton]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NM'''&lt;td&gt;N.M.&lt;td&gt;[[New Mexico]]&lt;td&gt;[[Santa Fe, New Mexico|Santa Fe]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NY'''&lt;td&gt;N.Y.&lt;td&gt;[[New York]]&lt;td&gt;[[Albany, New York|Albany]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NC'''&lt;td&gt;N.C.&lt;td&gt;[[North Carolina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Raleigh, North Carolina|Raleigh]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''ND'''&lt;td&gt;N.D.&lt;td&gt;[[North Dakota]]&lt;td&gt;[[Bismarck, North Dakota|Bismarck]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''OH'''&lt;td&gt;Ohio&lt;td&gt;[[Ohio]]&lt;td&gt;[[Columbus, Ohio|Columbus]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''OK'''&lt;td&gt;Okla.&lt;td&gt;[[Oklahoma]]&lt;td&gt;[[Oklahoma City, Oklahoma|Oklahoma City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''OR'''&lt;td&gt;Ore.&lt;td&gt;[[Oregon]]&lt;td&gt;[[Salem, Oregon|Salem]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''PA'''&lt;td&gt;Pa.&lt;td&gt;[[Pennsylvania]]&lt;td&gt;[[Harrisburg, Pennsylvania|Harrisburg]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''RI'''&lt;td&gt;R.I.&lt;td&gt;[[Rhode Island]]&lt;td&gt;[[Providence, Rhode Island|Providence]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''SC'''&lt;td&gt;S.C.&lt;td&gt;[[South Carolina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Columbia, South Carolina|Columbia]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''SD'''&lt;td&gt;S.D.&lt;td&gt;[[South Dakota]]&lt;td&gt;[[Pierre, South Dakota|Pierre]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''TN'''&lt;td&gt;Tenn.&lt;td&gt;[[Tennessee]]&lt;td&gt;[[Nashville, Tennessee|Nashville]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''TX'''&lt;td&gt;Texas&lt;td&gt;[[Texas]]&lt;td&gt;[[Austin, Texas|Austin]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''UT'''&lt;td&gt;Utah&lt;td&gt;[[Utah]]&lt;td&gt;[[Salt Lake City, Utah|Salt Lake City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''VT'''&lt;td&gt;Vt.&lt;td&gt;[[Vermont]]&lt;td&gt;[[Montpelier, Vermont|Montpelier]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''VA'''&lt;td&gt;Va.&lt;td&gt;[[Virginia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Richmond, Virginia|Richmond]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WA'''&lt;td&gt;Wash.&lt;td&gt;[[Washington]]&lt;td&gt;[[Olympia, Washington|Olympia]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WV'''&lt;td&gt;W.Va.&lt;td&gt;[[West Virginia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Charleston, West Virginia|Charleston]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WI'''&lt;td&gt;Wis.&lt;td&gt;[[Wisconsin]]&lt;td&gt;[[Madison, Wisconsin|Madison]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WY'''&lt;td&gt;Wyo.&lt;td&gt;[[Wyoming]]&lt;td&gt;[[Cheyenne, Wyoming|Cheyenne]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;

[[Category:America]]</text>
      <sha1>to6us2rn5ryn5l0227gobsex2hgdyeq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4455</id>
      <parentid>4454</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-02-07T05:58:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>130.126.67.39</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5738">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the conveniance of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are in. Generally you can find rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. Often you´re offered a place to overnite already in the cars. If you can deal with the bikers, they got a bar in every town and as long as they´re your friends, you won´t be left to sleep in snow.
In some states you can even hitch on the motorways, mostly in the west. Unfortunately in most states you can´t but you can always stand on the enter ramp like in Europe. You can also look for rides at the truck stops but some truck stops are unfriendly to hitchers and tell you to leave in a very rude manner. In some town the cops harass you by asking for your passport but as long as you have it with you, there shouldn´t be any problem. Some of them become rather polite after seeing a foreign passport, some others might ask you, where such state is (Belgium, Norway, Finland...)?

Hitchhiking is legal in most places, though ...


&lt;br clear="all"&gt;
&lt;table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AL'''&lt;td&gt;Ala.&lt;td&gt;[[Alabama]]&lt;td&gt;[[Montgomery, Alabama|Montgomery]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AK'''&lt;td&gt;Alaska&lt;td&gt;[[Alaska]]&lt;td&gt;[[Juneau, Alaska|Juneau]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AZ'''&lt;td&gt;Ariz.&lt;td&gt;[[Arizona]]&lt;td&gt;[[Phoenix, Arizona|Phoenix]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AR'''&lt;td&gt;Ark.&lt;td&gt;[[Arkansas]]&lt;td&gt;[[Little Rock, Arkansas|Little Rock]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''CA'''&lt;td&gt;Calif.&lt;td&gt;[[California]]&lt;td&gt;[[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''CO'''&lt;td&gt;Colo.&lt;td&gt;[[Colorado]]&lt;td&gt;[[Denver, Colorado|Denver]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''CT'''&lt;td&gt;Conn.&lt;td&gt;[[Connecticut]]&lt;td&gt;[[Hartford, Connecticut|Hartford]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''DE'''&lt;td&gt;Del.&lt;td&gt;[[Delaware]]&lt;td&gt;[[Dover, Delaware|Dover]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''FL'''&lt;td&gt;Fla.&lt;td&gt;[[Florida]]&lt;td&gt;[[Tallahassee, Florida|Tallahassee]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''GA'''&lt;td&gt;Ga.&lt;td&gt;[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Atlanta, Georgia|Atlanta]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''HI'''&lt;td&gt;Hawaii&lt;td&gt;[[Hawaii]]&lt;td&gt;[[Honolulu, Hawaii|Honolulu]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''ID'''&lt;td&gt;Idaho&lt;td&gt;[[Idaho]]&lt;td&gt;[[Boise, Idaho|Boise]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''IL'''&lt;td&gt;Ill.&lt;td&gt;[[Illinois]]&lt;td&gt;[[Springfield, Illinois|Springfield]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''IN'''&lt;td&gt;Ind.&lt;td&gt;[[Indiana]]&lt;td&gt;[[Indianapolis, Indiana|Indianapolis]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''IA'''&lt;td&gt;Iowa&lt;td&gt;[[Iowa]]&lt;td&gt;[[Des Moines, Iowa|Des Moines]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''KS'''&lt;td&gt;Kan.&lt;td&gt;[[Kansas]]&lt;td&gt;[[Topeka, Kansas|Topeka]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''KY'''&lt;td&gt;Ky.&lt;td&gt;[[Kentucky]]&lt;td&gt;[[Frankfort, Kentucky|Frankfort]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''LA'''&lt;td&gt;La.&lt;td&gt;[[Louisiana]]&lt;td&gt;[[Baton Rouge, Louisiana|Baton Rouge]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''ME'''&lt;td&gt;Maine&lt;td&gt;[[Maine]]&lt;td&gt;[[Augusta, Maine|Augusta]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MD'''&lt;td&gt;Md.&lt;td&gt;[[Maryland]]&lt;td&gt;[[Annapolis, Maryland|Annapolis]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MA'''&lt;td&gt;Mass.&lt;td&gt;[[Massachusetts]]&lt;td&gt;[[Boston, Massachusetts|Boston]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MI'''&lt;td&gt;Mich.&lt;td&gt;[[Michigan]]&lt;td&gt;[[Lansing, Michigan|Lansing]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MN'''&lt;td&gt;Minn.&lt;td&gt;[[Minnesota]]&lt;td&gt;[[Saint Paul, Minnesota|Saint Paul]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MS'''&lt;td&gt;Miss.&lt;td&gt;[[Mississippi]]&lt;td&gt;[[Jackson, Mississippi|Jackson]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MO'''&lt;td&gt;Mo.&lt;td&gt;[[Missouri]]&lt;td&gt;[[Jefferson City, Missouri|Jefferson City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
&lt;td&gt;
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MT'''&lt;td&gt;Mont.&lt;td&gt;[[Montana]]&lt;td&gt;[[Helena, Montana|Helena]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NE'''&lt;td&gt;Neb.&lt;td&gt;[[Nebraska]]&lt;td&gt;[[Lincoln, Nebraska|Lincoln]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NV'''&lt;td&gt;Nev.&lt;td&gt;[[Nevada]]&lt;td&gt;[[Carson City, Nevada|Carson City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NH'''&lt;td&gt;N.H.&lt;td&gt;[[New Hampshire]]&lt;td&gt;[[Concord, New Hampshire|Concord]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NJ'''&lt;td&gt;N.J.&lt;td&gt;[[New Jersey]]&lt;td&gt;[[Trenton, New Jersey|Trenton]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NM'''&lt;td&gt;N.M.&lt;td&gt;[[New Mexico]]&lt;td&gt;[[Santa Fe, New Mexico|Santa Fe]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NY'''&lt;td&gt;N.Y.&lt;td&gt;[[New York]]&lt;td&gt;[[Albany, New York|Albany]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NC'''&lt;td&gt;N.C.&lt;td&gt;[[North Carolina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Raleigh, North Carolina|Raleigh]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''ND'''&lt;td&gt;N.D.&lt;td&gt;[[North Dakota]]&lt;td&gt;[[Bismarck, North Dakota|Bismarck]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''OH'''&lt;td&gt;Ohio&lt;td&gt;[[Ohio]]&lt;td&gt;[[Columbus, Ohio|Columbus]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''OK'''&lt;td&gt;Okla.&lt;td&gt;[[Oklahoma]]&lt;td&gt;[[Oklahoma City, Oklahoma|Oklahoma City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''OR'''&lt;td&gt;Ore.&lt;td&gt;[[Oregon]]&lt;td&gt;[[Salem, Oregon|Salem]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''PA'''&lt;td&gt;Pa.&lt;td&gt;[[Pennsylvania]]&lt;td&gt;[[Harrisburg, Pennsylvania|Harrisburg]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''RI'''&lt;td&gt;R.I.&lt;td&gt;[[Rhode Island]]&lt;td&gt;[[Providence, Rhode Island|Providence]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''SC'''&lt;td&gt;S.C.&lt;td&gt;[[South Carolina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Columbia, South Carolina|Columbia]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''SD'''&lt;td&gt;S.D.&lt;td&gt;[[South Dakota]]&lt;td&gt;[[Pierre, South Dakota|Pierre]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''TN'''&lt;td&gt;Tenn.&lt;td&gt;[[Tennessee]]&lt;td&gt;[[Nashville, Tennessee|Nashville]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''TX'''&lt;td&gt;Texas&lt;td&gt;[[Texas]]&lt;td&gt;[[Austin, Texas|Austin]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''UT'''&lt;td&gt;Utah&lt;td&gt;[[Utah]]&lt;td&gt;[[Salt Lake City, Utah|Salt Lake City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''VT'''&lt;td&gt;Vt.&lt;td&gt;[[Vermont]]&lt;td&gt;[[Montpelier, Vermont|Montpelier]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''VA'''&lt;td&gt;Va.&lt;td&gt;[[Virginia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Richmond, Virginia|Richmond]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WA'''&lt;td&gt;Wash.&lt;td&gt;[[Washington]]&lt;td&gt;[[Olympia, Washington|Olympia]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WV'''&lt;td&gt;W.Va.&lt;td&gt;[[West Virginia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Charleston, West Virginia|Charleston]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WI'''&lt;td&gt;Wis.&lt;td&gt;[[Wisconsin]]&lt;td&gt;[[Madison, Wisconsin|Madison]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WY'''&lt;td&gt;Wyo.&lt;td&gt;[[Wyoming]]&lt;td&gt;[[Cheyenne, Wyoming|Cheyenne]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;

[[Category:America]]</text>
      <sha1>cd5uyn87c54cxhejqrvhqshc0jr0x39</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4456</id>
      <parentid>4455</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-02-07T06:09:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>130.126.67.39</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6413">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the conveniance of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are in. Generally you can find rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. Often you´re offered a place to overnite already in the cars.
In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in Europe. In a select few areas (such as certain towns, or the entire state of Pennsylvania) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police will never stop you from hitchhiking as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.

If you're going for speed, then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways, and to try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.
If you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have your passport with you there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 



&lt;br clear="all"&gt;
&lt;table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AL'''&lt;td&gt;Ala.&lt;td&gt;[[Alabama]]&lt;td&gt;[[Montgomery, Alabama|Montgomery]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AK'''&lt;td&gt;Alaska&lt;td&gt;[[Alaska]]&lt;td&gt;[[Juneau, Alaska|Juneau]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AZ'''&lt;td&gt;Ariz.&lt;td&gt;[[Arizona]]&lt;td&gt;[[Phoenix, Arizona|Phoenix]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AR'''&lt;td&gt;Ark.&lt;td&gt;[[Arkansas]]&lt;td&gt;[[Little Rock, Arkansas|Little Rock]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''CA'''&lt;td&gt;Calif.&lt;td&gt;[[California]]&lt;td&gt;[[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''CO'''&lt;td&gt;Colo.&lt;td&gt;[[Colorado]]&lt;td&gt;[[Denver, Colorado|Denver]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''CT'''&lt;td&gt;Conn.&lt;td&gt;[[Connecticut]]&lt;td&gt;[[Hartford, Connecticut|Hartford]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''DE'''&lt;td&gt;Del.&lt;td&gt;[[Delaware]]&lt;td&gt;[[Dover, Delaware|Dover]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''FL'''&lt;td&gt;Fla.&lt;td&gt;[[Florida]]&lt;td&gt;[[Tallahassee, Florida|Tallahassee]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''GA'''&lt;td&gt;Ga.&lt;td&gt;[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Atlanta, Georgia|Atlanta]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''HI'''&lt;td&gt;Hawaii&lt;td&gt;[[Hawaii]]&lt;td&gt;[[Honolulu, Hawaii|Honolulu]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''ID'''&lt;td&gt;Idaho&lt;td&gt;[[Idaho]]&lt;td&gt;[[Boise, Idaho|Boise]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''IL'''&lt;td&gt;Ill.&lt;td&gt;[[Illinois]]&lt;td&gt;[[Springfield, Illinois|Springfield]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''IN'''&lt;td&gt;Ind.&lt;td&gt;[[Indiana]]&lt;td&gt;[[Indianapolis, Indiana|Indianapolis]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''IA'''&lt;td&gt;Iowa&lt;td&gt;[[Iowa]]&lt;td&gt;[[Des Moines, Iowa|Des Moines]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''KS'''&lt;td&gt;Kan.&lt;td&gt;[[Kansas]]&lt;td&gt;[[Topeka, Kansas|Topeka]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''KY'''&lt;td&gt;Ky.&lt;td&gt;[[Kentucky]]&lt;td&gt;[[Frankfort, Kentucky|Frankfort]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''LA'''&lt;td&gt;La.&lt;td&gt;[[Louisiana]]&lt;td&gt;[[Baton Rouge, Louisiana|Baton Rouge]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''ME'''&lt;td&gt;Maine&lt;td&gt;[[Maine]]&lt;td&gt;[[Augusta, Maine|Augusta]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MD'''&lt;td&gt;Md.&lt;td&gt;[[Maryland]]&lt;td&gt;[[Annapolis, Maryland|Annapolis]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MA'''&lt;td&gt;Mass.&lt;td&gt;[[Massachusetts]]&lt;td&gt;[[Boston, Massachusetts|Boston]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MI'''&lt;td&gt;Mich.&lt;td&gt;[[Michigan]]&lt;td&gt;[[Lansing, Michigan|Lansing]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MN'''&lt;td&gt;Minn.&lt;td&gt;[[Minnesota]]&lt;td&gt;[[Saint Paul, Minnesota|Saint Paul]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MS'''&lt;td&gt;Miss.&lt;td&gt;[[Mississippi]]&lt;td&gt;[[Jackson, Mississippi|Jackson]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MO'''&lt;td&gt;Mo.&lt;td&gt;[[Missouri]]&lt;td&gt;[[Jefferson City, Missouri|Jefferson City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
&lt;td&gt;
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MT'''&lt;td&gt;Mont.&lt;td&gt;[[Montana]]&lt;td&gt;[[Helena, Montana|Helena]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NE'''&lt;td&gt;Neb.&lt;td&gt;[[Nebraska]]&lt;td&gt;[[Lincoln, Nebraska|Lincoln]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NV'''&lt;td&gt;Nev.&lt;td&gt;[[Nevada]]&lt;td&gt;[[Carson City, Nevada|Carson City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NH'''&lt;td&gt;N.H.&lt;td&gt;[[New Hampshire]]&lt;td&gt;[[Concord, New Hampshire|Concord]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NJ'''&lt;td&gt;N.J.&lt;td&gt;[[New Jersey]]&lt;td&gt;[[Trenton, New Jersey|Trenton]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NM'''&lt;td&gt;N.M.&lt;td&gt;[[New Mexico]]&lt;td&gt;[[Santa Fe, New Mexico|Santa Fe]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NY'''&lt;td&gt;N.Y.&lt;td&gt;[[New York]]&lt;td&gt;[[Albany, New York|Albany]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NC'''&lt;td&gt;N.C.&lt;td&gt;[[North Carolina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Raleigh, North Carolina|Raleigh]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''ND'''&lt;td&gt;N.D.&lt;td&gt;[[North Dakota]]&lt;td&gt;[[Bismarck, North Dakota|Bismarck]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''OH'''&lt;td&gt;Ohio&lt;td&gt;[[Ohio]]&lt;td&gt;[[Columbus, Ohio|Columbus]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''OK'''&lt;td&gt;Okla.&lt;td&gt;[[Oklahoma]]&lt;td&gt;[[Oklahoma City, Oklahoma|Oklahoma City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''OR'''&lt;td&gt;Ore.&lt;td&gt;[[Oregon]]&lt;td&gt;[[Salem, Oregon|Salem]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''PA'''&lt;td&gt;Pa.&lt;td&gt;[[Pennsylvania]]&lt;td&gt;[[Harrisburg, Pennsylvania|Harrisburg]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''RI'''&lt;td&gt;R.I.&lt;td&gt;[[Rhode Island]]&lt;td&gt;[[Providence, Rhode Island|Providence]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''SC'''&lt;td&gt;S.C.&lt;td&gt;[[South Carolina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Columbia, South Carolina|Columbia]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''SD'''&lt;td&gt;S.D.&lt;td&gt;[[South Dakota]]&lt;td&gt;[[Pierre, South Dakota|Pierre]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''TN'''&lt;td&gt;Tenn.&lt;td&gt;[[Tennessee]]&lt;td&gt;[[Nashville, Tennessee|Nashville]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''TX'''&lt;td&gt;Texas&lt;td&gt;[[Texas]]&lt;td&gt;[[Austin, Texas|Austin]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''UT'''&lt;td&gt;Utah&lt;td&gt;[[Utah]]&lt;td&gt;[[Salt Lake City, Utah|Salt Lake City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''VT'''&lt;td&gt;Vt.&lt;td&gt;[[Vermont]]&lt;td&gt;[[Montpelier, Vermont|Montpelier]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''VA'''&lt;td&gt;Va.&lt;td&gt;[[Virginia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Richmond, Virginia|Richmond]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WA'''&lt;td&gt;Wash.&lt;td&gt;[[Washington]]&lt;td&gt;[[Olympia, Washington|Olympia]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WV'''&lt;td&gt;W.Va.&lt;td&gt;[[West Virginia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Charleston, West Virginia|Charleston]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WI'''&lt;td&gt;Wis.&lt;td&gt;[[Wisconsin]]&lt;td&gt;[[Madison, Wisconsin|Madison]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WY'''&lt;td&gt;Wyo.&lt;td&gt;[[Wyoming]]&lt;td&gt;[[Cheyenne, Wyoming|Cheyenne]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;

[[Category:America]]</text>
      <sha1>0b9uh4njrsyf5my0v7166mybg2scbgr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4457</id>
      <parentid>4456</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-02-07T06:10:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>130.126.67.39</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6431">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the conveniance of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. Often you´re offered a place to overnite already in the cars.
In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in Europe. In a select few areas (such as certain towns, or the entire state of Pennsylvania) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police will never stop you from hitchhiking as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.

If you're going for speed, then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways, and to try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.
If you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have your passport with you there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 



&lt;br clear="all"&gt;
&lt;table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AL'''&lt;td&gt;Ala.&lt;td&gt;[[Alabama]]&lt;td&gt;[[Montgomery, Alabama|Montgomery]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AK'''&lt;td&gt;Alaska&lt;td&gt;[[Alaska]]&lt;td&gt;[[Juneau, Alaska|Juneau]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AZ'''&lt;td&gt;Ariz.&lt;td&gt;[[Arizona]]&lt;td&gt;[[Phoenix, Arizona|Phoenix]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AR'''&lt;td&gt;Ark.&lt;td&gt;[[Arkansas]]&lt;td&gt;[[Little Rock, Arkansas|Little Rock]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''CA'''&lt;td&gt;Calif.&lt;td&gt;[[California]]&lt;td&gt;[[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''CO'''&lt;td&gt;Colo.&lt;td&gt;[[Colorado]]&lt;td&gt;[[Denver, Colorado|Denver]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''CT'''&lt;td&gt;Conn.&lt;td&gt;[[Connecticut]]&lt;td&gt;[[Hartford, Connecticut|Hartford]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''DE'''&lt;td&gt;Del.&lt;td&gt;[[Delaware]]&lt;td&gt;[[Dover, Delaware|Dover]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''FL'''&lt;td&gt;Fla.&lt;td&gt;[[Florida]]&lt;td&gt;[[Tallahassee, Florida|Tallahassee]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''GA'''&lt;td&gt;Ga.&lt;td&gt;[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Atlanta, Georgia|Atlanta]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''HI'''&lt;td&gt;Hawaii&lt;td&gt;[[Hawaii]]&lt;td&gt;[[Honolulu, Hawaii|Honolulu]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''ID'''&lt;td&gt;Idaho&lt;td&gt;[[Idaho]]&lt;td&gt;[[Boise, Idaho|Boise]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''IL'''&lt;td&gt;Ill.&lt;td&gt;[[Illinois]]&lt;td&gt;[[Springfield, Illinois|Springfield]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''IN'''&lt;td&gt;Ind.&lt;td&gt;[[Indiana]]&lt;td&gt;[[Indianapolis, Indiana|Indianapolis]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''IA'''&lt;td&gt;Iowa&lt;td&gt;[[Iowa]]&lt;td&gt;[[Des Moines, Iowa|Des Moines]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''KS'''&lt;td&gt;Kan.&lt;td&gt;[[Kansas]]&lt;td&gt;[[Topeka, Kansas|Topeka]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''KY'''&lt;td&gt;Ky.&lt;td&gt;[[Kentucky]]&lt;td&gt;[[Frankfort, Kentucky|Frankfort]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''LA'''&lt;td&gt;La.&lt;td&gt;[[Louisiana]]&lt;td&gt;[[Baton Rouge, Louisiana|Baton Rouge]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''ME'''&lt;td&gt;Maine&lt;td&gt;[[Maine]]&lt;td&gt;[[Augusta, Maine|Augusta]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MD'''&lt;td&gt;Md.&lt;td&gt;[[Maryland]]&lt;td&gt;[[Annapolis, Maryland|Annapolis]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MA'''&lt;td&gt;Mass.&lt;td&gt;[[Massachusetts]]&lt;td&gt;[[Boston, Massachusetts|Boston]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MI'''&lt;td&gt;Mich.&lt;td&gt;[[Michigan]]&lt;td&gt;[[Lansing, Michigan|Lansing]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MN'''&lt;td&gt;Minn.&lt;td&gt;[[Minnesota]]&lt;td&gt;[[Saint Paul, Minnesota|Saint Paul]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MS'''&lt;td&gt;Miss.&lt;td&gt;[[Mississippi]]&lt;td&gt;[[Jackson, Mississippi|Jackson]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MO'''&lt;td&gt;Mo.&lt;td&gt;[[Missouri]]&lt;td&gt;[[Jefferson City, Missouri|Jefferson City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
&lt;td&gt;
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MT'''&lt;td&gt;Mont.&lt;td&gt;[[Montana]]&lt;td&gt;[[Helena, Montana|Helena]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NE'''&lt;td&gt;Neb.&lt;td&gt;[[Nebraska]]&lt;td&gt;[[Lincoln, Nebraska|Lincoln]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NV'''&lt;td&gt;Nev.&lt;td&gt;[[Nevada]]&lt;td&gt;[[Carson City, Nevada|Carson City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NH'''&lt;td&gt;N.H.&lt;td&gt;[[New Hampshire]]&lt;td&gt;[[Concord, New Hampshire|Concord]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NJ'''&lt;td&gt;N.J.&lt;td&gt;[[New Jersey]]&lt;td&gt;[[Trenton, New Jersey|Trenton]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NM'''&lt;td&gt;N.M.&lt;td&gt;[[New Mexico]]&lt;td&gt;[[Santa Fe, New Mexico|Santa Fe]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NY'''&lt;td&gt;N.Y.&lt;td&gt;[[New York]]&lt;td&gt;[[Albany, New York|Albany]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NC'''&lt;td&gt;N.C.&lt;td&gt;[[North Carolina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Raleigh, North Carolina|Raleigh]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''ND'''&lt;td&gt;N.D.&lt;td&gt;[[North Dakota]]&lt;td&gt;[[Bismarck, North Dakota|Bismarck]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''OH'''&lt;td&gt;Ohio&lt;td&gt;[[Ohio]]&lt;td&gt;[[Columbus, Ohio|Columbus]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''OK'''&lt;td&gt;Okla.&lt;td&gt;[[Oklahoma]]&lt;td&gt;[[Oklahoma City, Oklahoma|Oklahoma City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''OR'''&lt;td&gt;Ore.&lt;td&gt;[[Oregon]]&lt;td&gt;[[Salem, Oregon|Salem]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''PA'''&lt;td&gt;Pa.&lt;td&gt;[[Pennsylvania]]&lt;td&gt;[[Harrisburg, Pennsylvania|Harrisburg]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''RI'''&lt;td&gt;R.I.&lt;td&gt;[[Rhode Island]]&lt;td&gt;[[Providence, Rhode Island|Providence]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''SC'''&lt;td&gt;S.C.&lt;td&gt;[[South Carolina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Columbia, South Carolina|Columbia]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''SD'''&lt;td&gt;S.D.&lt;td&gt;[[South Dakota]]&lt;td&gt;[[Pierre, South Dakota|Pierre]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''TN'''&lt;td&gt;Tenn.&lt;td&gt;[[Tennessee]]&lt;td&gt;[[Nashville, Tennessee|Nashville]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''TX'''&lt;td&gt;Texas&lt;td&gt;[[Texas]]&lt;td&gt;[[Austin, Texas|Austin]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''UT'''&lt;td&gt;Utah&lt;td&gt;[[Utah]]&lt;td&gt;[[Salt Lake City, Utah|Salt Lake City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''VT'''&lt;td&gt;Vt.&lt;td&gt;[[Vermont]]&lt;td&gt;[[Montpelier, Vermont|Montpelier]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''VA'''&lt;td&gt;Va.&lt;td&gt;[[Virginia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Richmond, Virginia|Richmond]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WA'''&lt;td&gt;Wash.&lt;td&gt;[[Washington]]&lt;td&gt;[[Olympia, Washington|Olympia]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WV'''&lt;td&gt;W.Va.&lt;td&gt;[[West Virginia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Charleston, West Virginia|Charleston]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WI'''&lt;td&gt;Wis.&lt;td&gt;[[Wisconsin]]&lt;td&gt;[[Madison, Wisconsin|Madison]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WY'''&lt;td&gt;Wyo.&lt;td&gt;[[Wyoming]]&lt;td&gt;[[Cheyenne, Wyoming|Cheyenne]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;

[[Category:America]]</text>
      <sha1>7x3ok8xsa8502xgvrhi2m85zctvngqh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4458</id>
      <parentid>4457</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-02-07T06:11:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>130.126.67.39</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6368">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the conveniance of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.
In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in Europe. In a select few areas (such as certain towns, or the entire state of Pennsylvania) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police will never stop you from hitchhiking as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.

If you're going for speed, then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways, and to try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.
If you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have your passport with you there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 



&lt;br clear="all"&gt;
&lt;table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AL'''&lt;td&gt;Ala.&lt;td&gt;[[Alabama]]&lt;td&gt;[[Montgomery, Alabama|Montgomery]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AK'''&lt;td&gt;Alaska&lt;td&gt;[[Alaska]]&lt;td&gt;[[Juneau, Alaska|Juneau]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AZ'''&lt;td&gt;Ariz.&lt;td&gt;[[Arizona]]&lt;td&gt;[[Phoenix, Arizona|Phoenix]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AR'''&lt;td&gt;Ark.&lt;td&gt;[[Arkansas]]&lt;td&gt;[[Little Rock, Arkansas|Little Rock]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''CA'''&lt;td&gt;Calif.&lt;td&gt;[[California]]&lt;td&gt;[[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''CO'''&lt;td&gt;Colo.&lt;td&gt;[[Colorado]]&lt;td&gt;[[Denver, Colorado|Denver]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''CT'''&lt;td&gt;Conn.&lt;td&gt;[[Connecticut]]&lt;td&gt;[[Hartford, Connecticut|Hartford]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''DE'''&lt;td&gt;Del.&lt;td&gt;[[Delaware]]&lt;td&gt;[[Dover, Delaware|Dover]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''FL'''&lt;td&gt;Fla.&lt;td&gt;[[Florida]]&lt;td&gt;[[Tallahassee, Florida|Tallahassee]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''GA'''&lt;td&gt;Ga.&lt;td&gt;[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Atlanta, Georgia|Atlanta]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''HI'''&lt;td&gt;Hawaii&lt;td&gt;[[Hawaii]]&lt;td&gt;[[Honolulu, Hawaii|Honolulu]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''ID'''&lt;td&gt;Idaho&lt;td&gt;[[Idaho]]&lt;td&gt;[[Boise, Idaho|Boise]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''IL'''&lt;td&gt;Ill.&lt;td&gt;[[Illinois]]&lt;td&gt;[[Springfield, Illinois|Springfield]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''IN'''&lt;td&gt;Ind.&lt;td&gt;[[Indiana]]&lt;td&gt;[[Indianapolis, Indiana|Indianapolis]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''IA'''&lt;td&gt;Iowa&lt;td&gt;[[Iowa]]&lt;td&gt;[[Des Moines, Iowa|Des Moines]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''KS'''&lt;td&gt;Kan.&lt;td&gt;[[Kansas]]&lt;td&gt;[[Topeka, Kansas|Topeka]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''KY'''&lt;td&gt;Ky.&lt;td&gt;[[Kentucky]]&lt;td&gt;[[Frankfort, Kentucky|Frankfort]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''LA'''&lt;td&gt;La.&lt;td&gt;[[Louisiana]]&lt;td&gt;[[Baton Rouge, Louisiana|Baton Rouge]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''ME'''&lt;td&gt;Maine&lt;td&gt;[[Maine]]&lt;td&gt;[[Augusta, Maine|Augusta]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MD'''&lt;td&gt;Md.&lt;td&gt;[[Maryland]]&lt;td&gt;[[Annapolis, Maryland|Annapolis]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MA'''&lt;td&gt;Mass.&lt;td&gt;[[Massachusetts]]&lt;td&gt;[[Boston, Massachusetts|Boston]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MI'''&lt;td&gt;Mich.&lt;td&gt;[[Michigan]]&lt;td&gt;[[Lansing, Michigan|Lansing]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MN'''&lt;td&gt;Minn.&lt;td&gt;[[Minnesota]]&lt;td&gt;[[Saint Paul, Minnesota|Saint Paul]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MS'''&lt;td&gt;Miss.&lt;td&gt;[[Mississippi]]&lt;td&gt;[[Jackson, Mississippi|Jackson]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MO'''&lt;td&gt;Mo.&lt;td&gt;[[Missouri]]&lt;td&gt;[[Jefferson City, Missouri|Jefferson City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
&lt;td&gt;
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MT'''&lt;td&gt;Mont.&lt;td&gt;[[Montana]]&lt;td&gt;[[Helena, Montana|Helena]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NE'''&lt;td&gt;Neb.&lt;td&gt;[[Nebraska]]&lt;td&gt;[[Lincoln, Nebraska|Lincoln]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NV'''&lt;td&gt;Nev.&lt;td&gt;[[Nevada]]&lt;td&gt;[[Carson City, Nevada|Carson City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NH'''&lt;td&gt;N.H.&lt;td&gt;[[New Hampshire]]&lt;td&gt;[[Concord, New Hampshire|Concord]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NJ'''&lt;td&gt;N.J.&lt;td&gt;[[New Jersey]]&lt;td&gt;[[Trenton, New Jersey|Trenton]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NM'''&lt;td&gt;N.M.&lt;td&gt;[[New Mexico]]&lt;td&gt;[[Santa Fe, New Mexico|Santa Fe]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NY'''&lt;td&gt;N.Y.&lt;td&gt;[[New York]]&lt;td&gt;[[Albany, New York|Albany]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NC'''&lt;td&gt;N.C.&lt;td&gt;[[North Carolina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Raleigh, North Carolina|Raleigh]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''ND'''&lt;td&gt;N.D.&lt;td&gt;[[North Dakota]]&lt;td&gt;[[Bismarck, North Dakota|Bismarck]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''OH'''&lt;td&gt;Ohio&lt;td&gt;[[Ohio]]&lt;td&gt;[[Columbus, Ohio|Columbus]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''OK'''&lt;td&gt;Okla.&lt;td&gt;[[Oklahoma]]&lt;td&gt;[[Oklahoma City, Oklahoma|Oklahoma City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''OR'''&lt;td&gt;Ore.&lt;td&gt;[[Oregon]]&lt;td&gt;[[Salem, Oregon|Salem]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''PA'''&lt;td&gt;Pa.&lt;td&gt;[[Pennsylvania]]&lt;td&gt;[[Harrisburg, Pennsylvania|Harrisburg]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''RI'''&lt;td&gt;R.I.&lt;td&gt;[[Rhode Island]]&lt;td&gt;[[Providence, Rhode Island|Providence]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''SC'''&lt;td&gt;S.C.&lt;td&gt;[[South Carolina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Columbia, South Carolina|Columbia]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''SD'''&lt;td&gt;S.D.&lt;td&gt;[[South Dakota]]&lt;td&gt;[[Pierre, South Dakota|Pierre]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''TN'''&lt;td&gt;Tenn.&lt;td&gt;[[Tennessee]]&lt;td&gt;[[Nashville, Tennessee|Nashville]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''TX'''&lt;td&gt;Texas&lt;td&gt;[[Texas]]&lt;td&gt;[[Austin, Texas|Austin]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''UT'''&lt;td&gt;Utah&lt;td&gt;[[Utah]]&lt;td&gt;[[Salt Lake City, Utah|Salt Lake City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''VT'''&lt;td&gt;Vt.&lt;td&gt;[[Vermont]]&lt;td&gt;[[Montpelier, Vermont|Montpelier]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''VA'''&lt;td&gt;Va.&lt;td&gt;[[Virginia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Richmond, Virginia|Richmond]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WA'''&lt;td&gt;Wash.&lt;td&gt;[[Washington]]&lt;td&gt;[[Olympia, Washington|Olympia]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WV'''&lt;td&gt;W.Va.&lt;td&gt;[[West Virginia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Charleston, West Virginia|Charleston]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WI'''&lt;td&gt;Wis.&lt;td&gt;[[Wisconsin]]&lt;td&gt;[[Madison, Wisconsin|Madison]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WY'''&lt;td&gt;Wyo.&lt;td&gt;[[Wyoming]]&lt;td&gt;[[Cheyenne, Wyoming|Cheyenne]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;

[[Category:America]]</text>
      <sha1>42ov9jsgqb44dshszyba4l3uy4uzpv1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4459</id>
      <parentid>4458</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-02-07T06:13:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>130.126.67.39</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6380">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the conveniance of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in Europe. In a select few areas (such as certain towns, or the entire state of Pennsylvania) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police will never stop you from hitchhiking as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.

If you're going for speed, then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways, and to try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.
If you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 



&lt;br clear="all"&gt;
&lt;table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AL'''&lt;td&gt;Ala.&lt;td&gt;[[Alabama]]&lt;td&gt;[[Montgomery, Alabama|Montgomery]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AK'''&lt;td&gt;Alaska&lt;td&gt;[[Alaska]]&lt;td&gt;[[Juneau, Alaska|Juneau]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AZ'''&lt;td&gt;Ariz.&lt;td&gt;[[Arizona]]&lt;td&gt;[[Phoenix, Arizona|Phoenix]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''AR'''&lt;td&gt;Ark.&lt;td&gt;[[Arkansas]]&lt;td&gt;[[Little Rock, Arkansas|Little Rock]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''CA'''&lt;td&gt;Calif.&lt;td&gt;[[California]]&lt;td&gt;[[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''CO'''&lt;td&gt;Colo.&lt;td&gt;[[Colorado]]&lt;td&gt;[[Denver, Colorado|Denver]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''CT'''&lt;td&gt;Conn.&lt;td&gt;[[Connecticut]]&lt;td&gt;[[Hartford, Connecticut|Hartford]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''DE'''&lt;td&gt;Del.&lt;td&gt;[[Delaware]]&lt;td&gt;[[Dover, Delaware|Dover]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''FL'''&lt;td&gt;Fla.&lt;td&gt;[[Florida]]&lt;td&gt;[[Tallahassee, Florida|Tallahassee]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''GA'''&lt;td&gt;Ga.&lt;td&gt;[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Atlanta, Georgia|Atlanta]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''HI'''&lt;td&gt;Hawaii&lt;td&gt;[[Hawaii]]&lt;td&gt;[[Honolulu, Hawaii|Honolulu]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''ID'''&lt;td&gt;Idaho&lt;td&gt;[[Idaho]]&lt;td&gt;[[Boise, Idaho|Boise]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''IL'''&lt;td&gt;Ill.&lt;td&gt;[[Illinois]]&lt;td&gt;[[Springfield, Illinois|Springfield]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''IN'''&lt;td&gt;Ind.&lt;td&gt;[[Indiana]]&lt;td&gt;[[Indianapolis, Indiana|Indianapolis]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''IA'''&lt;td&gt;Iowa&lt;td&gt;[[Iowa]]&lt;td&gt;[[Des Moines, Iowa|Des Moines]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''KS'''&lt;td&gt;Kan.&lt;td&gt;[[Kansas]]&lt;td&gt;[[Topeka, Kansas|Topeka]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''KY'''&lt;td&gt;Ky.&lt;td&gt;[[Kentucky]]&lt;td&gt;[[Frankfort, Kentucky|Frankfort]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''LA'''&lt;td&gt;La.&lt;td&gt;[[Louisiana]]&lt;td&gt;[[Baton Rouge, Louisiana|Baton Rouge]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''ME'''&lt;td&gt;Maine&lt;td&gt;[[Maine]]&lt;td&gt;[[Augusta, Maine|Augusta]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MD'''&lt;td&gt;Md.&lt;td&gt;[[Maryland]]&lt;td&gt;[[Annapolis, Maryland|Annapolis]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MA'''&lt;td&gt;Mass.&lt;td&gt;[[Massachusetts]]&lt;td&gt;[[Boston, Massachusetts|Boston]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MI'''&lt;td&gt;Mich.&lt;td&gt;[[Michigan]]&lt;td&gt;[[Lansing, Michigan|Lansing]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MN'''&lt;td&gt;Minn.&lt;td&gt;[[Minnesota]]&lt;td&gt;[[Saint Paul, Minnesota|Saint Paul]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MS'''&lt;td&gt;Miss.&lt;td&gt;[[Mississippi]]&lt;td&gt;[[Jackson, Mississippi|Jackson]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MO'''&lt;td&gt;Mo.&lt;td&gt;[[Missouri]]&lt;td&gt;[[Jefferson City, Missouri|Jefferson City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
&lt;td&gt;
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''MT'''&lt;td&gt;Mont.&lt;td&gt;[[Montana]]&lt;td&gt;[[Helena, Montana|Helena]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NE'''&lt;td&gt;Neb.&lt;td&gt;[[Nebraska]]&lt;td&gt;[[Lincoln, Nebraska|Lincoln]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NV'''&lt;td&gt;Nev.&lt;td&gt;[[Nevada]]&lt;td&gt;[[Carson City, Nevada|Carson City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NH'''&lt;td&gt;N.H.&lt;td&gt;[[New Hampshire]]&lt;td&gt;[[Concord, New Hampshire|Concord]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NJ'''&lt;td&gt;N.J.&lt;td&gt;[[New Jersey]]&lt;td&gt;[[Trenton, New Jersey|Trenton]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NM'''&lt;td&gt;N.M.&lt;td&gt;[[New Mexico]]&lt;td&gt;[[Santa Fe, New Mexico|Santa Fe]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NY'''&lt;td&gt;N.Y.&lt;td&gt;[[New York]]&lt;td&gt;[[Albany, New York|Albany]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''NC'''&lt;td&gt;N.C.&lt;td&gt;[[North Carolina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Raleigh, North Carolina|Raleigh]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''ND'''&lt;td&gt;N.D.&lt;td&gt;[[North Dakota]]&lt;td&gt;[[Bismarck, North Dakota|Bismarck]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''OH'''&lt;td&gt;Ohio&lt;td&gt;[[Ohio]]&lt;td&gt;[[Columbus, Ohio|Columbus]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''OK'''&lt;td&gt;Okla.&lt;td&gt;[[Oklahoma]]&lt;td&gt;[[Oklahoma City, Oklahoma|Oklahoma City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''OR'''&lt;td&gt;Ore.&lt;td&gt;[[Oregon]]&lt;td&gt;[[Salem, Oregon|Salem]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''PA'''&lt;td&gt;Pa.&lt;td&gt;[[Pennsylvania]]&lt;td&gt;[[Harrisburg, Pennsylvania|Harrisburg]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''RI'''&lt;td&gt;R.I.&lt;td&gt;[[Rhode Island]]&lt;td&gt;[[Providence, Rhode Island|Providence]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''SC'''&lt;td&gt;S.C.&lt;td&gt;[[South Carolina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Columbia, South Carolina|Columbia]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''SD'''&lt;td&gt;S.D.&lt;td&gt;[[South Dakota]]&lt;td&gt;[[Pierre, South Dakota|Pierre]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''TN'''&lt;td&gt;Tenn.&lt;td&gt;[[Tennessee]]&lt;td&gt;[[Nashville, Tennessee|Nashville]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''TX'''&lt;td&gt;Texas&lt;td&gt;[[Texas]]&lt;td&gt;[[Austin, Texas|Austin]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''UT'''&lt;td&gt;Utah&lt;td&gt;[[Utah]]&lt;td&gt;[[Salt Lake City, Utah|Salt Lake City]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''VT'''&lt;td&gt;Vt.&lt;td&gt;[[Vermont]]&lt;td&gt;[[Montpelier, Vermont|Montpelier]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''VA'''&lt;td&gt;Va.&lt;td&gt;[[Virginia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Richmond, Virginia|Richmond]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WA'''&lt;td&gt;Wash.&lt;td&gt;[[Washington]]&lt;td&gt;[[Olympia, Washington|Olympia]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WV'''&lt;td&gt;W.Va.&lt;td&gt;[[West Virginia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Charleston, West Virginia|Charleston]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WI'''&lt;td&gt;Wis.&lt;td&gt;[[Wisconsin]]&lt;td&gt;[[Madison, Wisconsin|Madison]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''WY'''&lt;td&gt;Wyo.&lt;td&gt;[[Wyoming]]&lt;td&gt;[[Cheyenne, Wyoming|Cheyenne]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;

[[Category:America]]</text>
      <sha1>nuflx7gxorhvq2pt6yunwinp48tl37u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4460</id>
      <parentid>4459</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-05T00:39:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2904">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the conveniance of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in Europe. In a select few areas (such as certain towns, or the entire state of Pennsylvania) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police will never stop you from hitchhiking as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.

If you're going for speed, then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways, and to try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.
If you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 


{| border="0" cellspacing="10"
|- valign="top"
| width="20%"|
*[[Alabama]]
*[[Alaska]]
*[[Arizona]]
*[[Arkansas]]
*[[California]]
*[[Colorado]]
*[[Connecticut]]
*[[Delaware]]
*[[Florida]]
*[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Hawaii]]
*[[Idaho]]
*[[Illinois]]
*[[Indiana]]
*[[Iowa]]
*[[Kansas]]
*[[Kentucky]]
*[[Louisiana]]
*[[Maine]]
*[[Maryland]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Massachusetts]]
*[[Michigan]]
*[[Minnesota]]
*[[Mississippi]]
*[[Missouri]]
*[[Montana]]
*[[Nebraska]]
*[[Nevada]]
*[[New Hampshire]]
*[[New Jersey]]
| width="20%"|
*[[New Mexico]]
*[[New York]]
*[[North Carolina]]
*[[North Dakota]]
*[[Ohio]]
*[[Oklahoma]]
*[[Oregon]]
*[[Pennsylvania]]
*[[Rhode Island]]
*[[South Carolina]]
| width="20%"|
*[[South Dakota]]
*[[Tennessee]]
*[[Texas]]
*[[Utah]]
*[[Vermont]]
*[[Virginia]]
*[[Washington]]
*[[West Virginia]]
*[[Wisconsin]]
*[[Wyoming]]
|}


[[Category:America]]</text>
      <sha1>8cb1zgtvb7xz2cyq748qlnnud9ju9wv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4461</id>
      <parentid>4460</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-05T00:40:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2935">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the conveniance of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in Europe. In a select few areas (such as certain towns, or the entire state of Pennsylvania) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police will never stop you from hitchhiking as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.

If you're going for speed, then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways, and to try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.
If you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

==States of the United States==
{| border="0" cellspacing="10"
|- valign="top"
| width="20%"|
*[[Alabama]]
*[[Alaska]]
*[[Arizona]]
*[[Arkansas]]
*[[California]]
*[[Colorado]]
*[[Connecticut]]
*[[Delaware]]
*[[Florida]]
*[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Hawaii]]
*[[Idaho]]
*[[Illinois]]
*[[Indiana]]
*[[Iowa]]
*[[Kansas]]
*[[Kentucky]]
*[[Louisiana]]
*[[Maine]]
*[[Maryland]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Massachusetts]]
*[[Michigan]]
*[[Minnesota]]
*[[Mississippi]]
*[[Missouri]]
*[[Montana]]
*[[Nebraska]]
*[[Nevada]]
*[[New Hampshire]]
*[[New Jersey]]
| width="20%"|
*[[New Mexico]]
*[[New York]]
*[[North Carolina]]
*[[North Dakota]]
*[[Ohio]]
*[[Oklahoma]]
*[[Oregon]]
*[[Pennsylvania]]
*[[Rhode Island]]
*[[South Carolina]]
| width="20%"|
*[[South Dakota]]
*[[Tennessee]]
*[[Texas]]
*[[Utah]]
*[[Vermont]]
*[[Virginia]]
*[[Washington]]
*[[West Virginia]]
*[[Wisconsin]]
*[[Wyoming]]
|}


[[Category:America]]</text>
      <sha1>br3mwp6wwibykjd1tim0u1s9inkk2xj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4462</id>
      <parentid>4461</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-05T00:40:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2975">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the conveniance of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in Europe. In a select few areas (such as certain towns, or the entire state of Pennsylvania) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police will never stop you from hitchhiking as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.

If you're going for speed, then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways, and to try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.
If you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

==States of the United States==
{| border="0" cellspacing="10"
|- valign="top"
| width="20%"|
*[[Alabama]]
*[[Alaska]]
*[[Arizona]]
*[[Arkansas]]
*[[California]]
*[[Colorado]]
*[[Connecticut]]
*[[Delaware]]
*[[Florida]]
*[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Hawaii]]
*[[Idaho]]
*[[Illinois]]
*[[Indiana]]
*[[Iowa]]
*[[Kansas]]
*[[Kentucky]]
*[[Louisiana]]
*[[Maine]]
*[[Maryland]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Massachusetts]]
*[[Michigan]]
*[[Minnesota]]
*[[Mississippi]]
*[[Missouri]]
*[[Montana]]
*[[Nebraska]]
*[[Nevada]]
*[[New Hampshire]]
*[[New Jersey]]
| width="20%"|
*[[New Mexico]]
*[[New York]]
*[[North Carolina]]
*[[North Dakota]]
*[[Ohio]]
*[[Oklahoma]]
*[[Oregon]]
*[[Pennsylvania]]
*[[Rhode Island]]
*[[South Carolina]]
| width="20%"|
*[[South Dakota]]
*[[Tennessee]]
*[[Texas]]
*[[Utah]]
*[[Vermont]]
*[[Virginia]]
*[[Washington]]
*[[West Virginia]]
*[[Wisconsin]]
*[[Wyoming]]
|}


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:United States of America|*]]</text>
      <sha1>9x77jt8pwkrfiu7i568n7gucv9xxpna</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4463</id>
      <parentid>4462</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-05T00:45:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2975">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in Europe. In a select few areas (such as certain towns, or the entire state of Pennsylvania) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police will never stop you from hitchhiking as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.

If you're going for speed, then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways, and to try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.
If you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

==States of the United States==
{| border="0" cellspacing="10"
|- valign="top"
| width="20%"|
*[[Alabama]]
*[[Alaska]]
*[[Arizona]]
*[[Arkansas]]
*[[California]]
*[[Colorado]]
*[[Connecticut]]
*[[Delaware]]
*[[Florida]]
*[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Hawaii]]
*[[Idaho]]
*[[Illinois]]
*[[Indiana]]
*[[Iowa]]
*[[Kansas]]
*[[Kentucky]]
*[[Louisiana]]
*[[Maine]]
*[[Maryland]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Massachusetts]]
*[[Michigan]]
*[[Minnesota]]
*[[Mississippi]]
*[[Missouri]]
*[[Montana]]
*[[Nebraska]]
*[[Nevada]]
*[[New Hampshire]]
*[[New Jersey]]
| width="20%"|
*[[New Mexico]]
*[[New York]]
*[[North Carolina]]
*[[North Dakota]]
*[[Ohio]]
*[[Oklahoma]]
*[[Oregon]]
*[[Pennsylvania]]
*[[Rhode Island]]
*[[South Carolina]]
| width="20%"|
*[[South Dakota]]
*[[Tennessee]]
*[[Texas]]
*[[Utah]]
*[[Vermont]]
*[[Virginia]]
*[[Washington]]
*[[West Virginia]]
*[[Wisconsin]]
*[[Wyoming]]
|}


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:United States of America|*]]</text>
      <sha1>dfs9zfkdrtjxjabrpsw4c9kxblrw52x</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4464</id>
      <parentid>4463</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-06-08T14:42:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2983">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns, or the entire state of [[Pennsylvania]]) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police will never stop you from hitchhiking as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.

If you're going for speed, then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways, and to try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.
If you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

==States of the United States==
{| border="0" cellspacing="10"
|- valign="top"
| width="20%"|
*[[Alabama]]
*[[Alaska]]
*[[Arizona]]
*[[Arkansas]]
*[[California]]
*[[Colorado]]
*[[Connecticut]]
*[[Delaware]]
*[[Florida]]
*[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Hawaii]]
*[[Idaho]]
*[[Illinois]]
*[[Indiana]]
*[[Iowa]]
*[[Kansas]]
*[[Kentucky]]
*[[Louisiana]]
*[[Maine]]
*[[Maryland]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Massachusetts]]
*[[Michigan]]
*[[Minnesota]]
*[[Mississippi]]
*[[Missouri]]
*[[Montana]]
*[[Nebraska]]
*[[Nevada]]
*[[New Hampshire]]
*[[New Jersey]]
| width="20%"|
*[[New Mexico]]
*[[New York]]
*[[North Carolina]]
*[[North Dakota]]
*[[Ohio]]
*[[Oklahoma]]
*[[Oregon]]
*[[Pennsylvania]]
*[[Rhode Island]]
*[[South Carolina]]
| width="20%"|
*[[South Dakota]]
*[[Tennessee]]
*[[Texas]]
*[[Utah]]
*[[Vermont]]
*[[Virginia]]
*[[Washington]]
*[[West Virginia]]
*[[Wisconsin]]
*[[Wyoming]]
|}


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:United States of America|*]]</text>
      <sha1>4mze84eaeumsvmelej9amzrw8aevcs5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4465</id>
      <parentid>4464</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-07-31T06:28:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Salman</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3143">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or other transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.

If you're going for speed, then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways, and to try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.
If you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

==States of the United States==
{| border="0" cellspacing="10"
|- valign="top"
| width="20%"|
*[[Alabama]]
*[[Alaska]]
*[[Arizona]]
*[[Arkansas]]
*[[California]]
*[[Colorado]]
*[[Connecticut]]
*[[Delaware]]
*[[Florida]]
*[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Hawaii]]
*[[Idaho]]
*[[Illinois]]
*[[Indiana]]
*[[Iowa]]
*[[Kansas]]
*[[Kentucky]]
*[[Louisiana]]
*[[Maine]]
*[[Maryland]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Massachusetts]]
*[[Michigan]]
*[[Minnesota]]
*[[Mississippi]]
*[[Missouri]]
*[[Montana]]
*[[Nebraska]]
*[[Nevada]]
*[[New Hampshire]]
*[[New Jersey]]
| width="20%"|
*[[New Mexico]]
*[[New York]]
*[[North Carolina]]
*[[North Dakota]]
*[[Ohio]]
*[[Oklahoma]]
*[[Oregon]]
*[[Pennsylvania]]
*[[Rhode Island]]
*[[South Carolina]]
| width="20%"|
*[[South Dakota]]
*[[Tennessee]]
*[[Texas]]
*[[Utah]]
*[[Vermont]]
*[[Virginia]]
*[[Washington]]
*[[West Virginia]]
*[[Wisconsin]]
*[[Wyoming]]
|}


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:United States of America|*]]</text>
      <sha1>4hrjtmi0aer0hj4lhnuh0mmcsvs7mpa</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4466</id>
      <parentid>4465</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-08-08T13:41:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lukestodola</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3679">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or other transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic (Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be going by '''you're'' on ramp.).  Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

==States of the United States==
{| border="0" cellspacing="10"
|- valign="top"
| width="20%"|
*[[Alabama]]
*[[Alaska]]
*[[Arizona]]
*[[Arkansas]]
*[[California]]
*[[Colorado]]
*[[Connecticut]]
*[[Delaware]]
*[[Florida]]
*[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Hawaii]]
*[[Idaho]]
*[[Illinois]]
*[[Indiana]]
*[[Iowa]]
*[[Kansas]]
*[[Kentucky]]
*[[Louisiana]]
*[[Maine]]
*[[Maryland]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Massachusetts]]
*[[Michigan]]
*[[Minnesota]]
*[[Mississippi]]
*[[Missouri]]
*[[Montana]]
*[[Nebraska]]
*[[Nevada]]
*[[New Hampshire]]
*[[New Jersey]]
| width="20%"|
*[[New Mexico]]
*[[New York]]
*[[North Carolina]]
*[[North Dakota]]
*[[Ohio]]
*[[Oklahoma]]
*[[Oregon]]
*[[Pennsylvania]]
*[[Rhode Island]]
*[[South Carolina]]
| width="20%"|
*[[South Dakota]]
*[[Tennessee]]
*[[Texas]]
*[[Utah]]
*[[Vermont]]
*[[Virginia]]
*[[Washington]]
*[[West Virginia]]
*[[Wisconsin]]
*[[Wyoming]]
|}


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:United States of America|*]]</text>
      <sha1>hr7xm24dlk6tiutt8dxw0skceuy086r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4467</id>
      <parentid>4466</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-08-23T18:08:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3881">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or other transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic (Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be going by '''you're'' on ramp.).  Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.


==States of the United States==
{| border="0" cellspacing="10"
|- valign="top"
| width="20%"|
*[[Alabama]]
*[[Alaska]]
*[[Arizona]]
*[[Arkansas]]
*[[California]]
*[[Colorado]]
*[[Connecticut]]
*[[Delaware]]
*[[Florida]]
*[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Hawaii]]
*[[Idaho]]
*[[Illinois]]
*[[Indiana]]
*[[Iowa]]
*[[Kansas]]
*[[Kentucky]]
*[[Louisiana]]
*[[Maine]]
*[[Maryland]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Massachusetts]]
*[[Michigan]]
*[[Minnesota]]
*[[Mississippi]]
*[[Missouri]]
*[[Montana]]
*[[Nebraska]]
*[[Nevada]]
*[[New Hampshire]]
*[[New Jersey]]
| width="20%"|
*[[New Mexico]]
*[[New York]]
*[[North Carolina]]
*[[North Dakota]]
*[[Ohio]]
*[[Oklahoma]]
*[[Oregon]]
*[[Pennsylvania]]
*[[Rhode Island]]
*[[South Carolina]]
| width="20%"|
*[[South Dakota]]
*[[Tennessee]]
*[[Texas]]
*[[Utah]]
*[[Vermont]]
*[[Virginia]]
*[[Washington]]
*[[West Virginia]]
*[[Wisconsin]]
*[[Wyoming]]
|}


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:United States of America|*]]</text>
      <sha1>r6mlykk15is6gwc6nhcwed4e1lkf94e</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4468</id>
      <parentid>4467</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-08-23T18:23:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>24.199.120.30</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3896">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or other transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic (Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be going by '''you're'' on ramp.).  Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.


==States of the United States==
{| border="0" cellspacing="10"
|- valign="top"
| width="20%"|
*[[Alabama]]
*[[Alaska]]
*[[Arizona]]
*[[Arkansas]]
*[[California]]
*[[Colorado]]
*[[Connecticut]]
*[[Delaware]]
*[[Florida]]
*[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Hawaii]]
*[[Idaho]]
*[[Illinois]]
*[[Indiana]]
*[[Iowa]]
*[[Kansas]]
*[[Kentucky]]
*[[Louisiana]]
*[[Maine]]
*[[Maryland]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Massachusetts]]
*[[Michigan]]
*[[Minnesota]]
*[[Mississippi]]
*[[Missouri]]
*[[Montana]]
*[[Nebraska]]
*[[Nevada]]
*[[New Hampshire]]
*[[New Jersey]]
| width="20%"|
*[[New Mexico]]
*[[New York State|New York]]
*[[North Carolina]]
*[[North Dakota]]
*[[Ohio]]
*[[Oklahoma]]
*[[Oregon]]
*[[Pennsylvania]]
*[[Rhode Island]]
*[[South Carolina]]
| width="20%"|
*[[South Dakota]]
*[[Tennessee]]
*[[Texas]]
*[[Utah]]
*[[Vermont]]
*[[Virginia]]
*[[Washington]]
*[[West Virginia]]
*[[Wisconsin]]
*[[Wyoming]]
|}


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:United States of America|*]]</text>
      <sha1>ddb155r6xj5drbzh56hrrqlcd7lmm8k</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4469</id>
      <parentid>4468</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-18T07:18:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3912">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or other transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic (Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be going by '''you're'' on ramp.).  Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states on the Eastcoast hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==States of the United States==
{| border="0" cellspacing="10"
|- valign="top"
| width="20%"|
*[[Alabama]]
*[[Alaska]]
*[[Arizona]]
*[[Arkansas]]
*[[California]]
*[[Colorado]]
*[[Connecticut]]
*[[Delaware]]
*[[Florida]]
*[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Hawaii]]
*[[Idaho]]
*[[Illinois]]
*[[Indiana]]
*[[Iowa]]
*[[Kansas]]
*[[Kentucky]]
*[[Louisiana]]
*[[Maine]]
*[[Maryland]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Massachusetts]]
*[[Michigan]]
*[[Minnesota]]
*[[Mississippi]]
*[[Missouri]]
*[[Montana]]
*[[Nebraska]]
*[[Nevada]]
*[[New Hampshire]]
*[[New Jersey]]
| width="20%"|
*[[New Mexico]]
*[[New York State|New York]]
*[[North Carolina]]
*[[North Dakota]]
*[[Ohio]]
*[[Oklahoma]]
*[[Oregon]]
*[[Pennsylvania]]
*[[Rhode Island]]
*[[South Carolina]]
| width="20%"|
*[[South Dakota]]
*[[Tennessee]]
*[[Texas]]
*[[Utah]]
*[[Vermont]]
*[[Virginia]]
*[[Washington]]
*[[West Virginia]]
*[[Wisconsin]]
*[[Wyoming]]
|}


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:United States of America|*]]</text>
      <sha1>brhib42uxmezdde80iproxo2scrc4qh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4470</id>
      <parentid>4469</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-18T07:23:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4064">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or other transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic (Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be going by '''you're'' on ramp.).  Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states on the Eastcoast hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==People picking up hitchhikers==
A lot of people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way.

==States of the United States==
{| border="0" cellspacing="10"
|- valign="top"
| width="20%"|
*[[Alabama]]
*[[Alaska]]
*[[Arizona]]
*[[Arkansas]]
*[[California]]
*[[Colorado]]
*[[Connecticut]]
*[[Delaware]]
*[[Florida]]
*[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Hawaii]]
*[[Idaho]]
*[[Illinois]]
*[[Indiana]]
*[[Iowa]]
*[[Kansas]]
*[[Kentucky]]
*[[Louisiana]]
*[[Maine]]
*[[Maryland]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Massachusetts]]
*[[Michigan]]
*[[Minnesota]]
*[[Mississippi]]
*[[Missouri]]
*[[Montana]]
*[[Nebraska]]
*[[Nevada]]
*[[New Hampshire]]
*[[New Jersey]]
| width="20%"|
*[[New Mexico]]
*[[New York State|New York]]
*[[North Carolina]]
*[[North Dakota]]
*[[Ohio]]
*[[Oklahoma]]
*[[Oregon]]
*[[Pennsylvania]]
*[[Rhode Island]]
*[[South Carolina]]
| width="20%"|
*[[South Dakota]]
*[[Tennessee]]
*[[Texas]]
*[[Utah]]
*[[Vermont]]
*[[Virginia]]
*[[Washington]]
*[[West Virginia]]
*[[Wisconsin]]
*[[Wyoming]]
|}


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:United States of America|*]]</text>
      <sha1>cu49fxjh4lrb0y9y2rz2ko4xcrndnns</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4471</id>
      <parentid>4470</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-10-05T09:04:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4188">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or other transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic (Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be going by '''you're'' on ramp.).  Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states on the Eastcoast hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==People picking up hitchhikers==
A lot of people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way.

==States of the United States==
{| border="0" cellspacing="10"
|- valign="top"
| width="20%"|
*[[Alabama]]
*[[Alaska]]
*[[Arizona]]
*[[Arkansas]]
*[[California]]
*[[Colorado]]
*[[Connecticut]]
*[[Delaware]]
*[[Florida]]
*[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Hawaii]]
*[[Idaho]]
*[[Illinois]]
*[[Indiana]]
*[[Iowa]]
*[[Kansas]]
*[[Kentucky]]
*[[Louisiana]]
*[[Maine]]
*[[Maryland]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Massachusetts]]
*[[Michigan]]
*[[Minnesota]]
*[[Mississippi]]
*[[Missouri]]
*[[Montana]]
*[[Nebraska]]
*[[Nevada]]
*[[New Hampshire]]
*[[New Jersey]]
| width="20%"|
*[[New Mexico]]
*[[New York State|New York]]
*[[North Carolina]]
*[[North Dakota]]
*[[Ohio]]
*[[Oklahoma]]
*[[Oregon]]
*[[Pennsylvania]]
*[[Rhode Island]]
*[[South Carolina]]
| width="20%"|
*[[South Dakota]]
*[[Tennessee]]
*[[Texas]]
*[[Utah]]
*[[Vermont]]
*[[Virginia]]
*[[Washington]]
*[[West Virginia]]
*[[Wisconsin]]
*[[Wyoming]]
|}


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:United States of America|*]]</text>
      <sha1>8zqx9pf38ns40etcrlrk3ygf42yzc6l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4472</id>
      <parentid>4471</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-10-25T01:19:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4336">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or other transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic (Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be going by '''you're'' on ramp.).  Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states on the Eastcoast hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==People picking up hitchhikers==
A lot of people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

==States of the United States==
{| border="0" cellspacing="10"
|- valign="top"
| width="20%"|
*[[Alabama]]
*[[Alaska]]
*[[Arizona]]
*[[Arkansas]]
*[[California]]
*[[Colorado]]
*[[Connecticut]]
*[[Delaware]]
*[[Florida]]
*[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Hawaii]]
*[[Idaho]]
*[[Illinois]]
*[[Indiana]]
*[[Iowa]]
*[[Kansas]]
*[[Kentucky]]
*[[Louisiana]]
*[[Maine]]
*[[Maryland]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Massachusetts]]
*[[Michigan]]
*[[Minnesota]]
*[[Mississippi]]
*[[Missouri]]
*[[Montana]]
*[[Nebraska]]
*[[Nevada]]
*[[New Hampshire]]
*[[New Jersey]]
| width="20%"|
*[[New Mexico]]
*[[New York State|New York]]
*[[North Carolina]]
*[[North Dakota]]
*[[Ohio]]
*[[Oklahoma]]
*[[Oregon]]
*[[Pennsylvania]]
*[[Rhode Island]]
*[[South Carolina]]
| width="20%"|
*[[South Dakota]]
*[[Tennessee]]
*[[Texas]]
*[[Utah]]
*[[Vermont]]
*[[Virginia]]
*[[Washington]]
*[[West Virginia]]
*[[Wisconsin]]
*[[Wyoming]]
|}


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:United States of America|*]]</text>
      <sha1>si0t0fbdow1o8wyal9d0au07n3mtij7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4473</id>
      <parentid>4472</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-10-31T11:14:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4426">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or other transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic (Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be going by '''you're'' on ramp.).  Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==People picking up hitchhikers==
A lot of people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

==States of the United States==
{| border="0" cellspacing="10"
|- valign="top"
| width="20%"|
*[[Alabama]]
*[[Alaska]]
*[[Arizona]]
*[[Arkansas]]
*[[California]]
*[[Colorado]]
*[[Connecticut]]
*[[Delaware]]
*[[Florida]]
*[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Hawaii]]
*[[Idaho]]
*[[Illinois]]
*[[Indiana]]
*[[Iowa]]
*[[Kansas]]
*[[Kentucky]]
*[[Louisiana]]
*[[Maine]]
*[[Maryland]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Massachusetts]]
*[[Michigan]]
*[[Minnesota]]
*[[Mississippi]]
*[[Missouri]]
*[[Montana]]
*[[Nebraska]]
*[[Nevada]]
*[[New Hampshire]]
*[[New Jersey]]
| width="20%"|
*[[New Mexico]]
*[[New York State|New York]]
*[[North Carolina]]
*[[North Dakota]]
*[[Ohio]]
*[[Oklahoma]]
*[[Oregon]]
*[[Pennsylvania]]
*[[Rhode Island]]
*[[South Carolina]]
| width="20%"|
*[[South Dakota]]
*[[Tennessee]]
*[[Texas]]
*[[Utah]]
*[[Vermont]]
*[[Virginia]]
*[[Washington]]
*[[West Virginia]]
*[[Wisconsin]]
*[[Wyoming]]
|}


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:United States of America|*]]</text>
      <sha1>o2jncx48w70b8gg4ctu7akcrw156arw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4474</id>
      <parentid>1576</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4434">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or other transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==People picking up hitchhikers==
A lot of people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

==States of the United States==
{| border="0" cellspacing="10"
|- valign="top"
| width="20%"|
*[[Alabama]]
*[[Alaska]]
*[[Arizona]]
*[[Arkansas]]
*[[California]]
*[[Colorado]]
*[[Connecticut]]
*[[Delaware]]
*[[Florida]]
*[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Hawaii]]
*[[Idaho]]
*[[Illinois]]
*[[Indiana]]
*[[Iowa]]
*[[Kansas]]
*[[Kentucky]]
*[[Louisiana]]
*[[Maine]]
*[[Maryland]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Massachusetts]]
*[[Michigan]]
*[[Minnesota]]
*[[Mississippi]]
*[[Missouri]]
*[[Montana]]
*[[Nebraska]]
*[[Nevada]]
*[[New Hampshire]]
*[[New Jersey]]
| width="20%"|
*[[New Mexico]]
*[[New York State|New York]]
*[[North Carolina]]
*[[North Dakota]]
*[[Ohio]]
*[[Oklahoma]]
*[[Oregon]]
*[[Pennsylvania]]
*[[Rhode Island]]
*[[South Carolina]]
| width="20%"|
*[[South Dakota]]
*[[Tennessee]]
*[[Texas]]
*[[Utah]]
*[[Vermont]]
*[[Virginia]]
*[[Washington]]
*[[West Virginia]]
*[[Wisconsin]]
*[[Wyoming]]
|}


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:United States of America|*]]</text>
      <sha1>qeq75cmkr3mspimia4ohujepnw7ev6r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9320</id>
      <parentid>4474</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-29T23:09:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zac Stewart</username>
        <id>5</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4978">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or other transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==People picking up hitchhikers==
A lot of people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

==Eat==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. At some Burger King's, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).


==States of the United States==
{| border="0" cellspacing="10"
|- valign="top"
| width="20%"|
*[[Alabama]]
*[[Alaska]]
*[[Arizona]]
*[[Arkansas]]
*[[California]]
*[[Colorado]]
*[[Connecticut]]
*[[Delaware]]
*[[Florida]]
*[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Hawaii]]
*[[Idaho]]
*[[Illinois]]
*[[Indiana]]
*[[Iowa]]
*[[Kansas]]
*[[Kentucky]]
*[[Louisiana]]
*[[Maine]]
*[[Maryland]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Massachusetts]]
*[[Michigan]]
*[[Minnesota]]
*[[Mississippi]]
*[[Missouri]]
*[[Montana]]
*[[Nebraska]]
*[[Nevada]]
*[[New Hampshire]]
*[[New Jersey]]
| width="20%"|
*[[New Mexico]]
*[[New York State|New York]]
*[[North Carolina]]
*[[North Dakota]]
*[[Ohio]]
*[[Oklahoma]]
*[[Oregon]]
*[[Pennsylvania]]
*[[Rhode Island]]
*[[South Carolina]]
| width="20%"|
*[[South Dakota]]
*[[Tennessee]]
*[[Texas]]
*[[Utah]]
*[[Vermont]]
*[[Virginia]]
*[[Washington]]
*[[West Virginia]]
*[[Wisconsin]]
*[[Wyoming]]
|}


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:United States of America|*]]</text>
      <sha1>afr7iqc1uodoh3snale025mg0nzog9d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9357</id>
      <parentid>9320</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-01T23:32:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5001">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or other transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==People picking up hitchhikers==
A lot of people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

==Eat==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. At some Burger King's, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).


==States of the United States==
{| border="0" cellspacing="10"
|- valign="top"
| width="20%"|
*[[Alabama]]
*[[Alaska]]
*[[Arizona]]
*[[Arkansas]]
*[[California]]
*[[Colorado]]
*[[Connecticut]]
*[[Delaware]]
*[[Florida]]
*[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Hawaii]]
*[[Idaho]]
*[[Illinois]]
*[[Indiana]]
*[[Iowa]]
*[[Kansas]]
*[[Kentucky]]
*[[Louisiana]]
*[[Maine]]
*[[Maryland]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Massachusetts]]
*[[Michigan]]
*[[Minnesota]]
*[[Mississippi]]
*[[Missouri]]
*[[Montana]]
*[[Nebraska]]
*[[Nevada]]
*[[New Hampshire]]
*[[New Jersey]]
| width="20%"|
*[[New Mexico]]
*[[New York State|New York]]
*[[North Carolina]]
*[[North Dakota]]
*[[Ohio]]
*[[Oklahoma]]
*[[Oregon]]
*[[Pennsylvania]]
*[[Rhode Island]]
*[[South Carolina]]
| width="20%"|
*[[South Dakota]]
*[[Tennessee]]
*[[Texas]]
*[[Utah]]
*[[Vermont]]
*[[Virginia]]
*[[Washington]]
*[[West Virginia]]
*[[Wisconsin]]
*[[Wyoming]]
|}


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:United States of America|*]]

[[digi:usa-map.html]]</text>
      <sha1>tp8uxomop545jvi29f0fvu5vkx72yz4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9358</id>
      <parentid>9357</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-01T23:33:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5026">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or other transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==People picking up hitchhikers==
A lot of people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

==Eat==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. At some Burger King's, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).


==States of the United States==
{| border="0" cellspacing="10"
|- valign="top"
| width="20%"|
*[[Alabama]]
*[[Alaska]]
*[[Arizona]]
*[[Arkansas]]
*[[California]]
*[[Colorado]]
*[[Connecticut]]
*[[Delaware]]
*[[Florida]]
*[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Hawaii]]
*[[Idaho]]
*[[Illinois]]
*[[Indiana]]
*[[Iowa]]
*[[Kansas]]
*[[Kentucky]]
*[[Louisiana]]
*[[Maine]]
*[[Maryland]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Massachusetts]]
*[[Michigan]]
*[[Minnesota]]
*[[Mississippi]]
*[[Missouri]]
*[[Montana]]
*[[Nebraska]]
*[[Nevada]]
*[[New Hampshire]]
*[[New Jersey]]
| width="20%"|
*[[New Mexico]]
*[[New York State|New York]]
*[[North Carolina]]
*[[North Dakota]]
*[[Ohio]]
*[[Oklahoma]]
*[[Oregon]]
*[[Pennsylvania]]
*[[Rhode Island]]
*[[South Carolina]]
| width="20%"|
*[[South Dakota]]
*[[Tennessee]]
*[[Texas]]
*[[Utah]]
*[[Vermont]]
*[[Virginia]]
*[[Washington]]
*[[West Virginia]]
*[[Wisconsin]]
*[[Wyoming]]
|}


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:United States of America|*]]

[[digi:usa-map.html]]
[[cswiki:United States]]</text>
      <sha1>rdirffphm49bebl88eni3bmmd5w710p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9378</id>
      <parentid>9358</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-02T01:31:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5036">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or other transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==People picking up hitchhikers==
A lot of people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

==Eat==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. At some Burger King's, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).


==States of the United States==
{| border="0" cellspacing="10"
|- valign="top"
| width="20%"|
*[[Alabama]]
*[[Alaska]]
*[[Arizona]]
*[[Arkansas]]
*[[California]]
*[[Colorado]]
*[[Connecticut]]
*[[Delaware]]
*[[Florida]]
*[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Hawaii]]
*[[Idaho]]
*[[Illinois]]
*[[Indiana]]
*[[Iowa]]
*[[Kansas]]
*[[Kentucky]]
*[[Louisiana]]
*[[Maine]]
*[[Maryland]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Massachusetts]]
*[[Michigan]]
*[[Minnesota]]
*[[Mississippi]]
*[[Missouri]]
*[[Montana]]
*[[Nebraska]]
*[[Nevada]]
*[[New Hampshire]]
*[[New Jersey]]
| width="20%"|
*[[New Mexico]]
*[[New York State|New York]]
*[[North Carolina]]
*[[North Dakota]]
*[[Ohio]]
*[[Oklahoma]]
*[[Oregon]]
*[[Pennsylvania]]
*[[Rhode Island]]
*[[South Carolina]]
| width="20%"|
*[[South Dakota]]
*[[Tennessee]]
*[[Texas]]
*[[Utah]]
*[[Vermont]]
*[[Virginia]]
*[[Washington]]
*[[West Virginia]]
*[[Wisconsin]]
*[[Wyoming]]
|}


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:United States of America|*]]

[[digi:usa-map.html]]
[[cswiki:United States]]
[[lh:US]]</text>
      <sha1>p7vzvwzauqk1zvs2s9gt4baua84d9ff</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9379</id>
      <parentid>9378</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-02T01:37:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5026">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or other transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==People picking up hitchhikers==
A lot of people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

==Eat==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. At some Burger King's, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).


==States of the United States==
{| border="0" cellspacing="10"
|- valign="top"
| width="20%"|
*[[Alabama]]
*[[Alaska]]
*[[Arizona]]
*[[Arkansas]]
*[[California]]
*[[Colorado]]
*[[Connecticut]]
*[[Delaware]]
*[[Florida]]
*[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Hawaii]]
*[[Idaho]]
*[[Illinois]]
*[[Indiana]]
*[[Iowa]]
*[[Kansas]]
*[[Kentucky]]
*[[Louisiana]]
*[[Maine]]
*[[Maryland]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Massachusetts]]
*[[Michigan]]
*[[Minnesota]]
*[[Mississippi]]
*[[Missouri]]
*[[Montana]]
*[[Nebraska]]
*[[Nevada]]
*[[New Hampshire]]
*[[New Jersey]]
| width="20%"|
*[[New Mexico]]
*[[New York State|New York]]
*[[North Carolina]]
*[[North Dakota]]
*[[Ohio]]
*[[Oklahoma]]
*[[Oregon]]
*[[Pennsylvania]]
*[[Rhode Island]]
*[[South Carolina]]
| width="20%"|
*[[South Dakota]]
*[[Tennessee]]
*[[Texas]]
*[[Utah]]
*[[Vermont]]
*[[Virginia]]
*[[Washington]]
*[[West Virginia]]
*[[Wisconsin]]
*[[Wyoming]]
|}


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:United States of America|*]]

[[digi:usa-map.html]]
[[cswiki:United States]]</text>
      <sha1>rdirffphm49bebl88eni3bmmd5w710p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9380</id>
      <parentid>9379</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-02T01:49:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5036">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or other transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==People picking up hitchhikers==
A lot of people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

==Eat==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. At some Burger King's, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).


==States of the United States==
{| border="0" cellspacing="10"
|- valign="top"
| width="20%"|
*[[Alabama]]
*[[Alaska]]
*[[Arizona]]
*[[Arkansas]]
*[[California]]
*[[Colorado]]
*[[Connecticut]]
*[[Delaware]]
*[[Florida]]
*[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Hawaii]]
*[[Idaho]]
*[[Illinois]]
*[[Indiana]]
*[[Iowa]]
*[[Kansas]]
*[[Kentucky]]
*[[Louisiana]]
*[[Maine]]
*[[Maryland]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Massachusetts]]
*[[Michigan]]
*[[Minnesota]]
*[[Mississippi]]
*[[Missouri]]
*[[Montana]]
*[[Nebraska]]
*[[Nevada]]
*[[New Hampshire]]
*[[New Jersey]]
| width="20%"|
*[[New Mexico]]
*[[New York State|New York]]
*[[North Carolina]]
*[[North Dakota]]
*[[Ohio]]
*[[Oklahoma]]
*[[Oregon]]
*[[Pennsylvania]]
*[[Rhode Island]]
*[[South Carolina]]
| width="20%"|
*[[South Dakota]]
*[[Tennessee]]
*[[Texas]]
*[[Utah]]
*[[Vermont]]
*[[Virginia]]
*[[Washington]]
*[[West Virginia]]
*[[Wisconsin]]
*[[Wyoming]]
|}


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:United States of America|*]]

[[digi:usa-map.html]]
[[cswiki:United States]]
[[lh:US]]</text>
      <sha1>p7vzvwzauqk1zvs2s9gt4baua84d9ff</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9926</id>
      <parentid>9380</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-21T06:51:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>KennethSime</username>
        <id>27</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5555">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or other transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==People picking up hitchhikers==
A lot of people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

==Eat==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger King's, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).


===Dumpster Diving===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.

==States of the United States==
{| border="0" cellspacing="10"
|- valign="top"
| width="20%"|
*[[Alabama]]
*[[Alaska]]
*[[Arizona]]
*[[Arkansas]]
*[[California]]
*[[Colorado]]
*[[Connecticut]]
*[[Delaware]]
*[[Florida]]
*[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Hawaii]]
*[[Idaho]]
*[[Illinois]]
*[[Indiana]]
*[[Iowa]]
*[[Kansas]]
*[[Kentucky]]
*[[Louisiana]]
*[[Maine]]
*[[Maryland]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Massachusetts]]
*[[Michigan]]
*[[Minnesota]]
*[[Mississippi]]
*[[Missouri]]
*[[Montana]]
*[[Nebraska]]
*[[Nevada]]
*[[New Hampshire]]
*[[New Jersey]]
| width="20%"|
*[[New Mexico]]
*[[New York State|New York]]
*[[North Carolina]]
*[[North Dakota]]
*[[Ohio]]
*[[Oklahoma]]
*[[Oregon]]
*[[Pennsylvania]]
*[[Rhode Island]]
*[[South Carolina]]
| width="20%"|
*[[South Dakota]]
*[[Tennessee]]
*[[Texas]]
*[[Utah]]
*[[Vermont]]
*[[Virginia]]
*[[Washington]]
*[[West Virginia]]
*[[Wisconsin]]
*[[Wyoming]]
|}


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:United States of America|*]]

[[digi:usa-map.html]]
[[cswiki:United States]]
[[lh:US]]</text>
      <sha1>9nddrs6urvrxf5fevpz0m86k8rpjplu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9927</id>
      <parentid>9926</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-21T06:52:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>KennethSime</username>
        <id>27</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5554">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or other transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==People picking up hitchhikers==
A lot of people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

==Eat==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger King's, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).

===Dumpster Diving===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.

==States of the United States==
{| border="0" cellspacing="10"
|- valign="top"
| width="20%"|
*[[Alabama]]
*[[Alaska]]
*[[Arizona]]
*[[Arkansas]]
*[[California]]
*[[Colorado]]
*[[Connecticut]]
*[[Delaware]]
*[[Florida]]
*[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Hawaii]]
*[[Idaho]]
*[[Illinois]]
*[[Indiana]]
*[[Iowa]]
*[[Kansas]]
*[[Kentucky]]
*[[Louisiana]]
*[[Maine]]
*[[Maryland]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Massachusetts]]
*[[Michigan]]
*[[Minnesota]]
*[[Mississippi]]
*[[Missouri]]
*[[Montana]]
*[[Nebraska]]
*[[Nevada]]
*[[New Hampshire]]
*[[New Jersey]]
| width="20%"|
*[[New Mexico]]
*[[New York State|New York]]
*[[North Carolina]]
*[[North Dakota]]
*[[Ohio]]
*[[Oklahoma]]
*[[Oregon]]
*[[Pennsylvania]]
*[[Rhode Island]]
*[[South Carolina]]
| width="20%"|
*[[South Dakota]]
*[[Tennessee]]
*[[Texas]]
*[[Utah]]
*[[Vermont]]
*[[Virginia]]
*[[Washington]]
*[[West Virginia]]
*[[Wisconsin]]
*[[Wyoming]]
|}


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:United States of America|*]]

[[digi:usa-map.html]]
[[cswiki:United States]]
[[lh:US]]</text>
      <sha1>ihk4vm1ieh2fof08qy90eqlrl7x9dm2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9952</id>
      <parentid>9927</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-21T10:44:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5541">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or other transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==People picking up hitchhikers==
A lot of people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

==Eat==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger King's, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).

===Dumpster Diving===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.

==States of the United States==
{| border="0" cellspacing="10"
|- valign="top"
| width="20%"|
*[[Alabama]]
*[[Alaska]]
*[[Arizona]]
*[[Arkansas]]
*[[California]]
*[[Colorado]]
*[[Connecticut]]
*[[Delaware]]
*[[Florida]]
*[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Hawaii]]
*[[Idaho]]
*[[Illinois]]
*[[Indiana]]
*[[Iowa]]
*[[Kansas]]
*[[Kentucky]]
*[[Louisiana]]
*[[Maine]]
*[[Maryland]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Massachusetts]]
*[[Michigan]]
*[[Minnesota]]
*[[Mississippi]]
*[[Missouri]]
*[[Montana]]
*[[Nebraska]]
*[[Nevada]]
*[[New Hampshire]]
*[[New Jersey]]
| width="20%"|
*[[New Mexico]]
*[[New York State|New York]]
*[[North Carolina]]
*[[North Dakota]]
*[[Ohio]]
*[[Oklahoma]]
*[[Oregon]]
*[[Pennsylvania]]
*[[Rhode Island]]
*[[South Carolina]]
| width="20%"|
*[[South Dakota]]
*[[Tennessee]]
*[[Texas]]
*[[Utah]]
*[[Vermont]]
*[[Virginia]]
*[[Washington]]
*[[West Virginia]]
*[[Wisconsin]]
*[[Wyoming]]
|}


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[digi:usa-map.html]]
[[cswiki:United States]]
[[lh:US]]</text>
      <sha1>nef1e5bhtoyii4oebdvycuhpzl051vu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10001</id>
      <parentid>9952</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-25T07:25:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>157.132.107.105</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5540">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or other transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==People picking up hitchhikers==
A lot of people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

==Eat==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger Kings, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).

===Dumpster Diving===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.

==States of the United States==
{| border="0" cellspacing="10"
|- valign="top"
| width="20%"|
*[[Alabama]]
*[[Alaska]]
*[[Arizona]]
*[[Arkansas]]
*[[California]]
*[[Colorado]]
*[[Connecticut]]
*[[Delaware]]
*[[Florida]]
*[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Hawaii]]
*[[Idaho]]
*[[Illinois]]
*[[Indiana]]
*[[Iowa]]
*[[Kansas]]
*[[Kentucky]]
*[[Louisiana]]
*[[Maine]]
*[[Maryland]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Massachusetts]]
*[[Michigan]]
*[[Minnesota]]
*[[Mississippi]]
*[[Missouri]]
*[[Montana]]
*[[Nebraska]]
*[[Nevada]]
*[[New Hampshire]]
*[[New Jersey]]
| width="20%"|
*[[New Mexico]]
*[[New York State|New York]]
*[[North Carolina]]
*[[North Dakota]]
*[[Ohio]]
*[[Oklahoma]]
*[[Oregon]]
*[[Pennsylvania]]
*[[Rhode Island]]
*[[South Carolina]]
| width="20%"|
*[[South Dakota]]
*[[Tennessee]]
*[[Texas]]
*[[Utah]]
*[[Vermont]]
*[[Virginia]]
*[[Washington]]
*[[West Virginia]]
*[[Wisconsin]]
*[[Wyoming]]
|}


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[digi:usa-map.html]]
[[cswiki:United States]]
[[lh:US]]</text>
      <sha1>s72zla2mbgx19oe00rs9g0plm98lqee</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12544</id>
      <parentid>10001</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-31T13:46:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5527">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or other transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==People picking up hitchhikers==
A lot of people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

==Eat==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger Kings, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).

===Dumpster Diving===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.

==States of the United States==
{| border="0" cellspacing="10"
|- valign="top"
| width="20%"|
*[[Alabama]]
*[[Alaska]]
*[[Arizona]]
*[[Arkansas]]
*[[California]]
*[[Colorado]]
*[[Connecticut]]
*[[Delaware]]
*[[Florida]]
*[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Hawaii]]
*[[Idaho]]
*[[Illinois]]
*[[Indiana]]
*[[Iowa]]
*[[Kansas]]
*[[Kentucky]]
*[[Louisiana]]
*[[Maine]]
*[[Maryland]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Massachusetts]]
*[[Michigan]]
*[[Minnesota]]
*[[Mississippi]]
*[[Missouri]]
*[[Montana]]
*[[Nebraska]]
*[[Nevada]]
*[[New Hampshire]]
*[[New Jersey]]
| width="20%"|
*[[New Mexico]]
*[[New York State|New York]]
*[[North Carolina]]
*[[North Dakota]]
*[[Ohio]]
*[[Oklahoma]]
*[[Oregon]]
*[[Pennsylvania]]
*[[Rhode Island]]
*[[South Carolina]]
| width="20%"|
*[[South Dakota]]
*[[Tennessee]]
*[[Texas]]
*[[Utah]]
*[[Vermont]]
*[[Virginia]]
*[[Washington]]
*[[West Virginia]]
*[[Wisconsin]]
*[[Wyoming]]
|}


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[digi:usa-map.html]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]</text>
      <sha1>1mj7s9eifgtyctnn6ts6xuqn90iakjf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13632</id>
      <parentid>12544</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-12T14:14:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5528">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or other transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==People picking up hitchhikers==
A lot of people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

==Eat==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger Kings, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).

===Dumpster Diving===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.

==States of the United States==
{| border="0" cellspacing="10"
|- valign="top"
| width="20%"|
*[[Alabama]]
*[[Alaska]]
*[[Arizona]]
*[[Arkansas]]
*[[California]]
*[[Colorado]]
*[[Connecticut]]
*[[Delaware]]
*[[Florida]]
*[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Hawaii]]
*[[Idaho]]
*[[Illinois]]
*[[Indiana]]
*[[Iowa]]
*[[Kansas]]
*[[Kentucky]]
*[[Louisiana]]
*[[Maine]]
*[[Maryland]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Massachusetts]]
*[[Michigan]]
*[[Minnesota]]
*[[Mississippi]]
*[[Missouri]]
*[[Montana]]
*[[Nebraska]]
*[[Nevada]]
*[[New Hampshire]]
*[[New Jersey]]
| width="20%"|
*[[New Mexico]]
*[[New York State|New York]]
*[[North Carolina]]
*[[North Dakota]]
*[[Ohio]]
*[[Oklahoma]]
*[[Oregon]]
*[[Pennsylvania]]
*[[Rhode Island]]
*[[South Carolina]]
| width="20%"|
*[[South Dakota]]
*[[Tennessee]]
*[[Texas]]
*[[Utah]]
*[[Vermont]]
*[[Virginia]]
*[[Washington]]
*[[West Virginia]]
*[[Wisconsin]]
*[[Wyoming]]
|}


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[digi:usa-map.html]]

[[es:Estados Unidos]]</text>
      <sha1>bkq3zzjqmf9fgmtlic19yqzrmn8b81e</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13748</id>
      <parentid>13632</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-13T16:50:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5604">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages. The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or other transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==People picking up hitchhikers==
A lot of people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

==Eat==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger Kings, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).

===Dumpster Diving===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.

==States of the United States==
{| border="0" cellspacing="10"
|- valign="top"
| width="20%"|
*[[Alabama]]
*[[Alaska]]
*[[Arizona]]
*[[Arkansas]]
*[[California]]
*[[Colorado]]
*[[Connecticut]]
*[[Delaware]]
*[[Florida]]
*[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Hawaii]]
*[[Idaho]]
*[[Illinois]]
*[[Indiana]]
*[[Iowa]]
*[[Kansas]]
*[[Kentucky]]
*[[Louisiana]]
*[[Maine]]
*[[Maryland]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Massachusetts]]
*[[Michigan]]
*[[Minnesota]]
*[[Mississippi]]
*[[Missouri]]
*[[Montana]]
*[[Nebraska]]
*[[Nevada]]
*[[New Hampshire]]
*[[New Jersey]]
| width="20%"|
*[[New Mexico]]
*[[New York State|New York]]
*[[North Carolina]]
*[[North Dakota]]
*[[Ohio]]
*[[Oklahoma]]
*[[Oregon]]
*[[Pennsylvania]]
*[[Rhode Island]]
*[[South Carolina]]
| width="20%"|
*[[South Dakota]]
*[[Tennessee]]
*[[Texas]]
*[[Utah]]
*[[Vermont]]
*[[Virginia]]
*[[Washington]]
*[[West Virginia]]
*[[Wisconsin]]
*[[Wyoming]]
|}


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[digi:usa-map.html]]

[[es:Estados Unidos]]</text>
      <sha1>po2oga37wiyrbkpmjkebhyzwqid86oo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14091</id>
      <parentid>13748</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-23T16:19:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5581">'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages. The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or other transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==People picking up hitchhikers==
A lot of people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

==Eat==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger Kings, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).

===Dumpster Diving===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.

==States of the United States==
{| border="0" cellspacing="10"
|- valign="top"
| width="20%"|
*[[Alabama]]
*[[Alaska]]
*[[Arizona]]
*[[Arkansas]]
*[[California]]
*[[Colorado]]
*[[Connecticut]]
*[[Delaware]]
*[[Florida]]
*[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Hawaii]]
*[[Idaho]]
*[[Illinois]]
*[[Indiana]]
*[[Iowa]]
*[[Kansas]]
*[[Kentucky]]
*[[Louisiana]]
*[[Maine]]
*[[Maryland]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Massachusetts]]
*[[Michigan]]
*[[Minnesota]]
*[[Mississippi]]
*[[Missouri]]
*[[Montana]]
*[[Nebraska]]
*[[Nevada]]
*[[New Hampshire]]
*[[New Jersey]]
| width="20%"|
*[[New Mexico]]
*[[New York State|New York]]
*[[North Carolina]]
*[[North Dakota]]
*[[Ohio]]
*[[Oklahoma]]
*[[Oregon]]
*[[Pennsylvania]]
*[[Rhode Island]]
*[[South Carolina]]
| width="20%"|
*[[South Dakota]]
*[[Tennessee]]
*[[Texas]]
*[[Utah]]
*[[Vermont]]
*[[Virginia]]
*[[Washington]]
*[[West Virginia]]
*[[Wisconsin]]
*[[Wyoming]]
|}

[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]

[[es:Estados Unidos]]</text>
      <sha1>1bvavio805to1zzyi18e9sq6f2pkcqd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14486</id>
      <parentid>14091</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-08T13:37:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5784">[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages. The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or other transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==People picking up hitchhikers==
A lot of people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

==Eat==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger Kings, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).

===Dumpster Diving===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.

==States of the United States==
{| border="0" cellspacing="10"
|- valign="top"
| width="20%"|
*[[Alabama]]
*[[Alaska]]
*[[Arizona]]
*[[Arkansas]]
*[[California]]
*[[Colorado]]
*[[Connecticut]]
*[[Delaware]]
*[[Florida]]
*[[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Hawaii]]
*[[Idaho]]
*[[Illinois]]
*[[Indiana]]
*[[Iowa]]
*[[Kansas]]
*[[Kentucky]]
*[[Louisiana]]
*[[Maine]]
*[[Maryland]]
| width="20%"|
*[[Massachusetts]]
*[[Michigan]]
*[[Minnesota]]
*[[Mississippi]]
*[[Missouri]]
*[[Montana]]
*[[Nebraska]]
*[[Nevada]]
*[[New Hampshire]]
*[[New Jersey]]
| width="20%"|
*[[New Mexico]]
*[[New York State|New York]]
*[[North Carolina]]
*[[North Dakota]]
*[[Ohio]]
*[[Oklahoma]]
*[[Oregon]]
*[[Pennsylvania]]
*[[Rhode Island]]
*[[South Carolina]]
| width="20%"|
*[[South Dakota]]
*[[Tennessee]]
*[[Texas]]
*[[Utah]]
*[[Vermont]]
*[[Virginia]]
*[[Washington]]
*[[West Virginia]]
*[[Wisconsin]]
*[[Wyoming]]
|}

[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]

[[es:Estados Unidos]]</text>
      <sha1>marvny85x4x1aby82mty9sjvoo6fdfv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15122</id>
      <parentid>14486</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-25T14:22:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4878">[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]
'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or other transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates. 

A lot of people in the '''United States''' are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way. More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==Eat==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger Kings, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).

===Dumpster Diving===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]

[[es:Estados Unidos]]</text>
      <sha1>ad21joaxtgmqgw771ab6ab4jw4fq4gd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15288</id>
      <parentid>15122</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-31T20:43:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4952"> For specific state information, have a look at the bottom of this page.
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or other transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates. 

A lot of people in the '''United States''' are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way. More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==Eat==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger Kings, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).

===Dumpster Diving===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]

[[es:Estados Unidos]]</text>
      <sha1>3f0fuikywk1sleh82gt4uqe5fwip2q8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15378</id>
      <parentid>15288</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-04T01:42:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4951">For specific state information, have a look at the bottom of this page.
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the onramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or other transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates. 

A lot of people in the '''United States''' are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way. More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to onramps that have truckstops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Oftentimes, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==Eat==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger Kings, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).

===Dumpster Diving===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]

[[es:Estados Unidos]]</text>
      <sha1>bly5dzap134xgim9cuf8awc60r6tw1y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15453</id>
      <parentid>15378</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-06T16:30:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5280">For specific state information, have a look at the bottom of this page.
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the on-ramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue and behaving correctly.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates. 

A lot of people in the '''United States''' are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

=== Car License Plate ===

Every States are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some staffs or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their property if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==Eat==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger Kings, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).

===Dumpster Diving===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]

[[es:Estados Unidos]]</text>
      <sha1>trvl8m50prf8rpczqn4gc9os54nexkf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16621</id>
      <parentid>15453</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-23T22:01:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5322">Hitchability: {{Good}} to {{Average}}
''For specific state information, have a look at the bottom of this page.''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the on-ramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue and behaving correctly.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates. 

A lot of people in the '''United States''' are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

=== Car License Plate ===

Every States are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some staffs or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their property if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==Eat==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger Kings, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).

===Dumpster Diving===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]

[[es:Estados Unidos]]</text>
      <sha1>b8m8g0glqldp11l4ed42yi84r9543fq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16622</id>
      <parentid>16621</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-23T22:02:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5329">Hitchability: {{Good}} to {{Average}}

'''''For specific state information, have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the on-ramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue and behaving correctly.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates. 

A lot of people in the '''United States''' are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

=== Car License Plate ===

Every States are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some staffs or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their property if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==Eat==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger Kings, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).

===Dumpster Diving===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]

[[es:Estados Unidos]]</text>
      <sha1>q6s78w6fo4dlp7j5t1y5vi0ndw4pib9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16872</id>
      <parentid>16622</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-30T20:47:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5349">{{Infobox Country}}
Hitchability: {{Good}} to {{Average}}

'''''For specific state information, have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the on-ramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue and behaving correctly.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates. 

A lot of people in the '''United States''' are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

=== Car License Plate ===

Every States are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some staffs or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their property if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==Eat==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger Kings, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).

===Dumpster Diving===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]

[[es:Estados Unidos]]</text>
      <sha1>3a4ra29diljj4gtcu0mn8jt572gixh4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17404</id>
      <parentid>16872</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-02T07:15:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5376">{{Infobox Country}}
Hitchability: {{Good}} to {{Average}}

'''''For specific state information, have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the on-ramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue and behaving correctly.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates. 

A lot of people in the '''United States''' are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

=== Car License Plate ===

Every States are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some staffs or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their property if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==Eat==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger Kings, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).

===Dumpster Diving===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[es:Estados Unidos]]</text>
      <sha1>fa21s3xr3kudgg8rlvjg89wm88gci53</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17530</id>
      <parentid>17404</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-03T00:15:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5546">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English, ''Spanish, French (unofficial)''
|capital = [[Washington]]
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Good}} (''good'') to {{Average}} (''average'')
}}


'''''For specific state information, have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the on-ramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue and behaving correctly.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates. 

A lot of people in the '''United States''' are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

=== Car License Plate ===

Every States are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some staffs or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their property if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==Eat==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger Kings, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).

===Dumpster Diving===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[es:Estados Unidos]]</text>
      <sha1>r6qh1uo7tri0ils2267y75bcf04vv69</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17531</id>
      <parentid>17530</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-03T00:16:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5562">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English, ''Spanish, French (unofficial)''
|capital = [[Washington]]
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Good}} (''good'') to {{Average}} (''average'')
|surface = km²
}}


'''''For specific state information, have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the on-ramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue and behaving correctly.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates. 

A lot of people in the '''United States''' are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

=== Car License Plate ===

Every States are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some staffs or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their property if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==Eat==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger Kings, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).

===Dumpster Diving===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[es:Estados Unidos]]</text>
      <sha1>78a0f5ng34qubt0f22ppu1691j38vwz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17532</id>
      <parentid>17531</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-03T00:17:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5560">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English, ''Spanish, French (unofficial State level)''
|capital = [[Washington]]
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Good}} (''good'') to {{Average}} (''average'')
}}


'''''For specific state information, have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the on-ramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue and behaving correctly.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates. 

A lot of people in the '''United States''' are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

=== Car License Plate ===

Every States are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some staffs or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their property if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==Eat==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger Kings, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).

===Dumpster Diving===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:United States|*]]

[[es:Estados Unidos]]</text>
      <sha1>pnx3k1v4b5dgzqr0ays7544sti9w3nc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18184</id>
      <parentid>17532</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-20T23:03:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5560">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English, ''Spanish, French (unofficial State level)''
|capital = [[Washington]]
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Good}} (''good'') to {{Average}} (''average'')
}}


'''''For specific state information, have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the on-ramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue and behaving correctly.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates. 

A lot of people in the '''United States''' are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

=== Car License Plate ===

Every States are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some staffs or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their property if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==Eat==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger Kings, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).

===Dumpster Diving===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States|*]]
[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]

[[es:Estados Unidos]]</text>
      <sha1>4gjjc17bg02zmsu95bgq2l9oovow7vh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19623</id>
      <parentid>18184</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-04-21T11:59:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5579">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English, ''Spanish, French (unofficial State level)''
|capital = [[Washington]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Good}} (''good'') to {{Average}} (''average'')
}}


'''''For specific state information, have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the on-ramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue and behaving correctly.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates. 

A lot of people in the '''United States''' are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

=== Car License Plate ===

Every States are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some staffs or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their property if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==Eat==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger Kings, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).

===Dumpster Diving===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States|*]]
[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]

[[es:Estados Unidos]]</text>
      <sha1>p9qkheq98krkuxtzry2fxl9sa0dh50p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19856</id>
      <parentid>19623</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-05-12T12:34:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Jonathaneo</username>
        <id>195</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5609">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English, ''Spanish, French (unofficial State level)''
|capital = [[Washington]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Good}} (''good'') to {{Average}} (''average'')
}}


'''''For specific state information, have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the on-ramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue and behaving correctly.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates. 

A lot of people in the '''United States''' are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

=== Car License Plate ===

Every States are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some staffs or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their property if not call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==Eat==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger Kings, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).

===Dumpster Diving===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States|*]]
[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]

[[fr:Etats Unis d'Amérique]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]</text>
      <sha1>id7ag4paf8aix2mqqwk061z8nqagdtq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19957</id>
      <parentid>19856</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-05-16T05:56:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>65.81.7.213</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5582">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English, ''Spanish, French (unofficial State level)''
|capital = [[Washington]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Good}} (''good'') to {{Average}} (''average'')
}}


'''''For specific state information, have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the on-ramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates. 

A lot of people in the '''United States''' are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

=== Car License Plate ===

Every States are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some staffs or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their property or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==Eat==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger Kings, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).

===Dumpster Diving===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States|*]]
[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]

[[fr:Etats Unis d'Amérique]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]</text>
      <sha1>21w4h8g8wapf36480twi3lis4i8qaxn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>20005</id>
      <parentid>19957</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-05-18T00:45:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5582">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English, ''Spanish, French (unofficial State level)''
|capital = [[Washington]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Good}} (''good'') to {{Average}} (''average'')
}}


'''''For specific state information, have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the on-ramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates. 

A lot of people in the '''United States''' are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

=== Car License Plate ===

Every States are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some staffs or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their property or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==Eat==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger Kings, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).

===Dumpster Diving===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States|*]]
[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]

[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:Etats Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>m4lydx29hbs9uronkofge2zcpe93upf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>20308</id>
      <parentid>20005</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-05-31T23:04:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5593">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English, ''Spanish, French (unofficial State level)''
|capital = [[Washington]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Good}} (''good'') to {{Average}} (''average'')
}}


'''''For specific state information, have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the on-ramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates. 

A lot of people in the '''United States''' are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

=== Car License Plate ===

Every States are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.

==Long vs. short distance==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some staffs or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their property or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

==Police==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

==Eat==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger Kings, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).

===Dumpster Diving===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States|*]]
[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]

[[de:USA]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:Etats Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>nlm067cs8cw5ftdwpem5rbwwpbovzf4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>20506</id>
      <parentid>20308</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-09T01:19:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5589">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English, ''Spanish, French (unofficial State level)''
|capital = [[Washington]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Good}} (''good'') to {{Average}} (''average'')
}}

'''''For specific state information, have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the on-ramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates. 

A lot of people in the '''United States''' are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

=== Car License Plate ===
Every States are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some staffs or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their property or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

== Eat ==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger Kings, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).

=== Dumpster Diving ===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States of America| ]]

[[de:Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:Etats Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>k6pkrcpiqz2je579k3fyf4lhkroqivn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>20535</id>
      <parentid>20506</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-09T09:02:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5590">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English, ''Spanish, French (unofficial State level)''
|capital = [[Washington]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Good}} (''good'') to {{Average}} (''average'')
}}

'''''For specific state information, have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can´t hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the on-ramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates. 

A lot of people in the '''United States''' are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

=== Car License Plate ===
Every States are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some staffs or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their property or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal - though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

== Eat ==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger Kings, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).

=== Dumpster Diving ===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States of America| ]]

[[de:Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>h4vm1i8fxn0ujb9jftp6cmfahxl0z3f</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21137</id>
      <parentid>20535</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-13T21:03:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5566">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English, ''Spanish, French (unofficial State level)''
|capital = [[Washington]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Good}} to {{Average}}
}}
'''''For specific state information, have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the on-ramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates. 

A lot of people in the '''United States''' are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

=== Car License Plate ===
Every States are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some staffs or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their property or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal – though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

== Eat ==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger Kings, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).

=== Dumpster Diving ===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States of America| ]]

[[de:Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>qmn7pq29cznt1he4jd0lyp66d082zm1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21496</id>
      <parentid>21137</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-18T08:08:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5584">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English, ''Spanish, French (unofficial State level)''
|capital = [[Washington]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Good}} to {{Average}}
}}
'''''For specific state information, have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the on-ramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates. 

A lot of people in the '''United States''' are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

=== Car License Plate ===
Every States are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some staffs or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their property or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal – though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

== Eat ==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger Kings, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).

=== Dumpster Diving ===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States of America| ]]

[[de:Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]
{{IsIn|Americas}}</text>
      <sha1>49jea5e2u4czexl2z6d2rpftywov0io</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21498</id>
      <parentid>21496</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-18T08:09:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5589">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English, ''Spanish, French (unofficial State level)''
|capital = [[Washington]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Good}} to {{Average}}
}}
'''''For specific state information, have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the on-ramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates. 

A lot of people in the '''United States''' are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

=== Car License Plate ===
Every States are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some staffs or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their property or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal – though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

== Eat ==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger Kings, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).

=== Dumpster Diving ===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States of America| ]]

[[de:Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]
{{IsIn|North_America}}</text>
      <sha1>6eyctot548x5w5da1s1ejjkh0ghg2fd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21942</id>
      <parentid>21498</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-21T22:22:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5590">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English, ''Spanish, French (unofficial State level)''
|capital = [[Washington]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Good}} to {{Average}}
}}
'''''For specific state information, have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the on-ramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates. 

A lot of people in the '''United States''' are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

=== Car License Plate ===
Every States are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some staffs or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their property or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal – though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

== Eat ==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger Kings, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).

=== Dumpster Diving ===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States of America| ]]

{{IsIn|North_America}}

[[de:Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>mk5d6nb82p2idkss2svlzideu74zi4d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22445</id>
      <parentid>21942</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-14T00:00:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>98.221.28.197</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5664">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English, ''Spanish, French (unofficial State level)''
|capital = [[Washington]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Good}} to {{Average}}
}}
'''''For specific state information, have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the on-ramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates. 

A lot of people in the '''United States''' are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

=== Car License Plate ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  It might be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some staffs or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their property or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal – though in most it's not. Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.

== Eat ==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger Kings, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).

=== Dumpster Diving ===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States of America| ]]

{{IsIn|North_America}}

[[de:Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>74uo10r7wpkwtm2pj3s1wvu593ehyfc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22954</id>
      <parentid>22445</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-27T20:40:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>12.156.88.143</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6361">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English, ''Spanish, French (unofficial State level)''
|capital = [[Washington]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Good}} to {{Average}}
}}
'''''For specific state information, have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the on-ramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates. 

A lot of people in the '''United States''' are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

=== Car License Plate ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  It might be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some staffs or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their property or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In some states, like [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, hitchhiking is illegal.  Even if it's not actually illegal, the police can ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''.  Corrrection:  In most states there are laws against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated.  Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic.  If the police pass and see a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but they technically have no reason to pull you over.  As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser.  The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly, but police rarely give tickets to hitchhikers... they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Eat ==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger Kings, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).

=== Dumpster Diving ===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States of America| ]]

{{IsIn|North_America}}

[[de:Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>mvtnn7hd7tiv6bcveao5ig9hhu8jtrj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22955</id>
      <parentid>22954</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-27T20:49:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robino</username>
        <id>4</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6271">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English, ''Spanish, French (unofficial State level)''
|capital = [[Washington]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Good}} to {{Average}}
}}
'''''For specific state information, have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the on-ramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates. 

A lot of people in the '''United States''' are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

=== Car License Plate ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  It might be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some staffs or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their property or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are laws against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police pass and see a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but they technically have no reason to pull you over.  As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly, but police rarely give tickets to hitchhikers, they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Eat ==
On the back of receipts at all Burger King restaurants in the U.S., there is a toll-free phone number and a blank coupon. Call the number and you will be connected to an automated customer satisfaction poll. At the end of the poll, you will be given a code to enter into the blank spot on the coupon on the back of your receipt. The coupon is good for a free chicken sandwich or small whopper with purchase of a drink or fries. Pick up a large cup outside in the rubbish and refill it inside free of charge. At some Burger Kings, your meal is free if they don't give you a receipt (there's no way you can lose!).

=== Dumpster Diving ===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States of America| ]]

{{IsIn|North_America}}

[[de:Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>4u0r6whxhthkq7f2gxaz3sfcd7fhn0a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26339</id>
      <parentid>22955</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-17T18:07:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>207.190.109.194</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5779">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English, ''Spanish, French (unofficial State level)''
|capital = [[Washington]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Good}} to {{Average}}
}}
'''''For specific state information, have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the on-ramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates. 

A lot of people in the '''United States''' are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

=== Car License Plate ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  It might be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some staffs or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their property or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are laws against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police pass and see a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but they technically have no reason to pull you over.  As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly, but police rarely give tickets to hitchhikers, they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Eat ==
To obtain free drinks, it is often simple to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants and refill them.

=== Dumpster Diving ===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States of America| ]]

{{IsIn|North_America}}

[[de:Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>g39zut8wnku723rg7ttbgxys2ikh24g</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29065</id>
      <parentid>26339</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-10T08:27:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5815">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English, ''Spanish, French (unofficial State level)''
|capital = [[Washington]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Good}} to {{Average}}
}}
'''''For specific state information, have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the on-ramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates. 

A lot of people in the '''United States''' are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

=== Car License Plate ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  It might be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, gas stations, etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some staffs or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their property or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the police will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are laws against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police pass and see a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but they technically have no reason to pull you over.  As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly, but police rarely give tickets to hitchhikers, they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Eat ==
To obtain free drinks, it is often simple to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants and refill them.

=== Dumpster Diving ===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for Dumpster Diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food (Trader Joe's is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States of America| ]]

{{IsIn|North_America}}

[[de:Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]

[[trash:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>6kphu25dt1fs29s32c20yuunt7yfvtk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29069</id>
      <parentid>29065</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-10T08:32:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5962">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English, ''Spanish, French (unofficial State level)''
|capital = [[Washington]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Good}} to {{Average}}
}}
'''''For specific state information, have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the on-ramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates. 

A lot of people in the '''United States''' are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

=== Car License Plate ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  It might be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some staffs or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their property or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police pass and see a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but they technically have no reason to pull you over.  As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly, but police rarely give tickets to hitchhikers, they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Eat ==
To obtain free drinks, it is often simple to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants and refill them.

=== Dumpster Diving ===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.  ''Check [[trash:United States of America|Trashwiki for detailed dumpster diving info of the United States]].''


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States of America| ]]

{{IsIn|North_America}}

[[de:Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]

[[trash:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>rxzitnfmn209ib8au53eo4cixw6g7zq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29070</id>
      <parentid>29069</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-10T08:33:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5964">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English, ''Spanish, French (unofficial State level)''
|capital = [[Washington]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Good}} to {{Average}}
}}
'''''For specific state information, have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact oftentimes you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates (motorways) themselves, but you can always stand on the on-ramp (entry ramp) like in [[Europe]]. In a select few areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however de facto it is still allowed. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue.  There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on ramps and off ramps) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on ramp).

In the West Coast it's generally easier to hitchhike. In [[Oregon]] it's even legal to hitchhike right on the interstates. 

A lot of people in the '''United States''' are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people! Most of the time [[User:Guaka|Guaka]] was dropped off exactly at his point of destination.

=== Car License Plate ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  It might be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways.  Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, rest stops, or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some staffs or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their property or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads.  There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police pass and see a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but they technically have no reason to pull you over.  As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly, but police rarely give tickets to hitchhikers, they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Eat ==
To obtain free drinks, it is often simple to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants and refill them.

=== Dumpster Diving ===
The United States among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.  ''Check [[:trash:United States of America|Trashwiki for detailed dumpster diving info of the United States]].''


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States of America| ]]

{{IsIn|North_America}}

[[de:Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]

[[trash:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>imt8a1is1jnq9yg6vaqihd2aad4gkcd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30222</id>
      <parentid>29070</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-19T05:10:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sigurdas</username>
        <id>1658</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6060">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto)
|capital = [[Washington]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as, for example, shows hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  It might be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Eat ==
To obtain free drinks, it is often simple to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants and refill them.

=== Dumpster Diving ===
The United States are among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.  ''Check [[:trash:United States of America|Trashwiki]] for detailed information on dumpster diving in the United States.''


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:North America]]

{{IsIn|North_America}}

[[de:Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]

[[trash:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>jpg1metjrihdttdn91hkh801qhobnv7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30732</id>
      <parentid>30222</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-03T08:56:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>69.131.148.103</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6291">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto)
|capital = [[Washington]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as, for example, shows hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  It might be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Eat ==
To obtain free drinks, it is often simple to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants and refill them.

=== Dumpster Diving ===
The United States are among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check [[:trash:United States of America|Trashwiki]] for detailed information on dumpster diving in the United States.''


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:North America]]

{{IsIn|North_America}}

[[de:Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]

[[trash:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>frai56674kzidtgaiyn5uu3w9m0lbet</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30903</id>
      <parentid>30732</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-08T01:39:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6266">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto)
|capital = [[Washington]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as, for example, shows hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  It might be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Eat ==
To obtain free drinks, it is often simple to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants and refill them.

=== Dumpster Diving ===
The United States are among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check [[:trash:United States of America|Trashwiki]] for detailed information on dumpster diving in the United States.''


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States| ]]

{{IsIn|North America}}

[[de:Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]

[[trash:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>g9hjyxuit3pmk31kcr5iz0t28612y8f</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30905</id>
      <parentid>30903</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-08T01:45:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6265">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto)
|capital = [[Washington]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US are bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as, for example, shows hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  It might be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Eat ==
To obtain free drinks, it is often simple to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants and refill them.

=== Dumpster Diving ===
The United States are among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check [[:trash:United States of America|Trashwiki]] for detailed information on dumpster diving in the United States.''


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States| ]]

{{IsIn|North America}}

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]

[[trash:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>t8lg9yf8tfsfdonekj1ws87jtdqvpz9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31706</id>
      <parentid>30905</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-14T02:20:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>12.99.127.246</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6264">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto)
|capital = [[Washington]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as, for example, shows hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  It might be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Eat ==
To obtain free drinks, it is often simple to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants and refill them.

=== Dumpster Diving ===
The United States are among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check [[:trash:United States of America|Trashwiki]] for detailed information on dumpster diving in the United States.''


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States| ]]

{{IsIn|North America}}

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]

[[trash:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>cygmmsczi2xo9s87x23hlswqcm0nfg2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31707</id>
      <parentid>31706</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-14T02:22:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>12.99.127.246</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6263">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto)
|capital = [[Washington]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  It might be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Eat ==
To obtain free drinks, it is often simple to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants and refill them.

=== Dumpster Diving ===
The United States are among the top of wasteful societies (if not ''the'' top). The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check [[:trash:United States of America|Trashwiki]] for detailed information on dumpster diving in the United States.''


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States| ]]

{{IsIn|North America}}

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]

[[trash:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>cqiu6o3euht03u00cq9a3u2g9kznuzk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31708</id>
      <parentid>31707</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-14T02:26:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>12.99.127.246</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6269">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto)
|capital = [[Washington]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  It might be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Eat ==
To obtain free drinks, it is often simple to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants and refill them.

=== Dumpster Diving ===
The United States has a culture of throwing many useful things and food in the trash. The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas. Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States| ]]

{{IsIn|North America}}

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]

[[trash:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>gyukg74y401q3tmgz874b4gc20ie921</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31709</id>
      <parentid>31708</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-14T02:27:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>12.99.127.246</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6482">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto)
|capital = [[Washington]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  It might be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Eat ==
To obtain free drinks, it is often simple to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants and refill them.

=== Dumpster Diving ===
The United States has a culture of throwing many useful things and food in the trash. The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.


Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States| ]]

{{IsIn|North America}}

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]

[[trash:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>r76zddbkmnx9rxn4iwby7jz1os006s3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31710</id>
      <parentid>31709</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-14T02:29:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>12.99.127.246</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6490">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto)
|capital = [[Washington]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  It might be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==
== Drink ==
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.

=== Eat ===
The United States has a culture of throwing many useful things and food in the trash. The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.


Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States| ]]

{{IsIn|North America}}

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]

[[trash:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>rjupvar9ezanwt4lhsqcyf7r1sn8l67</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31711</id>
      <parentid>31710</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-14T02:29:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>12.99.127.246</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6491">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto)
|capital = [[Washington]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  It might be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==
*** Drink ***
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.

=== Eat ===
The United States has a culture of throwing many useful things and food in the trash. The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.


Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States| ]]

{{IsIn|North America}}

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]

[[trash:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>eumd7wjdjryhf4btlbdhglaabzimct8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31712</id>
      <parentid>31711</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-14T02:30:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>12.99.127.246</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6493">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto)
|capital = [[Washington]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  It might be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==
''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.

''' Eat: '''
The United States has a culture of throwing many useful things and food in the trash. The advent of urban sprawl has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.


Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States| ]]

{{IsIn|North America}}

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]

[[trash:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>fp5soo8hbfq9nqojel2wshkmi4vkgkd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31713</id>
      <parentid>31712</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-14T02:31:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>12.99.127.246</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6530">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto)
|capital = [[Washington]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  It might be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==
''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.

''' Eat: '''
The advent of urban sprawl, and the The United States' culture of throwing many useful things and food in the trash has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.


Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States| ]]

{{IsIn|North America}}

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]

[[trash:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>lsvygu9s2ufl4qsy1ny6g0fqkmhdv83</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31714</id>
      <parentid>31713</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-14T02:32:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>12.99.127.246</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6530">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto)
|capital = [[Washington]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  It might be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==
''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.


''' Eat: '''
The advent of urban sprawl, and the The United States' culture of throwing many useful things and food in the trash has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] is really wasteful and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States| ]]

{{IsIn|North America}}

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]

[[trash:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>p6l0e4jz8c9mjbm68o418rlqlf5qprx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31715</id>
      <parentid>31714</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-14T02:34:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>12.99.127.246</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6562">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto)
|capital = [[Washington]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  It might be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==
''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.


''' Eat: '''
The advent of urban sprawl, and the The United States' culture of throwing many useful things and food in the trash has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] is especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States| ]]

{{IsIn|North America}}

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]

[[trash:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>d89d4l1atfw1mma0x35kdy8v7m4recu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32125</id>
      <parentid>31715</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-04-09T20:05:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>98.244.56.151</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6565">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto)
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  It might be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==
''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.


''' Eat: '''
The advent of urban sprawl, and the The United States' culture of throwing many useful things and food in the trash has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] is especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States| ]]

{{IsIn|North America}}

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]

[[trash:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>8jbawr3khmpvjmdolv00nxp5mzjv9v4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>33761</id>
      <parentid>32125</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-06-03T01:26:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6743">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto)
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as your. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==
''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.


''' Eat: '''
The advent of urban sprawl, and the The United States' culture of throwing many useful things and food in the trash has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] is especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States| ]]

{{IsIn|North America}}

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]

[[trash:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>a5vuodknk0az6og3vnjaygaknl3yic0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>34256</id>
      <parentid>33761</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-01T14:30:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>62.235.152.29</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6753">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto)
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], Virginia and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as your. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==
''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.


''' Eat: '''
The advent of urban sprawl, and the The United States' culture of throwing many useful things and food in the trash has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] is especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States| ]]

{{IsIn|North America}}

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]

[[trash:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>rzvq7ky2a1jgcxxi9xoa1q9g62oi639</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>34257</id>
      <parentid>34256</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-01T14:31:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>62.235.152.29</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6757">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto)
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[Image:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[user talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as your. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==
''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.


''' Eat: '''
The advent of urban sprawl, and the The United States' culture of throwing many useful things and food in the trash has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] is especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States| ]]

{{IsIn|North America}}

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]

[[trash:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>t1ljfneifzfu6g8lntr00ene5efao1x</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35592</id>
      <parentid>34257</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T19:14:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6756">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto)
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as your. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==
''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.


''' Eat: '''
The advent of urban sprawl, and the The United States' culture of throwing many useful things and food in the trash has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] is especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]</text>
      <sha1>ey4mviiqv6mbgm3xafaicobolejx2l5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>37805</id>
      <parentid>35592</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-10-09T23:09:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6755">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto)
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious. If you're not, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as your. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==
''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.


''' Eat: '''
The advent of urban sprawl, and the The United States' culture of throwing many useful things and food in the trash has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] is especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>9f3bnhv6tv5w6imqaskkwj5xkhnjraq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38267</id>
      <parentid>37805</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-10-26T23:14:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>206.108.168.131</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6652">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto)
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Naturally, it is difficult to predict the precise point at which you will be dropped off.  If you are lucky, you may be dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as your. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==
''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.


''' Eat: '''
The advent of urban sprawl, and the The United States' culture of throwing many useful things and food in the trash has the side-effect of creating many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] is especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>6q6902crjxxp4f0idh22gkrh4oa500w</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38270</id>
      <parentid>38267</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-10-26T23:32:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>206.108.168.131</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6554">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto)
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Naturally, it is difficult to predict the precise point at which you will be dropped off.  If you are lucky, you may be dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as your. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==
''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.


''' Eat: '''
Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] is especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>jdybqjyfl5rpfxtkholl0qbs3vpgibn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38273</id>
      <parentid>38270</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-10-26T23:37:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6728">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto)
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as your. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==
''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.


''' Eat: '''
Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] is especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>nxsbfb9obucr4opt2jjd0bfls3z0u5o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38552</id>
      <parentid>38273</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-11-24T09:16:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>75.102.200.45</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6756">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto)
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as your. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==
''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.


''' Eat: '''
Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>jr1yq91zj5y1vvryfsog4xubf960xwl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38805</id>
      <parentid>38552</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-12-05T08:13:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>82.181.180.28</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6804">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as your. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==
''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.


''' Eat: '''
Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>9upmzu4qe4bj6xinxeopavmab7krwxo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38992</id>
      <parentid>38805</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-12-21T18:32:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>71.22.35.65</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6813">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as you are going. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==
''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.


''' Eat: '''
Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>5xf49kk8w6dfqdpt2gd2ve1hm9hy0uj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39369</id>
      <parentid>38992</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-01-14T15:23:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sketch</username>
        <id>2217</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7543">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as you are going. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''
Look, if you are friendly, at least in my experience in the US (I have never been elsewhere) people will offer to buy you food at restaurants ALL THE TIME. Aditionally, they will just throw you some bucks to eat to. From change to $100. $100 dollars has happened to me twice. $60 dollars has happened to me several times and I have been given so many twenties... The key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what do you do to eat- "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (Sad and scrappy slight but pointed emphasis on the "some"- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout- *for which you should thank them profusely*, of course. :)

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.

{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>i918enxeqyj3nh8vvkpnzyw49ux7xjj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39370</id>
      <parentid>39369</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-01-14T15:24:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sketch</username>
        <id>2217</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7544">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as you are going. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''
Look, if you are friendly, at least in my experience in the US (I have never been elsewhere) people will offer to buy you food at restaurants ALL THE TIME. Aditionally, they will just throw you some bucks to eat to. From change to $100. $100 dollars has happened to me twice. $60 dollars has happened to me several times and I have been given so many twenties... The key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what do you do to eat- "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (Sad and scrappy slight but pointed emphasis on the "some")- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout- *for which you should thank them profusely*, of course. :)

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.

{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>lvv586n7aawwyobnwphf1vhqrdmt0z1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39371</id>
      <parentid>39370</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-01-14T15:25:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sketch</username>
        <id>2217</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7542">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as you are going. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''
Look, if you are friendly, at least in my experience in the US (I have never been elsewhere) people will offer to buy you food at restaurants ALL THE TIME. Aditionally, they will just throw you some bucks to eat. From change to $100. $100 dollars has happened to us twice. $60 dollars has happened to us several times and we have been given so many twenties... The key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what do you do to eat- "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (Sad and scrappy slight but pointed emphasis on the "some")- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout- *for which you should thank them profusely*, of course. :)

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.

{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>p0ofy2piw4uh9haplvw5j97l2r3dgpi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39411</id>
      <parentid>39371</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-01-15T17:45:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sketch</username>
        <id>2217</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7913">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as you are going. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''
Look, if you are friendly, at least in my experience in the US (I have never been elsewhere) people who pick you up will offer to buy you food at restaurants ALL THE TIME. Additionally, they will just throw you some bucks to eat. From change to $100. $100 dollars has happened to us twice. $60 dollars has happened to us several times and we have been given so many twenties... The key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what do you do to eat- "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (Sad and scrappy slight but pointed emphasis on the "some")- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout- *for which you should thank them profusely*, of course. :)

If you are a vegan traveling between cities, prepare to starve. Or carry your own food somehow, I dunno. Yeah, if you can't eat eggs OR milk, you can't eat eggs OR icecream, really the only non meat dishes in McDonalds type situations besides frenchfries and onionrings- pure carbohydrates. If you want any protein your gonna have to bring it yourself.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.

{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>ni6and8ew7o90qwnhpmo7jidoqyij12</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41329</id>
      <parentid>39411</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-13T03:08:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>24.29.233.163</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8206">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as you are going. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.  Some licnese plates display the name of the county.  Others have a number that represents the county.

There are many licnese plates to look at while on the road.  Flat license plates are gay.  Bonus points if you spot a license plate from Canada (especially if you are not near the border).

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''
Look, if you are friendly, at least in my experience in the US (I have never been elsewhere) people who pick you up will offer to buy you food at restaurants ALL THE TIME. Additionally, they will just throw you some bucks to eat. From change to $100. $100 dollars has happened to us twice. $60 dollars has happened to us several times and we have been given so many twenties... The key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what do you do to eat- "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (Sad and scrappy slight but pointed emphasis on the "some")- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout- *for which you should thank them profusely*, of course. :)

If you are a vegan traveling between cities, prepare to starve. Or carry your own food somehow, I dunno. Yeah, if you can't eat eggs OR milk, you can't eat eggs OR icecream, really the only non meat dishes in McDonalds type situations besides frenchfries and onionrings- pure carbohydrates. If you want any protein your gonna have to bring it yourself.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.

{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>jutn86ojjeogd9s2dsi8u37l4kisk6j</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41373</id>
      <parentid>41329</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-13T06:48:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7913">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as you are going. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''
Look, if you are friendly, at least in my experience in the US (I have never been elsewhere) people who pick you up will offer to buy you food at restaurants ALL THE TIME. Additionally, they will just throw you some bucks to eat. From change to $100. $100 dollars has happened to us twice. $60 dollars has happened to us several times and we have been given so many twenties... The key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what do you do to eat- "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (Sad and scrappy slight but pointed emphasis on the "some")- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout- *for which you should thank them profusely*, of course. :)

If you are a vegan traveling between cities, prepare to starve. Or carry your own food somehow, I dunno. Yeah, if you can't eat eggs OR milk, you can't eat eggs OR icecream, really the only non meat dishes in McDonalds type situations besides frenchfries and onionrings- pure carbohydrates. If you want any protein your gonna have to bring it yourself.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.

{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>ni6and8ew7o90qwnhpmo7jidoqyij12</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41892</id>
      <parentid>41373</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-05-12T18:08:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>204.187.76.9</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7888">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = o
|currency = Canadian Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a province is divided up into 51 states; for the convenience of the common hitcher these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Europe]] to the South.

Bitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[California]], [[Arkansas]] and [[Nunavut]], on the East Coast and [[Vermont]] and [[Delaware]] in the West, there are [[people]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''nudity he police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check PGHut technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as you are going. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''
Look, if you are friendly, at least in my experience in the US (I have never been elsewhere) people who pick you up will offer to buy you food at restaurants ALL THE TIME. Additionally, they will just throw you some pucks to eat. From change to 0000. $-100dollars has happened to us twice. $01 dollars has happened to us several times and we have been given so many twenties... The key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what do you do to eat- "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (Sad and scrappy slight but pointed emphasis on the "some")- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout- *for which you should thank them profusely*, of course. :)

If you are a meat eater goingbetween cities, prepare to love it Or carry your own food somehow, I dunno. Yeah, if you can't eat eggs OR milk, you can't eat eggs OR icecream, really the only non meat dishes in McDonalds type situations besides frenchfries and onionrings- pure carbohydrates. If you want any protein your gonna have to bring it yourself.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.

{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>4xyg8zprdxezomwf6au6y3ovze6vrs0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41899</id>
      <parentid>41892</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-05-12T19:36:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kb</username>
        <id>1332</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7913">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as you are going. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''
Look, if you are friendly, at least in my experience in the US (I have never been elsewhere) people who pick you up will offer to buy you food at restaurants ALL THE TIME. Additionally, they will just throw you some bucks to eat. From change to $100. $100 dollars has happened to us twice. $60 dollars has happened to us several times and we have been given so many twenties... The key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what do you do to eat- "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (Sad and scrappy slight but pointed emphasis on the "some")- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout- *for which you should thank them profusely*, of course. :)

If you are a vegan traveling between cities, prepare to starve. Or carry your own food somehow, I dunno. Yeah, if you can't eat eggs OR milk, you can't eat eggs OR icecream, really the only non meat dishes in McDonalds type situations besides frenchfries and onionrings- pure carbohydrates. If you want any protein your gonna have to bring it yourself.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.

{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>ni6and8ew7o90qwnhpmo7jidoqyij12</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>43998</id>
      <parentid>41899</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-08-12T13:17:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>221.134.108.201</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7914">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.a

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as you are going. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''
Look, if you are friendly, at least in my experience in the US (I have never been elsewhere) people who pick you up will offer to buy you food at restaurants ALL THE TIME. Additionally, they will just throw you some bucks to eat. From change to $100. $100 dollars has happened to us twice. $60 dollars has happened to us several times and we have been given so many twenties... The key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what do you do to eat- "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (Sad and scrappy slight but pointed emphasis on the "some")- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout- *for which you should thank them profusely*, of course. :)

If you are a vegan traveling between cities, prepare to starve. Or carry your own food somehow, I dunno. Yeah, if you can't eat eggs OR milk, you can't eat eggs OR icecream, really the only non meat dishes in McDonalds type situations besides frenchfries and onionrings- pure carbohydrates. If you want any protein your gonna have to bring it yourself.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.

{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>98ul2cwt5pt9n4ubkupx03rk6i4d8j4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>43999</id>
      <parentid>43998</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-08-12T13:17:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>221.134.108.201</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7915">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.mu

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as you are going. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''
Look, if you are friendly, at least in my experience in the US (I have never been elsewhere) people who pick you up will offer to buy you food at restaurants ALL THE TIME. Additionally, they will just throw you some bucks to eat. From change to $100. $100 dollars has happened to us twice. $60 dollars has happened to us several times and we have been given so many twenties... The key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what do you do to eat- "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (Sad and scrappy slight but pointed emphasis on the "some")- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout- *for which you should thank them profusely*, of course. :)

If you are a vegan traveling between cities, prepare to starve. Or carry your own food somehow, I dunno. Yeah, if you can't eat eggs OR milk, you can't eat eggs OR icecream, really the only non meat dishes in McDonalds type situations besides frenchfries and onionrings- pure carbohydrates. If you want any protein your gonna have to bring it yourself.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.

{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>o0q3zrjed4zlsa4cyu7e5w7cgdspmup</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44000</id>
      <parentid>43999</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-08-12T13:26:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>221.134.108.201</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7913">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as you are going. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''
Look, if you are friendly, at least in my experience in the US (I have never been elsewhere) people who pick you up will offer to buy you food at restaurants ALL THE TIME. Additionally, they will just throw you some bucks to eat. From change to $100. $100 dollars has happened to us twice. $60 dollars has happened to us several times and we have been given so many twenties... The key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what do you do to eat- "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (Sad and scrappy slight but pointed emphasis on the "some")- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout- *for which you should thank them profusely*, of course. :)

If you are a vegan traveling between cities, prepare to starve. Or carry your own food somehow, I dunno. Yeah, if you can't eat eggs OR milk, you can't eat eggs OR icecream, really the only non meat dishes in McDonalds type situations besides frenchfries and onionrings- pure carbohydrates. If you want any protein your gonna have to bring it yourself.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.

{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>ni6and8ew7o90qwnhpmo7jidoqyij12</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48499</id>
      <parentid>44000</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-31T22:28:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>69.251.176.110</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8005">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as you are going. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''
Look, if you are friendly, at least in my experience in the US (I have never been elsewhere) people who pick you up will offer to buy you food at restaurants ALL THE TIME. Additionally, they will just throw you some bucks to eat. From change to $100. $100 dollars has happened to us twice. $60 dollars has happened to us several times and we have been given so many twenties... The key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what do you do to eat- "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (Sad and scrappy slight but pointed emphasis on the "some")- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout- *for which you should thank them profusely*, of course. :)

If you are a vegan traveling between cities, prepare to starve. Or carry your own food somehow, I dunno. Yeah, if you can't eat eggs OR milk, you can't eat eggs OR icecream, really the only non meat dishes in McDonalds type situations besides frenchfries and onionrings- pure carbohydrates. If you want any protein your gonna have to bring it yourself.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.

{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>2o0o65vj0fhx3j8go1xea2cnwsazspy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>50187</id>
      <parentid>48499</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-03-15T01:51:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>71.193.192.162</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8433">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays.  Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as you are going. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''
Look, if you are friendly, at least in my experience in the US (I have never been elsewhere) people who pick you up will offer to buy you food at restaurants ALL THE TIME. Additionally, they will just throw you some bucks to eat. From change to $100. $100 dollars has happened to us twice. $60 dollars has happened to us several times and we have been given so many twenties... The key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what do you do to eat- "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (Sad and scrappy slight but pointed emphasis on the "some")- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout- *for which you should thank them profusely*, of course. :)

If you are a vegan traveling between cities, prepare to starve. Or carry your own food somehow, I dunno. Yeah, if you can't eat eggs OR milk, you can't eat eggs OR icecream, really the only non meat dishes in McDonalds type situations besides frenchfries and onionrings- pure carbohydrates. If you want any protein your gonna have to bring it yourself.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.

{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>pmy5l49fvgojsbte683dx4fv8mgcw0l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>50254</id>
      <parentid>50187</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-03-21T09:10:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Quarim</username>
        <id>1290</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8542">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays.  Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumnavigated. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as you are going. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''
Look, if you are friendly, at least in my experience in the US (I have never been elsewhere) people who pick you up will offer to buy you food at restaurants ALL THE TIME. Additionally, they will just throw you some bucks to eat. From change to $100. $100 dollars has happened to us twice. $60 dollars has happened to us several times and we have been given so many twenties... The key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what do you do to eat- "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (Sad and scrappy slight but pointed emphasis on the "some")- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout- *for which you should thank them profusely*, of course. :)

If you are a vegan traveling between cities, prepare to starve. Or carry your own food somehow, I dunno. Yeah, if you can't eat eggs OR milk, you can't eat eggs OR icecream, really the only non meat dishes in McDonalds type situations besides frenchfries and onionrings- pure carbohydrates. If you want any protein your gonna have to bring it yourself.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.

== Links ==
* [http://www.hitchhiker.50megs.com/custom.html|About laws against hitchhiking for each state]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>r9oge08xokox8kwoidglwbri4wzsw8g</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>50298</id>
      <parentid>50254</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-03-22T00:59:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>24.152.191.86</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8539">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays.  Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred kilometers, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as you are going. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''
Look, if you are friendly, at least in my experience in the US (I have never been elsewhere) people who pick you up will offer to buy you food at restaurants ALL THE TIME. Additionally, they will just throw you some bucks to eat. From change to $100. $100 dollars has happened to us twice. $60 dollars has happened to us several times and we have been given so many twenties... The key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what do you do to eat- "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (Sad and scrappy slight but pointed emphasis on the "some")- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout- *for which you should thank them profusely*, of course. :)

If you are a vegan traveling between cities, prepare to starve. Or carry your own food somehow, I dunno. Yeah, if you can't eat eggs OR milk, you can't eat eggs OR icecream, really the only non meat dishes in McDonalds type situations besides frenchfries and onionrings- pure carbohydrates. If you want any protein your gonna have to bring it yourself.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.

== Links ==
* [http://www.hitchhiker.50megs.com/custom.html|About laws against hitchhiking for each state]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>s9yh5or2wxbv83snopavc2qirh8l9c5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>50345</id>
      <parentid>50298</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-03-23T16:46:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>98.27.150.182</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8534">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays.  Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as you are going. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''
Look, if you are friendly, at least in my experience in the US (I have never been elsewhere) people who pick you up will offer to buy you food at restaurants ALL THE TIME. Additionally, they will just throw you some bucks to eat. From change to $100. $100 dollars has happened to us twice. $60 dollars has happened to us several times and we have been given so many twenties... The key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what do you do to eat- "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (Sad and scrappy slight but pointed emphasis on the "some")- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout- *for which you should thank them profusely*, of course. :)

If you are a vegan traveling between cities, prepare to starve. Or carry your own food somehow, I dunno. Yeah, if you can't eat eggs OR milk, you can't eat eggs OR icecream, really the only non meat dishes in McDonalds type situations besides frenchfries and onionrings- pure carbohydrates. If you want any protein your gonna have to bring it yourself.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.

== Links ==
* [http://www.hitchhiker.50megs.com/custom.html|About laws against hitchhiking for each state]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>64q04j2mk1h85z62510agjzhud3q73j</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>51897</id>
      <parentid>50345</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-04-20T00:10:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>98.242.109.166</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8693">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays.  Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
The Police in the United States are often aliens from another world. When you talk to them just say "OY YO OY YO", they will understand and leave you alone. 

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as you are going. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''
Look, if you are friendly, at least in my experience in the US (I have never been elsewhere) people who pick you up will offer to buy you food at restaurants ALL THE TIME. Additionally, they will just throw you some bucks to eat. From change to $100. $100 dollars has happened to us twice. $60 dollars has happened to us several times and we have been given so many twenties... The key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what do you do to eat- "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (Sad and scrappy slight but pointed emphasis on the "some")- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout- *for which you should thank them profusely*, of course. :)

If you are a vegan traveling between cities, prepare to starve. Or carry your own food somehow, I dunno. Yeah, if you can't eat eggs OR milk, you can't eat eggs OR icecream, really the only non meat dishes in McDonalds type situations besides frenchfries and onionrings- pure carbohydrates. If you want any protein your gonna have to bring it yourself.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.

== Links ==
* [http://www.hitchhiker.50megs.com/custom.html|About laws against hitchhiking for each state]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>nj2rx7vxouiv3fcu4yyl72xy9sggmy9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>51898</id>
      <parentid>51897</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-04-20T00:58:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8534">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays.  Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as you are going. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''
Look, if you are friendly, at least in my experience in the US (I have never been elsewhere) people who pick you up will offer to buy you food at restaurants ALL THE TIME. Additionally, they will just throw you some bucks to eat. From change to $100. $100 dollars has happened to us twice. $60 dollars has happened to us several times and we have been given so many twenties... The key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what do you do to eat- "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (Sad and scrappy slight but pointed emphasis on the "some")- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout- *for which you should thank them profusely*, of course. :)

If you are a vegan traveling between cities, prepare to starve. Or carry your own food somehow, I dunno. Yeah, if you can't eat eggs OR milk, you can't eat eggs OR icecream, really the only non meat dishes in McDonalds type situations besides frenchfries and onionrings- pure carbohydrates. If you want any protein your gonna have to bring it yourself.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them.

== Links ==
* [http://www.hitchhiker.50megs.com/custom.html|About laws against hitchhiking for each state]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>64q04j2mk1h85z62510agjzhud3q73j</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>52540</id>
      <parentid>51898</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-05-19T23:38:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8619">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays.  Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as you are going. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''
Look, if you are friendly, at least in my experience in the US (I have never been elsewhere) people who pick you up will offer to buy you food at restaurants ALL THE TIME. Additionally, they will just throw you some bucks to eat. From change to $100. $100 dollars has happened to us twice. $60 dollars has happened to us several times and we have been given so many twenties... The key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what do you do to eat- "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (Sad and scrappy slight but pointed emphasis on the "some")- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout- *for which you should thank them profusely*, of course. :)

If you are a vegan traveling between cities, prepare to starve. Or carry your own food somehow, I dunno. Yeah, if you can't eat eggs OR milk, you can't eat eggs OR icecream, really the only non meat dishes in McDonalds type situations besides frenchfries and onionrings- pure carbohydrates. If you want any protein your gonna have to bring it yourself.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as anywhere else in the world.

== Links ==
* [http://www.hitchhiker.50megs.com/custom.html|About laws against hitchhiking for each state]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>0cedx9xxql6lgxkp6qsxfgbp3f1u9gl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>52548</id>
      <parentid>52540</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-05-21T03:03:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>N0id</username>
        <id>2043</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8626">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = {{Average}} to {{Good}}
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays.  Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as you are going. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''
Look, if you are friendly, at least in my experience in the US (I have never been elsewhere) people who pick you up will offer to buy you food at restaurants ALL THE TIME. Additionally, they will just throw you some bucks to eat. From change to $100. $100 dollars has happened to us twice. $60 dollars has happened to us several times and we have been given so many twenties... The key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what do you do to eat- "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (Sad and scrappy slight but pointed emphasis on the "some")- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout- *for which you should thank them profusely*, of course. :)

If you are a vegan traveling between cities, prepare to starve. Or carry your own food somehow, I dunno. Yeah, if you can't eat eggs OR milk, you can't eat eggs OR icecream, really the only non meat dishes in McDonalds type situations besides frenchfries and onionrings- pure carbohydrates. If you want any protein your gonna have to bring it yourself.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as some other countries of the world.

== Links ==
* [http://www.hitchhiker.50megs.com/custom.html|About laws against hitchhiking for each state]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>o3gr1sglkh28ixrgadgyr5uzgrzsua3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>54520</id>
      <parentid>52548</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-09-05T13:16:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8626">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays.  Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as you are going. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''
Look, if you are friendly, at least in my experience in the US (I have never been elsewhere) people who pick you up will offer to buy you food at restaurants ALL THE TIME. Additionally, they will just throw you some bucks to eat. From change to $100. $100 dollars has happened to us twice. $60 dollars has happened to us several times and we have been given so many twenties... The key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what do you do to eat- "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (Sad and scrappy slight but pointed emphasis on the "some")- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout- *for which you should thank them profusely*, of course. :)

If you are a vegan traveling between cities, prepare to starve. Or carry your own food somehow, I dunno. Yeah, if you can't eat eggs OR milk, you can't eat eggs OR icecream, really the only non meat dishes in McDonalds type situations besides frenchfries and onionrings- pure carbohydrates. If you want any protein your gonna have to bring it yourself.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as some other countries of the world.

== Links ==
* [http://www.hitchhiker.50megs.com/custom.html|About laws against hitchhiking for each state]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>1mye2ljhhnbshpd8dhzsa5sgb5z7jkp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>55080</id>
      <parentid>54520</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-09-23T01:03:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8635">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays.  Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as you are going. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''
Look, if you are friendly, at least in my experience in the US (I have never been elsewhere) people who pick you up will offer to buy you food at restaurants ALL THE TIME. Additionally, they will just throw you some bucks to eat. From change to $100. $100 dollars has happened to us twice. $60 dollars has happened to us several times and we have been given so many twenties... The key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what do you do to eat- "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (Sad and scrappy slight but pointed emphasis on the "some")- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout- *for which you should thank them profusely*, of course. :)

If you are a vegan traveling between cities, prepare to starve. Or carry your own food somehow, I dunno. Yeah, if you can't eat eggs OR milk, you can't eat eggs OR icecream, really the only non meat dishes in McDonalds type situations besides frenchfries and onionrings- pure carbohydrates. If you want any protein your gonna have to bring it yourself.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as some other countries of the world.

== Links ==
* [http://www.hitchhiker.50megs.com/custom.html|About laws against hitchhiking for each state]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>gsg1bdwef2yyv17z1q49kl6yi8sxtd6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>55194</id>
      <parentid>55080</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-09-30T12:46:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>JaneRobinson</username>
        <id>3948</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9989">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[motorway]]s) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays.  Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[law]]s against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as you are going. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''
Look, if you are friendly, at least in my experience in the US (I have never been elsewhere) people who pick you up will offer to buy you food at restaurants ALL THE TIME. Additionally, they will just throw you some bucks to eat. From change to $100. $100 dollars has happened to us twice. $60 dollars has happened to us several times and we have been given so many twenties... The key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what do you do to eat- "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (Sad and scrappy slight but pointed emphasis on the "some")- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout- *for which you should thank them profusely*, of course. :)

If you are a vegan traveling between cities, prepare to starve. Or carry your own food somehow, I dunno. Yeah, if you can't eat eggs OR milk, you can't eat eggs OR icecream, really the only non meat dishes in McDonalds type situations besides frenchfries and onionrings- pure carbohydrates. If you want any protein your gonna have to bring it yourself.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as some other countries of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]


== Links ==
* [http://www.hitchhiker.50megs.com/custom.html|About laws against hitchhiking for each state]
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>kcdiik20e2cswtsltqat7tz3ipw1j32</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>56312</id>
      <parentid>55194</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-08T01:22:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10052">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays.  Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as you are going. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''
Look, if you are friendly, at least in my experience in the US (I have never been elsewhere) people who pick you up will offer to buy you food at restaurants ALL THE TIME. Additionally, they will just throw you some bucks to eat. From change to $100. $100 dollars has happened to us twice. $60 dollars has happened to us several times and we have been given so many twenties... The key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what do you do to eat- "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (Sad and scrappy slight but pointed emphasis on the "some")- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout- *for which you should thank them profusely*, of course. :)

If you are a vegan traveling between cities, prepare to starve. Or carry your own food somehow, I dunno. Yeah, if you can't eat eggs OR milk, you can't eat eggs OR icecream, really the only non meat dishes in McDonalds type situations besides frenchfries and onionrings- pure carbohydrates. If you want any protein your gonna have to bring it yourself.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as some other countries of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]


== Links ==
* [http://www.hitchhiker.50megs.com/custom.html About laws against hitchhiking for each state]
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>bbebxf3bsvc5io73acuhxi0fj3urzuq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>59739</id>
      <parentid>56312</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-02-17T23:19:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Chael777</username>
        <id>3758</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10743">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays.  Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as you are going. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''
Look, if you are friendly, at least in my experience in the US (I have never been elsewhere) people who pick you up will offer to buy you food at restaurants ALL THE TIME. Additionally, they will just throw you some bucks to eat. From change to $100. $100 dollars has happened to us twice. $60 dollars has happened to us several times and we have been given so many twenties... The key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what do you do to eat- "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (Sad and scrappy slight but pointed emphasis on the "some")- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout- *for which you should thank them profusely*, of course. :)

If you are a vegan traveling between cities, prepare to starve. Or carry your own food somehow, I dunno. Yeah, if you can't eat eggs OR milk, you can't eat eggs OR icecream, really the only non meat dishes in McDonalds type situations besides frenchfries and onionrings- pure carbohydrates. If you want any protein your gonna have to bring it yourself.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as some other countries of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

''Haven't hitched extensively, but where I have the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the states is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

== Links ==
* [http://www.hitchhiker.50megs.com/custom.html About laws against hitchhiking for each state]
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>631gd1r4lwuzj6lfzbdagodutukpov6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>59740</id>
      <parentid>59739</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-02-17T23:20:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Chael777</username>
        <id>3758</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10755">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays.  Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as you are going. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''
Look, if you are friendly, at least in my experience in the US (I have never been elsewhere) people who pick you up will offer to buy you food at restaurants ALL THE TIME. Additionally, they will just throw you some bucks to eat. From change to $100. $100 dollars has happened to us twice. $60 dollars has happened to us several times and we have been given so many twenties... The key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what do you do to eat- "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (Sad and scrappy slight but pointed emphasis on the "some")- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout- *for which you should thank them profusely*, of course. :)

If you are a vegan traveling between cities, prepare to starve. Or carry your own food somehow, I dunno. Yeah, if you can't eat eggs OR milk, you can't eat eggs OR icecream, really the only non meat dishes in McDonalds type situations besides frenchfries and onionrings- pure carbohydrates. If you want any protein your gonna have to bring it yourself.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as some other countries of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

== Links ==
* [http://www.hitchhiker.50megs.com/custom.html About laws against hitchhiking for each state]
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>7pl0bkogrz29657ffl6e3jgerfu3ekz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>59743</id>
      <parentid>59740</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-02-17T23:36:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Chael777</username>
        <id>3758</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10915">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays.  Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as you are going. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''
Look, if you are friendly, at least in my experience in the US (I have never been elsewhere) people who pick you up will offer to buy you food at restaurants ALL THE TIME. Additionally, they will just throw you some bucks to eat. From change to $100. $100 dollars has happened to us twice. $60 dollars has happened to us several times and we have been given so many twenties... The key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what do you do to eat- "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (Sad and scrappy slight but pointed emphasis on the "some")- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout- *for which you should thank them profusely*, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

If you are a vegan traveling between cities, prepare to starve. Or carry your own food somehow, I dunno. Yeah, if you can't eat eggs OR milk, you can't eat eggs OR icecream, really the only non meat dishes in McDonalds type situations besides frenchfries and onionrings- pure carbohydrates. If you want any protein your gonna have to bring it yourself.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as some other countries of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

== Links ==
* [http://www.hitchhiker.50megs.com/custom.html About laws against hitchhiking for each state]
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>r7ogvh3z3jwsgaj8mnrfj49zs4ginl4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>61191</id>
      <parentid>59743</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-05-17T22:24:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10820">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

In most states you can't hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves, but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

It's generally easier to hitchhike on the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays.  Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be friendly when you come up clean, sometimes even driving you to a better spot. 

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]], on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy''. If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

== Car License Plate ==
Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be added information if you spot such car that might be going the same direction as you are going. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''
Look, if you are friendly, at least in my experience in the US (I have never been elsewhere) people who pick you up will offer to buy you food at restaurants ALL THE TIME. Additionally, they will just throw you some bucks to eat. From change to $100. $100 dollars has happened to us twice. $60 dollars has happened to us several times and we have been given so many twenties... The key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what do you do to eat- "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (Sad and scrappy slight but pointed emphasis on the "some")- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout- *for which you should thank them profusely*, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

If you are a vegan traveling between cities, prepare to starve. Or carry your own food somehow, I dunno. Yeah, if you can't eat eggs OR milk, you can't eat eggs OR icecream, really the only non meat dishes in McDonalds type situations besides frenchfries and onionrings- pure carbohydrates. If you want any protein your gonna have to bring it yourself.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date.  Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as some other countries of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>pwerfnvidb6uifghb0hhlvkhhui3hvy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>61529</id>
      <parentid>61191</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-05-30T17:14:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11885">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US, sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (even though throughout the West the enforcement of this rule varies), but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp). 

It's generally easier to hitchhike around the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays.  Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]] on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy'' (the latter of which can be avoided by having at least a few dollars at any time). If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over and you are not required to identify yourself except if there is any way that you could have done something unlawful. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police very rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>62g3mb6dtoybgqbb3cxxn92zbo56zue</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>62741</id>
      <parentid>61529</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-07-30T16:27:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12385">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US, sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (even though throughout the West the enforcement of this rule varies), but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp). 

It's generally easier to hitchhike around the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays.  Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
[[File:Hitchhiking Laws United States.jpg|thumb|350px|Overview over hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; White: Hitchhiking is legal on the shoulder of any road including freeways.&lt;br&gt; Blue: Hitchhiking legal on the shoulder of any road except freeways.&lt;br&gt; Green: Stay off the paved section of the road to be safe, freeways are off-limit.&lt;br&gt; Yellow: Particular laws, read up in the respective state article.&lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is technically illegal; more information in the respective state article.]]
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]] on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy'' (the latter of which can be avoided by having at least a few dollars at any time). If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over and you are not required to identify yourself except if there is any way that you could have done something unlawful. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police very rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>5j0lzwhc4l3gz7iznyssxicoghbdi39</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>63942</id>
      <parentid>62741</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-09-23T05:59:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12363">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US, sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (even though throughout the West the enforcement of this rule varies), but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp). 

It's generally easier to hitchhike around the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays.  Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
[[File:USHHlaws.jpg|thumb|350px|Overview over hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; White: Hitchhiking is legal on the shoulder of any road including freeways.&lt;br&gt; Blue: Hitchhiking legal on the shoulder of any road except freeways.&lt;br&gt; Green: Stay off the paved section of the road to be safe, freeways are off-limit.&lt;br&gt; Yellow: Particular laws, read up in the respective state article.&lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is technically illegal; more information in the respective state article.]]
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]] on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy'' (the latter of which can be avoided by having at least a few dollars at any time). If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over and you are not required to identify yourself except if there is any way that you could have done something unlawful. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police very rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>gs2v959v03i4qhk94uwnfwwi6pv1sqh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>67314</id>
      <parentid>63942</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-10-28T03:35:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12363">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US, sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (even though throughout the West the enforcement of this rule varies), but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp). 

It's generally easier to hitchhike around the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays.  Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
[[File:USHHlaws.jpg|thumb|350px|Overview over hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; White: Hitchhiking is legal on the shoulder of any road including freeways.&lt;br&gt; Blue: Hitchhiking legal on the shoulder of any road except freeways.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while off the paved surface of any road except freeways.&lt;br&gt; Yellow: Particular laws, read up in the respective state article.&lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is technically illegal; more information in the respective state article.]]
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]] on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy'' (the latter of which can be avoided by having at least a few dollars at any time). If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over and you are not required to identify yourself except if there is any way that you could have done something unlawful. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police very rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>6pdbzwcm1xfj946tyg9y1sthc2pvs5k</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>67315</id>
      <parentid>67314</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-10-28T03:35:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12367">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US, sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (even though throughout the West the enforcement of this rule varies), but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp). 

It's generally easier to hitchhike around the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays.  Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
[[File:USHHlaws.jpg|thumb|350px|''Overview over hitchhiking laws by state''.&lt;br&gt; White: Hitchhiking is legal on the shoulder of any road including freeways.&lt;br&gt; Blue: Hitchhiking legal on the shoulder of any road except freeways.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while off the paved surface of any road except freeways.&lt;br&gt; Yellow: Particular laws, read up in the respective state article.&lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is technically illegal; more information in the respective state article.]]
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]] on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy'' (the latter of which can be avoided by having at least a few dollars at any time). If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over and you are not required to identify yourself except if there is any way that you could have done something unlawful. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police very rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>jggyquufogf6dlehzoay4oh60tv6477</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>67316</id>
      <parentid>67315</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-10-28T03:42:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12756">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US, sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (even though throughout the West the enforcement of this rule varies), but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp). 

It's generally easier to hitchhike around the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays.  Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
[[File:USHHlaws.jpg|thumb|350px|''Overview over hitchhiking laws by state''.&lt;br&gt; White: Hitchhiking is legal on the shoulder of any road including freeways.&lt;br&gt; Blue: Hitchhiking legal on the shoulder of any road except freeways.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while off the paved surface of any road except freeways.&lt;br&gt; Yellow: Particular laws, read up in the respective state article.&lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is technically illegal; more information in the respective state article.]]
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]] on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy'' (the latter of which can be avoided by having at least a few dollars at any time). If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over and you are not required to identify yourself except if there is any way that you could have done something unlawful. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police very rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"I have hitchhiked over 30,000 miles in the United States, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that hitchhiking in the United States is easy and fun. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[West Virginia]]." [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>a8vrpu4i2gfbnnqbt220claiopr0dx9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>67317</id>
      <parentid>67316</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-10-28T03:44:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12822">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US, sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (even though throughout the West the enforcement of this rule varies), but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp). 

It's generally easier to hitchhike around the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays.  Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
[[File:USHHlaws.jpg|thumb|350px|''Overview over hitchhiking laws by state''.&lt;br&gt; White: Hitchhiking is legal on the shoulder of any road including freeways.&lt;br&gt; Blue: Hitchhiking legal on the shoulder of any road except freeways.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while off the paved surface of any road except freeways.&lt;br&gt; Yellow: Particular laws, read up in the respective state article.&lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is technically illegal; more information in the respective state article.]]
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]] on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy'' (the latter of which can be avoided by having at least a few dollars at any time). If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over and you are not required to identify yourself except if there is any way that you could have done something unlawful. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police very rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked over 30,000 miles in the United States, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that hitchhiking in the United States is easy and fun. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[West Virginia]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>dolfsi28la2libiiuqhovfwsv5x5e5r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>67875</id>
      <parentid>67317</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-12-24T00:08:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Haggismn</username>
        <id>1667</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13238">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US, sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (even though throughout the West the enforcement of this rule varies), but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp). 

It's generally easier to hitchhike around the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays.  Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
[[File:USHHlaws.jpg|thumb|350px|''Overview over hitchhiking laws by state''.&lt;br&gt; White: Hitchhiking is legal on the shoulder of any road including freeways.&lt;br&gt; Blue: Hitchhiking legal on the shoulder of any road except freeways.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while off the paved surface of any road except freeways.&lt;br&gt; Yellow: Particular laws, read up in the respective state article.&lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is technically illegal; more information in the respective state article.]]
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

In most states, such as [[New Jersey]], [[Virginia]] and [[New York State]] on the East Coast and [[Nevada]] and [[Arizona]] in the West, there are [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" in any way, i.e. showing a sign or a thumb to traffic. The police could ticket you for ''loitering'' or ''vagrancy'' (the latter of which can be avoided by having at least a few dollars at any time). If the police passes and sees a hitchhiker walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but technically they have no reason to pull you over and you are not required to identify yourself except if there is any way that you could have done something unlawful. As a result, the best result is to not use a sign or your thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser. The laws are enforced because of "traffic safety" reasons mostly but in reality police very rarely gives tickets to hitchhikers - they just check IDs for warrants whenever possible.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status, if you decide to leave and enter the USA again, and may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiking friendly state.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked over 30,000 miles in the United States, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that hitchhiking in the United States is easy and fun. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[West Virginia]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>ltxknl1foskk7j3slcpe8vx2zxnfky9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68167</id>
      <parentid>67875</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-01-22T23:16:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12995">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US, sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (even though throughout the West the enforcement of this rule varies), but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp). 

It's generally easier to hitchhike around the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays.  Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police ==
[[File:USHHlaws.jpg|thumb|350px|''Overview over hitchhiking laws by state''.&lt;br&gt; White: Hitchhiking is legal on the shoulder of any road including freeways.&lt;br&gt; Blue: Hitchhiking legal on the shoulder of any road except freeways.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while off the paved surface of any road except freeways.&lt;br&gt; Yellow: Particular laws, read up in the respective state article.&lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is technically illegal; more information in the respective state article.]]
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

In most states there are [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". Most states define roadway as "exclusive of a shoulder", making these statutes easy to circumvent. If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but you are not required to identify yourself except if there is any way that you could have done something unlawful. As a result, the best method is to not use a sign or thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010 (most recent year with available statistics) they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status, if you decide to leave and enter the USA again, and may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiking friendly state.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked over 30,000 miles in the United States, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that hitchhiking in the United States is easy and fun. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[West Virginia]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>h6bp0x1a57qc34hi9kpy97nz1aula9l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68168</id>
      <parentid>68167</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-01-22T23:28:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13510">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US, sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (even though throughout the West the enforcement of this rule varies), but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp). 

It's generally easier to hitchhike around the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays.  Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:USHHlaws.jpg|thumb|350px|''Overview over hitchhiking laws by state''.&lt;br&gt; White: Hitchhiking is legal on the shoulder of any road including freeways.&lt;br&gt; Blue: Hitchhiking legal on the shoulder of any road except freeways.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while off the paved surface of any road except freeways.&lt;br&gt; Yellow: Particular laws, read up in the respective state article.&lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is technically illegal; more information in the respective state article.]]

The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information on which ones allow it.

Most states have [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is typically defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder", making these statutes easy to circumvent. If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but you are not required to identify yourself except if there is any way that you could have done something unlawful. As a result, the best method is to not use a sign or thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010 (most recent year with available statistics) they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status, if you decide to leave and enter the USA again, and may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiking friendly state.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked over 30,000 miles in the United States, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that hitchhiking in the United States is easy and fun. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[West Virginia]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>qtua3v62b4ox573x31adtdjn8lzbm5n</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68169</id>
      <parentid>68168</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-01-22T23:34:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13510">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please have a look at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US, sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (even though throughout the West the enforcement of this rule varies), but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp). 

It's generally easier to hitchhike around the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays.  Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:USHHlaws.jpg|thumb|350px|''Overview over hitchhiking laws by state''.&lt;br&gt; White: Hitchhiking is legal on the shoulder of any road including freeways.&lt;br&gt; Blue: Hitchhiking legal on the shoulder of any road except freeways.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while off the paved surface of any road except freeways.&lt;br&gt; Yellow: Particular laws, read up in the respective state article.&lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is technically illegal; more information in the respective state article.]]

The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information on which ones allow it.

Most states have [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is typically defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010 (most recent year with available statistics) they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them.

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but you are not required to identify yourself except if there is any way that you could have done something unlawful. As a result, the best method is to not use a sign or thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status, if you decide to leave and enter the USA again, and may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiking friendly state.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked over 30,000 miles in the United States, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that hitchhiking in the United States is easy and fun. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[West Virginia]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>kzfinjbpv0clq2bam7wulq8g7pi7q4l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68171</id>
      <parentid>68169</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-01-22T23:43:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13514">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US, sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (even though throughout the West the enforcement of this rule varies), but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp). 

It's generally easier to hitchhike around the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays.  Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:USHHlaws.jpg|thumb|350px|''Overview over hitchhiking laws by state''.&lt;br&gt; White: Hitchhiking is legal on the shoulder of any road including freeways.&lt;br&gt; Blue: Hitchhiking legal on the shoulder of any road except freeways.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while off the paved surface of any road except freeways.&lt;br&gt; Yellow: Particular laws, read up in the respective state article.&lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is technically illegal; more information in the respective state article.]]

The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information on which ones allow it.

Most states have [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is typically defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010 (most recent year with available statistics) they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them.

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but you are not required to identify yourself except if there is any way that you could have done something unlawful. As a result, the best method is to not use a sign or thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status, if you decide to leave and enter the USA again, and may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiking friendly state.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked over 30,000 miles in the United States, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that hitchhiking in the United States is easy and fun. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[West Virginia]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>jzy0qjdeyob9x66m2du48jzmnx3qa30</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68237</id>
      <parentid>68171</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-02-05T01:13:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13587">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US, sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (even though throughout the West the enforcement of this rule varies), but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp). 

It's generally easier to hitchhike around the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays.  Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:USHHlaws.jpg|thumb|350px|''Overview over hitchhiking laws by state''.&lt;br&gt; White: Hitchhiking is legal on the shoulder of any road including freeways.&lt;br&gt; Blue: Hitchhiking legal on the shoulder of any road except freeways.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while off the paved surface of any road except freeways.&lt;br&gt; Yellow: Particular laws, read up in the respective state article.&lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is technically illegal; more information in the respective state article.]]

The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information on which ones allow it.

Most states have [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Look to the map pictured on the right which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is typically defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010 (most recent year with available statistics) they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them.

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but you are not required to identify yourself except if there is any way that you could have done something unlawful. As a result, the best method is to not use a sign or thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status, if you decide to leave and enter the USA again, and may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiking friendly state.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked over 30,000 miles in the United States, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that hitchhiking in the United States is easy and fun. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[West Virginia]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>4coilx7cwwungxai9ziz6tjh1wyjvj6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68297</id>
      <parentid>68237</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-02-15T17:13:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13750">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US, sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (even though throughout the West the enforcement of this rule varies), but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp). 

It's generally easier to hitchhike around the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you. As a rule Love's and Pilot truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Flying J truck stops are generally a lot more lenient towards hitchhikers.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:USHHlaws.jpg|thumb|350px|''Overview over hitchhiking laws by state''.&lt;br&gt; White: Hitchhiking is legal on the shoulder of any road including freeways.&lt;br&gt; Blue: Hitchhiking legal on the shoulder of any road except freeways.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while off the paved surface of any road except freeways.&lt;br&gt; Yellow: Particular laws, read up in the respective state article.&lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is technically illegal; more information in the respective state article.]]

The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information on which ones allow it.

Most states have [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Look to the map pictured on the right which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is typically defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010 (most recent year with available statistics) they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them.

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but you are not required to identify yourself except if there is any way that you could have done something unlawful. As a result, the best method is to not use a sign or thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status, if you decide to leave and enter the USA again, and may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiking friendly state.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked over 30,000 miles in the United States, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that hitchhiking in the United States is easy and fun. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[West Virginia]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>ru957ff1k4j8jb6d07axa4vp2ooi8d5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68298</id>
      <parentid>68297</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-02-15T17:17:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13781">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US, sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (even though throughout the West the enforcement of this rule varies), but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp). 

It's generally easier to hitchhike around the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you. As a rule Love's and Pilot truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Flying J truck stops are generally a lot more lenient towards hitchhikers.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:USHHlaws.jpg|thumb|350px|''Overview over hitchhiking laws by state''.&lt;br&gt; White: Hitchhiking is legal on the shoulder of any road including freeways.&lt;br&gt; Blue: Hitchhiking legal on the shoulder of any road except freeways.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while off the paved surface of any road except freeways.&lt;br&gt; Yellow: Particular laws, read up in the respective state article.&lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is technically illegal; more information in the respective state article.]]

The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information on which ones allow it.

Most states have [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Look to the map pictured on the right which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is typically defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010 (most recent year with available statistics) they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them.

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but you are not required to identify yourself except if there is any way that you could have done something unlawful. As a result, the best method is to not use a sign or thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status, if you decide to leave and enter the USA again, and may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiking friendly state (ie. Arizona, Idaho, Michigan).

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked over 30,000 miles in the United States, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that hitchhiking in the United States is easy and fun. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[West Virginia]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>7j337c3bv22qpadqw9dqi2oji0mn8eh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68407</id>
      <parentid>68298</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-03-01T02:49:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13757">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US, sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (even though throughout the West the enforcement of this rule varies), but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp). 

It's generally easier to hitchhike around the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you. As a rule Love's and Pilot truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Flying J truck stops are generally a lot more lenient towards hitchhikers.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:USHHlaws.jpg|thumb|400px|''Overview over hitchhiking laws by state''.&lt;br&gt; Dark Blues: Hitchhiking is legal on the shoulder of any road including interstates.&lt;br&gt; Light Blue: Hitchhiking legal on the shoulder of any road except interstates.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while off the paved surface of any road except interstates.&lt;br&gt; Orange: Particular laws, read up in the respective state article.&lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is technically illegal; more.]]

The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information on which ones allow it.

Most states have [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Look to the map pictured on the right which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is typically defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010 (most recent year with available statistics) they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them.

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but you are not required to identify yourself except if there is any way that you could have done something unlawful. As a result, the best method is to not use a sign or thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status, if you decide to leave and enter the USA again, and may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiking friendly state (ie. Arizona, Idaho, Michigan).

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked over 30,000 miles in the United States, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that hitchhiking in the United States is easy and fun. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[West Virginia]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>8oc00mjic7h173b6oro2u7mf38ze7dn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68408</id>
      <parentid>68407</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-03-01T02:50:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13766">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US, sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (even though throughout the West the enforcement of this rule varies), but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp). 

It's generally easier to hitchhike around the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you. As a rule Love's and Pilot truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Flying J truck stops are generally a lot more lenient towards hitchhikers.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:USHHlaws.jpg|thumb|400px|''Overview over hitchhiking laws by state''.&lt;br&gt; Dark Blues: Hitchhiking is legal on the shoulder of any road including interstates.&lt;br&gt; Light Blue: Hitchhiking legal on the shoulder of any road except interstates.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while off the paved surface of the road; interstates are off-limits.&lt;br&gt; Orange: Particular laws, read up in the respective state article.&lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is technically illegal; more.]]

The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information on which ones allow it.

Most states have [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Look to the map pictured on the right which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is typically defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010 (most recent year with available statistics) they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them.

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but you are not required to identify yourself except if there is any way that you could have done something unlawful. As a result, the best method is to not use a sign or thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status, if you decide to leave and enter the USA again, and may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiking friendly state (ie. Arizona, Idaho, Michigan).

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked over 30,000 miles in the United States, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that hitchhiking in the United States is easy and fun. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[West Virginia]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>69omdfoi8aud7hfob1993cp2cogq37d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68409</id>
      <parentid>68408</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-03-01T02:52:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13763">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US, sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (even though throughout the West the enforcement of this rule varies), but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp). 

It's generally easier to hitchhike around the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you. As a rule Love's and Pilot truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Flying J truck stops are generally a lot more lenient towards hitchhikers.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:USHHlaws.jpg|thumb|400px|''Overview of hitchhiking laws by state''.&lt;br&gt; Dark Blue: Hitchhiking is legal on the shoulder of any road including interstates.&lt;br&gt; Light Blue: Hitchhiking legal on the shoulder of any road except interstates.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while off the paved surface of the road; interstates are off-limits.&lt;br&gt; Orange: Particular laws, read up in the respective state article.&lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is technically illegal; more.]]

The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information on which ones allow it.

Most states have [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Look to the map pictured on the right which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is typically defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010 (most recent year with available statistics) they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them.

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but you are not required to identify yourself except if there is any way that you could have done something unlawful. As a result, the best method is to not use a sign or thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status, if you decide to leave and enter the USA again, and may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiking friendly state (ie. Arizona, Idaho, Michigan).

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked over 30,000 miles in the United States, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that hitchhiking in the United States is easy and fun. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[West Virginia]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>e9bwff3b3a9pccpen6x0r4avddgdyd4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68410</id>
      <parentid>68409</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-03-01T02:54:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13775">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc.

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US, sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (even though throughout the West the enforcement of this rule varies), but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp). 

It's generally easier to hitchhike around the West Coast. In [[Oregon]] and [[Montana]], it's not even prohibited by law to hitchhike right on interstates. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you. As a rule Love's and Pilot truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Flying J truck stops are generally a lot more lenient towards hitchhikers.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:USHHlaws.jpg|thumb|400px|''Overview of hitchhiking laws by state''.&lt;br&gt; Dark Blue: Hitchhiking is legal on the shoulder of any road including interstates.&lt;br&gt; Light Blue: Hitchhiking legal on the shoulder of any road except interstates.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while off the paved surface of the road; interstates are off-limits.&lt;br&gt; Orange: Particular laws, read up in the respective state article.&lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is technically illegal; more.]]

The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information on which ones allow it.

Most states have [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Look to the map pictured on the right which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is typically defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming.)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs but you are not required to identify yourself except if there is any way that you could have done something unlawful. As a result, the best method is to not use a sign or thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status, if you decide to leave and enter the USA again, and may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiking friendly state (ie. Arizona, Idaho, Michigan).

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked over 30,000 miles in the United States, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that hitchhiking in the United States is easy and fun. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[West Virginia]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>k8sg8vqdi97oq206224nrb7t30iumxq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68831</id>
      <parentid>68410</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-03-26T21:44:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13604">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you. As a rule Love's and Pilot truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Flying J truck stops are generally a lot more lenient towards hitchhikers.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:USHHlaws.jpg|thumb|400px|''Overview of hitchhiking laws by state''.&lt;br&gt; Dark Blue: Hitchhiking is legal on the shoulder of any road including interstates.&lt;br&gt; Light Blue: Hitchhiking legal on the shoulder of any road except interstates.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while off the paved surface of the road; interstates are off-limits.&lt;br&gt; Orange: Particular laws, read up in the respective state article.&lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is technically illegal; more.]]

The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information on which ones allow it.

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (even though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

Most states have [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Look to the map pictured on the right which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is typically defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming.)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself except if there is any way that you could have done something unlawful. As a result, the best method is to not use a sign or thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status, if you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiking friendly state (ie. Arizona, Idaho, Michigan).

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked over 30,000 miles in the United States, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that hitchhiking in the United States is easy and fun. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[West Virginia]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>kljrjll89fqfz98416zaz9e3zl2tcmm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69294</id>
      <parentid>68831</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-05-07T02:22:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13612">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you. As a rule Love's and Pilot truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Flying J truck stops are generally a lot more lenient towards hitchhikers.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:USHHlaws.jpg|thumb|400px|''Overview of hitchhiking laws by state''.&lt;br&gt; Dark Blue: Hitchhiking is legal on the shoulder of any road including interstates.&lt;br&gt; Light Blue: Hitchhiking legal on the shoulder of any road except interstates.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of a road, interstate property is off-limits.&lt;br&gt; Orange: Particular laws, read up in the respective state article.&lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is technically illegal; more.]]

The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information on which ones allow it.

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (even though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

Most states have [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Look to the map pictured on the right which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is typically defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming.)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself except if there is any way that you could have done something unlawful. As a result, the best method is to not use a sign or thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status, if you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiking friendly state (ie. Arizona, Idaho, Michigan).

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked over 30,000 miles in the United States, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that hitchhiking in the United States is easy and fun. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[West Virginia]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>0yzinnt17azcmez5qabgtucehjuz70q</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70629</id>
      <parentid>69294</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-07-24T07:33:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13812">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you. As a rule Love's and Pilot truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Flying J truck stops are generally a lot more lenient towards hitchhikers.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:USHHlaws.jpg|thumb|400px|''Overview of hitchhiking laws by state''.&lt;br&gt; Dark Blue: Hitchhiking is legal on the shoulder of any road including interstates.&lt;br&gt; Light Blue: Hitchhiking legal on the shoulder of any road except interstates.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of a road, interstate property is off-limits.&lt;br&gt; Orange: Particular laws, read up in the respective state article.&lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is technically illegal; more information available in respective state articles.]]

The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information on which ones allow it.

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (even though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

Most states have [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Look to the map pictured on the right which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is typically defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming.)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself except if there is any way that you could have done something unlawful. As a result, the best method is to not use a sign or thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status, if you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiking friendly state (ie. Arizona, Idaho, Michigan).

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Untitled2.png|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked over 30,000 miles in the United States, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that hitchhiking in the United States is easy and fun. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[West Virginia]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>e1fcp61i5i51i2yg8kvmuhz4ijdd3nh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70630</id>
      <parentid>70629</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-07-24T07:34:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13814">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you. As a rule Love's and Pilot truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Flying J truck stops are generally a lot more lenient towards hitchhikers.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:USHHlaws.jpg|thumb|400px|''Overview of hitchhiking laws by state''.&lt;br&gt; Dark Blue: Hitchhiking is legal on the shoulder of any road including interstates.&lt;br&gt; Light Blue: Hitchhiking legal on the shoulder of any road except interstates.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of a road, interstate property is off-limits.&lt;br&gt; Orange: Particular laws, read up in the respective state article.&lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is technically illegal; more information available in respective state articles.]]

The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information on which ones allow it.

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (even though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

Most states have [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Look to the map pictured on the right which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is typically defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming.)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself except if there is any way that you could have done something unlawful. As a result, the best method is to not use a sign or thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status, if you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiking friendly state (ie. Arizona, Idaho, Michigan).

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Untitled2.png|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked almost 50,000 miles in the United States, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that hitchhiking in the United States is easy and fun. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[West Virginia]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>alb0p08tw5817oiqq68mpe9hbt56m9v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70636</id>
      <parentid>70630</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-07-24T08:14:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13644">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you. As a rule Love's and Pilot truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Flying J truck stops are generally a lot more lenient towards hitchhikers.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:USHHlaws.jpg|thumb|400px|''Overview of hitchhiking laws by state''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information on which ones allow it.

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (even though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

Most states have [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Look to the map pictured on the right which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is typically defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming.)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself except if there is any way that you could have done something unlawful. As a result, the best method is to not use a sign or thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status, if you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiking friendly state (ie. Arizona, Idaho, Michigan).

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Untitled2.png|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked almost 50,000 miles in the United States, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that hitchhiking in the United States is easy and fun. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[West Virginia]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>tw8ws9hwihcvcdvb73ddykmyim28rm0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70737</id>
      <parentid>70636</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-08-05T18:16:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13637">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you. As a rule Love's and Pilot truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Flying J truck stops are generally a lot more lenient towards hitchhikers.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:USHHlaws.jpg|thumb|400px|''Overview of hitchhiking laws by state''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information on which ones allow it.

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (even though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

Most states have [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is typically defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming.)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself except if there is any way that you could have done something unlawful. As a result, the best method is to not use a sign or thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status, if you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiking friendly state (ie. Arizona, Idaho, Michigan).

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Untitled2.png|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked almost 50,000 miles in the United States, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that hitchhiking in the United States is easy and fun. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[West Virginia]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>nz4yoffb49menl5y85b1mnkb4zlt18v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70918</id>
      <parentid>70737</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-08-18T06:46:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13638">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you. As a rule Love's and Pilot truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Flying J truck stops are generally a lot more lenient towards hitchhikers.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:USHHlaws.jpg|thumb|400px|''Overview of hitchhiking laws by state''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information on which ones allow it.

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (even though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

Most states have [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is typically defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming.)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself except if there is any way that you could have done something unlawful. As a result, the best method is to not use a sign or thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status, if you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiking friendly state (ie. Arizona, Idaho, Michigan).

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Untitled2.png|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked almost 50,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[West Virginia]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>o150firdx1f73rsu57u2b2qt5525thg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72357</id>
      <parentid>70918</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-12T20:01:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13640">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you. As a rule Love's and Pilot truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Flying J truck stops are generally a lot more lenient towards hitchhikers.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|400px|''Overview of hitchhiking laws by state''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information on which ones allow it.

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (even though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

Most states have [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is typically defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming.)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself except if there is any way that you could have done something unlawful. As a result, the best method is to not use a sign or thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status, if you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiking friendly state (ie. Arizona, Idaho, Michigan).

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Untitled2.png|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked almost 50,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[West Virginia]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>6hfbbp3ro6de7e55gyh4v1buzfj3dva</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72358</id>
      <parentid>72357</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-12T20:05:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13946">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you. As a rule Love's and Pilot truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Flying J truck stops are generally a lot more lenient towards hitchhikers.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|400px|right|''Overview of hitchhiking laws by state''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

Overview of hitchhiking laws by state: Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road. Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal. Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).

The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information on which ones allow it.

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (even though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

Most states have [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is typically defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming.)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself except if there is any way that you could have done something unlawful. As a result, the best method is to not use a sign or thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status, if you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiking friendly state (ie. Arizona, Idaho, Michigan).

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Untitled2.png|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked almost 50,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[West Virginia]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>r5hiishc0aexw8l5kc7r2lut1tli39q</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72365</id>
      <parentid>72358</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-12T20:34:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14037">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you. As a rule Love's and Pilot truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Flying J truck stops are generally a lot more lenient towards hitchhikers.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|400px|right|''Overview of hitchhiking laws by state''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

Overview of hitchhiking laws by state: Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road. Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal. Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).

The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information on which ones allow it.

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (even though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

Most states have [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is typically defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming.)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself except if there is any way that you could have done something unlawful. As a result, the best method is to not use a sign or thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status, if you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiking friendly state (ie. Arizona, Idaho, Michigan).

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked almost 50,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[West Virginia]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>p3sxqjyi4sj799i6ec1q2tjqs95yil1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72366</id>
      <parentid>72365</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-12T20:35:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14039">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you. As a rule Love's and Pilot truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Flying J truck stops are generally a lot more lenient towards hitchhikers.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

Overview of hitchhiking laws by state: Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road. Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal. Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).

The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information on which ones allow it.

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (even though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

Most states have [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is typically defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming.)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself except if there is any way that you could have done something unlawful. As a result, the best method is to not use a sign or thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status, if you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiking friendly state (ie. Arizona, Idaho, Michigan).

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked almost 50,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[West Virginia]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>0zuc5vrmqmy3t50mz60du1qzbnzwi89</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72367</id>
      <parentid>72366</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-12T20:36:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13739">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you. As a rule Love's and Pilot truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Flying J truck stops are generally a lot more lenient towards hitchhikers.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information on which ones allow it.

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (even though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can always stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries) like in [[Europe]]; if there is a "No hitchhiking/pedestrians" sign, don't stand or hitch from beyond the sign. In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. The police in a region may interpret laws related to hitchhiking differently, at times forcing a hitchhiker to choose an alternate route by walking or using other means of transportation. In most cases, though, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated as long as you are not on the interstate itself, where it is rightly considered a safety issue. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system; these typically prohibit hitchhiking as well (other than at the on-ramp).

Most states have [[laws]] against hitchhiking that are possible to be circumvented. Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is typically defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming.)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself except if there is any way that you could have done something unlawful. As a result, the best method is to not use a sign or thumb whenever an oncoming car looks like a police cruiser.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status, if you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiking friendly state (ie. Arizona, Idaho, Michigan).

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked almost 50,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[West Virginia]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>dtxezmtygszwsxau5czlc4vm6byadn0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72424</id>
      <parentid>72367</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-13T20:38:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13607">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Long vs. short distance ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated by "I-##) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], etc.) You can also look for rides at the truck stops themselves, but be discreet about it as some a staff or customers are rather unfriendly to hitchers and will rudely ask you to leave their territory or call the police on you. As a rule Love's and Pilot truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Flying J truck stops are generally a lot more lenient towards hitchhikers.  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates where the police are unfriendly to standing where you're visible to the through traffic on the freeway.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

If you are only going a few hundred miles, you can often make better time on state or local roads. There are many more places to wait at, and there is much more potential traffic. Most of the traffic on the Interstate system won't be able to notice you while on the on-ramp. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time then getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways and smaller roads will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

=== Overview ===
The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Nationwide ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and Local ===.
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked almost 50,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[West Virginia]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>9y6e9r3vgxm0bdhu0b1qnw7ozww7cwv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72426</id>
      <parentid>72424</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-13T21:13:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14486">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Methods for catching rides ==

=== Long Distance ===
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated on maps by "i-#": road signs appearing [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this]) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.) 

Often times the best way to hitchhike is just to stay on high traffic ramps with large shoulders for people to pull over on. Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates, especially where the police are unfriendly.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

Asking for rides at rest areas, particularly on toll roads such as I-90 between [[Boston]] and [[Chicago]] is one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

You can also look for rides at the truck stops or gas stations themselves, but be discreet about it as with rest areas, some customers will complain and staff will make you leave the property. As a rule Love's and TA truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. 

=== Short Distance ===
If you are only going a hundred miles, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways or local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

=== Overview ===
The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Nationwide ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and Local ===.
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked almost 50,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[West Virginia]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>1pds665c9oax0vvo23bqq65h3iheh81</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72427</id>
      <parentid>72426</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-13T21:24:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15744">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Methods for catching rides ==

=== Long Distance ===
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated on maps by "i-#": road signs appearing [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this]) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.) 

Often times the best way to hitchhike is just to stay on high traffic ramps with large shoulders for people to pull over on. Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates, especially where the police are unfriendly.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

Asking for rides at rest areas, particularly on toll roads such as I-90 between [[Boston]] and [[Chicago]] is one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

You can also look for rides at the truck stops or gas stations themselves, but be discreet about it as with rest areas, some customers will complain and staff will make you leave the property. As a rule Love's and TA truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. 

=== Short Distance ===
If you are only going a hundred miles, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways or local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

=== Overview ===
The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Nationwide ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and Local ===.
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked almost 50,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[West Virginia]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>r26uohlxrexta59vq9r64e5rmet93h4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72428</id>
      <parentid>72427</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-13T21:31:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15743">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Methods for catching rides ==

=== Long Distance ===
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated on maps by "i-#": road signs appearing [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this]) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.) 

Often times the best way to hitchhike is just to stay on high traffic ramps with large shoulders for people to pull over on. Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates, especially where the police are unfriendly.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

Asking for rides at rest areas, particularly on toll roads such as I-90 between [[Boston]] and [[Chicago]] is one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

You can also look for rides at the truck stops or gas stations themselves, but be discreet about it as with rest areas, some customers will complain and staff will make you leave the property. As a rule Love's and TA truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. 

=== Short Distance ===
If you are only going a hundred miles, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways or local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

=== Overview ===
The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Nationwide ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and Local ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked almost 50,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[West Virginia]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>ex5b26wvxi8e7ywllg3beuh92ln3crg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72429</id>
      <parentid>72428</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-13T21:52:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16974">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Methods for catching rides ==

=== Long Distance ===
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated on maps by "i-#": road signs appearing [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this]) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.) 

Often times the best way to hitchhike is just to stay on high traffic ramps with large shoulders for people to pull over on. Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates, especially where the police are unfriendly.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

Asking for rides at rest areas, particularly on toll roads such as I-90 between [[Boston]] and [[Chicago]] is one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

You can also look for rides at the truck stops or gas stations themselves, but be discreet about it as with rest areas, some customers will complain and staff will make you leave the property. As a rule Love's and TA truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. 

=== Short Distance ===
If you are only going a hundred miles, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways or local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

=== Overview ===
The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Nationwide ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and Local ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

=== Ignorant Police Officers ===

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:TheWindAndRain TheWindAndRain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has never ran into any trouble because of this after many many encounters. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively. They may call you names or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff and they will never come back. If it is not worth the battle to them, they may give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally. This may be the only way to resolve a situation with a stubborn cop.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked almost 50,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[West Virginia]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>8pz3q30gc30nay50i7nmipniqz8lxhb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72430</id>
      <parentid>72429</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-13T21:55:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16964">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Methods for catching rides ==

=== Long Distance ===
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated on maps by "i-#": road signs appearing [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this]) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.) 

Often times the best way to hitchhike is just to stay on high traffic ramps with large shoulders for people to pull over on. Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates, especially where the police are unfriendly.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

Asking for rides at rest areas, particularly on toll roads such as I-90 between [[Boston]] and [[Chicago]] is one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

You can also look for rides at the truck stops or gas stations themselves, but be discreet about it as with rest areas, some customers will complain and staff will make you leave the property. As a rule Love's and TA truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. 

=== Short Distance ===
If you are only going a hundred miles, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways or local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

=== Overview ===
The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Nationwide ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and Local ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

=== Ignorant Police Officers ===

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Kyle]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has never ran into any trouble because of this after many many encounters. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively. They may call you names or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff and they will never come back. If it is not worth the battle to them, they may give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally. This may be the only way to resolve a situation with a stubborn cop.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked almost 50,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[West Virginia]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>9e7fu6miyhbqi62kwpnnyk7rooos399</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72431</id>
      <parentid>72430</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-13T21:57:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16975">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Methods for catching rides ==

=== Long Distance ===
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated on maps by "i-#": road signs appearing [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this]) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.) 

Often times the best way to hitchhike is just to stay on high traffic ramps with large shoulders for people to pull over on. Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates, especially where the police are unfriendly.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

Asking for rides at rest areas, particularly on toll roads such as I-90 between [[Boston]] and [[Chicago]] is one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

You can also look for rides at the truck stops or gas stations themselves, but be discreet about it as with rest areas, some customers will complain and staff will make you leave the property. As a rule Love's and TA truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. 

=== Short Distance ===
If you are only going a hundred miles, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways or local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

=== Overview ===
The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Nationwide ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and Local ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

=== Ignorant Police Officers ===

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Kyle]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has never ran into any trouble because of this after many many encounters. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively. They may call you names or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff and they will never come back. If it is not worth the battle to them, they may give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally. This may be the only way to resolve a situation with a stubborn cop.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked over 50,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun to hitchhike here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[West Virginia]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>cf9fbhf5cichor512eacmle9kyzdzid</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72719</id>
      <parentid>72431</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-30T17:39:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16970">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Methods for catching rides ==

=== Long Distance ===
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated on maps by "i-#": road signs appearing [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this]) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.) 

Often times the best way to hitchhike is just to stay on high traffic ramps with large shoulders for people to pull over on. Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates, especially where the police are unfriendly.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

Asking for rides at rest areas, particularly on toll roads such as I-90 between [[Boston]] and [[Chicago]] is one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

You can also look for rides at the truck stops or gas stations themselves, but be discreet about it as with rest areas, some customers will complain and staff will make you leave the property. As a rule Love's and TA truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. 

=== Short Distance ===
If you are only going a hundred miles, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways or local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

=== Overview ===
The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Nationwide ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and Local ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

=== Ignorant Police Officers ===

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Kyle]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has never ran into any trouble because of this after many many encounters. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively. They may call you names or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff and they will never come back. If it is not worth the battle to them, they may give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally. This may be the only way to resolve a situation with a stubborn cop.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked over 50,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun to hitchhike here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[Arkansas]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>dgf4e2ojhg7fv9omna9toap3j2plh1b</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>73460</id>
      <parentid>72719</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-12-04T23:37:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16980">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Methods for catching rides ==

=== Long Distance ===
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated on maps by "i-#": road signs appearing [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this]) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.) 

Often times the best way to hitchhike is just to stay on high traffic ramps with large shoulders for people to pull over on. Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates, especially where the police are unfriendly.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck.

Asking for rides at rest areas, particularly on toll roads such as I-90 between [[Boston]] and [[Chicago]] is one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

You can also look for rides at the truck stops or gas stations themselves, but be discreet about it as with rest areas, some customers will complain and staff will make you leave the property. As a rule Love's and TA truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. 

=== Short Distance ===
If you are only going a hundred miles, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways or local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

=== Overview ===
The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Nationwide ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and Local ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

=== Ignorant Police Officers ===

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has never ran into any trouble because of this after many many encounters. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively. They may call you names or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff and they will never come back. If it is not worth the battle to them, they may give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally. This may be the only way to resolve a situation with a stubborn cop.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked over 50,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun to hitchhike here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[Arkansas]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>afy99o1foy8g0hxxt2in7b7zfmcatch</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>74602</id>
      <parentid>73460</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-03-25T02:11:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17266">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Methods for catching rides ==

=== Long Distance ===
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated on maps by "i-#": road signs appearing [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this]) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.) 

Often times the best way to hitchhike is just to stay on high traffic ramps with large shoulders for people to pull over on. Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates, especially where the police are unfriendly.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck. If you do get stuck on a low traffic ramp, you can try hitchhiking on the highway itself even if pedestrians are prohibited. There is a good chance you will get picked up before police see you, and if they do they are just going to give you a warning and ask you to go back to the ramp.

Asking for rides at rest areas, particularly on toll roads such as I-90 between [[Boston]] and [[Chicago]] is one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

You can also look for rides at the truck stops or gas stations themselves, but be discreet about it as with rest areas, some customers will complain and staff will make you leave the property. As a rule Love's and TA truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient.

=== Short Distance ===
If you are only going a hundred miles, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways or local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

=== Overview ===
The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Nationwide ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and Local ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

=== Ignorant Police Officers ===

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has never ran into any trouble because of this after many many encounters. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively. They may call you names or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff and they will never come back. If it is not worth the battle to them, they may give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally. This may be the only way to resolve a situation with a stubborn cop.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked over 50,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun to hitchhike here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[Arkansas]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>0gr5khtwvl6wbjbsglyx8c89l95ahhg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>74603</id>
      <parentid>74602</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-03-25T02:13:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17274">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Methods for catching rides ==

=== Long Distance ===
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated on maps by "i-#": road signs appearing [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this]) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.) 

Often times the best way to hitchhike is just to stay on high traffic ramps with large shoulders for people to pull over on. Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates, especially where the police are unfriendly.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck. If you do get stuck on a low traffic ramp, you can try hitchhiking on the highway itself even if pedestrians are prohibited. There is a good chance you will get picked up before police see you, and if they do they are just going to give you a warning and ask you to go back to the ramp.

Asking for rides at rest areas, particularly on toll roads such as I-90 between [[Boston]] and [[Chicago]] is one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

You can also look for rides at the truck stops or gas stations themselves, but be discreet about it as with rest areas, some customers will complain and staff will make you leave the property. As a rule Love's, Petro, and TA truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient.

=== Short Distance ===
If you are only going a hundred miles, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways or local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

=== Overview ===
The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Nationwide ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and Local ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

=== Ignorant Police Officers ===

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has never ran into any trouble because of this after many many encounters. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively. They may call you names or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff and they will never come back. If it is not worth the battle to them, they may give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally. This may be the only way to resolve a situation with a stubborn cop.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked over 50,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun to hitchhike here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[Arkansas]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>qn2f5wqg0n68pbx8xy6itewet1iv7e6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>74604</id>
      <parentid>74603</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-03-25T02:22:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17317">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Methods for catching rides ==

=== Long Distance ===
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated on maps by "i-#": road signs appearing [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this]) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.) 

Often times the best way to hitchhike is just to stay on high traffic ramps with large shoulders for people to pull over on. Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates, especially where the police are unfriendly.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck. If you do get stuck on a low traffic ramp, you can try hitchhiking on the highway itself even if pedestrians are prohibited. There is a good chance you will get picked up before police see you, and if they do they are just going to give you a warning and ask you to go back to the ramp.

Asking for rides at rest areas, particularly on toll roads such as I-90 between [[Boston]] and [[Chicago]] is one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

You can also look for rides at the truck stops or gas stations themselves, but be discreet about it as with rest areas, some customers will complain and staff will make you leave the property. As a rule Love's, Petro, and TA truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient.

=== Short Distance ===
If you are only going a hundred miles, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways or local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

=== Overview ===
The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Nationwide ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and Local ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

=== Ignorant Police Officers ===

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively. They may call you names or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They are likely to cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked over 50,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun to hitchhike here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[Arkansas]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>j5w5eml7o0kwltk65t7ya2gnb07699m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>74605</id>
      <parentid>74604</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-03-25T02:23:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17312">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Methods for catching rides ==

=== Long Distance ===
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated on maps by "i-#": road signs appearing [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this]) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.) 

Often times the best way to hitchhike is just to stay on high traffic ramps with large shoulders for people to pull over on. Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates, especially where the police are unfriendly.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck. If you do get stuck on a low traffic ramp, you can try hitchhiking on the highway itself even if pedestrians are prohibited. There is a good chance you will get picked up before police see you, and if they do they are just going to give you a warning and ask you to go back to the ramp.

Asking for rides at rest areas, particularly on toll roads such as I-90 between [[Boston]] and [[Chicago]] is one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

You can also look for rides at the truck stops or gas stations themselves, but be discreet about it as with rest areas, some customers will complain and staff will make you leave the property. As a rule Love's, Petro, and TA truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient.

=== Short Distance ===
If you are only going a hundred miles, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways or local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

=== Overview ===
The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Nationwide ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and Local ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

=== Ignorant Police Officers ===

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively. They may call you names or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked over 50,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun to hitchhike here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[Arkansas]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>58b9a3fuu2urk4iwgw9mpxpgaso30am</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>74606</id>
      <parentid>74605</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-03-25T02:24:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17312">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 303,893,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Methods for catching rides ==

=== Long Distance ===
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated on maps by "i-#": road signs appearing [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this]) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.) 

Often times the best way to hitchhike is just to stay on high traffic ramps with large shoulders for people to pull over on. Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates, especially where the police are unfriendly.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck. If you do get stuck on a low traffic ramp, you can try hitchhiking on the highway itself even if pedestrians are prohibited. There is a good chance you will get picked up before police see you, and if they do they are just going to give you a warning and ask you to go back to the ramp.

Asking for rides at rest areas, particularly on toll roads such as I-90 between [[Boston]] and [[Chicago]] is one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

You can also look for rides at the truck stops or gas stations themselves, but be discreet about it as with rest areas, some customers will complain and staff will make you leave the property. As a rule Love's, Petro, and TA truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient.

=== Short Distance ===
If you are only going a hundred miles, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways or local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

=== Overview ===
The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Nationwide ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and Local ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.
Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

=== Ignorant Police Officers ===

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively. They may call you names or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West.

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''I have hitchhiked over 70,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun to hitchhike here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[Arkansas]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>3zpe61fuqpnq64lyo65w4b88g97emme</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>74674</id>
      <parentid>74606</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-04-02T00:15:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Keep trying</username>
        <id>17408</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19351">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Methods for catching rides ==

=== Long Distance ===
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated on maps by "i-#": road signs appearing [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this]) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.). State highways is also a good way to catch rides especially when your destination is not very near to an interstate, Its easier to hitch a ride on interstates as drivers are more relaxed and not going very fast. 

Often times the best way to hitchhike is just to stay on high traffic ramps with large shoulders for people to pull over on. Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates, especially where the police are unfriendly.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck. If you do get stuck on a low traffic ramp, you can try hitchhiking on the highway itself even if pedestrians are prohibited. There is a good chance you will get picked up before police see you, and if they do they are just going to give you a warning and ask you to go back to the ramp or even give you a ride to the next one just to get rid of you..

Asking for rides at rest areas, particularly on toll roads such as I-90 between [[Boston]] and [[Chicago]] is one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

You can also look for rides at the truck stops or gas stations themselves, but be discreet about it as with rest areas, some customers will complain and staff will make you leave the property. As a rule Love's, Petro, and TA truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== Short Distance ===
If you are only going a hundred miles, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways or local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

=== Overview ===
The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Nationwide ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and Local ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

=== Ignorant Police Officers ===

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race(its occasional but as long as you are prepared and confident you would be fine). They may call you names or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat and even give you shelter if its late at night. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West, however if you are looking in right places you can always find vegan food like cheese and bean burritos, biscuit, cheese pizza etc.  You can even ask restaurants to remove the meat part from the meal, 

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores and gas station(with fast food)are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

"Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]]" [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]

''I have hitchhiked over 70,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun to hitchhike here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[Arkansas]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>latwr8lai7fotssakydsu38i467wx3q</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>74677</id>
      <parentid>74674</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-04-02T08:49:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>N0id</username>
        <id>2043</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19356">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Methods for catching rides ==

=== Long Distance ===
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated on maps by "i-#": road signs appearing [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this]) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.). State highways is also a good way to catch rides especially when your destination is not very near to an interstate, Its easier to hitch a ride on interstates as drivers are more relaxed and not going very fast. 

Often times the best way to hitchhike is just to stay on high traffic ramps with large shoulders for people to pull over on. Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates, especially where the police are unfriendly.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck. If you do get stuck on a low traffic ramp, you can try hitchhiking on the highway itself even if pedestrians are prohibited. There is a good chance you will get picked up before police see you, and if they do they are just going to give you a warning and ask you to go back to the ramp or even give you a ride to the next one just to get rid of you..

Asking for rides at rest areas, particularly on toll roads such as I-90 between [[Boston]] and [[Chicago]] is one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

You can also look for rides at the truck stops or gas stations themselves, but be discreet about it as with rest areas, some customers will complain and staff will make you leave the property. As a rule Love's, Petro, and TA truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== Short Distance ===
If you are only going a hundred miles, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways or local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

=== Overview ===
The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Nationwide ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and Local ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

=== Ignorant Police Officers ===

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race(its occasional but as long as you are prepared and confident you would be fine). They may call you names or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat and even give you shelter if its late at night. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West, however if you are looking in right places you can always find vegan food like cheese and bean burritos, biscuit, cheese pizza etc.  You can even ask restaurants to remove the meat part from the meal, 

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores and gas station(with fast food)are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]

''I have hitchhiked over 70,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun to hitchhike here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[Arkansas]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>h14mpezoqnr70knnhdps4u5gycsx6gr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77195</id>
      <parentid>74677</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-09-20T14:11:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Rockner</username>
        <id>16802</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19660">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Methods for catching rides ==

=== Long Distance ===
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated on maps by "i-#": road signs appearing [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this]) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.). State highways is also a good way to catch rides especially when your destination is not very near to an interstate, Its easier to hitch a ride on interstates as drivers are more relaxed and not going very fast. 

Often times the best way to hitchhike is just to stay on high traffic ramps with large shoulders for people to pull over on. Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates, especially where the police are unfriendly.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck. If you do get stuck on a low traffic ramp, you can try hitchhiking on the highway itself even if pedestrians are prohibited. There is a good chance you will get picked up before police see you, and if they do they are just going to give you a warning and ask you to go back to the ramp or even give you a ride to the next one just to get rid of you..

Asking for rides at rest areas, particularly on toll roads such as I-90 between [[Boston]] and [[Chicago]] is one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

You can also look for rides at the truck stops or gas stations themselves, but be discreet about it as with rest areas, some customers will complain and staff will make you leave the property. As a rule Love's, Petro, and TA truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== Short Distance ===
If you are only going a hundred miles, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways or local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

=== Overview ===
The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Nationwide ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and Local ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

=== Ignorant Police Officers ===

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race(its occasional but as long as you are prepared and confident you would be fine). They may call you names or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat and even give you shelter if its late at night. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West, however if you are looking in right places you can always find vegan food like cheese and bean burritos, biscuit, cheese pizza etc.  You can even ask restaurants to remove the meat part from the meal, 

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores and gas station(with fast food)are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]

''I have hitchhiked over 70,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun to hitchhike here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[Arkansas]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

"I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone." Summer '14

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>mehwnv8wn2mtreq7wh2jb75sm1bxpfw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77196</id>
      <parentid>77195</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-09-20T14:15:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Rockner</username>
        <id>16802</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19662">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Methods for catching rides ==

=== Long Distance ===
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated on maps by "i-#": road signs appearing [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this]) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.). State highways is also a good way to catch rides especially when your destination is not very near to an interstate, Its easier to hitch a ride on interstates as drivers are more relaxed and not going very fast. 

Often times the best way to hitchhike is just to stay on high traffic ramps with large shoulders for people to pull over on. Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates, especially where the police are unfriendly.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck. If you do get stuck on a low traffic ramp, you can try hitchhiking on the highway itself even if pedestrians are prohibited. There is a good chance you will get picked up before police see you, and if they do they are just going to give you a warning and ask you to go back to the ramp or even give you a ride to the next one just to get rid of you..

Asking for rides at rest areas, particularly on toll roads such as I-90 between [[Boston]] and [[Chicago]] is one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

You can also look for rides at the truck stops or gas stations themselves, but be discreet about it as with rest areas, some customers will complain and staff will make you leave the property. As a rule Love's, Petro, and TA truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== Short Distance ===
If you are only going a hundred miles, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways or local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

=== Overview ===
The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Nationwide ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and Local ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

=== Ignorant Police Officers ===

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race(its occasional but as long as you are prepared and confident you would be fine). They may call you names or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat and even give you shelter if its late at night. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West, however if you are looking in right places you can always find vegan food like cheese and bean burritos, biscuit, cheese pizza etc.  You can even ask restaurants to remove the meat part from the meal, 

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores and gas station(with fast food)are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]

''I have hitchhiked over 70,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun to hitchhike here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], and [[Arkansas]].'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' Summer '14

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>23od5t80rsi9vm2ylx53asm25qk2y98</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77204</id>
      <parentid>77196</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-09-20T19:32:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19817">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Methods for catching rides ==

=== Long Distance ===
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated on maps by "i-#": road signs appearing [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this]) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.). State highways is also a good way to catch rides especially when your destination is not very near to an interstate, Its easier to hitch a ride on interstates as drivers are more relaxed and not going very fast. 

Often times the best way to hitchhike is just to stay on high traffic ramps with large shoulders for people to pull over on. Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates, especially where the police are unfriendly.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck. If you do get stuck on a low traffic ramp, you can try hitchhiking on the highway itself even if pedestrians are prohibited. There is a good chance you will get picked up before police see you, and if they do they are just going to give you a warning and ask you to go back to the ramp or even give you a ride to the next one just to get rid of you..

Asking for rides at rest areas, particularly on toll roads such as I-90 between [[Boston]] and [[Chicago]] is one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

You can also look for rides at the truck stops or gas stations themselves, but be discreet about it as with rest areas, some customers will complain and staff will make you leave the property. As a rule Love's, Petro, and TA truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== Short Distance ===
If you are only going a hundred miles, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways or local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

=== Overview ===
The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Nationwide ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and Local ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

=== Ignorant Police Officers ===

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race(its occasional but as long as you are prepared and confident you would be fine). They may call you names or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat and even give you shelter if its late at night. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West, however if you are looking in right places you can always find vegan food like cheese and bean burritos, biscuit, cheese pizza etc.  You can even ask restaurants to remove the meat part from the meal, 

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores and gas station(with fast food)are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]

''I have hitchhiked over 100,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun to hitchhike here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[Texas]] and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with any number of other people. Hitchhiking with two people seems to be the ideal scenario with the shortest waits. '' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' Summer '14

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>oxxnpz3zenqte9u4xi2jbtexfbm75sm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77205</id>
      <parentid>77204</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-09-20T19:35:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19915">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Methods for catching rides ==

=== Long Distance ===
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated on maps by "i-#": road signs appearing [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this]) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.). State highways is also a good way to catch rides especially when your destination is not very near to an interstate, Its easier to hitch a ride on interstates as drivers are more relaxed and not going very fast. 

Often times the best way to hitchhike is just to stay on high traffic ramps with large shoulders for people to pull over on. Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates, especially where the police are unfriendly.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck. If you do get stuck on a low traffic ramp, you can try hitchhiking on the highway itself even if pedestrians are prohibited. There is a good chance you will get picked up before police see you, and if they do they are just going to give you a warning and ask you to go back to the ramp or even give you a ride to the next one just to get rid of you..

Asking for rides at rest areas, particularly on toll roads such as I-90 between [[Boston]] and [[Chicago]] is one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

You can also look for rides at the truck stops or gas stations themselves, but be discreet about it as with rest areas, some customers will complain and staff will make you leave the property. As a rule Love's, Petro, and TA truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== Short Distance ===
If you are only going a hundred miles, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways or local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

=== Overview ===
The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Nationwide ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and Local ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

=== Ignorant Police Officers ===

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race(its occasional but as long as you are prepared and confident you would be fine). They may call you names or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat and even give you shelter if its late at night. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West, however if you are looking in right places you can always find vegan food like cheese and bean burritos, biscuit, cheese pizza etc.  You can even ask restaurants to remove the meat part from the meal, 

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores and gas station(with fast food)are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]

''I have hitchhiked over 100,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun to hitchhike here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[Texas]] and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with any number of other people. Hitchhiking with two people seems to be the ideal scenario with the shortest waits. '' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' Summer '14

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>mmjlqzq51s3hsks5e33dhi2vqywco2c</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>78661</id>
      <parentid>77205</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-01-31T16:04:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19985">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Methods for catching rides ==

=== Long Distance ===
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated on maps by "i-#": road signs appearing [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this]) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.). State highways is also a good way to catch rides especially when your destination is not very near to an interstate, Its easier to hitch a ride on interstates as drivers are more relaxed and not going very fast. 

Often times the best way to hitchhike is just to stay on high traffic ramps with large shoulders for people to pull over on. Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates, especially where the police are unfriendly.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck. If you do get stuck on a low traffic ramp, you can try hitchhiking on the highway itself even if pedestrians are prohibited. There is a good chance you will get picked up before police see you, and if they do they are just going to give you a warning and ask you to go back to the ramp or even give you a ride to the next one just to get rid of you..

Asking for rides at rest areas, particularly on toll roads such as I-90 between [[Boston]] and [[Chicago]] is one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

You can also look for rides at the truck stops or gas stations themselves, but be discreet about it as with rest areas, some customers will complain and staff will make you leave the property. As a rule Love's, Petro, and TA truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== Short Distance ===
If you are only going a hundred miles, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways or local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

=== Overview ===
The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Nationwide ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and Local ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

=== Ignorant Police Officers ===

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race(its occasional but as long as you are prepared and confident you would be fine). They may call you names or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat and even give you shelter if its late at night. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West, however if you are looking in right places you can always find vegan food like cheese and bean burritos, biscuit, cheese pizza etc.  You can even ask restaurants to remove the meat part from the meal, 

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores and gas station(with fast food)are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]

''I have hitchhiked over 100,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun to hitchhike here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[Texas]] and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with any number of other people. Hitchhiking with two people seems to be the ideal scenario with the shortest waits. '' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' Summer '14

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/]
* {http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]
[[nomad:United States]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]


{{move_to_nomadwiki}}
{{move_to_trashwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>mfejoplxvl20et3gfbso981qku2q134</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>78662</id>
      <parentid>78661</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-01-31T16:09:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20055">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''' as a country is divided up into 50 states; for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages (see below). The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the North and [[Mexico]] to the South.

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. Detours for hitchhikers are much more common here than in Europe due to cheaper gas.

== Methods for catching rides ==

=== Long Distance ===
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates (designated on maps by "i-#": road signs appearing [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this]) instead of local highways. Try to stick to on-ramps that have truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.). State highways is also a good way to catch rides especially when your destination is not very near to an interstate, Its easier to hitch a ride on interstates as drivers are more relaxed and not going very fast. 

Often times the best way to hitchhike is just to stay on high traffic ramps with large shoulders for people to pull over on. Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates, especially where the police are unfriendly.  It can easily lead to long, long delays. Identify the last truck stop, major intersection (with a non-freeway), or rest area before your driver's destination, and get off there rather than risking getting stuck. If you do get stuck on a low traffic ramp, you can try hitchhiking on the highway itself even if pedestrians are prohibited. There is a good chance you will get picked up before police see you, and if they do they are just going to give you a warning and ask you to go back to the ramp or even give you a ride to the next one just to get rid of you..

Asking for rides at rest areas, particularly on toll roads such as I-90 between [[Boston]] and [[Chicago]] is one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

You can also look for rides at the truck stops or gas stations themselves, but be discreet about it as with rest areas, some customers will complain and staff will make you leave the property. As a rule Love's, Petro, and TA truck stops will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== Short Distance ===
If you are only going a hundred miles, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways or local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

=== Overview ===
The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Nationwide ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and Local ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

=== Ignorant Police Officers ===

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race(its occasional but as long as you are prepared and confident you would be fine). They may call you names or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

== Car License Plate ==

Every state issues its own specific car plates. For example, a car from Alabama will have be specifically [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_the_United_States Car license] tagged as such.  In some States, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Food ==

''' Eat: '''

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat and even give you shelter if its late at night. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West, however if you are looking in right places you can always find vegan food like cheese and bean burritos, biscuit, cheese pizza etc.  You can even ask restaurants to remove the meat part from the meal, 

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores and gas station(with fast food)are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]

''I have hitchhiked over 100,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun to hitchhike here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[Texas]] and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with any number of other people. Hitchhiking with two people seems to be the ideal scenario with the shortest waits. '' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' Summer '14

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/ Review of the book "Readwood to Deadwood"]
* [http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com "Readwood to Deadwood" book]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]
[[nomad:United States]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]


{{move_to_nomadwiki}}
{{move_to_trashwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>kap15kl0lbzc6qr54vypkeq1kc8evzi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>78984</id>
      <parentid>78662</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-03-16T05:12:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dr.Keith</username>
        <id>3060</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="22593">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America'' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  In fact, enjoy it.  It's a part of our culture.  

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
:''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs, while an additional 11 percent carpool. Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16, and all states require that one obtain a driver's license before they may operate a motor vehicle.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million cars in the USA, the most of any country.  You may need to drastically change your technique to accomodate to unfamiliar infastructure.  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below). 

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.  

=== License plates ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates, and most states have several different styles. In some states, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = "[[Philadelphia]]"
*"D.C." = "[[Washington, D.C]]"
*"N.Y.C." = "[[New York City]]"
*"S.F" = "[[San Fransisco]]"
*"L.A." = "[[Los Angeles]]"
*"NOLA" ="[[New Orleans]]" (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.  

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

=== Overview ===
The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Nationwide ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and Local ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

=== Ignorant Police Officers ===

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race(its occasional but as long as you are prepared and confident you would be fine). They may call you names or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.


== Food ==

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat and even give you shelter if its late at night. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West, however if you are looking in right places you can always find vegan food like cheese and bean burritos, biscuit, cheese pizza etc.  You can even ask restaurants to remove the meat part from the meal, 

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores and gas station(with fast food)are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]

''I have hitchhiked over 100,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun to hitchhike here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[Texas]] and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with any number of other people. Hitchhiking with two people seems to be the ideal scenario with the shortest waits. '' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' Summer '14

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/ Review of the book "Readwood to Deadwood"]
* [http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com "Readwood to Deadwood" book]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]
[[nomad:United States]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]


{{move_to_nomadwiki}}
{{move_to_trashwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>2fzsi1t6mx4bz6k72fq9tzt95ju4qk3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>78985</id>
      <parentid>78984</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-03-16T05:13:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dr.Keith</username>
        <id>3060</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="22591">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America'' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  In fact, enjoy it.  It's a part of our culture.  

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
:''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs, while an additional 11 percent carpool. Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16, and all states require that one obtain a driver's license before they may operate a motor vehicle.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million cars in the USA, the most of any country.  You may need to drastically change your technique to accomodate to unfamiliar infastructure.  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below). 

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.  

=== License plates ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates, and most states have several different styles. In some states, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = "[[Philadelphia]]"
*"D.C." = "[[Washington, D.C]]"
*"N.Y.C." = "[[New York City]]"
*"S.F" = "[[San Francisco]]"
*"L.A." = "[[Los Angeles]]"
*"NOLA" ="[[New Orleans]]" (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

=== Overview ===
The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Nationwide ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and Local ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

=== Ignorant Police Officers ===

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race(its occasional but as long as you are prepared and confident you would be fine). They may call you names or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.


== Food ==

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat and even give you shelter if its late at night. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West, however if you are looking in right places you can always find vegan food like cheese and bean burritos, biscuit, cheese pizza etc.  You can even ask restaurants to remove the meat part from the meal, 

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores and gas station(with fast food)are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]

''I have hitchhiked over 100,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun to hitchhike here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[Texas]] and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with any number of other people. Hitchhiking with two people seems to be the ideal scenario with the shortest waits. '' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' Summer '14

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/ Review of the book "Readwood to Deadwood"]
* [http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com "Readwood to Deadwood" book]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]
[[nomad:United States]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]


{{move_to_nomadwiki}}
{{move_to_trashwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>qkpheym8xw9c3jzu28vxwc7a574zqim</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>78986</id>
      <parentid>78985</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-03-16T05:13:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dr.Keith</username>
        <id>3060</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="22592">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America'' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  In fact, enjoy it.  It's a part of our culture.  

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
:''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs, while an additional 11 percent carpool. Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16, and all states require that one obtain a driver's license before they may operate a motor vehicle.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million cars in the USA, the most of any country.  You may need to drastically change your technique to accomodate to unfamiliar infastructure.  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below). 

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.  

=== License plates ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates, and most states have several different styles. In some states, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = "[[Philadelphia]]"
*"D.C." = "[[Washington, D.C.]]"
*"N.Y.C." = "[[New York City]]"
*"S.F" = "[[San Francisco]]"
*"L.A." = "[[Los Angeles]]"
*"NOLA" ="[[New Orleans]]" (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

=== Overview ===
The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Nationwide ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and Local ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

=== Ignorant Police Officers ===

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race(its occasional but as long as you are prepared and confident you would be fine). They may call you names or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.


== Food ==

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat and even give you shelter if its late at night. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West, however if you are looking in right places you can always find vegan food like cheese and bean burritos, biscuit, cheese pizza etc.  You can even ask restaurants to remove the meat part from the meal, 

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores and gas station(with fast food)are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]

''I have hitchhiked over 100,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun to hitchhike here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[Texas]] and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with any number of other people. Hitchhiking with two people seems to be the ideal scenario with the shortest waits. '' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' Summer '14

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/ Review of the book "Readwood to Deadwood"]
* [http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com "Readwood to Deadwood" book]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]
[[nomad:United States]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]


{{move_to_nomadwiki}}
{{move_to_trashwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>nmoj7odh17noq1t7l4ugv2l8zlz9h3x</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>78990</id>
      <parentid>78986</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-03-16T20:21:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dr.Keith</username>
        <id>3060</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="22583">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
:'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  In fact, enjoy it.  It's a part of our culture.  

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
:''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs, while an additional 11 percent carpool. Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16, and all states require that one obtain a driver's license before they may operate a motor vehicle.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million cars in the USA, the most of any country.  You may need to drastically change your technique to accomodate to unfamiliar infastructure.  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below). 

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.  

=== License plates ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates, and most states have several different styles. In some states, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

=== Overview ===
The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Nationwide ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and Local ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

=== Ignorant Police Officers ===

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race(its occasional but as long as you are prepared and confident you would be fine). They may call you names or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.


== Food ==

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat and even give you shelter if its late at night. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West, however if you are looking in right places you can always find vegan food like cheese and bean burritos, biscuit, cheese pizza etc.  You can even ask restaurants to remove the meat part from the meal, 

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores and gas station(with fast food)are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]

''I have hitchhiked over 100,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun to hitchhike here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[Texas]] and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with any number of other people. Hitchhiking with two people seems to be the ideal scenario with the shortest waits. '' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' Summer '14

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/ Review of the book "Readwood to Deadwood"]
* [http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com "Readwood to Deadwood" book]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]
[[nomad:United States]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]


{{move_to_nomadwiki}}
{{move_to_trashwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>sgsy6db9vu78cxsmekuj1d41yda35o2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>78992</id>
      <parentid>78990</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-03-17T03:55:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dr.Keith</username>
        <id>3060</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="22961">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
:'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  In fact, enjoy it.  It's a part of our culture.  

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
:''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs, while an additional 11 percent carpool. Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16, and all states require that one obtain a driver's license before they may operate a motor vehicle.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million cars in the USA, the most of any country.  You may need to drastically change your technique to accomodate to unfamiliar infastructure.  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below). 

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.  

=== License plates ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates, and most states have several different styles. In some states, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out [flexyourrights.org].  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Food ==

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat and even give you shelter if its late at night. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West, however if you are looking in right places you can always find vegan food like cheese and bean burritos, biscuit, cheese pizza etc.  You can even ask restaurants to remove the meat part from the meal, 

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores and gas station(with fast food)are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]

''I have hitchhiked over 100,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun to hitchhike here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[Texas]] and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with any number of other people. Hitchhiking with two people seems to be the ideal scenario with the shortest waits. '' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' Summer '14

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/ Review of the book "Readwood to Deadwood"]
* [http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com "Readwood to Deadwood" book]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]
[[nomad:United States]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]


{{move_to_nomadwiki}}
{{move_to_trashwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>41vag1inu1u28gjmxrd1ca5w627erlx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79019</id>
      <parentid>78992</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-03-24T14:04:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dr.Keith</username>
        <id>3060</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="23040">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
:'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  In fact, enjoy it.  It's a part of our culture.  

Relatively quite a few people in the United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
:''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs, while an additional 11 percent carpool. Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16, and all states require that one obtain a driver's license before they may operate a motor vehicle.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million cars in the USA, the most of any country.  You may need to drastically change your technique to accomodate to unfamiliar infastructure.  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below). 

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.

=== License plates ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates, and most states have several different styles. In some states, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out [flexyourrights.org].  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Food ==

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat and even give you shelter if its late at night. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West, however if you are looking in right places you can always find vegan food like cheese and bean burritos, biscuit, cheese pizza etc.  You can even ask restaurants to remove the meat part from the meal, 

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores and gas station(with fast food)are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]

''I have hitchhiked over 100,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun to hitchhike here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[Texas]] and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with any number of other people. Hitchhiking with two people seems to be the ideal scenario with the shortest waits. '' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' Summer '14

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/ Review of the book "Readwood to Deadwood"]
* [http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com "Readwood to Deadwood" book]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]
[[nomad:United States]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]


{{move_to_nomadwiki}}
{{move_to_trashwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>2n3stjdt6883xrolpn17ghqipebkvwt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79318</id>
      <parentid>79019</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-05-05T02:53:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dr.Keith</username>
        <id>3060</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="23170">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
:'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.  

Relatively quite a few people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
:''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below). 

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.

=== License plates ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates, and most states have several different styles. In some states, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out [flexyourrights.org].  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Food ==

If you are friendly, people who pick you up will offer to buy you food quite a lot. Additionally, a lot of people will throw you some bucks to eat and even give you shelter if its late at night. From change up to $100. An anonymous hitchhiker has been given $100 dollars twice, and they have been given $60 dollars several times as has [[User:Zenit|Zenit]]... If you are looking for monetary gifts, the key is the right type of answer when they ask, concernedly, what you do to eat - "Naw, we're pretty much all right, we got *some* money." (emphasizing the "some" slightly)- if they've asked this question and you answer this way you'll basically always get a friendly handout - for which you should thank them profusely, of course. :)[[File:ChaelUSwalking.jpg|thumb|350px|[[User:Chael777|Chael]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://www.velabas.com/ site]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; crossing a bridge in Oregon, August 2009]]

For vegetarians and especially for vegans traveling between cities, times can be hard. [[User:Zenit|Zenit]] for one has sustained himself mostly on chips and granola bars for weeks at a time in the Mid West, however if you are looking in right places you can always find vegan food like cheese and bean burritos, biscuit, cheese pizza etc.  You can even ask restaurants to remove the meat part from the meal, 

Once you open your mind to it, there are actually many opportunities for dumpster diving in urban areas.  Port cities are especially good.  Note, however that dumpster diving is in a similar sort of gray area as hitchhiking, with local legality depending on the particular state's laws, and the prevalent attitudes of local law enforcement officers.

Grocery stores and gas station(with fast food)are prime targets for food ([[:trash:Trader Joe's|Trader Joe's]] or Starbucks are especially likely to have an unlocked dumpster, and has lots of organics). Grocery stores cannot sell packaged foods past their expiration date, and so throw them away still wrapped in dumpsters behind the store.

Another great place to dive is food distribution centers.  As they supply restaurants, their food comes in bulk and they throw out their food sometimes days before the expiration date. Google Maps can help you turn up locations.  ''Check Trashwiki for detailed information on [[:trash:United States of America|dumpster diving in the United States]].''

''' Drink: '''
It is often possible to retrieve used cups from the trash at fast food restaurants with "free refill" policies and refill them. Otherwise, American water is just as free and healthy as any other country of the world.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]

''I have hitchhiked over 100,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun to hitchhike here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[Texas]] and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with any number of other people. Hitchhiking with two people seems to be the ideal scenario with the shortest waits. '' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' Summer '14

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/ Review of the book "Readwood to Deadwood"]
* [http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com "Readwood to Deadwood" book]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]
[[nomad:United States]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]


{{move_to_nomadwiki}}
{{move_to_trashwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>sfrig0y7m8jqt0lfdf0wxdo3qa82xga</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79831</id>
      <parentid>79318</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-07-07T08:44:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20570">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
:'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.  

Relatively quite a few people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion.  If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference.  

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
:''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below). 

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.

=== License plates ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates, and most states have several different styles. In some states, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out [flexyourrights.org].  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]

''I have hitchhiked over 100,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun to hitchhike here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[Texas]] and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with any number of other people. Hitchhiking with two people seems to be the ideal scenario with the shortest waits. '' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' Summer '14

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/ Review of the book "Readwood to Deadwood"]
* [http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com "Readwood to Deadwood" book]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]
[[nomad:United States]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]


{{move_to_nomadwiki}}
{{move_to_trashwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>p3nr4whtbpd8ac20icfpurjri5uadyz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79864</id>
      <parentid>79831</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-07-10T07:25:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Vmpfc1</username>
        <id>23679</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21314">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
:'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.

Despite a large number of immigrants all across the country, most Americans are still curious about people from different parts of the world, fascinated by foreign accents, and eager to introduce visitors to American culture. Despite an undercurrent of xenophobia and racism in rural parts of the country, Americans tend to have a pragmatic view towards foreigners: Americans might profoundly dislike your country of origin, but they will rarely hold that against you as an individual.

Relative to other Western countries, people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion. If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. Despite a level of religious intolerance much higher than in Europe, Americans tend to have a pragmatic approach to people of unfamiliar religious backgrounds: Americans tend not to judge you badly even if they might be suspicious of your religion.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
:''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below).

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.

=== License plates ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates, and most states have several different styles. In some states, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out [flexyourrights.org].  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

Rather than a genre of its own, hitchhiking books probably fit better in a genre of alternative travel books, with Jack Kerouac’s On The Road, Bill Bryson’s A Walk in the Woods and Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

To that list of fun and funny and moving and important books, we should add Colin Flaherty’s Redwood to Deadwood, a 53-year old dude hitchhikes across America. Again.

Redwood to Deadwood describes Flaherty’s hitchhiking trip across America. 

"''Before I tucked my thumb in for the final time, I'd run with wild horses. Visit a pot farm. Hunt big game. Poach big game. Get by a police helicopter. Get info family feuds. Ride in cop cars. Reconnect with old friends. Make new ones. Get tired and exhilarated. Lost and found. Kicked out and invited in''."

"I know how to cook muskrat, squiirrel and rockchuck. And oh yea, I almost got killed.”

Book reviewer Janet Jay said the book is  [“the best hitchhiking I have ever read or even heard about.  My friend heard about it when she was sitting next to a guy on an airplane who was reading it. He was laughing out loud. So she asked about it. He said that was how he heard about it too. So books hitchhike as well as people.”]

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]

''I have hitchhiked over 100,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun to hitchhike here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[Texas]] and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with any number of other people. Hitchhiking with two people seems to be the ideal scenario with the shortest waits. '' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' Summer '14

== Links ==
* [http://thebplot.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/6249/ Review of the book "Readwood to Deadwood"]
* [http://www.RedwoodtoDeadwoodbook.com "Readwood to Deadwood" book]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]
[[nomad:United States]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]


{{move_to_nomadwiki}}
{{move_to_trashwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>am25x27kilcikvcpmfefx0oce07j6fb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>85237</id>
      <parentid>79864</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-01-13T18:13:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Koendev</username>
        <id>4236</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20382">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
:'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.

Despite a large number of immigrants all across the country, most Americans are still curious about people from different parts of the world, fascinated by foreign accents, and eager to introduce visitors to American culture. Despite an undercurrent of xenophobia and racism in rural parts of the country, Americans tend to have a pragmatic view towards foreigners: Americans might profoundly dislike your country of origin, but they will rarely hold that against you as an individual.

Relative to other Western countries, people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion. If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. Despite a level of religious intolerance much higher than in Europe, Americans tend to have a pragmatic approach to people of unfamiliar religious backgrounds: Americans tend not to judge you badly even if they might be suspicious of your religion.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
:''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below).

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.

=== License plates ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates, and most states have several different styles. In some states, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out [flexyourrights.org].  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

With a long history of vagabonding, the amount of literature on hitchhiking in the USA is extensive. The following list gives an overview, which by all means is not complete.

Jack Kerouac - On The Road
Bill Bryson - A Walk in the Woods
Robert Pirsig - Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance
Jacob Holdt - American Pictures
Colin Flaherty - Redwood to Deadwood
Jon Krakauer - Into the Wild
Tom Robbins - Even Cowgirls Get the Blues
Richard Grant - Ghost Riders

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]

''I have hitchhiked over 100,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun to hitchhike here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[Texas]] and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with any number of other people. Hitchhiking with two people seems to be the ideal scenario with the shortest waits. '' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' Summer '14

== Links ==



{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]
[[nomad:United States]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]


{{move_to_nomadwiki}}
{{move_to_trashwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>l8867fyp1cyefn2wlt5vyjpkacdygoi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>85238</id>
      <parentid>85237</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-01-13T18:16:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Koendev</username>
        <id>4236</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20417">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
:'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.

Despite a large number of immigrants all across the country, most Americans are still curious about people from different parts of the world, fascinated by foreign accents, and eager to introduce visitors to American culture. Despite an undercurrent of xenophobia and racism in rural parts of the country, Americans tend to have a pragmatic view towards foreigners: Americans might profoundly dislike your country of origin, but they will rarely hold that against you as an individual.

Relative to other Western countries, people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion. If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. Despite a level of religious intolerance much higher than in Europe, Americans tend to have a pragmatic approach to people of unfamiliar religious backgrounds: Americans tend not to judge you badly even if they might be suspicious of your religion.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
:''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below).

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.

=== License plates ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates, and most states have several different styles. In some states, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out [flexyourrights.org].  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

With a long history of vagabonding, the amount of literature on hitchhiking in the USA is extensive. The following list gives an overview, which by all means is not complete.

Jack Kerouac - On The Road &lt;br&gt;
Bill Bryson - A Walk in the Woods &lt;br&gt;
Robert Pirsig - Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance &lt;br&gt;
Jacob Holdt - American Pictures &lt;br&gt;
Colin Flaherty - Redwood to Deadwood &lt;br&gt;
Jon Krakauer - Into the Wild &lt;br&gt;
Tom Robbins - Even Cowgirls Get the Blues &lt;br&gt;
Richard Grant - Ghost Riders

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]

''I have hitchhiked over 100,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun to hitchhike here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[Texas]] and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with any number of other people. Hitchhiking with two people seems to be the ideal scenario with the shortest waits. '' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' Summer '14

== Links ==



{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]
[[nomad:United States]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]


{{move_to_nomadwiki}}
{{move_to_trashwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>cjz228sr1tobd0kaur87ycc62uq7siv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>85468</id>
      <parentid>85238</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-02-20T09:35:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Korn</username>
        <id>2330</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20542">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
:'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.

Despite a large number of immigrants all across the country, most Americans are still curious about people from different parts of the world, fascinated by foreign accents, and eager to introduce visitors to American culture. Despite an undercurrent of xenophobia and racism in rural parts of the country, Americans tend to have a pragmatic view towards foreigners: Americans might profoundly dislike your country of origin, but they will rarely hold that against you as an individual.

Relative to other Western countries, people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion. If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. Despite a level of religious intolerance much higher than in Europe, Americans tend to have a pragmatic approach to people of unfamiliar religious backgrounds: Americans tend not to judge you badly even if they might be suspicious of your religion.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
:''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below).

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.

=== License plates ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates, and most states have several different styles. In some states, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out [flexyourrights.org].  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

With a long history of vagabonding, the amount of literature on hitchhiking in the USA is extensive. The following list gives an overview, which by all means is not complete.

Jack Kerouac - On The Road &lt;br&gt;
Bill Bryson - A Walk in the Woods &lt;br&gt;
Robert Pirsig - Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance &lt;br&gt;
Jacob Holdt - American Pictures &lt;br&gt;
Colin Flaherty - Redwood to Deadwood &lt;br&gt;
Jon Krakauer - Into the Wild &lt;br&gt;
Tom Robbins - Even Cowgirls Get the Blues &lt;br&gt;
Richard Grant - Ghost Riders

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]

''I have hitchhiked over 100,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun to hitchhike here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[Texas]] and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with any number of other people. Hitchhiking with two people seems to be the ideal scenario with the shortest waits. '' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' Summer '14

== Links ==
Analyses of hitchhiking in the USA by [[User:Korn|Korn]] on [https://warmroads.de/en/hitchhiking-in-19-the-usa/ - warmroads.]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]
[[nomad:United States]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]


{{move_to_nomadwiki}}
{{move_to_trashwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>qdlgn436tpztul3mytgcx9swhf0qmr8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>85469</id>
      <parentid>85468</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-02-20T09:37:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Korn</username>
        <id>2330</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20568">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
:'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.

Despite a large number of immigrants all across the country, most Americans are still curious about people from different parts of the world, fascinated by foreign accents, and eager to introduce visitors to American culture. Despite an undercurrent of xenophobia and racism in rural parts of the country, Americans tend to have a pragmatic view towards foreigners: Americans might profoundly dislike your country of origin, but they will rarely hold that against you as an individual.

Relative to other Western countries, people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion. If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. Despite a level of religious intolerance much higher than in Europe, Americans tend to have a pragmatic approach to people of unfamiliar religious backgrounds: Americans tend not to judge you badly even if they might be suspicious of your religion.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
:''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below).

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.

=== License plates ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates, and most states have several different styles. In some states, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out [flexyourrights.org].  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

With a long history of vagabonding, the amount of literature on hitchhiking in the USA is extensive. The following list gives an overview, which by all means is not complete.

Jack Kerouac - On The Road &lt;br&gt;
Bill Bryson - A Walk in the Woods &lt;br&gt;
Robert Pirsig - Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance &lt;br&gt;
Jacob Holdt - American Pictures &lt;br&gt;
Colin Flaherty - Redwood to Deadwood &lt;br&gt;
Jon Krakauer - Into the Wild &lt;br&gt;
Tom Robbins - Even Cowgirls Get the Blues &lt;br&gt;
Richard Grant - Ghost Riders

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]

''I have hitchhiked over 100,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun to hitchhike here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[Texas]] and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with any number of other people. Hitchhiking with two people seems to be the ideal scenario with the shortest waits. '' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' Summer '14

== Links ==
Analyses of hitchhiking in the USA by [[User:Korn|Korn]] on warmroads.de [https://warmroads.de/en/hitchhiking-in-19-the-usa/ - Hitchhiking in the USA.]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]
[[nomad:United States]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]


{{move_to_nomadwiki}}
{{move_to_trashwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>jvqytk9bz1k6h3vxkx7efb2ni1xj5hw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>85514</id>
      <parentid>85469</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-02-25T03:09:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Wallpaper</username>
        <id>18365</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20719">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
:'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.

Despite a large number of immigrants all across the country, most Americans are still curious about people from different parts of the world, fascinated by foreign accents, and eager to introduce visitors to American culture. Despite an undercurrent of xenophobia and racism in rural parts of the country, Americans tend to have a pragmatic view towards foreigners: Americans might profoundly dislike your country of origin, but they will rarely hold that against you as an individual.

Relative to other Western countries, people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion. If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. Despite a level of religious intolerance much higher than in Europe, Americans tend to have a pragmatic approach to people of unfamiliar religious backgrounds: Americans tend not to judge you badly even if they might be suspicious of your religion.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
:''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below).

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.

=== License plates ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates, and most states have several different styles. In some states, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out [flexyourrights.org].  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

With a long history of vagabonding, the amount of literature on hitchhiking in the USA is extensive. The following list gives an overview, which by all means is not complete.

Jack Kerouac - On The Road &lt;br&gt;
Bill Bryson - A Walk in the Woods &lt;br&gt;
Robert Pirsig - Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance &lt;br&gt;
Jacob Holdt - American Pictures &lt;br&gt;
Colin Flaherty - Redwood to Deadwood &lt;br&gt;
Jon Krakauer - Into the Wild &lt;br&gt;
Katia Noyes - Crashing America &lt;br&gt;
Cheryl Strayed - Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail &lt;br&gt;
Tom Robbins - Even Cowgirls Get the Blues &lt;br&gt;
Richard Grant - Ghost Riders &lt;br&gt;
Elijah Wald - Riding with Strangers

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]

''I have hitchhiked over 100,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun to hitchhike here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[Texas]] and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with any number of other people. Hitchhiking with two people seems to be the ideal scenario with the shortest waits. '' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' Summer '14

== Links ==
Analyses of hitchhiking in the USA by [[User:Korn|Korn]] on warmroads.de [https://warmroads.de/en/hitchhiking-in-19-the-usa/ - Hitchhiking in the USA.]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]
[[nomad:United States]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]


{{move_to_nomadwiki}}
{{move_to_trashwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>24hfjcw5l3arko9soagmyux9jaikicq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>88794</id>
      <parentid>85514</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-08-21T15:00:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Nora</username>
        <id>28590</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21135">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
:'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.

Despite a large number of immigrants all across the country, most Americans are still curious about people from different parts of the world, fascinated by foreign accents, and eager to introduce visitors to American culture. Despite an undercurrent of xenophobia and racism in rural parts of the country, Americans tend to have a pragmatic view towards foreigners: Americans might profoundly dislike your country of origin, but they will rarely hold that against you as an individual.

Relative to other Western countries, people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion. If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. Despite a level of religious intolerance much higher than in Europe, Americans tend to have a pragmatic approach to people of unfamiliar religious backgrounds: Americans tend not to judge you badly even if they might be suspicious of your religion.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
:''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below).

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.

=== License plates ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates, and most states have several different styles. In some states, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

=== Getting out of big cities ===
You may find yourself in very sprawled out cities like LA or Phoenix, then try your luck on Craigslist! I (http://hitchwiki.org/en/User:Nora) crossed the US and found a few rides on Craiglist, messaging people who offer rides and asking if they would take me for free. Probably works best as a foreigner and a girl, but is worth a try. And maybe you can 'pay' in stories or music!

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out [flexyourrights.org].  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

With a long history of vagabonding, the amount of literature on hitchhiking in the USA is extensive. The following list gives an overview, which by all means is not complete.

Jack Kerouac - On The Road &lt;br&gt;
Bill Bryson - A Walk in the Woods &lt;br&gt;
Robert Pirsig - Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance &lt;br&gt;
Jacob Holdt - American Pictures &lt;br&gt;
Colin Flaherty - Redwood to Deadwood &lt;br&gt;
Jon Krakauer - Into the Wild &lt;br&gt;
Katia Noyes - Crashing America &lt;br&gt;
Cheryl Strayed - Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail &lt;br&gt;
Tom Robbins - Even Cowgirls Get the Blues &lt;br&gt;
Richard Grant - Ghost Riders &lt;br&gt;
Elijah Wald - Riding with Strangers

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]

''I have hitchhiked over 100,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun to hitchhike here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[Texas]] and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with any number of other people. Hitchhiking with two people seems to be the ideal scenario with the shortest waits. '' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' Summer '14

== Links ==
Analyses of hitchhiking in the USA by [[User:Korn|Korn]] on warmroads.de [https://warmroads.de/en/hitchhiking-in-19-the-usa/ - Hitchhiking in the USA.]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]
[[nomad:United States]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]


{{move_to_nomadwiki}}
{{move_to_trashwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>rei27wcbr4eznfkgdf2uyobpiic36sw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>88798</id>
      <parentid>88794</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-08-21T15:13:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Nora</username>
        <id>28590</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21849">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
:'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.

Despite a large number of immigrants all across the country, most Americans are still curious about people from different parts of the world, fascinated by foreign accents, and eager to introduce visitors to American culture. Despite an undercurrent of xenophobia and racism in rural parts of the country, Americans tend to have a pragmatic view towards foreigners: Americans might profoundly dislike your country of origin, but they will rarely hold that against you as an individual.

Relative to other Western countries, people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion. If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. Despite a level of religious intolerance much higher than in Europe, Americans tend to have a pragmatic approach to people of unfamiliar religious backgrounds: Americans tend not to judge you badly even if they might be suspicious of your religion.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
:''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below).

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.

=== License plates ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates, and most states have several different styles. In some states, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

=== Getting out of big cities ===
You may find yourself in very sprawled out cities like LA or Phoenix, then try your luck on Craigslist! I (http://hitchwiki.org/en/User:Nora) crossed the US and found a few rides on Craiglist, messaging people who offer rides and asking if they would take me for free. Probably works best as a foreigner and a girl, but is worth a try. And maybe you can 'pay' in stories or music!

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out [flexyourrights.org].  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Hitchhiking Books ==

With a long history of vagabonding, the amount of literature on hitchhiking in the USA is extensive. The following list gives an overview, which by all means is not complete.

Jack Kerouac - On The Road &lt;br&gt;
Bill Bryson - A Walk in the Woods &lt;br&gt;
Robert Pirsig - Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance &lt;br&gt;
Jacob Holdt - American Pictures &lt;br&gt;
Colin Flaherty - Redwood to Deadwood &lt;br&gt;
Jon Krakauer - Into the Wild &lt;br&gt;
Katia Noyes - Crashing America &lt;br&gt;
Cheryl Strayed - Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail &lt;br&gt;
Tom Robbins - Even Cowgirls Get the Blues &lt;br&gt;
Richard Grant - Ghost Riders &lt;br&gt;
Elijah Wald - Riding with Strangers

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]

''I have hitchhiked over 100,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun to hitchhike here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[Texas]] and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with any number of other people. Hitchhiking with two people seems to be the ideal scenario with the shortest waits. '' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' Summer '14

''I crossed the US from Boston to San Francisco the southern way. The north east is tough, prepare for some waits and looks as if you were not worth anyone's attention. Luckily it gets better soon! Texas was the best state for me, lots of rides even from women, and basically no waites. Also California is pretty good to hitchhike, though more tourists. To all girls - it's definitely safe enough in my opinion, though I was asked for sex a few times by people not understanding hitchhiking much. And in general - for me waites for longer than in Europe (when alone I have to hardly wait longer than 10 minutes ever), but still the longest wait during the whole trip were ~2 hours at a bad spot. [[user:Nora]]
''

== Links ==
Analyses of hitchhiking in the USA by [[User:Korn|Korn]] on warmroads.de [https://warmroads.de/en/hitchhiking-in-19-the-usa/ - Hitchhiking in the USA.]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]
[[nomad:United States]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]


{{move_to_nomadwiki}}
{{move_to_trashwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>plwmnrq86s87clp2oxgoows9qh3io51</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>89393</id>
      <parentid>88798</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-10-02T02:43:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Traumschule</username>
        <id>28627</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21127">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
:'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.

Despite a large number of immigrants all across the country, most Americans are still curious about people from different parts of the world, fascinated by foreign accents, and eager to introduce visitors to American culture. Despite an undercurrent of xenophobia and racism in rural parts of the country, Americans tend to have a pragmatic view towards foreigners: Americans might profoundly dislike your country of origin, but they will rarely hold that against you as an individual.

Relative to other Western countries, people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion. If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. Despite a level of religious intolerance much higher than in Europe, Americans tend to have a pragmatic approach to people of unfamiliar religious backgrounds: Americans tend not to judge you badly even if they might be suspicious of your religion.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
:''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below).

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.

=== License plates ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates, and most states have several different styles. In some states, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

=== Getting out of big cities ===
You may find yourself in very sprawled out cities like LA or Phoenix, then try your luck on Craigslist! I (http://hitchwiki.org/en/User:Nora) crossed the US and found a few rides on Craiglist, messaging people who offer rides and asking if they would take me for free. Probably works best as a foreigner and a girl, but is worth a try. And maybe you can 'pay' in stories or music!

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out [flexyourrights.org].  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]

''I have hitchhiked over 100,000 miles in the United States, been through every state, and while I have nothing to compare it to other than Canada, I would say in general that it is easy and fun to hitchhike here. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My personal favorite states are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[Texas]] and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with any number of other people. Hitchhiking with two people seems to be the ideal scenario with the shortest waits. '' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' Summer '14

''I crossed the US from Boston to San Francisco the southern way. The north east is tough, prepare for some waits and looks as if you were not worth anyone's attention. Luckily it gets better soon! Texas was the best state for me, lots of rides even from women, and basically no waites. Also California is pretty good to hitchhike, though more tourists. To all girls - it's definitely safe enough in my opinion, though I was asked for sex a few times by people not understanding hitchhiking much. And in general - for me waites for longer than in Europe (when alone I have to hardly wait longer than 10 minutes ever), but still the longest wait during the whole trip were ~2 hours at a bad spot. [[user:Nora]]
''

== Links ==
Analyses of hitchhiking in the USA by [[User:Korn|Korn]] on warmroads.de [https://warmroads.de/en/hitchhiking-in-19-the-usa/ - Hitchhiking in the USA.]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]
[[nomad:United States]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>e9r7yujp5dgucbzmlwcqdwrbdetqabg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>90497</id>
      <parentid>89393</parentid>
      <timestamp>2018-03-11T05:09:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21397">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
:'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.

Despite a large number of immigrants all across the country, most Americans are still curious about people from different parts of the world, fascinated by foreign accents, and eager to introduce visitors to American culture. Despite an undercurrent of xenophobia and racism in rural parts of the country, Americans tend to have a pragmatic view towards foreigners: Americans might profoundly dislike your country of origin, but they will rarely hold that against you as an individual.

Relative to other Western countries, people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion. If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. Despite a level of religious intolerance much higher than in Europe, Americans tend to have a pragmatic approach to people of unfamiliar religious backgrounds: Americans tend not to judge you badly even if they might be suspicious of your religion.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
:''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below).

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.

=== License plates ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates, and most states have several different styles. In some states, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

=== Getting out of big cities ===
You may find yourself in very sprawled out cities like LA or Phoenix, then try your luck on Craigslist! I (http://hitchwiki.org/en/User:Nora) crossed the US and found a few rides on Craiglist, messaging people who offer rides and asking if they would take me for free. Probably works best as a foreigner and a girl, but is worth a try. And maybe you can 'pay' in stories or music!

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out [flexyourrights.org].  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]

''I hitchhiked over 200,000 miles in 50 states of the US, 19 states of Mexico, and 8 provinces of Canada I would say in general that it is easy to hitchhike in all those countries but some of the most difficult places are in America. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My favorite states for travelers are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[New Mexico]], [[Oregon]], and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with numbers of other people. Hitchhiking with two people or large equipment like a bicycle or kayak seems to give shortest waits. I would rank hitchhiking as a slightly more risky activity than cycle touring on windy highways with no shoulder. These days I prefer to ride freight trains and motorized bicycles, and I recommend you do the same.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' Summer '14

''I crossed the US from Boston to San Francisco the southern way. The north east is tough, prepare for some waits and looks as if you were not worth anyone's attention. Luckily it gets better soon! Texas was the best state for me, lots of rides even from women, and basically no waites. Also California is pretty good to hitchhike, though more tourists. To all girls - it's definitely safe enough in my opinion, though I was asked for sex a few times by people not understanding hitchhiking much. And in general - for me waites for longer than in Europe (when alone I have to hardly wait longer than 10 minutes ever), but still the longest wait during the whole trip were ~2 hours at a bad spot. [[user:Nora]]
''

== Links ==
Analyses of hitchhiking in the USA by [[User:Korn|Korn]] on warmroads.de [https://warmroads.de/en/hitchhiking-in-19-the-usa/ - Hitchhiking in the USA.]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]
[[nomad:United States]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>eubebfxtigwmc5mc6t821ut2ocw75fb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>97771</id>
      <parentid>90497</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-05-25T17:00:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Links */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21442">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
:'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.

Despite a large number of immigrants all across the country, most Americans are still curious about people from different parts of the world, fascinated by foreign accents, and eager to introduce visitors to American culture. Despite an undercurrent of xenophobia and racism in rural parts of the country, Americans tend to have a pragmatic view towards foreigners: Americans might profoundly dislike your country of origin, but they will rarely hold that against you as an individual.

Relative to other Western countries, people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion. If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. Despite a level of religious intolerance much higher than in Europe, Americans tend to have a pragmatic approach to people of unfamiliar religious backgrounds: Americans tend not to judge you badly even if they might be suspicious of your religion.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
:''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below).

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.

=== License plates ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates, and most states have several different styles. In some states, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

=== Getting out of big cities ===
You may find yourself in very sprawled out cities like LA or Phoenix, then try your luck on Craigslist! I (http://hitchwiki.org/en/User:Nora) crossed the US and found a few rides on Craiglist, messaging people who offer rides and asking if they would take me for free. Probably works best as a foreigner and a girl, but is worth a try. And maybe you can 'pay' in stories or music!

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out [flexyourrights.org].  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]

''I hitchhiked over 200,000 miles in 50 states of the US, 19 states of Mexico, and 8 provinces of Canada I would say in general that it is easy to hitchhike in all those countries but some of the most difficult places are in America. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My favorite states for travelers are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[New Mexico]], [[Oregon]], and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with numbers of other people. Hitchhiking with two people or large equipment like a bicycle or kayak seems to give shortest waits. I would rank hitchhiking as a slightly more risky activity than cycle touring on windy highways with no shoulder. These days I prefer to ride freight trains and motorized bicycles, and I recommend you do the same.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' Summer '14

''I crossed the US from Boston to San Francisco the southern way. The north east is tough, prepare for some waits and looks as if you were not worth anyone's attention. Luckily it gets better soon! Texas was the best state for me, lots of rides even from women, and basically no waites. Also California is pretty good to hitchhike, though more tourists. To all girls - it's definitely safe enough in my opinion, though I was asked for sex a few times by people not understanding hitchhiking much. And in general - for me waites for longer than in Europe (when alone I have to hardly wait longer than 10 minutes ever), but still the longest wait during the whole trip were ~2 hours at a bad spot. [[user:Nora]]
''

== Links ==

Analyses of hitchhiking in the USA by [[User:Korn|Korn]] on warmroads.de [https://warmroads.de/en/hitchhiking-in-19-the-usa/ - Hitchhiking in the USA.]


== Trashwiki &amp; Nomadwiki ==

[[nomad:United States of America]] [[trash:United States of America]]



{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}



[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>8374a1ui3ga9gvfbwiog9j5wwbz1ft8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>99335</id>
      <parentid>97771</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-10-02T15:03:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Trashwiki &amp; Nomadwiki */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21442">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
:'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.

Despite a large number of immigrants all across the country, most Americans are still curious about people from different parts of the world, fascinated by foreign accents, and eager to introduce visitors to American culture. Despite an undercurrent of xenophobia and racism in rural parts of the country, Americans tend to have a pragmatic view towards foreigners: Americans might profoundly dislike your country of origin, but they will rarely hold that against you as an individual.

Relative to other Western countries, people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion. If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. Despite a level of religious intolerance much higher than in Europe, Americans tend to have a pragmatic approach to people of unfamiliar religious backgrounds: Americans tend not to judge you badly even if they might be suspicious of your religion.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
:''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below).

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.

=== License plates ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates, and most states have several different styles. In some states, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

=== Getting out of big cities ===
You may find yourself in very sprawled out cities like LA or Phoenix, then try your luck on Craigslist! I (http://hitchwiki.org/en/User:Nora) crossed the US and found a few rides on Craiglist, messaging people who offer rides and asking if they would take me for free. Probably works best as a foreigner and a girl, but is worth a try. And maybe you can 'pay' in stories or music!

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out [flexyourrights.org].  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]

''I hitchhiked over 200,000 miles in 50 states of the US, 19 states of Mexico, and 8 provinces of Canada I would say in general that it is easy to hitchhike in all those countries but some of the most difficult places are in America. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My favorite states for travelers are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[New Mexico]], [[Oregon]], and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with numbers of other people. Hitchhiking with two people or large equipment like a bicycle or kayak seems to give shortest waits. I would rank hitchhiking as a slightly more risky activity than cycle touring on windy highways with no shoulder. These days I prefer to ride freight trains and motorized bicycles, and I recommend you do the same.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' Summer '14

''I crossed the US from Boston to San Francisco the southern way. The north east is tough, prepare for some waits and looks as if you were not worth anyone's attention. Luckily it gets better soon! Texas was the best state for me, lots of rides even from women, and basically no waites. Also California is pretty good to hitchhike, though more tourists. To all girls - it's definitely safe enough in my opinion, though I was asked for sex a few times by people not understanding hitchhiking much. And in general - for me waites for longer than in Europe (when alone I have to hardly wait longer than 10 minutes ever), but still the longest wait during the whole trip were ~2 hours at a bad spot. [[user:Nora]]
''

== Links ==

Analyses of hitchhiking in the USA by [[User:Korn|Korn]] on warmroads.de [https://warmroads.de/en/hitchhiking-in-19-the-usa/ - Hitchhiking in the USA.]


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

[[nomad:United States of America]] [[trash:United States of America]]



{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}



[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>190y009si86q04gys4q4ytgapm0quim</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>99724</id>
      <parentid>99335</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-10-14T14:28:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21386">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
:'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.

Despite a large number of immigrants all across the country, most Americans are still curious about people from different parts of the world, fascinated by foreign accents, and eager to introduce visitors to American culture. Despite an undercurrent of xenophobia and racism in rural parts of the country, Americans tend to have a pragmatic view towards foreigners: Americans might profoundly dislike your country of origin, but they will rarely hold that against you as an individual.

Relative to other Western countries, people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion. If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. Despite a level of religious intolerance much higher than in Europe, Americans tend to have a pragmatic approach to people of unfamiliar religious backgrounds: Americans tend not to judge you badly even if they might be suspicious of your religion.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
:''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below).

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.

=== License plates ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates, and most states have several different styles. In some states, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

=== Getting out of big cities ===
You may find yourself in very sprawled out cities like LA or Phoenix, then try your luck on Craigslist! I (http://hitchwiki.org/en/User:Nora) crossed the US and found a few rides on Craiglist, messaging people who offer rides and asking if they would take me for free. Probably works best as a foreigner and a girl, but is worth a try. And maybe you can 'pay' in stories or music!

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out [flexyourrights.org].  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]

''I hitchhiked over 200,000 miles in 50 states of the US, 19 states of Mexico, and 8 provinces of Canada I would say in general that it is easy to hitchhike in all those countries but some of the most difficult places are in America. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My favorite states for travelers are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[New Mexico]], [[Oregon]], and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with numbers of other people. Hitchhiking with two people or large equipment like a bicycle or kayak seems to give shortest waits. I would rank hitchhiking as a slightly more risky activity than cycle touring on windy highways with no shoulder. These days I prefer to ride freight trains and motorized bicycles, and I recommend you do the same.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' Summer '14

''I crossed the US from Boston to San Francisco the southern way. The north east is tough, prepare for some waits and looks as if you were not worth anyone's attention. Luckily it gets better soon! Texas was the best state for me, lots of rides even from women, and basically no waites. Also California is pretty good to hitchhike, though more tourists. To all girls - it's definitely safe enough in my opinion, though I was asked for sex a few times by people not understanding hitchhiking much. And in general - for me waites for longer than in Europe (when alone I have to hardly wait longer than 10 minutes ever), but still the longest wait during the whole trip were ~2 hours at a bad spot. [[user:Nora]]
''

== Links ==

Analyses of hitchhiking in the USA by [[User:Korn|Korn]] on warmroads.de [https://warmroads.de/en/hitchhiking-in-19-the-usa/ - Hitchhiking in the USA.]


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}



[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>3frr73tl3resypts0xew4mmt0gw6wgd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>100094</id>
      <parentid>99724</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-01-01T21:20:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Police */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21383">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
:'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.

Despite a large number of immigrants all across the country, most Americans are still curious about people from different parts of the world, fascinated by foreign accents, and eager to introduce visitors to American culture. Despite an undercurrent of xenophobia and racism in rural parts of the country, Americans tend to have a pragmatic view towards foreigners: Americans might profoundly dislike your country of origin, but they will rarely hold that against you as an individual.

Relative to other Western countries, people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion. If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. Despite a level of religious intolerance much higher than in Europe, Americans tend to have a pragmatic approach to people of unfamiliar religious backgrounds: Americans tend not to judge you badly even if they might be suspicious of your religion.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
:''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below).

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.

=== License plates ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates, and most states have several different styles. In some states, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

=== Getting out of big cities ===
You may find yourself in very sprawled out cities like LA or Phoenix, then try your luck on Craigslist! I (http://hitchwiki.org/en/User:Nora) crossed the US and found a few rides on Craiglist, messaging people who offer rides and asking if they would take me for free. Probably works best as a foreigner and a girl, but is worth a try. And maybe you can 'pay' in stories or music!

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out flexyourrights.org  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]

''I hitchhiked over 200,000 miles in 50 states of the US, 19 states of Mexico, and 8 provinces of Canada I would say in general that it is easy to hitchhike in all those countries but some of the most difficult places are in America. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My favorite states for travelers are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[New Mexico]], [[Oregon]], and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with numbers of other people. Hitchhiking with two people or large equipment like a bicycle or kayak seems to give shortest waits. I would rank hitchhiking as a slightly more risky activity than cycle touring on windy highways with no shoulder. These days I prefer to ride freight trains and motorized bicycles, and I recommend you do the same.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' Summer '14

''I crossed the US from Boston to San Francisco the southern way. The north east is tough, prepare for some waits and looks as if you were not worth anyone's attention. Luckily it gets better soon! Texas was the best state for me, lots of rides even from women, and basically no waites. Also California is pretty good to hitchhike, though more tourists. To all girls - it's definitely safe enough in my opinion, though I was asked for sex a few times by people not understanding hitchhiking much. And in general - for me waites for longer than in Europe (when alone I have to hardly wait longer than 10 minutes ever), but still the longest wait during the whole trip were ~2 hours at a bad spot. [[user:Nora]]
''

== Links ==

Analyses of hitchhiking in the USA by [[User:Korn|Korn]] on warmroads.de [https://warmroads.de/en/hitchhiking-in-19-the-usa/ - Hitchhiking in the USA.]


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}



[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>3wkene7062tsxhw74tb8k7uoo99jokn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>100095</id>
      <parentid>100094</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-01-01T21:21:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Police */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21396">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
:'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.

Despite a large number of immigrants all across the country, most Americans are still curious about people from different parts of the world, fascinated by foreign accents, and eager to introduce visitors to American culture. Despite an undercurrent of xenophobia and racism in rural parts of the country, Americans tend to have a pragmatic view towards foreigners: Americans might profoundly dislike your country of origin, but they will rarely hold that against you as an individual.

Relative to other Western countries, people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion. If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. Despite a level of religious intolerance much higher than in Europe, Americans tend to have a pragmatic approach to people of unfamiliar religious backgrounds: Americans tend not to judge you badly even if they might be suspicious of your religion.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
:''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below).

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.

=== License plates ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates, and most states have several different styles. In some states, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

=== Getting out of big cities ===
You may find yourself in very sprawled out cities like LA or Phoenix, then try your luck on Craigslist! I (http://hitchwiki.org/en/User:Nora) crossed the US and found a few rides on Craiglist, messaging people who offer rides and asking if they would take me for free. Probably works best as a foreigner and a girl, but is worth a try. And maybe you can 'pay' in stories or music!

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out https://www.flexyourrights.org/  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]

''I hitchhiked over 200,000 miles in 50 states of the US, 19 states of Mexico, and 8 provinces of Canada I would say in general that it is easy to hitchhike in all those countries but some of the most difficult places are in America. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My favorite states for travelers are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[New Mexico]], [[Oregon]], and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with numbers of other people. Hitchhiking with two people or large equipment like a bicycle or kayak seems to give shortest waits. I would rank hitchhiking as a slightly more risky activity than cycle touring on windy highways with no shoulder. These days I prefer to ride freight trains and motorized bicycles, and I recommend you do the same.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' Summer '14

''I crossed the US from Boston to San Francisco the southern way. The north east is tough, prepare for some waits and looks as if you were not worth anyone's attention. Luckily it gets better soon! Texas was the best state for me, lots of rides even from women, and basically no waites. Also California is pretty good to hitchhike, though more tourists. To all girls - it's definitely safe enough in my opinion, though I was asked for sex a few times by people not understanding hitchhiking much. And in general - for me waites for longer than in Europe (when alone I have to hardly wait longer than 10 minutes ever), but still the longest wait during the whole trip were ~2 hours at a bad spot. [[user:Nora]]
''

== Links ==

Analyses of hitchhiking in the USA by [[User:Korn|Korn]] on warmroads.de [https://warmroads.de/en/hitchhiking-in-19-the-usa/ - Hitchhiking in the USA.]


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}



[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>f0aionm9l3brj4i3vbt6kznw2tghdyv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>100096</id>
      <parentid>100095</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-01-01T21:30:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Personal Experiences */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21337">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
:'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.

Despite a large number of immigrants all across the country, most Americans are still curious about people from different parts of the world, fascinated by foreign accents, and eager to introduce visitors to American culture. Despite an undercurrent of xenophobia and racism in rural parts of the country, Americans tend to have a pragmatic view towards foreigners: Americans might profoundly dislike your country of origin, but they will rarely hold that against you as an individual.

Relative to other Western countries, people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion. If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. Despite a level of religious intolerance much higher than in Europe, Americans tend to have a pragmatic approach to people of unfamiliar religious backgrounds: Americans tend not to judge you badly even if they might be suspicious of your religion.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
:''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below).

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.

=== License plates ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates, and most states have several different styles. In some states, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

=== Getting out of big cities ===
You may find yourself in very sprawled out cities like LA or Phoenix, then try your luck on Craigslist! I (http://hitchwiki.org/en/User:Nora) crossed the US and found a few rides on Craiglist, messaging people who offer rides and asking if they would take me for free. Probably works best as a foreigner and a girl, but is worth a try. And maybe you can 'pay' in stories or music!

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out https://www.flexyourrights.org/  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]

''I hitchhiked over 200,000 miles in 50 states of the US, 19 states of Mexico, and 8 provinces of Canada I would say in general that it is easy to hitchhike in all those countries but some of the most difficult places are in America. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My favorite states for travelers are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[New Mexico]], [[Oregon]], and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with numbers of other people. Hitchhiking with two people or large equipment like a bicycle or kayak seems to give shortest waits. I would rank hitchhiking as a slightly more risky activity than cycle touring on windy highways with no shoulder. These days I prefer to ride freight trains and motorized bicycles, and I recommend you do the same.'' - [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]]

''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' - Summer '14

''I crossed the US from Boston to San Francisco the southern way. The north east is tough, prepare for some waits and looks as if you were not worth anyone's attention. Luckily it gets better soon! Texas was the best state for me, lots of rides even from women, and basically no waites. Also California is pretty good to hitchhike, though more tourists. To all girls - it's definitely safe enough in my opinion, though I was asked for sex a few times by people not understanding hitchhiking much. And in general - for me waites for longer than in Europe (when alone I have to hardly wait longer than 10 minutes ever), but still the longest wait during the whole trip were ~2 hours at a bad spot. - [[user:Nora]]
''

== Links ==

Analyses of hitchhiking in the USA by [[User:Korn|Korn]] on warmroads.de [https://warmroads.de/en/hitchhiking-in-19-the-usa/ - Hitchhiking in the USA.]


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}



[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>8kgr807ssg42wqahy1ixerzvf4r0wsh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>100097</id>
      <parentid>100096</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-01-01T21:30:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Personal Experiences */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21341">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
:'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.

Despite a large number of immigrants all across the country, most Americans are still curious about people from different parts of the world, fascinated by foreign accents, and eager to introduce visitors to American culture. Despite an undercurrent of xenophobia and racism in rural parts of the country, Americans tend to have a pragmatic view towards foreigners: Americans might profoundly dislike your country of origin, but they will rarely hold that against you as an individual.

Relative to other Western countries, people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion. If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. Despite a level of religious intolerance much higher than in Europe, Americans tend to have a pragmatic approach to people of unfamiliar religious backgrounds: Americans tend not to judge you badly even if they might be suspicious of your religion.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
:''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below).

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.

=== License plates ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates, and most states have several different styles. In some states, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

=== Getting out of big cities ===
You may find yourself in very sprawled out cities like LA or Phoenix, then try your luck on Craigslist! I (http://hitchwiki.org/en/User:Nora) crossed the US and found a few rides on Craiglist, messaging people who offer rides and asking if they would take me for free. Probably works best as a foreigner and a girl, but is worth a try. And maybe you can 'pay' in stories or music!

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out https://www.flexyourrights.org/  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]


''I hitchhiked over 200,000 miles in 50 states of the US, 19 states of Mexico, and 8 provinces of Canada I would say in general that it is easy to hitchhike in all those countries but some of the most difficult places are in America. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My favorite states for travelers are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[New Mexico]], [[Oregon]], and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with numbers of other people. Hitchhiking with two people or large equipment like a bicycle or kayak seems to give shortest waits. I would rank hitchhiking as a slightly more risky activity than cycle touring on windy highways with no shoulder. These days I prefer to ride freight trains and motorized bicycles, and I recommend you do the same.'' - [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]]


''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' - Summer '14


''I crossed the US from Boston to San Francisco the southern way. The north east is tough, prepare for some waits and looks as if you were not worth anyone's attention. Luckily it gets better soon! Texas was the best state for me, lots of rides even from women, and basically no waites. Also California is pretty good to hitchhike, though more tourists. To all girls - it's definitely safe enough in my opinion, though I was asked for sex a few times by people not understanding hitchhiking much. And in general - for me waites for longer than in Europe (when alone I have to hardly wait longer than 10 minutes ever), but still the longest wait during the whole trip were ~2 hours at a bad spot. - [[user:Nora]]
''

== Links ==

Analyses of hitchhiking in the USA by [[User:Korn|Korn]] on warmroads.de [https://warmroads.de/en/hitchhiking-in-19-the-usa/ - Hitchhiking in the USA.]


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}



[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>j977yedr2bwqa6vgabzsglcx8j2ksl3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>100098</id>
      <parentid>100097</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-01-01T21:32:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Personal Experiences */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21345">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
:'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.

Despite a large number of immigrants all across the country, most Americans are still curious about people from different parts of the world, fascinated by foreign accents, and eager to introduce visitors to American culture. Despite an undercurrent of xenophobia and racism in rural parts of the country, Americans tend to have a pragmatic view towards foreigners: Americans might profoundly dislike your country of origin, but they will rarely hold that against you as an individual.

Relative to other Western countries, people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion. If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. Despite a level of religious intolerance much higher than in Europe, Americans tend to have a pragmatic approach to people of unfamiliar religious backgrounds: Americans tend not to judge you badly even if they might be suspicious of your religion.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
:''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below).

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.

=== License plates ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates, and most states have several different styles. In some states, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

=== Getting out of big cities ===
You may find yourself in very sprawled out cities like LA or Phoenix, then try your luck on Craigslist! I (http://hitchwiki.org/en/User:Nora) crossed the US and found a few rides on Craiglist, messaging people who offer rides and asking if they would take me for free. Probably works best as a foreigner and a girl, but is worth a try. And maybe you can 'pay' in stories or music!

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out https://www.flexyourrights.org/  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]


''I hitchhiked over 200,000 miles in 50 states of the US, 19 states of Mexico, and 8 provinces of Canada I would say in general that it is easy to hitchhike in all those countries but some of the most difficult places are in America. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My favorite states for travelers are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[New Mexico]], [[Oregon]], and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with numbers of other people. Hitchhiking with two people or large equipment like a bicycle or kayak seems to give shortest waits. I would rank hitchhiking as a slightly more risky activity than cycle touring on windy highways with no shoulder. These days I prefer to ride freight trains and motorized bicycles, and I recommend you do the same.'' - [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]]


''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' - Summer '14


''I crossed the US from Boston to San Francisco the southern way. The north east is tough, prepare for some waits and looks as if you were not worth anyone's attention. Luckily it gets better soon! Texas was the best state for me, lots of rides even from women, and basically no waites. Also California is pretty good to hitchhike, though more tourists. To all girls - it's definitely safe enough in my opinion, though I was asked for sex a few times by people not understanding hitchhiking much. And in general - for me waites for longer than in Europe (when alone I have to hardly wait longer than 10 minutes ever), but still the longest wait during the whole trip were ~2 hours at a bad spot.'' - [[user:Nora|Nora]]

== Links ==

Analyses of hitchhiking in the USA by [[User:Korn|Korn]] on warmroads.de [https://warmroads.de/en/hitchhiking-in-19-the-usa/ - Hitchhiking in the USA.]


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}



[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>eyu2d621n4amoulamn5gefzwvxq22io</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101082</id>
      <parentid>100098</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-05T11:30:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Cars */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21344">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
:'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.

Despite a large number of immigrants all across the country, most Americans are still curious about people from different parts of the world, fascinated by foreign accents, and eager to introduce visitors to American culture. Despite an undercurrent of xenophobia and racism in rural parts of the country, Americans tend to have a pragmatic view towards foreigners: Americans might profoundly dislike your country of origin, but they will rarely hold that against you as an individual.

Relative to other Western countries, people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion. If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. Despite a level of religious intolerance much higher than in Europe, Americans tend to have a pragmatic approach to people of unfamiliar religious backgrounds: Americans tend not to judge you badly even if they might be suspicious of your religion.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below).

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.

=== License plates ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates, and most states have several different styles. In some states, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

=== Getting out of big cities ===
You may find yourself in very sprawled out cities like LA or Phoenix, then try your luck on Craigslist! I (http://hitchwiki.org/en/User:Nora) crossed the US and found a few rides on Craiglist, messaging people who offer rides and asking if they would take me for free. Probably works best as a foreigner and a girl, but is worth a try. And maybe you can 'pay' in stories or music!

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out https://www.flexyourrights.org/  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]


''I hitchhiked over 200,000 miles in 50 states of the US, 19 states of Mexico, and 8 provinces of Canada I would say in general that it is easy to hitchhike in all those countries but some of the most difficult places are in America. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My favorite states for travelers are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[New Mexico]], [[Oregon]], and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with numbers of other people. Hitchhiking with two people or large equipment like a bicycle or kayak seems to give shortest waits. I would rank hitchhiking as a slightly more risky activity than cycle touring on windy highways with no shoulder. These days I prefer to ride freight trains and motorized bicycles, and I recommend you do the same.'' - [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]]


''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' - Summer '14


''I crossed the US from Boston to San Francisco the southern way. The north east is tough, prepare for some waits and looks as if you were not worth anyone's attention. Luckily it gets better soon! Texas was the best state for me, lots of rides even from women, and basically no waites. Also California is pretty good to hitchhike, though more tourists. To all girls - it's definitely safe enough in my opinion, though I was asked for sex a few times by people not understanding hitchhiking much. And in general - for me waites for longer than in Europe (when alone I have to hardly wait longer than 10 minutes ever), but still the longest wait during the whole trip were ~2 hours at a bad spot.'' - [[user:Nora|Nora]]

== Links ==

Analyses of hitchhiking in the USA by [[User:Korn|Korn]] on warmroads.de [https://warmroads.de/en/hitchhiking-in-19-the-usa/ - Hitchhiking in the USA.]


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}



[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>tfs7uhn4g5y4pki5uwwkz98jkc43ewf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101185</id>
      <parentid>101082</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-05T15:23:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20877">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.

Despite a large number of immigrants all across the country, most Americans are still curious about people from different parts of the world, fascinated by foreign accents, and eager to introduce visitors to American culture. Despite an undercurrent of xenophobia and racism in rural parts of the country, Americans tend to have a pragmatic view towards foreigners: Americans might profoundly dislike your country of origin, but they will rarely hold that against you as an individual.

Relative to other Western countries, people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion. If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. Despite a level of religious intolerance much higher than in Europe, Americans tend to have a pragmatic approach to people of unfamiliar religious backgrounds: Americans tend not to judge you badly even if they might be suspicious of your religion.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below).

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.


== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

=== Getting out of big cities ===
You may find yourself in very sprawled out cities like LA or Phoenix, then try your luck on Craigslist! I (http://hitchwiki.org/en/User:Nora) crossed the US and found a few rides on Craiglist, messaging people who offer rides and asking if they would take me for free. Probably works best as a foreigner and a girl, but is worth a try. And maybe you can 'pay' in stories or music!

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out https://www.flexyourrights.org/  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]


''I hitchhiked over 200,000 miles in 50 states of the US, 19 states of Mexico, and 8 provinces of Canada I would say in general that it is easy to hitchhike in all those countries but some of the most difficult places are in America. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My favorite states for travelers are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[New Mexico]], [[Oregon]], and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with numbers of other people. Hitchhiking with two people or large equipment like a bicycle or kayak seems to give shortest waits. I would rank hitchhiking as a slightly more risky activity than cycle touring on windy highways with no shoulder. These days I prefer to ride freight trains and motorized bicycles, and I recommend you do the same.'' - [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]]


''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' - Summer '14


''I crossed the US from Boston to San Francisco the southern way. The north east is tough, prepare for some waits and looks as if you were not worth anyone's attention. Luckily it gets better soon! Texas was the best state for me, lots of rides even from women, and basically no waites. Also California is pretty good to hitchhike, though more tourists. To all girls - it's definitely safe enough in my opinion, though I was asked for sex a few times by people not understanding hitchhiking much. And in general - for me waites for longer than in Europe (when alone I have to hardly wait longer than 10 minutes ever), but still the longest wait during the whole trip were ~2 hours at a bad spot.'' - [[user:Nora|Nora]]

== Links ==

Analyses of hitchhiking in the USA by [[User:Korn|Korn]] on warmroads.de [https://warmroads.de/en/hitchhiking-in-19-the-usa/ - Hitchhiking in the USA.]


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}



[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>gzvaaq7nqgp87202ohflns39vpq46x8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101993</id>
      <parentid>101185</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-05-10T22:25:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Warlo</username>
        <id>9016</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>Reverted edits by [[Special:Contributions/Dxc|Dxc]] ([[User talk:Dxc|talk]]) to last revision by [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]]</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="21397">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
:'''''For specific information on each state please check the links at the bottom of this page.'''''
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.

Despite a large number of immigrants all across the country, most Americans are still curious about people from different parts of the world, fascinated by foreign accents, and eager to introduce visitors to American culture. Despite an undercurrent of xenophobia and racism in rural parts of the country, Americans tend to have a pragmatic view towards foreigners: Americans might profoundly dislike your country of origin, but they will rarely hold that against you as an individual.

Relative to other Western countries, people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion. If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. Despite a level of religious intolerance much higher than in Europe, Americans tend to have a pragmatic approach to people of unfamiliar religious backgrounds: Americans tend not to judge you badly even if they might be suspicious of your religion.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
:''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below).

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.

=== License plates ===
Every state issues its own specific car plates, and most states have several different styles. In some states, the license plate will also show the county of residence. This can be helpful if you spot a car that might be going in the same direction as you. It might also be helpful to write down the license plate number in case of foul play.

== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

=== Getting out of big cities ===
You may find yourself in very sprawled out cities like LA or Phoenix, then try your luck on Craigslist! I (http://hitchwiki.org/en/User:Nora) crossed the US and found a few rides on Craiglist, messaging people who offer rides and asking if they would take me for free. Probably works best as a foreigner and a girl, but is worth a try. And maybe you can 'pay' in stories or music!

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out [flexyourrights.org].  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]

''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]

''I hitchhiked over 200,000 miles in 50 states of the US, 19 states of Mexico, and 8 provinces of Canada I would say in general that it is easy to hitchhike in all those countries but some of the most difficult places are in America. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My favorite states for travelers are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[New Mexico]], [[Oregon]], and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with numbers of other people. Hitchhiking with two people or large equipment like a bicycle or kayak seems to give shortest waits. I would rank hitchhiking as a slightly more risky activity than cycle touring on windy highways with no shoulder. These days I prefer to ride freight trains and motorized bicycles, and I recommend you do the same.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 04:42, 28 October 2012 (CET)

''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' Summer '14

''I crossed the US from Boston to San Francisco the southern way. The north east is tough, prepare for some waits and looks as if you were not worth anyone's attention. Luckily it gets better soon! Texas was the best state for me, lots of rides even from women, and basically no waites. Also California is pretty good to hitchhike, though more tourists. To all girls - it's definitely safe enough in my opinion, though I was asked for sex a few times by people not understanding hitchhiking much. And in general - for me waites for longer than in Europe (when alone I have to hardly wait longer than 10 minutes ever), but still the longest wait during the whole trip were ~2 hours at a bad spot. [[user:Nora]]
''

== Links ==
Analyses of hitchhiking in the USA by [[User:Korn|Korn]] on warmroads.de [https://warmroads.de/en/hitchhiking-in-19-the-usa/ - Hitchhiking in the USA.]


{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}

[[trash:United States of America]]
[[nomad:United States]]

[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>eubebfxtigwmc5mc6t821ut2ocw75fb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101994</id>
      <parentid>101993</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-05-10T22:26:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Warlo</username>
        <id>9016</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>Reverted edits by [[Special:Contributions/Warlo|Warlo]] ([[User talk:Warlo|talk]]) to last revision by [[User:Dxc|Dxc]]</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20877">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.

Despite a large number of immigrants all across the country, most Americans are still curious about people from different parts of the world, fascinated by foreign accents, and eager to introduce visitors to American culture. Despite an undercurrent of xenophobia and racism in rural parts of the country, Americans tend to have a pragmatic view towards foreigners: Americans might profoundly dislike your country of origin, but they will rarely hold that against you as an individual.

Relative to other Western countries, people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion. If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. Despite a level of religious intolerance much higher than in Europe, Americans tend to have a pragmatic approach to people of unfamiliar religious backgrounds: Americans tend not to judge you badly even if they might be suspicious of your religion.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below).

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.


== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

=== Getting out of big cities ===
You may find yourself in very sprawled out cities like LA or Phoenix, then try your luck on Craigslist! I (http://hitchwiki.org/en/User:Nora) crossed the US and found a few rides on Craiglist, messaging people who offer rides and asking if they would take me for free. Probably works best as a foreigner and a girl, but is worth a try. And maybe you can 'pay' in stories or music!

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out https://www.flexyourrights.org/  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]


''I hitchhiked over 200,000 miles in 50 states of the US, 19 states of Mexico, and 8 provinces of Canada I would say in general that it is easy to hitchhike in all those countries but some of the most difficult places are in America. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My favorite states for travelers are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[New Mexico]], [[Oregon]], and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with numbers of other people. Hitchhiking with two people or large equipment like a bicycle or kayak seems to give shortest waits. I would rank hitchhiking as a slightly more risky activity than cycle touring on windy highways with no shoulder. These days I prefer to ride freight trains and motorized bicycles, and I recommend you do the same.'' - [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]]


''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' - Summer '14


''I crossed the US from Boston to San Francisco the southern way. The north east is tough, prepare for some waits and looks as if you were not worth anyone's attention. Luckily it gets better soon! Texas was the best state for me, lots of rides even from women, and basically no waites. Also California is pretty good to hitchhike, though more tourists. To all girls - it's definitely safe enough in my opinion, though I was asked for sex a few times by people not understanding hitchhiking much. And in general - for me waites for longer than in Europe (when alone I have to hardly wait longer than 10 minutes ever), but still the longest wait during the whole trip were ~2 hours at a bad spot.'' - [[user:Nora|Nora]]

== Links ==

Analyses of hitchhiking in the USA by [[User:Korn|Korn]] on warmroads.de [https://warmroads.de/en/hitchhiking-in-19-the-usa/ - Hitchhiking in the USA.]


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}



[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>gzvaaq7nqgp87202ohflns39vpq46x8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104974</id>
      <parentid>101994</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-11-30T19:41:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Samuelnan</username>
        <id>47434</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Personal Experiences */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="24026">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.

Despite a large number of immigrants all across the country, most Americans are still curious about people from different parts of the world, fascinated by foreign accents, and eager to introduce visitors to American culture. Despite an undercurrent of xenophobia and racism in rural parts of the country, Americans tend to have a pragmatic view towards foreigners: Americans might profoundly dislike your country of origin, but they will rarely hold that against you as an individual.

Relative to other Western countries, people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion. If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. Despite a level of religious intolerance much higher than in Europe, Americans tend to have a pragmatic approach to people of unfamiliar religious backgrounds: Americans tend not to judge you badly even if they might be suspicious of your religion.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below).

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.


== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

=== Getting out of big cities ===
You may find yourself in very sprawled out cities like LA or Phoenix, then try your luck on Craigslist! I (http://hitchwiki.org/en/User:Nora) crossed the US and found a few rides on Craiglist, messaging people who offer rides and asking if they would take me for free. Probably works best as a foreigner and a girl, but is worth a try. And maybe you can 'pay' in stories or music!

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out https://www.flexyourrights.org/  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]


''I hitchhiked over 200,000 miles in 50 states of the US, 19 states of Mexico, and 8 provinces of Canada I would say in general that it is easy to hitchhike in all those countries but some of the most difficult places are in America. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My favorite states for travelers are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[New Mexico]], [[Oregon]], and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with numbers of other people. Hitchhiking with two people or large equipment like a bicycle or kayak seems to give shortest waits. I would rank hitchhiking as a slightly more risky activity than cycle touring on windy highways with no shoulder. These days I prefer to ride freight trains and motorized bicycles, and I recommend you do the same.'' - [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]]


''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' - Summer '14


''I crossed the US from Boston to San Francisco the southern way. The north east is tough, prepare for some waits and looks as if you were not worth anyone's attention. Luckily it gets better soon! Texas was the best state for me, lots of rides even from women, and basically no waites. Also California is pretty good to hitchhike, though more tourists. To all girls - it's definitely safe enough in my opinion, though I was asked for sex a few times by people not understanding hitchhiking much. And in general - for me waites for longer than in Europe (when alone I have to hardly wait longer than 10 minutes ever), but still the longest wait during the whole trip were ~2 hours at a bad spot.'' - [[user:Nora|Nora]]

''These experiences are from a voyage undertaken during Autumn of 2023. Approximately 6 weeks in length, 41 rides, 3000 miles. Los Angeles to New Orleans with lots of detours. For context, I am young, male, Asian, clean shaven and have short hair. I travelled with only a backpack. It was difficult to get rides, whether I was standing on an onramp, walking on the interstate, asking at gas stations, waiting after traffic lights, standing on the shoulder etc. I tried pretty much every method of hitching, and would like to say none of them have good chances of getting a ride quickly. For me, it was an even split between getting rides easily (matter of minutes) and waiting HOURS for rides. There is no State that was particularly easy, not even California along the 1 and 101 was easy, in fact some of my longest waits were in California. But of course, no one goes to the US and expects hitching to be smooth sailing. Public opinion towards hitchhikers is terrible, the vast majority don't give a damn who you are, where you're from and where you're trying to get to. Expect to be given ugly looks and get used to being ignored, since people see you as just another homeless person, which you are. Asking at gas stations is arduous, people are often scared and a lot simply won't take you no matter how nicely you ask. Mexicans will save you time and time again, they are often the only people who will pick you up on the side of the interstate or will actually hear you out at a gas station. Asking Mexicans or other Latinos in Spanish works beautifully, even a couple phrases will get you a vastly more positive response than using English. I often freedom camped in towns and rural areas, never in cities though. No bad experiences from that, but it does get cold. I preferred hitching at on ramps over gas stations just because I didn't want to run the goddamn gauntlet everytime I approached someone. Walking along the Interstate is an act of desperation, I don't recommend it (but have done it many times) because it is FUCKING DANGEROUS, and loud. Now the good parts: The people who do give you rides will be fucking AMAZING. Food, weed, beer, work, money, parties, couches to surf, fishing invites, intriguing conversations, crazy people, funny people, random people. WOW. The US has got it all, a kaleidescope of humanity in overflowing abundance. When that ride finally comes, it will be awesome so HANG IN THERE. Cops didn't care if they were driving past and I was on an onramp but State troopers will give you a hard time if you're on an interstate, I got two rides from cops to their county border and also had the police called on me thanks to some Karen in Texas. Racism is to be expected in the South if you're a person of colour, but the blacks will be so much more friendlier if you aren't white. I was never threatened or harmed, but most of my drivers were terrible at driving, some drank, some were high. Be wary of that. In conclusion, this country is NOT a walk in the park to hitch. It's hard. You'll need determination, the patience of a saint and a little courage, but it'll pay off. Trust me.''
-The Falling Leaf.

== Links ==

Analyses of hitchhiking in the USA by [[User:Korn|Korn]] on warmroads.de [https://warmroads.de/en/hitchhiking-in-19-the-usa/ - Hitchhiking in the USA.]


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}



[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>dbp57xaxzyanr3yld5ayspfxjqcivbr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105367</id>
      <parentid>104974</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-02-22T16:01:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Hitchhikernick</username>
        <id>47454</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Personal Experiences */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="24984">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.

Despite a large number of immigrants all across the country, most Americans are still curious about people from different parts of the world, fascinated by foreign accents, and eager to introduce visitors to American culture. Despite an undercurrent of xenophobia and racism in rural parts of the country, Americans tend to have a pragmatic view towards foreigners: Americans might profoundly dislike your country of origin, but they will rarely hold that against you as an individual.

Relative to other Western countries, people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion. If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. Despite a level of religious intolerance much higher than in Europe, Americans tend to have a pragmatic approach to people of unfamiliar religious backgrounds: Americans tend not to judge you badly even if they might be suspicious of your religion.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below).

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.


== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

=== Getting out of big cities ===
You may find yourself in very sprawled out cities like LA or Phoenix, then try your luck on Craigslist! I (http://hitchwiki.org/en/User:Nora) crossed the US and found a few rides on Craiglist, messaging people who offer rides and asking if they would take me for free. Probably works best as a foreigner and a girl, but is worth a try. And maybe you can 'pay' in stories or music!

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out https://www.flexyourrights.org/  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]


''I hitchhiked over 200,000 miles in 50 states of the US, 19 states of Mexico, and 8 provinces of Canada I would say in general that it is easy to hitchhike in all those countries but some of the most difficult places are in America. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My favorite states for travelers are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[New Mexico]], [[Oregon]], and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with numbers of other people. Hitchhiking with two people or large equipment like a bicycle or kayak seems to give shortest waits. I would rank hitchhiking as a slightly more risky activity than cycle touring on windy highways with no shoulder. These days I prefer to ride freight trains and motorized bicycles, and I recommend you do the same.'' - [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]]


''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' - Summer '14


''I crossed the US from Boston to San Francisco the southern way. The north east is tough, prepare for some waits and looks as if you were not worth anyone's attention. Luckily it gets better soon! Texas was the best state for me, lots of rides even from women, and basically no waites. Also California is pretty good to hitchhike, though more tourists. To all girls - it's definitely safe enough in my opinion, though I was asked for sex a few times by people not understanding hitchhiking much. And in general - for me waites for longer than in Europe (when alone I have to hardly wait longer than 10 minutes ever), but still the longest wait during the whole trip were ~2 hours at a bad spot.'' - [[user:Nora|Nora]]

''These experiences are from a voyage undertaken during Autumn of 2023. Approximately 6 weeks in length, 41 rides, 3000 miles. Los Angeles to New Orleans with lots of detours. For context, I am young, male, Asian, clean shaven and have short hair. I travelled with only a backpack. It was difficult to get rides, whether I was standing on an onramp, walking on the interstate, asking at gas stations, waiting after traffic lights, standing on the shoulder etc. I tried pretty much every method of hitching, and would like to say none of them have good chances of getting a ride quickly. For me, it was an even split between getting rides easily (matter of minutes) and waiting HOURS for rides. There is no State that was particularly easy, not even California along the 1 and 101 was easy, in fact some of my longest waits were in California. But of course, no one goes to the US and expects hitching to be smooth sailing. Public opinion towards hitchhikers is terrible, the vast majority don't give a damn who you are, where you're from and where you're trying to get to. Expect to be given ugly looks and get used to being ignored, since people see you as just another homeless person, which you are. Asking at gas stations is arduous, people are often scared and a lot simply won't take you no matter how nicely you ask. Mexicans will save you time and time again, they are often the only people who will pick you up on the side of the interstate or will actually hear you out at a gas station. Asking Mexicans or other Latinos in Spanish works beautifully, even a couple phrases will get you a vastly more positive response than using English. I often freedom camped in towns and rural areas, never in cities though. No bad experiences from that, but it does get cold. I preferred hitching at on ramps over gas stations just because I didn't want to run the goddamn gauntlet everytime I approached someone. Walking along the Interstate is an act of desperation, I don't recommend it (but have done it many times) because it is FUCKING DANGEROUS, and loud. Now the good parts: The people who do give you rides will be fucking AMAZING. Food, weed, beer, work, money, parties, couches to surf, fishing invites, intriguing conversations, crazy people, funny people, random people. WOW. The US has got it all, a kaleidescope of humanity in overflowing abundance. When that ride finally comes, it will be awesome so HANG IN THERE. Cops didn't care if they were driving past and I was on an onramp but State troopers will give you a hard time if you're on an interstate, I got two rides from cops to their county border and also had the police called on me thanks to some Karen in Texas. Racism is to be expected in the South if you're a person of colour, but the blacks will be so much more friendlier if you aren't white. I was never threatened or harmed, but most of my drivers were terrible at driving, some drank, some were high. Be wary of that. In conclusion, this country is NOT a walk in the park to hitch. It's hard. You'll need determination, the patience of a saint and a little courage, but it'll pay off. Trust me.''
-The Falling Leaf.

Hitchhikernick - I have hitched around the US many times, only 3 short of doing every state 3 times 😁.  WOW what can I say, definitely the most generous nation. I have been given money and bought food so many times without asking, several times being 100$ bills😁.  I'm actually there now on a skiing trip (Feb 2024) and same thing has happened on this trip.  Waiting times have been from instant pickups where I haven't had time to put my bag down to waiting 2 days consecutively (highway 6 Nevada in Feb 2014).  Never spend my own money and always leave with some money left over 😁. Average waiting time about 3.5hrs, though a lot less around ski areas. Definitely the only nation where I get checked by the cops, though many times they have proven to be helpful.  Some times I have had to walk up the onramp but never got into trouble for doing so, if cops arrived they would generally give me a ride to a better spot, never been given a ticket.

== Links ==

Analyses of hitchhiking in the USA by [[User:Korn|Korn]] on warmroads.de [https://warmroads.de/en/hitchhiking-in-19-the-usa/ - Hitchhiking in the USA.]


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}



[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>rwkjxkvxjr627glazyrxb3wti9ge28j</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105368</id>
      <parentid>105367</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-02-22T16:24:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Hitchhikernick</username>
        <id>47454</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Personal Experiences */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="25416">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.

Despite a large number of immigrants all across the country, most Americans are still curious about people from different parts of the world, fascinated by foreign accents, and eager to introduce visitors to American culture. Despite an undercurrent of xenophobia and racism in rural parts of the country, Americans tend to have a pragmatic view towards foreigners: Americans might profoundly dislike your country of origin, but they will rarely hold that against you as an individual.

Relative to other Western countries, people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion. If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. Despite a level of religious intolerance much higher than in Europe, Americans tend to have a pragmatic approach to people of unfamiliar religious backgrounds: Americans tend not to judge you badly even if they might be suspicious of your religion.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below).

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.


== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

=== Getting out of big cities ===
You may find yourself in very sprawled out cities like LA or Phoenix, then try your luck on Craigslist! I (http://hitchwiki.org/en/User:Nora) crossed the US and found a few rides on Craiglist, messaging people who offer rides and asking if they would take me for free. Probably works best as a foreigner and a girl, but is worth a try. And maybe you can 'pay' in stories or music!

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out https://www.flexyourrights.org/  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]


''I hitchhiked over 200,000 miles in 50 states of the US, 19 states of Mexico, and 8 provinces of Canada I would say in general that it is easy to hitchhike in all those countries but some of the most difficult places are in America. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My favorite states for travelers are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[New Mexico]], [[Oregon]], and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with numbers of other people. Hitchhiking with two people or large equipment like a bicycle or kayak seems to give shortest waits. I would rank hitchhiking as a slightly more risky activity than cycle touring on windy highways with no shoulder. These days I prefer to ride freight trains and motorized bicycles, and I recommend you do the same.'' - [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]]


''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' - Summer '14


''I crossed the US from Boston to San Francisco the southern way. The north east is tough, prepare for some waits and looks as if you were not worth anyone's attention. Luckily it gets better soon! Texas was the best state for me, lots of rides even from women, and basically no waites. Also California is pretty good to hitchhike, though more tourists. To all girls - it's definitely safe enough in my opinion, though I was asked for sex a few times by people not understanding hitchhiking much. And in general - for me waites for longer than in Europe (when alone I have to hardly wait longer than 10 minutes ever), but still the longest wait during the whole trip were ~2 hours at a bad spot.'' - [[user:Nora|Nora]]

''These experiences are from a voyage undertaken during Autumn of 2023. Approximately 6 weeks in length, 41 rides, 3000 miles. Los Angeles to New Orleans with lots of detours. For context, I am young, male, Asian, clean shaven and have short hair. I travelled with only a backpack. It was difficult to get rides, whether I was standing on an onramp, walking on the interstate, asking at gas stations, waiting after traffic lights, standing on the shoulder etc. I tried pretty much every method of hitching, and would like to say none of them have good chances of getting a ride quickly. For me, it was an even split between getting rides easily (matter of minutes) and waiting HOURS for rides. There is no State that was particularly easy, not even California along the 1 and 101 was easy, in fact some of my longest waits were in California. But of course, no one goes to the US and expects hitching to be smooth sailing. Public opinion towards hitchhikers is terrible, the vast majority don't give a damn who you are, where you're from and where you're trying to get to. Expect to be given ugly looks and get used to being ignored, since people see you as just another homeless person, which you are. Asking at gas stations is arduous, people are often scared and a lot simply won't take you no matter how nicely you ask. Mexicans will save you time and time again, they are often the only people who will pick you up on the side of the interstate or will actually hear you out at a gas station. Asking Mexicans or other Latinos in Spanish works beautifully, even a couple phrases will get you a vastly more positive response than using English. I often freedom camped in towns and rural areas, never in cities though. No bad experiences from that, but it does get cold. I preferred hitching at on ramps over gas stations just because I didn't want to run the goddamn gauntlet everytime I approached someone. Walking along the Interstate is an act of desperation, I don't recommend it (but have done it many times) because it is FUCKING DANGEROUS, and loud. Now the good parts: The people who do give you rides will be fucking AMAZING. Food, weed, beer, work, money, parties, couches to surf, fishing invites, intriguing conversations, crazy people, funny people, random people. WOW. The US has got it all, a kaleidescope of humanity in overflowing abundance. When that ride finally comes, it will be awesome so HANG IN THERE. Cops didn't care if they were driving past and I was on an onramp but State troopers will give you a hard time if you're on an interstate, I got two rides from cops to their county border and also had the police called on me thanks to some Karen in Texas. Racism is to be expected in the South if you're a person of colour, but the blacks will be so much more friendlier if you aren't white. I was never threatened or harmed, but most of my drivers were terrible at driving, some drank, some were high. Be wary of that. In conclusion, this country is NOT a walk in the park to hitch. It's hard. You'll need determination, the patience of a saint and a little courage, but it'll pay off. Trust me.''
-The Falling Leaf.

Hitchhikernick - I have hitched around the US many times, only 3 short of doing every state 3 times 😁.  WOW what can I say, definitely the most generous nation. I have been given money and bought food so many times without asking, several times being 100$ bills😁.  I'm actually there now on a skiing trip (Feb 2024) and same thing has happened on this trip.  Waiting times have been from instant pickups where I haven't had time to put my bag down to waiting 2 days consecutively (highway 6 Nevada in Feb 2014).  Never spend my own money and always leave with some money left over 😁. Average waiting time about 3.5hrs, though a lot less around ski areas. Definitely the only nation where I get checked by the cops, though many times they have proven to be helpful.  Some times I have had to walk up the onramp but never got into trouble for doing so, if cops arrived they would generally give me a ride to a better spot, never been given a ticket.  Definitely some of the greatest experiences too...drinking and partying with the natives in Monument valley, crusing on a boat around Kachemak Bay and hiking to the magic bus in Alaska, camping and hiking around the grand canyon and Yosemite, skiing all big ski resorts, experiencing city life and experiencing life with the homeless to name a few...!!! You could spend a lifetime experiencing, travelling and tasting the USA 😉

== Links ==

Analyses of hitchhiking in the USA by [[User:Korn|Korn]] on warmroads.de [https://warmroads.de/en/hitchhiking-in-19-the-usa/ - Hitchhiking in the USA.]


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}



[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>8n382ocv1mqc851zo20cyz55msev1ci</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105369</id>
      <parentid>105368</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-02-22T16:27:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Hitchhikernick</username>
        <id>47454</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Personal Experiences */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="25472">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.

Despite a large number of immigrants all across the country, most Americans are still curious about people from different parts of the world, fascinated by foreign accents, and eager to introduce visitors to American culture. Despite an undercurrent of xenophobia and racism in rural parts of the country, Americans tend to have a pragmatic view towards foreigners: Americans might profoundly dislike your country of origin, but they will rarely hold that against you as an individual.

Relative to other Western countries, people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion. If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. Despite a level of religious intolerance much higher than in Europe, Americans tend to have a pragmatic approach to people of unfamiliar religious backgrounds: Americans tend not to judge you badly even if they might be suspicious of your religion.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below).

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.


== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

=== Getting out of big cities ===
You may find yourself in very sprawled out cities like LA or Phoenix, then try your luck on Craigslist! I (http://hitchwiki.org/en/User:Nora) crossed the US and found a few rides on Craiglist, messaging people who offer rides and asking if they would take me for free. Probably works best as a foreigner and a girl, but is worth a try. And maybe you can 'pay' in stories or music!

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out https://www.flexyourrights.org/  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]


''I hitchhiked over 200,000 miles in 50 states of the US, 19 states of Mexico, and 8 provinces of Canada I would say in general that it is easy to hitchhike in all those countries but some of the most difficult places are in America. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My favorite states for travelers are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[New Mexico]], [[Oregon]], and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with numbers of other people. Hitchhiking with two people or large equipment like a bicycle or kayak seems to give shortest waits. I would rank hitchhiking as a slightly more risky activity than cycle touring on windy highways with no shoulder. These days I prefer to ride freight trains and motorized bicycles, and I recommend you do the same.'' - [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]]


''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' - Summer '14


''I crossed the US from Boston to San Francisco the southern way. The north east is tough, prepare for some waits and looks as if you were not worth anyone's attention. Luckily it gets better soon! Texas was the best state for me, lots of rides even from women, and basically no waites. Also California is pretty good to hitchhike, though more tourists. To all girls - it's definitely safe enough in my opinion, though I was asked for sex a few times by people not understanding hitchhiking much. And in general - for me waites for longer than in Europe (when alone I have to hardly wait longer than 10 minutes ever), but still the longest wait during the whole trip were ~2 hours at a bad spot.'' - [[user:Nora|Nora]]

''These experiences are from a voyage undertaken during Autumn of 2023. Approximately 6 weeks in length, 41 rides, 3000 miles. Los Angeles to New Orleans with lots of detours. For context, I am young, male, Asian, clean shaven and have short hair. I travelled with only a backpack. It was difficult to get rides, whether I was standing on an onramp, walking on the interstate, asking at gas stations, waiting after traffic lights, standing on the shoulder etc. I tried pretty much every method of hitching, and would like to say none of them have good chances of getting a ride quickly. For me, it was an even split between getting rides easily (matter of minutes) and waiting HOURS for rides. There is no State that was particularly easy, not even California along the 1 and 101 was easy, in fact some of my longest waits were in California. But of course, no one goes to the US and expects hitching to be smooth sailing. Public opinion towards hitchhikers is terrible, the vast majority don't give a damn who you are, where you're from and where you're trying to get to. Expect to be given ugly looks and get used to being ignored, since people see you as just another homeless person, which you are. Asking at gas stations is arduous, people are often scared and a lot simply won't take you no matter how nicely you ask. Mexicans will save you time and time again, they are often the only people who will pick you up on the side of the interstate or will actually hear you out at a gas station. Asking Mexicans or other Latinos in Spanish works beautifully, even a couple phrases will get you a vastly more positive response than using English. I often freedom camped in towns and rural areas, never in cities though. No bad experiences from that, but it does get cold. I preferred hitching at on ramps over gas stations just because I didn't want to run the goddamn gauntlet everytime I approached someone. Walking along the Interstate is an act of desperation, I don't recommend it (but have done it many times) because it is FUCKING DANGEROUS, and loud. Now the good parts: The people who do give you rides will be fucking AMAZING. Food, weed, beer, work, money, parties, couches to surf, fishing invites, intriguing conversations, crazy people, funny people, random people. WOW. The US has got it all, a kaleidescope of humanity in overflowing abundance. When that ride finally comes, it will be awesome so HANG IN THERE. Cops didn't care if they were driving past and I was on an onramp but State troopers will give you a hard time if you're on an interstate, I got two rides from cops to their county border and also had the police called on me thanks to some Karen in Texas. Racism is to be expected in the South if you're a person of colour, but the blacks will be so much more friendlier if you aren't white. I was never threatened or harmed, but most of my drivers were terrible at driving, some drank, some were high. Be wary of that. In conclusion, this country is NOT a walk in the park to hitch. It's hard. You'll need determination, the patience of a saint and a little courage, but it'll pay off. Trust me.''
-The Falling Leaf.

Hitchhikernick - I have hitched around the US many times, only 3 short of doing every state 3 times 😁.  WOW what can I say, definitely the most generous nation. I have been given money and bought food so many times without asking, several times being 100$ bills😁.  I'm actually there now on a skiing trip (Feb 2024) and same thing has happened on this trip.  Waiting times have been from instant pickups where I haven't had time to put my bag down to waiting 2 days consecutively (highway 6 Nevada in Feb 2014).  Never spend my own money and always leave with some money left over 😁. Average waiting time about 3.5hrs, though a lot less around ski areas. Definitely the only nation where I get checked by the cops, though many times they have proven to be helpful.  Some times I have had to walk up the onramp but never got into trouble for doing so, if cops arrived they would generally give me a ride to a better spot, never been given a ticket.  Definitely some of the greatest experiences too...drinking and partying with the natives in Monument valley, hitching and winging a ticket into Burning Man, crusing on a boat around Kachemak Bay and hiking to the magic bus in Alaska, camping and hiking around the Grand Canyon, Sedona and Yosemite, skiing all big ski resorts, experiencing city life and experiencing life with the homeless to name a few...!!! You could spend a lifetime experiencing, travelling and tasting the USA 😉

== Links ==

Analyses of hitchhiking in the USA by [[User:Korn|Korn]] on warmroads.de [https://warmroads.de/en/hitchhiking-in-19-the-usa/ - Hitchhiking in the USA.]


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}



[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>c5hvirlirlama7f9g8mf66dp2qjp8hz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105842</id>
      <parentid>105369</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-06-07T07:16:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="25537">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

&lt;iframe src="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page"&gt;&lt;/iframe&gt;

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.

Despite a large number of immigrants all across the country, most Americans are still curious about people from different parts of the world, fascinated by foreign accents, and eager to introduce visitors to American culture. Despite an undercurrent of xenophobia and racism in rural parts of the country, Americans tend to have a pragmatic view towards foreigners: Americans might profoundly dislike your country of origin, but they will rarely hold that against you as an individual.

Relative to other Western countries, people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion. If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. Despite a level of religious intolerance much higher than in Europe, Americans tend to have a pragmatic approach to people of unfamiliar religious backgrounds: Americans tend not to judge you badly even if they might be suspicious of your religion.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below).

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.


== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

=== Getting out of big cities ===
You may find yourself in very sprawled out cities like LA or Phoenix, then try your luck on Craigslist! I (http://hitchwiki.org/en/User:Nora) crossed the US and found a few rides on Craiglist, messaging people who offer rides and asking if they would take me for free. Probably works best as a foreigner and a girl, but is worth a try. And maybe you can 'pay' in stories or music!

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out https://www.flexyourrights.org/  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]


''I hitchhiked over 200,000 miles in 50 states of the US, 19 states of Mexico, and 8 provinces of Canada I would say in general that it is easy to hitchhike in all those countries but some of the most difficult places are in America. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My favorite states for travelers are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[New Mexico]], [[Oregon]], and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with numbers of other people. Hitchhiking with two people or large equipment like a bicycle or kayak seems to give shortest waits. I would rank hitchhiking as a slightly more risky activity than cycle touring on windy highways with no shoulder. These days I prefer to ride freight trains and motorized bicycles, and I recommend you do the same.'' - [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]]


''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' - Summer '14


''I crossed the US from Boston to San Francisco the southern way. The north east is tough, prepare for some waits and looks as if you were not worth anyone's attention. Luckily it gets better soon! Texas was the best state for me, lots of rides even from women, and basically no waites. Also California is pretty good to hitchhike, though more tourists. To all girls - it's definitely safe enough in my opinion, though I was asked for sex a few times by people not understanding hitchhiking much. And in general - for me waites for longer than in Europe (when alone I have to hardly wait longer than 10 minutes ever), but still the longest wait during the whole trip were ~2 hours at a bad spot.'' - [[user:Nora|Nora]]

''These experiences are from a voyage undertaken during Autumn of 2023. Approximately 6 weeks in length, 41 rides, 3000 miles. Los Angeles to New Orleans with lots of detours. For context, I am young, male, Asian, clean shaven and have short hair. I travelled with only a backpack. It was difficult to get rides, whether I was standing on an onramp, walking on the interstate, asking at gas stations, waiting after traffic lights, standing on the shoulder etc. I tried pretty much every method of hitching, and would like to say none of them have good chances of getting a ride quickly. For me, it was an even split between getting rides easily (matter of minutes) and waiting HOURS for rides. There is no State that was particularly easy, not even California along the 1 and 101 was easy, in fact some of my longest waits were in California. But of course, no one goes to the US and expects hitching to be smooth sailing. Public opinion towards hitchhikers is terrible, the vast majority don't give a damn who you are, where you're from and where you're trying to get to. Expect to be given ugly looks and get used to being ignored, since people see you as just another homeless person, which you are. Asking at gas stations is arduous, people are often scared and a lot simply won't take you no matter how nicely you ask. Mexicans will save you time and time again, they are often the only people who will pick you up on the side of the interstate or will actually hear you out at a gas station. Asking Mexicans or other Latinos in Spanish works beautifully, even a couple phrases will get you a vastly more positive response than using English. I often freedom camped in towns and rural areas, never in cities though. No bad experiences from that, but it does get cold. I preferred hitching at on ramps over gas stations just because I didn't want to run the goddamn gauntlet everytime I approached someone. Walking along the Interstate is an act of desperation, I don't recommend it (but have done it many times) because it is FUCKING DANGEROUS, and loud. Now the good parts: The people who do give you rides will be fucking AMAZING. Food, weed, beer, work, money, parties, couches to surf, fishing invites, intriguing conversations, crazy people, funny people, random people. WOW. The US has got it all, a kaleidescope of humanity in overflowing abundance. When that ride finally comes, it will be awesome so HANG IN THERE. Cops didn't care if they were driving past and I was on an onramp but State troopers will give you a hard time if you're on an interstate, I got two rides from cops to their county border and also had the police called on me thanks to some Karen in Texas. Racism is to be expected in the South if you're a person of colour, but the blacks will be so much more friendlier if you aren't white. I was never threatened or harmed, but most of my drivers were terrible at driving, some drank, some were high. Be wary of that. In conclusion, this country is NOT a walk in the park to hitch. It's hard. You'll need determination, the patience of a saint and a little courage, but it'll pay off. Trust me.''
-The Falling Leaf.

Hitchhikernick - I have hitched around the US many times, only 3 short of doing every state 3 times 😁.  WOW what can I say, definitely the most generous nation. I have been given money and bought food so many times without asking, several times being 100$ bills😁.  I'm actually there now on a skiing trip (Feb 2024) and same thing has happened on this trip.  Waiting times have been from instant pickups where I haven't had time to put my bag down to waiting 2 days consecutively (highway 6 Nevada in Feb 2014).  Never spend my own money and always leave with some money left over 😁. Average waiting time about 3.5hrs, though a lot less around ski areas. Definitely the only nation where I get checked by the cops, though many times they have proven to be helpful.  Some times I have had to walk up the onramp but never got into trouble for doing so, if cops arrived they would generally give me a ride to a better spot, never been given a ticket.  Definitely some of the greatest experiences too...drinking and partying with the natives in Monument valley, hitching and winging a ticket into Burning Man, crusing on a boat around Kachemak Bay and hiking to the magic bus in Alaska, camping and hiking around the Grand Canyon, Sedona and Yosemite, skiing all big ski resorts, experiencing city life and experiencing life with the homeless to name a few...!!! You could spend a lifetime experiencing, travelling and tasting the USA 😉

== Links ==

Analyses of hitchhiking in the USA by [[User:Korn|Korn]] on warmroads.de [https://warmroads.de/en/hitchhiking-in-19-the-usa/ - Hitchhiking in the USA.]


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}



[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>r22ygcaa2xe3t79vjzqbzdw310zpj9v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105843</id>
      <parentid>105842</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-06-07T07:17:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="25472">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.

Despite a large number of immigrants all across the country, most Americans are still curious about people from different parts of the world, fascinated by foreign accents, and eager to introduce visitors to American culture. Despite an undercurrent of xenophobia and racism in rural parts of the country, Americans tend to have a pragmatic view towards foreigners: Americans might profoundly dislike your country of origin, but they will rarely hold that against you as an individual.

Relative to other Western countries, people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion. If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. Despite a level of religious intolerance much higher than in Europe, Americans tend to have a pragmatic approach to people of unfamiliar religious backgrounds: Americans tend not to judge you badly even if they might be suspicious of your religion.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below).

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.


== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

=== Getting out of big cities ===
You may find yourself in very sprawled out cities like LA or Phoenix, then try your luck on Craigslist! I (http://hitchwiki.org/en/User:Nora) crossed the US and found a few rides on Craiglist, messaging people who offer rides and asking if they would take me for free. Probably works best as a foreigner and a girl, but is worth a try. And maybe you can 'pay' in stories or music!

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out https://www.flexyourrights.org/  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]


''I hitchhiked over 200,000 miles in 50 states of the US, 19 states of Mexico, and 8 provinces of Canada I would say in general that it is easy to hitchhike in all those countries but some of the most difficult places are in America. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My favorite states for travelers are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[New Mexico]], [[Oregon]], and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with numbers of other people. Hitchhiking with two people or large equipment like a bicycle or kayak seems to give shortest waits. I would rank hitchhiking as a slightly more risky activity than cycle touring on windy highways with no shoulder. These days I prefer to ride freight trains and motorized bicycles, and I recommend you do the same.'' - [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]]


''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' - Summer '14


''I crossed the US from Boston to San Francisco the southern way. The north east is tough, prepare for some waits and looks as if you were not worth anyone's attention. Luckily it gets better soon! Texas was the best state for me, lots of rides even from women, and basically no waites. Also California is pretty good to hitchhike, though more tourists. To all girls - it's definitely safe enough in my opinion, though I was asked for sex a few times by people not understanding hitchhiking much. And in general - for me waites for longer than in Europe (when alone I have to hardly wait longer than 10 minutes ever), but still the longest wait during the whole trip were ~2 hours at a bad spot.'' - [[user:Nora|Nora]]

''These experiences are from a voyage undertaken during Autumn of 2023. Approximately 6 weeks in length, 41 rides, 3000 miles. Los Angeles to New Orleans with lots of detours. For context, I am young, male, Asian, clean shaven and have short hair. I travelled with only a backpack. It was difficult to get rides, whether I was standing on an onramp, walking on the interstate, asking at gas stations, waiting after traffic lights, standing on the shoulder etc. I tried pretty much every method of hitching, and would like to say none of them have good chances of getting a ride quickly. For me, it was an even split between getting rides easily (matter of minutes) and waiting HOURS for rides. There is no State that was particularly easy, not even California along the 1 and 101 was easy, in fact some of my longest waits were in California. But of course, no one goes to the US and expects hitching to be smooth sailing. Public opinion towards hitchhikers is terrible, the vast majority don't give a damn who you are, where you're from and where you're trying to get to. Expect to be given ugly looks and get used to being ignored, since people see you as just another homeless person, which you are. Asking at gas stations is arduous, people are often scared and a lot simply won't take you no matter how nicely you ask. Mexicans will save you time and time again, they are often the only people who will pick you up on the side of the interstate or will actually hear you out at a gas station. Asking Mexicans or other Latinos in Spanish works beautifully, even a couple phrases will get you a vastly more positive response than using English. I often freedom camped in towns and rural areas, never in cities though. No bad experiences from that, but it does get cold. I preferred hitching at on ramps over gas stations just because I didn't want to run the goddamn gauntlet everytime I approached someone. Walking along the Interstate is an act of desperation, I don't recommend it (but have done it many times) because it is FUCKING DANGEROUS, and loud. Now the good parts: The people who do give you rides will be fucking AMAZING. Food, weed, beer, work, money, parties, couches to surf, fishing invites, intriguing conversations, crazy people, funny people, random people. WOW. The US has got it all, a kaleidescope of humanity in overflowing abundance. When that ride finally comes, it will be awesome so HANG IN THERE. Cops didn't care if they were driving past and I was on an onramp but State troopers will give you a hard time if you're on an interstate, I got two rides from cops to their county border and also had the police called on me thanks to some Karen in Texas. Racism is to be expected in the South if you're a person of colour, but the blacks will be so much more friendlier if you aren't white. I was never threatened or harmed, but most of my drivers were terrible at driving, some drank, some were high. Be wary of that. In conclusion, this country is NOT a walk in the park to hitch. It's hard. You'll need determination, the patience of a saint and a little courage, but it'll pay off. Trust me.''
-The Falling Leaf.

Hitchhikernick - I have hitched around the US many times, only 3 short of doing every state 3 times 😁.  WOW what can I say, definitely the most generous nation. I have been given money and bought food so many times without asking, several times being 100$ bills😁.  I'm actually there now on a skiing trip (Feb 2024) and same thing has happened on this trip.  Waiting times have been from instant pickups where I haven't had time to put my bag down to waiting 2 days consecutively (highway 6 Nevada in Feb 2014).  Never spend my own money and always leave with some money left over 😁. Average waiting time about 3.5hrs, though a lot less around ski areas. Definitely the only nation where I get checked by the cops, though many times they have proven to be helpful.  Some times I have had to walk up the onramp but never got into trouble for doing so, if cops arrived they would generally give me a ride to a better spot, never been given a ticket.  Definitely some of the greatest experiences too...drinking and partying with the natives in Monument valley, hitching and winging a ticket into Burning Man, crusing on a boat around Kachemak Bay and hiking to the magic bus in Alaska, camping and hiking around the Grand Canyon, Sedona and Yosemite, skiing all big ski resorts, experiencing city life and experiencing life with the homeless to name a few...!!! You could spend a lifetime experiencing, travelling and tasting the USA 😉

== Links ==

Analyses of hitchhiking in the USA by [[User:Korn|Korn]] on warmroads.de [https://warmroads.de/en/hitchhiking-in-19-the-usa/ - Hitchhiking in the USA.]


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}



[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>c5hvirlirlama7f9g8mf66dp2qjp8hz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106000</id>
      <parentid>105843</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-07-25T19:19:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Hitchhikernick</username>
        <id>47454</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Personal Experiences */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="26254">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.

Despite a large number of immigrants all across the country, most Americans are still curious about people from different parts of the world, fascinated by foreign accents, and eager to introduce visitors to American culture. Despite an undercurrent of xenophobia and racism in rural parts of the country, Americans tend to have a pragmatic view towards foreigners: Americans might profoundly dislike your country of origin, but they will rarely hold that against you as an individual.

Relative to other Western countries, people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion. If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. Despite a level of religious intolerance much higher than in Europe, Americans tend to have a pragmatic approach to people of unfamiliar religious backgrounds: Americans tend not to judge you badly even if they might be suspicious of your religion.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below).

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.


== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

=== Getting out of big cities ===
You may find yourself in very sprawled out cities like LA or Phoenix, then try your luck on Craigslist! I (http://hitchwiki.org/en/User:Nora) crossed the US and found a few rides on Craiglist, messaging people who offer rides and asking if they would take me for free. Probably works best as a foreigner and a girl, but is worth a try. And maybe you can 'pay' in stories or music!

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out https://www.flexyourrights.org/  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]


''I hitchhiked over 200,000 miles in 50 states of the US, 19 states of Mexico, and 8 provinces of Canada I would say in general that it is easy to hitchhike in all those countries but some of the most difficult places are in America. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My favorite states for travelers are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[New Mexico]], [[Oregon]], and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with numbers of other people. Hitchhiking with two people or large equipment like a bicycle or kayak seems to give shortest waits. I would rank hitchhiking as a slightly more risky activity than cycle touring on windy highways with no shoulder. These days I prefer to ride freight trains and motorized bicycles, and I recommend you do the same.'' - [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]]


''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' - Summer '14


''I crossed the US from Boston to San Francisco the southern way. The north east is tough, prepare for some waits and looks as if you were not worth anyone's attention. Luckily it gets better soon! Texas was the best state for me, lots of rides even from women, and basically no waites. Also California is pretty good to hitchhike, though more tourists. To all girls - it's definitely safe enough in my opinion, though I was asked for sex a few times by people not understanding hitchhiking much. And in general - for me waites for longer than in Europe (when alone I have to hardly wait longer than 10 minutes ever), but still the longest wait during the whole trip were ~2 hours at a bad spot.'' - [[user:Nora|Nora]]

''These experiences are from a voyage undertaken during Autumn of 2023. Approximately 6 weeks in length, 41 rides, 3000 miles. Los Angeles to New Orleans with lots of detours. For context, I am young, male, Asian, clean shaven and have short hair. I travelled with only a backpack. It was difficult to get rides, whether I was standing on an onramp, walking on the interstate, asking at gas stations, waiting after traffic lights, standing on the shoulder etc. I tried pretty much every method of hitching, and would like to say none of them have good chances of getting a ride quickly. For me, it was an even split between getting rides easily (matter of minutes) and waiting HOURS for rides. There is no State that was particularly easy, not even California along the 1 and 101 was easy, in fact some of my longest waits were in California. But of course, no one goes to the US and expects hitching to be smooth sailing. Public opinion towards hitchhikers is terrible, the vast majority don't give a damn who you are, where you're from and where you're trying to get to. Expect to be given ugly looks and get used to being ignored, since people see you as just another homeless person, which you are. Asking at gas stations is arduous, people are often scared and a lot simply won't take you no matter how nicely you ask. Mexicans will save you time and time again, they are often the only people who will pick you up on the side of the interstate or will actually hear you out at a gas station. Asking Mexicans or other Latinos in Spanish works beautifully, even a couple phrases will get you a vastly more positive response than using English. I often freedom camped in towns and rural areas, never in cities though. No bad experiences from that, but it does get cold. I preferred hitching at on ramps over gas stations just because I didn't want to run the goddamn gauntlet everytime I approached someone. Walking along the Interstate is an act of desperation, I don't recommend it (but have done it many times) because it is FUCKING DANGEROUS, and loud. Now the good parts: The people who do give you rides will be fucking AMAZING. Food, weed, beer, work, money, parties, couches to surf, fishing invites, intriguing conversations, crazy people, funny people, random people. WOW. The US has got it all, a kaleidescope of humanity in overflowing abundance. When that ride finally comes, it will be awesome so HANG IN THERE. Cops didn't care if they were driving past and I was on an onramp but State troopers will give you a hard time if you're on an interstate, I got two rides from cops to their county border and also had the police called on me thanks to some Karen in Texas. Racism is to be expected in the South if you're a person of colour, but the blacks will be so much more friendlier if you aren't white. I was never threatened or harmed, but most of my drivers were terrible at driving, some drank, some were high. Be wary of that. In conclusion, this country is NOT a walk in the park to hitch. It's hard. You'll need determination, the patience of a saint and a little courage, but it'll pay off. Trust me.''
-The Falling Leaf.

Hitchhikernick - I have hitched around the US many times, only 3 short of doing every state 3 times 😁.  WOW what can I say, definitely the most generous nation. I have been given money and bought food so many times without asking, several times being 100$ bills😁.  I'm actually there now on a skiing trip (Feb 2024) and same thing has happened on this trip.  Waiting times have been from instant pickups where I haven't had time to put my bag down to waiting 2 days consecutively (highway 6 Nevada in Feb 2014).  Never spend my own money and always leave with some money left over 😁. Average waiting time about 3.5hrs, though a lot less around ski areas. Definitely the only nation where I get checked by the cops, though many times they have proven to be helpful.  Some times I have had to walk up the onramp but never got into trouble for doing so, if cops arrived they would generally give me a ride to a better spot, never been given a ticket.  Definitely some of the greatest experiences too...drinking and partying with the natives in Monument valley, hitching and winging a ticket into Burning Man, crusing on a boat around Kachemak Bay and hiking to the magic bus in Alaska, camping and hiking around the Grand Canyon, Sedona and Yosemite, skiing all big ski resorts, experiencing city life and experiencing life with the homeless to name a few...!!! You could spend a lifetime experiencing, travelling and tasting the USA 😉. *UPDATE* I should also point out some of the downsides of hitching america, to paint a more accurate picture. On quite a few occasions, drivers would deliberately give me smoke clouds when they went past. There has been some real grumpy/bible obsessed/guilt tripping drivers. Not every police officer was so pleasant, telling me i couldn't hitchhike or that it was illegal (Idaho in particular). Waiting times could be brutal on some occasions. Temperatures can be extreme on both ends, you must be prepared, especially when you are familiar with long waiting times. And last but not least, the repetitive questions...thats what i love about countries I cant speak the language.  On the whole though, I gave found the USA hitchhiking good and happily do it again...many times😁

== Links ==

Analyses of hitchhiking in the USA by [[User:Korn|Korn]] on warmroads.de [https://warmroads.de/en/hitchhiking-in-19-the-usa/ - Hitchhiking in the USA.]


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}



[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>5igj8kfceg6tyi5ko9w14f4b4tz45p7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106001</id>
      <parentid>106000</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-07-25T19:21:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Hitchhikernick</username>
        <id>47454</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Personal Experiences */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="26254">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.

Despite a large number of immigrants all across the country, most Americans are still curious about people from different parts of the world, fascinated by foreign accents, and eager to introduce visitors to American culture. Despite an undercurrent of xenophobia and racism in rural parts of the country, Americans tend to have a pragmatic view towards foreigners: Americans might profoundly dislike your country of origin, but they will rarely hold that against you as an individual.

Relative to other Western countries, people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion. If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. Despite a level of religious intolerance much higher than in Europe, Americans tend to have a pragmatic approach to people of unfamiliar religious backgrounds: Americans tend not to judge you badly even if they might be suspicious of your religion.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below).

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.


== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

=== Getting out of big cities ===
You may find yourself in very sprawled out cities like LA or Phoenix, then try your luck on Craigslist! I (http://hitchwiki.org/en/User:Nora) crossed the US and found a few rides on Craiglist, messaging people who offer rides and asking if they would take me for free. Probably works best as a foreigner and a girl, but is worth a try. And maybe you can 'pay' in stories or music!

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out https://www.flexyourrights.org/  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]


''I hitchhiked over 200,000 miles in 50 states of the US, 19 states of Mexico, and 8 provinces of Canada I would say in general that it is easy to hitchhike in all those countries but some of the most difficult places are in America. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My favorite states for travelers are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[New Mexico]], [[Oregon]], and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with numbers of other people. Hitchhiking with two people or large equipment like a bicycle or kayak seems to give shortest waits. I would rank hitchhiking as a slightly more risky activity than cycle touring on windy highways with no shoulder. These days I prefer to ride freight trains and motorized bicycles, and I recommend you do the same.'' - [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]]


''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' - Summer '14


''I crossed the US from Boston to San Francisco the southern way. The north east is tough, prepare for some waits and looks as if you were not worth anyone's attention. Luckily it gets better soon! Texas was the best state for me, lots of rides even from women, and basically no waites. Also California is pretty good to hitchhike, though more tourists. To all girls - it's definitely safe enough in my opinion, though I was asked for sex a few times by people not understanding hitchhiking much. And in general - for me waites for longer than in Europe (when alone I have to hardly wait longer than 10 minutes ever), but still the longest wait during the whole trip were ~2 hours at a bad spot.'' - [[user:Nora|Nora]]

''These experiences are from a voyage undertaken during Autumn of 2023. Approximately 6 weeks in length, 41 rides, 3000 miles. Los Angeles to New Orleans with lots of detours. For context, I am young, male, Asian, clean shaven and have short hair. I travelled with only a backpack. It was difficult to get rides, whether I was standing on an onramp, walking on the interstate, asking at gas stations, waiting after traffic lights, standing on the shoulder etc. I tried pretty much every method of hitching, and would like to say none of them have good chances of getting a ride quickly. For me, it was an even split between getting rides easily (matter of minutes) and waiting HOURS for rides. There is no State that was particularly easy, not even California along the 1 and 101 was easy, in fact some of my longest waits were in California. But of course, no one goes to the US and expects hitching to be smooth sailing. Public opinion towards hitchhikers is terrible, the vast majority don't give a damn who you are, where you're from and where you're trying to get to. Expect to be given ugly looks and get used to being ignored, since people see you as just another homeless person, which you are. Asking at gas stations is arduous, people are often scared and a lot simply won't take you no matter how nicely you ask. Mexicans will save you time and time again, they are often the only people who will pick you up on the side of the interstate or will actually hear you out at a gas station. Asking Mexicans or other Latinos in Spanish works beautifully, even a couple phrases will get you a vastly more positive response than using English. I often freedom camped in towns and rural areas, never in cities though. No bad experiences from that, but it does get cold. I preferred hitching at on ramps over gas stations just because I didn't want to run the goddamn gauntlet everytime I approached someone. Walking along the Interstate is an act of desperation, I don't recommend it (but have done it many times) because it is FUCKING DANGEROUS, and loud. Now the good parts: The people who do give you rides will be fucking AMAZING. Food, weed, beer, work, money, parties, couches to surf, fishing invites, intriguing conversations, crazy people, funny people, random people. WOW. The US has got it all, a kaleidescope of humanity in overflowing abundance. When that ride finally comes, it will be awesome so HANG IN THERE. Cops didn't care if they were driving past and I was on an onramp but State troopers will give you a hard time if you're on an interstate, I got two rides from cops to their county border and also had the police called on me thanks to some Karen in Texas. Racism is to be expected in the South if you're a person of colour, but the blacks will be so much more friendlier if you aren't white. I was never threatened or harmed, but most of my drivers were terrible at driving, some drank, some were high. Be wary of that. In conclusion, this country is NOT a walk in the park to hitch. It's hard. You'll need determination, the patience of a saint and a little courage, but it'll pay off. Trust me.''
-The Falling Leaf.

Hitchhikernick - I have hitched around the US many times, only 3 short of doing every state 3 times 😁.  WOW what can I say, definitely the most generous nation. I have been given money and bought food so many times without asking, several times being 100$ bills😁.  I'm actually there now on a skiing trip (Feb 2024) and same thing has happened on this trip.  Waiting times have been from instant pickups where I haven't had time to put my bag down to waiting 2 days consecutively (highway 6 Nevada in Feb 2014).  Never spend my own money and always leave with some money left over 😁. Average waiting time about 3.5hrs, though a lot less around ski areas. Definitely the only nation where I get checked by the cops, though many times they have proven to be helpful.  Some times I have had to walk up the onramp but never got into trouble for doing so, if cops arrived they would generally give me a ride to a better spot, never been given a ticket.  Definitely some of the greatest experiences too...drinking and partying with the natives in Monument valley, hitching and winging a ticket into Burning Man, crusing on a boat around Kachemak Bay and hiking to the magic bus in Alaska, camping and hiking around the Grand Canyon, Sedona and Yosemite, skiing all big ski resorts, experiencing city life and experiencing life with the homeless to name a few...!!! You could spend a lifetime experiencing, travelling and tasting the USA 😉. *UPDATE* I should also point out some of the downsides of hitching america, to paint a more accurate picture. On quite a few occasions, drivers would deliberately give me smoke clouds when they went past. There has been some real grumpy/bible obsessed/guilt tripping drivers. Not every police officer was so pleasant, telling me i couldn't hitchhike or that it was illegal (Idaho in particular). Waiting times could be brutal on some occasions. Temperatures can be extreme on both ends, you must be prepared, especially when you are familiar with long waiting times. And last but not least, the repetitive questions...thats what i love about countries I cant speak the language.  On the whole though, I have found the USA hitchhiking good and happily do it again...many times😁

== Links ==

Analyses of hitchhiking in the USA by [[User:Korn|Korn]] on warmroads.de [https://warmroads.de/en/hitchhiking-in-19-the-usa/ - Hitchhiking in the USA.]


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}



[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>6797zqfg34r04d6is2yrzpbtq1h9tgs</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106019</id>
      <parentid>106001</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-08-01T15:34:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Hitchhikernick</username>
        <id>47454</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Personal Experiences */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="26294">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.

Despite a large number of immigrants all across the country, most Americans are still curious about people from different parts of the world, fascinated by foreign accents, and eager to introduce visitors to American culture. Despite an undercurrent of xenophobia and racism in rural parts of the country, Americans tend to have a pragmatic view towards foreigners: Americans might profoundly dislike your country of origin, but they will rarely hold that against you as an individual.

Relative to other Western countries, people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion. If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. Despite a level of religious intolerance much higher than in Europe, Americans tend to have a pragmatic approach to people of unfamiliar religious backgrounds: Americans tend not to judge you badly even if they might be suspicious of your religion.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below).

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.


== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

=== Getting out of big cities ===
You may find yourself in very sprawled out cities like LA or Phoenix, then try your luck on Craigslist! I (http://hitchwiki.org/en/User:Nora) crossed the US and found a few rides on Craiglist, messaging people who offer rides and asking if they would take me for free. Probably works best as a foreigner and a girl, but is worth a try. And maybe you can 'pay' in stories or music!

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out https://www.flexyourrights.org/  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]


''I hitchhiked over 200,000 miles in 50 states of the US, 19 states of Mexico, and 8 provinces of Canada I would say in general that it is easy to hitchhike in all those countries but some of the most difficult places are in America. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My favorite states for travelers are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[New Mexico]], [[Oregon]], and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with numbers of other people. Hitchhiking with two people or large equipment like a bicycle or kayak seems to give shortest waits. I would rank hitchhiking as a slightly more risky activity than cycle touring on windy highways with no shoulder. These days I prefer to ride freight trains and motorized bicycles, and I recommend you do the same.'' - [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]]


''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' - Summer '14


''I crossed the US from Boston to San Francisco the southern way. The north east is tough, prepare for some waits and looks as if you were not worth anyone's attention. Luckily it gets better soon! Texas was the best state for me, lots of rides even from women, and basically no waites. Also California is pretty good to hitchhike, though more tourists. To all girls - it's definitely safe enough in my opinion, though I was asked for sex a few times by people not understanding hitchhiking much. And in general - for me waites for longer than in Europe (when alone I have to hardly wait longer than 10 minutes ever), but still the longest wait during the whole trip were ~2 hours at a bad spot.'' - [[user:Nora|Nora]]

''These experiences are from a voyage undertaken during Autumn of 2023. Approximately 6 weeks in length, 41 rides, 3000 miles. Los Angeles to New Orleans with lots of detours. For context, I am young, male, Asian, clean shaven and have short hair. I travelled with only a backpack. It was difficult to get rides, whether I was standing on an onramp, walking on the interstate, asking at gas stations, waiting after traffic lights, standing on the shoulder etc. I tried pretty much every method of hitching, and would like to say none of them have good chances of getting a ride quickly. For me, it was an even split between getting rides easily (matter of minutes) and waiting HOURS for rides. There is no State that was particularly easy, not even California along the 1 and 101 was easy, in fact some of my longest waits were in California. But of course, no one goes to the US and expects hitching to be smooth sailing. Public opinion towards hitchhikers is terrible, the vast majority don't give a damn who you are, where you're from and where you're trying to get to. Expect to be given ugly looks and get used to being ignored, since people see you as just another homeless person, which you are. Asking at gas stations is arduous, people are often scared and a lot simply won't take you no matter how nicely you ask. Mexicans will save you time and time again, they are often the only people who will pick you up on the side of the interstate or will actually hear you out at a gas station. Asking Mexicans or other Latinos in Spanish works beautifully, even a couple phrases will get you a vastly more positive response than using English. I often freedom camped in towns and rural areas, never in cities though. No bad experiences from that, but it does get cold. I preferred hitching at on ramps over gas stations just because I didn't want to run the goddamn gauntlet everytime I approached someone. Walking along the Interstate is an act of desperation, I don't recommend it (but have done it many times) because it is FUCKING DANGEROUS, and loud. Now the good parts: The people who do give you rides will be fucking AMAZING. Food, weed, beer, work, money, parties, couches to surf, fishing invites, intriguing conversations, crazy people, funny people, random people. WOW. The US has got it all, a kaleidescope of humanity in overflowing abundance. When that ride finally comes, it will be awesome so HANG IN THERE. Cops didn't care if they were driving past and I was on an onramp but State troopers will give you a hard time if you're on an interstate, I got two rides from cops to their county border and also had the police called on me thanks to some Karen in Texas. Racism is to be expected in the South if you're a person of colour, but the blacks will be so much more friendlier if you aren't white. I was never threatened or harmed, but most of my drivers were terrible at driving, some drank, some were high. Be wary of that. In conclusion, this country is NOT a walk in the park to hitch. It's hard. You'll need determination, the patience of a saint and a little courage, but it'll pay off. Trust me.''
-The Falling Leaf.

Hitchhikernick - I have hitched around the US many times, only 3 short of doing every state 3 times 😁.  WOW what can I say, definitely the most generous nation. I have been given money and bought food so many times without asking, several times being 100$ bills😁.  I'm actually there now on a skiing trip (Feb 2024) and same thing has happened on this trip.  Waiting times have been from instant pickups where I haven't had time to put my bag down to waiting 2 days consecutively (highway 6 Nevada in Feb 2014).  Never spend my own money and always leave with some money left over 😁. Average waiting time about 3.5hrs, though a lot less around ski areas. Definitely the only nation where I get checked by the cops, though many times they have proven to be helpful.  Some times I have had to walk up the onramp but never got into trouble for doing so, if cops arrived they would generally give me a ride to a better spot, never been given a ticket.  Definitely some of the greatest experiences too...drinking and partying with the natives in Monument valley, hitching and winging a ticket into Burning Man, crusing on a boat around Kachemak Bay and hiking to the magic bus in Alaska, camping and hiking around the Grand Canyon, Sedona and Yosemite, skiing all big ski resorts, experiencing city life and experiencing life with the homeless to name a few...!!! You could spend a lifetime experiencing, travelling and tasting the USA 😉. *UPDATE* I should also point out some of the downsides of hitching america, to paint a more accurate picture. On quite a few occasions, drivers would deliberately give me smoke clouds when they went past. There has been some real grumpy/bible obsessed/guilt tripping drivers. Not every police officer was so pleasant, telling me i couldn't hitchhike or that it was illegal (Idaho in particular). Waiting times could be brutal on some occasions. Temperatures can be extreme on both ends, you must be prepared, especially when you are familiar with long waiting times. And last but not least, the repetitive questions...thats what i love about countries I cant speak the language.  On the whole though, I have found the USA hitchhiking good and happily do it again...many times😁. [[User:Hitchhikernick|Hitchhikernick]]

== Links ==

Analyses of hitchhiking in the USA by [[User:Korn|Korn]] on warmroads.de [https://warmroads.de/en/hitchhiking-in-19-the-usa/ - Hitchhiking in the USA.]


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}



[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>mp1mn1d9a5t350iwg6fyk4jc5zcyrcj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106036</id>
      <parentid>106019</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-08-08T13:58:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Hitchhikernick</username>
        <id>47454</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Personal Experiences */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="27046">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.

Despite a large number of immigrants all across the country, most Americans are still curious about people from different parts of the world, fascinated by foreign accents, and eager to introduce visitors to American culture. Despite an undercurrent of xenophobia and racism in rural parts of the country, Americans tend to have a pragmatic view towards foreigners: Americans might profoundly dislike your country of origin, but they will rarely hold that against you as an individual.

Relative to other Western countries, people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion. If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. Despite a level of religious intolerance much higher than in Europe, Americans tend to have a pragmatic approach to people of unfamiliar religious backgrounds: Americans tend not to judge you badly even if they might be suspicious of your religion.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below).

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.


== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

=== Getting out of big cities ===
You may find yourself in very sprawled out cities like LA or Phoenix, then try your luck on Craigslist! I (http://hitchwiki.org/en/User:Nora) crossed the US and found a few rides on Craiglist, messaging people who offer rides and asking if they would take me for free. Probably works best as a foreigner and a girl, but is worth a try. And maybe you can 'pay' in stories or music!

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out https://www.flexyourrights.org/  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]


''I hitchhiked over 200,000 miles in 50 states of the US, 19 states of Mexico, and 8 provinces of Canada I would say in general that it is easy to hitchhike in all those countries but some of the most difficult places are in America. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My favorite states for travelers are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[New Mexico]], [[Oregon]], and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with numbers of other people. Hitchhiking with two people or large equipment like a bicycle or kayak seems to give shortest waits. I would rank hitchhiking as a slightly more risky activity than cycle touring on windy highways with no shoulder. These days I prefer to ride freight trains and motorized bicycles, and I recommend you do the same.'' - [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]]


''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' - Summer '14


''I crossed the US from Boston to San Francisco the southern way. The north east is tough, prepare for some waits and looks as if you were not worth anyone's attention. Luckily it gets better soon! Texas was the best state for me, lots of rides even from women, and basically no waites. Also California is pretty good to hitchhike, though more tourists. To all girls - it's definitely safe enough in my opinion, though I was asked for sex a few times by people not understanding hitchhiking much. And in general - for me waites for longer than in Europe (when alone I have to hardly wait longer than 10 minutes ever), but still the longest wait during the whole trip were ~2 hours at a bad spot.'' - [[user:Nora|Nora]]

''These experiences are from a voyage undertaken during Autumn of 2023. Approximately 6 weeks in length, 41 rides, 3000 miles. Los Angeles to New Orleans with lots of detours. For context, I am young, male, Asian, clean shaven and have short hair. I travelled with only a backpack. It was difficult to get rides, whether I was standing on an onramp, walking on the interstate, asking at gas stations, waiting after traffic lights, standing on the shoulder etc. I tried pretty much every method of hitching, and would like to say none of them have good chances of getting a ride quickly. For me, it was an even split between getting rides easily (matter of minutes) and waiting HOURS for rides. There is no State that was particularly easy, not even California along the 1 and 101 was easy, in fact some of my longest waits were in California. But of course, no one goes to the US and expects hitching to be smooth sailing. Public opinion towards hitchhikers is terrible, the vast majority don't give a damn who you are, where you're from and where you're trying to get to. Expect to be given ugly looks and get used to being ignored, since people see you as just another homeless person, which you are. Asking at gas stations is arduous, people are often scared and a lot simply won't take you no matter how nicely you ask. Mexicans will save you time and time again, they are often the only people who will pick you up on the side of the interstate or will actually hear you out at a gas station. Asking Mexicans or other Latinos in Spanish works beautifully, even a couple phrases will get you a vastly more positive response than using English. I often freedom camped in towns and rural areas, never in cities though. No bad experiences from that, but it does get cold. I preferred hitching at on ramps over gas stations just because I didn't want to run the goddamn gauntlet everytime I approached someone. Walking along the Interstate is an act of desperation, I don't recommend it (but have done it many times) because it is FUCKING DANGEROUS, and loud. Now the good parts: The people who do give you rides will be fucking AMAZING. Food, weed, beer, work, money, parties, couches to surf, fishing invites, intriguing conversations, crazy people, funny people, random people. WOW. The US has got it all, a kaleidescope of humanity in overflowing abundance. When that ride finally comes, it will be awesome so HANG IN THERE. Cops didn't care if they were driving past and I was on an onramp but State troopers will give you a hard time if you're on an interstate, I got two rides from cops to their county border and also had the police called on me thanks to some Karen in Texas. Racism is to be expected in the South if you're a person of colour, but the blacks will be so much more friendlier if you aren't white. I was never threatened or harmed, but most of my drivers were terrible at driving, some drank, some were high. Be wary of that. In conclusion, this country is NOT a walk in the park to hitch. It's hard. You'll need determination, the patience of a saint and a little courage, but it'll pay off. Trust me.''
-The Falling Leaf.

Hitchhikernick - I have hitched around the US many times, only 3 short of doing every state 3 times 😁.  WOW what can I say, definitely the most generous nation. I have been given money and bought food so many times without asking, several times being 100$ bills😁.  I'm actually there now on a skiing trip (Feb 2024) and same thing has happened on this trip.  Waiting times have been from instant pickups where I haven't had time to put my bag down to waiting 2 days consecutively (highway 6 Nevada in Feb 2014).  Never spend my own money and always leave with some money left over 😁. Average waiting time about 3.5hrs, though a lot less around ski areas. Definitely the only nation where I get checked by the cops, though many times they have proven to be helpful.  Some times I have had to walk up the onramp but never got into trouble for doing so, if cops arrived they would generally give me a ride to a better spot, never been given a ticket.  Definitely some of the greatest experiences too...drinking and partying with the natives in Monument valley, hitching and winging a ticket into Burning Man, crusing on a boat around Kachemak Bay and hiking to the magic bus in Alaska, camping and hiking around the Grand Canyon, Sedona and Yosemite, skiing all big ski resorts, experiencing city life and experiencing life with the homeless to name a few...!!! You could spend a lifetime experiencing, travelling and tasting the USA 😉. *UPDATE* I should also point out some of the downsides of hitching america, to paint a more accurate picture. On quite a few occasions, drivers would deliberately give me smoke clouds when they went past. There has been some real grumpy/bible obsessed/guilt tripping drivers. Not every police officer was so pleasant, telling me i couldn't hitchhike or that it was illegal (Idaho in particular). Waiting times could be brutal on some occasions. Temperatures can be extreme on both ends, you must be prepared, especially when you are familiar with long waiting times. And last but not least, the repetitive questions...thats what i love about countries I cant speak the language (not always avoidable even if foreign language). One last point, that i must add, though not directly related to hitchhiking, is Tipping...this has become out of control in the US.  Once i had a tough day hitching so i wanted to make it better with a cheap can of beer. I went to a liqure store, found reduced price section and got a damaged can of beer for 1 usd.  When I got to the checkout to pay, the checkout girl asked how much i would like to tip. i gave her a dollar note and said that is all i have.  she then put it in a brown paper bag in a rather surly manner. its getting ridiculous and not good for budget concious travellers like hitchhikers.  Nowhere else in the world, that I have visited, is so reliant/entitled on tipping like the US. On the whole though, I have found the USA hitchhiking good and happily do it again...many times😁. [[User:Hitchhikernick|Hitchhikernick]]

== Links ==

Analyses of hitchhiking in the USA by [[User:Korn|Korn]] on warmroads.de [https://warmroads.de/en/hitchhiking-in-19-the-usa/ - Hitchhiking in the USA.]


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}



[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]</text>
      <sha1>anwe8l3bim7c68rdg7bwnjpie1hq07i</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>107187</id>
      <parentid>106036</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-11-23T16:01:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>{{geo-incorrect}}</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="27065">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.

Despite a large number of immigrants all across the country, most Americans are still curious about people from different parts of the world, fascinated by foreign accents, and eager to introduce visitors to American culture. Despite an undercurrent of xenophobia and racism in rural parts of the country, Americans tend to have a pragmatic view towards foreigners: Americans might profoundly dislike your country of origin, but they will rarely hold that against you as an individual.

Relative to other Western countries, people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion. If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. Despite a level of religious intolerance much higher than in Europe, Americans tend to have a pragmatic approach to people of unfamiliar religious backgrounds: Americans tend not to judge you badly even if they might be suspicious of your religion.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below).

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.


== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

=== Getting out of big cities ===
You may find yourself in very sprawled out cities like LA or Phoenix, then try your luck on Craigslist! I (http://hitchwiki.org/en/User:Nora) crossed the US and found a few rides on Craiglist, messaging people who offer rides and asking if they would take me for free. Probably works best as a foreigner and a girl, but is worth a try. And maybe you can 'pay' in stories or music!

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out https://www.flexyourrights.org/  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]


''I hitchhiked over 200,000 miles in 50 states of the US, 19 states of Mexico, and 8 provinces of Canada I would say in general that it is easy to hitchhike in all those countries but some of the most difficult places are in America. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My favorite states for travelers are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[New Mexico]], [[Oregon]], and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with numbers of other people. Hitchhiking with two people or large equipment like a bicycle or kayak seems to give shortest waits. I would rank hitchhiking as a slightly more risky activity than cycle touring on windy highways with no shoulder. These days I prefer to ride freight trains and motorized bicycles, and I recommend you do the same.'' - [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]]


''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' - Summer '14


''I crossed the US from Boston to San Francisco the southern way. The north east is tough, prepare for some waits and looks as if you were not worth anyone's attention. Luckily it gets better soon! Texas was the best state for me, lots of rides even from women, and basically no waites. Also California is pretty good to hitchhike, though more tourists. To all girls - it's definitely safe enough in my opinion, though I was asked for sex a few times by people not understanding hitchhiking much. And in general - for me waites for longer than in Europe (when alone I have to hardly wait longer than 10 minutes ever), but still the longest wait during the whole trip were ~2 hours at a bad spot.'' - [[user:Nora|Nora]]

''These experiences are from a voyage undertaken during Autumn of 2023. Approximately 6 weeks in length, 41 rides, 3000 miles. Los Angeles to New Orleans with lots of detours. For context, I am young, male, Asian, clean shaven and have short hair. I travelled with only a backpack. It was difficult to get rides, whether I was standing on an onramp, walking on the interstate, asking at gas stations, waiting after traffic lights, standing on the shoulder etc. I tried pretty much every method of hitching, and would like to say none of them have good chances of getting a ride quickly. For me, it was an even split between getting rides easily (matter of minutes) and waiting HOURS for rides. There is no State that was particularly easy, not even California along the 1 and 101 was easy, in fact some of my longest waits were in California. But of course, no one goes to the US and expects hitching to be smooth sailing. Public opinion towards hitchhikers is terrible, the vast majority don't give a damn who you are, where you're from and where you're trying to get to. Expect to be given ugly looks and get used to being ignored, since people see you as just another homeless person, which you are. Asking at gas stations is arduous, people are often scared and a lot simply won't take you no matter how nicely you ask. Mexicans will save you time and time again, they are often the only people who will pick you up on the side of the interstate or will actually hear you out at a gas station. Asking Mexicans or other Latinos in Spanish works beautifully, even a couple phrases will get you a vastly more positive response than using English. I often freedom camped in towns and rural areas, never in cities though. No bad experiences from that, but it does get cold. I preferred hitching at on ramps over gas stations just because I didn't want to run the goddamn gauntlet everytime I approached someone. Walking along the Interstate is an act of desperation, I don't recommend it (but have done it many times) because it is FUCKING DANGEROUS, and loud. Now the good parts: The people who do give you rides will be fucking AMAZING. Food, weed, beer, work, money, parties, couches to surf, fishing invites, intriguing conversations, crazy people, funny people, random people. WOW. The US has got it all, a kaleidescope of humanity in overflowing abundance. When that ride finally comes, it will be awesome so HANG IN THERE. Cops didn't care if they were driving past and I was on an onramp but State troopers will give you a hard time if you're on an interstate, I got two rides from cops to their county border and also had the police called on me thanks to some Karen in Texas. Racism is to be expected in the South if you're a person of colour, but the blacks will be so much more friendlier if you aren't white. I was never threatened or harmed, but most of my drivers were terrible at driving, some drank, some were high. Be wary of that. In conclusion, this country is NOT a walk in the park to hitch. It's hard. You'll need determination, the patience of a saint and a little courage, but it'll pay off. Trust me.''
-The Falling Leaf.

Hitchhikernick - I have hitched around the US many times, only 3 short of doing every state 3 times 😁.  WOW what can I say, definitely the most generous nation. I have been given money and bought food so many times without asking, several times being 100$ bills😁.  I'm actually there now on a skiing trip (Feb 2024) and same thing has happened on this trip.  Waiting times have been from instant pickups where I haven't had time to put my bag down to waiting 2 days consecutively (highway 6 Nevada in Feb 2014).  Never spend my own money and always leave with some money left over 😁. Average waiting time about 3.5hrs, though a lot less around ski areas. Definitely the only nation where I get checked by the cops, though many times they have proven to be helpful.  Some times I have had to walk up the onramp but never got into trouble for doing so, if cops arrived they would generally give me a ride to a better spot, never been given a ticket.  Definitely some of the greatest experiences too...drinking and partying with the natives in Monument valley, hitching and winging a ticket into Burning Man, crusing on a boat around Kachemak Bay and hiking to the magic bus in Alaska, camping and hiking around the Grand Canyon, Sedona and Yosemite, skiing all big ski resorts, experiencing city life and experiencing life with the homeless to name a few...!!! You could spend a lifetime experiencing, travelling and tasting the USA 😉. *UPDATE* I should also point out some of the downsides of hitching america, to paint a more accurate picture. On quite a few occasions, drivers would deliberately give me smoke clouds when they went past. There has been some real grumpy/bible obsessed/guilt tripping drivers. Not every police officer was so pleasant, telling me i couldn't hitchhike or that it was illegal (Idaho in particular). Waiting times could be brutal on some occasions. Temperatures can be extreme on both ends, you must be prepared, especially when you are familiar with long waiting times. And last but not least, the repetitive questions...thats what i love about countries I cant speak the language (not always avoidable even if foreign language). One last point, that i must add, though not directly related to hitchhiking, is Tipping...this has become out of control in the US.  Once i had a tough day hitching so i wanted to make it better with a cheap can of beer. I went to a liqure store, found reduced price section and got a damaged can of beer for 1 usd.  When I got to the checkout to pay, the checkout girl asked how much i would like to tip. i gave her a dollar note and said that is all i have.  she then put it in a brown paper bag in a rather surly manner. its getting ridiculous and not good for budget concious travellers like hitchhikers.  Nowhere else in the world, that I have visited, is so reliant/entitled on tipping like the US. On the whole though, I have found the USA hitchhiking good and happily do it again...many times😁. [[User:Hitchhikernick|Hitchhikernick]]

== Links ==

Analyses of hitchhiking in the USA by [[User:Korn|Korn]] on warmroads.de [https://warmroads.de/en/hitchhiking-in-19-the-usa/ - Hitchhiking in the USA.]


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}



[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]

{{geo-incorrect}}</text>
      <sha1>k5iyjlc996iphyaf0kkeyigfdkb8as8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>114721</id>
      <parentid>107187</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-10-03T10:26:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GriL</username>
        <id>24751</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="27079">{{Infobox Country
|country = United States of America
|language = English (de facto), Spanish widely spoken in southwest and Florida
|capital = [[Washington D.C.|Washington DC]]
|pop = 317,791,000
|currency = American Dollar ($)
|BW = US
|map= &lt;map lat='39.44525647027036' lng='-98.6623687744132' zoom='3' view='0' /&gt;
|hitch = &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
}}
[[File:Kasper-hitch-nh.jpg|thumb|250px|[[User:guaka|guaka]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://guaka.org/ site], [[User talk:guaka|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; hitching in New England, taken by [[User:Amylin|amylin]], September 2007]]

'''The United States of America''', commonly called '''The U.S.A.''', or simply '''America''' is a country consisting of 50 states.  For the convenience of the common hitchhiker, these states are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their individual pages (see below).  The US is bordered by [[Canada]] to the north and [[Mexico]] to the south. 

Hitching, like everything else in America, varies greatly depending on what type of area and what part of the country you are passing through. In general you can get rides fairly easily if you hitchhike the right way; in fact, often you can find more than just rides, such as offers for free meals, invitations to homes and parties, etc. 

__TOC__

== Culture ==

Many Americans have a limited worldview.  (I can say this because I am one.)  We think there are two places in the world: America and other places.  Don't waste your time explaining that "American" is an incorrect demonym.  And get used to our senseless system of measurement.  It's a part of our culture.

Despite a large number of immigrants all across the country, most Americans are still curious about people from different parts of the world, fascinated by foreign accents, and eager to introduce visitors to American culture. Despite an undercurrent of xenophobia and racism in rural parts of the country, Americans tend to have a pragmatic view towards foreigners: Americans might profoundly dislike your country of origin, but they will rarely hold that against you as an individual.

Relative to other Western countries, people in the rural United States are profoundly religious.  People who pick you up might inquire about your religion. If you're not religious, try to deal with it in a positive way and accept the difference. Despite a level of religious intolerance much higher than in Europe, Americans tend to have a pragmatic approach to people of unfamiliar religious backgrounds: Americans tend not to judge you badly even if they might be suspicious of your religion.

More often you will be picked up by really cool people, and often dropped off exactly at the point of your destination, as hitchhiker [[User:Guaka|Guaka]]'s experience shows, for example. 

=== Cars ===
''Driving in the United States is similar to driving in Canada, but very different from driving in Europe. It is not uncommon for Americans to drive more than an hour each way to work, and 77 percent of Americans drive alone to their jobs... Most states allow people to drive unaccompanied once they have reached the age of 16.''  -[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_in_the_United_States Wikipedia: Driving in the United States]

There are more than 250 million registered vehicles in the USA, the most of any country.  Everyone has a car, and gas is so cheap that people drive everywhere.  As a result there are a lot of roads and highways.  Sometimes you may need to change your technique to accommodate unfamiliar infrastructure.  Sometimes it can be hard to find a place with slow traffic!  Although traffic is heavy, hitchhiking is also hard because nobody trusts somebody with no car.  (Why don't you have a car?  There must be something wrong with you.)  It would help to look like a foreigner, but don't go so far as to wave a foreign flag around.  Hitchhiking is not as common as in Europe and Latin America, so expect to have to explain yourself, possibly to the police.  (See the section on police below).

== Transportation system ==

=== Interstates ===
[[File:2006-interstate-map.png|right|A map of the interstate system in 2006.  ]]
An 'interstate', also known as an '''expressway''', '''freeway''', or (confusingly) '''highway''', is a large, multilane road that covers vast distances, and passes through major cities.  If you aren't planning on going to the countryside, you probably won't need to stray far from the interstate system.  

Interstates are designated on maps by "I-..." and have road signs [http://hitchwiki.org/en/File:InterstateSign.svg#file like this].  Even-numbered routes run from west to east and are numbered from south to north.  For example, [[I-10]] runs across the south from [[L.A.]] to [[Jacksonville, FL]], and I-90 across the North from [[Seattle]] to [[Boston]].  Likewise, odd-numbered expressways start with [[I-5]] along the west coast (Seattle to L.A.) and I-95 along the east coast ([[Maine]] to [[Miami]]).  

The main interstates have two or three numbers, as in I-8 or I-76.  Offshoots or ring roads will have a preceeding digit, for example, I-295, which runs along I-95.


== Methods for catching rides ==
If you're going for speed over a long distance (3+ hours), then the best bet is to stay on the interstates.  Highways are better for shorter or more senic trips.  

=== Interstates ===
'''Thumbing it on on-ramps''' is sometimes the best way to hitchhike the interstates.  Standing along the shoulder with a thumb or sign can take a few hours so bring something to read.  Try to stick to exits that large towns, truck stops, [[rest area|rest stops]] or any other reason for drivers to stop there (restaurants, [[petrol station hitchhiking|gas stations]], hotels, etc.).  Ask a driver to drop you off at on on-ramp with plenty of traffic.  

For this same reason, be prepared to turn down a ride with someone who's "just going to the next exit".  Getting dropped off on a low-traffic exit is the gravest danger when hitching on interstates.  It can easily lead to long, long delays of a car every ten minutes and none of them stopping.  Eventually you may give up and stand on the highway or walk a few miles to the next exit.  Since pedestrians are not allowed along interstates in most states, you are likely to be picked up by a state trooper.  In the best case, your ID will be check and you may will be given a lift to the next exit.  See the section on police.  

When making '''signs''' in the states, it best to use the two-letter state abbreviations, which are universally understood, notable exceptions being OK, HI, and LA.  The first two could be confused for words, the last ([[Louisiana]]) could be confused with ([[Los Angeles]]).  Additionally: 

*"Philly" = [[Philadelphia]]
*"D.C." = [[Washington, D.C.]]
*"N.Y.C." = [[New York City]]
*"S.F" = [[San Francisco]]
*"L.A." = [[Los Angeles]]
*"NOLA" = [[New Orleans]] (not universally understood, but in the South at least)

'''Asking for rides at rest areas or gas stations''', is often one of the quickest ways to get a very long distance ride, but soliciting and loitering is might be prohibited there and sometimes you will be kicked out before finding a ride. A good way to avoid being kicked out is to greet everyone entering the building with a friendly smile and give them a friendly nod, then ask them for a ride as they leave the building. This gives them time to become comfortable with your presence and prevents them from having the opportunity to complain about your solicitation to the employees. 

'''Asking for rides at truck stops''' is the same way.  As a rule, Love's, Petro, and TA will be the quickest to kick you out. Pilot/Flying J truck stops and smaller locally owned truck stops are generally a lot more lenient. You may even find signs that prohibit you from soliciting a ride, so caution is necessary like asking instead of showing them a sign to your destination.

=== US/State Highways ===
If you are only going a hundred miles or less, you can often make better time on US highways, state highways, or even local roads. Even if you are going long distances, if you aren't concerned about making good time, getting off the interstates can be a very rewarding experience. Local highways will grant you a better picture of what local life is like in that area, and typically offer a greater variety of drivers and scenery. To hitchhike on these highways, it is best to stand at the edge of town right before the speed limit picks up, even walking on the highways also helps as shoulders most of the way are pretty wide. Standing at stop lights outside of towns along these highways is also a great way to catch a ride, even if the speed limit is quite high.

=== Urban and Suburban Short Distance ===
If you are hitchhiking within a large metropolitan area and trying to get to another part of the city, it is best to stay on the interstate on-ramps unless you want to do a lot of walking. Most larger cities have interstates passing through them and often have one or more spur or circumferential interstates surrounding them. These spur and circumferential interstates are designated by a three-digit highway number with signs that look just like normal blue interstate signs. When hitchhiking on these roads, it is best to accept every ride, even if they are only going a mile, as each exit you get to is closer to your destination and you are unlikely to get stranded on any of these ramps due to the amount of traffic.

An alternate method to hitchhiking within urban areas is to walk up to cars stuck at red lights and ask them in person if you can have a ride in the direction they are going. This works best if they already have their window down, but usually people will roll their window down to talk to you if you stand in front of their car trying to get their attention.

Another way is to pay a small amount for public transportation to drop you off outside the city(check your map/GPS).

You may also wish to try asking for rides at smaller local gas stations, but you are unlikely to make as much progress doing this.

=== Getting out of big cities ===
You may find yourself in very sprawled out cities like LA or Phoenix, then try your luck on Craigslist! I (http://hitchwiki.org/en/User:Nora) crossed the US and found a few rides on Craiglist, messaging people who offer rides and asking if they would take me for free. Probably works best as a foreigner and a girl, but is worth a try. And maybe you can 'pay' in stories or music!

== Police/Laws ==
[[File:Unitedstateslaws.jpg|thumb|400px|right|Overview of hitchhiking laws by state.&lt;br&gt; Green: Hitchhiking legal while on the shoulder of the road &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Hitchhiking legal while off the traveled portion of the road, stay in the grass to be safe. &lt;br&gt; Red: Hitchhiking is completely illegal.&lt;br&gt; Gray: Specific laws, check the respective state article(s).]]

The legal status of hitchhiking in the United States is a bit of a difficult topic; laws and their enforcement differ greatly from state to state as does the information available online and in general knowledge. Many people (including police officers) mistakenly believe hitchhiking is illegal anywhere in the US; sometimes you'll get away with holding a cardboard sign but not with holding out your thumb, and sometimes nobody will hassle you even if you stand or walk right on the interstate. The specific articles on states will give you more information on this topic.

=== Police ===

Many police in this country have arrest quotas, not to mention many police (not all!) are assholes.  That being said, you may encounter an officer of the law who is a rather enthusiastic about giving you a hard time.  Keep in mind that even foreigners have rights, such as the right to refuse being searched.  For good information about dealing with the police, check out https://www.flexyourrights.org/  

Being in a state which permits hitchhiking does not guarantee that the police will not harass you. Most police don't know the laws and will tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in that state. [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] argues with cops on a regular basis and refuses to stop hitchhiking where it is legal. He has been innocently arrested for this twice, but has remained confident and never been taken to jail even after being cuffed and in the car and continuing to stand up for his rights. They are usually bluffing right to the very end. If you know the law in that state, don't be afraid to tell the police they are wrong!

Frequently when confronted with your response, law enforcement officers will react unprofessionally and occasionally aggressively and even in a discriminatory way if you are not their race (sad but true: white people will have an easier time than blacks or latinos). They may curse, call you names, and/or threaten to arrest you if they see you hitchhiking again and then leave the scene. This is usually a bluff. They may even cuff you then give you a ride out of their jurisdiction. Occasionally they may admit to their mistake and leave you alone. If you are uncomfortable and feel threatened by the officer, you may request to speak to his/her supervisor. Supervisors will show up to talk with you about the law openly and professionally.

=== National laws ===
The only nationwide law (Code of Federal Regulations) that prohibits hitchhiking is 36 CFR 4.31 which states that hitchhiking is illegal on any property under jurisdiction of the Department of the Interior: National Park Service. This includes but is not limited to National Parks, National Scenic Byways, and National Recreation Areas. This law is often amended  to allow hitchhiking at the discretion of each park. Check with the park's respective state article for information

=== State and local laws ===
Look to the map pictured above which indicates each state's laws. Most often, the laws state that the hitchhiker may not "solicit a ride" "on a roadway". The word roadway is usually defined in state statute books as "exclusive of a shoulder" or "the traveled portion of the highway", making these statutes easy to circumvent.

In most states it's illegal to hitch from the interstates ([[highway|motorways]]) themselves (though enforcement of this rule varies), but you can typically stand at [[on-ramp]]s (highway entries). That being said, understand that the ramps are still technically considered interstate property and are illegal for pedestrians to be on, although it is almost without exception permitted if you stand in front of the "no pedestrians" sign. 

In some areas (such as certain towns or municipal areas) hitching is illegal everywhere, however, it is still allowed de facto. In most cases, hitchhiking is legal or tolerated. There are also many limited-access highways (i.e. with on-ramps and [[off-ramp]]s) that are not part of the interstate system which prohibit pedestrians as well. [[California]] is notorious for prohibiting pedestrians on many of its controlled access highways.

Even in states where hitchhiking is illegal, the law is rarely enforced. Wyoming Highway Patrol reports that in 2010, they approached 524 hitchhikers but only cited eight of them (note that hitchhiking is no longer illegal in Wyoming as of 2013!)

If the police pass you walking or sitting by the side of the road without soliciting in any way, they may still stop to check IDs, but you are not required to identify yourself unless there is suspicion that you could have committed a crime. You may wish to hide your thumb or sign when a police car is approaching to avoid being hassled.

Often, particularly close to major cities, the [[police]] will ask you for photo ID, but as long as you have one with you (such as a passport) there shouldn't be a problem. Most of the time they will be polite when you come up clean, and not too rarely they'll give you a lift out of their area to get rid of you.

Especially in smaller towns and in the countryside, the officer stopping you is likely to never have seen a passport before. If that's your form of ID, bear with the delay caused, help the poor guy out by point out which is your name and your birth date and enjoy the confusion and the hilarious misconceptions that arise.

Tourists who intend to cross into the USA by hitchhiking should note that the US immigration department will log that you have been hitchhiking, should they discover that you are. This log will be visible to any guard who subsequently checks your immigration status. If you decide to leave and enter the USA again, it may make your entry back into the USA more difficult if it is not a hitchhiker friendly state.

== Personal Experiences ==

[[File:Unitedstateshitchhiking.jpg|thumb|400px|''Relative Ease of Hitchhiking Each State of America (based on a survey of hitchhikers with 114,000 miles cumulative experience.)''.&lt;br&gt; Green: Easy &lt;br&gt; Yellow: Average &lt;br&gt; Red: Difficult]]

''Haven't hitched extensively there, but where I have, the experiences have been unique. I've hitched Oregon to Mexico along the famous highway 101. I also hitched from Oregon to Chicago on i90 in the dead of winter. Lots of clothes for that one, and a warm place to retreat to at every stop. The most remarkable thing about hitching in the States is that you get picked up by REALLY interesting people. Not all the time. But our beloved weirdos are more common in the US than anywhere else I've hitched. Regardless of what you think about the States, it's easily one of the most interesting places to hitchhike, especially if you LIKE adventure.'' - [[User:Chael777|Chael]]


''Have hitchhiked moderately in US, about 9,000 miles(including ferries and train hopping). Its a diverse country so generalizing a state or even a county(as I have been picked up in the most conservative counties) would not be right. I have been picked up by really awesome people(some of them are now my friends), Friendly cops(who offered me water and money) to discriminatory cops(who just wanted to get rid of me), people who turned out to be gay(asked sexual favors), bored people looking for a good conversation(what you have to do is just listen and and ask question to acknowledge that you are listening), people who saw me as a curious and tired foreigner etc. It was a great experience and helped me learn a lot about the culture here. One thing I learned is that if you are having fun then you get picked up easily as compared to when you are not. My personal favorite states are [[Alaska]] and [[Missouri]].'' - [[User:Keep_trying|Tarun]]


''I hitchhiked over 200,000 miles in 50 states of the US, 19 states of Mexico, and 8 provinces of Canada I would say in general that it is easy to hitchhike in all those countries but some of the most difficult places are in America. Each state varies greatly in geography and ease of hitchhiking. In the south,  for example it is easier to hop freight trains since the hitching is so difficult. My favorite states for travelers are [[Colorado]], [[California]], [[New Mexico]], [[Oregon]], and [[Arkansas]]. I have hitched alone, and with numbers of other people. Hitchhiking with two people or large equipment like a bicycle or kayak seems to give shortest waits. I would rank hitchhiking as a slightly more risky activity than cycle touring on windy highways with no shoulder. These days I prefer to ride freight trains and motorized bicycles, and I recommend you do the same.'' - [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]]


''I hitchhiked from Panama to the US, intending to go through the whole of the US by hitchhiking with my little brother. I cannot recommend to hitchhike in pairs. It takes _days_ to find rides. We looked like regular guys, did 20k+ miles in more than 10 countries. If you do it, do it alone.'' - Summer '14


''I crossed the US from Boston to San Francisco the southern way. The north east is tough, prepare for some waits and looks as if you were not worth anyone's attention. Luckily it gets better soon! Texas was the best state for me, lots of rides even from women, and basically no waites. Also California is pretty good to hitchhike, though more tourists. To all girls - it's definitely safe enough in my opinion, though I was asked for sex a few times by people not understanding hitchhiking much. And in general - for me waites for longer than in Europe (when alone I have to hardly wait longer than 10 minutes ever), but still the longest wait during the whole trip were ~2 hours at a bad spot.'' - [[user:Nora|Nora]]

''These experiences are from a voyage undertaken during Autumn of 2023. Approximately 6 weeks in length, 41 rides, 3000 miles. Los Angeles to New Orleans with lots of detours. For context, I am young, male, Asian, clean shaven and have short hair. I travelled with only a backpack. It was difficult to get rides, whether I was standing on an onramp, walking on the interstate, asking at gas stations, waiting after traffic lights, standing on the shoulder etc. I tried pretty much every method of hitching, and would like to say none of them have good chances of getting a ride quickly. For me, it was an even split between getting rides easily (matter of minutes) and waiting HOURS for rides. There is no State that was particularly easy, not even California along the 1 and 101 was easy, in fact some of my longest waits were in California. But of course, no one goes to the US and expects hitching to be smooth sailing. Public opinion towards hitchhikers is terrible, the vast majority don't give a damn who you are, where you're from and where you're trying to get to. Expect to be given ugly looks and get used to being ignored, since people see you as just another homeless person, which you are. Asking at gas stations is arduous, people are often scared and a lot simply won't take you no matter how nicely you ask. Mexicans will save you time and time again, they are often the only people who will pick you up on the side of the interstate or will actually hear you out at a gas station. Asking Mexicans or other Latinos in Spanish works beautifully, even a couple phrases will get you a vastly more positive response than using English. I often freedom camped in towns and rural areas, never in cities though. No bad experiences from that, but it does get cold. I preferred hitching at on ramps over gas stations just because I didn't want to run the goddamn gauntlet everytime I approached someone. Walking along the Interstate is an act of desperation, I don't recommend it (but have done it many times) because it is FUCKING DANGEROUS, and loud. Now the good parts: The people who do give you rides will be fucking AMAZING. Food, weed, beer, work, money, parties, couches to surf, fishing invites, intriguing conversations, crazy people, funny people, random people. WOW. The US has got it all, a kaleidescope of humanity in overflowing abundance. When that ride finally comes, it will be awesome so HANG IN THERE. Cops didn't care if they were driving past and I was on an onramp but State troopers will give you a hard time if you're on an interstate, I got two rides from cops to their county border and also had the police called on me thanks to some Karen in Texas. Racism is to be expected in the South if you're a person of colour, but the blacks will be so much more friendlier if you aren't white. I was never threatened or harmed, but most of my drivers were terrible at driving, some drank, some were high. Be wary of that. In conclusion, this country is NOT a walk in the park to hitch. It's hard. You'll need determination, the patience of a saint and a little courage, but it'll pay off. Trust me.''
-The Falling Leaf.

Hitchhikernick - I have hitched around the US many times, only 3 short of doing every state 3 times 😁.  WOW what can I say, definitely the most generous nation. I have been given money and bought food so many times without asking, several times being 100$ bills😁.  I'm actually there now on a skiing trip (Feb 2024) and same thing has happened on this trip.  Waiting times have been from instant pickups where I haven't had time to put my bag down to waiting 2 days consecutively (highway 6 Nevada in Feb 2014).  Never spend my own money and always leave with some money left over 😁. Average waiting time about 3.5hrs, though a lot less around ski areas. Definitely the only nation where I get checked by the cops, though many times they have proven to be helpful.  Some times I have had to walk up the onramp but never got into trouble for doing so, if cops arrived they would generally give me a ride to a better spot, never been given a ticket.  Definitely some of the greatest experiences too...drinking and partying with the natives in Monument valley, hitching and winging a ticket into Burning Man, crusing on a boat around Kachemak Bay and hiking to the magic bus in Alaska, camping and hiking around the Grand Canyon, Sedona and Yosemite, skiing all big ski resorts, experiencing city life and experiencing life with the homeless to name a few...!!! You could spend a lifetime experiencing, travelling and tasting the USA 😉. *UPDATE* I should also point out some of the downsides of hitching america, to paint a more accurate picture. On quite a few occasions, drivers would deliberately give me smoke clouds when they went past. There has been some real grumpy/bible obsessed/guilt tripping drivers. Not every police officer was so pleasant, telling me i couldn't hitchhike or that it was illegal (Idaho in particular). Waiting times could be brutal on some occasions. Temperatures can be extreme on both ends, you must be prepared, especially when you are familiar with long waiting times. And last but not least, the repetitive questions...thats what i love about countries I cant speak the language (not always avoidable even if foreign language). One last point, that i must add, though not directly related to hitchhiking, is Tipping...this has become out of control in the US.  Once i had a tough day hitching so i wanted to make it better with a cheap can of beer. I went to a liqure store, found reduced price section and got a damaged can of beer for 1 usd.  When I got to the checkout to pay, the checkout girl asked how much i would like to tip. i gave her a dollar note and said that is all i have.  she then put it in a brown paper bag in a rather surly manner. its getting ridiculous and not good for budget concious travellers like hitchhikers.  Nowhere else in the world, that I have visited, is so reliant/entitled on tipping like the US. On the whole though, I have found the USA hitchhiking good and happily do it again...many times😁. [[User:Hitchhikernick|Hitchhikernick]]

== Links ==

Analyses of hitchhiking in the USA by [[User:Korn|Korn]] on warmroads.de [https://warmroads.de/en/hitchhiking-in-19-the-usa/ - Hitchhiking in the USA.]


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Template:States USA}}
{{IsIn|North America}}



[[Category:United States| ]]

[[de:Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika]]
[[es:Estados Unidos]]
[[fr:États-Unis d'Amérique]]
[[ru:США]]

{{geo-incorrect}}</text>
      <sha1>tl3egg8l1wzryaw5scha3s0zvz5sg7g</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Digihitch.com</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1536</id>
    <redirect title="Digihitch" />
    <revision>
      <id>1577</id>
      <parentid>4475</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T13:45:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="34">#redirect [[Hitchhiking websites]]</text>
      <sha1>jvcovfl6jd97nndhquslxro33591rfi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1578</id>
      <parentid>1577</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="34">#redirect [[Hitchhiking websites]]</text>
      <sha1>jvcovfl6jd97nndhquslxro33591rfi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4475</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T21:11:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4447">'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 30,000 visitors each month and has been featured in British, Canadian and U.S. media (television, radio, newspaper, books) many times since it began in March 2001.

===Featured Sections===
Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles. The most popular sections are:
 
;[http://www.digihitch.com/new.html This Week on digihitch]
:New stories, travel tips, recommended links, biographies and travel terms - all posted within the last 7 days.

;[http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums]
:Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.

;[http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World]
: Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')

;[http://www.digihitch.com/links.html Web Linkage]
: Over 1,500 recommended links to web sites featuring hitchhiking, road culture or alternative media. Search by keyword, category, rank or country.

;[http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture]
:Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

;[http://www.digihitch.com/forums-album.html Photo Thumbing Albums]
:Photo albums for hitchhikers, with many hundreds of images, including photos from past hitchhiker events/ competitions.

;[http://gathering.digihitch.com/ Hitchhiker Happenings]
: The homebase for hitchhiking events in North America. Get details about upcoming gatherings of hitchhikers, or learn about past events.

[http://www.digihitch.com/reviews.html Road Reviews]: Product reviews for hitchhiking and road-related books, music, movies and more.

[http://beat.digihitch.com/ digihitch Beat Pages]: Read up on the Beat Generation, with articles, links, biographies and photos.

[http://rideboard.digihitch.com/ Rideboard]: The rideboard lets visitors search or offer rides anywhere in North America or Europe. The rideboard engine is provided by [[hitchhikers.org]].

[http://www.digihitch.com/featured_writers.html Featured Writers]: Meet digihitch's core writers and travelers, see their photos and read biographies. Get motivated by their quotes and book/music/video recommendations.


There are of course many other feature sections on the website, and some of these extras- such as ''Road Techniques'' and ''Downloads'' are only accessible to registered members. It is free to sign up.

===Upcoming Features===
In early 2006 expect to see:

''digihitch Mobile'' A wap-enabled version of digihitch for travelers using cell phones and other wireless mobile devices.

''My digihitch'' An advanced user profile system for active members of the website. Features will include: a map-based profile, book/music/movie recommendations, testimonials, more syndicated content and much more.

===Staff and Contributing Editors===

The core team of editors at digihitch.com includes [http://www.digihitch.com/userinfo-hikecrazy.html Jon 'Hikecrazy'] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan 'Sal'man Strub]. Both are strong promoters of hitchhiking culture. Morgan has logged over 30,000 miles hitchhiking North America. Jon has hitchhiked over 60,000 miles in Europe and the USA, along with regions of Africa and Asia.
The website also has many contributing editors, as you will see on the ''Featured Writers'' page listed above.

===Mission Statement===

Digihitch's goal is to provide a welcome place for hitchhikers around the world, on the web. We believe hitchhiking is a valuable form of travel and exchange, and our team will continue to provide free resources to encourage travelers to hit the road and make the connection.

* http://www.digihitch.com.

[[Category:Website]]</text>
      <sha1>7mjd3pljub1j6n9ztcf5wdtod1xl3v4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4476</id>
      <parentid>1578</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="34">#redirect [[Hitchhiking websites]]</text>
      <sha1>jvcovfl6jd97nndhquslxro33591rfi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15380</id>
      <parentid>4476</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-04T04:26:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="24">#redirect [[Multimedia]]</text>
      <sha1>16qvo4w8l7cbxy2n6l0btb5pat339zq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>42414</id>
      <parentid>15380</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-06-14T00:02:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="23">#redirect [[Digihitch]]</text>
      <sha1>e6o7rzmt30towt130spk6ghl7hfsku7</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Dallas</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1537</id>
    <redirect title="DFW" />
    <revision>
      <id>1579</id>
      <parentid>4478</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-24T22:59:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3805">'''Dallas''' [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&amp;hl=en&amp;q=dallas&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;z=12&amp;ll=32.784965,-96.79985&amp;spn=0.136813,0.432243&amp;om=1&amp;iwloc=A] (and most of [[Texas]]) isn't eactly the best place
to be hitchhiking. Unfortunately with the wide-spread
use of Air Conditioning, hugh masses of people (mostly
Vogons) have moved down here are are decidely un-friendly.
This coupled with the fact that Texas doesn't have a
state personal-income tax, has drawn vogons (and their
gas guzzlin' SUV's in fleets of thousands).

However, should you be in the vicinity of North Dallas,
you might want to stop in at the Art Department of
Brookhaven College. Most of the froodz there are
super hoopy and sass the ways of artists; a few are
even conversant with the h2g2 (ask for Richard). Also,
the theatre, dance, and music depts are hoopy as well.
In addition, the foreign languages division offers 
courses in over 20 languages.

To get there follow these directions (or use MapQuest.com
or similar).

Running North/South pretty much thru the middle of
the vast sprawling megopollis that is Dallas-Fort Worth,
is a major highway "35".  35 splits in two just north
in the city of Denton (well known for two major universities
UNT (University of North Texas) and TWU (Texas Women's 
University). As 35 proceeds south, 35W heads slightly 
to the south-west towards Fort Worth, and 35E heads
slightly south-EAST towards Dallas. Stay on 35W and
look for the signs. You will first pass thru Lake Dallas,
then Lewisville, and finally enter North Dallas. You are
looking for BELT LINE ROAD, which you will then take
back to the EAST (you have to dodge under the overpass
and make a left turn to head west, if you turn right
you'll see the end of civilisation as we know it).

Anyway, you will then proceed up a steep hill (you
are still on Belt Line right?) this is technically
speaking Carrolton (old town) -- a very hoopy arts
oriented city. As you top the hill you will (eventually)
cross Josey Lane, and then Webbs Chappel, and then Marsh
Lane.  When you get to Marsh lane, get in the right
lane and turn right (heading south). Technically you are
now in Addison -- another super hoopy arts-oriented
town; they have a super fab "Watchtower Theatre" as well
as "The Taste of Addison" -- Belt Line is known as the
main drag for restauratns and fine dine-ing. 

Heading south on Marsh Lane, You will come to a few 
stoplights, among which is Spring Valley Road keep
going straight on Marsh. You are technically now
in Carrollton (another arts-oriented city) as you
go up a slight hill, you will want to get into the
LEFT lane, and at the light (Valley View Lane) you
will want to turn LEFT. Heading past the police
station and water tower on your left, you come
to a light which you want to turn left on. (If you 
come to a fork in the road you have gone too far).

As you enter onto campus, stay in the left lane,
and then you come to a "T" intersection. Turning
left (you are now on "Windmill Circle" which 
encircles the entire campus).  Keep going West
on the road, it slowly curves around to the right
(plus a serpintine curve) observe the 20mph speed
limit. Finally on your right will be the "F"
building. If you see the "J" building, look to
the right of it, and you will see the "F" building.

Next you get to play: "Try to find a parking space!"
(it's all part of the fun of campus life).  Enter
the F-building and make your way to F-110 (the
printmaking room), there (almost any time of
day, almost any day of the week you will find
ARTISTS).  Ask for either Jim or Richard.

The art department's phone number is: 972.860.4730
and the address of the campus is 3939 Valley View
Lane, Carrollton (Dallas) TX, 75244.

&lt;!---- Filed by: Drongo the Magnificent (TheArtistT2001@yahoo.com) --&gt;


[[Category:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>2qspne1lcmrlqjxlcygsq05ielcnf5d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1580</id>
      <parentid>1579</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3805">'''Dallas''' [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&amp;hl=en&amp;q=dallas&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;z=12&amp;ll=32.784965,-96.79985&amp;spn=0.136813,0.432243&amp;om=1&amp;iwloc=A] (and most of [[Texas]]) isn't eactly the best place
to be hitchhiking. Unfortunately with the wide-spread
use of Air Conditioning, hugh masses of people (mostly
Vogons) have moved down here are are decidely un-friendly.
This coupled with the fact that Texas doesn't have a
state personal-income tax, has drawn vogons (and their
gas guzzlin' SUV's in fleets of thousands).

However, should you be in the vicinity of North Dallas,
you might want to stop in at the Art Department of
Brookhaven College. Most of the froodz there are
super hoopy and sass the ways of artists; a few are
even conversant with the h2g2 (ask for Richard). Also,
the theatre, dance, and music depts are hoopy as well.
In addition, the foreign languages division offers 
courses in over 20 languages.

To get there follow these directions (or use MapQuest.com
or similar).

Running North/South pretty much thru the middle of
the vast sprawling megopollis that is Dallas-Fort Worth,
is a major highway "35".  35 splits in two just north
in the city of Denton (well known for two major universities
UNT (University of North Texas) and TWU (Texas Women's 
University). As 35 proceeds south, 35W heads slightly 
to the south-west towards Fort Worth, and 35E heads
slightly south-EAST towards Dallas. Stay on 35W and
look for the signs. You will first pass thru Lake Dallas,
then Lewisville, and finally enter North Dallas. You are
looking for BELT LINE ROAD, which you will then take
back to the EAST (you have to dodge under the overpass
and make a left turn to head west, if you turn right
you'll see the end of civilisation as we know it).

Anyway, you will then proceed up a steep hill (you
are still on Belt Line right?) this is technically
speaking Carrolton (old town) -- a very hoopy arts
oriented city. As you top the hill you will (eventually)
cross Josey Lane, and then Webbs Chappel, and then Marsh
Lane.  When you get to Marsh lane, get in the right
lane and turn right (heading south). Technically you are
now in Addison -- another super hoopy arts-oriented
town; they have a super fab "Watchtower Theatre" as well
as "The Taste of Addison" -- Belt Line is known as the
main drag for restauratns and fine dine-ing. 

Heading south on Marsh Lane, You will come to a few 
stoplights, among which is Spring Valley Road keep
going straight on Marsh. You are technically now
in Carrollton (another arts-oriented city) as you
go up a slight hill, you will want to get into the
LEFT lane, and at the light (Valley View Lane) you
will want to turn LEFT. Heading past the police
station and water tower on your left, you come
to a light which you want to turn left on. (If you 
come to a fork in the road you have gone too far).

As you enter onto campus, stay in the left lane,
and then you come to a "T" intersection. Turning
left (you are now on "Windmill Circle" which 
encircles the entire campus).  Keep going West
on the road, it slowly curves around to the right
(plus a serpintine curve) observe the 20mph speed
limit. Finally on your right will be the "F"
building. If you see the "J" building, look to
the right of it, and you will see the "F" building.

Next you get to play: "Try to find a parking space!"
(it's all part of the fun of campus life).  Enter
the F-building and make your way to F-110 (the
printmaking room), there (almost any time of
day, almost any day of the week you will find
ARTISTS).  Ask for either Jim or Richard.

The art department's phone number is: 972.860.4730
and the address of the campus is 3939 Valley View
Lane, Carrollton (Dallas) TX, 75244.

&lt;!---- Filed by: Drongo the Magnificent (TheArtistT2001@yahoo.com) --&gt;


[[Category:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>2qspne1lcmrlqjxlcygsq05ielcnf5d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4477</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T21:11:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3645">'''Dallas''' (and most of [[Texas]]) isn't eactly the best place
to be hitchhiking. Unfortunately with the wide-spread
use of Air Conditioning, hugh masses of people (mostly
Vogons) have moved down here are are decidely un-friendly.
This coupled with the fact that Texas doesn't have a
state personal-income tax, has drawn vogons (and their
gas guzzlin' SUV's in fleets of thousands).

However, should you be in the vicinity of NORTH DALLAS,
you might want to stop in at the Art Department of
Brookhaven College. Most of the froodz there are
super hoopy and sass the ways of artists; a few are
even conversant with the h2g2 (ask for Richard). Also,
the theatre, dance, and music depts are hoopy as well.
In addition, the foreign languages division offers 
courses in over 20 languages.

To get there follow these directions (or use MapQuest.com
or similar).

Running North/South pretty much thru the middle of
the vast sprawling megopollis that is Dallas-Fort Worth,
is a major highway "35".  35 splits in two just north
in the city of Denton (well known for two major universities
UNT (University of North Texas) and TWU (Texas Women's 
University). As 35 proceeds south, 35W heads slightly 
to the south-west towards Fort Worth, and 35E heads
slightly south-EAST towards Dallas. Stay on 35W and
look for the signs. You will first pass thru Lake Dallas,
then Lewisville, and finally enter North Dallas. You are
looking for BELT LINE ROAD, which you will then take
back to the EAST (you have to dodge under the overpass
and make a left turn to head west, if you turn right
you'll see the end of civilisation as we know it).

Anyway, you will then proceed up a steep hill (you
are still on Belt Line right?) this is technically
speaking Carrolton (old town) -- a very hoopy arts
oriented city. As you top the hill you will (eventually)
cross Josey Lane, and then Webbs Chappel, and then Marsh
Lane.  When you get to Marsh lane, get in the right
lane and turn right (heading south). Technically you are
now in Addison -- another super hoopy arts-oriented
town; they have a super fab "Watchtower Theatre" as well
as "The Taste of Addison" -- Belt Line is known as the
main drag for restauratns and fine dine-ing. 

Heading south on Marsh Lane, You will come to a few 
stoplights, among which is Spring Valley Road keep
going straight on Marsh. You are technically now
in Carrollton (another arts-oriented city) as you
go up a slight hill, you will want to get into the
LEFT lane, and at the light (Valley View Lane) you
will want to turn LEFT. Heading past the police
station and water tower on your left, you come
to a light which you want to turn left on. (If you 
come to a fork in the road you have gone too far).

As you enter onto campus, stay in the left lane,
and then you come to a "T" intersection. Turning
left (you are now on "Windmill Circle" which 
encircles the entire campus).  Keep going West
on the road, it slowly curves around to the right
(plus a serpintine curve) observe the 20mph speed
limit. Finally on your right will be the "F"
building. If you see the "J" building, look to
the right of it, and you will see the "F" building.

Next you get to play: "Try to find a parking space!"
(it's all part of the fun of campus life).  Enter
the F-building and make your way to F-110 (the
printmaking room), there (almost any time of
day, almost any day of the week you will find
ARTISTS).  Ask for either Jim or Richard.

The art department's phone number is: 972.860.4730
and the address of the campus is 3939 Valley View
Lane, Carrollton (Dallas) TX, 75244.

&lt;!---- Filed by: Drongo the Magnificent (TheArtistT2001@yahoo.com) --&gt;</text>
      <sha1>neiruh6arnq8x3hqf4dierctbaxgng5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4478</id>
      <parentid>4477</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-03-29T17:36:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3685">'''Dallas''' (and most of [[Texas]]) isn't eactly the best place
to be hitchhiking. Unfortunately with the wide-spread
use of Air Conditioning, hugh masses of people (mostly
Vogons) have moved down here are are decidely un-friendly.
This coupled with the fact that Texas doesn't have a
state personal-income tax, has drawn vogons (and their
gas guzzlin' SUV's in fleets of thousands).

However, should you be in the vicinity of NORTH DALLAS,
you might want to stop in at the Art Department of
Brookhaven College. Most of the froodz there are
super hoopy and sass the ways of artists; a few are
even conversant with the h2g2 (ask for Richard). Also,
the theatre, dance, and music depts are hoopy as well.
In addition, the foreign languages division offers 
courses in over 20 languages.

To get there follow these directions (or use MapQuest.com
or similar).

Running North/South pretty much thru the middle of
the vast sprawling megopollis that is Dallas-Fort Worth,
is a major highway "35".  35 splits in two just north
in the city of Denton (well known for two major universities
UNT (University of North Texas) and TWU (Texas Women's 
University). As 35 proceeds south, 35W heads slightly 
to the south-west towards Fort Worth, and 35E heads
slightly south-EAST towards Dallas. Stay on 35W and
look for the signs. You will first pass thru Lake Dallas,
then Lewisville, and finally enter North Dallas. You are
looking for BELT LINE ROAD, which you will then take
back to the EAST (you have to dodge under the overpass
and make a left turn to head west, if you turn right
you'll see the end of civilisation as we know it).

Anyway, you will then proceed up a steep hill (you
are still on Belt Line right?) this is technically
speaking Carrolton (old town) -- a very hoopy arts
oriented city. As you top the hill you will (eventually)
cross Josey Lane, and then Webbs Chappel, and then Marsh
Lane.  When you get to Marsh lane, get in the right
lane and turn right (heading south). Technically you are
now in Addison -- another super hoopy arts-oriented
town; they have a super fab "Watchtower Theatre" as well
as "The Taste of Addison" -- Belt Line is known as the
main drag for restauratns and fine dine-ing. 

Heading south on Marsh Lane, You will come to a few 
stoplights, among which is Spring Valley Road keep
going straight on Marsh. You are technically now
in Carrollton (another arts-oriented city) as you
go up a slight hill, you will want to get into the
LEFT lane, and at the light (Valley View Lane) you
will want to turn LEFT. Heading past the police
station and water tower on your left, you come
to a light which you want to turn left on. (If you 
come to a fork in the road you have gone too far).

As you enter onto campus, stay in the left lane,
and then you come to a "T" intersection. Turning
left (you are now on "Windmill Circle" which 
encircles the entire campus).  Keep going West
on the road, it slowly curves around to the right
(plus a serpintine curve) observe the 20mph speed
limit. Finally on your right will be the "F"
building. If you see the "J" building, look to
the right of it, and you will see the "F" building.

Next you get to play: "Try to find a parking space!"
(it's all part of the fun of campus life).  Enter
the F-building and make your way to F-110 (the
printmaking room), there (almost any time of
day, almost any day of the week you will find
ARTISTS).  Ask for either Jim or Richard.

The art department's phone number is: 972.860.4730
and the address of the campus is 3939 Valley View
Lane, Carrollton (Dallas) TX, 75244.

&lt;!---- Filed by: Drongo the Magnificent (TheArtistT2001@yahoo.com) --&gt;


[[Category:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>jzx7y4fqrxfcf4i5ineky9im53bu95f</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4479</id>
      <parentid>1580</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3805">'''Dallas''' [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&amp;hl=en&amp;q=dallas&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;z=12&amp;ll=32.784965,-96.79985&amp;spn=0.136813,0.432243&amp;om=1&amp;iwloc=A] (and most of [[Texas]]) isn't eactly the best place
to be hitchhiking. Unfortunately with the wide-spread
use of Air Conditioning, hugh masses of people (mostly
Vogons) have moved down here are are decidely un-friendly.
This coupled with the fact that Texas doesn't have a
state personal-income tax, has drawn vogons (and their
gas guzzlin' SUV's in fleets of thousands).

However, should you be in the vicinity of North Dallas,
you might want to stop in at the Art Department of
Brookhaven College. Most of the froodz there are
super hoopy and sass the ways of artists; a few are
even conversant with the h2g2 (ask for Richard). Also,
the theatre, dance, and music depts are hoopy as well.
In addition, the foreign languages division offers 
courses in over 20 languages.

To get there follow these directions (or use MapQuest.com
or similar).

Running North/South pretty much thru the middle of
the vast sprawling megopollis that is Dallas-Fort Worth,
is a major highway "35".  35 splits in two just north
in the city of Denton (well known for two major universities
UNT (University of North Texas) and TWU (Texas Women's 
University). As 35 proceeds south, 35W heads slightly 
to the south-west towards Fort Worth, and 35E heads
slightly south-EAST towards Dallas. Stay on 35W and
look for the signs. You will first pass thru Lake Dallas,
then Lewisville, and finally enter North Dallas. You are
looking for BELT LINE ROAD, which you will then take
back to the EAST (you have to dodge under the overpass
and make a left turn to head west, if you turn right
you'll see the end of civilisation as we know it).

Anyway, you will then proceed up a steep hill (you
are still on Belt Line right?) this is technically
speaking Carrolton (old town) -- a very hoopy arts
oriented city. As you top the hill you will (eventually)
cross Josey Lane, and then Webbs Chappel, and then Marsh
Lane.  When you get to Marsh lane, get in the right
lane and turn right (heading south). Technically you are
now in Addison -- another super hoopy arts-oriented
town; they have a super fab "Watchtower Theatre" as well
as "The Taste of Addison" -- Belt Line is known as the
main drag for restauratns and fine dine-ing. 

Heading south on Marsh Lane, You will come to a few 
stoplights, among which is Spring Valley Road keep
going straight on Marsh. You are technically now
in Carrollton (another arts-oriented city) as you
go up a slight hill, you will want to get into the
LEFT lane, and at the light (Valley View Lane) you
will want to turn LEFT. Heading past the police
station and water tower on your left, you come
to a light which you want to turn left on. (If you 
come to a fork in the road you have gone too far).

As you enter onto campus, stay in the left lane,
and then you come to a "T" intersection. Turning
left (you are now on "Windmill Circle" which 
encircles the entire campus).  Keep going West
on the road, it slowly curves around to the right
(plus a serpintine curve) observe the 20mph speed
limit. Finally on your right will be the "F"
building. If you see the "J" building, look to
the right of it, and you will see the "F" building.

Next you get to play: "Try to find a parking space!"
(it's all part of the fun of campus life).  Enter
the F-building and make your way to F-110 (the
printmaking room), there (almost any time of
day, almost any day of the week you will find
ARTISTS).  Ask for either Jim or Richard.

The art department's phone number is: 972.860.4730
and the address of the campus is 3939 Valley View
Lane, Carrollton (Dallas) TX, 75244.

&lt;!---- Filed by: Drongo the Magnificent (TheArtistT2001@yahoo.com) --&gt;


[[Category:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>2qspne1lcmrlqjxlcygsq05ielcnf5d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9944</id>
      <parentid>4479</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-21T10:41:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3812">'''Dallas''' [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&amp;hl=en&amp;q=dallas&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;z=12&amp;ll=32.784965,-96.79985&amp;spn=0.136813,0.432243&amp;om=1&amp;iwloc=A] (and most of [[Texas]]) isn't eactly the best place
to be hitchhiking. Unfortunately with the wide-spread
use of Air Conditioning, hugh masses of people (mostly
Vogons) have moved down here are are decidely un-friendly.
This coupled with the fact that Texas doesn't have a
state personal-income tax, has drawn vogons (and their
gas guzzlin' SUV's in fleets of thousands).

However, should you be in the vicinity of North Dallas,
you might want to stop in at the Art Department of
Brookhaven College. Most of the froodz there are
super hoopy and sass the ways of artists; a few are
even conversant with the h2g2 (ask for Richard). Also,
the theatre, dance, and music depts are hoopy as well.
In addition, the foreign languages division offers 
courses in over 20 languages.

To get there follow these directions (or use MapQuest.com
or similar).

Running North/South pretty much thru the middle of
the vast sprawling megopollis that is Dallas-Fort Worth,
is a major highway "35".  35 splits in two just north
in the city of Denton (well known for two major universities
UNT (University of North Texas) and TWU (Texas Women's 
University). As 35 proceeds south, 35W heads slightly 
to the south-west towards Fort Worth, and 35E heads
slightly south-EAST towards Dallas. Stay on 35W and
look for the signs. You will first pass thru Lake Dallas,
then Lewisville, and finally enter North Dallas. You are
looking for BELT LINE ROAD, which you will then take
back to the EAST (you have to dodge under the overpass
and make a left turn to head west, if you turn right
you'll see the end of civilisation as we know it).

Anyway, you will then proceed up a steep hill (you
are still on Belt Line right?) this is technically
speaking Carrolton (old town) -- a very hoopy arts
oriented city. As you top the hill you will (eventually)
cross Josey Lane, and then Webbs Chappel, and then Marsh
Lane.  When you get to Marsh lane, get in the right
lane and turn right (heading south). Technically you are
now in Addison -- another super hoopy arts-oriented
town; they have a super fab "Watchtower Theatre" as well
as "The Taste of Addison" -- Belt Line is known as the
main drag for restauratns and fine dine-ing. 

Heading south on Marsh Lane, You will come to a few 
stoplights, among which is Spring Valley Road keep
going straight on Marsh. You are technically now
in Carrollton (another arts-oriented city) as you
go up a slight hill, you will want to get into the
LEFT lane, and at the light (Valley View Lane) you
will want to turn LEFT. Heading past the police
station and water tower on your left, you come
to a light which you want to turn left on. (If you 
come to a fork in the road you have gone too far).

As you enter onto campus, stay in the left lane,
and then you come to a "T" intersection. Turning
left (you are now on "Windmill Circle" which 
encircles the entire campus).  Keep going West
on the road, it slowly curves around to the right
(plus a serpintine curve) observe the 20mph speed
limit. Finally on your right will be the "F"
building. If you see the "J" building, look to
the right of it, and you will see the "F" building.

Next you get to play: "Try to find a parking space!"
(it's all part of the fun of campus life).  Enter
the F-building and make your way to F-110 (the
printmaking room), there (almost any time of
day, almost any day of the week you will find
ARTISTS).  Ask for either Jim or Richard.

The art department's phone number is: 972.860.4730
and the address of the campus is 3939 Valley View
Lane, Carrollton (Dallas) TX, 75244.

&lt;!---- Filed by: Drongo the Magnificent (TheArtistT2001@yahoo.com) --&gt;

[[Category:Texas]]
[[Category:United States]]</text>
      <sha1>gkplmgjzryzlerpqfe8sk03jcvct3cf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16143</id>
      <parentid>9944</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-26T16:06:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3829">'''Dallas''' [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&amp;hl=en&amp;q=dallas&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;z=12&amp;ll=32.784965,-96.79985&amp;spn=0.136813,0.432243&amp;om=1&amp;iwloc=A] (and most of [[Texas]]) isn't eactly the best place
to be hitchhiking. Unfortunately with the wide-spread
use of Air Conditioning, hugh masses of people (mostly
Vogons) have moved down here and are decidedly unfriendly.
This coupled with the fact that Texas doesn't have a
state personal-income tax, has drawn Vogons (and their
gas guzzlin' SUV's) in fleets of thousands.

&lt;!--However, should you be in the vicinity of North Dallas,
you might want to stop in at the Art Department of
Brookhaven College. Most of the froodz there are
super hoopy and sass the ways of artists; a few are
even conversant with the h2g2 (ask for Richard). Also,
the theatre, dance, and music depts are hoopy as well.
In addition, the foreign languages division offers 
courses in over 20 languages.

To get there follow these directions (or use MapQuest.com
or similar).

Running North/South pretty much thru the middle of
the vast sprawling megopollis that is Dallas-Fort Worth,
is a major highway "35".  35 splits in two just north
in the city of Denton (well known for two major universities
UNT (University of North Texas) and TWU (Texas Women's 
University). As 35 proceeds south, 35W heads slightly 
to the south-west towards Fort Worth, and 35E heads
slightly south-EAST towards Dallas. Stay on 35W and
look for the signs. You will first pass thru Lake Dallas,
then Lewisville, and finally enter North Dallas. You are
looking for BELT LINE ROAD, which you will then take
back to the EAST (you have to dodge under the overpass
and make a left turn to head west, if you turn right
you'll see the end of civilisation as we know it).

Anyway, you will then proceed up a steep hill (you
are still on Belt Line right?) this is technically
speaking Carrolton (old town) -- a very hoopy arts
oriented city. As you top the hill you will (eventually)
cross Josey Lane, and then Webbs Chappel, and then Marsh
Lane.  When you get to Marsh lane, get in the right
lane and turn right (heading south). Technically you are
now in Addison -- another super hoopy arts-oriented
town; they have a super fab "Watchtower Theatre" as well
as "The Taste of Addison" -- Belt Line is known as the
main drag for restauratns and fine dine-ing. 

Heading south on Marsh Lane, You will come to a few 
stoplights, among which is Spring Valley Road keep
going straight on Marsh. You are technically now
in Carrollton (another arts-oriented city) as you
go up a slight hill, you will want to get into the
LEFT lane, and at the light (Valley View Lane) you
will want to turn LEFT. Heading past the police
station and water tower on your left, you come
to a light which you want to turn left on. (If you 
come to a fork in the road you have gone too far).

As you enter onto campus, stay in the left lane,
and then you come to a "T" intersection. Turning
left (you are now on "Windmill Circle" which 
encircles the entire campus).  Keep going West
on the road, it slowly curves around to the right
(plus a serpintine curve) observe the 20mph speed
limit. Finally on your right will be the "F"
building. If you see the "J" building, look to
the right of it, and you will see the "F" building.

Next you get to play: "Try to find a parking space!"
(it's all part of the fun of campus life).  Enter
the F-building and make your way to F-110 (the
printmaking room), there (almost any time of
day, almost any day of the week you will find
ARTISTS).  Ask for either Jim or Richard.

The art department's phone number is: 972.860.4730
and the address of the campus is 3939 Valley View
Lane, Carrollton (Dallas) TX, 75244.
--&gt;
&lt;!---- Filed by: Drongo the Magnificent (TheArtistT2001@yahoo.com) --&gt;

{{stub}}

[[Category:Texas]]
[[Category:United States]]</text>
      <sha1>5e4t954try1zx6ldoul8vtga2vegl4e</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31347</id>
      <parentid>16143</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-01T01:21:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sigurdas</username>
        <id>1658</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3795">'''Dallas''' [http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&amp;hl=en&amp;q=dallas&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;z=12&amp;ll=32.784965,-96.79985&amp;spn=0.136813,0.432243&amp;om=1&amp;iwloc=A] (and most of [[Texas]]) isn't the best place
to be hitchhiking. Unfortunately with the wide-spread
use of Air Conditioning, hugh masses of people (mostly
Vogons) have moved down here and are decidedly unfriendly.
This coupled with the fact that Texas doesn't have a
state personal-income tax, has drawn Vogons (and their
gas guzzlin' SUV's) in fleets of thousands.

&lt;!--However, should you be in the vicinity of North Dallas,
you might want to stop in at the Art Department of
Brookhaven College. Most of the froodz there are
super hoopy and sass the ways of artists; a few are
even conversant with the h2g2 (ask for Richard). Also,
the theatre, dance, and music depts are hoopy as well.
In addition, the foreign languages division offers 
courses in over 20 languages.

To get there follow these directions (or use MapQuest.com
or similar).

Running North/South pretty much thru the middle of
the vast sprawling megopollis that is Dallas-Fort Worth,
is a major highway "35".  35 splits in two just north
in the city of Denton (well known for two major universities
UNT (University of North Texas) and TWU (Texas Women's 
University). As 35 proceeds south, 35W heads slightly 
to the south-west towards Fort Worth, and 35E heads
slightly south-EAST towards Dallas. Stay on 35W and
look for the signs. You will first pass thru Lake Dallas,
then Lewisville, and finally enter North Dallas. You are
looking for BELT LINE ROAD, which you will then take
back to the EAST (you have to dodge under the overpass
and make a left turn to head west, if you turn right
you'll see the end of civilisation as we know it).

Anyway, you will then proceed up a steep hill (you
are still on Belt Line right?) this is technically
speaking Carrolton (old town) -- a very hoopy arts
oriented city. As you top the hill you will (eventually)
cross Josey Lane, and then Webbs Chappel, and then Marsh
Lane.  When you get to Marsh lane, get in the right
lane and turn right (heading south). Technically you are
now in Addison -- another super hoopy arts-oriented
town; they have a super fab "Watchtower Theatre" as well
as "The Taste of Addison" -- Belt Line is known as the
main drag for restauratns and fine dine-ing. 

Heading south on Marsh Lane, You will come to a few 
stoplights, among which is Spring Valley Road keep
going straight on Marsh. You are technically now
in Carrollton (another arts-oriented city) as you
go up a slight hill, you will want to get into the
LEFT lane, and at the light (Valley View Lane) you
will want to turn LEFT. Heading past the police
station and water tower on your left, you come
to a light which you want to turn left on. (If you 
come to a fork in the road you have gone too far).

As you enter onto campus, stay in the left lane,
and then you come to a "T" intersection. Turning
left (you are now on "Windmill Circle" which 
encircles the entire campus).  Keep going West
on the road, it slowly curves around to the right
(plus a serpintine curve) observe the 20mph speed
limit. Finally on your right will be the "F"
building. If you see the "J" building, look to
the right of it, and you will see the "F" building.

Next you get to play: "Try to find a parking space!"
(it's all part of the fun of campus life).  Enter
the F-building and make your way to F-110 (the
printmaking room), there (almost any time of
day, almost any day of the week you will find
ARTISTS).  Ask for either Jim or Richard.

The art department's phone number is: 972.860.4730
and the address of the campus is 3939 Valley View
Lane, Carrollton (Dallas) TX, 75244.
--&gt;
&lt;!---- Filed by: Drongo the Magnificent (TheArtistT2001@yahoo.com) --&gt;

{{stub}}

[[Category:Texas]]</text>
      <sha1>88a2imj12ny4ewjxi29w4iidmfk1dxs</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44772</id>
      <parentid>31347</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-09-13T11:28:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.31.0.33</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="75">'''Dallas''' is a city in [[Texas]], [[USA]].

{{stub}}

[[Category:Texas]]</text>
      <sha1>pt0oatpkoq9iqlti63o7bhn53w9gdo2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44780</id>
      <parentid>44772</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-09-13T14:51:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="116">'''Dallas''' is a city in [[Texas]], [[USA]].

==Hitchhiking Out==
''please add info''

{{stub}}

[[Category:Texas]]</text>
      <sha1>tfssoe4mv5cwbdgtw5l30a400vwl86f</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48794</id>
      <parentid>44780</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-17T13:03:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>78.47.138.23</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="133">'''Dallas''' is a city in [[Texas]], [[USA]].

==Hitchhiking Out==
''please add info''

{{stub}}

[[Category:Texas]]
[[trash:Dallas]]</text>
      <sha1>fiytcdtded3lmc32d62kp0o4urqk2cw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>53300</id>
      <parentid>48794</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-07-11T19:34:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Marcool</username>
        <id>3407</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="0" />
      <sha1>phoiac9h4m842xq45sp7s6u21eteeq1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>53308</id>
      <parentid>53300</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-07-11T22:05:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="133">'''Dallas''' is a city in [[Texas]], [[USA]].

==Hitchhiking Out==
''please add info''

{{stub}}

[[Category:Texas]]
[[trash:Dallas]]</text>
      <sha1>fiytcdtded3lmc32d62kp0o4urqk2cw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>53309</id>
      <parentid>53308</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-07-11T22:05:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="133">'''Dallas''' is a city in [[Texas]], [[USA]].

==Hitchhiking Out==
''please add info''

{{stub}}

[[Category:Texas]]
[[trash:Dallas]]</text>
      <sha1>fiytcdtded3lmc32d62kp0o4urqk2cw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>53313</id>
      <parentid>53309</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-07-11T22:06:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="133">'''Dallas''' is a city in [[Texas]], [[USA]].

==Hitchhiking Out==
''please add info''

{{stub}}

[[Category:Texas]]
[[trash:Dallas]]</text>
      <sha1>fiytcdtded3lmc32d62kp0o4urqk2cw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>55725</id>
      <parentid>53313</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-08T01:09:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="160">'''Dallas''' is a city in [[Texas]], [[United States of America|USA]].

== Hitchhiking Out ==
''please add info''

{{stub}}
[[trash:Dallas]]

[[Category:Texas]]</text>
      <sha1>67g67fpqlbsml4b4zjc01rvzvvhskwk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>97899</id>
      <parentid>55725</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-06-01T15:24:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Hitchhiking Out */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="167">'''Dallas''' is a city in [[Texas]], [[United States of America|USA]].

== Trashwiki &amp; Nomadwiki ==

[[trash:Dallas]] [[nomad:Dallas]]



{{stub}}


[[Category:Texas]]</text>
      <sha1>lypaw718avo73r151rbdzckvhppphlw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>98883</id>
      <parentid>97899</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-09-17T09:00:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Trashwiki &amp; Nomadwiki */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="204">'''Dallas''' is a city in [[Texas]], [[United States of America|USA]].

== Hitchiking Out ==

Add info pls


== Trashwiki &amp; Nomadwiki ==

[[trash:Dallas]] [[nomad:Dallas]]



{{stub}}


[[Category:Texas]]</text>
      <sha1>9bw7oe54bs9dyqid95svdki0m2fli8p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>100010</id>
      <parentid>98883</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-12-22T09:02:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Trashwiki &amp; Nomadwiki */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="185">'''Dallas''' is a city in [[Texas]], [[United States of America|USA]].

== Hitchiking Out ==

Add info pls


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}




{{stub}}


[[Category:Texas]]</text>
      <sha1>5ra7cek8rybj49osv5tu7ujzbhfl5so</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>100015</id>
      <parentid>100010</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-12-22T09:03:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="176">'''Dallas''' is a city in [[Texas]], [[United States of America|USA]].

== Hitchiking Out ==

Add info pls


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}






[[Category:Texas]]</text>
      <sha1>4j4jzgd3q2958fac5y97apxmlbih80e</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104406</id>
      <parentid>100015</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-06-19T19:53:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>AngryOtter</username>
        <id>47354</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>Added NOTOC, and "IsIn" tags</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="188">'''Dallas''' is a city in [[Texas]], [[United States of America|USA]].

== Hitchiking Out ==




== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}




__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|:Texas}}
[[Category:Texas]]</text>
      <sha1>a707euztvrzwqkxyqke41ftz27jyrsw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104407</id>
      <parentid>104406</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-06-19T20:47:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>AngryOtter</username>
        <id>47354</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>Adding info for Hitching out towards the north</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1195">'''Dallas''' is a city in [[Texas]], [[United States of America|USA]].

== Hitchiking Out ==

=== North ===
There are two main routes that head north out of The Metroplex. '''I-35''' towards [[Oklahoma City|O.K.C.]], and '''US-75''' towards [[Tulsa]], OK.

==== I-35 ====
* Take public transit out to Denton, and walk out of town via US-77, towards the TA Travel center. There is a pretty big pullout on the I-35 frontage road, so you can hitch from there safely.
( 33.2643938, -97.1773855 )


* There is a Pilot Travel Center at the intersection of I-35W, and the Alliance Gateway Fwy. At this spot, you should throw up a sign at the Travel Center.
( 32.9579181, -97.3079048 )


Note: As of 2023, there is a massive amount of road construction happening in this area, so hitching from the frontage road isn't really an option.


==== US-75 ====
* From Parker Road Station (Orange/Red Line) in Plano, walk north west to the Costco. The northern most entrance to their parking lot is the Truck entrance, and it offers a great place for traffic to pull off the frontage road.
( 33.0454252, -96.6997427 )


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}




__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|:Texas}}
[[Category:Texas]]</text>
      <sha1>ajfymbioocomq6efw0v310d0wr07fuw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104408</id>
      <parentid>104407</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-06-19T20:56:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>AngryOtter</username>
        <id>47354</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>Fixed the formatting on the note.</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1230">'''Dallas''' is a city in [[Texas]], [[United States of America|USA]].

== Hitchiking Out ==

=== North ===
There are two main routes that head north out of The Metroplex. '''I-35''' towards [[Oklahoma City|O.K.C.]], and '''US-75''' towards [[Tulsa]], OK.

==== I-35 ====
* Take public transit out to Denton, and walk out of town via US-77, towards the TA Travel center. There is a pretty big pullout on the I-35 frontage road, so you can hitch from there safely.
( 33.2643938, -97.1773855 )


* There is a Pilot Travel Center at the intersection of I-35W, and the Alliance Gateway Fwy. At this spot, you should throw up a sign at the Travel Center.
( 32.9579181, -97.3079048 )
 '''Note:''' As of 2023, there is a massive amount of road construction happening in the area around the Pilot Travel Center, so hitching from the frontage road isn't really an option.


==== US-75 ====
* From Parker Road Station (Orange/Red Line) in Plano, walk north west to the Costco. The northern most entrance to their parking lot is the Truck entrance, and it offers a great place for traffic to pull off the frontage road.
( 33.0454252, -96.6997427 )


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}




__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|:Texas}}
[[Category:Texas]]</text>
      <sha1>fv8jk6qaeuyty7enfhjdag06ck35pei</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104414</id>
      <parentid>104408</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-06-20T17:58:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>AngryOtter</username>
        <id>47354</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>Changed page to redirect to DFW</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17">#REDIRECT [[DFW]]</text>
      <sha1>fqxl5p02dehyddsn76rn7ygr7dtc0y2</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Romania</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1538</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1581</id>
      <parentid>4481</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-10-16T05:33:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="189">In '''Romania''' drivers often expect some payment for a ride. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though.

* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]

[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]</text>
      <sha1>6tlhkffpj5xbyr202j1dgmspjd4fzer</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1582</id>
      <parentid>1581</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="189">In '''Romania''' drivers often expect some payment for a ride. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though.

* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]

[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]</text>
      <sha1>6tlhkffpj5xbyr202j1dgmspjd4fzer</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4480</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T21:13:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="147">In '''Romania''' drivers often expect some payment for a ride. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though.

* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]</text>
      <sha1>4ujpoxwn81g4u2swr7mp8segjga5alo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4481</id>
      <parentid>4480</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-03-29T17:34:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="168">In '''Romania''' drivers often expect some payment for a ride. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though.

* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]

[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>bmw3pcu9wh2pzuse38mkuhjaena4yzk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4482</id>
      <parentid>1582</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="189">In '''Romania''' drivers often expect some payment for a ride. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though.

* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]

[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]</text>
      <sha1>6tlhkffpj5xbyr202j1dgmspjd4fzer</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10889</id>
      <parentid>4482</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-21T23:19:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TruckThor</username>
        <id>82</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="263">In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is almost always expected. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei). It is still cheaper than trains and buses though.

* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]

[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]</text>
      <sha1>2rtpxm2tw8a5hbzolutps8n1tmm1z6i</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10901</id>
      <parentid>10889</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-22T09:35:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TruckThor</username>
        <id>82</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="654">In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is almost always expected. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei). It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. Try and pay the driver about 1Euro / 50km, though, this rate decreases as the distance grows. Also, you can tell the driver you don't have any money; 4 out of 5 people will take you anyway.&lt;br&gt;

== Number plates ==

The first two letters of the number plates represent the county.

== Cities in Romania ==
* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]

[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]</text>
      <sha1>bdzv8z2xk9of523b4vjthgs2v3q6tab</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10925</id>
      <parentid>10901</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-23T16:05:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TruckThor</username>
        <id>82</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="685">In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is almost always expected. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei). It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. Try and pay the driver about 1Euro / 50km, though, this rate decreases as the distance grows. Also, you can tell the driver you don't have any money; 4 out of 5 people will take you anyway.&lt;br&gt;

== Number plates ==

The first two letters of the number plates represent the county.

== Cities in Romania ==
* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]
* [[Constan%C5%A3a|Constanta]]

[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]</text>
      <sha1>5qqeoc7216p99r3l50tghb86glyocvz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10927</id>
      <parentid>10925</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-23T16:18:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TruckThor</username>
        <id>82</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1364">In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is almost always expected. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei). It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. Try and pay the driver about 1Euro / 50km, though, this rate decreases as the distance grows. Also, you can tell the driver you don't have any money; 4 out of 5 people will take you anyway.&lt;br&gt;

== Number plates ==

The first two letters of the number plates represent the county (judet, plural judete):&lt;br&gt;
Alba - AB&lt;br&gt;
Arad - AR&lt;br&gt;
Arges - AG&lt;br&gt;
Bacau - BC&lt;br&gt;
Bihor - BH&lt;br&gt;
Bistrita-Nasaud - BN&lt;br&gt;
Botosani - BT&lt;br&gt;
Brasov - BV&lt;br&gt;
Braila - BR&lt;br&gt;
Buzau - BZ&lt;br&gt;
Caras-Severin - CS&lt;br&gt;
Cluj - CJ&lt;br&gt;
Calarasi - CL&lt;br&gt;
Constanta - CT&lt;br&gt;
Covasna - CV&lt;br&gt;
Dambovita - DB&lt;br&gt;
Dolj - DJ&lt;br&gt;
Galati - GL&lt;br&gt;
Giurgiu - GR&lt;br&gt;
Gorj - GJ&lt;br&gt;
Harghita - HR&lt;br&gt;
Hunedoara - HD&lt;br&gt;
Ialomita - IL&lt;br&gt;
Maramures - MM&lt;br&gt;
Mehedinti - MH&lt;br&gt;
Mures - MS&lt;br&gt;
Neamt - NT&lt;br&gt;
Olt - OT&lt;br&gt;
Prahova - PH&lt;br&gt;
Satu-Mare - SM&lt;br&gt;
Salaj - SJ&lt;br&gt;
Sibiu - SB&lt;br&gt;
Teleorman - TR&lt;br&gt;
Timis - TM&lt;br&gt;
Tulcea - TL&lt;br&gt;
Valcea - VL&lt;br&gt;
Vaslui - VS&lt;br&gt;
Vrancea - VN&lt;br&gt;
Bucuresti - B&lt;br&gt;
== Cities in Romania ==
* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]
* [[Constan%C5%A3a|Constanta]]

[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]</text>
      <sha1>3ynbggcfc5xa3ww7bikf1fn47nijbu5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10932</id>
      <parentid>10927</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-23T18:49:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TruckThor</username>
        <id>82</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1442">[[Image:ro-flag.gif|right|Romanian flag]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is almost always expected. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei). It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. Try and pay the driver about 1Euro / 50km, though, this rate decreases as the distance grows. Also, you can tell the driver you don't have any money; 4 out of 5 people will take you anyway.&lt;br&gt;
[[Image:ro-map.gif|center|Romania]]

== Number plates ==

The first two letters of the number plates represent the county (judet, plural judete):&lt;br&gt;
Alba - AB&lt;br&gt;
Arad - AR&lt;br&gt;
Arges - AG&lt;br&gt;
Bacau - BC&lt;br&gt;
Bihor - BH&lt;br&gt;
Bistrita-Nasaud - BN&lt;br&gt;
Botosani - BT&lt;br&gt;
Brasov - BV&lt;br&gt;
Braila - BR&lt;br&gt;
Buzau - BZ&lt;br&gt;
Caras-Severin - CS&lt;br&gt;
Cluj - CJ&lt;br&gt;
Calarasi - CL&lt;br&gt;
Constanta - CT&lt;br&gt;
Covasna - CV&lt;br&gt;
Dambovita - DB&lt;br&gt;
Dolj - DJ&lt;br&gt;
Galati - GL&lt;br&gt;
Giurgiu - GR&lt;br&gt;
Gorj - GJ&lt;br&gt;
Harghita - HR&lt;br&gt;
Hunedoara - HD&lt;br&gt;
Ialomita - IL&lt;br&gt;
Maramures - MM&lt;br&gt;
Mehedinti - MH&lt;br&gt;
Mures - MS&lt;br&gt;
Neamt - NT&lt;br&gt;
Olt - OT&lt;br&gt;
Prahova - PH&lt;br&gt;
Satu-Mare - SM&lt;br&gt;
Salaj - SJ&lt;br&gt;
Sibiu - SB&lt;br&gt;
Teleorman - TR&lt;br&gt;
Timis - TM&lt;br&gt;
Tulcea - TL&lt;br&gt;
Valcea - VL&lt;br&gt;
Vaslui - VS&lt;br&gt;
Vrancea - VN&lt;br&gt;
Bucuresti - B&lt;br&gt;
== Cities in Romania ==
* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]
* [[Constan%C5%A3a|Constanta]]

[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]</text>
      <sha1>aq73nvx8ogbcpp3j0k1i8ki98s7bmwd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10933</id>
      <parentid>10932</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-23T20:28:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1460">[[Image:ro-flag.gif|thumb|right|Romanian flag]]
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is almost always expected. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei). It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. Try and pay the driver about 1Euro / 50km, though, this rate decreases as the distance grows. Also, you can tell the driver you don't have any money; 4 out of 5 people will take you anyway.&lt;br&gt;

== Number plates ==

The first two letters of the number plates represent the county (judet, plural judete):&lt;br&gt;
Alba - AB&lt;br&gt;
Arad - AR&lt;br&gt;
Arges - AG&lt;br&gt;
Bacau - BC&lt;br&gt;
Bihor - BH&lt;br&gt;
Bistrita-Nasaud - BN&lt;br&gt;
Botosani - BT&lt;br&gt;
Brasov - BV&lt;br&gt;
Braila - BR&lt;br&gt;
Buzau - BZ&lt;br&gt;
Caras-Severin - CS&lt;br&gt;
Cluj - CJ&lt;br&gt;
Calarasi - CL&lt;br&gt;
Constanta - CT&lt;br&gt;
Covasna - CV&lt;br&gt;
Dambovita - DB&lt;br&gt;
Dolj - DJ&lt;br&gt;
Galati - GL&lt;br&gt;
Giurgiu - GR&lt;br&gt;
Gorj - GJ&lt;br&gt;
Harghita - HR&lt;br&gt;
Hunedoara - HD&lt;br&gt;
Ialomita - IL&lt;br&gt;
Maramures - MM&lt;br&gt;
Mehedinti - MH&lt;br&gt;
Mures - MS&lt;br&gt;
Neamt - NT&lt;br&gt;
Olt - OT&lt;br&gt;
Prahova - PH&lt;br&gt;
Satu-Mare - SM&lt;br&gt;
Salaj - SJ&lt;br&gt;
Sibiu - SB&lt;br&gt;
Teleorman - TR&lt;br&gt;
Timis - TM&lt;br&gt;
Tulcea - TL&lt;br&gt;
Valcea - VL&lt;br&gt;
Vaslui - VS&lt;br&gt;
Vrancea - VN&lt;br&gt;
Bucuresti - B&lt;br&gt;
== Cities in Romania ==
* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]
* [[Constan%C5%A3a|Constanta]]

[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]</text>
      <sha1>nkh6v7ikkybihwgmxaorm8ffwknre4z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10985</id>
      <parentid>10933</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-24T18:53:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TruckThor</username>
        <id>82</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2500">[[Image:ro-flag.gif|thumb|right|Romanian flag]]
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is almost always expected. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei). It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. Try and pay the driver about 1Euro / 50km, though, this rate decreases as the distance grows. Also, you can tell the driver you don't have any money; 4 out of 5 people will take you anyway.&lt;br&gt;

== Cities in Romania ==
* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]
* [[Constan%C5%A3a|Constanta]]

== Number plates ==

Romanian license plate numbers usually have 2 formats:&lt;br&gt;
*Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
*Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.&lt;br&gt;
There are also special number plates:&lt;br&gt;
*diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
*some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)&lt;br&gt;
Where x is a random number.
===County license plate codes===

Alba - AB&lt;br&gt;
Arad - AR&lt;br&gt;
Arges - AG&lt;br&gt;
Bacau - BC&lt;br&gt;
Bihor - BH&lt;br&gt;
Bistrita-Nasaud - BN&lt;br&gt;
Botosani - BT&lt;br&gt;
Brasov - BV&lt;br&gt;
Braila - BR&lt;br&gt;
Buzau - BZ&lt;br&gt;
Caras-Severin - CS&lt;br&gt;
Cluj - CJ&lt;br&gt;
Calarasi - CL&lt;br&gt;
Constanta - CT&lt;br&gt;
Covasna - CV&lt;br&gt;
Dambovita - DB&lt;br&gt;
Dolj - DJ&lt;br&gt;
Galati - GL&lt;br&gt;
Giurgiu - GR&lt;br&gt;
Gorj - GJ&lt;br&gt;
Harghita - HR&lt;br&gt;
Hunedoara - HD&lt;br&gt;
Ialomita - IL&lt;br&gt;
Maramures - MM&lt;br&gt;
Mehedinti - MH&lt;br&gt;
Mures - MS&lt;br&gt;
Neamt - NT&lt;br&gt;
Olt - OT&lt;br&gt;
Prahova - PH&lt;br&gt;
Satu-Mare - SM&lt;br&gt;
Salaj - SJ&lt;br&gt;
Sibiu - SB&lt;br&gt;
Teleorman - TR&lt;br&gt;
Timis - TM&lt;br&gt;
Tulcea - TL&lt;br&gt;
Valcea - VL&lt;br&gt;
Vaslui - VS&lt;br&gt;
Vrancea - VN&lt;br&gt;
Bucuresti - B&lt;br&gt;

[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]</text>
      <sha1>muljfruuynqkw1wbumdg3bidafchkrd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11374</id>
      <parentid>10985</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-20T03:20:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>203.45.221.184</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2834">[[Image:ro-flag.gif|thumb|right|Romanian flag]]
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei). It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. Try and pay the driver about 1Euro / 50km, though, this rate decreases as the distance grows. You can also tell the driver you don't have any money; 4 out of 5 people will take you anyway.&lt;br&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as most cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.

== Cities in Romania ==
* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]
* [[Constan%C5%A3a|Constanta]]

== Number plates ==

Romanian license plate numbers usually have 2 formats:&lt;br&gt;
*Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
*Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.&lt;br&gt;
There are also special number plates:&lt;br&gt;
*diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
*some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)&lt;br&gt;
Where x is a random number.
===County license plate codes===

Alba - AB&lt;br&gt;
Arad - AR&lt;br&gt;
Arges - AG&lt;br&gt;
Bacau - BC&lt;br&gt;
Bihor - BH&lt;br&gt;
Bistrita-Nasaud - BN&lt;br&gt;
Botosani - BT&lt;br&gt;
Brasov - BV&lt;br&gt;
Braila - BR&lt;br&gt;
Buzau - BZ&lt;br&gt;
Caras-Severin - CS&lt;br&gt;
Cluj - CJ&lt;br&gt;
Calarasi - CL&lt;br&gt;
Constanta - CT&lt;br&gt;
Covasna - CV&lt;br&gt;
Dambovita - DB&lt;br&gt;
Dolj - DJ&lt;br&gt;
Galati - GL&lt;br&gt;
Giurgiu - GR&lt;br&gt;
Gorj - GJ&lt;br&gt;
Harghita - HR&lt;br&gt;
Hunedoara - HD&lt;br&gt;
Ialomita - IL&lt;br&gt;
Maramures - MM&lt;br&gt;
Mehedinti - MH&lt;br&gt;
Mures - MS&lt;br&gt;
Neamt - NT&lt;br&gt;
Olt - OT&lt;br&gt;
Prahova - PH&lt;br&gt;
Satu-Mare - SM&lt;br&gt;
Salaj - SJ&lt;br&gt;
Sibiu - SB&lt;br&gt;
Teleorman - TR&lt;br&gt;
Timis - TM&lt;br&gt;
Tulcea - TL&lt;br&gt;
Valcea - VL&lt;br&gt;
Vaslui - VS&lt;br&gt;
Vrancea - VN&lt;br&gt;
Bucuresti - B&lt;br&gt;

[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]</text>
      <sha1>ja26flc1jcn6l9jfxruulblxtxluvm9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12348</id>
      <parentid>11374</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-22T15:36:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TruckThor</username>
        <id>82</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3599">[[Image:ro-flag.gif|thumb|right|Romanian flag]]
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei). It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. Try and pay the driver about 1Euro / 50km, though, this rate decreases as the distance grows. You can also tell the driver you don't have any money; 4 out of 5 people will take you anyway.&lt;br&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as most cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.

== Cities in Romania ==
* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]
* [[Constan%C5%A3a|Constanta]]

== Number plates ==

Romanian license plate numbers usually have 2 formats:&lt;br&gt;
*Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
*Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.&lt;br&gt;
There are also special number plates:&lt;br&gt;
*diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
*some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)&lt;br&gt;
Where x is a random number.
===County license plate codes===

&lt;table border="1"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Alba&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Buzau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BZ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Gorj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Prahova&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;PH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arad&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Caras-Severin&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Harghita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Satu-Mare&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arges&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AG&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Cluj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Hunedoara&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HD&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Salaj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bacau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BC&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Calarasi&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ialomita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Sibiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bihor&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Constanta&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ilfov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IF&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Teleorman&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bistrita-Nasaud&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Covasna&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Maramures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Timis&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Botosani&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dambovita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mehedinti&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Tulcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Brasov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dolj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Valcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Braila&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Galati&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Neamt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;NT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vaslui&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bucuresti&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;B&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Giurgiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Olt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;OT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vrancea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;


[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]</text>
      <sha1>7laacfolij56cywce8wgn0t2id4xwoq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12349</id>
      <parentid>12348</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-22T15:37:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TruckThor</username>
        <id>82</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3603">[[Image:ro-flag.gif|thumb|right|Romanian flag]]
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei). It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. Try and pay the driver about 1Euro / 50km, though, this rate decreases as the distance grows. You can also tell the driver you don't have any money; 4 out of 5 people will take you anyway.&lt;br&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as most cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.

== Cities in Romania ==
* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]
* [[Constan%C5%A3a|Constanta]]

== Number plates ==

Romanian license plate numbers usually have 2 formats:&lt;br&gt;
*Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
*Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.&lt;br&gt;&lt;br&gt;
There are also special number plates:&lt;br&gt;
*diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
*some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)&lt;br&gt;
Where x is a random number.
===County license plate codes===

&lt;table border="1"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Alba&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Buzau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BZ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Gorj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Prahova&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;PH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arad&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Caras-Severin&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Harghita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Satu-Mare&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arges&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AG&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Cluj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Hunedoara&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HD&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Salaj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bacau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BC&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Calarasi&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ialomita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Sibiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bihor&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Constanta&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ilfov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IF&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Teleorman&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bistrita-Nasaud&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Covasna&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Maramures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Timis&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Botosani&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dambovita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mehedinti&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Tulcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Brasov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dolj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Valcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Braila&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Galati&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Neamt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;NT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vaslui&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bucuresti&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;B&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Giurgiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Olt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;OT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vrancea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;


[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]</text>
      <sha1>9o0eq2gza3efeinyqeulsn3flix9nlj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12351</id>
      <parentid>12349</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-22T15:39:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TruckThor</username>
        <id>82</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3650">[[Image:ro-flag.gif|thumb|right|Romanian flag]]
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei). It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. Try and pay the driver about 1Euro / 50km, though, this rate decreases as the distance grows. You can also tell the driver you don't have any money; 4 out of 5 people will take you anyway.&lt;br&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as most cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.

== Cities in Romania ==
* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]
* [[Constan%C5%A3a|Constanta]]

== Number plates ==

Romanian license plate numbers usually have 2 formats:&lt;br&gt;
*Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
*Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.&lt;br&gt;&lt;br&gt;
There are also special number plates:&lt;br&gt;
*diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
*some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)&lt;br&gt;
Where x is a random number.
===County license plate codes===
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|Map of Romania]]
&lt;table border="1"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Alba&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Buzau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BZ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Gorj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Prahova&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;PH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arad&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Caras-Severin&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Harghita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Satu-Mare&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arges&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AG&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Cluj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Hunedoara&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HD&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Salaj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bacau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BC&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Calarasi&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ialomita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Sibiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bihor&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Constanta&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ilfov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IF&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Teleorman&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bistrita-Nasaud&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Covasna&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Maramures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Timis&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Botosani&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dambovita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mehedinti&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Tulcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Brasov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dolj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Valcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Braila&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Galati&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Neamt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;NT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vaslui&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bucuresti&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;B&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Giurgiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Olt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;OT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vrancea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;


[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]</text>
      <sha1>prsy3v0iukk6pyc2p4aausd83ly7bup</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12352</id>
      <parentid>12351</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-22T15:40:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TruckThor</username>
        <id>82</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3720">[[Image:ro-flag.gif|thumb|right|Romanian flag]]
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei). It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. Try and pay the driver about 1Euro / 50km, though, this rate decreases as the distance grows. You can also tell the driver you don't have any money; 4 out of 5 people will take you anyway.&lt;br&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as most cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.

== Cities in Romania ==
* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]
* [[Constan%C5%A3a|Constanta]]

== Number plates ==

Romanian license plate numbers usually have 2 formats:&lt;br&gt;
*Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
*Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.&lt;br&gt;&lt;br&gt;
There are also special number plates:&lt;br&gt;
*diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
*some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)&lt;br&gt;
Where x is a random number.
===County license plate codes===
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
&lt;table border="1"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Alba&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Buzau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BZ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Gorj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Prahova&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;PH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arad&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Caras-Severin&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Harghita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Satu-Mare&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arges&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AG&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Cluj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Hunedoara&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HD&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Salaj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bacau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BC&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Calarasi&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ialomita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Sibiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bihor&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Constanta&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ilfov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IF&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Teleorman&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bistrita-Nasaud&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Covasna&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Maramures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Timis&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Botosani&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dambovita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mehedinti&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Tulcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Brasov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dolj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Valcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Braila&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Galati&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Neamt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;NT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vaslui&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bucuresti&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;B&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Giurgiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Olt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;OT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vrancea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;


[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]</text>
      <sha1>q0vi37rm287zbauvt289z42835odvea</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12378</id>
      <parentid>12352</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-24T12:32:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TruckThor</username>
        <id>82</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3741">[[Image:ro-flag.gif|thumb|right|Romanian flag]]
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei). It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. Try and pay the driver about 1Euro / 50km, though, this rate decreases as the distance grows. You can also tell the driver you don't have any money; 4 out of 5 people will take you anyway.&lt;br&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.

== Cities in Romania ==
* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]
* [[Constan%C5%A3a|Constanta]]

== Number plates ==

Romanian license plate numbers usually have 2 formats:&lt;br&gt;
*Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
*Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.&lt;br&gt;&lt;br&gt;
There are also special number plates:&lt;br&gt;
*diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
*some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)&lt;br&gt;
Where x is a random number.
===County license plate codes===
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
&lt;table border="1"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Alba&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Buzau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BZ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Gorj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Prahova&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;PH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arad&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Caras-Severin&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Harghita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Satu-Mare&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arges&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AG&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Cluj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Hunedoara&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HD&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Salaj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bacau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BC&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Calarasi&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ialomita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Sibiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bihor&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Constanta&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ilfov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IF&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Teleorman&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bistrita-Nasaud&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Covasna&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Maramures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Timis&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Botosani&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dambovita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mehedinti&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Tulcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Brasov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dolj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Valcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Braila&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Galati&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Neamt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;NT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vaslui&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bucuresti&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;B&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Giurgiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Olt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;OT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vrancea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;


[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]</text>
      <sha1>5cat9kioow2mmawbf41334ksz1a2sex</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12711</id>
      <parentid>12378</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-11T11:31:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TruckThor</username>
        <id>82</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3991">[[Image:ro-flag.gif|thumb|right|Romanian flag]]
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei). It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. Try and pay the driver about 1Euro / 50km, though, this rate decreases as the distance grows. You can also tell the driver you don't have any money; 4 out of 5 people will take you anyway.&lt;br&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.&lt;br&gt;

[[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Cities in Romania ==
* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]
* [[Constan%C5%A3a|Constanta]]

== Number plates ==

Romanian license plate numbers usually have 2 formats:&lt;br&gt;
*Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
*Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.&lt;br&gt;&lt;br&gt;
There are also special number plates:&lt;br&gt;
*diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
*some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)&lt;br&gt;
Where x is a random number.
===County license plate codes===
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
&lt;table border="1"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Alba&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Buzau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BZ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Gorj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Prahova&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;PH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arad&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Caras-Severin&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Harghita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Satu-Mare&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arges&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AG&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Cluj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Hunedoara&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HD&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Salaj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bacau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BC&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Calarasi&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ialomita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Sibiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bihor&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Constanta&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ilfov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IF&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Teleorman&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bistrita-Nasaud&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Covasna&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Maramures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Timis&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Botosani&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dambovita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mehedinti&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Tulcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Brasov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dolj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Valcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Braila&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Galati&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Neamt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;NT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vaslui&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bucuresti&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;B&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Giurgiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Olt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;OT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vrancea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;


[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]</text>
      <sha1>9s2ifsx05jgqpnsjijpah5cdc352pp8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12717</id>
      <parentid>12711</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-11T13:47:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TruckThor</username>
        <id>82</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3992">[[Image:ro-flag.gif|thumb|right|Romanian flag]]
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei). It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. Try and pay the driver about 1Euro / 50km, though, this rate decreases as the distance grows. You can also tell the driver you don't have any money; 4 out of 5 people will take you anyway.&lt;br&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.&lt;br&gt;

*[[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Cities in Romania ==
* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]
* [[Constan%C5%A3a|Constanta]]

== Number plates ==

Romanian license plate numbers usually have 2 formats:&lt;br&gt;
*Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
*Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.&lt;br&gt;&lt;br&gt;
There are also special number plates:&lt;br&gt;
*diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
*some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)&lt;br&gt;
Where x is a random number.
===County license plate codes===
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
&lt;table border="1"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Alba&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Buzau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BZ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Gorj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Prahova&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;PH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arad&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Caras-Severin&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Harghita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Satu-Mare&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arges&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AG&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Cluj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Hunedoara&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HD&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Salaj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bacau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BC&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Calarasi&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ialomita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Sibiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bihor&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Constanta&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ilfov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IF&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Teleorman&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bistrita-Nasaud&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Covasna&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Maramures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Timis&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Botosani&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dambovita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mehedinti&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Tulcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Brasov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dolj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Valcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Braila&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Galati&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Neamt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;NT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vaslui&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bucuresti&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;B&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Giurgiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Olt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;OT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vrancea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;


[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]</text>
      <sha1>dz4gkwi2xwrdzor7ibomcvhwgsr9j1e</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12718</id>
      <parentid>12717</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-11T14:02:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TruckThor</username>
        <id>82</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4982">[[Image:ro-flag.gif|thumb|right|Romanian flag]]
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei). It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. Try and pay the driver about 1Euro / 50km, though, this rate decreases as the distance grows. You can also tell the driver you don't have any money; 4 out of 5 people will take you anyway.&lt;br&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.&lt;br&gt;

*[[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Cities in Romania ==
* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]
* [[Constan%C5%A3a|Constanta]]

== Number plates ==

Romanian license plate numbers usually have 2 formats:&lt;br&gt;
*Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
*Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.&lt;br&gt;&lt;br&gt;
There are also special number plates:&lt;br&gt;
*diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
*some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)&lt;br&gt;
Where x is a random number.
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
===County license plate codes===
&lt;table border="1"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Alba&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Alba-Iulia]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Buzau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BZ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Buzau]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Gorj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Targu Jiu]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Prahova&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;PH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Ploiesti]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arad&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Arad]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Caras-Severin&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Resita]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Harghita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Miercurea Ciuc]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Satu-Mare&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Satu-Mare]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arges&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AG&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Pitesti]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Cluj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Cluj-Napoca]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Hunedoara&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HD&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Deva]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Salaj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Zalau]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bacau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BC&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bacau]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Calarasi&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Calarasi]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ialomita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Slobozia]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Sibiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Sibiu]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bihor&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Oradea]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Constanta&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Constanta]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ilfov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IF&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bucharest|Bucuresti]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Teleorman&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Alexandria]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bistrita-Nasaud&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bistrita]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Covasna&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Sfantu Gheorghe]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Maramures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Baia Mare]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Timis&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Timisoara]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Botosani&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Botosani]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dambovita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Targoviste]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mehedinti&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Tulcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Tulcea]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Brasov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Brasov]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dolj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Craiova]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Targu Mures]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Valcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Ramnicu Valcea]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Braila&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Braila]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Galati&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Galati]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Neamt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;NT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Piatra Neamt]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vaslui&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Vaslui]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bucharest|Bucuresti]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;B&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;-&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Giurgiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Giurgiu]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Olt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;OT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Slatina]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vrancea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Focsani]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;


[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]</text>
      <sha1>r6du8ht15gu6j2csibahl1u5s14v1c3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12719</id>
      <parentid>12718</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-11T14:04:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TruckThor</username>
        <id>82</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4982">[[Image:ro-flag.gif|thumb|right|Romanian flag]]
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei). It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. Try and pay the driver about 1Euro / 50km, though, this rate decreases as the distance grows. You can also tell the driver you don't have any money; 4 out of 5 people will take you anyway.&lt;br&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.&lt;br&gt;

*[[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Cities in Romania ==
* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]
* [[Constan%C5%A3a|Constanta]]

== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
Romanian license plate numbers usually have 2 formats:&lt;br&gt;
*Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
*Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.&lt;br&gt;&lt;br&gt;
There are also special number plates:&lt;br&gt;
*diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
*some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)&lt;br&gt;
Where x is a random number.

===County license plate codes===
&lt;table border="1"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Alba&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Alba-Iulia]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Buzau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BZ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Buzau]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Gorj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Targu Jiu]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Prahova&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;PH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Ploiesti]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arad&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Arad]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Caras-Severin&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Resita]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Harghita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Miercurea Ciuc]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Satu-Mare&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Satu-Mare]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arges&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AG&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Pitesti]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Cluj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Cluj-Napoca]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Hunedoara&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HD&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Deva]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Salaj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Zalau]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bacau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BC&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bacau]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Calarasi&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Calarasi]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ialomita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Slobozia]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Sibiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Sibiu]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bihor&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Oradea]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Constanta&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Constanta]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ilfov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IF&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bucharest|Bucuresti]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Teleorman&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Alexandria]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bistrita-Nasaud&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bistrita]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Covasna&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Sfantu Gheorghe]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Maramures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Baia Mare]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Timis&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Timisoara]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Botosani&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Botosani]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dambovita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Targoviste]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mehedinti&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Tulcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Tulcea]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Brasov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Brasov]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dolj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Craiova]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Targu Mures]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Valcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Ramnicu Valcea]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Braila&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Braila]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Galati&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Galati]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Neamt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;NT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Piatra Neamt]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vaslui&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Vaslui]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bucharest|Bucuresti]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;B&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;-&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Giurgiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Giurgiu]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Olt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;OT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Slatina]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vrancea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Focsani]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;


[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]</text>
      <sha1>enqzvhp2xaky2gkvsi62njwdr0gvssh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12721</id>
      <parentid>12719</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-11T14:06:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TruckThor</username>
        <id>82</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4967">[[Image:ro-flag.gif|thumb|right|Romanian flag]]
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei). It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. Try and pay the driver about 1Euro / 50km, though, this rate decreases as the distance grows. You can also tell the driver you don't have any money; 4 out of 5 people will take you anyway.&lt;br&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.&lt;br&gt;

*[[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Cities in Romania ==
* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]
* [[Constanta]]

== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
Romanian license plate numbers usually have 2 formats:&lt;br&gt;
*Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
*Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.&lt;br&gt;&lt;br&gt;
There are also special number plates:&lt;br&gt;
*diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
*some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)&lt;br&gt;
Where x is a random number.

===County license plate codes===
&lt;table border="1"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Alba&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Alba-Iulia]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Buzau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BZ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Buzau]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Gorj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Targu Jiu]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Prahova&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;PH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Ploiesti]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arad&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Arad]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Caras-Severin&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Resita]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Harghita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Miercurea Ciuc]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Satu-Mare&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Satu-Mare]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arges&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AG&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Pitesti]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Cluj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Cluj-Napoca]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Hunedoara&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HD&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Deva]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Salaj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Zalau]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bacau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BC&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bacau]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Calarasi&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Calarasi]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ialomita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Slobozia]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Sibiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Sibiu]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bihor&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Oradea]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Constanta&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Constanta]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ilfov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IF&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bucharest|Bucuresti]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Teleorman&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Alexandria]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bistrita-Nasaud&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bistrita]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Covasna&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Sfantu Gheorghe]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Maramures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Baia Mare]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Timis&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Timisoara]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Botosani&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Botosani]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dambovita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Targoviste]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mehedinti&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Tulcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Tulcea]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Brasov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Brasov]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dolj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Craiova]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Targu Mures]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Valcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Ramnicu Valcea]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Braila&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Braila]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Galati&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Galati]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Neamt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;NT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Piatra Neamt]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vaslui&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Vaslui]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bucharest|Bucuresti]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;B&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;-&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Giurgiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Giurgiu]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Olt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;OT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Slatina]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vrancea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Focsani]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;


[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]</text>
      <sha1>dvu4c3zzn2w5sbeegjxto2e3467a9gp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12729</id>
      <parentid>12721</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-11T14:27:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TruckThor</username>
        <id>82</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4983">[[Image:ro-flag.gif|thumb|right|Romanian flag]]
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei). It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. Try and pay the driver about 1Euro / 50km, though, this rate decreases as the distance grows. You can also tell the driver you don't have any money; 4 out of 5 people will take you anyway.&lt;br&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.&lt;br&gt;

*[[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Cities in Romania ==
* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]
* [[Constanta]]
* [[Baia-Mare]]

== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
Romanian license plate numbers usually have 2 formats:&lt;br&gt;
*Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
*Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.&lt;br&gt;&lt;br&gt;
There are also special number plates:&lt;br&gt;
*diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
*some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)&lt;br&gt;
Where x is a random number.

===County license plate codes===
&lt;table border="1"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Alba&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Alba-Iulia]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Buzau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BZ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Buzau]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Gorj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Targu Jiu]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Prahova&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;PH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Ploiesti]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arad&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Arad]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Caras-Severin&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Resita]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Harghita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Miercurea Ciuc]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Satu-Mare&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Satu-Mare]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arges&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AG&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Pitesti]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Cluj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Cluj-Napoca]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Hunedoara&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HD&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Deva]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Salaj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Zalau]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bacau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BC&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bacau]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Calarasi&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Calarasi]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ialomita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Slobozia]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Sibiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Sibiu]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bihor&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Oradea]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Constanta&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Constanta]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ilfov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IF&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bucharest|Bucuresti]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Teleorman&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Alexandria]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bistrita-Nasaud&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bistrita]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Covasna&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Sfantu Gheorghe]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Maramures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Baia Mare]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Timis&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Timisoara]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Botosani&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Botosani]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dambovita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Targoviste]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mehedinti&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Tulcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Tulcea]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Brasov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Brasov]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dolj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Craiova]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Targu Mures]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Valcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Ramnicu Valcea]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Braila&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Braila]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Galati&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Galati]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Neamt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;NT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Piatra Neamt]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vaslui&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Vaslui]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bucharest|Bucuresti]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;B&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;-&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Giurgiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Giurgiu]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Olt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;OT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Slatina]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vrancea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Focsani]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;


[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]</text>
      <sha1>mkxndx7gn2u573i4v0438bl8lg1szik</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12730</id>
      <parentid>12729</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-11T14:28:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TruckThor</username>
        <id>82</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4983">[[Image:ro-flag.gif|thumb|right|Romanian flag]]
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei). It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. Try and pay the driver about 1Euro / 50km, though, this rate decreases as the distance grows. You can also tell the driver you don't have any money; 4 out of 5 people will take you anyway.&lt;br&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.&lt;br&gt;

*[[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Cities in Romania ==
* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]
* [[Constanta]]
* [[Baia Mare]]

== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
Romanian license plate numbers usually have 2 formats:&lt;br&gt;
*Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
*Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.&lt;br&gt;&lt;br&gt;
There are also special number plates:&lt;br&gt;
*diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
*some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)&lt;br&gt;
Where x is a random number.

===County license plate codes===
&lt;table border="1"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Alba&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Alba-Iulia]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Buzau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BZ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Buzau]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Gorj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Targu Jiu]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Prahova&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;PH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Ploiesti]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arad&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Arad]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Caras-Severin&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Resita]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Harghita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Miercurea Ciuc]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Satu-Mare&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Satu-Mare]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arges&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AG&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Pitesti]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Cluj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Cluj-Napoca]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Hunedoara&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HD&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Deva]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Salaj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Zalau]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bacau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BC&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bacau]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Calarasi&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Calarasi]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ialomita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Slobozia]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Sibiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Sibiu]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bihor&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Oradea]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Constanta&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Constanta]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ilfov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IF&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bucharest|Bucuresti]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Teleorman&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Alexandria]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bistrita-Nasaud&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bistrita]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Covasna&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Sfantu Gheorghe]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Maramures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Baia Mare]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Timis&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Timisoara]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Botosani&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Botosani]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dambovita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Targoviste]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mehedinti&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Tulcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Tulcea]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Brasov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Brasov]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dolj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Craiova]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Targu Mures]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Valcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Ramnicu Valcea]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Braila&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Braila]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Galati&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Galati]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Neamt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;NT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Piatra Neamt]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vaslui&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Vaslui]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bucharest|Bucuresti]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;B&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;-&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Giurgiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Giurgiu]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Olt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;OT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Slatina]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vrancea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Focsani]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;


[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]</text>
      <sha1>01lc1s286gofvlvq79w7dt0fkpgut51</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12758</id>
      <parentid>12730</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-13T11:28:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TruckThor</username>
        <id>82</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4983">[[Image:ro-flag.gif|thumb|right|Romanian flag]]
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei). It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. Try and pay the driver about 1Euro / 50km, though, this rate decreases as the distance grows. You can also tell the driver you don't have any money; 4 out of 5 people will take you anyway.&lt;br&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.&lt;br&gt;

*[[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Cities in Romania ==
* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]
* [[Constanta]]
* [[Baia Mare]]

== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
Romanian license plate numbers usually have 2 formats:&lt;br&gt;
*Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
*Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.&lt;br&gt;&lt;br&gt;
There are also special number plates:&lt;br&gt;
*diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
*some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)&lt;br&gt;
Where x is a random number.

===County license plate codes===
&lt;table border="1"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Alba&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Alba Iulia]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Buzau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BZ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Buzau]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Gorj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Targu Jiu]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Prahova&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;PH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Ploiesti]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arad&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Arad]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Caras-Severin&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Resita]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Harghita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Miercurea Ciuc]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Satu-Mare&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Satu-Mare]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arges&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AG&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Pitesti]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Cluj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Cluj-Napoca]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Hunedoara&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HD&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Deva]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Salaj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Zalau]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bacau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BC&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bacau]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Calarasi&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Calarasi]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ialomita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Slobozia]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Sibiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Sibiu]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bihor&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Oradea]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Constanta&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Constanta]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ilfov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IF&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bucharest|Bucuresti]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Teleorman&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Alexandria]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bistrita-Nasaud&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bistrita]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Covasna&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Sfantu Gheorghe]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Maramures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Baia Mare]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Timis&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Timisoara]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Botosani&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Botosani]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dambovita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Targoviste]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mehedinti&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Tulcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Tulcea]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Brasov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Brasov]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dolj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Craiova]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Targu Mures]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Valcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Ramnicu Valcea]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Braila&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Braila]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Galati&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Galati]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Neamt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;NT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Piatra Neamt]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vaslui&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Vaslui]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bucharest|Bucuresti]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;B&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;-&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Giurgiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Giurgiu]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Olt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;OT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Slatina]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vrancea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Focsani]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;


[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]</text>
      <sha1>d1zgyp7bf2evry51tmqj7mgcgq8832v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12759</id>
      <parentid>12758</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-13T11:29:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TruckThor</username>
        <id>82</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4963">[[Image:ro-flag.gif|thumb|right|Romanian flag]]
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei). It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. Try and pay the driver about 1Euro / 50km, though, this rate decreases as the distance grows. You can also tell the driver you don't have any money; 4 out of 5 people will take you anyway.&lt;br&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.&lt;br&gt;

*[[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Cities in Romania ==
* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]
* [[Constanta]]
* [[Baia Mare]]

== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
Romanian license plate numbers usually have 2 formats:&lt;br&gt;
*Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
*Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.&lt;br&gt;&lt;br&gt;
There are also special number plates:&lt;br&gt;
*diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
*some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)&lt;br&gt;
Where x is a random number.

===County license plate codes===
&lt;table border="1"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Alba&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Alba Iulia]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Buzau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BZ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Buzau]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Gorj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Targu Jiu]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Prahova&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;PH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Ploiesti]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arad&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Arad]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Caras-Severin&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Resita]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Harghita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Miercurea Ciuc]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Satu-Mare&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Satu-Mare]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arges&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AG&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Pitesti]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Cluj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Cluj-Napoca]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Hunedoara&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HD&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Deva]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Salaj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Zalau]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bacau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BC&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bacau]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Calarasi&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Calarasi]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ialomita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Slobozia]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Sibiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Sibiu]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bihor&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Oradea]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Constanta&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Constanta]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ilfov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IF&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bucharest]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Teleorman&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Alexandria]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bistrita-Nasaud&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bistrita]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Covasna&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Sfantu Gheorghe]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Maramures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Baia Mare]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Timis&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Timisoara]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Botosani&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Botosani]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dambovita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Targoviste]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mehedinti&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Tulcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Tulcea]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Brasov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Brasov]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dolj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Craiova]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Targu Mures]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Valcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Ramnicu Valcea]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Braila&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Braila]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Galati&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Galati]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Neamt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;NT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Piatra Neamt]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vaslui&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Vaslui]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bucharest]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;B&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;-&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Giurgiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Giurgiu]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Olt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;OT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Slatina]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vrancea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Focsani]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;


[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]</text>
      <sha1>hhrg7qz5tmjan1mvyfhsky92ns1wnh4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13704</id>
      <parentid>12759</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-13T09:41:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4989">[[Image:ro-flag.gif|thumb|right|Romanian flag]]
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei). It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. Try and pay the driver about 1Euro / 50km, though, this rate decreases as the distance grows. You can also tell the driver you don't have any money; 4 out of 5 people will take you anyway.&lt;br&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.&lt;br&gt;

*[[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Cities in Romania ==
* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]
* [[Constanta]]
* [[Baia Mare]]

== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
Romanian license plate numbers usually have 2 formats:&lt;br&gt;
*Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
*Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.&lt;br&gt;&lt;br&gt;
There are also special number plates:&lt;br&gt;
*diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
*some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)&lt;br&gt;
Where x is a random number.

===County license plate codes===
&lt;table border="1"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Alba&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Alba Iulia]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Buzau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BZ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Buzau]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Gorj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Targu Jiu]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Prahova&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;PH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Ploiesti]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arad&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Arad]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Caras-Severin&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Resita]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Harghita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Miercurea Ciuc]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Satu-Mare&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Satu-Mare]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arges&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AG&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Pitesti]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Cluj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Cluj-Napoca]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Hunedoara&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HD&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Deva]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Salaj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Zalau]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bacau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BC&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bacau]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Calarasi&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Calarasi]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ialomita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Slobozia]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Sibiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Sibiu]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bihor&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Oradea]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Constanta&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Constanta]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ilfov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IF&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bucharest]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Teleorman&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Alexandria]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bistrita-Nasaud&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bistrita]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Covasna&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Sfantu Gheorghe]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Maramures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Baia Mare]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Timis&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Timisoara]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Botosani&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Botosani]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dambovita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Targoviste]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mehedinti&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Tulcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Tulcea]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Brasov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Brasov]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dolj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Craiova]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Targu Mures]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Valcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Ramnicu Valcea]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Braila&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Braila]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Galati&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Galati]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Neamt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;NT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Piatra Neamt]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vaslui&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Vaslui]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bucharest]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;B&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;-&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Giurgiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Giurgiu]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Olt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;OT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Slatina]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vrancea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Focsani]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;


[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]
{{hitchbase_country|160}}</text>
      <sha1>jcsmywz61hvqc6jzio87sex8auj4kzm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13879</id>
      <parentid>13704</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-16T20:09:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>86.122.56.152</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5001">[[Image:ro-flag.gif|thumb|right|Romanian flag]]
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei). It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. Try and pay the driver about 1Euro / 50km, though, this rate decreases as the distance grows. You can also tell the driver you don't have any money; 4 out of 5 people will take you anyway.&lt;br&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.&lt;br&gt;

*[[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Cities in Romania ==
* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]
* [[Constanta]]
* [[Baia Mare]]
* [[Sibiu]]

== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
Romanian license plate numbers usually have 2 formats:&lt;br&gt;
*Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
*Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.&lt;br&gt;&lt;br&gt;
There are also special number plates:&lt;br&gt;
*diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
*some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)&lt;br&gt;
Where x is a random number.

===County license plate codes===
&lt;table border="1"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Alba&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Alba Iulia]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Buzau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BZ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Buzau]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Gorj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Targu Jiu]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Prahova&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;PH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Ploiesti]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arad&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Arad]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Caras-Severin&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Resita]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Harghita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Miercurea Ciuc]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Satu-Mare&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Satu-Mare]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arges&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AG&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Pitesti]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Cluj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Cluj-Napoca]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Hunedoara&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HD&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Deva]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Salaj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Zalau]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bacau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BC&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bacau]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Calarasi&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Calarasi]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ialomita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Slobozia]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Sibiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Sibiu]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bihor&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Oradea]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Constanta&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Constanta]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ilfov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IF&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bucharest]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Teleorman&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Alexandria]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bistrita-Nasaud&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bistrita]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Covasna&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Sfantu Gheorghe]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Maramures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Baia Mare]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Timis&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Timisoara]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Botosani&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Botosani]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dambovita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Targoviste]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mehedinti&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Tulcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Tulcea]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Brasov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Brasov]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dolj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Craiova]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Targu Mures]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Valcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Ramnicu Valcea]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Braila&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Braila]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Galati&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Galati]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Neamt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;NT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Piatra Neamt]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vaslui&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Vaslui]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bucharest]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;B&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;-&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Giurgiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Giurgiu]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Olt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;OT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Slatina]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vrancea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Focsani]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;


[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]
{{hitchbase_country|160}}</text>
      <sha1>myt6i2rsbde6znq95w9wtw7ytfvrdmu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13880</id>
      <parentid>13879</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-16T21:03:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>86.122.56.152</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4989">[[Image:ro-flag.gif|thumb|right|Romanian flag]]
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei). It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. Try and pay the driver about 1Euro / 50km, though, this rate decreases as the distance grows. You can also tell the driver you don't have any money; 4 out of 5 people will take you anyway.&lt;br&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.&lt;br&gt;

*[[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Cities in Romania ==
* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]
* [[Constanta]]
* [[Baia Mare]]

== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
Romanian license plate numbers usually have 2 formats:&lt;br&gt;
*Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
*Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.&lt;br&gt;&lt;br&gt;
There are also special number plates:&lt;br&gt;
*diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
*some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)&lt;br&gt;
Where x is a random number.

===County license plate codes===
&lt;table border="1"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Alba&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Alba Iulia]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Buzau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BZ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Buzau]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Gorj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Targu Jiu]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Prahova&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;PH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Ploiesti]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arad&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Arad]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Caras-Severin&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Resita]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Harghita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Miercurea Ciuc]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Satu-Mare&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Satu-Mare]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arges&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AG&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Pitesti]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Cluj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Cluj-Napoca]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Hunedoara&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HD&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Deva]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Salaj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Zalau]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bacau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BC&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bacau]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Calarasi&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Calarasi]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ialomita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Slobozia]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Sibiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Sibiu]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bihor&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Oradea]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Constanta&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Constanta]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ilfov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IF&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bucharest]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Teleorman&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Alexandria]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bistrita-Nasaud&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bistrita]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Covasna&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Sfantu Gheorghe]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Maramures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Baia Mare]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Timis&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Timisoara]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Botosani&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Botosani]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dambovita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Targoviste]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mehedinti&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Tulcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Tulcea]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Brasov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Brasov]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dolj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Craiova]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Targu Mures]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Valcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Ramnicu Valcea]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Braila&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Braila]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Galati&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Galati]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Neamt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;NT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Piatra Neamt]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vaslui&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Vaslui]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bucharest]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;B&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;-&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Giurgiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Giurgiu]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Olt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;OT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Slatina]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vrancea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Focsani]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;


[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]
{{hitchbase_country|160}}</text>
      <sha1>jcsmywz61hvqc6jzio87sex8auj4kzm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14667</id>
      <parentid>13880</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-12T13:30:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Danielziom</username>
        <id>224</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5001">[[Image:ro-flag.gif|thumb|right|Romanian flag]]
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei). It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. Try and pay the driver about 1Euro / 50km, though, this rate decreases as the distance grows. You can also tell the driver you don't have any money; 4 out of 5 people will take you anyway.&lt;br&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.&lt;br&gt;

*[[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Cities in Romania ==
* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]
* [[Constanta]]
* [[Baia Mare]]
* [[Sibiu]]

== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
Romanian license plate numbers usually have 2 formats:&lt;br&gt;
*Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
*Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)&lt;br&gt;
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.&lt;br&gt;&lt;br&gt;
There are also special number plates:&lt;br&gt;
*diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
*Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
*some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)&lt;br&gt;
Where x is a random number.

===County license plate codes===
&lt;table border="1"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;County&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Code&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;th&gt;Residence&lt;/th&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Alba&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Alba Iulia]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Buzau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BZ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Buzau]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Gorj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Targu Jiu]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Prahova&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;PH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Ploiesti]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arad&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Arad]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Caras-Severin&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Resita]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Harghita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Miercurea Ciuc]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Satu-Mare&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Satu-Mare]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Arges&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;AG&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Pitesti]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Cluj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Cluj-Napoca]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Hunedoara&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;HD&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Deva]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Salaj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Zalau]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bacau&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BC&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bacau]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Calarasi&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Calarasi]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ialomita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Slobozia]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Sibiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;SB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Sibiu]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bihor&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Oradea]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Constanta&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Constanta]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Ilfov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;IF&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bucharest]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Teleorman&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Alexandria]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Bistrita-Nasaud&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bistrita]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Covasna&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;CV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Sfantu Gheorghe]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Maramures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Baia Mare]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Timis&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TM&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Timisoara]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Botosani&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Botosani]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dambovita&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DB&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Targoviste]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mehedinti&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MH&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Tulcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;TL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Tulcea]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Brasov&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BV&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Brasov]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Dolj&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;DJ&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Craiova]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Mures&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;MS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Targu Mures]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Valcea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Ramnicu Valcea]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Braila&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;BR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Braila]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Galati&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GL&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Galati]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Neamt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;NT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Piatra Neamt]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vaslui&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VS&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Vaslui]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Bucharest]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;B&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;-&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Giurgiu&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;GR&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Giurgiu]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Olt&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;OT&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Slatina]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;Vrancea&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;VN&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;td&gt;[[Focsani]]&lt;/td&gt;
&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;


[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]
{{hitchbase_country|160}}</text>
      <sha1>myt6i2rsbde6znq95w9wtw7ytfvrdmu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14740</id>
      <parentid>14667</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-13T19:35:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.106.220.74</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4089">[[Image:ro-flag.gif|thumb|right|Romanian flag]]
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei). It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. Try and pay the driver about 1 Euro / 50 km, though, this rate decreases as the distance grows. You can also tell the driver you don't have any money; 4 out of 5 people will take you anyway.&lt;br /&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Cities in Romania ==
* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]
* [[Constanta]]
* [[Baia Mare]]
* [[Sibiu]]

== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
Romanian license plate numbers usually have two formats:
* Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.

There are also special number plates:
* diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
* some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)
Where x is a random number.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzau || BZ || [[Buzau]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Targu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploiesti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caras-Severin || CS || [[Resita]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Arges || AG || [[Pitesti]] || Cluj || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Salaj || SJ || [[Zalau]]
|-
| Bacau || BC || [[Bacau]] || Calarasi || CL || [[Calarasi]] || Ialomita || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanta || CT || [[Constanta]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucharest]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistrita-Nasaud || BN || [[Bistrita]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfantu Gheorghe]] || Maramures || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timis || TM || [[Timisoara]]
|-
| Botosani || BT || [[Botosani]] || Dambovita || DB || [[Targoviste]] || Mehedinti || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Brasov || BV || [[Brasov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mures || MS || [[Targu Mures]] || Valcea || VL || [[Ramnicu Valcea]]
|-
| Braila || BR || [[Braila]] || Galati || GL || [[Galati]] || Neamt || NT || [[Piatra Neamt]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucharest]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focsani]]
|}


[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]
{{hitchbase_country|160}}

[[de:Rumänien]]</text>
      <sha1>cj0kijpnwkp4nzdqw61098rfs9zhju2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16740</id>
      <parentid>14740</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-26T19:47:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4223">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucharest]]
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu ( RON )
|hitch = {{Very Good}} (''very good'')
}}
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|300px|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei). It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. Try and pay the driver about 1 Euro / 50 km, though, this rate decreases as the distance grows. You can also tell the driver you don't have any money; 4 out of 5 people will take you anyway.&lt;br /&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Cities in Romania ==
* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]
* [[Constanta]]
* [[Baia Mare]]
* [[Sibiu]]

== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
Romanian license plate numbers usually have two formats:
* Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.

There are also special number plates:
* diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
* some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)
Where x is a random number.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzau || BZ || [[Buzau]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Targu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploiesti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caras-Severin || CS || [[Resita]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Arges || AG || [[Pitesti]] || Cluj || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Salaj || SJ || [[Zalau]]
|-
| Bacau || BC || [[Bacau]] || Calarasi || CL || [[Calarasi]] || Ialomita || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanta || CT || [[Constanta]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucharest]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistrita-Nasaud || BN || [[Bistrita]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfantu Gheorghe]] || Maramures || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timis || TM || [[Timisoara]]
|-
| Botosani || BT || [[Botosani]] || Dambovita || DB || [[Targoviste]] || Mehedinti || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Brasov || BV || [[Brasov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mures || MS || [[Targu Mures]] || Valcea || VL || [[Ramnicu Valcea]]
|-
| Braila || BR || [[Braila]] || Galati || GL || [[Galati]] || Neamt || NT || [[Piatra Neamt]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucharest]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focsani]]
|}


[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
__NOTOC__
[[de:Rumänien]]</text>
      <sha1>0922sm87cot9ti2qm1uyzjmlhptw8ga</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16817</id>
      <parentid>16740</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-30T01:38:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4224">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucharest]]
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu ( RON )
|hitch = {{Very Good}} (''very good'')
}}
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|300px|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei). It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. Try and pay the driver about 1 Euro / 50 km, though, this rate decreases as the distance grows. You can also tell the driver you don't have any money; 4 out of 5 people will take you anyway.&lt;br /&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Cities in Romania ==
* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]
* [[Constanta]]
* [[Baia Mare]]
* [[Sibiu]]

== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
Romanian license plate numbers usually have two formats:
* Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.

There are also special number plates:
* diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
* some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)
Where x is a random number.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzau || BZ || [[Buzau]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Targu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploiesti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caras-Severin || CS || [[Resita]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Arges || AG || [[Pitesti]] || Cluj || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Salaj || SJ || [[Zalau]]
|-
| Bacau || BC || [[Bacau]] || Calarasi || CL || [[Calarasi]] || Ialomita || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanta || CT || [[Constanta]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucharest]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistrita-Nasaud || BN || [[Bistrita]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfantu Gheorghe]] || Maramures || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timis || TM || [[Timisoara]]
|-
| Botosani || BT || [[Botosani]] || Dambovita || DB || [[Targoviste]] || Mehedinti || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Brasov || BV || [[Brasov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mures || MS || [[Targu Mures]] || Valcea || VL || [[Ramnicu Valcea]]
|-
| Braila || BR || [[Braila]] || Galati || GL || [[Galati]] || Neamt || NT || [[Piatra Neamt]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucharest]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focsani]]
|}


[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
__NOTOC__

[[de:Rumänien]]</text>
      <sha1>aiuvfy9v6kup7tgn9yi86xi040mpazy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18169</id>
      <parentid>16817</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-20T22:38:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4226">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucharest]]
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu ( RON )
|hitch = {{Very Good}} (''very good'')
}}
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|300px|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei). It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. Try and pay the driver about 1 Euro / 50 km, though, this rate decreases as the distance grows. You can also tell the driver you don't have any money; 4 out of 5 people will take you anyway.&lt;br /&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Cities in Romania ==
* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]
* [[Constanta]]
* [[Baia Mare]]
* [[Sibiu]]

== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
Romanian license plate numbers usually have two formats:
* Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.

There are also special number plates:
* diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
* some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)
Where x is a random number.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzau || BZ || [[Buzau]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Targu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploiesti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caras-Severin || CS || [[Resita]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Arges || AG || [[Pitesti]] || Cluj || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Salaj || SJ || [[Zalau]]
|-
| Bacau || BC || [[Bacau]] || Calarasi || CL || [[Calarasi]] || Ialomita || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanta || CT || [[Constanta]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucharest]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistrita-Nasaud || BN || [[Bistrita]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfantu Gheorghe]] || Maramures || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timis || TM || [[Timisoara]]
|-
| Botosani || BT || [[Botosani]] || Dambovita || DB || [[Targoviste]] || Mehedinti || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Brasov || BV || [[Brasov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mures || MS || [[Targu Mures]] || Valcea || VL || [[Ramnicu Valcea]]
|-
| Braila || BR || [[Braila]] || Galati || GL || [[Galati]] || Neamt || NT || [[Piatra Neamt]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucharest]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focsani]]
|}


{{hitchbase_country|160}}
[[Category:Romania| ]]
[[Category:Europe]]
__NOTOC__

[[de:Rumänien]]</text>
      <sha1>ra4b5hzf69u65etqhvx4ynj436hh4fc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18756</id>
      <parentid>18169</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-06T06:40:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TruckThor</username>
        <id>82</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4423">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucharest]]
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu ( RON )
|hitch = {{Very Good}} (''very good'')
}}
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|300px|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei).  When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. People expect to be payed for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 4 out of 5 will take you anyway.&lt;br /&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.&lt;br&gt;
Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Cities in Romania (by size) ==
* [[Bucharest]]
* [[Cluj-Napoca]]
* [[Constanta]]
* [[Oradea]]
* [[Sibiu]]
* [[Baia Mare]]



== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
Romanian license plate numbers usually have two formats:
* Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.

There are also special number plates:
* diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (non-reflective, black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
* some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)
Where x is a random number.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzau || BZ || [[Buzau]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Targu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploiesti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caras-Severin || CS || [[Resita]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Arges || AG || [[Pitesti]] || Cluj || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Salaj || SJ || [[Zalau]]
|-
| Bacau || BC || [[Bacau]] || Calarasi || CL || [[Calarasi]] || Ialomita || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanta || CT || [[Constanta]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucharest]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistrita-Nasaud || BN || [[Bistrita]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfantu Gheorghe]] || Maramures || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timis || TM || [[Timisoara]]
|-
| Botosani || BT || [[Botosani]] || Dambovita || DB || [[Targoviste]] || Mehedinti || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Brasov || BV || [[Brasov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mures || MS || [[Targu Mures]] || Valcea || VL || [[Ramnicu Valcea]]
|-
| Braila || BR || [[Braila]] || Galati || GL || [[Galati]] || Neamt || NT || [[Piatra Neamt]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucharest]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focsani]]
|}


{{hitchbase_country|160}}
[[Category:Romania| ]]
[[Category:Europe]]
__NOTOC__

[[de:Rumänien]]</text>
      <sha1>0oka8n3q54i3o7y9f1hsz3eskwg3prh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18993</id>
      <parentid>18756</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-22T09:26:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TruckThor</username>
        <id>82</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4797">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucharest]]
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu ( RON )
|hitch = {{Very Good}} (''very good'')
}}
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|300px|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei).  When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. People expect to be payed for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 4 out of 5 will take you anyway.&lt;br /&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.&lt;br&gt;
Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Historical regions ==

*[[Transylvania]]
*[[Wallachia]]
*[[Moldavia]]
*[[Dobruja]]

== Cities in Romania ==
=== Largest ===
First 10 largest cities, by population within city limits&lt;br&gt;
* [[Bucharest]] - 1,931,838
* [[Iasi]] - 315,214
* [[Cluj-Napoca]] - 310,243
* [[Timisoara]] - 307,347 
* [[Constanta]] - 304,279
* [[Craiova]] - 299,429
* [[Galati]] - 293,523
* [[Brasov]] - 277,945
* [[Ploiesti]] - 230,240
* [[Braila]] - 215,316
=== Other cities ===
* [[Oradea]]
* [[Sibiu]]
* [[Baia Mare]]



== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
Romanian license plate numbers usually have two formats:
* Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.

There are also special number plates:
* diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (non-reflective, black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
* some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)
Where x is a random number.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzau || BZ || [[Buzau]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Targu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploiesti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caras-Severin || CS || [[Resita]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Arges || AG || [[Pitesti]] || Cluj || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Salaj || SJ || [[Zalau]]
|-
| Bacau || BC || [[Bacau]] || Calarasi || CL || [[Calarasi]] || Ialomita || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanta || CT || [[Constanta]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucharest]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistrita-Nasaud || BN || [[Bistrita]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfantu Gheorghe]] || Maramures || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timis || TM || [[Timisoara]]
|-
| Botosani || BT || [[Botosani]] || Dambovita || DB || [[Targoviste]] || Mehedinti || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Brasov || BV || [[Brasov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mures || MS || [[Targu Mures]] || Valcea || VL || [[Ramnicu Valcea]]
|-
| Braila || BR || [[Braila]] || Galati || GL || [[Galati]] || Neamt || NT || [[Piatra Neamt]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucharest]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focsani]]
|}


{{hitchbase_country|160}}
[[Category:Romania| ]]
[[Category:Europe]]
__NOTOC__

[[de:Rumänien]]</text>
      <sha1>ifgsgheix3mktajhj1cdg1coi8d849e</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19414</id>
      <parentid>18993</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-04-08T15:09:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>79.112.96.232</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4798">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucharest]]
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu ( RON )
|hitch = {{Very Good}} (''very good'')
}}
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|300px|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei).  When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. People expect to be payed for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 4 out of 5 will take you anyway.&lt;br /&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.&lt;br&gt;
Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Historical regions ==

*[[Transylvania]]
*[[Wallachia]]
*[[Moldavia]]
*[[Dobrogea]]

== Cities in Romania ==
=== Largest ===
First 10 largest cities, by population within city limits&lt;br&gt;
* [[Bucharest]] - 1,931,838
* [[Iasi]] - 315,214
* [[Cluj-Napoca]] - 310,243
* [[Timisoara]] - 307,347 
* [[Constanta]] - 304,279
* [[Craiova]] - 299,429
* [[Galati]] - 293,523
* [[Brasov]] - 277,945
* [[Ploiesti]] - 230,240
* [[Braila]] - 215,316
=== Other cities ===
* [[Oradea]]
* [[Sibiu]]
* [[Baia Mare]]



== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
Romanian license plate numbers usually have two formats:
* Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.

There are also special number plates:
* diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (non-reflective, black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
* some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)
Where x is a random number.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzau || BZ || [[Buzau]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Targu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploiesti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caras-Severin || CS || [[Resita]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Arges || AG || [[Pitesti]] || Cluj || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Salaj || SJ || [[Zalau]]
|-
| Bacau || BC || [[Bacau]] || Calarasi || CL || [[Calarasi]] || Ialomita || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanta || CT || [[Constanta]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucharest]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistrita-Nasaud || BN || [[Bistrita]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfantu Gheorghe]] || Maramures || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timis || TM || [[Timisoara]]
|-
| Botosani || BT || [[Botosani]] || Dambovita || DB || [[Targoviste]] || Mehedinti || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Brasov || BV || [[Brasov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mures || MS || [[Targu Mures]] || Valcea || VL || [[Ramnicu Valcea]]
|-
| Braila || BR || [[Braila]] || Galati || GL || [[Galati]] || Neamt || NT || [[Piatra Neamt]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucharest]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focsani]]
|}


{{hitchbase_country|160}}
[[Category:Romania| ]]
[[Category:Europe]]
__NOTOC__

[[de:Rumänien]]</text>
      <sha1>ivb9sd25l20b0qdpqeuj8oy1953r0ak</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19683</id>
      <parentid>19414</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-04-28T10:11:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TruckThor</username>
        <id>82</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4822">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucharest]]
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu ( RON )
|hitch = {{Very Good}} (''very good'')
}}
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|300px|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei).  When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. People expect to be payed for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 4 out of 5 will take you anyway.&lt;br /&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.&lt;br&gt;
Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Historical regions ==

*[[Transylvania]]
*[[Wallachia]]
*[[Moldavia]]
*[[Dobrogea]]

== Cities in Romania ==
=== Largest ===
First 10 largest cities, by population within city limits&lt;br&gt;
* [[Bucharest]] - 1,931,838
* [[Iasi]] - 315,214
* [[Cluj-Napoca]] - 310,243
* [[Timisoara]] - 307,347 
* [[Constanta]] - 304,279
* [[Craiova]] - 299,429
* [[Galati]] - 293,523
* [[Brasov]] - 277,945
* [[Ploiesti]] - 230,240
* [[Braila]] - 215,316
=== Other cities ===
* [[Oradea]]
* [[Sibiu]]
* [[Baia Mare]]



== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
Romanian license plate numbers usually have two formats:
* Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.

There are also special number plates:
* diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (non-reflective, black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
* some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)
Where x is a random number.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzau || BZ || [[Buzau]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Targu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploiesti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caras-Severin || CS || [[Resita]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Arges || AG || [[Pitesti]] || Cluj || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Salaj || SJ || [[Zalau]]
|-
| Bacau || BC || [[Bacau]] || Calarasi || CL || [[Calarasi]] || Ialomita || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanta || CT || [[Constanta]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucharest]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistrita-Nasaud || BN || [[Bistrita]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfantu Gheorghe]] || Maramures || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timis || TM || [[Timisoara]]
|-
| Botosani || BT || [[Botosani]] || Dambovita || DB || [[Targoviste]] || Mehedinti || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Brasov || BV || [[Brasov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mures || MS || [[Targu Mures]] || Valcea || VL || [[Ramnicu Valcea]]
|-
| Braila || BR || [[Braila]] || Galati || GL || [[Galati]] || Neamt || NT || [[Piatra Neamt]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucharest]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focsani]]
|}

----

{{Cities Romania}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
[[Category:Romania| ]]
[[Category:Europe]]
__NOTOC__

[[de:Rumänien]]</text>
      <sha1>55gr5k03cibfrfd882mc0ah7p1wn3a0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19700</id>
      <parentid>19683</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-04-28T10:48:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TruckThor</username>
        <id>82</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4826">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucharest]]
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu ( RON )
|hitch = {{Very Good}} (''very good'')
}}
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|300px|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei).  When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. People expect to be payed for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 4 out of 5 will take you anyway.&lt;br /&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.&lt;br&gt;
Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Historical regions ==

*[[Transylvania]]
*[[Wallachia]]
*[[Moldavia]]
*[[Dobrogea]]

== Cities in Romania ==
=== Largest ===
First 10 largest cities, by population within city limits&lt;br&gt;
* [[Bucharest]] - 1,931,838
* [[Iasi]] - 315,214
* [[Cluj-Napoca]] - 310,243
* [[Timisoara]] - 307,347 
* [[Constanta]] - 304,279
* [[Craiova]] - 299,429
* [[Galati]] - 293,523
* [[Brasov]] - 277,945
* [[Ploiesti]] - 230,240
* [[Braila]] - 215,316
=== Other cities ===
* [[Oradea]]
* [[Sibiu]]
* [[Baia Mare]]



== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
Romanian license plate numbers usually have two formats:
* Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.

There are also special number plates:
* diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (non-reflective, black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
* some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)
Where x is a random number.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzau || BZ || [[Buzau]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Targu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploiesti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caras-Severin || CS || [[Resita]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Arges || AG || [[Pitesti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Salaj || SJ || [[Zalau]]
|-
| Bacau || BC || [[Bacau]] || Calarasi || CL || [[Calarasi]] || Ialomita || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanta || CT || [[Constanta]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucharest]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistrita-Nasaud || BN || [[Bistrita]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfantu Gheorghe]] || Maramures || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timis || TM || [[Timisoara]]
|-
| Botosani || BT || [[Botosani]] || Dambovita || DB || [[Targoviste]] || Mehedinti || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Brasov || BV || [[Brasov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mures || MS || [[Targu Mures]] || Valcea || VL || [[Ramnicu Valcea]]
|-
| Braila || BR || [[Braila]] || Galati || GL || [[Galati]] || Neamt || NT || [[Piatra Neamt]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucharest]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focsani]]
|}

----

{{Cities Romania}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
[[Category:Romania| ]]
[[Category:Europe]]
__NOTOC__

[[de:Rumänien]]</text>
      <sha1>dueiijg9zxvkg13t54mgox7hcmtxf8u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19727</id>
      <parentid>19700</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-04-29T11:48:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4413">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucharest]]
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu ( RON )
|hitch = {{Very Good}} (''very good'')
}}
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|300px|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei).  When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. People expect to be payed for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 4 out of 5 will take you anyway.&lt;br /&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.&lt;br&gt;
Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Historical regions ==

*[[Transylvania]]
*[[Wallachia]]
*[[Moldavia]]
*[[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
Romanian license plate numbers usually have two formats:
* Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.

There are also special number plates:
* diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (non-reflective, black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
* some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)
Where x is a random number.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzau || BZ || [[Buzau]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Targu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploiesti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caras-Severin || CS || [[Resita]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Arges || AG || [[Pitesti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Salaj || SJ || [[Zalau]]
|-
| Bacau || BC || [[Bacau]] || Calarasi || CL || [[Calarasi]] || Ialomita || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanta || CT || [[Constanta]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucharest]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistrita-Nasaud || BN || [[Bistrita]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfantu Gheorghe]] || Maramures || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timis || TM || [[Timisoara]]
|-
| Botosani || BT || [[Botosani]] || Dambovita || DB || [[Targoviste]] || Mehedinti || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Brasov || BV || [[Brasov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mures || MS || [[Targu Mures]] || Valcea || VL || [[Ramnicu Valcea]]
|-
| Braila || BR || [[Braila]] || Galati || GL || [[Galati]] || Neamt || NT || [[Piatra Neamt]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucharest]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focsani]]
|}

----


{{hitchbase_country|160}}
[[Category:Romania| ]]
[[Category:Europe]]
__NOTOC__

[[de:Rumänien]]</text>
      <sha1>88olsa7thhzucrwj5dsequraire6nb8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21062</id>
      <parentid>19727</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-12T07:10:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TruckThor</username>
        <id>82</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4467">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu ( RON )
|hitch = {{Very Good}} (''very good'')
}}
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|300px|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei).  When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. People expect to be payed for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 4 out of 5 will take you anyway.&lt;br /&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.&lt;br&gt;
Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Historical regions ==

*[[Transylvania]]
*[[Wallachia]]
*[[Moldavia]]
*[[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
Romanian license plate numbers usually have two formats:
* Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.

There are also special number plates:
* diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (non-reflective, black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
* some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)
Where x is a random number.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

----


{{hitchbase_country|160}}
[[Category:Romania| ]]
[[Category:Europe]]
__NOTOC__

[[de:Rumänien]]</text>
      <sha1>ja1ekxuqb4vt12bzpf6eaqhdnz15reb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21287</id>
      <parentid>21062</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-14T23:17:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4434">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|300px|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei).  When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. People expect to be payed for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 4 out of 5 will take you anyway.&lt;br /&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.&lt;br /&gt;
Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Historical regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
Romanian license plate numbers usually have two formats:
* Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.

There are also special number plates:
* diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (non-reflective, black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
* some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)
Where x is a random number.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

----

{{hitchbase_country|160}}
[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]

__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>jchmjl83p021an502h5v8ab1vi6jwf0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21762</id>
      <parentid>21287</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-19T09:12:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4457">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|300px|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei).  When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. People expect to be payed for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 4 out of 5 will take you anyway.&lt;br /&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.&lt;br /&gt;
Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Historical regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
Romanian license plate numbers usually have two formats:
* Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.

There are also special number plates:
* diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (non-reflective, black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
* some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)
Where x is a random number.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

----

{{hitchbase_country|160}}
[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>qapc9i3tj8defk5y0i098p42sp0dk8e</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21930</id>
      <parentid>21762</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-21T22:16:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4458">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|300px|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei).  When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. People expect to be payed for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 4 out of 5 will take you anyway.&lt;br /&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.&lt;br /&gt;
Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Historical regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
Romanian license plate numbers usually have two formats:
* Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.

There are also special number plates:
* diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (non-reflective, black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
* some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)
Where x is a random number.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

----

{{hitchbase_country|160}}
[[Category:Romania| ]]

{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__

[[de:Rumänien]]</text>
      <sha1>1lwipu22ka7cxgqhuwbsrmhrd2kk1ai</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21959</id>
      <parentid>21930</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-21T22:29:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4473">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|300px|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei).  When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. People expect to be payed for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 4 out of 5 will take you anyway.&lt;br /&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.&lt;br /&gt;
Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Historical regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
Romanian license plate numbers usually have two formats:
* Regular number plates: XX-yy-ZZZ (black writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Temporary leasing number plates: XX-yyyyyy (red writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
Where XX is the two letter code of the county (see below), y is a random number, and Z a random letter.

There are also special number plates:
* diplomatic: TC-xxxxxx, CD-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Ministry of Internal Affairs: MAI-xxxxxx (blue writing on white background, blue strip on the left, with the country code "RO" and the Romanian or EU flag)
* Romanian Army: A-xxxxxx (non-reflective, black writing on white background, no other markings on the plates)
* some cities have special, internal, or local license plate numbers, usually used for machinery (excavators, rollers, public transport ...)
Where x is a random number.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

----

{{hitchbase_country|160}}
[[Category:Romania| ]]

{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]</text>
      <sha1>fepomc1n0ps5dsmdu4krxh3g1qw7ebv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22128</id>
      <parentid>21959</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-29T17:05:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TruckThor</username>
        <id>82</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4051">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|300px|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei).  When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go. People expect to be payed for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 4 out of 5 will take you anyway.&lt;br /&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.&lt;br /&gt;
Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It uses the Latin script and is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Historical regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
[[Image:Romanian_car_registration_plate.jpg|thumb|right|float|New style E.U. flag number plate. The old ones have the Romanian flag in stead of the E.U. flag.]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'', where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing. 

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

----

{{hitchbase_country|160}}
[[Category:Romania| ]]

{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]</text>
      <sha1>76bu1g8e0xz0n5roju7z8an9aly9ck3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22129</id>
      <parentid>22128</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-29T17:07:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TruckThor</username>
        <id>82</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4050">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|300px|Map of Romania]]
In '''Romania''' payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (exchange rate: 1 Euro = aprox. 3.5 Lei).  When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go. People expect to be payed for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 4 out of 5 will take you anyway.&lt;br /&gt;
Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.&lt;br /&gt;
Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It uses the Latin script and is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Historical regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
[[Image:Romanian_car_registration_plate.jpg|thumb|left|float|New style E.U. flag number plate. The old ones have the Romanian flag in stead of the E.U. flag.]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'', where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing. 

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

----

{{hitchbase_country|160}}
[[Category:Romania| ]]

{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]</text>
      <sha1>bexgnyxlf9bgfw6eyz9k93snhbfdejb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22204</id>
      <parentid>22129</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-02T15:31:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TruckThor</username>
        <id>82</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4738">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|300px|Map of Romania]]
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with Hungary and Serbia to the west, Ukraine and the Republic of Moldova to the northeast, and Bulgaria to the south.

In Romania payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. People expect to be payed for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 4 out of 5 will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It uses the Latin script and is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

== Cities ==

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] - the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] - only 75% completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] - under construction, due 2013
The other roads usually are in very poor condition. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic..

== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing. 

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

----

{{hitchbase_country|160}}
[[Category:Romania| ]]

{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]</text>
      <sha1>3nw3qu2p37u54jgye6bg2ruix5nw5so</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22205</id>
      <parentid>22204</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-02T15:33:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TruckThor</username>
        <id>82</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4756">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|300px|Map of Romania]]
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with Hungary and Serbia to the west, Ukraine and the Republic of Moldova to the northeast, and Bulgaria to the south.

In Romania payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. People expect to be payed for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 4 out of 5 will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It uses the Latin script and is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

== Cities ==

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] - the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] - only 75% completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] - under construction, due 2013
The other roads usually are in very poor condition. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic..

== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing. 

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

----

{{hitchbase_country|160}}
[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]

{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]</text>
      <sha1>stc0j8kp7lhafy6gu2q4uy5h1ybc6ss</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22235</id>
      <parentid>22205</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-04T11:54:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TruckThor</username>
        <id>82</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4786">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|300px|Map of Romania]]
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with Hungary and Serbia to the west, Ukraine and the Republic of Moldova to the northeast, and Bulgaria to the south.

In Romania payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. People expect to be payed for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 4 out of 5 will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It uses the Latin script and is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

== Cities ==

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] - the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] - only 75% completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] - under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing. 

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

----

{{hitchbase_country|160}}
[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]

{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]</text>
      <sha1>imaz9nwpu17afg42e8fj4qou86llhff</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27004</id>
      <parentid>22235</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-06T00:00:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>87.179.73.154</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4786">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|300px|Map of Romania]]
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with Hungary and Serbia to the west, Ukraine and the Republic of Moldova to the northeast, and Bulgaria to the south.

In Romania payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. People expect to be payed for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 1 out of 2 will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It uses the Latin script and is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

== Cities ==

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] - the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] - only 75% completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] - under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing. 

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

----

{{hitchbase_country|160}}
[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]

{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]</text>
      <sha1>fvqewsi7uwqpyt0w5hllli9jes5yex6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27785</id>
      <parentid>27004</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-15T15:32:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>91.20.83.21</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4954">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|300px|Map of Romania]]
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with Hungary and Serbia to the west, Ukraine and the Republic of Moldova to the northeast, and Bulgaria to the south.

In Romania payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. People expect to be payed for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 1 out of 2 will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

It´s recommended to try hitchhiking right on the highway. For people from west Europe it might feel strange but it´s most defintetly the fastest way to get a lift. 

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It uses the Latin script and is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

== Cities ==

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] - the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] - only 75% completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] - under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing. 

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

----

{{hitchbase_country|160}}
[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]

{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]</text>
      <sha1>n216nhg8re10m6gz2s90ua90g9jciae</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27808</id>
      <parentid>27785</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-16T10:20:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4984">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|300px|Map of Romania]]
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with Hungary and Serbia to the west, Ukraine and the Republic of Moldova to the northeast, and Bulgaria to the south.

In Romania payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. People expect to be payed for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 1 out of 2 will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

It´s recommended to try hitchhiking right on the highway. For people from west Europe it might feel strange but it´s most defintetly the fastest way to get a lift. 

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It uses the Latin script and is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

== Cities ==

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] - the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] - only 75% completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] - under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing. 

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

----

{{hitchbase_country|160}}
[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Romania]]

{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
__NOTOC__

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]</text>
      <sha1>czil7qcag9lyz6furjid8mb7fqaochl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32046</id>
      <parentid>27808</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-04-08T08:49:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4988">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|300px|Map of Romania]]
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with Hungary and Serbia to the west, Ukraine and the Republic of Moldova to the northeast, and Bulgaria to the south.

In Romania payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. People expect to be payed for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 1 out of 2 will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

It's recommended to try hitchhiking right on the highway. For people from west Europe it might feel strange but it's most defintetly the fastest way to get a lift.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It uses the Latin script and is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

== Cities ==
{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75&amp;nbsp;% completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]

__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>2mjmt361y4snmcmlkloh087o3wbsywr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>34233</id>
      <parentid>32046</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-06-30T18:21:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5327">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|300px|Map of Romania]]
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with Hungary and Serbia to the west, Ukraine and the Republic of Moldova to the northeast, and Bulgaria to the south.

In Romania payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. People expect to be payed for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 1 out of 2 will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

It's recommended to try hitchhiking right on the highway. For people from west Europe it might feel strange but it's most defintetly the fastest way to get a lift.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It uses the Latin script and is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

== Cities ==
{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75&amp;nbsp;% completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

==Border crossings==

===[[Ukraine]]===
There is no way to cross South from [[Moldova]] into the [[Ukraine]] apart from trying to get on a boat over de Danube.  With that your only chance is private boats and in 2005 one guy tried to charge [[User:Guaka|guaka]] some ridiculous amount of money for getting across.

===[[Moldova]]===
...


{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]

__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>m64yqeyvqtr9to9avws60jaurga6ljm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>34234</id>
      <parentid>34233</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-06-30T18:25:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5337">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
[[Image:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|300px|Map of Romania]]
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with Hungary and Serbia to the west, Ukraine and the Republic of Moldova to the northeast, and Bulgaria to the south.

In Romania payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. People expect to be payed for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 1 out of 2 will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

It's recommended to try hitchhiking right on the highway. For people from west Europe it might feel strange but it's most defintetly the fastest way to get a lift.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It uses the Latin script and is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

== Cities ==
{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75&amp;nbsp;% completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[Image:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

==Border crossings==

===[[Ukraine]]===
There is no way to cross South from [[Moldova]] into the [[Ukraine]] apart from trying to get on a boat over the very wide river.  With that your only chance is private boats and in 2005 one guy tried to charge [[User:Guaka|guaka]] some ridiculous amount of money for getting across.

===[[Moldova]]===
...


{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]

__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>dmx0seuptmw7nrzsm3tsvvk35rqu5nq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35395</id>
      <parentid>34234</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T18:42:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5335">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
[[File:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|300px|Map of Romania]]
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with Hungary and Serbia to the west, Ukraine and the Republic of Moldova to the northeast, and Bulgaria to the south.

In Romania payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. People expect to be payed for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 1 out of 2 will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

It's recommended to try hitchhiking right on the highway. For people from west Europe it might feel strange but it's most defintetly the fastest way to get a lift.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It uses the Latin script and is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

== Cities ==
{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

=== [[Ukraine]] ===
There is no way to cross South from [[Moldova]] into the [[Ukraine]] apart from trying to get on a boat over the very wide river.  With that your only chance is private boats and in 2005 one guy tried to charge [[User:Guaka|guaka]] some ridiculous amount of money for getting across.

=== [[Moldova]] ===
...


{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]</text>
      <sha1>fmfc2bp9v4ruxenymf8xdibhpnt0eg3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36534</id>
      <parentid>35395</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-08-14T08:48:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5411">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
[[File:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|300px|Map of Romania]]
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with Hungary and Serbia to the west, Ukraine and the Republic of Moldova to the northeast, and Bulgaria to the south.

In Romania payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. People expect to be payed for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 1 out of 2 will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

It's recommended to try hitchhiking right on the highway. For people from west Europe it might feel strange but it's most defintetly the fastest way to get a lift.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic East-European languages. It uses the Latin script and is related with French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

== Cities ==
{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

=== [[Ukraine]] ===

* [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing]]

There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are private boats that may ferry travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

=== [[Moldova]] ===

* [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing‎]]


{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]</text>
      <sha1>hfatzmdfrscs493dvzm1a9fv7gzuoan</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36539</id>
      <parentid>36534</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-08-14T15:01:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5514">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
[[File:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|300px|Map of Romania]]
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with Hungary and Serbia to the west, Ukraine and the Republic of Moldova to the northeast, and Bulgaria to the south.

In Romania payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. People expect to be paid for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 1 out of 2 will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country. Getting a lift in a truck is fairly rare in Romania compared to the surrounding countries.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

Romania has very few kilometers of real highway. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

== Cities ==
{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

=== [[Ukraine]] ===

* [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing]]

There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are private boats that may ferry travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

=== [[Moldova]] ===

* [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing‎]]


{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]</text>
      <sha1>010kebptktdataiwe98ev9a09ydum1u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36955</id>
      <parentid>36539</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-09-06T16:42:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Luunatick</username>
        <id>2050</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5557">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
[[File:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|300px|Map of Romania]]
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with Hungary and Serbia to the west, Ukraine and the Republic of Moldova to the northeast, and Bulgaria to the south.

In Romania payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. People expect to be paid for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 1 out of 2 will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country. Getting a lift in a truck is fairly rare in Romania compared to the surrounding countries.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

Romania has very few kilometers of real highway. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there. Don't drink the tapwater!!

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

== Cities ==
{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

=== [[Ukraine]] ===

* [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing]]

There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are private boats that may ferry travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

=== [[Moldova]] ===

* [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing‎]]


{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]</text>
      <sha1>g41d6nzy2mahyayyzdqpvjf1vnddejq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36998</id>
      <parentid>36955</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-09-06T22:50:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5557">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
[[File:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|300px|Map of Romania]]
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with Hungary and Serbia to the west, Ukraine and the Republic of Moldova to the northeast, and Bulgaria to the south.

In Romania payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. People expect to be paid for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 1 out of 2 will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country. Getting a lift in a truck is fairly rare in Romania compared to the surrounding countries.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

Romania has very few kilometers of real highway. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there. Don't drink the tapwater!!

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

== Cities ==
{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

=== [[Ukraine]] ===

* [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing]]

There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are private boats that may ferry travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

=== [[Moldova]] ===

* [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing‎]]


{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[fr:Roumanie]]

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]</text>
      <sha1>sajyuqj1hog3xz3yczkmrgk9lq54m54</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>37786</id>
      <parentid>36998</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-10-09T22:57:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5557">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
[[File:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|300px|Map of Romania]]
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with Hungary and Serbia to the west, Ukraine and the Republic of Moldova to the northeast, and Bulgaria to the south.

In Romania payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. People expect to be paid for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 1 out of 2 will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country. Getting a lift in a truck is fairly rare in Romania compared to the surrounding countries.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

Romania has very few kilometers of real highway. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there. Don't drink the tapwater!!

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

== Cities ==
{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

=== [[Ukraine]] ===

* [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing]]

There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are private boats that may ferry travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

=== [[Moldova]] ===

* [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing‎]]


{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]</text>
      <sha1>g41d6nzy2mahyayyzdqpvjf1vnddejq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38288</id>
      <parentid>37786</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-10-29T15:17:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Quarim</username>
        <id>1290</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5581">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
[[File:ro-map.gif|thumb|right|300px|Map of Romania]]
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

In Romania payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. People expect to be paid for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 1 out of 2 will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country. Getting a lift in a truck is fairly rare in Romania compared to the surrounding countries.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

Romania has very few kilometers of real highway. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there. Don't drink the tapwater!!

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

== Cities ==
{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

=== [[Ukraine]] ===

* [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing]]

There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are private boats that may [[ferry]] travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

=== [[Moldova]] ===

* [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing‎]]


{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]</text>
      <sha1>p15wdhr13b2aaa8efqyubdvidn1u4km</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39064</id>
      <parentid>38288</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-12-29T10:34:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Quarim</username>
        <id>1290</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5624">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

In Romania payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. People expect to be paid for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 1 out of 2 will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country. Getting a lift in a truck is fairly rare in Romania compared to the surrounding countries.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

Romania has very few kilometers of real highway. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there. Don't drink the tapwater!!

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

== Cities ==
{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

=== [[Ukraine]] ===

* [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing]]

There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are private boats that may [[ferry]] travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

=== [[Moldova]] ===

* [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing‎]]


{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]</text>
      <sha1>ega8efauf4ssh185hu37zlrug7a14wj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40263</id>
      <parentid>39064</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-14T18:34:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Vidimian</username>
        <id>1703</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5639">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

In Romania payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. People expect to be paid for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 1 out of 2 will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country. Getting a lift in a truck is fairly rare in Romania compared to the surrounding countries.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

Romania has very few kilometers of real highway. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there. Don't drink the tapwater!!

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

== Cities ==
{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

=== [[Ukraine]] ===

* [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing]]

There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are private boats that may [[ferry]] travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

=== [[Moldova]] ===

* [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing‎]]


{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>pqknjlc93vnqgx0wb77m2thta5qrwwo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40590</id>
      <parentid>40263</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-22T08:11:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>80.109.77.117</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5719">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

In Romania payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. People expect to be paid for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 1 out of 2 will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country. Getting a lift in a truck is fairly rare in Romania compared to the surrounding countries.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

Romania has very few kilometers of real highway. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there. Don't drink the tapwater(explain why?? i think it's good in Transylvania, but bad in every other region)!!

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

== Cities ==
{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

=== [[Ukraine]] ===

* [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing]]

There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are private boats that may [[ferry]] travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

=== [[Moldova]] ===

* [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing‎]]


{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>m42p8vjdusmalcq9tvxg2ec0sza9my5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40591</id>
      <parentid>40590</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-22T09:12:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5612">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

In Romania payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. People expect to be paid for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 1 out of 2 will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country. Getting a lift in a truck is fairly rare in Romania compared to the surrounding countries.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

Romania has very few kilometers of real highway. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

== Cities ==
{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

=== [[Ukraine]] ===

* [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing]]

There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are private boats that may [[ferry]] travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

=== [[Moldova]] ===

* [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing‎]]


{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>6j7g542hlibwrgdbzkazq6ualnbvj0r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>42216</id>
      <parentid>40591</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-06-03T07:56:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.121.224.113</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6610">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

In Romania payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. People expect to be paid for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 1 out of 2 will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country. Getting a lift in a truck is fairly rare in Romania compared to the surrounding countries.

Many cities, such as Timișoara, have specific places where one can hitchhike from. They are interspersed around the city, so just ask someone where the nearest one is. They look like bus stops but you will notice they have no bus numbers or maps. Some are intended for short distances, e.g. towns and villages within 50 kilometers of the city, and others for longer distances, such as to the next major town or city. At these stops, there are unofficial taxis (called sharks) waiting there at most times of day that charge a fixed rate of about 6 lei (less than 2 USD) per person for a short distance, but they will only go if the car is full. If you are willing to pay for the other seats they will take you straight away. Regular cars often pick people up as well, and the advantage to this is that they will take you without demanding the car be full and you can give them a 5 lei note for about a 20k ride. However, that rate is not fixed, so some may argue a different price is appropriate.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

Romania has very few kilometers of real highway. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

== Cities ==
{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

=== [[Ukraine]] ===

* [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing]]

There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are private boats that may [[ferry]] travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

=== [[Moldova]] ===

* [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing‎]]


{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>c52ykpqjmm05x7qe1jw7u6ipaqdgec8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44442</id>
      <parentid>42216</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-08-31T21:46:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6811">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

In Romania payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. People expect to be paid for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 1 out of 2 will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country. Getting a lift in a truck is fairly rare in Romania compared to the surrounding countries.

Many cities, such as Timișoara, have specific places where one can hitchhike from. They are interspersed around the city, so just ask someone where the nearest one is. They look like bus stops but you will notice they have no bus numbers or maps. Some are intended for short distances, e.g. towns and villages within 50 kilometers of the city, and others for longer distances, such as to the next major town or city. At these stops, there are unofficial taxis (called sharks) waiting there at most times of day that charge a fixed rate of about 6 lei (less than 2 USD) per person for a short distance, but they will only go if the car is full. If you are willing to pay for the other seats they will take you straight away. Regular cars often pick people up as well, and the advantage to this is that they will take you without demanding the car be full and you can give them a 5 lei note for about a 20k ride. However, that rate is not fixed, so some may argue a different price is appropriate.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

Romania has very few kilometers of real highway. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

== Cities ==
{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

=== [[Ukraine]] ===

* [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing]]

There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are private boats that may [[ferry]] travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

=== [[Moldova]] ===

* [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing‎]]


{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>34w6jcn3u47dp5cm5wef9qh8vk6f5fm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44443</id>
      <parentid>44442</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-08-31T21:47:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6798">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

In Romania payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. People expect to be paid for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 1 out of 2 will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country. Getting a lift in a truck is fairly rare in Romania compared to the surrounding countries.

Many cities, such as Timișoara, have specific places where one can hitchhike from. They are interspersed around the city, so just ask someone where the nearest one is. They look like bus stops but you will notice they have no bus numbers or maps. Some are intended for short distances, e.g. towns and villages within 50 kilometers of the city, and others for longer distances, such as to the next major town or city. At these stops, there are unofficial taxis (called sharks) waiting there at most times of day that charge a fixed rate of about 6 lei (less than 2 USD) per person for a short distance, but they will only go if the car is full. If you are willing to pay for the other seats they will take you straight away. Regular cars often pick people up as well, and the advantage to this is that they will take you without demanding the car be full and you can give them a 5 lei note for about a 20k ride. However, that rate is not fixed, so some may argue a different price is appropriate.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

Romania has very few kilometers of real highway. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

=== [[Ukraine]] ===

* [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing]]

There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are private boats that may [[ferry]] travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

=== [[Moldova]] ===

* [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing‎]]


{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>at69orn8raqg0keqp332y51jgiu4xks</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44450</id>
      <parentid>44443</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-08-31T22:04:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6842">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

In Romania payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. People expect to be paid for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 1 out of 2 will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country. Getting a lift in a truck is fairly rare in Romania compared to the surrounding countries.

Many cities, such as Timișoara, have specific places where one can hitchhike from. They are interspersed around the city, so just ask someone where the nearest one is. They look like bus stops but you will notice they have no bus numbers or maps. Some are intended for short distances, e.g. towns and villages within 50 kilometers of the city, and others for longer distances, such as to the next major town or city. At these stops, there are unofficial taxis (called sharks) waiting there at most times of day that charge a fixed rate of about 6 lei (less than 2 USD) per person for a short distance, but they will only go if the car is full. If you are willing to pay for the other seats they will take you straight away. Regular cars often pick people up as well, and the advantage to this is that they will take you without demanding the car be full and you can give them a 5 lei note for about a 20k ride. However, that rate is not fixed, so some may argue a different price is appropriate.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

Romania has very few kilometers of real highway. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

With the [[Ukraine]]:
* [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing]]
* There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are private boats that may [[ferry]] travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

[[Moldova]]:
* [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing‎]]

[[Bulgaria]]:
* [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing]]


{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>coftcqsxyrzgt8gaueujsgsivndo119</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44880</id>
      <parentid>44450</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-09-15T23:24:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6843">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

In Romania payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. People expect to be paid for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 1 out of 2 will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country. Getting a lift in a truck is fairly rare in Romania compared to the surrounding countries.

Many cities, such as Timișoara, have specific places where one can hitchhike from. They are interspersed around the city, so just ask someone where the nearest one is. They look like bus stops but you will notice they have no bus numbers or maps. Some are intended for short distances, e.g. towns and villages within 50 kilometers of the city, and others for longer distances, such as to the next major town or city. At these stops, there are unofficial taxis (called sharks) waiting there at most times of day that charge a fixed rate of about 6 lei (less than 2 USD) per person for a short distance, but they will only go if the car is full. If you are willing to pay for the other seats they will take you straight away. Regular cars often pick people up as well, and the advantage to this is that they will take you without demanding the car be full and you can give them a 5 lei note for about a 20k ride. However, that rate is not fixed, so some may argue a different price is appropriate.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

Romania has very few kilometers of real motorway. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

With the [[Ukraine]]:
* [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing]]
* There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are private boats that may [[ferry]] travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

[[Moldova]]:
* [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing‎]]

[[Bulgaria]]:
* [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing]]


{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>afmrm0ianpc88rc8vp24pnmsg71lnvl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48897</id>
      <parentid>44880</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-17T13:07:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>78.47.138.23</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6861">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

In Romania payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. People expect to be paid for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 1 out of 2 will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country. Getting a lift in a truck is fairly rare in Romania compared to the surrounding countries.

Many cities, such as Timișoara, have specific places where one can hitchhike from. They are interspersed around the city, so just ask someone where the nearest one is. They look like bus stops but you will notice they have no bus numbers or maps. Some are intended for short distances, e.g. towns and villages within 50 kilometers of the city, and others for longer distances, such as to the next major town or city. At these stops, there are unofficial taxis (called sharks) waiting there at most times of day that charge a fixed rate of about 6 lei (less than 2 USD) per person for a short distance, but they will only go if the car is full. If you are willing to pay for the other seats they will take you straight away. Regular cars often pick people up as well, and the advantage to this is that they will take you without demanding the car be full and you can give them a 5 lei note for about a 20k ride. However, that rate is not fixed, so some may argue a different price is appropriate.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

Romania has very few kilometers of real motorway. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

With the [[Ukraine]]:
* [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing]]
* There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are private boats that may [[ferry]] travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

[[Moldova]]:
* [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing‎]]

[[Bulgaria]]:
* [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing]]


{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[tr:Romanya]]
[[trash:Romania]]</text>
      <sha1>6f4m87lfbnu5y1t215b91q33dwodhc3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>49788</id>
      <parentid>48897</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-02-25T14:56:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6950">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

In Romania payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. People expect to be paid for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 1 out of 2 will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country. Getting a lift in a truck is fairly rare in Romania compared to the surrounding countries.

Many cities, such as Timișoara, have specific places where one can hitchhike from. They are interspersed around the city, so just ask someone where the nearest one is. They look like bus stops but you will notice they have no bus numbers or maps. Some are intended for short distances, e.g. towns and villages within 50 kilometers of the city, and others for longer distances, such as to the next major town or city. At these stops, there are unofficial taxis (called sharks) waiting there at most times of day that charge a fixed rate of about 6 lei (less than 2 USD) per person for a short distance, but they will only go if the car is full. If you are willing to pay for the other seats they will take you straight away. Regular cars often pick people up as well, and the advantage to this is that they will take you without demanding the car be full and you can give them a 5 lei note for about a 20k ride. However, that rate is not fixed, so some may argue a different price is appropriate.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

Romania has very few kilometers of real motorway. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

With Hungary:
* [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing]]
* [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎]]

With [[Ukraine]]:
* [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing]]
* There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are private boats that may [[ferry]] travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

[[Moldova]]:
* [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing‎]]

[[Bulgaria]]:
* [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing]]


{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[tr:Romanya]]
[[trash:Romania]]</text>
      <sha1>sx4dn0ucs6ht801sfr4pri6taypxa8p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>49924</id>
      <parentid>49788</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-03-01T17:54:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7029">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

In Romania payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. People expect to be paid for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 1 out of 2 will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country. Getting a lift in a truck is fairly rare in Romania compared to the surrounding countries.

Many cities, such as Timișoara, have specific places where one can hitchhike from. They are interspersed around the city, so just ask someone where the nearest one is. They look like bus stops but you will notice they have no bus numbers or maps. Some are intended for short distances, e.g. towns and villages within 50 kilometers of the city, and others for longer distances, such as to the next major town or city. At these stops, there are unofficial taxis (called sharks) waiting there at most times of day that charge a fixed rate of about 6 lei (less than 2 USD) per person for a short distance, but they will only go if the car is full. If you are willing to pay for the other seats they will take you straight away. Regular cars often pick people up as well, and the advantage to this is that they will take you without demanding the car be full and you can give them a 5 lei note for about a 20k ride. However, that rate is not fixed, so some may argue a different price is appropriate.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

Romania has very few kilometers of real motorway. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

With Hungary:
* [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
* [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]

With [[Ukraine]]:
* [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
* There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are private boats that may [[ferry]] travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

[[Moldova]]:
* [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]

[[Bulgaria]]:
* [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]]

{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[tr:Romanya]]
[[trash:Romania]]</text>
      <sha1>dpah0v6px0rqj3j5n16zsw2ibyl8vr0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>51893</id>
      <parentid>49924</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-04-19T21:59:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7078">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

In Romania payment for the ride is often expected, although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. People expect to be paid for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, 1 out of 2 will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country. Getting a lift in a truck is fairly rare in Romania compared to the surrounding countries.

Many cities, such as Timișoara, have specific places where one can hitchhike from. They are interspersed around the city, so just ask someone where the nearest one is. They look like bus stops but you will notice they have no bus numbers or maps. Some are intended for short distances, e.g. towns and villages within 50 kilometers of the city, and others for longer distances, such as to the next major town or city. At these stops, there are unofficial taxis (called sharks) waiting there at most times of day that charge a fixed rate of about 6 lei (less than 2 USD) per person for a short distance, but they will only go if the car is full. If you are willing to pay for the other seats they will take you straight away. Regular cars often pick people up as well, and the advantage to this is that they will take you without demanding the car be full and you can give them a 5 lei note for about a 20k ride. However, that rate is not fixed, so some may argue a different price is appropriate.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

Romania has very few kilometers of real motorway. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

With [[Bulgaria]]:
* [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]]

With Hungary:
* [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
* [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]

With [[Moldova]]:
* [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]

With [[Ukraine]]:
* [[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing]]
* [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
* There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are private boats that may [[ferry]] travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.



{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[tr:Romanya]]
[[trash:Romania]]</text>
      <sha1>ad3okuetzlk9emu09qxw0lf9jvzs3zu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>54204</id>
      <parentid>51893</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-08-25T21:09:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7204">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = {{very good}}
}}
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

'''In Romania payment for the ride is often expected''', although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. Make sure you're expecting to go for free before you get into the car, otherwise you might find yourself in a ugly situation. People expect to be paid for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, some will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country. Getting a lift in a truck is fairly rare in Romania compared to the surrounding countries.

Many cities, such as Timișoara, have specific places where one can hitchhike from. They are interspersed around the city, so just ask someone where the nearest one is. They look like bus stops but you will notice they have no bus numbers or maps. Some are intended for short distances, e.g. towns and villages within 50 kilometers of the city, and others for longer distances, such as to the next major town or city. At these stops, there are unofficial taxis (called sharks) waiting there at most times of day that charge a fixed rate of about 6 lei (less than 2 USD) per person for a short distance, but they will only go if the car is full. If you are willing to pay for the other seats they will take you straight away. Regular cars often pick people up as well, and the advantage to this is that they will take you without demanding the car be full and you can give them a 5 lei note for about a 20k ride. However, that rate is not fixed, so some may argue a different price is appropriate.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

Romania has very few kilometers of real motorway. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

With [[Bulgaria]]:
* [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]]

With Hungary:
* [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
* [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]

With [[Moldova]]:
* [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]

With [[Ukraine]]:
* [[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing]]
* [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
* There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are private boats that may [[ferry]] travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.



{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[tr:Romanya]]
[[trash:Romania]]</text>
      <sha1>lexarrnm1r5nsf634bj7gwqmy4oqrgz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>54497</id>
      <parentid>54204</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-09-05T11:00:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7214">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ro' /&gt;
}}
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

'''In Romania payment for the ride is often expected''', although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. Make sure you're expecting to go for free before you get into the car, otherwise you might find yourself in a ugly situation. People expect to be paid for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, some will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country. Getting a lift in a truck is fairly rare in Romania compared to the surrounding countries.

Many cities, such as Timișoara, have specific places where one can hitchhike from. They are interspersed around the city, so just ask someone where the nearest one is. They look like bus stops but you will notice they have no bus numbers or maps. Some are intended for short distances, e.g. towns and villages within 50 kilometers of the city, and others for longer distances, such as to the next major town or city. At these stops, there are unofficial taxis (called sharks) waiting there at most times of day that charge a fixed rate of about 6 lei (less than 2 USD) per person for a short distance, but they will only go if the car is full. If you are willing to pay for the other seats they will take you straight away. Regular cars often pick people up as well, and the advantage to this is that they will take you without demanding the car be full and you can give them a 5 lei note for about a 20k ride. However, that rate is not fixed, so some may argue a different price is appropriate.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

Romania has very few kilometers of real motorway. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

With [[Bulgaria]]:
* [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]]

With Hungary:
* [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
* [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]

With [[Moldova]]:
* [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]

With [[Ukraine]]:
* [[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing]]
* [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
* There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are private boats that may [[ferry]] travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.



{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[tr:Romanya]]
[[trash:Romania]]</text>
      <sha1>sfm9bthjp6bucr5ijvehnowsy99t22k</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>55093</id>
      <parentid>54497</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-09-23T01:13:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7223">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|BW = RO
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ro' /&gt;
}}
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

'''In Romania payment for the ride is often expected''', although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. Make sure you're expecting to go for free before you get into the car, otherwise you might find yourself in a ugly situation. People expect to be paid for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, some will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country. Getting a lift in a truck is fairly rare in Romania compared to the surrounding countries.

Many cities, such as Timișoara, have specific places where one can hitchhike from. They are interspersed around the city, so just ask someone where the nearest one is. They look like bus stops but you will notice they have no bus numbers or maps. Some are intended for short distances, e.g. towns and villages within 50 kilometers of the city, and others for longer distances, such as to the next major town or city. At these stops, there are unofficial taxis (called sharks) waiting there at most times of day that charge a fixed rate of about 6 lei (less than 2 USD) per person for a short distance, but they will only go if the car is full. If you are willing to pay for the other seats they will take you straight away. Regular cars often pick people up as well, and the advantage to this is that they will take you without demanding the car be full and you can give them a 5 lei note for about a 20k ride. However, that rate is not fixed, so some may argue a different price is appropriate.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

Romania has very few kilometers of real motorway. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

With [[Bulgaria]]:
* [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]]

With Hungary:
* [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
* [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]

With [[Moldova]]:
* [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]

With [[Ukraine]]:
* [[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing]]
* [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
* There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are private boats that may [[ferry]] travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.



{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[tr:Romanya]]
[[trash:Romania]]</text>
      <sha1>0o5rb501a3jtz047ai2973jicqg2y8f</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>56169</id>
      <parentid>55093</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-08T01:19:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7282">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|BW = RO
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ro' /&gt;
}}
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

'''In Romania payment for the ride is often expected''', although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. Make sure you're expecting to go for free before you get into the car, otherwise you might find yourself in a ugly situation. People expect to be paid for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, some will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country. Getting a lift in a truck is fairly rare in Romania compared to the surrounding countries.

Many cities, such as Timișoara, have specific places where one can hitchhike from. They are interspersed around the city, so just ask someone where the nearest one is. They look like bus stops but you will notice they have no bus numbers or maps. Some are intended for short distances, e.g. towns and villages within 50 kilometers of the city, and others for longer distances, such as to the next major town or city. At these stops, there are unofficial taxis (called sharks) waiting there at most times of day that charge a fixed rate of about 6 lei (less than 2 USD) per person for a short distance, but they will only go if the car is full. If you are willing to pay for the other seats they will take you straight away. Regular cars often pick people up as well, and the advantage to this is that they will take you without demanding the car be full and you can give them a 5 lei note for about a 20k ride. However, that rate is not fixed, so some may argue a different price is appropriate.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

Romania has very few kilometers of real motorway. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Template:Phrasebook/Romanian|Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucureşti|Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

With [[Bulgaria]]:
* [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]]

With Hungary:
* [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
* [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]

With [[Moldova]]:
* [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]

With [[Ukraine]]:
* [[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing]]
* [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
* There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are private boats that may [[hitchhiking a boat|ferry]] travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.



{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Romania]]

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>k1yi6p9dg8qralgb4duanxu6b1tjohq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>62000</id>
      <parentid>56169</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-06-30T20:23:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7353">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|BW = RO
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ro' /&gt;
}}
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

'''In Romania payment for the ride is often expected''', although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. Make sure you're expecting to go for free before you get into the car, otherwise you might find yourself in a ugly situation. People expect to be paid for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, some will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country. Getting a lift in a truck is fairly rare in Romania compared to the surrounding countries.

Many cities, such as Timișoara, have specific places where one can hitchhike from. They are interspersed around the city, so just ask someone where the nearest one is. They look like bus stops but you will notice they have no bus numbers or maps. Some are intended for short distances, e.g. towns and villages within 50 kilometers of the city, and others for longer distances, such as to the next major town or city. At these stops, there are unofficial taxis (called sharks) waiting there at most times of day that charge a fixed rate of about 6 lei (less than 2 USD) per person for a short distance, but they will only go if the car is full. If you are willing to pay for the other seats they will take you straight away. Regular cars often pick people up as well, and the advantage to this is that they will take you without demanding the car be full and you can give them a 5 lei note for about a 20k ride. However, that rate is not fixed, so some may argue a different price is appropriate.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

Romania has very few kilometers of real motorway. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Template:Phrasebook/Romanian|Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucureşti|Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

* [[Bulgaria]]:
** [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]]
* [[Hungary]]
**[[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
**[[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]
*[[Moldova]]
**[[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]
*[[Serbia]]
**[[Moravița-Stamora border crossing|Moravița-Stamora]]
*[[Ukraine]]:
**[[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing|Dyakove-Halmeu]]
**[[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
**There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are private boats that may [[hitchhiking a boat|ferry]] travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.



{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
__NOTOC__
[[trash:Romania]]

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>bf7l4vgv2evqmwez4r6n2een25uok36</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>62311</id>
      <parentid>62000</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-07-13T18:09:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7355">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|BW = RO
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ro' /&gt;
}}
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

'''In Romania payment for the ride is often expected''', although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. Make sure you're expecting to go for free before you get into the car, otherwise you might find yourself in a ugly situation. People expect to be paid for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, some will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country. Getting a lift in a truck is fairly rare in Romania compared to the surrounding countries.

Many cities, such as Timișoara, have specific places where one can hitchhike from. They are interspersed around the city, so just ask someone where the nearest one is. They look like bus stops but you will notice they have no bus numbers or maps. Some are intended for short distances, e.g. towns and villages within 50 kilometers of the city, and others for longer distances, such as to the next major town or city. At these stops, there are unofficial taxis (called sharks) waiting there at most times of day that charge a fixed rate of about 6 lei (less than 2 USD) per person for a short distance, but they will only go if the car is full. If you are willing to pay for the other seats they will take you straight away. Regular cars often pick people up as well, and the advantage to this is that they will take you without demanding the car be full and you can give them a 5 lei note for about a 20k ride. However, that rate is not fixed, so some may argue a different price is appropriate.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

Romania has very few kilometers of real motorway. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Template:Phrasebook/Romanian|Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucureşti|Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

* [[Bulgaria]]:
** [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]]
* [[Hungary]]
**[[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
**[[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]
*[[Moldova]]
**[[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]
*[[Serbia]]
**[[Stamora Moravița-Vatin border crossing|Stamora Moravița-Vatin]]
*[[Ukraine]]:
**[[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing|Dyakove-Halmeu]]
**[[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
**There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are private boats that may [[hitchhiking a boat|ferry]] travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.



{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
[[trash:Romania]]

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>n6rcpzutqkvw1j41ado4pezypdh3e7d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>62316</id>
      <parentid>62311</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-07-13T18:23:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7377">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|BW = RO
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ro' /&gt;
}}
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

'''In Romania payment for the ride is often expected''', although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. Make sure you're expecting to go for free before you get into the car, otherwise you might find yourself in a ugly situation. People expect to be paid for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, some will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country. Getting a lift in a truck is fairly rare in Romania compared to the surrounding countries.

Many cities, such as Timișoara, have specific places where one can hitchhike from. They are interspersed around the city, so just ask someone where the nearest one is. They look like bus stops but you will notice they have no bus numbers or maps. Some are intended for short distances, e.g. towns and villages within 50 kilometers of the city, and others for longer distances, such as to the next major town or city. At these stops, there are unofficial taxis (called sharks) waiting there at most times of day that charge a fixed rate of about 6 lei (less than 2 USD) per person for a short distance, but they will only go if the car is full. If you are willing to pay for the other seats they will take you straight away. Regular cars often pick people up as well, and the advantage to this is that they will take you without demanding the car be full and you can give them a 5 lei note for about a 20k ride. However, that rate is not fixed, so some may argue a different price is appropriate.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

Romania has very few kilometers of real motorway. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Template:Phrasebook/Romanian|Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucureşti|Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

* [[Bulgaria]]:
** [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]]
* [[Hungary]]
**[[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
**[[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]
*[[Moldova]]
**[[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]
*[[Serbia]]
** The [[Iron Gates]]
**[[Stamora Moravița-Vatin border crossing|Stamora Moravița-Vatin]]
*[[Ukraine]]:
**[[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing|Dyakove-Halmeu]]
**[[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
**There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are private boats that may [[hitchhiking a boat|ferry]] travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.



{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
[[trash:Romania]]

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>7tw6w4oiodqpfx56eqxwi3z92myxm5e</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>64109</id>
      <parentid>62316</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-09-24T01:02:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7409">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|BW = RO
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ro' /&gt;
}}
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

'''In Romania payment for the ride is often expected''', although foreigners often aren't asked for anything. Make sure you're expecting to go for free before you get into the car, otherwise you might find yourself in a ugly situation. People expect to be paid for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, some will take you anyway. It is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a ride can sometimes be difficult, as some of the cars that pass seem tiny, ancient and packed with more people than there are seats. This is probably due to the low rate of car ownership in some areas, and the fact that hitching is still a common way for locals to travel, particularly in the country. Getting a lift in a truck is fairly rare in Romania compared to the surrounding countries.

Many cities, such as Timișoara, have specific places where one can hitchhike from. They are interspersed around the city, so just ask someone where the nearest one is. They look like bus stops but you will notice they have no bus numbers or maps. Some are intended for short distances, e.g. towns and villages within 50 kilometers of the city, and others for longer distances, such as to the next major town or city. At these stops, there are unofficial taxis (called sharks) waiting there at most times of day that charge a fixed rate of about 6 lei (less than 2 USD) per person for a short distance, but they will only go if the car is full. If you are willing to pay for the other seats they will take you straight away. Regular cars often pick people up as well, and the advantage to this is that they will take you without demanding the car be full and you can give them a 5 lei note for about a 20k ride. However, that rate is not fixed, so some may argue a different price is appropriate.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

Romania has very few kilometers of real motorway. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Template:Phrasebook/Romanian|Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucureşti|Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

* [[Bulgaria]]:
** [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]]
* [[Hungary]]
** [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
** [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]
* [[Moldova]]
** [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]
* [[Serbia]]
** The [[Iron Gates]]
** [[Stamora Moravița-Vatin border crossing|Stamora Moravița-Vatin]]
* [[Ukraine]]:
** [[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing|Dyakove-Halmeu]]
** [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
** There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are private boats that may [[hitchhiking a boat|ferry]] travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.



{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
[[trash:Romania]]

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[ru:Румыния]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>aqm20ucm3l018xj72adtse9wqqugq7z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>67846</id>
      <parentid>64109</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-12-19T20:53:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Phidias81</username>
        <id>3137</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7590">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|BW = RO
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ro' /&gt;
}}
'''Romania''' is one of the newest members of the [[European Union]], located in South-East Central Europe. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

Hitchhiking in Romania is usually very easy, despite payment for the ride is often expected, foreigners usually aren't asked for anything. Make sure you're expecting to go for free before you get into the car, otherwise you might find yourself in a ugly situation. People expect to be paid for giving a ride, but if you tell them in advance that you are unable to pay, most will take you anyway; when talking with the driver say "Fora Bani" (without money) or "Nu am bani" (I have no money"). If you'll end up paying, it is still cheaper than trains and buses though. The local currency is the Leu (pl. Lei). When hitchhiking, it's best to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go. The most common method is using the 2-letter county code for the place you want to go.

Getting a lift in a truck is much easier in Romania than in Western Europe: drivers don't care too much of the insurance, and they even pick up more people at a time despite it's illegal.

In most of the cities there are unofficial but locally known places for hitchhiking that you can ask to the people. But It might be a good idea to hitchhike a little bit further, because people stopping there are expecting to make some money. 
Many cities, such as Timișoara, have specific places where one can hitchhike from. They are interspersed around the city, so just ask someone where the nearest one is. They look like bus stops but you will notice they have no bus numbers or maps. Some are intended for short distances, e.g. towns and villages within 50 kilometers of the city, and others for longer distances, such as to the next major town or city. At these stops, there are unofficial taxis (called sharks) waiting there at most times of day that charge a fixed rate of about 6 lei (less than 2 USD) per person for a short distance, but they will only go if the car is full. If you are willing to pay for the other seats they will take you straight away. Regular cars often pick people up as well, and the advantage to this is that they will take you without demanding the car be full and you can give them a 5 lei note for about a 20k ride. However, that rate is not fixed, so some may argue a different price is appropriate.

Romania has a long established hitchhiking tradition from the communist era. Back then, few people had cars, and there was a constant fuel shortage, so sharing a ride was the best way to get from A to B.

Romania has very few kilometers of real motorway. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Template:Phrasebook/Romanian|Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucureşti|Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

* [[Bulgaria]]:
** [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]]
* [[Hungary]]
** [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
** [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]
* [[Moldova]]
** [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]
* [[Serbia]]
** The [[Iron Gates]]
** [[Stamora Moravița-Vatin border crossing|Stamora Moravița-Vatin]]
* [[Ukraine]]:
** [[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing|Dyakove-Halmeu]]
** [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
** There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are private boats that may [[hitchhiking a boat|ferry]] travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.



{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
[[trash:Romania]]

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[ru:Румыния]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>n44jsjuppvtavuqhzaa8nl64zeexxhz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69529</id>
      <parentid>67846</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-05-13T02:11:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6283">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|BW = RO
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ro' /&gt;
}}
'''Romania''' a county in southeastern Europe, a member of the [[European Union]] but not yet a member of the Schengen zone. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

Hitchhiking in Romania is usually very easy. Payment for the ride is often expected, however. Make sure to tell the driver that you are travelling without money (''fără bani'' ‘without money’ or ''nu am bani'' ‘I have no money’) before you get in the car. Most drivers will agree to take you anyway, but if you don't tell them beforehand, they can aggressively demand payment when you get out later. If you wish to pay drivers like local hitchhikers do, it is still cheaper than trains and buses though, about 5 lei (1.25€) for every 100 km. 

At the exits of most cities, there are established places to hitchhike and you may find yourself competing with local people who will pay drivers. In some cases, it is better to walk a little bit down the road and hitchhike where you can stand alone. The common practice is to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go; Romanian usually write the two-letter code of the county seat they are going to (e.g. "CJ" for Cluj).

Romania has very a couple of hundred kilometers of real motorway, in the south of the country. Elsewhere, long-distance traffic is going on national roads with E numbers. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Template:Phrasebook/Romanian|Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucureşti|Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

* [[Bulgaria]]:
** [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]]
* [[Hungary]]
** [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
** [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]
* [[Moldova]]
** [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]
* [[Serbia]]
** The [[Iron Gates]]
** [[Stamora Moravița-Vatin border crossing|Stamora Moravița-Vatin]]
* [[Ukraine]]:
** [[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing|Dyakove-Halmeu]]
** [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
** There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are privately owned boats that may takes travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
[[trash:Romania]]

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[ru:Румыния]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>e07hl0wl4k7uqepzhg1btbwpl6z7fms</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69530</id>
      <parentid>69529</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-05-13T02:12:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6335">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|BW = RO
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ro' /&gt;
}}
'''Romania''' a county in southeastern Europe, a member of the [[European Union]] but not yet a member of the Schengen zone. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

Hitchhiking in Romania is usually very easy. Payment for the ride is often expected, however. Make sure to tell the driver that you are travelling without money (''fără bani'' ‘without money’ or ''nu am bani'' ‘I have no money’) before you get in the car. Most drivers will agree to take you anyway, but if you don't tell them beforehand, they can aggressively demand payment when you get out later. If you wish to pay drivers like local hitchhikers do, it is still cheaper than trains and buses though, about 5 lei (1.25€) for every 100 km. 

At the exits of most cities, there are established places to hitchhike and you may find yourself competing with local people who will pay drivers. In some cases, it is better to walk a little bit down the road and hitchhike where you can stand alone. The common practice is to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go; Romanian usually write the two-letter code of the county seat they are going to (e.g. "CJ" for Cluj).

Romania has very a couple of hundred kilometers of real motorway, in the south of the country. Elsewhere, long-distance traffic is going on national roads with E numbers. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Template:Phrasebook/Romanian|Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucureşti|Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

* [[Bulgaria]]:
** [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]]
* [[Hungary]]
** [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
** [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]
* [[Moldova]]
** [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]
* [[Serbia]]
** The [[Iron Gates]]
** [[Stamora Moravița-Vatin border crossing|Stamora Moravița-Vatin]]
* [[Ukraine]]:
** [[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing|Dyakove-Halmeu]]
** [[Sighetu Marmației-Solotvyno border crossing]]
** [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
** There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are privately owned boats that may takes travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
[[trash:Romania]]

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[ru:Румыния]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>jkis9qgl2xq0b7cj3cc7o8pt8s2mhnw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72290</id>
      <parentid>69530</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-07T20:11:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6411">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|BW = RO
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ro' /&gt;
}}
'''Romania''' a county in southeastern Europe, a member of the [[European Union]] but not yet a member of the Schengen zone. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

Hitchhiking in Romania is usually very easy. Payment for the ride is often expected, however. Make sure to tell the driver that you are travelling without money (''fără bani'' ‘without money’ or ''nu am bani'' ‘I have no money’) before you get in the car. Most drivers will agree to take you anyway, but if you don't tell them beforehand, they can aggressively demand payment when you get out later. If you wish to pay drivers like local hitchhikers do, it is still cheaper than trains and buses though, about 5 lei (1.25€) for every 100 km. 

At the exits of most cities, there are established places to hitchhike and you may find yourself competing with local people who will pay drivers. In some cases, it is better to walk a little bit down the road and hitchhike where you can stand alone. The common practice is to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go; Romanian usually write the two-letter code of the county seat they are going to (e.g. "CJ" for Cluj).

Romania has very a couple of hundred kilometers of real motorway, in the south of the country. Elsewhere, long-distance traffic is going on national roads with E numbers. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Template:Phrasebook/Romanian|Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucureşti|Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

* [[Bulgaria]]:
** [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]], the major international route
** [[Durankulak-Vama Veche border crossing]]
* [[Hungary]]
** [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
** [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]
* [[Moldova]]
** [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]
* [[Serbia]]
** The [[Iron Gates]]
** [[Stamora Moravița-Vatin border crossing|Stamora Moravița-Vatin]]
* [[Ukraine]]:
** [[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing|Dyakove-Halmeu]]
** [[Sighetu Marmației-Solotvyno border crossing]]
** [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
** There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are privately owned boats that may takes travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
[[trash:Romania]]

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[ru:Румыния]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>jh8gulbg7dx1y0jgphbi8si72182at3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72291</id>
      <parentid>72290</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-07T20:11:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6433">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|BW = RO
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ro' /&gt;
}}
'''Romania''' a county in southeastern Europe, a member of the [[European Union]] but not yet a member of the Schengen zone. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

Hitchhiking in Romania is usually very easy. Payment for the ride is often expected, however. Make sure to tell the driver that you are travelling without money (''fără bani'' ‘without money’ or ''nu am bani'' ‘I have no money’) before you get in the car. Most drivers will agree to take you anyway, but if you don't tell them beforehand, they can aggressively demand payment when you get out later. If you wish to pay drivers like local hitchhikers do, it is still cheaper than trains and buses though, about 5 lei (1.25€) for every 100 km. 

At the exits of most cities, there are established places to hitchhike and you may find yourself competing with local people who will pay drivers. In some cases, it is better to walk a little bit down the road and hitchhike where you can stand alone. The common practice is to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go; Romanian usually write the two-letter code of the county seat they are going to (e.g. "CJ" for Cluj).

Romania has very a couple of hundred kilometers of real motorway, in the south of the country. Elsewhere, long-distance traffic is going on national roads with E numbers. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Template:Phrasebook/Romanian|Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucureşti|Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

* [[Bulgaria]]:
** [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]], the major international route
** [[Durankulak-Vama Veche border crossing|Durankulak-Vama Veche]]
* [[Hungary]]
** [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
** [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]
* [[Moldova]]
** [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]
* [[Serbia]]
** The [[Iron Gates]]
** [[Stamora Moravița-Vatin border crossing|Stamora Moravița-Vatin]]
* [[Ukraine]]:
** [[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing|Dyakove-Halmeu]]
** [[Sighetu Marmației-Solotvyno border crossing]]
** [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
** There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are privately owned boats that may takes travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
[[trash:Romania]]

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[ru:Румыния]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>l7dvp89buyw2ew1u60ef1mh26xcz7uh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72295</id>
      <parentid>72291</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-07T20:17:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6484">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|BW = RO
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ro' /&gt;
}}
'''Romania''' a county in southeastern Europe, a member of the [[European Union]] but not yet a member of the Schengen zone. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

Hitchhiking in Romania is usually very easy. Payment for the ride is often expected, however. Make sure to tell the driver that you are travelling without money (''fără bani'' ‘without money’ or ''nu am bani'' ‘I have no money’) before you get in the car. Most drivers will agree to take you anyway, but if you don't tell them beforehand, they can aggressively demand payment when you get out later. If you wish to pay drivers like local hitchhikers do, it is still cheaper than trains and buses though, about 5 lei (1.25€) for every 100 km. 

At the exits of most cities, there are established places to hitchhike and you may find yourself competing with local people who will pay drivers. In some cases, it is better to walk a little bit down the road and hitchhike where you can stand alone. The common practice is to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go; Romanian usually write the two-letter code of the county seat they are going to (e.g. "CJ" for Cluj).

Romania has very a couple of hundred kilometers of real motorway, in the south of the country. Elsewhere, long-distance traffic is going on national roads with E numbers. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Template:Phrasebook/Romanian|Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucureşti|Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

* [[Bulgaria]]:
** [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]], the major international route
** [[Calafat-Vidin border crossing|Calafat-Vidin]]
** [[Durankulak-Vama Veche border crossing|Durankulak-Vama Veche]]
* [[Hungary]]
** [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
** [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]
* [[Moldova]]
** [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]
* [[Serbia]]
** The [[Iron Gates]]
** [[Stamora Moravița-Vatin border crossing|Stamora Moravița-Vatin]]
* [[Ukraine]]:
** [[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing|Dyakove-Halmeu]]
** [[Sighetu Marmației-Solotvyno border crossing]]
** [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
** There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are privately owned boats that may takes travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
[[trash:Romania]]

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[ru:Румыния]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>sjrxvpcmi1kbm8hi0b0hvn6gkvv69de</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>74656</id>
      <parentid>72295</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-03-30T15:53:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Podz</username>
        <id>3951</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6499">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|BW = RO
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ro' /&gt;
}}
'''Romania''' a county in southeastern Europe, a member of the [[European Union]] and a member of the Schengen zone since January 1st 2014. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

Hitchhiking in Romania is usually very easy. Payment for the ride is often expected, however. Make sure to tell the driver that you are travelling without money (''fără bani'' ‘without money’ or ''nu am bani'' ‘I have no money’) before you get in the car. Most drivers will agree to take you anyway, but if you don't tell them beforehand, they can aggressively demand payment when you get out later. If you wish to pay drivers like local hitchhikers do, it is still cheaper than trains and buses though, about 5 lei (1.25€) for every 100 km. 

At the exits of most cities, there are established places to hitchhike and you may find yourself competing with local people who will pay drivers. In some cases, it is better to walk a little bit down the road and hitchhike where you can stand alone. The common practice is to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go; Romanian usually write the two-letter code of the county seat they are going to (e.g. "CJ" for Cluj).

Romania has very a couple of hundred kilometers of real motorway, in the south of the country. Elsewhere, long-distance traffic is going on national roads with E numbers. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Template:Phrasebook/Romanian|Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucureşti|Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

* [[Bulgaria]]:
** [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]], the major international route
** [[Calafat-Vidin border crossing|Calafat-Vidin]]
** [[Durankulak-Vama Veche border crossing|Durankulak-Vama Veche]]
* [[Hungary]]
** [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
** [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]
* [[Moldova]]
** [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]
* [[Serbia]]
** The [[Iron Gates]]
** [[Stamora Moravița-Vatin border crossing|Stamora Moravița-Vatin]]
* [[Ukraine]]:
** [[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing|Dyakove-Halmeu]]
** [[Sighetu Marmației-Solotvyno border crossing]]
** [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
** There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are privately owned boats that may takes travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
[[trash:Romania]]

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[ru:Румыния]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>1oag035vdmlrkju6uzp84hrnjy77lje</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>74658</id>
      <parentid>74656</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-03-31T03:30:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6484">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|BW = RO
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ro' /&gt;
}}
'''Romania''' a county in southeastern Europe, a member of the [[European Union]] but not yet a member of the Schengen zone. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

Hitchhiking in Romania is usually very easy. Payment for the ride is often expected, however. Make sure to tell the driver that you are travelling without money (''fără bani'' ‘without money’ or ''nu am bani'' ‘I have no money’) before you get in the car. Most drivers will agree to take you anyway, but if you don't tell them beforehand, they can aggressively demand payment when you get out later. If you wish to pay drivers like local hitchhikers do, it is still cheaper than trains and buses though, about 5 lei (1.25€) for every 100 km. 

At the exits of most cities, there are established places to hitchhike and you may find yourself competing with local people who will pay drivers. In some cases, it is better to walk a little bit down the road and hitchhike where you can stand alone. The common practice is to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go; Romanian usually write the two-letter code of the county seat they are going to (e.g. "CJ" for Cluj).

Romania has very a couple of hundred kilometers of real motorway, in the south of the country. Elsewhere, long-distance traffic is going on national roads with E numbers. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Template:Phrasebook/Romanian|Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucureşti|Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

* [[Bulgaria]]:
** [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]], the major international route
** [[Calafat-Vidin border crossing|Calafat-Vidin]]
** [[Durankulak-Vama Veche border crossing|Durankulak-Vama Veche]]
* [[Hungary]]
** [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
** [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]
* [[Moldova]]
** [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]
* [[Serbia]]
** The [[Iron Gates]]
** [[Stamora Moravița-Vatin border crossing|Stamora Moravița-Vatin]]
* [[Ukraine]]:
** [[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing|Dyakove-Halmeu]]
** [[Sighetu Marmației-Solotvyno border crossing]]
** [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
** There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are privately owned boats that may takes travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
[[trash:Romania]]

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[ru:Румыния]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>sjrxvpcmi1kbm8hi0b0hvn6gkvv69de</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77097</id>
      <parentid>74658</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-09-15T09:14:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mrkvon</username>
        <id>19594</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6485">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|BW = RO
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ro' /&gt;
}}
'''Romania''' a country in southeastern Europe, a member of the [[European Union]] but not yet a member of the Schengen zone. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

Hitchhiking in Romania is usually very easy. Payment for the ride is often expected, however. Make sure to tell the driver that you are travelling without money (''fără bani'' ‘without money’ or ''nu am bani'' ‘I have no money’) before you get in the car. Most drivers will agree to take you anyway, but if you don't tell them beforehand, they can aggressively demand payment when you get out later. If you wish to pay drivers like local hitchhikers do, it is still cheaper than trains and buses though, about 5 lei (1.25€) for every 100 km. 

At the exits of most cities, there are established places to hitchhike and you may find yourself competing with local people who will pay drivers. In some cases, it is better to walk a little bit down the road and hitchhike where you can stand alone. The common practice is to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go; Romanian usually write the two-letter code of the county seat they are going to (e.g. "CJ" for Cluj).

Romania has very a couple of hundred kilometers of real motorway, in the south of the country. Elsewhere, long-distance traffic is going on national roads with E numbers. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Template:Phrasebook/Romanian|Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucureşti|Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

* [[Bulgaria]]:
** [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]], the major international route
** [[Calafat-Vidin border crossing|Calafat-Vidin]]
** [[Durankulak-Vama Veche border crossing|Durankulak-Vama Veche]]
* [[Hungary]]
** [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
** [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]
* [[Moldova]]
** [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]
* [[Serbia]]
** The [[Iron Gates]]
** [[Stamora Moravița-Vatin border crossing|Stamora Moravița-Vatin]]
* [[Ukraine]]:
** [[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing|Dyakove-Halmeu]]
** [[Sighetu Marmației-Solotvyno border crossing]]
** [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
** There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are privately owned boats that may takes travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
[[trash:Romania]]

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[ru:Румыния]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>ch2vpj4am0umrhl5w1mluij8uvkqrts</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79729</id>
      <parentid>77097</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-06-21T11:35:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Danitarrino</username>
        <id>23545</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6979">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|BW = RO
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ro' /&gt;
}}
'''Romania''' a country in southeastern Europe, a member of the [[European Union]] but not yet a member of the Schengen zone. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

Hitchhiking in Romania is usually very easy. Payment for the ride is often expected, however. Make sure to tell the driver that you are travelling without money (''fără bani'' ‘without money’ or ''nu am bani'' ‘I have no money’) before you get in the car. Most drivers will agree to take you anyway, but if you don't tell them beforehand, they can aggressively demand payment when you get out later. If you wish to pay drivers like local hitchhikers do, it is still cheaper than trains and buses though, about 5 lei (1.25€) for every 100 km.

Sometimes it's possible to find some drivers that will ask you for a lot of money, maybe even 100€ for a short trip. Some people is trying to work as illegal drivers taking people from one place to another, due to the high unemployment. When they see foreings they will try to convince them to go with them and ask for lots of money, even if local travellers have just paid 5 lei. Recently, Romanian goverment has forbiden asking for money when taking hitchhikers, but not hitchhikng itself.

At the exits of most cities, there are established places to hitchhike and you may find yourself competing with local people who will pay drivers. In some cases, it is better to walk a little bit down the road and hitchhike where you can stand alone. The common practice is to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go; Romanian usually write the two-letter code of the county seat they are going to (e.g. "CJ" for Cluj).

Romania has very a couple of hundred kilometers of real motorway, in the south of the country. Elsewhere, long-distance traffic is going on national roads with E numbers. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Template:Phrasebook/Romanian|Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucureşti|Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

* [[Bulgaria]]:
** [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]], the major international route
** [[Calafat-Vidin border crossing|Calafat-Vidin]]
** [[Durankulak-Vama Veche border crossing|Durankulak-Vama Veche]]
* [[Hungary]]
** [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
** [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]
* [[Moldova]]
** [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]
* [[Serbia]]
** The [[Iron Gates]]
** [[Stamora Moravița-Vatin border crossing|Stamora Moravița-Vatin]]
* [[Ukraine]]:
** [[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing|Dyakove-Halmeu]]
** [[Sighetu Marmației-Solotvyno border crossing]]
** [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
** There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are privately owned boats that may takes travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
[[trash:Romania]]

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[ru:Румыния]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>d0d9c16d1sc8x23spzki41u9i5mqmaf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>81190</id>
      <parentid>79729</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-10-13T14:07:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Henridv</username>
        <id>24524</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6987">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|BW = RO
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ro' /&gt;
}}
'''Romania''' a country in southeastern Europe, a member of the [[European Union]] but not yet a member of the Schengen zone. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

Hitchhiking in Romania is usually very easy. Payment for the ride is often expected, however. Make sure to tell the driver that you are travelling without money (''fără bani'' ‘without money’ or ''nu am bani'' ‘I have no money’) before you get in the car. Most drivers will agree to take you anyway, but if you don't tell them beforehand, they can aggressively demand payment when you get out later. If you wish to pay drivers like local hitchhikers do, it is still cheaper than trains and buses though, about 5 lei (1.25€) for every 100 km.

Sometimes it's possible to find some drivers that will ask you for a lot of money, maybe even 100€ for a short trip. Some people are trying to work as illegal drivers taking people from one place to another, due to the high unemployment. When they see foreings they will try to convince them to go with them and ask for lots of money, even if local travellers have just paid 5 lei. Recently, the Romanian government has forbidden asking for money when taking hitchhikers, but not hitchhiking itself.

At the exits of most cities, there are established places to hitchhike and you may find yourself competing with local people who will pay drivers. In some cases, it is better to walk a little bit down the road and hitchhike where you can stand alone. The common practice is to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go; Romanian usually write the two-letter code of the county seat they are going to (e.g. "CJ" for Cluj).

Romania has very a couple of hundred kilometers of real motorway, in the south of the country. Elsewhere, long-distance traffic is going on national roads with E numbers. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Template:Phrasebook/Romanian|Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucureşti|Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

* [[Bulgaria]]:
** [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]], the major international route
** [[Calafat-Vidin border crossing|Calafat-Vidin]]
** [[Durankulak-Vama Veche border crossing|Durankulak-Vama Veche]]
* [[Hungary]]
** [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
** [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]
* [[Moldova]]
** [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]
* [[Serbia]]
** The [[Iron Gates]]
** [[Stamora Moravița-Vatin border crossing|Stamora Moravița-Vatin]]
* [[Ukraine]]:
** [[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing|Dyakove-Halmeu]]
** [[Sighetu Marmației-Solotvyno border crossing]]
** [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
** There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are privately owned boats that may takes travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
[[trash:Romania]]

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[ru:Румыния]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>56lb9mo418dwqlnzziep6th5jcu4q9n</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>84218</id>
      <parentid>81190</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-08-16T23:30:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>BMartin20</username>
        <id>26469</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7137">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|BW = RO
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ro' /&gt;
}}
'''Romania''' a country in southeastern Europe, a member of the [[European Union]] but not yet a member of the Schengen zone. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

Hitchhiking in Romania is usually very easy. Payment for the ride is often expected, however. Make sure to tell the driver that you are travelling without money (''fără bani'' ‘without money’ or ''nu am bani'' ‘I have no money’) before you get in the car. Most drivers will agree to take you anyway, but if you don't tell them beforehand, they can aggressively demand payment when you get out later. If you wish to pay drivers like local hitchhikers do, it is still cheaper than trains and buses though, about 5 lei (1.25€) for every 100 km.

Sometimes it's possible to find some drivers that will ask you for a lot of money, maybe even 100€ for a short trip. Some people are trying to work as illegal drivers taking people from one place to another, due to the high unemployment. When they see foreings they will try to convince them to go with them and ask for lots of money, even if local travellers have just paid 5 lei. Recently, the Romanian government has forbidden asking for money when taking hitchhikers, but not hitchhiking itself.

At the exits of most cities, there are established places to hitchhike and you may find yourself competing with local people who will pay drivers. In some cases, it is better to walk a little bit down the road and hitchhike where you can stand alone. The common practice is to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go; Romanian usually write the two-letter code of the county seat they are going to (e.g. "CJ" for Cluj).

Romania has very a couple of hundred kilometers of real motorway, in the south of the country. Elsewhere, long-distance traffic is going on national roads with E numbers. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Template:Phrasebook/Romanian|Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania 
A 1 parts 2016 situation Sibiu Deva ready 
                                      Traian Vuia ,Lugoj,Timisoara,Arad,Nadlac to Szeged (Hungary) ready 
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucureşti|Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

* [[Bulgaria]]:
** [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]], the major international route
** [[Calafat-Vidin border crossing|Calafat-Vidin]]
** [[Durankulak-Vama Veche border crossing|Durankulak-Vama Veche]]
* [[Hungary]]
** [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
** [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]
* [[Moldova]]
** [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]
* [[Serbia]]
** The [[Iron Gates]]
** [[Stamora Moravița-Vatin border crossing|Stamora Moravița-Vatin]]
* [[Ukraine]]:
** [[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing|Dyakove-Halmeu]]
** [[Sighetu Marmației-Solotvyno border crossing]]
** [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
** There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are privately owned boats that may takes travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
[[trash:Romania]]

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[ru:Румыния]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>q3q2bi6c2qky81mzndv6cd1ewy5kjnm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>84219</id>
      <parentid>84218</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-08-16T23:31:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>BMartin20</username>
        <id>26469</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7100">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|BW = RO
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ro' /&gt;
}}
'''Romania''' a country in southeastern Europe, a member of the [[European Union]] but not yet a member of the Schengen zone. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

Hitchhiking in Romania is usually very easy. Payment for the ride is often expected, however. Make sure to tell the driver that you are travelling without money (''fără bani'' ‘without money’ or ''nu am bani'' ‘I have no money’) before you get in the car. Most drivers will agree to take you anyway, but if you don't tell them beforehand, they can aggressively demand payment when you get out later. If you wish to pay drivers like local hitchhikers do, it is still cheaper than trains and buses though, about 5 lei (1.25€) for every 100 km.

Sometimes it's possible to find some drivers that will ask you for a lot of money, maybe even 100€ for a short trip. Some people are trying to work as illegal drivers taking people from one place to another, due to the high unemployment. When they see foreings they will try to convince them to go with them and ask for lots of money, even if local travellers have just paid 5 lei. Recently, the Romanian government has forbidden asking for money when taking hitchhikers, but not hitchhiking itself.

At the exits of most cities, there are established places to hitchhike and you may find yourself competing with local people who will pay drivers. In some cases, it is better to walk a little bit down the road and hitchhike where you can stand alone. The common practice is to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go; Romanian usually write the two-letter code of the county seat they are going to (e.g. "CJ" for Cluj).

Romania has very a couple of hundred kilometers of real motorway, in the south of the country. Elsewhere, long-distance traffic is going on national roads with E numbers. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Template:Phrasebook/Romanian|Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania 
A 1 parts 2016 situation Sibiu Deva ready 
 Traian Vuia ,Lugoj,Timisoara,Arad,Nadlac to Szeged (Hungary) ready 
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucureşti|Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

* [[Bulgaria]]:
** [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]], the major international route
** [[Calafat-Vidin border crossing|Calafat-Vidin]]
** [[Durankulak-Vama Veche border crossing|Durankulak-Vama Veche]]
* [[Hungary]]
** [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
** [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]
* [[Moldova]]
** [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]
* [[Serbia]]
** The [[Iron Gates]]
** [[Stamora Moravița-Vatin border crossing|Stamora Moravița-Vatin]]
* [[Ukraine]]:
** [[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing|Dyakove-Halmeu]]
** [[Sighetu Marmației-Solotvyno border crossing]]
** [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
** There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are privately owned boats that may takes travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
[[trash:Romania]]

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[ru:Румыния]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>f4c61gfvuredyxj7i9gpkn0rwb1q077</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>84220</id>
      <parentid>84219</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-08-16T23:32:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>BMartin20</username>
        <id>26469</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7104">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|BW = RO
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ro' /&gt;
}}
'''Romania''' a country in southeastern Europe, a member of the [[European Union]] but not yet a member of the Schengen zone. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

Hitchhiking in Romania is usually very easy. Payment for the ride is often expected, however. Make sure to tell the driver that you are travelling without money (''fără bani'' ‘without money’ or ''nu am bani'' ‘I have no money’) before you get in the car. Most drivers will agree to take you anyway, but if you don't tell them beforehand, they can aggressively demand payment when you get out later. If you wish to pay drivers like local hitchhikers do, it is still cheaper than trains and buses though, about 5 lei (1.25€) for every 100 km.

Sometimes it's possible to find some drivers that will ask you for a lot of money, maybe even 100€ for a short trip. Some people are trying to work as illegal drivers taking people from one place to another, due to the high unemployment. When they see foreings they will try to convince them to go with them and ask for lots of money, even if local travellers have just paid 5 lei. Recently, the Romanian government has forbidden asking for money when taking hitchhikers, but not hitchhiking itself.

At the exits of most cities, there are established places to hitchhike and you may find yourself competing with local people who will pay drivers. In some cases, it is better to walk a little bit down the road and hitchhike where you can stand alone. The common practice is to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go; Romanian usually write the two-letter code of the county seat they are going to (e.g. "CJ" for Cluj).

Romania has very a couple of hundred kilometers of real motorway, in the south of the country. Elsewhere, long-distance traffic is going on national roads with E numbers. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Template:Phrasebook/Romanian|Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania 
A 1 parts 2016 situation Sibiu to Deva ready /Traian Vuia ,Lugoj,Timisoara,Arad,Nadlac to Szeged (Hungary) ready 
 
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucureşti|Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

* [[Bulgaria]]:
** [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]], the major international route
** [[Calafat-Vidin border crossing|Calafat-Vidin]]
** [[Durankulak-Vama Veche border crossing|Durankulak-Vama Veche]]
* [[Hungary]]
** [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
** [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]
* [[Moldova]]
** [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]
* [[Serbia]]
** The [[Iron Gates]]
** [[Stamora Moravița-Vatin border crossing|Stamora Moravița-Vatin]]
* [[Ukraine]]:
** [[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing|Dyakove-Halmeu]]
** [[Sighetu Marmației-Solotvyno border crossing]]
** [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
** There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are privately owned boats that may takes travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
[[trash:Romania]]

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[ru:Румыния]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>b2cw2a1bek96ifsoikgum54663igfu1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>84221</id>
      <parentid>84220</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-08-16T23:42:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>BMartin20</username>
        <id>26469</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7119">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|BW = RO
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ro' /&gt;
}}
'''Romania''' a country in southeastern Europe, a member of the [[European Union]] but not yet a member of the Schengen zone. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

Hitchhiking in Romania is usually very easy. Payment for the ride is often expected, however. Make sure to tell the driver that you are travelling without money (''fără bani'' ‘without money’ or ''nu am bani'' ‘I have no money’) before you get in the car. Most drivers will agree to take you anyway, but if you don't tell them beforehand, they can aggressively demand payment when you get out later. If you wish to pay drivers like local hitchhikers do, it is still cheaper than trains and buses though, about 5 lei (1.25€) for every 100 km.

Sometimes it's possible to find some drivers that will ask you for a lot of money, maybe even 100€ for a short trip. Some people are trying to work as illegal drivers taking people from one place to another, due to the high unemployment. When they see foreings they will try to convince them to go with them and ask for lots of money, even if local travellers have just paid 5 lei. Recently, the Romanian government has forbidden asking for money when taking hitchhikers, but not hitchhiking itself.

At the exits of most cities, there are established places to hitchhike and you may find yourself competing with local people who will pay drivers. In some cases, it is better to walk a little bit down the road and hitchhike where you can stand alone. The common practice is to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go; Romanian usually write the two-letter code of the county seat they are going to (e.g. "CJ" for Cluj).

Romania has very a couple of hundred kilometers of real motorway, in the south of the country. Elsewhere, long-distance traffic is going on national roads with E numbers. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Template:Phrasebook/Romanian|Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania 
A 1 parts 2016 situation Sibiu to Deva 140km ready /Traian Vuia ,Lugoj,Timisoara,Arad,Nadlac to Szeged (Hungary) +/-170km ready 
 
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucureşti|Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

* [[Bulgaria]]:
** [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]], the major international route
** [[Calafat-Vidin border crossing|Calafat-Vidin]]
** [[Durankulak-Vama Veche border crossing|Durankulak-Vama Veche]]
* [[Hungary]]
** [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
** [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]
* [[Moldova]]
** [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]
* [[Serbia]]
** The [[Iron Gates]]
** [[Stamora Moravița-Vatin border crossing|Stamora Moravița-Vatin]]
* [[Ukraine]]:
** [[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing|Dyakove-Halmeu]]
** [[Sighetu Marmației-Solotvyno border crossing]]
** [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
** There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are privately owned boats that may takes travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
[[trash:Romania]]

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[ru:Румыния]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>3i43t4istslm6ab80wksnuzc9tu8ldl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>84222</id>
      <parentid>84221</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-08-16T23:51:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>BMartin20</username>
        <id>26469</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7209">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|BW = RO
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ro' /&gt;
}}
'''Romania''' a country in southeastern Europe, a member of the [[European Union]] but not yet a member of the Schengen zone. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

Hitchhiking in Romania is usually very easy. Payment for the ride is often expected, however. Make sure to tell the driver that you are travelling without money (''fără bani'' ‘without money’ or ''nu am bani'' ‘I have no money’) before you get in the car. Most drivers will agree to take you anyway, but if you don't tell them beforehand, they can aggressively demand payment when you get out later. If you wish to pay drivers like local hitchhikers do, it is still cheaper than trains and buses though, about 5 lei (1.25€) for every 100 km.

Sometimes it's possible to find some drivers that will ask you for a lot of money, maybe even 100€ for a short trip. Some people are trying to work as illegal drivers taking people from one place to another, due to the high unemployment. When they see foreings they will try to convince them to go with them and ask for lots of money, even if local travellers have just paid 5 lei. Recently, the Romanian government has forbidden asking for money when taking hitchhikers, but not hitchhiking itself.

At the exits of most cities, there are established places to hitchhike and you may find yourself competing with local people who will pay drivers. In some cases, it is better to walk a little bit down the road and hitchhike where you can stand alone. The common practice is to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go; Romanian usually write the two-letter code of the county seat they are going to (e.g. "CJ" for Cluj).

Romania has very a couple of hundred kilometers of real motorway, in the south of the country. Elsewhere, long-distance traffic is going on national roads with E numbers. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Template:Phrasebook/Romanian|Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania 
A 1 parts 2016 situation : Sibiu to Deva 140km ready /Traian Vuia ,Lugoj,Timisoara,Arad,Nadlac to Szeged (Hungary) +/-170km ready 
 
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
A3  parts 2016 situation [[Bucuresti]] to[[Ploiesti]] 60km in use Turda to Gilau in use
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucureşti|Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

* [[Bulgaria]]:
** [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]], the major international route
** [[Calafat-Vidin border crossing|Calafat-Vidin]]
** [[Durankulak-Vama Veche border crossing|Durankulak-Vama Veche]]
* [[Hungary]]
** [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
** [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]
* [[Moldova]]
** [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]
* [[Serbia]]
** The [[Iron Gates]]
** [[Stamora Moravița-Vatin border crossing|Stamora Moravița-Vatin]]
* [[Ukraine]]:
** [[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing|Dyakove-Halmeu]]
** [[Sighetu Marmației-Solotvyno border crossing]]
** [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
** There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are privately owned boats that may takes travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
[[trash:Romania]]

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[ru:Румыния]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>qj9a5amy43zinww7v8h27l7gxpc5txx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>84223</id>
      <parentid>84222</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-08-16T23:52:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>BMartin20</username>
        <id>26469</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7212">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|BW = RO
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ro' /&gt;
}}
'''Romania''' a country in southeastern Europe, a member of the [[European Union]] but not yet a member of the Schengen zone. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

Hitchhiking in Romania is usually very easy. Payment for the ride is often expected, however. Make sure to tell the driver that you are travelling without money (''fără bani'' ‘without money’ or ''nu am bani'' ‘I have no money’) before you get in the car. Most drivers will agree to take you anyway, but if you don't tell them beforehand, they can aggressively demand payment when you get out later. If you wish to pay drivers like local hitchhikers do, it is still cheaper than trains and buses though, about 5 lei (1.25€) for every 100 km.

Sometimes it's possible to find some drivers that will ask you for a lot of money, maybe even 100€ for a short trip. Some people are trying to work as illegal drivers taking people from one place to another, due to the high unemployment. When they see foreings they will try to convince them to go with them and ask for lots of money, even if local travellers have just paid 5 lei. Recently, the Romanian government has forbidden asking for money when taking hitchhikers, but not hitchhiking itself.

At the exits of most cities, there are established places to hitchhike and you may find yourself competing with local people who will pay drivers. In some cases, it is better to walk a little bit down the road and hitchhike where you can stand alone. The common practice is to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go; Romanian usually write the two-letter code of the county seat they are going to (e.g. "CJ" for Cluj).

Romania has very a couple of hundred kilometers of real motorway, in the south of the country. Elsewhere, long-distance traffic is going on national roads with E numbers. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Template:Phrasebook/Romanian|Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania 
A 1 parts 2016 situation : Sibiu to Deva 140km ready /Traian Vuia ,Lugoj,Timisoara,Arad,Nadlac to Szeged (Hungary) +/-170km ready 
 
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] – only 75 % completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
A3  parts 2016 situation [[Bucuresti]] to [[Ploiesti]] 60km in use ,Turda to Gilau in use.
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucureşti|Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

* [[Bulgaria]]:
** [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]], the major international route
** [[Calafat-Vidin border crossing|Calafat-Vidin]]
** [[Durankulak-Vama Veche border crossing|Durankulak-Vama Veche]]
* [[Hungary]]
** [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
** [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]
* [[Moldova]]
** [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]
* [[Serbia]]
** The [[Iron Gates]]
** [[Stamora Moravița-Vatin border crossing|Stamora Moravița-Vatin]]
* [[Ukraine]]:
** [[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing|Dyakove-Halmeu]]
** [[Sighetu Marmației-Solotvyno border crossing]]
** [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
** There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are privately owned boats that may takes travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
[[trash:Romania]]

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[ru:Румыния]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>t782djkg72m9u1pu1ysie1qn8o1sd1a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>84225</id>
      <parentid>84223</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-08-17T00:09:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>BMartin20</username>
        <id>26469</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7199">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|BW = RO
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ro' /&gt;
}}
'''Romania''' a country in southeastern Europe, a member of the [[European Union]] but not yet a member of the Schengen zone. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

Hitchhiking in Romania is usually very easy. Payment for the ride is often expected, however. Make sure to tell the driver that you are travelling without money (''fără bani'' ‘without money’ or ''nu am bani'' ‘I have no money’) before you get in the car. Most drivers will agree to take you anyway, but if you don't tell them beforehand, they can aggressively demand payment when you get out later. If you wish to pay drivers like local hitchhikers do, it is still cheaper than trains and buses though, about 5 lei (1.25€) for every 100 km.

Sometimes it's possible to find some drivers that will ask you for a lot of money, maybe even 100€ for a short trip. Some people are trying to work as illegal drivers taking people from one place to another, due to the high unemployment. When they see foreings they will try to convince them to go with them and ask for lots of money, even if local travellers have just paid 5 lei. Recently, the Romanian government has forbidden asking for money when taking hitchhikers, but not hitchhiking itself.

At the exits of most cities, there are established places to hitchhike and you may find yourself competing with local people who will pay drivers. In some cases, it is better to walk a little bit down the road and hitchhike where you can stand alone. The common practice is to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go; Romanian usually write the two-letter code of the county seat they are going to (e.g. "CJ" for Cluj).

Romania has very a couple of hundred kilometers of real motorway, in the south of the country. Elsewhere, long-distance traffic is going on national roads with E numbers. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Template:Phrasebook/Romanian|Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania 
A 1 parts 2016 situation : Sibiu to Deva 140km ready /Traian Vuia ,Lugoj,Timisoara,Arad,Nadlac to Szeged (Hungary) +/-170km ready 
 
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]]  completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
A3  parts 2016 situation [[Bucuresti]] to [[Ploiesti]] 60km in use ,Turda to Gilau in use.
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucureşti|Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

* [[Bulgaria]]:
** [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]], the major international route
** [[Calafat-Vidin border crossing|Calafat-Vidin]]
** [[Durankulak-Vama Veche border crossing|Durankulak-Vama Veche]]
* [[Hungary]]
** [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
** [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]
* [[Moldova]]
** [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]
* [[Serbia]]
** The [[Iron Gates]]
** [[Stamora Moravița-Vatin border crossing|Stamora Moravița-Vatin]]
* [[Ukraine]]:
** [[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing|Dyakove-Halmeu]]
** [[Sighetu Marmației-Solotvyno border crossing]]
** [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
** There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are privately owned boats that may takes travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
[[trash:Romania]]

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[ru:Румыния]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>btxm8vy17bv199kxozzjxbsn3veon16</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>85216</id>
      <parentid>84225</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-01-08T20:38:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>HoboSpirit</username>
        <id>21833</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8508">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|BW = RO
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ro' /&gt;
}}
'''Romania''' a country in southeastern Europe, a member of the [[European Union]] but not yet a member of the Schengen zone. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

Hitchhiking in Romania is usually very easy. Payment for the ride is often expected, however. Make sure to tell the driver that you are travelling without money (''fără bani'' ‘without money’ or ''nu am bani'' ‘I have no money’) before you get in the car. Most drivers will agree to take you anyway, but if you don't tell them beforehand, they can aggressively demand payment when you get out later. If you wish to pay drivers like local hitchhikers do, it is still cheaper than trains and buses though, about 5 lei (1.25€) for every 100 km.

Sometimes it's possible to find some drivers that will ask you for a lot of money, maybe even 100€ for a short trip. Some people are trying to work as illegal drivers taking people from one place to another, due to the high unemployment. When they see foreings they will try to convince them to go with them and ask for lots of money, even if local travellers have just paid 5 lei. Recently, the Romanian government has forbidden asking for money when taking hitchhikers, but not hitchhiking itself.

At the exits of most cities, there are established places to hitchhike and you may find yourself competing with local people who will pay drivers. In some cases, it is better to walk a little bit down the road and hitchhike where you can stand alone. The common practice is to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go; Romanian usually write the two-letter code of the county seat they are going to (e.g. "CJ" for Cluj).

Romania has very a couple of hundred kilometers of real motorway, in the south of the country. Elsewhere, long-distance traffic is going on national roads with E numbers. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Template:Phrasebook/Romanian|Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania 
A 1 parts 2016 situation : Sibiu to Deva 140km ready /Traian Vuia ,Lugoj,Timisoara,Arad,Nadlac to Szeged (Hungary) +/-170km ready 
 
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]]  completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
A3  parts 2016 situation [[Bucuresti]] to [[Ploiesti]] 60km in use ,Turda to Gilau in use.
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucureşti|Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

* [[Bulgaria]]:
** [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]], the major international route
** [[Calafat-Vidin border crossing|Calafat-Vidin]]
** [[Durankulak-Vama Veche border crossing|Durankulak-Vama Veche]]
* [[Hungary]]
** [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
** [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]
* [[Moldova]]
** [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]
* [[Serbia]]
** The [[Iron Gates]]
** [[Stamora Moravița-Vatin border crossing|Stamora Moravița-Vatin]]
* [[Ukraine]]:
** [[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing|Dyakove-Halmeu]]
** [[Sighetu Marmației-Solotvyno border crossing]]
** [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
** There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are privately owned boats that may takes travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In total I spent around three months in Romania. I hitchhiked from Bucharest to Timisoara, Brasov and Iasi and also spent a few weeks camping in Transylvania. I hitchhiked to many landmarks such as Dracula's Castle, Rasnov Castle and the National Park in Zarnesti. Romanian people are incredibly friendly and happy to see travelers. I never found safety to be a problem and camped out at night in the national park in special spherical huts built for shepherds (I think they are for protection from bears). There are maps of the park which indicate the location of these huts and the best trails. Romania was the first country where I traveled for more than two days with the one truck driver. You should be ok to get around speaking English although if you have Italian that's a huge bonus and maybe learn a few basic Romanian words to be polite with any elderly farmers who pick you up in the country (Hungarian instead in many parts of Transylvania). Some drivers are quite lethal here too, so be prepared to take bends while overtaking gypsy carts at worrying speeds! Twice I was asked to contribute to the gas expenditure (out of maybe 30 lifts). This country can't be skipped on a Europe trip if you like sheeps cheese, nature and castles'' -[[User:HoboSpirit|HoboSpirit]]

{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
[[trash:Romania]]

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[ru:Румыния]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>9t7hevco3a8dvmwj95il0ojjlq1iqhl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>85217</id>
      <parentid>85216</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-01-08T21:07:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>HoboSpirit</username>
        <id>21833</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8697">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|BW = RO
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ro' /&gt;
}}
'''Romania''' a country in southeastern Europe, a member of the [[European Union]] but not yet a member of the Schengen zone. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

Hitchhiking in Romania is usually very easy. Payment for the ride is often expected, however. Make sure to tell the driver that you are travelling without money (''fără bani'' ‘without money’ or ''nu am bani'' ‘I have no money’) before you get in the car. Most drivers will agree to take you anyway, but if you don't tell them beforehand, they can aggressively demand payment when you get out later. If you wish to pay drivers like local hitchhikers do, it is still cheaper than trains and buses though, about 5 lei (1.25€) for every 100 km.

Sometimes it's possible to find some drivers that will ask you for a lot of money, maybe even 100€ for a short trip. Some people are trying to work as illegal drivers taking people from one place to another, due to the high unemployment. When they see foreings they will try to convince them to go with them and ask for lots of money, even if local travellers have just paid 5 lei. Recently, the Romanian government has forbidden asking for money when taking hitchhikers, but not hitchhiking itself.

At the exits of most cities, there are established places to hitchhike and you may find yourself competing with local people who will pay drivers. In some cases, it is better to walk a little bit down the road and hitchhike where you can stand alone. The common practice is to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go; Romanian usually write the two-letter code of the county seat they are going to (e.g. "CJ" for Cluj).

Romania has very a couple of hundred kilometers of real motorway, in the south of the country. Elsewhere, long-distance traffic is going on national roads with E numbers. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to pronounce and understand Romanian.

* [[Template:Phrasebook/Romanian|Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania 
A 1 parts 2016 situation : Sibiu to Deva 140km ready /Traian Vuia ,Lugoj,Timisoara,Arad,Nadlac to Szeged (Hungary) +/-170km ready 
 
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]]  completed
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013
A3  parts 2016 situation [[Bucuresti]] to [[Ploiesti]] 60km in use ,Turda to Gilau in use.
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucureşti|Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

* [[Bulgaria]]:
** [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]], the major international route
** [[Calafat-Vidin border crossing|Calafat-Vidin]]
** [[Durankulak-Vama Veche border crossing|Durankulak-Vama Veche]]
* [[Hungary]]
** [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
** [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]
* [[Moldova]]
** [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]
* [[Serbia]]
** The [[Iron Gates]]
** [[Stamora Moravița-Vatin border crossing|Stamora Moravița-Vatin]]
* [[Ukraine]]:
** [[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing|Dyakove-Halmeu]]
** [[Sighetu Marmației-Solotvyno border crossing]]
** [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
** There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are privately owned boats that may takes travelers, but they ask into the hundreds of euro for the service.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In total I spent around three months in Romania. I hitchhiked from Bucharest to Timisoara, Brasov and Iasi and also spent a few weeks camping in Transylvania. I hitchhiked to many landmarks such as Dracula's Castle, Rasnov Castle and the National Park in Zarnesti. Romanian people are incredibly friendly and happy to see travelers. I never found safety to be a problem and camped out at night in the national park in special spherical huts built for shepherds (I think they are for protection from bears). There are maps of the park which indicate the location of these huts and the best trails. Romania was the first country where I traveled for more than two days with the one truck driver. You should be ok to get around speaking English although if you have Italian that's a huge bonus and maybe learn a few basic Romanian words to be polite with any elderly farmers who pick you up in the country (Hungarian instead in many parts of Transylvania). Some drivers are quite lethal here too, so be prepared to take bends while overtaking gypsy carts at worrying speeds! Twice I was asked to contribute to the gas expenditure (out of maybe 30 lifts). I found hitchhiking at the side of the road with thumb out to be more time effective than petrol stations, many towns have hitchhiking spots where locals can be seen with their thumbs out. This country can't be skipped on a Europe trip if you like sheeps cheese, nature and castles'' -[[User:HoboSpirit|HoboSpirit]]

{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
[[trash:Romania]]

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[ru:Румыния]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>kmez0q76951bnw7w7fz7i9p3j8i6ihw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>97377</id>
      <parentid>85217</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-02-17T21:09:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Hippietrail</username>
        <id>2459</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>move currency sign € to the left of the amount as is standard in English; other spelling and english fixes</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8802">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|BW = RO
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ro' /&gt;
}}
'''Romania''' a country in southeastern Europe, a member of the [[European Union]] but not yet a member of the Schengen zone. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

Hitchhiking in Romania is usually very easy. Payment for the ride is often expected, however. Make sure to tell the driver that you are travelling without money (''fără bani'' ‘without money’ or ''nu am bani'' ‘I have no money’) before you get in the car. Most drivers will agree to take you anyway, but if you don't tell them beforehand, they can aggressively demand payment when you get out later. If you wish to pay drivers like local hitchhikers do, it is still cheaper than trains and buses though, about 5 lei (€1.25) for every 100 km.

Sometimes it's possible to find some drivers that will ask you for a lot of money, maybe even €100 for a short trip. Some people are trying to work as illegal drivers taking people from one place to another, due to the high unemployment. When they see foreigners they will try to convince them to go with them and ask for lots of money, even if local travellers just pay 5 lei. Recently, the Romanian government has forbidden asking for money when taking hitchhikers, but not hitchhiking itself.

At the exits of most cities, there are established places to hitchhike and you may find yourself competing with local people who will pay drivers. In some cases, it is better to walk a little bit down the road and hitchhike where you can stand alone. The common practice is to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go; Romanian usually write the two-letter code of the county seat they are going to (e.g. "CJ" for Cluj).

Romania has just a couple of hundred kilometers of real motorway, in the south of the country. Elsewhere, long-distance traffic is going on national roads with E numbers. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to understand Romanian though speakers of Slavic languages will find it easier to pronounce as its sounds have been influenced by its neighbours.

* [[Template:Phrasebook/Romanian|Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania 
A 1 parts 2016 situation : Sibiu to Deva 140km ready /Traian Vuia, Lugoj, Timisoara, Arad, Nadlac to Szeged (Hungary) +/-170km ready.
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]]  completed.
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013.
A3  parts 2016 situation [[Bucuresti]] to [[Ploiesti]] 60km in use, Turda to Gilau in use.
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucureşti|Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

* [[Bulgaria]]:
** [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]], the major international route
** [[Calafat-Vidin border crossing|Calafat-Vidin]]
** [[Durankulak-Vama Veche border crossing|Durankulak-Vama Veche]]
* [[Hungary]]
** [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
** [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]
* [[Moldova]]
** [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]
* [[Serbia]]
** The [[Iron Gates]]
** [[Stamora Moravița-Vatin border crossing|Stamora Moravița-Vatin]]
* [[Ukraine]]:
** [[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing|Dyakove-Halmeu]]
** [[Sighetu Marmației-Solotvyno border crossing]]
** [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
** There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are privately owned boats that may takes travelers, but they ask up to hundreds of euro for the service.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In total I spent around three months in Romania. I hitchhiked from Bucharest to Timisoara, Brasov and Iasi and also spent a few weeks camping in Transylvania. I hitchhiked to many landmarks such as Dracula's Castle, Rasnov Castle and the National Park in Zarnesti. Romanian people are incredibly friendly and happy to see travelers. I never found safety to be a problem and camped out at night in the national park in special spherical huts built for shepherds (I think they are for protection from bears). There are maps of the park which indicate the location of these huts and the best trails. Romania was the first country where I traveled for more than two days with the one truck driver. You should be OK to get around speaking English although if you have Italian that's a huge bonus and maybe learn a few basic Romanian words to be polite with any elderly farmers who pick you up in the country (Hungarian instead in many parts of Transylvania). Some drivers are quite lethal here too, so be prepared to take bends while overtaking gypsy carts at worrying speeds! Twice I was asked to contribute to the gas expenditure (out of maybe 30 lifts). I found hitchhiking at the side of the road with thumb out to be more time effective than petrol stations, many towns have hitchhiking spots where locals can be seen with their thumbs out. This country can't be skipped on a Europe trip if you like sheep's cheese, nature and castles'' -[[User:HoboSpirit|HoboSpirit]]

{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
[[trash:Romania]]

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[ru:Румыния]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>e1yp5doxmiwsz6g51sfkqjja6n9gh5j</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>100356</id>
      <parentid>97377</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-01-24T20:58:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Personal Experiences */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8829">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|BW = RO
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ro' /&gt;
}}
'''Romania''' a country in southeastern Europe, a member of the [[European Union]] but not yet a member of the Schengen zone. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

Hitchhiking in Romania is usually very easy. Payment for the ride is often expected, however. Make sure to tell the driver that you are travelling without money (''fără bani'' ‘without money’ or ''nu am bani'' ‘I have no money’) before you get in the car. Most drivers will agree to take you anyway, but if you don't tell them beforehand, they can aggressively demand payment when you get out later. If you wish to pay drivers like local hitchhikers do, it is still cheaper than trains and buses though, about 5 lei (€1.25) for every 100 km.

Sometimes it's possible to find some drivers that will ask you for a lot of money, maybe even €100 for a short trip. Some people are trying to work as illegal drivers taking people from one place to another, due to the high unemployment. When they see foreigners they will try to convince them to go with them and ask for lots of money, even if local travellers just pay 5 lei. Recently, the Romanian government has forbidden asking for money when taking hitchhikers, but not hitchhiking itself.

At the exits of most cities, there are established places to hitchhike and you may find yourself competing with local people who will pay drivers. In some cases, it is better to walk a little bit down the road and hitchhike where you can stand alone. The common practice is to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go; Romanian usually write the two-letter code of the county seat they are going to (e.g. "CJ" for Cluj).

Romania has just a couple of hundred kilometers of real motorway, in the south of the country. Elsewhere, long-distance traffic is going on national roads with E numbers. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to understand Romanian though speakers of Slavic languages will find it easier to pronounce as its sounds have been influenced by its neighbours.

* [[Template:Phrasebook/Romanian|Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania 
A 1 parts 2016 situation : Sibiu to Deva 140km ready /Traian Vuia, Lugoj, Timisoara, Arad, Nadlac to Szeged (Hungary) +/-170km ready.
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]]  completed.
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013.
A3  parts 2016 situation [[Bucuresti]] to [[Ploiesti]] 60km in use, Turda to Gilau in use.
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
[[File:Map_romania_regions_and_districts.jpg|thumb|right|float|Political map of Romania: historical regions and counties]]
The most used type of license plate uses a ''cc-99-xyz'' format, where ''cc'' is the 2-letter county code, ''99'' a random 2-digit number, and ''xyz'' 3 random letters.&lt;br /&gt;
It's quite possible to see [[Bucureşti|Bucharest]] registered plates ('''B'''''-99-xyz'') all over the country, as all the leasing companies are based in Bucharest, and people are obliged to use Bucharest plates while their cars are in leasing.

=== County license plate codes ===
{|
| County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence || County || Code || Residence
|-
| Alba || AB || [[Alba Iulia]] || Buzău || BZ || [[Buzău]] || Gorj || GJ || [[Târgu Jiu]] || Prahova || PH || [[Ploieşti]]
|-
| Arad || AR || [[Arad]] || Caraş-Severin || CS || [[Resiţa]] || Harghita || HR || [[Miercurea Ciuc]] || Satu-Mare || SM || [[Satu-Mare]]
|-
| Argeş || AG || [[Piteşti]] || [[Cluj]] || CJ || [[Cluj-Napoca]] || Hunedoara || HD || [[Deva]] || Sălaj || SJ || [[Zalău]]
|-
| Bacău || BC || [[Bacău]] || Călăraşi || CL || [[Călăraşi]] || Ialomiţa || IL || [[Slobozia]] || Sibiu || SB || [[Sibiu]]
|-
| Bihor || BH || [[Oradea]] || Constanţa || CT || [[Constanţa]] || Ilfov || IF || [[Bucureşti]] || Teleorman || TR || [[Alexandria]]
|-
| Bistriţa-Năsăud || BN || [[Bistriţa]] || Covasna || CV || [[Sfântu Gheorghe]] || Maramureş || MM || [[Baia Mare]] || Timiş || TM || [[Timişoara]]
|-
| Botoşani || BT || [[Botoşani]] || Dâmboviţa || DB || [[Târgovişte]] || Mehedinţi || MH || [[Drobeta Turnu-Severin]] || Tulcea || TL || [[Tulcea]]
|-
| Braşov || BV || [[Braşov]] || Dolj || DJ || [[Craiova]] || Mureş || MS || [[Târgu Mureş]] || Vâlcea || VL || [[Râmnicu Vâlcea]]
|-
| Brăila || BR || [[Brăila]] || Galaţi || GL || [[Galaţi]] || Neamţ || NT || [[Piatra Neamţ]] || Vaslui || VS || [[Vaslui]]
|-
| [[Bucureşti]] || B || – || Giurgiu || GR || [[Giurgiu]] || Olt || OT || [[Slatina]] || Vrancea || VN || [[Focşani]]
|}

== Border crossings ==

* [[Bulgaria]]:
** [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]], the major international route
** [[Calafat-Vidin border crossing|Calafat-Vidin]]
** [[Durankulak-Vama Veche border crossing|Durankulak-Vama Veche]]
* [[Hungary]]
** [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
** [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]
* [[Moldova]]
** [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]
* [[Serbia]]
** The [[Iron Gates]]
** [[Stamora Moravița-Vatin border crossing|Stamora Moravița-Vatin]]
* [[Ukraine]]:
** [[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing|Dyakove-Halmeu]]
** [[Sighetu Marmației-Solotvyno border crossing]]
** [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
** There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are privately owned boats that may takes travelers, but they ask up to hundreds of euro for the service.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In total I spent around three months in Romania. I hitchhiked from Bucharest to Timisoara, Brasov and Iasi and also spent a few weeks camping in Transylvania. I hitchhiked to many landmarks such as Dracula's Castle, Rasnov Castle and the National Park in Zarnesti. Romanian people are incredibly friendly and happy to see travelers. I never found safety to be a problem and camped out at night in the national park in special spherical huts built for shepherds (I think they are for protection from bears). There are maps of the park which indicate the location of these huts and the best trails. Romania was the first country where I traveled for more than two days with the one truck driver. You should be OK to get around speaking English although if you have Italian that's a huge bonus and maybe learn a few basic Romanian words to be polite with any elderly farmers who pick you up in the country (Hungarian instead in many parts of Transylvania). Some drivers are quite lethal here too, so be prepared to take bends while overtaking gypsy carts at worrying speeds! Twice I was asked to contribute to the gas expenditure (out of maybe 30 lifts). I found hitchhiking at the side of the road with thumb out to be more time effective than petrol stations, many towns have hitchhiking spots where locals can be seen with their thumbs out. This country can't be skipped on a Europe trip if you like sheep's cheese, nature and castles'' -[[User:HoboSpirit|HoboSpirit]]


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[ru:Румыния]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>oyu6r0r9d7qxvfy7fiigsl6vpcs19el</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101154</id>
      <parentid>100356</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-05T14:55:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Number plates */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6704">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|BW = RO
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ro' /&gt;
}}
'''Romania''' a country in southeastern Europe, a member of the [[European Union]] but not yet a member of the Schengen zone. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

Hitchhiking in Romania is usually very easy. Payment for the ride is often expected, however. Make sure to tell the driver that you are travelling without money (''fără bani'' ‘without money’ or ''nu am bani'' ‘I have no money’) before you get in the car. Most drivers will agree to take you anyway, but if you don't tell them beforehand, they can aggressively demand payment when you get out later. If you wish to pay drivers like local hitchhikers do, it is still cheaper than trains and buses though, about 5 lei (€1.25) for every 100 km.

Sometimes it's possible to find some drivers that will ask you for a lot of money, maybe even €100 for a short trip. Some people are trying to work as illegal drivers taking people from one place to another, due to the high unemployment. When they see foreigners they will try to convince them to go with them and ask for lots of money, even if local travellers just pay 5 lei. Recently, the Romanian government has forbidden asking for money when taking hitchhikers, but not hitchhiking itself.

At the exits of most cities, there are established places to hitchhike and you may find yourself competing with local people who will pay drivers. In some cases, it is better to walk a little bit down the road and hitchhike where you can stand alone. The common practice is to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go; Romanian usually write the two-letter code of the county seat they are going to (e.g. "CJ" for Cluj).

Romania has just a couple of hundred kilometers of real motorway, in the south of the country. Elsewhere, long-distance traffic is going on national roads with E numbers. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to understand Romanian though speakers of Slavic languages will find it easier to pronounce as its sounds have been influenced by its neighbours.

* [[Template:Phrasebook/Romanian|Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Regions ==
* [[Transylvania]]
* [[Wallachia]]
* [[Moldavia]]
* [[Dobrogea]]

{{Cities Romania}}

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania 
A 1 parts 2016 situation : Sibiu to Deva 140km ready /Traian Vuia, Lugoj, Timisoara, Arad, Nadlac to Szeged (Hungary) +/-170km ready.
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]]  completed.
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013.
A3  parts 2016 situation [[Bucuresti]] to [[Ploiesti]] 60km in use, Turda to Gilau in use.
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Border crossings ==

* [[Bulgaria]]:
** [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]], the major international route
** [[Calafat-Vidin border crossing|Calafat-Vidin]]
** [[Durankulak-Vama Veche border crossing|Durankulak-Vama Veche]]
* [[Hungary]]
** [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
** [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]
* [[Moldova]]
** [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]
* [[Serbia]]
** The [[Iron Gates]]
** [[Stamora Moravița-Vatin border crossing|Stamora Moravița-Vatin]]
* [[Ukraine]]:
** [[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing|Dyakove-Halmeu]]
** [[Sighetu Marmației-Solotvyno border crossing]]
** [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
** There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are privately owned boats that may takes travelers, but they ask up to hundreds of euro for the service.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In total I spent around three months in Romania. I hitchhiked from Bucharest to Timisoara, Brasov and Iasi and also spent a few weeks camping in Transylvania. I hitchhiked to many landmarks such as Dracula's Castle, Rasnov Castle and the National Park in Zarnesti. Romanian people are incredibly friendly and happy to see travelers. I never found safety to be a problem and camped out at night in the national park in special spherical huts built for shepherds (I think they are for protection from bears). There are maps of the park which indicate the location of these huts and the best trails. Romania was the first country where I traveled for more than two days with the one truck driver. You should be OK to get around speaking English although if you have Italian that's a huge bonus and maybe learn a few basic Romanian words to be polite with any elderly farmers who pick you up in the country (Hungarian instead in many parts of Transylvania). Some drivers are quite lethal here too, so be prepared to take bends while overtaking gypsy carts at worrying speeds! Twice I was asked to contribute to the gas expenditure (out of maybe 30 lifts). I found hitchhiking at the side of the road with thumb out to be more time effective than petrol stations, many towns have hitchhiking spots where locals can be seen with their thumbs out. This country can't be skipped on a Europe trip if you like sheep's cheese, nature and castles'' -[[User:HoboSpirit|HoboSpirit]]


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[ru:Румыния]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>id3ealkt6dgqfahxw9ta0epc8rydicl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101157</id>
      <parentid>101154</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-05T14:56:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Regions */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6604">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|BW = RO
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ro' /&gt;
}}
'''Romania''' a country in southeastern Europe, a member of the [[European Union]] but not yet a member of the Schengen zone. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

Hitchhiking in Romania is usually very easy. Payment for the ride is often expected, however. Make sure to tell the driver that you are travelling without money (''fără bani'' ‘without money’ or ''nu am bani'' ‘I have no money’) before you get in the car. Most drivers will agree to take you anyway, but if you don't tell them beforehand, they can aggressively demand payment when you get out later. If you wish to pay drivers like local hitchhikers do, it is still cheaper than trains and buses though, about 5 lei (€1.25) for every 100 km.

Sometimes it's possible to find some drivers that will ask you for a lot of money, maybe even €100 for a short trip. Some people are trying to work as illegal drivers taking people from one place to another, due to the high unemployment. When they see foreigners they will try to convince them to go with them and ask for lots of money, even if local travellers just pay 5 lei. Recently, the Romanian government has forbidden asking for money when taking hitchhikers, but not hitchhiking itself.

At the exits of most cities, there are established places to hitchhike and you may find yourself competing with local people who will pay drivers. In some cases, it is better to walk a little bit down the road and hitchhike where you can stand alone. The common practice is to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go; Romanian usually write the two-letter code of the county seat they are going to (e.g. "CJ" for Cluj).

Romania has just a couple of hundred kilometers of real motorway, in the south of the country. Elsewhere, long-distance traffic is going on national roads with E numbers. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to understand Romanian though speakers of Slavic languages will find it easier to pronounce as its sounds have been influenced by its neighbours.

* [[Template:Phrasebook/Romanian|Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania 
A 1 parts 2016 situation : Sibiu to Deva 140km ready /Traian Vuia, Lugoj, Timisoara, Arad, Nadlac to Szeged (Hungary) +/-170km ready.
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]]  completed.
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013.
A3  parts 2016 situation [[Bucuresti]] to [[Ploiesti]] 60km in use, Turda to Gilau in use.
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Border crossings ==

* [[Bulgaria]]:
** [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]], the major international route
** [[Calafat-Vidin border crossing|Calafat-Vidin]]
** [[Durankulak-Vama Veche border crossing|Durankulak-Vama Veche]]
* [[Hungary]]
** [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
** [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]
* [[Moldova]]
** [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]
* [[Serbia]]
** The [[Iron Gates]]
** [[Stamora Moravița-Vatin border crossing|Stamora Moravița-Vatin]]
* [[Ukraine]]:
** [[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing|Dyakove-Halmeu]]
** [[Sighetu Marmației-Solotvyno border crossing]]
** [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
** There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are privately owned boats that may takes travelers, but they ask up to hundreds of euro for the service.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In total I spent around three months in Romania. I hitchhiked from Bucharest to Timisoara, Brasov and Iasi and also spent a few weeks camping in Transylvania. I hitchhiked to many landmarks such as Dracula's Castle, Rasnov Castle and the National Park in Zarnesti. Romanian people are incredibly friendly and happy to see travelers. I never found safety to be a problem and camped out at night in the national park in special spherical huts built for shepherds (I think they are for protection from bears). There are maps of the park which indicate the location of these huts and the best trails. Romania was the first country where I traveled for more than two days with the one truck driver. You should be OK to get around speaking English although if you have Italian that's a huge bonus and maybe learn a few basic Romanian words to be polite with any elderly farmers who pick you up in the country (Hungarian instead in many parts of Transylvania). Some drivers are quite lethal here too, so be prepared to take bends while overtaking gypsy carts at worrying speeds! Twice I was asked to contribute to the gas expenditure (out of maybe 30 lifts). I found hitchhiking at the side of the road with thumb out to be more time effective than petrol stations, many towns have hitchhiking spots where locals can be seen with their thumbs out. This country can't be skipped on a Europe trip if you like sheep's cheese, nature and castles'' -[[User:HoboSpirit|HoboSpirit]]


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{hitchbase_country|160}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[ru:Румыния]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>gxwtrm2qdq6nmmc0lc1ku15zt4uat8h</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101158</id>
      <parentid>101157</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-05T14:56:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6599">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|BW = RO
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ro' /&gt;
}}
'''Romania''' a country in southeastern Europe, a member of the [[European Union]] but not yet a member of the Schengen zone. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

Hitchhiking in Romania is usually very easy. Payment for the ride is often expected, however. Make sure to tell the driver that you are travelling without money (''fără bani'' ‘without money’ or ''nu am bani'' ‘I have no money’) before you get in the car. Most drivers will agree to take you anyway, but if you don't tell them beforehand, they can aggressively demand payment when you get out later. If you wish to pay drivers like local hitchhikers do, it is still cheaper than trains and buses though, about 5 lei (€1.25) for every 100 km.

Sometimes it's possible to find some drivers that will ask you for a lot of money, maybe even €100 for a short trip. Some people are trying to work as illegal drivers taking people from one place to another, due to the high unemployment. When they see foreigners they will try to convince them to go with them and ask for lots of money, even if local travellers just pay 5 lei. Recently, the Romanian government has forbidden asking for money when taking hitchhikers, but not hitchhiking itself.

At the exits of most cities, there are established places to hitchhike and you may find yourself competing with local people who will pay drivers. In some cases, it is better to walk a little bit down the road and hitchhike where you can stand alone. The common practice is to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go; Romanian usually write the two-letter code of the county seat they are going to (e.g. "CJ" for Cluj).

Romania has just a couple of hundred kilometers of real motorway, in the south of the country. Elsewhere, long-distance traffic is going on national roads with E numbers. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to understand Romanian though speakers of Slavic languages will find it easier to pronounce as its sounds have been influenced by its neighbours.

* [[Template:Phrasebook/Romanian|Romanian phrasebook]]

[[File:Lien-hitching-one-car-before-romania.jpg|right|thumb|250px|[[User:Guaka|guaka]] spotted his room mate from Brussels at the side of the road in August 2010, this was a couple of minutes later]]

== Roads ==
The roads are very outdated. There are only 3 motorways in all of Romania:
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 127&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Piteşti]] – the only fully operational motorway in Romania 
A 1 parts 2016 situation : Sibiu to Deva 140km ready /Traian Vuia, Lugoj, Timisoara, Arad, Nadlac to Szeged (Hungary) +/-170km ready.
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]]  completed.
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] – under construction, due 2013.
A3  parts 2016 situation [[Bucuresti]] to [[Ploiesti]] 60km in use, Turda to Gilau in use.
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Border crossings ==

* [[Bulgaria]]:
** [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]], the major international route
** [[Calafat-Vidin border crossing|Calafat-Vidin]]
** [[Durankulak-Vama Veche border crossing|Durankulak-Vama Veche]]
* [[Hungary]]
** [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
** [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]
* [[Moldova]]
** [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]
* [[Serbia]]
** The [[Iron Gates]]
** [[Stamora Moravița-Vatin border crossing|Stamora Moravița-Vatin]]
* [[Ukraine]]:
** [[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing|Dyakove-Halmeu]]
** [[Sighetu Marmației-Solotvyno border crossing]]
** [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
** There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are privately owned boats that may takes travelers, but they ask up to hundreds of euro for the service.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In total I spent around three months in Romania. I hitchhiked from Bucharest to Timisoara, Brasov and Iasi and also spent a few weeks camping in Transylvania. I hitchhiked to many landmarks such as Dracula's Castle, Rasnov Castle and the National Park in Zarnesti. Romanian people are incredibly friendly and happy to see travelers. I never found safety to be a problem and camped out at night in the national park in special spherical huts built for shepherds (I think they are for protection from bears). There are maps of the park which indicate the location of these huts and the best trails. Romania was the first country where I traveled for more than two days with the one truck driver. You should be OK to get around speaking English although if you have Italian that's a huge bonus and maybe learn a few basic Romanian words to be polite with any elderly farmers who pick you up in the country (Hungarian instead in many parts of Transylvania). Some drivers are quite lethal here too, so be prepared to take bends while overtaking gypsy carts at worrying speeds! Twice I was asked to contribute to the gas expenditure (out of maybe 30 lifts). I found hitchhiking at the side of the road with thumb out to be more time effective than petrol stations, many towns have hitchhiking spots where locals can be seen with their thumbs out. This country can't be skipped on a Europe trip if you like sheep's cheese, nature and castles'' -[[User:HoboSpirit|HoboSpirit]]


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


{{Cities Romania}}

{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[ru:Румыния]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>6kfzyflx2qufrl10250ogl6h6e91it1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104848</id>
      <parentid>101158</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-10-08T09:09:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mrmagicmax</username>
        <id>39099</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>update roads section and removing non existing image</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6660">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|BW = RO
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ro' /&gt;
}}
'''Romania''' a country in southeastern Europe, a member of the [[European Union]] but not yet a member of the Schengen zone. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

Hitchhiking in Romania is usually very easy. Payment for the ride is often expected, however. Make sure to tell the driver that you are travelling without money (''fără bani'' ‘without money’ or ''nu am bani'' ‘I have no money’) before you get in the car. Most drivers will agree to take you anyway, but if you don't tell them beforehand, they can aggressively demand payment when you get out later. If you wish to pay drivers like local hitchhikers do, it is still cheaper than trains and buses though, about 5 lei (€1.25) for every 100 km.

Sometimes it's possible to find some drivers that will ask you for a lot of money, maybe even €100 for a short trip. Some people are trying to work as illegal drivers taking people from one place to another, due to the high unemployment. When they see foreigners they will try to convince them to go with them and ask for lots of money, even if local travellers just pay 5 lei. Recently, the Romanian government has forbidden asking for money when taking hitchhikers, but not hitchhiking itself.

At the exits of most cities, there are established places to hitchhike and you may find yourself competing with local people who will pay drivers. In some cases, it is better to walk a little bit down the road and hitchhike where you can stand alone. The common practice is to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go; Romanian usually write the two-letter code of the county seat they are going to (e.g. "CJ" for Cluj).

Romania has just a couple of hundred kilometers of real motorway, in the south of the country. Elsewhere, long-distance traffic is going on national roads with E numbers. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to understand Romanian though speakers of Slavic languages will find it easier to pronounce as its sounds have been influenced by its neighbours.

* [[Template:Phrasebook/Romanian|Romanian phrasebook]]


== Roads ==
[[File:Romania Motorways DE 1.svg|thumb|Highways in Romania (in 2021). The white middle line depicts sections in use, dotted middle line depicts sections under construction, while light green represents proposed expressways.]]
There is an excellent [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roads_in_Romania Wikipedia article] about the roads in Romania. A lot of money is put into building roads as of 2023, so the roadnetwork is under constant change.
Summing it up, these are some important Motorways or ''Autostrada'':
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 580&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] at [[Nădlac-Nagylak_border_crossing]] – partly finished 
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] - completed.
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] at [[Ártánd-Borş_border_crossing]] – partly finished.
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Border crossings ==

* [[Bulgaria]]:
** [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]], the major international route
** [[Calafat-Vidin border crossing|Calafat-Vidin]]
** [[Durankulak-Vama Veche border crossing|Durankulak-Vama Veche]]
* [[Hungary]]
** [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
** [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]
* [[Moldova]]
** [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]
* [[Serbia]]
** The [[Iron Gates]]
** [[Stamora Moravița-Vatin border crossing|Stamora Moravița-Vatin]]
* [[Ukraine]]:
** [[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing|Dyakove-Halmeu]]
** [[Sighetu Marmației-Solotvyno border crossing]]
** [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
** There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are privately owned boats that may takes travelers, but they ask up to hundreds of euro for the service.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In total I spent around three months in Romania. I hitchhiked from Bucharest to Timisoara, Brasov and Iasi and also spent a few weeks camping in Transylvania. I hitchhiked to many landmarks such as Dracula's Castle, Rasnov Castle and the National Park in Zarnesti. Romanian people are incredibly friendly and happy to see travelers. I never found safety to be a problem and camped out at night in the national park in special spherical huts built for shepherds (I think they are for protection from bears). There are maps of the park which indicate the location of these huts and the best trails. Romania was the first country where I traveled for more than two days with the one truck driver. You should be OK to get around speaking English although if you have Italian that's a huge bonus and maybe learn a few basic Romanian words to be polite with any elderly farmers who pick you up in the country (Hungarian instead in many parts of Transylvania). Some drivers are quite lethal here too, so be prepared to take bends while overtaking gypsy carts at worrying speeds! Twice I was asked to contribute to the gas expenditure (out of maybe 30 lifts). I found hitchhiking at the side of the road with thumb out to be more time effective than petrol stations, many towns have hitchhiking spots where locals can be seen with their thumbs out. This country can't be skipped on a Europe trip if you like sheep's cheese, nature and castles'' -[[User:HoboSpirit|HoboSpirit]]


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


{{Cities Romania}}

{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[ru:Румыния]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>hb3eqyzz43xlr6l3h3as7ao5g0b6igw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104923</id>
      <parentid>104848</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-11-13T10:42:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mrmagicmax</username>
        <id>39099</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>adding information about number plates</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7165">{{infobox Country
|country = Romania
|language = Romanian
|capital = [[Bucureşti]]
|map = &lt;map lat='46' lng='25' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' height='320' country='Romania' /&gt;
|pop = 22,276,056
|currency = Leu (RON)
|BW = RO
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ro' /&gt;
}}
'''Romania''' a country in southeastern Europe, a member of the [[European Union]] but not yet a member of the Schengen zone. It shares a border with [[Hungary]] and [[Serbia]] to the west, [[Ukraine]] and the Republic of [[Moldova]] to the northeast, and [[Bulgaria]] to the south.

Hitchhiking in Romania is usually very easy. Payment for the ride is often expected, however. Make sure to tell the driver that you are travelling without money (''fără bani'' ‘without money’ or ''nu am bani'' ‘I have no money’) before you get in the car. Most drivers will agree to take you anyway, but if you don't tell them beforehand, they can aggressively demand payment when you get out later. If you wish to pay drivers like local hitchhikers do, it is still cheaper than trains and buses though, about 5 lei (€1.25) for every 100 km.

Sometimes it's possible to find some drivers that will ask you for a lot of money, maybe even €100 for a short trip. Some people are trying to work as illegal drivers taking people from one place to another, due to the high unemployment. When they see foreigners they will try to convince them to go with them and ask for lots of money, even if local travellers just pay 5 lei. Recently, the Romanian government has forbidden asking for money when taking hitchhikers, but not hitchhiking itself.

At the exits of most cities, there are established places to hitchhike and you may find yourself competing with local people who will pay drivers. In some cases, it is better to walk a little bit down the road and hitchhike where you can stand alone. The common practice is to hold a sign with the name of the place you want to go; Romanian usually write the two-letter code of the county seat they are going to (e.g. "CJ" for Cluj).

Romania has just a couple of hundred kilometers of real motorway, in the south of the country. Elsewhere, long-distance traffic is going on national roads with E numbers. You can stand directly on the national roads and thumb, though junctions are always best because cars go more slowly there.

== Language ==
Romanian is one of the few non-Slavic languages of Eastern Europe. It uses the Latin alphabet and is related to French, Italian, Spanish etc. Speakers of one of these languages will find it easier to understand Romanian though speakers of Slavic languages will find it easier to pronounce as its sounds have been influenced by its neighbours.

* [[Template:Phrasebook/Romanian|Romanian phrasebook]]


== Roads ==
[[File:Romania Motorways DE 1.svg|thumb|Highways in Romania (in 2021). The white middle line depicts sections in use, dotted middle line depicts sections under construction, while light green represents proposed expressways.]]
There is an excellent [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roads_in_Romania Wikipedia article] about the roads in Romania. A lot of money is put into building roads as of 2023, so the roadnetwork is under constant change.
Summing it up, these are some important Motorways or ''Autostrada'':
* The [[A1 (Romania)|A1]] going 580&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] at [[Nădlac-Nagylak_border_crossing]] – partly finished 
* The [[A2 (Romania)|A2]] or ''Sun's motorway'', going 204&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to [[Constanţa]] - completed.
* The [[A3 (Romania)|A3]] or ''Transylvania motorway'', going 588&amp;nbsp;km from [[Bucureşti]] to the border with [[Hungary]] at [[Ártánd-Borş_border_crossing]] – partly finished.
Most of the other roads are in poor condition, the European routes being the best. Even so, hitching a ride is quite easy, especially on the major European roads that get a lot of traffic.

== Number plates ==
The first two letters of the number plates show you in which of the 42 [sic] counties the car was registered, which might be useful when talking to people at gas stations or resting areas. Red letters mean it's a temporally registered vehicle, green means electric. Further information can be found in the excellent [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Romania wikipedia article].
[[File:Romanian license plate codes.png|thumb|Romanian license plate codes]]


== Border crossings ==

* [[Bulgaria]]:
** [[Ruse-Giurgiu border crossing|Ruse-Giurgiu]], the major international route
** [[Calafat-Vidin border crossing|Calafat-Vidin]]
** [[Durankulak-Vama Veche border crossing|Durankulak-Vama Veche]]
* [[Hungary]]
** [[Ártánd-Borş border crossing|Ártánd-Borş]]
** [[Nădlac-Nagylak border crossing‎|Nădlac-Nagylak]]
* [[Moldova]]
** [[Galaţi-Giugiuleşti border crossing|Galaţi-Giugiuleşti‎]]
* [[Serbia]]
** The [[Iron Gates]]
** [[Stamora Moravița-Vatin border crossing|Stamora Moravița-Vatin]]
* [[Ukraine]]:
** [[Dyakove-Halmeu border crossing|Dyakove-Halmeu]]
** [[Sighetu Marmației-Solotvyno border crossing]]
** [[Siret-Porubnoe border crossing|Siret-Porubnoe]]
** There is no border crossing between Ukraine and the Danube Delta region of Romania. Travelers going between eastern Romania and southern Ukraine must pass through Moldova. There are privately owned boats that may takes travelers, but they ask up to hundreds of euro for the service.

== Personal Experiences ==
''In total I spent around three months in Romania. I hitchhiked from Bucharest to Timisoara, Brasov and Iasi and also spent a few weeks camping in Transylvania. I hitchhiked to many landmarks such as Dracula's Castle, Rasnov Castle and the National Park in Zarnesti. Romanian people are incredibly friendly and happy to see travelers. I never found safety to be a problem and camped out at night in the national park in special spherical huts built for shepherds (I think they are for protection from bears). There are maps of the park which indicate the location of these huts and the best trails. Romania was the first country where I traveled for more than two days with the one truck driver. You should be OK to get around speaking English although if you have Italian that's a huge bonus and maybe learn a few basic Romanian words to be polite with any elderly farmers who pick you up in the country (Hungarian instead in many parts of Transylvania). Some drivers are quite lethal here too, so be prepared to take bends while overtaking gypsy carts at worrying speeds! Twice I was asked to contribute to the gas expenditure (out of maybe 30 lifts). I found hitchhiking at the side of the road with thumb out to be more time effective than petrol stations, many towns have hitchhiking spots where locals can be seen with their thumbs out. This country can't be skipped on a Europe trip if you like sheep's cheese, nature and castles'' -[[User:HoboSpirit|HoboSpirit]]


== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


{{Cities Romania}}

{{Template:Europe/countries}}
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}

[[Category:Romania| ]]

[[de:Rumänien]]
[[es:Rumania]]
[[fr:Roumanie]]
[[ru:Румыния]]
[[tr:Romanya]]</text>
      <sha1>9hjaw2qtr8w5ojc4cxfee1xitb6q83d</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Hitchhiking websites</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1539</id>
    <redirect title="Multimedia" />
    <revision>
      <id>1583</id>
      <parentid>4521</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-14T00:55:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4291">This is a list of '''websites''' with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==
* Hitchhiker's guide to Europe

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 40,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase], is a database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike. Most entries are in English, but some entries are written in German. Updating information is not very easy, but for tips in hitching Finland it's unbeatable.

As of August 2006 it includes 28 countries, Germany with 146 places, Finland 82, and Sweden 28, France 18.

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly hitchhiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/ his own site] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors.

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by Kirsi Jokisalo with tips about hitchhiking in several European countries: [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Hitch-hiking===
[http://hitch-hiking.org www.hitch-hiking.org] is a great site in English and German language with lots of information about hitchhiking in general, legal issues and dozens of funny anecdotes about hitching.

===In the Netherlands===
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands] (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling), a nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''[http://www.liftari.org Liftari.org]''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, though irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and available under the  GNU Free Documentation License (which is compatible with this wiki).

==Russian==
* [http://www.hike.ru hike.ru], with some information [http://hike.ru/?newlang=eng in English]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>mrprqtddpi9eupxzpqaetmqcvh30vou</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1584</id>
      <parentid>1583</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4291">This is a list of '''websites''' with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==
* Hitchhiker's guide to Europe

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 40,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase], is a database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike. Most entries are in English, but some entries are written in German. Updating information is not very easy, but for tips in hitching Finland it's unbeatable.

As of August 2006 it includes 28 countries, Germany with 146 places, Finland 82, and Sweden 28, France 18.

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly hitchhiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/ his own site] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors.

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by Kirsi Jokisalo with tips about hitchhiking in several European countries: [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Hitch-hiking===
[http://hitch-hiking.org www.hitch-hiking.org] is a great site in English and German language with lots of information about hitchhiking in general, legal issues and dozens of funny anecdotes about hitching.

===In the Netherlands===
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands] (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling), a nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''[http://www.liftari.org Liftari.org]''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, though irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and available under the  GNU Free Documentation License (which is compatible with this wiki).

==Russian==
* [http://www.hike.ru hike.ru], with some information [http://hike.ru/?newlang=eng in English]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>mrprqtddpi9eupxzpqaetmqcvh30vou</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4483</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T21:15:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="33">
* Digihitch
* http://www.hike.ru</text>
      <sha1>c7cizl4wzj56vzjk2lc9rp42bgmrjt3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4484</id>
      <parentid>4483</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T21:15:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="58">
In English:
* Digihitch

In Russian:
* http://www.hike.ru</text>
      <sha1>2b88ig61o0v3w515ul7x30qdp1w1jtx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4485</id>
      <parentid>4484</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T21:26:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="803">In English:
* Digihitch

==Suite101==
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly Hitch-hiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on his own site:
* http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/

and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors:
* http://www.digihitch.com


In Russian:
* http://www.hike.ru</text>
      <sha1>rn76mnev7pouq4q6puha1s6mhra4uv8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4486</id>
      <parentid>4485</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T21:26:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1512">In English:
* Digihitch

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly Hitch-hiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on his own site:
* http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/

and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors:
* http://www.digihitch.com

==Finnish==
'''Liftari.org''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, thoug irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

=External links and references=
http://www.liftari.org


==Russian==
* http://www.hike.ru</text>
      <sha1>flxsisu4j4dma3ev8tj5yz5oyhruklp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4487</id>
      <parentid>4486</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T21:35:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1760">==In English==
* Digihitch

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly Hitch-hiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on his own site:
* http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/

and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors:
* http://www.digihitch.com

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by [[Kirsi Jokisalo]]. There are tips about hitchhiking in several European countries.

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

==Finnish==
'''Liftari.org''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, thoug irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

=External links and references=
http://www.liftari.org


==Russian==
* http://www.hike.ru</text>
      <sha1>87h0yuaivrmta1wuivqnssf86xdbjo5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4488</id>
      <parentid>4487</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T21:40:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2003">==In English==
* Digihitch

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the Hitchbase, is an easy-to-use database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike.

* [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase.com]

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly Hitch-hiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on his own site:
* http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/

and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors:
* http://www.digihitch.com

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by [[Kirsi Jokisalo]]. There are tips about hitchhiking in several European countries.

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

==Finnish==
'''Liftari.org''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, thoug irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

=External links and references=
http://www.liftari.org


==Russian==
* http://www.hike.ru</text>
      <sha1>a0n43zdwlb1spbj0misj73trau6k1ac</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4489</id>
      <parentid>4488</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T13:47:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4145">==In English==

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 30,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles. The most popular sections are:
* [http://www.digihitch.com/new.html This Week on digihitch] - new stories, travel tips, recommended links, biographies and travel terms - all posted within the last 7 days.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/links.html Web Linkage] - Over 1,500 recommended links to web sites featuring hitchhiking, road culture or alternative media. Search by keyword, category, rank or country.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums-album.html Photo Thumbing Albums] - Photo albums for hitchhikers, with many hundreds of images, including photos from past hitchhiker events/ competitions.
* [http://gathering.digihitch.com/ Hitchhiker Happenings] - The homebase for hitchhiking events in North America. Get details about upcoming gatherings of hitchhikers, or learn about past events.
* http://www.digihitch.com.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the Hitchbase, is an easy-to-use database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike.

* [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase.com]

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly Hitch-hiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on his own site:
* http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/

and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors:
* http://www.digihitch.com

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by [[Kirsi Jokisalo]]. There are tips about hitchhiking in several European countries.

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

==Finnish==
'''Liftari.org''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, thoug irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

=External links and references=
http://www.liftari.org


==Russian==
* http://www.hike.ru</text>
      <sha1>ijvvg1b59lku81h0gw08gyhrl3kphtv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4490</id>
      <parentid>4489</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T13:47:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4111">==English==

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 30,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles. The most popular sections are:
* [http://www.digihitch.com/new.html This Week on digihitch] - new stories, travel tips, recommended links, biographies and travel terms - all posted within the last 7 days.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/links.html Web Linkage] - Over 1,500 recommended links to web sites featuring hitchhiking, road culture or alternative media. Search by keyword, category, rank or country.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums-album.html Photo Thumbing Albums] - Photo albums for hitchhikers, with many hundreds of images, including photos from past hitchhiker events/ competitions.
* [http://gathering.digihitch.com/ Hitchhiker Happenings] - The homebase for hitchhiking events in North America. Get details about upcoming gatherings of hitchhikers, or learn about past events.
* http://www.digihitch.com.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the Hitchbase, is an easy-to-use database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike.

* [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase.com]

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly Hitch-hiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on his own site:
* http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/

and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors:
* http://www.digihitch.com

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by [[Kirsi Jokisalo]]. There are tips about hitchhiking in several European countries.

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

==Finnish==
'''Liftari.org''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, thoug irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

* http://www.liftari.org

==Russian==
* http://www.hike.ru</text>
      <sha1>5ln4q3tmcrl6n2tr9nk0xp8wsouvwd4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4491</id>
      <parentid>4490</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T14:46:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4222">==English==
* Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers
* Hitchhiker's guide to Europe

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 30,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles. The most popular sections are:
* [http://www.digihitch.com/new.html This Week on digihitch] - new stories, travel tips, recommended links, biographies and travel terms - all posted within the last 7 days.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/links.html Web Linkage] - Over 1,500 recommended links to web sites featuring hitchhiking, road culture or alternative media. Search by keyword, category, rank or country.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums-album.html Photo Thumbing Albums] - Photo albums for hitchhikers, with many hundreds of images, including photos from past hitchhiker events/ competitions.
* [http://gathering.digihitch.com/ Hitchhiker Happenings] - The homebase for hitchhiking events in North America. Get details about upcoming gatherings of hitchhikers, or learn about past events.
* http://www.digihitch.com.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the Hitchbase, is an easy-to-use database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike.

* [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase.com]

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly Hitch-hiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on his own site:
* http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/

and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors:
* http://www.digihitch.com

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by [[Kirsi Jokisalo]]. There are tips about hitchhiking in several European countries.

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

==Finnish==
'''Liftari.org''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, thoug irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

* http://www.liftari.org

==Russian==
* http://www.hike.ru
&lt;math&gt;Insert formula here&lt;/math&gt;</text>
      <sha1>tsqzivyrgpy6zukmwy8cewy4y6iqqjh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4492</id>
      <parentid>4491</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T14:49:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4189">==English==
* Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers
* Hitchhiker's guide to Europe

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 30,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles. The most popular sections are:
* [http://www.digihitch.com/new.html This Week on digihitch] - new stories, travel tips, recommended links, biographies and travel terms - all posted within the last 7 days.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/links.html Web Linkage] - Over 1,500 recommended links to web sites featuring hitchhiking, road culture or alternative media. Search by keyword, category, rank or country.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums-album.html Photo Thumbing Albums] - Photo albums for hitchhikers, with many hundreds of images, including photos from past hitchhiker events/ competitions.
* [http://gathering.digihitch.com/ Hitchhiker Happenings] - The homebase for hitchhiking events in North America. Get details about upcoming gatherings of hitchhikers, or learn about past events.
* http://www.digihitch.com.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the Hitchbase, is an easy-to-use database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike.

* [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase.com]

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly Hitch-hiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on his own site:
* http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/

and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors:
* http://www.digihitch.com

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by [[Kirsi Jokisalo]]. There are tips about hitchhiking in several European countries.

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

==Finnish==
'''Liftari.org''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, thoug irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

* http://www.liftari.org

==Russian==
* http://www.hike.ru</text>
      <sha1>a88p82kpwcfbiteyjjvnz7f1pa4mf96</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4493</id>
      <parentid>4492</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-01-24T17:28:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Jenseb</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4258">==English==
* Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers
* Hitchhiker's guide to Europe

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 30,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles. The most popular sections are:
* [http://www.digihitch.com/new.html This Week on digihitch] - new stories, travel tips, recommended links, biographies and travel terms - all posted within the last 7 days.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/links.html Web Linkage] - Over 1,500 recommended links to web sites featuring hitchhiking, road culture or alternative media. Search by keyword, category, rank or country.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums-album.html Photo Thumbing Albums] - Photo albums for hitchhikers, with many hundreds of images, including photos from past hitchhiker events/ competitions.
* [http://gathering.digihitch.com/ Hitchhiker Happenings] - The homebase for hitchhiking events in North America. Get details about upcoming gatherings of hitchhikers, or learn about past events.
* http://www.digihitch.com.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the Hitchbase, is an easy-to-use database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike.

* [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase.com]

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly Hitch-hiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on his own site:
* http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/

and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors:
* http://www.digihitch.com

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by [[Kirsi Jokisalo]]. There are tips about hitchhiking in several European countries.

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

==Finnish==
'''Liftari.org''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, thoug irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

* http://www.liftari.org

==Russian==
* http://www.hike.ru

==Netherlands==
* http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm</text>
      <sha1>f9hzjeqawrtcq6prgau0c8mi4npl0de</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4494</id>
      <parentid>4493</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-01-24T17:36:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Jenseb</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4335">==English==
* Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers
* Hitchhiker's guide to Europe

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 30,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles. The most popular sections are:
* [http://www.digihitch.com/new.html This Week on digihitch] - new stories, travel tips, recommended links, biographies and travel terms - all posted within the last 7 days.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/links.html Web Linkage] - Over 1,500 recommended links to web sites featuring hitchhiking, road culture or alternative media. Search by keyword, category, rank or country.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums-album.html Photo Thumbing Albums] - Photo albums for hitchhikers, with many hundreds of images, including photos from past hitchhiker events/ competitions.
* [http://gathering.digihitch.com/ Hitchhiker Happenings] - The homebase for hitchhiking events in North America. Get details about upcoming gatherings of hitchhikers, or learn about past events.
* http://www.digihitch.com.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the Hitchbase, is an easy-to-use database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike.

* [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase.com]

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly Hitch-hiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on his own site:
* http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/

and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors:
* http://www.digihitch.com

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by [[Kirsi Jokisalo]]. There are tips about hitchhiking in several European countries.

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Hitchhiking in the Netherlands ( Ad-Hoc-Carpooling )===
* http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm
nice Website by [[Frank Verhart]]

==Finnish==
'''Liftari.org''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, thoug irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

* http://www.liftari.org

==Russian==
* http://www.hike.ru</text>
      <sha1>qb2nfp2x6pvx4ueu3xw8b496i2r2yt8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4495</id>
      <parentid>4494</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-03-29T17:43:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4362">==English==
* Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers
* Hitchhiker's guide to Europe

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 30,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles. The most popular sections are:
* [http://www.digihitch.com/new.html This Week on digihitch] - new stories, travel tips, recommended links, biographies and travel terms - all posted within the last 7 days.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/links.html Web Linkage] - Over 1,500 recommended links to web sites featuring hitchhiking, road culture or alternative media. Search by keyword, category, rank or country.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums-album.html Photo Thumbing Albums] - Photo albums for hitchhikers, with many hundreds of images, including photos from past hitchhiker events/ competitions.
* [http://gathering.digihitch.com/ Hitchhiker Happenings] - The homebase for hitchhiking events in North America. Get details about upcoming gatherings of hitchhikers, or learn about past events.
* http://www.digihitch.com.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the Hitchbase, is an easy-to-use database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike.

* [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase.com]

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly Hitch-hiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on his own site:
* http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/

and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors:
* http://www.digihitch.com

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by [[Kirsi Jokisalo]]. There are tips about hitchhiking in several European countries.

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Hitchhiking in the Netherlands ( Ad-Hoc-Carpooling )===
* http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm
nice Website by [[Frank Verhart]]

==Finnish==
'''Liftari.org''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, thoug irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

* http://www.liftari.org

==Russian==
* http://www.hike.ru

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>hjy1sptajuf4ycoj7k3271jwzavdgj9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4496</id>
      <parentid>4495</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-05T00:10:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4425">This is a list of websites with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==
* Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers
* Hitchhiker's guide to Europe

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 30,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles. The most popular sections are:
* [http://www.digihitch.com/new.html This Week on digihitch] - new stories, travel tips, recommended links, biographies and travel terms - all posted within the last 7 days.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/links.html Web Linkage] - Over 1,500 recommended links to web sites featuring hitchhiking, road culture or alternative media. Search by keyword, category, rank or country.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums-album.html Photo Thumbing Albums] - Photo albums for hitchhikers, with many hundreds of images, including photos from past hitchhiker events/ competitions.
* [http://gathering.digihitch.com/ Hitchhiker Happenings] - The homebase for hitchhiking events in North America. Get details about upcoming gatherings of hitchhikers, or learn about past events.
* http://www.digihitch.com.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the Hitchbase, is an easy-to-use database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike.

* [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase.com]

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly Hitch-hiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on his own site:
* http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/

and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors:
* http://www.digihitch.com

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by [[Kirsi Jokisalo]]. There are tips about hitchhiking in several European countries.

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Hitchhiking in the Netherlands (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling)===
* http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm
Nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''Liftari.org''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, thoug irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

* http://www.liftari.org

==Russian==
* http://www.hike.ru

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>pj1m2iwsuati6kczewa42u2pi74vvdj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4497</id>
      <parentid>4496</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-06T22:34:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4555">This is a list of websites with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==
* Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers
* Hitchhiker's guide to Europe

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 30,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles. The most popular sections are:
* [http://www.digihitch.com/new.html This Week on digihitch] - new stories, travel tips, recommended links, biographies and travel terms - all posted within the last 7 days.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/links.html Web Linkage] - Over 1,500 recommended links to web sites featuring hitchhiking, road culture or alternative media. Search by keyword, category, rank or country.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums-album.html Photo Thumbing Albums] - Photo albums for hitchhikers, with many hundreds of images, including photos from past hitchhiker events/ competitions.
* [http://gathering.digihitch.com/ Hitchhiker Happenings] - The homebase for hitchhiking events in North America. Get details about upcoming gatherings of hitchhikers, or learn about past events.
* http://www.digihitch.com.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the Hitchbase, is an easy-to-use database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike.

* [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase.com]

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly Hitch-hiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on his own site:
* http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/

and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors:
* http://www.digihitch.com

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by [[Kirsi Jokisalo]]. There are tips about hitchhiking in several European countries.

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Hitchhiking in the Netherlands (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling)===
* http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm
Nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''Liftari.org''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, thoug irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

* http://www.liftari.org

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and '''GFDL'''.

==Russian==
* http://www.hike.ru

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>3vy0d6z31oatzurp8ircaxcznxktw92</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4498</id>
      <parentid>4497</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-06T22:35:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4331">This is a list of websites with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==
* Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers
* Hitchhiker's guide to Europe

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 30,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles. The most popular sections are:
* [http://www.digihitch.com/new.html This Week on digihitch] - new stories, travel tips, recommended links, biographies and travel terms - all posted within the last 7 days.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/links.html Web Linkage] - Over 1,500 recommended links to web sites featuring hitchhiking, road culture or alternative media. Search by keyword, category, rank or country.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums-album.html Photo Thumbing Albums] - Photo albums for hitchhikers, with many hundreds of images, including photos from past hitchhiker events/ competitions.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the Hitchbase, is an easy-to-use database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike.

* [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase.com]

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly Hitch-hiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on his own site:
* http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/

and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors:
* http://www.digihitch.com

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by [[Kirsi Jokisalo]]. There are tips about hitchhiking in several European countries.

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Hitchhiking in the Netherlands (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling)===
* http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm
Nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''Liftari.org''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, thoug irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

* http://www.liftari.org

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and '''GFDL'''.

==Russian==
* http://www.hike.ru

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>kq3603mwwazdk8liamlsnofcuohdctz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4499</id>
      <parentid>4498</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-06T23:31:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3735">This is a list of websites with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==
* Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers
* Hitchhiker's guide to Europe

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 30,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the Hitchbase, is an easy-to-use database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike.

* [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase.com]

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly Hitch-hiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on his own site:
* http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/

and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors:
* http://www.digihitch.com

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by [[Kirsi Jokisalo]]. There are tips about hitchhiking in several European countries.

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Hitchhiking in the Netherlands (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling)===
* http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm
Nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''Liftari.org''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, thoug irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

* http://www.liftari.org

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and '''GFDL'''.

==Russian==
* http://www.hike.ru

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>r1xen4zt4j7yjr610fiyvswhkut082s</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4500</id>
      <parentid>4499</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-06T23:32:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3705">This is a list of websites with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==
* Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers
* Hitchhiker's guide to Europe

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 30,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the Hitchbase, is an easy-to-use database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike.

* [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase.com]

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly hitchhiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/
his own site] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors.

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by [[Kirsi Jokisalo]]. There are tips about hitchhiking in several European countries.

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Hitchhiking in the Netherlands (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling)===
* http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm
Nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''Liftari.org''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, thoug irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

* http://www.liftari.org

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and '''GFDL'''.

==Russian==
* http://www.hike.ru

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>mnorm030dsmsgcyynv8dfn0chjielw2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4501</id>
      <parentid>4500</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-06T23:32:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3705">This is a list of websites with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==
* Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers
* Hitchhiker's guide to Europe

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 30,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the Hitchbase, is an easy-to-use database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike.

* [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase.com]

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly hitchhiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/ his own site] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors.

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by [[Kirsi Jokisalo]]. There are tips about hitchhiking in several European countries.

* [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Hitchhiking in the Netherlands (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling)===
* http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm
Nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''Liftari.org''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, thoug irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

* http://www.liftari.org

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and '''GFDL'''.

==Russian==
* http://www.hike.ru

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>cnhtcpu528sss2dfqg98afnxsicz75v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4502</id>
      <parentid>4501</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-06T23:33:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3692">This is a list of websites with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==
* Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers
* Hitchhiker's guide to Europe

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 30,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the Hitchbase, is an easy-to-use database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike.

* [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase.com]

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly hitchhiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/ his own site] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors.

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by Kirsi Jokisalo with tips about hitchhiking in several European countries: [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Hitchhiking in the Netherlands (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling)===
* http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm
Nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''Liftari.org''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, thoug irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

* http://www.liftari.org

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and '''GFDL'''.

==Russian==
* http://www.hike.ru

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>dn0vh0y49v797ymoe40toceem6lt15m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4503</id>
      <parentid>4502</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-06T23:33:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3693">This is a list of websites with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==
* Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers
* Hitchhiker's guide to Europe

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 30,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the Hitchbase, is an easy-to-use database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike.

* [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase.com]

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly hitchhiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/ his own site] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors.

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by Kirsi Jokisalo with tips about hitchhiking in several European countries: [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Hitchhiking in the Netherlands (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling)===
* http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm
Nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''Liftari.org''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, though irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

* http://www.liftari.org

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and '''GFDL'''.

==Russian==
* http://www.hike.ru

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>k1t12x5n5yzqotgs2b4pnpf01r1xppp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4504</id>
      <parentid>4503</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-06T23:34:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3699">This is a list of '''websites''' with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==
* Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers
* Hitchhiker's guide to Europe

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 30,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the Hitchbase, is an easy-to-use database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike.

* [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase.com]

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly hitchhiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/ his own site] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors.

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by Kirsi Jokisalo with tips about hitchhiking in several European countries: [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Hitchhiking in the Netherlands (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling)===
* http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm
Nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''Liftari.org''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, though irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

* http://www.liftari.org

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and '''GFDL'''.

==Russian==
* http://www.hike.ru

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>c8hku36h4948chv0it11nv4ye4dkks7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4505</id>
      <parentid>4504</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-06T23:36:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3773">This is a list of '''websites''' with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==
* Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers
* Hitchhiker's guide to Europe

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 30,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the Hitchbase, is an easy-to-use database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike.

* [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase.com]

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly hitchhiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/ his own site] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors.

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by Kirsi Jokisalo with tips about hitchhiking in several European countries: [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Hitchhiking in the Netherlands (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling)===
* http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm
Nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''Liftari.org''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, though irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

* http://www.liftari.org

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and '''GFDL'''.

==Russian==
* [http://www.hike.ru hike.ru], with some information [http://hike.ru/?newlang=eng in English]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>7wdwb9jot3er7cu8dqffezl9jht15ti</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4506</id>
      <parentid>4505</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-06-01T01:29:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>210.214.91.117</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1359">I felt the celebrity part, and all the walk-ons we not at all the focus of this movie, it just uses that world as a backdrop
* [http://www.aishwaryalife.com aishwarya rai]
* [http://www.aishwaryalife.com/aishwarya-rai-life-style.php life style]
* [http://www.aishwaryalife.com/aishwarya-rai-gallery.php aishwarya rai gallery]
* [http://www.aishwaryalife.com aishwarya rai pictures]
* [http://www.aishwaryalife.com aishwarya rai wallpapers]
* [http://www.jessicaalbalife.com/ jessica alba]
* [http://www.jessicaalbalife.com/jessica--alba-gallery.php jessica alba gallery]
* [http://www.jessicaalbalife.com jessica alba pics]
* [http://www.jessicaalbalife.com jessica alba wallpaper]
* [http://www.shakiralife.com/ shakira]
* [http://www.shakiralife.com/shakira-gallery.php shakira gallery]
* [http://www.shakiralife.com/ shakira lyrics]
* [http://www.shakiralife.com/ shakira video]
* [http://www.shakiralife.com shakira photo]
* [http://www.terapatricklife.com/ tera patrick]
* [http://www.terapatricklife.com/filmography.php tera patrick filmography]
* [http://www.terapatricklife.com/ tera patrick wallpapers]
* [http://www.terapatricklife.com/ tera patrick pictures]
* [http://www.adrianalimapics.org/ Adriana Lima] 
* [http://www.adrianalimapics.org/biography.php Adriana Lima Biography]
* [http://www.adrianalimapics.org/gallery.php Adriana Lima gallery]</text>
      <sha1>bvckmzanzgebkso6qvwpu2ofzyvb8td</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4507</id>
      <parentid>4506</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-06-01T16:09:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3773">This is a list of '''websites''' with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==
* Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers
* Hitchhiker's guide to Europe

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 30,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the Hitchbase, is an easy-to-use database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike.

* [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase.com]

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly hitchhiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/ his own site] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors.

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by Kirsi Jokisalo with tips about hitchhiking in several European countries: [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Hitchhiking in the Netherlands (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling)===
* http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm
Nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''Liftari.org''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, though irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

* http://www.liftari.org

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and '''GFDL'''.

==Russian==
* [http://www.hike.ru hike.ru], with some information [http://hike.ru/?newlang=eng in English]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>7wdwb9jot3er7cu8dqffezl9jht15ti</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4508</id>
      <parentid>4507</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-07-31T06:41:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Salman</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3773">This is a list of '''websites''' with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==
* Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers
* Hitchhiker's guide to Europe

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 50,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the Hitchbase, is an easy-to-use database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike.

* [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase.com]

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly hitchhiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/ his own site] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors.

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by Kirsi Jokisalo with tips about hitchhiking in several European countries: [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Hitchhiking in the Netherlands (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling)===
* http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm
Nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''Liftari.org''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, though irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

* http://www.liftari.org

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and '''GFDL'''.

==Russian==
* [http://www.hike.ru hike.ru], with some information [http://hike.ru/?newlang=eng in English]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>jvq8vkmuftk3x1hbaawkz1k5zlk33dg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4509</id>
      <parentid>4508</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-07-31T06:42:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Salman</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3773">This is a list of '''websites''' with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==
* Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers
* Hitchhiker's guide to Europe

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 40,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the Hitchbase, is an easy-to-use database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike.

* [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase.com]

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly hitchhiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/ his own site] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors.

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by Kirsi Jokisalo with tips about hitchhiking in several European countries: [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Hitchhiking in the Netherlands (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling)===
* http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm
Nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''Liftari.org''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, though irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

* http://www.liftari.org

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and '''GFDL'''.

==Russian==
* [http://www.hike.ru hike.ru], with some information [http://hike.ru/?newlang=eng in English]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>j8lcpawes0sl6hapzs5y7v5tz3ai6yt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4510</id>
      <parentid>4509</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-08-03T21:43:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3949">This is a list of '''websites''' with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==
* Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers
* Hitchhiker's guide to Europe

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 40,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the Hitchbase, is an easy-to-use database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike. Most entries are in English, but some entries are written in German.
As of August 2006 it includes 28 countries, Germany with 146 places, Finland 82, and Sweden 28, France 18.

* [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase.com]

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly hitchhiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/ his own site] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors.

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by Kirsi Jokisalo with tips about hitchhiking in several European countries: [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Hitchhiking in the Netherlands (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling)===
* http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm
Nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''Liftari.org''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, though irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

* http://www.liftari.org

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and '''GFDL'''.

==Russian==
* [http://www.hike.ru hike.ru], with some information [http://hike.ru/?newlang=eng in English]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>elobg62pnix0546h0nhi9psttwl0mzd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4511</id>
      <parentid>4510</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-08-03T21:59:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3973">This is a list of '''websites''' with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==
* Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers
* Hitchhiker's guide to Europe

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 40,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the Hitchbase, is an easy-to-use database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike. Most entries are in English, but some entries are written in German.
As of August 2006 it includes 28 countries, Germany with 146 places, Finland 82, and Sweden 28, France 18.

* [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase.com]

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly hitchhiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/ his own site] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors.

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by Kirsi Jokisalo with tips about hitchhiking in several European countries: [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===In the Netherlands===
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands] (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling), a nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''Liftari.org''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, though irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

* http://www.liftari.org

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and '''GFDL'''.

==Russian==
* [http://www.hike.ru hike.ru], with some information [http://hike.ru/?newlang=eng in English]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>jorhp9ksu2pzuk19zgwbry26d0or9u2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4512</id>
      <parentid>4511</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-08-03T22:00:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3972">This is a list of '''websites''' with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==
* Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers
* Hitchhiker's guide to Europe

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 40,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the Hitchbase, is an easy-to-use database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike. Most entries are in English, but some entries are written in German.
As of August 2006 it includes 28 countries, Germany with 146 places, Finland 82, and Sweden 28, France 18.

* [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase.com]

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly hitchhiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/ his own site] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors.

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by Kirsi Jokisalo with tips about hitchhiking in several European countries: [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===In the Netherlands===
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands] (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling), a nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''[http://www.liftari.org Liftari.org]''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, though irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and '''GFDL'''.

==Russian==
* [http://www.hike.ru hike.ru], with some information [http://hike.ru/?newlang=eng in English]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>dh0ekgz5p960ndyjbsv775g3vv2ebde</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4513</id>
      <parentid>4512</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-08-03T22:00:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3909">This is a list of '''websites''' with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==
* Hitchhiker's guide to Europe

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 40,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase], is an easy-to-use database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike. Most entries are in English, but some entries are written in German.

As of August 2006 it includes 28 countries, Germany with 146 places, Finland 82, and Sweden 28, France 18.

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly hitchhiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/ his own site] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors.

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by Kirsi Jokisalo with tips about hitchhiking in several European countries: [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===In the Netherlands===
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands] (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling), a nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''[http://www.liftari.org Liftari.org]''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, though irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and '''GFDL'''.

==Russian==
* [http://www.hike.ru hike.ru], with some information [http://hike.ru/?newlang=eng in English]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>a40q0yx0r2u5x9ix9ku5ttdxd4lulsj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4514</id>
      <parentid>4513</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-19T21:54:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>145.254.238.56</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4149">This is a list of '''websites''' with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==
* Hitchhiker's guide to Europe

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 40,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase], is an easy-to-use database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike. Most entries are in English, but some entries are written in German.

As of August 2006 it includes 28 countries, Germany with 146 places, Finland 82, and Sweden 28, France 18.

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly hitchhiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/ his own site] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors.

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by Kirsi Jokisalo with tips about hitchhiking in several European countries: [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Anhalterfreunde===
It’s a great German site in English with lots of information about hitchhiking in general, legal issues and dozens of funny anecdotes about hitching.
[http://www.anhalterfreunde.de/english/home.htm Anhalterfreunde]

===In the Netherlands===
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands] (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling), a nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''[http://www.liftari.org Liftari.org]''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, though irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and '''GFDL'''.

==Russian==
* [http://www.hike.ru hike.ru], with some information [http://hike.ru/?newlang=eng in English]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>la3ackoiecsrjp3s2h1hdpqpj2wfzi7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4515</id>
      <parentid>4514</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-19T21:57:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>145.254.238.56</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4151">This is a list of '''websites''' with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==
* Hitchhiker's guide to Europe

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 40,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase], is an easy-to-use database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike. Most entries are in English, but some entries are written in German.

As of August 2006 it includes 28 countries, Germany with 146 places, Finland 82, and Sweden 28, France 18.

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly hitchhiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/ his own site] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors.

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by Kirsi Jokisalo with tips about hitchhiking in several European countries: [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Anhalterfreunde===
It’s a great German site in English with lots of information about hitchhiking in general, legal issues and dozens of funny anecdotes about hitching.
* [http://www.anhalterfreunde.de/english/home.htm Anhalterfreunde]

===In the Netherlands===
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands] (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling), a nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''[http://www.liftari.org Liftari.org]''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, though irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and '''GFDL'''.

==Russian==
* [http://www.hike.ru hike.ru], with some information [http://hike.ru/?newlang=eng in English]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>dbiy176wzdxxkfbwnly5dhwx0pts5f3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4516</id>
      <parentid>4515</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-19T22:05:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>145.254.241.222</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4301">This is a list of '''websites''' with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==
* Hitchhiker's guide to Europe

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 40,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase], is an easy-to-use database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike. Most entries are in English, but some entries are written in German.

As of August 2006 it includes 28 countries, Germany with 146 places, Finland 82, and Sweden 28, France 18.

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly hitchhiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/ his own site] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors.

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by Kirsi Jokisalo with tips about hitchhiking in several European countries: [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Anhalterfreunde===
'''Anhalterfreunde''' means something like Supporters of hitchhiking. It's a great German site in English language with lots of information all about hitchhiking in general, legal issues and dozens of funny anecdotes.
* [http://www.anhalterfreunde.de/english/home.htm Anhalterfreunde]- Englisch version
* [http://www.anhalterfreunde.de Anhalterfreunde]- German version

===In the Netherlands===
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands] (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling), a nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''[http://www.liftari.org Liftari.org]''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, though irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and '''GFDL'''.

==Russian==
* [http://www.hike.ru hike.ru], with some information [http://hike.ru/?newlang=eng in English]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>k1zwolti3y8snvcoo8wzslg9mwfve1f</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4517</id>
      <parentid>4516</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-19T22:07:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>145.254.241.222</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4303">This is a list of '''websites''' with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==
* Hitchhiker's guide to Europe

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 40,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase], is an easy-to-use database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike. Most entries are in English, but some entries are written in German.

As of August 2006 it includes 28 countries, Germany with 146 places, Finland 82, and Sweden 28, France 18.

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly hitchhiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/ his own site] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors.

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by Kirsi Jokisalo with tips about hitchhiking in several European countries: [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Anhalterfreunde===
'''Anhalterfreunde''' means something like "Supporters of Hitchhiking". It's a great German site in English language with lots of information all about hitchhiking in general, legal issues and dozens of funny anecdotes.
* [http://www.anhalterfreunde.de/english/home.htm Anhalterfreunde]- Englisch version
* [http://www.anhalterfreunde.de Anhalterfreunde]- German version

===In the Netherlands===
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands] (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling), a nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''[http://www.liftari.org Liftari.org]''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, though irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and '''GFDL'''.

==Russian==
* [http://www.hike.ru hike.ru], with some information [http://hike.ru/?newlang=eng in English]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>07p6f9std13a7r89aod2ce3jka7xept</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4518</id>
      <parentid>4517</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-20T00:40:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4159">This is a list of '''websites''' with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==
* Hitchhiker's guide to Europe

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 40,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase], is an easy-to-use database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike. Most entries are in English, but some entries are written in German.

As of August 2006 it includes 28 countries, Germany with 146 places, Finland 82, and Sweden 28, France 18.

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly hitchhiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/ his own site] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors.

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by Kirsi Jokisalo with tips about hitchhiking in several European countries: [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Anhalterfreunde===
[http://www.anhalterfreunde.de/english/home.htm Anhalterfreunde] is a great German site in English (and German) with lots of information about hitchhiking in general, legal issues and dozens of funny anecdotes about hitching.

===In the Netherlands===
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands] (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling), a nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''[http://www.liftari.org Liftari.org]''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, though irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and 
'''GFDL'''.

==Russian==
* [http://www.hike.ru hike.ru], with some information [http://hike.ru/?newlang=eng in English]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>swvnn10q5zukldozmuvbby32exoytc0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4519</id>
      <parentid>4518</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-20T00:44:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4236">This is a list of '''websites''' with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==
* Hitchhiker's guide to Europe

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 40,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase], is an easy-to-use database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike. Most entries are in English, but some entries are written in German.

As of August 2006 it includes 28 countries, Germany with 146 places, Finland 82, and Sweden 28, France 18.

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly hitchhiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/ his own site] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors.

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by Kirsi Jokisalo with tips about hitchhiking in several European countries: [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Anhalterfreunde===
[http://www.anhalterfreunde.de/english/home.htm Anhalterfreunde] is a great German site in English (and German) with lots of information about hitchhiking in general, legal issues and dozens of funny anecdotes about hitching.

===In the Netherlands===
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands] (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling), a nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''[http://www.liftari.org Liftari.org]''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, though irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and available under the  GNU Free Documentation License (which is compatible with this wiki).

==Russian==
* [http://www.hike.ru hike.ru], with some information [http://hike.ru/?newlang=eng in English]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>9v9r4puwlq14xnqeo54bpw5um5tr7nf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4520</id>
      <parentid>4519</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-09T19:36:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>84.170.188.74</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4215">This is a list of '''websites''' with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==
* Hitchhiker's guide to Europe

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 40,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase], is an easy-to-use database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike. Most entries are in English, but some entries are written in German.

As of August 2006 it includes 28 countries, Germany with 146 places, Finland 82, and Sweden 28, France 18.

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly hitchhiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/ his own site] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors.

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by Kirsi Jokisalo with tips about hitchhiking in several European countries: [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Hitch-hiking===
[http://hitch-hiking.org www.hitch-hiking.org] is a great German site in English (and German) with lots of information about hitchhiking in general, legal issues and dozens of funny anecdotes about hitching.

===In the Netherlands===
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands] (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling), a nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''[http://www.liftari.org Liftari.org]''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, though irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and available under the  GNU Free Documentation License (which is compatible with this wiki).

==Russian==
* [http://www.hike.ru hike.ru], with some information [http://hike.ru/?newlang=eng in English]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>j7l374did5t2ej6v6ezkts578t2dba0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4521</id>
      <parentid>4520</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-09T19:38:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>84.170.188.74</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4215">This is a list of '''websites''' with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==
* Hitchhiker's guide to Europe

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 40,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase], is an easy-to-use database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike. Most entries are in English, but some entries are written in German.

As of August 2006 it includes 28 countries, Germany with 146 places, Finland 82, and Sweden 28, France 18.

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly hitchhiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/ his own site] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors.

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by Kirsi Jokisalo with tips about hitchhiking in several European countries: [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Hitch-hiking===
[http://hitch-hiking.org www.hitch-hiking.org] is a great site in English and German language with lots of information about hitchhiking in general, legal issues and dozens of funny anecdotes about hitching.

===In the Netherlands===
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands] (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling), a nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''[http://www.liftari.org Liftari.org]''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, though irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and available under the  GNU Free Documentation License (which is compatible with this wiki).

==Russian==
* [http://www.hike.ru hike.ru], with some information [http://hike.ru/?newlang=eng in English]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>szjsukg45vlhar6jcv7ba7zmr9lmfpl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4522</id>
      <parentid>1584</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4291">This is a list of '''websites''' with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==
* Hitchhiker's guide to Europe

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 40,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase], is a database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike. Most entries are in English, but some entries are written in German. Updating information is not very easy, but for tips in hitching Finland it's unbeatable.

As of August 2006 it includes 28 countries, Germany with 146 places, Finland 82, and Sweden 28, France 18.

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly hitchhiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/ his own site] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors.

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by Kirsi Jokisalo with tips about hitchhiking in several European countries: [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Hitch-hiking===
[http://hitch-hiking.org www.hitch-hiking.org] is a great site in English and German language with lots of information about hitchhiking in general, legal issues and dozens of funny anecdotes about hitching.

===In the Netherlands===
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands] (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling), a nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''[http://www.liftari.org Liftari.org]''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, though irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and available under the  GNU Free Documentation License (which is compatible with this wiki).

==Russian==
* [http://www.hike.ru hike.ru], with some information [http://hike.ru/?newlang=eng in English]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>mrprqtddpi9eupxzpqaetmqcvh30vou</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9327</id>
      <parentid>4522</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-30T00:12:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>85.177.184.167</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4494">This is a list of '''websites''' with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 40,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===Liftershalte.info===
'''[http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte.info]''' is a world map where everyone can add markers to good hitching spots. Thus it will hopefully become valuable help for hitching in any place of the world.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase], is a database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike. Most entries are in English, but some entries are written in German. Updating information is not very easy, but for tips in hitching Finland it's unbeatable.

As of August 2006 it includes 28 countries, Germany with 146 places, Finland 82, and Sweden 28, France 18.

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly hitchhiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/ his own site] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors.

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by Kirsi Jokisalo with tips about hitchhiking in several European countries: [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Hitch-hiking===
[http://hitch-hiking.org www.hitch-hiking.org] is a great site in English and German language with lots of information about hitchhiking in general, legal issues and dozens of funny anecdotes about hitching.

===In the Netherlands===
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands] (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling), a nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''[http://www.liftari.org Liftari.org]''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, though irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and available under the  GNU Free Documentation License (which is compatible with this wiki).

==Russian==
* [http://www.hike.ru hike.ru], with some information [http://hike.ru/?newlang=eng in English]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>eegk1d1zwj6y481figqoasxw79q6g46</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10203</id>
      <parentid>9327</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-01-26T12:33:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4498">This is a list of '''websites''' with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 40,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===[[Liftershalte.info]]===
'''[http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte.info]''' is a world map where everyone can add markers to good hitching spots. Thus it will hopefully become valuable help for hitching in any place of the world.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase], is a database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike. Most entries are in English, but some entries are written in German. Updating information is not very easy, but for tips in hitching Finland it's unbeatable.

As of August 2006 it includes 28 countries, Germany with 146 places, Finland 82, and Sweden 28, France 18.

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly hitchhiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/ his own site] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors.

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by Kirsi Jokisalo with tips about hitchhiking in several European countries: [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Hitch-hiking===
[http://hitch-hiking.org www.hitch-hiking.org] is a great site in English and German language with lots of information about hitchhiking in general, legal issues and dozens of funny anecdotes about hitching.

===In the Netherlands===
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands] (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling), a nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''[http://www.liftari.org Liftari.org]''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, though irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and available under the  GNU Free Documentation License (which is compatible with this wiki).

==Russian==
* [http://www.hike.ru hike.ru], with some information [http://hike.ru/?newlang=eng in English]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>knv1njzr04g4f41el31hjwsmpgqh4pi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10786</id>
      <parentid>10203</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-13T13:56:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.25.12.4</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4605">This is a list of '''websites''' with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 40,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===[[Liftershalte.info]]===
'''[http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte.info]''' is a world map where everyone can add markers to good hitching spots. Thus it will hopefully become valuable help for hitching in any place of the world.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase], is a database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike. Most entries are in English, but some entries are written in German. Updating information is not very easy, but for tips in hitching Finland it's unbeatable.

As of August 2006 it includes 28 countries, Germany with 146 places, Finland 82, and Sweden 28, France 18.

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly hitchhiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/ his own site] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors.

===The European Hitchhikers Engine===
* [http://www.pass-europe.eu Pass-Europe - hitchhiking information]

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by Kirsi Jokisalo with tips about hitchhiking in several European countries: [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Hitch-hiking===
[http://hitch-hiking.org www.hitch-hiking.org] is a great site in English and German language with lots of information about hitchhiking in general, legal issues and dozens of funny anecdotes about hitching.

===In the Netherlands===
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands] (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling), a nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''[http://www.liftari.org Liftari.org]''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, though irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and available under the  GNU Free Documentation License (which is compatible with this wiki).

==Russian==
* [http://www.hike.ru hike.ru], with some information [http://hike.ru/?newlang=eng in English]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>3fj5hdgi6laq4zisyx1rumufsg3xrb4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10787</id>
      <parentid>10786</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-13T14:00:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.25.12.4</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4679">This is a list of '''websites''' with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 40,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===[[Liftershalte.info]]===
'''[http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte.info]''' is a world map where everyone can add markers to good hitching spots. Thus it will hopefully become valuable help for hitching in any place of the world.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase], is a database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike. Most entries are in English, but some entries are written in German. Updating information is not very easy, but for tips in hitching Finland it's unbeatable.

As of August 2006 it includes 28 countries, Germany with 146 places, Finland 82, and Sweden 28, France 18.

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly hitchhiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/ his own site] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors.

===The European Hitchhikers Engine===
* [http://www.pass-europe.eu Pass-Europe - hitchhiking information]

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by Kirsi Jokisalo with tips about hitchhiking in several European countries: [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Hitch-hiking===
[http://hitch-hiking.org www.hitch-hiking.org] is a great site in English and German language with lots of information about hitchhiking in general, legal issues and dozens of funny anecdotes about hitching.

===In the Netherlands===
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands] (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling), a nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''[http://www.liftari.org Liftari.org]''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, though irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and available under the  GNU Free Documentation License (which is compatible with this wiki).

==Bulgarian==
* [http://www.shofior.com?lang=BG Hitchhikers information]

==Russian==
* [http://www.hike.ru hike.ru], with some information [http://hike.ru/?newlang=eng in English]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>6jfpyun6vgl5g1e9x3xxgt689uwh33v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10815</id>
      <parentid>10787</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-16T11:07:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4498">This is a list of '''websites''' with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 40,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===[[Liftershalte.info]]===
'''[http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte.info]''' is a world map where everyone can add markers to good hitching spots. Thus it will hopefully become valuable help for hitching in any place of the world.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase], is a database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike. Most entries are in English, but some entries are written in German. Updating information is not very easy, but for tips in hitching Finland it's unbeatable.

As of August 2006 it includes 28 countries, Germany with 146 places, Finland 82, and Sweden 28, France 18.

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly hitchhiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/ his own site] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors.

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by Kirsi Jokisalo with tips about hitchhiking in several European countries: [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Hitch-hiking===
[http://hitch-hiking.org www.hitch-hiking.org] is a great site in English and German language with lots of information about hitchhiking in general, legal issues and dozens of funny anecdotes about hitching.

===In the Netherlands===
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands] (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling), a nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''[http://www.liftari.org Liftari.org]''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, though irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and available under the  GNU Free Documentation License (which is compatible with this wiki).

==Russian==
* [http://www.hike.ru hike.ru], with some information [http://hike.ru/?newlang=eng in English]

[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>knv1njzr04g4f41el31hjwsmpgqh4pi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11178</id>
      <parentid>10815</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-07T07:09:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>SAn</username>
        <id>50</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4734">This is a list of '''websites''' with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 40,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===[[Liftershalte.info]]===
'''[http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte.info]''' is a world map where everyone can add markers to good hitching spots. Thus it will hopefully become valuable help for hitching in any place of the world.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase], is a database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike. Most entries are in English, but some entries are written in German. Updating information is not very easy, but for tips in hitching Finland it's unbeatable.

As of August 2006 it includes 28 countries, Germany with 146 places, Finland 82, and Sweden 28, France 18.

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly hitchhiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/ his own site] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors.

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by Kirsi Jokisalo with tips about hitchhiking in several European countries: [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Hitch-hiking===
[http://hitch-hiking.org www.hitch-hiking.org] is a great site in English and German language with lots of information about hitchhiking in general, legal issues and dozens of funny anecdotes about hitching.

===In the Netherlands===
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands] (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling), a nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''[http://www.liftari.org Liftari.org]''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, though irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and available under the  GNU Free Documentation License (which is compatible with this wiki).

==Russian==
* [http://www.hike.ru hike.ru], with some information [http://hike.ru/?newlang=eng in English]

==Spanish==
* [http://www.autostopargentina.com.ar AutostopArgentina] is a comunity page for Argentina and south America Hitchhikers. Theres lot of data about Argentina, HOWTO´s, and theres a forum with about 1200  registered members.
[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>3jvatumkpepce8akzpy52n1n0zz6g1a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11182</id>
      <parentid>11178</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-07T07:58:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4737">This is a list of '''websites''' with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 40,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===[[Liftershalte.info]]===
'''[http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte.info]''' is a world map where everyone can add markers to good hitching spots. Thus it will hopefully become valuable help for hitching in any place of the world.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase], is a database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike. Most entries are in English, but some entries are written in German. Updating information is not very easy, but for tips in hitching Finland it's unbeatable.

As of August 2006 it includes 28 countries, Germany with 146 places, Finland 82, and Sweden 28, France 18.

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly hitchhiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/ his own site] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors.

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by Kirsi Jokisalo with tips about hitchhiking in several European countries: [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Hitch-hiking===
[http://hitch-hiking.org www.hitch-hiking.org] is a great site in English and German language with lots of information about hitchhiking in general, legal issues and dozens of funny anecdotes about hitching.

===In the Netherlands===
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands] (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling), a nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''[http://www.liftari.org Liftari.org]''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, though irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and available under the  GNU Free Documentation License (which is compatible with this wiki).

==Russian==
* [http://www.hike.ru hike.ru], with some information [http://hike.ru/?newlang=eng in English]

==Spanish==
* [http://www.autostopargentina.com.ar AutostopArgentina] is a community page for [[Argentina]] and South American hitchhikers. There's lots of data about [[Argentina]], HOWTO's, and a forum with about 1200 registered members.
[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>ptd6jjkvsipkghqkvwn02w89j7xvl0s</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11892</id>
      <parentid>11182</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-06-25T18:55:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>137.120.3.244</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4861">This is a list of '''websites''' with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 40,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===[[Liftershalte.info]]===
'''[http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte.info]''' is a world map where everyone can add markers to good hitching spots. Thus it will hopefully become valuable help for hitching in any place of the world.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase], is a database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike. Most entries are in English, but some entries are written in German. Updating information is not very easy, but for tips in hitching Finland it's unbeatable.

As of August 2006 it includes 28 countries, Germany with 146 places, Finland 82, and Sweden 28, France 18.

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly hitchhiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/ his own site] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors.

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by Kirsi Jokisalo with tips about hitchhiking in several European countries: [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Hitch-hiking===
[http://hitch-hiking.org www.hitch-hiking.org] is a great site in English and German language with lots of information about hitchhiking in general, legal issues and dozens of funny anecdotes about hitching.

===In the Netherlands===
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands] (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling), a nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''[http://www.liftari.org Liftari.org]''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, though irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and available under the  GNU Free Documentation License (which is compatible with this wiki).
* [http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com Abgefahren e.V. - Deutsche AutoStop Gesellschaft] Verein, Ideen, Trampprojekte, Blogs,..

==Russian==
* [http://www.hike.ru hike.ru], with some information [http://hike.ru/?newlang=eng in English]

==Spanish==
* [http://www.autostopargentina.com.ar AutostopArgentina] is a community page for [[Argentina]] and South American hitchhikers. There's lots of data about [[Argentina]], HOWTO's, and a forum with about 1200 registered members.
[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>atlrxgpcmnwgrda1o8uy8pq6jtk0jv9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12565</id>
      <parentid>11892</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-02T09:51:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4762">This is a list of '''websites''' with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 40,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===[[Liftershalte.info]]===
'''[http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte.info]''' is a world map where everyone can mark hitching spots.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase], is a database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike. Most entries are in English, but some entries are written in German. Updating information is not very easy, but for tips in hitching Finland it's unbeatable.

As of August 2006 it includes 28 countries, Germany with 146 places, Finland 82, and Sweden 28, France 18.

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly hitchhiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/ his own site] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors.

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by Kirsi Jokisalo with tips about hitchhiking in several European countries: [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Hitch-hiking===
[http://hitch-hiking.org www.hitch-hiking.org] is a great site in English and German language with lots of information about hitchhiking in general, legal issues and dozens of funny anecdotes about hitching.

===In the Netherlands===
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands] (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling), a nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''[http://www.liftari.org Liftari.org]''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, though irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and available under the  GNU Free Documentation License (which is compatible with this wiki).
* [http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com Abgefahren e.V. - Deutsche AutoStop Gesellschaft] Verein, Ideen, Trampprojekte, Blogs,..

==Russian==
* [http://www.hike.ru hike.ru], with some information [http://hike.ru/?newlang=eng in English]

==Spanish==
* [http://www.autostopargentina.com.ar AutostopArgentina] is a community page for [[Argentina]] and South American hitchhikers. There's lots of data about [[Argentina]], HOWTO's, and a forum with about 1200 registered members.
[[Category:General info]]</text>
      <sha1>5k54qhezgfwe2o3iqjajubs1yfgjb3a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13978</id>
      <parentid>12565</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-21T18:34:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4780">This is a list of '''websites''' with useful information for hitchhikers.

==English==

===Digihitch===
'''Digihitch''' is a complete web portal devoted to hitchhiking, with thousands of members around the world and new, original content every day. The site receives over 40,000 visitors each month. Digihitch.com has many different areas of information to: showcase new stuff, help travelers prepare for a trip, or to allow registered members to share stories and articles.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/forums.html Great Campfire Forums] - Discussion forums with thousands of topics on everything related to hitchhiking, including forums on road culture and regional travel. People new to hitchhiking can get help in our ''Sparkies'' forum.
* [http://www.digihitch.com/world/ digihitch World] - Map-based navigation of worldwide hitchhiking resources. Click on a country or sub-region to view its stories, links and discussion groups. Members can also vote for each region based on 5 key points (including affordability, safety and 'hitchhikability')
* [http://www.digihitch.com/encyclopedia.html Encyclopedia of Road Sub-Culture] - Includes hundreds of biographies, song lyrics, travel terms and movies. Favorites include our ''Hitchhiking in the Movies'' section- listing all movies that have hitchhiking- and ''Celebrity Sub-culture'', with a listing of actors, musicians and other notables who have been on the road.

===[[Liftershalte.info]]===
'''[http://www.liftershalte.info Liftershalte.info]''' is a world map where everyone can mark hitching spots.

===Hitchbase===
The Worldwide Database of places for Hitchhikers, also known as the [http://www.hitchbase.com/index.php?LANG=eng Hitchbase], is a database where hitchhikers can seek for good places to hitchhike. Most entries are in English, but some entries are written in German. Updating information is not very easy, but for tips in hitching Finland it's unbeatable.

As of August 2006 it includes 28 countries, Germany with 146 places, Finland 82, and Sweden 28, France 18.

===Suite101===
'''Suite 101''' is a sort of on-line magazine which ran a monthly hitchhiking column from October 1996 to February 2003. The columnist, [http://bernd.wechner.info Bernd Wechner], ceased writing for Suite 101 in 2003 and the archive at Suite 101 itself has fallen into an embarrasing state of disrepair since. All the same it is available at:
* http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/hitch_hiking

Bernd Wechner has however archived all the articles written for that column on [http://bernd.wechner.info/Hitchhiking/Suite101/ his own site] and [http://www.digihitch.com/featured_salman.html Morgan Salman Strub] has archived them on digihitch along with a wealth of other material from many contributors.

===Hitchhiker's guide to Europe===
Hitchhikers' guide to Europe is a website by Kirsi Jokisalo with tips about hitchhiking in several European countries: [http://www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/kjokisal/liftaus/ Hitchhikers' guide to Europe]

===Hitch-hiking===
[http://hitch-hiking.org www.hitch-hiking.org] is a great site in English and German language with lots of information about hitchhiking in general, legal issues and dozens of funny anecdotes about hitching.

===In the Netherlands===
* [http://www.franknature.nl/hitchhike/hitchhike.htm Hitchhiking in the Netherlands] (Ad-Hoc-Carpooling), a nice website by Frank Verhart

==Finnish==
'''[http://www.liftari.org Liftari.org]''' is a community webpage for [[Finland | Finnish]] hitchhikers. It's a community blog started in early 2004, containing tips and stories about hitchhiking.

After the first year there were more than 200 members signed on the website, about 100 articles about hitchhiking posted to the site and a working bulletin board for discussions. The community organizes gettogether meetings, though irregularly, and there has been interest to the community by the local media.

The site is mostly in [[finland#Language | Finnish]], but foreigners coming to [[hitchhiking | hitchhike]] in [[Finland]] can post questions on the forum.

==German==
* [http://deu.anarchopedia.org/index.php/Tramp-Ratgeberin Hitchhike info on Anarchopedia], '''wiki''' and available under the  GNU Free Documentation License (which is compatible with this wiki).
* [http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com Abgefahren e.V. - Deutsche AutoStop Gesellschaft] Verein, Ideen, Trampprojekte, Blogs,..

==Russian==
* [http://www.hike.ru hike.ru], with some information [http://hike.ru/?newlang=eng in English]

==Spanish==
* [http://www.autostopargentina.com.ar AutostopArgentina] is a community page for [[Argentina]] and South American hitchhikers. There's lots of data about [[Argentina]], HOWTO's, and a forum with about 1200 registered members.
[[Category:General info]]

[[de:Webseiten]]</text>
      <sha1>jzy0ty07av3l0f14dafc219yg9km7gk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15260</id>
      <parentid>13978</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-31T19:29:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="24">#redirect [[Multimedia]]</text>
      <sha1>16qvo4w8l7cbxy2n6l0btb5pat339zq</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Hitchwiki:Sandbox</title>
    <ns>4</ns>
    <id>1540</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1585</id>
      <parentid>4527</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-12T22:38:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="217">Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

[[Category:Help]]</text>
      <sha1>jescdwm1kfgg8b7c0z9g8mzlnbe0goi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1586</id>
      <parentid>1585</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="217">Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

[[Category:Help]]</text>
      <sha1>jescdwm1kfgg8b7c0z9g8mzlnbe0goi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4523</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T21:16:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="42">Here you can practice [[wiki]] ''syntax''.</text>
      <sha1>tngbs6u9edq2uyy2kgzbsiilpc5xeoj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4524</id>
      <parentid>4523</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T21:16:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="69">Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki] ''syntax''.</text>
      <sha1>q3024q9ofnbhbc2pgpoxt9ybjoqqxov</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4525</id>
      <parentid>4524</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T21:16:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="74">Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.</text>
      <sha1>funy9b6yf7lftht7o3dr679zxbq4dmd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4526</id>
      <parentid>4525</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-12T22:32:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="198">Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]</text>
      <sha1>ppuctk2dclm2hum87xacic4y3x1azd2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4527</id>
      <parentid>4526</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-12T22:36:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="219">Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

[[Category:Browse]]</text>
      <sha1>889jxm6bug7f7cprlvl85pvujgdqxn9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4528</id>
      <parentid>1586</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="217">Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

[[Category:Help]]</text>
      <sha1>jescdwm1kfgg8b7c0z9g8mzlnbe0goi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10130</id>
      <parentid>4528</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-01-14T19:39:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Daniel</username>
        <id>25</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="216">Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
 [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

[[Category:Help]]</text>
      <sha1>b3r0n6kqhk6rvcfyk01rjskx846e5mj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10131</id>
      <parentid>10130</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-01-14T19:40:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Daniel</username>
        <id>25</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="217">Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

[[Category:Help]]</text>
      <sha1>jescdwm1kfgg8b7c0z9g8mzlnbe0goi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13053</id>
      <parentid>10131</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-19T11:31:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="251">Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[Category:Help]]</text>
      <sha1>clv7qwjks6ftl0nqxghhoik2bxht35l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13674</id>
      <parentid>13053</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-12T21:18:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="281">Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

&lt;!--==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;  not working--&gt;

{{user}}


[[Category:Help]]</text>
      <sha1>8rvctergm3q24o5ori95f4wdnhy7dqx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13728</id>
      <parentid>13674</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-13T14:56:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="417">Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

&lt;!--==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;  not working--&gt;

{{user}}


o rly? --[[User:MrTweek|&amp;#123;&amp;#123;SUBST:user&amp;#124;MrTweek&amp;#124;http&amp;#58;//www.liftershalte.info/}}]] 16:56, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

[[Category:Help]]</text>
      <sha1>hkw3m9rk11kacxbod573pxryugmebux</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13729</id>
      <parentid>13728</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-13T14:57:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="543">Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

&lt;!--==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;  not working--&gt;

{{user}}


o rly? --[[User:MrTweek|&amp;#123;&amp;#123;SUBST:user&amp;#124;MrTweek&amp;#124;http&amp;#58;//www.liftershalte.info/}}]] 16:56, 13 September 2007 (CEST)
now? --[[User:MrTweek|&amp;#123;&amp;#123;user&amp;#124;MrTweek&amp;#124;http&amp;#58;//www.liftershalte.info/}}]] 16:57, 13 September 2007 (CEST)
[[Category:Help]]</text>
      <sha1>kj4mh8cq7o7j8jcnvhia4hicgp0b8pr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13730</id>
      <parentid>13729</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-13T14:58:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="716">Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

&lt;!--==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;  not working--&gt;

{{user}}


o rly? --[[User:MrTweek|&amp;#123;&amp;#123;SUBST:user&amp;#124;MrTweek&amp;#124;http&amp;#58;//www.liftershalte.info/}}]] 16:56, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

now? --[[User:MrTweek|&amp;#123;&amp;#123;user&amp;#124;MrTweek&amp;#124;http&amp;#58;//www.liftershalte.info/}}]] 16:57, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

once again --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 16:58, 13 September 2007 (CEST)
[[Category:Help]]</text>
      <sha1>mirdj3h3gckudsp3p8nynh7a64fn3pi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13986</id>
      <parentid>13730</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-21T20:44:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="741">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

&lt;!--==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;  not working--&gt;

{{user}}


o rly? --[[User:MrTweek|&amp;#123;&amp;#123;SUBST:user&amp;#124;MrTweek&amp;#124;http&amp;#58;//www.liftershalte.info/}}]] 16:56, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

now? --[[User:MrTweek|&amp;#123;&amp;#123;user&amp;#124;MrTweek&amp;#124;http&amp;#58;//www.liftershalte.info/}}]] 16:57, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

once again --[[User:MrTweek|MrTweek]]&lt;small&gt;&lt;sup&gt;[http://http://www.liftershalte.info/ site], [[user talk:MrTweek|wikitalk]]&lt;/sup&gt;&lt;/small&gt; 16:58, 13 September 2007 (CEST)
[[Category:Help]]</text>
      <sha1>kl6xyh0vhnniz5v8krffyhtrj8dndu0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14023</id>
      <parentid>13986</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-22T14:40:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="286">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

&lt;!--==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;  not working--&gt;

{{user}}</text>
      <sha1>4egn94ayghlny4mpftvjfwn8zefn4qc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14215</id>
      <parentid>14023</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-28T23:27:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="266">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;

{{user}}</text>
      <sha1>9qxzkzadakr7rscqm1z7zxpxkccsusq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14310</id>
      <parentid>14215</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-03T09:06:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>88.70.26.124</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="279">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;

{{user}}
captcha test</text>
      <sha1>ej7o6yv7uwzn8gwr3h8pn7zd50q8mbl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14311</id>
      <parentid>14310</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-03T09:07:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>88.70.26.124</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="292">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de</text>
      <sha1>7bkng5flq4sbo5cfjh2bcvqukm8x7bd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14312</id>
      <parentid>14311</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-03T09:08:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>88.70.26.124</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="332">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;</text>
      <sha1>fzy1l9hi5fdw7gsnksf06981otyv9co</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14993</id>
      <parentid>14312</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-19T09:54:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TeamMG</username>
        <id>1040</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="399">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)</text>
      <sha1>43l1cdqhxppxrbzs153m0px1rhf9rjt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15312</id>
      <parentid>14993</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-01T11:55:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>81.208.106.78</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="404">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
nice</text>
      <sha1>jap6c5a9zkiwgdh3ln9s8pdt8v04gz0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15313</id>
      <parentid>15312</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-01T11:57:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>81.208.106.78</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="410">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]</text>
      <sha1>4xpk1cal09z7aiyd52ktp7xmp3bxa6l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18352</id>
      <parentid>15313</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-02-13T12:48:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>2001:6F8:1118:0:219:66FF:FE2E:D48F</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="441">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now</text>
      <sha1>sryoarvwxt0wb8p0m4l5winb07idod2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18589</id>
      <parentid>18352</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-02-29T09:19:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="707">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.</text>
      <sha1>ovkn9oiwyv2a0itsf944wgkqhq4oyei</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>20187</id>
      <parentid>18589</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-05-27T15:23:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="801">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' view='0' width='800' height='600' /&gt;</text>
      <sha1>gb1fmj581k2bbeuke8dy4nhnj1boxsv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22230</id>
      <parentid>20187</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-04T09:33:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="897">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==
&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' view='0' width='400' height='300' /&gt;

=== slippymap ===
&lt;slippymap&gt;lat=51.485|lon=-0.15|z=11|w=450|h=330|layer=osmarender&lt;/slippymap&gt;</text>
      <sha1>tg4xeeq9hy3ph5hkobvzpy4rafv8mno</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22231</id>
      <parentid>22230</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-04T09:42:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="888">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==
&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' /&gt;

=== slippymap ===
&lt;slippymap&gt;lat=51.485|lon=-0.15|z=11|w=450|h=330|layer=osmarender&lt;/slippymap&gt;</text>
      <sha1>mk2qcir8ig6m8izcjt24pby3bp3cat5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22232</id>
      <parentid>22231</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-04T09:46:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="891">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==
&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' /&gt;
bla
=== slippymap ===
&lt;slippymap&gt;lat=51.485|lon=-0.15|z=11|w=450|h=330|layer=osmarender&lt;/slippymap&gt;</text>
      <sha1>ikro5hywfp8ztx009tcfew562qc7h2m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22233</id>
      <parentid>22232</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-04T09:46:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="888">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==
&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' /&gt;

=== slippymap ===
&lt;slippymap&gt;lat=51.485|lon=-0.15|z=11|w=450|h=330|layer=osmarender&lt;/slippymap&gt;</text>
      <sha1>mk2qcir8ig6m8izcjt24pby3bp3cat5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22237</id>
      <parentid>22233</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-04T12:03:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1045">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==
&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='osmarender' /&gt;
&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;
&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='maplint' /&gt;
&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='google' /&gt;</text>
      <sha1>8owb4phfttma3en1b77l90pkvw9bpd0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22238</id>
      <parentid>22237</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-04T12:06:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="807">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='google' /&gt;</text>
      <sha1>062gidzs0cu3c7xly2q3waqdk1we5qt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22239</id>
      <parentid>22238</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-04T12:07:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="807">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;</text>
      <sha1>rhtuji06po114nlv9nm5fdwziylynln</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22788</id>
      <parentid>22239</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-23T18:09:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Alex</username>
        <id>89</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="852">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

== Template == 
{{Infobox_Country_Sandbox}}</text>
      <sha1>cta4dgac6e7i8yn91171wpe9x0391a3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22791</id>
      <parentid>22788</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-23T18:21:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Alex</username>
        <id>89</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="825">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|lala}}</text>
      <sha1>23mifpevp9wqv4wpxs9twy6kxgp09zu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22792</id>
      <parentid>22791</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-23T18:22:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Alex</username>
        <id>89</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="833">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}</text>
      <sha1>rktezntl1lopn7gvgl8zz4ndtk7q35y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22795</id>
      <parentid>22792</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-23T18:25:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Alex</username>
        <id>89</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="962">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...</text>
      <sha1>ccvf0d362q6uone6xplxj5sngkaq2gz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>22805</id>
      <parentid>22795</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-07-24T08:16:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1007">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

{{Infobox Country Sandbox
|country=Blubb
}}

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...</text>
      <sha1>kpl7yuopllr5omv45pby4wtttpfzecw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24389</id>
      <parentid>22805</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-03T21:29:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1007">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

{{Infobox Country Sandbox
|country=Blubb
}}

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...</text>
      <sha1>kpl7yuopllr5omv45pby4wtttpfzecw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24710</id>
      <parentid>24389</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-10T20:53:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1128">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

{{Infobox Country Sandbox
|country=Blubb
}}

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://newsrss.bbc.co.uk/rss/newsonline_uk_edition/world/rss.xml|template=Template:BBC&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...</text>
      <sha1>7g5wksfzkx2igpl7zdn9acjnsgzrynx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24711</id>
      <parentid>24710</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-10T20:54:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1141">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

{{Infobox Country Sandbox
|country=Blubb
}}

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://newsrss.bbc.co.uk/rss/newsonline_uk_edition/world/rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/RSS test&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...</text>
      <sha1>e18hazhl1pzq7ryohyb3qgquc8j7cme</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24712</id>
      <parentid>24711</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-10T20:55:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1114">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

{{Infobox Country Sandbox
|country=Blubb
}}

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/RSS test&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...</text>
      <sha1>j82612iseom06a2908kgn1bvkei8ddf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24713</id>
      <parentid>24712</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-10T20:55:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1125">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

{{Infobox Country Sandbox
|country=Blubb
}}

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...</text>
      <sha1>s2tvy9m45cstph4skxpc2krvbip2x60</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>25167</id>
      <parentid>24713</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-19T13:34:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1157">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

{{Infobox Country Sandbox
|country=Blubb
}}

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...</text>
      <sha1>p1y4752cidn0d6e12avx117v41igbxv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>25386</id>
      <parentid>25167</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-29T13:32:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1272">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

{{Infobox Country Sandbox
|country=Blubb
}}


[[User:Guaka|Guaka]]&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Guaka|talk]], [http://guaka.org site]&lt;/sup&gt; 15:32, 29 September 2008 (CEST)

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...</text>
      <sha1>k35qwl8pfe39t28ccce2p3ajdk0ul0v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26281</id>
      <parentid>25386</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-15T12:38:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1348">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

{{Infobox Country Sandbox
|country=Blubb
}}


[[User:Guaka|Guaka]]&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Guaka|talk]], [http://guaka.org site]&lt;/sup&gt; 15:32, 29 September 2008 (CEST)

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;</text>
      <sha1>nie08pq4nxtb32vwyyg3bif4j6fvznc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30091</id>
      <parentid>26281</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-16T16:50:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1436">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

{{Infobox Country Sandbox
|country=Blubb
}}


[[User:Guaka|Guaka]]&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Guaka|talk]], [http://guaka.org site]&lt;/sup&gt; 15:32, 29 September 2008 (CEST)

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php&lt;/rss&gt;</text>
      <sha1>qqjn4e7gfajgbclzhwu4qbwx2ozc4c8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30092</id>
      <parentid>30091</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-16T16:51:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1472">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

{{Infobox Country Sandbox
|country=Blubb
}}


[[User:Guaka|Guaka]]&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Guaka|talk]], [http://guaka.org site]&lt;/sup&gt; 15:32, 29 September 2008 (CEST)

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki&lt;/rss&gt;</text>
      <sha1>829qwpt09s2nhbwlsjd2ngcqauho0tr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30093</id>
      <parentid>30092</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-16T16:51:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1449">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

{{Infobox Country Sandbox
|country=Blubb
}}


[[User:Guaka|Guaka]]&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Guaka|talk]], [http://guaka.org site]&lt;/sup&gt; 15:32, 29 September 2008 (CEST)

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;</text>
      <sha1>jegvs8qo3pqos2yl5sjrmqz848xpfiz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31104</id>
      <parentid>30093</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-17T09:43:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Alex</username>
        <id>89</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1561">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

{{Infobox Country Sandbox
|country=Blubb
}}


[[User:Guaka|Guaka]]&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Guaka|talk]], [http://guaka.org site]&lt;/sup&gt; 15:32, 29 September 2008 (CEST)

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




== Mittrampzentrale ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/taxonomy/term/69/all/feed|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;</text>
      <sha1>puv0mxewz7cg3l8ieycnnkg9y7lfnef</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31105</id>
      <parentid>31104</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-17T09:49:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Alex</username>
        <id>89</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1557">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

{{Infobox Country Sandbox
|country=Blubb
}}


[[User:Guaka|Guaka]]&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Guaka|talk]], [http://guaka.org site]&lt;/sup&gt; 15:32, 29 September 2008 (CEST)

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




== Mittrampzentrale ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/taxonomy/term/69/feed|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;</text>
      <sha1>csdcvolasdz52aser9o7qmqavgfs6by</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36809</id>
      <parentid>31105</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-08-26T20:08:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1576">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

&lt;randomimage /&gt;



{{Infobox Country Sandbox
|country=Blubb
}}


[[User:Guaka|Guaka]]&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Guaka|talk]], [http://guaka.org site]&lt;/sup&gt; 15:32, 29 September 2008 (CEST)

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




== Mittrampzentrale ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/taxonomy/term/69/feed|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;</text>
      <sha1>fyxhe8zyylmintr5x5ytd8nrt972xmt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36810</id>
      <parentid>36809</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-08-26T20:10:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1604">{{DISPLAYTITLE:Lugash}}

&lt;randomimage /&gt;
&lt;randomimage&gt;&lt;/randomimage&gt;



{{Infobox Country Sandbox
|country=Blubb
}}


[[User:Guaka|Guaka]]&lt;sup&gt;[[User talk:Guaka|talk]], [http://guaka.org site]&lt;/sup&gt; 15:32, 29 September 2008 (CEST)

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




== Mittrampzentrale ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/taxonomy/term/69/feed|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;</text>
      <sha1>jqromsc9epudfho3rwo8d6oa8m6yp1b</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38391</id>
      <parentid>36810</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-11-07T10:39:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1513">Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]

----

==ogv video tag==
not working now, maybe later: [[File:Ile-de-France - Tramway - T2 - Citadis.ogv|thumb|right|300px|Tram in Paris]]



==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




== Mittrampzentrale ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/taxonomy/term/69/feed|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;</text>
      <sha1>tl3n0siq149xo09vev8z443iy4f7dzy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38666</id>
      <parentid>38391</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-11-29T16:20:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>91.63.151.129</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1565">Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]


* [[wikitravel:Testing]]
* [[:wikitravel:Testing]]
----

==ogv video tag==
not working now, maybe later: [[File:Ile-de-France - Tramway - T2 - Citadis.ogv|thumb|right|300px|Tram in Paris]]



==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




== Mittrampzentrale ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/taxonomy/term/69/feed|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;</text>
      <sha1>b6hbxk8302fgn20xap4if4mwv0p379d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40775</id>
      <parentid>38666</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-30T18:44:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1582">Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]


* [[wikitravel:Testing]]
* [[:wikitravel:Testing]]
----

==ogv video tag==
not working now, maybe later: [[File:Ile-de-France - Tramway - T2 - Citadis.ogv|thumb|right|300px|Tram in Paris]]



==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




== Mittrampzentrale ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/taxonomy/term/69/feed|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;



&lt;sharethis /&gt;</text>
      <sha1>odaydlk5jwv29azdxx3axqy3npna8d3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40776</id>
      <parentid>40775</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-30T18:51:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1597">&lt;sharethis /&gt;

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]


* [[wikitravel:Testing]]
* [[:wikitravel:Testing]]
----

==ogv video tag==
not working now, maybe later: [[File:Ile-de-France - Tramway - T2 - Citadis.ogv|thumb|right|300px|Tram in Paris]]



==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




== Mittrampzentrale ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/taxonomy/term/69/feed|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;



&lt;sharethis /&gt;</text>
      <sha1>ewzhqkvh0pkev5r1l768wrichgjsglm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41657</id>
      <parentid>40776</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-27T11:50:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>81.242.243.152</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1616">&lt;sharethis /&gt;

[[trash:sandbox]]

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]


* [[wikitravel:Testing]]
* [[:wikitravel:Testing]]
----

==ogv video tag==
not working now, maybe later: [[File:Ile-de-France - Tramway - T2 - Citadis.ogv|thumb|right|300px|Tram in Paris]]



==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




== Mittrampzentrale ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/taxonomy/term/69/feed|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;



&lt;sharethis /&gt;</text>
      <sha1>ajl146pzac4q04p8uh3vo7t9slava3n</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>45258</id>
      <parentid>41657</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-09-25T17:02:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1635">&lt;categorytree /&gt;


&lt;sharethis /&gt;

[[trash:sandbox]]

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]


* [[wikitravel:Testing]]
* [[:wikitravel:Testing]]
----

==ogv video tag==
not working now, maybe later: [[File:Ile-de-France - Tramway - T2 - Citadis.ogv|thumb|right|300px|Tram in Paris]]



==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




== Mittrampzentrale ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/taxonomy/term/69/feed|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;



&lt;sharethis /&gt;</text>
      <sha1>nvjijnldawfxnrzbjs70zdbw6l3nxfe</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>47827</id>
      <parentid>45258</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-11-25T15:25:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1657">&lt;categorytree /&gt;


&lt;sharethis /&gt;

[[trash:sandbox]]

[[maps:test|blabla]]

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]


* [[wikitravel:Testing]]
* [[:wikitravel:Testing]]
----

==ogv video tag==
not working now, maybe later: [[File:Ile-de-France - Tramway - T2 - Citadis.ogv|thumb|right|300px|Tram in Paris]]



==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




== Mittrampzentrale ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/taxonomy/term/69/feed|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;



&lt;sharethis /&gt;</text>
      <sha1>2poi1k3aavs22gbtbbvh96ipxdgj8dv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48064</id>
      <parentid>47827</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-06T15:17:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1719">== ratings ==

&lt;countryrating country='de' /&gt;

== rubbish ==

&lt;categorytree /&gt;


&lt;sharethis /&gt;

[[trash:sandbox]]

[[maps:test|blabla]]

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]


* [[wikitravel:Testing]]
* [[:wikitravel:Testing]]
----

==ogv video tag==
not working now, maybe later: [[File:Ile-de-France - Tramway - T2 - Citadis.ogv|thumb|right|300px|Tram in Paris]]



==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




== Mittrampzentrale ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/taxonomy/term/69/feed|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;



&lt;sharethis /&gt;</text>
      <sha1>f6jb1ldr9x2399568src9emrd1kahvs</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48066</id>
      <parentid>48064</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-06T15:26:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1712">== ratings ==

&lt;rating country='de' /&gt;

== rubbish ==

&lt;categorytree /&gt;


&lt;sharethis /&gt;

[[trash:sandbox]]

[[maps:test|blabla]]

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]


* [[wikitravel:Testing]]
* [[:wikitravel:Testing]]
----

==ogv video tag==
not working now, maybe later: [[File:Ile-de-France - Tramway - T2 - Citadis.ogv|thumb|right|300px|Tram in Paris]]



==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




== Mittrampzentrale ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/taxonomy/term/69/feed|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;



&lt;sharethis /&gt;</text>
      <sha1>gusbp21og096qua6sqhn5q828xyvhlt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48069</id>
      <parentid>48066</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-06T16:11:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1865">== ratings ==

* Germany: &lt;rating country='de' /&gt;
* France: &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
* Netherlands: &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
* Poland: &lt;rating country='pl' /&gt;
* Belgium: &lt;rating country='be' /&gt;

== rubbish ==

&lt;categorytree /&gt;


&lt;sharethis /&gt;

[[trash:sandbox]]

[[maps:test|blabla]]

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]


* [[wikitravel:Testing]]
* [[:wikitravel:Testing]]
----

==ogv video tag==
not working now, maybe later: [[File:Ile-de-France - Tramway - T2 - Citadis.ogv|thumb|right|300px|Tram in Paris]]



==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




== Mittrampzentrale ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/taxonomy/term/69/feed|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;



&lt;sharethis /&gt;</text>
      <sha1>lfjrz9on5el2fcmrylnkjqem3kn5iar</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48074</id>
      <parentid>48069</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-06T16:46:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2028">== ratings ==

* Germany: &lt;rating country='de' /&gt;
* France: &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
* Netherlands: &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
* Poland: &lt;rating country='pl' /&gt;
* Belgium: &lt;rating country='be' /&gt;
* Spain: &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
* Denmark: &lt;rating country='dk' /&gt;
* Sweden: &lt;rating country='se' /&gt;
* USA: &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
* UK: &lt;rating country='uk' /&gt;

== rubbish ==

&lt;categorytree /&gt;


&lt;sharethis /&gt;

[[trash:sandbox]]

[[maps:test|blabla]]

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]


* [[wikitravel:Testing]]
* [[:wikitravel:Testing]]
----

==ogv video tag==
not working now, maybe later: [[File:Ile-de-France - Tramway - T2 - Citadis.ogv|thumb|right|300px|Tram in Paris]]



==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




== Mittrampzentrale ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/taxonomy/term/69/feed|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;



&lt;sharethis /&gt;</text>
      <sha1>qd10cqjlzh62a7bnfzn95sp4fgi8xs0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48075</id>
      <parentid>48074</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-06T16:53:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2061">== ratings ==

* Germany: &lt;rating country='de' /&gt;
* France: &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
* Netherlands: &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
* Poland: &lt;rating country='pl' /&gt;
* Belgium: &lt;rating country='be' /&gt;
* Spain: &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
* Denmark: &lt;rating country='dk' /&gt;
* Sweden: &lt;rating country='se' /&gt;
* USA: &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
* UK: &lt;rating country='uk' /&gt;
* Russia: &lt;rating country='ru' /&gt;
== rubbish ==

&lt;categorytree /&gt;


&lt;sharethis /&gt;

[[trash:sandbox]]

[[maps:test|blabla]]

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]


* [[wikitravel:Testing]]
* [[:wikitravel:Testing]]
----

==ogv video tag==
not working now, maybe later: [[File:Ile-de-France - Tramway - T2 - Citadis.ogv|thumb|right|300px|Tram in Paris]]



==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




== Mittrampzentrale ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/taxonomy/term/69/feed|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;



&lt;sharethis /&gt;</text>
      <sha1>9k3ifofv8ixjcaajsx1bx3nud4j7w5b</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48076</id>
      <parentid>48075</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-06T18:48:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2062">== ratings ==

* Germany: &lt;rating country='de' /&gt;
* France: &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
* Netherlands: &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
* Poland: &lt;rating country='pl' /&gt;
* Belgium: &lt;rating country='be' /&gt;
* Spain: &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
* Denmark: &lt;rating country='dk' /&gt;
* Sweden: &lt;rating country='se' /&gt;
* USA: &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
* UK: &lt;rating country='uk' /&gt;
* Russia: &lt;rating country='ru' /&gt;

== rubbish ==

&lt;categorytree /&gt;


&lt;sharethis /&gt;

[[trash:sandbox]]

[[maps:test|blabla]]

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]


* [[wikitravel:Testing]]
* [[:wikitravel:Testing]]
----

==ogv video tag==
not working now, maybe later: [[File:Ile-de-France - Tramway - T2 - Citadis.ogv|thumb|right|300px|Tram in Paris]]



==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




== Mittrampzentrale ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/taxonomy/term/69/feed|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;



&lt;sharethis /&gt;</text>
      <sha1>d69wjyeoourm6bq1walqljslqgnunnd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48079</id>
      <parentid>48076</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-06T22:37:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2241">== ratings ==

* Germany: &lt;rating country='de' /&gt;
* France: &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
* Netherlands: &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
* Poland: &lt;rating country='pl' /&gt;
* Belgium: &lt;rating country='be' /&gt;
* Spain: &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
* Denmark: &lt;rating country='dk' /&gt;
* Sweden: &lt;rating country='se' /&gt;
* USA: &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
* UK: &lt;rating country='uk' /&gt;
* Russia: &lt;rating country='ru' /&gt;
* Ireland: &lt;rating country='ie' /&gt;
* Finland: &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
* Lithuania: &lt;rating country='lt' /&gt;
* Switzerland: &lt;rating country='ch' /&gt;
* Chile: &lt;rating country='cl' /&gt;

== rubbish ==

&lt;categorytree /&gt;


&lt;sharethis /&gt;

[[trash:sandbox]]

[[maps:test|blabla]]

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]


* [[wikitravel:Testing]]
* [[:wikitravel:Testing]]
----

==ogv video tag==
not working now, maybe later: [[File:Ile-de-France - Tramway - T2 - Citadis.ogv|thumb|right|300px|Tram in Paris]]



==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




== Mittrampzentrale ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/taxonomy/term/69/feed|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;



&lt;sharethis /&gt;</text>
      <sha1>ng00lqtt0qo7swboz050v0qvafmrbtt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48084</id>
      <parentid>48079</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-07T08:14:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Quarim</username>
        <id>1290</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2276">== ratings ==

* Germany: &lt;rating country='de' /&gt;
* France: &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
* Netherlands: &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
* Poland: &lt;rating country='pl' /&gt;
* Belgium: &lt;rating country='be' /&gt;
* Spain: &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
* Denmark: &lt;rating country='dk' /&gt;
* Sweden: &lt;rating country='se' /&gt;
* USA: &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
* UK: &lt;rating country='uk' /&gt;
* Russia: &lt;rating country='ru' /&gt;
* Ireland: &lt;rating country='ie' /&gt;
* Finland: &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
* Lithuania: &lt;rating country='lt' /&gt;
* Switzerland: &lt;rating country='ch' /&gt;
* Chile: &lt;rating country='cl' /&gt;
* Croatia: &lt;rating country='hr' /&gt;

== rubbish ==

&lt;categorytree /&gt;


&lt;sharethis /&gt;

[[trash:sandbox]]

[[maps:test|blabla]]

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]


* [[wikitravel:Testing]]
* [[:wikitravel:Testing]]
----

==ogv video tag==
not working now, maybe later: [[File:Ile-de-France - Tramway - T2 - Citadis.ogv|thumb|right|300px|Tram in Paris]]



==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




== Mittrampzentrale ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/taxonomy/term/69/feed|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;



&lt;sharethis /&gt;</text>
      <sha1>52y4v57hqmpea52pq64ihe8zcm0tse6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>49310</id>
      <parentid>48084</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-02-08T08:57:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>213.144.15.3</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2366">== Test ==

* [http://hitchwiki.org/ asdfasfd]
* [http://www.google.de/ asdfasdfasdfasdf]
== ratings ==

* Germany: &lt;rating country='de' /&gt;
* France: &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
* Netherlands: &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
* Poland: &lt;rating country='pl' /&gt;
* Belgium: &lt;rating country='be' /&gt;
* Spain: &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
* Denmark: &lt;rating country='dk' /&gt;
* Sweden: &lt;rating country='se' /&gt;
* USA: &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
* UK: &lt;rating country='uk' /&gt;
* Russia: &lt;rating country='ru' /&gt;
* Ireland: &lt;rating country='ie' /&gt;
* Finland: &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
* Lithuania: &lt;rating country='lt' /&gt;
* Switzerland: &lt;rating country='ch' /&gt;
* Chile: &lt;rating country='cl' /&gt;
* Croatia: &lt;rating country='hr' /&gt;

== rubbish ==

&lt;categorytree /&gt;


&lt;sharethis /&gt;

[[trash:sandbox]]

[[maps:test|blabla]]

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]


* [[wikitravel:Testing]]
* [[:wikitravel:Testing]]
----

==ogv video tag==
not working now, maybe later: [[File:Ile-de-France - Tramway - T2 - Citadis.ogv|thumb|right|300px|Tram in Paris]]



==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




== Mittrampzentrale ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/taxonomy/term/69/feed|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;



&lt;sharethis /&gt;</text>
      <sha1>52kxwjub4v55i0v5b9a5ezx0qb5e53k</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>49331</id>
      <parentid>49310</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-02-08T12:35:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>N0id</username>
        <id>2043</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2388">== Test ==

* [http://hitchwiki.org/ asdfasfd]
* [http://www.google.de/ asdfasdfasdfasdf]
== ratings ==

* Germany: &lt;rating country='de' /&gt;
* France: &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
* Netherlands: &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
* Poland: &lt;rating country='pl' /&gt;
* Belgium: &lt;rating country='be' /&gt;
* Spain: &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
* Denmark: &lt;rating country='dk' /&gt;
* Sweden: &lt;rating country='se' /&gt;
* USA: &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
* UK: &lt;rating country='uk' /&gt;
* Russia: &lt;rating country='ru' /&gt;
* Ireland: &lt;rating country='ie' /&gt;
* Finland: &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
* Lithuania: &lt;rating country='lt' /&gt;
* Switzerland: &lt;rating country='ch' /&gt;
* Chile: &lt;rating country='cl' /&gt;
* Croatia: &lt;rating country='hr' /&gt;

== rubbish ==

&lt;categorytree /&gt;


&lt;sharethis /&gt;

[[trash:sandbox]]

[[maps:test|blabla]]

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]


* [[wikitravel:Testing]]
* [[:wikitravel:Testing]]
----

==ogv video tag==
not working now, maybe later: [[File:Ile-de-France - Tramway - T2 - Citadis.ogv|thumb|right|300px|Tram in Paris]]



==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




== Mittrampzentrale ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/taxonomy/term/69/feed|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;



&lt;sharethis /&gt;

[[Category:Sandbox]]</text>
      <sha1>rt87o5sh54kf1sh4myi1ckywmktukke</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>49374</id>
      <parentid>49331</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-02-09T00:50:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2433">== Test ==
[http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:Combating_spam#Honeypots.2C_DNS_BL.27s_and_HTTP_BL.27s testing sorbs] spam blacklist

== ratings ==

* Germany: &lt;rating country='de' /&gt;
* France: &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
* Netherlands: &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
* Poland: &lt;rating country='pl' /&gt;
* Belgium: &lt;rating country='be' /&gt;
* Spain: &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
* Denmark: &lt;rating country='dk' /&gt;
* Sweden: &lt;rating country='se' /&gt;
* USA: &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
* UK: &lt;rating country='uk' /&gt;
* Russia: &lt;rating country='ru' /&gt;
* Ireland: &lt;rating country='ie' /&gt;
* Finland: &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
* Lithuania: &lt;rating country='lt' /&gt;
* Switzerland: &lt;rating country='ch' /&gt;
* Chile: &lt;rating country='cl' /&gt;
* Croatia: &lt;rating country='hr' /&gt;

== rubbish ==

&lt;categorytree /&gt;


&lt;sharethis /&gt;

[[trash:sandbox]]

[[maps:test|blabla]]

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]


* [[wikitravel:Testing]]
* [[:wikitravel:Testing]]
----

==ogv video tag==
not working now, maybe later: [[File:Ile-de-France - Tramway - T2 - Citadis.ogv|thumb|right|300px|Tram in Paris]]



==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




== Mittrampzentrale ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/taxonomy/term/69/feed|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;



&lt;sharethis /&gt;

[[Category:Sandbox]]</text>
      <sha1>0bjieqjwpian3jvrkgbbgm4r58i07n5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>49375</id>
      <parentid>49374</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-02-09T00:55:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>217.132.18.114</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2459">== Test ==
[http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:Combating_spam#Honeypots.2C_DNS_BL.27s_and_HTTP_BL.27s testing sorbs] spam blacklist

[http://guaka.org/ oops]

== ratings ==

* Germany: &lt;rating country='de' /&gt;
* France: &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
* Netherlands: &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
* Poland: &lt;rating country='pl' /&gt;
* Belgium: &lt;rating country='be' /&gt;
* Spain: &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
* Denmark: &lt;rating country='dk' /&gt;
* Sweden: &lt;rating country='se' /&gt;
* USA: &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
* UK: &lt;rating country='uk' /&gt;
* Russia: &lt;rating country='ru' /&gt;
* Ireland: &lt;rating country='ie' /&gt;
* Finland: &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
* Lithuania: &lt;rating country='lt' /&gt;
* Switzerland: &lt;rating country='ch' /&gt;
* Chile: &lt;rating country='cl' /&gt;
* Croatia: &lt;rating country='hr' /&gt;

== rubbish ==

&lt;categorytree /&gt;


&lt;sharethis /&gt;

[[trash:sandbox]]

[[maps:test|blabla]]

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]


* [[wikitravel:Testing]]
* [[:wikitravel:Testing]]
----

==ogv video tag==
not working now, maybe later: [[File:Ile-de-France - Tramway - T2 - Citadis.ogv|thumb|right|300px|Tram in Paris]]



==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




== Mittrampzentrale ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/taxonomy/term/69/feed|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;



&lt;sharethis /&gt;

[[Category:Sandbox]]</text>
      <sha1>sws297gd2j1wj0mk1f7yi2l9vcwo6ok</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>49892</id>
      <parentid>49375</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-03-01T02:12:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tobias</username>
        <id>2938</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2483">== Test ==
[http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:Combating_spam#Honeypots.2C_DNS_BL.27s_and_HTTP_BL.27s testing sorbs] spam blacklist

[http://guaka.org/ oops]
|BW = DE/Hamburg/Hamburg
== ratings ==

* Germany: &lt;rating country='de' /&gt;
* France: &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
* Netherlands: &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
* Poland: &lt;rating country='pl' /&gt;
* Belgium: &lt;rating country='be' /&gt;
* Spain: &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
* Denmark: &lt;rating country='dk' /&gt;
* Sweden: &lt;rating country='se' /&gt;
* USA: &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
* UK: &lt;rating country='uk' /&gt;
* Russia: &lt;rating country='ru' /&gt;
* Ireland: &lt;rating country='ie' /&gt;
* Finland: &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
* Lithuania: &lt;rating country='lt' /&gt;
* Switzerland: &lt;rating country='ch' /&gt;
* Chile: &lt;rating country='cl' /&gt;
* Croatia: &lt;rating country='hr' /&gt;

== rubbish ==

&lt;categorytree /&gt;


&lt;sharethis /&gt;

[[trash:sandbox]]

[[maps:test|blabla]]

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]


* [[wikitravel:Testing]]
* [[:wikitravel:Testing]]
----

==ogv video tag==
not working now, maybe later: [[File:Ile-de-France - Tramway - T2 - Citadis.ogv|thumb|right|300px|Tram in Paris]]



==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




== Mittrampzentrale ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/taxonomy/term/69/feed|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;



&lt;sharethis /&gt;

[[Category:Sandbox]]</text>
      <sha1>o8hyiw7mhkz6jih1lv5dx5dxwcbabgb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>54835</id>
      <parentid>49892</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-09-09T11:21:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2508">== Test ==
[http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:Combating_spam#Honeypots.2C_DNS_BL.27s_and_HTTP_BL.27s testing sorbs] spam blacklist


[[:bw:|BW]]
[[bw:|BW]]

[http://guaka.org/ oops]
|BW = DE/Hamburg/Hamburg
== ratings ==

* Germany: &lt;rating country='de' /&gt;
* France: &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
* Netherlands: &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
* Poland: &lt;rating country='pl' /&gt;
* Belgium: &lt;rating country='be' /&gt;
* Spain: &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
* Denmark: &lt;rating country='dk' /&gt;
* Sweden: &lt;rating country='se' /&gt;
* USA: &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
* UK: &lt;rating country='uk' /&gt;
* Russia: &lt;rating country='ru' /&gt;
* Ireland: &lt;rating country='ie' /&gt;
* Finland: &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
* Lithuania: &lt;rating country='lt' /&gt;
* Switzerland: &lt;rating country='ch' /&gt;
* Chile: &lt;rating country='cl' /&gt;
* Croatia: &lt;rating country='hr' /&gt;

== rubbish ==

&lt;categorytree /&gt;


&lt;sharethis /&gt;

[[trash:sandbox]]

[[maps:test|blabla]]

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]


* [[wikitravel:Testing]]
* [[:wikitravel:Testing]]
----

==ogv video tag==
not working now, maybe later: [[File:Ile-de-France - Tramway - T2 - Citadis.ogv|thumb|right|300px|Tram in Paris]]



==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




== Mittrampzentrale ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/taxonomy/term/69/feed|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;



&lt;sharethis /&gt;

[[Category:Sandbox]]</text>
      <sha1>bnwymzd75tvgwg533n7rx2vw2exx6di</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>57483</id>
      <parentid>54835</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-11-23T11:07:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2662">== Test ==
[http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:Combating_spam#Honeypots.2C_DNS_BL.27s_and_HTTP_BL.27s testing sorbs] spam blacklist


[[:bw:|BW]]
[[bw:|BW]]

[http://guaka.org/ oops]
|BW = DE/Hamburg/Hamburg
== ratings ==

* Germany: &lt;rating country='de' /&gt;
* France: &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
* Netherlands: &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
* Poland: &lt;rating country='pl' /&gt;
* Belgium: &lt;rating country='be' /&gt;
* Spain: &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
* Denmark: &lt;rating country='dk' /&gt;
* Sweden: &lt;rating country='se' /&gt;
* USA: &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
* UK: &lt;rating country='uk' /&gt;
* Russia: &lt;rating country='ru' /&gt;
* Ireland: &lt;rating country='ie' /&gt;
* Finland: &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
* Lithuania: &lt;rating country='lt' /&gt;
* Switzerland: &lt;rating country='ch' /&gt;
* Chile: &lt;rating country='cl' /&gt;
* Croatia: &lt;rating country='hr' /&gt;

== rubbish ==

&lt;categorytree /&gt;


&lt;sharethis /&gt;

[[trash:sandbox]]

[[maps:test|blabla]]

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]


* [[wikitravel:Testing]]
* [[:wikitravel:Testing]]
----

==ogv video tag==
not working now, maybe later: [[File:Ile-de-France - Tramway - T2 - Citadis.ogv|thumb|right|300px|Tram in Paris]]



==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




== Mittrampzentrale ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/taxonomy/term/69/feed|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;



&lt;sharethis /&gt;

===Test map===
&lt;travelmap countries="af,bi,cf,td,cd,er,et,gn,lr,mm,np,rw,sl,so,ug,ye" width="1000" description='Low income conflict-effected states' /&gt;


[[Category:Sandbox]]</text>
      <sha1>3fwsys2dz57na31hig9gi6sy1qiw0z7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>57484</id>
      <parentid>57483</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-11-23T11:26:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>OpenIDUser4</username>
        <id>4196</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2714">== Test ==
[http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:Combating_spam#Honeypots.2C_DNS_BL.27s_and_HTTP_BL.27s testing sorbs] spam blacklist


[[:bw:|BW]]
[[bw:|BW]]

[http://guaka.org/ oops]
|BW = DE/Hamburg/Hamburg
== ratings ==

* Germany: &lt;rating country='de' /&gt;
* France: &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
* Netherlands: &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
* Poland: &lt;rating country='pl' /&gt;
* Belgium: &lt;rating country='be' /&gt;
* Spain: &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
* Denmark: &lt;rating country='dk' /&gt;
* Sweden: &lt;rating country='se' /&gt;
* USA: &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
* UK: &lt;rating country='uk' /&gt;
* Russia: &lt;rating country='ru' /&gt;
* Ireland: &lt;rating country='ie' /&gt;
* Finland: &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
* Lithuania: &lt;rating country='lt' /&gt;
* Switzerland: &lt;rating country='ch' /&gt;
* Chile: &lt;rating country='cl' /&gt;
* Croatia: &lt;rating country='hr' /&gt;

== rubbish ==

&lt;categorytree /&gt;


&lt;sharethis /&gt;

[[trash:sandbox]]

[[maps:test|blabla]]

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]


* [[wikitravel:Testing]]
* [[:wikitravel:Testing]]
----

==ogv video tag==
not working now, maybe later: [[File:Ile-de-France - Tramway - T2 - Citadis.ogv|thumb|right|300px|Tram in Paris]]



==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




== Mittrampzentrale ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/taxonomy/term/69/feed|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;



&lt;sharethis /&gt;

===Test map===
&lt;travelmap countries="af,bi,cf,td,cd,er,et,gn,lr,mm,np,rw,sl,so,ug,ye" c2="ao,ci,ge,in,id,iq,ng,pk,ps,ph,lk,sd,th,tl" c3="" width="1000" description='Low income conflict-effected states' /&gt;

[[Category:Sandbox]]</text>
      <sha1>sgtbpv39pfceecdqfsdlh2hbi2mjbr9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>57485</id>
      <parentid>57484</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-11-23T11:34:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>OpenIDUser4</username>
        <id>4196</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2728">== Test ==
[http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:Combating_spam#Honeypots.2C_DNS_BL.27s_and_HTTP_BL.27s testing sorbs] spam blacklist


[[:bw:|BW]]
[[bw:|BW]]

[http://guaka.org/ oops]
|BW = DE/Hamburg/Hamburg
== ratings ==

* Germany: &lt;rating country='de' /&gt;
* France: &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
* Netherlands: &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
* Poland: &lt;rating country='pl' /&gt;
* Belgium: &lt;rating country='be' /&gt;
* Spain: &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
* Denmark: &lt;rating country='dk' /&gt;
* Sweden: &lt;rating country='se' /&gt;
* USA: &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
* UK: &lt;rating country='uk' /&gt;
* Russia: &lt;rating country='ru' /&gt;
* Ireland: &lt;rating country='ie' /&gt;
* Finland: &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
* Lithuania: &lt;rating country='lt' /&gt;
* Switzerland: &lt;rating country='ch' /&gt;
* Chile: &lt;rating country='cl' /&gt;
* Croatia: &lt;rating country='hr' /&gt;

== rubbish ==

&lt;categorytree /&gt;


&lt;sharethis /&gt;

[[trash:sandbox]]

[[maps:test|blabla]]

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]


* [[wikitravel:Testing]]
* [[:wikitravel:Testing]]
----

==ogv video tag==
not working now, maybe later: [[File:Ile-de-France - Tramway - T2 - Citadis.ogv|thumb|right|300px|Tram in Paris]]



==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




== Mittrampzentrale ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/taxonomy/term/69/feed|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;



&lt;sharethis /&gt;

===Test map===
&lt;travelmap countries="af,bi,cf,td,cd,er,et,gn,lr,mm,np,rw,sl,so,ug,ye" c2="ao,ci,ge,in,id,iq,ng,pk,ps,ph,lk,sd,th,tl" c3="ru,rs,tr,dz,co" width="1000" description='Low income conflict-effected states' /&gt;

[[Category:Sandbox]]</text>
      <sha1>jza5ho0yziwkkoswn9jj8qzgfv7e374</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>57487</id>
      <parentid>57485</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-11-23T11:40:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2708">== Test ==
[http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:Combating_spam#Honeypots.2C_DNS_BL.27s_and_HTTP_BL.27s testing sorbs] spam blacklist


[[:bw:|BW]]
[[bw:|BW]]

[http://guaka.org/ oops]
|BW = DE/Hamburg/Hamburg
== ratings ==

* Germany: &lt;rating country='de' /&gt;
* France: &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
* Netherlands: &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
* Poland: &lt;rating country='pl' /&gt;
* Belgium: &lt;rating country='be' /&gt;
* Spain: &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
* Denmark: &lt;rating country='dk' /&gt;
* Sweden: &lt;rating country='se' /&gt;
* USA: &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
* UK: &lt;rating country='uk' /&gt;
* Russia: &lt;rating country='ru' /&gt;
* Ireland: &lt;rating country='ie' /&gt;
* Finland: &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
* Lithuania: &lt;rating country='lt' /&gt;
* Switzerland: &lt;rating country='ch' /&gt;
* Chile: &lt;rating country='cl' /&gt;
* Croatia: &lt;rating country='hr' /&gt;

== rubbish ==

&lt;categorytree /&gt;


&lt;sharethis /&gt;

[[trash:sandbox]]

[[maps:test|blabla]]

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]


* [[wikitravel:Testing]]
* [[:wikitravel:Testing]]
----

==ogv video tag==
not working now, maybe later: [[File:Ile-de-France - Tramway - T2 - Citadis.ogv|thumb|right|300px|Tram in Paris]]



==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




== Mittrampzentrale ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/taxonomy/term/69/feed|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;



&lt;sharethis /&gt;

===Test map===
&lt;travelmap countries="af,bi,cf,td,cd,er,et,gn,lr,mm,np,rw,sl,so,ug,ye" c2="ao,ci,ge,in,id,iq,ng,pk,ps,ph,lk,sd,th,tl" width="1000" description='Low income conflict-effected states' /&gt;

[[Category:Sandbox]]</text>
      <sha1>7z1v5e7kwqjbtecj6cd8bbohztccyr0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>62058</id>
      <parentid>57487</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-07-03T22:45:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GeorgDerReisende</username>
        <id>1903</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2685">== Test ==
[http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:Combating_spam#Honeypots.2C_DNS_BL.27s_and_HTTP_BL.27s testing sorbs] spam blacklist


[http://guaka.org/ oops]
|BW = DE/Hamburg/Hamburg

== ratings ==

* Germany: &lt;rating country='de' /&gt;
* France: &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
* Netherlands: &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
* Poland: &lt;rating country='pl' /&gt;
* Belgium: &lt;rating country='be' /&gt;
* Spain: &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
* Denmark: &lt;rating country='dk' /&gt;
* Sweden: &lt;rating country='se' /&gt;
* USA: &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
* UK: &lt;rating country='uk' /&gt;
* Russia: &lt;rating country='ru' /&gt;
* Ireland: &lt;rating country='ie' /&gt;
* Finland: &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
* Lithuania: &lt;rating country='lt' /&gt;
* Switzerland: &lt;rating country='ch' /&gt;
* Chile: &lt;rating country='cl' /&gt;
* Croatia: &lt;rating country='hr' /&gt;

== rubbish ==

&lt;categorytree /&gt;


&lt;sharethis /&gt;

[[trash:sandbox]]

[[maps:test|blabla]]

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]


* [[wikitravel:Testing]]
* [[:wikitravel:Testing]]
----

==ogv video tag==
not working now, maybe later: [[File:Ile-de-France - Tramway - T2 - Citadis.ogv|thumb|right|300px|Tram in Paris]]



==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




== Mittrampzentrale ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/taxonomy/term/69/feed|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;



&lt;sharethis /&gt;

===Test map===
&lt;travelmap countries="af,bi,cf,td,cd,er,et,gn,lr,mm,np,rw,sl,so,ug,ye" c2="ao,ci,ge,in,id,iq,ng,pk,ps,ph,lk,sd,th,tl" width="1000" description='Low income conflict-effected states' /&gt;

[[Category:Sandbox]]</text>
      <sha1>1mipafvqvehnwdeiwxwpovjrd8x67jc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>64615</id>
      <parentid>62058</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-09-26T00:06:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2687">== Test ==
[http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:Combating_spam#Honeypots.2C_DNS_BL.27s_and_HTTP_BL.27s testing sorbs] spam blacklist


[http://guaka.org/ oops]
|BW = DE/Hamburg/Hamburg

== ratings ==

* Germany: &lt;rating country='de' /&gt;
* France: &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
* Netherlands: &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
* Poland: &lt;rating country='pl' /&gt;
* Belgium: &lt;rating country='be' /&gt;
* Spain: &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
* Denmark: &lt;rating country='dk' /&gt;
* Sweden: &lt;rating country='se' /&gt;
* USA: &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
* UK: &lt;rating country='uk' /&gt;
* Russia: &lt;rating country='ru' /&gt;
* Ireland: &lt;rating country='ie' /&gt;
* Finland: &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
* Lithuania: &lt;rating country='lt' /&gt;
* Switzerland: &lt;rating country='ch' /&gt;
* Chile: &lt;rating country='cl' /&gt;
* Croatia: &lt;rating country='hr' /&gt;

== rubbish ==

&lt;categorytree /&gt;


&lt;sharethis /&gt;

[[trash:sandbox]]

[[maps:test|blabla]]

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]


* [[wikitravel:Testing]]
* [[:wikitravel:Testing]]
----

==ogv video tag==
not working now, maybe later: [[File:Ile-de-France - Tramway - T2 - Citadis.ogv|thumb|right|300px|Tram in Paris]]



==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




== Mittrampzentrale ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/taxonomy/term/69/feed|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;



&lt;sharethis /&gt;

===Test map===
&lt;travelmap countries="af,bi,cf,td,cd,er,et,gn,lr,mm,np,rw,sl,so,ug,ye" c2="ao,ci,ge,in,id,iq,ng,pk,ps,ph,lk,sd,th,tl" width="1000" description='Low income conflict-effected states' /&gt;

[[Category:Hitchwiki]]</text>
      <sha1>3a0sxf4p6elalr92mvwequ20en5hsyx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>81746</id>
      <parentid>64615</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-12-21T06:10:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2693">== Test ==
[http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:Combating_spam#Honeypots.2C_DNS_BL.27s_and_HTTP_BL.27s testing sorbs] spam blacklist


[http://guaka.org/ oops]
|BW = DE/Hamburg/Hamburg

test

== ratings ==

* Germany: &lt;rating country='de' /&gt;
* France: &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
* Netherlands: &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
* Poland: &lt;rating country='pl' /&gt;
* Belgium: &lt;rating country='be' /&gt;
* Spain: &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
* Denmark: &lt;rating country='dk' /&gt;
* Sweden: &lt;rating country='se' /&gt;
* USA: &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
* UK: &lt;rating country='uk' /&gt;
* Russia: &lt;rating country='ru' /&gt;
* Ireland: &lt;rating country='ie' /&gt;
* Finland: &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
* Lithuania: &lt;rating country='lt' /&gt;
* Switzerland: &lt;rating country='ch' /&gt;
* Chile: &lt;rating country='cl' /&gt;
* Croatia: &lt;rating country='hr' /&gt;

== rubbish ==

&lt;categorytree /&gt;


&lt;sharethis /&gt;

[[trash:sandbox]]

[[maps:test|blabla]]

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]


* [[wikitravel:Testing]]
* [[:wikitravel:Testing]]
----

==ogv video tag==
not working now, maybe later: [[File:Ile-de-France - Tramway - T2 - Citadis.ogv|thumb|right|300px|Tram in Paris]]



==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




== Mittrampzentrale ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/taxonomy/term/69/feed|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;



&lt;sharethis /&gt;

===Test map===
&lt;travelmap countries="af,bi,cf,td,cd,er,et,gn,lr,mm,np,rw,sl,so,ug,ye" c2="ao,ci,ge,in,id,iq,ng,pk,ps,ph,lk,sd,th,tl" width="1000" description='Low income conflict-effected states' /&gt;

[[Category:Hitchwiki]]</text>
      <sha1>b8zcziu4amp152udpn2mw9qcn230a2r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>108807</id>
      <parentid>81746</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-01-24T22:11:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Chris9012</username>
        <id>47192</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3813">== Test ==
[http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:Combating_spam#Honeypots.2C_DNS_BL.27s_and_HTTP_BL.27s testing sorbs] spam blacklist


[http://guaka.org/ oops]
|BW = DE/Hamburg/Hamburg

test

== ratings ==

* Germany: &lt;rating country='de' /&gt;
* France: &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
* Netherlands: &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
* Poland: &lt;rating country='pl' /&gt;
* Belgium: &lt;rating country='be' /&gt;
* Spain: &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
* Denmark: &lt;rating country='dk' /&gt;
* Sweden: &lt;rating country='se' /&gt;
* USA: &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
* UK: &lt;rating country='uk' /&gt;
* Russia: &lt;rating country='ru' /&gt;
* Ireland: &lt;rating country='ie' /&gt;
* Finland: &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
* Lithuania: &lt;rating country='lt' /&gt;
* Switzerland: &lt;rating country='ch' /&gt;
* Chile: &lt;rating country='cl' /&gt;
* Croatia: &lt;rating country='hr' /&gt;

== rubbish ==

&lt;categorytree /&gt;


&lt;sharethis /&gt;

[[trash:sandbox]]

[[maps:test|blabla]]

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]


* [[wikitravel:Testing]]
* [[:wikitravel:Testing]]
----

==ogv video tag==
not working now, maybe later: [[File:Ile-de-France - Tramway - T2 - Citadis.ogv|thumb|right|300px|Tram in Paris]]



==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




== Mittrampzentrale ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/taxonomy/term/69/feed|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




&lt;sharethis /&gt;

===Test map===
&lt;travelmap countries="af,bi,cf,td,cd,er,et,gn,lr,mm,np,rw,sl,so,ug,ye" c2="ao,ci,ge,in,id,iq,ng,pk,ps,ph,lk,sd,th,tl" width="1000" description='Low income conflict-effected states' /&gt;

=Style guide=
*In every chapter make the first instance of a placename [[clickable]] by using &lt;nowiki&gt;[[brackets]]&lt;/nowiki&gt; even if the page doesn't exist yet. Someone might create the page later, and they won't have to come back to put in the brackets. 
*''Street names'', names for ''bus stops'', and ''other things'' that don't need their own page get ''Italic'', by using &lt;nowiki&gt;''double quotation marks''&lt;/nowiki&gt;

==Introduction==
*The first instant of the '''Placename''' is bold. Use &lt;nowiki&gt;'''{{FULLPAGENAME}}'''&lt;/nowiki&gt; Don't put the placename between brackets.
*Where is this city/village? '''Placename''' is a village/city in [[State]]. 
*It is famous for....
*Highway X and Y run close to it/through it
*Safe the hitchhiking stuff for the next chapter

==Hitchhiking out==
*Maybe some general info that isn't specific to one location. Like ''Most drivers only go to city X'' or ''don't go to city Y, you'll get stuck there''.

===West towards [[City X]], [[City Y]] on highway Z===
===Option 1===
*Use [[template:Coords]] for the coordinates.
*Describe how to get there.
===Option 2, 3, 4, etc....===


[[Category:Hitchwiki]]</text>
      <sha1>a0dthhn0a25rsauf810zqbeo526y75g</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>108932</id>
      <parentid>108807</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-02-26T08:26:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Chris9012</username>
        <id>47192</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4804">== Test ==
[http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:Combating_spam#Honeypots.2C_DNS_BL.27s_and_HTTP_BL.27s testing sorbs] spam blacklist


[http://guaka.org/ oops]
|BW = DE/Hamburg/Hamburg

test

== ratings ==

* Germany: &lt;rating country='de' /&gt;
* France: &lt;rating country='fr' /&gt;
* Netherlands: &lt;rating country='nl' /&gt;
* Poland: &lt;rating country='pl' /&gt;
* Belgium: &lt;rating country='be' /&gt;
* Spain: &lt;rating country='es' /&gt;
* Denmark: &lt;rating country='dk' /&gt;
* Sweden: &lt;rating country='se' /&gt;
* USA: &lt;rating country='us' /&gt;
* UK: &lt;rating country='uk' /&gt;
* Russia: &lt;rating country='ru' /&gt;
* Ireland: &lt;rating country='ie' /&gt;
* Finland: &lt;rating country='fi' /&gt;
* Lithuania: &lt;rating country='lt' /&gt;
* Switzerland: &lt;rating country='ch' /&gt;
* Chile: &lt;rating country='cl' /&gt;
* Croatia: &lt;rating country='hr' /&gt;

== rubbish ==

&lt;categorytree /&gt;


&lt;sharethis /&gt;

[[trash:sandbox]]

[[maps:test|blabla]]

Here you can practice [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/wiki wiki] ''syntax''.

Try addings links, like [[Germany]], [[Warsaw]], or playing with lists:
* [[Moscow]]
* [[Kiev]]
* [[New York]]
* [[Paris]]


* [[wikitravel:Testing]]
* [[:wikitravel:Testing]]
----

==ogv video tag==
not working now, maybe later: [[File:Ile-de-France - Tramway - T2 - Citadis.ogv|thumb|right|300px|Tram in Paris]]



==RandomImage==
&lt;randomimage /&gt;


[[digi:wiki/|digihitch wiki?]]

==RSS feeds==
&lt;rss&gt;http://hitchwiki.org/forum/?q=rss.xml|template=Template:sandbox/Hitchwiki Forum RSS&lt;/rss&gt;


----

{{user}}

captcha test
www.hans.de
&lt;a href='http://www.blubb.de/'&gt;asfd&lt;/a&gt;

Just testing [[User:TeamMG|TeamMG]] 11:54, 19 October 2007 (CEST)
* [[nice]]

==IPv6==
...seems to work now

&lt;table border='1'&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/French}}&lt;/td&gt;
   &lt;td valign='top'&gt;{{Phrasebook/German}}&lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
That way, we can combine any languages to generate phrasebooks. However it's very important to keep all phrasebook synchronous.

== OpenStreetMap ==

&lt;osm lat='49' lng='8.41' zoom='12' width='400' height='300' layer='mapnik' /&gt;

{{Sandbox|param=lalala}}
: Does anyone know how to include a template when there are values added only? I would need this for a template in a template...

== Travelmap ==

&lt;travelmap countries='de,fr,es,au,jp,ru' width='500px' /&gt;


== Live from the road ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://yoshi.mega2000.de/~philipp/smsblog/rss.php|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




== Mittrampzentrale ==
&lt;rss&gt;http://abgefahren.hitchbase.com/DE/taxonomy/term/69/feed|template=RSS&lt;/rss&gt;




&lt;sharethis /&gt;

===Test map===
&lt;travelmap countries="af,bi,cf,td,cd,er,et,gn,lr,mm,np,rw,sl,so,ug,ye" c2="ao,ci,ge,in,id,iq,ng,pk,ps,ph,lk,sd,th,tl" width="1000" description='Low income conflict-effected states' /&gt;

=Style guide=
*The main chapters should be formatted with a level 2 heading by putting the title between double equal signs like this: &lt;nowiki&gt;==Hitchhiking out==&lt;/nowiki&gt;.
*Paragraphs under a main chapter should use one more equal sign than the heading they are under: &lt;nowiki&gt;===Going west===&lt;/nowiki&gt;, and for deeper sections, &lt;nowiki&gt;====Option 1====&lt;/nowiki&gt;.
*In every chapter make the first instance of a placename [[clickable]] by using &lt;nowiki&gt;[[brackets]]&lt;/nowiki&gt; even if the page doesn't exist yet. This ensures that if the page is created later, the link will already be in place.
*Place names like ''street names'', ''bus stops'', and ''other landmarks'' that don’t need their own page should be formatted in ''italics'' by using &lt;nowiki&gt;''&lt;/nowiki&gt;''double quotation marks''&lt;nowiki&gt;''&lt;/nowiki&gt;.
*The first instant of the '''Pagenname''' should be '''bold'''. Use [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:FULLPAGENAME| Template]] '''&lt;nowiki&gt;{{FULLPAGENAME}}&lt;/nowiki&gt; '''with '''&lt;nowiki&gt;'''triple quotation marks'''&lt;/nowiki&gt;''' Don't put the pagename between &lt;nowiki&gt;[[brackets]]&lt;/nowiki&gt;.

==Introduction==
*The introduction doesn't fall under any chapter yet.
*If the place has different names in other languages, enclose those names in parentheses, like this: '''Istanbul''' (Latin: '''Constantinople''', Greek: '''Byzantium''').
*Where is this city/village? '''Placename''' is a small/big village/city in [[State]]. 
*It is famous for....
*It has xxx.xxx inhabitants..
*Highway X and Y run close to it/through it
*Safe the hitchhiking stuff for the next chapter

==Hitchhiking out==
*Maybe some general info that isn't specific to one location. Like ''Most drivers only go to city X'' or ''don't go to city Y, you'll get stuck there''.

===West towards [[City X]], [[City Y]] on highway Z===
===Option 1===
*Use [[template:Coords]] for the coordinates. &lt;nowiki&gt;{{Coords|1.12456|52.456}}&lt;/nowiki&gt; will display as: {{Coords|1.12456|52.456}}.
*Describe how to get there, what bus to take. 

===Option 2, 3, 4, etc....===
*Follow the same structure as Option 1 for other directions or options.

[[Category:Hitchwiki]]</text>
      <sha1>mrm2372z65f486axs7iz8q0wryr72ix</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Future of hitchhiking</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1541</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1587</id>
      <parentid>4530</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-03-27T17:31:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2356">On-demand [[car-pooling]] is expected to arise as a result of the location reporting capabilities that are to be incorporated in all new mobile phones by the end of 2005 according to the requirements for [[E911]] services in the [[United States]].  Once users can expose their location to 3rd parties that coordinate ridesharing, the main restrictions on car-pooling – same time, same place pick-ups and drop-offs – may be removed.  This will facilitate sharing of vehicles not only on commutes but also for trips of all kinds.
 
Drivers will be especially encouraged to participate in these programs by:
# cost sharing with electronic credits that are processed automatically by the ridesharing systems, 
# the continued existence or expansion of High Occupancy Vehicle lanes, 
# desire to socialize.  
Abuses will be strongly discouraged by participant feedback and the identification and location reporting that is intrinsic to the system.  Proof of insurance may be required by ridesharing agreements or provided as a rider benefit.

As with other form of social networking, riders and drivers will be matched according to personal criteria.  While users may restrict matching criteria in order to exclude non-neighbors or according to other chosen factors, they may also broaden their matches in order to meet a more representative sample of the population.  The resulting interactions could significantly increase the degree of social connectedness.  

If the participant pools are not overly fragmented by an uncoordinated commercialization – a significant risk that ought to be eliminated by creation of open standards for matching subscribers to different services – riders in good standing should be able to travel wherever mobile phone service is available with much quicker pick-ups, faster connections and almost no stops as compared with mass transit, and at substantially lower cost than operating their own vehicles.  Drivers who participate regularly and exhibit good driving skills should be able to offset a substantial fraction of their expenses.  The result should be a marked and permanent increase in average vehicle occupancy.

See also [[Hospitality exchange networks]].
*      craigslist.com

&lt;!-- To research and develop this article further, please see the links on the "discussion" tab. --&gt;

[[Category:Transportation]]</text>
      <sha1>96czhrha72qklcidoqxki4l9meaaxmj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1588</id>
      <parentid>1587</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2356">On-demand [[car-pooling]] is expected to arise as a result of the location reporting capabilities that are to be incorporated in all new mobile phones by the end of 2005 according to the requirements for [[E911]] services in the [[United States]].  Once users can expose their location to 3rd parties that coordinate ridesharing, the main restrictions on car-pooling – same time, same place pick-ups and drop-offs – may be removed.  This will facilitate sharing of vehicles not only on commutes but also for trips of all kinds.
 
Drivers will be especially encouraged to participate in these programs by:
# cost sharing with electronic credits that are processed automatically by the ridesharing systems, 
# the continued existence or expansion of High Occupancy Vehicle lanes, 
# desire to socialize.  
Abuses will be strongly discouraged by participant feedback and the identification and location reporting that is intrinsic to the system.  Proof of insurance may be required by ridesharing agreements or provided as a rider benefit.

As with other form of social networking, riders and drivers will be matched according to personal criteria.  While users may restrict matching criteria in order to exclude non-neighbors or according to other chosen factors, they may also broaden their matches in order to meet a more representative sample of the population.  The resulting interactions could significantly increase the degree of social connectedness.  

If the participant pools are not overly fragmented by an uncoordinated commercialization – a significant risk that ought to be eliminated by creation of open standards for matching subscribers to different services – riders in good standing should be able to travel wherever mobile phone service is available with much quicker pick-ups, faster connections and almost no stops as compared with mass transit, and at substantially lower cost than operating their own vehicles.  Drivers who participate regularly and exhibit good driving skills should be able to offset a substantial fraction of their expenses.  The result should be a marked and permanent increase in average vehicle occupancy.

See also [[Hospitality exchange networks]].
*      craigslist.com

&lt;!-- To research and develop this article further, please see the links on the "discussion" tab. --&gt;

[[Category:Transportation]]</text>
      <sha1>96czhrha72qklcidoqxki4l9meaaxmj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4529</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T21:18:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2354">On-demand [[car-pooling]] is expected to arise as a result of the location reporting capabilities that are to be incorporated in all new [[mobile phone]]s by the end of [[2005]] according to the requirements for [[E911]] services in the [[United States]].  Once users can expose their location to 3rd parties that coordinate ridesharing, the main restrictions on car-pooling – same time, same place pick-ups and drop-offs – may be removed.  This will facilitate sharing of vehicles not only on commutes but also for trips of all kinds.
 
Drivers will be especially encouraged to participate in these programs by:
# cost sharing with electronic credits that are processed automatically by the ridesharing systems, 
# the continued existence or expansion of High Occupancy Vehicle lanes, 
# desire to socialize.  
Abuses will be strongly discouraged by participant feedback and the identification and location reporting that is intrinsic to the system.  Proof of insurance may be required by ridesharing agreements or provided as a rider benefit.

As with other form of [[social networking]], riders and drivers will be matched according to personal criteria.  While users may restrict matching criteria in order to exclude non-neighbors or according to other chosen factors, they may also broaden their matches in order to meet a more representative sample of the population.  The resulting interactions could significantly increase the degree of social connectedness.  

If the participant pools are not overly fragmented by an uncoordinated commercialization – a significant risk that ought to be eliminated by creation of open standards for matching subscribers to different services – riders in good standing should be able to travel wherever mobile phone service is available with much quicker pick-ups, faster connections and almost no stops as compared with mass transit, and at substantially lower cost than operating their own vehicles.  Drivers who participate regularly and exhibit good driving skills should be able to offset a substantial fraction of their expenses.  The result should be a marked and permanent increase in average vehicle occupancy.

See also [[Hospitality Club]].
      craigslist.com

&lt;!-- To research and develop this article further, please see the links on the "discussion" tab. --&gt;

[[Category:Transportation]]</text>
      <sha1>1pwi7l06whzrcvv38xwclpewby90kss</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4530</id>
      <parentid>4529</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-28T22:58:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2367">On-demand [[car-pooling]] is expected to arise as a result of the location reporting capabilities that are to be incorporated in all new [[mobile phone]]s by the end of [[2005]] according to the requirements for [[E911]] services in the [[United States]].  Once users can expose their location to 3rd parties that coordinate ridesharing, the main restrictions on car-pooling – same time, same place pick-ups and drop-offs – may be removed.  This will facilitate sharing of vehicles not only on commutes but also for trips of all kinds.
 
Drivers will be especially encouraged to participate in these programs by:
# cost sharing with electronic credits that are processed automatically by the ridesharing systems, 
# the continued existence or expansion of High Occupancy Vehicle lanes, 
# desire to socialize.  
Abuses will be strongly discouraged by participant feedback and the identification and location reporting that is intrinsic to the system.  Proof of insurance may be required by ridesharing agreements or provided as a rider benefit.

As with other form of [[social networking]], riders and drivers will be matched according to personal criteria.  While users may restrict matching criteria in order to exclude non-neighbors or according to other chosen factors, they may also broaden their matches in order to meet a more representative sample of the population.  The resulting interactions could significantly increase the degree of social connectedness.  

If the participant pools are not overly fragmented by an uncoordinated commercialization – a significant risk that ought to be eliminated by creation of open standards for matching subscribers to different services – riders in good standing should be able to travel wherever mobile phone service is available with much quicker pick-ups, faster connections and almost no stops as compared with mass transit, and at substantially lower cost than operating their own vehicles.  Drivers who participate regularly and exhibit good driving skills should be able to offset a substantial fraction of their expenses.  The result should be a marked and permanent increase in average vehicle occupancy.

See also [[Hospitality exchange networks]].
      craigslist.com

&lt;!-- To research and develop this article further, please see the links on the "discussion" tab. --&gt;

[[Category:Transportation]]</text>
      <sha1>m2p3jfh9ifup8a3gq91cptx2l91adn9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4531</id>
      <parentid>1588</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2356">On-demand [[car-pooling]] is expected to arise as a result of the location reporting capabilities that are to be incorporated in all new mobile phones by the end of 2005 according to the requirements for [[E911]] services in the [[United States]].  Once users can expose their location to 3rd parties that coordinate ridesharing, the main restrictions on car-pooling – same time, same place pick-ups and drop-offs – may be removed.  This will facilitate sharing of vehicles not only on commutes but also for trips of all kinds.
 
Drivers will be especially encouraged to participate in these programs by:
# cost sharing with electronic credits that are processed automatically by the ridesharing systems, 
# the continued existence or expansion of High Occupancy Vehicle lanes, 
# desire to socialize.  
Abuses will be strongly discouraged by participant feedback and the identification and location reporting that is intrinsic to the system.  Proof of insurance may be required by ridesharing agreements or provided as a rider benefit.

As with other form of social networking, riders and drivers will be matched according to personal criteria.  While users may restrict matching criteria in order to exclude non-neighbors or according to other chosen factors, they may also broaden their matches in order to meet a more representative sample of the population.  The resulting interactions could significantly increase the degree of social connectedness.  

If the participant pools are not overly fragmented by an uncoordinated commercialization – a significant risk that ought to be eliminated by creation of open standards for matching subscribers to different services – riders in good standing should be able to travel wherever mobile phone service is available with much quicker pick-ups, faster connections and almost no stops as compared with mass transit, and at substantially lower cost than operating their own vehicles.  Drivers who participate regularly and exhibit good driving skills should be able to offset a substantial fraction of their expenses.  The result should be a marked and permanent increase in average vehicle occupancy.

See also [[Hospitality exchange networks]].
*      craigslist.com

&lt;!-- To research and develop this article further, please see the links on the "discussion" tab. --&gt;

[[Category:Transportation]]</text>
      <sha1>96czhrha72qklcidoqxki4l9meaaxmj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24422</id>
      <parentid>4531</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-03T23:44:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>80.171.138.97</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2380">=Ride share evolution=

On-demand [[car-pooling]] is expected to arise as a result of the location reporting capabilities that are to be incorporated in all new mobile phones by the end of 2005 according to the requirements for [[E911]] services in the [[United States]].  Once users can expose their location to 3rd parties that coordinate ridesharing, the main restrictions on car-pooling – same time, same place pick-ups and drop-offs – may be removed.  This will facilitate sharing of vehicles not only on commutes but also for trips of all kinds.
 
Drivers will be especially encouraged to participate in these programs by:
# cost sharing with electronic credits that are processed automatically by the ridesharing systems, 
# the continued existence or expansion of High Occupancy Vehicle lanes, 
# desire to socialize.  
Abuses will be strongly discouraged by participant feedback and the identification and location reporting that is intrinsic to the system.  Proof of insurance may be required by ridesharing agreements or provided as a rider benefit.

As with other form of social networking, riders and drivers will be matched according to personal criteria.  While users may restrict matching criteria in order to exclude non-neighbors or according to other chosen factors, they may also broaden their matches in order to meet a more representative sample of the population.  The resulting interactions could significantly increase the degree of social connectedness.  

If the participant pools are not overly fragmented by an uncoordinated commercialization – a significant risk that ought to be eliminated by creation of open standards for matching subscribers to different services – riders in good standing should be able to travel wherever mobile phone service is available with much quicker pick-ups, faster connections and almost no stops as compared with mass transit, and at substantially lower cost than operating their own vehicles.  Drivers who participate regularly and exhibit good driving skills should be able to offset a substantial fraction of their expenses.  The result should be a marked and permanent increase in average vehicle occupancy.

See also [[Hospitality exchange networks]].
*      craigslist.com

&lt;!-- To research and develop this article further, please see the links on the "discussion" tab. --&gt;

[[Category:Transportation]]</text>
      <sha1>98m3fehvd3lw25u58b30elanhdmyhxn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24579</id>
      <parentid>24422</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-06T11:52:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2378">==Ride share evolution==

On-demand [[car-pooling]] is expected to arise as a result of the location reporting capabilities that are to be incorporated in all new mobile phones by the end of 2005 according to the requirements for [[E911]] services in the [[United States]].  Once users can expose their location to 3rd parties that coordinate ridesharing, the main restrictions on car-pooling – same time, same place pick-ups and drop-offs – may be removed.  This will facilitate sharing of vehicles not only on commutes but also for trips of all kinds.
 
Drivers will be especially encouraged to participate in these programs by:
# cost sharing with electronic credits that are processed automatically by the ridesharing systems, 
# the continued existence or expansion of High Occupancy Vehicle lanes, 
# desire to socialize.  
Abuses will be strongly discouraged by participant feedback and the identification and location reporting that is intrinsic to the system.  Proof of insurance may be required by ridesharing agreements or provided as a rider benefit.

As with other form of social networking, riders and drivers will be matched according to personal criteria.  While users may restrict matching criteria in order to exclude non-neighbors or according to other chosen factors, they may also broaden their matches in order to meet a more representative sample of the population.  The resulting interactions could significantly increase the degree of social connectedness.  

If the participant pools are not overly fragmented by an uncoordinated commercialization – a significant risk that ought to be eliminated by creation of open standards for matching subscribers to different services – riders in good standing should be able to travel wherever mobile phone service is available with much quicker pick-ups, faster connections and almost no stops as compared with mass transit, and at substantially lower cost than operating their own vehicles.  Drivers who participate regularly and exhibit good driving skills should be able to offset a substantial fraction of their expenses.  The result should be a marked and permanent increase in average vehicle occupancy.

See also [[Hospitality exchange networks]].
*      craigslist.com

&lt;!-- To research and develop this article further, please see the links on the "discussion" tab. --&gt;

[[Category:Philosophy]]</text>
      <sha1>ghso8gayeqymqqkwurvc5kj2i18u747</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24706</id>
      <parentid>24579</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-10T18:57:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robino</username>
        <id>4</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2732">==Ride share evolution==

On-demand [[car-pooling]] is expected to arise as a result of the location reporting capabilities that are to be incorporated in all new mobile phones by the end of 2005 according to the requirements for [[E911]] services in the [[United States]].  Once users can expose their location to 3rd parties that coordinate ride-sharing, the main restrictions on car-pooling – same time, same place pick-ups and drop-offs – may be removed.  This will facilitate sharing of vehicles not only on commutes but also for trips of all kinds.
 
Drivers will be especially encouraged to participate in these programs by:
# cost sharing with electronic credits that are processed automatically by the ridesharing systems, 
# the continued existence or expansion of High Occupancy Vehicle lanes, 
# desire to socialize.  
Abuses will be strongly discouraged by participant feedback and the identification and location reporting that is intrinsic to the system.  Proof of insurance may be required by ridesharing agreements or provided as a rider benefit.

As with other form of social networking, riders and drivers will be matched according to personal criteria.  While users may restrict matching criteria in order to exclude non-neighbors or according to other chosen factors, they may also broaden their matches in order to meet a more representative sample of the population.  The resulting interactions could significantly increase the degree of social connectedness.  

If the participant pools are not overly fragmented by an uncoordinated commercialization – a significant risk that ought to be eliminated by creation of open standards for matching subscribers to different services – riders in good standing should be able to travel wherever mobile phone service is available with much quicker pick-ups, faster connections and almost no stops as compared with mass transit, and at substantially lower cost than operating their own vehicles.  Drivers who participate regularly and exhibit good driving skills should be able to offset a substantial fraction of their expenses.  The result should be a marked and permanent increase in average vehicle occupancy.

==Recent developments==
Avego is an application that runs on iPhones and other mobile devices, and matches drivers and passengers who are going the same way. "Avego Stops", the best places to pick up and drop off riders. It also wants to connect it with a social networking website. Launched in September 2008 [http://avego.com/ui/index.action Avego]


See also [[Hospitality exchange networks]].
*      craigslist.com

&lt;!-- To research and develop this article further, please see the links on the "discussion" tab. --&gt;

[[Category:Philosophy]]</text>
      <sha1>qzf3i93j50m8gti6kb7e39guusx9miq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32240</id>
      <parentid>24706</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-04-14T10:56:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Alex</username>
        <id>89</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2929">==Ride share evolution==

On-demand [[car-pooling]] is expected to arise as a result of the location reporting capabilities that are to be incorporated in all new mobile phones by the end of 2005 according to the requirements for [[E911]] services in the [[United States]].  Once users can expose their location to 3rd parties that coordinate ride-sharing, the main restrictions on car-pooling – same time, same place pick-ups and drop-offs – may be removed.  This will facilitate sharing of vehicles not only on commutes but also for trips of all kinds.
 
Drivers will be especially encouraged to participate in these programs by:
# cost sharing with electronic credits that are processed automatically by the ridesharing systems, 
# the continued existence or expansion of High Occupancy Vehicle lanes, 
# desire to socialize.  
Abuses will be strongly discouraged by participant feedback and the identification and location reporting that is intrinsic to the system.  Proof of insurance may be required by ridesharing agreements or provided as a rider benefit.

As with other form of social networking, riders and drivers will be matched according to personal criteria.  While users may restrict matching criteria in order to exclude non-neighbors or according to other chosen factors, they may also broaden their matches in order to meet a more representative sample of the population.  The resulting interactions could significantly increase the degree of social connectedness.  

If the participant pools are not overly fragmented by an uncoordinated commercialization – a significant risk that ought to be eliminated by creation of open standards for matching subscribers to different services – riders in good standing should be able to travel wherever mobile phone service is available with much quicker pick-ups, faster connections and almost no stops as compared with mass transit, and at substantially lower cost than operating their own vehicles.  Drivers who participate regularly and exhibit good driving skills should be able to offset a substantial fraction of their expenses.  The result should be a marked and permanent increase in average vehicle occupancy.

==Recent developments==
Avego is an application that runs on iPhones and other mobile devices, and matches drivers and passengers who are going the same way. "Avego Stops", the best places to pick up and drop off riders. It also wants to connect it with a social networking website. Launched in September 2008 [http://avego.com/ui/index.action Avego]

Carticipate on the iPhone is the first ride sharing application on a location aware mobile platform and is available as a free download on Apple's App Store on iTunes.
http://www.carticipate.com/


See also [[Hospitality exchange networks]].
*      craigslist.com

&lt;!-- To research and develop this article further, please see the links on the "discussion" tab. --&gt;

[[Category:Philosophy]]</text>
      <sha1>rcpjssulmjnswv3tcc4ersjkxf7zz1d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>34916</id>
      <parentid>32240</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T17:22:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2917">==Ride share evolution==

On-demand [[car-pooling]] is expected to arise as a result of the location reporting capabilities that are to be incorporated in all new mobile phones by the end of 2005 according to the requirements for [[E911]] services in the [[United States]]. Once users can expose their location to 3rd parties that coordinate ride-sharing, the main restrictions on car-pooling – same time, same place pick-ups and drop-offs – may be removed. This will facilitate sharing of vehicles not only on commutes but also for trips of all kinds.
 
Drivers will be especially encouraged to participate in these programs by:
# cost sharing with electronic credits that are processed automatically by the ridesharing systems, 
# the continued existence or expansion of High Occupancy Vehicle lanes, 
# desire to socialize. 
Abuses will be strongly discouraged by participant feedback and the identification and location reporting that is intrinsic to the system. Proof of insurance may be required by ridesharing agreements or provided as a rider benefit.

As with other form of social networking, riders and drivers will be matched according to personal criteria. While users may restrict matching criteria in order to exclude non-neighbors or according to other chosen factors, they may also broaden their matches in order to meet a more representative sample of the population. The resulting interactions could significantly increase the degree of social connectedness. 

If the participant pools are not overly fragmented by an uncoordinated commercialization – a significant risk that ought to be eliminated by creation of open standards for matching subscribers to different services – riders in good standing should be able to travel wherever mobile phone service is available with much quicker pick-ups, faster connections and almost no stops as compared with mass transit, and at substantially lower cost than operating their own vehicles. Drivers who participate regularly and exhibit good driving skills should be able to offset a substantial fraction of their expenses. The result should be a marked and permanent increase in average vehicle occupancy.

== Recent developments ==
Avego is an application that runs on iPhones and other mobile devices, and matches drivers and passengers who are going the same way. "Avego Stops", the best places to pick up and drop off riders. It also wants to connect it with a social networking website. Launched in September 2008 [http://avego.com/ui/index.action Avego]

Carticipate on the iPhone is the first ride sharing application on a location aware mobile platform and is available as a free download on Apple's App Store on iTunes.
http://www.carticipate.com/


See also [[Hospitality exchange networks]].
* craigslist.com

&lt;!-- To research and develop this article further, please see the links on the "discussion" tab. --&gt;

[[Category:Philosophy]]</text>
      <sha1>57vormfiuf2uq0lbyhc26x7bkm761fg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35812</id>
      <parentid>34916</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-15T14:17:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2921">==Ride share evolution==

On-demand [[car-pooling]] is expected to arise as a result of the location reporting capabilities that are to be incorporated in all new mobile phones by the end of 2005 according to the requirements for [[E911]] services in the [[United States]]. Once users can expose their location to 3rd parties that coordinate ride-sharing, the main restrictions on car-pooling – same time, same place pick-ups and drop-offs – may be removed. This will facilitate sharing of vehicles not only on commutes but also for trips of all kinds.
 
Drivers will be especially encouraged to participate in these programs by:
# cost sharing with electronic credits that are processed automatically by the ridesharing systems, 
# the continued existence or expansion of High Occupancy Vehicle lanes, 
# desire to socialize. 
Abuses will be strongly discouraged by participant feedback and the identification and location reporting that is intrinsic to the system. Proof of [[insurance]] may be required by ridesharing agreements or provided as a rider benefit.

As with other form of social networking, riders and drivers will be matched according to personal criteria. While users may restrict matching criteria in order to exclude non-neighbors or according to other chosen factors, they may also broaden their matches in order to meet a more representative sample of the population. The resulting interactions could significantly increase the degree of social connectedness. 

If the participant pools are not overly fragmented by an uncoordinated commercialization – a significant risk that ought to be eliminated by creation of open standards for matching subscribers to different services – riders in good standing should be able to travel wherever mobile phone service is available with much quicker pick-ups, faster connections and almost no stops as compared with mass transit, and at substantially lower cost than operating their own vehicles. Drivers who participate regularly and exhibit good driving skills should be able to offset a substantial fraction of their expenses. The result should be a marked and permanent increase in average vehicle occupancy.

== Recent developments ==
Avego is an application that runs on iPhones and other mobile devices, and matches drivers and passengers who are going the same way. "Avego Stops", the best places to pick up and drop off riders. It also wants to connect it with a social networking website. Launched in September 2008 [http://avego.com/ui/index.action Avego]

Carticipate on the iPhone is the first ride sharing application on a location aware mobile platform and is available as a free download on Apple's App Store on iTunes.
http://www.carticipate.com/


See also [[Hospitality exchange networks]].
* craigslist.com

&lt;!-- To research and develop this article further, please see the links on the "discussion" tab. --&gt;

[[Category:Philosophy]]</text>
      <sha1>7fkmjzotk1xtepvols6aea5vrkfusz0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>55801</id>
      <parentid>35812</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-08T01:12:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2968">==Ride share evolution==

On-demand [[car-pooling]] is expected to arise as a result of the location reporting capabilities that are to be incorporated in all new mobile phones by the end of 2005 according to the requirements for [[E911]] services in the [[United States of America|United States]]. Once users can expose their location to 3rd parties that coordinate ride-sharing, the main restrictions on car-pooling – same time, same place pick-ups and drop-offs – may be removed. This will facilitate sharing of vehicles not only on commutes but also for trips of all kinds.
 
Drivers will be especially encouraged to participate in these programs by:
# cost sharing with electronic credits that are processed automatically by the ridesharing systems, 
# the continued existence or expansion of High Occupancy Vehicle lanes, 
# desire to socialize. 
Abuses will be strongly discouraged by participant feedback and the identification and location reporting that is intrinsic to the system. Proof of [[insurance]] may be required by ridesharing agreements or provided as a rider benefit.

As with other form of social networking, riders and drivers will be matched according to personal criteria. While users may restrict matching criteria in order to exclude non-neighbors or according to other chosen factors, they may also broaden their matches in order to meet a more representative sample of the population. The resulting interactions could significantly increase the degree of social connectedness. 

If the participant pools are not overly fragmented by an uncoordinated commercialization – a significant risk that ought to be eliminated by creation of open standards for matching subscribers to different services – riders in good standing should be able to travel wherever mobile phone service is available with much quicker pick-ups, faster connections and almost no stops as compared with mass transit, and at substantially lower cost than operating their own vehicles. Drivers who participate regularly and exhibit good driving skills should be able to offset a substantial fraction of their expenses. The result should be a marked and permanent increase in average vehicle occupancy.

== Recent developments ==
Avego is an application that runs on iPhones and other mobile devices, and matches drivers and passengers who are going the same way. "Avego Stops", the best places to pick up and drop off riders. It also wants to connect it with a social networking website. Launched in September 2008 [http://avego.com/ui/index.action Avego]

Carticipate on the iPhone is the first ride sharing application on a location aware mobile platform and is available as a free download on Apple's App Store on iTunes.
http://www.carticipate.com/


See also [[Finding accommodation|Hospitality exchange networks]].
* craigslist.com

&lt;!-- To research and develop this article further, please see the links on the "discussion" tab. --&gt;

[[Category:Philosophy]]</text>
      <sha1>ngtglseaer22evsgq74a6b60r3m754v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>107389</id>
      <parentid>55801</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-11-23T19:55:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robyt</username>
        <id>9747</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>Added {{geo-missing}}</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2985">==Ride share evolution==

On-demand [[car-pooling]] is expected to arise as a result of the location reporting capabilities that are to be incorporated in all new mobile phones by the end of 2005 according to the requirements for [[E911]] services in the [[United States of America|United States]]. Once users can expose their location to 3rd parties that coordinate ride-sharing, the main restrictions on car-pooling – same time, same place pick-ups and drop-offs – may be removed. This will facilitate sharing of vehicles not only on commutes but also for trips of all kinds.
 
Drivers will be especially encouraged to participate in these programs by:
# cost sharing with electronic credits that are processed automatically by the ridesharing systems, 
# the continued existence or expansion of High Occupancy Vehicle lanes, 
# desire to socialize. 
Abuses will be strongly discouraged by participant feedback and the identification and location reporting that is intrinsic to the system. Proof of [[insurance]] may be required by ridesharing agreements or provided as a rider benefit.

As with other form of social networking, riders and drivers will be matched according to personal criteria. While users may restrict matching criteria in order to exclude non-neighbors or according to other chosen factors, they may also broaden their matches in order to meet a more representative sample of the population. The resulting interactions could significantly increase the degree of social connectedness. 

If the participant pools are not overly fragmented by an uncoordinated commercialization – a significant risk that ought to be eliminated by creation of open standards for matching subscribers to different services – riders in good standing should be able to travel wherever mobile phone service is available with much quicker pick-ups, faster connections and almost no stops as compared with mass transit, and at substantially lower cost than operating their own vehicles. Drivers who participate regularly and exhibit good driving skills should be able to offset a substantial fraction of their expenses. The result should be a marked and permanent increase in average vehicle occupancy.

== Recent developments ==
Avego is an application that runs on iPhones and other mobile devices, and matches drivers and passengers who are going the same way. "Avego Stops", the best places to pick up and drop off riders. It also wants to connect it with a social networking website. Launched in September 2008 [http://avego.com/ui/index.action Avego]

Carticipate on the iPhone is the first ride sharing application on a location aware mobile platform and is available as a free download on Apple's App Store on iTunes.
http://www.carticipate.com/


See also [[Finding accommodation|Hospitality exchange networks]].
* craigslist.com

&lt;!-- To research and develop this article further, please see the links on the "discussion" tab. --&gt;

[[Category:Philosophy]]

{{geo-missing}}</text>
      <sha1>c9kvgac67bwnu03ogo7t2di0rdrde01</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>112540</id>
      <parentid>107389</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-09-04T10:58:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Recent developments */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2918">==Ride share evolution==

On-demand [[car-pooling]] is expected to arise as a result of the location reporting capabilities that are to be incorporated in all new mobile phones by the end of 2005 according to the requirements for [[E911]] services in the [[United States of America|United States]]. Once users can expose their location to 3rd parties that coordinate ride-sharing, the main restrictions on car-pooling – same time, same place pick-ups and drop-offs – may be removed. This will facilitate sharing of vehicles not only on commutes but also for trips of all kinds.
 
Drivers will be especially encouraged to participate in these programs by:
# cost sharing with electronic credits that are processed automatically by the ridesharing systems, 
# the continued existence or expansion of High Occupancy Vehicle lanes, 
# desire to socialize. 
Abuses will be strongly discouraged by participant feedback and the identification and location reporting that is intrinsic to the system. Proof of [[insurance]] may be required by ridesharing agreements or provided as a rider benefit.

As with other form of social networking, riders and drivers will be matched according to personal criteria. While users may restrict matching criteria in order to exclude non-neighbors or according to other chosen factors, they may also broaden their matches in order to meet a more representative sample of the population. The resulting interactions could significantly increase the degree of social connectedness. 

If the participant pools are not overly fragmented by an uncoordinated commercialization – a significant risk that ought to be eliminated by creation of open standards for matching subscribers to different services – riders in good standing should be able to travel wherever mobile phone service is available with much quicker pick-ups, faster connections and almost no stops as compared with mass transit, and at substantially lower cost than operating their own vehicles. Drivers who participate regularly and exhibit good driving skills should be able to offset a substantial fraction of their expenses. The result should be a marked and permanent increase in average vehicle occupancy.

== Recent developments ==
Avego is an application that runs on iPhones and other mobile devices, and matches drivers and passengers who are going the same way. "Avego Stops", the best places to pick up and drop off riders. It also wants to connect it with a social networking website.

[http://www.carticipate.com/ Carticipate] on the iPhone is the first ride sharing application on a location aware mobile platform and is available as a free download on Apple's App Store on iTunes.

See also [[Finding accommodation|Hospitality exchange networks]].
* craigslist.com

&lt;!-- To research and develop this article further, please see the links on the "discussion" tab. --&gt;

[[Category:Philosophy]]

{{geo-missing}}</text>
      <sha1>cutto73f93fvjiactcoznydxwz4xqd3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>112541</id>
      <parentid>112540</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-09-04T10:58:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2928">{{stub}}

==Ride share evolution==

On-demand [[car-pooling]] is expected to arise as a result of the location reporting capabilities that are to be incorporated in all new mobile phones by the end of 2005 according to the requirements for [[E911]] services in the [[United States of America|United States]]. Once users can expose their location to 3rd parties that coordinate ride-sharing, the main restrictions on car-pooling – same time, same place pick-ups and drop-offs – may be removed. This will facilitate sharing of vehicles not only on commutes but also for trips of all kinds.
 
Drivers will be especially encouraged to participate in these programs by:
# cost sharing with electronic credits that are processed automatically by the ridesharing systems, 
# the continued existence or expansion of High Occupancy Vehicle lanes, 
# desire to socialize. 
Abuses will be strongly discouraged by participant feedback and the identification and location reporting that is intrinsic to the system. Proof of [[insurance]] may be required by ridesharing agreements or provided as a rider benefit.

As with other form of social networking, riders and drivers will be matched according to personal criteria. While users may restrict matching criteria in order to exclude non-neighbors or according to other chosen factors, they may also broaden their matches in order to meet a more representative sample of the population. The resulting interactions could significantly increase the degree of social connectedness. 

If the participant pools are not overly fragmented by an uncoordinated commercialization – a significant risk that ought to be eliminated by creation of open standards for matching subscribers to different services – riders in good standing should be able to travel wherever mobile phone service is available with much quicker pick-ups, faster connections and almost no stops as compared with mass transit, and at substantially lower cost than operating their own vehicles. Drivers who participate regularly and exhibit good driving skills should be able to offset a substantial fraction of their expenses. The result should be a marked and permanent increase in average vehicle occupancy.

== Recent developments ==
Avego is an application that runs on iPhones and other mobile devices, and matches drivers and passengers who are going the same way. "Avego Stops", the best places to pick up and drop off riders. It also wants to connect it with a social networking website.

[http://www.carticipate.com/ Carticipate] on the iPhone is the first ride sharing application on a location aware mobile platform and is available as a free download on Apple's App Store on iTunes.

See also [[Finding accommodation|Hospitality exchange networks]].
* craigslist.com

&lt;!-- To research and develop this article further, please see the links on the "discussion" tab. --&gt;

[[Category:Philosophy]]

{{geo-missing}}</text>
      <sha1>ppuo5218ftoueqeb8ghxx0exnxstnye</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Future of Hitchhiking</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1542</id>
    <redirect title="Future of hitchhiking" />
    <revision>
      <id>1589</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T21:19:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="35">#REDIRECT [[Future of hitchhiking]]</text>
      <sha1>7nnjhb7ocz2j6fe5u9xdqrbil13e510</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1590</id>
      <parentid>1589</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="35">#REDIRECT [[Future of hitchhiking]]</text>
      <sha1>7nnjhb7ocz2j6fe5u9xdqrbil13e510</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Safety</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1543</id>
    <redirect title="Hitchhiker&#039;s safety" />
    <revision>
      <id>1591</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T21:19:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="33">#REDIRECT [[Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>3l92ds91epcf0m7kzxaoi8pq88tkzef</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1592</id>
      <parentid>1591</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="33">#REDIRECT [[Hitchhiker's safety]]</text>
      <sha1>3l92ds91epcf0m7kzxaoi8pq88tkzef</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Canada</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1544</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1593</id>
      <parentid>4535</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-05-10T23:34:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1219">'''Canada''' has ten provinces and three territories. English is the majority language in most provinces of Canada. French is the majority language of Quebec, and is widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the majority language in Nunavut and has official status there. So for the conveniance of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.



&lt;table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Newfoundland and Labrador]]&lt;td&gt;[[St. John's]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nova Scotia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Halifax]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[New Brunswick]]&lt;td&gt;[[Fredericton]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec]]&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec City]],&lt;td&gt;[[Montreal]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Ontario]]&lt;td&gt;[[Toronto]],&lt;td&gt;[[Ottawa]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Manitoba]]&lt;td&gt;[[Winnipeg]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatchewan]]&lt;td&gt;[[Regina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatoon]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Alberta]]&lt;td&gt;[[Edmonton]]&lt;td&gt;[[Calgary]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[British Columbia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Victoria (Canada)|Victoria]]&lt;td&gt;[[Vancouver]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Yukon]]&lt;td&gt;[[Whitehorse]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Northwest Territories]]&lt;td&gt;[[Yellowknife]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nunavut]]&lt;td&gt;[[Iqaluit]]

[[Category:America]]
[[Category:Canada|*]]</text>
      <sha1>oe4rudr3fdov3l78q7l78pkj9za6nqm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1594</id>
      <parentid>1593</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1219">'''Canada''' has ten provinces and three territories. English is the majority language in most provinces of Canada. French is the majority language of Quebec, and is widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the majority language in Nunavut and has official status there. So for the conveniance of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.



&lt;table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Newfoundland and Labrador]]&lt;td&gt;[[St. John's]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nova Scotia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Halifax]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[New Brunswick]]&lt;td&gt;[[Fredericton]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec]]&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec City]],&lt;td&gt;[[Montreal]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Ontario]]&lt;td&gt;[[Toronto]],&lt;td&gt;[[Ottawa]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Manitoba]]&lt;td&gt;[[Winnipeg]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatchewan]]&lt;td&gt;[[Regina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatoon]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Alberta]]&lt;td&gt;[[Edmonton]]&lt;td&gt;[[Calgary]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[British Columbia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Victoria (Canada)|Victoria]]&lt;td&gt;[[Vancouver]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Yukon]]&lt;td&gt;[[Whitehorse]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Northwest Territories]]&lt;td&gt;[[Yellowknife]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nunavut]]&lt;td&gt;[[Iqaluit]]

[[Category:America]]
[[Category:Canada|*]]</text>
      <sha1>oe4rudr3fdov3l78q7l78pkj9za6nqm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4532</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T21:21:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1217">'''Canada''' has ten provinces and three territories. English is the majority language in most provinces of Canada. French is the majority language of Quebec, and is widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the majority language in Nunavut and has official status there. So for the conveniance of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.



&lt;table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Newfoundland and Labrador]]&lt;td&gt;[[St. John's]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nova Scotia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Halifax]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[New Brunswick]]&lt;td&gt;[[Fredericton]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec]]&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec City]],&lt;td&gt;[[Montreal]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Ontario]]&lt;td&gt;[[Toronto]],&lt;td&gt;[[Ottawa]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Manitoba]]&lt;td&gt;[[Winnipeg]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatchewan]]&lt;td&gt;[[Regina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatoon]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Alberta]]&lt;td&gt;[[Edmonton]]&lt;td&gt;[[Calgary]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[British Columbia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Victoria]]&lt;td&gt;[[Vancouver]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Yukon]]&lt;td&gt;[[Whitehorse]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Northwest Territories]]&lt;td&gt;[[Yellowknife]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nunavut]]&lt;td&gt;[[Iqaluit]]&lt;/tr&gt;</text>
      <sha1>svuc4kc5hzu0lxkjtffmyb10tp05a8i</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4533</id>
      <parentid>4532</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T14:10:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1239">'''Canada''' has ten provinces and three territories. English is the majority language in most provinces of Canada. French is the majority language of Quebec, and is widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the majority language in Nunavut and has official status there. So for the conveniance of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.



&lt;table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Newfoundland and Labrador]]&lt;td&gt;[[St. John's]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nova Scotia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Halifax]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[New Brunswick]]&lt;td&gt;[[Fredericton]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec]]&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec City]],&lt;td&gt;[[Montreal]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Ontario]]&lt;td&gt;[[Toronto]],&lt;td&gt;[[Ottawa]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Manitoba]]&lt;td&gt;[[Winnipeg]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatchewan]]&lt;td&gt;[[Regina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatoon]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Alberta]]&lt;td&gt;[[Edmonton]]&lt;td&gt;[[Calgary]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[British Columbia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Victoria]]&lt;td&gt;[[Vancouver]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Yukon]]&lt;td&gt;[[Whitehorse]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Northwest Territories]]&lt;td&gt;[[Yellowknife]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nunavut]]&lt;td&gt;[[Iqaluit]]&lt;/tr&gt;

[[Category:America]]</text>
      <sha1>rtfzbqppjktbur4lrqfge6gcsdeso46</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4534</id>
      <parentid>4533</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-04-27T04:48:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1261">'''Canada''' has ten provinces and three territories. English is the majority language in most provinces of Canada. French is the majority language of Quebec, and is widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the majority language in Nunavut and has official status there. So for the conveniance of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.



&lt;table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Newfoundland and Labrador]]&lt;td&gt;[[St. John's]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nova Scotia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Halifax]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[New Brunswick]]&lt;td&gt;[[Fredericton]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec]]&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec City]],&lt;td&gt;[[Montreal]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Ontario]]&lt;td&gt;[[Toronto]],&lt;td&gt;[[Ottawa]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Manitoba]]&lt;td&gt;[[Winnipeg]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatchewan]]&lt;td&gt;[[Regina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatoon]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Alberta]]&lt;td&gt;[[Edmonton]]&lt;td&gt;[[Calgary]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[British Columbia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Victoria]]&lt;td&gt;[[Vancouver]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Yukon]]&lt;td&gt;[[Whitehorse]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Northwest Territories]]&lt;td&gt;[[Yellowknife]]&lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nunavut]]&lt;td&gt;[[Iqaluit]]&lt;/tr&gt;

[[Category:America]]
[[Category:Canada|*]]</text>
      <sha1>7u1kncu6krw5y53os3lc0jskrdexih1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4535</id>
      <parentid>4534</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-04-27T04:50:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1201">'''Canada''' has ten provinces and three territories. English is the majority language in most provinces of Canada. French is the majority language of Quebec, and is widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the majority language in Nunavut and has official status there. So for the conveniance of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.



&lt;table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Newfoundland and Labrador]]&lt;td&gt;[[St. John's]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nova Scotia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Halifax]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[New Brunswick]]&lt;td&gt;[[Fredericton]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec]]&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec City]],&lt;td&gt;[[Montreal]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Ontario]]&lt;td&gt;[[Toronto]],&lt;td&gt;[[Ottawa]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Manitoba]]&lt;td&gt;[[Winnipeg]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatchewan]]&lt;td&gt;[[Regina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatoon]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Alberta]]&lt;td&gt;[[Edmonton]]&lt;td&gt;[[Calgary]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[British Columbia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Victoria]]&lt;td&gt;[[Vancouver]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Yukon]]&lt;td&gt;[[Whitehorse]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Northwest Territories]]&lt;td&gt;[[Yellowknife]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nunavut]]&lt;td&gt;[[Iqaluit]]

[[Category:America]]
[[Category:Canada|*]]</text>
      <sha1>sffgu7zlnsmrm6qq2vfji69ve92dc00</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4536</id>
      <parentid>1594</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1219">'''Canada''' has ten provinces and three territories. English is the majority language in most provinces of Canada. French is the majority language of Quebec, and is widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the majority language in Nunavut and has official status there. So for the conveniance of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals at the following pages.



&lt;table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Newfoundland and Labrador]]&lt;td&gt;[[St. John's]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nova Scotia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Halifax]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[New Brunswick]]&lt;td&gt;[[Fredericton]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec]]&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec City]],&lt;td&gt;[[Montreal]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Ontario]]&lt;td&gt;[[Toronto]],&lt;td&gt;[[Ottawa]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Manitoba]]&lt;td&gt;[[Winnipeg]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatchewan]]&lt;td&gt;[[Regina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatoon]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Alberta]]&lt;td&gt;[[Edmonton]]&lt;td&gt;[[Calgary]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[British Columbia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Victoria (Canada)|Victoria]]&lt;td&gt;[[Vancouver]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Yukon]]&lt;td&gt;[[Whitehorse]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Northwest Territories]]&lt;td&gt;[[Yellowknife]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nunavut]]&lt;td&gt;[[Iqaluit]]

[[Category:America]]
[[Category:Canada|*]]</text>
      <sha1>oe4rudr3fdov3l78q7l78pkj9za6nqm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11946</id>
      <parentid>4536</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-01T01:52:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1382">'''Canada''' has ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.



&lt;table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Newfoundland and Labrador]]&lt;td&gt;[[St. John's]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nova Scotia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Halifax]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[New Brunswick]]&lt;td&gt;[[Fredericton]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec]]&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec City]],&lt;td&gt;[[Montreal]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Ontario]]&lt;td&gt;[[Toronto]],&lt;td&gt;[[Ottawa]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Manitoba]]&lt;td&gt;[[Winnipeg]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatchewan]]&lt;td&gt;[[Regina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatoon]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Alberta]]&lt;td&gt;[[Edmonton]]&lt;td&gt;[[Calgary]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[British Columbia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Victoria (Canada)|Victoria]]&lt;td&gt;[[Vancouver]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Yukon]]&lt;td&gt;[[Whitehorse]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Northwest Territories]]&lt;td&gt;[[Yellowknife]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nunavut]]&lt;td&gt;[[Iqaluit]]

[[Category:America]]
[[Category:Canada|*]]</text>
      <sha1>mmb5gy05emaiiw3g92rxrhzqe2g9vo1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11962</id>
      <parentid>11946</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-01T03:48:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1382">'''Canada''' has ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.



&lt;table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Newfoundland and Labrador]]&lt;td&gt;[[St. John's]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nova Scotia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Halifax]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[New Brunswick]]&lt;td&gt;[[Fredericton]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec]]&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec city]],&lt;td&gt;[[Montreal]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Ontario]]&lt;td&gt;[[Toronto]],&lt;td&gt;[[Ottawa]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Manitoba]]&lt;td&gt;[[Winnipeg]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatchewan]]&lt;td&gt;[[Regina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatoon]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Alberta]]&lt;td&gt;[[Edmonton]]&lt;td&gt;[[Calgary]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[British Columbia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Victoria (Canada)|Victoria]]&lt;td&gt;[[Vancouver]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Yukon]]&lt;td&gt;[[Whitehorse]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Northwest Territories]]&lt;td&gt;[[Yellowknife]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nunavut]]&lt;td&gt;[[Iqaluit]]

[[Category:America]]
[[Category:Canada|*]]</text>
      <sha1>a377o41q96a45hxy22i86oqm4m59xkc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11973</id>
      <parentid>11962</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-01T04:19:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2187">'''Canada''' has ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area.


&lt;table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Newfoundland and Labrador]]&lt;td&gt;[[St. John's]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nova Scotia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Halifax]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[New Brunswick]]&lt;td&gt;[[Fredericton]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec]]&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec city]],&lt;td&gt;[[Montreal]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Ontario]]&lt;td&gt;[[Toronto]],&lt;td&gt;[[Ottawa]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Manitoba]]&lt;td&gt;[[Winnipeg]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatchewan]]&lt;td&gt;[[Regina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatoon]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Alberta]]&lt;td&gt;[[Edmonton]]&lt;td&gt;[[Calgary]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[British Columbia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Victoria (Canada)|Victoria]]&lt;td&gt;[[Vancouver]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Yukon]]&lt;td&gt;[[Whitehorse]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Northwest Territories]]&lt;td&gt;[[Yellowknife]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nunavut]]&lt;td&gt;[[Iqaluit]]

[[Category:America]]
[[Category:Canada|*]]</text>
      <sha1>90c9wafa0eh8lwlubapfg3w5at2qeqt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12011</id>
      <parentid>11973</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-02T21:46:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3235">'''Canada''' has ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when aboarding them and be less keen to help.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area.


&lt;table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Newfoundland and Labrador]]&lt;td&gt;[[St. John's]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nova Scotia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Halifax]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[New Brunswick]]&lt;td&gt;[[Fredericton]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec]]&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec city]],&lt;td&gt;[[Montreal]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Ontario]]&lt;td&gt;[[Toronto]],&lt;td&gt;[[Ottawa]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Manitoba]]&lt;td&gt;[[Winnipeg]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatchewan]]&lt;td&gt;[[Regina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatoon]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Alberta]]&lt;td&gt;[[Edmonton]]&lt;td&gt;[[Calgary]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[British Columbia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Victoria (Canada)|Victoria]]&lt;td&gt;[[Vancouver]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Yukon]]&lt;td&gt;[[Whitehorse]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Northwest Territories]]&lt;td&gt;[[Yellowknife]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nunavut]]&lt;td&gt;[[Iqaluit]]

[[Category:America]]
[[Category:Canada|*]]</text>
      <sha1>hwolg5mumu8k4aoglkkzlx0l9ma51is</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12046</id>
      <parentid>12011</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-03T04:19:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3881">'''Canada''' has ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when aboarding them and be less keen to help.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area.


&lt;table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Newfoundland and Labrador]]&lt;td&gt;[[St. John's]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nova Scotia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Halifax]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[New Brunswick]]&lt;td&gt;[[Fredericton]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec]]&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec city]],&lt;td&gt;[[Montreal]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Ontario]]&lt;td&gt;[[Toronto]],&lt;td&gt;[[Ottawa]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Manitoba]]&lt;td&gt;[[Winnipeg]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatchewan]]&lt;td&gt;[[Regina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatoon]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Alberta]]&lt;td&gt;[[Edmonton]]&lt;td&gt;[[Calgary]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[British Columbia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Victoria (Canada)|Victoria]]&lt;td&gt;[[Vancouver]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Yukon]]&lt;td&gt;[[Whitehorse]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Northwest Territories]]&lt;td&gt;[[Yellowknife]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nunavut]]&lt;td&gt;[[Iqaluit]]


== Communication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and usually at every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are always in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a few 'quarter' available.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

[[Category:America]]
[[Category:Canada|*]]</text>
      <sha1>e4vgmc97tqp664qfhhj67cc8j04w1dh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12116</id>
      <parentid>12046</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-04T23:21:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3880">'''Canada''' has ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when aboarding them and be less keen to help.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area.

== Communication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and usually at every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are always in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a few 'quarter' available.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

&lt;table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Newfoundland and Labrador]]&lt;td&gt;[[St. John's]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nova Scotia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Halifax]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[New Brunswick]]&lt;td&gt;[[Fredericton]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec]]&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec city]],&lt;td&gt;[[Montreal]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Ontario]]&lt;td&gt;[[Toronto]],&lt;td&gt;[[Ottawa]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Manitoba]]&lt;td&gt;[[Winnipeg]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatchewan]]&lt;td&gt;[[Regina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatoon]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Alberta]]&lt;td&gt;[[Edmonton]]&lt;td&gt;[[Calgary]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[British Columbia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Victoria (Canada)|Victoria]]&lt;td&gt;[[Vancouver]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Yukon]]&lt;td&gt;[[Whitehorse]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Northwest Territories]]&lt;td&gt;[[Yellowknife]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nunavut]]&lt;td&gt;[[Iqaluit]]


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:Canada|*]]</text>
      <sha1>65k7gngep5upnvunisyc6crkea5w908</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12117</id>
      <parentid>12116</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-04T23:27:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4129">'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when aboarding them and be less keen to help.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country has some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

== Communication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and usually at every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are always in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a few 'quarter' available.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.


&lt;table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Newfoundland and Labrador]]&lt;td&gt;[[St. John's]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nova Scotia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Halifax]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[New Brunswick]]&lt;td&gt;[[Fredericton]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec]]&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec city]],&lt;td&gt;[[Montreal]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Ontario]]&lt;td&gt;[[Toronto]],&lt;td&gt;[[Ottawa]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Manitoba]]&lt;td&gt;[[Winnipeg]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatchewan]]&lt;td&gt;[[Regina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatoon]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Alberta]]&lt;td&gt;[[Edmonton]]&lt;td&gt;[[Calgary]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[British Columbia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Victoria (Canada)|Victoria]]&lt;td&gt;[[Vancouver]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Yukon]]&lt;td&gt;[[Whitehorse]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Northwest Territories]]&lt;td&gt;[[Yellowknife]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nunavut]]&lt;td&gt;[[Iqaluit]]


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:Canada|*]]</text>
      <sha1>lxf179gj4mvylbldqtm8vqf0l796uzp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12118</id>
      <parentid>12117</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-04T23:28:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4130">'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when aboarding them and be less keen to help.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

== Communication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and usually at every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are always in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a few 'quarter' available.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.


&lt;table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Newfoundland and Labrador]]&lt;td&gt;[[St. John's]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nova Scotia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Halifax]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[New Brunswick]]&lt;td&gt;[[Fredericton]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec]]&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec city]],&lt;td&gt;[[Montreal]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Ontario]]&lt;td&gt;[[Toronto]],&lt;td&gt;[[Ottawa]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Manitoba]]&lt;td&gt;[[Winnipeg]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatchewan]]&lt;td&gt;[[Regina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatoon]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Alberta]]&lt;td&gt;[[Edmonton]]&lt;td&gt;[[Calgary]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[British Columbia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Victoria (Canada)|Victoria]]&lt;td&gt;[[Vancouver]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Yukon]]&lt;td&gt;[[Whitehorse]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Northwest Territories]]&lt;td&gt;[[Yellowknife]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nunavut]]&lt;td&gt;[[Iqaluit]]


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:Canada|*]]</text>
      <sha1>l261h6511fh152iauh8pck4tpr7cqb2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12126</id>
      <parentid>12118</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-05T00:02:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5191">'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when aboarding them and be less keen to help.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

== Communication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and usually at every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are always in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a few 'quarter' available. Local calls costs a 'quarter' (25 cents) although for some stupid historical and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, it would be worth to contact them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested in the phone booth and it is normal practice (not for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will be only existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though.


&lt;table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Newfoundland and Labrador]]&lt;td&gt;[[St. John's]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nova Scotia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Halifax]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[New Brunswick]]&lt;td&gt;[[Fredericton]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec]]&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec city]],&lt;td&gt;[[Montreal]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Ontario]]&lt;td&gt;[[Toronto]],&lt;td&gt;[[Ottawa]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Manitoba]]&lt;td&gt;[[Winnipeg]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatchewan]]&lt;td&gt;[[Regina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatoon]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Alberta]]&lt;td&gt;[[Edmonton]]&lt;td&gt;[[Calgary]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[British Columbia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Victoria (Canada)|Victoria]]&lt;td&gt;[[Vancouver]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Yukon]]&lt;td&gt;[[Whitehorse]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Northwest Territories]]&lt;td&gt;[[Yellowknife]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nunavut]]&lt;td&gt;[[Iqaluit]]


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:Canada|*]]</text>
      <sha1>ll0ddd28mdjthfgzihf2orqov79b15j</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12141</id>
      <parentid>12126</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-06T18:54:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6062">'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when aboarding them and be less keen to help.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

== Communication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and usually at every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are always in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a few 'quarter' available. Local calls costs a 'quarter' (25 cents) although for some stupid historical and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, it would be worth to contact them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested in the phone booth and it is normal practice (not for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will be only existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though.


== Border Crossing ==

Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal being a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorist came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passenger in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car.

Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in more details in the appropriate province page.


&lt;table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Newfoundland and Labrador]]&lt;td&gt;[[St. John's]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nova Scotia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Halifax]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[New Brunswick]]&lt;td&gt;[[Fredericton]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec]]&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec city]],&lt;td&gt;[[Montreal]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Ontario]]&lt;td&gt;[[Toronto]],&lt;td&gt;[[Ottawa]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Manitoba]]&lt;td&gt;[[Winnipeg]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatchewan]]&lt;td&gt;[[Regina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatoon]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Alberta]]&lt;td&gt;[[Edmonton]]&lt;td&gt;[[Calgary]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[British Columbia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Victoria (Canada)|Victoria]]&lt;td&gt;[[Vancouver]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Yukon]]&lt;td&gt;[[Whitehorse]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Northwest Territories]]&lt;td&gt;[[Yellowknife]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nunavut]]&lt;td&gt;[[Iqaluit]]


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:Canada|*]]</text>
      <sha1>k7oz1p0v5kxha9as677cz5u73gugrss</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12149</id>
      <parentid>12141</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-09T00:27:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6065">'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when aboarding them and be less keen to help.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

== Communication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and usually at every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are always in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a few 'quarter' available. Local calls costs a 'quarter' (25 cents) although for some stupid historical and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, it would be worth to contact them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested in the phone booth and it is normal practice (not for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will be only existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though.


== Border Crossing ==

Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal being a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorist came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passenger in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car.

Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.


&lt;table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Newfoundland and Labrador]]&lt;td&gt;[[St. John's]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nova Scotia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Halifax]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[New Brunswick]]&lt;td&gt;[[Fredericton]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec]]&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec city]],&lt;td&gt;[[Montreal]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Ontario]]&lt;td&gt;[[Toronto]],&lt;td&gt;[[Ottawa]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Manitoba]]&lt;td&gt;[[Winnipeg]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatchewan]]&lt;td&gt;[[Regina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatoon]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Alberta]]&lt;td&gt;[[Edmonton]]&lt;td&gt;[[Calgary]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[British Columbia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Victoria (Canada)|Victoria]]&lt;td&gt;[[Vancouver]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Yukon]]&lt;td&gt;[[Whitehorse]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Northwest Territories]]&lt;td&gt;[[Yellowknife]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nunavut]]&lt;td&gt;[[Iqaluit]]


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:Canada|*]]</text>
      <sha1>qmdfuvohnkxfkhya3hffe1rap36hibg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12433</id>
      <parentid>12149</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-28T03:37:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8014">'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when aboarding them and be less keen to help.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

== Communication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and usually at every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are always in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a few 'quarter' available. Local calls costs a 'quarter' (25 cents) although for some stupid historical and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, it would be worth to contact them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested in the phone booth and it is normal practice (not for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will be only existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though.

== Winter Hitch-hiking ==

BE CAREFUL!

With temperature often dropping beneath -30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsability of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!


== Border Crossing ==

Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal being a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorist came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passenger in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car.

Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.


&lt;table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Newfoundland and Labrador]]&lt;td&gt;[[St. John's]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nova Scotia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Halifax]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[New Brunswick]]&lt;td&gt;[[Fredericton]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec]]&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec city]],&lt;td&gt;[[Montreal]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Ontario]]&lt;td&gt;[[Toronto]],&lt;td&gt;[[Ottawa]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Manitoba]]&lt;td&gt;[[Winnipeg]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatchewan]]&lt;td&gt;[[Regina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatoon]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Alberta]]&lt;td&gt;[[Edmonton]]&lt;td&gt;[[Calgary]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[British Columbia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Victoria (Canada)|Victoria]]&lt;td&gt;[[Vancouver]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Yukon]]&lt;td&gt;[[Whitehorse]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Northwest Territories]]&lt;td&gt;[[Yellowknife]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nunavut]]&lt;td&gt;[[Iqaluit]]


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:Canada|*]]</text>
      <sha1>dzwwd87eucncpg9y16q695505g2cl5q</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13769</id>
      <parentid>12433</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-13T18:39:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8214">'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when aboarding them and be less keen to help.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

== Communication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and usually at every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are always in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a few 'quarter' available. Local calls costs a 'quarter' (25 cents) although for some stupid historical and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, it would be worth to contact them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested in the phone booth and it is normal practice (not for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will be only existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though.

== Winter Hitch-hiking ==

BE CAREFUL!

With temperature often dropping beneath -30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsability of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!


== Border Crossing ==

Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal being a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorist came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passenger in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car.

Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.


&lt;table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Newfoundland and Labrador]]&lt;td&gt;[[St. John's]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nova Scotia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Halifax]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[New Brunswick]]&lt;td&gt;[[Fredericton]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec]]&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec city]],&lt;td&gt;[[Montreal]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Ontario]]&lt;td&gt;[[Toronto]],&lt;td&gt;[[Ottawa]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Manitoba]]&lt;td&gt;[[Winnipeg]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatchewan]]&lt;td&gt;[[Regina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatoon]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Alberta]]&lt;td&gt;[[Edmonton]]&lt;td&gt;[[Calgary]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[British Columbia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Victoria (Canada)|Victoria]]&lt;td&gt;[[Vancouver]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Yukon]]&lt;td&gt;[[Whitehorse]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Northwest Territories]]&lt;td&gt;[[Yellowknife]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nunavut]]&lt;td&gt;[[Iqaluit]]


[[Category:America]]
[[Category:Canada|*]]</text>
      <sha1>mm4qel26l9d5hz11hln3h502dh5u84h</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14079</id>
      <parentid>13769</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-23T16:04:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8219">'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when aboarding them and be less keen to help.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

== Communication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and usually at every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are always in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a few 'quarter' available. Local calls costs a 'quarter' (25 cents) although for some stupid historical and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, it would be worth to contact them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested in the phone booth and it is normal practice (not for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will be only existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though.

== Winter Hitch-hiking ==

BE CAREFUL!

With temperature often dropping beneath -30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsability of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!


== Border Crossing ==

Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal being a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorist came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passenger in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car.

Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.


&lt;table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Newfoundland and Labrador]]&lt;td&gt;[[St. John's]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nova Scotia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Halifax]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[New Brunswick]]&lt;td&gt;[[Fredericton]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec]]&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec city]],&lt;td&gt;[[Montreal]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Ontario]]&lt;td&gt;[[Toronto]],&lt;td&gt;[[Ottawa]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Manitoba]]&lt;td&gt;[[Winnipeg]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatchewan]]&lt;td&gt;[[Regina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatoon]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Alberta]]&lt;td&gt;[[Edmonton]]&lt;td&gt;[[Calgary]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[British Columbia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Victoria (Canada)|Victoria]]&lt;td&gt;[[Vancouver]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Yukon]]&lt;td&gt;[[Whitehorse]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Northwest Territories]]&lt;td&gt;[[Yellowknife]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nunavut]]&lt;td&gt;[[Iqaluit]]

[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]</text>
      <sha1>ki3vxc2vacxfu0wfh1u5dnopdqslupd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14380</id>
      <parentid>14079</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-07T04:44:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Worldhitch</username>
        <id>147</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8540">'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when aboarding them and be less keen to help.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

== Communication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and usually at every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are always in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a few 'quarter' available. Local calls costs a 'quarter' (25 cents) although for some stupid historical and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, it would be worth to contact them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested in the phone booth and it is normal practice (not for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will be only existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though.

== Winter Hitch-hiking ==

BE CAREFUL!

With temperature often dropping beneath -30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsability of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!


== Border Crossing ==

Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal being a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorist came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passenger in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car.

Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.

My experience on the vancouver border: i was turned away because i said i wanted to hitchhike to alaska and hitchhiking -so i was told- is illegal in canda...but works perfectly. so lie to them, ask your driver for a story if you are in car, also they ask sometimes for money and stuff. once you re in, its really great.

&lt;table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Newfoundland and Labrador]]&lt;td&gt;[[St. John's]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nova Scotia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Halifax]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[New Brunswick]]&lt;td&gt;[[Fredericton]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec]]&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec city]],&lt;td&gt;[[Montreal]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Ontario]]&lt;td&gt;[[Toronto]],&lt;td&gt;[[Ottawa]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Manitoba]]&lt;td&gt;[[Winnipeg]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatchewan]]&lt;td&gt;[[Regina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatoon]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Alberta]]&lt;td&gt;[[Edmonton]]&lt;td&gt;[[Calgary]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[British Columbia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Victoria (Canada)|Victoria]]&lt;td&gt;[[Vancouver]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Yukon]]&lt;td&gt;[[Whitehorse]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Northwest Territories]]&lt;td&gt;[[Yellowknife]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nunavut]]&lt;td&gt;[[Iqaluit]]

[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]</text>
      <sha1>85ji5pue3jyf8cp9y7c7pyaz6urxy4j</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14525</id>
      <parentid>14380</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-09T11:56:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8560">'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when aboarding them and be less keen to help.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

== Communication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and usually at every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are always in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a few 'quarter' available. Local calls costs a 'quarter' (25 cents) although for some stupid historical and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, it would be worth to contact them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested in the phone booth and it is normal practice (not for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will be only existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though.

== Winter Hitch-hiking ==

BE CAREFUL!

With temperature often dropping beneath -30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsability of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!


== Border Crossing ==

Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal being a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorist came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passenger in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car.

Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.

My experience on the vancouver border: i was turned away because i said i wanted to hitchhike to alaska and hitchhiking -so i was told- is illegal in canda...but works perfectly. so lie to them, ask your driver for a story if you are in car, also they ask sometimes for money and stuff. once you re in, its really great.

&lt;table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;'''
&lt;table border="0"  cellpadding="3"&gt;
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Newfoundland and Labrador]]&lt;td&gt;[[St. John's]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nova Scotia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Halifax]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[New Brunswick]]&lt;td&gt;[[Fredericton]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec]]&lt;td&gt;[[Quebec city]],&lt;td&gt;[[Montreal]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Ontario]]&lt;td&gt;[[Toronto]],&lt;td&gt;[[Ottawa]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Manitoba]]&lt;td&gt;[[Winnipeg]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatchewan]]&lt;td&gt;[[Regina]]&lt;td&gt;[[Saskatoon]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Alberta]]&lt;td&gt;[[Edmonton]]&lt;td&gt;[[Calgary]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[British Columbia]]&lt;td&gt;[[Victoria (Canada)|Victoria]]&lt;td&gt;[[Vancouver]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Yukon]]&lt;td&gt;[[Whitehorse]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Northwest Territories]]&lt;td&gt;[[Yellowknife]]
&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;[[Nunavut]]&lt;td&gt;[[Iqaluit]]

[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>r9lkke6knlii7lvyilii3enz1f3vfuk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14526</id>
      <parentid>14525</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-09T12:02:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8427">'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when aboarding them and be less keen to help.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

== Communication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and usually at every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are always in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a few 'quarter' available. Local calls costs a 'quarter' (25 cents) although for some stupid historical and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, it would be worth to contact them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested in the phone booth and it is normal practice (not for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will be only existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though.

== Winter Hitch-hiking ==

BE CAREFUL!

With temperature often dropping beneath -30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsability of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!


== Border Crossing ==

Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal being a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorist came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passenger in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car.

Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.

My experience on the vancouver border: i was turned away because i said i wanted to hitchhike to alaska and hitchhiking -so i was told- is illegal in canda...but works perfectly. so lie to them, ask your driver for a story if you are in car, also they ask sometimes for money and stuff. once you re in, its really great.


{| border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"
|-
|[[Newfoundland and Labrador]]||[[St. John's]]
|-
|[[Nova Scotia]]||[[Halifax]]
|-
|[[New Brunswick]]||[[Fredericton]]
|-
|[[Quebec]]||[[Quebec city]]||[[Montreal]]
|-
|[[Ontario]]||[[Toronto]]||[[Ottawa]]
|-
|[[Manitoba]]||[[Winnipeg]]
|-
|[[Saskatchewan]]||[[Regina]]||[[Saskatoon]]
|-
|[[Alberta]]||[[Edmonton]]||[[Calgary]]
|-
|[[British Columbia]]||[[Victoria (Canada)|Victoria]]||[[Vancouver]]
|-
|[[Yukon]]||[[Whitehorse]]
|-
|[[Northwest Territories]]||[[Yellowknife]]
|-
|[[Nunavut]]||[[Iqaluit]]
|}
[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>4o7us2683gcygkq45fefnqo9kpi0c84</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15324</id>
      <parentid>14526</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-01T21:35:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8560">'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when aboarding them and be less keen to help.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

== Telecommunication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are always in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a few 'quarter' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarter' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, it would be worth to contact them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though people might be keen enough to help you with it.

== Winter Hitch-hiking ==

BE CAREFUL!

With temperature often dropping beneath -30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsability of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!


== Border Crossing ==

Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal being a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorist came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passenger in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car.

Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.

My experience on the vancouver border: i was turned away because i said i wanted to hitchhike to alaska and hitchhiking -so i was told- is illegal in canda...but works perfectly. so lie to them, ask your driver for a story if you are in car, also they ask sometimes for money and stuff. once you re in, its really great.


{| border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"
|-
|[[Newfoundland and Labrador]]||[[St. John's]]
|-
|[[Nova Scotia]]||[[Halifax]]
|-
|[[New Brunswick]]||[[Fredericton]]
|-
|[[Quebec]]||[[Quebec city]]||[[Montreal]]
|-
|[[Ontario]]||[[Toronto]]||[[Ottawa]]
|-
|[[Manitoba]]||[[Winnipeg]]
|-
|[[Saskatchewan]]||[[Regina]]||[[Saskatoon]]
|-
|[[Alberta]]||[[Edmonton]]||[[Calgary]]
|-
|[[British Columbia]]||[[Victoria (Canada)|Victoria]]||[[Vancouver]]
|-
|[[Yukon]]||[[Whitehorse]]
|-
|[[Northwest Territories]]||[[Yellowknife]]
|-
|[[Nunavut]]||[[Iqaluit]]
|}
[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>olzqx7q12t7hxeu3c6n5utnisitt5fy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15325</id>
      <parentid>15324</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-01T21:48:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9329">'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when aboarding them and be less keen to help.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

== Telecommunication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are always in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a few 'quarter' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarter' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, it would be worth to contact them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though people might be keen enough to help you with it.

== Winter Hitch-hiking ==

BE CAREFUL!

With temperature often dropping beneath -30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsability of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!


== Border Crossing ==

Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal to be a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interogated aside). The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the question as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthousiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be ask to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). 


''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''
''(see: [[Quebec]], [[Ontario]], [[Manitoba]], [[New Brunswick]], [[Saskatchewan]], [[Alberta]], [[British Columbia]], [[Yukon]] for the appropriate crossing)''


{| border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"
|-
|[[Newfoundland and Labrador]]||[[St. John's]]
|-
|[[Nova Scotia]]||[[Halifax]]
|-
|[[New Brunswick]]||[[Fredericton]]
|-
|[[Quebec]]||[[Quebec city]]||[[Montreal]]
|-
|[[Ontario]]||[[Toronto]]||[[Ottawa]]
|-
|[[Manitoba]]||[[Winnipeg]]
|-
|[[Saskatchewan]]||[[Regina]]||[[Saskatoon]]
|-
|[[Alberta]]||[[Edmonton]]||[[Calgary]]
|-
|[[British Columbia]]||[[Victoria (Canada)|Victoria]]||[[Vancouver]]
|-
|[[Yukon]]||[[Whitehorse]]
|-
|[[Northwest Territories]]||[[Yellowknife]]
|-
|[[Nunavut]]||[[Iqaluit]]
|}
[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>fptpnw0gz3y8oxzj0ol70xc0urzq0s8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15326</id>
      <parentid>15325</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-01T21:48:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9330">'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when aboarding them and be less keen to help.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

== Telecommunication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are always in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a few 'quarter' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarter' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, it would be worth to contact them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though people might be keen enough to help you with it.

== Winter Hitch-hiking ==

BE CAREFUL!

With temperature often dropping beneath -30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsability of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!


== Border Crossing ==

Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal to be a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interogated aside). The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the question as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthousiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be ask to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). 


''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''

''(see: [[Quebec]], [[Ontario]], [[Manitoba]], [[New Brunswick]], [[Saskatchewan]], [[Alberta]], [[British Columbia]], [[Yukon]] for the appropriate crossing)''


{| border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"
|-
|[[Newfoundland and Labrador]]||[[St. John's]]
|-
|[[Nova Scotia]]||[[Halifax]]
|-
|[[New Brunswick]]||[[Fredericton]]
|-
|[[Quebec]]||[[Quebec city]]||[[Montreal]]
|-
|[[Ontario]]||[[Toronto]]||[[Ottawa]]
|-
|[[Manitoba]]||[[Winnipeg]]
|-
|[[Saskatchewan]]||[[Regina]]||[[Saskatoon]]
|-
|[[Alberta]]||[[Edmonton]]||[[Calgary]]
|-
|[[British Columbia]]||[[Victoria (Canada)|Victoria]]||[[Vancouver]]
|-
|[[Yukon]]||[[Whitehorse]]
|-
|[[Northwest Territories]]||[[Yellowknife]]
|-
|[[Nunavut]]||[[Iqaluit]]
|}
[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>eqqe482yzl6ft1djnebckoslch8nmyw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15331</id>
      <parentid>15326</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-01T21:56:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10668">'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when aboarding them and be less keen to help.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

== Telecommunication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are always in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a few 'quarter' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarter' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, it would be worth to contact them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though people might be keen enough to help you with it.

== Winter Hitch-hiking ==

BE CAREFUL!

With temperature often dropping beneath -30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsability of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!


== Border Crossing ==

Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal to be a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interogated aside). The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the question as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthousiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be ask to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). 

==== While Crossing the Border ====

Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't volunteer the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

==Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens==

U.S. and Canadian citizens are NOT required to show a passport. At least not yet. That doesn't mean a border guard won't ask to see one, though. But, a border guard is not supposed to deny you just because you don't have a passport. Until January of 2008, border guards are supposed to continue accepting "oral declarations of citizenship" which basically means, "you have to believe me because I told you so."

If you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant). But don't think that just 'cause you don't own a passport you can't cross. You can.


''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''

''(see: [[Quebec]], [[Ontario]], [[Manitoba]], [[New Brunswick]], [[Saskatchewan]], [[Alberta]], [[British Columbia]], [[Yukon]] for the appropriate crossing)''


{| border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"
|-
|[[Newfoundland and Labrador]]||[[St. John's]]
|-
|[[Nova Scotia]]||[[Halifax]]
|-
|[[New Brunswick]]||[[Fredericton]]
|-
|[[Quebec]]||[[Quebec city]]||[[Montreal]]
|-
|[[Ontario]]||[[Toronto]]||[[Ottawa]]
|-
|[[Manitoba]]||[[Winnipeg]]
|-
|[[Saskatchewan]]||[[Regina]]||[[Saskatoon]]
|-
|[[Alberta]]||[[Edmonton]]||[[Calgary]]
|-
|[[British Columbia]]||[[Victoria (Canada)|Victoria]]||[[Vancouver]]
|-
|[[Yukon]]||[[Whitehorse]]
|-
|[[Northwest Territories]]||[[Yellowknife]]
|-
|[[Nunavut]]||[[Iqaluit]]
|}
[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>su2tjl0gj3km9v77xpl43fowjmp545k</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15332</id>
      <parentid>15331</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-01T21:56:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10672">'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when aboarding them and be less keen to help.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

== Telecommunication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are always in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a few 'quarter' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarter' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, it would be worth to contact them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though people might be keen enough to help you with it.

== Winter Hitch-hiking ==

BE CAREFUL!

With temperature often dropping beneath -30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsability of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!


== Border Crossing ==

Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal to be a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interogated aside). The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the question as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthousiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be ask to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). 

==== While Crossing the Border ====

Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't volunteer the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===

U.S. and Canadian citizens are NOT required to show a passport. At least not yet. That doesn't mean a border guard won't ask to see one, though. But, a border guard is not supposed to deny you just because you don't have a passport. Until January of 2008, border guards are supposed to continue accepting "oral declarations of citizenship" which basically means, "you have to believe me because I told you so."

If you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant). But don't think that just 'cause you don't own a passport you can't cross. You can.


''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''

''(see: [[Quebec]], [[Ontario]], [[Manitoba]], [[New Brunswick]], [[Saskatchewan]], [[Alberta]], [[British Columbia]], [[Yukon]] for the appropriate crossing)''


{| border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"
|-
|[[Newfoundland and Labrador]]||[[St. John's]]
|-
|[[Nova Scotia]]||[[Halifax]]
|-
|[[New Brunswick]]||[[Fredericton]]
|-
|[[Quebec]]||[[Quebec city]]||[[Montreal]]
|-
|[[Ontario]]||[[Toronto]]||[[Ottawa]]
|-
|[[Manitoba]]||[[Winnipeg]]
|-
|[[Saskatchewan]]||[[Regina]]||[[Saskatoon]]
|-
|[[Alberta]]||[[Edmonton]]||[[Calgary]]
|-
|[[British Columbia]]||[[Victoria (Canada)|Victoria]]||[[Vancouver]]
|-
|[[Yukon]]||[[Whitehorse]]
|-
|[[Northwest Territories]]||[[Yellowknife]]
|-
|[[Nunavut]]||[[Iqaluit]]
|}
[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>ohbp83fxm54ksq96iih6nmet428jxaf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15333</id>
      <parentid>15332</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-01T21:56:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10674">'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when aboarding them and be less keen to help.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

== Telecommunication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are always in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a few 'quarter' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarter' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, it would be worth to contact them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though people might be keen enough to help you with it.

== Winter Hitch-hiking ==

BE CAREFUL!

With temperature often dropping beneath -30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsability of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!


== Border Crossing ==

Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal to be a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interogated aside). The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the question as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthousiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be ask to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). 

===== While Crossing the Border =====

Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't volunteer the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===

U.S. and Canadian citizens are NOT required to show a passport. At least not yet. That doesn't mean a border guard won't ask to see one, though. But, a border guard is not supposed to deny you just because you don't have a passport. Until January of 2008, border guards are supposed to continue accepting "oral declarations of citizenship" which basically means, "you have to believe me because I told you so."

If you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant). But don't think that just 'cause you don't own a passport you can't cross. You can.


''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''

''(see: [[Quebec]], [[Ontario]], [[Manitoba]], [[New Brunswick]], [[Saskatchewan]], [[Alberta]], [[British Columbia]], [[Yukon]] for the appropriate crossing)''


{| border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"
|-
|[[Newfoundland and Labrador]]||[[St. John's]]
|-
|[[Nova Scotia]]||[[Halifax]]
|-
|[[New Brunswick]]||[[Fredericton]]
|-
|[[Quebec]]||[[Quebec city]]||[[Montreal]]
|-
|[[Ontario]]||[[Toronto]]||[[Ottawa]]
|-
|[[Manitoba]]||[[Winnipeg]]
|-
|[[Saskatchewan]]||[[Regina]]||[[Saskatoon]]
|-
|[[Alberta]]||[[Edmonton]]||[[Calgary]]
|-
|[[British Columbia]]||[[Victoria (Canada)|Victoria]]||[[Vancouver]]
|-
|[[Yukon]]||[[Whitehorse]]
|-
|[[Northwest Territories]]||[[Yellowknife]]
|-
|[[Nunavut]]||[[Iqaluit]]
|}
[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>00e1y7vvu3v79kblg03hf5ale0t33nl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15334</id>
      <parentid>15333</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-01T21:58:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10699">'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.


=== Local Attitude ===

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when aboarding them and be less keen to help.

== Telecommunication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are always in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a few 'quarter' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarter' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, it would be worth to contact them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though people might be keen enough to help you with it.

== Winter Hitch-hiking ==

BE CAREFUL!

With temperature often dropping beneath -30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsability of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!


== Border Crossing ==

Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal to be a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interogated aside). The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the question as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthousiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be ask to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). 

===== While Crossing the Border =====

Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't volunteer the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===

U.S. and Canadian citizens are NOT required to show a passport. At least not yet. That doesn't mean a border guard won't ask to see one, though. But, a border guard is not supposed to deny you just because you don't have a passport. Until January of 2008, border guards are supposed to continue accepting "oral declarations of citizenship" which basically means, "you have to believe me because I told you so."

If you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant). But don't think that just 'cause you don't own a passport you can't cross. You can.


''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''

''(see: [[Quebec]], [[Ontario]], [[Manitoba]], [[New Brunswick]], [[Saskatchewan]], [[Alberta]], [[British Columbia]], [[Yukon]] for the appropriate crossing)''


{| border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"
|-
|[[Newfoundland and Labrador]]||[[St. John's]]
|-
|[[Nova Scotia]]||[[Halifax]]
|-
|[[New Brunswick]]||[[Fredericton]]
|-
|[[Quebec]]||[[Quebec city]]||[[Montreal]]
|-
|[[Ontario]]||[[Toronto]]||[[Ottawa]]
|-
|[[Manitoba]]||[[Winnipeg]]
|-
|[[Saskatchewan]]||[[Regina]]||[[Saskatoon]]
|-
|[[Alberta]]||[[Edmonton]]||[[Calgary]]
|-
|[[British Columbia]]||[[Victoria (Canada)|Victoria]]||[[Vancouver]]
|-
|[[Yukon]]||[[Whitehorse]]
|-
|[[Northwest Territories]]||[[Yellowknife]]
|-
|[[Nunavut]]||[[Iqaluit]]
|}
[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>4qw20jbimwixxeorpyrs846ybzfzg86</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15335</id>
      <parentid>15334</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-01T21:59:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10698">'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

=== Local Attitude ===

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when aboarding them and be less keen to help.

== Telecommunication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are always in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a few 'quarter' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarter' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, it would be worth to contact them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though people might be keen enough to help you with it.

== Winter Hitch-hiking ==

BE CAREFUL!

With temperature often dropping beneath -30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsability of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!


== Border Crossing ==

Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal to be a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interogated aside). The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the question as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthousiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be ask to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). 

===== While Crossing the Border =====

Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't volunteer the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===

U.S. and Canadian citizens are NOT required to show a passport. At least not yet. That doesn't mean a border guard won't ask to see one, though. But, a border guard is not supposed to deny you just because you don't have a passport. Until January of 2008, border guards are supposed to continue accepting "oral declarations of citizenship" which basically means, "you have to believe me because I told you so."

If you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant). But don't think that just 'cause you don't own a passport you can't cross. You can.


''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''

''(see: [[Quebec]], [[Ontario]], [[Manitoba]], [[New Brunswick]], [[Saskatchewan]], [[Alberta]], [[British Columbia]], [[Yukon]] for the appropriate crossing)''


{| border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2"
|-
|[[Newfoundland and Labrador]]||[[St. John's]]
|-
|[[Nova Scotia]]||[[Halifax]]
|-
|[[New Brunswick]]||[[Fredericton]]
|-
|[[Quebec]]||[[Quebec city]]||[[Montreal]]
|-
|[[Ontario]]||[[Toronto]]||[[Ottawa]]
|-
|[[Manitoba]]||[[Winnipeg]]
|-
|[[Saskatchewan]]||[[Regina]]||[[Saskatoon]]
|-
|[[Alberta]]||[[Edmonton]]||[[Calgary]]
|-
|[[British Columbia]]||[[Victoria (Canada)|Victoria]]||[[Vancouver]]
|-
|[[Yukon]]||[[Whitehorse]]
|-
|[[Northwest Territories]]||[[Yellowknife]]
|-
|[[Nunavut]]||[[Iqaluit]]
|}
[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]
[[Category:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>099pw5vqv94678kwhykvmbdgs2vb14r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15368</id>
      <parentid>15335</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-03T17:35:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10108"> For specific information about provinces and territories, have a look at the bottom of the page.
'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.
__NOTOC__
Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

=== Local Attitude ===

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when aboarding them and be less keen to help.

== Telecommunication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are always in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a few 'quarter' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarter' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, it would be worth to contact them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though people might be keen enough to help you with it.

== Winter Hitch-hiking ==

BE CAREFUL!

With temperature often dropping beneath -30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsability of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!


== Border Crossing ==

Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal to be a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interogated aside). The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the question as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthousiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be ask to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). 

===== While Crossing the Border =====

Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't volunteer the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===

U.S. and Canadian citizens are NOT required to show a passport. At least not yet. That doesn't mean a border guard won't ask to see one, though. But, a border guard is not supposed to deny you just because you don't have a passport. Until January of 2008, border guards are supposed to continue accepting "oral declarations of citizenship" which basically means, "you have to believe me because I told you so."

If you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant). But don't think that just 'cause you don't own a passport you can't cross. You can.


''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''

{{Provinces Canada}}

[[Category:Canada|*]]
[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]</text>
      <sha1>mw7qzp7282rqsivanxivo4mqo5crq8p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15451</id>
      <parentid>15368</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-06T16:22:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10416"> For specific information about provinces and territories, have a look at the bottom of the page.
'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.
__NOTOC__
Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

=== Local Attitude ===

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when approaching them and be less keen to help.

== Car Number Plate ==

Just like it's southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_Canada Car licenses] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are always in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a few 'quarter' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarter' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, it would be worth to contact them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though people might be keen enough to help you with it.

== Winter Hitch-hiking ==

BE CAREFUL!

With temperature often dropping beneath -30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsability of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!


== Border Crossing ==

Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal to be a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interogated aside). The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the question as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthousiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be ask to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). 

===== While Crossing the Border =====

Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't volunteer the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===

U.S. and Canadian citizens are NOT required to show a passport. At least not yet. That doesn't mean a border guard won't ask to see one, though. But, a border guard is not supposed to deny you just because you don't have a passport. Until January of 2008, border guards are supposed to continue accepting "oral declarations of citizenship" which basically means, "you have to believe me because I told you so."

If you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant). But don't think that just 'cause you don't own a passport you can't cross. You can.


''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''

{{Provinces Canada}}

[[Category:Canada|*]]
[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]</text>
      <sha1>s3zmbt4w5qu4l6tdthcjzw8hjfo5rvg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15452</id>
      <parentid>15451</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-06T16:23:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10418"> For specific information about provinces and territories, have a look at the bottom of the page.
'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.
__NOTOC__
Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

=== Local Attitude ===

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when approaching them and be less keen to help.

=== Car Number Plate ===

Just like it's southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_Canada Car licenses] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are always in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a few 'quarter' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarter' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, it would be worth to contact them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though people might be keen enough to help you with it.

== Winter Hitch-hiking ==

BE CAREFUL!

With temperature often dropping beneath -30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsability of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!


== Border Crossing ==

Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal to be a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interogated aside). The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the question as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthousiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be ask to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). 

===== While Crossing the Border =====

Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't volunteer the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===

U.S. and Canadian citizens are NOT required to show a passport. At least not yet. That doesn't mean a border guard won't ask to see one, though. But, a border guard is not supposed to deny you just because you don't have a passport. Until January of 2008, border guards are supposed to continue accepting "oral declarations of citizenship" which basically means, "you have to believe me because I told you so."

If you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant). But don't think that just 'cause you don't own a passport you can't cross. You can.


''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''

{{Provinces Canada}}

[[Category:Canada|*]]
[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]</text>
      <sha1>14ci4sw1crvgwofohws3fei2zo9old4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15522</id>
      <parentid>15452</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-06T22:09:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>66.128.89.218</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10419">For specific information about provinces and territories, have a look at the bottom of the page.
'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.
__NOTOC__
Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

=== Local Attitude ===

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when approaching them and be less keen to help.

=== Car Number Plate ===

Just like it's southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_Canada Car licenses] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are always in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a few 'quarter' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarter' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, it would be worth to contact them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though people might be keen enough to help you with it.

== Winter Hitch-hiking ==

BE CAREFUL!

With temperature often dropping beneath -30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might be too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!

== Border Crossing ==

Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal to be a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interogated aside). The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the question as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthousiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be ask to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). 

===== While Crossing the Border =====

Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't volunteer the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===

U.S. and Canadian citizens are NOT required to show a passport. At least not yet. That doesn't mean a border guard won't ask to see one, though. But, a border guard is not supposed to deny you just because you don't have a passport. Until January of 2008, border guards are supposed to continue accepting "oral declarations of citizenship" which basically means, "you have to believe me because I told you so."

If you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant). But don't think that just 'cause you don't own a passport you can't cross. You can.


''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''

{{Provinces Canada}}

[[Category:Canada|*]]
[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]</text>
      <sha1>lsyh8a1tgx4ma244qcyv7dumfhfhp4z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15744</id>
      <parentid>15522</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-08T19:21:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10420"> For specific information about provinces and territories, have a look at the bottom of the page.
'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.
__NOTOC__
Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

=== Local Attitude ===

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when approaching them and be less keen to help.

=== Car Number Plate ===

Just like it's southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_Canada Car licenses] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are always in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a few 'quarter' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarter' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, it would be worth to contact them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though people might be keen enough to help you with it.

== Winter Hitch-hiking ==

BE CAREFUL!

With temperature often dropping beneath -30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might be too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!

== Border Crossing ==

Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal to be a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interogated aside). The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the question as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthousiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be ask to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). 

===== While Crossing the Border =====

Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't volunteer the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===

U.S. and Canadian citizens are NOT required to show a passport. At least not yet. That doesn't mean a border guard won't ask to see one, though. But, a border guard is not supposed to deny you just because you don't have a passport. Until January of 2008, border guards are supposed to continue accepting "oral declarations of citizenship" which basically means, "you have to believe me because I told you so."

If you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant). But don't think that just 'cause you don't own a passport you can't cross. You can.


''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''

{{Provinces Canada}}

[[Category:Canada|*]]
[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]</text>
      <sha1>dr9gsfs67l6j6e1q27nzqegm2vd25h4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15981</id>
      <parentid>15744</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-15T19:46:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10426">'''For specific information about provinces and territories, have a look at the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.
__NOTOC__
Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

=== Local Attitude ===

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when approaching them and be less keen to help.

=== Car Number Plate ===

Just like it's southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_Canada Car licenses] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are always in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a few 'quarter' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarter' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, it would be worth to contact them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though people might be keen enough to help you with it.

== Winter Hitch-hiking ==

BE CAREFUL!

With temperature often dropping beneath -30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might be too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!

== Border Crossing ==

Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal to be a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interogated aside). The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the question as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthousiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be ask to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). 

===== While Crossing the Border =====

Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't volunteer the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===

U.S. and Canadian citizens are NOT required to show a passport. At least not yet. That doesn't mean a border guard won't ask to see one, though. But, a border guard is not supposed to deny you just because you don't have a passport. Until January of 2008, border guards are supposed to continue accepting "oral declarations of citizenship" which basically means, "you have to believe me because I told you so."

If you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant). But don't think that just 'cause you don't own a passport you can't cross. You can.


''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''

{{Provinces Canada}}

[[Category:Canada|*]]
[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]</text>
      <sha1>s35le2qjodphxsdthe20iuzpdkicr22</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16620</id>
      <parentid>15981</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-23T21:57:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10467">Hitchability: {{Good}} to {{Very Good}}

'''For specific information about provinces and territories, have a look at the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.
__NOTOC__
Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

=== Local Attitude ===

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when approaching them and be less keen to help.

=== Car Number Plate ===

Just like it's southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_Canada Car licenses] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are always in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a few 'quarter' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarter' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, it would be worth to contact them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though people might be keen enough to help you with it.

== Winter Hitch-hiking ==

BE CAREFUL!

With temperature often dropping beneath -30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might be too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!

== Border Crossing ==

Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal to be a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interogated aside). The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the question as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthousiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be ask to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). 

===== While Crossing the Border =====

Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't volunteer the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===

U.S. and Canadian citizens are NOT required to show a passport. At least not yet. That doesn't mean a border guard won't ask to see one, though. But, a border guard is not supposed to deny you just because you don't have a passport. Until January of 2008, border guards are supposed to continue accepting "oral declarations of citizenship" which basically means, "you have to believe me because I told you so."

If you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant). But don't think that just 'cause you don't own a passport you can't cross. You can.


''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''

{{Provinces Canada}}

[[Category:Canada|*]]
[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]</text>
      <sha1>5sv9iforpiij6zmvwy5y8p1dmwfbe3d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16871</id>
      <parentid>16620</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-12-30T20:45:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10487">{{Infobox Country}}
Hitchability: {{Good}} to {{Very Good}}

'''For specific information about provinces and territories, have a look at the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.
__NOTOC__
Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

=== Local Attitude ===

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when approaching them and be less keen to help.

=== Car Number Plate ===

Just like it's southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_Canada Car licenses] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are always in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a few 'quarter' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarter' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, it would be worth to contact them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though people might be keen enough to help you with it.

== Winter Hitch-hiking ==

BE CAREFUL!

With temperature often dropping beneath -30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might be too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!

== Border Crossing ==

Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal to be a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interogated aside). The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the question as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthousiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be ask to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). 

===== While Crossing the Border =====

Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't volunteer the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===

U.S. and Canadian citizens are NOT required to show a passport. At least not yet. That doesn't mean a border guard won't ask to see one, though. But, a border guard is not supposed to deny you just because you don't have a passport. Until January of 2008, border guards are supposed to continue accepting "oral declarations of citizenship" which basically means, "you have to believe me because I told you so."

If you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant). But don't think that just 'cause you don't own a passport you can't cross. You can.


''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''

{{Provinces Canada}}

[[Category:Canada|*]]
[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]</text>
      <sha1>58enapd53y5gjfxt6dj4lg417661etr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17524</id>
      <parentid>16871</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-03T00:01:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10733">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 31,612,897
|currency = Canadian Dollar
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'') to {{Very Good}} (''very good'')
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}

'''For specific information about provinces and territories, have a look at the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.
__NOTOC__
Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

=== Local Attitude ===

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when approaching them and be less keen to help.

=== Car Number Plate ===

Just like it's southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_Canada Car licenses] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are always in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a few 'quarter' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarter' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, it would be worth to contact them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though people might be keen enough to help you with it.

== Winter Hitch-hiking ==

BE CAREFUL!

With temperature often dropping beneath -30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might be too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!

== Border Crossing ==

Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal to be a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interogated aside). The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the question as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthousiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be ask to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). 

===== While Crossing the Border =====

Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't volunteer the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===

U.S. and Canadian citizens are NOT required to show a passport. At least not yet. That doesn't mean a border guard won't ask to see one, though. But, a border guard is not supposed to deny you just because you don't have a passport. Until January of 2008, border guards are supposed to continue accepting "oral declarations of citizenship" which basically means, "you have to believe me because I told you so."

If you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant). But don't think that just 'cause you don't own a passport you can't cross. You can.


''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''

{{Provinces Canada}}

[[Category:Canada|*]]
[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]</text>
      <sha1>aaw4yxkjnhv8kzxmc8ron9uflxbg0pn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17533</id>
      <parentid>17524</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-03T00:20:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10792">{{Infobox Country
[[Image:Flag of Canada.png|26x23px|border|Flag of Canada]]
|country = Canada
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 31,612,897
|currency = Canadian Dollar
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'') to {{Very Good}} (''very good'')
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}

'''For specific information about provinces and territories, have a look at the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.
__NOTOC__
Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

=== Local Attitude ===

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when approaching them and be less keen to help.

=== Car Number Plate ===

Just like it's southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_Canada Car licenses] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are always in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a few 'quarter' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarter' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, it would be worth to contact them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though people might be keen enough to help you with it.

== Winter Hitch-hiking ==

BE CAREFUL!

With temperature often dropping beneath -30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might be too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!

== Border Crossing ==

Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal to be a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interogated aside). The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the question as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthousiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be ask to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). 

===== While Crossing the Border =====

Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't volunteer the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===

U.S. and Canadian citizens are NOT required to show a passport. At least not yet. That doesn't mean a border guard won't ask to see one, though. But, a border guard is not supposed to deny you just because you don't have a passport. Until January of 2008, border guards are supposed to continue accepting "oral declarations of citizenship" which basically means, "you have to believe me because I told you so."

If you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant). But don't think that just 'cause you don't own a passport you can't cross. You can.


''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''

{{Provinces Canada}}

[[Category:Canada|*]]
[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]</text>
      <sha1>tclntl6xn5ct0ltnqeo60yvxazwybpj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17534</id>
      <parentid>17533</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-03T00:20:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10426">'''For specific information about provinces and territories, have a look at the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.
__NOTOC__
Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

=== Local Attitude ===

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when approaching them and be less keen to help.

=== Car Number Plate ===

Just like it's southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_Canada Car licenses] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are always in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a few 'quarter' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarter' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, it would be worth to contact them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though people might be keen enough to help you with it.

== Winter Hitch-hiking ==

BE CAREFUL!

With temperature often dropping beneath -30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might be too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!

== Border Crossing ==

Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal to be a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interogated aside). The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the question as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthousiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be ask to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). 

===== While Crossing the Border =====

Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't volunteer the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===

U.S. and Canadian citizens are NOT required to show a passport. At least not yet. That doesn't mean a border guard won't ask to see one, though. But, a border guard is not supposed to deny you just because you don't have a passport. Until January of 2008, border guards are supposed to continue accepting "oral declarations of citizenship" which basically means, "you have to believe me because I told you so."

If you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant). But don't think that just 'cause you don't own a passport you can't cross. You can.


''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''

{{Provinces Canada}}

[[Category:Canada|*]]
[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]</text>
      <sha1>s35le2qjodphxsdthe20iuzpdkicr22</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17535</id>
      <parentid>17534</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-03T00:21:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10792">{{Infobox Country
[[Image:Flag of Canada.png|26x23px|border|Flag of Canada]]
|country = Canada
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 31,612,897
|currency = Canadian Dollar
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'') to {{Very Good}} (''very good'')
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}

'''For specific information about provinces and territories, have a look at the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.
__NOTOC__
Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

=== Local Attitude ===

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when approaching them and be less keen to help.

=== Car Number Plate ===

Just like it's southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_Canada Car licenses] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are always in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a few 'quarter' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarter' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, it would be worth to contact them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though people might be keen enough to help you with it.

== Winter Hitch-hiking ==

BE CAREFUL!

With temperature often dropping beneath -30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might be too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!

== Border Crossing ==

Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal to be a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interogated aside). The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the question as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthousiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be ask to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). 

===== While Crossing the Border =====

Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't volunteer the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===

U.S. and Canadian citizens are NOT required to show a passport. At least not yet. That doesn't mean a border guard won't ask to see one, though. But, a border guard is not supposed to deny you just because you don't have a passport. Until January of 2008, border guards are supposed to continue accepting "oral declarations of citizenship" which basically means, "you have to believe me because I told you so."

If you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant). But don't think that just 'cause you don't own a passport you can't cross. You can.


''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''

{{Provinces Canada}}

[[Category:Canada|*]]
[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]</text>
      <sha1>tclntl6xn5ct0ltnqeo60yvxazwybpj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17536</id>
      <parentid>17535</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-03T00:21:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10733">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 31,612,897
|currency = Canadian Dollar
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'') to {{Very Good}} (''very good'')
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}

'''For specific information about provinces and territories, have a look at the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.
__NOTOC__
Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

=== Local Attitude ===

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when approaching them and be less keen to help.

=== Car Number Plate ===

Just like it's southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_Canada Car licenses] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are always in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a few 'quarter' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarter' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, it would be worth to contact them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though people might be keen enough to help you with it.

== Winter Hitch-hiking ==

BE CAREFUL!

With temperature often dropping beneath -30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might be too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!

== Border Crossing ==

Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal to be a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interogated aside). The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the question as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthousiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be ask to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). 

===== While Crossing the Border =====

Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't volunteer the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===

U.S. and Canadian citizens are NOT required to show a passport. At least not yet. That doesn't mean a border guard won't ask to see one, though. But, a border guard is not supposed to deny you just because you don't have a passport. Until January of 2008, border guards are supposed to continue accepting "oral declarations of citizenship" which basically means, "you have to believe me because I told you so."

If you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant). But don't think that just 'cause you don't own a passport you can't cross. You can.


''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''

{{Provinces Canada}}

[[Category:Canada|*]]
[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]</text>
      <sha1>aaw4yxkjnhv8kzxmc8ron9uflxbg0pn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>20314</id>
      <parentid>17536</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-02T00:53:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>72.161.51.134</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11804">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 31,612,897
|currency = Canadian Dollar
|hitch = {{good}} (''good'') to {{Very Good}} (''very good'')
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}

'''For specific information about provinces and territories, have a look at the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.
__NOTOC__
Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

=== Local Attitude ===

The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when approaching them and be less keen to help.

=== Car Number Plate ===

Just like it's southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_Canada Car licenses] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==

The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarters' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. It's often simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dail the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada.  The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.   

Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though people might be keen enough to help you with it.

== Winter Hitch-hiking ==

BE CAREFUL!

With temperature often dropping beneath -30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might be too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!

== Border Crossing ==

Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal to be a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interogated aside). The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the question as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthousiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be ask to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). 

===== While Crossing the Border =====

Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't volunteer the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===

U.S. and Canadian citizens are NOT required to show a passport. At least not yet. That doesn't mean a border guard won't ask to see one, though. But, a border guard is not supposed to deny you just because you don't have a passport. Until January of 2008, border guards are supposed to continue accepting "oral declarations of citizenship" which basically means, "you have to believe me because I told you so."

If you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant). But don't think that just 'cause you don't own a passport you can't cross. You can.


''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''

{{Provinces Canada}}

[[Category:Canada|*]]
[[Category:North America]]
[[Category:Americas]]</text>
      <sha1>gqgrdl4c10slwnv2egtztj1j4hoibqa</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21264</id>
      <parentid>20314</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-14T22:33:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11731">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 31,612,897
|currency = Canadian Dollar
|hitch = {{good}} to {{Very Good}}
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, have a look at the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75% of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

=== Local Attitude ===
The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when approaching them and be less keen to help.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like it's southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/License_plates_of_Canada Car licenses] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarters' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. It's often simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dail the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada.  The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.   

Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though people might be keen enough to help you with it.

== Winter Hitch-hiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might be too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal to be a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interogated aside). The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the question as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthousiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be ask to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). 

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't volunteer the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
U.S. and Canadian citizens are NOT required to show a passport. At least not yet. That doesn't mean a border guard won't ask to see one, though. But, a border guard is not supposed to deny you just because you don't have a passport. Until January of 2008, border guards are supposed to continue accepting "oral declarations of citizenship" which basically means, "you have to believe me because I told you so."

If you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant). But don't think that just 'cause you don't own a passport you can't cross. You can.


''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''

{{Provinces Canada}}


[[Category:Canada| ]]

__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>a1zjfz1nnkhkuyjho8mutyuj1b4g8dz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21295</id>
      <parentid>21264</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-14T23:29:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11718">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 31,612,897
|currency = Canadian Dollar
|hitch = {{good}} to {{very good}}
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, have a look at the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75 % of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

=== Local Attitude ===
The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when approaching them and be less keen to help.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like it's southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarters' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. It's often simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dail the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada. The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.

Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though people might be keen enough to help you with it.

== Winter Hitch-hiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might be too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal to be a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interogated aside). The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the question as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthousiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be ask to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket).

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't volunteer the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
U.S. and Canadian citizens are NOT required to show a passport. At least not yet. That doesn't mean a border guard won't ask to see one, though. But, a border guard is not supposed to deny you just because you don't have a passport. Until January of 2008, border guards are supposed to continue accepting “oral declarations of citizenship” which basically means, “you have to believe me because I told you so.”

If you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant). But don't think that just 'cause you don't own a passport you can't cross. You can.


''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''

{{Provinces Canada}}


[[Category:Canada| ]]

__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>fwsbpenh2y7tmmvdmait67scbscurnm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21359</id>
      <parentid>21295</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-15T13:30:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11740">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 31,612,897
|currency = Canadian Dollar
|hitch = {{good}} to {{very good}}
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, have a look at the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75 % of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

=== Local Attitude ===
The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when approaching them and be less keen to help.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like it's southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarters' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. It's often simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dail the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada. The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.

Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though people might be keen enough to help you with it.

== Winter Hitch-hiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might be too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal to be a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interogated aside). The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the question as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthousiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be ask to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket).

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't volunteer the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
U.S. and Canadian citizens are NOT required to show a passport. At least not yet. That doesn't mean a border guard won't ask to see one, though. But, a border guard is not supposed to deny you just because you don't have a passport. Until January of 2008, border guards are supposed to continue accepting “oral declarations of citizenship” which basically means, “you have to believe me because I told you so.”

If you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant). But don't think that just 'cause you don't own a passport you can't cross. You can.


''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''

{{Provinces Canada}}


[[Category:Canada| ]]
{{IsIn|North America}}
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>57tibbmupd50oghnr0d4c5m9dwo3cev</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21888</id>
      <parentid>21359</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-20T15:37:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11756">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 31,612,897
|currency = Canadian Dollar
|hitch = {{good}} to {{very good}}
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, have a look at the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75 % of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

=== Local Attitude ===
The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when approaching them and be less keen to help.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like it's southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarters' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. It's often simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dail the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada. The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.

Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though people might be keen enough to help you with it.

== Winter Hitch-hiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might be too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal to be a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interogated aside). The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the question as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthousiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be ask to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket).

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't volunteer the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
U.S. and Canadian citizens are NOT required to show a passport. At least not yet. That doesn't mean a border guard won't ask to see one, though. But, a border guard is not supposed to deny you just because you don't have a passport. Until January of 2008, border guards are supposed to continue accepting “oral declarations of citizenship” which basically means, “you have to believe me because I told you so.”

If you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant). But don't think that just 'cause you don't own a passport you can't cross. You can.


''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''

{{Provinces Canada}}


[[Category:Canada| ]]
{{IsIn|North America}}
__NOTOC__

[[es:Canadá]]</text>
      <sha1>sp6vgw348uhwv24r1vdy9fyszsl5z4j</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29064</id>
      <parentid>21888</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-10T08:27:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11774">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 31,612,897
|currency = Canadian Dollar
|hitch = {{good}} to {{very good}}
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, have a look at the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75 % of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

=== Local Attitude ===
The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necesserily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but especially existing during some specific peak situation usually caused by an intern political tumult. It might be useful for a traveller to know if there is an important referendum or political crisis going on, deciding on the future of the country as your accent might 'tag' you to one or another of the country's nation and therefore become a ball and chain. For example, it might not always be of good help to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others during a National Referendum or Election time. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when approaching them and be less keen to help.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like it's southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarters' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. It's often simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dail the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada. The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.

Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though people might be keen enough to help you with it.

== Winter Hitch-hiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might be too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal to be a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interogated aside). The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the question as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthousiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be ask to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket).

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't volunteer the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
U.S. and Canadian citizens are NOT required to show a passport. At least not yet. That doesn't mean a border guard won't ask to see one, though. But, a border guard is not supposed to deny you just because you don't have a passport. Until January of 2008, border guards are supposed to continue accepting “oral declarations of citizenship” which basically means, “you have to believe me because I told you so.”

If you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant). But don't think that just 'cause you don't own a passport you can't cross. You can.


''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''

{{Provinces Canada}}


[[Category:Canada| ]]
{{IsIn|North America}}
__NOTOC__

[[es:Canadá]]

[[trash:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>fu2jj0tyl75j5j9e6de2ypgq4vt3dt4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31047</id>
      <parentid>29064</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-12T05:30:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12167">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 31,612,897
|currency = Canadian Dollar
|hitch = {{good}} to {{very good}}
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, have a look at the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75 % of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

=== Local Attitude ===
The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country, this has been enabled by the size of the country which allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necessarily being bothered by anybody else in a 'Live and let live' motto. Therefore, hate crime are absent and major ''difference'' clash more rare but may exist or be apparent (commented) during some particular intern political tumult situation usually, which still remains rare. It might be useful for a traveller to know the current news as matter to avoid getting into a political discussion which may offend more than anything else. Sometimes, during such potential situation and with some people, it might not always be helpful to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when approaching them and be less keen to help.

The rural population should be entirely keen to help if the traveller is making the first steps into breaking the 'stranger in the locality' image, as the split between urban and rural citizen is also existent. The rural community feeling is usually pretty strong and people will believe you belong there and act more altruistic. However, some rural regions have strong influence from urban resident which has the tendency to bring a more individualistic mentality.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like it's southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarters' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. It's often simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dail the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada. The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.

Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though people might be keen enough to help you with it.

== Winter Hitch-hiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might be too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitch-hiker might reveal to be a hard thing, especially since 2001. The border control is now more thighten, especially since the non-proven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada, and several questions are asked according to the relations between the passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitch-hiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interogated aside). The vast majority of the drivers will most likely be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the question as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthousiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be ask to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket).

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't volunteer the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
U.S. and Canadian citizens are NOT required to show a passport. At least not yet. That doesn't mean a border guard won't ask to see one, though. But, a border guard is not supposed to deny you just because you don't have a passport. Until January of 2008, border guards are supposed to continue accepting “oral declarations of citizenship” which basically means, “you have to believe me because I told you so.”

If you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant). But don't think that just 'cause you don't own a passport you can't cross. You can.


''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''

{{Provinces Canada}}


[[Category:Canada| ]]
{{IsIn|North America}}
__NOTOC__

[[es:Canadá]]

[[trash:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>dbwln07zbu88h186xspj38urdex9kwh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31064</id>
      <parentid>31047</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-13T22:50:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11930">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 31,612,897
|currency = Canadian Dollar
|hitch = {{good}} to {{very good}}
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, have a look at the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75 % of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

=== Local Attitude ===
The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country.   The size of the country allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necessarily being bothered by anybody else, in a 'Live and let live' motto.  Therefore, hate crimes are absent and major ''difference'' clash even rarer but may exist or be apparent (commented) during some particular intern political tumult situation usually. It still remains rare.  It might be useful for a traveller to be aware of the current events to avoid getting into a political discussion which may offend more than anything else.  Sometimes, during such potential situation and with some people, it might not always be helpful to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when approaching them and be less keen to help.  &lt;!-- this section needs a rewrite --&gt;

The rural population should be entirely keen to help if the traveller is making the first steps into breaking the 'stranger in the locality' image, as the split between urban and rural citizen is also existent. The rural community feeling is usually pretty strong and people will believe you belong there and act more altruistic. However, some rural regions have strong influence from urban resident which has the tendency to bring a more individualistic mentality.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like its southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarters' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. It's often simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dail the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada. The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.

Colleges and Universities are usually providing huge computer classes for their students but those are only accessible with username and password, it might be worth to ask though people might be keen enough to help you with it.

== [[Winter]] hitchhiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might be too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitchhiker might be a hard, especially since 2001. The border control is quite tight, especially since the unproven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada. Questions might be asked about the relations between passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitchhiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that s/he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interrogated).  The vast majority of the drivers will be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the questions as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthousiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be asked to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket).

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't advertise the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
Since 2008 U.S. and Canadian citizens are required to show a passport.  That doesn't mean a border guard won't ask to see one, though. But, a border guard is not supposed to deny you just because you don't have a passport.

If you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant). But don't think that just 'cause you don't own a passport you can't cross. You can.


''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''

{{Provinces Canada}}


[[Category:Canada| ]]
{{IsIn|North America}}
__NOTOC__

[[es:Canadá]]

[[trash:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>j80n91559yyd7mw5kn2dor2wdxwd4oe</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31074</id>
      <parentid>31064</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-15T11:28:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Unforgettableid</username>
        <id>1765</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12039">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 31,612,897
|currency = Canadian Dollar
|hitch = {{good}} to {{very good}}
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, have a look at the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75 % of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

=== Local Attitude ===
The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country.   The size of the country allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necessarily being bothered by anybody else, in a 'Live and let live' motto.  Therefore, hate crimes are absent and major ''difference'' clash even rarer but may exist or be apparent (commented) during some particular intern political tumult situation usually. It still remains rare.  It might be useful for a traveller to be aware of the current events to avoid getting into a political discussion which may offend more than anything else.  Sometimes, during such potential situation and with some people, it might not always be helpful to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when approaching them and be less keen to help.  &lt;!-- this section needs a rewrite --&gt;

The rural population should be entirely keen to help if the traveller is making the first steps into breaking the 'stranger in the locality' image, as the split between urban and rural citizen is also existent. The rural community feeling is usually pretty strong and people will believe you belong there and act more altruistic. However, some rural regions have strong influence from urban resident which has the tendency to bring a more individualistic mentality.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like its southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarters' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. It's often simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dail the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada. The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.  Many college and university libraries also provide free internet access to the public.  Ask the circulation desk staff for a ''guest account''; but you may need a driver's license or other government-issued photo ID.  College and university guest accounts will let you use the Internet as much as you like, but only for the current day.

== [[Winter]] hitchhiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might be too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitchhiker might be a hard, especially since 2001. The border control is quite tight, especially since the unproven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada. Questions might be asked about the relations between passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitchhiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that s/he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interrogated).  The vast majority of the drivers will be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the questions as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthousiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be asked to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket).

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't advertise the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
Since 2008 U.S. and Canadian citizens are required to show a passport.  That doesn't mean a border guard won't ask to see one, though. But, a border guard is not supposed to deny you just because you don't have a passport.

If you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant). But don't think that just 'cause you don't own a passport you can't cross. You can.


''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''

{{Provinces Canada}}


[[Category:Canada| ]]
{{IsIn|North America}}
__NOTOC__

[[es:Canadá]]

[[trash:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>s0bg56i4momvsze5j7lan83elq7tarw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32866</id>
      <parentid>31074</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-09T17:48:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11839">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 31,612,897
|currency = Canadian Dollar
|hitch = {{good}} to {{very good}}
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, have a look at the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75 % of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

=== Local Attitude ===
The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country.   The size of the country allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necessarily being bothered by anybody else, in a 'Live and let live' motto.  Therefore, hate crimes are absent and major ''difference'' clash even rarer but may exist or be apparent (commented) during some particular intern political tumult situation usually. It still remains rare.  It might be useful for a traveller to be aware of the current events to avoid getting into a political discussion which may offend more than anything else.  Sometimes, during such potential situation and with some people, it might not always be helpful to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when approaching them and be less keen to help.  &lt;!-- this section needs a rewrite --&gt;

The rural population should be entirely keen to help if the traveller is making the first steps into breaking the 'stranger in the locality' image, as the split between urban and rural citizen is also existent. The rural community feeling is usually pretty strong and people will believe you belong there and act more altruistic. However, some rural regions have strong influence from urban resident which has the tendency to bring a more individualistic mentality.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like its southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarters' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. It's often simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dail the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada. The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.  Many college and university libraries also provide free internet access to the public.  Ask the circulation desk staff for a ''guest account''; but you may need a driver's license or other government-issued photo ID.  College and university guest accounts will let you use the Internet as much as you like, but only for the current day.

== [[Winter]] hitchhiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might be too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitchhiker might be a hard, especially since 2001. The border control is quite tight, especially since the unproven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada. Questions might be asked about the relations between passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitchhiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that s/he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interrogated).  The vast majority of the drivers will be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the questions as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthousiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be asked to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket).

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't advertise the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
From Summer 2009 on, U.S. and Canadian citizens are required to show a passport to cross the border.

Also, if you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant).

''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''


{{Provinces Canada}}


[[Category:Canada| ]]
{{IsIn|North America}}
__NOTOC__

[[es:Canadá]]

[[trash:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>3otfv8mv4hvlmytwbt9d8d98dmg0v6a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32882</id>
      <parentid>32866</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-09T17:53:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12175">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 31,612,897
|currency = Canadian Dollar
|hitch = {{good}} to {{very good}}
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, have a look at the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75 % of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

=== Local Attitude ===
The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country.   The size of the country allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necessarily being bothered by anybody else, in a 'Live and let live' motto.  Therefore, hate crimes are absent and major ''difference'' clash even rarer but may exist or be apparent (commented) during some particular intern political tumult situation usually. It still remains rare.  It might be useful for a traveller to be aware of the current events to avoid getting into a political discussion which may offend more than anything else.  Sometimes, during such potential situation and with some people, it might not always be helpful to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when approaching them and be less keen to help.  &lt;!-- this section needs a rewrite --&gt;

The rural population should be entirely keen to help if the traveller is making the first steps into breaking the 'stranger in the locality' image, as the split between urban and rural citizen is also existent. The rural community feeling is usually pretty strong and people will believe you belong there and act more altruistic. However, some rural regions have strong influence from urban resident which has the tendency to bring a more individualistic mentality.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like its southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarters' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. It's often simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dail the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada. The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.  Many college and university libraries also provide free internet access to the public.  Ask the circulation desk staff for a ''guest account''; but you may need a driver's license or other government-issued photo ID.  College and university guest accounts will let you use the Internet as much as you like, but only for the current day.

== [[Winter]] hitchhiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might be too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitchhiker might be a hard, especially since 2001. The border control is quite tight, especially since the unproven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada. Questions might be asked about the relations between passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitchhiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that s/he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interrogated).  The vast majority of the drivers will be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the questions as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthusiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be asked to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). Also bear in mind that most Canadian and American land crossing control are separated from each other by a no man's land short distance between the two borders in which you will only be controlled by the welcoming country. So if you get denied entrance by one, you will have further enquiry to enter back into the country you came from.

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't advertise the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
From Summer 2009 on, U.S. and Canadian citizens are required to show a passport to cross the border.

Also, if you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant).

''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''


{{Provinces Canada}}


[[Category:Canada| ]]
{{IsIn|North America}}
__NOTOC__

[[es:Canadá]]

[[trash:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>0c76y0rioqb74fr0ocqwftyot4dytrt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>33722</id>
      <parentid>32882</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-28T14:28:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.156.213.38</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12189">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 31,612,897
|currency = Canadian Dollar
|hitch = {{good}} to {{very good}}
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, have a look at the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75 % of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

=== Local Attitude ===
The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country.   The size of the country allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necessarily being bothered by anybody else, in a 'Live and let live' motto.  Therefore, hate crimes are absent and major ''difference'' clash even rarer but may exist or be apparent (commented) during some particular intern political tumult situation usually. It still remains rare.  It might be useful for a traveller to be aware of the current events to avoid getting into a political discussion which may offend more than anything else.  Sometimes, during such potential situation and with some people, it might not always be helpful to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when approaching them and be less keen to help.  &lt;!-- this section needs a rewrite --&gt;

The rural population should be entirely keen to help if the traveller is making the first steps into breaking the 'stranger in the locality' image, as the split between urban and rural citizen is also existent. The rural community feeling is usually pretty strong and people will believe you belong there and act more altruistic. However, some rural regions have strong influence from urban resident which has the tendency to bring a more individualistic mentality.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like its southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarters' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. It's often simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dail the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada. The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.  Many college and university libraries also provide free internet access to the public.  Ask the circulation desk staff for a ''guest account''; but you may need a driver's license or other government-issued photo ID.  College and university guest accounts will let you use the Internet as much as you like, but only for the current day.

== [[Winter]] hitchhiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might be too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitchhiker might be a hard, especially since 2001. The border control is quite tight, especially since the unproven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada. Questions might be asked about the relations between passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitchhiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that s/he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interrogated).  The vast majority of the drivers will be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the questions as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthusiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be asked to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). Also bear in mind that most Canadian and American land crossing control are separated from each other by a no man's land short distance between the two borders in which you will only be controlled by the welcoming country. So if you get denied entrance by one, you will have further enquiry to enter back into the country you came from.

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't advertise the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
From Summer 2009 on, U.S. and Canadian citizens are required to show a passport to cross the border.

Also, if you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant).

''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''


{{Provinces Canada}}


[[Category:Canada| ]]
{{IsIn|North America}}
__NOTOC__

[[es:Canadá]]
[[fr:Canada]]

[[trash:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>ofqbtcue9e8lakr8h68nc8h78mw0byv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>34764</id>
      <parentid>33722</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T16:56:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12189">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 31,612,897
|currency = Canadian Dollar
|hitch = {{good}} to {{very good}}
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, have a look at the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75 % of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

=== Local Attitude ===
The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country.   The size of the country allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necessarily being bothered by anybody else, in a 'Live and let live' motto.  Therefore, hate crimes are absent and major ''difference'' clash even rarer but may exist or be apparent (commented) during some particular intern political tumult situation usually. It still remains rare.  It might be useful for a traveller to be aware of the current events to avoid getting into a political discussion which may offend more than anything else.  Sometimes, during such potential situation and with some people, it might not always be helpful to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when approaching them and be less keen to help.  &lt;!-- this section needs a rewrite --&gt;

The rural population should be entirely keen to help if the traveller is making the first steps into breaking the 'stranger in the locality' image, as the split between urban and rural citizen is also existent. The rural community feeling is usually pretty strong and people will believe you belong there and act more altruistic. However, some rural regions have strong influence from urban resident which has the tendency to bring a more individualistic mentality.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like its southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarters' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. It's often simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dail the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada. The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.  Many college and university libraries also provide free internet access to the public.  Ask the circulation desk staff for a ''guest account''; but you may need a driver's license or other government-issued photo ID.  College and university guest accounts will let you use the Internet as much as you like, but only for the current day.

== [[Winter]] hitchhiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might be too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards his insurance.

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitchhiker might be a hard, especially since 2001. The border control is quite tight, especially since the unproven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada. Questions might be asked about the relations between passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitchhiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that s/he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interrogated).  The vast majority of the drivers will be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the questions as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthusiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be asked to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). Also bear in mind that most Canadian and American land crossing control are separated from each other by a no man's land short distance between the two borders in which you will only be controlled by the welcoming country. So if you get denied entrance by one, you will have further enquiry to enter back into the country you came from.

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't advertise the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
From Summer 2009 on, U.S. and Canadian citizens are required to show a passport to cross the border.

Also, if you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant).

''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''


{{Provinces Canada}}
{{IsIn|North America}}
__NOTOC__

[[fr:Canada]]

[[trash:Canada]]

[[Category:Canada| ]]

[[es:Canadá]]</text>
      <sha1>4j86glx04bu1hpg9f9yxzeqxbbuuqlz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35811</id>
      <parentid>34764</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-15T14:17:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12193">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 31,612,897
|currency = Canadian Dollar
|hitch = {{good}} to {{very good}}
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, have a look at the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75 % of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

=== Local Attitude ===
The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country.   The size of the country allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necessarily being bothered by anybody else, in a 'Live and let live' motto.  Therefore, hate crimes are absent and major ''difference'' clash even rarer but may exist or be apparent (commented) during some particular intern political tumult situation usually. It still remains rare.  It might be useful for a traveller to be aware of the current events to avoid getting into a political discussion which may offend more than anything else.  Sometimes, during such potential situation and with some people, it might not always be helpful to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when approaching them and be less keen to help.  &lt;!-- this section needs a rewrite --&gt;

The rural population should be entirely keen to help if the traveller is making the first steps into breaking the 'stranger in the locality' image, as the split between urban and rural citizen is also existent. The rural community feeling is usually pretty strong and people will believe you belong there and act more altruistic. However, some rural regions have strong influence from urban resident which has the tendency to bring a more individualistic mentality.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like its southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarters' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. It's often simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dail the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada. The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.  Many college and university libraries also provide free internet access to the public.  Ask the circulation desk staff for a ''guest account''; but you may need a driver's license or other government-issued photo ID.  College and university guest accounts will let you use the Internet as much as you like, but only for the current day.

== [[Winter]] hitchhiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might be too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards his [[insurance]].

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitchhiker might be a hard, especially since 2001. The border control is quite tight, especially since the unproven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada. Questions might be asked about the relations between passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitchhiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that s/he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interrogated).  The vast majority of the drivers will be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the questions as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthusiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be asked to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). Also bear in mind that most Canadian and American land crossing control are separated from each other by a no man's land short distance between the two borders in which you will only be controlled by the welcoming country. So if you get denied entrance by one, you will have further enquiry to enter back into the country you came from.

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't advertise the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
From Summer 2009 on, U.S. and Canadian citizens are required to show a passport to cross the border.

Also, if you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant).

''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''


{{Provinces Canada}}
{{IsIn|North America}}
__NOTOC__

[[fr:Canada]]

[[trash:Canada]]

[[Category:Canada| ]]

[[es:Canadá]]</text>
      <sha1>bm4shxfgc3kv4ftnppa79rllgwj2jsm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>37066</id>
      <parentid>35811</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-09-08T19:28:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>129.173.209.151</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12313">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 31,612,897
|currency = Canadian Dollar
|hitch = {{good}} to {{very good}}
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, have a look at the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75 % of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

=== Local Attitude ===
The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country.   The size of the country allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necessarily being bothered by anybody else, in a 'Live and let live' motto.  Therefore, hate crimes are absent and major ''difference'' clash even rarer but may exist or be apparent (commented) during some particular intern political tumult situation usually. It still remains rare.  It might be useful for a traveller to be aware of the current events to avoid getting into a political discussion which may offend more than anything else.  Sometimes, during such potential situation and with some people, generally- it is difficult to be a "racial minority" / "person of colour" everywhere in Canada;  sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when approaching them and be less keen to help.  &lt;!-- this section needs a rewrite --&gt;

The rural population should be entirely keen to help if the traveller is making the first steps into breaking the 'stranger in the locality' image, as the split between urban and rural citizen is also existent. The rural community feeling is usually pretty strong and people will believe you belong there and act more altruistic. However, some rural regions have strong influence from urban resident which has the tendency to bring a more individualistic mentality.   In Atlantic Canada, locals consider and call outsiders "people who come from away".  Be aware.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like its southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarters' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. It's often simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dail the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada. The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.  Many college and university libraries also provide free internet access to the public.  Ask the circulation desk staff for a ''guest account''; but you may need a driver's license or other government-issued photo ID.  College and university guest accounts will let you use the Internet as much as you like, but only for the current day.

== [[Winter]] hitchhiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might be too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards his [[insurance]].

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitchhiker might be a hard, especially since 2001. The border control is quite tight, especially since the unproven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada. Questions might be asked about the relations between passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitchhiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that s/he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interrogated).  The vast majority of the drivers will be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the questions as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthusiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be asked to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). Also bear in mind that most Canadian and American land crossing control are separated from each other by a no man's land short distance between the two borders in which you will only be controlled by the welcoming country. So if you get denied entrance by one, you will have further enquiry to enter back into the country you came from.

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't advertise the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
From Summer 2009 on, U.S. and Canadian citizens are required to show a passport to cross the border.

Also, if you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant).

''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''


{{Provinces Canada}}
{{IsIn|North America}}
__NOTOC__

[[fr:Canada]]

[[trash:Canada]]

[[Category:Canada| ]]

[[es:Canadá]]</text>
      <sha1>5lg7dpie2ksmtpnpemqgyaaqhgdarps</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>37067</id>
      <parentid>37066</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-09-08T22:28:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>CRCulver</username>
        <id>60</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12193">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 31,612,897
|currency = Canadian Dollar
|hitch = {{good}} to {{very good}}
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, have a look at the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75 % of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

=== Local Attitude ===
The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country.   The size of the country allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necessarily being bothered by anybody else, in a 'Live and let live' motto.  Therefore, hate crimes are absent and major ''difference'' clash even rarer but may exist or be apparent (commented) during some particular intern political tumult situation usually. It still remains rare.  It might be useful for a traveller to be aware of the current events to avoid getting into a political discussion which may offend more than anything else.  Sometimes, during such potential situation and with some people, it might not always be helpful to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when approaching them and be less keen to help.  &lt;!-- this section needs a rewrite --&gt;

The rural population should be entirely keen to help if the traveller is making the first steps into breaking the 'stranger in the locality' image, as the split between urban and rural citizen is also existent. The rural community feeling is usually pretty strong and people will believe you belong there and act more altruistic. However, some rural regions have strong influence from urban resident which has the tendency to bring a more individualistic mentality.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like its southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarters' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. It's often simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dail the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada. The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.  Many college and university libraries also provide free internet access to the public.  Ask the circulation desk staff for a ''guest account''; but you may need a driver's license or other government-issued photo ID.  College and university guest accounts will let you use the Internet as much as you like, but only for the current day.

== [[Winter]] hitchhiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might be too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards his [[insurance]].

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitchhiker might be a hard, especially since 2001. The border control is quite tight, especially since the unproven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada. Questions might be asked about the relations between passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitchhiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that s/he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interrogated).  The vast majority of the drivers will be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the questions as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthusiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be asked to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). Also bear in mind that most Canadian and American land crossing control are separated from each other by a no man's land short distance between the two borders in which you will only be controlled by the welcoming country. So if you get denied entrance by one, you will have further enquiry to enter back into the country you came from.

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't advertise the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
From Summer 2009 on, U.S. and Canadian citizens are required to show a passport to cross the border.

Also, if you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant).

''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''


{{Provinces Canada}}
{{IsIn|North America}}
__NOTOC__

[[fr:Canada]]

[[trash:Canada]]

[[Category:Canada| ]]

[[es:Canadá]]</text>
      <sha1>bm4shxfgc3kv4ftnppa79rllgwj2jsm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>37746</id>
      <parentid>37067</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-10-09T22:22:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12192">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 31,612,897
|currency = Canadian Dollar
|hitch = {{good}} to {{very good}}
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, have a look at the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English being spoken by 2/3 of the population is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. So for the convenience of the common hitchhiker these provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in the following pages.

Canada is a wide country where many visitors do not really realise its scale prior to their arrival and neither realise the various extreme temperature that can suddenly happen and hit at different season. Certain nothern rural regions in each provinces are inhabited by a scarce or even absent permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipement nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to do such journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3,2 habitants/km² and about 75 % of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is common and normal in some part of the country to drive few hundreds km without any living soul in the area. Noneless to say, even if the country bear some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

=== Local Attitude ===
The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country.   The size of the country allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necessarily being bothered by anybody else, in a 'Live and let live' motto.  Therefore, hate crimes are absent and major ''difference'' clash even rarer but may exist or be apparent (commented) during some particular intern political tumult situation usually. It still remains rare.  It might be useful for a traveller to be aware of the current events to avoid getting into a political discussion which may offend more than anything else.  Sometimes, during such potential situation and with some people, it might not always be helpful to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when approaching them and be less keen to help.  &lt;!-- this section needs a rewrite --&gt;

The rural population should be entirely keen to help if the traveller is making the first steps into breaking the 'stranger in the locality' image, as the split between urban and rural citizen is also existent. The rural community feeling is usually pretty strong and people will believe you belong there and act more altruistic. However, some rural regions have strong influence from urban resident which has the tendency to bring a more individualistic mentality.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like its southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarters' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. It's often simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dail the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada. The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.  Many college and university libraries also provide free internet access to the public.  Ask the circulation desk staff for a ''guest account''; but you may need a driver's license or other government-issued photo ID.  College and university guest accounts will let you use the Internet as much as you like, but only for the current day.

== [[Winter]] hitchhiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might be too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards his [[insurance]].

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitchhiker might be a hard, especially since 2001. The border control is quite tight, especially since the unproven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada. Questions might be asked about the relations between passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitchhiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that s/he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interrogated).  The vast majority of the drivers will be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the questions as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthusiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be asked to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). Also bear in mind that most Canadian and American land crossing control are separated from each other by a no man's land short distance between the two borders in which you will only be controlled by the welcoming country. So if you get denied entrance by one, you will have further enquiry to enter back into the country you came from.

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't advertise the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
From Summer 2009 on, U.S. and Canadian citizens are required to show a passport to cross the border.

Also, if you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant).

''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''


{{Provinces Canada}}
{{IsIn|North America}}
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Canada]]

[[Category:Canada| ]]

[[es:Canadá]]
[[fr:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>r9vt2oecc8sxtu3cyo8vitxjw021x8o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39726</id>
      <parentid>37746</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-02-14T16:33:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tofu2</username>
        <id>2248</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12111">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 34,001,000 (2009 est.)
|currency = Canadian Dollar ($CAD)
|hitch = {{good}} to {{very good}}
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, see the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is composed of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English, being spoken by 2/3 of the population, is the majority language in most provinces while French is the main official language in the province of Quebec but widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. For the convenience of the common hitchhiker the provinces and territories are discussed in detail along with their capitals in their separate pages.

Canada is a vast country (the second biggest in the world) and many visitors do not really realize its scale or extreme temperatures prior to  arrival. Certain northern rural regions are inhabited by few or even no permanent population. It might not always be bright to adventure by yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipment nor having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to such a journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3.2 habitants/km² and about 75 % of that population lives in the south by the border with the USA. It is normal in some parts of the country to drive a hundred kilometres without any living soul in the area. Nonetheless, even if the country bears some similitude with its southern and only neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life approach of the population is quite unique.

For a journey over the country, the [[Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country coast to coast. The highway system is specific to every provinces and usually quite comprehensive.

=== Local Attitude ===
The vast majority of the population lives in harmony within their vast country.   The size of the country allowed people to live using their own belief, languages or religion without necessarily being bothered by anybody else, in a 'Live and let live' motto.  Therefore, hate crimes are absent and major ''difference'' clash even rarer but may exist or be apparent (commented) during some particular intern political tumult situation usually. It still remains rare.  It might be useful for a traveller to be aware of the current events to avoid getting into a political discussion which may offend more than anything else.  Sometimes, during such potential situation and with some people, it might not always be helpful to be White in some First Nation reserves, sounding French in some parts of the country or English in others. As many people might think you are from the other part of the country when approaching them and be less keen to help.  &lt;!-- this section needs a rewrite --&gt;

The rural population should be entirely keen to help if the traveller is making the first steps into breaking the 'stranger in the locality' image, as the split between urban and rural citizen is also existent. The rural community feeling is usually pretty strong and people will believe you belong there and act more altruistic. However, some rural regions have strong influence from urban resident which has the tendency to bring a more individualistic mentality.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like its southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth, there are usually plenty within in a city and even the in country side, usually you will find one by every petrol station, shops or restaurant. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition and reliable so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls now costs two 'quarters' (50 cents) although for some stupid historical divisions and economical reasons, in some areas some phone booths will belong to another company and what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and will request an higher amount. It's often simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dail the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada. The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually cost less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phone!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually pay to make call and to receive call, he will also usually have no signal when he reaches the nearest mountains or hills.

Internet cafés are rare and will only be existing in main urban and touristic centre. They are usually not used by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding. In rural areas, Internet might not even exists or be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.  Many college and university libraries also provide free internet access to the public.  Ask the circulation desk staff for a ''guest account''; but you may need a driver's license or other government-issued photo ID.  College and university guest accounts will let you use the Internet as much as you like, but only for the current day.

== [[Winter]] hitchhiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes, wear the appropriate gear and make sure that you are never being stuck anywhere.

The majority of the roads will be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank. So it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might be too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards his [[insurance]].

On another hand, every citizen should be bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in needs by the hazard of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, locals way prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home by such extreme temperature.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitchhiker might be a hard, especially since 2001. The border control is quite tight, especially since the unproven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada. Questions might be asked about the relations between passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitchhiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that s/he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interrogated).  The vast majority of the drivers will be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the questions as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthusiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be asked to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). Also bear in mind that most Canadian and American land crossing control are separated from each other by a no man's land short distance between the two borders in which you will only be controlled by the welcoming country. So if you get denied entrance by one, you will have further enquiry to enter back into the country you came from.

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't advertise the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
From Summer 2009 on, U.S. and Canadian citizens are required to show a passport to cross the border.

Also, if you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant).

''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''


{{Provinces Canada}}
{{IsIn|North America}}
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Canada]]

[[Category:Canada| ]]

[[es:Canadá]]
[[fr:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>0bvr3xcqucv0rit83ktv24nelj5b4sw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39727</id>
      <parentid>39726</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-02-14T17:31:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tofu2</username>
        <id>2248</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11675">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 34,001,000 (2009 est.)
|currency = Canadian Dollar ($CAD)
|hitch = {{good}} to {{very good}}
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, see the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is comprised of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English, being spoken by 3/4 of the population, is the majority language in most provinces. French is the main official language in the province of Quebec, but also widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. For the convenience of the common hitchhiker the provinces and territories are discussed in detail, along with their capitals, in separate pages.

Canada is a vast country (the second biggest in the world) and many visitors do not realize its size or extremes in temperature prior to arrival. Certain northern rural regions are inhabited by few or even no permanent population, so it might not always be bright to adventure by yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipment or having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to such a journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3.2 habitants/km², and about 75 % of that population lives in the south, nestled by the US border. It is normal in some parts of the country to drive a hundred kilometres without any living soul.

Even if the country bears some similitude with its southern (and only) neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life outlook of the population is markedly unique.

For a journey across the country, the [[Trans-Canada Highway|Transcanadian Highway]] is the main road crossing the country east to west. However, the highway system numbering system is specific to every province.

=== Local Attitude ===
The majority of the Canadian population lives in harmony within their vast country.   The size of the country has allowed people to live using their own beliefs, languages or religion without being bothered by anybody else, in a 'Live and let live' motto.  Therefore, hate crimes are mostly absent and major ''difference'' clashes even rarer, but may exist. It might be useful for a traveler to be aware of the current political situation to avoid getting into a discussion which may offend more than anything else.  Sometimes, during such situations, it might not be helpful to hitchhike as a white in a First Nation reserve, or sound French in an English area, or visa versa.  That said, Canadians are generally friendly and forget their stereotypes once they meet you in person.

The rural population will usually be keen to help if the traveler is making the first steps into breaking the 'stranger in the locality' image, as the split between country- and city-folk is also existent. The rural community feeling is usually pretty strong and when people believe you belong there and act more altruistic. However, some rural regions have large populations of urban commuters which has the tendency to bring a more individualistic mentality.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like its southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth. There are plenty within the cities and even the in country side; usually you will find one by every petrol station, or by shops or restaurants. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition, so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls cost a quarter (25 cents) but in some areas what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and the phone will request an higher amount. It's simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dial the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada. The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the United States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually costs less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phones!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phones are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually has to pay to make and receive calls, and will likely have no signal when he leaves the nearest city.

Internet cafés are rare and will only exist in main urban and touristic centres. They are not frequented by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding area. In rural areas, Internet may be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.  Many college and university libraries also provide free internet access to the public.  Ask the circulation desk staff. College and university guest accounts will let you use the Internet as much as you like, but only for the current day.

== [[Winter]] hitchhiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes. Make sure you wear the appropriate gear and take precautions to never be stuck anywhere outside without shelter.

In winter the roads can be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank, so it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might be too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards his [[insurance]].

In some areas, especially in the north, every citizen is bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in need from the hazards of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, most locals prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home at times of such extreme temperatures.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitchhiker might be a hard, especially since 2001. The border control is quite tight, especially since the unproven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada. Questions might be asked about the relations between passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitchhiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that s/he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interrogated).  The vast majority of the drivers will be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the questions as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthusiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be asked to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). Also bear in mind that most Canadian and American land crossing control are separated from each other by a no man's land short distance between the two borders in which you will only be controlled by the welcoming country. So if you get denied entrance by one, you will have further enquiry to enter back into the country you came from.

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't advertise the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
From Summer 2009 on, U.S. and Canadian citizens are required to show a passport to cross the border.

Also, if you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant).

''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''


{{Provinces Canada}}
{{IsIn|North America}}
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Canada]]

[[Category:Canada| ]]

[[es:Canadá]]
[[fr:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>kg97iaocl6mg5bn5bzl3hcm4oj5lhze</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39734</id>
      <parentid>39727</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-02-14T20:14:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tofu2</username>
        <id>2248</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11741">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|map = &lt;map lat='60.673178565817715' lng='-97.03125' zoom='2' view='0' float='right' /&gt;
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 34,001,000 (2009 est.)
|currency = Canadian Dollar ($CAD)
|hitch = {{good}} to {{very good}}
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, see the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is comprised of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English, being spoken by 3/4 of the population, is the majority language in most provinces. French is the main official language in the province of Quebec, but also widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. For the convenience of the common hitchhiker the provinces and territories are discussed in detail, along with their capitals, in separate pages.

Canada is a vast country (the second biggest in the world) and many visitors do not realize its size or extremes in temperature prior to arrival. Certain northern rural regions are inhabited by few or even no permanent population, so it might not always be bright to adventure by yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipment or having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to such a journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3.2 habitants/km², and about 75 % of that population lives in the south, nestled by the US border. It is normal in some parts of the country to drive a hundred kilometres without any living soul.

Even if the country bears some similitude with its southern (and only) neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life outlook of the population is markedly unique.

For a journey across the country, the [[Trans-Canada Highway]] is the main road crossing the country east to west. However, the highway system numbering system is specific to every province.

=== Local Attitude ===
The majority of the Canadian population lives in harmony within their vast country.   The size of the country has allowed people to live using their own beliefs, languages or religion without being bothered by anybody else, in a 'Live and let live' motto.  Therefore, hate crimes are mostly absent and major ''difference'' clashes even rarer, but may exist. It might be useful for a traveler to be aware of the current political situation to avoid getting into a discussion which may offend more than anything else.  Sometimes, during such situations, it might not be helpful to hitchhike as a white in a First Nation reserve, or sound French in an English area, or visa versa.  That said, Canadians are generally friendly and forget their stereotypes once they meet you in person.

The rural population will usually be keen to help if the traveler is making the first steps into breaking the 'stranger in the locality' image, as the split between country- and city-folk is also existent. The rural community feeling is usually pretty strong and when people believe you belong there and act more altruistic. However, some rural regions have large populations of urban commuters which has the tendency to bring a more individualistic mentality.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like its southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth. There are plenty within the cities and even the in country side; usually you will find one by every petrol station, or by shops or restaurants. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition, so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls cost a quarter (25 cents) but in some areas what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and the phone will request an higher amount. It's simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dial the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada. The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the United States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually costs less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phones!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phones are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually has to pay to make and receive calls, and will likely have no signal when he leaves the nearest city.

Internet cafés are rare and will only exist in main urban and touristic centres. They are not frequented by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding area. In rural areas, Internet may be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.  Many college and university libraries also provide free internet access to the public.  Ask the circulation desk staff. College and university guest accounts will let you use the Internet as much as you like, but only for the current day.

== [[Winter]] hitchhiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes. Make sure you wear the appropriate gear and take precautions to never be stuck anywhere outside without shelter.

In winter the roads can be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank, so it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might be too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards his [[insurance]].

In some areas, especially in the north, every citizen is bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in need from the hazards of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, most locals prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home at times of such extreme temperatures.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitchhiker might be a hard, especially since 2001. The border control is quite tight, especially since the unproven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada. Questions might be asked about the relations between passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitchhiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that s/he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interrogated).  The vast majority of the drivers will be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the questions as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthusiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be asked to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). Also bear in mind that most Canadian and American land crossing control are separated from each other by a no man's land short distance between the two borders in which you will only be controlled by the welcoming country. So if you get denied entrance by one, you will have further enquiry to enter back into the country you came from.

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't advertise the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
From Summer 2009 on, U.S. and Canadian citizens are required to show a passport to cross the border.

Also, if you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant).

''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''


{{Provinces Canada}}
{{IsIn|North America}}
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Canada]]

[[Category:Canada| ]]

[[es:Canadá]]
[[fr:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>8bn8or0vm16gmv9mj014moomzwafbco</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39735</id>
      <parentid>39734</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-02-14T20:15:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tofu2</username>
        <id>2248</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11757">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|map = &lt;map lat='60.673178565817715' lng='-97.03125' zoom='2' view='0' float='right' country='Canada'/&gt;
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 34,001,000 (2009 est.)
|currency = Canadian Dollar ($CAD)
|hitch = {{good}} to {{very good}}
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, see the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is comprised of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English, being spoken by 3/4 of the population, is the majority language in most provinces. French is the main official language in the province of Quebec, but also widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. For the convenience of the common hitchhiker the provinces and territories are discussed in detail, along with their capitals, in separate pages.

Canada is a vast country (the second biggest in the world) and many visitors do not realize its size or extremes in temperature prior to arrival. Certain northern rural regions are inhabited by few or even no permanent population, so it might not always be bright to adventure by yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipment or having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to such a journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3.2 habitants/km², and about 75 % of that population lives in the south, nestled by the US border. It is normal in some parts of the country to drive a hundred kilometres without any living soul.

Even if the country bears some similitude with its southern (and only) neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life outlook of the population is markedly unique.

For a journey across the country, the [[Trans-Canada Highway]] is the main road crossing the country east to west. However, the highway system numbering system is specific to every province.

=== Local Attitude ===
The majority of the Canadian population lives in harmony within their vast country.   The size of the country has allowed people to live using their own beliefs, languages or religion without being bothered by anybody else, in a 'Live and let live' motto.  Therefore, hate crimes are mostly absent and major ''difference'' clashes even rarer, but may exist. It might be useful for a traveler to be aware of the current political situation to avoid getting into a discussion which may offend more than anything else.  Sometimes, during such situations, it might not be helpful to hitchhike as a white in a First Nation reserve, or sound French in an English area, or visa versa.  That said, Canadians are generally friendly and forget their stereotypes once they meet you in person.

The rural population will usually be keen to help if the traveler is making the first steps into breaking the 'stranger in the locality' image, as the split between country- and city-folk is also existent. The rural community feeling is usually pretty strong and when people believe you belong there and act more altruistic. However, some rural regions have large populations of urban commuters which has the tendency to bring a more individualistic mentality.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like its southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth. There are plenty within the cities and even the in country side; usually you will find one by every petrol station, or by shops or restaurants. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition, so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls cost a quarter (25 cents) but in some areas what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and the phone will request an higher amount. It's simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dial the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada. The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the United States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually costs less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phones!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phones are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually has to pay to make and receive calls, and will likely have no signal when he leaves the nearest city.

Internet cafés are rare and will only exist in main urban and touristic centres. They are not frequented by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding area. In rural areas, Internet may be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.  Many college and university libraries also provide free internet access to the public.  Ask the circulation desk staff. College and university guest accounts will let you use the Internet as much as you like, but only for the current day.

== [[Winter]] hitchhiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes. Make sure you wear the appropriate gear and take precautions to never be stuck anywhere outside without shelter.

In winter the roads can be slippery, icy or narrowed by the snowbank, so it will often be impossible for cars to stop by and pull over safely and they won't do it if they can't as the risk of causing an accident might be too high and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards his [[insurance]].

In some areas, especially in the north, every citizen is bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in need from the hazards of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain... being out by this weather'. It is true that it will be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without all the effective preparation by such weather, most locals prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home at times of such extreme temperatures.

Although and for that reason, no shops, restaurants or gas stations would be allowed to kick you out of their property. Either no car should be allowed to ignore you if the needs is there. This would usually be the case in rural areas while people in urban areas might simply think, someone else can do it. If you feel your life threatened by the hazard of nature, you are allowed to do anything possible to get help by the surrounding. Which would include entering a house, 'stopping' a car or denouncing to the authorities any refusal for help. This does not mean ''abuse'' and, is to be use logically and tactfully. Bear in mind that if you attempt such behaviour, an investigation might be done afterwhile to verify if you didn't put yourself at risk at your own will and full knowledge of the consequences! Which situation you are, by law, not allowed to find yourself into!

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitchhiker might be a hard, especially since 2001. The border control is quite tight, especially since the unproven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada. Questions might be asked about the relations between passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitchhiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that s/he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interrogated).  The vast majority of the drivers will be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the questions as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthusiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be asked to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). Also bear in mind that most Canadian and American land crossing control are separated from each other by a no man's land short distance between the two borders in which you will only be controlled by the welcoming country. So if you get denied entrance by one, you will have further enquiry to enter back into the country you came from.

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't advertise the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
From Summer 2009 on, U.S. and Canadian citizens are required to show a passport to cross the border.

Also, if you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant).

''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''


{{Provinces Canada}}
{{IsIn|North America}}
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Canada]]

[[Category:Canada| ]]

[[es:Canadá]]
[[fr:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>pnmanor37spd0tc2ygzrp51f5gqs5dd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39749</id>
      <parentid>39735</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-02-16T14:29:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>24.224.227.40</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11241">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|map = &lt;map lat='60.673178565817715' lng='-97.03125' zoom='2' view='0' float='right' country='Canada'/&gt;
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 34,001,000 (2009 est.)
|currency = Canadian Dollar ($CAD)
|hitch = {{good}} to {{very good}}
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, see the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is comprised of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country, English, being spoken by 3/4 of the population, is the majority language in most provinces. French is the main official language in the province of Quebec, but also widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is widely spoken. For the convenience of the common hitchhiker the provinces and territories are discussed in detail, along with their capitals, in separate pages.

Canada is a vast country (the second biggest in the world) and many visitors do not realize its size or extremes in temperature prior to arrival. Certain northern rural regions are inhabited by few or even no permanent population, so it might not always be bright to adventure by yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipment or having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to such a journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3.2 habitants/km², and about 75 % of that population lives in the south, nestled by the US border. It is normal in some parts of the country to drive a hundred kilometres without any living soul.

Even if the country bears some similitude with its southern (and only) neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life outlook of the population is markedly unique.

For a journey across the country, the [[Trans-Canada Highway]] is the main road crossing the country east to west. However, the highway system numbering system is specific to every province.

=== Local Attitude ===
The majority of the Canadian population lives in harmony within their vast country.   The size of the country has allowed people to live using their own beliefs, languages or religion without being bothered by anybody else, in a 'Live and let live' motto.  Therefore, hate crimes are mostly absent and major ''difference'' clashes even rarer, but may exist. It might be useful for a traveler to be aware of the current political situation to avoid getting into a discussion which may offend more than anything else.  Sometimes, during such situations, it might not be helpful to hitchhike as a white in a First Nation reserve, or sound French in an English area, or visa versa.  That said, Canadians are generally friendly and forget their stereotypes once they meet you in person.

The rural population will usually be keen to help if the traveler is making the first steps into breaking the 'stranger in the locality' image, as the split between country- and city-folk is also existent. The rural community feeling is usually pretty strong and when people believe you belong there and act more altruistic. However, some rural regions have large populations of urban commuters which has the tendency to bring a more individualistic mentality.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like its southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth. There are plenty within the cities and even the in country side; usually you will find one by every petrol station, or by shops or restaurants. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition, so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls cost a quarter (25 cents) but in some areas what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and the phone will request an higher amount. It's simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dial the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada. The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the United States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually costs less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phones!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phones are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually has to pay to make and receive calls, and will likely have no signal when he leaves the nearest city.

Internet cafés are rare and will only exist in main urban and touristic centres. They are not frequented by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding area. In rural areas, Internet may be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.  Many college and university libraries also provide free internet access to the public.  Ask the circulation desk staff. College and university guest accounts will let you use the Internet as much as you like, but only for the current day.

== [[Winter]] hitchhiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes. It's VERY important to make sure you wear the appropriate gear and take precautions to never be stuck anywhere outside without shelter.

In winter the roads can be icy or narrowed by the snowbank, so it will often be hard for cars to stop by and pull over safely. Drivers won't do it if they don't feel safe as the risk of causing an accident might be too high, and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards their [[insurance]].  It's even more important in icy conditions to make sure you find a hitching spot where there is good visibility and a safe place to pull over.

In some areas, especially in the northern territories, every citizen is bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in need from the hazards of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain!?!? being out by this weather!'. Your actions may be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without being prepared for the weather, as most locals prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home in winter storms. For that reason, shops, restaurants, or gas stations usually won't kick you off their property in extreme weather. In the summer it's different, and you may be asked to leave if there is no danger from the outside elements.

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitchhiker might be a hard, especially since 2001. The border control is quite tight, especially since the unproven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada. Questions might be asked about the relations between passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitchhiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that s/he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interrogated).  The vast majority of the drivers will be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the questions as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthusiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be asked to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). Also bear in mind that most Canadian and American land crossing control are separated from each other by a no man's land short distance between the two borders in which you will only be controlled by the welcoming country. So if you get denied entrance by one, you will have further enquiry to enter back into the country you came from.

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't advertise the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
From Summer 2009 on, U.S. and Canadian citizens are required to show a passport to cross the border.

Also, if you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant).

''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''


{{Provinces Canada}}
{{IsIn|North America}}
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Canada]]

[[Category:Canada| ]]

[[es:Canadá]]
[[fr:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>9dmf8m6tp6lvy188iln3m012d9qn320</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39750</id>
      <parentid>39749</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-02-16T14:31:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>24.224.227.40</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11247">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|map = &lt;map lat='60.673178565817715' lng='-97.03125' zoom='2' view='0' float='right' country='Canada'/&gt;
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 34,001,000 (2009 est.)
|currency = Canadian Dollar ($CAD)
|hitch = {{good}} to {{very good}}
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, see the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is comprised of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country. English, being spoken by 3/4 of the population, is the majority language in most provinces. French is the main official language in the province of Quebec, but also widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is still widely spoken. For the convenience of the common hitchhiker the provinces and territories are discussed in detail, along with their capitals, in separate pages.

Canada is a vast country (the second biggest in the world) and many visitors do not realize its size or extremes in temperature prior to arrival. Certain northern rural regions are inhabited by few or even no permanent population, so it might not always be bright to adventure by yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipment or having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to such a journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3.2 habitants/km², and about 75 % of that population lives in the south, nestled by the US border. It is normal in some parts of the country to drive a hundred kilometres without any living soul.

Even if the country bears some similitude with its southern (and only) neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life outlook of the population is markedly unique.

For a journey across the country, the [[Trans-Canada Highway]] is the main road crossing the country east to west. However, the highway system numbering system is specific to every province.

=== Local Attitude ===
The majority of the Canadian population lives in harmony within their vast country.   The size of the country has allowed people to live using their own beliefs, languages or religion without being bothered by anybody else, in a 'Live and let live' motto.  Therefore, hate crimes are mostly absent and major ''difference'' clashes even rarer, but may exist. It might be useful for a traveler to be aware of the current political situation to avoid getting into a discussion which may offend more than anything else.  Sometimes, during such situations, it might not be helpful to hitchhike as a white in a First Nation reserve, or sound French in an English area, or visa versa.  That said, Canadians are generally friendly and forget their stereotypes once they meet you in person.

The rural population will usually be keen to help if the traveler is making the first steps into breaking the 'stranger in the locality' image, as the split between country- and city-folk is also existent. The rural community feeling is usually pretty strong and when people believe you belong there and act more altruistic. However, some rural regions have large populations of urban commuters which has the tendency to bring a more individualistic mentality.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like its southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth. There are plenty within the cities and even the in country side; usually you will find one by every petrol station, or by shops or restaurants. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition, so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls cost a quarter (25 cents) but in some areas what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and the phone will request an higher amount. It's simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dial the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada. The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the United States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually costs less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phones!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phones are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually has to pay to make and receive calls, and will likely have no signal when he leaves the nearest city.

Internet cafés are rare and will only exist in main urban and touristic centres. They are not frequented by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding area. In rural areas, Internet may be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.  Many college and university libraries also provide free internet access to the public.  Ask the circulation desk staff. College and university guest accounts will let you use the Internet as much as you like, but only for the current day.

== [[Winter]] hitchhiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes. It's VERY important to make sure you wear the appropriate gear and take precautions to never be stuck anywhere outside without shelter.

In winter the roads can be icy or narrowed by the snowbank, so it will often be hard for cars to stop by and pull over safely. Drivers won't do it if they don't feel safe as the risk of causing an accident might be too high, and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards their [[insurance]].  It's even more important in icy conditions to make sure you find a hitching spot where there is good visibility and a safe place to pull over.

In some areas, especially in the northern territories, every citizen is bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in need from the hazards of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain!?!? being out by this weather!'. Your actions may be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without being prepared for the weather, as most locals prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home in winter storms. For that reason, shops, restaurants, or gas stations usually won't kick you off their property in extreme weather. In the summer it's different, and you may be asked to leave if there is no danger from the outside elements.

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitchhiker might be a hard, especially since 2001. The border control is quite tight, especially since the unproven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada. Questions might be asked about the relations between passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitchhiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that s/he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interrogated).  The vast majority of the drivers will be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the questions as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthusiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be asked to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). Also bear in mind that most Canadian and American land crossing control are separated from each other by a no man's land short distance between the two borders in which you will only be controlled by the welcoming country. So if you get denied entrance by one, you will have further enquiry to enter back into the country you came from.

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't advertise the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
From Summer 2009 on, U.S. and Canadian citizens are required to show a passport to cross the border.

Also, if you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant).

''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''


{{Provinces Canada}}
{{IsIn|North America}}
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Canada]]

[[Category:Canada| ]]

[[es:Canadá]]
[[fr:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>1up4hkwg3qvdqkgoluqrbhtanvlyu7y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39921</id>
      <parentid>39750</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-04T10:43:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Quarim</username>
        <id>1290</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11260">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|map = &lt;map lat='60.673178565817715' lng='-97.03125' zoom='2' view='0' float='right' country='Canada'/&gt;
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 34,001,000 (2009 est.)
|currency = Canadian Dollar ($CAD)
|hitch = {{good}} to {{very good}}
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, see the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is comprised of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country. English, being spoken by 3/4 of the population, is the majority language in most provinces. French is the main official language in the province of Quebec, but also widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is still widely spoken. For the convenience of the common hitchhiker the provinces and territories are discussed in detail, along with their capitals, in separate pages.

Canada is a vast country (the second biggest in the world) and many visitors do not realize its size or extremes in temperature prior to arrival. Certain northern rural regions are inhabited by few or even no permanent population, so it might not always be bright to adventure by yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipment or having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to such a journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3.2 habitants/km², and about 75 % of that population lives in the south, nestled by the US border. It is normal in some parts of the country to drive a hundred kilometres without any living soul.

Even if the country bears some similitude with its southern (and only) neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life outlook of the population is markedly unique.

For a journey across the country, the [[Trans-Canada Highway]] is the main road crossing the country east to west. However, the highway system numbering system is specific to every province.

=== Local Attitude ===
The majority of the Canadian population lives in harmony within their vast country.   The size of the country has allowed people to live using their own beliefs, languages or religion without being bothered by anybody else, in a 'Live and let live' motto.  Therefore, hate crimes are mostly absent and major ''difference'' clashes even rarer, but may exist. It might be useful for a traveler to be aware of the current political situation to avoid getting into a discussion which may offend more than anything else.  Sometimes, during such situations, it might not be helpful to hitchhike as a white in a First Nation reserve, or sound French in an English area, or visa versa.  That said, Canadians are generally friendly and forget their stereotypes once they meet you in person.

The rural population will usually be keen to help if the traveler is making the first steps into breaking the 'stranger in the locality' image, as the split between country- and city-folk is also existent. The rural community feeling is usually pretty strong and when people believe you belong there and act more altruistic. However, some rural regions have large populations of urban commuters which has the tendency to bring a more individualistic mentality.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like its southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth. There are plenty within the cities and even the in country side; usually you will find one by every petrol station, or by shops or restaurants. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition, so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls cost a quarter (25 cents) but in some areas what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and the phone will request an higher amount. It's simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dial the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada. The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the United States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually costs less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phones!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phones are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually has to pay to make and receive calls, and will likely have no signal when he leaves the nearest city.

Internet cafés are rare and will only exist in main urban and touristic centres. They are not frequented by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding area. In rural areas, Internet may be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.  Many college and university libraries also provide free internet access to the public.  Ask the circulation desk staff. College and university guest accounts will let you use the Internet as much as you like, but only for the current day.

== [[Winter]] hitchhiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes. It's VERY important to make sure you wear the appropriate gear and take precautions to never be stuck anywhere outside without shelter.

In winter the roads can be icy or narrowed by the snowbank, so it will often be hard for cars to stop by and pull over safely. Drivers won't do it if they don't feel safe as the risk of causing an accident might be too high, and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards their [[insurance]].  It's even more important in icy conditions to make sure you find a hitching spot where there is good visibility and a safe place to pull over.

In some areas, especially in the northern territories, every citizen is bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in need from the hazards of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain!?!? being out by this weather!'. Your actions may be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without being prepared for the weather, as most locals prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home in winter storms. For that reason, shops, restaurants, or gas stations usually won't kick you off their property in extreme weather. In the summer it's different, and you may be asked to leave if there is no danger from the outside elements.

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitchhiker might be a hard, especially since 2001. The border control is quite tight, especially since the unproven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada. Questions might be asked about the relations between passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitchhiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that s/he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interrogated).  The vast majority of the drivers will be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the questions as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthusiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be asked to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). Also bear in mind that most Canadian and American land crossing control are separated from each other by a no man's land short distance between the two borders in which you will only be controlled by the welcoming country. So if you get denied entrance by one, you will have further enquiry to enter back into the country you came from.

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't advertise the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
From Summer 2009 on, U.S. and Canadian citizens are required to show a passport to cross the border.

Also, if you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant).

''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''


{{Provinces Canada}}
{{IsIn|North America}}
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Canada]]

[[Category:Canada| ]]
[[de:Kanada]]
[[es:Canadá]]
[[fr:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>je4t2h6nk17ldlsc28vp41smpalhme8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40816</id>
      <parentid>39921</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-30T20:53:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11261">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|map = &lt;map lat='60.673178565817715' lng='-97.03125' zoom='2' view='0' float='right' country='Canada'/&gt;
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 34,001,000 (2009 est.)
|currency = Canadian Dollar ($CAD)
|hitch = {{good}} to {{very good}}
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, see the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is comprised of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country. English, being spoken by 3/4 of the population, is the majority language in most provinces. French is the main official language in the province of Quebec, but also widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is still widely spoken. For the convenience of the common hitchhiker the provinces and territories are discussed in detail, along with their capitals, in separate pages.

Canada is a vast country (the second biggest in the world) and many visitors do not realize its size or extremes in temperature prior to arrival. Certain northern rural regions are inhabited by few or even no permanent population, so it might not always be bright to adventure by yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipment or having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to such a journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3.2 habitants/km², and about 75 % of that population lives in the south, nestled by the US border. It is normal in some parts of the country to drive a hundred kilometres without any living soul.

Even if the country bears some similitude with its southern (and only) neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life outlook of the population is markedly unique.

For a journey across the country, the [[Trans-Canada Highway]] is the main road crossing the country east to west. However, the highway system numbering system is specific to every province.

=== Local Attitude ===
The majority of the Canadian population lives in harmony within their vast country.   The size of the country has allowed people to live using their own beliefs, languages or religion without being bothered by anybody else, in a 'Live and let live' motto.  Therefore, hate crimes are mostly absent and major ''difference'' clashes even rarer, but may exist. It might be useful for a traveler to be aware of the current political situation to avoid getting into a discussion which may offend more than anything else.  Sometimes, during such situations, it might not be helpful to hitchhike as a white in a First Nation reserve, or sound French in an English area, or visa versa.  That said, Canadians are generally friendly and forget their stereotypes once they meet you in person.

The rural population will usually be keen to help if the traveler is making the first steps into breaking the 'stranger in the locality' image, as the split between country- and city-folk is also existent. The rural community feeling is usually pretty strong and when people believe you belong there and act more altruistic. However, some rural regions have large populations of urban commuters which has the tendency to bring a more individualistic mentality.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like its southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth. There are plenty within the cities and even the in country side; usually you will find one by every petrol station, or by shops or restaurants. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition, so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls cost a quarter (25 cents) but in some areas what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and the phone will request an higher amount. It's simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dial the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada. The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the United States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually costs less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phones!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phones are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually has to pay to make and receive calls, and will likely have no signal when he leaves the nearest city.

Internet cafés are rare and will only exist in main urban and touristic centres. They are not frequented by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding area. In rural areas, Internet may be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.  Many college and university libraries also provide free internet access to the public.  Ask the circulation desk staff. College and university guest accounts will let you use the Internet as much as you like, but only for the current day.

== [[Winter]] hitchhiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes. It's VERY important to make sure you wear the appropriate gear and take precautions to never be stuck anywhere outside without shelter.

In winter the roads can be icy or narrowed by the snowbank, so it will often be hard for cars to stop by and pull over safely. Drivers won't do it if they don't feel safe as the risk of causing an accident might be too high, and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards their [[insurance]].  It's even more important in icy conditions to make sure you find a hitching spot where there is good visibility and a safe place to pull over.

In some areas, especially in the northern territories, every citizen is bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in need from the hazards of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain!?!? being out by this weather!'. Your actions may be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without being prepared for the weather, as most locals prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home in winter storms. For that reason, shops, restaurants, or gas stations usually won't kick you off their property in extreme weather. In the summer it's different, and you may be asked to leave if there is no danger from the outside elements.

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitchhiker might be a hard, especially since 2001. The border control is quite tight, especially since the unproven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada. Questions might be asked about the relations between passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitchhiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that s/he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interrogated).  The vast majority of the drivers will be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the questions as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthusiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be asked to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). Also bear in mind that most Canadian and American land crossing control are separated from each other by a no man's land short distance between the two borders in which you will only be controlled by the welcoming country. So if you get denied entrance by one, you will have further enquiry to enter back into the country you came from.

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't advertise the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
From Summer 2009 on, U.S. and Canadian citizens are required to show a passport to cross the border.

Also, if you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant).

''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''


{{Provinces Canada}}
{{IsIn|North America}}
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Canada]]

[[Category:Canada| ]]

[[de:Kanada]]
[[es:Canadá]]
[[fr:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>8c3fusnfhfxz37enu16njabr7pqx06u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41334</id>
      <parentid>40816</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-13T03:13:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>24.29.233.163</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11291">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|map = &lt;map lat='60.673178565817715' lng='-97.03125' zoom='2' view='0' float='right' country='Canada'/&gt;
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 34,001,000 (2009 est.)
|currency = Canadian Dollar ($CAD)
|hitch = {{good}} to {{very good}}
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, see the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is comprised of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country. English, being spoken by 3/4 of the population, is the majority language in most provinces. French is the main official language in the province of Quebec, but also widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is still widely spoken. For the convenience of the common hitchhiker the provinces and territories are discussed in detail, along with their capitals, in separate pages.  Gasoline is legal in Canada.

Canada is a vast country (the second biggest in the world) and many visitors do not realize its size or extremes in temperature prior to arrival. Certain northern rural regions are inhabited by few or even no permanent population, so it might not always be bright to adventure by yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipment or having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to such a journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3.2 habitants/km², and about 75 % of that population lives in the south, nestled by the US border. It is normal in some parts of the country to drive a hundred kilometres without any living soul.

Even if the country bears some similitude with its southern (and only) neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life outlook of the population is markedly unique.

For a journey across the country, the [[Trans-Canada Highway]] is the main road crossing the country east to west. However, the highway system numbering system is specific to every province.

=== Local Attitude ===
The majority of the Canadian population lives in harmony within their vast country.   The size of the country has allowed people to live using their own beliefs, languages or religion without being bothered by anybody else, in a 'Live and let live' motto.  Therefore, hate crimes are mostly absent and major ''difference'' clashes even rarer, but may exist. It might be useful for a traveler to be aware of the current political situation to avoid getting into a discussion which may offend more than anything else.  Sometimes, during such situations, it might not be helpful to hitchhike as a white in a First Nation reserve, or sound French in an English area, or visa versa.  That said, Canadians are generally friendly and forget their stereotypes once they meet you in person.

The rural population will usually be keen to help if the traveler is making the first steps into breaking the 'stranger in the locality' image, as the split between country- and city-folk is also existent. The rural community feeling is usually pretty strong and when people believe you belong there and act more altruistic. However, some rural regions have large populations of urban commuters which has the tendency to bring a more individualistic mentality.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like its southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth. There are plenty within the cities and even the in country side; usually you will find one by every petrol station, or by shops or restaurants. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition, so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls cost a quarter (25 cents) but in some areas what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and the phone will request an higher amount. It's simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dial the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada. The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the United States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually costs less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phones!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phones are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually has to pay to make and receive calls, and will likely have no signal when he leaves the nearest city.

Internet cafés are rare and will only exist in main urban and touristic centres. They are not frequented by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding area. In rural areas, Internet may be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.  Many college and university libraries also provide free internet access to the public.  Ask the circulation desk staff. College and university guest accounts will let you use the Internet as much as you like, but only for the current day.

== [[Winter]] hitchhiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes. It's VERY important to make sure you wear the appropriate gear and take precautions to never be stuck anywhere outside without shelter.

In winter the roads can be icy or narrowed by the snowbank, so it will often be hard for cars to stop by and pull over safely. Drivers won't do it if they don't feel safe as the risk of causing an accident might be too high, and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards their [[insurance]].  It's even more important in icy conditions to make sure you find a hitching spot where there is good visibility and a safe place to pull over.

In some areas, especially in the northern territories, every citizen is bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in need from the hazards of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain!?!? being out by this weather!'. Your actions may be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without being prepared for the weather, as most locals prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home in winter storms. For that reason, shops, restaurants, or gas stations usually won't kick you off their property in extreme weather. In the summer it's different, and you may be asked to leave if there is no danger from the outside elements.

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitchhiker might be a hard, especially since 2001. The border control is quite tight, especially since the unproven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada. Questions might be asked about the relations between passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitchhiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that s/he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interrogated).  The vast majority of the drivers will be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the questions as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthusiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be asked to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). Also bear in mind that most Canadian and American land crossing control are separated from each other by a no man's land short distance between the two borders in which you will only be controlled by the welcoming country. So if you get denied entrance by one, you will have further enquiry to enter back into the country you came from.

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't advertise the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
From Summer 2009 on, U.S. and Canadian citizens are required to show a passport to cross the border.

Also, if you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant).

''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''


{{Provinces Canada}}
{{IsIn|North America}}
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Canada]]

[[Category:Canada| ]]

[[de:Kanada]]
[[es:Canadá]]
[[fr:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>kuuercc834lu1fjl8nkbxrqx62zophs</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41374</id>
      <parentid>41334</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-13T06:48:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11261">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|map = &lt;map lat='60.673178565817715' lng='-97.03125' zoom='2' view='0' float='right' country='Canada'/&gt;
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 34,001,000 (2009 est.)
|currency = Canadian Dollar ($CAD)
|hitch = {{good}} to {{very good}}
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, see the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is comprised of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country. English, being spoken by 3/4 of the population, is the majority language in most provinces. French is the main official language in the province of Quebec, but also widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is still widely spoken. For the convenience of the common hitchhiker the provinces and territories are discussed in detail, along with their capitals, in separate pages.

Canada is a vast country (the second biggest in the world) and many visitors do not realize its size or extremes in temperature prior to arrival. Certain northern rural regions are inhabited by few or even no permanent population, so it might not always be bright to adventure by yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipment or having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to such a journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3.2 habitants/km², and about 75 % of that population lives in the south, nestled by the US border. It is normal in some parts of the country to drive a hundred kilometres without any living soul.

Even if the country bears some similitude with its southern (and only) neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life outlook of the population is markedly unique.

For a journey across the country, the [[Trans-Canada Highway]] is the main road crossing the country east to west. However, the highway system numbering system is specific to every province.

=== Local Attitude ===
The majority of the Canadian population lives in harmony within their vast country.   The size of the country has allowed people to live using their own beliefs, languages or religion without being bothered by anybody else, in a 'Live and let live' motto.  Therefore, hate crimes are mostly absent and major ''difference'' clashes even rarer, but may exist. It might be useful for a traveler to be aware of the current political situation to avoid getting into a discussion which may offend more than anything else.  Sometimes, during such situations, it might not be helpful to hitchhike as a white in a First Nation reserve, or sound French in an English area, or visa versa.  That said, Canadians are generally friendly and forget their stereotypes once they meet you in person.

The rural population will usually be keen to help if the traveler is making the first steps into breaking the 'stranger in the locality' image, as the split between country- and city-folk is also existent. The rural community feeling is usually pretty strong and when people believe you belong there and act more altruistic. However, some rural regions have large populations of urban commuters which has the tendency to bring a more individualistic mentality.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like its southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth. There are plenty within the cities and even the in country side; usually you will find one by every petrol station, or by shops or restaurants. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition, so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls cost a quarter (25 cents) but in some areas what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and the phone will request an higher amount. It's simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dial the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada. The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the United States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually costs less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phones!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phones are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually has to pay to make and receive calls, and will likely have no signal when he leaves the nearest city.

Internet cafés are rare and will only exist in main urban and touristic centres. They are not frequented by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding area. In rural areas, Internet may be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.  Many college and university libraries also provide free internet access to the public.  Ask the circulation desk staff. College and university guest accounts will let you use the Internet as much as you like, but only for the current day.

== [[Winter]] hitchhiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes. It's VERY important to make sure you wear the appropriate gear and take precautions to never be stuck anywhere outside without shelter.

In winter the roads can be icy or narrowed by the snowbank, so it will often be hard for cars to stop by and pull over safely. Drivers won't do it if they don't feel safe as the risk of causing an accident might be too high, and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards their [[insurance]].  It's even more important in icy conditions to make sure you find a hitching spot where there is good visibility and a safe place to pull over.

In some areas, especially in the northern territories, every citizen is bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in need from the hazards of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain!?!? being out by this weather!'. Your actions may be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without being prepared for the weather, as most locals prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home in winter storms. For that reason, shops, restaurants, or gas stations usually won't kick you off their property in extreme weather. In the summer it's different, and you may be asked to leave if there is no danger from the outside elements.

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitchhiker might be a hard, especially since 2001. The border control is quite tight, especially since the unproven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada. Questions might be asked about the relations between passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitchhiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that s/he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interrogated).  The vast majority of the drivers will be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the questions as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthusiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be asked to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). Also bear in mind that most Canadian and American land crossing control are separated from each other by a no man's land short distance between the two borders in which you will only be controlled by the welcoming country. So if you get denied entrance by one, you will have further enquiry to enter back into the country you came from.

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't advertise the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
From Summer 2009 on, U.S. and Canadian citizens are required to show a passport to cross the border.

Also, if you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant).

''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''


{{Provinces Canada}}
{{IsIn|North America}}
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Canada]]

[[Category:Canada| ]]

[[de:Kanada]]
[[es:Canadá]]
[[fr:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>8c3fusnfhfxz37enu16njabr7pqx06u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>49660</id>
      <parentid>41374</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-02-22T09:14:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>216.121.248.189</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11265">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|map = &lt;map lat='60.673178565817715' lng='-97.03125' zoom='2' view='0' float='right' country='Canada'/&gt;
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 34,001,000 (2009 est.)
|currency = Canadian Dollar ($CAD)
|hitch = {{good}} to {{very good}}
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, see the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is comprised of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country. English, being spoken by 3/4 of the population, is the majority language in most provinces. French is the main official language in the province of Quebec, but also widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is still widely spoken. For the convenience of the common hitchhiker the provinces and territories are discussed in detail, along with their capitals, in separate pages.

Canada is a vast country (the second biggest in the world) and many visitors do not realize its size or extremes in temperature prior to arrival. Certain northern rural regions are inhabited by few or even no permanent population, so it might not always be bright to adventure by yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipment or having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to such a journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3.2 habitants/km², and about 75 % of that population lives in the south, nestled by the US border. It is normal in some parts of the country to drive a hundred kilometres without any living soul.

Even if the country bears some similitude with its southern (and only) neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life outlook of the population is markedly unique.

For a journey across the country, the [[Trans-Canada Highway]] is the main road crossing the country east to west. However, the highway system numbering system is specific to every province.

=== Local Attitude ===
The majority of the Canadian population lives in harmony within their vast country.   The size of the country has allowed people to live using their own beliefs, languages or religion without being bothered by anybody else, in a 'Live and let live' motto.  Therefore, hate crimes are mostly absent and major ''difference'' clashes even rarer, but may exist. It might be useful for a traveler to be aware of the current political situation to avoid getting into a discussion which may offend more than anything else.  Sometimes, during such situations, it might not be helpful to hitchhike as a white in a First Nation reserve, or sound French in an English area, or visa versa.  That said, Canadians are generally friendly and forget their stereotypes once they meet you in person.

The rural population will usually be keen to help if the traveler is making the first steps into breaking the 'stranger in the locality' image, as the split between country- and city-folk is also existent. The rural community feeling is usually pretty strong and when people believe you belong there and act more altruistic. However, some rural regions have large populations of urban commuters which has the tendency to bring a more individualistic mentality.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like its southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth. There are plenty within the cities and even the in country side; usually you will find one by every petrol station, or by shops or restaurants. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition, so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls cost two quarters (50 cents), but in some areas what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and the phone will request an higher amount. It's simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dial the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada. The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the United States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually costs less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phones!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phones are not widely spread within the country and the networks are expensive, unreliable, primitive and only cover certain urban areas. A mobile phone user usually has to pay to make and receive calls, and will likely have no signal when he leaves the nearest city.

Internet cafés are rare and will only exist in main urban and touristic centres. They are not frequented by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding area. In rural areas, Internet may be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.  Many college and university libraries also provide free internet access to the public.  Ask the circulation desk staff. College and university guest accounts will let you use the Internet as much as you like, but only for the current day.

== [[Winter]] hitchhiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes. It's VERY important to make sure you wear the appropriate gear and take precautions to never be stuck anywhere outside without shelter.

In winter the roads can be icy or narrowed by the snowbank, so it will often be hard for cars to stop by and pull over safely. Drivers won't do it if they don't feel safe as the risk of causing an accident might be too high, and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards their [[insurance]].  It's even more important in icy conditions to make sure you find a hitching spot where there is good visibility and a safe place to pull over.

In some areas, especially in the northern territories, every citizen is bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in need from the hazards of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain!?!? being out by this weather!'. Your actions may be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without being prepared for the weather, as most locals prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home in winter storms. For that reason, shops, restaurants, or gas stations usually won't kick you off their property in extreme weather. In the summer it's different, and you may be asked to leave if there is no danger from the outside elements.

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitchhiker might be a hard, especially since 2001. The border control is quite tight, especially since the unproven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada. Questions might be asked about the relations between passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitchhiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that s/he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interrogated).  The vast majority of the drivers will be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the questions as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthusiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be asked to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). Also bear in mind that most Canadian and American land crossing control are separated from each other by a no man's land short distance between the two borders in which you will only be controlled by the welcoming country. So if you get denied entrance by one, you will have further enquiry to enter back into the country you came from.

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't advertise the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
From Summer 2009 on, U.S. and Canadian citizens are required to show a passport to cross the border.

Also, if you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant).

''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''


{{Provinces Canada}}
{{IsIn|North America}}
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Canada]]

[[Category:Canada| ]]

[[de:Kanada]]
[[es:Canadá]]
[[fr:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>ct8pet7nl5bmco5dld4dowe3t5rjs4r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>51664</id>
      <parentid>49660</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-04-10T06:03:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>198.53.187.53</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11184">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|map = &lt;map lat='60.673178565817715' lng='-97.03125' zoom='2' view='0' float='right' country='Canada'/&gt;
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 34,001,000 (2009 est.)
|currency = Canadian Dollar ($CAD)
|hitch = {{good}} to {{very good}}
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, see the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is comprised of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country. English, being spoken by 3/4 of the population, is the majority language in most provinces. French is the main official language in the province of Quebec, but also widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is still widely spoken. For the convenience of the common hitchhiker the provinces and territories are discussed in detail, along with their capitals, in separate pages.

Canada is a vast country (the second biggest in the world) and many visitors do not realize its size or extremes in temperature prior to arrival. Certain northern rural regions are inhabited by few or even no permanent population, so it might not always be bright to adventure by yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipment or having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to such a journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3.2 habitants/km², and about 75 % of that population lives in the south, nestled by the US border. It is normal in some parts of the country to drive a hundred kilometres without any living soul.

Even if the country bears some similitude with its southern (and only) neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life outlook of the population is markedly unique.

For a journey across the country, the [[Trans-Canada Highway]] is the main road crossing the country east to west. However, the highway system numbering system is specific to every province.

=== Local Attitude ===
The majority of the Canadian population lives in harmony within their vast country.   The size of the country has allowed people to live using their own beliefs, languages or religion without being bothered by anybody else, in a 'Live and let live' motto.  Therefore, hate crimes are mostly absent and major ''difference'' clashes even rarer, but may exist. It might be useful for a traveler to be aware of the current political situation to avoid getting into a discussion which may offend more than anything else.  Sometimes, during such situations, it might not be helpful to hitchhike as a white in a First Nation reserve, or sound French in an English area, or visa versa.  That said, Canadians are generally friendly and forget their stereotypes once they meet you in person.

The rural population will usually be keen to help if the traveler is making the first steps into breaking the 'stranger in the locality' image, as the split between country- and city-folk is also existent. The rural community feeling is usually pretty strong and when people believe you belong there and act more altruistic. However, some rural regions have large populations of urban commuters which has the tendency to bring a more individualistic mentality.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like its southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth. There are plenty within the cities and even the in country side; usually you will find one by every petrol station, or by shops or restaurants. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition, so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls cost two quarters (50 cents), but in some areas what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and the phone will request an higher amount. It's simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dial the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada. The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the United States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually costs less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phones!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone networks have improved dramatically over the years, and most people carry a cellular phone with them. "Roaming" charges will usually apply when outside of your local coverage area.

Internet cafés are rare and will only exist in main urban and touristic centres. They are not frequented by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding area. In rural areas, Internet may be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.  Many college and university libraries also provide free internet access to the public.  Ask the circulation desk staff. College and university guest accounts will let you use the Internet as much as you like, but only for the current day.

== [[Winter]] hitchhiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes. It's VERY important to make sure you wear the appropriate gear and take precautions to never be stuck anywhere outside without shelter.

In winter the roads can be icy or narrowed by the snowbank, so it will often be hard for cars to stop by and pull over safely. Drivers won't do it if they don't feel safe as the risk of causing an accident might be too high, and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards their [[insurance]].  It's even more important in icy conditions to make sure you find a hitching spot where there is good visibility and a safe place to pull over.

In some areas, especially in the northern territories, every citizen is bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in need from the hazards of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain!?!? being out by this weather!'. Your actions may be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without being prepared for the weather, as most locals prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home in winter storms. For that reason, shops, restaurants, or gas stations usually won't kick you off their property in extreme weather. In the summer it's different, and you may be asked to leave if there is no danger from the outside elements.

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitchhiker might be a hard, especially since 2001. The border control is quite tight, especially since the unproven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada. Questions might be asked about the relations between passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitchhiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that s/he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interrogated).  The vast majority of the drivers will be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the questions as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthusiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be asked to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). Also bear in mind that most Canadian and American land crossing control are separated from each other by a no man's land short distance between the two borders in which you will only be controlled by the welcoming country. So if you get denied entrance by one, you will have further enquiry to enter back into the country you came from.

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't advertise the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
From Summer 2009 on, U.S. and Canadian citizens are required to show a passport to cross the border.

Also, if you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant).

''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''


{{Provinces Canada}}
{{IsIn|North America}}
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Canada]]

[[Category:Canada| ]]

[[de:Kanada]]
[[es:Canadá]]
[[fr:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>o6x1nuk6zp5yj6gxiz9ay0xfdqg5qb8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>54523</id>
      <parentid>51664</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-09-05T13:18:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11182">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|map = &lt;map lat='60.673178565817715' lng='-97.03125' zoom='2' view='0' float='right' country='Canada'/&gt;
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 34,001,000 (2009 est.)
|currency = Canadian Dollar ($CAD)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ca' /&gt;
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, see the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is comprised of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country. English, being spoken by 3/4 of the population, is the majority language in most provinces. French is the main official language in the province of Quebec, but also widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is still widely spoken. For the convenience of the common hitchhiker the provinces and territories are discussed in detail, along with their capitals, in separate pages.

Canada is a vast country (the second biggest in the world) and many visitors do not realize its size or extremes in temperature prior to arrival. Certain northern rural regions are inhabited by few or even no permanent population, so it might not always be bright to adventure by yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipment or having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to such a journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3.2 habitants/km², and about 75 % of that population lives in the south, nestled by the US border. It is normal in some parts of the country to drive a hundred kilometres without any living soul.

Even if the country bears some similitude with its southern (and only) neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life outlook of the population is markedly unique.

For a journey across the country, the [[Trans-Canada Highway]] is the main road crossing the country east to west. However, the highway system numbering system is specific to every province.

=== Local Attitude ===
The majority of the Canadian population lives in harmony within their vast country.   The size of the country has allowed people to live using their own beliefs, languages or religion without being bothered by anybody else, in a 'Live and let live' motto.  Therefore, hate crimes are mostly absent and major ''difference'' clashes even rarer, but may exist. It might be useful for a traveler to be aware of the current political situation to avoid getting into a discussion which may offend more than anything else.  Sometimes, during such situations, it might not be helpful to hitchhike as a white in a First Nation reserve, or sound French in an English area, or visa versa.  That said, Canadians are generally friendly and forget their stereotypes once they meet you in person.

The rural population will usually be keen to help if the traveler is making the first steps into breaking the 'stranger in the locality' image, as the split between country- and city-folk is also existent. The rural community feeling is usually pretty strong and when people believe you belong there and act more altruistic. However, some rural regions have large populations of urban commuters which has the tendency to bring a more individualistic mentality.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like its southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth. There are plenty within the cities and even the in country side; usually you will find one by every petrol station, or by shops or restaurants. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition, so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls cost two quarters (50 cents), but in some areas what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and the phone will request an higher amount. It's simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dial the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada. The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the United States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually costs less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phones!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone networks have improved dramatically over the years, and most people carry a cellular phone with them. "Roaming" charges will usually apply when outside of your local coverage area.

Internet cafés are rare and will only exist in main urban and touristic centres. They are not frequented by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding area. In rural areas, Internet may be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.  Many college and university libraries also provide free internet access to the public.  Ask the circulation desk staff. College and university guest accounts will let you use the Internet as much as you like, but only for the current day.

== [[Winter]] hitchhiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes. It's VERY important to make sure you wear the appropriate gear and take precautions to never be stuck anywhere outside without shelter.

In winter the roads can be icy or narrowed by the snowbank, so it will often be hard for cars to stop by and pull over safely. Drivers won't do it if they don't feel safe as the risk of causing an accident might be too high, and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards their [[insurance]].  It's even more important in icy conditions to make sure you find a hitching spot where there is good visibility and a safe place to pull over.

In some areas, especially in the northern territories, every citizen is bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in need from the hazards of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain!?!? being out by this weather!'. Your actions may be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without being prepared for the weather, as most locals prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home in winter storms. For that reason, shops, restaurants, or gas stations usually won't kick you off their property in extreme weather. In the summer it's different, and you may be asked to leave if there is no danger from the outside elements.

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitchhiker might be a hard, especially since 2001. The border control is quite tight, especially since the unproven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada. Questions might be asked about the relations between passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitchhiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that s/he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interrogated).  The vast majority of the drivers will be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the questions as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthusiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be asked to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). Also bear in mind that most Canadian and American land crossing control are separated from each other by a no man's land short distance between the two borders in which you will only be controlled by the welcoming country. So if you get denied entrance by one, you will have further enquiry to enter back into the country you came from.

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't advertise the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
From Summer 2009 on, U.S. and Canadian citizens are required to show a passport to cross the border.

Also, if you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant).

''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''


{{Provinces Canada}}
{{IsIn|North America}}
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Canada]]

[[Category:Canada| ]]

[[de:Kanada]]
[[es:Canadá]]
[[fr:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>qti57onqswkvsbrnhwovy630hz8irgq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>55079</id>
      <parentid>54523</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-09-23T01:02:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11191">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|map = &lt;map lat='60.673178565817715' lng='-97.03125' zoom='2' view='0' float='right' country='Canada'/&gt;
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 34,001,000 (2009 est.)
|currency = Canadian Dollar ($CAD)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ca' /&gt;
|BW = CA
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, see the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is comprised of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country. English, being spoken by 3/4 of the population, is the majority language in most provinces. French is the main official language in the province of Quebec, but also widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is still widely spoken. For the convenience of the common hitchhiker the provinces and territories are discussed in detail, along with their capitals, in separate pages.

Canada is a vast country (the second biggest in the world) and many visitors do not realize its size or extremes in temperature prior to arrival. Certain northern rural regions are inhabited by few or even no permanent population, so it might not always be bright to adventure by yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipment or having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to such a journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3.2 habitants/km², and about 75 % of that population lives in the south, nestled by the US border. It is normal in some parts of the country to drive a hundred kilometres without any living soul.

Even if the country bears some similitude with its southern (and only) neighbour, the [[United States]], the cultural and life outlook of the population is markedly unique.

For a journey across the country, the [[Trans-Canada Highway]] is the main road crossing the country east to west. However, the highway system numbering system is specific to every province.

=== Local Attitude ===
The majority of the Canadian population lives in harmony within their vast country.   The size of the country has allowed people to live using their own beliefs, languages or religion without being bothered by anybody else, in a 'Live and let live' motto.  Therefore, hate crimes are mostly absent and major ''difference'' clashes even rarer, but may exist. It might be useful for a traveler to be aware of the current political situation to avoid getting into a discussion which may offend more than anything else.  Sometimes, during such situations, it might not be helpful to hitchhike as a white in a First Nation reserve, or sound French in an English area, or visa versa.  That said, Canadians are generally friendly and forget their stereotypes once they meet you in person.

The rural population will usually be keen to help if the traveler is making the first steps into breaking the 'stranger in the locality' image, as the split between country- and city-folk is also existent. The rural community feeling is usually pretty strong and when people believe you belong there and act more altruistic. However, some rural regions have large populations of urban commuters which has the tendency to bring a more individualistic mentality.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like its southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth. There are plenty within the cities and even the in country side; usually you will find one by every petrol station, or by shops or restaurants. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition, so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls cost two quarters (50 cents), but in some areas what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and the phone will request an higher amount. It's simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dial the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada. The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the United States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually costs less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phones!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone networks have improved dramatically over the years, and most people carry a cellular phone with them. "Roaming" charges will usually apply when outside of your local coverage area.

Internet cafés are rare and will only exist in main urban and touristic centres. They are not frequented by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding area. In rural areas, Internet may be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.  Many college and university libraries also provide free internet access to the public.  Ask the circulation desk staff. College and university guest accounts will let you use the Internet as much as you like, but only for the current day.

== [[Winter]] hitchhiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes. It's VERY important to make sure you wear the appropriate gear and take precautions to never be stuck anywhere outside without shelter.

In winter the roads can be icy or narrowed by the snowbank, so it will often be hard for cars to stop by and pull over safely. Drivers won't do it if they don't feel safe as the risk of causing an accident might be too high, and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards their [[insurance]].  It's even more important in icy conditions to make sure you find a hitching spot where there is good visibility and a safe place to pull over.

In some areas, especially in the northern territories, every citizen is bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in need from the hazards of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain!?!? being out by this weather!'. Your actions may be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without being prepared for the weather, as most locals prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home in winter storms. For that reason, shops, restaurants, or gas stations usually won't kick you off their property in extreme weather. In the summer it's different, and you may be asked to leave if there is no danger from the outside elements.

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitchhiker might be a hard, especially since 2001. The border control is quite tight, especially since the unproven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada. Questions might be asked about the relations between passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitchhiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that s/he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interrogated).  The vast majority of the drivers will be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the questions as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthusiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be asked to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). Also bear in mind that most Canadian and American land crossing control are separated from each other by a no man's land short distance between the two borders in which you will only be controlled by the welcoming country. So if you get denied entrance by one, you will have further enquiry to enter back into the country you came from.

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't advertise the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
From Summer 2009 on, U.S. and Canadian citizens are required to show a passport to cross the border.

Also, if you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant).

''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''


{{Provinces Canada}}
{{IsIn|North America}}
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Canada]]

[[Category:Canada| ]]

[[de:Kanada]]
[[es:Canadá]]
[[fr:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>d7l9qae3pmf8ri3tlz2mu7vtc4k4hk8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>55683</id>
      <parentid>55079</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-08T01:07:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11267">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|map = &lt;map lat='60.673178565817715' lng='-97.03125' zoom='2' view='0' float='right' country='Canada'/&gt;
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 34,001,000 (2009 est.)
|currency = Canadian Dollar ($CAD)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ca' /&gt;
|BW = CA
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint-Pierre and Miquelon|Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, see the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is comprised of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country. English, being spoken by 3/4 of the population, is the majority language in most provinces. French is the main official language in the province of Quebec, but also widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is still widely spoken. For the convenience of the common hitchhiker the provinces and territories are discussed in detail, along with their capitals, in separate pages.

Canada is a vast country (the second biggest in the world) and many visitors do not realize its size or extremes in temperature prior to arrival. Certain northern rural regions are inhabited by few or even no permanent population, so it might not always be bright to adventure by yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipment or having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to such a journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3.2 habitants/km², and about 75 % of that population lives in the south, nestled by the US border. It is normal in some parts of the country to drive a hundred kilometres without any living soul.

Even if the country bears some similitude with its southern (and only) neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], the cultural and life outlook of the population is markedly unique.

For a journey across the country, the [[Trans-Canada Highway]] is the main road crossing the country east to west. However, the highway system numbering system is specific to every province.

=== Local Attitude ===
The majority of the Canadian population lives in harmony within their vast country.   The size of the country has allowed people to live using their own beliefs, languages or religion without being bothered by anybody else, in a 'Live and let live' motto.  Therefore, hate crimes are mostly absent and major ''difference'' clashes even rarer, but may exist. It might be useful for a traveler to be aware of the current political situation to avoid getting into a discussion which may offend more than anything else.  Sometimes, during such situations, it might not be helpful to hitchhike as a white in a First Nation reserve, or sound French in an English area, or visa versa.  That said, Canadians are generally friendly and forget their stereotypes once they meet you in person.

The rural population will usually be keen to help if the traveler is making the first steps into breaking the 'stranger in the locality' image, as the split between country- and city-folk is also existent. The rural community feeling is usually pretty strong and when people believe you belong there and act more altruistic. However, some rural regions have large populations of urban commuters which has the tendency to bring a more individualistic mentality.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like its southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth. There are plenty within the cities and even the in country side; usually you will find one by every petrol station, or by shops or restaurants. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition, so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls cost two quarters (50 cents), but in some areas what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and the phone will request an higher amount. It's simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dial the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada. The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the United States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually costs less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phones!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone networks have improved dramatically over the years, and most people carry a cellular phone with them. "Roaming" charges will usually apply when outside of your local coverage area.

Internet cafés are rare and will only exist in main urban and touristic centres. They are not frequented by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding area. In rural areas, Internet may be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.  Many college and university libraries also provide free internet access to the public.  Ask the circulation desk staff. College and university guest accounts will let you use the Internet as much as you like, but only for the current day.

== [[Winter]] hitchhiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes. It's VERY important to make sure you wear the appropriate gear and take precautions to never be stuck anywhere outside without shelter.

In winter the roads can be icy or narrowed by the snowbank, so it will often be hard for cars to stop by and pull over safely. Drivers won't do it if they don't feel safe as the risk of causing an accident might be too high, and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards their [[insurance]].  It's even more important in icy conditions to make sure you find a hitching spot where there is good visibility and a safe place to pull over.

In some areas, especially in the northern territories, every citizen is bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in need from the hazards of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain!?!? being out by this weather!'. Your actions may be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without being prepared for the weather, as most locals prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home in winter storms. For that reason, shops, restaurants, or gas stations usually won't kick you off their property in extreme weather. In the summer it's different, and you may be asked to leave if there is no danger from the outside elements.

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitchhiker might be a hard, especially since 2001. The border control is quite tight, especially since the unproven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada. Questions might be asked about the relations between passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitchhiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that s/he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interrogated).  The vast majority of the drivers will be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the questions as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthusiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be asked to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). Also bear in mind that most Canadian and American land crossing control are separated from each other by a no man's land short distance between the two borders in which you will only be controlled by the welcoming country. So if you get denied entrance by one, you will have further enquiry to enter back into the country you came from.

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't advertise the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
From Summer 2009 on, U.S. and Canadian citizens are required to show a passport to cross the border.

Also, if you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant).

''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''


{{Provinces Canada}}
{{IsIn|North America}}
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Canada]]

[[Category:Canada| ]]

[[de:Kanada]]
[[es:Canadá]]
[[fr:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>t2q9ichjct18gekzf5ox52a9dzau31x</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69987</id>
      <parentid>55683</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-06-04T22:45:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12229">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|map = &lt;map lat='60.673178565817715' lng='-97.03125' zoom='2' view='0' float='right' country='Canada'/&gt;
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 34,001,000 (2009 est.)
|currency = Canadian Dollar ($CAD)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ca' /&gt;
|BW = CA
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint-Pierre and Miquelon|Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, see the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is comprised of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country. English, being spoken by 3/4 of the population, is the majority language in most provinces. French is the main official language in the province of Quebec, but also widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is still widely spoken. For the convenience of the common hitchhiker the provinces and territories are discussed in detail, along with their capitals, in separate pages.

Canada is a vast country (the second biggest in the world) and many visitors do not realize its size or extremes in temperature prior to arrival. Certain northern rural regions are inhabited by few or even no permanent population, so it might not always be bright to adventure by yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipment or having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to such a journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3.2 habitants/km², and about 75 % of that population lives in the south, nestled by the US border. It is normal in some parts of the country to drive a hundred kilometres without any living soul.

Even if the country bears some similitude with its southern (and only) neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], the cultural and life outlook of the population is markedly unique.

For a journey across the country, the [[Trans-Canada Highway]] is the main road crossing the country east to west. However, the highway system numbering system is specific to every province.

=== Local Attitude ===
The majority of the Canadian population lives in harmony within their vast country.   The size of the country has allowed people to live using their own beliefs, languages or religion without being bothered by anybody else, in a 'Live and let live' motto.  Therefore, hate crimes are mostly absent and major ''difference'' clashes even rarer, but may exist. It might be useful for a traveler to be aware of the current political situation to avoid getting into a discussion which may offend more than anything else.  Sometimes, during such situations, it might not be helpful to hitchhike as a white in a First Nation reserve, or sound French in an English area, or visa versa.  That said, Canadians are generally friendly and forget their stereotypes once they meet you in person.

The rural population will usually be keen to help if the traveler is making the first steps into breaking the 'stranger in the locality' image, as the split between country- and city-folk is also existent. The rural community feeling is usually pretty strong and when people believe you belong there and act more altruistic. However, some rural regions have large populations of urban commuters which has the tendency to bring a more individualistic mentality.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like its southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth. There are plenty within the cities and even the in country side; usually you will find one by every petrol station, or by shops or restaurants. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition, so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls cost two quarters (50 cents), but in some areas what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and the phone will request an higher amount. It's simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dial the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada. The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the United States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually costs less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phones!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone networks have improved dramatically over the years, and most people carry a cellular phone with them. "Roaming" charges will usually apply when outside of your local coverage area.

Internet cafés are rare and will only exist in main urban and touristic centres. They are not frequented by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding area. In rural areas, Internet may be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.  Many college and university libraries also provide free internet access to the public.  Ask the circulation desk staff. College and university guest accounts will let you use the Internet as much as you like, but only for the current day.

== [[Winter]] hitchhiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes. It's VERY important to make sure you wear the appropriate gear and take precautions to never be stuck anywhere outside without shelter.

In winter the roads can be icy or narrowed by the snowbank, so it will often be hard for cars to stop by and pull over safely. Drivers won't do it if they don't feel safe as the risk of causing an accident might be too high, and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards their [[insurance]].  It's even more important in icy conditions to make sure you find a hitching spot where there is good visibility and a safe place to pull over.

In some areas, especially in the northern territories, every citizen is bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in need from the hazards of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain!?!? being out by this weather!'. Your actions may be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without being prepared for the weather, as most locals prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home in winter storms. For that reason, shops, restaurants, or gas stations usually won't kick you off their property in extreme weather. In the summer it's different, and you may be asked to leave if there is no danger from the outside elements.

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitchhiker might be a hard, especially since 2001. The border control is quite tight, especially since the unproven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada. Questions might be asked about the relations between passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitchhiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that s/he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interrogated).  The vast majority of the drivers will be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the questions as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthusiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be asked to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). Also bear in mind that most Canadian and American land crossing control are separated from each other by a no man's land short distance between the two borders in which you will only be controlled by the welcoming country. So if you get denied entrance by one, you will have further enquiry to enter back into the country you came from.

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't advertise the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
From Summer 2009 on, U.S. and Canadian citizens are required to show a passport to cross the border.

Also, if you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant).

''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''

== Experiences ==
''I have hitchhiked many thousands of miles through most of the provinces. Getting rides is usually slightly easier than the [[United States]], but harder in some places. The cost of food makes travel here very expensive. Border crossing as an American citizen is incredibly frustrating! It usually takes four to six hours of intense interrogation of myself and violation of the privacy of other people in my life. The first time I was held and interrogated for over six hours and eventually turned away because I couldn't provide documentation proving that I had a reason to return to the states (how do you prove that?!). Well I got a little crafty with their requirements and subsequent attempts to enter have been easier. You may have to get creative, but where there's a will, there's a way; don't give up! This is a beautiful country.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 00:45, 5 June 2013 (CEST)

{{Provinces Canada}}
{{IsIn|North America}}
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Canada]]

[[Category:Canada| ]]

[[de:Kanada]]
[[es:Canadá]]
[[fr:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>0mchuwgrhmo124ct2xd8j3umucf5qpw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69988</id>
      <parentid>69987</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-06-04T22:51:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12315">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|map = &lt;map lat='60.673178565817715' lng='-97.03125' zoom='2' view='0' float='right' country='Canada'/&gt;
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 34,001,000 (2009 est.)
|currency = Canadian Dollar ($CAD)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ca' /&gt;
|BW = CA
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint-Pierre and Miquelon|Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, see the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is comprised of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country. English, being spoken by 3/4 of the population, is the majority language in most provinces. French is the main official language in the province of Quebec, but also widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is still widely spoken. For the convenience of the common hitchhiker the provinces and territories are discussed in detail, along with their capitals, in separate pages.

Canada is a vast country (the second biggest in the world) and many visitors do not realize its size or extremes in temperature prior to arrival. Certain northern rural regions are inhabited by few or even no permanent population, so it might not always be bright to adventure by yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipment or having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to such a journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3.2 habitants/km², and about 75 % of that population lives in the south, nestled by the US border. It is normal in some parts of the country to drive a hundred kilometres without any living soul.

Even if the country bears some similitude with its southern (and only) neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], the cultural and life outlook of the population is markedly unique.

For a journey across the country, the [[Trans-Canada Highway]] is the main road crossing the country east to west. However, the highway system numbering system is specific to every province.

=== Local Attitude ===
The majority of the Canadian population lives in harmony within their vast country.   The size of the country has allowed people to live using their own beliefs, languages or religion without being bothered by anybody else, in a 'Live and let live' motto.  Therefore, hate crimes are mostly absent and major ''difference'' clashes even rarer, but may exist. It might be useful for a traveler to be aware of the current political situation to avoid getting into a discussion which may offend more than anything else.  Sometimes, during such situations, it might not be helpful to hitchhike as a white in a First Nation reserve, or sound French in an English area, or visa versa.  That said, Canadians are generally friendly and forget their stereotypes once they meet you in person.

The rural population will usually be keen to help if the traveler is making the first steps into breaking the 'stranger in the locality' image, as the split between country- and city-folk is also existent. The rural community feeling is usually pretty strong and when people believe you belong there and act more altruistic. However, some rural regions have large populations of urban commuters which has the tendency to bring a more individualistic mentality.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like its southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth. There are plenty within the cities and even the in country side; usually you will find one by every petrol station, or by shops or restaurants. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition, so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls cost two quarters (50 cents), but in some areas what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and the phone will request an higher amount. It's simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dial the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada. The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the United States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually costs less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phones!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone networks have improved dramatically over the years, and most people carry a cellular phone with them. "Roaming" charges will usually apply when outside of your local coverage area.

Internet cafés are rare and will only exist in main urban and touristic centres. They are not frequented by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding area. In rural areas, Internet may be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.  Many college and university libraries also provide free internet access to the public.  Ask the circulation desk staff. College and university guest accounts will let you use the Internet as much as you like, but only for the current day.

== [[Winter]] hitchhiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes. It's VERY important to make sure you wear the appropriate gear and take precautions to never be stuck anywhere outside without shelter.

In winter the roads can be icy or narrowed by the snowbank, so it will often be hard for cars to stop by and pull over safely. Drivers won't do it if they don't feel safe as the risk of causing an accident might be too high, and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards their [[insurance]].  It's even more important in icy conditions to make sure you find a hitching spot where there is good visibility and a safe place to pull over.

In some areas, especially in the northern territories, every citizen is bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in need from the hazards of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain!?!? being out by this weather!'. Your actions may be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without being prepared for the weather, as most locals prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home in winter storms. For that reason, shops, restaurants, or gas stations usually won't kick you off their property in extreme weather. In the summer it's different, and you may be asked to leave if there is no danger from the outside elements.

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitchhiker might be a hard, especially since 2001. The border control is quite tight, especially since the unproven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada. Questions might be asked about the relations between passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitchhiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that s/he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interrogated).  The vast majority of the drivers will be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the questions as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthusiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be asked to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). Also bear in mind that most Canadian and American land crossing control are separated from each other by a no man's land short distance between the two borders in which you will only be controlled by the welcoming country. So if you get denied entrance by one, you will have further enquiry to enter back into the country you came from.

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't advertise the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
From Summer 2009 on, U.S. and Canadian citizens are required to show a passport to cross the border.

Also, if you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant).

''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''

== Experiences ==
''I have hitchhiked many thousands of miles through most of the provinces. Getting rides is usually slightly easier than the [[United States]], but harder in some places. The cost of food makes travel here very expensive. Border crossing as an American citizen is incredibly frustrating! It usually takes four to six hours of intense interrogation of myself and violation of the privacy of other people in my life. The first time I was held and interrogated for over six hours and eventually turned away because I couldn't provide documentation proving that I had a reason to return to the states; they wanted me to buy a return bus ticket to prove I was only staying a short while, sorry, not happening! Well I got a little crafty with their requirements and subsequent attempts to enter have been easier, heh. You may have to get creative, but where there's a will, there's a way. Don't give up! This is a beautiful country!'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 00:45, 5 June 2013 (CEST)

{{Provinces Canada}}
{{IsIn|North America}}
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Canada]]

[[Category:Canada| ]]

[[de:Kanada]]
[[es:Canadá]]
[[fr:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>2vx6d5eyr602vppdcszmg3j8xcujh23</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>73918</id>
      <parentid>69988</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-01-05T00:40:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robyt</username>
        <id>9747</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12331">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|map = &lt;map lat='60.673178565817715' lng='-97.03125' zoom='2' view='0' float='right' country='Canada'/&gt;
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 34,001,000 (2009 est.)
|currency = Canadian Dollar ($CAD)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ca' /&gt;
|BW = CA
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint-Pierre and Miquelon|Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, see the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is comprised of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country. English, being spoken by 3/4 of the population, is the majority language in most provinces. French is the main official language in the province of Quebec, but also widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is still widely spoken. For the convenience of the common hitchhiker the provinces and territories are discussed in detail, along with their capitals, in separate pages.

Canada is a vast country (the second biggest in the world) and many visitors do not realize its size or extremes in temperature prior to arrival. Certain northern rural regions are inhabited by few or even no permanent population, so it might not always be bright to adventure by yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipment or having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to such a journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3.2 habitants/km², and about 75 % of that population lives in the south, nestled by the US border. It is normal in some parts of the country to drive a hundred kilometres without any living soul.

Even if the country bears some similitude with its southern (and only) neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], the cultural and life outlook of the population is markedly unique.

For a journey across the country, the [[Trans-Canada Highway]] is the main road crossing the country east to west. However, the highway system numbering system is specific to every province.

=== Local Attitude ===
The majority of the Canadian population lives in harmony within their vast country.   The size of the country has allowed people to live using their own beliefs, languages or religion without being bothered by anybody else, in a 'Live and let live' motto.  Therefore, hate crimes are mostly absent and major ''difference'' clashes even rarer, but may exist. It might be useful for a traveler to be aware of the current political situation to avoid getting into a discussion which may offend more than anything else.  Sometimes, during such situations, it might not be helpful to hitchhike as a white in a First Nation reserve, or sound French in an English area, or visa versa.  That said, Canadians are generally friendly and forget their stereotypes once they meet you in person.

The rural population will usually be keen to help if the traveler is making the first steps into breaking the 'stranger in the locality' image, as the split between country- and city-folk is also existent. The rural community feeling is usually pretty strong and when people believe you belong there and act more altruistic. However, some rural regions have large populations of urban commuters which has the tendency to bring a more individualistic mentality.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like its southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth. There are plenty within the cities and even the in country side; usually you will find one by every petrol station, or by shops or restaurants. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition, so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls cost two quarters (50 cents), but in some areas what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and the phone will request an higher amount. It's simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dial the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada. The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the United States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually costs less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phones!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone networks have improved dramatically over the years, and most people carry a cellular phone with them. "Roaming" charges will usually apply when outside of your local coverage area.

Internet cafés are rare and will only exist in main urban and touristic centres. They are not frequented by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding area. In rural areas, Internet may be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.  Many college and university libraries also provide free internet access to the public.  Ask the circulation desk staff. College and university guest accounts will let you use the Internet as much as you like, but only for the current day.

== [[Winter]] hitchhiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes. It's VERY important to make sure you wear the appropriate gear and take precautions to never be stuck anywhere outside without shelter.

In winter the roads can be icy or narrowed by the snowbank, so it will often be hard for cars to stop by and pull over safely. Drivers won't do it if they don't feel safe as the risk of causing an accident might be too high, and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards their [[insurance]].  It's even more important in icy conditions to make sure you find a hitching spot where there is good visibility and a safe place to pull over.

In some areas, especially in the northern territories, every citizen is bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in need from the hazards of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain!?!? being out by this weather!'. Your actions may be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without being prepared for the weather, as most locals prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home in winter storms. For that reason, shops, restaurants, or gas stations usually won't kick you off their property in extreme weather. In the summer it's different, and you may be asked to leave if there is no danger from the outside elements.

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitchhiker might be a hard, especially since 2001. The border control is quite tight, especially since the unproven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada. Questions might be asked about the relations between passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitchhiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that s/he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interrogated).  The vast majority of the drivers will be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the questions as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthusiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be asked to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). Also bear in mind that most Canadian and American land crossing control are separated from each other by a no man's land short distance between the two borders in which you will only be controlled by the welcoming country. So if you get denied entrance by one, you will have further enquiry to enter back into the country you came from.

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't advertise the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
From Summer 2009 on, U.S. and Canadian citizens are required to show a passport to cross the border.

Also, if you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant).

''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''

== Experiences ==
''I have hitchhiked many thousands of miles through most of the provinces. Getting rides is usually slightly easier than the [[United States]], but harder in some places. The cost of food makes travel here very expensive. Border crossing as an American citizen is incredibly frustrating! It usually takes four to six hours of intense interrogation of myself and violation of the privacy of other people in my life. The first time I was held and interrogated for over six hours and eventually turned away because I couldn't provide documentation proving that I had a reason to return to the states; they wanted me to buy a return bus ticket to prove I was only staying a short while, sorry, not happening! Well I got a little crafty with their requirements and subsequent attempts to enter have been easier, heh. You may have to get creative, but where there's a will, there's a way. Don't give up! This is a beautiful country!'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 00:45, 5 June 2013 (CEST)

{{Provinces Canada}}
{{IsIn|North America}}
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Canada]]

[[Category:Canada| ]]

[[de:Kanada]]
[[es:Canadá]]
[[fr:Canada]]
[[visa:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>j806622no88758459v2xs32mq64w2n4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>79126</id>
      <parentid>73918</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-04-06T22:29:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Edward101277</username>
        <id>4545</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12589">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|map = &lt;map lat='60.673178565817715' lng='-97.03125' zoom='2' view='0' float='right' country='Canada'/&gt;
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 34,001,000 (2009 est.)
|currency = Canadian Dollar ($CAD)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ca' /&gt;
|BW = CA
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint-Pierre and Miquelon|Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, see the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is comprised of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country. English, being spoken by 3/4 of the population, is the majority language in most provinces. French is the main official language in the province of Quebec, but also widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is still widely spoken. For the convenience of the common hitchhiker the provinces and territories are discussed in detail, along with their capitals, in separate pages.

Canada is a vast country (the second biggest in the world) and many visitors do not realize its size or extremes in temperature prior to arrival. Certain northern rural regions are inhabited by few or even no permanent population, so it might not always be bright to adventure by yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipment or having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to such a journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3.2 habitants/km², and about 75 % of that population lives in the south, nestled by the US border. It is normal in some parts of the country to drive a hundred kilometres without any living soul.

Even if the country bears some similitude with its southern (and only) neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], the cultural and life outlook of the population is markedly unique.

For a journey across the country, the [[Trans-Canada Highway]] is the main road crossing the country east to west. However, the highway system numbering system is specific to every province.

=== Local Attitude ===
The majority of the Canadian population lives in harmony within their vast country.   The size of the country has allowed people to live using their own beliefs, languages or religion without being bothered by anybody else, in a 'Live and let live' motto.  Therefore, hate crimes are mostly absent and major ''difference'' clashes even rarer, but may exist. It might be useful for a traveler to be aware of the current political situation to avoid getting into a discussion which may offend more than anything else.  Sometimes, during such situations, it might not be helpful to hitchhike as a white in a First Nation reserve, or sound French in an English area, or visa versa.  That said, Canadians are generally friendly and forget their stereotypes once they meet you in person.

The rural population will usually be keen to help if the traveler is making the first steps into breaking the 'stranger in the locality' image, as the split between country- and city-folk is also existent. The rural community feeling is usually pretty strong and when people believe you belong there and act more altruistic. However, some rural regions have large populations of urban commuters which has the tendency to bring a more individualistic mentality.

It is worth noting that in Quebec, the carshare website "AmigoExpress" is extremely popular. Worth checking out if a bit pressed for time and have a bit of cash to spare. There are more than 50 rides a day between Quebec and Montreal at costs of 10-15 CAD.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like its southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

== Telecommunication ==
The best and cheapest way is to contact people in the area you are is to find the nearest phone booth. There are plenty within the cities and even the in country side; usually you will find one by every petrol station, or by shops or restaurants. Unlike many countries, they are usually in good condition, so always make sure to have a pre-paid phone-card or a few 'quarters' available. Local calls cost two quarters (50 cents), but in some areas what seems to be a local call will in fact be a 'long distance call' and the phone will request an higher amount. It's simplest to call using pre-paid calling cards.  You can make calls from public phones without using coins when you dial the card's toll-free "1-800" number, and, for many of these cards, there is no extra fee for making the call from a public phone.  Credit is deducted from the card at the same rate as with calls from land-lines.  Most cards will cost somewhere between 2 and 10 cents per minute for calls to anywhere in Canada. The same, or similar, rates will often apply to calls to the United States and parts of Europe as well.

If the person you are trying to contact is expecting a call from you, and you don't have a pre-paid phone card, you can also try to call them 'collect'. It usually costs less than the amount requested by the booth and it is normal practice (does not apply for mobile phones!) to receive and accept collect call. To do a collect call, simply dial '0' and follow the instructions of the operator.

Mobile phone networks have improved dramatically over the years, and most people carry a cellular phone with them. "Roaming" charges will usually apply when outside of your local coverage area.

Internet cafés are rare and will only exist in main urban and touristic centres. They are not frequented by locals, so it is possible that nobody knows if there is one in the surrounding area. In rural areas, Internet may be limited to dial-up only. In most Canadian cities and towns of significant size, there are public libraries which offer free internet access to the general public - regardless of where you are from.  This is generally the best bet for travelers without their own computer or access to a friend's. If there are several people waiting to use them though, you may have to wait a while for one to be available.  You'll usually be given a time block of anywhere from 15 minutes to one hour.  Many college and university libraries also provide free internet access to the public.  Ask the circulation desk staff. College and university guest accounts will let you use the Internet as much as you like, but only for the current day.

== [[Winter]] hitchhiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes. It's VERY important to make sure you wear the appropriate gear and take precautions to never be stuck anywhere outside without shelter.

In winter the roads can be icy or narrowed by the snowbank, so it will often be hard for cars to stop by and pull over safely. Drivers won't do it if they don't feel safe as the risk of causing an accident might be too high, and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards their [[insurance]].  It's even more important in icy conditions to make sure you find a hitching spot where there is good visibility and a safe place to pull over.

In some areas, especially in the northern territories, every citizen is bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in need from the hazards of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain!?!? being out by this weather!'. Your actions may be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without being prepared for the weather, as most locals prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home in winter storms. For that reason, shops, restaurants, or gas stations usually won't kick you off their property in extreme weather. In the summer it's different, and you may be asked to leave if there is no danger from the outside elements.

== Border Crossing ==
Canada has only one neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], and even if this border is known as the longest unprotected border in the world, entering the country as a backpacker, hiker or hitchhiker might be a hard, especially since 2001. The border control is quite tight, especially since the unproven allegation that some terrorists came from Canada. Questions might be asked about the relations between passengers in a car.

Because of these strong security measures, a hitchhiker probably will have to cross the border by foot and start again once the control is done. You might also discuss with your driver beforehand in the matter to get to know each other and to ensure that everything will be alright with the crossing and that s/he is fine with the hassle (or fine waiting for you if you are being interrogated).  The vast majority of the drivers will be frisky at helping a stranger to cross from Canada to the States in their car. The best way to be at a border control is too remain calm, be confident, do not lie and simply answer the questions as asked without being witty or vague. Just remember that you do not have to tell that you are bumming around and bring some suspicious travelling plan (yes, hiking and hitching around in a ''blown by the wind way'' is a suspicious thing! Especially for the the average citizen!). So just be reliable, show enthusiasm and that your adventure is part of a life plan holiday... not a way to escape reality.

It is custom to be asked to prove that you have the means to sustain your holiday (money) and that your holiday is part of a plan (a return ticket). Also bear in mind that most Canadian and American land crossing control are separated from each other by a no man's land short distance between the two borders in which you will only be controlled by the welcoming country. So if you get denied entrance by one, you will have further enquiry to enter back into the country you came from.

===== While Crossing the Border =====
Don't panic! Just because a border guard treats you like a scumbag doesn't mean you are one. Armed with this attitude try and maintain your dignity and self-confidence throughout the encounter and the guard will more likely respect you (even if he or she doesn't show it). Trust me, things will go more smoothly. If you're passing the border inside a car, don't advertise the fact that you are a hitchhiker. But if it becomes obvious, don't try and deny it, either. Remember, there's no shame in hitching.

=== Passports for U.S. and Canadian citizens ===
From Summer 2009 on, U.S. and Canadian citizens are required to show a passport to cross the border.

Also, if you are a U.S. citizen going into Canada or a Canadian going into the U.S., a guard can deny you entry for a number of reasons (usually because of a criminal record or you don't look like you have enough money for lunch at a fast-food restaurant).

''Every border crossing point will usually be discussed in greater details in the appropriate province page.''

== Experiences ==
''I have hitchhiked many thousands of miles through most of the provinces. Getting rides is usually slightly easier than the [[United States]], but harder in some places. The cost of food makes travel here very expensive. Border crossing as an American citizen is incredibly frustrating! It usually takes four to six hours of intense interrogation of myself and violation of the privacy of other people in my life. The first time I was held and interrogated for over six hours and eventually turned away because I couldn't provide documentation proving that I had a reason to return to the states; they wanted me to buy a return bus ticket to prove I was only staying a short while, sorry, not happening! Well I got a little crafty with their requirements and subsequent attempts to enter have been easier, heh. You may have to get creative, but where there's a will, there's a way. Don't give up! This is a beautiful country!'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 00:45, 5 June 2013 (CEST)

{{Provinces Canada}}
{{IsIn|North America}}
__NOTOC__

[[trash:Canada]]

[[Category:Canada| ]]

[[de:Kanada]]
[[es:Canadá]]
[[fr:Canada]]
[[visa:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>cfsja9zftomrjat9gt8s703hfb0eczk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>89505</id>
      <parentid>79126</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-10-04T23:43:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Traumschule</username>
        <id>28627</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6846">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|map = &lt;map lat='60.673178565817715' lng='-97.03125' zoom='2' view='0' float='right' country='Canada'/&gt;
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 34,001,000 (2009 est.)
|currency = Canadian Dollar ($CAD)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ca' /&gt;
|BW = CA
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint-Pierre and Miquelon|Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, see the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is comprised of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country. English, being spoken by 3/4 of the population, is the majority language in most provinces. French is the main official language in the province of Quebec, but also widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is still widely spoken. For the convenience of the common hitchhiker the provinces and territories are discussed in detail, along with their capitals, in separate pages.

For a journey across the country, the [[Trans-Canada Highway]] is the main road crossing the country east to west. However, the highway system numbering system is specific to every province.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like its southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

=== Local attitude ===
Even if the country bears some similitude with its southern (and only) neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], the cultural and life outlook of the population is markedly unique.

The majority of the Canadian population lives in harmony within their vast country.   The size of the country has allowed people to live using their own beliefs, languages or religion without being bothered by anybody else, in a 'Live and let live' motto.  Therefore, hate crimes are mostly absent and major ''difference'' clashes even rarer, but may exist. It might be useful for a traveler to be aware of the current political situation to avoid getting into a discussion which may offend more than anything else.  Sometimes, during such situations, it might not be helpful to hitchhike as a white in a First Nation reserve, or sound French in an English area, or visa versa.  That said, Canadians are generally friendly and forget their stereotypes once they meet you in person.

The rural population will usually be keen to help if the traveler is making the first steps into breaking the 'stranger in the locality' image, as the split between country- and city-folk is also existent. The rural community feeling is usually pretty strong and when people believe you belong there and act more altruistic. However, some rural regions have large populations of urban commuters which has the tendency to bring a more individualistic mentality.

It is worth noting that in Quebec, the carshare website "AmigoExpress" is extremely popular. Worth checking out if a bit pressed for time and have a bit of cash to spare. There are more than 50 rides a day between Quebec and Montreal at costs of 10-15 CAD.

== [[Winter]] hitchhiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

Canada is a vast country (the second biggest in the world) and many visitors do not realize its size or extremes in temperature prior to arrival. Certain northern rural regions are inhabited by few or even no permanent population, so it might not always be bright to adventure by yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipment or having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to such a journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3.2 habitants/km², and about 75 % of that population lives in the south, nestled by the US border. It is normal in some parts of the country to drive a hundred kilometres without any living soul.

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes. It's VERY important to make sure you wear the appropriate gear and take precautions to never be stuck anywhere outside without shelter.

In winter the roads can be icy or narrowed by the snowbank, so it will often be hard for cars to stop by and pull over safely. Drivers won't do it if they don't feel safe as the risk of causing an accident might be too high, and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards their [[insurance]].  It's even more important in icy conditions to make sure you find a hitching spot where there is good visibility and a safe place to pull over.

In some areas, especially in the northern territories, every citizen is bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in need from the hazards of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain!?!? being out by this weather!'. Your actions may be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without being prepared for the weather, as most locals prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home in winter storms. For that reason, shops, restaurants, or gas stations usually won't kick you off their property in extreme weather. In the summer it's different, and you may be asked to leave if there is no danger from the outside elements.

== Experiences ==
''I have hitchhiked many thousands of miles through most of the provinces. Getting rides is usually slightly easier than the [[United States]], but harder in some places. The cost of food makes travel here very expensive. Border crossing as an American citizen is incredibly frustrating! It usually takes four to six hours of intense interrogation of myself and violation of the privacy of other people in my life. The first time I was held and interrogated for over six hours and eventually turned away because I couldn't provide documentation proving that I had a reason to return to the states; they wanted me to buy a return bus ticket to prove I was only staying a short while, sorry, not happening! Well I got a little crafty with their requirements and subsequent attempts to enter have been easier, heh. You may have to get creative, but where there's a will, there's a way. Don't give up! This is a beautiful country!'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 00:45, 5 June 2013 (CEST)

== Resources ==
{{nomadwiki}}

{{Provinces Canada}}
{{IsIn|North America}}
[[Category:Canada| ]]

[[de:Kanada]]
[[es:Canadá]]
[[fr:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>fcyjskhz5cpwc6etoqqon7xa1egd95g</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>99342</id>
      <parentid>89505</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-10-02T15:07:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Resources */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6859">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|map = &lt;map lat='60.673178565817715' lng='-97.03125' zoom='2' view='0' float='right' country='Canada'/&gt;
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 34,001,000 (2009 est.)
|currency = Canadian Dollar ($CAD)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ca' /&gt;
|BW = CA
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint-Pierre and Miquelon|Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, see the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is comprised of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country. English, being spoken by 3/4 of the population, is the majority language in most provinces. French is the main official language in the province of Quebec, but also widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is still widely spoken. For the convenience of the common hitchhiker the provinces and territories are discussed in detail, along with their capitals, in separate pages.

For a journey across the country, the [[Trans-Canada Highway]] is the main road crossing the country east to west. However, the highway system numbering system is specific to every province.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like its southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

=== Local attitude ===
Even if the country bears some similitude with its southern (and only) neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], the cultural and life outlook of the population is markedly unique.

The majority of the Canadian population lives in harmony within their vast country.   The size of the country has allowed people to live using their own beliefs, languages or religion without being bothered by anybody else, in a 'Live and let live' motto.  Therefore, hate crimes are mostly absent and major ''difference'' clashes even rarer, but may exist. It might be useful for a traveler to be aware of the current political situation to avoid getting into a discussion which may offend more than anything else.  Sometimes, during such situations, it might not be helpful to hitchhike as a white in a First Nation reserve, or sound French in an English area, or visa versa.  That said, Canadians are generally friendly and forget their stereotypes once they meet you in person.

The rural population will usually be keen to help if the traveler is making the first steps into breaking the 'stranger in the locality' image, as the split between country- and city-folk is also existent. The rural community feeling is usually pretty strong and when people believe you belong there and act more altruistic. However, some rural regions have large populations of urban commuters which has the tendency to bring a more individualistic mentality.

It is worth noting that in Quebec, the carshare website "AmigoExpress" is extremely popular. Worth checking out if a bit pressed for time and have a bit of cash to spare. There are more than 50 rides a day between Quebec and Montreal at costs of 10-15 CAD.

== [[Winter]] hitchhiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

Canada is a vast country (the second biggest in the world) and many visitors do not realize its size or extremes in temperature prior to arrival. Certain northern rural regions are inhabited by few or even no permanent population, so it might not always be bright to adventure by yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipment or having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to such a journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3.2 habitants/km², and about 75 % of that population lives in the south, nestled by the US border. It is normal in some parts of the country to drive a hundred kilometres without any living soul.

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes. It's VERY important to make sure you wear the appropriate gear and take precautions to never be stuck anywhere outside without shelter.

In winter the roads can be icy or narrowed by the snowbank, so it will often be hard for cars to stop by and pull over safely. Drivers won't do it if they don't feel safe as the risk of causing an accident might be too high, and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards their [[insurance]].  It's even more important in icy conditions to make sure you find a hitching spot where there is good visibility and a safe place to pull over.

In some areas, especially in the northern territories, every citizen is bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in need from the hazards of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain!?!? being out by this weather!'. Your actions may be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without being prepared for the weather, as most locals prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home in winter storms. For that reason, shops, restaurants, or gas stations usually won't kick you off their property in extreme weather. In the summer it's different, and you may be asked to leave if there is no danger from the outside elements.

== Experiences ==
''I have hitchhiked many thousands of miles through most of the provinces. Getting rides is usually slightly easier than the [[United States]], but harder in some places. The cost of food makes travel here very expensive. Border crossing as an American citizen is incredibly frustrating! It usually takes four to six hours of intense interrogation of myself and violation of the privacy of other people in my life. The first time I was held and interrogated for over six hours and eventually turned away because I couldn't provide documentation proving that I had a reason to return to the states; they wanted me to buy a return bus ticket to prove I was only staying a short while, sorry, not happening! Well I got a little crafty with their requirements and subsequent attempts to enter have been easier, heh. You may have to get creative, but where there's a will, there's a way. Don't give up! This is a beautiful country!'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 00:45, 5 June 2013 (CEST)

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{Provinces Canada}}
{{IsIn|North America}}
[[Category:Canada| ]]

[[de:Kanada]]
[[es:Canadá]]
[[fr:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>5vp99pav2p26lxan2ohevplxx0xw747</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101186</id>
      <parentid>99342</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-05T15:25:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Experiences */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6868">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|map = &lt;map lat='60.673178565817715' lng='-97.03125' zoom='2' view='0' float='right' country='Canada'/&gt;
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 34,001,000 (2009 est.)
|currency = Canadian Dollar ($CAD)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ca' /&gt;
|BW = CA
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint-Pierre and Miquelon|Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, see the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is comprised of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country. English, being spoken by 3/4 of the population, is the majority language in most provinces. French is the main official language in the province of Quebec, but also widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is still widely spoken. For the convenience of the common hitchhiker the provinces and territories are discussed in detail, along with their capitals, in separate pages.

For a journey across the country, the [[Trans-Canada Highway]] is the main road crossing the country east to west. However, the highway system numbering system is specific to every province.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like its southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

=== Local attitude ===
Even if the country bears some similitude with its southern (and only) neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], the cultural and life outlook of the population is markedly unique.

The majority of the Canadian population lives in harmony within their vast country.   The size of the country has allowed people to live using their own beliefs, languages or religion without being bothered by anybody else, in a 'Live and let live' motto.  Therefore, hate crimes are mostly absent and major ''difference'' clashes even rarer, but may exist. It might be useful for a traveler to be aware of the current political situation to avoid getting into a discussion which may offend more than anything else.  Sometimes, during such situations, it might not be helpful to hitchhike as a white in a First Nation reserve, or sound French in an English area, or visa versa.  That said, Canadians are generally friendly and forget their stereotypes once they meet you in person.

The rural population will usually be keen to help if the traveler is making the first steps into breaking the 'stranger in the locality' image, as the split between country- and city-folk is also existent. The rural community feeling is usually pretty strong and when people believe you belong there and act more altruistic. However, some rural regions have large populations of urban commuters which has the tendency to bring a more individualistic mentality.

It is worth noting that in Quebec, the carshare website "AmigoExpress" is extremely popular. Worth checking out if a bit pressed for time and have a bit of cash to spare. There are more than 50 rides a day between Quebec and Montreal at costs of 10-15 CAD.

== [[Winter]] hitchhiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

Canada is a vast country (the second biggest in the world) and many visitors do not realize its size or extremes in temperature prior to arrival. Certain northern rural regions are inhabited by few or even no permanent population, so it might not always be bright to adventure by yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipment or having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to such a journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3.2 habitants/km², and about 75 % of that population lives in the south, nestled by the US border. It is normal in some parts of the country to drive a hundred kilometres without any living soul.

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes. It's VERY important to make sure you wear the appropriate gear and take precautions to never be stuck anywhere outside without shelter.

In winter the roads can be icy or narrowed by the snowbank, so it will often be hard for cars to stop by and pull over safely. Drivers won't do it if they don't feel safe as the risk of causing an accident might be too high, and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards their [[insurance]].  It's even more important in icy conditions to make sure you find a hitching spot where there is good visibility and a safe place to pull over.

In some areas, especially in the northern territories, every citizen is bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in need from the hazards of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain!?!? being out by this weather!'. Your actions may be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without being prepared for the weather, as most locals prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home in winter storms. For that reason, shops, restaurants, or gas stations usually won't kick you off their property in extreme weather. In the summer it's different, and you may be asked to leave if there is no danger from the outside elements.

== Personal Experiences ==
''I have hitchhiked many thousands of miles through most of the provinces. Getting rides is usually slightly easier than the [[United States]], but harder in some places. The cost of food makes travel here very expensive. Border crossing as an American citizen is incredibly frustrating! It usually takes four to six hours of intense interrogation of myself and violation of the privacy of other people in my life. The first time I was held and interrogated for over six hours and eventually turned away because I couldn't provide documentation proving that I had a reason to return to the states; they wanted me to buy a return bus ticket to prove I was only staying a short while, sorry, not happening! Well I got a little crafty with their requirements and subsequent attempts to enter have been easier, heh. You may have to get creative, but where there's a will, there's a way. Don't give up! This is a beautiful country!'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 00:45, 5 June 2013 (CEST)

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{Provinces Canada}}
{{IsIn|North America}}
[[Category:Canada| ]]

[[de:Kanada]]
[[es:Canadá]]
[[fr:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>t9qzqlyz0ezuv05wdfw1idg5khkkrk0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105370</id>
      <parentid>101186</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-02-22T17:14:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Hitchhikernick</username>
        <id>47454</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Personal Experiences */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8020">{{Infobox Country
|country = Canada
|map = &lt;map lat='60.673178565817715' lng='-97.03125' zoom='2' view='0' float='right' country='Canada'/&gt;
|language = English, French
|capital = [[Ottawa]]
|pop = 34,001,000 (2009 est.)
|currency = Canadian Dollar ($CAD)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='ca' /&gt;
|BW = CA
|neighbour = ([[Greenland]]), [[Saint-Pierre and Miquelon|Saint Pierre and Miquelon]] (''incorporated''), [[United States of America]]
}}
'''For specific information about provinces and territories, see the bottom of the page.'''

'''Canada''' is the northernmost country of [[North America]] and is comprised of ten provinces and three territories. English and French are the two official languages of the country. English, being spoken by 3/4 of the population, is the majority language in most provinces. French is the main official language in the province of Quebec, but also widely spoken in New Brunswick and some areas of Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and Manitoba. Inuktitut is the main language in Nunavut and has official status there but English is still widely spoken. For the convenience of the common hitchhiker the provinces and territories are discussed in detail, along with their capitals, in separate pages.

For a journey across the country, the [[Trans-Canada Highway]] is the main road crossing the country east to west. However, the highway system numbering system is specific to every province.

=== Car Number Plate ===
Just like its southern neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], every provinces are issuing their own specific car plates. For example, a car from Manitoba will have a specific [[wikipedia:License plates of Canada|Car licenses]] tagged as such.

=== Local attitude ===
Even if the country bears some similitude with its southern (and only) neighbour, the [[United States of America|United States]], the cultural and life outlook of the population is markedly unique.

The majority of the Canadian population lives in harmony within their vast country.   The size of the country has allowed people to live using their own beliefs, languages or religion without being bothered by anybody else, in a 'Live and let live' motto.  Therefore, hate crimes are mostly absent and major ''difference'' clashes even rarer, but may exist. It might be useful for a traveler to be aware of the current political situation to avoid getting into a discussion which may offend more than anything else.  Sometimes, during such situations, it might not be helpful to hitchhike as a white in a First Nation reserve, or sound French in an English area, or visa versa.  That said, Canadians are generally friendly and forget their stereotypes once they meet you in person.

The rural population will usually be keen to help if the traveler is making the first steps into breaking the 'stranger in the locality' image, as the split between country- and city-folk is also existent. The rural community feeling is usually pretty strong and when people believe you belong there and act more altruistic. However, some rural regions have large populations of urban commuters which has the tendency to bring a more individualistic mentality.

It is worth noting that in Quebec, the carshare website "AmigoExpress" is extremely popular. Worth checking out if a bit pressed for time and have a bit of cash to spare. There are more than 50 rides a day between Quebec and Montreal at costs of 10-15 CAD.

== [[Winter]] hitchhiking ==
'''Be careful!'''

Canada is a vast country (the second biggest in the world) and many visitors do not realize its size or extremes in temperature prior to arrival. Certain northern rural regions are inhabited by few or even no permanent population, so it might not always be bright to adventure by yourself into some wild or less inhabited part of the country without the proper equipment or having registered yourself to some local authorities prior to such a journey. As a simple reminder, the density of population is about 3.2 habitants/km², and about 75 % of that population lives in the south, nestled by the US border. It is normal in some parts of the country to drive a hundred kilometres without any living soul.

With temperature often dropping beneath −30 Celsius, you should not stand outside more than 15 minutes. It's VERY important to make sure you wear the appropriate gear and take precautions to never be stuck anywhere outside without shelter.

In winter the roads can be icy or narrowed by the snowbank, so it will often be hard for cars to stop by and pull over safely. Drivers won't do it if they don't feel safe as the risk of causing an accident might be too high, and the driver would have to bear entire responsibility of it towards their [[insurance]].  It's even more important in icy conditions to make sure you find a hitching spot where there is good visibility and a safe place to pull over.

In some areas, especially in the northern territories, every citizen is bound by law to provide help and safety to every citizen in need from the hazards of temperature and nature. The reaction towards that will often differ, going from immediate support to a 'where have you left your brain!?!? being out by this weather!'. Your actions may be perceived as quite stupid and irresponsible to have dared outside without being prepared for the weather, as most locals prefer to enjoy the cosiness of their home in winter storms. For that reason, shops, restaurants, or gas stations usually won't kick you off their property in extreme weather. In the summer it's different, and you may be asked to leave if there is no danger from the outside elements.

== Personal Experiences ==
''I have hitchhiked many thousands of miles through most of the provinces. Getting rides is usually slightly easier than the [[United States]], but harder in some places. The cost of food makes travel here very expensive. Border crossing as an American citizen is incredibly frustrating! It usually takes four to six hours of intense interrogation of myself and violation of the privacy of other people in my life. The first time I was held and interrogated for over six hours and eventually turned away because I couldn't provide documentation proving that I had a reason to return to the states; they wanted me to buy a return bus ticket to prove I was only staying a short while, sorry, not happening! Well I got a little crafty with their requirements and subsequent attempts to enter have been easier, heh. You may have to get creative, but where there's a will, there's a way. Don't give up! This is a beautiful country!'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 00:45, 5 June 2013 (CEST)

Hitchhikernick - I have hitched across the country twice from west to east and been up to Alaska 3 times.  Generally hitching is pretty reasonable though there can be tough spots like I experienced on the north side of lake superior, west coast north of Kitwanga on highway 37, Dempster highway to Inuvik (crazy Japanese guy pulling a cart whilst walking from whitehorse to Tuk and saw two grizzlies straight out of hibernation 10 miles beyond him next to the road) and road to Yellowknife.  Nearly got stuck south of Calgary where temps were about to drop to -40, but managed to convince a truck driver to drive me to Montana, so be well prepared for cold.  Never had issues getting into Canada being a Brit and most overland borders into USA have  been easy going though the border between Seattle and Vancouver can be a little more strict at times. Average waiting time 3hrs.  Most of my hitching has been around BC and it's pretty good there, it's technically illegal but I have never had any issues with cops about this. Be a little careful around Thunder Bay area as few methheads and one driver I got a lift with was windscreen punching loopy.

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{Provinces Canada}}
{{IsIn|North America}}
[[Category:Canada| ]]

[[de:Kanada]]
[[es:Canadá]]
[[fr:Canada]]</text>
      <sha1>mar618jjypwn3f0ajt4l9galqtyd14y</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Norway</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1545</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1595</id>
      <parentid>4538</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-03-29T17:41:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1195">'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location!
Hitching in big cities is almost impossible, unless it's weekend. People have a tendancy to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in Norway: "there is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing".

Places close to small towns are good hitching spots. But do take care of your appearance, as people are a bit judging in this country. 

You should definitely write your destination (if you know it) on a big piece of paper, with a thick marker. Don't necessarily write your final destination, but the next town or city in your desired direction is a good start, once you're in the car you can find out if it's going any further. 

Also, you can contact truck drivers and companies to hitch a ride if you're traveling far. 

Most people speak English well enough for reasonable communication.

Don't try hitchhiking out of Oslo's airport.

&lt;!-- I also think there is an official website where people coordinate there trips, try to google it. 

GOOD LUCK! --&gt;

==Cities==
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* 
[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>pu17gi7dy19vvbr8e3qknd357dk8hyn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1596</id>
      <parentid>1595</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1195">'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location!
Hitching in big cities is almost impossible, unless it's weekend. People have a tendancy to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in Norway: "there is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing".

Places close to small towns are good hitching spots. But do take care of your appearance, as people are a bit judging in this country. 

You should definitely write your destination (if you know it) on a big piece of paper, with a thick marker. Don't necessarily write your final destination, but the next town or city in your desired direction is a good start, once you're in the car you can find out if it's going any further. 

Also, you can contact truck drivers and companies to hitch a ride if you're traveling far. 

Most people speak English well enough for reasonable communication.

Don't try hitchhiking out of Oslo's airport.

&lt;!-- I also think there is an official website where people coordinate there trips, try to google it. 

GOOD LUCK! --&gt;

==Cities==
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* 
[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>pu17gi7dy19vvbr8e3qknd357dk8hyn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4537</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T21:22:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1163">'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location!
Hitching in big cities is almost impossible, unless it's weekend. People have a tendancy to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in Norway: "there is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing".

Places close to small towns are good hitching spots. But do take care of your appearance, as people are a bit judging in this country. 

You should definitely write your destination (if you know it) on a big piece of paper, with a thick marker. Don't necessarily write your final destination, but the next town or city in your desired direction is a good start, once you're in the car you can find out if it's going any further. 

Also, you can contact truck drivers and companies to hitch a ride if you're traveling far. 

Most people speak English well enough for reasonable communication.

Don't try hitchhiking out of Oslo's airport.

&lt;!-- I also think there is an official website where people coordinate there trips, try to google it. 

GOOD LUCK! --&gt;

[[Category:Northern Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>90kxgxurs2agvtapt0n6akrehc0p2a3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4538</id>
      <parentid>4537</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-03-29T17:40:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1154">'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location!
Hitching in big cities is almost impossible, unless it's weekend. People have a tendancy to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in Norway: "there is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing".

Places close to small towns are good hitching spots. But do take care of your appearance, as people are a bit judging in this country. 

You should definitely write your destination (if you know it) on a big piece of paper, with a thick marker. Don't necessarily write your final destination, but the next town or city in your desired direction is a good start, once you're in the car you can find out if it's going any further. 

Also, you can contact truck drivers and companies to hitch a ride if you're traveling far. 

Most people speak English well enough for reasonable communication.

Don't try hitchhiking out of Oslo's airport.

&lt;!-- I also think there is an official website where people coordinate there trips, try to google it. 

GOOD LUCK! --&gt;

[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>mteo76en2latcasp55gq2getcyq4dge</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4539</id>
      <parentid>1596</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:20:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1195">'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location!
Hitching in big cities is almost impossible, unless it's weekend. People have a tendancy to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in Norway: "there is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing".

Places close to small towns are good hitching spots. But do take care of your appearance, as people are a bit judging in this country. 

You should definitely write your destination (if you know it) on a big piece of paper, with a thick marker. Don't necessarily write your final destination, but the next town or city in your desired direction is a good start, once you're in the car you can find out if it's going any further. 

Also, you can contact truck drivers and companies to hitch a ride if you're traveling far. 

Most people speak English well enough for reasonable communication.

Don't try hitchhiking out of Oslo's airport.

&lt;!-- I also think there is an official website where people coordinate there trips, try to google it. 

GOOD LUCK! --&gt;

==Cities==
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* 
[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>pu17gi7dy19vvbr8e3qknd357dk8hyn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9843</id>
      <parentid>4539</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-17T23:06:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1226">'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location!
Hitching in big cities is almost impossible, unless it's weekend. People have a tendancy to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in Norway: "there is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing".

Places close to small towns are good hitching spots. But do take care of your appearance, as people are a bit judging in this country. 

You should definitely write your destination (if you know it) on a big piece of paper, with a thick marker. Don't necessarily write your final destination, but the next town or city in your desired direction is a good start, once you're in the car you can find out if it's going any further. 

Also, you can contact truck drivers and companies to hitch a ride if you're traveling far. 

Most people speak English well enough for reasonable communication.

Don't try hitchhiking out of Oslo's airport.

&lt;!-- I also think there is an official website where people coordinate there trips, try to google it. 

GOOD LUCK! --&gt;

==Cities==
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Narvik]]

[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Norway]]</text>
      <sha1>jzjfjgafdtrwc5vw99530btronu14b6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9844</id>
      <parentid>9843</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-17T23:08:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3053">'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location!
Hitching in big cities is almost impossible, unless it's weekend. People have a tendancy to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in Norway: "there is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing".

Places close to small towns are good hitching spots. But do take care of your appearance, as people are a bit judging in this country. 

You should definitely write your destination (if you know it) on a big piece of paper, with a thick marker. Don't necessarily write your final destination, but the next town or city in your desired direction is a good start, once you're in the car you can find out if it's going any further. 

Also, you can contact truck drivers and companies to hitch a ride if you're traveling far. 

Most people speak English well enough for reasonable communication.

Don't try hitchhiking out of Oslo's airport.


[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people.  Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee.  

Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien.  This has not worked for me.

They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.

One thing that makes hitching easy in Norway is that almost all of the population lives near the E6 road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.  

North is spelled "NORD" and south is "SOR," with a slash through the "O," which gives it a short sound, as opposed to the unslashed "O," which is pronounced "oo," as in "book."

To go north, a convenient place is Inherredsveien, around where it crosses Mellomveien.  You can get there by crossing one of the bridges bridge east of the train station, Bakke Bur (bridge) or Nidelv Bru.  Inherredsveien becomes the E6.  

To go South, you can intercept the E6 at Heimdal, near the train station, by taking a train or city bus south.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in Norway, but not illegal from rest stops or on ramps.  It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently.

Hithing is MUCH easier in the beautiful north (at least in the Summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.


==Cities==
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Narvik]]

[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Norway]]</text>
      <sha1>a5vqeovh8iyt3gxu7cl248g4t9bzmm7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9847</id>
      <parentid>9844</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-17T23:11:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2700">'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location!
Hitching in big cities is almost impossible, unless it's weekend. People have a tendancy to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in Norway: "there is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing".

Places close to small towns are good hitching spots. But do take care of your appearance, as people are a bit judging in this country. 

You should definitely write your destination (if you know it) on a big piece of paper, with a thick marker. Don't necessarily write your final destination, but the next town or city in your desired direction is a good start, once you're in the car you can find out if it's going any further. 

Also, you can contact truck drivers and companies to hitch a ride if you're traveling far. 

Most people speak English well enough for reasonable communication.

Don't try hitchhiking out of Oslo's airport.


[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people.  Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee.  

Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien.  This has not worked for me.

They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.

One thing that makes hitching easy in Norway is that almost all of the population lives near the E6 road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.  

North is spelled "NORD" and south is "SOR," with a slash through the "O," which gives it a short sound, as opposed to the unslashed "O," which is pronounced "oo," as in "book."

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in Norway, but not illegal from rest stops or on ramps.  It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently.

Hithing is MUCH easier in the beautiful north (at least in the Summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.


==Cities==
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Narvik]]

[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Norway]]</text>
      <sha1>eb4xmut2mkoixrwmjslsk81eqz2l7ao</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9849</id>
      <parentid>9847</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-17T23:15:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2678">'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location!
Hitching in big cities is almost impossible, unless it's weekend. People have a tendancy to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in Norway: "there is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing".

Places close to small towns are good hitching spots. But do take care of your appearance, as people are a bit judging in this country. 

You should definitely write your destination (if you know it) on a big piece of paper, with a thick marker. Don't necessarily write your final destination, but the next town or city in your desired direction is a good start, once you're in the car you can find out if it's going any further. 

Also, you can contact truck drivers and companies to hitch a ride if you're traveling far. 

Most people speak English well enough for reasonable communication.

Don't try hitchhiking out of Oslo's airport.


[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people.  Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee.  

Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien.  This has not worked for me.

They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.

One thing that makes hitching easy in Norway is that almost all of the population lives near the E6 road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.  

North is spelled ''"nord"'' and south is ''"sør"''. The ''ø'' gives it a short sound, as opposed to "o",  which is pronounced ''"oo"'', as in ''"book"''.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in Norway, but not illegal from rest stops or on ramps. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently.

Hithing is MUCH easier in the beautiful north (at least in the Summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.


==Cities==
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Narvik]]

[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Norway]]</text>
      <sha1>dn3fojqvoyc6t89ibjycgalvnnzl9ez</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10700</id>
      <parentid>9849</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-02T13:17:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Abstorz</username>
        <id>73</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3527">'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location!
Hitching in big cities is almost impossible, unless it's weekend. People have a tendancy to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in Norway: "there is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing".

Places close to small towns are good hitching spots. But do take care of your appearance, as people are a bit judging in this country. 

You should definitely write your destination (if you know it) on a big piece of paper, with a thick marker. Don't necessarily write your final destination, but the next town or city in your desired direction is a good start, once you're in the car you can find out if it's going any further. 

Also, you can contact truck drivers and companies to hitch a ride if you're traveling far. 

Most people speak English well enough for reasonable communication.

Don't try hitchhiking out of Oslo's airport.


[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people.  Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee.  

Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien.  This has not worked for me.

They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.

One thing that makes hitching easy in Norway is that almost all of the population lives near the E6 road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.  

North is spelled ''"nord"'' and south is ''"sør"''. The ''ø'' gives it a short sound, as opposed to "o",  which is pronounced ''"oo"'', as in ''"book"''.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in Norway, but not illegal from rest stops or on ramps. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently.

Hithing is MUCH easier in the beautiful north (at least in the Summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

Even though "haike" is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. It is always hard to find a spot to get out of big Cities though. 

If you want to get out of Oslo, you should definitely get behind the E6 tunnel, in the inner city it's worthless. There are several highway entrances behind the tunnel, the further out, the easier it get's. Around IKEA is the area where most trucks start. 

[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the highway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the highway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås.


==Cities==
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Narvik]]

[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Norway]]</text>
      <sha1>2knrbuu8znkisqc8txhsw4t35atpzer</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10701</id>
      <parentid>10700</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-02T13:36:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Abstorz</username>
        <id>73</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3204">'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! 

Even though "haike" is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. It is always hard to find a spot to get out of big Cities though. 
People have a tendancy to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in Norway: "there is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing".

Places close to small towns are good hitching spots. But do take care of your appearance, as people are a bit judging in this country. 

You should definitely write your destination (if you know it) on a big piece of paper, with a thick marker. Don't necessarily write your final destination, but the next town or city in your desired direction is a good start, once you're in the car you can find out if it's going any further. 

Also, you can contact truck drivers and companies to hitch a ride if you're traveling far. 

Most people speak English well enough for reasonable communication.

Don't try hitchhiking out of Oslo's airport.


[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people.  Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee.  

Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien.  This has not worked for me.

They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.

One thing that makes hitching easy in Norway is that almost all of the population lives near the E6 road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.  

North is spelled ''"nord"'' and south is ''"sør"''. The ''ø'' gives it a short sound, as opposed to "o",  which is pronounced ''"oo"'', as in ''"book"''.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in Norway, but not illegal from rest stops or on ramps. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently.

Hithing is MUCH easier in the beautiful north (at least in the Summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the highway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the highway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås.


==Cities==
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Narvik]]

[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Norway]]</text>
      <sha1>rqokkqtznnbdt63idqoipvzdp20cp4t</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10702</id>
      <parentid>10701</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-02T13:51:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Abstorz</username>
        <id>73</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3292">'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! 

Even though "haike" is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. It is always hard to find a spot to get out of big Cities though. 
People have a tendancy to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in Norway: "there is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing".

Places close to small towns are good hitching spots. But do take care of your appearance, as people are a bit judging in this country. 

You should definitely write your destination (if you know it) on a big piece of paper, with a thick marker. Don't necessarily write your final destination, but the next town or city in your desired direction is a good start, once you're in the car you can find out if it's going any further. 

Also, you can contact truck drivers and companies to hitch a ride if you're traveling far. 

Most people speak English well enough for reasonable communication.

Don't try hitchhiking out of Oslo's airport.


[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people.  Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee.  

Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien.  This has not worked for me.

They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.

One thing that makes hitching easy in Norway is that almost all of the population lives near the E6 road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.  

North is spelled ''"nord"'' and south is ''"sør"''. The ''ø'' gives it a short sound, as opposed to "o",  which is pronounced ''"oo"'', as in ''"book"''.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in Norway, but not illegal from rest stops or on ramps. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently.

Hithing is MUCH easier in the beautiful north (at least in the Summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the highway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the highway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check http://www.liftershalte.info/index.php for exact locations, or find better ones! 


==Cities==
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Narvik]]

[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Norway]]</text>
      <sha1>1iraw6rwtfmbgbrqwwjn3j8pis90y87</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10938</id>
      <parentid>10702</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-23T20:36:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3306">'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! 

Even though "haike" is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. It is always hard to find a spot to get out of big Cities though. 
People have a tendancy to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in Norway: "there is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing".

Places close to small towns are good hitching spots. But do take care of your appearance, as people are a bit judging in this country. 

You should definitely write your destination (if you know it) on a big piece of paper, with a thick marker. Don't necessarily write your final destination, but the next town or city in your desired direction is a good start, once you're in the car you can find out if it's going any further. 

Also, you can contact truck drivers and companies to hitch a ride if you're traveling far. 

Most people speak English well enough for reasonable communication.

Don't try hitchhiking out of Oslo's airport.


[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people.  Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee.  

Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien.  This has not worked for me.

They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.

One thing that makes hitching easy in Norway is that almost all of the population lives near the E6 road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.  

North is spelled ''"nord"'' and south is ''"sør"''. The ''ø'' gives it a short sound, as opposed to "o",  which is pronounced ''"oo"'', as in ''"book"''.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in Norway, but not illegal from rest stops or on ramps. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently.

Hithing is MUCH easier in the beautiful north (at least in the Summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the highway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the highway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check http://www.liftershalte.info/index.php for exact locations, or find better ones! 


==Cities==
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Tromsø]]

[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Norway]]</text>
      <sha1>d39u25o3u23ys27nrkt962acpufumi9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13131</id>
      <parentid>10938</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-08-21T09:10:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3338">'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! 

Even though "haike" is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. It is always hard to find a spot to get out of big Cities though. 
People have a tendancy to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in Norway: "there is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing".

Places close to small towns are good hitching spots. But do take care of your appearance, as people are a bit judging in this country. 

You should definitely write your destination (if you know it) on a big piece of paper, with a thick marker. Don't necessarily write your final destination, but the next town or city in your desired direction is a good start, once you're in the car you can find out if it's going any further. 

Also, you can contact truck drivers and companies to hitch a ride if you're traveling far. 

Most people speak English well enough for reasonable communication.

Don't try hitchhiking out of Oslo's airport.


[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people.  Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee.  

Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien.  This has not worked for me.

They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.

One thing that makes hitching easy in Norway is that almost all of the population lives near the E6 road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.  

North is spelled ''"nord"'' and south is ''"sør"''. The ''ø'' gives it a short sound, as opposed to "o",  which is pronounced ''"oo"'', as in ''"book"''.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in Norway, but not illegal from rest stops or on ramps. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently.

Hithing is MUCH easier in the beautiful north (at least in the Summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the highway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the highway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check http://www.liftershalte.info/index.php for exact locations, or find better ones! 


==Cities==
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Tromsø]]

==Other places==
* [[Lofoten]]

[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Norway]]</text>
      <sha1>a4ckcurk9dvpmysing2cnj4upjzr26e</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13700</id>
      <parentid>13131</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-13T09:39:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3364">'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! 

Even though "haike" is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. It is always hard to find a spot to get out of big Cities though. 
People have a tendancy to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in Norway: "there is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing".

Places close to small towns are good hitching spots. But do take care of your appearance, as people are a bit judging in this country. 

You should definitely write your destination (if you know it) on a big piece of paper, with a thick marker. Don't necessarily write your final destination, but the next town or city in your desired direction is a good start, once you're in the car you can find out if it's going any further. 

Also, you can contact truck drivers and companies to hitch a ride if you're traveling far. 

Most people speak English well enough for reasonable communication.

Don't try hitchhiking out of Oslo's airport.


[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people.  Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee.  

Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien.  This has not worked for me.

They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.

One thing that makes hitching easy in Norway is that almost all of the population lives near the E6 road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.  

North is spelled ''"nord"'' and south is ''"sør"''. The ''ø'' gives it a short sound, as opposed to "o",  which is pronounced ''"oo"'', as in ''"book"''.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in Norway, but not illegal from rest stops or on ramps. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently.

Hithing is MUCH easier in the beautiful north (at least in the Summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the highway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the highway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check http://www.liftershalte.info/index.php for exact locations, or find better ones! 


==Cities==
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Tromsø]]

==Other places==
* [[Lofoten]]

[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Norway]]
{{hitchbase_country|147}}</text>
      <sha1>nh1eop1a8csrq3s7186r4axybwldxy0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14222</id>
      <parentid>13700</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-29T22:02:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3381">'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! 

Even though "haike" is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. It is always hard to find a spot to get out of big Cities though. 
People have a tendancy to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in Norway: "there is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing".

Places close to small towns are good hitching spots. But do take care of your appearance, as people are a bit judging in this country. 

You should definitely write your destination (if you know it) on a big piece of paper, with a thick marker. Don't necessarily write your final destination, but the next town or city in your desired direction is a good start, once you're in the car you can find out if it's going any further. 

Also, you can contact truck drivers and companies to hitch a ride if you're traveling far. 

Most people speak English well enough for reasonable communication.

Don't try hitchhiking out of Oslo's airport.


[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people.  Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee.  

Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien.  This has not worked for me.

They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.

One thing that makes hitching easy in Norway is that almost all of the population lives near the E6 road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.  

North is spelled ''"nord"'' and south is ''"sør"''. The ''ø'' gives it a short sound, as opposed to "o",  which is pronounced ''"oo"'', as in ''"book"''.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in Norway, but not illegal from rest stops or on ramps. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently.

Hithing is MUCH easier in the beautiful north (at least in the Summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the highway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the highway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check http://www.liftershalte.info/index.php for exact locations, or find better ones! 


==Cities==
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Tromsø]]

==Other places==
* [[Lofoten]]

[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Norway]]
{{hitchbase_country|147}}

[[de:Norwegen]]</text>
      <sha1>qntd09elt1v5vhu0uam1nwy14artdmh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14736</id>
      <parentid>14222</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-13T19:00:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3375">'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location!

Even though "haike" is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. It is always hard to find a spot to get out of big Cities though.
People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in Norway: "there is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing".

Places close to small towns are good hitching spots. But do take care of your appearance, as people are a bit judging in this country.

You should definitely write your destination (if you know it) on a big piece of paper, with a thick marker. Don't necessarily write your final destination, but the next town or city in your desired direction is a good start, once you're in the car you can find out if it's going any further.

Also, you can contact truck drivers and companies to hitch a ride if you're traveling far.

Most people speak English well enough for reasonable communication.

Don't try hitchhiking out of Oslo's airport.


[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people.  Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee.

Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien.  This has not worked for me.

They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.

One thing that makes hitching easy in Norway is that almost all of the population lives near the E6 road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

North is spelled ''"nord"'' and south is ''"sør"''. The ''ø'' gives it a short sound, as opposed to "o",  which is pronounced ''"oo"'', as in ''"book"''.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in Norway, but not illegal from rest stops or on ramps. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently.

Hithing is MUCH easier in the beautiful north (at least in the Summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the highway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the highway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check http://www.liftershalte.info/index.php for exact locations, or find better ones!

== Cities ==
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Tromsø]]

== Other places ==
* [[Lofoten]]


[[Category:Europe]]
[[Category:Norway]]
{{hitchbase_country|147}}

[[de:Norwegen]]</text>
      <sha1>2f4jfeibfuokr76enaatkt3z6igrnjo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14874</id>
      <parentid>14736</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-14T18:18:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3377">'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location!

Even though "haike" is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. It is always hard to find a spot to get out of big Cities though.
People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in Norway: "there is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing".

Places close to small towns are good hitching spots. But do take care of your appearance, as people are a bit judging in this country.

You should definitely write your destination (if you know it) on a big piece of paper, with a thick marker. Don't necessarily write your final destination, but the next town or city in your desired direction is a good start, once you're in the car you can find out if it's going any further.

Also, you can contact truck drivers and companies to hitch a ride if you're traveling far.

Most people speak English well enough for reasonable communication.

Don't try hitchhiking out of Oslo's airport.


[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people.  Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee.

Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien.  This has not worked for me.

They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.

One thing that makes hitching easy in Norway is that almost all of the population lives near the E6 road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

North is spelled ''"nord"'' and south is ''"sør"''. The ''ø'' gives it a short sound, as opposed to "o",  which is pronounced ''"oo"'', as in ''"book"''.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in Norway, but not illegal from rest stops or on ramps. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently.

Hithing is MUCH easier in the beautiful north (at least in the Summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the highway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the highway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check http://www.liftershalte.info/index.php for exact locations, or find better ones!

== Cities ==
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Tromsø]]

== Other places ==
* [[Lofoten]]


[[Category:Norway| ]]
[[Category:Europe]]
{{hitchbase_country|147}}

[[de:Norwegen]]</text>
      <sha1>87a7ica4wkhouphzf676r2a4oscko0g</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17852</id>
      <parentid>14874</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-10T21:48:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2993">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norway Kronen (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} (''average'') to {{good}} (''good'')
|language = Norwegian, Sami
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
}}
'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location!

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hithing is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from rest stops or on ramps. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

=== Cities ===
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Trondheim]], [[Tromsø]]

=== Districs of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]

== Language ==
*north - nord
*south - sør  (the ''ø'' gives it a short sound, as opposed too ''o'', which is pronounced ''oo'', as in ''book''.

== User Experiences ==

:''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

:''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the highway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the highway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!

[[Category:Norway| ]]
[[Category:Europe]]
{{hitchbase_country|147}}
[[de:Norwegen]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>rdnzhvdo2w2zyv0kw2d2lysblkm56r1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17853</id>
      <parentid>17852</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-10T21:51:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2995">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} (''average'') to {{good}} (''good'')
|language = Norwegian, Sami
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
}}
'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location!

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hithing is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from rest stops or on ramps. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

=== Cities ===
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Trondheim]], [[Tromsø]]

=== Districs of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]

== Language ==
*north - nord
*south - sør  (the ''ø'' gives it a short sound, as opposed too ''o'', which is pronounced ''oo'', as in ''book''.

== User Experiences ==

:''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

:''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the highway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the highway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!

[[Category:Norway| ]]
[[Category:Europe]]
{{hitchbase_country|147}}
[[de:Norwegen]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>2mo58k4sqi7mnsfjc8dgr4zav0d0p5q</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17858</id>
      <parentid>17853</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-10T22:14:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3009">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} (''average'') to {{good}} (''good'')
|language = Norwegian, Sami
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
}}
'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location!

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hithing is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from rest stops or on ramps. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

=== Cities ===
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Trondheim]], [[Tromsø]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
*north - nord
*south - sør  (the ''ø'' gives it a short sound, as opposed too ''o'', which is pronounced ''oo'', as in ''book''.

== User Experiences ==

:''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

:''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the highway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the highway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!

[[Category:Norway| ]]
[[Category:Europe]]
{{hitchbase_country|147}}
[[de:Norwegen]]
__NOTOC__</text>
      <sha1>q1yvl6rkzjsq0eyqk3drt4bgmsp8dpv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>17901</id>
      <parentid>17858</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-01-13T01:36:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3010">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} (''average'') to {{good}} (''good'')
|language = Norwegian, Sami
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
}}
'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location!

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hithing is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from rest stops or on ramps. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

=== Cities ===
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Trondheim]], [[Tromsø]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
*north - nord
*south - sør  (the ''ø'' gives it a short sound, as opposed too ''o'', which is pronounced ''oo'', as in ''book''.

== User Experiences ==

:''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

:''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the highway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the highway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!

[[Category:Norway| ]]
[[Category:Europe]]
{{hitchbase_country|147}}
__NOTOC__

[[de:Norwegen]]</text>
      <sha1>dmiv5x4qm2amg5d15u5fkr0vzvj3y7t</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18400</id>
      <parentid>17901</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-02-15T12:56:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3044">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} (''average'') to {{good}} (''good'')
|language = Norwegian, Sami
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
}}
'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]].

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hithing is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from rest stops or on ramps. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

=== Cities ===
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Trondheim]], [[Tromsø]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
* north - nord
* south - sør  (the ''ø'' gives it a short sound, as opposed too ''o'', which is pronounced ''oo'', as in ''book''.

== User Experiences ==
:''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

:''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the highway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the highway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!


[[Category:Norway| ]]
{{hitchbase_country|147}}
__NOTOC__

[[de:Norwegen]]</text>
      <sha1>jp0obitmy512810sf7keqf3z67dkek0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21228</id>
      <parentid>18400</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-14T21:55:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3021">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
}}
'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]].

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hithing is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from rest stops or on ramps. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

=== Cities ===
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Trondheim]], [[Tromsø]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
* north - nord
* south - sør  (the ''ø'' gives it a short sound, as opposed too ''o'', which is pronounced ''oo'', as in ''book''.

== User Experiences ==
: ''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

: ''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the highway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the highway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!


[[Category:Norway| ]]
{{hitchbase_country|147}}
__NOTOC__

[[de:Norwegen]]</text>
      <sha1>igu1a7o40gk22lc9sqmrcie2xkxlj73</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21321</id>
      <parentid>21228</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-15T13:11:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3036">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
}}
'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]].

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hithing is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from rest stops or on ramps. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

=== Cities ===
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Trondheim]], [[Tromsø]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
* north - nord
* south - sør  (the ''ø'' gives it a short sound, as opposed too ''o'', which is pronounced ''oo'', as in ''book''.

== User Experiences ==
: ''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

: ''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the highway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the highway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!


[[Category:Norway| ]]
{{hitchbase_country|147}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Europe}}
[[de:Norwegen]]</text>
      <sha1>0x3tt7dfpmn7b6dvk0jrtza9wbvjml1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21925</id>
      <parentid>21321</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-21T22:13:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3037">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
}}
'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]].

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hithing is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from rest stops or on ramps. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

=== Cities ===
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Trondheim]], [[Tromsø]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
* north - nord
* south - sør  (the ''ø'' gives it a short sound, as opposed too ''o'', which is pronounced ''oo'', as in ''book''.

== User Experiences ==
: ''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

: ''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the highway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the highway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!


[[Category:Norway| ]]
{{hitchbase_country|147}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Europe}}

[[de:Norwegen]]</text>
      <sha1>pzdla2lv0h5ys8ew164mae4ioa6y7vo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21962</id>
      <parentid>21925</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-21T22:31:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3052">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
}}
'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]].

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hithing is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from rest stops or on ramps. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

=== Cities ===
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Trondheim]], [[Tromsø]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
* north - nord
* south - sør  (the ''ø'' gives it a short sound, as opposed too ''o'', which is pronounced ''oo'', as in ''book''.

== User Experiences ==
: ''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

: ''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the highway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the highway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!


[[Category:Norway| ]]
{{hitchbase_country|147}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Europe}}

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>d9028wufanovd0b5gcext198ddwk4i8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27024</id>
      <parentid>21962</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-06T05:36:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sigurdas</username>
        <id>1658</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3202">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
}}
'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]].

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hithing is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from rest stops or on ramps. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

=== Cities === 
[[Image:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Trondheim]], [[Tromsø]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
* north - nord
* south - sør  (the ''ø'' gives it a short sound, as opposed too ''o'', which is pronounced ''oo'', as in ''book''.

== User Experiences ==
: ''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

: ''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the highway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the highway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!


[[Category:Norway| ]]
{{hitchbase_country|147}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Europe}}

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>e2znf84b5en955hz9guqcvhyw72qnyq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27498</id>
      <parentid>27024</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-09T08:40:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sigurdas</username>
        <id>1658</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3237">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
}}
'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]].

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hithing is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from rest stops or on ramps. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

=== Cities === 
[[Image:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Trondheim]], [[Tromsø]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
* north - nord
* south - sør  (the ''ø'' gives it a short sound, as opposed too ''o'', which is pronounced ''oo'', as in ''book''.

== User Experiences ==
: ''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

: ''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the highway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the highway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!


[[Category:Norway| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>gsa2asdfsrhhi46sia93kql7win8qsq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27811</id>
      <parentid>27498</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-16T10:21:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3267">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
}}
'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]].

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hithing is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from rest stops or on ramps. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

=== Cities === 
[[Image:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Trondheim]], [[Tromsø]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
* north - nord
* south - sør  (the ''ø'' gives it a short sound, as opposed too ''o'', which is pronounced ''oo'', as in ''book''.

== User Experiences ==
: ''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

: ''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the highway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the highway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!


[[Category:Norway| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>0tadxre7gf8c49i2cbk86e29mbk2zwv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>28176</id>
      <parentid>27811</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-27T09:41:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>85.164.139.232</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3777">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
}}
'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]].

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hithing is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from rest stops or on ramps. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

=== Cities === 
[[Image:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Trondheim]], [[Tromsø]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
* north - nord
* south - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounsed "ah" as in bar
* E pronounsed "eh" as in heck
* I pronounsed "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounsed "w" as in willy and in other times, "o" as in hockey
* U pronounsed "oo" as in poop
* Y pronounsed "y" as in young
* Æ pronounsed "a" as in hack
* Ø pronounsed "uh" as in hull
* Å pronounsed "o" as in hockey

Aditionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounsed the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== User Experiences ==
: ''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

: ''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the highway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the highway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!


[[Category:Norway| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>cmj986ijtqzpuuyykzja8lov8exu3y4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31209</id>
      <parentid>28176</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-02-22T11:02:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3779">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
}}
'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]].

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hithing is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from rest stops or on ramps. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

=== Cities === 
[[Image:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Trondheim]], [[Tromsø]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
* north - nord
* south - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounsed "ah" as in bar
* E pronounsed "eh" as in heck
* I pronounsed "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounsed "w" as in willy and in other times, "o" as in hockey
* U pronounsed "oo" as in poop
* Y pronounsed "y" as in young
* Æ pronounsed "a" as in hack
* Ø pronounsed "uh" as in hull
* Å pronounsed "o" as in hockey

Aditionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounsed the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== User Experiences ==
: ''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

: ''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the motorway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the motorway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!


[[Category:Norway| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>dpsgqsc1qs9n2uo10x4qhrlu01zn5p2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31321</id>
      <parentid>31209</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-01T00:15:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sigurdas</username>
        <id>1658</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3790">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
}}
'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]].

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hithing is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from [[rest stop]]s or at [[on-ramp]]s. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

=== Cities === 
[[Image:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Trondheim]], [[Tromsø]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
* north - nord
* south - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounsed "ah" as in bar
* E pronounsed "eh" as in heck
* I pronounsed "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounsed "w" as in willy and in other times, "o" as in hockey
* U pronounsed "oo" as in poop
* Y pronounsed "y" as in young
* Æ pronounsed "a" as in hack
* Ø pronounsed "uh" as in hull
* Å pronounsed "o" as in hockey

Aditionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounsed the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== User Experiences ==
: ''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

: ''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the motorway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the motorway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!


[[Category:Norway| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>gesb4jdopzp2gd2rc0v26ah5uu0a5lk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31659</id>
      <parentid>31321</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-10T15:42:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Alex</username>
        <id>89</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3851">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
}}
'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]].

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hithing is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from [[rest stop]]s or at [[on-ramp]]s. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

=== Cities === 
[[Image:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Trondheim]], [[Tromsø]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
* north - nord
* south - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounsed "ah" as in bar
* E pronounsed "eh" as in heck
* I pronounsed "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounsed "w" as in willy and in other times, "o" as in hockey
* U pronounsed "oo" as in poop
* Y pronounsed "y" as in young
* Æ pronounsed "a" as in hack
* Ø pronounsed "uh" as in hull
* Å pronounsed "o" as in hockey

Aditionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounsed the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== User Experiences ==
: ''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

: ''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the motorway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the motorway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!


[[Category:Norway| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>pyi7ce464g7suidct7mijwmp7olzbdw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32389</id>
      <parentid>31659</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-04-24T08:21:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>85.166.114.199</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3864">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
}}
'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]].

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hithing is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from [[rest stop]]s or at [[on-ramp]]s. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

=== Cities === 
[[Image:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Trondheim]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
* north - nord
* south - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounsed "ah" as in bar
* E pronounsed "eh" as in heck
* I pronounsed "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounsed "w" as in willy and in other times, "o" as in hockey
* U pronounsed "oo" as in poop
* Y pronounsed "y" as in young
* Æ pronounsed "a" as in hack
* Ø pronounsed "uh" as in hull
* Å pronounsed "o" as in hockey

Aditionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounsed the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== User Experiences ==
: ''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

: ''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the motorway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the motorway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!


[[Category:Norway| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>b0x1wwf0qf9daru4ttakdoes46ggu9y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32473</id>
      <parentid>32389</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-04-28T18:39:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>JuJu</username>
        <id>1860</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3877">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
}}
'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]].

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hithing is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from [[rest stop]]s or at [[on-ramp]]s. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

=== Cities === 
[[Image:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Trondheim]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
* north - nord
* south - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounsed "ah" as in bar
* E pronounsed "eh" as in heck
* I pronounsed "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounsed "w" as in willy and in other times, "o" as in hockey
* U pronounsed "oo" as in poop
* Y pronounsed "y" as in young
* Æ pronounsed "a" as in hack
* Ø pronounsed "uh" as in hull
* Å pronounsed "o" as in hockey

Aditionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounsed the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== User Experiences ==
: ''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

: ''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the motorway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the motorway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!


[[Category:Norway| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>mhfeuzchif9rie0453cllm4jtd5h6s0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32476</id>
      <parentid>32473</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-04-28T20:53:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>JuJu</username>
        <id>1860</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3980">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
}}
&lt;map lat='64.16810689799152' lng='9.84375' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='200' height='300' /&gt;
'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]].

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hithing is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from [[rest stop]]s or at [[on-ramp]]s. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

=== Cities === 
[[Image:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Trondheim]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
* north - nord
* south - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounsed "ah" as in bar
* E pronounsed "eh" as in heck
* I pronounsed "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounsed "w" as in willy and in other times, "o" as in hockey
* U pronounsed "oo" as in poop
* Y pronounsed "y" as in young
* Æ pronounsed "a" as in hack
* Ø pronounsed "uh" as in hull
* Å pronounsed "o" as in hockey

Aditionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounsed the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== User Experiences ==
: ''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

: ''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the motorway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the motorway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!


[[Category:Norway| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>45plte2wtsz4vj53ufkkn88z1xtlz12</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32477</id>
      <parentid>32476</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-04-28T20:54:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>JuJu</username>
        <id>1860</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3981">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
&lt;map lat='64.16810689799152' lng='9.84375' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='200' height='350' /&gt;
}}

'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]].

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hithing is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from [[rest stop]]s or at [[on-ramp]]s. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

=== Cities === 
[[Image:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Trondheim]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
* north - nord
* south - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounsed "ah" as in bar
* E pronounsed "eh" as in heck
* I pronounsed "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounsed "w" as in willy and in other times, "o" as in hockey
* U pronounsed "oo" as in poop
* Y pronounsed "y" as in young
* Æ pronounsed "a" as in hack
* Ø pronounsed "uh" as in hull
* Å pronounsed "o" as in hockey

Aditionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounsed the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== User Experiences ==
: ''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

: ''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the motorway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the motorway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!


[[Category:Norway| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>74kdn2l3dycsr3osiyzxh5zp1jnjcgv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32478</id>
      <parentid>32477</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-04-28T20:55:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>JuJu</username>
        <id>1860</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3988">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
|map = &lt;map lat='64.16810689799152' lng='9.84375' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='220' height='375' /&gt;
}}

'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]].

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hithing is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from [[rest stop]]s or at [[on-ramp]]s. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

=== Cities === 
[[Image:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Trondheim]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
* north - nord
* south - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounsed "ah" as in bar
* E pronounsed "eh" as in heck
* I pronounsed "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounsed "w" as in willy and in other times, "o" as in hockey
* U pronounsed "oo" as in poop
* Y pronounsed "y" as in young
* Æ pronounsed "a" as in hack
* Ø pronounsed "uh" as in hull
* Å pronounsed "o" as in hockey

Aditionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounsed the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== User Experiences ==
: ''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

: ''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the motorway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the motorway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!


[[Category:Norway| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>akup50wvuq6zs2yonqsd9kd4ywurpao</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32479</id>
      <parentid>32478</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-04-28T20:55:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>JuJu</username>
        <id>1860</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3988">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
|map = &lt;map lat='64.16810689799152' lng='9.84375' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='245' height='375' /&gt;
}}

'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]].

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hithing is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from [[rest stop]]s or at [[on-ramp]]s. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

=== Cities === 
[[Image:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Trondheim]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
* north - nord
* south - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounsed "ah" as in bar
* E pronounsed "eh" as in heck
* I pronounsed "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounsed "w" as in willy and in other times, "o" as in hockey
* U pronounsed "oo" as in poop
* Y pronounsed "y" as in young
* Æ pronounsed "a" as in hack
* Ø pronounsed "uh" as in hull
* Å pronounsed "o" as in hockey

Aditionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounsed the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== User Experiences ==
: ''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

: ''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the motorway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the motorway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!


[[Category:Norway| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>gtv70ksi82s4qh5we4eqqa7ccb4oid7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32480</id>
      <parentid>32479</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-04-28T20:56:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>JuJu</username>
        <id>1860</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3988">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
|map = &lt;map lat='64.16810689799152' lng='9.84375' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='260' height='375' /&gt;
}}

'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]].

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hithing is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from [[rest stop]]s or at [[on-ramp]]s. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

=== Cities === 
[[Image:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Trondheim]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
* north - nord
* south - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounsed "ah" as in bar
* E pronounsed "eh" as in heck
* I pronounsed "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounsed "w" as in willy and in other times, "o" as in hockey
* U pronounsed "oo" as in poop
* Y pronounsed "y" as in young
* Æ pronounsed "a" as in hack
* Ø pronounsed "uh" as in hull
* Å pronounsed "o" as in hockey

Aditionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounsed the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== User Experiences ==
: ''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

: ''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the motorway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the motorway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!


[[Category:Norway| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>lxml8x6olj6z7sgkgg6ccm3e5t02z2w</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32481</id>
      <parentid>32480</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-04-28T20:57:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>JuJu</username>
        <id>1860</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3993">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='260' height='375' /&gt;
}}

'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]].

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hithing is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from [[rest stop]]s or at [[on-ramp]]s. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

=== Cities === 
[[Image:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Trondheim]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
* north - nord
* south - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounsed "ah" as in bar
* E pronounsed "eh" as in heck
* I pronounsed "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounsed "w" as in willy and in other times, "o" as in hockey
* U pronounsed "oo" as in poop
* Y pronounsed "y" as in young
* Æ pronounsed "a" as in hack
* Ø pronounsed "uh" as in hull
* Å pronounsed "o" as in hockey

Aditionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounsed the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== User Experiences ==
: ''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

: ''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the motorway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the motorway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!


[[Category:Norway| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>k9w830f1ammnsgz07yds3vqkl5kjp6a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32482</id>
      <parentid>32481</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-04-28T20:57:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>JuJu</username>
        <id>1860</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3993">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' /&gt;
}}

'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]].

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hithing is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from [[rest stop]]s or at [[on-ramp]]s. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

=== Cities === 
[[Image:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Trondheim]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
* north - nord
* south - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounsed "ah" as in bar
* E pronounsed "eh" as in heck
* I pronounsed "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounsed "w" as in willy and in other times, "o" as in hockey
* U pronounsed "oo" as in poop
* Y pronounsed "y" as in young
* Æ pronounsed "a" as in hack
* Ø pronounsed "uh" as in hull
* Å pronounsed "o" as in hockey

Aditionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounsed the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== User Experiences ==
: ''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

: ''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the motorway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the motorway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!


[[Category:Norway| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>saqn7epvs0gxwd68tckhv1lgu27pa3m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32483</id>
      <parentid>32482</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-04-28T20:58:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>JuJu</username>
        <id>1860</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4032">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' /&gt;
}}

'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the European Union.

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hithing is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from [[rest stop]]s or at [[on-ramp]]s. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

=== Cities === 
[[Image:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Trondheim]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
* north - nord
* south - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounsed "ah" as in bar
* E pronounsed "eh" as in heck
* I pronounsed "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounsed "w" as in willy and in other times, "o" as in hockey
* U pronounsed "oo" as in poop
* Y pronounsed "y" as in young
* Æ pronounsed "a" as in hack
* Ø pronounsed "uh" as in hull
* Å pronounsed "o" as in hockey

Aditionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounsed the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== User Experiences ==
: ''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

: ''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the motorway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the motorway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!


[[Category:Norway| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>24g0gpcgx2kph0tbicurbj06x4kl2n6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32485</id>
      <parentid>32483</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-04-28T21:04:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>JuJu</username>
        <id>1860</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4103">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' /&gt;
}}

'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the European Union. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hithing is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from [[rest stop]]s or at [[on-ramp]]s. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

=== Cities === 
[[Image:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Trondheim]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
* north - nord
* south - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounsed "ah" as in bar
* E pronounsed "eh" as in heck
* I pronounsed "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounsed "w" as in willy and in other times, "o" as in hockey
* U pronounsed "oo" as in poop
* Y pronounsed "y" as in young
* Æ pronounsed "a" as in hack
* Ø pronounsed "uh" as in hull
* Å pronounsed "o" as in hockey

Aditionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounsed the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== User Experiences ==
: ''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

: ''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the motorway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the motorway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!


[[Category:Norway| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>4gl1bbozxxezuwn9fqe4qno4b2edd7l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32486</id>
      <parentid>32485</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-04-28T21:05:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>JuJu</username>
        <id>1860</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4107">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' /&gt;
}}

'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hithing is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from [[rest stop]]s or at [[on-ramp]]s. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

=== Cities === 
[[Image:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Trondheim]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
* north - nord
* south - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounsed "ah" as in bar
* E pronounsed "eh" as in heck
* I pronounsed "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounsed "w" as in willy and in other times, "o" as in hockey
* U pronounsed "oo" as in poop
* Y pronounsed "y" as in young
* Æ pronounsed "a" as in hack
* Ø pronounsed "uh" as in hull
* Å pronounsed "o" as in hockey

Aditionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounsed the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== User Experiences ==
: ''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

: ''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the motorway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the motorway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!


[[Category:Norway| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>92g3d83wnjmkyp9zo5kwcdjcp18p572</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>34006</id>
      <parentid>32486</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-06-17T07:28:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>87.6.193.9</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4157">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' /&gt;
}}

'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hithing is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute. Be aware that traffic may be very light at times.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from [[rest stop]]s or at [[on-ramp]]s. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

=== Cities === 
[[Image:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Trondheim]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
* north - nord
* south - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounsed "ah" as in bar
* E pronounsed "eh" as in heck
* I pronounsed "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounsed "w" as in willy and in other times, "o" as in hockey
* U pronounsed "oo" as in poop
* Y pronounsed "y" as in young
* Æ pronounsed "a" as in hack
* Ø pronounsed "uh" as in hull
* Å pronounsed "o" as in hockey

Aditionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounsed the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== User Experiences ==
: ''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

: ''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the motorway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the motorway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!


[[Category:Norway| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>oz2w3xu169m8c56wddtpuq3qz2k8tal</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35253</id>
      <parentid>34006</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T18:18:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4153">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' /&gt;
}}

'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hithing is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute. Be aware that traffic may be very light at times.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from [[rest stop]]s or at [[on-ramp]]s. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

=== Cities ===
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Trondheim]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
* north - nord
* south - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounsed "ah" as in bar
* E pronounsed "eh" as in heck
* I pronounsed "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounsed "w" as in willy and in other times, "o" as in hockey
* U pronounsed "oo" as in poop
* Y pronounsed "y" as in young
* Æ pronounsed "a" as in hack
* Ø pronounsed "uh" as in hull
* Å pronounsed "o" as in hockey

Aditionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounsed the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== User Experiences ==
: ''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

: ''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the motorway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the motorway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!
{{hitchbase_country|147}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Norway| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>50rbngouts8vqxqrpho023cla4ghkrp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36380</id>
      <parentid>35253</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-08-08T22:44:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>85.221.29.197</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4548">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' /&gt;
}}

'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hithing is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute. Be aware that traffic may be very light at times.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from [[rest stop]]s or at [[on-ramp]]s. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

Norwegians will often offer to take you so many Norwegian miles. One Norwegian mile is 10km. Recently there have been some Roma / Romanian people faking broken down cars and then robbing people who stop to help, police confirm this as so, so try not waiting near cars. Also asking people directly at service stations is morelikely to get a result than just thumbing as result of this.

=== Cities ===
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Trondheim]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
* north - nord
* south - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounsed "ah" as in bar
* E pronounsed "eh" as in heck
* I pronounsed "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounsed "w" as in willy and in other times, "o" as in hockey
* U pronounsed "oo" as in poop
* Y pronounsed "y" as in young
* Æ pronounsed "a" as in hack
* Ø pronounsed "uh" as in hull
* Å pronounsed "o" as in hockey

Aditionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounsed the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== User Experiences ==
: ''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

: ''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the motorway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the motorway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!
{{hitchbase_country|147}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Norway| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>ebi2d4jvx2mxlm3xwqhfamf5eqjifll</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36382</id>
      <parentid>36380</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-08-08T22:53:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>85.221.29.197</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4948">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' /&gt;
}}

'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from [[Italy]] to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hithing is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute. Be aware that traffic may be very light at times.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from [[rest stop]]s or at [[on-ramp]]s. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

Norwegians will often offer to take you so many Norwegian miles. One Norwegian mile is 10km. Recently there have been some Roma / Romanian people faking broken down cars and then robbing people who stop to help, police confirm this as so, so try not waiting near cars. Also asking people directly at service stations is morelikely to get a result than just thumbing as result of this.

=== Cities ===
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Trondheim]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
* north - nord
* south - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounsed "ah" as in bar
* E pronounsed "eh" as in heck
* I pronounsed "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounsed "w" as in willy and in other times, "o" as in hockey
* U pronounsed "oo" as in poop
* Y pronounsed "y" as in young
* Æ pronounsed "a" as in hack
* Ø pronounsed "uh" as in hull
* Å pronounsed "o" as in hockey

Aditionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounsed the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== User Experiences ==


: ''[[User:markus|markus]] is a dude and hitched from Stavangar to Mandal (1 day), Mandal to Oslo (1 day) Oslo to Trondheim (1 day) Trondheim to Mor e Rana (1 day) and Mor e Rana to Karlsøya (1 day) sequentially. Long rides and easy hitching, some big waits outside Oslo. English speaking was seen as a good thing and several drivers told me they dropped silent, drunk or drugged people quickly.

: ''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any nonwhite who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

: ''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the motorway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the motorway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!
{{hitchbase_country|147}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Norway| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>q88s29omqdk2vqdj90gerv8ar2atfn7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36508</id>
      <parentid>36382</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-08-12T22:19:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kb</username>
        <id>1332</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5001">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
}}

'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the south to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hitching is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute. Be aware that traffic may be very light at times.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from [[rest stop]]s or at [[on-ramp]]s. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

Norwegians will often offer to take you so many Norwegian miles. One Norwegian mile is 10km. Recently there have been some Roma / Romanian people faking broken down cars and then robbing people who stop to help, police confirm this as so, so try not waiting near cars. Also asking people directly at service stations is more likely to get a result than just thumbing as result of this.

=== Cities ===
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Trondheim]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
* north - nord
* south - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounsed "ah" as in bar
* E pronounsed "eh" as in heck
* I pronounsed "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounsed "w" as in willy and in other times, "o" as in hockey
* U pronounsed "oo" as in poop
* Y pronounsed "y" as in young
* Æ pronounsed "a" as in hack
* Ø pronounsed "uh" as in hull
* Å pronounsed "o" as in hockey

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== User Experiences ==


: ''[[User:markus|markus]] is a dude and hitched from Stavangar to Mandal (1 day), Mandal to Oslo (1 day) Oslo to Trondheim (1 day) Trondheim to Mor e Rana (1 day) and Mor e Rana to Karlsøya (1 day) sequentially. Long rides and easy hitching, some big waits outside Oslo. English speaking was seen as a good thing and several drivers told me they dropped silent, drunk or drugged people quickly.

: ''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any non-white who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

: ''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the motorway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the motorway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!
{{hitchbase_country|147}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Norway| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>7xzlsaqzvk1vwzyf2vkkgwdwluzfipi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36710</id>
      <parentid>36508</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-08-21T18:20:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>213.186.242.46</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5134">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
}}

'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the south to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hitching is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute. Be aware that traffic may be very light at times.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from [[rest stop]]s or at [[on-ramp]]s. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

Norwegians will often offer to take you so many Norwegian miles. One Norwegian mile is 10km. Recently there have been some Roma / Romanian people faking broken down cars and then robbing people who stop to help, police confirm this as so, so try not waiting near cars. Also asking people directly at service stations is more likely to get a result than just thumbing as result of this.

=== Cities ===
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Trondheim]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
* north - nord
* south - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounsed "ah" as in bar
* E pronounsed "eh" as in heck
* I pronounsed "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounsed "w" as in willy and in other times, "o" as in hockey
* U pronounsed "oo" as in poop
* Y pronounsed "y" as in young
* Æ pronounsed "a" as in hack
* Ø pronounsed "uh" as in hull
* Å pronounsed "o" as in hockey

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== User Experiences ==


: ''[[User:markus|markus]] is a dude and hitched from Stavangar to Mandal (1 day), Mandal to Oslo (1 day) Oslo to Trondheim (1 day) Trondheim to Mor e Rana (1 day) and Mor e Rana to Karlsøya (1 day) sequentially. Long rides and easy hitching, some big waits outside Oslo. English speaking was seen as a good thing and several drivers told me they dropped silent, drunk or drugged people quickly. He also hitched back from Karlsøya to Tampere in 1 day and night non-stop, but thinks it shoudl take 2 days for any normal hitcher.

: ''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any non-white who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

: ''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the motorway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the motorway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!
{{hitchbase_country|147}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Norway| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>pbtgsvd53eiw2tirgz86n741ge0fhzz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36714</id>
      <parentid>36710</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-08-21T22:03:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5142">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
}}

'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the south to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hitching is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute. Be aware that traffic may be very light at times.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from [[rest stop]]s or at [[on-ramp]]s. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

Norwegians will often offer to take you so many Norwegian miles. One Norwegian mile is 10km. Recently there have been some Roma / Romanian people faking broken down cars and then robbing people who stop to help, police confirm this as so, so try not waiting near cars. Also asking people directly at service stations is more likely to get a result than just thumbing as result of this.

=== Cities ===
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Trondheim]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
* north - nord
* south - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounsed "ah" as in bar
* E pronounsed "eh" as in heck
* I pronounsed "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounsed "w" as in willy and in other times, "o" as in hockey
* U pronounsed "oo" as in poop
* Y pronounsed "y" as in young
* Æ pronounsed "a" as in hack
* Ø pronounsed "uh" as in hull
* Å pronounsed "o" as in hockey

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== User Experiences ==


: ''[[User:markus|markus]] is a dude and hitched from Stavangar to Mandal (1 day), Mandal to Oslo (1 day) Oslo to Trondheim (1 day) Trondheim to Mor e Rana (1 day) and Mor e Rana to Karlsøya (1 day) sequentially. Long rides and easy hitching, some big waits outside Oslo. English speaking was seen as a good thing and several drivers told me they dropped silent, drunk or drugged people quickly. He also hitched back from [[Karlsøya]] to [[Tampere]] in 1 day and night non-stop, but thinks it should take 2 days for any normal hitcher.

: ''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any non-white who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

: ''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the motorway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the motorway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!
{{hitchbase_country|147}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Norway| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>essbm2s73jhd9ukbq0prsv66ci3tzjo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38457</id>
      <parentid>36714</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-11-15T15:55:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>84.247.144.125</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6776">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
}}

'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the south to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hitching is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute. Be aware that traffic may be very light at times.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from [[rest stop]]s or at [[on-ramp]]s. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

Norwegians will often offer to take you so many Norwegian miles. One Norwegian mile is 10km. Recently there have been some Roma / Romanian people faking broken down cars and then robbing people who stop to help, police confirm this as so, so try not waiting near cars. Also asking people directly at service stations is more likely to get a result than just thumbing as result of this.

=== Cities ===
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Trondheim]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
* north - nord
* south - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounsed "ah" as in bar
* E pronounsed "eh" as in heck
* I pronounsed "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounsed "w" as in willy and in other times, "o" as in hockey
* U pronounsed "oo" as in poop
* Y pronounsed "y" as in young
* Æ pronounsed "a" as in hack
* Ø pronounsed "uh" as in hull
* Å pronounsed "o" as in hockey

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== User Experiences ==


: ''[[User:markus|markus]] is a dude and hitched from Stavangar to Mandal (1 day), Mandal to Oslo (1 day) Oslo to Trondheim (1 day) Trondheim to Mor e Rana (1 day) and Mor e Rana to Karlsøya (1 day) sequentially. Long rides and easy hitching, some big waits outside Oslo. English speaking was seen as a good thing and several drivers told me they dropped silent, drunk or drugged people quickly. He also hitched back from [[Karlsøya]] to [[Tampere]] in 1 day and night non-stop, but thinks it should take 2 days for any normal hitcher.

: ''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any non-white who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

: ''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the motorway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the motorway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!
{{hitchbase_country|147}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Norway| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]

[Bergen to Noordkapp in Winter (October - November)]
Jai is probably a dude and he hitched rides from Bergen all the way North stopping in Bangsund (near Steinkjer), Bodo, Tromso, Alta and Sarnes.
People might look at you a little funny, but it is possible to hitch North this late after the main tourist season, and don't let anyone tell you there is nothing to see. Total darkness doesn't really set in until mid November. Be prepared for long waits though and a good quilted, wind resistant jacket, boots, gloves and a hat are imperative (goes without saying really). May be easier with one person because keep in mind Trucks and some cars in Norway (green license plates) can only have 2 people in the cabin (driver and one passenger). Also this is low season, so you are relying on just locals mainly and its generally only people who have hitch hiked themselves once before that will probably stop. A lone traveller traveller looks more helpless and sorry, and two people looks a little intimidating for a driver new to hitchhikers unless perhaps you are a guy and girl. Not fair I know but just seems to be the way it is.
If you tire of freezing your butt off, and I am not sure if it is legal but try asking around at truck parks, loading bays, docks for trucks going to where you want. They can tell you when the truck leaves and then its up to the driver if he wants to take you. Remember super politeness and a good outward appearance go a long way. Most places didn't seem to mind me asking around and I had a lot of success this way. Sure beats the uncertainty and you can wait somewhere out of the cold. Happy trails !</text>
      <sha1>hrc3js7qknh6tny0g1zsakr2g5vtj9y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38458</id>
      <parentid>38457</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-11-15T16:01:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>84.247.144.125</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7024">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,770,000
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
}}

'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, Norwegians are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. People have a tendency to always be in a rush on weekdays. The main thing to be aware of is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say in '''Norway''': ''There is nothing called bad weather, only bad clothing''. Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. One thing that makes hitching easy in '''Norway''' is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the south to almost all the way north, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way. Hitching is ''much'' easier in the beautiful north (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute. Be aware that traffic may be very light at times.

It is illegal to hitch on the expressway in '''Norway''', but not illegal from [[rest stop]]s or at [[on-ramp]]s. It is legal to camp out almost anywhere if it is a good distance from a private house, but not permanently. 

Norwegians will often offer to take you so many Norwegian miles. One Norwegian mile is 10km. Recently there have been some Roma / Romanian people faking broken down cars and then robbing people who stop to help, police confirm this as so, so try not waiting near cars. Also asking people directly at service stations is more likely to get a result than just thumbing as result of this.

=== Cities ===
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Trondheim]]

=== Regions of Norway ===
* [[Lofoten]]
* [[Nordkapp]]

== Language ==
* north - nord
* south - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounsed "ah" as in bar
* E pronounsed "eh" as in heck
* I pronounsed "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounsed "w" as in willy and in other times, "o" as in hockey
* U pronounsed "oo" as in poop
* Y pronounsed "y" as in young
* Æ pronounsed "a" as in hack
* Ø pronounsed "uh" as in hull
* Å pronounsed "o" as in hockey

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== User Experiences ==


: ''[[User:markus|markus]] is a dude and hitched from Stavangar to Mandal (1 day), Mandal to Oslo (1 day) Oslo to Trondheim (1 day) Trondheim to Mor e Rana (1 day) and Mor e Rana to Karlsøya (1 day) sequentially. Long rides and easy hitching, some big waits outside Oslo. English speaking was seen as a good thing and several drivers told me they dropped silent, drunk or drugged people quickly. He also hitched back from [[Karlsøya]] to [[Tampere]] in 1 day and night non-stop, but thinks it should take 2 days for any normal hitcher.

: ''[[User:ReZz|ReZz]] is a dude, and he has  found that [[Trondheim]] one of the worst places to hitch from.  Still, he has done it, even in the winter, all the way to [[Oslo]] in the South and [[Hammerfest]]/[[North Cape]] in the extreme North.  Sadly, I must say that one steadfast rule of hitchhiking has to be amended.  Although I am a polyglot and love language, I must say that if you are not white, speak English to people. Norwegians are extremely wary of foreigners and any non-white who speaks English is assumed to be a refugee. Still, a lot of white women tell me that truckers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien. This has not worked for me. They love foreign tourists, though, as long as you keep telling them that you love Norway.''

: ''[[User:abstorz|abstorz]] is a dude, and hitched from Trondheim to Oslo and back in March/April. Both trips took one day. From Oslo he was able to hitch a ride onto the motorway behind the tunnel in the area of Etterstad, from Trondheim he took the bus to Heimdal and walked another couple of miles to a bus stop. Once on the motorway everything went fine. He took the route over Oppdal/Dombås. Check [[Liftershalte]] for exact locations, or find better ones!
{{hitchbase_country|147}}
__NOTOC__
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Norway| ]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]

[Bergen to Noordkapp in Winter (October - November)]
Jai is probably a dude and he hitched rides from Bergen all the way North stopping in Bangsund (near Steinkjer), Bodo, Tromso, Alta and Sarnes.
People might look at you a little funny, but it is possible to hitch North this late after the main tourist season, and don't let anyone tell you there is nothing to see. Total darkness doesn't really set in until mid November. Be prepared for long waits though and a good quilted, wind resistant jacket, boots, gloves and a hat are imperative (goes without saying really). May be easier with one person because keep in mind Trucks and some cars in Norway (green license plates) can only have 2 people in the cabin (driver and one passenger). Also this is low season, so you are relying on just locals mainly and its generally only people who have hitch hiked themselves once before that will probably stop. A lone traveller traveller looks more helpless and sorry, and two people looks a little intimidating for a driver new to hitchhikers unless perhaps you are a guy and girl. Not fair I know but just seems to be the way it is.
If you tire of freezing your butt off, and I am not sure if it is legal but try asking around at truck parks, loading bays, docks for trucks going to where you want. They can tell you when the truck leaves and then its up to the driver if he wants to take you. Remember super politeness and a good outward appearance go a long way. Most places didn't seem to mind me asking around and I had a lot of success this way. It works particularly well in the larger cities. Around four in the afternoon seems to be the time when divers have loaded incomng goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city. Sure beats the uncertainty and you can get a time to plan towards and wait somewhere out of the cold. Happy trails !</text>
      <sha1>0ebhrevo1sbhattqeoretmtfhlhrmiv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38859</id>
      <parentid>38458</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-12-11T18:23:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Perilisk</username>
        <id>117</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5209">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is not such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary from foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. 

==Hitchhiking culture==

'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. They have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

One thing that makes hitching easy in Norway is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitching is ''much'' easier in the beautiful North (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster travelling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city. 

=== Distances ===

According to [[User:markus|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day'''
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''

* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

===License Plates===

There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on
* [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

=== Useful Language Bits ===
* north - nord
* south - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounsed "ah" as in bar
* E pronounsed "eh" as in heck
* I pronounsed "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounsed "w" as in willy and in other times, "o" as in hockey
* U pronounsed "oo" as in poop
* Y pronounsed "y" as in young
* Æ pronounsed "a" as in hack
* Ø pronounsed "uh" as in hull
* Å pronounsed "o" as in hockey

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

==Regions &amp; Cities==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===

* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===

* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]

==Border Crossing==

Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

==Eating &amp; Drinking==

==Accommodation &amp; Sleeping==

==Other Useful Info==


{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>2zcp0ewlnnjyxuy8s9da9oe5jvqr8p2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39707</id>
      <parentid>38859</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-02-11T19:01:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>84.250.32.3</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5241">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is not such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary from foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. 

==Hitchhiking culture==

'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. They have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

One thing that makes hitching easy in Norway is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitching is ''much'' easier in the beautiful North (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halsels Gate and north of Stradveien, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster travelling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city. 

=== Distances ===

According to [[User:markus|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day'''
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''

* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

===License Plates===

There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on
* [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

=== Useful Language Bits ===
* north - nord
* south - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

==Regions &amp; Cities==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===

* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===

* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]

==Border Crossing==

Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

==Eating &amp; Drinking==

==Accommodation &amp; Sleeping==

==Other Useful Info==


{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>2xlk0ojd7zg9dp1k7jv4kr4vh3y2cck</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39840</id>
      <parentid>39707</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-02-23T07:30:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Perilisk</username>
        <id>117</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6234">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is not such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary from foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. 

==Hitchhiking culture==

'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. They have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

One thing that makes hitching easy in Norway is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitching is ''much'' easier in the beautiful North (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Stradveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster travelling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Just start knocking on people's windows when they drive and wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. Try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry (they generally pay for the car including passengers) so you don't have to pay for the ride. Apparently for many ferries this is sadly not possible.

=== Distances ===

According to [[User:markus|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day'''
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''

===License Plates===

There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on
* [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

==Regions &amp; Cities==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===

* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===

* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]

==Border Crossing==

Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

==Eating &amp; Drinking==

==Accommodation &amp; Sleeping==

==Other Useful Info==

*[https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
*[http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>fz8vszmfzz98c6wbitmeb84y4ruotce</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39974</id>
      <parentid>39840</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-07T18:53:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>87.60.49.35</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6245">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is not such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary from foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. 

==Hitchhiking culture==

'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. They have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

One thing that makes hitching easy in Norway is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitching is ''much'' easier in the beautiful North (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Stradveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster travelling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Just start knocking on people's windows when they drive and wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. Try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry (they generally pay for the car including passengers) so you don't have to pay for the ride. Apparently for many ferries this is sadly not possible.

=== Distances ===

According to [[User:markus|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day'''
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''

===License Plates===

There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on
* [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

==Regions &amp; Cities==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===

* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===

* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]

==Border Crossing==

Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

==Eating &amp; Drinking==

==Accommodation &amp; Sleeping==

==Other Useful Info==

*[https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
*[http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>0yorxron5cee6qf2c4716a69jnk67zc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39994</id>
      <parentid>39974</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-09T14:40:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Gutuater</username>
        <id>1862</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7026">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is not such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary from foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. 

==Hitchhiking culture==

'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. They have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

One thing that makes hitching easy in Norway is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitching is ''much'' easier in the beautiful North (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Stradveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster travelling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Just start knocking on people's windows when they drive and wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. Try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry (they generally pay for the car including passengers) so you don't have to pay for the ride. Apparently for many ferries this is sadly not possible.

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free. StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from Larvik in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

=== Distances ===

According to [[User:markus|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day'''
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''

===License Plates===

There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on
* [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

==Regions &amp; Cities==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===

* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===

* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]

==Border Crossing==

Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

==Eating &amp; Drinking==

==Accommodation &amp; Sleeping==

==Other Useful Info==

*[https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
*[http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>doppfntnnfajy6yvcf6lq60n09fgn08</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>40863</id>
      <parentid>39994</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-03-30T20:57:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7027">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is not such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary from foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. 

==Hitchhiking culture==

'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. They have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

One thing that makes hitching easy in Norway is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitching is ''much'' easier in the beautiful North (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Stradveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster travelling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Just start knocking on people's windows when they drive and wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. Try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry (they generally pay for the car including passengers) so you don't have to pay for the ride. Apparently for many ferries this is sadly not possible.

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free. StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from Larvik in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

=== Distances ===

According to [[User:markus|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day'''
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''

===License Plates===

There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on
* [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

==Regions &amp; Cities==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===

* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===

* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]

==Border Crossing==

Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

==Eating &amp; Drinking==

==Accommodation &amp; Sleeping==

==Other Useful Info==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>6nt2h7dmyxjj16bqm53ys1epgtt29wy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41075</id>
      <parentid>40863</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-06T21:55:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Grata</username>
        <id>2321</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7926">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is not such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary from foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. 

==Hitchhiking culture==

'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful. They have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

One thing that makes hitching easy in Norway is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitching is ''much'' easier in the beautiful North (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Stradveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster travelling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Just start knocking on people's windows when they drive and wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. Try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry (they generally pay for the car including passengers) so you don't have to pay for the ride. Apparently for many ferries this is sadly not possible.

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free. StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from Larvik in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

=== Distances ===

According to [[User:markus|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day'''
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''

===License Plates===

There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on
* [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

==Regions &amp; Cities==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===

* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===

* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]

==Border Crossing==

Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

==Eating &amp; Drinking==

==Accommodation &amp; Sleeping==

It is legal to pitch your tent in Norway, 500m from the main road and 500 meters from habitations.
Another rule says that you can stay as long as you want, 'till somebody require your spot to pitch his own tent.
It is tolerated to pitch your tent in a park at night, or behind a gas station if you kindly ask.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the carpark. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the highway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight).

==Other Useful Info==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>9k85aevkza071p1d2j5ic261cl934ep</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41100</id>
      <parentid>41075</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-07T14:56:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Grata</username>
        <id>2321</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8002">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is not such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary from foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. 

==Hitchhiking culture==

'''Norway''' is a good country to hitch in, of course depending on location! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

They have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

One thing that makes hitching easy in Norway is that almost all of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitching is ''much'' easier in the beautiful North (at least in the summer), where many locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Stradveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster travelling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Just start knocking on people's windows when they drive and wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. Try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry (they generally pay for the car including passengers) so you don't have to pay for the ride. Apparently for many ferries this is sadly not possible.

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free. StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from Larvik in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

=== Distances ===

According to [[User:markus|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day'''
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''

===License Plates===

There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on
* [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

==Regions &amp; Cities==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===

* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===

* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]

==Border Crossing==

Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

==Eating &amp; Drinking==

==Accommodation &amp; Sleeping==

It is legal to pitch your tent in Norway, 500m from the main road and 500 meters from habitations.
Another rule says that you can stay as long as you want, 'till somebody require your spot to pitch his own tent.
It is tolerated to pitch your tent in a park at night, or behind a gas station if you kindly ask.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the carpark. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the highway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight).

==Other Useful Info==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>2x3l9e2qb4k192umaogr5feum2y1hm0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41111</id>
      <parentid>41100</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-07T21:00:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8558">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is not such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary from foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. 

==Hitchhiking culture==

'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Stradveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster travelling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Just start knocking on people's windows when they drive and wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. Try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry (they generally pay for the car including passengers) so you don't have to pay for the ride. Apparently for many ferries this is sadly not possible.

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free. StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

=== Distances ===

According to [[User:markus|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day'''
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''

===License plates===

There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

==Regions &amp; Cities==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===

* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===

* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]

==Border Crossing==

Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for for goods. Norwegian border  checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

==Eating &amp; Drinking==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North.  Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry.  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket.

==Accommodation &amp; Sleeping==
It is legal to pitch your tent in Norway, 500m from the main road and 500 meters from habitations.
Another rule says that you can stay as long as you want, 'till somebody require your spot to pitch his own tent.
It is tolerated to pitch your tent in a park at night, or behind a gas station if you kindly ask.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the carpark. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the highway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight).

==Other Useful Info==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>d9u69jinr02md8oqf51glzoyxovj7ja</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41300</id>
      <parentid>41111</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-13T02:41:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>24.29.233.163</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8585">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is not such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication.  Sorry about the scabies.  People have been told to be wary from foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. 

==Hitchhiking culture==

'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Stradveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster travelling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Just start knocking on people's windows when they drive and wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. Try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry (they generally pay for the car including passengers) so you don't have to pay for the ride. Apparently for many ferries this is sadly not possible.

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free. StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

=== Distances ===

According to [[User:markus|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day'''
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''

===License plates===

There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

==Regions &amp; Cities==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===

* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===

* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]

==Border Crossing==

Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for for goods. Norwegian border  checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

==Eating &amp; Drinking==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North.  Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry.  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket.

==Accommodation &amp; Sleeping==
It is legal to pitch your tent in Norway, 500m from the main road and 500 meters from habitations.
Another rule says that you can stay as long as you want, 'till somebody require your spot to pitch his own tent.
It is tolerated to pitch your tent in a park at night, or behind a gas station if you kindly ask.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the carpark. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the highway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight).

==Other Useful Info==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>casvaxw6mzp2r6rrouke6tv1uo3oza8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>41369</id>
      <parentid>41300</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-04-13T06:48:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8558">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is not such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary from foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. 

==Hitchhiking culture==

'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Stradveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster travelling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Just start knocking on people's windows when they drive and wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. Try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry (they generally pay for the car including passengers) so you don't have to pay for the ride. Apparently for many ferries this is sadly not possible.

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free. StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

=== Distances ===

According to [[User:markus|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day'''
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''

===License plates===

There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

==Regions &amp; Cities==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===

* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===

* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]

==Border Crossing==

Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for for goods. Norwegian border  checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

==Eating &amp; Drinking==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North.  Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry.  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket.

==Accommodation &amp; Sleeping==
It is legal to pitch your tent in Norway, 500m from the main road and 500 meters from habitations.
Another rule says that you can stay as long as you want, 'till somebody require your spot to pitch his own tent.
It is tolerated to pitch your tent in a park at night, or behind a gas station if you kindly ask.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the carpark. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the highway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight).

==Other Useful Info==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>d9u69jinr02md8oqf51glzoyxovj7ja</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>42548</id>
      <parentid>41369</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-06-19T08:34:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>193.71.113.198</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8628">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is not such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary from foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. 

==Hitchhiking culture==

'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster travelling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Just start knocking on people's windows when they drive and wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. Try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry (they generally pay for the car including passengers) so you don't have to pay for the ride. Apparently for many ferries this is sadly not possible.

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free. StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

=== Distances ===

According to [[User:markus|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day'''
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''

===License plates===

There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

==Regions &amp; Cities==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===

* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===

* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]

==Border Crossing==

Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for for goods. Norwegian border  checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

==Eating &amp; Drinking==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North.  Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry.  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket.

==Accommodation &amp; Sleeping==
It is legal to pitch your tent in Norway, 500m from the main road and 500 meters from habitations.
Another rule says that you can stay as long as you want, 'till somebody require your spot to pitch his own tent.
It is tolerated to pitch your tent in a park at night, or behind a gas station if you kindly ask.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the carpark. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the highway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight).

==Other Useful Info==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>3u02un5gcpje1dizg1v0me839nfxp0b</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>43671</id>
      <parentid>42548</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-08-02T17:27:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>81.191.86.161</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8981">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is not such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary from foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. 

==Hitchhiking culture==

'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster travelling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Just start knocking on people's windows when they drive and wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. Try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry (they generally pay for the car including passengers, up to 4 or 5) so you don't have to pay for the ride. Apparently for many ferries this is sadly not possible. Usually (atleast on Sterna Lines) the driver will have to add your name to the list of passengers before boarding. 

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free. StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on sterna lines and probably colorline as well. only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===

According to [[User:markus|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day'''
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''

===License plates===

There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

==Regions &amp; Cities==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===

* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===

* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]

==Border Crossing==

Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for for goods. Norwegian border  checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

==Eating &amp; Drinking==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North.  Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry.  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket.

==Accommodation &amp; Sleeping==
It is legal to pitch your tent in Norway, 500m from the main road and 500 meters from habitations.
Another rule says that you can stay as long as you want, 'till somebody require your spot to pitch his own tent.
It is tolerated to pitch your tent in a park at night, or behind a gas station if you kindly ask.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the carpark. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the highway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight).

==Other Useful Info==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>m6qs72of8j7k9wlq5zoaxxqgg2srofb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44234</id>
      <parentid>43671</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-08-21T13:22:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>90.149.165.22</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9130">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is not such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary from foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

==Hitchhiking culture==

'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster travelling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Just start knocking on people's windows when they drive and wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. Try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry (they generally pay for the car including passengers, up to 4 or 5) so you don't have to pay for the ride. Apparently for many ferries this is sadly not possible. Usually (atleast on Sterna Lines) the driver will have to add your name to the list of passengers before boarding. 

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free. StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on sterna lines and probably colorline as well. only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===

According to [[User:markus|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day'''
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''

===License plates===

There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

==Regions &amp; Cities==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===

* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===

* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]

==Border Crossing==

Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for for goods. Norwegian border  checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

==Eating &amp; Drinking==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North.  Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry.  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket.

==Accommodation &amp; Sleeping==
It is legal to pitch your tent in Norway, 500m from the main road and 500 meters from habitations.
Another rule says that you can stay as long as you want, 'till somebody require your spot to pitch his own tent.
It is tolerated to pitch your tent in a park at night, or behind a gas station if you kindly ask.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the carpark. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the highway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight).

==Other Useful Info==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>133iub8bpay7lra440lcbv83l73p61q</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>44864</id>
      <parentid>44234</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-09-15T23:16:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9134">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is not such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary from foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

==Hitchhiking culture==

'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster travelling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Just start knocking on people's windows when they drive and wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. Try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry (they generally pay for the car including passengers, up to 4 or 5) so you don't have to pay for the ride. Apparently for many ferries this is sadly not possible. Usually (atleast on Sterna Lines) the driver will have to add your name to the list of passengers before boarding. 

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free. StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on sterna lines and probably colorline as well. only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===

According to [[User:markus|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day'''
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''

===License plates===

There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

==Regions &amp; Cities==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===

* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===

* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]

==Border Crossing==

Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for for goods. Norwegian border  checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

==Eating &amp; Drinking==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North.  Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry.  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket.

==Accommodation &amp; Sleeping==
It is legal to pitch your tent in Norway, 500m from the main road and 500 meters from habitations.
Another rule says that you can stay as long as you want, 'till somebody require your spot to pitch his own tent.
It is tolerated to pitch your tent in a park at night, or behind a petrol station if you kindly ask.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the carpark. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight).

==Other Useful Info==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>2ncbt662hkvqmxbqbzbileoj8nsprql</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>45131</id>
      <parentid>44864</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-09-21T08:17:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>ThorRune</username>
        <id>2640</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9104">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is not such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary from foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

==Hitchhiking culture==

'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster travelling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Yuu can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passanger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependant on passangers, but that is a rare case.

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free. StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on sterna lines and probably colorline as well. only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===

According to [[User:markus|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day'''
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''

===License plates===

There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

==Regions &amp; Cities==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===

* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===

* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]

==Border Crossing==

Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for for goods. Norwegian border  checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

==Eating &amp; Drinking==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North.  Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry.  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket.

==Accommodation &amp; Sleeping==
It is legal to pitch your tent in Norway, 500m from the main road and 500 meters from habitations.
Another rule says that you can stay as long as you want, 'till somebody require your spot to pitch his own tent.
It is tolerated to pitch your tent in a park at night, or behind a petrol station if you kindly ask.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the carpark. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight).

==Other Useful Info==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>jiq95plyuj8khf6z0tw7iyxgoneuy88</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>45133</id>
      <parentid>45131</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-09-21T08:22:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>ThorRune</username>
        <id>2640</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9521">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is not such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary from foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

==Hitchhiking culture==

'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster travelling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Yuu can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passanger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependant on passangers, but that is a rare case.

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free. StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on sterna lines and probably colorline as well. only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===

According to [[User:markus|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day'''
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
*[[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortsh day.
*[[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
*[[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
*Hithhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
*[[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
*[[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

===License plates===

There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

==Regions &amp; Cities==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===

* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===

* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]

==Border Crossing==

Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for for goods. Norwegian border  checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

==Eating &amp; Drinking==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North.  Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry.  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket.

==Accommodation &amp; Sleeping==
It is legal to pitch your tent in Norway, 500m from the main road and 500 meters from habitations.
Another rule says that you can stay as long as you want, 'till somebody require your spot to pitch his own tent.
It is tolerated to pitch your tent in a park at night, or behind a petrol station if you kindly ask.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the carpark. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight).

==Other Useful Info==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>li0aqfmggnevsfw9u3jexr1fxxw9unr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>45135</id>
      <parentid>45133</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-09-21T08:48:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>ThorRune</username>
        <id>2640</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10312">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is not such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary from foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

==Hitchhiking culture==

'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster travelling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Yuu can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passanger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependant on passangers, but that is a rare case.

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free. StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on sterna lines and probably colorline as well. only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===

According to [[User:markus|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day'''
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
*[[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortsh day.
*[[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
*[[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
*Hithhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
*[[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
*[[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

===License plates===

There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

==Regions &amp; Cities==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===

* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===

* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]

==Border Crossing==

Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for for goods. Norwegian border  checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

==Eating &amp; Drinking==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North.  Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry.  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket.

==Accommodation &amp; Sleeping==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the tenters a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contraty to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in a farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forrest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are rquired to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tollerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a gas station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the carpark. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forrest somwhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

==Other Useful Info==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>r252ec7rmz2ad6a704e5cqppok55t56</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>45867</id>
      <parentid>45135</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-10-14T23:19:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>76.9.52.36</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10307">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is not such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary from foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

==Hitchhiking culture==

'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster travelling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Yuu can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passanger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependant on passangers, but that is a rare case.

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free. StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on sterna lines and probably colorline as well. only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===

According to [[User:markus|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day'''
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
*[[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortsh day.
*[[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
*[[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
*Hithhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
*[[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
*[[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

===License plates===

There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

==Regions &amp; Cities==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===

* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===

* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]

==Border Crossing==

Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

==Eating &amp; Drinking==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North.  Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry.  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket.

==Accommodation &amp; Sleeping==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the tenters a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contraty to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in a farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forrest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are rquired to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tollerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a gas station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the carpark. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forrest somwhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

==Other Useful Info==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>bufgzvlmydtq6ew06au7edx8a3fahb0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48181</id>
      <parentid>45867</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-12-14T07:13:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>81.166.35.38</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10306">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary from foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

==Hitchhiking culture==

'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster travelling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Yuu can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passanger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependant on passangers, but that is a rare case.

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free. StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on sterna lines and probably colorline as well. only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===

According to [[User:markus|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day'''
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
*[[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortsh day.
*[[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
*[[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
*Hithhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
*[[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
*[[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

===License plates===

There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

==Regions &amp; Cities==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===

* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===

* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]

==Border Crossing==

Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

==Eating &amp; Drinking==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North.  Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry.  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket.

==Accommodation &amp; Sleeping==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the tenters a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contraty to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in a farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forrest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are rquired to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tollerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a gas station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the carpark. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forrest somwhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

==Other Useful Info==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>801srxbdfqzaj6ui7kaidib42o0r0rz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48731</id>
      <parentid>48181</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-16T18:24:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>87.104.41.201</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10457">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary from foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

==Hitchhiking culture==

'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster travelling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Yuu can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passanger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependant on passangers, but that is a rare case.

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free. StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on sterna lines and probably colorline as well. only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===

According to [[User:markus|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day'''
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
*[[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortsh day.
*[[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
*[[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
*Hithhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
*[[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
*[[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

===License plates===

There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

==Regions &amp; Cities==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===

* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===

* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]

==Border Crossing==

Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

==Eating &amp; Drinking==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North.  Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry.  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket.

==Accommodation &amp; Sleeping==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the tenters a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contraty to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in a farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forrest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are rquired to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tollerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a gas station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5 a.m.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the carpark. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forrest somwhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

==Other Useful Info==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>ohct6ikxa5b3rjef4v2j9q1fk9anhsn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>50321</id>
      <parentid>48731</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-03-22T17:02:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>213.167.97.194</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11017">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary from foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

==Hitchhiking culture==

'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster travelling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Yuu can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passanger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependant on passangers, but that is a rare case.

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free. StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on sterna lines and probably colorline as well. only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===

According to [[User:markus|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
*[[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortsh day.
*[[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
*[[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
*Hithhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
*[[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
*[[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.


&lt;b&gt;Distances&lt;/b&gt; - NOTE: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

*Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
*Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 timer
*Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
*Oslo Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
*Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
*Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
*Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
*Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
*Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
*Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope thats any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

===License plates===

There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

==Regions &amp; Cities==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===

* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===

* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]

==Border Crossing==

Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

==Eating &amp; Drinking==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North.  Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry.  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket.

==Accommodation &amp; Sleeping==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the tenters a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contraty to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in a farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forrest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are rquired to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tollerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a gas station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5 a.m.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the carpark. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forrest somwhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

==Other Useful Info==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>cmwzp0d3d75zf5hixwk8ojc7q5ozqg9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>52280</id>
      <parentid>50321</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-05-05T19:46:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11015">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

==Hitchhiking culture==

'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster travelling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Yuu can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passanger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependant on passangers, but that is a rare case.

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free. StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on sterna lines and probably colorline as well. only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===

According to [[User:markus|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
*[[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortsh day.
*[[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
*[[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
*Hithhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
*[[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
*[[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.


&lt;b&gt;Distances&lt;/b&gt; - NOTE: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

*Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
*Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 timer
*Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
*Oslo Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
*Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
*Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
*Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
*Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
*Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
*Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope thats any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

===License plates===

There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

==Regions &amp; Cities==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===

* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===

* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]

==Border Crossing==

Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

==Eating &amp; Drinking==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North.  Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry.  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket.

==Accommodation &amp; Sleeping==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the tenters a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contraty to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in a farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forrest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are rquired to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tollerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a gas station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5 a.m.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the carpark. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forrest somwhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

==Other Useful Info==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>0e8rxmwa2cl1bzg1ecd3dspm9wtdf84</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>52281</id>
      <parentid>52280</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-05-05T19:55:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11017">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

==Hitchhiking culture==

'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster travelling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Yuu can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passanger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependant on passangers, but that is a rare case.

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free. StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on sterna lines and probably colorline as well. only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===

According to [[User:markus|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
*[[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
*[[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
*[[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
*Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
*[[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
*[[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.


&lt;b&gt;Distances&lt;/b&gt; - NOTE: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

*Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
*Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 timer
*Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
*Oslo Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
*Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
*Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
*Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
*Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
*Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
*Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope thats any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

===License plates===

There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

==Regions &amp; Cities==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===

* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===

* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]

==Border Crossing==

Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

==Eating &amp; Drinking==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North.  Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry.  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket.

==Accommodation &amp; Sleeping==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the tenters a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contraty to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in a farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forrest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are rquired to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tollerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a gas station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5 a.m.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the carpark. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forrest somwhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

==Other Useful Info==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>cz2puqlpy3hmnt8t5tjs0zxdk8f6du3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>52282</id>
      <parentid>52281</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-05-05T20:12:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11030">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = {{average}} to {{good}}
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while traveling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Yuu can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case.

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free. StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
According to [[User:markus|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
*[[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
*[[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
*[[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
*Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
*[[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
*[[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

&lt;b&gt;Distances&lt;/b&gt; - NOTE: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

*Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
*Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 timer
*Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
*Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
*Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
*Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
*Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
*Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
*Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
*Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

==Regions &amp; Cities==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North.  Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry.  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket.

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

==Other Useful Info==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>tqelnt01not2lst9b9jiu0rivyf3zm0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>54494</id>
      <parentid>52282</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-09-05T10:59:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Zenit</username>
        <id>1875</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11030">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while traveling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Yuu can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case.

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free. StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
According to [[User:markus|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
*[[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
*[[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
*[[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
*Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
*[[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
*[[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

&lt;b&gt;Distances&lt;/b&gt; - NOTE: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

*Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
*Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 timer
*Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
*Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
*Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
*Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
*Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
*Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
*Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
*Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

==Regions &amp; Cities==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North.  Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry.  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket.

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

==Other Useful Info==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>4wbaxksd96xriidk37du0yhvlutnmi6</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>55094</id>
      <parentid>54494</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-09-23T01:14:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11039">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while traveling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the [[E6]] road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Yuu can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case.

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free. StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
According to [[User:markus|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
*[[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
*[[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
*[[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
*Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
*[[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
*[[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

&lt;b&gt;Distances&lt;/b&gt; - NOTE: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

*Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
*Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 timer
*Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
*Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
*Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
*Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
*Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
*Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
*Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
*Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

==Regions &amp; Cities==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North.  Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry.  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket.

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

==Other Useful Info==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>50fl4yfczzbjfucrxfpcmng2tqaua26</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>56071</id>
      <parentid>55094</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-08T01:18:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11074">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while traveling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Yuu can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case.

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free. StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

'''Distances''' - NOTE: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 timer
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North.  Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry.  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket.

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

== Other Useful Info ==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>ijuw05dnwbp8tf2mkbqca3tmstqcxyj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>60300</id>
      <parentid>56071</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-03-30T17:59:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Koendev</username>
        <id>4236</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11097">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while traveling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Yuu can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case.

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free. StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

'''Distances''' - NOTE: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 timer
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North.  Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry.  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket.

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

== Other Useful Info ==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>j192r3h361aq78ftz0npzealcjwbu7c</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>62560</id>
      <parentid>60300</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-07-20T18:41:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11188">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while traveling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Yuu can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case.

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free. StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

'''Distances''' - NOTE: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 timer
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North.  Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry.  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket.

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

== Other Useful Info ==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>4a73hw3hbgq1try1yvcpi85yiyjsj9d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>67497</id>
      <parentid>62560</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-11-11T14:28:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Redjo27</username>
        <id>7265</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11402">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while traveling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Yuu can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case.

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free. StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.
According to [[User:Redjo27|Redjo27]], one guy.
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

'''Distances''' - NOTE: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 timer
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North.  Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry.  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket.

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

== Other Useful Info ==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>gtc7r5cof4owho0eu2oegj85ox9q63h</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>67498</id>
      <parentid>67497</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-11-11T14:30:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Redjo27</username>
        <id>7265</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11414">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while traveling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Yuu can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case.

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free. StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:Redjo27|Redjo27]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

'''Distances''' - NOTE: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 timer
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North.  Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry.  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket.

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

== Other Useful Info ==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>epgn91ywe9ekvqpzx5r3hzs41k5ss95</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>67613</id>
      <parentid>67498</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-11-22T15:20:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>J. O'Hannes</username>
        <id>7753</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11422">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while traveling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Yuu can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case.

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free. StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

'''Distances''' - NOTE: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 timer
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North.  Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry.  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket.

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

== Other Useful Info ==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>6hb5frm9f50murnp8m3i7y881f7kb90</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>67812</id>
      <parentid>67613</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-12-14T11:30:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Phidias81</username>
        <id>3137</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11775">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while traveling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Yuu can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case.

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct anymore as of November 2012: extra passenger is 5€. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

'''Distances''' - NOTE: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 timer
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North.  Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry.  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket.

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

== Other Useful Info ==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>hq1ye8d0o6f7b5qg6f60fjtput9r0q4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68588</id>
      <parentid>67812</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-03-13T11:13:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Koendev</username>
        <id>4236</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11776">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while traveling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Yuu can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case.

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct anymore as of November 2012: extra passenger is 5€. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

'''Distances''' - NOTE: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North.  Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry.  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket.

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

== Other Useful Info ==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikitravel:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>h9e9bkotitpniga1lqwoqprl5zk6hb7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70354</id>
      <parentid>68588</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-07-07T10:53:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robyt</username>
        <id>9747</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11776">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while traveling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Yuu can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case.

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct anymore as of November 2012: extra passenger is 5€. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

'''Distances''' - NOTE: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North.  Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry.  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket.

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

== Other Useful Info ==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>7gy2hmn3dimbwdv0hu8044o835v0zj0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72220</id>
      <parentid>70354</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-04T21:00:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fedecicco</username>
        <id>4349</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12857">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while traveling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Yuu can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]


Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct anymore as of November 2012: extra passenger is 5€. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

'''Distances''' - NOTE: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North.  Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry.  [[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket. 
[[User:Fedecicco|Fede]] and his brother dumpsterdived all across the country, didn't pay almost any money for food (except cheap flat bread, oat).

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

== Other Useful Info ==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>7b2cgyl95ryj77vg4ae3sqkm5nqjon0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72253</id>
      <parentid>72220</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-06T09:36:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Fedecicco</username>
        <id>4349</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13674">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while traveling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Yuu can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]


Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct anymore as of November 2012: extra passenger is 5€. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

'''Distances''' - NOTE: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North; but the dumpsters are full! especially of fresh fruits and veggies (mostly exotic like mangos avocados and bananas, tonnes of them but also of any other, from tomatoes to strawberries, blueberries, anything your appetite and taste may want) . Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry, but no worries, when you will have finished it the dumpsters will surely fill your stomach, prefer small villages and towns than big cities since there is more food and dumpsters are (almost) always unlocked; plus food like oat, flat "fullkorn" bread, cooked legumes in metal or tetrapak boxes like beans, chickpeas, lentils, etc are defniitely cheap or at least affordable (around 1E per piece but often even less) and constitute a good way to buy something in order to "borrow" from supermarkets (since the security is not really active) the expensive food you need and can't pay.
[[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket. 
[[User:Fedecicco|Fede]] and his brother hitchhiked and dumpsterdived all across the country for 3 weeks, and paid very few money for food .

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

== Other Useful Info ==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>t3mlob5dkyox4mlydi7lw0qstekiqar</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72386</id>
      <parentid>72253</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-12T21:49:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robyt</username>
        <id>9747</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13691">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while traveling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Yuu can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]


Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct anymore as of November 2012: extra passenger is 5€. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

'''Distances''' - NOTE: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North; but the dumpsters are full! especially of fresh fruits and veggies (mostly exotic like mangos avocados and bananas, tonnes of them but also of any other, from tomatoes to strawberries, blueberries, anything your appetite and taste may want) . Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry, but no worries, when you will have finished it the dumpsters will surely fill your stomach, prefer small villages and towns than big cities since there is more food and dumpsters are (almost) always unlocked; plus food like oat, flat "fullkorn" bread, cooked legumes in metal or tetrapak boxes like beans, chickpeas, lentils, etc are defniitely cheap or at least affordable (around 1E per piece but often even less) and constitute a good way to buy something in order to "borrow" from supermarkets (since the security is not really active) the expensive food you need and can't pay.
[[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket. 
[[User:Fedecicco|Fede]] and his brother hitchhiked and dumpsterdived all across the country for 3 weeks, and paid very few money for food .

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

== Other Useful Info ==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]
[[nomad:Norway]]</text>
      <sha1>tefktba19puyffylp223nbabjbtbnuh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72604</id>
      <parentid>72386</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-21T22:08:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Peregrine</username>
        <id>14972</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14375">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while traveling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Yuu can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]


Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct anymore as of November 2012: extra passenger is 5€. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (2pm to 6pm)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (9 am to 4pm)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...


'''Distances''' - NOTE: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North; but the dumpsters are full! especially of fresh fruits and veggies (mostly exotic like mangos avocados and bananas, tonnes of them but also of any other, from tomatoes to strawberries, blueberries, anything your appetite and taste may want) . Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry, but no worries, when you will have finished it the dumpsters will surely fill your stomach, prefer small villages and towns than big cities since there is more food and dumpsters are (almost) always unlocked; plus food like oat, flat "fullkorn" bread, cooked legumes in metal or tetrapak boxes like beans, chickpeas, lentils, etc are defniitely cheap or at least affordable (around 1E per piece but often even less) and constitute a good way to buy something in order to "borrow" from supermarkets (since the security is not really active) the expensive food you need and can't pay.
[[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket. 
[[User:Fedecicco|Fede]] and his brother hitchhiked and dumpsterdived all across the country for 3 weeks, and paid very few money for food .

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

== Other Useful Info ==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]
[[nomad:Norway]]</text>
      <sha1>kds8gceg1qcbwjmvv3k1spthahzt2ie</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72611</id>
      <parentid>72604</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-21T22:24:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Peregrine</username>
        <id>14972</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14385">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while traveling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Yuu can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]


Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct anymore as of November 2012: extra passenger is 5€. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (2pm to 6pm)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (9 am to 4pm)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...


'''Distances''' - NOTE: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is registered, but as Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North; but the dumpsters are full! especially of fresh fruits and veggies (mostly exotic like mangos avocados and bananas, tonnes of them but also of any other, from tomatoes to strawberries, blueberries, anything your appetite and taste may want) . Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry, but no worries, when you will have finished it the dumpsters will surely fill your stomach, prefer small villages and towns than big cities since there is more food and dumpsters are (almost) always unlocked; plus food like oat, flat "fullkorn" bread, cooked legumes in metal or tetrapak boxes like beans, chickpeas, lentils, etc are defniitely cheap or at least affordable (around 1E per piece but often even less) and constitute a good way to buy something in order to "borrow" from supermarkets (since the security is not really active) the expensive food you need and can't pay.
[[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket. 
[[User:Fedecicco|Fede]] and his brother hitchhiked and dumpsterdived all across the country for 3 weeks, and paid very few money for food .

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

== Other Useful Info ==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]
[[nomad:Norway]]</text>
      <sha1>ao9piwpe6loxfzncrvelvdxjb3iqdj4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>73925</id>
      <parentid>72611</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-01-05T15:10:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14431">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while traveling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. Yuu can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]


Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct anymore as of November 2012: extra passenger is 5€. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (2pm to 6pm)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (9 am to 4pm)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...


'''Distances''' - NOTE: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North; but the dumpsters are full! especially of fresh fruits and veggies (mostly exotic like mangos avocados and bananas, tonnes of them but also of any other, from tomatoes to strawberries, blueberries, anything your appetite and taste may want) . Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry, but no worries, when you will have finished it the dumpsters will surely fill your stomach, prefer small villages and towns than big cities since there is more food and dumpsters are (almost) always unlocked; plus food like oat, flat "fullkorn" bread, cooked legumes in metal or tetrapak boxes like beans, chickpeas, lentils, etc are defniitely cheap or at least affordable (around 1E per piece but often even less) and constitute a good way to buy something in order to "borrow" from supermarkets (since the security is not really active) the expensive food you need and can't pay.
[[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket. 
[[User:Fedecicco|Fede]] and his brother hitchhiked and dumpsterdived all across the country for 3 weeks, and paid very few money for food .

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

== Other Useful Info ==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]
[[nomad:Norway]]</text>
      <sha1>tjjabw5hc73imwkjbxnqzsksub6pwcu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>75849</id>
      <parentid>73925</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-06-27T17:47:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thomasmyrman</username>
        <id>18359</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14763">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while traveling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway.


''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]


Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct anymore as of November 2012: extra passenger is 5€. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (2pm to 6pm)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (9 am to 4pm)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...


'''Distances''' - NOTE: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North; but the dumpsters are full! especially of fresh fruits and veggies (mostly exotic like mangos avocados and bananas, tonnes of them but also of any other, from tomatoes to strawberries, blueberries, anything your appetite and taste may want) . Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry, but no worries, when you will have finished it the dumpsters will surely fill your stomach, prefer small villages and towns than big cities since there is more food and dumpsters are (almost) always unlocked; plus food like oat, flat "fullkorn" bread, cooked legumes in metal or tetrapak boxes like beans, chickpeas, lentils, etc are defniitely cheap or at least affordable (around 1E per piece but often even less) and constitute a good way to buy something in order to "borrow" from supermarkets (since the security is not really active) the expensive food you need and can't pay.
[[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket. 
[[User:Fedecicco|Fede]] and his brother hitchhiked and dumpsterdived all across the country for 3 weeks, and paid very few money for food .

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

== Other Useful Info ==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]
[[nomad:Norway]]</text>
      <sha1>mjn274xc4jlue84cl93k41orh7rr23v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>75853</id>
      <parentid>75849</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-06-27T20:53:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14762">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while traveling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]


Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct anymore as of November 2012: extra passenger is 5€. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (2pm to 6pm)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (9 am to 4pm)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...


'''Distances''' - NOTE: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North; but the dumpsters are full! especially of fresh fruits and veggies (mostly exotic like mangos avocados and bananas, tonnes of them but also of any other, from tomatoes to strawberries, blueberries, anything your appetite and taste may want) . Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry, but no worries, when you will have finished it the dumpsters will surely fill your stomach, prefer small villages and towns than big cities since there is more food and dumpsters are (almost) always unlocked; plus food like oat, flat "fullkorn" bread, cooked legumes in metal or tetrapak boxes like beans, chickpeas, lentils, etc are defniitely cheap or at least affordable (around 1E per piece but often even less) and constitute a good way to buy something in order to "borrow" from supermarkets (since the security is not really active) the expensive food you need and can't pay.
[[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket. 
[[User:Fedecicco|Fede]] and his brother hitchhiked and dumpsterdived all across the country for 3 weeks, and paid very few money for food .

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

== Other Useful Info ==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]
[[nomad:Norway]]</text>
      <sha1>i82kkgsvz5n2svjwuuj02m6sr3k6t3a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>76358</id>
      <parentid>75853</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-08-02T17:45:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Yak</username>
        <id>18935</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14773">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while traveling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]


Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct anymore as of November 2012: extra passenger is 5€. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night
According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], a gal
* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (2pm to 6pm)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (9 am to 4pm)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...


'''Distances''' - NOTE: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North; but the dumpsters are full! especially of fresh fruits and veggies (mostly exotic like mangos avocados and bananas, tonnes of them but also of any other, from tomatoes to strawberries, blueberries, anything your appetite and taste may want) . Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry, but no worries, when you will have finished it the dumpsters will surely fill your stomach, prefer small villages and towns than big cities since there is more food and dumpsters are (almost) always unlocked; plus food like oat, flat "fullkorn" bread, cooked legumes in metal or tetrapak boxes like beans, chickpeas, lentils, etc are defniitely cheap or at least affordable (around 1E per piece but often even less) and constitute a good way to buy something in order to "borrow" from supermarkets (since the security is not really active) the expensive food you need and can't pay.
[[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket. 
[[User:Fedecicco|Fede]] and his brother hitchhiked and dumpsterdived all across the country for 3 weeks, and paid very few money for food .

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

== Other Useful Info ==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]
[[nomad:Norway]]</text>
      <sha1>kxzqvxacypqkadl9v6t85jisf3pcu1v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>76513</id>
      <parentid>76358</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-08-10T22:11:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mila.77</username>
        <id>18832</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15342">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while traveling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]


Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct anymore as of November 2012: extra passenger is 5€. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]]  
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 1.5 Days on very bad traffic, maybe possible on 1 day. 
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of citiey, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (2pm to 6pm)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (9 am to 4pm)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...


'''Distances''' - NOTE: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North; but the dumpsters are full! especially of fresh fruits and veggies (mostly exotic like mangos avocados and bananas, tonnes of them but also of any other, from tomatoes to strawberries, blueberries, anything your appetite and taste may want) . Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry, but no worries, when you will have finished it the dumpsters will surely fill your stomach, prefer small villages and towns than big cities since there is more food and dumpsters are (almost) always unlocked; plus food like oat, flat "fullkorn" bread, cooked legumes in metal or tetrapak boxes like beans, chickpeas, lentils, etc are defniitely cheap or at least affordable (around 1E per piece but often even less) and constitute a good way to buy something in order to "borrow" from supermarkets (since the security is not really active) the expensive food you need and can't pay.
[[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket. 
[[User:Fedecicco|Fede]] and his brother hitchhiked and dumpsterdived all across the country for 3 weeks, and paid very few money for food .

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

== Other Useful Info ==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]
[[nomad:Norway]]</text>
      <sha1>rk7yof1exp94avauqeeqkdarcg13slg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>76514</id>
      <parentid>76513</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-08-10T22:12:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mila.77</username>
        <id>18832</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15362">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while traveling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]


Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct anymore as of November 2012: extra passenger is 5€. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night


According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]]  , female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of citiey, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (2pm to 6pm)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (9 am to 4pm)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...


'''Distances''' - NOTE: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North; but the dumpsters are full! especially of fresh fruits and veggies (mostly exotic like mangos avocados and bananas, tonnes of them but also of any other, from tomatoes to strawberries, blueberries, anything your appetite and taste may want) . Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry, but no worries, when you will have finished it the dumpsters will surely fill your stomach, prefer small villages and towns than big cities since there is more food and dumpsters are (almost) always unlocked; plus food like oat, flat "fullkorn" bread, cooked legumes in metal or tetrapak boxes like beans, chickpeas, lentils, etc are defniitely cheap or at least affordable (around 1E per piece but often even less) and constitute a good way to buy something in order to "borrow" from supermarkets (since the security is not really active) the expensive food you need and can't pay.
[[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket. 
[[User:Fedecicco|Fede]] and his brother hitchhiked and dumpsterdived all across the country for 3 weeks, and paid very few money for food .

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

== Other Useful Info ==

* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]
[[nomad:Norway]]</text>
      <sha1>qawm6fry8vyreu96chijiirtlwfcpvh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>78641</id>
      <parentid>76514</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-01-31T12:24:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15438">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while traveling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]


Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct anymore as of November 2012: extra passenger is 5€. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night


According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]]  , female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of citiey, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (2pm to 6pm)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (9 am to 4pm)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...


'''Distances''' - NOTE: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North; but the dumpsters are full! especially of fresh fruits and veggies (mostly exotic like mangos avocados and bananas, tonnes of them but also of any other, from tomatoes to strawberries, blueberries, anything your appetite and taste may want) . Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry, but no worries, when you will have finished it the dumpsters will surely fill your stomach, prefer small villages and towns than big cities since there is more food and dumpsters are (almost) always unlocked; plus food like oat, flat "fullkorn" bread, cooked legumes in metal or tetrapak boxes like beans, chickpeas, lentils, etc are defniitely cheap or at least affordable (around 1E per piece but often even less) and constitute a good way to buy something in order to "borrow" from supermarkets (since the security is not really active) the expensive food you need and can't pay.
[[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket. 
[[User:Fedecicco|Fede]] and his brother hitchhiked and dumpsterdived all across the country for 3 weeks, and paid very few money for food .

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

== See also ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group
* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]
[[nomad:Norway]]</text>
      <sha1>e3a4e5wdfha5smkpusfr7fzah3szkdc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>78642</id>
      <parentid>78641</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-01-31T12:25:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Mikael</username>
        <id>1424</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15483">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while traveling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]


Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct anymore as of November 2012: extra passenger is 5€. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night


According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]]  , female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of citiey, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (2pm to 6pm)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (9 am to 4pm)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...


'''Distances''' - NOTE: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North; but the dumpsters are full! especially of fresh fruits and veggies (mostly exotic like mangos avocados and bananas, tonnes of them but also of any other, from tomatoes to strawberries, blueberries, anything your appetite and taste may want) . Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry, but no worries, when you will have finished it the dumpsters will surely fill your stomach, prefer small villages and towns than big cities since there is more food and dumpsters are (almost) always unlocked; plus food like oat, flat "fullkorn" bread, cooked legumes in metal or tetrapak boxes like beans, chickpeas, lentils, etc are defniitely cheap or at least affordable (around 1E per piece but often even less) and constitute a good way to buy something in order to "borrow" from supermarkets (since the security is not really active) the expensive food you need and can't pay.
[[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket. 
[[User:Fedecicco|Fede]] and his brother hitchhiked and dumpsterdived all across the country for 3 weeks, and paid very few money for food .

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

== See also ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group
* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]
[[nomad:Norway]]

{{move_to_trashwiki}}
{{move_to_nomadwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>qlzqqne8d3mtr19dxv835rdr2sui5pq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>80326</id>
      <parentid>78642</parentid>
      <timestamp>2015-08-29T15:54:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15502">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while traveling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]


Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct anymore as of November 2012: extra passenger is 5€. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night


According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]]  , female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of citiey, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (2pm to 6pm)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (9 am to 4pm)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...


'''Distances''' - NOTE: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North; but the dumpsters are full! especially of fresh fruits and veggies (mostly exotic like mangos avocados and bananas, tonnes of them but also of any other, from tomatoes to strawberries, blueberries, anything your appetite and taste may want) . Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry, but no worries, when you will have finished it the dumpsters will surely fill your stomach, prefer small villages and towns than big cities since there is more food and dumpsters are (almost) always unlocked; plus food like oat, flat "fullkorn" bread, cooked legumes in metal or tetrapak boxes like beans, chickpeas, lentils, etc are defniitely cheap or at least affordable (around 1E per piece but often even less) and constitute a good way to buy something in order to "borrow" from supermarkets (since the security is not really active) the expensive food you need and can't pay.
[[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket. 
[[User:Fedecicco|Fede]] and his brother hitchhiked and dumpsterdived all across the country for 3 weeks, and paid very few money for food .

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

== See also ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group
* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]
[[nomad:Norway]]

{{move_to_trashwiki}}
{{move_to_nomadwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>p1xij4j6sr4lhpz9my8kxkniehk13xr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>82252</id>
      <parentid>80326</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-03-01T23:48:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15505">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while traveling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]


Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct anymore as of November 2012: extra passenger is 5€. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

'''Distances''' - NOTE: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North; but the dumpsters are full! especially of fresh fruits and veggies (mostly exotic like mangos avocados and bananas, tonnes of them but also of any other, from tomatoes to strawberries, blueberries, anything your appetite and taste may want) . Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry, but no worries, when you will have finished it the dumpsters will surely fill your stomach, prefer small villages and towns than big cities since there is more food and dumpsters are (almost) always unlocked; plus food like oat, flat "fullkorn" bread, cooked legumes in metal or tetrapak boxes like beans, chickpeas, lentils, etc are definitely cheap or at least affordable (around 1E per piece but often even less) and constitute a good way to buy something in order to "borrow" from supermarkets (since the security is not really active) the expensive food you need and can't pay.
[[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket. 
[[User:Fedecicco|Fede]] and his brother hitchhiked and dumpsterdived all across the country for 3 weeks, and paid very few money for food .

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

== See also ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group
* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]
[[nomad:Norway]]

{{move_to_trashwiki}}
{{move_to_nomadwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>5mu6kxi7r55ogv0fna42bv3cxk087bc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>82533</id>
      <parentid>82252</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-03-31T14:11:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Francisco1</username>
        <id>25352</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15860">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while traveling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]


Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct anymore as of November 2012: extra passenger is 5€. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definetely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - NOTE: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North; but the dumpsters are full! especially of fresh fruits and veggies (mostly exotic like mangos avocados and bananas, tonnes of them but also of any other, from tomatoes to strawberries, blueberries, anything your appetite and taste may want) . Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry, but no worries, when you will have finished it the dumpsters will surely fill your stomach, prefer small villages and towns than big cities since there is more food and dumpsters are (almost) always unlocked; plus food like oat, flat "fullkorn" bread, cooked legumes in metal or tetrapak boxes like beans, chickpeas, lentils, etc are definitely cheap or at least affordable (around 1E per piece but often even less) and constitute a good way to buy something in order to "borrow" from supermarkets (since the security is not really active) the expensive food you need and can't pay.
[[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket. 
[[User:Fedecicco|Fede]] and his brother hitchhiked and dumpsterdived all across the country for 3 weeks, and paid very few money for food .

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

== See also ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group
* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]
[[nomad:Norway]]

{{move_to_trashwiki}}
{{move_to_nomadwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>7r4u9q0xwdrytb3npjmaty0toupen3r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>82536</id>
      <parentid>82533</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-03-31T14:54:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Francisco1</username>
        <id>25352</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15928">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while traveling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|NORWAY, A PARADISE FOR HITCHHIKERS]])''

According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]


Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct anymore as of November 2012: extra passenger is 5€. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definetely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - NOTE: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North; but the dumpsters are full! especially of fresh fruits and veggies (mostly exotic like mangos avocados and bananas, tonnes of them but also of any other, from tomatoes to strawberries, blueberries, anything your appetite and taste may want) . Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry, but no worries, when you will have finished it the dumpsters will surely fill your stomach, prefer small villages and towns than big cities since there is more food and dumpsters are (almost) always unlocked; plus food like oat, flat "fullkorn" bread, cooked legumes in metal or tetrapak boxes like beans, chickpeas, lentils, etc are definitely cheap or at least affordable (around 1E per piece but often even less) and constitute a good way to buy something in order to "borrow" from supermarkets (since the security is not really active) the expensive food you need and can't pay.
[[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket. 
[[User:Fedecicco|Fede]] and his brother hitchhiked and dumpsterdived all across the country for 3 weeks, and paid very few money for food .

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

== See also ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group
* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]
[[nomad:Norway]]

{{move_to_trashwiki}}
{{move_to_nomadwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>0hu9pmwx7x8icguuwqds827f76o18bc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>82537</id>
      <parentid>82536</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-03-31T15:13:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Francisco1</username>
        <id>25352</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17762">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while traveling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chance decreases further. Look presentable to increase your chances of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is difficult to class as a good or bad country for hitchhiking (see the Discussion page). There are both very good and very bad feedback from hitchhikers in Norway:

==POSITIVE==

'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|NORWAY, A PARADISE FOR HITCHHIKERS]])''

==NEGATIVE==

According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. Grata[[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

==MORE ADVICE==

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

==NORTH NORWAY==

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]


Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct anymore as of November 2012: extra passenger is 5€. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definetely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - NOTE: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border check for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North; but the dumpsters are full! especially of fresh fruits and veggies (mostly exotic like mangos avocados and bananas, tonnes of them but also of any other, from tomatoes to strawberries, blueberries, anything your appetite and taste may want) . Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry, but no worries, when you will have finished it the dumpsters will surely fill your stomach, prefer small villages and towns than big cities since there is more food and dumpsters are (almost) always unlocked; plus food like oat, flat "fullkorn" bread, cooked legumes in metal or tetrapak boxes like beans, chickpeas, lentils, etc are definitely cheap or at least affordable (around 1E per piece but often even less) and constitute a good way to buy something in order to "borrow" from supermarkets (since the security is not really active) the expensive food you need and can't pay.
[[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket. 
[[User:Fedecicco|Fede]] and his brother hitchhiked and dumpsterdived all across the country for 3 weeks, and paid very few money for food .

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

ENJOY YOUR TRIP !

== See also ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group
* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]
[[nomad:Norway]]

{{move_to_trashwiki}}
{{move_to_nomadwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>08u8mvm1nj5khhzjkxcs5qsr0puydy1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>82542</id>
      <parentid>82537</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-03-31T20:18:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17779">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is difficult to class as a good or bad country for hitchhiking (see the Discussion page). There are both very good and very bad feedback from hitchhikers in Norway:

=== Positive ===

'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===

According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. Grata[[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== More advice ===

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

== North Norway ==

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border checks for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North; but the dumpsters are full! especially of fresh fruits and veggies (mostly exotic like mangos avocados and bananas, tonnes of them but also of any other, from tomatoes to strawberries, blueberries, anything your appetite and taste may want) . Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry, but no worries, when you will have finished it the dumpsters will surely fill your stomach, prefer small villages and towns than big cities since there is more food and dumpsters are (almost) always unlocked; plus food like oat, flat "fullkorn" bread, cooked legumes in metal or tetrapak boxes like beans, chickpeas, lentils, etc are definitely cheap or at least affordable (around 1E per piece but often even less) and constitute a good way to buy something in order to "borrow" from supermarkets (since the security is not really active) the expensive food you need and can't pay.
[[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket. 
[[User:Fedecicco|Fede]] and his brother hitchhiked and dumpster-dived all across the country for 3 weeks, and paid very few money for food .

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

ENJOY YOUR TRIP !

== See also ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group
* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]
[[nomad:Norway]]

{{move_to_trashwiki}}
{{move_to_nomadwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>j6czh1qngp5gwidm2eqa1wna7abka4l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>82598</id>
      <parentid>82542</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-04-04T16:06:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Michialbi</username>
        <id>24135</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="18325">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is difficult to class as a good or bad country for hitchhiking (see the Discussion page). There are both very good and very bad feedback from hitchhikers in Norway:

=== Positive ===

'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===

According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. Grata[[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== More advice ===

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Hurtigruten is a daily shipping service on Norway's coast, it stops in most towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.

== North Norway ==

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border checks for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North; but the dumpsters are full! especially of fresh fruits and veggies (mostly exotic like mangos avocados and bananas, tonnes of them but also of any other, from tomatoes to strawberries, blueberries, anything your appetite and taste may want) . Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry, but no worries, when you will have finished it the dumpsters will surely fill your stomach, prefer small villages and towns than big cities since there is more food and dumpsters are (almost) always unlocked; plus food like oat, flat "fullkorn" bread, cooked legumes in metal or tetrapak boxes like beans, chickpeas, lentils, etc are definitely cheap or at least affordable (around 1E per piece but often even less) and constitute a good way to buy something in order to "borrow" from supermarkets (since the security is not really active) the expensive food you need and can't pay.
[[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket. 
[[User:Fedecicco|Fede]] and his brother hitchhiked and dumpster-dived all across the country for 3 weeks, and paid very few money for food .

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

ENJOY YOUR TRIP !

== See also ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group
* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]
[[nomad:Norway]]

{{move_to_trashwiki}}
{{move_to_nomadwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>swdtdl8xyt2eeasnjeun9dntn0jlv88</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>82924</id>
      <parentid>82598</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-05-24T11:38:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Peder Østring</username>
        <id>25788</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="18403">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is difficult to class as a good or bad country for hitchhiking (see the Discussion page). There are both very good and very bad feedback from hitchhikers in Norway:

=== Positive ===

'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===

According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. Grata[[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== More advice ===

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Hurtigruten is a daily shipping service on Norway's coast, it stops in most towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.

== North Norway ==

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border checks for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North; but the dumpsters are full! especially of fresh fruits and veggies (mostly exotic like mangos avocados and bananas, tonnes of them but also of any other, from tomatoes to strawberries, blueberries, anything your appetite and taste may want) . Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry, but no worries, when you will have finished it the dumpsters will surely fill your stomach, prefer small villages and towns than big cities since there is more food and dumpsters are (almost) always unlocked; plus food like oat, flat "fullkorn" bread, cooked legumes in metal or tetrapak boxes like beans, chickpeas, lentils, etc are definitely cheap or at least affordable (around 1E per piece but often even less) and constitute a good way to buy something in order to "borrow" from supermarkets (since the security is not really active) the expensive food you need and can't pay.
[[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket. 
[[User:Fedecicco|Fede]] and his brother hitchhiked and dumpster-dived all across the country for 3 weeks, and paid very few money for food .

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

ENJOY YOUR TRIP !

== See also ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group
* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]
[[nomad:Norway]]

{{move_to_trashwiki}}
{{move_to_nomadwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>6m3u6bp8ogk4ud1yvdr9peieldg2q29</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>88010</id>
      <parentid>82924</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-05-28T01:50:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Ools</username>
        <id>28102</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19005">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is difficult to class as a good or bad country for hitchhiking (see the Discussion page). There are both very good and very bad feedback from hitchhikers in Norway:

=== Positive ===

'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===

According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. Grata[[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== More advice ===

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Hurtigruten is a daily shipping service on Norway's coast, it stops in most towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.

== North Norway ==

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have rear seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, or at most with only one companion, trying to hitch a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double passenger seat in front, but except from those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had rear seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed, for tax reasons, upon importation to Norway. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pickup trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and also some minivans and SUVs.

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border checks for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North; but the dumpsters are full! especially of fresh fruits and veggies (mostly exotic like mangos avocados and bananas, tonnes of them but also of any other, from tomatoes to strawberries, blueberries, anything your appetite and taste may want) . Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry, but no worries, when you will have finished it the dumpsters will surely fill your stomach, prefer small villages and towns than big cities since there is more food and dumpsters are (almost) always unlocked; plus food like oat, flat "fullkorn" bread, cooked legumes in metal or tetrapak boxes like beans, chickpeas, lentils, etc are definitely cheap or at least affordable (around 1E per piece but often even less) and constitute a good way to buy something in order to "borrow" from supermarkets (since the security is not really active) the expensive food you need and can't pay.
[[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket. 
[[User:Fedecicco|Fede]] and his brother hitchhiked and dumpster-dived all across the country for 3 weeks, and paid very few money for food .

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

ENJOY YOUR TRIP !

== See also ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group
* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]
[[nomad:Norway]]

{{move_to_trashwiki}}
{{move_to_nomadwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>q92jijq43j0x8fq12o1rm733kbv143e</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>88011</id>
      <parentid>88010</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-05-28T01:55:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Ools</username>
        <id>28102</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19036">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is difficult to class as a good or bad country for hitchhiking (see the Discussion page). There are both very good and very bad feedback from hitchhikers in Norway:

=== Positive ===

'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===

According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. Grata[[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== More advice ===

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Hurtigruten is a daily shipping service on Norway's coast, it stops in most towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.

== North Norway ==

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have rear seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, or at most with only one companion, trying to hitch a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except from those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had rear seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed, for tax reasons, upon importation to Norway. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pickup trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border checks for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North; but the dumpsters are full! especially of fresh fruits and veggies (mostly exotic like mangos avocados and bananas, tonnes of them but also of any other, from tomatoes to strawberries, blueberries, anything your appetite and taste may want) . Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry, but no worries, when you will have finished it the dumpsters will surely fill your stomach, prefer small villages and towns than big cities since there is more food and dumpsters are (almost) always unlocked; plus food like oat, flat "fullkorn" bread, cooked legumes in metal or tetrapak boxes like beans, chickpeas, lentils, etc are definitely cheap or at least affordable (around 1E per piece but often even less) and constitute a good way to buy something in order to "borrow" from supermarkets (since the security is not really active) the expensive food you need and can't pay.
[[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket. 
[[User:Fedecicco|Fede]] and his brother hitchhiked and dumpster-dived all across the country for 3 weeks, and paid very few money for food .

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

ENJOY YOUR TRIP !

== See also ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group
* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]
[[nomad:Norway]]

{{move_to_trashwiki}}
{{move_to_nomadwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>nt3rlm5wouutgzc3n3eb4km7isey483</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>88012</id>
      <parentid>88011</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-05-28T01:57:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Ools</username>
        <id>28102</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19035">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}

'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
'''Norway''' is difficult to class as a good or bad country for hitchhiking (see the Discussion page). There are both very good and very bad feedback from hitchhikers in Norway:

=== Positive ===

'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===

According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. Grata[[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== More advice ===

Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Hurtigruten is a daily shipping service on Norway's coast, it stops in most towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.

== North Norway ==

Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===

If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have rear seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, or at most with only one companion, trying to hitch a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had rear seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed, for tax reasons, upon importation to Norway. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pickup trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]

=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

== Borders ==
Norway is part of Schengen and doesn't have border checks for people coming from Sweden or Finland.  It does have a border with Russia though, and there are still checks for goods. Norwegian border checks can be picky, especially if you're crossing it with a truck and even more if it's an empty one.

== Eating &amp; Drinking ==
Food is expensive!  Fresh fruits and veggies are even more expensive, especially in the North; but the dumpsters are full! especially of fresh fruits and veggies (mostly exotic like mangos avocados and bananas, tonnes of them but also of any other, from tomatoes to strawberries, blueberries, anything your appetite and taste may want) . Take as much food across the border as you can possibly carry, but no worries, when you will have finished it the dumpsters will surely fill your stomach, prefer small villages and towns than big cities since there is more food and dumpsters are (almost) always unlocked; plus food like oat, flat "fullkorn" bread, cooked legumes in metal or tetrapak boxes like beans, chickpeas, lentils, etc are definitely cheap or at least affordable (around 1E per piece but often even less) and constitute a good way to buy something in order to "borrow" from supermarkets (since the security is not really active) the expensive food you need and can't pay.
[[User:Guaka|guaka]] and Erga had a ride from Sweden all the way to [[Alta]] in the North and were smart enough to buy a box of food in a Swedish supermarket. 
[[User:Fedecicco|Fede]] and his brother hitchhiked and dumpster-dived all across the country for 3 weeks, and paid very few money for food .

== Accommodation &amp; Sleeping ==
It's a common misconception that you can put your tent anywhere for as long as you like in Norway. Norway has very liberal laws on tenting that gives the campers a lot of rights, but it's important to know the limitations. 

You are allowed (and even have the right by law) to put your tent anywhere that is defined as "outland", as contrary to "inland". That means, anywhere the land is not cultivated. For instance, it is not allowed in farmland, in a park, in a roundabout, or in a backyard. If it is, however, a untended forest or a wild-growing field, you can by right pitch your tent and stay there for 3 days. After 3 days you are required to move your tent.

Though you cannot by right put your tent in a place like a park, it is generally tolerated for a night, but don't leave your tent standing while you explore the city during the day. You can also ask at a place like a petrol station if you may put it up out back.

Few train stations are open 24h, it can be handy for a warmer night in winter time (Oppdall, Mosjoen ...)
Other way to not freeze during winter, you can sleep in elevators on the train station like Paradis station in Stavanger. Nobody disturbed till 5:00 in the morning.

In Oslo, you can pitch your tent around the train station of Skullerud, or in Bygdoy (where you find most of the museums) walk West before the King's property. There take any trails into the forest.

The Torp Airport is closed overnight, but there is a nice forest just before the car park. There is as well a nice park on the hill in Sandfjord. Do not hitch on the motorway but take the secondary road between the airport and the town (Sandford train station is closed overnight). Oslo Gardemoen also has a nice pitch of forest somewhere inside that giant parking lot, you can even take the free parking shuttle bus back to the bus stop in the morning ;)

ENJOY YOUR TRIP !

== See also ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group
* [https://lavprisekspressen.no/ Lavprisekspressen] runs buses between Stavanger and Trondheim
* [http://www.nsb.no/ticket_and_travelterms/minipris/minipris-article24726-2752.html Minipris] are cheaper fare train tickets on the NSB.

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]
[[nomad:Norway]]

{{move_to_trashwiki}}
{{move_to_nomadwiki}}</text>
      <sha1>d8jfezx5dyeyln21sxuqpvsmw7sphga</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>89380</id>
      <parentid>88012</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-10-02T00:44:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Traumschule</username>
        <id>28627</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16336">__NOTOC__
{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have rear seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, or at most with only one companion, trying to hitch a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had rear seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed, for tax reasons, upon importation to Norway. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pickup trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' is difficult to class as a good or bad country for hitchhiking (see the Discussion page). There are both very good and very bad feedback from hitchhikers in Norway:

[[Hitchhiking]] is not easy, although still very possible and chances of finding a long ride are quite good. In [[Tromsø]] it's even possible to hitchhike instead of taking public transport, by using a 2km sign (not as fast as the bus, however still better than walking).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. Grata[[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching ferries ===
On hitchhiking short distance ferries that are usually paid by the amount of people in the car, especially around the fjords of Bergen and the Western coast of Norway:
When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Hurtigruten is a daily shipping service on Norway's coast, it stops in most towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== See also ==
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]
[[nomad:Norway]]
[[trash:Norway]]</text>
      <sha1>qmq22zj95m76n17hve72vy3i0vimcyr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>89475</id>
      <parentid>89380</parentid>
      <timestamp>2017-10-04T15:53:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Traumschule</username>
        <id>28627</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16297">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also  [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicle_registration_plates_of_Norway#Car_number_prefixes_and_sequence_numbers List of codes] on Wikipedia

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have rear seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, or at most with only one companion, trying to hitch a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had rear seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed, for tax reasons, upon importation to Norway. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pickup trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' is difficult to class as a good or bad country for hitchhiking (see the Discussion page). There are both very good and very bad feedback from hitchhikers in Norway:

[[Hitchhiking]] is not easy, although still very possible and chances of finding a long ride are quite good. In [[Tromsø]] it's even possible to hitchhike instead of taking public transport, by using a 2km sign (not as fast as the bus, however still better than walking).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. Grata[[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching ferries ===
On hitchhiking short distance ferries that are usually paid by the amount of people in the car, especially around the fjords of Bergen and the Western coast of Norway:
When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Hurtigruten is a daily shipping service on Norway's coast, it stops in most towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== See also ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>mewve8f6sldym7otorkaq8k5v8um6hw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>91227</id>
      <parentid>89475</parentid>
      <timestamp>2018-06-09T07:01:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Wiki Wikardo</username>
        <id>30397</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16269">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have rear seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, or at most with only one companion, trying to hitch a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had rear seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed, for tax reasons, upon importation to Norway. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pickup trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' is difficult to class as a good or bad country for hitchhiking (see the Discussion page). There are both very good and very bad feedback from hitchhikers in Norway:

[[Hitchhiking]] is not easy, although still very possible and chances of finding a long ride are quite good. In [[Tromsø]] it's even possible to hitchhike instead of taking public transport, by using a 2km sign (not as fast as the bus, however still better than walking).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. Grata[[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching ferries ===
On hitchhiking short distance ferries that are usually paid by the amount of people in the car, especially around the fjords of Bergen and the Western coast of Norway:
When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Hurtigruten is a daily shipping service on Norway's coast, it stops in most towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== See also ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>pexo7bbs5mk24e2z3hi5u0ii89n6k8j</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>91868</id>
      <parentid>91227</parentid>
      <timestamp>2018-08-16T12:36:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>ZacNFNP</username>
        <id>30279</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16286">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Kautokeino]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have rear seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, or at most with only one companion, trying to hitch a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had rear seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed, for tax reasons, upon importation to Norway. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pickup trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' is difficult to class as a good or bad country for hitchhiking (see the Discussion page). There are both very good and very bad feedback from hitchhikers in Norway:

[[Hitchhiking]] is not easy, although still very possible and chances of finding a long ride are quite good. In [[Tromsø]] it's even possible to hitchhike instead of taking public transport, by using a 2km sign (not as fast as the bus, however still better than walking).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. Grata[[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching ferries ===
On hitchhiking short distance ferries that are usually paid by the amount of people in the car, especially around the fjords of Bergen and the Western coast of Norway:
When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Hurtigruten is a daily shipping service on Norway's coast, it stops in most towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== See also ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>8kjeof6lf7r0esce5ftq9tnbvm8wz6c</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>95101</id>
      <parentid>91868</parentid>
      <timestamp>2019-07-28T21:46:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Ools</username>
        <id>28102</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16299">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Kautokeino]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have back seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, or at most with only one companion, trying to hitch a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had back seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed upon importation to Norway. This is done for tax reasons. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pick-up trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' is difficult to class as a good or bad country for hitchhiking (see the Discussion page). There are both very good and very bad feedback from hitchhikers in Norway:

[[Hitchhiking]] is not easy, although still very possible and chances of finding a long ride are quite good. In [[Tromsø]] it's even possible to hitchhike instead of taking public transport, by using a 2km sign (not as fast as the bus, however still better than walking).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. Grata[[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching ferries ===
On hitchhiking short distance ferries that are usually paid by the amount of people in the car, especially around the fjords of Bergen and the Western coast of Norway:
When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Hurtigruten is a daily shipping service on Norway's coast, it stops in most towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== See also ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>p2yt5xd1eenjxxghel5jjqqd871niai</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>95102</id>
      <parentid>95101</parentid>
      <timestamp>2019-07-28T21:49:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Ools</username>
        <id>28102</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16256">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Kautokeino]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have back seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, hitching a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had back seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed upon importation to Norway. This is done for tax reasons. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pick-up trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' is difficult to class as a good or bad country for hitchhiking (see the Discussion page). There are both very good and very bad feedback from hitchhikers in Norway:

[[Hitchhiking]] is not easy, although still very possible and chances of finding a long ride are quite good. In [[Tromsø]] it's even possible to hitchhike instead of taking public transport, by using a 2km sign (not as fast as the bus, however still better than walking).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. Grata[[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching ferries ===
On hitchhiking short distance ferries that are usually paid by the amount of people in the car, especially around the fjords of Bergen and the Western coast of Norway:
When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Hurtigruten is a daily shipping service on Norway's coast, it stops in most towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== See also ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>mnmxmthsb972xtcci30ny0qwypn666b</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>96403</id>
      <parentid>95102</parentid>
      <timestamp>2019-09-11T09:19:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Quarim</username>
        <id>1290</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16251">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Kautokeino]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have back seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, hitching a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had back seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed upon importation to Norway. This is done for tax reasons. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pick-up trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' is difficult to class as a good or bad country for hitchhiking (see the Discussion page). There are both very good and very bad feedback from hitchhikers in Norway:

[[Hitchhiking]] is not easy, although still very possible and chances of finding a long ride are quite good. In [[Tromsø]] it's even possible to hitchhike instead of taking public transport, by using a 2km sign (not as fast as the bus, however still better than walking).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. [[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching ferries ===
On hitchhiking short distance ferries that are usually paid by the amount of people in the car, especially around the fjords of Bergen and the Western coast of Norway:
When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Hurtigruten is a daily shipping service on Norway's coast, it stops in most towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== See also ==
{{nomadwiki}}
* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group

{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>s33ntdqgtsxyxf3gycqmlnbxm9v06il</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>97798</id>
      <parentid>96403</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-05-25T17:23:20Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* See also */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16287">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Kautokeino]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have back seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, hitching a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had back seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed upon importation to Norway. This is done for tax reasons. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pick-up trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' is difficult to class as a good or bad country for hitchhiking (see the Discussion page). There are both very good and very bad feedback from hitchhikers in Norway:

[[Hitchhiking]] is not easy, although still very possible and chances of finding a long ride are quite good. In [[Tromsø]] it's even possible to hitchhike instead of taking public transport, by using a 2km sign (not as fast as the bus, however still better than walking).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. [[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching ferries ===
On hitchhiking short distance ferries that are usually paid by the amount of people in the car, especially around the fjords of Bergen and the Western coast of Norway:
When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Hurtigruten is a daily shipping service on Norway's coast, it stops in most towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Trashwiki &amp; Nomadwiki ==

[[trash:Norway]] [[nomad:Norway]]

* [https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group


{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]

[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>ixmmlsahak0s7hr9vs5unn4zpu24a0x</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>97800</id>
      <parentid>97798</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-05-25T17:24:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Trashwiki &amp; Nomadwiki */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16286">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Kautokeino]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have back seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, hitching a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had back seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed upon importation to Norway. This is done for tax reasons. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pick-up trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' is difficult to class as a good or bad country for hitchhiking (see the Discussion page). There are both very good and very bad feedback from hitchhikers in Norway:

[[Hitchhiking]] is not easy, although still very possible and chances of finding a long ride are quite good. In [[Tromsø]] it's even possible to hitchhike instead of taking public transport, by using a 2km sign (not as fast as the bus, however still better than walking).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. [[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching ferries ===
On hitchhiking short distance ferries that are usually paid by the amount of people in the car, especially around the fjords of Bergen and the Western coast of Norway:
When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Hurtigruten is a daily shipping service on Norway's coast, it stops in most towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Trashwiki &amp; Nomadwiki ==

[[trash:Norway]] [[nomad:Norway]]

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]


{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}


[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>195g9sfv3chp9iz2kx6m790hbyfxgzw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>97801</id>
      <parentid>97800</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-05-25T17:24:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Trashwiki &amp; Nomadwiki */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16292">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Kautokeino]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have back seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, hitching a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had back seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed upon importation to Norway. This is done for tax reasons. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pick-up trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==
[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' is difficult to class as a good or bad country for hitchhiking (see the Discussion page). There are both very good and very bad feedback from hitchhikers in Norway:

[[Hitchhiking]] is not easy, although still very possible and chances of finding a long ride are quite good. In [[Tromsø]] it's even possible to hitchhike instead of taking public transport, by using a 2km sign (not as fast as the bus, however still better than walking).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. [[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching ferries ===
On hitchhiking short distance ferries that are usually paid by the amount of people in the car, especially around the fjords of Bergen and the Western coast of Norway:
When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Hurtigruten is a daily shipping service on Norway's coast, it stops in most towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Trashwiki &amp; Nomadwiki ==

[[trash:Norway]] [[nomad:Norway]]

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group &lt;/br&gt;
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]


{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}


[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>8gdkjy1xmki9vbrc44ystni8iyfxf7p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>98934</id>
      <parentid>97801</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-09-19T09:11:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Hitchhiking culture */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17970">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Kautokeino]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have back seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, hitching a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had back seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed upon importation to Norway. This is done for tax reasons. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pick-up trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' is difficult to class as a good or bad country for hitchhiking (see the Discussion page). There are both very good and very bad feedback from hitchhikers in Norway:

[[Hitchhiking]] is not easy, although still very possible and chances of finding a long ride are quite good. In [[Tromsø]] it's even possible to hitchhike instead of taking public transport, by using a 2km sign (not as fast as the bus, however still better than walking).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. [[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching ferries ===
On hitchhiking short distance ferries that are usually paid by the amount of people in the car, especially around the fjords of Bergen and the Western coast of Norway:
When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Hurtigruten is a daily shipping service on Norway's coast, it stops in most towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.


== Highway rest stops with paid showers ==


Eastern Norway

E6 Svinesundparken, Halden, Østfold
E6 Fugleåsen, Ski, Akershus
E6 Ormlia, Eidsvoll, Akershus
E6 Circle K Minnesund, Eidsvoll, Akershus
E6 Biri travpark, Gjøvik, Oppland
E6 Vinstra vegpark, Nord-Fron, Oppland
E6 Dovreskogen, Dovre, Oppland
E18 Ørje, Marker, Østfold
NR 3 Myklagard, Løten, Hedmark
NR 3 Shell Koppang, Stor-Elvdal, Hedmark
NR 3 Alvdal, Hedmark


Southern Norway

E18 Kjellstad, Lier, Buskerud
E18 Furulund Kro &amp; Motel, Stokke, Vestfold
E18 Horisonten Lillesand, Aust-Agder
E18 YX Lillesand, Aust-Agder
E18 Circle K Lillesand, Aust-Agder 
E39 Circle K Livold, Lindesnes, Vest-Agder


Western Norway

E16 Shell Dale, Vaksdal, Hordaland
E16 YX Skulestadmo, Voss, Hordaland
E16 Shell Gudvangen, Aurland, Sogn og Fjordane
E16 Steinklepp, Lærdal, Sogn og Fjordane
E39 Esso Vikeså, Bjerkreim, Rogaland
E39 Søylandskiosken, Gjesdal, Rogaland
E39 Heiane, Stord, Hordaland
E39 Bergen travpark, Vågsbotn, Hordaland
E39 Haugsvær, Masfjorden, Hordaland
E39 Esso Skei, Jølster, Sogn og Fjordane
E134 Best Kyrping, Etne, Hordaland


Central Norway

E6 Oppdalsporten, Oppdal, Trøndelag
E6/E39 Circle K Klett, Trondheim, Trøndelag 
E6 Stav Gjestegård, Malvik, Trøndelag
E6 YX Gråmyra, Levanger, Trøndelag
E6 Best Brekkvasselv, Namsskogan, Trøndelag
E39 Digerneset, Skodje, Møre og Romsdal
NR 70 Håsøran, Sunndalsøra, Sunndal, Møre og Romsdal  


Northern Norway

E6 Mosjøen, Vefsn, Nordland
E6 Fauske, Nordland
E6 Innhavet, Hamarøy, Nordland
E6 Buktamoen, Målselv, Troms
E6 Circle K Storslett, Nordreisa
E6 Shell Talvik, Alta, Finnmark
E6/E75 Tana bru, Finnmark
NR 80 Bodø havn, Nordland

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Trashwiki &amp; Nomadwiki ==

[[trash:Norway]] [[nomad:Norway]]

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group &lt;/br&gt;
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]


{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}


[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>favsqh12e4mys8m5oyxbxw16x7obgzq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>98935</id>
      <parentid>98934</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-09-19T09:14:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Highway rest stops with paid showers */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="18007">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Kautokeino]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have back seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, hitching a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had back seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed upon importation to Norway. This is done for tax reasons. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pick-up trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' is difficult to class as a good or bad country for hitchhiking (see the Discussion page). There are both very good and very bad feedback from hitchhikers in Norway:

[[Hitchhiking]] is not easy, although still very possible and chances of finding a long ride are quite good. In [[Tromsø]] it's even possible to hitchhike instead of taking public transport, by using a 2km sign (not as fast as the bus, however still better than walking).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. [[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching ferries ===
On hitchhiking short distance ferries that are usually paid by the amount of people in the car, especially around the fjords of Bergen and the Western coast of Norway:
When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Hurtigruten is a daily shipping service on Norway's coast, it stops in most towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.


== Highway rest stops with paid showers ==


Eastern Norway

E6 Svinesundparken, Halden, Østfold

E6 Fugleåsen, Ski, Akershus

E6 Ormlia, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Circle K Minnesund, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Biri travpark, Gjøvik, Oppland

E6 Vinstra vegpark, Nord-Fron, Oppland

E6 Dovreskogen, Dovre, Oppland

E18 Ørje, Marker, Østfold

NR 3 Myklagard, Løten, Hedmark

NR 3 Shell Koppang, Stor-Elvdal, Hedmark

NR 3 Alvdal, Hedmark


Southern Norway

E18 Kjellstad, Lier, Buskerud

E18 Furulund Kro &amp; Motel, Stokke, Vestfold

E18 Horisonten Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 YX Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 Circle K Lillesand, Aust-Agder 

E39 Circle K Livold, Lindesnes, Vest-Agder


Western Norway

E16 Shell Dale, Vaksdal, Hordaland

E16 YX Skulestadmo, Voss, Hordaland

E16 Shell Gudvangen, Aurland, Sogn og Fjordane

E16 Steinklepp, Lærdal, Sogn og Fjordane

E39 Esso Vikeså, Bjerkreim, Rogaland

E39 Søylandskiosken, Gjesdal, Rogaland

E39 Heiane, Stord, Hordaland

E39 Bergen travpark, Vågsbotn, Hordaland

E39 Haugsvær, Masfjorden, Hordaland

E39 Esso Skei, Jølster, Sogn og Fjordane

E134 Best Kyrping, Etne, Hordaland


Central Norway

E6 Oppdalsporten, Oppdal, Trøndelag

E6/E39 Circle K Klett, Trondheim, Trøndelag 

E6 Stav Gjestegård, Malvik, Trøndelag

E6 YX Gråmyra, Levanger, Trøndelag

E6 Best Brekkvasselv, Namsskogan, Trøndelag

E39 Digerneset, Skodje, Møre og Romsdal

NR 70 Håsøran, Sunndalsøra, Sunndal, Møre og Romsdal  


Northern Norway

E6 Mosjøen, Vefsn, Nordland

E6 Fauske, Nordland

E6 Innhavet, Hamarøy, Nordland

E6 Buktamoen, Målselv, Troms

E6 Circle K Storslett, Nordreisa

E6 Shell Talvik, Alta, Finnmark

E6/E75 Tana bru, Finnmark
NR 80 Bodø havn, Nordland

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Trashwiki &amp; Nomadwiki ==

[[trash:Norway]] [[nomad:Norway]]

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group &lt;/br&gt;
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]


{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}


[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>jbfkhqxxnbcryj4wqfi0kk4mrmniz9w</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>98936</id>
      <parentid>98935</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-09-19T09:14:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Highway rest stops with paid showers */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="18007">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Kautokeino]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have back seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, hitching a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had back seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed upon importation to Norway. This is done for tax reasons. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pick-up trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' is difficult to class as a good or bad country for hitchhiking (see the Discussion page). There are both very good and very bad feedback from hitchhikers in Norway:

[[Hitchhiking]] is not easy, although still very possible and chances of finding a long ride are quite good. In [[Tromsø]] it's even possible to hitchhike instead of taking public transport, by using a 2km sign (not as fast as the bus, however still better than walking).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. [[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching ferries ===
On hitchhiking short distance ferries that are usually paid by the amount of people in the car, especially around the fjords of Bergen and the Western coast of Norway:
When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Hurtigruten is a daily shipping service on Norway's coast, it stops in most towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.


== Highway rest areas with paid showers ==


Eastern Norway

E6 Svinesundparken, Halden, Østfold

E6 Fugleåsen, Ski, Akershus

E6 Ormlia, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Circle K Minnesund, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Biri travpark, Gjøvik, Oppland

E6 Vinstra vegpark, Nord-Fron, Oppland

E6 Dovreskogen, Dovre, Oppland

E18 Ørje, Marker, Østfold

NR 3 Myklagard, Løten, Hedmark

NR 3 Shell Koppang, Stor-Elvdal, Hedmark

NR 3 Alvdal, Hedmark


Southern Norway

E18 Kjellstad, Lier, Buskerud

E18 Furulund Kro &amp; Motel, Stokke, Vestfold

E18 Horisonten Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 YX Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 Circle K Lillesand, Aust-Agder 

E39 Circle K Livold, Lindesnes, Vest-Agder


Western Norway

E16 Shell Dale, Vaksdal, Hordaland

E16 YX Skulestadmo, Voss, Hordaland

E16 Shell Gudvangen, Aurland, Sogn og Fjordane

E16 Steinklepp, Lærdal, Sogn og Fjordane

E39 Esso Vikeså, Bjerkreim, Rogaland

E39 Søylandskiosken, Gjesdal, Rogaland

E39 Heiane, Stord, Hordaland

E39 Bergen travpark, Vågsbotn, Hordaland

E39 Haugsvær, Masfjorden, Hordaland

E39 Esso Skei, Jølster, Sogn og Fjordane

E134 Best Kyrping, Etne, Hordaland


Central Norway

E6 Oppdalsporten, Oppdal, Trøndelag

E6/E39 Circle K Klett, Trondheim, Trøndelag 

E6 Stav Gjestegård, Malvik, Trøndelag

E6 YX Gråmyra, Levanger, Trøndelag

E6 Best Brekkvasselv, Namsskogan, Trøndelag

E39 Digerneset, Skodje, Møre og Romsdal

NR 70 Håsøran, Sunndalsøra, Sunndal, Møre og Romsdal  


Northern Norway

E6 Mosjøen, Vefsn, Nordland

E6 Fauske, Nordland

E6 Innhavet, Hamarøy, Nordland

E6 Buktamoen, Målselv, Troms

E6 Circle K Storslett, Nordreisa

E6 Shell Talvik, Alta, Finnmark

E6/E75 Tana bru, Finnmark
NR 80 Bodø havn, Nordland

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Trashwiki &amp; Nomadwiki ==

[[trash:Norway]] [[nomad:Norway]]

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group &lt;/br&gt;
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]


{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}


[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>be1v24fspya57ugec1afhbgagxt6cfu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>99349</id>
      <parentid>98936</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-10-02T15:11:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Trashwiki &amp; Nomadwiki */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="18007">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Kautokeino]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have back seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, hitching a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had back seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed upon importation to Norway. This is done for tax reasons. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pick-up trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' is difficult to class as a good or bad country for hitchhiking (see the Discussion page). There are both very good and very bad feedback from hitchhikers in Norway:

[[Hitchhiking]] is not easy, although still very possible and chances of finding a long ride are quite good. In [[Tromsø]] it's even possible to hitchhike instead of taking public transport, by using a 2km sign (not as fast as the bus, however still better than walking).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. [[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching ferries ===
On hitchhiking short distance ferries that are usually paid by the amount of people in the car, especially around the fjords of Bergen and the Western coast of Norway:
When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Hurtigruten is a daily shipping service on Norway's coast, it stops in most towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.


== Highway rest areas with paid showers ==


Eastern Norway

E6 Svinesundparken, Halden, Østfold

E6 Fugleåsen, Ski, Akershus

E6 Ormlia, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Circle K Minnesund, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Biri travpark, Gjøvik, Oppland

E6 Vinstra vegpark, Nord-Fron, Oppland

E6 Dovreskogen, Dovre, Oppland

E18 Ørje, Marker, Østfold

NR 3 Myklagard, Løten, Hedmark

NR 3 Shell Koppang, Stor-Elvdal, Hedmark

NR 3 Alvdal, Hedmark


Southern Norway

E18 Kjellstad, Lier, Buskerud

E18 Furulund Kro &amp; Motel, Stokke, Vestfold

E18 Horisonten Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 YX Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 Circle K Lillesand, Aust-Agder 

E39 Circle K Livold, Lindesnes, Vest-Agder


Western Norway

E16 Shell Dale, Vaksdal, Hordaland

E16 YX Skulestadmo, Voss, Hordaland

E16 Shell Gudvangen, Aurland, Sogn og Fjordane

E16 Steinklepp, Lærdal, Sogn og Fjordane

E39 Esso Vikeså, Bjerkreim, Rogaland

E39 Søylandskiosken, Gjesdal, Rogaland

E39 Heiane, Stord, Hordaland

E39 Bergen travpark, Vågsbotn, Hordaland

E39 Haugsvær, Masfjorden, Hordaland

E39 Esso Skei, Jølster, Sogn og Fjordane

E134 Best Kyrping, Etne, Hordaland


Central Norway

E6 Oppdalsporten, Oppdal, Trøndelag

E6/E39 Circle K Klett, Trondheim, Trøndelag 

E6 Stav Gjestegård, Malvik, Trøndelag

E6 YX Gråmyra, Levanger, Trøndelag

E6 Best Brekkvasselv, Namsskogan, Trøndelag

E39 Digerneset, Skodje, Møre og Romsdal

NR 70 Håsøran, Sunndalsøra, Sunndal, Møre og Romsdal  


Northern Norway

E6 Mosjøen, Vefsn, Nordland

E6 Fauske, Nordland

E6 Innhavet, Hamarøy, Nordland

E6 Buktamoen, Målselv, Troms

E6 Circle K Storslett, Nordreisa

E6 Shell Talvik, Alta, Finnmark

E6/E75 Tana bru, Finnmark
NR 80 Bodø havn, Nordland

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

[[trash:Norway]] [[nomad:Norway]]

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group &lt;/br&gt;
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]


{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}


[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>7zbsbxns0lex4yk3bt3kvcv11oymsb4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>100322</id>
      <parentid>99349</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-01-23T17:36:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17987">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Kautokeino]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have back seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, hitching a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had back seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed upon importation to Norway. This is done for tax reasons. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pick-up trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' is difficult to class as a good or bad country for hitchhiking (see the Discussion page). There are both very good and very bad feedback from hitchhikers in Norway:

[[Hitchhiking]] is not easy, although still very possible and chances of finding a long ride are quite good. In [[Tromsø]] it's even possible to hitchhike instead of taking public transport, by using a 2km sign (not as fast as the bus, however still better than walking).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. [[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching ferries ===
On hitchhiking short distance ferries that are usually paid by the amount of people in the car, especially around the fjords of Bergen and the Western coast of Norway:
When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Hurtigruten is a daily shipping service on Norway's coast, it stops in most towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.


== Highway rest areas with paid showers ==


Eastern Norway

E6 Svinesundparken, Halden, Østfold

E6 Fugleåsen, Ski, Akershus

E6 Ormlia, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Circle K Minnesund, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Biri travpark, Gjøvik, Oppland

E6 Vinstra vegpark, Nord-Fron, Oppland

E6 Dovreskogen, Dovre, Oppland

E18 Ørje, Marker, Østfold

NR 3 Myklagard, Løten, Hedmark

NR 3 Shell Koppang, Stor-Elvdal, Hedmark

NR 3 Alvdal, Hedmark


Southern Norway

E18 Kjellstad, Lier, Buskerud

E18 Furulund Kro &amp; Motel, Stokke, Vestfold

E18 Horisonten Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 YX Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 Circle K Lillesand, Aust-Agder 

E39 Circle K Livold, Lindesnes, Vest-Agder


Western Norway

E16 Shell Dale, Vaksdal, Hordaland

E16 YX Skulestadmo, Voss, Hordaland

E16 Shell Gudvangen, Aurland, Sogn og Fjordane

E16 Steinklepp, Lærdal, Sogn og Fjordane

E39 Esso Vikeså, Bjerkreim, Rogaland

E39 Søylandskiosken, Gjesdal, Rogaland

E39 Heiane, Stord, Hordaland

E39 Bergen travpark, Vågsbotn, Hordaland

E39 Haugsvær, Masfjorden, Hordaland

E39 Esso Skei, Jølster, Sogn og Fjordane

E134 Best Kyrping, Etne, Hordaland


Central Norway

E6 Oppdalsporten, Oppdal, Trøndelag

E6/E39 Circle K Klett, Trondheim, Trøndelag 

E6 Stav Gjestegård, Malvik, Trøndelag

E6 YX Gråmyra, Levanger, Trøndelag

E6 Best Brekkvasselv, Namsskogan, Trøndelag

E39 Digerneset, Skodje, Møre og Romsdal

NR 70 Håsøran, Sunndalsøra, Sunndal, Møre og Romsdal  


Northern Norway

E6 Mosjøen, Vefsn, Nordland

E6 Fauske, Nordland

E6 Innhavet, Hamarøy, Nordland

E6 Buktamoen, Målselv, Troms

E6 Circle K Storslett, Nordreisa

E6 Shell Talvik, Alta, Finnmark

E6/E75 Tana bru, Finnmark
NR 80 Bodø havn, Nordland

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group &lt;/br&gt;
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]


{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}


[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>edwqutlo0tam4a98hx0cnz8xciwjwgh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101122</id>
      <parentid>100322</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-05T14:42:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="18031">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Kautokeino]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have back seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, hitching a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had back seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed upon importation to Norway. This is done for tax reasons. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pick-up trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' is difficult to class as a good or bad country for hitchhiking (see the Discussion page). There are both very good and very bad feedback from hitchhikers in Norway:

[[Hitchhiking]] is not easy, although still very possible and chances of finding a long ride are quite good. In [[Tromsø]] it's even possible to hitchhike instead of taking public transport, by using a 2km sign (not as fast as the bus, however still better than walking).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. [[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching ferries ===
On hitchhiking short distance ferries that are usually paid by the amount of people in the car, especially around the fjords of Bergen and the Western coast of Norway:
When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Hurtigruten is a daily shipping service on Norway's coast, it stops in most towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.


== Highway rest areas with paid showers ==


Eastern Norway

E6 Svinesundparken, Halden, Østfold

E6 Fugleåsen, Ski, Akershus

E6 Ormlia, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Circle K Minnesund, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Biri travpark, Gjøvik, Oppland

E6 Vinstra vegpark, Nord-Fron, Oppland

E6 Dovreskogen, Dovre, Oppland

E18 Ørje, Marker, Østfold

NR 3 Myklagard, Løten, Hedmark

NR 3 Shell Koppang, Stor-Elvdal, Hedmark

NR 3 Alvdal, Hedmark


Southern Norway

E18 Kjellstad, Lier, Buskerud

E18 Furulund Kro &amp; Motel, Stokke, Vestfold

E18 Horisonten Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 YX Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 Circle K Lillesand, Aust-Agder 

E39 Circle K Livold, Lindesnes, Vest-Agder


Western Norway

E16 Shell Dale, Vaksdal, Hordaland

E16 YX Skulestadmo, Voss, Hordaland

E16 Shell Gudvangen, Aurland, Sogn og Fjordane

E16 Steinklepp, Lærdal, Sogn og Fjordane

E39 Esso Vikeså, Bjerkreim, Rogaland

E39 Søylandskiosken, Gjesdal, Rogaland

E39 Heiane, Stord, Hordaland

E39 Bergen travpark, Vågsbotn, Hordaland

E39 Haugsvær, Masfjorden, Hordaland

E39 Esso Skei, Jølster, Sogn og Fjordane

E134 Best Kyrping, Etne, Hordaland


Central Norway

E6 Oppdalsporten, Oppdal, Trøndelag

E6/E39 Circle K Klett, Trondheim, Trøndelag 

E6 Stav Gjestegård, Malvik, Trøndelag

E6 YX Gråmyra, Levanger, Trøndelag

E6 Best Brekkvasselv, Namsskogan, Trøndelag

E39 Digerneset, Skodje, Møre og Romsdal

NR 70 Håsøran, Sunndalsøra, Sunndal, Møre og Romsdal  


Northern Norway

E6 Mosjøen, Vefsn, Nordland

E6 Fauske, Nordland

E6 Innhavet, Hamarøy, Nordland

E6 Buktamoen, Målselv, Troms

E6 Circle K Storslett, Nordreisa

E6 Shell Talvik, Alta, Finnmark

E6/E75 Tana bru, Finnmark
NR 80 Bodø havn, Nordland

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Personal Experiences ==

Pls add info



== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group &lt;/br&gt;
[[wikipedia:Norway]]
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]


{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}


[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>2ahu26v9o69vkuibdn5wmv590ft3zc9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>101123</id>
      <parentid>101122</parentid>
      <timestamp>2021-02-05T14:42:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="17980">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Kautokeino]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have back seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, hitching a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had back seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed upon importation to Norway. This is done for tax reasons. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pick-up trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' is difficult to class as a good or bad country for hitchhiking (see the Discussion page). There are both very good and very bad feedback from hitchhikers in Norway:

[[Hitchhiking]] is not easy, although still very possible and chances of finding a long ride are quite good. In [[Tromsø]] it's even possible to hitchhike instead of taking public transport, by using a 2km sign (not as fast as the bus, however still better than walking).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. [[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching ferries ===
On hitchhiking short distance ferries that are usually paid by the amount of people in the car, especially around the fjords of Bergen and the Western coast of Norway:
When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Hurtigruten is a daily shipping service on Norway's coast, it stops in most towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.


== Highway rest areas with paid showers ==


Eastern Norway

E6 Svinesundparken, Halden, Østfold

E6 Fugleåsen, Ski, Akershus

E6 Ormlia, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Circle K Minnesund, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Biri travpark, Gjøvik, Oppland

E6 Vinstra vegpark, Nord-Fron, Oppland

E6 Dovreskogen, Dovre, Oppland

E18 Ørje, Marker, Østfold

NR 3 Myklagard, Løten, Hedmark

NR 3 Shell Koppang, Stor-Elvdal, Hedmark

NR 3 Alvdal, Hedmark


Southern Norway

E18 Kjellstad, Lier, Buskerud

E18 Furulund Kro &amp; Motel, Stokke, Vestfold

E18 Horisonten Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 YX Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 Circle K Lillesand, Aust-Agder 

E39 Circle K Livold, Lindesnes, Vest-Agder


Western Norway

E16 Shell Dale, Vaksdal, Hordaland

E16 YX Skulestadmo, Voss, Hordaland

E16 Shell Gudvangen, Aurland, Sogn og Fjordane

E16 Steinklepp, Lærdal, Sogn og Fjordane

E39 Esso Vikeså, Bjerkreim, Rogaland

E39 Søylandskiosken, Gjesdal, Rogaland

E39 Heiane, Stord, Hordaland

E39 Bergen travpark, Vågsbotn, Hordaland

E39 Haugsvær, Masfjorden, Hordaland

E39 Esso Skei, Jølster, Sogn og Fjordane

E134 Best Kyrping, Etne, Hordaland


Central Norway

E6 Oppdalsporten, Oppdal, Trøndelag

E6/E39 Circle K Klett, Trondheim, Trøndelag 

E6 Stav Gjestegård, Malvik, Trøndelag

E6 YX Gråmyra, Levanger, Trøndelag

E6 Best Brekkvasselv, Namsskogan, Trøndelag

E39 Digerneset, Skodje, Møre og Romsdal

NR 70 Håsøran, Sunndalsøra, Sunndal, Møre og Romsdal  


Northern Norway

E6 Mosjøen, Vefsn, Nordland

E6 Fauske, Nordland

E6 Innhavet, Hamarøy, Nordland

E6 Buktamoen, Målselv, Troms

E6 Circle K Storslett, Nordreisa

E6 Shell Talvik, Alta, Finnmark

E6/E75 Tana bru, Finnmark
NR 80 Bodø havn, Nordland

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Personal Experiences ==

Pls add info



== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group &lt;/br&gt;
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]


{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}


[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>ac7z4whru1i8w7m6t7q1ldxm4i9v5pq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>103241</id>
      <parentid>101123</parentid>
      <timestamp>2022-08-09T18:45:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Clicks</username>
        <id>47193</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* Hitching ferries */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="18147">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Kautokeino]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have back seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, hitching a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had back seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed upon importation to Norway. This is done for tax reasons. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pick-up trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' is difficult to class as a good or bad country for hitchhiking (see the Discussion page). There are both very good and very bad feedback from hitchhikers in Norway:

[[Hitchhiking]] is not easy, although still very possible and chances of finding a long ride are quite good. In [[Tromsø]] it's even possible to hitchhike instead of taking public transport, by using a 2km sign (not as fast as the bus, however still better than walking).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. [[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching ferries ===
On hitchhiking short distance ferries that are usually paid by the amount of people in the car, especially around the fjords of Bergen and the Western coast of Norway:
When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

In the north, many ferries are free to walk on if you are not in a car. It’s still best to ask around or at least meet people while waiting for the ferry, however.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Hurtigruten is a daily shipping service on Norway's coast, it stops in most towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.


== Highway rest areas with paid showers ==


Eastern Norway

E6 Svinesundparken, Halden, Østfold

E6 Fugleåsen, Ski, Akershus

E6 Ormlia, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Circle K Minnesund, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Biri travpark, Gjøvik, Oppland

E6 Vinstra vegpark, Nord-Fron, Oppland

E6 Dovreskogen, Dovre, Oppland

E18 Ørje, Marker, Østfold

NR 3 Myklagard, Løten, Hedmark

NR 3 Shell Koppang, Stor-Elvdal, Hedmark

NR 3 Alvdal, Hedmark


Southern Norway

E18 Kjellstad, Lier, Buskerud

E18 Furulund Kro &amp; Motel, Stokke, Vestfold

E18 Horisonten Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 YX Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 Circle K Lillesand, Aust-Agder 

E39 Circle K Livold, Lindesnes, Vest-Agder


Western Norway

E16 Shell Dale, Vaksdal, Hordaland

E16 YX Skulestadmo, Voss, Hordaland

E16 Shell Gudvangen, Aurland, Sogn og Fjordane

E16 Steinklepp, Lærdal, Sogn og Fjordane

E39 Esso Vikeså, Bjerkreim, Rogaland

E39 Søylandskiosken, Gjesdal, Rogaland

E39 Heiane, Stord, Hordaland

E39 Bergen travpark, Vågsbotn, Hordaland

E39 Haugsvær, Masfjorden, Hordaland

E39 Esso Skei, Jølster, Sogn og Fjordane

E134 Best Kyrping, Etne, Hordaland


Central Norway

E6 Oppdalsporten, Oppdal, Trøndelag

E6/E39 Circle K Klett, Trondheim, Trøndelag 

E6 Stav Gjestegård, Malvik, Trøndelag

E6 YX Gråmyra, Levanger, Trøndelag

E6 Best Brekkvasselv, Namsskogan, Trøndelag

E39 Digerneset, Skodje, Møre og Romsdal

NR 70 Håsøran, Sunndalsøra, Sunndal, Møre og Romsdal  


Northern Norway

E6 Mosjøen, Vefsn, Nordland

E6 Fauske, Nordland

E6 Innhavet, Hamarøy, Nordland

E6 Buktamoen, Målselv, Troms

E6 Circle K Storslett, Nordreisa

E6 Shell Talvik, Alta, Finnmark

E6/E75 Tana bru, Finnmark
NR 80 Bodø havn, Nordland

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Personal Experiences ==

Pls add info



== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group &lt;/br&gt;
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]


{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}


[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>2sj89q3pong48kubvueq5w1bnge2lzu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>103242</id>
      <parentid>103241</parentid>
      <timestamp>2022-08-09T18:49:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Clicks</username>
        <id>47193</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* In the North */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="18155">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Kautokeino]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* Bodø

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have back seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, hitching a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had back seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed upon importation to Norway. This is done for tax reasons. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pick-up trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' is difficult to class as a good or bad country for hitchhiking (see the Discussion page). There are both very good and very bad feedback from hitchhikers in Norway:

[[Hitchhiking]] is not easy, although still very possible and chances of finding a long ride are quite good. In [[Tromsø]] it's even possible to hitchhike instead of taking public transport, by using a 2km sign (not as fast as the bus, however still better than walking).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. [[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching ferries ===
On hitchhiking short distance ferries that are usually paid by the amount of people in the car, especially around the fjords of Bergen and the Western coast of Norway:
When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

In the north, many ferries are free to walk on if you are not in a car. It’s still best to ask around or at least meet people while waiting for the ferry, however.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Hurtigruten is a daily shipping service on Norway's coast, it stops in most towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.


== Highway rest areas with paid showers ==


Eastern Norway

E6 Svinesundparken, Halden, Østfold

E6 Fugleåsen, Ski, Akershus

E6 Ormlia, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Circle K Minnesund, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Biri travpark, Gjøvik, Oppland

E6 Vinstra vegpark, Nord-Fron, Oppland

E6 Dovreskogen, Dovre, Oppland

E18 Ørje, Marker, Østfold

NR 3 Myklagard, Løten, Hedmark

NR 3 Shell Koppang, Stor-Elvdal, Hedmark

NR 3 Alvdal, Hedmark


Southern Norway

E18 Kjellstad, Lier, Buskerud

E18 Furulund Kro &amp; Motel, Stokke, Vestfold

E18 Horisonten Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 YX Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 Circle K Lillesand, Aust-Agder 

E39 Circle K Livold, Lindesnes, Vest-Agder


Western Norway

E16 Shell Dale, Vaksdal, Hordaland

E16 YX Skulestadmo, Voss, Hordaland

E16 Shell Gudvangen, Aurland, Sogn og Fjordane

E16 Steinklepp, Lærdal, Sogn og Fjordane

E39 Esso Vikeså, Bjerkreim, Rogaland

E39 Søylandskiosken, Gjesdal, Rogaland

E39 Heiane, Stord, Hordaland

E39 Bergen travpark, Vågsbotn, Hordaland

E39 Haugsvær, Masfjorden, Hordaland

E39 Esso Skei, Jølster, Sogn og Fjordane

E134 Best Kyrping, Etne, Hordaland


Central Norway

E6 Oppdalsporten, Oppdal, Trøndelag

E6/E39 Circle K Klett, Trondheim, Trøndelag 

E6 Stav Gjestegård, Malvik, Trøndelag

E6 YX Gråmyra, Levanger, Trøndelag

E6 Best Brekkvasselv, Namsskogan, Trøndelag

E39 Digerneset, Skodje, Møre og Romsdal

NR 70 Håsøran, Sunndalsøra, Sunndal, Møre og Romsdal  


Northern Norway

E6 Mosjøen, Vefsn, Nordland

E6 Fauske, Nordland

E6 Innhavet, Hamarøy, Nordland

E6 Buktamoen, Målselv, Troms

E6 Circle K Storslett, Nordreisa

E6 Shell Talvik, Alta, Finnmark

E6/E75 Tana bru, Finnmark
NR 80 Bodø havn, Nordland

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Personal Experiences ==

Pls add info



== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group &lt;/br&gt;
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]


{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}


[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>0gvbaohg27n3gqlvtdh32l1o2p87trf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>103243</id>
      <parentid>103242</parentid>
      <timestamp>2022-08-09T18:54:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Clicks</username>
        <id>47193</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* In the North */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="18159">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Kautokeino]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Bodø]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have back seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, hitching a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had back seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed upon importation to Norway. This is done for tax reasons. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pick-up trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' is difficult to class as a good or bad country for hitchhiking (see the Discussion page). There are both very good and very bad feedback from hitchhikers in Norway:

[[Hitchhiking]] is not easy, although still very possible and chances of finding a long ride are quite good. In [[Tromsø]] it's even possible to hitchhike instead of taking public transport, by using a 2km sign (not as fast as the bus, however still better than walking).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. [[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching ferries ===
On hitchhiking short distance ferries that are usually paid by the amount of people in the car, especially around the fjords of Bergen and the Western coast of Norway:
When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

In the north, many ferries are free to walk on if you are not in a car. It’s still best to ask around or at least meet people while waiting for the ferry, however.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Hurtigruten is a daily shipping service on Norway's coast, it stops in most towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.


== Highway rest areas with paid showers ==


Eastern Norway

E6 Svinesundparken, Halden, Østfold

E6 Fugleåsen, Ski, Akershus

E6 Ormlia, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Circle K Minnesund, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Biri travpark, Gjøvik, Oppland

E6 Vinstra vegpark, Nord-Fron, Oppland

E6 Dovreskogen, Dovre, Oppland

E18 Ørje, Marker, Østfold

NR 3 Myklagard, Løten, Hedmark

NR 3 Shell Koppang, Stor-Elvdal, Hedmark

NR 3 Alvdal, Hedmark


Southern Norway

E18 Kjellstad, Lier, Buskerud

E18 Furulund Kro &amp; Motel, Stokke, Vestfold

E18 Horisonten Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 YX Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 Circle K Lillesand, Aust-Agder 

E39 Circle K Livold, Lindesnes, Vest-Agder


Western Norway

E16 Shell Dale, Vaksdal, Hordaland

E16 YX Skulestadmo, Voss, Hordaland

E16 Shell Gudvangen, Aurland, Sogn og Fjordane

E16 Steinklepp, Lærdal, Sogn og Fjordane

E39 Esso Vikeså, Bjerkreim, Rogaland

E39 Søylandskiosken, Gjesdal, Rogaland

E39 Heiane, Stord, Hordaland

E39 Bergen travpark, Vågsbotn, Hordaland

E39 Haugsvær, Masfjorden, Hordaland

E39 Esso Skei, Jølster, Sogn og Fjordane

E134 Best Kyrping, Etne, Hordaland


Central Norway

E6 Oppdalsporten, Oppdal, Trøndelag

E6/E39 Circle K Klett, Trondheim, Trøndelag 

E6 Stav Gjestegård, Malvik, Trøndelag

E6 YX Gråmyra, Levanger, Trøndelag

E6 Best Brekkvasselv, Namsskogan, Trøndelag

E39 Digerneset, Skodje, Møre og Romsdal

NR 70 Håsøran, Sunndalsøra, Sunndal, Møre og Romsdal  


Northern Norway

E6 Mosjøen, Vefsn, Nordland

E6 Fauske, Nordland

E6 Innhavet, Hamarøy, Nordland

E6 Buktamoen, Målselv, Troms

E6 Circle K Storslett, Nordreisa

E6 Shell Talvik, Alta, Finnmark

E6/E75 Tana bru, Finnmark
NR 80 Bodø havn, Nordland

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Personal Experiences ==

Pls add info



== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group &lt;/br&gt;
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]


{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}


[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>lbsvpttykojyj6sr6vk98ijq10xgnyq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>103822</id>
      <parentid>103243</parentid>
      <timestamp>2022-12-03T18:44:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Capy</username>
        <id>42305</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>Added info about Hurtigruten</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="18455">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Kautokeino]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Bodø]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have back seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, hitching a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had back seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed upon importation to Norway. This is done for tax reasons. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pick-up trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' is difficult to class as a good or bad country for hitchhiking (see the Discussion page). There are both very good and very bad feedback from hitchhikers in Norway:

[[Hitchhiking]] is not easy, although still very possible and chances of finding a long ride are quite good. In [[Tromsø]] it's even possible to hitchhike instead of taking public transport, by using a 2km sign (not as fast as the bus, however still better than walking).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. [[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching ferries ===
On hitchhiking short distance ferries that are usually paid by the amount of people in the car, especially around the fjords of Bergen and the Western coast of Norway:
When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

In the north, many ferries are free to walk on if you are not in a car. It’s still best to ask around or at least meet people while waiting for the ferry, however.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Hurtigruten is a daily shipping service on Norway's coast(less service in winter, about twice a week as of 2022), it stops in most towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free. If you stay on the ship for less than 24 hours, you don't have to take a cabin, which makes the trip much cheaper. Also, students get a 50 percent discount. Capy hasn't been checked for his student status on his three trips with Hurtigruten.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.

== Highway rest areas with paid showers ==


Eastern Norway

E6 Svinesundparken, Halden, Østfold

E6 Fugleåsen, Ski, Akershus

E6 Ormlia, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Circle K Minnesund, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Biri travpark, Gjøvik, Oppland

E6 Vinstra vegpark, Nord-Fron, Oppland

E6 Dovreskogen, Dovre, Oppland

E18 Ørje, Marker, Østfold

NR 3 Myklagard, Løten, Hedmark

NR 3 Shell Koppang, Stor-Elvdal, Hedmark

NR 3 Alvdal, Hedmark


Southern Norway

E18 Kjellstad, Lier, Buskerud

E18 Furulund Kro &amp; Motel, Stokke, Vestfold

E18 Horisonten Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 YX Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 Circle K Lillesand, Aust-Agder 

E39 Circle K Livold, Lindesnes, Vest-Agder


Western Norway

E16 Shell Dale, Vaksdal, Hordaland

E16 YX Skulestadmo, Voss, Hordaland

E16 Shell Gudvangen, Aurland, Sogn og Fjordane

E16 Steinklepp, Lærdal, Sogn og Fjordane

E39 Esso Vikeså, Bjerkreim, Rogaland

E39 Søylandskiosken, Gjesdal, Rogaland

E39 Heiane, Stord, Hordaland

E39 Bergen travpark, Vågsbotn, Hordaland

E39 Haugsvær, Masfjorden, Hordaland

E39 Esso Skei, Jølster, Sogn og Fjordane

E134 Best Kyrping, Etne, Hordaland


Central Norway

E6 Oppdalsporten, Oppdal, Trøndelag

E6/E39 Circle K Klett, Trondheim, Trøndelag 

E6 Stav Gjestegård, Malvik, Trøndelag

E6 YX Gråmyra, Levanger, Trøndelag

E6 Best Brekkvasselv, Namsskogan, Trøndelag

E39 Digerneset, Skodje, Møre og Romsdal

NR 70 Håsøran, Sunndalsøra, Sunndal, Møre og Romsdal  


Northern Norway

E6 Mosjøen, Vefsn, Nordland

E6 Fauske, Nordland

E6 Innhavet, Hamarøy, Nordland

E6 Buktamoen, Målselv, Troms

E6 Circle K Storslett, Nordreisa

E6 Shell Talvik, Alta, Finnmark

E6/E75 Tana bru, Finnmark
NR 80 Bodø havn, Nordland

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Personal Experiences ==

Pls add info



== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group &lt;/br&gt;
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]


{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}


[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>3p7y6dbdzb9qhoncn5nt6nlb2o5p6wb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>103823</id>
      <parentid>103822</parentid>
      <timestamp>2022-12-03T18:48:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Capy</username>
        <id>42305</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>Added info about heated waiting areas at ferry ports</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="18763">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Kautokeino]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Bodø]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have back seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, hitching a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had back seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed upon importation to Norway. This is done for tax reasons. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pick-up trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' is difficult to class as a good or bad country for hitchhiking (see the Discussion page). There are both very good and very bad feedback from hitchhikers in Norway:

[[Hitchhiking]] is not easy, although still very possible and chances of finding a long ride are quite good. In [[Tromsø]] it's even possible to hitchhike instead of taking public transport, by using a 2km sign (not as fast as the bus, however still better than walking).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. [[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching ferries ===
On hitchhiking short distance ferries that are usually paid by the amount of people in the car, especially around the fjords of Bergen and the Western coast of Norway:
When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

In the north, many ferries are free to walk on if you are not in a car. It’s still best to ask around or at least meet people while waiting for the ferry, however.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice. 

There are usually heated waiting areas at the ferry ports (even if small and remote), as waiting for a ferry can take some time and it can get very cold in winter. They can be a good spot for sleeping and you will be able to ask for a ride the next morning. Most of them are equipped with toilets as well.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Hurtigruten is a daily shipping service on Norway's coast(less service in winter, about twice a week as of 2022), it stops in most towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free. If you stay on the ship for less than 24 hours, you don't have to take a cabin, which makes the trip much cheaper. Also, students get a 50 percent discount. Capy hasn't been checked for his student status on his three trips with Hurtigruten.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.

== Highway rest areas with paid showers ==


Eastern Norway

E6 Svinesundparken, Halden, Østfold

E6 Fugleåsen, Ski, Akershus

E6 Ormlia, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Circle K Minnesund, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Biri travpark, Gjøvik, Oppland

E6 Vinstra vegpark, Nord-Fron, Oppland

E6 Dovreskogen, Dovre, Oppland

E18 Ørje, Marker, Østfold

NR 3 Myklagard, Løten, Hedmark

NR 3 Shell Koppang, Stor-Elvdal, Hedmark

NR 3 Alvdal, Hedmark


Southern Norway

E18 Kjellstad, Lier, Buskerud

E18 Furulund Kro &amp; Motel, Stokke, Vestfold

E18 Horisonten Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 YX Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 Circle K Lillesand, Aust-Agder 

E39 Circle K Livold, Lindesnes, Vest-Agder


Western Norway

E16 Shell Dale, Vaksdal, Hordaland

E16 YX Skulestadmo, Voss, Hordaland

E16 Shell Gudvangen, Aurland, Sogn og Fjordane

E16 Steinklepp, Lærdal, Sogn og Fjordane

E39 Esso Vikeså, Bjerkreim, Rogaland

E39 Søylandskiosken, Gjesdal, Rogaland

E39 Heiane, Stord, Hordaland

E39 Bergen travpark, Vågsbotn, Hordaland

E39 Haugsvær, Masfjorden, Hordaland

E39 Esso Skei, Jølster, Sogn og Fjordane

E134 Best Kyrping, Etne, Hordaland


Central Norway

E6 Oppdalsporten, Oppdal, Trøndelag

E6/E39 Circle K Klett, Trondheim, Trøndelag 

E6 Stav Gjestegård, Malvik, Trøndelag

E6 YX Gråmyra, Levanger, Trøndelag

E6 Best Brekkvasselv, Namsskogan, Trøndelag

E39 Digerneset, Skodje, Møre og Romsdal

NR 70 Håsøran, Sunndalsøra, Sunndal, Møre og Romsdal  


Northern Norway

E6 Mosjøen, Vefsn, Nordland

E6 Fauske, Nordland

E6 Innhavet, Hamarøy, Nordland

E6 Buktamoen, Målselv, Troms

E6 Circle K Storslett, Nordreisa

E6 Shell Talvik, Alta, Finnmark

E6/E75 Tana bru, Finnmark
NR 80 Bodø havn, Nordland

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Personal Experiences ==

Pls add info



== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group &lt;/br&gt;
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]


{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}


[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>lfngn17th4fqgqo3msr31prlo7k8wgo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>103824</id>
      <parentid>103823</parentid>
      <timestamp>2022-12-03T18:49:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Capy</username>
        <id>42305</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* Hitchhiking culture */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="18790">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Kautokeino]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Bodø]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have back seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, hitching a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had back seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed upon importation to Norway. This is done for tax reasons. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pick-up trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' is difficult to class as a good or bad country for hitchhiking (see the Discussion page). There are both very good and very bad feedback from hitchhikers in Norway:

[[Hitchhiking]] is not easy, although still very possible and chances of finding a long ride are quite good. In [[Tromsø]] it's even possible to hitchhike instead of taking public transport, by using a 2km sign (not as fast as the bus, however still better than walking).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. [[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching ferries ===
On hitchhiking short distance ferries that are usually paid by the amount of people in the car, especially around the fjords of Bergen and the Western coast of Norway:
When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

In the north, many ferries are free to walk on if you are not in a car. It’s still best to ask around or at least meet people while waiting for the ferry, however.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice. 

There are usually heated waiting areas at the ferry ports (even if small and remote), as waiting for a ferry can take some time and it can get very cold in winter. They are usually very clean and can be a good spot for sleeping and you will be able to ask for a ride the next morning. Most of them are equipped with toilets as well.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Hurtigruten is a daily shipping service on Norway's coast(less service in winter, about twice a week as of 2022), it stops in most towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free. If you stay on the ship for less than 24 hours, you don't have to take a cabin, which makes the trip much cheaper. Also, students get a 50 percent discount. Capy hasn't been checked for his student status on his three trips with Hurtigruten.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.

== Highway rest areas with paid showers ==


Eastern Norway

E6 Svinesundparken, Halden, Østfold

E6 Fugleåsen, Ski, Akershus

E6 Ormlia, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Circle K Minnesund, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Biri travpark, Gjøvik, Oppland

E6 Vinstra vegpark, Nord-Fron, Oppland

E6 Dovreskogen, Dovre, Oppland

E18 Ørje, Marker, Østfold

NR 3 Myklagard, Løten, Hedmark

NR 3 Shell Koppang, Stor-Elvdal, Hedmark

NR 3 Alvdal, Hedmark


Southern Norway

E18 Kjellstad, Lier, Buskerud

E18 Furulund Kro &amp; Motel, Stokke, Vestfold

E18 Horisonten Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 YX Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 Circle K Lillesand, Aust-Agder 

E39 Circle K Livold, Lindesnes, Vest-Agder


Western Norway

E16 Shell Dale, Vaksdal, Hordaland

E16 YX Skulestadmo, Voss, Hordaland

E16 Shell Gudvangen, Aurland, Sogn og Fjordane

E16 Steinklepp, Lærdal, Sogn og Fjordane

E39 Esso Vikeså, Bjerkreim, Rogaland

E39 Søylandskiosken, Gjesdal, Rogaland

E39 Heiane, Stord, Hordaland

E39 Bergen travpark, Vågsbotn, Hordaland

E39 Haugsvær, Masfjorden, Hordaland

E39 Esso Skei, Jølster, Sogn og Fjordane

E134 Best Kyrping, Etne, Hordaland


Central Norway

E6 Oppdalsporten, Oppdal, Trøndelag

E6/E39 Circle K Klett, Trondheim, Trøndelag 

E6 Stav Gjestegård, Malvik, Trøndelag

E6 YX Gråmyra, Levanger, Trøndelag

E6 Best Brekkvasselv, Namsskogan, Trøndelag

E39 Digerneset, Skodje, Møre og Romsdal

NR 70 Håsøran, Sunndalsøra, Sunndal, Møre og Romsdal  


Northern Norway

E6 Mosjøen, Vefsn, Nordland

E6 Fauske, Nordland

E6 Innhavet, Hamarøy, Nordland

E6 Buktamoen, Målselv, Troms

E6 Circle K Storslett, Nordreisa

E6 Shell Talvik, Alta, Finnmark

E6/E75 Tana bru, Finnmark
NR 80 Bodø havn, Nordland

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Personal Experiences ==

Pls add info



== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group &lt;/br&gt;
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]


{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}


[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>ecz8copcefsrd9ub7hokpx0cssm1kj5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>103825</id>
      <parentid>103824</parentid>
      <timestamp>2022-12-03T18:52:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Capy</username>
        <id>42305</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>Added opinion on hitchhikeability</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="18906">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Kautokeino]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Bodø]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have back seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, hitching a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had back seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed upon importation to Norway. This is done for tax reasons. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pick-up trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' is difficult to class as a good or bad country for hitchhiking (see the Discussion page). There are both very good and very bad feedback from hitchhikers in Norway:

[[Hitchhiking]] is not easy, although still very possible and chances of finding a long ride are quite good. In [[Tromsø]] it's even possible to hitchhike instead of taking public transport, by using a 2km sign (not as fast as the bus, however still better than walking).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

According to Capy, hitchhiking in Norway was easy. They were getting picked up by Norwegians and foreigners alike.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. [[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching ferries ===
On hitchhiking short distance ferries that are usually paid by the amount of people in the car, especially around the fjords of Bergen and the Western coast of Norway:
When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

In the north, many ferries are free to walk on if you are not in a car. It’s still best to ask around or at least meet people while waiting for the ferry, however.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice. 

There are usually heated waiting areas at the ferry ports (even if small and remote), as waiting for a ferry can take some time and it can get very cold in winter. They are usually very clean and can be a good spot for sleeping and you will be able to ask for a ride the next morning. Most of them are equipped with toilets as well.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Hurtigruten is a daily shipping service on Norway's coast(less service in winter, about twice a week as of 2022), it stops in most towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free. If you stay on the ship for less than 24 hours, you don't have to take a cabin, which makes the trip much cheaper. Also, students get a 50 percent discount. Capy hasn't been checked for his student status on his three trips with Hurtigruten.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.

== Highway rest areas with paid showers ==


Eastern Norway

E6 Svinesundparken, Halden, Østfold

E6 Fugleåsen, Ski, Akershus

E6 Ormlia, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Circle K Minnesund, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Biri travpark, Gjøvik, Oppland

E6 Vinstra vegpark, Nord-Fron, Oppland

E6 Dovreskogen, Dovre, Oppland

E18 Ørje, Marker, Østfold

NR 3 Myklagard, Løten, Hedmark

NR 3 Shell Koppang, Stor-Elvdal, Hedmark

NR 3 Alvdal, Hedmark


Southern Norway

E18 Kjellstad, Lier, Buskerud

E18 Furulund Kro &amp; Motel, Stokke, Vestfold

E18 Horisonten Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 YX Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 Circle K Lillesand, Aust-Agder 

E39 Circle K Livold, Lindesnes, Vest-Agder


Western Norway

E16 Shell Dale, Vaksdal, Hordaland

E16 YX Skulestadmo, Voss, Hordaland

E16 Shell Gudvangen, Aurland, Sogn og Fjordane

E16 Steinklepp, Lærdal, Sogn og Fjordane

E39 Esso Vikeså, Bjerkreim, Rogaland

E39 Søylandskiosken, Gjesdal, Rogaland

E39 Heiane, Stord, Hordaland

E39 Bergen travpark, Vågsbotn, Hordaland

E39 Haugsvær, Masfjorden, Hordaland

E39 Esso Skei, Jølster, Sogn og Fjordane

E134 Best Kyrping, Etne, Hordaland


Central Norway

E6 Oppdalsporten, Oppdal, Trøndelag

E6/E39 Circle K Klett, Trondheim, Trøndelag 

E6 Stav Gjestegård, Malvik, Trøndelag

E6 YX Gråmyra, Levanger, Trøndelag

E6 Best Brekkvasselv, Namsskogan, Trøndelag

E39 Digerneset, Skodje, Møre og Romsdal

NR 70 Håsøran, Sunndalsøra, Sunndal, Møre og Romsdal  


Northern Norway

E6 Mosjøen, Vefsn, Nordland

E6 Fauske, Nordland

E6 Innhavet, Hamarøy, Nordland

E6 Buktamoen, Målselv, Troms

E6 Circle K Storslett, Nordreisa

E6 Shell Talvik, Alta, Finnmark

E6/E75 Tana bru, Finnmark
NR 80 Bodø havn, Nordland

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Personal Experiences ==

Pls add info



== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group &lt;/br&gt;
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]


{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}


[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>ffhdy79suy8knj23fk1xqjvz4d0jrkf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>105051</id>
      <parentid>103825</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-12-12T09:25:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>QueerAmann</username>
        <id>47453</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>sugesting to check the altitude when in the mountains</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19185">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Most people speak [[England|English]] well enough for reasonable communication. People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

Be careful to check the altitude of the places where you wish to go, and through which you travel. A lot of people might be able get you closer to your destination, but they are not willing to drop you where it is cold (there can be freezing temperatures even in the summer).  

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Kautokeino]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Bodø]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have back seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, hitching a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had back seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed upon importation to Norway. This is done for tax reasons. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pick-up trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' is difficult to class as a good or bad country for hitchhiking (see the Discussion page). There are both very good and very bad feedback from hitchhikers in Norway:

[[Hitchhiking]] is not easy, although still very possible and chances of finding a long ride are quite good. In [[Tromsø]] it's even possible to hitchhike instead of taking public transport, by using a 2km sign (not as fast as the bus, however still better than walking).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

According to Capy, hitchhiking in Norway was easy. They were getting picked up by Norwegians and foreigners alike.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. [[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching ferries ===
On hitchhiking short distance ferries that are usually paid by the amount of people in the car, especially around the fjords of Bergen and the Western coast of Norway:
When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

In the north, many ferries are free to walk on if you are not in a car. It’s still best to ask around or at least meet people while waiting for the ferry, however.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice. 

There are usually heated waiting areas at the ferry ports (even if small and remote), as waiting for a ferry can take some time and it can get very cold in winter. They are usually very clean and can be a good spot for sleeping and you will be able to ask for a ride the next morning. Most of them are equipped with toilets as well.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Hurtigruten is a daily shipping service on Norway's coast(less service in winter, about twice a week as of 2022), it stops in most towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free. If you stay on the ship for less than 24 hours, you don't have to take a cabin, which makes the trip much cheaper. Also, students get a 50 percent discount. Capy hasn't been checked for his student status on his three trips with Hurtigruten.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.

== Highway rest areas with paid showers ==


Eastern Norway

E6 Svinesundparken, Halden, Østfold

E6 Fugleåsen, Ski, Akershus

E6 Ormlia, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Circle K Minnesund, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Biri travpark, Gjøvik, Oppland

E6 Vinstra vegpark, Nord-Fron, Oppland

E6 Dovreskogen, Dovre, Oppland

E18 Ørje, Marker, Østfold

NR 3 Myklagard, Løten, Hedmark

NR 3 Shell Koppang, Stor-Elvdal, Hedmark

NR 3 Alvdal, Hedmark


Southern Norway

E18 Kjellstad, Lier, Buskerud

E18 Furulund Kro &amp; Motel, Stokke, Vestfold

E18 Horisonten Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 YX Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 Circle K Lillesand, Aust-Agder 

E39 Circle K Livold, Lindesnes, Vest-Agder


Western Norway

E16 Shell Dale, Vaksdal, Hordaland

E16 YX Skulestadmo, Voss, Hordaland

E16 Shell Gudvangen, Aurland, Sogn og Fjordane

E16 Steinklepp, Lærdal, Sogn og Fjordane

E39 Esso Vikeså, Bjerkreim, Rogaland

E39 Søylandskiosken, Gjesdal, Rogaland

E39 Heiane, Stord, Hordaland

E39 Bergen travpark, Vågsbotn, Hordaland

E39 Haugsvær, Masfjorden, Hordaland

E39 Esso Skei, Jølster, Sogn og Fjordane

E134 Best Kyrping, Etne, Hordaland


Central Norway

E6 Oppdalsporten, Oppdal, Trøndelag

E6/E39 Circle K Klett, Trondheim, Trøndelag 

E6 Stav Gjestegård, Malvik, Trøndelag

E6 YX Gråmyra, Levanger, Trøndelag

E6 Best Brekkvasselv, Namsskogan, Trøndelag

E39 Digerneset, Skodje, Møre og Romsdal

NR 70 Håsøran, Sunndalsøra, Sunndal, Møre og Romsdal  


Northern Norway

E6 Mosjøen, Vefsn, Nordland

E6 Fauske, Nordland

E6 Innhavet, Hamarøy, Nordland

E6 Buktamoen, Målselv, Troms

E6 Circle K Storslett, Nordreisa

E6 Shell Talvik, Alta, Finnmark

E6/E75 Tana bru, Finnmark
NR 80 Bodø havn, Nordland

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Personal Experiences ==

Pls add info



== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group &lt;/br&gt;
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]


{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}


[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>ru5j8x7spkcjw8kx40sgkk63df3wtrm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106164</id>
      <parentid>105051</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-09-07T02:07:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Muhtriangles</username>
        <id>47486</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19165">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Practically eveeryone is fluent in [[England|English]]. Sadly People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

Be careful to check the altitude of the places where you wish to go, and through which you travel. A lot of people might be able get you closer to your destination, but they are not willing to drop you where it is cold (there can be freezing temperatures even in the summer).

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Kautokeino]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Bodø]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have back seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, hitching a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had back seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed upon importation to Norway. This is done for tax reasons. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pick-up trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' is difficult to class as a good or bad country for hitchhiking (see the Discussion page). There are both very good and very bad feedback from hitchhikers in Norway:

[[Hitchhiking]] is not easy, although still very possible and chances of finding a long ride are quite good. In [[Tromsø]] it's even possible to hitchhike instead of taking public transport, by using a 2km sign (not as fast as the bus, however still better than walking).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

According to Capy, hitchhiking in Norway was easy. They were getting picked up by Norwegians and foreigners alike.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. [[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching ferries ===
On hitchhiking short distance ferries that are usually paid by the amount of people in the car, especially around the fjords of Bergen and the Western coast of Norway:
When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

In the north, many ferries are free to walk on if you are not in a car. It’s still best to ask around or at least meet people while waiting for the ferry, however.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice. 

There are usually heated waiting areas at the ferry ports (even if small and remote), as waiting for a ferry can take some time and it can get very cold in winter. They are usually very clean and can be a good spot for sleeping and you will be able to ask for a ride the next morning. Most of them are equipped with toilets as well.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Hurtigruten is a daily shipping service on Norway's coast(less service in winter, about twice a week as of 2022), it stops in most towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free. If you stay on the ship for less than 24 hours, you don't have to take a cabin, which makes the trip much cheaper. Also, students get a 50 percent discount. Capy hasn't been checked for his student status on his three trips with Hurtigruten.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.

== Highway rest areas with paid showers ==


Eastern Norway

E6 Svinesundparken, Halden, Østfold

E6 Fugleåsen, Ski, Akershus

E6 Ormlia, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Circle K Minnesund, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Biri travpark, Gjøvik, Oppland

E6 Vinstra vegpark, Nord-Fron, Oppland

E6 Dovreskogen, Dovre, Oppland

E18 Ørje, Marker, Østfold

NR 3 Myklagard, Løten, Hedmark

NR 3 Shell Koppang, Stor-Elvdal, Hedmark

NR 3 Alvdal, Hedmark


Southern Norway

E18 Kjellstad, Lier, Buskerud

E18 Furulund Kro &amp; Motel, Stokke, Vestfold

E18 Horisonten Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 YX Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 Circle K Lillesand, Aust-Agder 

E39 Circle K Livold, Lindesnes, Vest-Agder


Western Norway

E16 Shell Dale, Vaksdal, Hordaland

E16 YX Skulestadmo, Voss, Hordaland

E16 Shell Gudvangen, Aurland, Sogn og Fjordane

E16 Steinklepp, Lærdal, Sogn og Fjordane

E39 Esso Vikeså, Bjerkreim, Rogaland

E39 Søylandskiosken, Gjesdal, Rogaland

E39 Heiane, Stord, Hordaland

E39 Bergen travpark, Vågsbotn, Hordaland

E39 Haugsvær, Masfjorden, Hordaland

E39 Esso Skei, Jølster, Sogn og Fjordane

E134 Best Kyrping, Etne, Hordaland


Central Norway

E6 Oppdalsporten, Oppdal, Trøndelag

E6/E39 Circle K Klett, Trondheim, Trøndelag 

E6 Stav Gjestegård, Malvik, Trøndelag

E6 YX Gråmyra, Levanger, Trøndelag

E6 Best Brekkvasselv, Namsskogan, Trøndelag

E39 Digerneset, Skodje, Møre og Romsdal

NR 70 Håsøran, Sunndalsøra, Sunndal, Møre og Romsdal  


Northern Norway

E6 Mosjøen, Vefsn, Nordland

E6 Fauske, Nordland

E6 Innhavet, Hamarøy, Nordland

E6 Buktamoen, Målselv, Troms

E6 Circle K Storslett, Nordreisa

E6 Shell Talvik, Alta, Finnmark

E6/E75 Tana bru, Finnmark
NR 80 Bodø havn, Nordland

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Personal Experiences ==

Pls add info



== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group &lt;/br&gt;
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]


{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}


[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>2l35jj8mjerye4sz0hjahuhsgi3u57a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106165</id>
      <parentid>106164</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-09-07T02:18:14Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Muhtriangles</username>
        <id>47486</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Hitching ferries */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19950">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Practically eveeryone is fluent in [[England|English]]. Sadly People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

Be careful to check the altitude of the places where you wish to go, and through which you travel. A lot of people might be able get you closer to your destination, but they are not willing to drop you where it is cold (there can be freezing temperatures even in the summer).

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Kautokeino]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Bodø]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have back seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, hitching a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had back seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed upon importation to Norway. This is done for tax reasons. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pick-up trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' is difficult to class as a good or bad country for hitchhiking (see the Discussion page). There are both very good and very bad feedback from hitchhikers in Norway:

[[Hitchhiking]] is not easy, although still very possible and chances of finding a long ride are quite good. In [[Tromsø]] it's even possible to hitchhike instead of taking public transport, by using a 2km sign (not as fast as the bus, however still better than walking).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

According to Capy, hitchhiking in Norway was easy. They were getting picked up by Norwegians and foreigners alike.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. [[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching ferries ===

As of summer 2024, almost all normal car ferries are free of passengers and pedestrians, you just pay for the car, some are even free for the cars! I hitchiked from oslo to norkapp, took many ferries, including the long distance bodo to lofoten islands ferry, and all of them where free. 

Sometimes your driver will ask you to get out of the car and walk onto the ferry separately, "just in case". If this happens be super careful, as the second the last car is on the ferry it leaves, and pedestrians often get left behind. Thankfully the ferries are pretty frequent.

Occasionally the ferries have queues which can last hours, especially when one of the ferries is broken down. Because of this when your driver arrives at the ferry terminal, even if they are due to drive further it may make more sense to get out, walk onto the ferry alone and then hitchike away the other side without them, rather than waiting with their car in the queue. They can always pick you up again later.

Even though most ferries are now free, in case you come across a paid ferry here is the old info on how to get onto them for free:

When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice. 

There are usually heated waiting areas at the ferry ports (even if small and remote), as waiting for a ferry can take some time and it can get very cold in winter. They are usually very clean and can be a good spot for sleeping and you will be able to ask for a ride the next morning. Most of them are equipped with toilets as well.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Hurtigruten is a daily shipping service on Norway's coast(less service in winter, about twice a week as of 2022), it stops in most towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free. If you stay on the ship for less than 24 hours, you don't have to take a cabin, which makes the trip much cheaper. Also, students get a 50 percent discount. Capy hasn't been checked for his student status on his three trips with Hurtigruten.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.

== Highway rest areas with paid showers ==


Eastern Norway

E6 Svinesundparken, Halden, Østfold

E6 Fugleåsen, Ski, Akershus

E6 Ormlia, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Circle K Minnesund, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Biri travpark, Gjøvik, Oppland

E6 Vinstra vegpark, Nord-Fron, Oppland

E6 Dovreskogen, Dovre, Oppland

E18 Ørje, Marker, Østfold

NR 3 Myklagard, Løten, Hedmark

NR 3 Shell Koppang, Stor-Elvdal, Hedmark

NR 3 Alvdal, Hedmark


Southern Norway

E18 Kjellstad, Lier, Buskerud

E18 Furulund Kro &amp; Motel, Stokke, Vestfold

E18 Horisonten Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 YX Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 Circle K Lillesand, Aust-Agder 

E39 Circle K Livold, Lindesnes, Vest-Agder


Western Norway

E16 Shell Dale, Vaksdal, Hordaland

E16 YX Skulestadmo, Voss, Hordaland

E16 Shell Gudvangen, Aurland, Sogn og Fjordane

E16 Steinklepp, Lærdal, Sogn og Fjordane

E39 Esso Vikeså, Bjerkreim, Rogaland

E39 Søylandskiosken, Gjesdal, Rogaland

E39 Heiane, Stord, Hordaland

E39 Bergen travpark, Vågsbotn, Hordaland

E39 Haugsvær, Masfjorden, Hordaland

E39 Esso Skei, Jølster, Sogn og Fjordane

E134 Best Kyrping, Etne, Hordaland


Central Norway

E6 Oppdalsporten, Oppdal, Trøndelag

E6/E39 Circle K Klett, Trondheim, Trøndelag 

E6 Stav Gjestegård, Malvik, Trøndelag

E6 YX Gråmyra, Levanger, Trøndelag

E6 Best Brekkvasselv, Namsskogan, Trøndelag

E39 Digerneset, Skodje, Møre og Romsdal

NR 70 Håsøran, Sunndalsøra, Sunndal, Møre og Romsdal  


Northern Norway

E6 Mosjøen, Vefsn, Nordland

E6 Fauske, Nordland

E6 Innhavet, Hamarøy, Nordland

E6 Buktamoen, Målselv, Troms

E6 Circle K Storslett, Nordreisa

E6 Shell Talvik, Alta, Finnmark

E6/E75 Tana bru, Finnmark
NR 80 Bodø havn, Nordland

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Personal Experiences ==

Pls add info



== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group &lt;/br&gt;
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]


{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}


[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>d8gc3fw0gept0cgli46hfw55yjpiln9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106166</id>
      <parentid>106165</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-09-07T02:28:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Muhtriangles</username>
        <id>47486</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Hitchhiking culture */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19825">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Practically eveeryone is fluent in [[England|English]]. Sadly People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

Be careful to check the altitude of the places where you wish to go, and through which you travel. A lot of people might be able get you closer to your destination, but they are not willing to drop you where it is cold (there can be freezing temperatures even in the summer).

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Kautokeino]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Bodø]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have back seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, hitching a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had back seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed upon importation to Norway. This is done for tax reasons. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pick-up trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' has a mixed reputation for hitchiking, some people will try and convince you Norway is hitchhikers hell. Others will say it is a paradise. While the truth lies somewhere in between, hitchiking definitely works, so don't let the naysayers put you off (but equally don't get cockey and expect 10 second wait times).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

According to Capy, hitchhiking in Norway was easy. They were getting picked up by Norwegians and foreigners alike.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. [[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching ferries ===

As of summer 2024, almost all normal car ferries are free of passengers and pedestrians, you just pay for the car, some are even free for the cars! I hitchiked from oslo to norkapp, took many ferries, including the long distance bodo to lofoten islands ferry, and all of them where free. 

Sometimes your driver will ask you to get out of the car and walk onto the ferry separately, "just in case". If this happens be super careful, as the second the last car is on the ferry it leaves, and pedestrians often get left behind. Thankfully the ferries are pretty frequent.

Occasionally the ferries have queues which can last hours, especially when one of the ferries is broken down. Because of this when your driver arrives at the ferry terminal, even if they are due to drive further it may make more sense to get out, walk onto the ferry alone and then hitchike away the other side without them, rather than waiting with their car in the queue. They can always pick you up again later.

Even though most ferries are now free, in case you come across a paid ferry here is the old info on how to get onto them for free:

When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice. 

There are usually heated waiting areas at the ferry ports (even if small and remote), as waiting for a ferry can take some time and it can get very cold in winter. They are usually very clean and can be a good spot for sleeping and you will be able to ask for a ride the next morning. Most of them are equipped with toilets as well.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Hurtigruten is a daily shipping service on Norway's coast(less service in winter, about twice a week as of 2022), it stops in most towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free. If you stay on the ship for less than 24 hours, you don't have to take a cabin, which makes the trip much cheaper. Also, students get a 50 percent discount. Capy hasn't been checked for his student status on his three trips with Hurtigruten.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.

== Highway rest areas with paid showers ==


Eastern Norway

E6 Svinesundparken, Halden, Østfold

E6 Fugleåsen, Ski, Akershus

E6 Ormlia, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Circle K Minnesund, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Biri travpark, Gjøvik, Oppland

E6 Vinstra vegpark, Nord-Fron, Oppland

E6 Dovreskogen, Dovre, Oppland

E18 Ørje, Marker, Østfold

NR 3 Myklagard, Løten, Hedmark

NR 3 Shell Koppang, Stor-Elvdal, Hedmark

NR 3 Alvdal, Hedmark


Southern Norway

E18 Kjellstad, Lier, Buskerud

E18 Furulund Kro &amp; Motel, Stokke, Vestfold

E18 Horisonten Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 YX Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 Circle K Lillesand, Aust-Agder 

E39 Circle K Livold, Lindesnes, Vest-Agder


Western Norway

E16 Shell Dale, Vaksdal, Hordaland

E16 YX Skulestadmo, Voss, Hordaland

E16 Shell Gudvangen, Aurland, Sogn og Fjordane

E16 Steinklepp, Lærdal, Sogn og Fjordane

E39 Esso Vikeså, Bjerkreim, Rogaland

E39 Søylandskiosken, Gjesdal, Rogaland

E39 Heiane, Stord, Hordaland

E39 Bergen travpark, Vågsbotn, Hordaland

E39 Haugsvær, Masfjorden, Hordaland

E39 Esso Skei, Jølster, Sogn og Fjordane

E134 Best Kyrping, Etne, Hordaland


Central Norway

E6 Oppdalsporten, Oppdal, Trøndelag

E6/E39 Circle K Klett, Trondheim, Trøndelag 

E6 Stav Gjestegård, Malvik, Trøndelag

E6 YX Gråmyra, Levanger, Trøndelag

E6 Best Brekkvasselv, Namsskogan, Trøndelag

E39 Digerneset, Skodje, Møre og Romsdal

NR 70 Håsøran, Sunndalsøra, Sunndal, Møre og Romsdal  


Northern Norway

E6 Mosjøen, Vefsn, Nordland

E6 Fauske, Nordland

E6 Innhavet, Hamarøy, Nordland

E6 Buktamoen, Målselv, Troms

E6 Circle K Storslett, Nordreisa

E6 Shell Talvik, Alta, Finnmark

E6/E75 Tana bru, Finnmark
NR 80 Bodø havn, Nordland

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Personal Experiences ==

Pls add info



== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group &lt;/br&gt;
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]


{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}


[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>c8dkg4059p32q73lmpfv4pq3g1qu99l</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>106167</id>
      <parentid>106166</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-09-07T18:35:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Ools</username>
        <id>28102</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>Removed the remark about Hurtigruten/Kystruten being less frequent during winter, as it is no longer true. The situation in 2022 was an exemption.</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19837">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Practically eveeryone is fluent in [[England|English]]. Sadly People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

Be careful to check the altitude of the places where you wish to go, and through which you travel. A lot of people might be able get you closer to your destination, but they are not willing to drop you where it is cold (there can be freezing temperatures even in the summer).

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Kautokeino]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Bodø]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have back seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, hitching a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had back seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed upon importation to Norway. This is done for tax reasons. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pick-up trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' has a mixed reputation for hitchiking, some people will try and convince you Norway is hitchhikers hell. Others will say it is a paradise. While the truth lies somewhere in between, hitchiking definitely works, so don't let the naysayers put you off (but equally don't get cockey and expect 10 second wait times).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

According to Capy, hitchhiking in Norway was easy. They were getting picked up by Norwegians and foreigners alike.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. [[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching ferries ===

As of summer 2024, almost all normal car ferries are free of passengers and pedestrians, you just pay for the car, some are even free for the cars! I hitchiked from oslo to norkapp, took many ferries, including the long distance bodo to lofoten islands ferry, and all of them where free. 

Sometimes your driver will ask you to get out of the car and walk onto the ferry separately, "just in case". If this happens be super careful, as the second the last car is on the ferry it leaves, and pedestrians often get left behind. Thankfully the ferries are pretty frequent.

Occasionally the ferries have queues which can last hours, especially when one of the ferries is broken down. Because of this when your driver arrives at the ferry terminal, even if they are due to drive further it may make more sense to get out, walk onto the ferry alone and then hitchike away the other side without them, rather than waiting with their car in the queue. They can always pick you up again later.

Even though most ferries are now free, in case you come across a paid ferry here is the old info on how to get onto them for free:

When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice. 

There are usually heated waiting areas at the ferry ports (even if small and remote), as waiting for a ferry can take some time and it can get very cold in winter. They are usually very clean and can be a good spot for sleeping and you will be able to ask for a ride the next morning. Most of them are equipped with toilets as well.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Kystruten is a daily shipping and passenger service along Norway's coast, served jointly by the lines Hurtigruten and Havila. It calls in many towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free. If you stay on the ship for less than 24 hours, you don't have to take a cabin, which makes the trip much cheaper. Also, students get a 50 percent discount. Capy hasn't been checked for his student status on his three trips with Hurtigruten.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.

== Highway rest areas with paid showers ==


Eastern Norway

E6 Svinesundparken, Halden, Østfold

E6 Fugleåsen, Ski, Akershus

E6 Ormlia, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Circle K Minnesund, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Biri travpark, Gjøvik, Oppland

E6 Vinstra vegpark, Nord-Fron, Oppland

E6 Dovreskogen, Dovre, Oppland

E18 Ørje, Marker, Østfold

NR 3 Myklagard, Løten, Hedmark

NR 3 Shell Koppang, Stor-Elvdal, Hedmark

NR 3 Alvdal, Hedmark


Southern Norway

E18 Kjellstad, Lier, Buskerud

E18 Furulund Kro &amp; Motel, Stokke, Vestfold

E18 Horisonten Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 YX Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 Circle K Lillesand, Aust-Agder 

E39 Circle K Livold, Lindesnes, Vest-Agder


Western Norway

E16 Shell Dale, Vaksdal, Hordaland

E16 YX Skulestadmo, Voss, Hordaland

E16 Shell Gudvangen, Aurland, Sogn og Fjordane

E16 Steinklepp, Lærdal, Sogn og Fjordane

E39 Esso Vikeså, Bjerkreim, Rogaland

E39 Søylandskiosken, Gjesdal, Rogaland

E39 Heiane, Stord, Hordaland

E39 Bergen travpark, Vågsbotn, Hordaland

E39 Haugsvær, Masfjorden, Hordaland

E39 Esso Skei, Jølster, Sogn og Fjordane

E134 Best Kyrping, Etne, Hordaland


Central Norway

E6 Oppdalsporten, Oppdal, Trøndelag

E6/E39 Circle K Klett, Trondheim, Trøndelag 

E6 Stav Gjestegård, Malvik, Trøndelag

E6 YX Gråmyra, Levanger, Trøndelag

E6 Best Brekkvasselv, Namsskogan, Trøndelag

E39 Digerneset, Skodje, Møre og Romsdal

NR 70 Håsøran, Sunndalsøra, Sunndal, Møre og Romsdal  


Northern Norway

E6 Mosjøen, Vefsn, Nordland

E6 Fauske, Nordland

E6 Innhavet, Hamarøy, Nordland

E6 Buktamoen, Målselv, Troms

E6 Circle K Storslett, Nordreisa

E6 Shell Talvik, Alta, Finnmark

E6/E75 Tana bru, Finnmark
NR 80 Bodø havn, Nordland

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Personal Experiences ==

Pls add info



== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group &lt;/br&gt;
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]


{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}


[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>h56lfw1cp7nl1iygaakgbl4bjpfpsw3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>107711</id>
      <parentid>106167</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-11-24T03:50:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tales</username>
        <id>9710</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>/* Personal Experiences */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20711">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Practically eveeryone is fluent in [[England|English]]. Sadly People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

Be careful to check the altitude of the places where you wish to go, and through which you travel. A lot of people might be able get you closer to your destination, but they are not willing to drop you where it is cold (there can be freezing temperatures even in the summer).

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Kautokeino]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Bodø]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have back seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, hitching a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had back seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed upon importation to Norway. This is done for tax reasons. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pick-up trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' has a mixed reputation for hitchiking, some people will try and convince you Norway is hitchhikers hell. Others will say it is a paradise. While the truth lies somewhere in between, hitchiking definitely works, so don't let the naysayers put you off (but equally don't get cockey and expect 10 second wait times).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

According to Capy, hitchhiking in Norway was easy. They were getting picked up by Norwegians and foreigners alike.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. [[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching ferries ===

As of summer 2024, almost all normal car ferries are free of passengers and pedestrians, you just pay for the car, some are even free for the cars! I hitchiked from oslo to norkapp, took many ferries, including the long distance bodo to lofoten islands ferry, and all of them where free. 

Sometimes your driver will ask you to get out of the car and walk onto the ferry separately, "just in case". If this happens be super careful, as the second the last car is on the ferry it leaves, and pedestrians often get left behind. Thankfully the ferries are pretty frequent.

Occasionally the ferries have queues which can last hours, especially when one of the ferries is broken down. Because of this when your driver arrives at the ferry terminal, even if they are due to drive further it may make more sense to get out, walk onto the ferry alone and then hitchike away the other side without them, rather than waiting with their car in the queue. They can always pick you up again later.

Even though most ferries are now free, in case you come across a paid ferry here is the old info on how to get onto them for free:

When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice. 

There are usually heated waiting areas at the ferry ports (even if small and remote), as waiting for a ferry can take some time and it can get very cold in winter. They are usually very clean and can be a good spot for sleeping and you will be able to ask for a ride the next morning. Most of them are equipped with toilets as well.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Kystruten is a daily shipping and passenger service along Norway's coast, served jointly by the lines Hurtigruten and Havila. It calls in many towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free. If you stay on the ship for less than 24 hours, you don't have to take a cabin, which makes the trip much cheaper. Also, students get a 50 percent discount. Capy hasn't been checked for his student status on his three trips with Hurtigruten.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.

== Highway rest areas with paid showers ==


Eastern Norway

E6 Svinesundparken, Halden, Østfold

E6 Fugleåsen, Ski, Akershus

E6 Ormlia, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Circle K Minnesund, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Biri travpark, Gjøvik, Oppland

E6 Vinstra vegpark, Nord-Fron, Oppland

E6 Dovreskogen, Dovre, Oppland

E18 Ørje, Marker, Østfold

NR 3 Myklagard, Løten, Hedmark

NR 3 Shell Koppang, Stor-Elvdal, Hedmark

NR 3 Alvdal, Hedmark


Southern Norway

E18 Kjellstad, Lier, Buskerud

E18 Furulund Kro &amp; Motel, Stokke, Vestfold

E18 Horisonten Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 YX Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 Circle K Lillesand, Aust-Agder 

E39 Circle K Livold, Lindesnes, Vest-Agder


Western Norway

E16 Shell Dale, Vaksdal, Hordaland

E16 YX Skulestadmo, Voss, Hordaland

E16 Shell Gudvangen, Aurland, Sogn og Fjordane

E16 Steinklepp, Lærdal, Sogn og Fjordane

E39 Esso Vikeså, Bjerkreim, Rogaland

E39 Søylandskiosken, Gjesdal, Rogaland

E39 Heiane, Stord, Hordaland

E39 Bergen travpark, Vågsbotn, Hordaland

E39 Haugsvær, Masfjorden, Hordaland

E39 Esso Skei, Jølster, Sogn og Fjordane

E134 Best Kyrping, Etne, Hordaland


Central Norway

E6 Oppdalsporten, Oppdal, Trøndelag

E6/E39 Circle K Klett, Trondheim, Trøndelag 

E6 Stav Gjestegård, Malvik, Trøndelag

E6 YX Gråmyra, Levanger, Trøndelag

E6 Best Brekkvasselv, Namsskogan, Trøndelag

E39 Digerneset, Skodje, Møre og Romsdal

NR 70 Håsøran, Sunndalsøra, Sunndal, Møre og Romsdal  


Northern Norway

E6 Mosjøen, Vefsn, Nordland

E6 Fauske, Nordland

E6 Innhavet, Hamarøy, Nordland

E6 Buktamoen, Målselv, Troms

E6 Circle K Storslett, Nordreisa

E6 Shell Talvik, Alta, Finnmark

E6/E75 Tana bru, Finnmark
NR 80 Bodø havn, Nordland

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Personal Experiences ==

Tales, summer 2024: Hitchhiked all the Norway from far North to South in 20 days (Alta-Stavanger-Oslo). I would divide Norway in two ''countries'' - North and South (let's assume Mosjoen is an imaginary ''border''). People in the North are very nice and friendly, you do not wait for a ride much (1-30min), and it is mostly Norwegians who give you a ride. You go south, it is getting more and more difficult, especially around the Oslo-Stavanger-Trondheim triangle. You can get a ride after 5 min, but also after 2 hours (Rjukan was the most terrible experience). Not more than 10% of Norwegians will pick you up in the south - they are afraid, not that happy with the immigrants, and that makes them very untrustworthy towards any foreign face. A bunch of German tourists gave me a ride, Dutch, guest workers, etc. If I have to grade my experience - North 3.5 out of 5, South 2 out of 5.

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group &lt;/br&gt;
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]


{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}


[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>q5hz6vvb4ow6e8vmk1aw2zeey52o6yb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>107715</id>
      <parentid>107711</parentid>
      <timestamp>2024-11-24T04:03:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Tales</username>
        <id>9710</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Personal Experiences */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20902">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Practically eveeryone is fluent in [[England|English]]. Sadly People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

Be careful to check the altitude of the places where you wish to go, and through which you travel. A lot of people might be able get you closer to your destination, but they are not willing to drop you where it is cold (there can be freezing temperatures even in the summer).

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Kautokeino]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Bodø]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have back seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, hitching a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had back seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed upon importation to Norway. This is done for tax reasons. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pick-up trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' has a mixed reputation for hitchiking, some people will try and convince you Norway is hitchhikers hell. Others will say it is a paradise. While the truth lies somewhere in between, hitchiking definitely works, so don't let the naysayers put you off (but equally don't get cockey and expect 10 second wait times).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

According to Capy, hitchhiking in Norway was easy. They were getting picked up by Norwegians and foreigners alike.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. [[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching ferries ===

As of summer 2024, almost all normal car ferries are free of passengers and pedestrians, you just pay for the car, some are even free for the cars! I hitchiked from oslo to norkapp, took many ferries, including the long distance bodo to lofoten islands ferry, and all of them where free. 

Sometimes your driver will ask you to get out of the car and walk onto the ferry separately, "just in case". If this happens be super careful, as the second the last car is on the ferry it leaves, and pedestrians often get left behind. Thankfully the ferries are pretty frequent.

Occasionally the ferries have queues which can last hours, especially when one of the ferries is broken down. Because of this when your driver arrives at the ferry terminal, even if they are due to drive further it may make more sense to get out, walk onto the ferry alone and then hitchike away the other side without them, rather than waiting with their car in the queue. They can always pick you up again later.

Even though most ferries are now free, in case you come across a paid ferry here is the old info on how to get onto them for free:

When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice. 

There are usually heated waiting areas at the ferry ports (even if small and remote), as waiting for a ferry can take some time and it can get very cold in winter. They are usually very clean and can be a good spot for sleeping and you will be able to ask for a ride the next morning. Most of them are equipped with toilets as well.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Kystruten is a daily shipping and passenger service along Norway's coast, served jointly by the lines Hurtigruten and Havila. It calls in many towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free. If you stay on the ship for less than 24 hours, you don't have to take a cabin, which makes the trip much cheaper. Also, students get a 50 percent discount. Capy hasn't been checked for his student status on his three trips with Hurtigruten.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.

== Highway rest areas with paid showers ==


Eastern Norway

E6 Svinesundparken, Halden, Østfold

E6 Fugleåsen, Ski, Akershus

E6 Ormlia, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Circle K Minnesund, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Biri travpark, Gjøvik, Oppland

E6 Vinstra vegpark, Nord-Fron, Oppland

E6 Dovreskogen, Dovre, Oppland

E18 Ørje, Marker, Østfold

NR 3 Myklagard, Løten, Hedmark

NR 3 Shell Koppang, Stor-Elvdal, Hedmark

NR 3 Alvdal, Hedmark


Southern Norway

E18 Kjellstad, Lier, Buskerud

E18 Furulund Kro &amp; Motel, Stokke, Vestfold

E18 Horisonten Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 YX Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 Circle K Lillesand, Aust-Agder 

E39 Circle K Livold, Lindesnes, Vest-Agder


Western Norway

E16 Shell Dale, Vaksdal, Hordaland

E16 YX Skulestadmo, Voss, Hordaland

E16 Shell Gudvangen, Aurland, Sogn og Fjordane

E16 Steinklepp, Lærdal, Sogn og Fjordane

E39 Esso Vikeså, Bjerkreim, Rogaland

E39 Søylandskiosken, Gjesdal, Rogaland

E39 Heiane, Stord, Hordaland

E39 Bergen travpark, Vågsbotn, Hordaland

E39 Haugsvær, Masfjorden, Hordaland

E39 Esso Skei, Jølster, Sogn og Fjordane

E134 Best Kyrping, Etne, Hordaland


Central Norway

E6 Oppdalsporten, Oppdal, Trøndelag

E6/E39 Circle K Klett, Trondheim, Trøndelag 

E6 Stav Gjestegård, Malvik, Trøndelag

E6 YX Gråmyra, Levanger, Trøndelag

E6 Best Brekkvasselv, Namsskogan, Trøndelag

E39 Digerneset, Skodje, Møre og Romsdal

NR 70 Håsøran, Sunndalsøra, Sunndal, Møre og Romsdal  


Northern Norway

E6 Mosjøen, Vefsn, Nordland

E6 Fauske, Nordland

E6 Innhavet, Hamarøy, Nordland

E6 Buktamoen, Målselv, Troms

E6 Circle K Storslett, Nordreisa

E6 Shell Talvik, Alta, Finnmark

E6/E75 Tana bru, Finnmark
NR 80 Bodø havn, Nordland

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Personal Experiences ==

Tales, summer 2024: Hitchhiked all the Norway from far North to South in 20 days (Alta-Stavanger-Oslo). I would divide Norway in two ''countries'' - North and South (let's assume Mosjoen is an imaginary ''border''). People in the North are very nice and friendly, you do not wait for a ride much (1-30min), and it is mostly Norwegians who give you a ride. You go south, it is getting more and more difficult, especially around the Oslo-Stavanger-Trondheim triangle. You can get a ride after 5 min, but also after 2 hours (Rjukan was the most terrible experience). Not more than 10% of Norwegians will pick you up in the south - they are afraid, not that happy with the immigrants, and that makes them very untrustworthy towards any foreign face. A bunch of German tourists gave me a ride, Dutch, guest workers, etc. If I have to grade my experience - North 3.5 out of 5, South 2 out of 5. Oh yes, one more important thing. In the North, people could stop anywhere, but better at bus stops. In the South, you MUST be at the designated stop as people really got hectic about it. :)

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group &lt;/br&gt;
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]


{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}


[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>0424756cry1ot5ex3f8ix9jqb2ek9u5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>111412</id>
      <parentid>107715</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-08-03T11:14:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Metabugsdream</username>
        <id>47812</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Highway rest areas with paid showers */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20921">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Practically eveeryone is fluent in [[England|English]]. Sadly People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

Be careful to check the altitude of the places where you wish to go, and through which you travel. A lot of people might be able get you closer to your destination, but they are not willing to drop you where it is cold (there can be freezing temperatures even in the summer).

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Kautokeino]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Bodø]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have back seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, hitching a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had back seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed upon importation to Norway. This is done for tax reasons. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pick-up trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' has a mixed reputation for hitchiking, some people will try and convince you Norway is hitchhikers hell. Others will say it is a paradise. While the truth lies somewhere in between, hitchiking definitely works, so don't let the naysayers put you off (but equally don't get cockey and expect 10 second wait times).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

According to Capy, hitchhiking in Norway was easy. They were getting picked up by Norwegians and foreigners alike.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. [[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching ferries ===

As of summer 2024, almost all normal car ferries are free of passengers and pedestrians, you just pay for the car, some are even free for the cars! I hitchiked from oslo to norkapp, took many ferries, including the long distance bodo to lofoten islands ferry, and all of them where free. 

Sometimes your driver will ask you to get out of the car and walk onto the ferry separately, "just in case". If this happens be super careful, as the second the last car is on the ferry it leaves, and pedestrians often get left behind. Thankfully the ferries are pretty frequent.

Occasionally the ferries have queues which can last hours, especially when one of the ferries is broken down. Because of this when your driver arrives at the ferry terminal, even if they are due to drive further it may make more sense to get out, walk onto the ferry alone and then hitchike away the other side without them, rather than waiting with their car in the queue. They can always pick you up again later.

Even though most ferries are now free, in case you come across a paid ferry here is the old info on how to get onto them for free:

When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice. 

There are usually heated waiting areas at the ferry ports (even if small and remote), as waiting for a ferry can take some time and it can get very cold in winter. They are usually very clean and can be a good spot for sleeping and you will be able to ask for a ride the next morning. Most of them are equipped with toilets as well.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Kystruten is a daily shipping and passenger service along Norway's coast, served jointly by the lines Hurtigruten and Havila. It calls in many towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free. If you stay on the ship for less than 24 hours, you don't have to take a cabin, which makes the trip much cheaper. Also, students get a 50 percent discount. Capy hasn't been checked for his student status on his three trips with Hurtigruten.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.

== Highway rest areas with paid showers ==


Eastern Norway

E6 Svinesundparken, Halden, Østfold

E6 Circle K Øyer

E6 Fugleåsen, Ski, Akershus

E6 Ormlia, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Circle K Minnesund, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Biri travpark, Gjøvik, Oppland

E6 Vinstra vegpark, Nord-Fron, Oppland

E6 Dovreskogen, Dovre, Oppland

E18 Ørje, Marker, Østfold

NR 3 Myklagard, Løten, Hedmark

NR 3 Shell Koppang, Stor-Elvdal, Hedmark

NR 3 Alvdal, Hedmark


Southern Norway

E18 Kjellstad, Lier, Buskerud

E18 Furulund Kro &amp; Motel, Stokke, Vestfold

E18 Horisonten Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 YX Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 Circle K Lillesand, Aust-Agder 

E39 Circle K Livold, Lindesnes, Vest-Agder


Western Norway

E16 Shell Dale, Vaksdal, Hordaland

E16 YX Skulestadmo, Voss, Hordaland

E16 Shell Gudvangen, Aurland, Sogn og Fjordane

E16 Steinklepp, Lærdal, Sogn og Fjordane

E39 Esso Vikeså, Bjerkreim, Rogaland

E39 Søylandskiosken, Gjesdal, Rogaland

E39 Heiane, Stord, Hordaland

E39 Bergen travpark, Vågsbotn, Hordaland

E39 Haugsvær, Masfjorden, Hordaland

E39 Esso Skei, Jølster, Sogn og Fjordane

E134 Best Kyrping, Etne, Hordaland


Central Norway

E6 Oppdalsporten, Oppdal, Trøndelag

E6/E39 Circle K Klett, Trondheim, Trøndelag 

E6 Stav Gjestegård, Malvik, Trøndelag

E6 YX Gråmyra, Levanger, Trøndelag

E6 Best Brekkvasselv, Namsskogan, Trøndelag

E39 Digerneset, Skodje, Møre og Romsdal

NR 70 Håsøran, Sunndalsøra, Sunndal, Møre og Romsdal  


Northern Norway

E6 Mosjøen, Vefsn, Nordland

E6 Fauske, Nordland

E6 Innhavet, Hamarøy, Nordland

E6 Buktamoen, Målselv, Troms

E6 Circle K Storslett, Nordreisa

E6 Shell Talvik, Alta, Finnmark

E6/E75 Tana bru, Finnmark
NR 80 Bodø havn, Nordland

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Personal Experiences ==

Tales, summer 2024: Hitchhiked all the Norway from far North to South in 20 days (Alta-Stavanger-Oslo). I would divide Norway in two ''countries'' - North and South (let's assume Mosjoen is an imaginary ''border''). People in the North are very nice and friendly, you do not wait for a ride much (1-30min), and it is mostly Norwegians who give you a ride. You go south, it is getting more and more difficult, especially around the Oslo-Stavanger-Trondheim triangle. You can get a ride after 5 min, but also after 2 hours (Rjukan was the most terrible experience). Not more than 10% of Norwegians will pick you up in the south - they are afraid, not that happy with the immigrants, and that makes them very untrustworthy towards any foreign face. A bunch of German tourists gave me a ride, Dutch, guest workers, etc. If I have to grade my experience - North 3.5 out of 5, South 2 out of 5. Oh yes, one more important thing. In the North, people could stop anywhere, but better at bus stops. In the South, you MUST be at the designated stop as people really got hectic about it. :)

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group &lt;/br&gt;
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]


{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}


[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>a3xikziamrgsmnjhjtl2ie5gqgabz8v</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>111413</id>
      <parentid>111412</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-08-03T11:16:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Metabugsdream</username>
        <id>47812</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Hitching ferries */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20990">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='4' view='0' float='right' width='270' height='375' country='Norway'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Practically eveeryone is fluent in [[England|English]]. Sadly People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

Be careful to check the altitude of the places where you wish to go, and through which you travel. A lot of people might be able get you closer to your destination, but they are not willing to drop you where it is cold (there can be freezing temperatures even in the summer).

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Kautokeino]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Bodø]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have back seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, hitching a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had back seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed upon importation to Norway. This is done for tax reasons. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pick-up trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' has a mixed reputation for hitchiking, some people will try and convince you Norway is hitchhikers hell. Others will say it is a paradise. While the truth lies somewhere in between, hitchiking definitely works, so don't let the naysayers put you off (but equally don't get cockey and expect 10 second wait times).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

According to Capy, hitchhiking in Norway was easy. They were getting picked up by Norwegians and foreigners alike.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. [[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching ferries ===

As of summer 2024, almost all normal car ferries are free of passengers and pedestrians, you just pay for the car, some are even free for the cars!(List: https://autopassferje.no/en/free-ferries-from-july-1st-2022/).
I hitchiked from oslo to norkapp, took many ferries, including the long distance bodo to lofoten islands ferry, and all of them where free. 

Sometimes your driver will ask you to get out of the car and walk onto the ferry separately, "just in case". If this happens be super careful, as the second the last car is on the ferry it leaves, and pedestrians often get left behind. Thankfully the ferries are pretty frequent.

Occasionally the ferries have queues which can last hours, especially when one of the ferries is broken down. Because of this when your driver arrives at the ferry terminal, even if they are due to drive further it may make more sense to get out, walk onto the ferry alone and then hitchike away the other side without them, rather than waiting with their car in the queue. They can always pick you up again later.

Even though most ferries are now free, in case you come across a paid ferry here is the old info on how to get onto them for free:

When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice. 

There are usually heated waiting areas at the ferry ports (even if small and remote), as waiting for a ferry can take some time and it can get very cold in winter. They are usually very clean and can be a good spot for sleeping and you will be able to ask for a ride the next morning. Most of them are equipped with toilets as well.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Kystruten is a daily shipping and passenger service along Norway's coast, served jointly by the lines Hurtigruten and Havila. It calls in many towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free. If you stay on the ship for less than 24 hours, you don't have to take a cabin, which makes the trip much cheaper. Also, students get a 50 percent discount. Capy hasn't been checked for his student status on his three trips with Hurtigruten.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.

== Highway rest areas with paid showers ==


Eastern Norway

E6 Svinesundparken, Halden, Østfold

E6 Circle K Øyer

E6 Fugleåsen, Ski, Akershus

E6 Ormlia, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Circle K Minnesund, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Biri travpark, Gjøvik, Oppland

E6 Vinstra vegpark, Nord-Fron, Oppland

E6 Dovreskogen, Dovre, Oppland

E18 Ørje, Marker, Østfold

NR 3 Myklagard, Løten, Hedmark

NR 3 Shell Koppang, Stor-Elvdal, Hedmark

NR 3 Alvdal, Hedmark


Southern Norway

E18 Kjellstad, Lier, Buskerud

E18 Furulund Kro &amp; Motel, Stokke, Vestfold

E18 Horisonten Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 YX Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 Circle K Lillesand, Aust-Agder 

E39 Circle K Livold, Lindesnes, Vest-Agder


Western Norway

E16 Shell Dale, Vaksdal, Hordaland

E16 YX Skulestadmo, Voss, Hordaland

E16 Shell Gudvangen, Aurland, Sogn og Fjordane

E16 Steinklepp, Lærdal, Sogn og Fjordane

E39 Esso Vikeså, Bjerkreim, Rogaland

E39 Søylandskiosken, Gjesdal, Rogaland

E39 Heiane, Stord, Hordaland

E39 Bergen travpark, Vågsbotn, Hordaland

E39 Haugsvær, Masfjorden, Hordaland

E39 Esso Skei, Jølster, Sogn og Fjordane

E134 Best Kyrping, Etne, Hordaland


Central Norway

E6 Oppdalsporten, Oppdal, Trøndelag

E6/E39 Circle K Klett, Trondheim, Trøndelag 

E6 Stav Gjestegård, Malvik, Trøndelag

E6 YX Gråmyra, Levanger, Trøndelag

E6 Best Brekkvasselv, Namsskogan, Trøndelag

E39 Digerneset, Skodje, Møre og Romsdal

NR 70 Håsøran, Sunndalsøra, Sunndal, Møre og Romsdal  


Northern Norway

E6 Mosjøen, Vefsn, Nordland

E6 Fauske, Nordland

E6 Innhavet, Hamarøy, Nordland

E6 Buktamoen, Målselv, Troms

E6 Circle K Storslett, Nordreisa

E6 Shell Talvik, Alta, Finnmark

E6/E75 Tana bru, Finnmark
NR 80 Bodø havn, Nordland

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Personal Experiences ==

Tales, summer 2024: Hitchhiked all the Norway from far North to South in 20 days (Alta-Stavanger-Oslo). I would divide Norway in two ''countries'' - North and South (let's assume Mosjoen is an imaginary ''border''). People in the North are very nice and friendly, you do not wait for a ride much (1-30min), and it is mostly Norwegians who give you a ride. You go south, it is getting more and more difficult, especially around the Oslo-Stavanger-Trondheim triangle. You can get a ride after 5 min, but also after 2 hours (Rjukan was the most terrible experience). Not more than 10% of Norwegians will pick you up in the south - they are afraid, not that happy with the immigrants, and that makes them very untrustworthy towards any foreign face. A bunch of German tourists gave me a ride, Dutch, guest workers, etc. If I have to grade my experience - North 3.5 out of 5, South 2 out of 5. Oh yes, one more important thing. In the North, people could stop anywhere, but better at bus stops. In the South, you MUST be at the designated stop as people really got hectic about it. :)

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group &lt;/br&gt;
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]


{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}


[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>b1g374f3mqrbif9v8jlrf66s2vnsgyb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>112685</id>
      <parentid>111413</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-09-11T09:04:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20925">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='3'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Practically eveeryone is fluent in [[England|English]]. Sadly People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

Be careful to check the altitude of the places where you wish to go, and through which you travel. A lot of people might be able get you closer to your destination, but they are not willing to drop you where it is cold (there can be freezing temperatures even in the summer).

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Kautokeino]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Bodø]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have back seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, hitching a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had back seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed upon importation to Norway. This is done for tax reasons. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pick-up trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' has a mixed reputation for hitchiking, some people will try and convince you Norway is hitchhikers hell. Others will say it is a paradise. While the truth lies somewhere in between, hitchiking definitely works, so don't let the naysayers put you off (but equally don't get cockey and expect 10 second wait times).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

According to Capy, hitchhiking in Norway was easy. They were getting picked up by Norwegians and foreigners alike.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. [[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching ferries ===

As of summer 2024, almost all normal car ferries are free of passengers and pedestrians, you just pay for the car, some are even free for the cars!(List: https://autopassferje.no/en/free-ferries-from-july-1st-2022/).
I hitchiked from oslo to norkapp, took many ferries, including the long distance bodo to lofoten islands ferry, and all of them where free. 

Sometimes your driver will ask you to get out of the car and walk onto the ferry separately, "just in case". If this happens be super careful, as the second the last car is on the ferry it leaves, and pedestrians often get left behind. Thankfully the ferries are pretty frequent.

Occasionally the ferries have queues which can last hours, especially when one of the ferries is broken down. Because of this when your driver arrives at the ferry terminal, even if they are due to drive further it may make more sense to get out, walk onto the ferry alone and then hitchike away the other side without them, rather than waiting with their car in the queue. They can always pick you up again later.

Even though most ferries are now free, in case you come across a paid ferry here is the old info on how to get onto them for free:

When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice. 

There are usually heated waiting areas at the ferry ports (even if small and remote), as waiting for a ferry can take some time and it can get very cold in winter. They are usually very clean and can be a good spot for sleeping and you will be able to ask for a ride the next morning. Most of them are equipped with toilets as well.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Kystruten is a daily shipping and passenger service along Norway's coast, served jointly by the lines Hurtigruten and Havila. It calls in many towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free. If you stay on the ship for less than 24 hours, you don't have to take a cabin, which makes the trip much cheaper. Also, students get a 50 percent discount. Capy hasn't been checked for his student status on his three trips with Hurtigruten.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.

== Highway rest areas with paid showers ==


Eastern Norway

E6 Svinesundparken, Halden, Østfold

E6 Circle K Øyer

E6 Fugleåsen, Ski, Akershus

E6 Ormlia, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Circle K Minnesund, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Biri travpark, Gjøvik, Oppland

E6 Vinstra vegpark, Nord-Fron, Oppland

E6 Dovreskogen, Dovre, Oppland

E18 Ørje, Marker, Østfold

NR 3 Myklagard, Løten, Hedmark

NR 3 Shell Koppang, Stor-Elvdal, Hedmark

NR 3 Alvdal, Hedmark


Southern Norway

E18 Kjellstad, Lier, Buskerud

E18 Furulund Kro &amp; Motel, Stokke, Vestfold

E18 Horisonten Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 YX Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 Circle K Lillesand, Aust-Agder 

E39 Circle K Livold, Lindesnes, Vest-Agder


Western Norway

E16 Shell Dale, Vaksdal, Hordaland

E16 YX Skulestadmo, Voss, Hordaland

E16 Shell Gudvangen, Aurland, Sogn og Fjordane

E16 Steinklepp, Lærdal, Sogn og Fjordane

E39 Esso Vikeså, Bjerkreim, Rogaland

E39 Søylandskiosken, Gjesdal, Rogaland

E39 Heiane, Stord, Hordaland

E39 Bergen travpark, Vågsbotn, Hordaland

E39 Haugsvær, Masfjorden, Hordaland

E39 Esso Skei, Jølster, Sogn og Fjordane

E134 Best Kyrping, Etne, Hordaland


Central Norway

E6 Oppdalsporten, Oppdal, Trøndelag

E6/E39 Circle K Klett, Trondheim, Trøndelag 

E6 Stav Gjestegård, Malvik, Trøndelag

E6 YX Gråmyra, Levanger, Trøndelag

E6 Best Brekkvasselv, Namsskogan, Trøndelag

E39 Digerneset, Skodje, Møre og Romsdal

NR 70 Håsøran, Sunndalsøra, Sunndal, Møre og Romsdal  


Northern Norway

E6 Mosjøen, Vefsn, Nordland

E6 Fauske, Nordland

E6 Innhavet, Hamarøy, Nordland

E6 Buktamoen, Målselv, Troms

E6 Circle K Storslett, Nordreisa

E6 Shell Talvik, Alta, Finnmark

E6/E75 Tana bru, Finnmark
NR 80 Bodø havn, Nordland

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Personal Experiences ==

Tales, summer 2024: Hitchhiked all the Norway from far North to South in 20 days (Alta-Stavanger-Oslo). I would divide Norway in two ''countries'' - North and South (let's assume Mosjoen is an imaginary ''border''). People in the North are very nice and friendly, you do not wait for a ride much (1-30min), and it is mostly Norwegians who give you a ride. You go south, it is getting more and more difficult, especially around the Oslo-Stavanger-Trondheim triangle. You can get a ride after 5 min, but also after 2 hours (Rjukan was the most terrible experience). Not more than 10% of Norwegians will pick you up in the south - they are afraid, not that happy with the immigrants, and that makes them very untrustworthy towards any foreign face. A bunch of German tourists gave me a ride, Dutch, guest workers, etc. If I have to grade my experience - North 3.5 out of 5, South 2 out of 5. Oh yes, one more important thing. In the North, people could stop anywhere, but better at bus stops. In the South, you MUST be at the designated stop as people really got hectic about it. :)

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group &lt;/br&gt;
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]


{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}


[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>2llcsin2o086dpffbgucxl8zevymamc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>112686</id>
      <parentid>112685</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-09-11T09:05:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Hitching ferries */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20938">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='3'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Practically eveeryone is fluent in [[England|English]]. Sadly People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

Be careful to check the altitude of the places where you wish to go, and through which you travel. A lot of people might be able get you closer to your destination, but they are not willing to drop you where it is cold (there can be freezing temperatures even in the summer).

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Kautokeino]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Bodø]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have back seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, hitching a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had back seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed upon importation to Norway. This is done for tax reasons. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pick-up trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' has a mixed reputation for hitchiking, some people will try and convince you Norway is hitchhikers hell. Others will say it is a paradise. While the truth lies somewhere in between, hitchiking definitely works, so don't let the naysayers put you off (but equally don't get cockey and expect 10 second wait times).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

According to Capy, hitchhiking in Norway was easy. They were getting picked up by Norwegians and foreigners alike.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. [[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching [[ferries]] ===

As of summer 2024, almost all normal car ferries are free of passengers and pedestrians, you just pay for the car, some are even free for the cars!(List: https://autopassferje.no/en/free-ferries-from-july-1st-2022/).
I hitchhiked from Oslo to Norkapp, took many ferries, including the long distance [[Bodo]] to [[Lofoten]] islands ferry, and all of them where free. 

Sometimes your driver will ask you to get out of the car and walk onto the ferry separately, "just in case". If this happens be super careful, as the second the last car is on the ferry it leaves, and pedestrians often get left behind. Thankfully the ferries are pretty frequent.

Occasionally the ferries have queues which can last hours, especially when one of the ferries is broken down. Because of this when your driver arrives at the ferry terminal, even if they are due to drive further it may make more sense to get out, walk onto the ferry alone and then hitchike away the other side without them, rather than waiting with their car in the queue. They can always pick you up again later.

Even though most ferries are now free, in case you come across a paid ferry here is the old info on how to get onto them for free:

When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice. 

There are usually heated waiting areas at the ferry ports (even if small and remote), as waiting for a ferry can take some time and it can get very cold in winter. They are usually very clean and can be a good spot for sleeping and you will be able to ask for a ride the next morning. Most of them are equipped with toilets as well.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Kystruten is a daily shipping and passenger service along Norway's coast, served jointly by the lines Hurtigruten and Havila. It calls in many towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free. If you stay on the ship for less than 24 hours, you don't have to take a cabin, which makes the trip much cheaper. Also, students get a 50 percent discount. Capy hasn't been checked for his student status on his three trips with Hurtigruten.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.

== Highway rest areas with paid showers ==


Eastern Norway

E6 Svinesundparken, Halden, Østfold

E6 Circle K Øyer

E6 Fugleåsen, Ski, Akershus

E6 Ormlia, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Circle K Minnesund, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Biri travpark, Gjøvik, Oppland

E6 Vinstra vegpark, Nord-Fron, Oppland

E6 Dovreskogen, Dovre, Oppland

E18 Ørje, Marker, Østfold

NR 3 Myklagard, Løten, Hedmark

NR 3 Shell Koppang, Stor-Elvdal, Hedmark

NR 3 Alvdal, Hedmark


Southern Norway

E18 Kjellstad, Lier, Buskerud

E18 Furulund Kro &amp; Motel, Stokke, Vestfold

E18 Horisonten Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 YX Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 Circle K Lillesand, Aust-Agder 

E39 Circle K Livold, Lindesnes, Vest-Agder


Western Norway

E16 Shell Dale, Vaksdal, Hordaland

E16 YX Skulestadmo, Voss, Hordaland

E16 Shell Gudvangen, Aurland, Sogn og Fjordane

E16 Steinklepp, Lærdal, Sogn og Fjordane

E39 Esso Vikeså, Bjerkreim, Rogaland

E39 Søylandskiosken, Gjesdal, Rogaland

E39 Heiane, Stord, Hordaland

E39 Bergen travpark, Vågsbotn, Hordaland

E39 Haugsvær, Masfjorden, Hordaland

E39 Esso Skei, Jølster, Sogn og Fjordane

E134 Best Kyrping, Etne, Hordaland


Central Norway

E6 Oppdalsporten, Oppdal, Trøndelag

E6/E39 Circle K Klett, Trondheim, Trøndelag 

E6 Stav Gjestegård, Malvik, Trøndelag

E6 YX Gråmyra, Levanger, Trøndelag

E6 Best Brekkvasselv, Namsskogan, Trøndelag

E39 Digerneset, Skodje, Møre og Romsdal

NR 70 Håsøran, Sunndalsøra, Sunndal, Møre og Romsdal  


Northern Norway

E6 Mosjøen, Vefsn, Nordland

E6 Fauske, Nordland

E6 Innhavet, Hamarøy, Nordland

E6 Buktamoen, Målselv, Troms

E6 Circle K Storslett, Nordreisa

E6 Shell Talvik, Alta, Finnmark

E6/E75 Tana bru, Finnmark
NR 80 Bodø havn, Nordland

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Personal Experiences ==

Tales, summer 2024: Hitchhiked all the Norway from far North to South in 20 days (Alta-Stavanger-Oslo). I would divide Norway in two ''countries'' - North and South (let's assume Mosjoen is an imaginary ''border''). People in the North are very nice and friendly, you do not wait for a ride much (1-30min), and it is mostly Norwegians who give you a ride. You go south, it is getting more and more difficult, especially around the Oslo-Stavanger-Trondheim triangle. You can get a ride after 5 min, but also after 2 hours (Rjukan was the most terrible experience). Not more than 10% of Norwegians will pick you up in the south - they are afraid, not that happy with the immigrants, and that makes them very untrustworthy towards any foreign face. A bunch of German tourists gave me a ride, Dutch, guest workers, etc. If I have to grade my experience - North 3.5 out of 5, South 2 out of 5. Oh yes, one more important thing. In the North, people could stop anywhere, but better at bus stops. In the South, you MUST be at the designated stop as people really got hectic about it. :)

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

[https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group &lt;/br&gt;
[[wikivoyage:Norway]]


{{hitchbase_country|147}}
{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}


[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>ebqvxoouxx18k8vd9vu8g5lody179ou</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>112687</id>
      <parentid>112686</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-09-11T09:07:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20904">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='3'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Practically eveeryone is fluent in [[England|English]]. Sadly People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

Be careful to check the altitude of the places where you wish to go, and through which you travel. A lot of people might be able get you closer to your destination, but they are not willing to drop you where it is cold (there can be freezing temperatures even in the summer).

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Kautokeino]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Bodø]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have back seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, hitching a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had back seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed upon importation to Norway. This is done for tax reasons. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pick-up trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' has a mixed reputation for hitchiking, some people will try and convince you Norway is hitchhikers hell. Others will say it is a paradise. While the truth lies somewhere in between, hitchiking definitely works, so don't let the naysayers put you off (but equally don't get cockey and expect 10 second wait times).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

According to Capy, hitchhiking in Norway was easy. They were getting picked up by Norwegians and foreigners alike.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. [[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching [[ferries]] ===

As of summer 2024, almost all normal car ferries are free of passengers and pedestrians, you just pay for the car, some are even free for the cars!(List: https://autopassferje.no/en/free-ferries-from-july-1st-2022/).
I hitchhiked from Oslo to Norkapp, took many ferries, including the long distance [[Bodo]] to [[Lofoten]] islands ferry, and all of them where free. 

Sometimes your driver will ask you to get out of the car and walk onto the ferry separately, "just in case". If this happens be super careful, as the second the last car is on the ferry it leaves, and pedestrians often get left behind. Thankfully the ferries are pretty frequent.

Occasionally the ferries have queues which can last hours, especially when one of the ferries is broken down. Because of this when your driver arrives at the ferry terminal, even if they are due to drive further it may make more sense to get out, walk onto the ferry alone and then hitchike away the other side without them, rather than waiting with their car in the queue. They can always pick you up again later.

Even though most ferries are now free, in case you come across a paid ferry here is the old info on how to get onto them for free:

When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice. 

There are usually heated waiting areas at the ferry ports (even if small and remote), as waiting for a ferry can take some time and it can get very cold in winter. They are usually very clean and can be a good spot for sleeping and you will be able to ask for a ride the next morning. Most of them are equipped with toilets as well.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Kystruten is a daily shipping and passenger service along Norway's coast, served jointly by the lines Hurtigruten and Havila. It calls in many towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free. If you stay on the ship for less than 24 hours, you don't have to take a cabin, which makes the trip much cheaper. Also, students get a 50 percent discount. Capy hasn't been checked for his student status on his three trips with Hurtigruten.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.

== Highway rest areas with paid showers ==


Eastern Norway

E6 Svinesundparken, Halden, Østfold

E6 Circle K Øyer

E6 Fugleåsen, Ski, Akershus

E6 Ormlia, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Circle K Minnesund, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Biri travpark, Gjøvik, Oppland

E6 Vinstra vegpark, Nord-Fron, Oppland

E6 Dovreskogen, Dovre, Oppland

E18 Ørje, Marker, Østfold

NR 3 Myklagard, Løten, Hedmark

NR 3 Shell Koppang, Stor-Elvdal, Hedmark

NR 3 Alvdal, Hedmark


Southern Norway

E18 Kjellstad, Lier, Buskerud

E18 Furulund Kro &amp; Motel, Stokke, Vestfold

E18 Horisonten Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 YX Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 Circle K Lillesand, Aust-Agder 

E39 Circle K Livold, Lindesnes, Vest-Agder


Western Norway

E16 Shell Dale, Vaksdal, Hordaland

E16 YX Skulestadmo, Voss, Hordaland

E16 Shell Gudvangen, Aurland, Sogn og Fjordane

E16 Steinklepp, Lærdal, Sogn og Fjordane

E39 Esso Vikeså, Bjerkreim, Rogaland

E39 Søylandskiosken, Gjesdal, Rogaland

E39 Heiane, Stord, Hordaland

E39 Bergen travpark, Vågsbotn, Hordaland

E39 Haugsvær, Masfjorden, Hordaland

E39 Esso Skei, Jølster, Sogn og Fjordane

E134 Best Kyrping, Etne, Hordaland


Central Norway

E6 Oppdalsporten, Oppdal, Trøndelag

E6/E39 Circle K Klett, Trondheim, Trøndelag 

E6 Stav Gjestegård, Malvik, Trøndelag

E6 YX Gråmyra, Levanger, Trøndelag

E6 Best Brekkvasselv, Namsskogan, Trøndelag

E39 Digerneset, Skodje, Møre og Romsdal

NR 70 Håsøran, Sunndalsøra, Sunndal, Møre og Romsdal  


Northern Norway

E6 Mosjøen, Vefsn, Nordland

E6 Fauske, Nordland

E6 Innhavet, Hamarøy, Nordland

E6 Buktamoen, Målselv, Troms

E6 Circle K Storslett, Nordreisa

E6 Shell Talvik, Alta, Finnmark

E6/E75 Tana bru, Finnmark
NR 80 Bodø havn, Nordland

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Personal Experiences ==

Tales, summer 2024: Hitchhiked all the Norway from far North to South in 20 days (Alta-Stavanger-Oslo). I would divide Norway in two ''countries'' - North and South (let's assume Mosjoen is an imaginary ''border''). People in the North are very nice and friendly, you do not wait for a ride much (1-30min), and it is mostly Norwegians who give you a ride. You go south, it is getting more and more difficult, especially around the Oslo-Stavanger-Trondheim triangle. You can get a ride after 5 min, but also after 2 hours (Rjukan was the most terrible experience). Not more than 10% of Norwegians will pick you up in the south - they are afraid, not that happy with the immigrants, and that makes them very untrustworthy towards any foreign face. A bunch of German tourists gave me a ride, Dutch, guest workers, etc. If I have to grade my experience - North 3.5 out of 5, South 2 out of 5. Oh yes, one more important thing. In the North, people could stop anywhere, but better at bus stops. In the South, you MUST be at the designated stop as people really got hectic about it. :)


==External Links==
[https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}


[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]</text>
      <sha1>1410ein7sefdv84mdrugrd0pevox2nu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>114862</id>
      <parentid>112687</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-10-20T07:03:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>GriL</username>
        <id>24751</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20928">{{Infobox Country
|country = of Norway
|in = Europe
|map = &lt;map lat='65.33017791526852' lng='15.556640625' zoom='3'/&gt;
|capital = [[Oslo]]
|pop = 4,848,474
|currency = Norwegian Krone (NOK)
|hitch = &lt;rating country='no' /&gt;
|BW = NO
|language = Norwegian, Sami, Finnish
}}
'''Norway''' is a country in [[Europe]]. It is a member state of the [[Schengen Agreement]], but is not part of the [[European Union]]. Its capital is [[Oslo]]. Its neighbouring countries are [[Sweden]], [[Finland]] and [[Russia]].

The main challenge while travelling in Norway is the rapidly shifting weather, so be prepared for anything, as they say here: ''There is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing''.

Practically eveeryone is fluent in [[England|English]]. Sadly People have been told to be wary of foreigners. Recently, it's been all over the news that some gypsies wait on the road with a broken car and steal cars from people stopping to help them, and it doesn't help much, especially if you're not quite white. If you look like a hobo your chances decrease further. Look presentable to increase your chance of getting picked up and be friendly. Ask questions.

Be careful to check the altitude of the places where you wish to go, and through which you travel. A lot of people might be able get you closer to your destination, but they are not willing to drop you where it is cold (there can be freezing temperatures even in the summer).

== Regions &amp; Cities ==
__TOC__
=== In the North ===
* [[Alta]]
* [[Kautokeino]]
* [[Lofoten]], an archipelago
* [[Narvik]]
* [[Nordkapp]], the Northernmost point of [[Europe]]
* [[Svalbard and Jan Mayen Islands]]
* [[Trofors]]
* [[Tromsø]]
* [[Bodø]]

=== Other Cities ===
* [[Oslo]]
* [[Bergen]]
* [[Fredrikstad]]
* [[Horten]]
* [[Kristiansand]]
* [[Skien]]
* [[Stavanger]]
* [[Trondheim]]
* [[Voss]]
* [[Otta]]

=== License plates ===
There is a coding for areas: the two first letters identify the region in which the vehicle is first registered, but as the plates migrate with the vehicle and Norwegians travel pretty much all around the country, it's not something hitchhikers rely on.
See also [[:wikipedia:Vehicle registration plates of Norway#Prefixes_and_sequence_numbers|List of codes on Wikipedia]]

Vehicles with Norwegian '''green license plates do not have back seats'''. So if you are not traveling alone, hitching a ride with such a vehicle is of little use. Some vans have a double bench for passengers in front, but except for those, green plates means seating for one passenger only. Even if it is a vehicle that had back seats when it left the factory, they will have been removed upon importation to Norway. This is done for tax reasons. Vehicles affected by this include '''almost all pick-up trucks ''including'' 4-door models''', and some minivans and SUVs. Also some old station wagons.

== Hitchhiking culture ==

[[File:2002 hitch hiking in Norway.jpg|thumb|280px|right|[[User:Sigurdas|Sigurdas]] hitch-hiking somewhere in the middle of Norway. January 2002.]]
'''Norway''' has a mixed reputation for hitchiking, some people will try and convince you Norway is hitchhikers hell. Others will say it is a paradise. While the truth lies somewhere in between, hitchiking definitely works, so don't let the naysayers put you off (but equally don't get cockey and expect 10 second wait times).

=== Positive ===
'''Norway''' is not an easy country to hitch in, but it can be rewarding! Even though ''haike'' is not too common in Norway, people are very likely to pick you up and can be very friendly and helpful.  Like in Sweden, foreign tourists and immigrants are more likely to [[picking up hitchhikers|pick up hitchhikers]].

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]] (also said by  [[User:Fede|Fede]] [[User:Earlyturtle|Earlyturtle]]) although he didn't look very Norwegian and had no flag (see here below), just common nice cardboard signs, he always found people, many times locals (some foreigners also), any gender, any age, to pick him up, help him and give good advice. He doesn't agree with the idea that most Norwegians are unwelcoming to strangers, and even less nationalist or racist. 

According to Capy, hitchhiking in Norway was easy. They were getting picked up by Norwegians and foreigners alike.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|Norway, a paradise for hitchhikers]])''

=== Negative ===
According to [[User:thomasmyrman|thomasmyrman]] who hitched with a huge Norwegian flag, many drivers said they only stopped because it made them feel nationalistic pride and that it made the hitcher visible from far away. Consider having at least a small flag (even if you are not Norwegian) which you can buy anywhere in Norway. [[User:Grata|Grata]] also had a bad experience.

''(see also: [[Talk:Norway|No, it is not easy to hitchhike in Norway]])''

=== Hitching [[ferries]] ===

As of summer 2024, almost all normal car ferries are free of passengers and pedestrians, you just pay for the car, some are even free for the cars!(List: https://autopassferje.no/en/free-ferries-from-july-1st-2022/).
I hitchhiked from Oslo to Norkapp, took many ferries, including the long distance [[Bodo]] to [[Lofoten]] islands ferry, and all of them where free. 

Sometimes your driver will ask you to get out of the car and walk onto the ferry separately, "just in case". If this happens be super careful, as the second the last car is on the ferry it leaves, and pedestrians often get left behind. Thankfully the ferries are pretty frequent.

Occasionally the ferries have queues which can last hours, especially when one of the ferries is broken down. Because of this when your driver arrives at the ferry terminal, even if they are due to drive further it may make more sense to get out, walk onto the ferry alone and then hitchike away the other side without them, rather than waiting with their car in the queue. They can always pick you up again later.

Even though most ferries are now free, in case you come across a paid ferry here is the old info on how to get onto them for free:

When your driver enters a ferry, be sure he or she is not the first or second car in line. As soon as the person who collects the money from the cars, is with the first or second driver, get out of the car, go to the sundeck - or whereever else in the ferry - and back in the car when the boat is on the other side. Nobody will check on you during the ride or when the cars leave the ferry. Thus I would highly recommend you to be in a car while boarding a ferry. If you are not, just ask a few drivers! If you still cannot find a car, there's also a few possibilities to sneak if you time it right and you are not seen by the officials.

=== More advice ===
Norwegians have a tendency to always be on the rush on weekdays. Waiting times can be a bit longer around [[Oslo]] and in remote areas where traffic is very light. People expect some chatting since distances are long, and seem to have little tolerance for drug or alcohol use while on the road.

A large part of the population lives near the road, which extends from the [[Sweden|Swedish]] border in the South to almost all the way North, so when going North it's pretty hard to get lost, as long as you are headed the right way.

The roads going to Bergen and the West Coast (E16, 7, E134) aren't very big, don't expect motorways. They look more like small mountain roads, and are very nice to hitchhike along, you can stand directly on the road and admire the landscape at the same time. In winter (and fall and spring also) be aware that they might be closed to traffic due to snowstorms or pollution in the tunnels. The information is available for all roads in Norway on the internet.

It's common knowledge that truck drivers are very friendly and that the hitching is great if you go out to the shipping areas around Dyre Halses Gate in [[Trondheim]] and North of Strandveien&lt;sup&gt;Which one? Does this question refer to the previous misspelling of Strandveien?&lt;/sup&gt;, but some hitchhikers have said otherwise. It's also much faster traveling alone considering that trucks and some commercial vehicle can only take 1 passenger. Around four in the afternoon, drivers have loaded incoming goods from that day and are leaving for a late/overnight haul to the next major city.

Do think of the weather, it can get pretty cold and rainy (or snowy) and the distances are very big between the more populated east side of the country and the cities in the West Coast, or the North. Maybe taking a warm tent as I did was the best idea ever, the experience of camping in the woods in those mountains was very nice. 

There are usually heated waiting areas at the ferry ports (even if small and remote), as waiting for a ferry can take some time and it can get very cold in winter. They are usually very clean and can be a good spot for sleeping and you will be able to ask for a ride the next morning. Most of them are equipped with toilets as well.

Remember, hichhiking is about patience, so maybe you'll have to wait for a good while (it IS true that there are not that many cars), but just enjoy the beautiful landscapes and you can always walk along the roads, they are not highways properly said.

The Kystruten is a daily shipping and passenger service along Norway's coast, served jointly by the lines Hurtigruten and Havila. It calls in many towns along the way, starting in Bergen and going all the way up to Kirkenes on the Russian border. In many towns it stops for 3 or 4 hours and while it's in port, you can go onboard as a visitor for free. Just have your ID handy. Many ships have saunas and some have hot tubs that you can use for free. If you stay on the ship for less than 24 hours, you don't have to take a cabin, which makes the trip much cheaper. Also, students get a 50 percent discount. Capy hasn't been checked for his student status on his three trips with Hurtigruten.

In Statoil gas stations, you can buy one of their cups for the equivalent of 30 euros and drink as much coffee, tea and hot chocolate as you like for one year.

== Highway rest areas with paid showers ==


Eastern Norway

E6 Svinesundparken, Halden, Østfold

E6 Circle K Øyer

E6 Fugleåsen, Ski, Akershus

E6 Ormlia, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Circle K Minnesund, Eidsvoll, Akershus

E6 Biri travpark, Gjøvik, Oppland

E6 Vinstra vegpark, Nord-Fron, Oppland

E6 Dovreskogen, Dovre, Oppland

E18 Ørje, Marker, Østfold

NR 3 Myklagard, Løten, Hedmark

NR 3 Shell Koppang, Stor-Elvdal, Hedmark

NR 3 Alvdal, Hedmark


Southern Norway

E18 Kjellstad, Lier, Buskerud

E18 Furulund Kro &amp; Motel, Stokke, Vestfold

E18 Horisonten Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 YX Lillesand, Aust-Agder

E18 Circle K Lillesand, Aust-Agder 

E39 Circle K Livold, Lindesnes, Vest-Agder


Western Norway

E16 Shell Dale, Vaksdal, Hordaland

E16 YX Skulestadmo, Voss, Hordaland

E16 Shell Gudvangen, Aurland, Sogn og Fjordane

E16 Steinklepp, Lærdal, Sogn og Fjordane

E39 Esso Vikeså, Bjerkreim, Rogaland

E39 Søylandskiosken, Gjesdal, Rogaland

E39 Heiane, Stord, Hordaland

E39 Bergen travpark, Vågsbotn, Hordaland

E39 Haugsvær, Masfjorden, Hordaland

E39 Esso Skei, Jølster, Sogn og Fjordane

E134 Best Kyrping, Etne, Hordaland


Central Norway

E6 Oppdalsporten, Oppdal, Trøndelag

E6/E39 Circle K Klett, Trondheim, Trøndelag 

E6 Stav Gjestegård, Malvik, Trøndelag

E6 YX Gråmyra, Levanger, Trøndelag

E6 Best Brekkvasselv, Namsskogan, Trøndelag

E39 Digerneset, Skodje, Møre og Romsdal

NR 70 Håsøran, Sunndalsøra, Sunndal, Møre og Romsdal  


Northern Norway

E6 Mosjøen, Vefsn, Nordland

E6 Fauske, Nordland

E6 Innhavet, Hamarøy, Nordland

E6 Buktamoen, Målselv, Troms

E6 Circle K Storslett, Nordreisa

E6 Shell Talvik, Alta, Finnmark

E6/E75 Tana bru, Finnmark
NR 80 Bodø havn, Nordland

== North Norway ==
Hitchhikers had varying experiences in the beautiful North.  Some locals hitch regularly to commute. You can hitch a ride from mostly anywhere as there is not much traffic. Another challenge are the long winter nights, which make the hitchhiking day very short unless you are well equipped for [[Hitchhiking at night|night hitchhiking]]. In the North, total darkness sets in from around mid-November. Don't forget the specifics of [[Winter|winter hitchhiking]].


=== Hitching rides on ferries ===
If possible, try to find out the ferry schedule. Hitch on the side where the cars drive into the ferry because in many places it's hard to hitch on the other side. You can maybe knock on people's windows when they wait for the ferry, especially if they come early and have to wait long, it's easy to talk to them. You can maybe try to hitch into cars that have already paid for the ferry but on almost all car ferries, and definitely all the short distance ones, you pay extra for each passenger so that would be sneaking. In a few ferries the driver might have paid for the car not dependent on passengers, but that is a rare case. 
Blackriding the ferries is also very easy most of times. Just don't show up too much, there is always a queue (long or not) of cars waiting for it, ticket sellers are on board or at the harbour and they go directly, one by one to each car to make the ticket. When the ferry arrives and the ticket sellers (can recognize them easily) are busy making tickets to cars just enter the ferry and nobody will tell you anything, the guys at the entrance of the boat are not supposed to check tickets just to tell cars where to go so they won't stop you nor anything, just think that you have already paid before. Of course if there are other "backpackers" stay away from them cause they are the first to be approached for tickets when the boat arrives. Fede, his brother and a Polish hitchhiker (that makes 3 people together) easily entered in that way every time, from [[Lofoten]] Islands to [[Bodo]] as around Sognesfjord and [[Bergen]]

Popular Ferry routes to Denmark and Germany are Kristiansand-Hirtshals, Larvik-Hirtshals (ColorLine), Oslo-Frederikshavn and Oslo-Göteborg-Kiel (StenaLine). With ColorLine, cars carrying up to 5 people don't pay extra, so it's possible to hitch a ride on the ferry for free (not correct any more as of November 2012: extra passenger is EUR 5. It would be an acceptable price, but since ALL of the drivers buy tickets on-line with 50% discount, it's almost impossible to catch a ride at the ticket office. We had to give up and hitchhike all the way to Oslo, Sweden and then Denmark. So you better don't rely on this possibility)  StenaLine operates overnight only, so even if you manage to find a car, they'll still force you to pay for a very expensive berth (500+ kr). If you're heading to Denmark (the ports of Hirtshals and Frederikshavn are quite close to each other) it makes no sense to take the StenaLine from Oslo, because it takes a really long time (12h!!! that's the way to make you spend as much as possible on board) and you can sail from [[Larvik]] in about 4h, which is reasonably close to Oslo to reach in about 2 hours.

A note about hitching trucks! Alert, it is no longer possible to hitch trucks on Stena lines and probably Colorline as well. Only drivers allowed. when i asked several trucks in Frederikshaven they all said not possible.

=== Distances ===
[[File:Erga_trying_to_hitch_from_Alta_to_Tromso.jpg|320px|right|Erga hitchhiking in Alta]]
According to [[User:Markuspetz|markus]] and [[User:abstorz|abstorz]], two dudes.
* [[Stavanger]] - Mandal (near Kristiansand) - '''1 day''' 
* Mandal - [[Oslo]] - '''1 day''' 
* [[Oslo]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''1 day'''
* [[Trondheim]] - Mor e Rana - '''1 day'''
* Mo i Rana - Karlsøya  - '''1 day'''
* Karlsøya to [[Tampere]], [[Finland]] - '''2 days''' or 1 day and 1 night

According to [[User:Mila77|Mila77]], female
* A i Lofoten to Tromsö 2 Days on quite low traffic, maybe possible on 1 day in summertime
Note by Mila77: (now Mila.77) Please do calculate more time than usually in Norway. Remember they have a huge land but very few inhabitants. In the areas outside of cities, there are almost no people living. That means especially in the north, you will need much more time for the same distance than in Germany for example. You cannot compare this. Be prepared to wait much longer than you have ever in your life. There are few cars coming. However those who pick you up are very friendly. 

* [[Lofoten]] - [[Trondheim]] - '''2 days'''
According to [[User:ThorRune|Thor-Rune]], one guy.
* [[Sortland]] - [[Tromsø]] one shortish day.
* [[Steigen]] - [[Tromsø]] one longer day.
* [[Fredrikstad]] - [[Nesodden]] just a few hours.
* Hitchhiking in [[Meldal]] is virtually impossible, no ride for 6 hours. (2 guys then) Sørtrønderlag Countriside is heavily sceptical to hitchhikers.
* [[Berkåk]] - [[Oslo]] easily one day
* [[Oslo]] - [[Molde]] via E6 one day.

According to [[User:J. O'Hannes|J. O'Hannes]] in 2012, one guy
* [[Kirkenes]] (Norwegian/Russian border) - Honningsvåg ([[Nordkapp]]) 13 hours, E6
* [[Nordkapp]] - [[Tornio]] (Baltic Sea, border between Sweden and Finland) 14 hours

According to [[User:peregrine|Peregrine]] in 2013, one gal
*[[Stavanger]] - Mandal - half day (14:00 to 18:00)
*Mandal - [[Oslo]] - "1 day" (09:00 to 16:00)
*Mandal - Kristiansund - 30 minutes (10 min wait)
*Kristiansund to Tonsberg - 4 hours (10 min wait)
*Tonsberg to [[Oslo]] - not recommended as it was bad to wait on interstate: 1st attempt - 30 min, failed, got something to eat, returned and it was rush hour - the slower traffic helped! 10 min wait, hour ride to Oslo!
*[[Oslo]] - Swedish border - a few hours, 20 min wait in the rain, do not use hitch wiki's suggestion for the spot, 2 women took pity on me because they'd seen others standing at the "dangerous spot" and it was raining...

According to [[User:Francisco1|Francisco1]]
*[[Göteborg]](Sweden) - [[Bergen]] - two days by road number 7 (camping in Flå, between Honefoss and Gol)
consider a complete day (with as much light hours as possible) for [[Oslo]] - [[Bergen]]
I definitely recommend taking road 7 passing by the Aurlandsfjordet (fjord) at Aurland and Flåm, very beautiful

'''Distances''' - Note: By car, not including waiting time and change of rides:

* Oslo - Bergen : ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Trondheim: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Kristiandsand: ca. 4 hours
* Oslo - Stavanger: ca. 7 hours
* Oslo - Tromsø: ca. 22 hours
* Stavanger - Kristiandsand: ca. 3 hours
* Stavanger- Bergen: ca. 3,5 hours (2 ferries)
* Trondheim - Bergen: 10 hours
* Trondheim - Tromsø: 15 hours
* Most southern point of Norway(Lindesnes) - northern point (Nordkapp): ca. 1 day, 8 hours.
Hope that's of any help :)
Check out [http://no.avstand.org/nordkapp/lindesnes]this :)

== Useful Language Bits ==
* Thank you - Tusen takk
* Cheers - Skål
* How are you? - Hvordan går det? 
* North - nord
* South - sør
* West - vest
* East - øst

Vowels: Vowels are pronounced very differently in Norwegian as opposed to English
* A pronounced "ah" as in bar
* E pronounced "eh" as in heck
* I pronounced "e" as in here or "i" as in hill
* O pronounced "oo" as in moon and in other times, "aw" as in law
* U pronounced "ou" as in soup
* Y pronounced "ew" as in few (rounded lips)
* Æ pronounced "a" as in bag
* Ø pronounced "er" as in "her" without the R sound
* Å pronounced "aw" as in "law"

Additionally, the consonant J and the combination GJ is pronounced the same way you would pronounce Y (young). For instance, "jobb" (work) would be pronounced "yobb".

== Personal Experiences ==

Tales, summer 2024: Hitchhiked all the Norway from far North to South in 20 days (Alta-Stavanger-Oslo). I would divide Norway in two ''countries'' - North and South (let's assume Mosjoen is an imaginary ''border''). People in the North are very nice and friendly, you do not wait for a ride much (1-30min), and it is mostly Norwegians who give you a ride. You go south, it is getting more and more difficult, especially around the Oslo-Stavanger-Trondheim triangle. You can get a ride after 5 min, but also after 2 hours (Rjukan was the most terrible experience). Not more than 10% of Norwegians will pick you up in the south - they are afraid, not that happy with the immigrants, and that makes them very untrustworthy towards any foreign face. A bunch of German tourists gave me a ride, Dutch, guest workers, etc. If I have to grade my experience - North 3.5 out of 5, South 2 out of 5. Oh yes, one more important thing. In the North, people could stop anywhere, but better at bus stops. In the South, you MUST be at the designated stop as people really got hectic about it. :)


==External Links==
[https://www.facebook.com/groups/hitchhikersnorway/ Hitchhikers in Norway] FB group

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}


{{IsIn|Scandinavia}}


[[Category:E6|E6]]
[[Category:Norway]]
[[Category:Northern Europe]]
[[Category:East Route from North Cape to Cape of Good Hope]]

[[de:Norwegen]]
[[es:Noruega]]
[[ru:Норвегия]]</text>
      <sha1>nc45v2ucqq3dytnlyxpr4ldtimf4oug</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>California</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1546</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1597</id>
      <parentid>4552</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-16T11:16:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1627">[[Image:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops.

Cities:
* [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]]
* [[Los Angeles]]
* [[Sacramento]]
* [[San Diego]]
* [[Bay Area]] (San Francisco, Oakland, San Jose, and more)
* [[Santa Cruz]]
*  ...

==Various==

Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. 

[[Humbolt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa indian reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

The following places are recommended: Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite, Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury in [[San Francisco]] is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there.

[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>qjx321yoraut0jegkjblrcql8bplguy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1598</id>
      <parentid>1597</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1627">[[Image:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops.

Cities:
* [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]]
* [[Los Angeles]]
* [[Sacramento]]
* [[San Diego]]
* [[Bay Area]] (San Francisco, Oakland, San Jose, and more)
* [[Santa Cruz]]
*  ...

==Various==

Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. 

[[Humbolt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa indian reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

The following places are recommended: Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite, Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury in [[San Francisco]] is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there.

[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>qjx321yoraut0jegkjblrcql8bplguy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4540</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T21:22:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="854">'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]].

The rest stop in Vallejo is real good. 
Humbolt county is real good. They have a Hoopa indian reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway.
Lord ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to redding

I thought Vallejo was pretty ghetto, which I try to avoid. Rt. 101 and Rt. 1 are great roads to hitch. I reccomend the following places, Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite, Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. Arcata is mad cool as well.



[[Category:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>htmyhvyq7tux43235bkk9pdhpgnj7vi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4541</id>
      <parentid>4540</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-21T20:02:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="879">'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]].

The rest stop in Vallejo is real good. 
Humbolt county is real good. They have a Hoopa indian reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway.
Lord ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to redding

I thought Vallejo was pretty ghetto, which I try to avoid. Rt. 101 and Rt. 1 are great roads to hitch. I reccomend the following places, Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite, Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. Arcata is mad cool as well.


[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>c5meqnfqyqn8ygtsader00bkai15jes</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4542</id>
      <parentid>4541</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-22T14:14:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="977">'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]].

Major cities:
* [[Los Angeles]]
* [[Sacramento]]
* [[San Diego]]
* [[San Francisco]]
*  ...


The rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is real good. 
Humbolt county is real good. They have a Hoopa indian reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway.
Lord ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to redding

I thought Vallejo was pretty ghetto, which I try to avoid. Rt. 101 and Rt. 1 are great roads to hitch. I reccomend the following places, Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite, Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. Arcata is mad cool as well.


[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>5bu28tcc7mz1pwh7of355vjzvleym1a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4543</id>
      <parentid>4542</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-01-23T07:41:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>168.150.253.56</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1059">'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]].

Major cities:
* [[Los Angeles]]
* [[Sacramento]]
* [[San Diego]]
* [[San Francisco]]
*  ...


The rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is real good. 
Humbolt county is real good. They have a Hoopa indian reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway.
Lord ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to redding

I thought Vallejo was pretty ghetto, which I try to avoid. Rt. 101 and Rt. 1 are great roads to hitch, argueably the easyist hitchiking in amerikkka. incredibly beautifull scenery too. I reccomend the following places, Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite, Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. Arcata is mad cool as well.


[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>12e4g3t33od8puod7motyeum8ajdmeb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4544</id>
      <parentid>4543</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-01-24T16:27:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1067">'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]].

Major cities:
* [[Los Angeles]]
* [[Sacramento]]
* [[San Diego]]
* [[San Francisco]]
*  ...


The rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is real good. 
Humbolt county is real good. They have a Hoopa indian reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway.
Lord ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to redding

I thought Vallejo was pretty ghetto, which I try to avoid. Rt. 101 and Rt. 1 are great roads to hitch, argueably the easyist hitchiking in the United States. Incredibly beautifull scenery too. I reccomend the following places, Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite, Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. Arcata is mad cool as well.


[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>rwhcz3i1pmzgf2j9h8u6z6z7iyyhulo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4545</id>
      <parentid>4544</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-03-04T22:59:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>137.146.134.173</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1246">'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]].

Major cities:
* [[Los Angeles]]
* [[Sacramento]]
* [[San Diego]]
* [[San Francisco]]
*  ...


The rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is real good. 
Humbolt county is real good. They have a Hoopa indian reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway.
Lord ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to redding

I thought Vallejo was pretty ghetto, which I try to avoid. Rt. 101 and Rt. 1 are great roads to hitch, argueably the easyist hitchiking in the United States. Incredibly beautifull scenery too. I reccomend the following places, Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite, Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. Arcata is mad cool as well.

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to Mendocino. Its the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there.

[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>p011sq34zwkdbax01h52qkyxntn8tpt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4546</id>
      <parentid>4545</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-03-05T00:33:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1250">'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]].

Major cities:
* [[Los Angeles]]
* [[Sacramento]]
* [[San Diego]]
* [[San Francisco]]
*  ...


The rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is real good. 
Humbolt county is real good. They have a Hoopa indian reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway.
Lord ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to redding

I thought Vallejo was pretty ghetto, which I try to avoid. Rt. 101 and Rt. 1 are great roads to hitch, argueably the easyist hitchiking in the United States. Incredibly beautifull scenery too. I reccomend the following places, Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite, Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. Arcata is mad cool as well.

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. Its the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there.

[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>9ley44jx6el46vqbi1u4bxdm9r4mkkm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4547</id>
      <parentid>4546</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-02T22:02:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Rat</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1250">'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]].

Major cities:
* [[Los Angeles]]
* [[Sacramento]]
* [[San Diego]]
* [[San Francisco]]
*  ...


The rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is real good. 
Humbolt county is real good. They have a Hoopa indian reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway.
Lord ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to redding

I thought Vallejo was pretty ghetto, which I try to avoid. Rt. 101 and Rt. 1 are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. I recommend the following places, Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite, Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. Arcata is mad cool as well.

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there.

[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>p5i7p2dwwjqgpd195j5wf7ff7f9j0qc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4548</id>
      <parentid>4547</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-14T21:50:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1257">'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]].

Major cities:
* [[Los Angeles]]
* [[Sacramento]]
* [[San Diego]]
* [[San Francisco]]
*  ...


The rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. 

[[Humbolt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa indian reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway.
Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding

I thought Vallejo was pretty ghetto, which I try to avoid. Rt. 101 and Rt. 1 are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. I recommend the following places, Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite, Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. Arcata is mad cool as well.

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there.

[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>bxj57j7h676z85ml0bkh3sgqpedp4i3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4549</id>
      <parentid>4548</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-09-27T05:48:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1364">'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops.

Major cities:
* [[Los Angeles]]
* [[Sacramento]]
* [[San Diego]]
* [[San Francisco]]
*  ...


The rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. 

[[Humbolt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa indian reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway.
Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding

I thought Vallejo was pretty ghetto, which I try to avoid. Rt. 101 and Rt. 1 are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. I recommend the following places, Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite, Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. Arcata is mad cool as well.

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there.

[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>cgid0l29utxoi7ssng7zbjz6qh94qll</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4550</id>
      <parentid>4549</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-10-16T17:42:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1397">'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops.

Major cities:
* [[Los Angeles]]
* [[Sacramento]]
* [[San Diego]]
* [[San Francisco]]
* [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]]
*  ...


The rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. 

[[Humbolt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa indian reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway.
Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding

I thought Vallejo was pretty ghetto, which I try to avoid. Rt. 101 and Rt. 1 are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. I recommend the following places, Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite, Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. Arcata is mad cool as well.

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there.

[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>mvbtwibwjorv4onvqn2lprjl8gdjfxh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4551</id>
      <parentid>4550</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-10-16T17:48:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1488">'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops.

Cities:
* [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]]
* [[Los Angeles]]
* [[Sacramento]]
* [[San Diego]]
* [[San Francisco]]
* [[Santa Cruz]]
*  ...

==Various==

Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. 

[[Humbolt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa indian reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

The following places are recommended: Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite, Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury in [[San Francisco]] is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there.

[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>pij7d5gpib2gz64j72x8xbbe5jx04yk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4552</id>
      <parentid>4551</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-10-18T03:00:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1528">'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops.

Cities:
* [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]]
* [[Los Angeles]]
* [[Sacramento]]
* [[San Diego]]
* [[Bay Area]] (San Francisco, Oakland, San Jose, and more)
* [[Santa Cruz]]
*  ...

==Various==

Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. 

[[Humbolt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa indian reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

The following places are recommended: Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite, Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury in [[San Francisco]] is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there.

[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>saj96sa1xqinhl0kqyb396wmom4qirh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4553</id>
      <parentid>1598</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:21:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1627">[[Image:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|amylin hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops.

Cities:
* [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]]
* [[Los Angeles]]
* [[Sacramento]]
* [[San Diego]]
* [[Bay Area]] (San Francisco, Oakland, San Jose, and more)
* [[Santa Cruz]]
*  ...

==Various==

Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. 

[[Humbolt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa indian reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

The following places are recommended: Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite, Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury in [[San Francisco]] is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there.

[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>qjx321yoraut0jegkjblrcql8bplguy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9086</id>
      <parentid>4553</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-24T00:30:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1631">[[Image:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops.

Cities:
* [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]]
* [[Los Angeles]]
* [[Sacramento]]
* [[San Diego]]
* [[Bay Area]] (San Francisco, Oakland, San Jose, and more)
* [[Santa Cruz]]
*  ...

==Various==

Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. 

[[Humbolt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa indian reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

The following places are recommended: Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite, Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury in [[San Francisco]] is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there.

[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>bct8xuks2ti7yqu8xftpfzbssjka7sg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9871</id>
      <parentid>9086</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-19T06:51:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>KennethSime</username>
        <id>27</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2205">[[Image:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops.

==Cities==
* [[Arcata]]
* [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]]
* [[Los Angeles]]
* [[Sacramento]]
* [[San Diego]]
* [[Bay Area]] (San Francisco, Oakland, San Jose, and more)
* [[Santa Cruz]]
*  ...

==Major Highways==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

I-1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. I-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Raphael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US.

==Recommended places==
The following places are recommended: Big Sur (I-1 &amp; I-101), Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury in [[San Francisco]] is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

==Various==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. 

[[Humbolt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa indian reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there.



[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>ray9eta9ykqe636gao1zar28y0s767r</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9873</id>
      <parentid>9871</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-19T07:15:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>KennethSime</username>
        <id>27</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2412">[[Image:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops.

==Regions &amp; Cities==
===North Coast===
* [[Arcata]]
* [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]]
* [[Mendocino]]
===Central California===
====Valley====
* [[Redding]]
* [[Chico]]
* [[Sacramento]]
* [[Modesto]]
* [[Fresno]]
* [[Bakersfield]]
====Coast====
* [[Bay Area]] ([[San Francisco]], [[Oakland]], [[San Jose]], and more)
* [[Santa Cruz]]
===Southern California===
* [[Los Angeles]]
* [[San Diego]]
*  ...

==Major Highways==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

I-1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. I-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Raphael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US.

==Recommended places==
The following places are recommended: Big Sur (I-1 &amp; I-101), Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury in [[San Francisco]] is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

==Various==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. 

[[Humbolt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa indian reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there.



[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>3dqp5avwpkz59wzh9okbxf7h5fqfugu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9874</id>
      <parentid>9873</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-19T07:16:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>KennethSime</username>
        <id>27</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2405">[[Image:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops.

==Regions &amp; Cities==
===North Coast===
* [[Arcata]]
* [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]]
* [[Mendocino]]
===Central California===
====Valley====
* [[Redding]]
* [[Chico]]
* [[Sacramento]]
* [[Modesto]]
* [[Fresno]]
* [[Bakersfield]]
====Coast====
* [[Bay Area]] ([[San Francisco]], [[Oakland]], [[San Jose]], and more)
* [[Santa Cruz]]
===Southern California===
* [[Los Angeles]]
* [[San Diego]]

==Major Highways==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

I-1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. I-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Raphael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US.

==Recommended places==
The following places are recommended: Big Sur (I-1 &amp; I-101), Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury in [[San Francisco]] is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

==Various==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. 

[[Humbolt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa indian reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there.



[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>riql0az5hnbxl9fpkbxfgeyhcs2wxsg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9875</id>
      <parentid>9874</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-19T07:17:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>KennethSime</username>
        <id>27</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2395">[[Image:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops.

==Cities==
===North Coast===
* [[Arcata]]
* [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]]
* [[Mendocino]]
===Central California===
====Valley====
* [[Redding]]
* [[Chico]]
* [[Sacramento]]
* [[Modesto]]
* [[Fresno]]
* [[Bakersfield]]
====Coast====
* [[Bay Area]] ([[San Francisco]], [[Oakland]], [[San Jose]], and more)
* [[Santa Cruz]]
===Southern California===
* [[Los Angeles]]
* [[San Diego]]

==Major Highways==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

I-1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. I-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Raphael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US.

==Recommended places==
The following places are recommended: Big Sur (I-1 &amp; I-101), Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury in [[San Francisco]] is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

==Various==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. 

[[Humbolt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa indian reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there.



[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>1o27mvt5wpeci36v8ii8t4d3ybhptn8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9884</id>
      <parentid>9875</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-19T23:36:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>66.97.208.188</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2554">[[Image:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops.

==Cities==
===North Coast===
* [[Arcata]]
* [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]]
* [[Mendocino]]
===Central California===
====Valley====
* [[Redding]]
* [[Chico]]
* [[Sacramento]]
* [[Modesto]]
* [[Fresno]]
* [[Bakersfield]]
====Coast====
* [[Bay Area]] ([[San Francisco]], [[Oakland]], [[San Jose]], and more)
* [[Santa Cruz]]
===Southern California===
* [[Los Angeles]]
* [[San Diego]]

==Major Highways==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

I-1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. I-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Raphael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US.

==Recommended places==
The following places are recommended: Big Sur (I-1 &amp; I-101), Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury in [[San Francisco]] is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

==Various==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. 

[[Humbolt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa indian reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!



[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>b0wtz037f6boquxzvbh2qk6libnm2pe</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9956</id>
      <parentid>9884</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-22T12:18:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2543">[[Image:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops.

==Cities==
===North Coast===
* [[Arcata]]
* [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]]
* [[Mendocino]]
===Central California===
====Valley====
* [[Redding]]
* [[Chico]]
* [[Sacramento]]
* [[Modesto]]
* [[Fresno]]
* [[Bakersfield]]
====Coast====
* [[Bay Area]] ([[San Francisco]], [[Oakland]], [[San Jose]], and more)
* [[Santa Cruz]]
===Southern California===
* [[Los Angeles]]
* [[San Diego]]

==Major Highways==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

I-1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. I-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Raphael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US.

==Recommended places==
The following places are recommended: Big Sur (I-1 &amp; I-101), Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury in [[San Francisco]] is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

==Various==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. 

[[Humbolt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa indian reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!



[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States]]</text>
      <sha1>o225ez9djdbt22k91bzzaeqs3ke01eq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10477</id>
      <parentid>9956</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-08T10:05:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2619">[[Image:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops.

==Cities==
===North Coast===
* [[Arcata]]
* [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]]
* [[Mendocino]]
===Central California===
====Valley====
* [[Redding]]
* [[Chico]]
* [[Sacramento]]
* [[Modesto]]
* [[Fresno]]
* [[Bakersfield]]
====Coast====
* [[Bay Area]] ([[San Francisco]], [[Oakland]], [[San Jose]], and more)
* [[Santa Cruz]]
===Southern California===
* [[Los Angeles]]
* [[San Diego]]

==Major Highways==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

I-1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. I-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Raphael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US.

==Recommended places==
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur (I-1 &amp; I-101), Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury in [[San Francisco]] is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

==Various==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. 

[[Humbolt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa indian reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!



[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States]]</text>
      <sha1>83dasqdr8fl5wotz7zqf211oaw1l949</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10664</id>
      <parentid>10477</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-03-30T11:14:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>SpamBucket</username>
        <id>24368</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2633">[[Image:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops.

==Cities==
===North Coast===
* [[Arcata]]
* [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]]
* [[Mendocino]]
===Central California===
====Valley====
* [[Redding]]
* [[Chico]]
* [[Sacramento]]
* [[Modesto]]
* [[Fresno]]
* [[Bakersfield]]
====Coast====
* [[Bay Area]] ([[San Francisco]], [[Oakland]], [[San Jose]], and more)
* [[Santa Cruz]]
===Southern California===
* [[Los Angeles]]
* [[San Diego]]
* [[Barstow]]

==Major Highways==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

I-1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. I-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Raphael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US.

==Recommended places==
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur (I-1 &amp; I-101), Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury in [[San Francisco]] is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

==Various==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. 

[[Humbolt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa indian reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!



[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States]]</text>
      <sha1>0r83if3w3599a4dfz2wb6a5gozflu15</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11446</id>
      <parentid>10664</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-27T15:47:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>75.48.111.206</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2646">[[Image:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops.

==Cities==
===North Coast===
* [[Arcata]]
* [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]]
* [[Mendocino]]
===Central California===
====Valley====
* [[Redding]]
* [[Chico]]
* [[Sacramento]]
* [[Modesto]]
* [[Merced]]
* [[Fresno]]
* [[Bakersfield]]
====Coast====
* [[Bay Area]] ([[San Francisco]], [[Oakland]], [[San Jose]], and more)
* [[Santa Cruz]]
===Southern California===
* [[Los Angeles]]
* [[San Diego]]
* [[Barstow]]

==Major Highways==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

I-1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. I-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Raphael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US.

==Recommended places==
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur (I-1 &amp; I-101), Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury in [[San Francisco]] is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

==Various==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. 

[[Humbolt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa indian reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!



[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States]]</text>
      <sha1>2hwvx93lqs89w44fp6yay5b4aduhrqh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11447</id>
      <parentid>11446</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-27T15:51:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>75.48.111.206</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3001">[[Image:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban center's are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. 

==Cities==
===North Coast===
* [[Arcata]]
* [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]]
* [[Mendocino]]
===Central California===
====Valley====
* [[Redding]]
* [[Chico]]
* [[Sacramento]]
* [[Modesto]]
* [[Merced]]
* [[Fresno]]
* [[Bakersfield]]
====Coast====
* [[Bay Area]] ([[San Francisco]], [[Oakland]], [[San Jose]], and more)
* [[Santa Cruz]]
===Southern California===
* [[Los Angeles]]
* [[San Diego]]
* [[Barstow]]

==Major Highways==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

I-1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. I-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Raphael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US.

==Recommended places==
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur (I-1 &amp; I-101), Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury in [[San Francisco]] is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

==Various==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. 

[[Humbolt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa indian reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!



[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States]]</text>
      <sha1>8nuptddc0f12sozqcrcoig6co4ewvf1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11448</id>
      <parentid>11447</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-27T15:58:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Axiom</username>
        <id>97</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3193">[[Image:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban center's are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway 395) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

==Cities/Major Landmarks==
===North Coast===
* [[Arcata]]
* [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]]
* [[Mendocino]]
===Central California===
====Valley====
* [[Redding]]
* [[Chico]]
* [[Sacramento]]
* [[Modesto]]
* [[Merced]]
* [[Fresno]]
* [[Stockton]]
* [[Bakersfield]]
====Coast====
* [[Bay Area]] ([[San Francisco]], [[Oakland]], [[San Jose]], and more)
* [[Santa Cruz]]
===Southern California===
* [[Los Angeles]]
* [[San Diego]]
* [[Barstow]]
===Sierra Nevada===
* [[Mammoth]]
* [[Yosemite]]
* [[Bishop]]
* [[Tahoe]]


==Major Highways==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

I-1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. I-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Raphael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US.

==Recommended places==
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur (I-1 &amp; I-101), Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury in [[San Francisco]] is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

==Various==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. 

[[Humbolt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa indian reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!



[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States]]</text>
      <sha1>qaax2dexxiyu8w2ik6ls524hfthe5cs</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11489</id>
      <parentid>11448</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-30T07:19:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>66.53.123.96</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3238">[[Image:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban center's are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway 395) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

==Cities/Major Landmarks==
===North Coast===
* [[Arcata]]
* [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]]
* [[Mendocino]]
===Central California===
====Valley====
* [[Redding]]
* [[Chico]]
* [[Sacramento]]
* [[Modesto]]
* [[Merced]]
* [[Fresno]]
* [[Stockton]]
* [[Bakersfield]]
====Coast====
* [[Bay Area]] ([[San Francisco]], [[Oakland]], [[San Jose]], and more)
* [[Santa Cruz]]
===Southern California===
* [[Los Angeles]]
* [[San Diego]]
* [[Barstow]]
===Sierra Nevada===
* [[Mammoth]]
* [[Yosemite]]
* [[Bishop]]
* [[Tahoe]]


==Major Highways==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

I-1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. I-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Raphael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US.

==Recommended places==
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur (I-1 &amp; I-101), Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury in [[San Francisco]] is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

==Various==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humbolt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!



[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States]]</text>
      <sha1>p4f2ohuulwdsso2loilmhe8387xb5zi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11490</id>
      <parentid>11489</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-30T07:20:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>66.53.123.96</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3293">[[Image:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban center's are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway 395) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

==Cities/Major Landmarks==
===North Coast===
* [[Arcata]]
* [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]]
* [[Mendocino]]
===Central California===
====Valley====
* [[Redding]]
* [[Chico]]
* [[Sacramento]]
* [[Modesto]]
* [[Merced]]
* [[Fresno]]
* [[Stockton]]
* [[Bakersfield]]
====Coast====
* [[Bay Area]] ([[San Francisco]], [[Oakland]], [[San Jose]], and more)
* [[Santa Cruz]]
===Southern California===
* [[Los Angeles]]
* [[San Diego]]
* [[Barstow]]
===Sierra Nevada===
* [[Mammoth]]
* [[Yosemite]]
* [[Bishop]]
* [[Tahoe]]


==Major Highways==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Raphael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful.

==Recommended places==
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur (I-1 &amp; I-101), Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury in [[San Francisco]] is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

==Various==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humbolt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!



[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States]]</text>
      <sha1>g1ohb1aa6e22y9s4v5uhqqdw4l5l1kt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11491</id>
      <parentid>11490</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-30T07:23:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>66.53.123.96</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3294">[[Image:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban center's are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway 395) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

==Cities/Major Landmarks==
===North Coast===
* [[Arcata]]
* [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]]
* [[Mendocino]]
===Central California===
====Valley====
* [[Redding]]
* [[Chico]]
* [[Sacramento]]
* [[Stockton]]
* [[Modesto]]
* [[Merced]]
* [[Fresno]]
* [[Bakersfield]]

====Coast====
* [[Bay Area]] ([[San Francisco]], [[Oakland]], [[San Jose]], and more)
* [[Santa Cruz]]
===Southern California===
* [[Los Angeles]]
* [[San Diego]]
* [[Barstow]]
===Sierra Nevada===
* [[Mammoth]]
* [[Yosemite]]
* [[Bishop]]
* [[Tahoe]]


==Major Highways==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Raphael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful.

==Recommended places==
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur (I-1 &amp; I-101), Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury in [[San Francisco]] is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

==Various==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humbolt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!



[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States]]</text>
      <sha1>ns6xqnk7mrd5nhojkifajrm81wmjuv0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>11501</id>
      <parentid>11491</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-05-30T21:24:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>24.21.70.40</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3446">[[Image:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban center's are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway 395) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

==Cities/Major Landmarks==
===North Coast===
* [[Arcata]]
* [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]]
* [[Mendocino]]
===Central California===
====Valley====
* [[Redding]]
* [[Chico]]
* [[Sacramento]]
* [[Stockton]]
* [[Modesto]]
* [[Merced]]
* [[Fresno]]
* [[Bakersfield]]

====Coast====
* [[Bay Area]] ([[San Francisco]], [[Oakland]], [[San Jose]], and more)
* [[Santa Cruz]]
===Southern California===
* [[Los Angeles]]
* [[San Diego]]
* [[Barstow]]
===Sierra Nevada===
* [[Mammoth]]
* [[Yosemite]]
* [[Bishop]]
* [[Tahoe]]


==Major Highways==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Raphael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful.

==Recommended places==
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur (I-1 &amp; I-101), Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury in [[San Francisco]] is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

==Various==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!



[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States]]</text>
      <sha1>cbmj5hlthjoq9zmsg5bzw38npy5rllk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12361</id>
      <parentid>11501</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-23T04:12:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>67.150.141.29</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3516">[[Image:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban center's are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway 395) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

==Cities/Major Landmarks==
===North Coast===
* [[Arcata]]
* [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]]
* [[Mendocino]]
===Central California===
====Valley====
* [[Redding]]
* [[Chico]]
* [[Sacramento]]
* [[Stockton]]
* [[Modesto]]
* [[Merced]]
* [[Fresno]]
* [[Bakersfield]]

====Coast====
* [[Bay Area]] ([[San Francisco]], [[Oakland]], [[San Jose]], and more)
* [[Santa Cruz]]
===Southern California===
* [[Los Angeles]]
* [[San Diego]]
* [[Barstow]]
===Sierra Nevada===
* [[Mammoth]]
* [[Yosemite]]
* [[Bishop]]
* [[Tahoe]]


==Major Highways==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Raphael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful.

==Recommended places==
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur (I-1 &amp; I-101), Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury in [[San Francisco]] is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

==Various==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!



[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States]]</text>
      <sha1>jm3mumjlkbxxqhn93unakzhyxraj0vq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12362</id>
      <parentid>12361</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-23T04:21:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>67.150.141.29</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3530">[[Image:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban center's are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway 395) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

==Cities/Major Landmarks==
===North Coast===
* [[Arcata]]
* [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]]
* [[Mendocino]]
===Central California===
====Valley====
* [[Redding]]
* [[Chico]]
* [[Sacramento]]
* [[Stockton]]
* [[Modesto]]
* [[Merced]]
* [[Fresno]]
* [[Visalia]]
* [[Bakersfield]]

====Coast====
* [[Bay Area]] ([[San Francisco]], [[Oakland]], [[San Jose]], and more)
* [[Santa Cruz]]
===Southern California===
* [[Los Angeles]]
* [[San Diego]]
* [[Barstow]]
===Sierra Nevada===
* [[Mammoth]]
* [[Yosemite]]
* [[Bishop]]
* [[Tahoe]]


==Major Highways==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Raphael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful.

==Recommended places==
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur (I-1 &amp; I-101), Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury in [[San Francisco]] is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

==Various==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!



[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States]]</text>
      <sha1>m4k1aqkqglrn9t9menh6n027meebp5m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12363</id>
      <parentid>12362</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-23T04:22:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>KennethSime</username>
        <id>27</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3546">[[Image:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban center's are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway 395) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

==Cities/Major Landmarks==
===North Coast===
* [[Arcata]]
* [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]]
* [[Mendocino]]
===Central California===
====Valley====
* [[Redding]]
* [[Chico]]
* [[Sacramento]]
* [[Stockton]]
* [[Modesto]]
* [[Merced]]
* [[Fresno]]
* [[Visalia]]
* [[Bakersfield]]

====Coast====
* [[Bay Area]] ([[San Francisco]], [[Oakland]], [[San Jose]], and more)
* [[Santa Cruz]], [[Monterrey]]

===Southern California===
* [[Los Angeles]]
* [[San Diego]]
* [[Barstow]]
===Sierra Nevada===
* [[Mammoth]]
* [[Yosemite]]
* [[Bishop]]
* [[Tahoe]]


==Major Highways==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Raphael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful.

==Recommended places==
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur (I-1 &amp; I-101), Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury in [[San Francisco]] is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

==Various==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!



[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States]]</text>
      <sha1>nezdb3sie4lbaf4pvx8t2mc5dqfgtmq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15126</id>
      <parentid>12363</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-25T14:53:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3749">[[Image:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban center's are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway 395) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[San Francisko]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

==Major Highways==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Raphael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful.

==Recommended places==
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur (I-1 &amp; I-101), Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury in [[San Francisco]] is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

==Various==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States]]</text>
      <sha1>jhlaj0rs9qvho6lq4hf9prtum40fa58</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19018</id>
      <parentid>15126</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-03-24T19:45:39Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>81.219.121.200</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3748">[[Image:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway 395) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[San Francisko]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

==Major Highways==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Raphael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful.

==Recommended places==
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur (I-1 &amp; I-101), Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury in [[San Francisco]] is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

==Various==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States]]</text>
      <sha1>tqh3j7p4rq0aluuqnark7qjvy9sztaa</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>19748</id>
      <parentid>19018</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-05-01T12:24:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>87.65.22.161</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3748">[[Image:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway 395) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

==Major Highways==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Raphael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful.

==Recommended places==
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur (I-1 &amp; I-101), Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury in [[San Francisco]] is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

==Various==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:California|*]]
[[Category:United States]]</text>
      <sha1>cm6i4stwxc3qqkyu8pi8xlc1ctg55s7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>20507</id>
      <parentid>19748</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-09T01:26:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3727">[[Image:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway 395) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Raphael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful.

== Recommended places ==
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur (I-1 &amp; I-101), Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury in [[San Francisco]] is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:California| ]]</text>
      <sha1>tvp11fdrxlus6dg75haw8ay0zxjls9p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>20537</id>
      <parentid>20507</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-09T09:31:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3746">[[Image:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway 395) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Raphael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful.

== Recommended places ==
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur (I-1 &amp; I-101), Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury in [[San Francisco]] is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:California| ]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>lqzubo8ebsqy66yye9tnai6779nsn2n</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21594</id>
      <parentid>20537</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-18T17:43:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3780">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[Image:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway 395) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Raphael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful.

== Recommended places ==
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur (I-1 &amp; I-101), Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury in [[San Francisco]] is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:California| ]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>3utqnb9625ln0qv1bugu4c9kqj1fjsq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>26434</id>
      <parentid>21594</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-22T16:29:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>68.126.182.252</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3826">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[Image:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Raphael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful.

== Recommended places ==
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur (I-1 &amp; I-101), Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury in [[San Francisco]] is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:California| ]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>m4nggxlgzvw1vtbsvmjdwskkmmsdiz4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>29058</id>
      <parentid>26434</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-12-10T08:24:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3848">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[Image:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Raphael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful.

== Recommended places ==
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur (I-1 &amp; I-101), Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury in [[San Francisco]] is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:California| ]]

[[fr:Californie]]

[[trash:California]]</text>
      <sha1>sal30v0guepchcu3vfz8qddel9ut65h</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>30063</id>
      <parentid>29058</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-01-16T13:15:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Kalan</username>
        <id>1733</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3918">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[Image:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Raphael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

== Recommended places ==
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur (I-1 &amp; I-101), Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury in [[San Francisco]] is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:California| ]]

[[fr:Californie]]

[[trash:California]]</text>
      <sha1>000nh8p8xvuxked5pozfu17fal8ljo5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31344</id>
      <parentid>30063</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-01T01:16:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sigurdas</username>
        <id>1658</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3945">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[Image:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Raphael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

== Recommended places ==
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur (I-1 &amp; I-101), Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. Haight and Ashbury in [[San Francisco]] is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]

[[trash:California]]</text>
      <sha1>m5oqcmyzhx74sd8rs07b39lw6e3wq5h</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31716</id>
      <parentid>31344</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-14T02:38:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>12.99.127.246</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4044">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[Image:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Raphael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

== Recommended places ==
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur (I-1 &amp; I-101), Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[San Francisco]]. the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]

[[trash:California]]</text>
      <sha1>b8qt4x4lkv9rev8e16b894uz969il9m</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31717</id>
      <parentid>31716</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-14T02:38:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>12.99.127.246</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4043">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[Image:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Raphael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

== Recommended places ==
[[Image:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur (I-1 &amp; I-101), Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]

[[trash:California]]</text>
      <sha1>pes2px3bar7umgw353q7b0vk0hb386q</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>34760</id>
      <parentid>31717</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T16:56:11Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4040">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Raphael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur (I-1 &amp; I-101), Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

{{Template:States USA}}
[[fr:Californie]]

[[trash:California]]

[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]</text>
      <sha1>j9i9m8qhj70mlfzzjco28ihssg3vddv</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>37745</id>
      <parentid>34760</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-10-09T22:22:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4040">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Raphael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur (I-1 &amp; I-101), Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]

[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>awwyl93k64khofzhpandqv0bz6t4s8d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38960</id>
      <parentid>37745</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-12-17T17:36:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>166.5.49.149</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4039">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur (I-1 &amp; I-101), Jade Beach, Crescent City has a beautiful shore/beach. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]

[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>9hkuduofs38lae9i22l151zp6p3e0vw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>38961</id>
      <parentid>38960</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-12-17T17:38:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>166.5.49.149</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4045">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]

[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>a2cfsfgryw8m8at7d7ip9ukxw3zygqj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>39389</id>
      <parentid>38961</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-01-14T16:50:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sketch</username>
        <id>2217</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4566">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

HOWEVER! Southern California, as in L.A. and San Diego, is an incredibly bourgie place which sucks for hitchhiking and is full of smug ass holes with surfboards and perfect bodies and shit who cheerily wave for hours w/o stopping. Avoid southern California if you can- I mean the weather is of course fabulous and it is a beautiful place all the same, I just got a lot of negative feelings about the people- if you have a bag and a sign and you're walking around downtown people look at you like you're a pile of vomit.

{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]

[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>9o4enrtnbotl3dzrh61oiifuy16w0bg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>52588</id>
      <parentid>39389</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-05-25T19:44:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Headtrip</username>
        <id>3313</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4045">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]

[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>a2cfsfgryw8m8at7d7ip9ukxw3zygqj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>55046</id>
      <parentid>52588</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-09-21T04:30:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>OllieMonaghan</username>
        <id>3898</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5284">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.



== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.
{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]

[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>3sj357viajsxj55sykhv6bft5uqgxl7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>55681</id>
      <parentid>55046</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-08T01:07:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5334">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.



== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.
{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]

[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>gnmqxwfim9lhthnwb5yvr94nnga99by</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>57556</id>
      <parentid>55681</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-11-25T19:57:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="5446">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.



== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. 

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>32s37a1aaxtejbt9cwh79w1pd1tbun9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>59893</id>
      <parentid>57556</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-03-06T21:01:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6999">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:
(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for
sale, or otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service''
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:
   (1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off
ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the
freeway.
   (2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway
off ramp or on ramp.
   (3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp,
when vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
   (b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.
   (c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too.

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>glccr0zjr62gbgyh6mp03lzgbqev851</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>59894</id>
      <parentid>59893</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-03-06T21:02:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="6984">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:
(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for
sale, or otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service''
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off
ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the
freeway.
(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway
off ramp or on ramp.
(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp,
when vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.
(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too.

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>pfq3ji5xpyaoy85dri0o683890d3ih5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>59895</id>
      <parentid>59894</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-03-06T21:03:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7019">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:
(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for
sale, or otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service''
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off
ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the
freeway.
(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway
off ramp or on ramp.
(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp,
when vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.
(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too.

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.6]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>dd07kkzwod1nww8lbz2oykm56v72jy7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>59896</id>
      <parentid>59895</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-03-06T21:31:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7067">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too.

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.6]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>l5n4drx23phijrieursb03i1rmq1ie7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>60888</id>
      <parentid>59896</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-05-02T00:53:04Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Jaredjestes22</username>
        <id>5057</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7315">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch, with many mexican immigrants, who wont give you the time of day, and many suburbanites, north of modesto the going gets much easier, and from yuba city north we got ride after ride. - J-rod)

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too.

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.6]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>swmkf625b4uqr89qbyv1ebhhuro0y0g</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>60891</id>
      <parentid>60888</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-05-02T01:02:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Jaredjestes22</username>
        <id>5057</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7335">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch, with many mexican immigrants, who wont give you the time of day, and many suburbanites, north of modesto the going gets much easier, and from yuba city north we got ride after ride. - J-rod User: JaredJEstes22)

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too.

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.6]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>qdhwa5um9053ed458dgzsao44poj3d0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>60892</id>
      <parentid>60891</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-05-02T01:03:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Jaredjestes22</username>
        <id>5057</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7339">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch, with many mexican immigrants, who wont give you the time of day, and many suburbanites, north of modesto the going gets much easier, and from yuba city north we got ride after ride. - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too.

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.6]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>49ce72ouh77kde4syhpzpenheawlm39</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>60955</id>
      <parentid>60892</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-05-06T15:15:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Bmotley</username>
        <id>5071</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7764">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from! 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch, with many mexican immigrants, who wont give you the time of day, and many suburbanites, north of modesto the going gets much easier, and from yuba city north we got ride after ride. - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too.

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.6]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>dj9g8pqkiuk44i42h9eu9mqhsfn5oiu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>60956</id>
      <parentid>60955</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-05-06T15:16:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Bmotley</username>
        <id>5071</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7791">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from! 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch, with many mexican immigrants, who wont give you the time of day, and many suburbanites, north of modesto the going gets much easier, and from yuba city north we got ride after ride. - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too.

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.6]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>eyq13u19ztmiw2syjgz0zrsri9cyzjm</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>61238</id>
      <parentid>60956</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-05-19T13:59:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7809">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from! 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch, with many mexican immigrants, who wont give you the time of day, and many suburbanites, north of modesto the going gets much easier, and from yuba city north we got ride after ride. - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too.

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

== Experiences ==
''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.6]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>rpsxm6koqv0f2t6l19gcaxgj3l8yy4a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>61239</id>
      <parentid>61238</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-05-19T14:00:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="7810">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch, with many mexican immigrants, who wont give you the time of day, and many suburbanites, north of modesto the going gets much easier, and from yuba city north we got ride after ride. - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too.

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

== Experiences ==
''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.6]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>700la3gix5fg296xcn8spwpdda97ocp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>61362</id>
      <parentid>61239</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-05-21T15:31:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="8851">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch, with many mexican immigrants, who wont give you the time of day, and many suburbanites, north of modesto the going gets much easier, and from yuba city north we got ride after ride. - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.
=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All Federal "Parks, Forests, and public land" prohibit hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.

This is often amended by the superintendents of different Federal Districts making hitchhiking legal in places where this section is amended. The following are some such places:

'''Yosemite National Park'''
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too.

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

== Experiences ==
''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.6]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>gbosld8wr48lie9s29cjq48whqk2vtr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>61716</id>
      <parentid>61362</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-06-08T19:16:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>SpamBucket</username>
        <id>24368</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9739">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch, with many mexican immigrants, who wont give you the time of day, and many suburbanites, north of modesto the going gets much easier, and from yuba city north we got ride after ride. - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.
=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All Federal "Parks, Forests, and public land" prohibit hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.

This is often amended by the superintendents of different Federal Districts making hitchhiking legal in places where this section is amended. The following are some such places:

'''Yosemite National Park'''
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too.

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

== Experiences ==
''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!


Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take Highway 1. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on Highway 1, swhere the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on I-15.

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.6]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>j0ak8ceafsow6uxy0wc6p56dqbkqena</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>61719</id>
      <parentid>61716</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-06-08T19:31:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9741">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch, with many mexican immigrants, who wont give you the time of day, and many suburbanites, north of modesto the going gets much easier, and from yuba city north we got ride after ride. - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.
=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All Federal "Parks, Forests, and public land" prohibit hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.

This is often amended by the superintendents of different Federal Districts making hitchhiking legal in places where this section is amended. The following are some such places:

'''Yosemite National Park'''
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too.

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

== Experiences ==
''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!

:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take Highway 1. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on Highway 1, swhere the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on I-15."

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.6]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>rc79jixgi7nwrk2zci0wb00ujsq62yw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>63117</id>
      <parentid>61719</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-08-14T22:00:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9753">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]]
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch, with many mexican immigrants, who wont give you the time of day, and many suburbanites, north of modesto the going gets much easier, and from yuba city north we got ride after ride. - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.
=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All Federal "Parks, Forests, and public land" prohibit hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.

This is often amended by the superintendents of different Federal Districts making hitchhiking legal in places where this section is amended. The following are some such places:

'''Yosemite National Park'''
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too.

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

== Experiences ==
''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!

:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take Highway 1. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on Highway 1, swhere the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on I-15."

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.6]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>l2naxj2zc4l7ftedpsbozsg8hydmaxx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>64374</id>
      <parentid>63117</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-09-25T14:42:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="9775">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]] |
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[Santa Barbara]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch, with many mexican immigrants, who wont give you the time of day, and many suburbanites, north of modesto the going gets much easier, and from yuba city north we got ride after ride. - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.
=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All Federal "Parks, Forests, and public land" prohibit hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.

This is often amended by the superintendents of different Federal Districts making hitchhiking legal in places where this section is amended. The following are some such places:

'''Yosemite National Park'''
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too.

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

== Experiences ==
''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!

:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take Highway 1. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on Highway 1, swhere the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on I-15."

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.6]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>gdip0lsj65s2r5ghnwvyyct5q6hg8la</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>67813</id>
      <parentid>64374</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-12-14T16:42:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="10208">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]] |
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[Santa Barbara]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch, with many mexican immigrants, who wont give you the time of day, and many suburbanites, north of modesto the going gets much easier, and from yuba city north we got ride after ride. - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.


The following law is enforced more often:

21957.  No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of
soliciting a ride from the driver of any vehicle.

Definitions: 530.  A "roadway" is that portion of a highway improved, designed, or ordinarily used for vehicular travel.

As with other states where the roadway definition does not mention a shoulder, it might be wise to hitch from outside of the paved portion of the road.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All Federal "Parks, Forests, and public land" prohibit hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.

This is often amended by the superintendents of different Federal Districts making hitchhiking legal in places where this section is amended. The following are some such places:

'''Yosemite National Park'''
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too.

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

== Experiences ==
''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!

:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take Highway 1. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on Highway 1, swhere the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on I-15."

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.6]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>c0of3te07h9y1mgpzty9r3mwghz6uo9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>67923</id>
      <parentid>67813</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-12-31T14:53:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Nomadinexile</username>
        <id>8892</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11140">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]] |
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[Santa Barbara]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch, with many mexican immigrants, who wont give you the time of day, and many suburbanites, north of modesto the going gets much easier, and from yuba city north we got ride after ride. - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.


The following law is enforced more often:

21957.  No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of
soliciting a ride from the driver of any vehicle.

Definitions: 530.  A "roadway" is that portion of a highway improved, designed, or ordinarily used for vehicular travel.

As with other states where the roadway definition does not mention a shoulder, it might be wise to hitch from outside of the paved portion of the road.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All Federal "Parks, Forests, and public land" prohibit hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.

This is often amended by the superintendents of different Federal Districts making hitchhiking legal in places where this section is amended. The following are some such places:

'''Yosemite National Park'''
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too.

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

== Experiences ==
''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!

:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take Highway 1. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on Highway 1, swhere the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on I-15."

Experience Nov. 2012
I hitched from southern Oregon to Texas without any problems except one in Westmorland, CA.  I was standing on the edge of the shoulder of highway 86 on the south end of this rural small community when approached by two aggrevated and aggressive Imperial County sheriffs.  They asked if i knew that it was illegal to hitchhike in California.  I told them it was not.  Minutes of arguing later they retrieved their citation book and showed me the law shown above that you can not hitch on roadway.  I asked them to show me the state definition of a roadway.  This upset them.  Veins bulging and spit spewing, they pointed to a business wall 40 feet away and said that's where the roadway ends.  They then grabbed their pepper spray and asked if I'd be walking back to town.  I complied and spent $1 for a bus to El Centro and continued on my way.  Pick your battles wisely and be safe out there.  ~nomadinexile

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.6]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>h0m9sykajdtr8pmhpj4pzwoa5dx8x5s</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>67930</id>
      <parentid>67923</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-01-01T01:16:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="11140">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]] |
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[Santa Barbara]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch, with many mexican immigrants, who wont give you the time of day, and many suburbanites, north of modesto the going gets much easier, and from yuba city north we got ride after ride. - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.


The following law is enforced more often:

21957.  No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of
soliciting a ride from the driver of any vehicle.

Definitions: 530.  A "roadway" is that portion of a highway improved, designed, or ordinarily used for vehicular travel.

As with other states where the roadway definition does not mention a shoulder, it might be wise to hitch from outside of the paved portion of the road.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All Federal "Parks, Forests, and public land" prohibit hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.

This is often amended by the superintendents of different Federal Districts making hitchhiking legal in places where this section is amended. The following are some such places:

'''Yosemite National Park'''
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too.

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

== Experiences ==
''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!

:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take Highway 1. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on Highway 1, swhere the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on I-15."

Experience Nov. 2012
I hitched from southern Oregon to Texas without any problems except one in Westmorland, CA.  I was standing on the edge of the shoulder of highway 86 on the south end of this rural small community when approached by two aggrevated and aggressive Imperial County sheriffs.  They asked if i knew that it was illegal to hitchhike in California.  I told them it was not.  Minutes of arguing later they retrieved their citation book and showed me the law shown above that you can not hitch on roadway.  I asked them to show me the state definition of a roadway.  This upset them.  Veins bulging and spit spewing, they pointed to a business wall 40 feet away and said that's where the roadway ends.  They then grabbed their pepper spray and asked if I'd be walking back to town.  I complied and spent $1 for a bus to El Centro and continued on my way.  Pick your battles wisely and be safe out there.  ~nomadinexile

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.5]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>8shnx82nzmskk66lag1iz8floywagh5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68505</id>
      <parentid>67930</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-03-08T02:20:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="12377">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]] |
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[Santa Barbara]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch, with many mexican immigrants, who wont give you the time of day, and many suburbanites, north of modesto the going gets much easier, and from yuba city north we got ride after ride. - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.


The following law is enforced more often:

21957.  No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of
soliciting a ride from the driver of any vehicle.

Definitions: 530.  A "roadway" is that portion of a highway improved, designed, or ordinarily used for vehicular travel.

As with other states where the roadway definition does not mention a shoulder, it might be wise to hitch from outside of the paved portion of the road.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Yosemite National Park
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

*Joshua Tree National Park
Hitchhiking is only permitted under exigent conditions where the health and safety of the person 
hitchhiking is in jeopardy.

*Mojave National Preserve
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Death Valley National Park
Hitchhiking, or the soliciting of transportation, is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person is off the paved roadway on the shoulder, and visitor safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected.

*Sequoia and King's Canyon National Parks
Hitchhiking is permitted when not standing in the roadway, and visitor safety and traffic flow must not be adversely affected.

*Golden Gate National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas: Marin County - Marin Headlands

*Point Reyes National Seashore
Hitchhiking is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person does not stand in a 
roadway and the hitchhiking/solicitation does not adversely affect visitor safety or the 
normal flow of traffic.

*Lassen Volcanic National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Whiskeytown National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is explicitly prohibited at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area

*Redwood National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too.

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California is very, very bad for hitch hiking. Took 6 hours to catch a ride!

== Experiences ==
''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!

:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take Highway 1. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on Highway 1, swhere the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on I-15."

Experience Nov. 2012
I hitched from southern Oregon to Texas without any problems except one in Westmorland, CA.  I was standing on the edge of the shoulder of highway 86 on the south end of this rural small community when approached by two aggrevated and aggressive Imperial County sheriffs.  They asked if i knew that it was illegal to hitchhike in California.  I told them it was not.  Minutes of arguing later they retrieved their citation book and showed me the law shown above that you can not hitch on roadway.  I asked them to show me the state definition of a roadway.  This upset them.  Veins bulging and spit spewing, they pointed to a business wall 40 feet away and said that's where the roadway ends.  They then grabbed their pepper spray and asked if I'd be walking back to town.  I complied and spent $1 for a bus to El Centro and continued on my way.  Pick your battles wisely and be safe out there.  ~nomadinexile

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.5]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>7ga6kyq42ak0mj90gx4yf2h7cleooxd</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69164</id>
      <parentid>68505</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-04-21T00:10:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Defenestrate</username>
        <id>10374</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13151">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]] |
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[Santa Barbara]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch, with many mexican immigrants, who wont give you the time of day, and many suburbanites, north of modesto the going gets much easier, and from yuba city north we got ride after ride. - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.


The following law is enforced more often:

21957.  No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of
soliciting a ride from the driver of any vehicle.

Definitions: 530.  A "roadway" is that portion of a highway improved, designed, or ordinarily used for vehicular travel.

As with other states where the roadway definition does not mention a shoulder, it might be wise to hitch from outside of the paved portion of the road.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Yosemite National Park
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

*Joshua Tree National Park
Hitchhiking is only permitted under exigent conditions where the health and safety of the person 
hitchhiking is in jeopardy.

*Mojave National Preserve
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Death Valley National Park
Hitchhiking, or the soliciting of transportation, is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person is off the paved roadway on the shoulder, and visitor safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected.

*Sequoia and King's Canyon National Parks
Hitchhiking is permitted when not standing in the roadway, and visitor safety and traffic flow must not be adversely affected.

*Golden Gate National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas: Marin County - Marin Headlands

*Point Reyes National Seashore
Hitchhiking is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person does not stand in a 
roadway and the hitchhiking/solicitation does not adversely affect visitor safety or the 
normal flow of traffic.

*Lassen Volcanic National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Whiskeytown National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is explicitly prohibited at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area

*Redwood National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. From the bay, take public transit to the Diridon station in San Jose. There is a shuttle for $5.00 to Downtown Santa Cruz. the Make sure to hitch out of Santa Cruz instead of Capitola...or alternately, there is a bus for $3.00 from Santa Cruz to Monterrey. In Monterrey, the bus 24 will take you to Barnyard shopping village in Carmel. The red lights there are an excellent place to catch rides all the way to L.A. with many cars full of young people, travelers, surfers. It took me 5 minutes to get a ride there, and i´m a 24 year old dude with long messy hair.

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California can be difficult. It has been reported to take as long as 6 hours for someone to catch a ride. There are not many places for people to pull over, and Yuba City is a huge strip mall town that people just blast through on a multi lane road. Also it is a very conservative area.

== Experiences ==
''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!

:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take Highway 1. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on Highway 1, swhere the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on I-15."

Experience Nov. 2012
I hitched from southern Oregon to Texas without any problems except one in Westmorland, CA.  I was standing on the edge of the shoulder of highway 86 on the south end of this rural small community when approached by two aggrevated and aggressive Imperial County sheriffs.  They asked if i knew that it was illegal to hitchhike in California.  I told them it was not.  Minutes of arguing later they retrieved their citation book and showed me the law shown above that you can not hitch on roadway.  I asked them to show me the state definition of a roadway.  This upset them.  Veins bulging and spit spewing, they pointed to a business wall 40 feet away and said that's where the roadway ends.  They then grabbed their pepper spray and asked if I'd be walking back to town.  I complied and spent $1 for a bus to El Centro and continued on my way.  Pick your battles wisely and be safe out there.  ~nomadinexile

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.5]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>910hytz9o3qajykljtoefq63iwyzdi5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69165</id>
      <parentid>69164</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-04-21T00:14:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Defenestrate</username>
        <id>10374</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13489">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]] |
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[Santa Barbara]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch, with many mexican immigrants, who wont give you the time of day, and many suburbanites, north of modesto the going gets much easier, and from yuba city north we got ride after ride. - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur, Jade Beach, Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, and the redwoods are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.


The following law is enforced more often:

21957.  No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of
soliciting a ride from the driver of any vehicle.

Definitions: 530.  A "roadway" is that portion of a highway improved, designed, or ordinarily used for vehicular travel.

As with other states where the roadway definition does not mention a shoulder, it might be wise to hitch from outside of the paved portion of the road.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Yosemite National Park
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

*Joshua Tree National Park
Hitchhiking is only permitted under exigent conditions where the health and safety of the person 
hitchhiking is in jeopardy.

*Mojave National Preserve
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Death Valley National Park
Hitchhiking, or the soliciting of transportation, is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person is off the paved roadway on the shoulder, and visitor safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected.

*Sequoia and King's Canyon National Parks
Hitchhiking is permitted when not standing in the roadway, and visitor safety and traffic flow must not be adversely affected.

*Golden Gate National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas: Marin County - Marin Headlands

*Point Reyes National Seashore
Hitchhiking is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person does not stand in a 
roadway and the hitchhiking/solicitation does not adversely affect visitor safety or the 
normal flow of traffic.

*Lassen Volcanic National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Whiskeytown National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is explicitly prohibited at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area

*Redwood National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. From the bay, hitching can be difficult but not impossible. You can alternately take public transit to the Diridon station in San Jose. There is a shuttle for $5.00 to Downtown Santa Cruz. Make sure to hitch out of Santa Cruz instead of Capitola...or alternately, there is a bus for $3.00 from Santa Cruz to Monterrey. In Monterrey, the bus 24 for another $2.00 will take you to Barnyard shopping village in Carmel. The red lights there are an excellent place to catch rides as they are the last lights before the road turns into big sur area. Alot of drivers are headed all the way to L.A. with many cars full of young people, travelers, surfers. It took me literally 5 minutes to get a ride there, and i´m a 24 year old dude with long messy hair. Once in Big Sur hitchhiking is ridiculously easy and it is also an excellent place to camp for free on oceanside bluffs(as long as you are respectful).

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California can be difficult. It has been reported to take as long as 6 hours for someone to catch a ride. There are not many places for people to pull over, and Yuba City is a huge strip mall town that people just blast through on a multi lane road. Also it is a very conservative area.

== Experiences ==
''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!

:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take Highway 1. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on Highway 1, swhere the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on I-15."

Experience Nov. 2012
I hitched from southern Oregon to Texas without any problems except one in Westmorland, CA.  I was standing on the edge of the shoulder of highway 86 on the south end of this rural small community when approached by two aggrevated and aggressive Imperial County sheriffs.  They asked if i knew that it was illegal to hitchhike in California.  I told them it was not.  Minutes of arguing later they retrieved their citation book and showed me the law shown above that you can not hitch on roadway.  I asked them to show me the state definition of a roadway.  This upset them.  Veins bulging and spit spewing, they pointed to a business wall 40 feet away and said that's where the roadway ends.  They then grabbed their pepper spray and asked if I'd be walking back to town.  I complied and spent $1 for a bus to El Centro and continued on my way.  Pick your battles wisely and be safe out there.  ~nomadinexile

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.5]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>7fdiejbrqiqj3c3q5naptmqf9mrjfh9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69166</id>
      <parentid>69165</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-04-21T00:20:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Defenestrate</username>
        <id>10374</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13502">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]] |
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[Santa Barbara]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch, with many mexican immigrants, who wont give you the time of day, and many suburbanites, north of modesto the going gets much easier, and from yuba city north we got ride after ride. - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur and Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, the Redwoods and the Los Padres Forest are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.


The following law is enforced more often:

21957.  No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of
soliciting a ride from the driver of any vehicle.

Definitions: 530.  A "roadway" is that portion of a highway improved, designed, or ordinarily used for vehicular travel.

As with other states where the roadway definition does not mention a shoulder, it might be wise to hitch from outside of the paved portion of the road.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Yosemite National Park
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

*Joshua Tree National Park
Hitchhiking is only permitted under exigent conditions where the health and safety of the person 
hitchhiking is in jeopardy.

*Mojave National Preserve
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Death Valley National Park
Hitchhiking, or the soliciting of transportation, is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person is off the paved roadway on the shoulder, and visitor safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected.

*Sequoia and King's Canyon National Parks
Hitchhiking is permitted when not standing in the roadway, and visitor safety and traffic flow must not be adversely affected.

*Golden Gate National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas: Marin County - Marin Headlands

*Point Reyes National Seashore
Hitchhiking is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person does not stand in a 
roadway and the hitchhiking/solicitation does not adversely affect visitor safety or the 
normal flow of traffic.

*Lassen Volcanic National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Whiskeytown National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is explicitly prohibited at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area

*Redwood National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. From the bay, hitching can be difficult but not impossible. You can alternately take public transit to the Diridon station in San Jose. There is a shuttle for $5.00 to Downtown Santa Cruz. Make sure to hitch out of Santa Cruz instead of Capitola...or alternately, there is a bus for $3.00 from Santa Cruz to Monterrey. In Monterrey, the bus 24 for another $2.00 will take you to Barnyard shopping village in Carmel. The red lights there are an excellent place to catch rides as they are the last lights before the road turns into big sur area. Alot of drivers are headed all the way to L.A. with many cars full of young people, travelers, surfers. It took me literally 5 minutes to get a ride there, and i´m a 24 year old dude with long messy hair. Once in Big Sur hitchhiking is ridiculously easy and it is also an excellent place to camp for free on oceanside bluffs(as long as you are respectful).

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California can be difficult. It has been reported to take as long as 6 hours for someone to catch a ride. There are not many places for people to pull over, and Yuba City is a huge strip mall town that people just blast through on a multi lane road. Also it is a very conservative area.

== Experiences ==
''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!

:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take Highway 1. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on Highway 1, swhere the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on I-15."

Experience Nov. 2012
I hitched from southern Oregon to Texas without any problems except one in Westmorland, CA.  I was standing on the edge of the shoulder of highway 86 on the south end of this rural small community when approached by two aggrevated and aggressive Imperial County sheriffs.  They asked if i knew that it was illegal to hitchhike in California.  I told them it was not.  Minutes of arguing later they retrieved their citation book and showed me the law shown above that you can not hitch on roadway.  I asked them to show me the state definition of a roadway.  This upset them.  Veins bulging and spit spewing, they pointed to a business wall 40 feet away and said that's where the roadway ends.  They then grabbed their pepper spray and asked if I'd be walking back to town.  I complied and spent $1 for a bus to El Centro and continued on my way.  Pick your battles wisely and be safe out there.  ~nomadinexile

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.5]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>rpm25lmv56px1ejw1gmz645j0d0e7sn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69173</id>
      <parentid>69166</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-04-21T22:45:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13621">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]] |
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[Santa Barbara]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch, with many mexican immigrants, who wont give you the time of day, and many suburbanites, north of modesto the going gets much easier, and from yuba city north we got ride after ride. - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur and Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, the Redwoods and the Los Padres Forest are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.


The following law is enforced more often:

21957.  No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of
soliciting a ride from the driver of any vehicle.

Definitions: 530.  A "roadway" is that portion of a highway improved, designed, or ordinarily used for vehicular travel.

As with other states where the roadway definition does not mention a shoulder, it might be wise to hitch from outside of the paved portion of the road.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Yosemite National Park
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

*Joshua Tree National Park
Hitchhiking is only permitted under exigent conditions where the health and safety of the person 
hitchhiking is in jeopardy.

*Mojave National Preserve
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Death Valley National Park
Hitchhiking, or the soliciting of transportation, is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person is off the paved roadway on the shoulder, and visitor safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected.

*Sequoia and King's Canyon National Parks
Hitchhiking is permitted when not standing in the roadway, and visitor safety and traffic flow must not be adversely affected.

*Golden Gate National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas: Marin County - Marin Headlands

*Point Reyes National Seashore
Hitchhiking is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person does not stand in a 
roadway and the hitchhiking/solicitation does not adversely affect visitor safety or the 
normal flow of traffic.

*Lassen Volcanic National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Whiskeytown National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is explicitly prohibited at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area

*Redwood National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. From the bay, hitching can be difficult but not impossible. You can alternately take public transit to the Diridon station in San Jose. There is a shuttle for $5.00 to Downtown Santa Cruz. Make sure to hitch out of Santa Cruz instead of Capitola...or alternately, there is a bus for $3.00 from Santa Cruz to Monterrey. In Monterrey, the bus 24 for another $2.00 will take you to Barnyard shopping village in Carmel. The red lights there are an excellent place to catch rides as they are the last lights before the road turns into big sur area. Alot of drivers are headed all the way to L.A. with many cars full of young people, travelers, surfers. It took me literally 5 minutes to get a ride there, and i´m a 24 year old dude with long messy hair. Once in Big Sur hitchhiking is ridiculously easy and it is also an excellent place to camp for free on oceanside bluffs(as long as you are respectful).

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California can be difficult. It has been reported to take as long as 6 hours for someone to catch a ride. There are not many places for people to pull over, and Yuba City is a huge strip mall town that people just blast through on a multi lane road. Also it is a very conservative area. On the other hand, [[User:Thewindanrain]] has had nothing but easy experiences hitching around Yuba City and Williams.

== Experiences ==
''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!

:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take Highway 1. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on Highway 1, swhere the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on I-15."

Experience Nov. 2012
I hitched from southern Oregon to Texas without any problems except one in Westmorland, CA.  I was standing on the edge of the shoulder of highway 86 on the south end of this rural small community when approached by two aggrevated and aggressive Imperial County sheriffs.  They asked if i knew that it was illegal to hitchhike in California.  I told them it was not.  Minutes of arguing later they retrieved their citation book and showed me the law shown above that you can not hitch on roadway.  I asked them to show me the state definition of a roadway.  This upset them.  Veins bulging and spit spewing, they pointed to a business wall 40 feet away and said that's where the roadway ends.  They then grabbed their pepper spray and asked if I'd be walking back to town.  I complied and spent $1 for a bus to El Centro and continued on my way.  Pick your battles wisely and be safe out there.  ~nomadinexile

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.5]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>ovc1r77keu70aehsuyqbfmzyhjx4gyc</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69174</id>
      <parentid>69173</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-04-21T22:46:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="13622">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]] |
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[Santa Barbara]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch, with many mexican immigrants, who wont give you the time of day, and many suburbanites, north of modesto the going gets much easier, and from yuba city north we got ride after ride. - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur and Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, the Redwoods and the Los Padres Forest are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.


The following law is enforced more often:

21957.  No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of
soliciting a ride from the driver of any vehicle.

Definitions: 530.  A "roadway" is that portion of a highway improved, designed, or ordinarily used for vehicular travel.

As with other states where the roadway definition does not mention a shoulder, it might be wise to hitch from outside of the paved portion of the road.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Yosemite National Park
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

*Joshua Tree National Park
Hitchhiking is only permitted under exigent conditions where the health and safety of the person 
hitchhiking is in jeopardy.

*Mojave National Preserve
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Death Valley National Park
Hitchhiking, or the soliciting of transportation, is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person is off the paved roadway on the shoulder, and visitor safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected.

*Sequoia and King's Canyon National Parks
Hitchhiking is permitted when not standing in the roadway, and visitor safety and traffic flow must not be adversely affected.

*Golden Gate National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas: Marin County - Marin Headlands

*Point Reyes National Seashore
Hitchhiking is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person does not stand in a 
roadway and the hitchhiking/solicitation does not adversely affect visitor safety or the 
normal flow of traffic.

*Lassen Volcanic National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Whiskeytown National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is explicitly prohibited at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area

*Redwood National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. From the bay, hitching can be difficult but not impossible. You can alternately take public transit to the Diridon station in San Jose. There is a shuttle for $5.00 to Downtown Santa Cruz. Make sure to hitch out of Santa Cruz instead of Capitola...or alternately, there is a bus for $3.00 from Santa Cruz to Monterrey. In Monterrey, the bus 24 for another $2.00 will take you to Barnyard shopping village in Carmel. The red lights there are an excellent place to catch rides as they are the last lights before the road turns into big sur area. Alot of drivers are headed all the way to L.A. with many cars full of young people, travelers, surfers. It took me literally 5 minutes to get a ride there, and i´m a 24 year old dude with long messy hair. Once in Big Sur hitchhiking is ridiculously easy and it is also an excellent place to camp for free on oceanside bluffs(as long as you are respectful).

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California can be difficult. It has been reported to take as long as 6 hours for someone to catch a ride. There are not many places for people to pull over, and Yuba City is a huge strip mall town that people just blast through on a multi lane road. Also it is a very conservative area. On the other hand, [[User:Thewindandrain]] has had nothing but easy experiences hitching around Yuba City and Williams.

== Experiences ==
''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!

:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take Highway 1. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on Highway 1, swhere the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on I-15."

Experience Nov. 2012
I hitched from southern Oregon to Texas without any problems except one in Westmorland, CA.  I was standing on the edge of the shoulder of highway 86 on the south end of this rural small community when approached by two aggrevated and aggressive Imperial County sheriffs.  They asked if i knew that it was illegal to hitchhike in California.  I told them it was not.  Minutes of arguing later they retrieved their citation book and showed me the law shown above that you can not hitch on roadway.  I asked them to show me the state definition of a roadway.  This upset them.  Veins bulging and spit spewing, they pointed to a business wall 40 feet away and said that's where the roadway ends.  They then grabbed their pepper spray and asked if I'd be walking back to town.  I complied and spent $1 for a bus to El Centro and continued on my way.  Pick your battles wisely and be safe out there.  ~nomadinexile

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.5]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>p3d069vthk5w5bxaz57b3b0x2qxk2tj</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69765</id>
      <parentid>69174</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-05-25T21:13:27Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14277">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]] |
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[Santa Barbara]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch, with many mexican immigrants, who wont give you the time of day, and many suburbanites, north of modesto the going gets much easier, and from yuba city north we got ride after ride. - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur and Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, the Redwoods and the Los Padres Forest are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Road Infrastructure ==

[[User:Thewindandrain]] gives the hitchhiking infrastructure here a score of 1 out of 3 stars. 

*Shoulders
:Broad shoulders are common along many roadsides, giving people plenty of room to pull over for you. However, it is not uncommon to encounter places where shoulders have not been built or are prohibitively narrow.

*Pedestrian Rights
:All interstates and a good many highways in California prohibit pedestrians.

*Interchanges
:[[split-traffic interchange|Split-traffic interchanges]] are all too common in California. Many interchanges also do not require drivers to slow down, which can lead to longer waiting times.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.


The following law is enforced more often:

21957.  No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of
soliciting a ride from the driver of any vehicle.

Definitions: 530.  A "roadway" is that portion of a highway improved, designed, or ordinarily used for vehicular travel.

As with other states where the roadway definition does not mention a shoulder, it might be wise to hitch from outside of the paved portion of the road.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Yosemite National Park
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

*Joshua Tree National Park
Hitchhiking is only permitted under exigent conditions where the health and safety of the person 
hitchhiking is in jeopardy.

*Mojave National Preserve
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Death Valley National Park
Hitchhiking, or the soliciting of transportation, is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person is off the paved roadway on the shoulder, and visitor safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected.

*Sequoia and King's Canyon National Parks
Hitchhiking is permitted when not standing in the roadway, and visitor safety and traffic flow must not be adversely affected.

*Golden Gate National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas: Marin County - Marin Headlands

*Point Reyes National Seashore
Hitchhiking is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person does not stand in a 
roadway and the hitchhiking/solicitation does not adversely affect visitor safety or the 
normal flow of traffic.

*Lassen Volcanic National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Whiskeytown National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is explicitly prohibited at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area

*Redwood National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. From the bay, hitching can be difficult but not impossible. You can alternately take public transit to the Diridon station in San Jose. There is a shuttle for $5.00 to Downtown Santa Cruz. Make sure to hitch out of Santa Cruz instead of Capitola...or alternately, there is a bus for $3.00 from Santa Cruz to Monterrey. In Monterrey, the bus 24 for another $2.00 will take you to Barnyard shopping village in Carmel. The red lights there are an excellent place to catch rides as they are the last lights before the road turns into big sur area. Alot of drivers are headed all the way to L.A. with many cars full of young people, travelers, surfers. It took me literally 5 minutes to get a ride there, and i´m a 24 year old dude with long messy hair. Once in Big Sur hitchhiking is ridiculously easy and it is also an excellent place to camp for free on oceanside bluffs(as long as you are respectful).

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California can be difficult. It has been reported to take as long as 6 hours for someone to catch a ride. There are not many places for people to pull over, and Yuba City is a huge strip mall town that people just blast through on a multi lane road. Also it is a very conservative area. On the other hand, [[User:Thewindandrain]] has had nothing but easy experiences hitching around Yuba City and Williams.

== Experiences ==
''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!

:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take Highway 1. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on Highway 1, swhere the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on I-15."

Experience Nov. 2012
I hitched from southern Oregon to Texas without any problems except one in Westmorland, CA.  I was standing on the edge of the shoulder of highway 86 on the south end of this rural small community when approached by two aggrevated and aggressive Imperial County sheriffs.  They asked if i knew that it was illegal to hitchhike in California.  I told them it was not.  Minutes of arguing later they retrieved their citation book and showed me the law shown above that you can not hitch on roadway.  I asked them to show me the state definition of a roadway.  This upset them.  Veins bulging and spit spewing, they pointed to a business wall 40 feet away and said that's where the roadway ends.  They then grabbed their pepper spray and asked if I'd be walking back to town.  I complied and spent $1 for a bus to El Centro and continued on my way.  Pick your battles wisely and be safe out there.  ~nomadinexile

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.5]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>nwzr7pz2ysl0kzpkz3372k44hifydfz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69766</id>
      <parentid>69765</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-05-25T21:17:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14347">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]] |
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[Santa Barbara]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch, with many mexican immigrants, who wont give you the time of day, and many suburbanites, north of modesto the going gets much easier, and from yuba city north we got ride after ride. - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur and Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, the Redwoods and the Los Padres Forest are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Roads ==

[[User:Thewindandrain]] gives the roads here a score of 1 out of 3 stars. Pedestrian rights are the greatest weakness of California roads. 

*Shoulders
:Broad shoulders are common along many roadsides, giving people plenty of room to pull over for you. However, it is not uncommon to encounter places where shoulders have not been built or are prohibitively narrow.

*Pedestrian Rights
:All interstates and many major many four lane and even several two lane highways in California prohibit pedestrians.

*Interchanges
:[[split-traffic interchange|Split-traffic interchanges]] are all too common in California. Many interchanges also do not require drivers to slow down, which can lead to longer waiting times.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.


The following law is enforced more often:

21957.  No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of
soliciting a ride from the driver of any vehicle.

Definitions: 530.  A "roadway" is that portion of a highway improved, designed, or ordinarily used for vehicular travel.

As with other states where the roadway definition does not mention a shoulder, it might be wise to hitch from outside of the paved portion of the road.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Yosemite National Park
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

*Joshua Tree National Park
Hitchhiking is only permitted under exigent conditions where the health and safety of the person 
hitchhiking is in jeopardy.

*Mojave National Preserve
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Death Valley National Park
Hitchhiking, or the soliciting of transportation, is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person is off the paved roadway on the shoulder, and visitor safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected.

*Sequoia and King's Canyon National Parks
Hitchhiking is permitted when not standing in the roadway, and visitor safety and traffic flow must not be adversely affected.

*Golden Gate National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas: Marin County - Marin Headlands

*Point Reyes National Seashore
Hitchhiking is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person does not stand in a 
roadway and the hitchhiking/solicitation does not adversely affect visitor safety or the 
normal flow of traffic.

*Lassen Volcanic National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Whiskeytown National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is explicitly prohibited at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area

*Redwood National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. From the bay, hitching can be difficult but not impossible. You can alternately take public transit to the Diridon station in San Jose. There is a shuttle for $5.00 to Downtown Santa Cruz. Make sure to hitch out of Santa Cruz instead of Capitola...or alternately, there is a bus for $3.00 from Santa Cruz to Monterrey. In Monterrey, the bus 24 for another $2.00 will take you to Barnyard shopping village in Carmel. The red lights there are an excellent place to catch rides as they are the last lights before the road turns into big sur area. Alot of drivers are headed all the way to L.A. with many cars full of young people, travelers, surfers. It took me literally 5 minutes to get a ride there, and i´m a 24 year old dude with long messy hair. Once in Big Sur hitchhiking is ridiculously easy and it is also an excellent place to camp for free on oceanside bluffs(as long as you are respectful).

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California can be difficult. It has been reported to take as long as 6 hours for someone to catch a ride. There are not many places for people to pull over, and Yuba City is a huge strip mall town that people just blast through on a multi lane road. Also it is a very conservative area. On the other hand, [[User:Thewindandrain]] has had nothing but easy experiences hitching around Yuba City and Williams.

== Experiences ==
''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!

:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take Highway 1. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on Highway 1, swhere the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on I-15."

Experience Nov. 2012
I hitched from southern Oregon to Texas without any problems except one in Westmorland, CA.  I was standing on the edge of the shoulder of highway 86 on the south end of this rural small community when approached by two aggrevated and aggressive Imperial County sheriffs.  They asked if i knew that it was illegal to hitchhike in California.  I told them it was not.  Minutes of arguing later they retrieved their citation book and showed me the law shown above that you can not hitch on roadway.  I asked them to show me the state definition of a roadway.  This upset them.  Veins bulging and spit spewing, they pointed to a business wall 40 feet away and said that's where the roadway ends.  They then grabbed their pepper spray and asked if I'd be walking back to town.  I complied and spent $1 for a bus to El Centro and continued on my way.  Pick your battles wisely and be safe out there.  ~nomadinexile

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.5]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>n020x7viftn4njjy87ea4pftvuphk7e</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69815</id>
      <parentid>69766</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-05-27T11:40:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14356">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]] |
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[Santa Barbara]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch, with many mexican immigrants, who wont give you the time of day, and many suburbanites, north of modesto the going gets much easier, and from yuba city north we got ride after ride. - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur and Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, the Redwoods and the Los Padres Forest are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Roads ==

[[User:Thewindandrain]] gives the roads here a score of 1 out of 3 stars. Pedestrian rights are the greatest weakness of California roads. 

*Shoulders
:Broad shoulders are common along many roadsides, giving people plenty of room to pull over for you. However, it is not uncommon to encounter places where shoulders have not been built or are prohibitively narrow.

*Pedestrian Rights
:All interstates and many major many four lane and even several two lane highways in California prohibit pedestrians.

*Interchanges
:[[split-traffic interchange|Split-traffic interchanges]] are all too common in California. Many interchanges also do not require drivers to slow down, which can lead to longer waiting times.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.


The following law is enforced more often:

21957.  No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of
soliciting a ride from the driver of any vehicle.

Definitions: 530.  A "roadway" is that portion of a highway improved, designed, or ordinarily used for vehicular travel.

As with other states where the roadway definition does not mention a shoulder, it might be wise to hitch from outside of the paved portion of the road.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Yosemite National Park
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

*Joshua Tree National Park
Hitchhiking is only permitted under exigent conditions where the health and safety of the person 
hitchhiking is in jeopardy.

*Mojave National Preserve
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Death Valley National Park
Hitchhiking, or the soliciting of transportation, is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person is off the paved roadway on the shoulder, and visitor safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected.

*Sequoia and King's Canyon National Parks
Hitchhiking is permitted when not standing in the roadway, and visitor safety and traffic flow must not be adversely affected.

*Golden Gate National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas: Marin County - Marin Headlands

*Point Reyes National Seashore
Hitchhiking is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person does not stand in a 
roadway and the hitchhiking/solicitation does not adversely affect visitor safety or the 
normal flow of traffic.

*Lassen Volcanic National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Whiskeytown National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is explicitly prohibited at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area

*Redwood National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. From the bay, hitching can be difficult but not impossible. You can alternately take public transit to the Diridon station in San Jose. There is a shuttle for $5.00 to Downtown Santa Cruz. Make sure to hitch out of Santa Cruz instead of Capitola...or alternately, there is a bus for $3.00 from Santa Cruz to Monterrey. In Monterrey, the bus 24 for another $2.00 will take you to Barnyard shopping village in Carmel. The red lights there are an excellent place to catch rides as they are the last lights before the road turns into big sur area. Alot of drivers are headed all the way to L.A. with many cars full of young people, travelers, surfers. It took me literally 5 minutes to get a ride there, and i´m a 24 year old dude with long messy hair. Once in Big Sur hitchhiking is ridiculously easy and it is also an excellent place to camp for free on oceanside bluffs(as long as you are respectful).

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California can be difficult. It has been reported to take as long as 6 hours for someone to catch a ride. There are not many places for people to pull over, and Yuba City is a huge strip mall town that people just blast through on a multi lane road. Also it is a very conservative area. On the other hand, [[User:Thewindandrain]] has had nothing but easy experiences hitching around Yuba City and Williams.

== Experiences ==
''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!

:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take Highway 1. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on Highway 1, swhere the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on I-15."

Experience Nov. 2012
:I hitched from southern Oregon to Texas without any problems except one in Westmorland, CA.  I was standing on the edge of the shoulder of highway 86 on the south end of this rural small community when approached by two aggrevated and aggressive Imperial County sheriffs.  They asked if i knew that it was [[illegal]] to hitchhike in California.  I told them it was not.  Minutes of arguing later they retrieved their citation book and showed me the law shown above that you can not hitch on roadway.  I asked them to show me the state definition of a roadway.  This upset them.  Veins bulging and spit spewing, they pointed to a business wall 40 feet away and said that's where the roadway ends.  They then grabbed their [[pepper spray]] and asked if I'd be walking back to town.  I complied and spent $1 for a bus to El Centro and continued on my way.  Pick your battles wisely and be safe out there.  ~nomadinexile

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.5]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>ctz71detpknidn2w6wx3ditiowod1k4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>69893</id>
      <parentid>69815</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-06-01T21:33:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14891">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]] |
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[Santa Barbara]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch, with many mexican immigrants, who wont give you the time of day, and many suburbanites, north of modesto the going gets much easier, and from yuba city north we got ride after ride. - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur and Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, the Redwoods and the Los Padres Forest are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Roads ==

[[User:Thewindandrain]] gives the roads here a score of 1 out of 3 stars. Pedestrian rights are the greatest weakness of California roads. 

*Shoulders
:Broad shoulders are common along many roadsides, giving people plenty of room to pull over for you. However, it is not uncommon to encounter places where shoulders have not been built or are prohibitively narrow.

*Pedestrian Rights
:All interstates and many major many four lane and even several two lane highways in California prohibit pedestrians.

*Interchanges
:[[split-traffic interchange|Split-traffic interchanges]] are all too common in California. Many interchanges also do not require drivers to slow down, which can lead to longer waiting times.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.


The following law is enforced more often:

21957.  No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of
soliciting a ride from the driver of any vehicle.

Definitions: 530.  A "roadway" is that portion of a highway improved, designed, or ordinarily used for vehicular travel.

As with other states where the roadway definition does not mention a shoulder, it might be wise to hitch from outside of the paved portion of the road.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Yosemite National Park
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

*Joshua Tree National Park
Hitchhiking is only permitted under exigent conditions where the health and safety of the person 
hitchhiking is in jeopardy.

*Mojave National Preserve
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Death Valley National Park
Hitchhiking, or the soliciting of transportation, is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person is off the paved roadway on the shoulder, and visitor safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected.

*Sequoia and King's Canyon National Parks
Hitchhiking is permitted when not standing in the roadway, and visitor safety and traffic flow must not be adversely affected.

*Golden Gate National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas: Marin County - Marin Headlands

*Point Reyes National Seashore
Hitchhiking is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person does not stand in a 
roadway and the hitchhiking/solicitation does not adversely affect visitor safety or the 
normal flow of traffic.

*Lassen Volcanic National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Whiskeytown National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is explicitly prohibited at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area

*Redwood National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. From the bay, hitching can be difficult but not impossible. You can alternately take public transit to the Diridon station in San Jose. There is a shuttle for $5.00 to Downtown Santa Cruz. Make sure to hitch out of Santa Cruz instead of Capitola...or alternately, there is a bus for $3.00 from Santa Cruz to Monterrey. In Monterrey, the bus 24 for another $2.00 will take you to Barnyard shopping village in Carmel. The red lights there are an excellent place to catch rides as they are the last lights before the road turns into big sur area. Alot of drivers are headed all the way to L.A. with many cars full of young people, travelers, surfers. It took me literally 5 minutes to get a ride there, and i´m a 24 year old dude with long messy hair. Once in Big Sur hitchhiking is ridiculously easy and it is also an excellent place to camp for free on oceanside bluffs(as long as you are respectful).

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California can be difficult. It has been reported to take as long as 6 hours for someone to catch a ride. There are not many places for people to pull over, and Yuba City is a huge strip mall town that people just blast through on a multi lane road. Also it is a very conservative area. On the other hand, [[User:Thewindandrain]] has had nothing but easy experiences hitching around Yuba City and Williams.

== Experiences ==
''The difference between hitching in the mountainous areas and the valley is like night and day. While the mountainous areas in any region of the state are very easy, hitchhiking in the valley can be a challenge at times. '''California''' has many of the best swimming holes in America, an excellent climate, and a virtually unlimited selection of hiking opportunities. A fan of the outdoors could spend a lifetime exploring here.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 23:33, 1 June 2013 (CEST)

''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!

:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take Highway 1. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on Highway 1, swhere the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on I-15."

Experience Nov. 2012
:I hitched from southern Oregon to Texas without any problems except one in Westmorland, CA.  I was standing on the edge of the shoulder of highway 86 on the south end of this rural small community when approached by two aggrevated and aggressive Imperial County sheriffs.  They asked if i knew that it was [[illegal]] to hitchhike in California.  I told them it was not.  Minutes of arguing later they retrieved their citation book and showed me the law shown above that you can not hitch on roadway.  I asked them to show me the state definition of a roadway.  This upset them.  Veins bulging and spit spewing, they pointed to a business wall 40 feet away and said that's where the roadway ends.  They then grabbed their [[pepper spray]] and asked if I'd be walking back to town.  I complied and spent $1 for a bus to El Centro and continued on my way.  Pick your battles wisely and be safe out there.  ~nomadinexile

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.5]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>k13xeeamoh39dthgktst0ywo0671bba</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>70616</id>
      <parentid>69893</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-07-22T03:50:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14750">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]] |
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[Santa Barbara]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch, with many mexican immigrants, who wont give you the time of day, and many suburbanites, north of modesto the going gets much easier, and from yuba city north we got ride after ride. - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have any time to spare at all, do take the 1!

''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur and Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, the Redwoods and the Los Padres Forest are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Roads ==

*Shoulders
:Broad shoulders are common along many roadsides, giving people plenty of room to pull over for you. However, it is not uncommon to encounter places where shoulders have not been built or are prohibitively narrow.

*Pedestrian Rights
:All interstates and many major many four lane and even several two lane highways in California prohibit pedestrians.

*Interchanges
:[[split-traffic interchange|Split-traffic interchanges]] are all too common in California. Many interchanges also do not require drivers to slow down, which can lead to longer waiting times.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.


The following law is enforced more often:

21957.  No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of
soliciting a ride from the driver of any vehicle.

Definitions: 530.  A "roadway" is that portion of a highway improved, designed, or ordinarily used for vehicular travel.

As with other states where the roadway definition does not mention a shoulder, it might be wise to hitch from outside of the paved portion of the road.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Yosemite National Park
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

*Joshua Tree National Park
Hitchhiking is only permitted under exigent conditions where the health and safety of the person 
hitchhiking is in jeopardy.

*Mojave National Preserve
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Death Valley National Park
Hitchhiking, or the soliciting of transportation, is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person is off the paved roadway on the shoulder, and visitor safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected.

*Sequoia and King's Canyon National Parks
Hitchhiking is permitted when not standing in the roadway, and visitor safety and traffic flow must not be adversely affected.

*Golden Gate National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas: Marin County - Marin Headlands

*Point Reyes National Seashore
Hitchhiking is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person does not stand in a 
roadway and the hitchhiking/solicitation does not adversely affect visitor safety or the 
normal flow of traffic.

*Lassen Volcanic National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Whiskeytown National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is explicitly prohibited at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area

*Redwood National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. From the bay, hitching can be difficult but not impossible. You can alternately take public transit to the Diridon station in San Jose. There is a shuttle for $5.00 to Downtown Santa Cruz. Make sure to hitch out of Santa Cruz instead of Capitola...or alternately, there is a bus for $3.00 from Santa Cruz to Monterrey. In Monterrey, the bus 24 for another $2.00 will take you to Barnyard shopping village in Carmel. The red lights there are an excellent place to catch rides as they are the last lights before the road turns into big sur area. Alot of drivers are headed all the way to L.A. with many cars full of young people, travelers, surfers. It took me literally 5 minutes to get a ride there, and i´m a 24 year old dude with long messy hair. Once in Big Sur hitchhiking is ridiculously easy and it is also an excellent place to camp for free on oceanside bluffs(as long as you are respectful).

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California can be difficult. It has been reported to take as long as 6 hours for someone to catch a ride. There are not many places for people to pull over, and Yuba City is a huge strip mall town that people just blast through on a multi lane road. Also it is a very conservative area. On the other hand, [[User:Thewindandrain]] has had nothing but easy experiences hitching around Yuba City and Williams.

== Experiences ==
''The difference between hitching in the mountainous areas and the valley is like night and day. While the mountainous areas in any region of the state are very easy, hitchhiking in the valley can be a challenge at times. '''California''' has many of the best swimming holes in America, an excellent climate, and a virtually unlimited selection of hiking opportunities. A fan of the outdoors could spend a lifetime exploring here.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 23:33, 1 June 2013 (CEST)

''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!

:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take Highway 1. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on Highway 1, swhere the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on I-15."

Experience Nov. 2012
:I hitched from southern Oregon to Texas without any problems except one in Westmorland, CA.  I was standing on the edge of the shoulder of highway 86 on the south end of this rural small community when approached by two aggrevated and aggressive Imperial County sheriffs.  They asked if i knew that it was [[illegal]] to hitchhike in California.  I told them it was not.  Minutes of arguing later they retrieved their citation book and showed me the law shown above that you can not hitch on roadway.  I asked them to show me the state definition of a roadway.  This upset them.  Veins bulging and spit spewing, they pointed to a business wall 40 feet away and said that's where the roadway ends.  They then grabbed their [[pepper spray]] and asked if I'd be walking back to town.  I complied and spent $1 for a bus to El Centro and continued on my way.  Pick your battles wisely and be safe out there.  ~nomadinexile

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.5]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>hx7u8hpdsf2r6ekjjvhetsnpprq8hmo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>72432</id>
      <parentid>70616</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-09-14T02:53:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Irningston</username>
        <id>3766</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15010">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]] |
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[Santa Barbara]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch, with many mexican immigrants, who wont give you the time of day, and many suburbanites, north of modesto the going gets much easier, and from yuba city north we got ride after ride. - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. Sonoma-north is all Redwoods, and it's beautiful...that is to say, if you have time to spare at all, do take the 1! Hitchhiking along the 1 north of San Francisco is not easy as there is little traffic, no on-ramps, no service stations, and very few stop lights. If you're lucky, you might find a construction site where all traffic has to stop and wait for five or ten minutes.

US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US.  ''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur and Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, the Redwoods and the Los Padres Forest are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Roads ==

*Shoulders
:Broad shoulders are common along many roadsides, giving people plenty of room to pull over for you. However, it is not uncommon to encounter places where shoulders have not been built or are prohibitively narrow.

*Pedestrian Rights
:All interstates and many major many four lane and even several two lane highways in California prohibit pedestrians.

*Interchanges
:[[split-traffic interchange|Split-traffic interchanges]] are all too common in California. Many interchanges also do not require drivers to slow down, which can lead to longer waiting times.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.


The following law is enforced more often:

21957.  No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of
soliciting a ride from the driver of any vehicle.

Definitions: 530.  A "roadway" is that portion of a highway improved, designed, or ordinarily used for vehicular travel.

As with other states where the roadway definition does not mention a shoulder, it might be wise to hitch from outside of the paved portion of the road.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Yosemite National Park
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

*Joshua Tree National Park
Hitchhiking is only permitted under exigent conditions where the health and safety of the person 
hitchhiking is in jeopardy.

*Mojave National Preserve
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Death Valley National Park
Hitchhiking, or the soliciting of transportation, is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person is off the paved roadway on the shoulder, and visitor safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected.

*Sequoia and King's Canyon National Parks
Hitchhiking is permitted when not standing in the roadway, and visitor safety and traffic flow must not be adversely affected.

*Golden Gate National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas: Marin County - Marin Headlands

*Point Reyes National Seashore
Hitchhiking is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person does not stand in a 
roadway and the hitchhiking/solicitation does not adversely affect visitor safety or the 
normal flow of traffic.

*Lassen Volcanic National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Whiskeytown National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is explicitly prohibited at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area

*Redwood National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. From the bay, hitching can be difficult but not impossible. You can alternately take public transit to the Diridon station in San Jose. There is a shuttle for $5.00 to Downtown Santa Cruz. Make sure to hitch out of Santa Cruz instead of Capitola...or alternately, there is a bus for $3.00 from Santa Cruz to Monterrey. In Monterrey, the bus 24 for another $2.00 will take you to Barnyard shopping village in Carmel. The red lights there are an excellent place to catch rides as they are the last lights before the road turns into big sur area. Alot of drivers are headed all the way to L.A. with many cars full of young people, travelers, surfers. It took me literally 5 minutes to get a ride there, and i´m a 24 year old dude with long messy hair. Once in Big Sur hitchhiking is ridiculously easy and it is also an excellent place to camp for free on oceanside bluffs(as long as you are respectful).

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California can be difficult. It has been reported to take as long as 6 hours for someone to catch a ride. There are not many places for people to pull over, and Yuba City is a huge strip mall town that people just blast through on a multi lane road. Also it is a very conservative area. On the other hand, [[User:Thewindandrain]] has had nothing but easy experiences hitching around Yuba City and Williams.

== Experiences ==
''The difference between hitching in the mountainous areas and the valley is like night and day. While the mountainous areas in any region of the state are very easy, hitchhiking in the valley can be a challenge at times. '''California''' has many of the best swimming holes in America, an excellent climate, and a virtually unlimited selection of hiking opportunities. A fan of the outdoors could spend a lifetime exploring here.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 23:33, 1 June 2013 (CEST)

''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!

:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take Highway 1. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on Highway 1, swhere the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on I-15."

Experience Nov. 2012
:I hitched from southern Oregon to Texas without any problems except one in Westmorland, CA.  I was standing on the edge of the shoulder of highway 86 on the south end of this rural small community when approached by two aggrevated and aggressive Imperial County sheriffs.  They asked if i knew that it was [[illegal]] to hitchhike in California.  I told them it was not.  Minutes of arguing later they retrieved their citation book and showed me the law shown above that you can not hitch on roadway.  I asked them to show me the state definition of a roadway.  This upset them.  Veins bulging and spit spewing, they pointed to a business wall 40 feet away and said that's where the roadway ends.  They then grabbed their [[pepper spray]] and asked if I'd be walking back to town.  I complied and spent $1 for a bus to El Centro and continued on my way.  Pick your battles wisely and be safe out there.  ~nomadinexile

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.5]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>tmhqlpbfnzmasr4id8pyvfen5s1mzav</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>73869</id>
      <parentid>72432</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-12-31T23:19:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Shannon</username>
        <id>11265</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="14990">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]] |
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[Santa Barbara]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch, with many mexican immigrants, who wont give you the time of day, and many suburbanites, north of modesto the going gets much easier, and from yuba city north we got ride after ride. - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. North of Sonoma is beautiful...that is to say, if you have time to spare at all, do take the 1! Hitchhiking along the 1 north of San Francisco is not easy as there is little traffic, no on-ramps, no service stations, and very few stop lights. If you're lucky, you might find a construction site where all traffic has to stop and wait for five or ten minutes.

US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US.  ''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur and Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, the Redwoods and the Los Padres Forest are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Roads ==

*Shoulders
:Broad shoulders are common along many roadsides, giving people plenty of room to pull over for you. However, it is not uncommon to encounter places where shoulders have not been built or are prohibitively narrow.

*Pedestrian Rights
:All interstates and many major many four lane and even several two lane highways in California prohibit pedestrians.

*Interchanges
:[[split-traffic interchange|Split-traffic interchanges]] are all too common in California. Many interchanges also do not require drivers to slow down, which can lead to longer waiting times.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.


The following law is enforced more often:

21957.  No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of
soliciting a ride from the driver of any vehicle.

Definitions: 530.  A "roadway" is that portion of a highway improved, designed, or ordinarily used for vehicular travel.

As with other states where the roadway definition does not mention a shoulder, it might be wise to hitch from outside of the paved portion of the road.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Yosemite National Park
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

*Joshua Tree National Park
Hitchhiking is only permitted under exigent conditions where the health and safety of the person 
hitchhiking is in jeopardy.

*Mojave National Preserve
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Death Valley National Park
Hitchhiking, or the soliciting of transportation, is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person is off the paved roadway on the shoulder, and visitor safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected.

*Sequoia and King's Canyon National Parks
Hitchhiking is permitted when not standing in the roadway, and visitor safety and traffic flow must not be adversely affected.

*Golden Gate National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas: Marin County - Marin Headlands

*Point Reyes National Seashore
Hitchhiking is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person does not stand in a 
roadway and the hitchhiking/solicitation does not adversely affect visitor safety or the 
normal flow of traffic.

*Lassen Volcanic National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Whiskeytown National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is explicitly prohibited at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area

*Redwood National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. From the bay, hitching can be difficult but not impossible. You can alternately take public transit to the Diridon station in San Jose. There is a shuttle for $5.00 to Downtown Santa Cruz. Make sure to hitch out of Santa Cruz instead of Capitola...or alternately, there is a bus for $3.00 from Santa Cruz to Monterrey. In Monterrey, the bus 24 for another $2.00 will take you to Barnyard shopping village in Carmel. The red lights there are an excellent place to catch rides as they are the last lights before the road turns into big sur area. Alot of drivers are headed all the way to L.A. with many cars full of young people, travelers, surfers. It took me literally 5 minutes to get a ride there, and i´m a 24 year old dude with long messy hair. Once in Big Sur hitchhiking is ridiculously easy and it is also an excellent place to camp for free on oceanside bluffs(as long as you are respectful).

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California can be difficult. It has been reported to take as long as 6 hours for someone to catch a ride. There are not many places for people to pull over, and Yuba City is a huge strip mall town that people just blast through on a multi lane road. Also it is a very conservative area. On the other hand, [[User:Thewindandrain]] has had nothing but easy experiences hitching around Yuba City and Williams.

== Experiences ==
''The difference between hitching in the mountainous areas and the valley is like night and day. While the mountainous areas in any region of the state are very easy, hitchhiking in the valley can be a challenge at times. '''California''' has many of the best swimming holes in America, an excellent climate, and a virtually unlimited selection of hiking opportunities. A fan of the outdoors could spend a lifetime exploring here.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 23:33, 1 June 2013 (CEST)

''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!

:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take Highway 1. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on Highway 1, swhere the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on I-15."

Experience Nov. 2012
:I hitched from southern Oregon to Texas without any problems except one in Westmorland, CA.  I was standing on the edge of the shoulder of highway 86 on the south end of this rural small community when approached by two aggrevated and aggressive Imperial County sheriffs.  They asked if i knew that it was [[illegal]] to hitchhike in California.  I told them it was not.  Minutes of arguing later they retrieved their citation book and showed me the law shown above that you can not hitch on roadway.  I asked them to show me the state definition of a roadway.  This upset them.  Veins bulging and spit spewing, they pointed to a business wall 40 feet away and said that's where the roadway ends.  They then grabbed their [[pepper spray]] and asked if I'd be walking back to town.  I complied and spent $1 for a bus to El Centro and continued on my way.  Pick your battles wisely and be safe out there.  ~nomadinexile

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.5]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>dz3vtpcdbubasz05qbzlhljrcfqzagn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>73870</id>
      <parentid>73869</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-12-31T23:25:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Shannon</username>
        <id>11265</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15087">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]] |
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[Santa Barbara]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch, with many mexican immigrants, who wont give you the time of day, and many suburbanites, north of modesto the going gets much easier, and from yuba city north we got ride after ride. - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. North of Sonoma is beautiful...that is to say, if you have time to spare at all, do take the 1! Hitchhiking along the 1 north of San Francisco is not easy as there is little traffic, no on-ramps, no service stations, and very few stop lights. If you're lucky, you might find a construction site where all traffic has to stop and wait for five or ten minutes.

US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US.  ''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur and Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, the Redwoods and the Los Padres Forest are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Roads ==

*Shoulders
:Broad shoulders are common along many roadsides, giving people plenty of room to pull over for you. However, it is not uncommon to encounter places where shoulders have not been built or are prohibitively narrow.

*Pedestrian Rights
:All interstates and many major many four lane and even several two lane highways in California prohibit pedestrians.

*Interchanges
:[[split-traffic interchange|Split-traffic interchanges]] are all too common in California. Many interchanges also do not require drivers to slow down, which can lead to longer waiting times.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.


The following law is enforced more often:

21957.  No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of
soliciting a ride from the driver of any vehicle.

Definitions: 530.  A "roadway" is that portion of a highway improved, designed, or ordinarily used for vehicular travel.

As with other states where the roadway definition does not mention a shoulder, it might be wise to hitch from outside of the paved portion of the road.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Yosemite National Park
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

*Joshua Tree National Park
Hitchhiking is only permitted under exigent conditions where the health and safety of the person 
hitchhiking is in jeopardy.

*Mojave National Preserve
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Death Valley National Park
Hitchhiking, or the soliciting of transportation, is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person is off the paved roadway on the shoulder, and visitor safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected.

*Sequoia and King's Canyon National Parks
Hitchhiking is permitted when not standing in the roadway, and visitor safety and traffic flow must not be adversely affected.

*Golden Gate National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas: Marin County - Marin Headlands

*Point Reyes National Seashore
Hitchhiking is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person does not stand in a 
roadway and the hitchhiking/solicitation does not adversely affect visitor safety or the 
normal flow of traffic.

*Lassen Volcanic National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Whiskeytown National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is explicitly prohibited at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area

*Redwood National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. From the bay, hitching can be difficult but not impossible. You can alternately take public transit to the Diridon station in San Jose. There is a shuttle for $5.00 to Downtown Santa Cruz. Make sure to hitch out of Santa Cruz instead of Capitola...or alternately, there is a bus for $3.00 from Santa Cruz to Monterrey. In Monterrey, the bus 24 for another $2.00 will take you to Barnyard shopping village in Carmel. The red lights there are an excellent place to catch rides as they are the last lights before the road turns into big sur area. Alot of drivers are headed all the way to L.A. with many cars full of young people, travelers, surfers. It took me literally 5 minutes to get a ride there, and i´m a 24 year old dude with long messy hair. Once in Big Sur hitchhiking is ridiculously easy and it is also an excellent place to camp for free on oceanside bluffs(as long as you are respectful).

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California can be difficult. It has been reported to take as long as 6 hours for someone to catch a ride. There are not many places for people to pull over, and Yuba City is a huge strip mall town that people just blast through on a multi lane road. If hitching from Yuba City, wait at the intersection of Hwys 20 &amp; 99. The 99 commuter bus runs between Yuba City and Sacramento, too. On the other hand, [[User:Thewindandrain]] has had nothing but easy experiences hitching around Yuba City and Williams.

== Experiences ==
''The difference between hitching in the mountainous areas and the valley is like night and day. While the mountainous areas in any region of the state are very easy, hitchhiking in the valley can be a challenge at times. '''California''' has many of the best swimming holes in America, an excellent climate, and a virtually unlimited selection of hiking opportunities. A fan of the outdoors could spend a lifetime exploring here.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 23:33, 1 June 2013 (CEST)

''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!

:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take Highway 1. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on Highway 1, swhere the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on I-15."

Experience Nov. 2012
:I hitched from southern Oregon to Texas without any problems except one in Westmorland, CA.  I was standing on the edge of the shoulder of highway 86 on the south end of this rural small community when approached by two aggrevated and aggressive Imperial County sheriffs.  They asked if i knew that it was [[illegal]] to hitchhike in California.  I told them it was not.  Minutes of arguing later they retrieved their citation book and showed me the law shown above that you can not hitch on roadway.  I asked them to show me the state definition of a roadway.  This upset them.  Veins bulging and spit spewing, they pointed to a business wall 40 feet away and said that's where the roadway ends.  They then grabbed their [[pepper spray]] and asked if I'd be walking back to town.  I complied and spent $1 for a bus to El Centro and continued on my way.  Pick your battles wisely and be safe out there.  ~nomadinexile

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.5]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>59vcvhx08ko4hdzlsfg2ksi36nqir1q</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>73871</id>
      <parentid>73870</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-01-01T00:02:48Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Shannon</username>
        <id>11265</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16633">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]] |
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[Santa Barbara]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch, with many mexican immigrants, who wont give you the time of day, and many suburbanites, north of modesto the going gets much easier, and from yuba city north we got ride after ride. - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. North of Sonoma is beautiful...that is to say, if you have time to spare at all, do take the 1! Hitchhiking along the 1 north of San Francisco is not easy as there is little traffic, no on-ramps, no service stations, and very few stop lights. If you're lucky, you might find a construction site where all traffic has to stop and wait for five or ten minutes.

US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US.  ''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur and Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, the Redwoods and the Los Padres Forest are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Roads ==

*Shoulders
:Broad shoulders are common along many roadsides, giving people plenty of room to pull over for you. However, it is not uncommon to encounter places where shoulders have not been built or are prohibitively narrow.

*Pedestrian Rights
:All interstates and many major many four lane and even several two lane highways in California prohibit pedestrians.

*Interchanges
:[[split-traffic interchange|Split-traffic interchanges]] are all too common in California. Many interchanges also do not require drivers to slow down, which can lead to longer waiting times.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.


The following law is enforced more often:

21957.  No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of
soliciting a ride from the driver of any vehicle.

Definitions: 530.  A "roadway" is that portion of a highway improved, designed, or ordinarily used for vehicular travel.

As with other states where the roadway definition does not mention a shoulder, it might be wise to hitch from outside of the paved portion of the road.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Yosemite National Park
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

*Joshua Tree National Park
Hitchhiking is only permitted under exigent conditions where the health and safety of the person 
hitchhiking is in jeopardy.

*Mojave National Preserve
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Death Valley National Park
Hitchhiking, or the soliciting of transportation, is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person is off the paved roadway on the shoulder, and visitor safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected.

*Sequoia and King's Canyon National Parks
Hitchhiking is permitted when not standing in the roadway, and visitor safety and traffic flow must not be adversely affected.

*Golden Gate National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas: Marin County - Marin Headlands

*Point Reyes National Seashore
Hitchhiking is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person does not stand in a 
roadway and the hitchhiking/solicitation does not adversely affect visitor safety or the 
normal flow of traffic.

*Lassen Volcanic National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Whiskeytown National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is explicitly prohibited at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area

*Redwood National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. From the bay, hitching can be difficult but not impossible. You can alternately take public transit to the Diridon station in San Jose. There is a shuttle for $5.00 to Downtown Santa Cruz. Make sure to hitch out of Santa Cruz instead of Capitola...or alternately, there is a bus for $3.00 from Santa Cruz to Monterrey. In Monterrey, the bus 24 for another $2.00 will take you to Barnyard shopping village in Carmel. The red lights there are an excellent place to catch rides as they are the last lights before the road turns into big sur area. Alot of drivers are headed all the way to L.A. with many cars full of young people, travelers, surfers. It took me literally 5 minutes to get a ride there, and i´m a 24 year old dude with long messy hair. Once in Big Sur hitchhiking is ridiculously easy and it is also an excellent place to camp for free on oceanside bluffs(as long as you are respectful).

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California can be difficult. It has been reported to take as long as 6 hours for someone to catch a ride. There are not many places for people to pull over, and Yuba City is a huge strip mall town that people just blast through on a multi lane road. If hitching from Yuba City, wait at the intersection of Hwys 20 &amp; 99. The 99 commuter bus runs between Yuba City and Sacramento, too. On the other hand, [[User:Thewindandrain]] has had nothing but easy experiences hitching around Yuba City and Williams.

== Experiences ==
''The difference between hitching in the mountainous areas and the valley is like night and day. While the mountainous areas in any region of the state are very easy, hitchhiking in the valley can be a challenge at times. '''California''' has many of the best swimming holes in America, an excellent climate, and a virtually unlimited selection of hiking opportunities. A fan of the outdoors could spend a lifetime exploring here.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 23:33, 1 June 2013 (CEST)

''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!

--Shannon: In SoCal, one just has to transit as far from the city as possible before attempting to hitch. Northbound, take the commuter bus from downtown LA Union Station to Valencia and hitch I-5 from there. Eastbound, Metrolink (~$13 from Union Station) to the truck stops along Fontana, Rialto, San Bernadino, etc. Hitching will get easier once you hit the desert in Indio, home to better truck stops, and a departure point for Niland/Slab City. Ontario is known for "lot lizards" and other urban truck-stop crime. It takes a long time, but one can transit through Los Angeles to Orange and San Diego Counties, all the way down to Mexico. See also Nick Cophee's excellent thread on "hitching in SoCal" on Squat the Planet. 

Northern California: If hitching north or east out of the Bay, the University Ave onramp in Berkeley is GOLD. The Octavia Ave onramp for the 101 south and 80 east seems to the best in SF. In Sacramento, the 16th St onramp is alright for commuting to the Bay (just stand on the left  side of the road, not by the onramp post, and hold your sign high), but hitching north or south will take a long long while to happen--if you can get rides from friends in the area, go to Lodi if heading further south, the Dunnigan truck stop if northbound, but otherwise consider Megabus, Union Pacific, or hitching from the Bay. If you're in the Shasta area, check out the regional bus system--you're more likely to get a quick ride from hippie-friendly towns like Mt Shasta and Weed than more conservative places such as Dunsmuir. 

:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take Highway 1. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on Highway 1, where the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on I-15."

Experience Nov. 2012
:I hitched from southern Oregon to Texas without any problems except one in Westmorland, CA.  I was standing on the edge of the shoulder of highway 86 on the south end of this rural small community when approached by two aggrevated and aggressive Imperial County sheriffs.  They asked if i knew that it was [[illegal]] to hitchhike in California.  I told them it was not.  Minutes of arguing later they retrieved their citation book and showed me the law shown above that you can not hitch on roadway.  I asked them to show me the state definition of a roadway.  This upset them.  Veins bulging and spit spewing, they pointed to a business wall 40 feet away and said that's where the roadway ends.  They then grabbed their [[pepper spray]] and asked if I'd be walking back to town.  I complied and spent $1 for a bus to El Centro and continued on my way.  Pick your battles wisely and be safe out there.  ~nomadinexile

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.5]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>ct5ufn7qkcqly6hby9si4vuyc495irg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>73872</id>
      <parentid>73871</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-01-01T00:04:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Shannon</username>
        <id>11265</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="15087">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]] |
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[Santa Barbara]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch, with many mexican immigrants, who wont give you the time of day, and many suburbanites, north of modesto the going gets much easier, and from yuba city north we got ride after ride. - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. North of Sonoma is beautiful...that is to say, if you have time to spare at all, do take the 1! Hitchhiking along the 1 north of San Francisco is not easy as there is little traffic, no on-ramps, no service stations, and very few stop lights. If you're lucky, you might find a construction site where all traffic has to stop and wait for five or ten minutes.

US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US.  ''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur and Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, the Redwoods and the Los Padres Forest are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Roads ==

*Shoulders
:Broad shoulders are common along many roadsides, giving people plenty of room to pull over for you. However, it is not uncommon to encounter places where shoulders have not been built or are prohibitively narrow.

*Pedestrian Rights
:All interstates and many major many four lane and even several two lane highways in California prohibit pedestrians.

*Interchanges
:[[split-traffic interchange|Split-traffic interchanges]] are all too common in California. Many interchanges also do not require drivers to slow down, which can lead to longer waiting times.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.


The following law is enforced more often:

21957.  No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of
soliciting a ride from the driver of any vehicle.

Definitions: 530.  A "roadway" is that portion of a highway improved, designed, or ordinarily used for vehicular travel.

As with other states where the roadway definition does not mention a shoulder, it might be wise to hitch from outside of the paved portion of the road.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Yosemite National Park
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

*Joshua Tree National Park
Hitchhiking is only permitted under exigent conditions where the health and safety of the person 
hitchhiking is in jeopardy.

*Mojave National Preserve
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Death Valley National Park
Hitchhiking, or the soliciting of transportation, is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person is off the paved roadway on the shoulder, and visitor safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected.

*Sequoia and King's Canyon National Parks
Hitchhiking is permitted when not standing in the roadway, and visitor safety and traffic flow must not be adversely affected.

*Golden Gate National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas: Marin County - Marin Headlands

*Point Reyes National Seashore
Hitchhiking is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person does not stand in a 
roadway and the hitchhiking/solicitation does not adversely affect visitor safety or the 
normal flow of traffic.

*Lassen Volcanic National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Whiskeytown National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is explicitly prohibited at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area

*Redwood National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

== Various ==
Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. From the bay, hitching can be difficult but not impossible. You can alternately take public transit to the Diridon station in San Jose. There is a shuttle for $5.00 to Downtown Santa Cruz. Make sure to hitch out of Santa Cruz instead of Capitola...or alternately, there is a bus for $3.00 from Santa Cruz to Monterrey. In Monterrey, the bus 24 for another $2.00 will take you to Barnyard shopping village in Carmel. The red lights there are an excellent place to catch rides as they are the last lights before the road turns into big sur area. Alot of drivers are headed all the way to L.A. with many cars full of young people, travelers, surfers. It took me literally 5 minutes to get a ride there, and i´m a 24 year old dude with long messy hair. Once in Big Sur hitchhiking is ridiculously easy and it is also an excellent place to camp for free on oceanside bluffs(as long as you are respectful).

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California can be difficult. It has been reported to take as long as 6 hours for someone to catch a ride. There are not many places for people to pull over, and Yuba City is a huge strip mall town that people just blast through on a multi lane road. If hitching from Yuba City, wait at the intersection of Hwys 20 &amp; 99. The 99 commuter bus runs between Yuba City and Sacramento, too. On the other hand, [[User:Thewindandrain]] has had nothing but easy experiences hitching around Yuba City and Williams.

== Experiences ==
''The difference between hitching in the mountainous areas and the valley is like night and day. While the mountainous areas in any region of the state are very easy, hitchhiking in the valley can be a challenge at times. '''California''' has many of the best swimming holes in America, an excellent climate, and a virtually unlimited selection of hiking opportunities. A fan of the outdoors could spend a lifetime exploring here.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 23:33, 1 June 2013 (CEST)

''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!


:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take Highway 1. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on Highway 1, where the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on I-15."

Experience Nov. 2012
:I hitched from southern Oregon to Texas without any problems except one in Westmorland, CA.  I was standing on the edge of the shoulder of highway 86 on the south end of this rural small community when approached by two aggrevated and aggressive Imperial County sheriffs.  They asked if i knew that it was [[illegal]] to hitchhike in California.  I told them it was not.  Minutes of arguing later they retrieved their citation book and showed me the law shown above that you can not hitch on roadway.  I asked them to show me the state definition of a roadway.  This upset them.  Veins bulging and spit spewing, they pointed to a business wall 40 feet away and said that's where the roadway ends.  They then grabbed their [[pepper spray]] and asked if I'd be walking back to town.  I complied and spent $1 for a bus to El Centro and continued on my way.  Pick your battles wisely and be safe out there.  ~nomadinexile

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.5]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>9o3ev8fxg569rf3jmacb9q63tcdge3s</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>73873</id>
      <parentid>73872</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-01-01T00:06:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Shannon</username>
        <id>11265</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16624">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterrey]] |
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[Santa Barbara]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch, with many mexican immigrants, who wont give you the time of day, and many suburbanites, north of modesto the going gets much easier, and from yuba city north we got ride after ride. - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. North of Sonoma is beautiful...that is to say, if you have time to spare at all, do take the 1! Hitchhiking along the 1 north of San Francisco is not easy as there is little traffic, no on-ramps, no service stations, and very few stop lights. If you're lucky, you might find a construction site where all traffic has to stop and wait for five or ten minutes.

US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US.  ''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur and Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, the Redwoods and the Los Padres Forest are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Roads ==

*Shoulders
:Broad shoulders are common along many roadsides, giving people plenty of room to pull over for you. However, it is not uncommon to encounter places where shoulders have not been built or are prohibitively narrow.

*Pedestrian Rights
:All interstates and many major many four lane and even several two lane highways in California prohibit pedestrians.

*Interchanges
:[[split-traffic interchange|Split-traffic interchanges]] are all too common in California. Many interchanges also do not require drivers to slow down, which can lead to longer waiting times.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.


The following law is enforced more often:

21957.  No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of
soliciting a ride from the driver of any vehicle.

Definitions: 530.  A "roadway" is that portion of a highway improved, designed, or ordinarily used for vehicular travel.

As with other states where the roadway definition does not mention a shoulder, it might be wise to hitch from outside of the paved portion of the road.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Yosemite National Park
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

*Joshua Tree National Park
Hitchhiking is only permitted under exigent conditions where the health and safety of the person 
hitchhiking is in jeopardy.

*Mojave National Preserve
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Death Valley National Park
Hitchhiking, or the soliciting of transportation, is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person is off the paved roadway on the shoulder, and visitor safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected.

*Sequoia and King's Canyon National Parks
Hitchhiking is permitted when not standing in the roadway, and visitor safety and traffic flow must not be adversely affected.

*Golden Gate National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas: Marin County - Marin Headlands

*Point Reyes National Seashore
Hitchhiking is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person does not stand in a 
roadway and the hitchhiking/solicitation does not adversely affect visitor safety or the 
normal flow of traffic.

*Lassen Volcanic National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Whiskeytown National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is explicitly prohibited at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area

*Redwood National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

== Various ==

In SoCal, one just has to transit as far from the city as possible before attempting to hitch. Northbound, take the commuter bus from downtown LA Union Station to Valencia and hitch I-5 from there. Eastbound, Metrolink (~$13 from Union Station) to the truck stops along Fontana, Rialto, San Bernadino, etc. Hitching will get easier once you hit the desert in Indio, home to better truck stops, and a departure point for Niland/Slab City. Ontario is known for "lot lizards" and other urban truck-stop crime. It takes a long time, but one can transit through Los Angeles to Orange and San Diego Counties, all the way down to Mexico. See also Nick Cophee's excellent thread on "hitching in SoCal" on Squat the Planet. 

Northern California: If hitching north or east out of the Bay, the University Ave onramp in Berkeley is GOLD. The Octavia Ave onramp for the 101 south and 80 east seems to the best in SF. In Sacramento, the 16th St onramp is alright for commuting to the Bay (just stand on the left  side of the road, not by the onramp post, and hold your sign high), but hitching north or south will take a long long while to happen--if you can get rides from friends in the area, go to Lodi if heading further south, the Dunnigan truck stop if northbound, but otherwise consider Megabus, Union Pacific, or hitching from the Bay. If you're in the Shasta area, check out the regional bus system--you're more likely to get a quick ride from hippie-friendly towns like Mt Shasta and Weed than more conservative places such as Dunsmuir. 

Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. From the bay, hitching can be difficult but not impossible. You can alternately take public transit to the Diridon station in San Jose. There is a shuttle for $5.00 to Downtown Santa Cruz. Make sure to hitch out of Santa Cruz instead of Capitola...or alternately, there is a bus for $3.00 from Santa Cruz to Monterrey. In Monterrey, the bus 24 for another $2.00 will take you to Barnyard shopping village in Carmel. The red lights there are an excellent place to catch rides as they are the last lights before the road turns into big sur area. Alot of drivers are headed all the way to L.A. with many cars full of young people, travelers, surfers. It took me literally 5 minutes to get a ride there, and i´m a 24 year old dude with long messy hair. Once in Big Sur hitchhiking is ridiculously easy and it is also an excellent place to camp for free on oceanside bluffs(as long as you are respectful).

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California can be difficult. It has been reported to take as long as 6 hours for someone to catch a ride. There are not many places for people to pull over, and Yuba City is a huge strip mall town that people just blast through on a multi lane road. If hitching from Yuba City, wait at the intersection of Hwys 20 &amp; 99. The 99 commuter bus runs between Yuba City and Sacramento, too. On the other hand, [[User:Thewindandrain]] has had nothing but easy experiences hitching around Yuba City and Williams.

== Experiences ==
''The difference between hitching in the mountainous areas and the valley is like night and day. While the mountainous areas in any region of the state are very easy, hitchhiking in the valley can be a challenge at times. '''California''' has many of the best swimming holes in America, an excellent climate, and a virtually unlimited selection of hiking opportunities. A fan of the outdoors could spend a lifetime exploring here.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 23:33, 1 June 2013 (CEST)

''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!


:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take Highway 1. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on Highway 1, where the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on I-15."

Experience Nov. 2012
:I hitched from southern Oregon to Texas without any problems except one in Westmorland, CA.  I was standing on the edge of the shoulder of highway 86 on the south end of this rural small community when approached by two aggrevated and aggressive Imperial County sheriffs.  They asked if i knew that it was [[illegal]] to hitchhike in California.  I told them it was not.  Minutes of arguing later they retrieved their citation book and showed me the law shown above that you can not hitch on roadway.  I asked them to show me the state definition of a roadway.  This upset them.  Veins bulging and spit spewing, they pointed to a business wall 40 feet away and said that's where the roadway ends.  They then grabbed their [[pepper spray]] and asked if I'd be walking back to town.  I complied and spent $1 for a bus to El Centro and continued on my way.  Pick your battles wisely and be safe out there.  ~nomadinexile

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.5]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>25gubuvjpzim7b32ky3ocw0d9m4pm4w</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>74146</id>
      <parentid>73873</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-01-29T21:15:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>SpamBucket</username>
        <id>24368</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16623">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterey]] |
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[Santa Barbara]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch, with many mexican immigrants, who wont give you the time of day, and many suburbanites, north of modesto the going gets much easier, and from yuba city north we got ride after ride. - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. North of Sonoma is beautiful...that is to say, if you have time to spare at all, do take the 1! Hitchhiking along the 1 north of San Francisco is not easy as there is little traffic, no on-ramps, no service stations, and very few stop lights. If you're lucky, you might find a construction site where all traffic has to stop and wait for five or ten minutes.

US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US.  ''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur and Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, the Redwoods and the Los Padres Forest are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Roads ==

*Shoulders
:Broad shoulders are common along many roadsides, giving people plenty of room to pull over for you. However, it is not uncommon to encounter places where shoulders have not been built or are prohibitively narrow.

*Pedestrian Rights
:All interstates and many major many four lane and even several two lane highways in California prohibit pedestrians.

*Interchanges
:[[split-traffic interchange|Split-traffic interchanges]] are all too common in California. Many interchanges also do not require drivers to slow down, which can lead to longer waiting times.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.


The following law is enforced more often:

21957.  No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of
soliciting a ride from the driver of any vehicle.

Definitions: 530.  A "roadway" is that portion of a highway improved, designed, or ordinarily used for vehicular travel.

As with other states where the roadway definition does not mention a shoulder, it might be wise to hitch from outside of the paved portion of the road.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Yosemite National Park
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

*Joshua Tree National Park
Hitchhiking is only permitted under exigent conditions where the health and safety of the person 
hitchhiking is in jeopardy.

*Mojave National Preserve
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Death Valley National Park
Hitchhiking, or the soliciting of transportation, is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person is off the paved roadway on the shoulder, and visitor safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected.

*Sequoia and King's Canyon National Parks
Hitchhiking is permitted when not standing in the roadway, and visitor safety and traffic flow must not be adversely affected.

*Golden Gate National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas: Marin County - Marin Headlands

*Point Reyes National Seashore
Hitchhiking is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person does not stand in a 
roadway and the hitchhiking/solicitation does not adversely affect visitor safety or the 
normal flow of traffic.

*Lassen Volcanic National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Whiskeytown National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is explicitly prohibited at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area

*Redwood National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

== Various ==

In SoCal, one just has to transit as far from the city as possible before attempting to hitch. Northbound, take the commuter bus from downtown LA Union Station to Valencia and hitch I-5 from there. Eastbound, Metrolink (~$13 from Union Station) to the truck stops along Fontana, Rialto, San Bernadino, etc. Hitching will get easier once you hit the desert in Indio, home to better truck stops, and a departure point for Niland/Slab City. Ontario is known for "lot lizards" and other urban truck-stop crime. It takes a long time, but one can transit through Los Angeles to Orange and San Diego Counties, all the way down to Mexico. See also Nick Cophee's excellent thread on "hitching in SoCal" on Squat the Planet. 

Northern California: If hitching north or east out of the Bay, the University Ave onramp in Berkeley is GOLD. The Octavia Ave onramp for the 101 south and 80 east seems to the best in SF. In Sacramento, the 16th St onramp is alright for commuting to the Bay (just stand on the left  side of the road, not by the onramp post, and hold your sign high), but hitching north or south will take a long long while to happen--if you can get rides from friends in the area, go to Lodi if heading further south, the Dunnigan truck stop if northbound, but otherwise consider Megabus, Union Pacific, or hitching from the Bay. If you're in the Shasta area, check out the regional bus system--you're more likely to get a quick ride from hippie-friendly towns like Mt Shasta and Weed than more conservative places such as Dunsmuir. 

Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. From the bay, hitching can be difficult but not impossible. You can alternately take public transit to the Diridon station in San Jose. There is a shuttle for $5.00 to Downtown Santa Cruz. Make sure to hitch out of Santa Cruz instead of Capitola...or alternately, there is a bus for $3.00 from Santa Cruz to Monterrey. In Monterrey, the bus 24 for another $2.00 will take you to Barnyard shopping village in Carmel. The red lights there are an excellent place to catch rides as they are the last lights before the road turns into big sur area. Alot of drivers are headed all the way to L.A. with many cars full of young people, travelers, surfers. It took me literally 5 minutes to get a ride there, and i´m a 24 year old dude with long messy hair. Once in Big Sur hitchhiking is ridiculously easy and it is also an excellent place to camp for free on oceanside bluffs(as long as you are respectful).

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California can be difficult. It has been reported to take as long as 6 hours for someone to catch a ride. There are not many places for people to pull over, and Yuba City is a huge strip mall town that people just blast through on a multi lane road. If hitching from Yuba City, wait at the intersection of Hwys 20 &amp; 99. The 99 commuter bus runs between Yuba City and Sacramento, too. On the other hand, [[User:Thewindandrain]] has had nothing but easy experiences hitching around Yuba City and Williams.

== Experiences ==
''The difference between hitching in the mountainous areas and the valley is like night and day. While the mountainous areas in any region of the state are very easy, hitchhiking in the valley can be a challenge at times. '''California''' has many of the best swimming holes in America, an excellent climate, and a virtually unlimited selection of hiking opportunities. A fan of the outdoors could spend a lifetime exploring here.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 23:33, 1 June 2013 (CEST)

''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!


:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take Highway 1. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on Highway 1, where the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on I-15."

Experience Nov. 2012
:I hitched from southern Oregon to Texas without any problems except one in Westmorland, CA.  I was standing on the edge of the shoulder of highway 86 on the south end of this rural small community when approached by two aggrevated and aggressive Imperial County sheriffs.  They asked if i knew that it was [[illegal]] to hitchhike in California.  I told them it was not.  Minutes of arguing later they retrieved their citation book and showed me the law shown above that you can not hitch on roadway.  I asked them to show me the state definition of a roadway.  This upset them.  Veins bulging and spit spewing, they pointed to a business wall 40 feet away and said that's where the roadway ends.  They then grabbed their [[pepper spray]] and asked if I'd be walking back to town.  I complied and spent $1 for a bus to El Centro and continued on my way.  Pick your battles wisely and be safe out there.  ~nomadinexile

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.5]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>46f83yxdfezti7i2nkk6lowxjs9tfvl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>74147</id>
      <parentid>74146</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-01-29T21:19:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>SpamBucket</username>
        <id>24368</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16446">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterey]] |
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[Santa Barbara]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch). - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. 

North of Sonoma is beautiful...that is to say, if you have time to spare at all, do take the 1! 

Hitchhiking along the 1 north of San Francisco is not easy as there is little traffic, no on-ramps, no service stations, and very few stop lights. If you're lucky, you might find a construction site where all traffic has to stop and wait for five or ten minutes.

US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US.  ''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur and Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, the Redwoods and the Los Padres Forest are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Roads ==

*Shoulders
:Broad shoulders are common along many roadsides, giving people plenty of room to pull over for you. However, it is not uncommon to encounter places where shoulders have not been built or are prohibitively narrow.

*Pedestrian Rights
:All interstates and many major many four lane and even several two lane highways in California prohibit pedestrians.

*Interchanges
:[[split-traffic interchange|Split-traffic interchanges]] are all too common in California. Many interchanges also do not require drivers to slow down, which can lead to longer waiting times.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.


The following law is enforced more often:

21957.  No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of
soliciting a ride from the driver of any vehicle.

Definitions: 530.  A "roadway" is that portion of a highway improved, designed, or ordinarily used for vehicular travel.

As with other states where the roadway definition does not mention a shoulder, it might be wise to hitch from outside of the paved portion of the road.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Yosemite National Park
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

*Joshua Tree National Park
Hitchhiking is only permitted under exigent conditions where the health and safety of the person 
hitchhiking is in jeopardy.

*Mojave National Preserve
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Death Valley National Park
Hitchhiking, or the soliciting of transportation, is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person is off the paved roadway on the shoulder, and visitor safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected.

*Sequoia and King's Canyon National Parks
Hitchhiking is permitted when not standing in the roadway, and visitor safety and traffic flow must not be adversely affected.

*Golden Gate National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas: Marin County - Marin Headlands

*Point Reyes National Seashore
Hitchhiking is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person does not stand in a 
roadway and the hitchhiking/solicitation does not adversely affect visitor safety or the 
normal flow of traffic.

*Lassen Volcanic National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Whiskeytown National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is explicitly prohibited at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area

*Redwood National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

== Various ==

In SoCal, one just has to transit as far from the city as possible before attempting to hitch. Northbound, take the commuter bus from downtown LA Union Station to Valencia and hitch I-5 from there. Eastbound, Metrolink (~$13 from Union Station) to the truck stops along Fontana, Rialto, San Bernadino, etc. Hitching will get easier once you hit the desert in Indio, home to better truck stops, and a departure point for Niland/Slab City. Ontario is known for "lot lizards" and other urban truck-stop crime. It takes a long time, but one can transit through Los Angeles to Orange and San Diego Counties, all the way down to Mexico. See also Nick Cophee's excellent thread on "hitching in SoCal" on Squat the Planet. 

Northern California: If hitching north or east out of the Bay, the University Ave onramp in Berkeley is GOLD. The Octavia Ave onramp for the 101 south and 80 east seems to the best in SF. In Sacramento, the 16th St onramp is alright for commuting to the Bay (just stand on the left  side of the road, not by the onramp post, and hold your sign high), but hitching north or south will take a long long while to happen--if you can get rides from friends in the area, go to Lodi if heading further south, the Dunnigan truck stop if northbound, but otherwise consider Megabus, Union Pacific, or hitching from the Bay. If you're in the Shasta area, check out the regional bus system--you're more likely to get a quick ride from hippie-friendly towns like Mt Shasta and Weed than more conservative places such as Dunsmuir. 

Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. From the bay, hitching can be difficult but not impossible. You can alternately take public transit to the Diridon station in San Jose. There is a shuttle for $5.00 to Downtown Santa Cruz. Make sure to hitch out of Santa Cruz instead of Capitola...or alternately, there is a bus for $3.00 from Santa Cruz to Monterrey. In Monterrey, the bus 24 for another $2.00 will take you to Barnyard shopping village in Carmel. The red lights there are an excellent place to catch rides as they are the last lights before the road turns into big sur area. Alot of drivers are headed all the way to L.A. with many cars full of young people, travelers, surfers. It took me literally 5 minutes to get a ride there, and i´m a 24 year old dude with long messy hair. Once in Big Sur hitchhiking is ridiculously easy and it is also an excellent place to camp for free on oceanside bluffs(as long as you are respectful).

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California can be difficult. It has been reported to take as long as 6 hours for someone to catch a ride. There are not many places for people to pull over, and Yuba City is a huge strip mall town that people just blast through on a multi lane road. If hitching from Yuba City, wait at the intersection of Hwys 20 &amp; 99. The 99 commuter bus runs between Yuba City and Sacramento, too. On the other hand, [[User:Thewindandrain]] has had nothing but easy experiences hitching around Yuba City and Williams.

== Experiences ==
''The difference between hitching in the mountainous areas and the valley is like night and day. While the mountainous areas in any region of the state are very easy, hitchhiking in the valley can be a challenge at times. '''California''' has many of the best swimming holes in America, an excellent climate, and a virtually unlimited selection of hiking opportunities. A fan of the outdoors could spend a lifetime exploring here.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 23:33, 1 June 2013 (CEST)

''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!


:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take Highway 1. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on Highway 1, where the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on I-15."

Experience Nov. 2012
:I hitched from southern Oregon to Texas without any problems except one in Westmorland, CA.  I was standing on the edge of the shoulder of highway 86 on the south end of this rural small community when approached by two aggrevated and aggressive Imperial County sheriffs.  They asked if i knew that it was [[illegal]] to hitchhike in California.  I told them it was not.  Minutes of arguing later they retrieved their citation book and showed me the law shown above that you can not hitch on roadway.  I asked them to show me the state definition of a roadway.  This upset them.  Veins bulging and spit spewing, they pointed to a business wall 40 feet away and said that's where the roadway ends.  They then grabbed their [[pepper spray]] and asked if I'd be walking back to town.  I complied and spent $1 for a bus to El Centro and continued on my way.  Pick your battles wisely and be safe out there.  ~nomadinexile

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.5]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>1q96s2cp2994vffyxnp0ftbma8qs2wk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>74148</id>
      <parentid>74147</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-01-29T21:21:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>SpamBucket</username>
        <id>24368</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16460">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Central Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterey]] | [[Big Sur]] |
'''South Coast'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[Santa Barbara]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch). - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. 

North of Sonoma is beautiful...that is to say, if you have time to spare at all, do take the 1! 

Hitchhiking along the 1 north of San Francisco is not easy as there is little traffic, no on-ramps, no service stations, and very few stop lights. If you're lucky, you might find a construction site where all traffic has to stop and wait for five or ten minutes.

US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US.  ''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur and Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, the Redwoods and the Los Padres Forest are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Roads ==

*Shoulders
:Broad shoulders are common along many roadsides, giving people plenty of room to pull over for you. However, it is not uncommon to encounter places where shoulders have not been built or are prohibitively narrow.

*Pedestrian Rights
:All interstates and many major many four lane and even several two lane highways in California prohibit pedestrians.

*Interchanges
:[[split-traffic interchange|Split-traffic interchanges]] are all too common in California. Many interchanges also do not require drivers to slow down, which can lead to longer waiting times.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.


The following law is enforced more often:

21957.  No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of
soliciting a ride from the driver of any vehicle.

Definitions: 530.  A "roadway" is that portion of a highway improved, designed, or ordinarily used for vehicular travel.

As with other states where the roadway definition does not mention a shoulder, it might be wise to hitch from outside of the paved portion of the road.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Yosemite National Park
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

*Joshua Tree National Park
Hitchhiking is only permitted under exigent conditions where the health and safety of the person 
hitchhiking is in jeopardy.

*Mojave National Preserve
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Death Valley National Park
Hitchhiking, or the soliciting of transportation, is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person is off the paved roadway on the shoulder, and visitor safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected.

*Sequoia and King's Canyon National Parks
Hitchhiking is permitted when not standing in the roadway, and visitor safety and traffic flow must not be adversely affected.

*Golden Gate National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas: Marin County - Marin Headlands

*Point Reyes National Seashore
Hitchhiking is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person does not stand in a 
roadway and the hitchhiking/solicitation does not adversely affect visitor safety or the 
normal flow of traffic.

*Lassen Volcanic National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Whiskeytown National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is explicitly prohibited at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area

*Redwood National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

== Various ==

In SoCal, one just has to transit as far from the city as possible before attempting to hitch. Northbound, take the commuter bus from downtown LA Union Station to Valencia and hitch I-5 from there. Eastbound, Metrolink (~$13 from Union Station) to the truck stops along Fontana, Rialto, San Bernadino, etc. Hitching will get easier once you hit the desert in Indio, home to better truck stops, and a departure point for Niland/Slab City. Ontario is known for "lot lizards" and other urban truck-stop crime. It takes a long time, but one can transit through Los Angeles to Orange and San Diego Counties, all the way down to Mexico. See also Nick Cophee's excellent thread on "hitching in SoCal" on Squat the Planet. 

Northern California: If hitching north or east out of the Bay, the University Ave onramp in Berkeley is GOLD. The Octavia Ave onramp for the 101 south and 80 east seems to the best in SF. In Sacramento, the 16th St onramp is alright for commuting to the Bay (just stand on the left  side of the road, not by the onramp post, and hold your sign high), but hitching north or south will take a long long while to happen--if you can get rides from friends in the area, go to Lodi if heading further south, the Dunnigan truck stop if northbound, but otherwise consider Megabus, Union Pacific, or hitching from the Bay. If you're in the Shasta area, check out the regional bus system--you're more likely to get a quick ride from hippie-friendly towns like Mt Shasta and Weed than more conservative places such as Dunsmuir. 

Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. From the bay, hitching can be difficult but not impossible. You can alternately take public transit to the Diridon station in San Jose. There is a shuttle for $5.00 to Downtown Santa Cruz. Make sure to hitch out of Santa Cruz instead of Capitola...or alternately, there is a bus for $3.00 from Santa Cruz to Monterrey. In Monterrey, the bus 24 for another $2.00 will take you to Barnyard shopping village in Carmel. The red lights there are an excellent place to catch rides as they are the last lights before the road turns into big sur area. Alot of drivers are headed all the way to L.A. with many cars full of young people, travelers, surfers. It took me literally 5 minutes to get a ride there, and i´m a 24 year old dude with long messy hair. Once in Big Sur hitchhiking is ridiculously easy and it is also an excellent place to camp for free on oceanside bluffs(as long as you are respectful).

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California can be difficult. It has been reported to take as long as 6 hours for someone to catch a ride. There are not many places for people to pull over, and Yuba City is a huge strip mall town that people just blast through on a multi lane road. If hitching from Yuba City, wait at the intersection of Hwys 20 &amp; 99. The 99 commuter bus runs between Yuba City and Sacramento, too. On the other hand, [[User:Thewindandrain]] has had nothing but easy experiences hitching around Yuba City and Williams.

== Experiences ==
''The difference between hitching in the mountainous areas and the valley is like night and day. While the mountainous areas in any region of the state are very easy, hitchhiking in the valley can be a challenge at times. '''California''' has many of the best swimming holes in America, an excellent climate, and a virtually unlimited selection of hiking opportunities. A fan of the outdoors could spend a lifetime exploring here.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 23:33, 1 June 2013 (CEST)

''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!


:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take Highway 1. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on Highway 1, where the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on I-15."

Experience Nov. 2012
:I hitched from southern Oregon to Texas without any problems except one in Westmorland, CA.  I was standing on the edge of the shoulder of highway 86 on the south end of this rural small community when approached by two aggrevated and aggressive Imperial County sheriffs.  They asked if i knew that it was [[illegal]] to hitchhike in California.  I told them it was not.  Minutes of arguing later they retrieved their citation book and showed me the law shown above that you can not hitch on roadway.  I asked them to show me the state definition of a roadway.  This upset them.  Veins bulging and spit spewing, they pointed to a business wall 40 feet away and said that's where the roadway ends.  They then grabbed their [[pepper spray]] and asked if I'd be walking back to town.  I complied and spent $1 for a bus to El Centro and continued on my way.  Pick your battles wisely and be safe out there.  ~nomadinexile

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.5]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>fvjgf281952zcur25zjohupbiu2m9ly</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>74149</id>
      <parentid>74148</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-01-29T21:22:47Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>SpamBucket</username>
        <id>24368</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="16488">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Central Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterey]] | [[Big Sur]] |
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[Santa Barbara]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]] | [[Inland Empire]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch). - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. 

North of Sonoma is beautiful...that is to say, if you have time to spare at all, do take the 1! 

Hitchhiking along the 1 north of San Francisco is not easy as there is little traffic, no on-ramps, no service stations, and very few stop lights. If you're lucky, you might find a construction site where all traffic has to stop and wait for five or ten minutes.

US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US.  ''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur and Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, the Redwoods and the Los Padres Forest are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Roads ==

*Shoulders
:Broad shoulders are common along many roadsides, giving people plenty of room to pull over for you. However, it is not uncommon to encounter places where shoulders have not been built or are prohibitively narrow.

*Pedestrian Rights
:All interstates and many major many four lane and even several two lane highways in California prohibit pedestrians.

*Interchanges
:[[split-traffic interchange|Split-traffic interchanges]] are all too common in California. Many interchanges also do not require drivers to slow down, which can lead to longer waiting times.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.


The following law is enforced more often:

21957.  No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of
soliciting a ride from the driver of any vehicle.

Definitions: 530.  A "roadway" is that portion of a highway improved, designed, or ordinarily used for vehicular travel.

As with other states where the roadway definition does not mention a shoulder, it might be wise to hitch from outside of the paved portion of the road.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Yosemite National Park
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

*Joshua Tree National Park
Hitchhiking is only permitted under exigent conditions where the health and safety of the person 
hitchhiking is in jeopardy.

*Mojave National Preserve
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Death Valley National Park
Hitchhiking, or the soliciting of transportation, is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person is off the paved roadway on the shoulder, and visitor safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected.

*Sequoia and King's Canyon National Parks
Hitchhiking is permitted when not standing in the roadway, and visitor safety and traffic flow must not be adversely affected.

*Golden Gate National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas: Marin County - Marin Headlands

*Point Reyes National Seashore
Hitchhiking is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person does not stand in a 
roadway and the hitchhiking/solicitation does not adversely affect visitor safety or the 
normal flow of traffic.

*Lassen Volcanic National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Whiskeytown National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is explicitly prohibited at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area

*Redwood National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

== Various ==

In SoCal, one just has to transit as far from the city as possible before attempting to hitch. Northbound, take the commuter bus from downtown LA Union Station to Valencia and hitch I-5 from there. Eastbound, Metrolink (~$13 from Union Station) to the truck stops along Fontana, Rialto, San Bernadino, etc. Hitching will get easier once you hit the desert in Indio, home to better truck stops, and a departure point for Niland/Slab City. Ontario is known for "lot lizards" and other urban truck-stop crime. It takes a long time, but one can transit through Los Angeles to Orange and San Diego Counties, all the way down to Mexico. See also Nick Cophee's excellent thread on "hitching in SoCal" on Squat the Planet. 

Northern California: If hitching north or east out of the Bay, the University Ave onramp in Berkeley is GOLD. The Octavia Ave onramp for the 101 south and 80 east seems to the best in SF. In Sacramento, the 16th St onramp is alright for commuting to the Bay (just stand on the left  side of the road, not by the onramp post, and hold your sign high), but hitching north or south will take a long long while to happen--if you can get rides from friends in the area, go to Lodi if heading further south, the Dunnigan truck stop if northbound, but otherwise consider Megabus, Union Pacific, or hitching from the Bay. If you're in the Shasta area, check out the regional bus system--you're more likely to get a quick ride from hippie-friendly towns like Mt Shasta and Weed than more conservative places such as Dunsmuir. 

Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. From the bay, hitching can be difficult but not impossible. You can alternately take public transit to the Diridon station in San Jose. There is a shuttle for $5.00 to Downtown Santa Cruz. Make sure to hitch out of Santa Cruz instead of Capitola...or alternately, there is a bus for $3.00 from Santa Cruz to Monterrey. In Monterrey, the bus 24 for another $2.00 will take you to Barnyard shopping village in Carmel. The red lights there are an excellent place to catch rides as they are the last lights before the road turns into big sur area. Alot of drivers are headed all the way to L.A. with many cars full of young people, travelers, surfers. It took me literally 5 minutes to get a ride there, and i´m a 24 year old dude with long messy hair. Once in Big Sur hitchhiking is ridiculously easy and it is also an excellent place to camp for free on oceanside bluffs(as long as you are respectful).

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California can be difficult. It has been reported to take as long as 6 hours for someone to catch a ride. There are not many places for people to pull over, and Yuba City is a huge strip mall town that people just blast through on a multi lane road. If hitching from Yuba City, wait at the intersection of Hwys 20 &amp; 99. The 99 commuter bus runs between Yuba City and Sacramento, too. On the other hand, [[User:Thewindandrain]] has had nothing but easy experiences hitching around Yuba City and Williams.

== Experiences ==
''The difference between hitching in the mountainous areas and the valley is like night and day. While the mountainous areas in any region of the state are very easy, hitchhiking in the valley can be a challenge at times. '''California''' has many of the best swimming holes in America, an excellent climate, and a virtually unlimited selection of hiking opportunities. A fan of the outdoors could spend a lifetime exploring here.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 23:33, 1 June 2013 (CEST)

''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!


:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take Highway 1. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on Highway 1, where the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on I-15."

Experience Nov. 2012
:I hitched from southern Oregon to Texas without any problems except one in Westmorland, CA.  I was standing on the edge of the shoulder of highway 86 on the south end of this rural small community when approached by two aggrevated and aggressive Imperial County sheriffs.  They asked if i knew that it was [[illegal]] to hitchhike in California.  I told them it was not.  Minutes of arguing later they retrieved their citation book and showed me the law shown above that you can not hitch on roadway.  I asked them to show me the state definition of a roadway.  This upset them.  Veins bulging and spit spewing, they pointed to a business wall 40 feet away and said that's where the roadway ends.  They then grabbed their [[pepper spray]] and asked if I'd be walking back to town.  I complied and spent $1 for a bus to El Centro and continued on my way.  Pick your battles wisely and be safe out there.  ~nomadinexile

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.5]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>7ccfncgl1hcaasxscuxb2xlk71n6zo4</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>77254</id>
      <parentid>74149</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-09-22T17:38:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Horsleyrichie</username>
        <id>19706</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="18245">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Central Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterey]] | [[Big Sur]] |
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[Santa Barbara]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]] | [[Inland Empire]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch). - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. 

North of Sonoma is beautiful...that is to say, if you have time to spare at all, do take the 1! 

Hitchhiking along the 1 north of San Francisco is not easy as there is little traffic, no on-ramps, no service stations, and very few stop lights. If you're lucky, you might find a construction site where all traffic has to stop and wait for five or ten minutes.

US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US.  ''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur and Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, the Redwoods and the Los Padres Forest are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Roads ==

*Shoulders
:Broad shoulders are common along many roadsides, giving people plenty of room to pull over for you. However, it is not uncommon to encounter places where shoulders have not been built or are prohibitively narrow.

*Pedestrian Rights
:All interstates and many major many four lane and even several two lane highways in California prohibit pedestrians.

*Interchanges
:[[split-traffic interchange|Split-traffic interchanges]] are all too common in California. Many interchanges also do not require drivers to slow down, which can lead to longer waiting times.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.


The following law is enforced more often:

21957.  No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of
soliciting a ride from the driver of any vehicle.

Definitions: 530.  A "roadway" is that portion of a highway improved, designed, or ordinarily used for vehicular travel.

As with other states where the roadway definition does not mention a shoulder, it might be wise to hitch from outside of the paved portion of the road.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Yosemite National Park
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

*Joshua Tree National Park
Hitchhiking is only permitted under exigent conditions where the health and safety of the person 
hitchhiking is in jeopardy.

*Mojave National Preserve
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Death Valley National Park
Hitchhiking, or the soliciting of transportation, is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person is off the paved roadway on the shoulder, and visitor safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected.

*Sequoia and King's Canyon National Parks
Hitchhiking is permitted when not standing in the roadway, and visitor safety and traffic flow must not be adversely affected.

*Golden Gate National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas: Marin County - Marin Headlands

*Point Reyes National Seashore
Hitchhiking is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person does not stand in a 
roadway and the hitchhiking/solicitation does not adversely affect visitor safety or the 
normal flow of traffic.

*Lassen Volcanic National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Whiskeytown National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is explicitly prohibited at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area

*Redwood National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

== Various ==

In SoCal, one just has to transit as far from the city as possible before attempting to hitch. Northbound, take the commuter bus from downtown LA Union Station to Valencia and hitch I-5 from there. Eastbound, Metrolink (~$13 from Union Station) to the truck stops along Fontana, Rialto, San Bernadino, etc. Hitching will get easier once you hit the desert in Indio, home to better truck stops, and a departure point for Niland/Slab City. Ontario is known for "lot lizards" and other urban truck-stop crime. It takes a long time, but one can transit through Los Angeles to Orange and San Diego Counties, all the way down to Mexico. See also Nick Cophee's excellent thread on "hitching in SoCal" on Squat the Planet. 

Northern California: If hitching north or east out of the Bay, the University Ave onramp in Berkeley is GOLD. The Octavia Ave onramp for the 101 south and 80 east seems to the best in SF. In Sacramento, the 16th St onramp is alright for commuting to the Bay (just stand on the left  side of the road, not by the onramp post, and hold your sign high), but hitching north or south will take a long long while to happen--if you can get rides from friends in the area, go to Lodi if heading further south, the Dunnigan truck stop if northbound, but otherwise consider Megabus, Union Pacific, or hitching from the Bay. If you're in the Shasta area, check out the regional bus system--you're more likely to get a quick ride from hippie-friendly towns like Mt Shasta and Weed than more conservative places such as Dunsmuir. 

Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. From the bay, hitching can be difficult but not impossible. You can alternately take public transit to the Diridon station in San Jose. There is a shuttle for $5.00 to Downtown Santa Cruz. Make sure to hitch out of Santa Cruz instead of Capitola...or alternately, there is a bus for $3.00 from Santa Cruz to Monterrey. In Monterrey, the bus 24 for another $2.00 will take you to Barnyard shopping village in Carmel. The red lights there are an excellent place to catch rides as they are the last lights before the road turns into big sur area. Alot of drivers are headed all the way to L.A. with many cars full of young people, travelers, surfers. It took me literally 5 minutes to get a ride there, and i´m a 24 year old dude with long messy hair. Once in Big Sur hitchhiking is ridiculously easy and it is also an excellent place to camp for free on oceanside bluffs(as long as you are respectful).

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California can be difficult. It has been reported to take as long as 6 hours for someone to catch a ride. There are not many places for people to pull over, and Yuba City is a huge strip mall town that people just blast through on a multi lane road. If hitching from Yuba City, wait at the intersection of Hwys 20 &amp; 99. The 99 commuter bus runs between Yuba City and Sacramento, too. On the other hand, [[User:Thewindandrain]] has had nothing but easy experiences hitching around Yuba City and Williams.

== Experiences ==
''The difference between hitching in the mountainous areas and the valley is like night and day. While the mountainous areas in any region of the state are very easy, hitchhiking in the valley can be a challenge at times. '''California''' has many of the best swimming holes in America, an excellent climate, and a virtually unlimited selection of hiking opportunities. A fan of the outdoors could spend a lifetime exploring here.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 23:33, 1 June 2013 (CEST)

''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!


:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take Highway 1. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on Highway 1, where the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on I-15."

Experience Nov. 2012
:I hitched from southern Oregon to Texas without any problems except one in Westmorland, CA.  I was standing on the edge of the shoulder of highway 86 on the south end of this rural small community when approached by two aggrevated and aggressive Imperial County sheriffs.  They asked if i knew that it was [[illegal]] to hitchhike in California.  I told them it was not.  Minutes of arguing later they retrieved their citation book and showed me the law shown above that you can not hitch on roadway.  I asked them to show me the state definition of a roadway.  This upset them.  Veins bulging and spit spewing, they pointed to a business wall 40 feet away and said that's where the roadway ends.  They then grabbed their [[pepper spray]] and asked if I'd be walking back to town.  I complied and spent $1 for a bus to El Centro and continued on my way.  Pick your battles wisely and be safe out there.  ~nomadinexile

Experience Sept. 2014

DAY 1 --- I hitched from San Francisco to San Luis Obispo in one-and-half days. Took the BART from Mission St to Daly City, then the 110 bus to Pacifica. Waited about 15 minutes for a ride down Highway 1 to a beach just north of Santa Cruz. I stood in the beach parking lot for 5 minutes before getting a ride into Santa Cruz, then waited 10 minutes near the onramp to Highway 1 before I got a ride to Carmel. Carmel was a bit tricky. I waited about 2 hours before a guy told me told me it was a bad hitching spot and took me down to the gas station junction where the 1 leads to Big Sur, I waited about 45 minutes for a ride. Got to Big Sur about seven and met some surfers who showed me a safe place to hide my sleeping bag and rest for the night. All four of my rides were solo men between 25 - 60.

DAY 2 --- Quiet in the morning, but by 10am I had a ride from Big Sur to Lucia. Walked 10 mins to the next good lay-by and got a ride from a German tourist couple who were driving all the way to San Luis Obispo (we stopped off and looked at the elephants seals, and then the sea lioons in Morro Bay). I arrived in SLO by 2.30pm

A week later I hitched from Highway 1 near Lompoc to L.A. in about 5 hours. The 1 looked tough heading south, but waited about 90 mins for a young elementary school teacher who took to me to Santa Barbara. Waited on the 101 onramp at a tricky multi-lane junction, waited about 90 mins for these two Nepalese guys to take me right into downtown L.A. I set off about 4pm and arrived about 9pm.

TIPS: Always carry a big cardboard sign of your destination. Smile infectiously, and even dance (though not too much to make you look mentally ill). STAY POSITIVE - it always works out some way or the other.

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.5]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>l1kmtcurkx5xpfafkjgttd5o9wobyvx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>83474</id>
      <parentid>77254</parentid>
      <timestamp>2016-06-13T18:01:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Koalajuj</username>
        <id>23382</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19454">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Central Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterey]] | [[Big Sur]] |
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[Santa Barbara]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]] | [[Inland Empire]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch). - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. 

North of Sonoma is beautiful...that is to say, if you have time to spare at all, do take the 1! 

Hitchhiking along the 1 north of San Francisco is not easy as there is little traffic, no on-ramps, no service stations, and very few stop lights. If you're lucky, you might find a construction site where all traffic has to stop and wait for five or ten minutes.

US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US.  ''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur and Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, the Redwoods and the Los Padres Forest are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Roads ==

*Shoulders
:Broad shoulders are common along many roadsides, giving people plenty of room to pull over for you. However, it is not uncommon to encounter places where shoulders have not been built or are prohibitively narrow.

*Pedestrian Rights
:All interstates and many major many four lane and even several two lane highways in California prohibit pedestrians.

*Interchanges
:[[split-traffic interchange|Split-traffic interchanges]] are all too common in California. Many interchanges also do not require drivers to slow down, which can lead to longer waiting times.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.


The following law is enforced more often:

21957.  No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of
soliciting a ride from the driver of any vehicle.

Definitions: 530.  A "roadway" is that portion of a highway improved, designed, or ordinarily used for vehicular travel.

As with other states where the roadway definition does not mention a shoulder, it might be wise to hitch from outside of the paved portion of the road.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Yosemite National Park
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

*Joshua Tree National Park
Hitchhiking is only permitted under exigent conditions where the health and safety of the person 
hitchhiking is in jeopardy.

*Mojave National Preserve
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Death Valley National Park
Hitchhiking, or the soliciting of transportation, is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person is off the paved roadway on the shoulder, and visitor safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected.

*Sequoia and King's Canyon National Parks
Hitchhiking is permitted when not standing in the roadway, and visitor safety and traffic flow must not be adversely affected.

*Golden Gate National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas: Marin County - Marin Headlands

*Point Reyes National Seashore
Hitchhiking is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person does not stand in a 
roadway and the hitchhiking/solicitation does not adversely affect visitor safety or the 
normal flow of traffic.

*Lassen Volcanic National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Whiskeytown National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is explicitly prohibited at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area

*Redwood National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

== Various ==

In SoCal, one just has to transit as far from the city as possible before attempting to hitch. Northbound, take the commuter bus from downtown LA Union Station to Valencia and hitch I-5 from there. Eastbound, Metrolink (~$13 from Union Station) to the truck stops along Fontana, Rialto, San Bernadino, etc. Hitching will get easier once you hit the desert in Indio, home to better truck stops, and a departure point for Niland/Slab City. Ontario is known for "lot lizards" and other urban truck-stop crime. It takes a long time, but one can transit through Los Angeles to Orange and San Diego Counties, all the way down to Mexico. See also Nick Cophee's excellent thread on "hitching in SoCal" on Squat the Planet. 

Northern California: If hitching north or east out of the Bay, the University Ave onramp in Berkeley is GOLD. The Octavia Ave onramp for the 101 south and 80 east seems to the best in SF. In Sacramento, the 16th St onramp is alright for commuting to the Bay (just stand on the left  side of the road, not by the onramp post, and hold your sign high), but hitching north or south will take a long long while to happen--if you can get rides from friends in the area, go to Lodi if heading further south, the Dunnigan truck stop if northbound, but otherwise consider Megabus, Union Pacific, or hitching from the Bay. If you're in the Shasta area, check out the regional bus system--you're more likely to get a quick ride from hippie-friendly towns like Mt Shasta and Weed than more conservative places such as Dunsmuir. 

Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. From the bay, hitching can be difficult but not impossible. You can alternately take public transit to the Diridon station in San Jose. There is a shuttle for $5.00 to Downtown Santa Cruz. Make sure to hitch out of Santa Cruz instead of Capitola...or alternately, there is a bus for $3.00 from Santa Cruz to Monterrey. In Monterrey, the bus 24 for another $2.00 will take you to Barnyard shopping village in Carmel. The red lights there are an excellent place to catch rides as they are the last lights before the road turns into big sur area. Alot of drivers are headed all the way to L.A. with many cars full of young people, travelers, surfers. It took me literally 5 minutes to get a ride there, and i´m a 24 year old dude with long messy hair. Once in Big Sur hitchhiking is ridiculously easy and it is also an excellent place to camp for free on oceanside bluffs(as long as you are respectful).

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California can be difficult. It has been reported to take as long as 6 hours for someone to catch a ride. There are not many places for people to pull over, and Yuba City is a huge strip mall town that people just blast through on a multi lane road. If hitching from Yuba City, wait at the intersection of Hwys 20 &amp; 99. The 99 commuter bus runs between Yuba City and Sacramento, too. On the other hand, [[User:Thewindandrain]] has had nothing but easy experiences hitching around Yuba City and Williams.

== Experiences ==
''The difference between hitching in the mountainous areas and the valley is like night and day. While the mountainous areas in any region of the state are very easy, hitchhiking in the valley can be a challenge at times. '''California''' has many of the best swimming holes in America, an excellent climate, and a virtually unlimited selection of hiking opportunities. A fan of the outdoors could spend a lifetime exploring here.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 23:33, 1 June 2013 (CEST)

''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!


:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take Highway 1. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on Highway 1, where the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on I-15."

Experience Nov. 2012
:I hitched from southern Oregon to Texas without any problems except one in Westmorland, CA.  I was standing on the edge of the shoulder of highway 86 on the south end of this rural small community when approached by two aggrevated and aggressive Imperial County sheriffs.  They asked if i knew that it was [[illegal]] to hitchhike in California.  I told them it was not.  Minutes of arguing later they retrieved their citation book and showed me the law shown above that you can not hitch on roadway.  I asked them to show me the state definition of a roadway.  This upset them.  Veins bulging and spit spewing, they pointed to a business wall 40 feet away and said that's where the roadway ends.  They then grabbed their [[pepper spray]] and asked if I'd be walking back to town.  I complied and spent $1 for a bus to El Centro and continued on my way.  Pick your battles wisely and be safe out there.  ~nomadinexile

Experience Sept. 2014

DAY 1 --- I hitched from San Francisco to San Luis Obispo in one-and-half days. Took the BART from Mission St to Daly City, then the 110 bus to Pacifica. Waited about 15 minutes for a ride down Highway 1 to a beach just north of Santa Cruz. I stood in the beach parking lot for 5 minutes before getting a ride into Santa Cruz, then waited 10 minutes near the onramp to Highway 1 before I got a ride to Carmel. Carmel was a bit tricky. I waited about 2 hours before a guy told me told me it was a bad hitching spot and took me down to the gas station junction where the 1 leads to Big Sur, I waited about 45 minutes for a ride. Got to Big Sur about seven and met some surfers who showed me a safe place to hide my sleeping bag and rest for the night. All four of my rides were solo men between 25 - 60.

DAY 2 --- Quiet in the morning, but by 10am I had a ride from Big Sur to Lucia. Walked 10 mins to the next good lay-by and got a ride from a German tourist couple who were driving all the way to San Luis Obispo (we stopped off and looked at the elephants seals, and then the sea lioons in Morro Bay). I arrived in SLO by 2.30pm

A week later I hitched from Highway 1 near Lompoc to L.A. in about 5 hours. The 1 looked tough heading south, but waited about 90 mins for a young elementary school teacher who took to me to Santa Barbara. Waited on the 101 onramp at a tricky multi-lane junction, waited about 90 mins for these two Nepalese guys to take me right into downtown L.A. I set off about 4pm and arrived about 9pm.

TIPS: Always carry a big cardboard sign of your destination. Smile infectiously, and even dance (though not too much to make you look mentally ill). STAY POSITIVE - it always works out some way or the other.

Experience March 2016:
''Hitched into Cali from Southern Oregon on the I-5, and stopped in Redding for the night. The next day was the weirdest day of hitchhiking I ever had. We were headed toward San Fran, which proved difficult . We got a lift from a trucker out of Redding, he was headed to Sacramento, but we'd heard lots of bad stuff about Sac so he offered to drop us somewhere before. We got dropped at the truck stop in Dunnigan, CA which had very little traffic on the on ramp. People often waved but no one ever stopped. We started walking on the highway, the 505 towards San Fran, even though we knew it was illegal. We made it a few miles before highway patrol pulled over. Showing IDs from New York and Florida, he let us off pretty easy and ended up taking us 20 miles down the road to Winters, CA where we got a ride in 5 minutes. Oh, and before dropping us the cop joked "If you want some real good Mexican food, there's a Taco Bell here for ya. Ha ha!". Lots of nice people willing to pick us up after that, after a ride with a restaurant owner and then a construction worker who dropped us at the transit station in San Rafael, we took the bus into San Fran.  '' [[User:Koalajuj|Koalajuj]]

== External links ==
* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.5]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:California]]



[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>ddbr4insbq9s4ljmaewp4l26fhwu0sk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>99727</id>
      <parentid>83474</parentid>
      <timestamp>2020-10-14T14:33:53Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Dxc</username>
        <id>18452</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* External links */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19480">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Central Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterey]] | [[Big Sur]] |
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[Santa Barbara]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]] | [[Inland Empire]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch). - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. 

North of Sonoma is beautiful...that is to say, if you have time to spare at all, do take the 1! 

Hitchhiking along the 1 north of San Francisco is not easy as there is little traffic, no on-ramps, no service stations, and very few stop lights. If you're lucky, you might find a construction site where all traffic has to stop and wait for five or ten minutes.

US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US.  ''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur and Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, the Redwoods and the Los Padres Forest are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Roads ==

*Shoulders
:Broad shoulders are common along many roadsides, giving people plenty of room to pull over for you. However, it is not uncommon to encounter places where shoulders have not been built or are prohibitively narrow.

*Pedestrian Rights
:All interstates and many major many four lane and even several two lane highways in California prohibit pedestrians.

*Interchanges
:[[split-traffic interchange|Split-traffic interchanges]] are all too common in California. Many interchanges also do not require drivers to slow down, which can lead to longer waiting times.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.


The following law is enforced more often:

21957.  No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of
soliciting a ride from the driver of any vehicle.

Definitions: 530.  A "roadway" is that portion of a highway improved, designed, or ordinarily used for vehicular travel.

As with other states where the roadway definition does not mention a shoulder, it might be wise to hitch from outside of the paved portion of the road.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Yosemite National Park
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

*Joshua Tree National Park
Hitchhiking is only permitted under exigent conditions where the health and safety of the person 
hitchhiking is in jeopardy.

*Mojave National Preserve
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Death Valley National Park
Hitchhiking, or the soliciting of transportation, is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person is off the paved roadway on the shoulder, and visitor safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected.

*Sequoia and King's Canyon National Parks
Hitchhiking is permitted when not standing in the roadway, and visitor safety and traffic flow must not be adversely affected.

*Golden Gate National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas: Marin County - Marin Headlands

*Point Reyes National Seashore
Hitchhiking is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person does not stand in a 
roadway and the hitchhiking/solicitation does not adversely affect visitor safety or the 
normal flow of traffic.

*Lassen Volcanic National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Whiskeytown National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is explicitly prohibited at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area

*Redwood National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

== Various ==

In SoCal, one just has to transit as far from the city as possible before attempting to hitch. Northbound, take the commuter bus from downtown LA Union Station to Valencia and hitch I-5 from there. Eastbound, Metrolink (~$13 from Union Station) to the truck stops along Fontana, Rialto, San Bernadino, etc. Hitching will get easier once you hit the desert in Indio, home to better truck stops, and a departure point for Niland/Slab City. Ontario is known for "lot lizards" and other urban truck-stop crime. It takes a long time, but one can transit through Los Angeles to Orange and San Diego Counties, all the way down to Mexico. See also Nick Cophee's excellent thread on "hitching in SoCal" on Squat the Planet. 

Northern California: If hitching north or east out of the Bay, the University Ave onramp in Berkeley is GOLD. The Octavia Ave onramp for the 101 south and 80 east seems to the best in SF. In Sacramento, the 16th St onramp is alright for commuting to the Bay (just stand on the left  side of the road, not by the onramp post, and hold your sign high), but hitching north or south will take a long long while to happen--if you can get rides from friends in the area, go to Lodi if heading further south, the Dunnigan truck stop if northbound, but otherwise consider Megabus, Union Pacific, or hitching from the Bay. If you're in the Shasta area, check out the regional bus system--you're more likely to get a quick ride from hippie-friendly towns like Mt Shasta and Weed than more conservative places such as Dunsmuir. 

Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. From the bay, hitching can be difficult but not impossible. You can alternately take public transit to the Diridon station in San Jose. There is a shuttle for $5.00 to Downtown Santa Cruz. Make sure to hitch out of Santa Cruz instead of Capitola...or alternately, there is a bus for $3.00 from Santa Cruz to Monterrey. In Monterrey, the bus 24 for another $2.00 will take you to Barnyard shopping village in Carmel. The red lights there are an excellent place to catch rides as they are the last lights before the road turns into big sur area. Alot of drivers are headed all the way to L.A. with many cars full of young people, travelers, surfers. It took me literally 5 minutes to get a ride there, and i´m a 24 year old dude with long messy hair. Once in Big Sur hitchhiking is ridiculously easy and it is also an excellent place to camp for free on oceanside bluffs(as long as you are respectful).

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California can be difficult. It has been reported to take as long as 6 hours for someone to catch a ride. There are not many places for people to pull over, and Yuba City is a huge strip mall town that people just blast through on a multi lane road. If hitching from Yuba City, wait at the intersection of Hwys 20 &amp; 99. The 99 commuter bus runs between Yuba City and Sacramento, too. On the other hand, [[User:Thewindandrain]] has had nothing but easy experiences hitching around Yuba City and Williams.

== Experiences ==
''The difference between hitching in the mountainous areas and the valley is like night and day. While the mountainous areas in any region of the state are very easy, hitchhiking in the valley can be a challenge at times. '''California''' has many of the best swimming holes in America, an excellent climate, and a virtually unlimited selection of hiking opportunities. A fan of the outdoors could spend a lifetime exploring here.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 23:33, 1 June 2013 (CEST)

''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!


:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take Highway 1. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on Highway 1, where the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on I-15."

Experience Nov. 2012
:I hitched from southern Oregon to Texas without any problems except one in Westmorland, CA.  I was standing on the edge of the shoulder of highway 86 on the south end of this rural small community when approached by two aggrevated and aggressive Imperial County sheriffs.  They asked if i knew that it was [[illegal]] to hitchhike in California.  I told them it was not.  Minutes of arguing later they retrieved their citation book and showed me the law shown above that you can not hitch on roadway.  I asked them to show me the state definition of a roadway.  This upset them.  Veins bulging and spit spewing, they pointed to a business wall 40 feet away and said that's where the roadway ends.  They then grabbed their [[pepper spray]] and asked if I'd be walking back to town.  I complied and spent $1 for a bus to El Centro and continued on my way.  Pick your battles wisely and be safe out there.  ~nomadinexile

Experience Sept. 2014

DAY 1 --- I hitched from San Francisco to San Luis Obispo in one-and-half days. Took the BART from Mission St to Daly City, then the 110 bus to Pacifica. Waited about 15 minutes for a ride down Highway 1 to a beach just north of Santa Cruz. I stood in the beach parking lot for 5 minutes before getting a ride into Santa Cruz, then waited 10 minutes near the onramp to Highway 1 before I got a ride to Carmel. Carmel was a bit tricky. I waited about 2 hours before a guy told me told me it was a bad hitching spot and took me down to the gas station junction where the 1 leads to Big Sur, I waited about 45 minutes for a ride. Got to Big Sur about seven and met some surfers who showed me a safe place to hide my sleeping bag and rest for the night. All four of my rides were solo men between 25 - 60.

DAY 2 --- Quiet in the morning, but by 10am I had a ride from Big Sur to Lucia. Walked 10 mins to the next good lay-by and got a ride from a German tourist couple who were driving all the way to San Luis Obispo (we stopped off and looked at the elephants seals, and then the sea lioons in Morro Bay). I arrived in SLO by 2.30pm

A week later I hitched from Highway 1 near Lompoc to L.A. in about 5 hours. The 1 looked tough heading south, but waited about 90 mins for a young elementary school teacher who took to me to Santa Barbara. Waited on the 101 onramp at a tricky multi-lane junction, waited about 90 mins for these two Nepalese guys to take me right into downtown L.A. I set off about 4pm and arrived about 9pm.

TIPS: Always carry a big cardboard sign of your destination. Smile infectiously, and even dance (though not too much to make you look mentally ill). STAY POSITIVE - it always works out some way or the other.

Experience March 2016:
''Hitched into Cali from Southern Oregon on the I-5, and stopped in Redding for the night. The next day was the weirdest day of hitchhiking I ever had. We were headed toward San Fran, which proved difficult . We got a lift from a trucker out of Redding, he was headed to Sacramento, but we'd heard lots of bad stuff about Sac so he offered to drop us somewhere before. We got dropped at the truck stop in Dunnigan, CA which had very little traffic on the on ramp. People often waved but no one ever stopped. We started walking on the highway, the 505 towards San Fran, even though we knew it was illegal. We made it a few miles before highway patrol pulled over. Showing IDs from New York and Florida, he let us off pretty easy and ended up taking us 20 miles down the road to Winters, CA where we got a ride in 5 minutes. Oh, and before dropping us the cop joked "If you want some real good Mexican food, there's a Taco Bell here for ya. Ha ha!". Lots of nice people willing to pick us up after that, after a ride with a restaurant owner and then a construction worker who dropped us at the transit station in San Rafael, we took the bus into San Fran.  '' [[User:Koalajuj|Koalajuj]]

== External links ==

* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.5]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Template:States USA}}




[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>dns6aksn666o8w0eudy8acbk59pxvob</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>104900</id>
      <parentid>99727</parentid>
      <timestamp>2023-11-08T14:26:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Samuelnan</username>
        <id>47434</id>
      </contributor>
      <comment>/* Experiences */</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20283">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''California''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from Bakersfield to, say, Sacramento (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Central Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterey]] | [[Big Sur]] |
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[Santa Barbara]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]] | [[Inland Empire]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
I-5 and CA-99 both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from Los Angeles up through Sacramento, Redding, and into [[Oregon]]. I-5 is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. CA-99 is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch). - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

Route 1 goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. 

North of Sonoma is beautiful...that is to say, if you have time to spare at all, do take the 1! 

Hitchhiking along the 1 north of San Francisco is not easy as there is little traffic, no on-ramps, no service stations, and very few stop lights. If you're lucky, you might find a construction site where all traffic has to stop and wait for five or ten minutes.

US-101 from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US.  ''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the 101, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: Big Sur and Crescent City (CA-1 &amp; US-101), have beautiful shores/beaches. Yosemite (Highway 120), Sequoia National Park, the Redwoods and the Los Padres Forest are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Roads ==

*Shoulders
:Broad shoulders are common along many roadsides, giving people plenty of room to pull over for you. However, it is not uncommon to encounter places where shoulders have not been built or are prohibitively narrow.

*Pedestrian Rights
:All interstates and many major many four lane and even several two lane highways in California prohibit pedestrians.

*Interchanges
:[[split-traffic interchange|Split-traffic interchanges]] are all too common in California. Many interchanges also do not require drivers to slow down, which can lead to longer waiting times.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.


The following law is enforced more often:

21957.  No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of
soliciting a ride from the driver of any vehicle.

Definitions: 530.  A "roadway" is that portion of a highway improved, designed, or ordinarily used for vehicular travel.

As with other states where the roadway definition does not mention a shoulder, it might be wise to hitch from outside of the paved portion of the road.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Yosemite National Park
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

*Joshua Tree National Park
Hitchhiking is only permitted under exigent conditions where the health and safety of the person 
hitchhiking is in jeopardy.

*Mojave National Preserve
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Death Valley National Park
Hitchhiking, or the soliciting of transportation, is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person is off the paved roadway on the shoulder, and visitor safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected.

*Sequoia and King's Canyon National Parks
Hitchhiking is permitted when not standing in the roadway, and visitor safety and traffic flow must not be adversely affected.

*Golden Gate National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas: Marin County - Marin Headlands

*Point Reyes National Seashore
Hitchhiking is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person does not stand in a 
roadway and the hitchhiking/solicitation does not adversely affect visitor safety or the 
normal flow of traffic.

*Lassen Volcanic National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Whiskeytown National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is explicitly prohibited at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area

*Redwood National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

== Various ==

In SoCal, one just has to transit as far from the city as possible before attempting to hitch. Northbound, take the commuter bus from downtown LA Union Station to Valencia and hitch I-5 from there. Eastbound, Metrolink (~$13 from Union Station) to the truck stops along Fontana, Rialto, San Bernadino, etc. Hitching will get easier once you hit the desert in Indio, home to better truck stops, and a departure point for Niland/Slab City. Ontario is known for "lot lizards" and other urban truck-stop crime. It takes a long time, but one can transit through Los Angeles to Orange and San Diego Counties, all the way down to Mexico. See also Nick Cophee's excellent thread on "hitching in SoCal" on Squat the Planet. 

Northern California: If hitching north or east out of the Bay, the University Ave onramp in Berkeley is GOLD. The Octavia Ave onramp for the 101 south and 80 east seems to the best in SF. In Sacramento, the 16th St onramp is alright for commuting to the Bay (just stand on the left  side of the road, not by the onramp post, and hold your sign high), but hitching north or south will take a long long while to happen--if you can get rides from friends in the area, go to Lodi if heading further south, the Dunnigan truck stop if northbound, but otherwise consider Megabus, Union Pacific, or hitching from the Bay. If you're in the Shasta area, check out the regional bus system--you're more likely to get a quick ride from hippie-friendly towns like Mt Shasta and Weed than more conservative places such as Dunsmuir. 

Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route 101, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and Route 1 South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. From the bay, hitching can be difficult but not impossible. You can alternately take public transit to the Diridon station in San Jose. There is a shuttle for $5.00 to Downtown Santa Cruz. Make sure to hitch out of Santa Cruz instead of Capitola...or alternately, there is a bus for $3.00 from Santa Cruz to Monterrey. In Monterrey, the bus 24 for another $2.00 will take you to Barnyard shopping village in Carmel. The red lights there are an excellent place to catch rides as they are the last lights before the road turns into big sur area. Alot of drivers are headed all the way to L.A. with many cars full of young people, travelers, surfers. It took me literally 5 minutes to get a ride there, and i´m a 24 year old dude with long messy hair. Once in Big Sur hitchhiking is ridiculously easy and it is also an excellent place to camp for free on oceanside bluffs(as long as you are respectful).

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California can be difficult. It has been reported to take as long as 6 hours for someone to catch a ride. There are not many places for people to pull over, and Yuba City is a huge strip mall town that people just blast through on a multi lane road. If hitching from Yuba City, wait at the intersection of Hwys 20 &amp; 99. The 99 commuter bus runs between Yuba City and Sacramento, too. On the other hand, [[User:Thewindandrain]] has had nothing but easy experiences hitching around Yuba City and Williams.

== Experiences ==
''The difference between hitching in the mountainous areas and the valley is like night and day. While the mountainous areas in any region of the state are very easy, hitchhiking in the valley can be a challenge at times. '''California''' has many of the best swimming holes in America, an excellent climate, and a virtually unlimited selection of hiking opportunities. A fan of the outdoors could spend a lifetime exploring here.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 23:33, 1 June 2013 (CEST)

''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!


:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take Highway 1. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on Highway 1, where the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on I-15."

Experience Nov. 2012
:I hitched from southern Oregon to Texas without any problems except one in Westmorland, CA.  I was standing on the edge of the shoulder of highway 86 on the south end of this rural small community when approached by two aggrevated and aggressive Imperial County sheriffs.  They asked if i knew that it was [[illegal]] to hitchhike in California.  I told them it was not.  Minutes of arguing later they retrieved their citation book and showed me the law shown above that you can not hitch on roadway.  I asked them to show me the state definition of a roadway.  This upset them.  Veins bulging and spit spewing, they pointed to a business wall 40 feet away and said that's where the roadway ends.  They then grabbed their [[pepper spray]] and asked if I'd be walking back to town.  I complied and spent $1 for a bus to El Centro and continued on my way.  Pick your battles wisely and be safe out there.  ~nomadinexile

Experience Sept. 2014

DAY 1 --- I hitched from San Francisco to San Luis Obispo in one-and-half days. Took the BART from Mission St to Daly City, then the 110 bus to Pacifica. Waited about 15 minutes for a ride down Highway 1 to a beach just north of Santa Cruz. I stood in the beach parking lot for 5 minutes before getting a ride into Santa Cruz, then waited 10 minutes near the onramp to Highway 1 before I got a ride to Carmel. Carmel was a bit tricky. I waited about 2 hours before a guy told me told me it was a bad hitching spot and took me down to the gas station junction where the 1 leads to Big Sur, I waited about 45 minutes for a ride. Got to Big Sur about seven and met some surfers who showed me a safe place to hide my sleeping bag and rest for the night. All four of my rides were solo men between 25 - 60.

DAY 2 --- Quiet in the morning, but by 10am I had a ride from Big Sur to Lucia. Walked 10 mins to the next good lay-by and got a ride from a German tourist couple who were driving all the way to San Luis Obispo (we stopped off and looked at the elephants seals, and then the sea lioons in Morro Bay). I arrived in SLO by 2.30pm

A week later I hitched from Highway 1 near Lompoc to L.A. in about 5 hours. The 1 looked tough heading south, but waited about 90 mins for a young elementary school teacher who took to me to Santa Barbara. Waited on the 101 onramp at a tricky multi-lane junction, waited about 90 mins for these two Nepalese guys to take me right into downtown L.A. I set off about 4pm and arrived about 9pm.

TIPS: Always carry a big cardboard sign of your destination. Smile infectiously, and even dance (though not too much to make you look mentally ill). STAY POSITIVE - it always works out some way or the other.

Experience March 2016:
''Hitched into Cali from Southern Oregon on the I-5, and stopped in Redding for the night. The next day was the weirdest day of hitchhiking I ever had. We were headed toward San Fran, which proved difficult . We got a lift from a trucker out of Redding, he was headed to Sacramento, but we'd heard lots of bad stuff about Sac so he offered to drop us somewhere before. We got dropped at the truck stop in Dunnigan, CA which had very little traffic on the on ramp. People often waved but no one ever stopped. We started walking on the highway, the 505 towards San Fran, even though we knew it was illegal. We made it a few miles before highway patrol pulled over. Showing IDs from New York and Florida, he let us off pretty easy and ended up taking us 20 miles down the road to Winters, CA where we got a ride in 5 minutes. Oh, and before dropping us the cop joked "If you want some real good Mexican food, there's a Taco Bell here for ya. Ha ha!". Lots of nice people willing to pick us up after that, after a ride with a restaurant owner and then a construction worker who dropped us at the transit station in San Rafael, we took the bus into San Fran.  '' [[User:Koalajuj|Koalajuj]]


October 2023

Los Angeles to Arcata along the 1 and 101. Definitely start hitching north from Malibu if you wanna take the 1, that spot worked beautifully. The road up to Big Sur was closed so I had to take the 101 and pass through SLO. I received a ride from a state park officer and all other policemen did not bother me. Stuck to onramps, didn't try gas stations or truck stops and my average wait time was about 90 (!) minutes, as a young, clean male with only a backpack. Some of my longest waits were along the 101, in Mendocino county, but my best experiences were in the Emerald Triangle! I was invited to a Halloween party high in the hills, hosted by weed farmers. A tent is a must in these cold, rainy winter months. Be sure to sample some of that Humboldt county weed!

- The Falling Leaf

== External links ==

* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.5]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}



{{Template:States USA}}




[[Category:California| ]]
[[Category:United States]]

[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>koptohifkh8ws4xb0vwuod9s8w5fc0u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>108804</id>
      <parentid>104900</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-01-24T18:28:57Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Chris9012</username>
        <id>47192</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20722">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''{{FULLPAGENAME}}''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from [[Bakersfield]] to, say, [[Sacramento]] (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.
 
{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Central Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterey]] | [[Big Sur]] |
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[Santa Barbara]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]] | [[Inland Empire]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
{{US-I|5}} and {{StateHighway|California|99}} both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from [[Los Angeles]] up through [[Sacramento]], [[Redding]], and into [[Oregon]]. {{US-I|5}} is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. {{StateHighway|California|99}} is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch). - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

{{StateHighway|California|1}} goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. 

North of Sonoma is beautiful...that is to say, if you have time to spare at all, do take the 1! 

Hitchhiking along the {{StateHighway|California|1}} north of [[San Francisco]] is not easy as there is little traffic, no on-ramps, no service stations, and very few stop lights. If you're lucky, you might find a construction site where all traffic has to stop and wait for five or ten minutes.

{{US-R|101}} from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US.  ''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the {{US-R|101}}, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: [[Big Sur]] and [[Crescent City]] {{StateHighway|California|1}} &amp; {{US-R|101}}, have beautiful shores/beaches. [[Yosemite]] {{US-I|20}}, [[Sequoia National Park]], the Redwoods and the Los Padres Forest are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Roads ==

*Shoulders
:Broad shoulders are common along many roadsides, giving people plenty of room to pull over for you. However, it is not uncommon to encounter places where shoulders have not been built or are prohibitively narrow.

*Pedestrian Rights
:All interstates and many major many four lane and even several two lane highways in California prohibit pedestrians.

*Interchanges
:[[split-traffic interchange|Split-traffic interchanges]] are all too common in California. Many interchanges also do not require drivers to slow down, which can lead to longer waiting times.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.


The following law is enforced more often:

21957.  No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of
soliciting a ride from the driver of any vehicle.

Definitions: 530.  A "roadway" is that portion of a highway improved, designed, or ordinarily used for vehicular travel.

As with other states where the roadway definition does not mention a shoulder, it might be wise to hitch from outside of the paved portion of the road.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Yosemite National Park
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

*Joshua Tree National Park
Hitchhiking is only permitted under exigent conditions where the health and safety of the person 
hitchhiking is in jeopardy.

*Mojave National Preserve
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Death Valley National Park
Hitchhiking, or the soliciting of transportation, is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person is off the paved roadway on the shoulder, and visitor safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected.

*Sequoia and King's Canyon National Parks
Hitchhiking is permitted when not standing in the roadway, and visitor safety and traffic flow must not be adversely affected.

*Golden Gate National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas: Marin County - Marin Headlands

*Point Reyes National Seashore
Hitchhiking is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person does not stand in a 
roadway and the hitchhiking/solicitation does not adversely affect visitor safety or the 
normal flow of traffic.

*Lassen Volcanic National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Whiskeytown National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is explicitly prohibited at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area

*Redwood National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

== Various ==

In SoCal, one just has to transit as far from the city as possible before attempting to hitch. Northbound, take the commuter bus from downtown LA Union Station to Valencia and hitch I-5 from there. Eastbound, Metrolink (~$13 from Union Station) to the truck stops along Fontana, Rialto, San Bernadino, etc. Hitching will get easier once you hit the desert in Indio, home to better truck stops, and a departure point for Niland/Slab City. Ontario is known for "lot lizards" and other urban truck-stop crime. It takes a long time, but one can transit through Los Angeles to Orange and San Diego Counties, all the way down to Mexico. See also Nick Cophee's excellent thread on "hitching in SoCal" on Squat the Planet. 

Northern California: If hitching north or east out of the Bay, the University Ave onramp in Berkeley is GOLD. The Octavia Ave onramp for the {{US-R|101}} south and 80 east seems to the best in SF. In Sacramento, the 16th St onramp is alright for commuting to the Bay (just stand on the left  side of the road, not by the onramp post, and hold your sign high), but hitching north or south will take a long long while to happen--if you can get rides from friends in the area, go to Lodi if heading further south, the Dunnigan truck stop if northbound, but otherwise consider Megabus, Union Pacific, or hitching from the Bay. If you're in the Shasta area, check out the regional bus system--you're more likely to get a quick ride from hippie-friendly towns like Mt Shasta and Weed than more conservative places such as Dunsmuir. 

Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route {{US-R|101}}, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and {{StateHighway|California|1}} South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. From the bay, hitching can be difficult but not impossible. You can alternately take public transit to the Diridon station in San Jose. There is a shuttle for $5.00 to Downtown Santa Cruz. Make sure to hitch out of Santa Cruz instead of Capitola...or alternately, there is a bus for $3.00 from Santa Cruz to Monterrey. In Monterrey, the bus 24 for another $2.00 will take you to Barnyard shopping village in Carmel. The red lights there are an excellent place to catch rides as they are the last lights before the road turns into big sur area. Alot of drivers are headed all the way to L.A. with many cars full of young people, travelers, surfers. It took me literally 5 minutes to get a ride there, and i´m a 24 year old dude with long messy hair. Once in Big Sur hitchhiking is ridiculously easy and it is also an excellent place to camp for free on oceanside bluffs(as long as you are respectful).

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California can be difficult. It has been reported to take as long as 6 hours for someone to catch a ride. There are not many places for people to pull over, and Yuba City is a huge strip mall town that people just blast through on a multi lane road. If hitching from Yuba City, wait at the intersection of Hwys 20 &amp; 99. The 99 commuter bus runs between Yuba City and Sacramento, too. On the other hand, [[User:Thewindandrain]] has had nothing but easy experiences hitching around Yuba City and Williams.

== Experiences ==
''The difference between hitching in the mountainous areas and the valley is like night and day. While the mountainous areas in any region of the state are very easy, hitchhiking in the valley can be a challenge at times. '''California''' has many of the best swimming holes in America, an excellent climate, and a virtually unlimited selection of hiking opportunities. A fan of the outdoors could spend a lifetime exploring here.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 23:33, 1 June 2013 (CEST)

''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!


:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take {{StateHighway|California|1}}. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on {{StateHighway|California|1}}, where the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on {{US-I|15}}."

Experience Nov. 2012
:I hitched from southern Oregon to Texas without any problems except one in Westmorland, CA.  I was standing on the edge of the shoulder of highway 86 on the south end of this rural small community when approached by two aggrevated and aggressive Imperial County sheriffs.  They asked if i knew that it was [[illegal]] to hitchhike in California.  I told them it was not.  Minutes of arguing later they retrieved their citation book and showed me the law shown above that you can not hitch on roadway.  I asked them to show me the state definition of a roadway.  This upset them.  Veins bulging and spit spewing, they pointed to a business wall 40 feet away and said that's where the roadway ends.  They then grabbed their [[pepper spray]] and asked if I'd be walking back to town.  I complied and spent $1 for a bus to El Centro and continued on my way.  Pick your battles wisely and be safe out there.  ~nomadinexile

Experience Sept. 2014

DAY 1 --- I hitched from San Francisco to San Luis Obispo in one-and-half days. Took the BART from Mission St to Daly City, then the 110 bus to Pacifica. Waited about 15 minutes for a ride down Highway 1 to a beach just north of Santa Cruz. I stood in the beach parking lot for 5 minutes before getting a ride into Santa Cruz, then waited 10 minutes near the onramp to {{StateHighway|California|1}} before I got a ride to Carmel. Carmel was a bit tricky. I waited about 2 hours before a guy told me told me it was a bad hitching spot and took me down to the gas station junction where the 1 leads to Big Sur, I waited about 45 minutes for a ride. Got to Big Sur about seven and met some surfers who showed me a safe place to hide my sleeping bag and rest for the night. All four of my rides were solo men between 25 - 60.

DAY 2 --- Quiet in the morning, but by 10am I had a ride from Big Sur to Lucia. Walked 10 mins to the next good lay-by and got a ride from a German tourist couple who were driving all the way to San Luis Obispo (we stopped off and looked at the elephants seals, and then the sea lioons in Morro Bay). I arrived in SLO by 2.30pm

A week later I hitched from {{StateHighway|California|1}} near Lompoc to L.A. in about 5 hours. The {{StateHighway|California|1}} looked tough heading south, but waited about 90 mins for a young elementary school teacher who took to me to Santa Barbara. Waited on the {{US-R|101}} onramp at a tricky multi-lane junction, waited about 90 mins for these two Nepalese guys to take me right into downtown L.A. I set off about 4pm and arrived about 9pm.

TIPS: Always carry a big cardboard sign of your destination. Smile infectiously, and even dance (though not too much to make you look mentally ill). STAY POSITIVE - it always works out some way or the other.

Experience March 2016:
''Hitched into Cali from Southern Oregon on the I-5, and stopped in Redding for the night. The next day was the weirdest day of hitchhiking I ever had. We were headed toward San Fran, which proved difficult . We got a lift from a trucker out of Redding, he was headed to Sacramento, but we'd heard lots of bad stuff about Sac so he offered to drop us somewhere before. We got dropped at the truck stop in Dunnigan, CA which had very little traffic on the on ramp. People often waved but no one ever stopped. We started walking on the highway, the 505 towards San Fran, even though we knew it was illegal. We made it a few miles before highway patrol pulled over. Showing IDs from New York and Florida, he let us off pretty easy and ended up taking us 20 miles down the road to Winters, CA where we got a ride in 5 minutes. Oh, and before dropping us the cop joked "If you want some real good Mexican food, there's a Taco Bell here for ya. Ha ha!". Lots of nice people willing to pick us up after that, after a ride with a restaurant owner and then a construction worker who dropped us at the transit station in San Rafael, we took the bus into San Fran.  '' [[User:Koalajuj|Koalajuj]]


October 2023

Los Angeles to Arcata along the {{StateHighway|California|1}} and {{US-R|101}}. Definitely start hitching north from Malibu if you wanna take the {{StateHighway|California|1}}, that spot worked beautifully. The road up to Big Sur was closed so I had to take the {{US-R|101}} and pass through SLO. I received a ride from a state park officer and all other policemen did not bother me. Stuck to onramps, didn't try gas stations or truck stops and my average wait time was about 90 (!) minutes, as a young, clean male with only a backpack. Some of my longest waits were along the {{US-R|101}}, in Mendocino county, but my best experiences were in the Emerald Triangle! I was invited to a Halloween party high in the hills, hosted by weed farmers. A tent is a must in these cold, rainy winter months. Be sure to sample some of that Humboldt county weed!

- The Falling Leaf

== External links ==

* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.5]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}
{{Template:States USA}}
[[Category:California]]
[[Category:United States]]
[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>qv542l9a2agglwyr5e360px4pa2tmmg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>111694</id>
      <parentid>108804</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-08-23T06:54:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20721">{{IsIn|United States of America}}
[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''{{FULLPAGENAME}}''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from [[Bakersfield]] to, say, [[Sacramento]] (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.

{| class="toccolours" align="center" style="margin: 0 2em; clear: both;"
!style="background:#ccccff" width="94%"| Cities and major landmarks of '''California'''
|-
|align="center" style="font-size: 90%;" colspan="2"|
'''North Coast'''  [[Arcata]] | [[Eureka (California)|Eureka]] | [[Mendocino]]
'''Central California'''  ''Valley'' | [[Redding]] | [[Chico]] | [[Sacramento, California|Sacramento]] | [[Stockton]] | [[Modesto]] |  [[Merced]] | [[Fresno]] | [[Visalia]] | [[Bakersfield]] | ''Central Coast'' | [[Bay Area]] | [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] | [[Oakland]] | [[San Jose]] | [[Santa Cruz]] | [[Monterey]] | [[Big Sur]] |
'''Southern California'''  [[Los Angeles]] | [[Santa Barbara]] | [[San Diego]] | [[Barstow]] | [[Inland Empire]]
'''Sierra Nevada'''  [[Mammoth]] | [[Yosemite]] |  [[Bishop]] | [[Tahoe]]
|-
|}

== Major Highways ==
{{US-I|5}} and {{StateHighway|California|99}} both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from [[Los Angeles]] up through [[Sacramento]], [[Redding]], and into [[Oregon]]. {{US-I|5}} is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. {{StateHighway|California|99}} is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch). - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

{{StateHighway|California|1}} goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. 

North of Sonoma is beautiful...that is to say, if you have time to spare at all, do take the 1! 

Hitchhiking along the {{StateHighway|California|1}} north of [[San Francisco]] is not easy as there is little traffic, no on-ramps, no service stations, and very few stop lights. If you're lucky, you might find a construction site where all traffic has to stop and wait for five or ten minutes.

{{US-R|101}} from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US.  ''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the {{US-R|101}}, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: [[Big Sur]] and [[Crescent City]] {{StateHighway|California|1}} &amp; {{US-R|101}}, have beautiful shores/beaches. [[Yosemite]] {{US-I|20}}, [[Sequoia National Park]], the Redwoods and the Los Padres Forest are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Roads ==

*Shoulders
:Broad shoulders are common along many roadsides, giving people plenty of room to pull over for you. However, it is not uncommon to encounter places where shoulders have not been built or are prohibitively narrow.

*Pedestrian Rights
:All interstates and many major many four lane and even several two lane highways in California prohibit pedestrians.

*Interchanges
:[[split-traffic interchange|Split-traffic interchanges]] are all too common in California. Many interchanges also do not require drivers to slow down, which can lead to longer waiting times.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.


The following law is enforced more often:

21957.  No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of
soliciting a ride from the driver of any vehicle.

Definitions: 530.  A "roadway" is that portion of a highway improved, designed, or ordinarily used for vehicular travel.

As with other states where the roadway definition does not mention a shoulder, it might be wise to hitch from outside of the paved portion of the road.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Yosemite National Park
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

*Joshua Tree National Park
Hitchhiking is only permitted under exigent conditions where the health and safety of the person 
hitchhiking is in jeopardy.

*Mojave National Preserve
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Death Valley National Park
Hitchhiking, or the soliciting of transportation, is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person is off the paved roadway on the shoulder, and visitor safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected.

*Sequoia and King's Canyon National Parks
Hitchhiking is permitted when not standing in the roadway, and visitor safety and traffic flow must not be adversely affected.

*Golden Gate National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas: Marin County - Marin Headlands

*Point Reyes National Seashore
Hitchhiking is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person does not stand in a 
roadway and the hitchhiking/solicitation does not adversely affect visitor safety or the 
normal flow of traffic.

*Lassen Volcanic National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Whiskeytown National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is explicitly prohibited at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area

*Redwood National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

== Various ==

In SoCal, one just has to transit as far from the city as possible before attempting to hitch. Northbound, take the commuter bus from downtown LA Union Station to Valencia and hitch I-5 from there. Eastbound, Metrolink (~$13 from Union Station) to the truck stops along Fontana, Rialto, San Bernadino, etc. Hitching will get easier once you hit the desert in Indio, home to better truck stops, and a departure point for Niland/Slab City. Ontario is known for "lot lizards" and other urban truck-stop crime. It takes a long time, but one can transit through Los Angeles to Orange and San Diego Counties, all the way down to Mexico. See also Nick Cophee's excellent thread on "hitching in SoCal" on Squat the Planet. 

Northern California: If hitching north or east out of the Bay, the University Ave onramp in Berkeley is GOLD. The Octavia Ave onramp for the {{US-R|101}} south and 80 east seems to the best in SF. In Sacramento, the 16th St onramp is alright for commuting to the Bay (just stand on the left  side of the road, not by the onramp post, and hold your sign high), but hitching north or south will take a long long while to happen--if you can get rides from friends in the area, go to Lodi if heading further south, the Dunnigan truck stop if northbound, but otherwise consider Megabus, Union Pacific, or hitching from the Bay. If you're in the Shasta area, check out the regional bus system--you're more likely to get a quick ride from hippie-friendly towns like Mt Shasta and Weed than more conservative places such as Dunsmuir. 

Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route {{US-R|101}}, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and {{StateHighway|California|1}} South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. From the bay, hitching can be difficult but not impossible. You can alternately take public transit to the Diridon station in San Jose. There is a shuttle for $5.00 to Downtown Santa Cruz. Make sure to hitch out of Santa Cruz instead of Capitola...or alternately, there is a bus for $3.00 from Santa Cruz to Monterrey. In Monterrey, the bus 24 for another $2.00 will take you to Barnyard shopping village in Carmel. The red lights there are an excellent place to catch rides as they are the last lights before the road turns into big sur area. Alot of drivers are headed all the way to L.A. with many cars full of young people, travelers, surfers. It took me literally 5 minutes to get a ride there, and i´m a 24 year old dude with long messy hair. Once in Big Sur hitchhiking is ridiculously easy and it is also an excellent place to camp for free on oceanside bluffs(as long as you are respectful).

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California can be difficult. It has been reported to take as long as 6 hours for someone to catch a ride. There are not many places for people to pull over, and Yuba City is a huge strip mall town that people just blast through on a multi lane road. If hitching from Yuba City, wait at the intersection of Hwys 20 &amp; 99. The 99 commuter bus runs between Yuba City and Sacramento, too. On the other hand, [[User:Thewindandrain]] has had nothing but easy experiences hitching around Yuba City and Williams.

== Experiences ==
''The difference between hitching in the mountainous areas and the valley is like night and day. While the mountainous areas in any region of the state are very easy, hitchhiking in the valley can be a challenge at times. '''California''' has many of the best swimming holes in America, an excellent climate, and a virtually unlimited selection of hiking opportunities. A fan of the outdoors could spend a lifetime exploring here.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 23:33, 1 June 2013 (CEST)

''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!


:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take {{StateHighway|California|1}}. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on {{StateHighway|California|1}}, where the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on {{US-I|15}}."

Experience Nov. 2012
:I hitched from southern Oregon to Texas without any problems except one in Westmorland, CA.  I was standing on the edge of the shoulder of highway 86 on the south end of this rural small community when approached by two aggrevated and aggressive Imperial County sheriffs.  They asked if i knew that it was [[illegal]] to hitchhike in California.  I told them it was not.  Minutes of arguing later they retrieved their citation book and showed me the law shown above that you can not hitch on roadway.  I asked them to show me the state definition of a roadway.  This upset them.  Veins bulging and spit spewing, they pointed to a business wall 40 feet away and said that's where the roadway ends.  They then grabbed their [[pepper spray]] and asked if I'd be walking back to town.  I complied and spent $1 for a bus to El Centro and continued on my way.  Pick your battles wisely and be safe out there.  ~nomadinexile

Experience Sept. 2014

DAY 1 --- I hitched from San Francisco to San Luis Obispo in one-and-half days. Took the BART from Mission St to Daly City, then the 110 bus to Pacifica. Waited about 15 minutes for a ride down Highway 1 to a beach just north of Santa Cruz. I stood in the beach parking lot for 5 minutes before getting a ride into Santa Cruz, then waited 10 minutes near the onramp to {{StateHighway|California|1}} before I got a ride to Carmel. Carmel was a bit tricky. I waited about 2 hours before a guy told me told me it was a bad hitching spot and took me down to the gas station junction where the 1 leads to Big Sur, I waited about 45 minutes for a ride. Got to Big Sur about seven and met some surfers who showed me a safe place to hide my sleeping bag and rest for the night. All four of my rides were solo men between 25 - 60.

DAY 2 --- Quiet in the morning, but by 10am I had a ride from Big Sur to Lucia. Walked 10 mins to the next good lay-by and got a ride from a German tourist couple who were driving all the way to San Luis Obispo (we stopped off and looked at the elephants seals, and then the sea lioons in Morro Bay). I arrived in SLO by 2.30pm

A week later I hitched from {{StateHighway|California|1}} near Lompoc to L.A. in about 5 hours. The {{StateHighway|California|1}} looked tough heading south, but waited about 90 mins for a young elementary school teacher who took to me to Santa Barbara. Waited on the {{US-R|101}} onramp at a tricky multi-lane junction, waited about 90 mins for these two Nepalese guys to take me right into downtown L.A. I set off about 4pm and arrived about 9pm.

TIPS: Always carry a big cardboard sign of your destination. Smile infectiously, and even dance (though not too much to make you look mentally ill). STAY POSITIVE - it always works out some way or the other.

Experience March 2016:
''Hitched into Cali from Southern Oregon on the I-5, and stopped in Redding for the night. The next day was the weirdest day of hitchhiking I ever had. We were headed toward San Fran, which proved difficult . We got a lift from a trucker out of Redding, he was headed to Sacramento, but we'd heard lots of bad stuff about Sac so he offered to drop us somewhere before. We got dropped at the truck stop in Dunnigan, CA which had very little traffic on the on ramp. People often waved but no one ever stopped. We started walking on the highway, the 505 towards San Fran, even though we knew it was illegal. We made it a few miles before highway patrol pulled over. Showing IDs from New York and Florida, he let us off pretty easy and ended up taking us 20 miles down the road to Winters, CA where we got a ride in 5 minutes. Oh, and before dropping us the cop joked "If you want some real good Mexican food, there's a Taco Bell here for ya. Ha ha!". Lots of nice people willing to pick us up after that, after a ride with a restaurant owner and then a construction worker who dropped us at the transit station in San Rafael, we took the bus into San Fran.  '' [[User:Koalajuj|Koalajuj]]


October 2023

Los Angeles to Arcata along the {{StateHighway|California|1}} and {{US-R|101}}. Definitely start hitching north from Malibu if you wanna take the {{StateHighway|California|1}}, that spot worked beautifully. The road up to Big Sur was closed so I had to take the {{US-R|101}} and pass through SLO. I received a ride from a state park officer and all other policemen did not bother me. Stuck to onramps, didn't try gas stations or truck stops and my average wait time was about 90 (!) minutes, as a young, clean male with only a backpack. Some of my longest waits were along the {{US-R|101}}, in Mendocino county, but my best experiences were in the Emerald Triangle! I was invited to a Halloween party high in the hills, hosted by weed farmers. A tent is a must in these cold, rainy winter months. Be sure to sample some of that Humboldt county weed!

- The Falling Leaf

== External links ==

* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.5]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}
{{Template:States USA}}
[[Category:California]]
[[Category:United States]]
[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>hh2hsk1l6o5zokclw8rk3w1yui6e7qb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>111696</id>
      <parentid>111694</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-08-23T07:02:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="19935">[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]
'''{{FULLPAGENAME}}''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from [[Bakersfield]] to, say, [[Sacramento]] (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.



== Major Highways ==
{{US-I|5}} and {{StateHighway|California|99}} both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from [[Los Angeles]] up through [[Sacramento]], [[Redding]], and into [[Oregon]]. {{US-I|5}} is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. {{StateHighway|California|99}} is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch). - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

{{StateHighway|California|1}} goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. 

North of Sonoma is beautiful...that is to say, if you have time to spare at all, do take the 1! 

Hitchhiking along the {{StateHighway|California|1}} north of [[San Francisco]] is not easy as there is little traffic, no on-ramps, no service stations, and very few stop lights. If you're lucky, you might find a construction site where all traffic has to stop and wait for five or ten minutes.

{{US-R|101}} from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US.  ''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the {{US-R|101}}, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: [[Big Sur]] and [[Crescent City]] {{StateHighway|California|1}} &amp; {{US-R|101}}, have beautiful shores/beaches. [[Yosemite]] {{US-I|20}}, [[Sequoia National Park]], the Redwoods and the Los Padres Forest are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Roads ==

*Shoulders
:Broad shoulders are common along many roadsides, giving people plenty of room to pull over for you. However, it is not uncommon to encounter places where shoulders have not been built or are prohibitively narrow.

*Pedestrian Rights
:All interstates and many major many four lane and even several two lane highways in California prohibit pedestrians.

*Interchanges
:[[split-traffic interchange|Split-traffic interchanges]] are all too common in California. Many interchanges also do not require drivers to slow down, which can lead to longer waiting times.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.


The following law is enforced more often:

21957.  No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of
soliciting a ride from the driver of any vehicle.

Definitions: 530.  A "roadway" is that portion of a highway improved, designed, or ordinarily used for vehicular travel.

As with other states where the roadway definition does not mention a shoulder, it might be wise to hitch from outside of the paved portion of the road.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Yosemite National Park
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

*Joshua Tree National Park
Hitchhiking is only permitted under exigent conditions where the health and safety of the person 
hitchhiking is in jeopardy.

*Mojave National Preserve
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Death Valley National Park
Hitchhiking, or the soliciting of transportation, is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person is off the paved roadway on the shoulder, and visitor safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected.

*Sequoia and King's Canyon National Parks
Hitchhiking is permitted when not standing in the roadway, and visitor safety and traffic flow must not be adversely affected.

*Golden Gate National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas: Marin County - Marin Headlands

*Point Reyes National Seashore
Hitchhiking is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person does not stand in a 
roadway and the hitchhiking/solicitation does not adversely affect visitor safety or the 
normal flow of traffic.

*Lassen Volcanic National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Whiskeytown National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is explicitly prohibited at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area

*Redwood National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

== Various ==

In SoCal, one just has to transit as far from the city as possible before attempting to hitch. Northbound, take the commuter bus from downtown LA Union Station to Valencia and hitch I-5 from there. Eastbound, Metrolink (~$13 from Union Station) to the truck stops along Fontana, Rialto, San Bernadino, etc. Hitching will get easier once you hit the desert in Indio, home to better truck stops, and a departure point for Niland/Slab City. Ontario is known for "lot lizards" and other urban truck-stop crime. It takes a long time, but one can transit through Los Angeles to Orange and San Diego Counties, all the way down to Mexico. See also Nick Cophee's excellent thread on "hitching in SoCal" on Squat the Planet. 

Northern California: If hitching north or east out of the Bay, the University Ave onramp in Berkeley is GOLD. The Octavia Ave onramp for the {{US-R|101}} south and 80 east seems to the best in SF. In Sacramento, the 16th St onramp is alright for commuting to the Bay (just stand on the left  side of the road, not by the onramp post, and hold your sign high), but hitching north or south will take a long long while to happen--if you can get rides from friends in the area, go to Lodi if heading further south, the Dunnigan truck stop if northbound, but otherwise consider Megabus, Union Pacific, or hitching from the Bay. If you're in the Shasta area, check out the regional bus system--you're more likely to get a quick ride from hippie-friendly towns like Mt Shasta and Weed than more conservative places such as Dunsmuir. 

Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route {{US-R|101}}, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and {{StateHighway|California|1}} South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. From the bay, hitching can be difficult but not impossible. You can alternately take public transit to the Diridon station in San Jose. There is a shuttle for $5.00 to Downtown Santa Cruz. Make sure to hitch out of Santa Cruz instead of Capitola...or alternately, there is a bus for $3.00 from Santa Cruz to Monterrey. In Monterrey, the bus 24 for another $2.00 will take you to Barnyard shopping village in Carmel. The red lights there are an excellent place to catch rides as they are the last lights before the road turns into big sur area. Alot of drivers are headed all the way to L.A. with many cars full of young people, travelers, surfers. It took me literally 5 minutes to get a ride there, and i´m a 24 year old dude with long messy hair. Once in Big Sur hitchhiking is ridiculously easy and it is also an excellent place to camp for free on oceanside bluffs(as long as you are respectful).

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California can be difficult. It has been reported to take as long as 6 hours for someone to catch a ride. There are not many places for people to pull over, and Yuba City is a huge strip mall town that people just blast through on a multi lane road. If hitching from Yuba City, wait at the intersection of Hwys 20 &amp; 99. The 99 commuter bus runs between Yuba City and Sacramento, too. On the other hand, [[User:Thewindandrain]] has had nothing but easy experiences hitching around Yuba City and Williams.

== Experiences ==
''The difference between hitching in the mountainous areas and the valley is like night and day. While the mountainous areas in any region of the state are very easy, hitchhiking in the valley can be a challenge at times. '''California''' has many of the best swimming holes in America, an excellent climate, and a virtually unlimited selection of hiking opportunities. A fan of the outdoors could spend a lifetime exploring here.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 23:33, 1 June 2013 (CEST)

''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!


:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take {{StateHighway|California|1}}. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on {{StateHighway|California|1}}, where the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on {{US-I|15}}."

Experience Nov. 2012
:I hitched from southern Oregon to Texas without any problems except one in Westmorland, CA.  I was standing on the edge of the shoulder of highway 86 on the south end of this rural small community when approached by two aggrevated and aggressive Imperial County sheriffs.  They asked if i knew that it was [[illegal]] to hitchhike in California.  I told them it was not.  Minutes of arguing later they retrieved their citation book and showed me the law shown above that you can not hitch on roadway.  I asked them to show me the state definition of a roadway.  This upset them.  Veins bulging and spit spewing, they pointed to a business wall 40 feet away and said that's where the roadway ends.  They then grabbed their [[pepper spray]] and asked if I'd be walking back to town.  I complied and spent $1 for a bus to El Centro and continued on my way.  Pick your battles wisely and be safe out there.  ~nomadinexile

Experience Sept. 2014

DAY 1 --- I hitched from San Francisco to San Luis Obispo in one-and-half days. Took the BART from Mission St to Daly City, then the 110 bus to Pacifica. Waited about 15 minutes for a ride down Highway 1 to a beach just north of Santa Cruz. I stood in the beach parking lot for 5 minutes before getting a ride into Santa Cruz, then waited 10 minutes near the onramp to {{StateHighway|California|1}} before I got a ride to Carmel. Carmel was a bit tricky. I waited about 2 hours before a guy told me told me it was a bad hitching spot and took me down to the gas station junction where the 1 leads to Big Sur, I waited about 45 minutes for a ride. Got to Big Sur about seven and met some surfers who showed me a safe place to hide my sleeping bag and rest for the night. All four of my rides were solo men between 25 - 60.

DAY 2 --- Quiet in the morning, but by 10am I had a ride from Big Sur to Lucia. Walked 10 mins to the next good lay-by and got a ride from a German tourist couple who were driving all the way to San Luis Obispo (we stopped off and looked at the elephants seals, and then the sea lioons in Morro Bay). I arrived in SLO by 2.30pm

A week later I hitched from {{StateHighway|California|1}} near Lompoc to L.A. in about 5 hours. The {{StateHighway|California|1}} looked tough heading south, but waited about 90 mins for a young elementary school teacher who took to me to Santa Barbara. Waited on the {{US-R|101}} onramp at a tricky multi-lane junction, waited about 90 mins for these two Nepalese guys to take me right into downtown L.A. I set off about 4pm and arrived about 9pm.

TIPS: Always carry a big cardboard sign of your destination. Smile infectiously, and even dance (though not too much to make you look mentally ill). STAY POSITIVE - it always works out some way or the other.

Experience March 2016:
''Hitched into Cali from Southern Oregon on the I-5, and stopped in Redding for the night. The next day was the weirdest day of hitchhiking I ever had. We were headed toward San Fran, which proved difficult . We got a lift from a trucker out of Redding, he was headed to Sacramento, but we'd heard lots of bad stuff about Sac so he offered to drop us somewhere before. We got dropped at the truck stop in Dunnigan, CA which had very little traffic on the on ramp. People often waved but no one ever stopped. We started walking on the highway, the 505 towards San Fran, even though we knew it was illegal. We made it a few miles before highway patrol pulled over. Showing IDs from New York and Florida, he let us off pretty easy and ended up taking us 20 miles down the road to Winters, CA where we got a ride in 5 minutes. Oh, and before dropping us the cop joked "If you want some real good Mexican food, there's a Taco Bell here for ya. Ha ha!". Lots of nice people willing to pick us up after that, after a ride with a restaurant owner and then a construction worker who dropped us at the transit station in San Rafael, we took the bus into San Fran.  '' [[User:Koalajuj|Koalajuj]]


October 2023

Los Angeles to Arcata along the {{StateHighway|California|1}} and {{US-R|101}}. Definitely start hitching north from Malibu if you wanna take the {{StateHighway|California|1}}, that spot worked beautifully. The road up to Big Sur was closed so I had to take the {{US-R|101}} and pass through SLO. I received a ride from a state park officer and all other policemen did not bother me. Stuck to onramps, didn't try gas stations or truck stops and my average wait time was about 90 (!) minutes, as a young, clean male with only a backpack. Some of my longest waits were along the {{US-R|101}}, in Mendocino county, but my best experiences were in the Emerald Triangle! I was invited to a Halloween party high in the hills, hosted by weed farmers. A tent is a must in these cold, rainy winter months. Be sure to sample some of that Humboldt county weed!

- The Falling Leaf

== External links ==

* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.5]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{IsIn|United States of America}}

{{Template:Cities California}}
{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:California]]
[[Category:United States]]
[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>bzfokvz9anb4l3ffx6xtp7ngotutj9o</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>111697</id>
      <parentid>111696</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-08-23T07:04:31Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20057">{{Infobox Location
|country = United States
|map = &lt;map lat='37.25' lng='119.75' zoom='6' /&gt;
|pop = -
|motorways = -
}}

[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]

'''{{FULLPAGENAME}}''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from [[Bakersfield]] to, say, [[Sacramento]] (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.



== Major Highways ==
{{US-I|5}} and {{StateHighway|California|99}} both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from [[Los Angeles]] up through [[Sacramento]], [[Redding]], and into [[Oregon]]. {{US-I|5}} is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. {{StateHighway|California|99}} is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch). - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

{{StateHighway|California|1}} goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. 

North of Sonoma is beautiful...that is to say, if you have time to spare at all, do take the 1! 

Hitchhiking along the {{StateHighway|California|1}} north of [[San Francisco]] is not easy as there is little traffic, no on-ramps, no service stations, and very few stop lights. If you're lucky, you might find a construction site where all traffic has to stop and wait for five or ten minutes.

{{US-R|101}} from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US.  ''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the {{US-R|101}}, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: [[Big Sur]] and [[Crescent City]] {{StateHighway|California|1}} &amp; {{US-R|101}}, have beautiful shores/beaches. [[Yosemite]] {{US-I|20}}, [[Sequoia National Park]], the Redwoods and the Los Padres Forest are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Roads ==

*Shoulders
:Broad shoulders are common along many roadsides, giving people plenty of room to pull over for you. However, it is not uncommon to encounter places where shoulders have not been built or are prohibitively narrow.

*Pedestrian Rights
:All interstates and many major many four lane and even several two lane highways in California prohibit pedestrians.

*Interchanges
:[[split-traffic interchange|Split-traffic interchanges]] are all too common in California. Many interchanges also do not require drivers to slow down, which can lead to longer waiting times.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.


The following law is enforced more often:

21957.  No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of
soliciting a ride from the driver of any vehicle.

Definitions: 530.  A "roadway" is that portion of a highway improved, designed, or ordinarily used for vehicular travel.

As with other states where the roadway definition does not mention a shoulder, it might be wise to hitch from outside of the paved portion of the road.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Yosemite National Park
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

*Joshua Tree National Park
Hitchhiking is only permitted under exigent conditions where the health and safety of the person 
hitchhiking is in jeopardy.

*Mojave National Preserve
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Death Valley National Park
Hitchhiking, or the soliciting of transportation, is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person is off the paved roadway on the shoulder, and visitor safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected.

*Sequoia and King's Canyon National Parks
Hitchhiking is permitted when not standing in the roadway, and visitor safety and traffic flow must not be adversely affected.

*Golden Gate National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas: Marin County - Marin Headlands

*Point Reyes National Seashore
Hitchhiking is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person does not stand in a 
roadway and the hitchhiking/solicitation does not adversely affect visitor safety or the 
normal flow of traffic.

*Lassen Volcanic National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Whiskeytown National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is explicitly prohibited at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area

*Redwood National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

== Various ==

In SoCal, one just has to transit as far from the city as possible before attempting to hitch. Northbound, take the commuter bus from downtown LA Union Station to Valencia and hitch I-5 from there. Eastbound, Metrolink (~$13 from Union Station) to the truck stops along Fontana, Rialto, San Bernadino, etc. Hitching will get easier once you hit the desert in Indio, home to better truck stops, and a departure point for Niland/Slab City. Ontario is known for "lot lizards" and other urban truck-stop crime. It takes a long time, but one can transit through Los Angeles to Orange and San Diego Counties, all the way down to Mexico. See also Nick Cophee's excellent thread on "hitching in SoCal" on Squat the Planet. 

Northern California: If hitching north or east out of the Bay, the University Ave onramp in Berkeley is GOLD. The Octavia Ave onramp for the {{US-R|101}} south and 80 east seems to the best in SF. In Sacramento, the 16th St onramp is alright for commuting to the Bay (just stand on the left  side of the road, not by the onramp post, and hold your sign high), but hitching north or south will take a long long while to happen--if you can get rides from friends in the area, go to Lodi if heading further south, the Dunnigan truck stop if northbound, but otherwise consider Megabus, Union Pacific, or hitching from the Bay. If you're in the Shasta area, check out the regional bus system--you're more likely to get a quick ride from hippie-friendly towns like Mt Shasta and Weed than more conservative places such as Dunsmuir. 

Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route {{US-R|101}}, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and {{StateHighway|California|1}} South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. From the bay, hitching can be difficult but not impossible. You can alternately take public transit to the Diridon station in San Jose. There is a shuttle for $5.00 to Downtown Santa Cruz. Make sure to hitch out of Santa Cruz instead of Capitola...or alternately, there is a bus for $3.00 from Santa Cruz to Monterrey. In Monterrey, the bus 24 for another $2.00 will take you to Barnyard shopping village in Carmel. The red lights there are an excellent place to catch rides as they are the last lights before the road turns into big sur area. Alot of drivers are headed all the way to L.A. with many cars full of young people, travelers, surfers. It took me literally 5 minutes to get a ride there, and i´m a 24 year old dude with long messy hair. Once in Big Sur hitchhiking is ridiculously easy and it is also an excellent place to camp for free on oceanside bluffs(as long as you are respectful).

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California can be difficult. It has been reported to take as long as 6 hours for someone to catch a ride. There are not many places for people to pull over, and Yuba City is a huge strip mall town that people just blast through on a multi lane road. If hitching from Yuba City, wait at the intersection of Hwys 20 &amp; 99. The 99 commuter bus runs between Yuba City and Sacramento, too. On the other hand, [[User:Thewindandrain]] has had nothing but easy experiences hitching around Yuba City and Williams.

== Experiences ==
''The difference between hitching in the mountainous areas and the valley is like night and day. While the mountainous areas in any region of the state are very easy, hitchhiking in the valley can be a challenge at times. '''California''' has many of the best swimming holes in America, an excellent climate, and a virtually unlimited selection of hiking opportunities. A fan of the outdoors could spend a lifetime exploring here.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 23:33, 1 June 2013 (CEST)

''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!


:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take {{StateHighway|California|1}}. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on {{StateHighway|California|1}}, where the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on {{US-I|15}}."

Experience Nov. 2012
:I hitched from southern Oregon to Texas without any problems except one in Westmorland, CA.  I was standing on the edge of the shoulder of highway 86 on the south end of this rural small community when approached by two aggrevated and aggressive Imperial County sheriffs.  They asked if i knew that it was [[illegal]] to hitchhike in California.  I told them it was not.  Minutes of arguing later they retrieved their citation book and showed me the law shown above that you can not hitch on roadway.  I asked them to show me the state definition of a roadway.  This upset them.  Veins bulging and spit spewing, they pointed to a business wall 40 feet away and said that's where the roadway ends.  They then grabbed their [[pepper spray]] and asked if I'd be walking back to town.  I complied and spent $1 for a bus to El Centro and continued on my way.  Pick your battles wisely and be safe out there.  ~nomadinexile

Experience Sept. 2014

DAY 1 --- I hitched from San Francisco to San Luis Obispo in one-and-half days. Took the BART from Mission St to Daly City, then the 110 bus to Pacifica. Waited about 15 minutes for a ride down Highway 1 to a beach just north of Santa Cruz. I stood in the beach parking lot for 5 minutes before getting a ride into Santa Cruz, then waited 10 minutes near the onramp to {{StateHighway|California|1}} before I got a ride to Carmel. Carmel was a bit tricky. I waited about 2 hours before a guy told me told me it was a bad hitching spot and took me down to the gas station junction where the 1 leads to Big Sur, I waited about 45 minutes for a ride. Got to Big Sur about seven and met some surfers who showed me a safe place to hide my sleeping bag and rest for the night. All four of my rides were solo men between 25 - 60.

DAY 2 --- Quiet in the morning, but by 10am I had a ride from Big Sur to Lucia. Walked 10 mins to the next good lay-by and got a ride from a German tourist couple who were driving all the way to San Luis Obispo (we stopped off and looked at the elephants seals, and then the sea lioons in Morro Bay). I arrived in SLO by 2.30pm

A week later I hitched from {{StateHighway|California|1}} near Lompoc to L.A. in about 5 hours. The {{StateHighway|California|1}} looked tough heading south, but waited about 90 mins for a young elementary school teacher who took to me to Santa Barbara. Waited on the {{US-R|101}} onramp at a tricky multi-lane junction, waited about 90 mins for these two Nepalese guys to take me right into downtown L.A. I set off about 4pm and arrived about 9pm.

TIPS: Always carry a big cardboard sign of your destination. Smile infectiously, and even dance (though not too much to make you look mentally ill). STAY POSITIVE - it always works out some way or the other.

Experience March 2016:
''Hitched into Cali from Southern Oregon on the I-5, and stopped in Redding for the night. The next day was the weirdest day of hitchhiking I ever had. We were headed toward San Fran, which proved difficult . We got a lift from a trucker out of Redding, he was headed to Sacramento, but we'd heard lots of bad stuff about Sac so he offered to drop us somewhere before. We got dropped at the truck stop in Dunnigan, CA which had very little traffic on the on ramp. People often waved but no one ever stopped. We started walking on the highway, the 505 towards San Fran, even though we knew it was illegal. We made it a few miles before highway patrol pulled over. Showing IDs from New York and Florida, he let us off pretty easy and ended up taking us 20 miles down the road to Winters, CA where we got a ride in 5 minutes. Oh, and before dropping us the cop joked "If you want some real good Mexican food, there's a Taco Bell here for ya. Ha ha!". Lots of nice people willing to pick us up after that, after a ride with a restaurant owner and then a construction worker who dropped us at the transit station in San Rafael, we took the bus into San Fran.  '' [[User:Koalajuj|Koalajuj]]


October 2023

Los Angeles to Arcata along the {{StateHighway|California|1}} and {{US-R|101}}. Definitely start hitching north from Malibu if you wanna take the {{StateHighway|California|1}}, that spot worked beautifully. The road up to Big Sur was closed so I had to take the {{US-R|101}} and pass through SLO. I received a ride from a state park officer and all other policemen did not bother me. Stuck to onramps, didn't try gas stations or truck stops and my average wait time was about 90 (!) minutes, as a young, clean male with only a backpack. Some of my longest waits were along the {{US-R|101}}, in Mendocino county, but my best experiences were in the Emerald Triangle! I was invited to a Halloween party high in the hills, hosted by weed farmers. A tent is a must in these cold, rainy winter months. Be sure to sample some of that Humboldt county weed!

- The Falling Leaf

== External links ==

* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.5]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{IsIn|United States of America}}

{{Template:Cities California}}
{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:California]]
[[Category:United States]]
[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>poc71mov5ey6ansm32junkjd0dpegdg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>111698</id>
      <parentid>111697</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-08-23T07:04:54Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20058">{{Infobox Location
|country = United States
|map = &lt;map lat='37.25' lng='-119.75' zoom='6' /&gt;
|pop = -
|motorways = -
}}

[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]

'''{{FULLPAGENAME}}''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from [[Bakersfield]] to, say, [[Sacramento]] (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.



== Major Highways ==
{{US-I|5}} and {{StateHighway|California|99}} both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from [[Los Angeles]] up through [[Sacramento]], [[Redding]], and into [[Oregon]]. {{US-I|5}} is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. {{StateHighway|California|99}} is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch). - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

{{StateHighway|California|1}} goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. 

North of Sonoma is beautiful...that is to say, if you have time to spare at all, do take the 1! 

Hitchhiking along the {{StateHighway|California|1}} north of [[San Francisco]] is not easy as there is little traffic, no on-ramps, no service stations, and very few stop lights. If you're lucky, you might find a construction site where all traffic has to stop and wait for five or ten minutes.

{{US-R|101}} from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US.  ''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the {{US-R|101}}, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: [[Big Sur]] and [[Crescent City]] {{StateHighway|California|1}} &amp; {{US-R|101}}, have beautiful shores/beaches. [[Yosemite]] {{US-I|20}}, [[Sequoia National Park]], the Redwoods and the Los Padres Forest are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Roads ==

*Shoulders
:Broad shoulders are common along many roadsides, giving people plenty of room to pull over for you. However, it is not uncommon to encounter places where shoulders have not been built or are prohibitively narrow.

*Pedestrian Rights
:All interstates and many major many four lane and even several two lane highways in California prohibit pedestrians.

*Interchanges
:[[split-traffic interchange|Split-traffic interchanges]] are all too common in California. Many interchanges also do not require drivers to slow down, which can lead to longer waiting times.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.


The following law is enforced more often:

21957.  No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of
soliciting a ride from the driver of any vehicle.

Definitions: 530.  A "roadway" is that portion of a highway improved, designed, or ordinarily used for vehicular travel.

As with other states where the roadway definition does not mention a shoulder, it might be wise to hitch from outside of the paved portion of the road.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Yosemite National Park
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

*Joshua Tree National Park
Hitchhiking is only permitted under exigent conditions where the health and safety of the person 
hitchhiking is in jeopardy.

*Mojave National Preserve
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Death Valley National Park
Hitchhiking, or the soliciting of transportation, is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person is off the paved roadway on the shoulder, and visitor safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected.

*Sequoia and King's Canyon National Parks
Hitchhiking is permitted when not standing in the roadway, and visitor safety and traffic flow must not be adversely affected.

*Golden Gate National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas: Marin County - Marin Headlands

*Point Reyes National Seashore
Hitchhiking is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person does not stand in a 
roadway and the hitchhiking/solicitation does not adversely affect visitor safety or the 
normal flow of traffic.

*Lassen Volcanic National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Whiskeytown National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is explicitly prohibited at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area

*Redwood National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

== Various ==

In SoCal, one just has to transit as far from the city as possible before attempting to hitch. Northbound, take the commuter bus from downtown LA Union Station to Valencia and hitch I-5 from there. Eastbound, Metrolink (~$13 from Union Station) to the truck stops along Fontana, Rialto, San Bernadino, etc. Hitching will get easier once you hit the desert in Indio, home to better truck stops, and a departure point for Niland/Slab City. Ontario is known for "lot lizards" and other urban truck-stop crime. It takes a long time, but one can transit through Los Angeles to Orange and San Diego Counties, all the way down to Mexico. See also Nick Cophee's excellent thread on "hitching in SoCal" on Squat the Planet. 

Northern California: If hitching north or east out of the Bay, the University Ave onramp in Berkeley is GOLD. The Octavia Ave onramp for the {{US-R|101}} south and 80 east seems to the best in SF. In Sacramento, the 16th St onramp is alright for commuting to the Bay (just stand on the left  side of the road, not by the onramp post, and hold your sign high), but hitching north or south will take a long long while to happen--if you can get rides from friends in the area, go to Lodi if heading further south, the Dunnigan truck stop if northbound, but otherwise consider Megabus, Union Pacific, or hitching from the Bay. If you're in the Shasta area, check out the regional bus system--you're more likely to get a quick ride from hippie-friendly towns like Mt Shasta and Weed than more conservative places such as Dunsmuir. 

Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route {{US-R|101}}, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and {{StateHighway|California|1}} South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. From the bay, hitching can be difficult but not impossible. You can alternately take public transit to the Diridon station in San Jose. There is a shuttle for $5.00 to Downtown Santa Cruz. Make sure to hitch out of Santa Cruz instead of Capitola...or alternately, there is a bus for $3.00 from Santa Cruz to Monterrey. In Monterrey, the bus 24 for another $2.00 will take you to Barnyard shopping village in Carmel. The red lights there are an excellent place to catch rides as they are the last lights before the road turns into big sur area. Alot of drivers are headed all the way to L.A. with many cars full of young people, travelers, surfers. It took me literally 5 minutes to get a ride there, and i´m a 24 year old dude with long messy hair. Once in Big Sur hitchhiking is ridiculously easy and it is also an excellent place to camp for free on oceanside bluffs(as long as you are respectful).

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California can be difficult. It has been reported to take as long as 6 hours for someone to catch a ride. There are not many places for people to pull over, and Yuba City is a huge strip mall town that people just blast through on a multi lane road. If hitching from Yuba City, wait at the intersection of Hwys 20 &amp; 99. The 99 commuter bus runs between Yuba City and Sacramento, too. On the other hand, [[User:Thewindandrain]] has had nothing but easy experiences hitching around Yuba City and Williams.

== Experiences ==
''The difference between hitching in the mountainous areas and the valley is like night and day. While the mountainous areas in any region of the state are very easy, hitchhiking in the valley can be a challenge at times. '''California''' has many of the best swimming holes in America, an excellent climate, and a virtually unlimited selection of hiking opportunities. A fan of the outdoors could spend a lifetime exploring here.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 23:33, 1 June 2013 (CEST)

''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!


:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take {{StateHighway|California|1}}. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on {{StateHighway|California|1}}, where the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on {{US-I|15}}."

Experience Nov. 2012
:I hitched from southern Oregon to Texas without any problems except one in Westmorland, CA.  I was standing on the edge of the shoulder of highway 86 on the south end of this rural small community when approached by two aggrevated and aggressive Imperial County sheriffs.  They asked if i knew that it was [[illegal]] to hitchhike in California.  I told them it was not.  Minutes of arguing later they retrieved their citation book and showed me the law shown above that you can not hitch on roadway.  I asked them to show me the state definition of a roadway.  This upset them.  Veins bulging and spit spewing, they pointed to a business wall 40 feet away and said that's where the roadway ends.  They then grabbed their [[pepper spray]] and asked if I'd be walking back to town.  I complied and spent $1 for a bus to El Centro and continued on my way.  Pick your battles wisely and be safe out there.  ~nomadinexile

Experience Sept. 2014

DAY 1 --- I hitched from San Francisco to San Luis Obispo in one-and-half days. Took the BART from Mission St to Daly City, then the 110 bus to Pacifica. Waited about 15 minutes for a ride down Highway 1 to a beach just north of Santa Cruz. I stood in the beach parking lot for 5 minutes before getting a ride into Santa Cruz, then waited 10 minutes near the onramp to {{StateHighway|California|1}} before I got a ride to Carmel. Carmel was a bit tricky. I waited about 2 hours before a guy told me told me it was a bad hitching spot and took me down to the gas station junction where the 1 leads to Big Sur, I waited about 45 minutes for a ride. Got to Big Sur about seven and met some surfers who showed me a safe place to hide my sleeping bag and rest for the night. All four of my rides were solo men between 25 - 60.

DAY 2 --- Quiet in the morning, but by 10am I had a ride from Big Sur to Lucia. Walked 10 mins to the next good lay-by and got a ride from a German tourist couple who were driving all the way to San Luis Obispo (we stopped off and looked at the elephants seals, and then the sea lioons in Morro Bay). I arrived in SLO by 2.30pm

A week later I hitched from {{StateHighway|California|1}} near Lompoc to L.A. in about 5 hours. The {{StateHighway|California|1}} looked tough heading south, but waited about 90 mins for a young elementary school teacher who took to me to Santa Barbara. Waited on the {{US-R|101}} onramp at a tricky multi-lane junction, waited about 90 mins for these two Nepalese guys to take me right into downtown L.A. I set off about 4pm and arrived about 9pm.

TIPS: Always carry a big cardboard sign of your destination. Smile infectiously, and even dance (though not too much to make you look mentally ill). STAY POSITIVE - it always works out some way or the other.

Experience March 2016:
''Hitched into Cali from Southern Oregon on the I-5, and stopped in Redding for the night. The next day was the weirdest day of hitchhiking I ever had. We were headed toward San Fran, which proved difficult . We got a lift from a trucker out of Redding, he was headed to Sacramento, but we'd heard lots of bad stuff about Sac so he offered to drop us somewhere before. We got dropped at the truck stop in Dunnigan, CA which had very little traffic on the on ramp. People often waved but no one ever stopped. We started walking on the highway, the 505 towards San Fran, even though we knew it was illegal. We made it a few miles before highway patrol pulled over. Showing IDs from New York and Florida, he let us off pretty easy and ended up taking us 20 miles down the road to Winters, CA where we got a ride in 5 minutes. Oh, and before dropping us the cop joked "If you want some real good Mexican food, there's a Taco Bell here for ya. Ha ha!". Lots of nice people willing to pick us up after that, after a ride with a restaurant owner and then a construction worker who dropped us at the transit station in San Rafael, we took the bus into San Fran.  '' [[User:Koalajuj|Koalajuj]]


October 2023

Los Angeles to Arcata along the {{StateHighway|California|1}} and {{US-R|101}}. Definitely start hitching north from Malibu if you wanna take the {{StateHighway|California|1}}, that spot worked beautifully. The road up to Big Sur was closed so I had to take the {{US-R|101}} and pass through SLO. I received a ride from a state park officer and all other policemen did not bother me. Stuck to onramps, didn't try gas stations or truck stops and my average wait time was about 90 (!) minutes, as a young, clean male with only a backpack. Some of my longest waits were along the {{US-R|101}}, in Mendocino county, but my best experiences were in the Emerald Triangle! I was invited to a Halloween party high in the hills, hosted by weed farmers. A tent is a must in these cold, rainy winter months. Be sure to sample some of that Humboldt county weed!

- The Falling Leaf

== External links ==

* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.5]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{IsIn|United States of America}}

{{Template:Cities California}}
{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:California]]
[[Category:United States]]
[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>oaeul96o96tc66d5cj29op7hnlxy8rt</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>111699</id>
      <parentid>111698</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-08-23T07:05:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>TillWenke</username>
        <id>47086</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="20058">{{Infobox Location
|country = United States
|map = &lt;map lat='37.25' lng='-119.75' zoom='5' /&gt;
|pop = -
|motorways = -
}}

[[File:Amylin hitching northern ca.jpg|thumb|300px|right|[[User:Amylin|Amylin]] hitching in Northern California]]

'''{{FULLPAGENAME}}''' is a state in the [[United States of America]]. Hitchhiking here is easier than in a lot of other states of the US. You usually won't be harassed by cops. The Central Valley is a concentrated version of the dixie-area "Bible-Belt", so getting around from [[Bakersfield]] to, say, [[Sacramento]] (and anywhere in between) is a real pain. The major urban centers are notoriously difficult to hitch out of too. It's usually better to take public transportation as reasonably far as possible, and then hitch from there. The Sierra Nevada (especially highway [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_395 395]) and the Coast are a breeze for hitchhiking.



== Major Highways ==
{{US-I|5}} and {{StateHighway|California|99}} both run up and down the middle of California in the Central Valley, from [[Los Angeles]] up through [[Sacramento]], [[Redding]], and into [[Oregon]]. {{US-I|5}} is a long-distance freeway; stick to truck stops. {{StateHighway|California|99}} is a more urban route, connecting towns and cities.

(anywhere south of modesto on ca-99 is a pain to hitch). - J-rod [[User: Jaredjestes22]])

{{StateHighway|California|1}} goes up and down the Coast, with beautiful scenery, but not the easiest to hitch on for the most part. 

North of Sonoma is beautiful...that is to say, if you have time to spare at all, do take the 1! 

Hitchhiking along the {{StateHighway|California|1}} north of [[San Francisco]] is not easy as there is little traffic, no on-ramps, no service stations, and very few stop lights. If you're lucky, you might find a construction site where all traffic has to stop and wait for five or ten minutes.

{{US-R|101}} from San Francisco up through Marin (San Rafael), Sonoma (Santa Rosa), Mendocino (Mendocino) and Humboldt (Arcata, Eureka) Counties is arguably the easiest hitching in the US.  ''Ollie Monaghan'' I would like to reiterate hitching on the {{US-R|101}}, particulary for the stunning scenery, redwood groves laced in white mist rolling down from the mountains on side with the crash of the pacific tide on the other ... also the route has a history of being used for hitch-hiking, was a very common route taken in the 50s, 60s &amp; 70s up and down the west coast, most of these people now have cars and will pick you up !

== Recommended places ==
[[File:Justinhitching.JPG|thumb|right|200px|Justin hitchhiking to Arcata]]
The following places are recommended: [[Big Sur]] and [[Crescent City]] {{StateHighway|California|1}} &amp; {{US-R|101}}, have beautiful shores/beaches. [[Yosemite]] {{US-I|20}}, [[Sequoia National Park]], the Redwoods and the Los Padres Forest are a must. The Haight-Ashbury (or just "the Haight") district in [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] the famous epicenter of much of the 1960s' drug and music culture is long gone and beat like a drum, but you might meet a few interesting people there. [[Arcata]] is mad cool as well.

== Roads ==

*Shoulders
:Broad shoulders are common along many roadsides, giving people plenty of room to pull over for you. However, it is not uncommon to encounter places where shoulders have not been built or are prohibitively narrow.

*Pedestrian Rights
:All interstates and many major many four lane and even several two lane highways in California prohibit pedestrians.

*Interchanges
:[[split-traffic interchange|Split-traffic interchanges]] are all too common in California. Many interchanges also do not require drivers to slow down, which can lead to longer waiting times.

== Laws ==
While hitchhiking is traditionally considered legal in California and the cops will rarely harass you, anecdotal evidence has been reported of people being threatened under California Vehicle Code Section 22520.5 which states:

(a) No person shall ''solicit'', display, sell, offer for sale, or 
otherwise vend or attempt to vend any merchandise or ''service'' 
while being wholly or partly within any of the following:

&lt;div style="padding-left:1em"&gt;
(1) The right-of-way of any freeway, including any on ramp, off ramp, or roadway shoulder which lies within the right-of-way of the freeway.

(2) Any roadway or adjacent shoulder within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp 
or on ramp.

(3) Any sidewalk within 500 feet of a freeway off ramp or on ramp, when 
vending or attempting to vend to vehicular traffic.
&lt;/div&gt;

(b) Subdivision (a) does not apply to a roadside rest area or
vista point located within a freeway right-of-way which is subject to
Section 22520.6, to a tow truck or service vehicle rendering
assistance to a disabled vehicle, or to a person issued a permit to
vend upon the freeway pursuant to Section 670 of the Streets and
Highways Code.

(c) A violation of this section is an infraction. A second or
subsequent conviction of a violation of this section is a
misdemeanor.

This law is generally only used against prostitution, however soliciting a ride is considered soliciting a service, so if the cops attempt to tell you it is illegal to hitchhike in California it is best to not argue with them.


The following law is enforced more often:

21957.  No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of
soliciting a ride from the driver of any vehicle.

Definitions: 530.  A "roadway" is that portion of a highway improved, designed, or ordinarily used for vehicular travel.

As with other states where the roadway definition does not mention a shoulder, it might be wise to hitch from outside of the paved portion of the road.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Yosemite National Park
:Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas under the terms and conditions noted:
::all areas of the park when the person is off the roadway surface and when public safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected
::when vehicles may safely pull off of the main traffic lane
::when not under the influence of alcohol or intoxicating drugs
::when hitchhiking behavior is safe and not a nuisance
::except in residential areas where signs exist establishing the area as residential areas only and discouraging public traffic

*Joshua Tree National Park
Hitchhiking is only permitted under exigent conditions where the health and safety of the person 
hitchhiking is in jeopardy.

*Mojave National Preserve
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Death Valley National Park
Hitchhiking, or the soliciting of transportation, is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person is off the paved roadway on the shoulder, and visitor safety and traffic flow are not adversely affected.

*Sequoia and King's Canyon National Parks
Hitchhiking is permitted when not standing in the roadway, and visitor safety and traffic flow must not be adversely affected.

*Golden Gate National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is permitted in the following areas: Marin County - Marin Headlands

*Point Reyes National Seashore
Hitchhiking is allowed anywhere in the park as long as the person does not stand in a 
roadway and the hitchhiking/solicitation does not adversely affect visitor safety or the 
normal flow of traffic.

*Lassen Volcanic National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

*Whiskeytown National Recreation Area
Hitchhiking is explicitly prohibited at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area

*Redwood National Park
4.31 has not been amended here, so hitchhiking is prohibited.

== Various ==

In SoCal, one just has to transit as far from the city as possible before attempting to hitch. Northbound, take the commuter bus from downtown LA Union Station to Valencia and hitch I-5 from there. Eastbound, Metrolink (~$13 from Union Station) to the truck stops along Fontana, Rialto, San Bernadino, etc. Hitching will get easier once you hit the desert in Indio, home to better truck stops, and a departure point for Niland/Slab City. Ontario is known for "lot lizards" and other urban truck-stop crime. It takes a long time, but one can transit through Los Angeles to Orange and San Diego Counties, all the way down to Mexico. See also Nick Cophee's excellent thread on "hitching in SoCal" on Squat the Planet. 

Northern California: If hitching north or east out of the Bay, the University Ave onramp in Berkeley is GOLD. The Octavia Ave onramp for the {{US-R|101}} south and 80 east seems to the best in SF. In Sacramento, the 16th St onramp is alright for commuting to the Bay (just stand on the left  side of the road, not by the onramp post, and hold your sign high), but hitching north or south will take a long long while to happen--if you can get rides from friends in the area, go to Lodi if heading further south, the Dunnigan truck stop if northbound, but otherwise consider Megabus, Union Pacific, or hitching from the Bay. If you're in the Shasta area, check out the regional bus system--you're more likely to get a quick ride from hippie-friendly towns like Mt Shasta and Weed than more conservative places such as Dunsmuir. 

Vallejo seems pretty ghetto, though the rest stop in [[Vallejo]] is really good. It's full of Urban Sprawl.

[[Humboldt]] county is real good. They have a Hoopa Indian Reservation up there that is pretty good. They'll stop if you're walking on the side because they think you're one of them, and then once they stop they feel bad and give you a ride anyway. Lord Ellis peak took me about half an hour to get a ride to Redding.

Route {{US-R|101}}, North from [[Bay Area|San Francisco]] and {{StateHighway|California|1}} South from the bay, towards [[Santa Cruz]], are great roads to hitch, arguably the easiest hitchhiking in the United States. Incredibly beautiful scenery too. From the bay, hitching can be difficult but not impossible. You can alternately take public transit to the Diridon station in San Jose. There is a shuttle for $5.00 to Downtown Santa Cruz. Make sure to hitch out of Santa Cruz instead of Capitola...or alternately, there is a bus for $3.00 from Santa Cruz to Monterrey. In Monterrey, the bus 24 for another $2.00 will take you to Barnyard shopping village in Carmel. The red lights there are an excellent place to catch rides as they are the last lights before the road turns into big sur area. Alot of drivers are headed all the way to L.A. with many cars full of young people, travelers, surfers. It took me literally 5 minutes to get a ride there, and i´m a 24 year old dude with long messy hair. Once in Big Sur hitchhiking is ridiculously easy and it is also an excellent place to camp for free on oceanside bluffs(as long as you are respectful).

Also, if you are heading down (or up) the coast, try and get to [[Mendocino]]. It's the county in Cali that produces the most marijuana, and there is this awesome communal farm there. Half the rides you get will even offer you a toke or two! Golden Gate Transit will get you up to Santa Rosa from the Bay Area, which is halfway there.

Highway 20, in between Yuba City (off Hwy 99) and Williams (off I-5) in Northern California can be difficult. It has been reported to take as long as 6 hours for someone to catch a ride. There are not many places for people to pull over, and Yuba City is a huge strip mall town that people just blast through on a multi lane road. If hitching from Yuba City, wait at the intersection of Hwys 20 &amp; 99. The 99 commuter bus runs between Yuba City and Sacramento, too. On the other hand, [[User:Thewindandrain]] has had nothing but easy experiences hitching around Yuba City and Williams.

== Experiences ==
''The difference between hitching in the mountainous areas and the valley is like night and day. While the mountainous areas in any region of the state are very easy, hitchhiking in the valley can be a challenge at times. '''California''' has many of the best swimming holes in America, an excellent climate, and a virtually unlimited selection of hiking opportunities. A fan of the outdoors could spend a lifetime exploring here.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 23:33, 1 June 2013 (CEST)

''Ollie Monaghan'' Northern California is the greatest hitch-hiking I have done in my life, I took the Route 299 to Redding and then the 44 &amp; 36 to Susanville via the breathtaking Lassen Volcanic Park, I never waiting longer than an hour and met some truly interesting and inspiring people. But a warning, out of about 20 lifts I got west to east across the state, at least half of them were stoned, so stoned on that gorgeous Humboldt county weed refrenced prior. I enjoyed this thoroughly, but it is worth taking into consideration that when hitchiking thro this part of the world, regardless of time of day (I had a guy pick me up at nine in the morning, and within five minutes was driving the steering wheel with his knee so he could roll a spliff) you will get picked up by many intoxicated drivers.

I Byron Motley tried to hitchhike from Ontario California on the on ramp but I was HARASSED by the police until I gave up trying! A close friend to which I will testify to his integrity told me he tried to hitchhike from the outskirts on on ramps of San Diego from 2 different locations and he was HARASSED at BOTH locations by the police until he gave up trying to hitch a ride! Southern California is a VERY DIFFICULT area to attempt hitching from!


:"Born and raised in North Cali - if you can, take {{StateHighway|California|1}}. Everyone who takes their time to enjoy life and see cool stuff is on {{StateHighway|California|1}}, where the party's at haha. I met this amazing acidhead couple who took me to Swanson Berry Farms between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz, where we sampled weird sacred Native American jams and sat around the barn on picnic tables talkin to wild westerners. Don't get stuck in So Cal. I was tryna get out of LA for about a week. When I finally got to Barstow, I hung out under the bridge on the freeway with other vagabonds, and like 3 of us were hitchhiking - I got picked up first by this awesome woman from Arkansas who lived in Baker, drove me there and we hung out with her neighborhood, getting drunk and having a good ol' fashioned fish fry. Bring loads and loads of water to So Cal, it gets hot, especially on your way out of state on {{US-I|15}}."

Experience Nov. 2012
:I hitched from southern Oregon to Texas without any problems except one in Westmorland, CA.  I was standing on the edge of the shoulder of highway 86 on the south end of this rural small community when approached by two aggrevated and aggressive Imperial County sheriffs.  They asked if i knew that it was [[illegal]] to hitchhike in California.  I told them it was not.  Minutes of arguing later they retrieved their citation book and showed me the law shown above that you can not hitch on roadway.  I asked them to show me the state definition of a roadway.  This upset them.  Veins bulging and spit spewing, they pointed to a business wall 40 feet away and said that's where the roadway ends.  They then grabbed their [[pepper spray]] and asked if I'd be walking back to town.  I complied and spent $1 for a bus to El Centro and continued on my way.  Pick your battles wisely and be safe out there.  ~nomadinexile

Experience Sept. 2014

DAY 1 --- I hitched from San Francisco to San Luis Obispo in one-and-half days. Took the BART from Mission St to Daly City, then the 110 bus to Pacifica. Waited about 15 minutes for a ride down Highway 1 to a beach just north of Santa Cruz. I stood in the beach parking lot for 5 minutes before getting a ride into Santa Cruz, then waited 10 minutes near the onramp to {{StateHighway|California|1}} before I got a ride to Carmel. Carmel was a bit tricky. I waited about 2 hours before a guy told me told me it was a bad hitching spot and took me down to the gas station junction where the 1 leads to Big Sur, I waited about 45 minutes for a ride. Got to Big Sur about seven and met some surfers who showed me a safe place to hide my sleeping bag and rest for the night. All four of my rides were solo men between 25 - 60.

DAY 2 --- Quiet in the morning, but by 10am I had a ride from Big Sur to Lucia. Walked 10 mins to the next good lay-by and got a ride from a German tourist couple who were driving all the way to San Luis Obispo (we stopped off and looked at the elephants seals, and then the sea lioons in Morro Bay). I arrived in SLO by 2.30pm

A week later I hitched from {{StateHighway|California|1}} near Lompoc to L.A. in about 5 hours. The {{StateHighway|California|1}} looked tough heading south, but waited about 90 mins for a young elementary school teacher who took to me to Santa Barbara. Waited on the {{US-R|101}} onramp at a tricky multi-lane junction, waited about 90 mins for these two Nepalese guys to take me right into downtown L.A. I set off about 4pm and arrived about 9pm.

TIPS: Always carry a big cardboard sign of your destination. Smile infectiously, and even dance (though not too much to make you look mentally ill). STAY POSITIVE - it always works out some way or the other.

Experience March 2016:
''Hitched into Cali from Southern Oregon on the I-5, and stopped in Redding for the night. The next day was the weirdest day of hitchhiking I ever had. We were headed toward San Fran, which proved difficult . We got a lift from a trucker out of Redding, he was headed to Sacramento, but we'd heard lots of bad stuff about Sac so he offered to drop us somewhere before. We got dropped at the truck stop in Dunnigan, CA which had very little traffic on the on ramp. People often waved but no one ever stopped. We started walking on the highway, the 505 towards San Fran, even though we knew it was illegal. We made it a few miles before highway patrol pulled over. Showing IDs from New York and Florida, he let us off pretty easy and ended up taking us 20 miles down the road to Winters, CA where we got a ride in 5 minutes. Oh, and before dropping us the cop joked "If you want some real good Mexican food, there's a Taco Bell here for ya. Ha ha!". Lots of nice people willing to pick us up after that, after a ride with a restaurant owner and then a construction worker who dropped us at the transit station in San Rafael, we took the bus into San Fran.  '' [[User:Koalajuj|Koalajuj]]


October 2023

Los Angeles to Arcata along the {{StateHighway|California|1}} and {{US-R|101}}. Definitely start hitching north from Malibu if you wanna take the {{StateHighway|California|1}}, that spot worked beautifully. The road up to Big Sur was closed so I had to take the {{US-R|101}} and pass through SLO. I received a ride from a state park officer and all other policemen did not bother me. Stuck to onramps, didn't try gas stations or truck stops and my average wait time was about 90 (!) minutes, as a young, clean male with only a backpack. Some of my longest waits were along the {{US-R|101}}, in Mendocino county, but my best experiences were in the Emerald Triangle! I was invited to a Halloween party high in the hills, hosted by weed farmers. A tent is a must in these cold, rainy winter months. Be sure to sample some of that Humboldt county weed!

- The Falling Leaf

== External links ==

* [http://www.interstaterestareas.com/california Interstate Rest Areas in California]
* [http://law.onecle.com/california/vehicle/22520.5.html California Vehicle Statute 22520.5]

== Nomadwiki &amp; Trashwiki ==

{{nomadwiki}}

{{IsIn|United States of America}}

{{Template:Cities California}}
{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:California]]
[[Category:United States]]
[[fr:Californie]]</text>
      <sha1>13epsn9lz3zt38t94smt9vagpfjy2us</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Colorado</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1547</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1599</id>
      <parentid>4554</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-21T20:01:16Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="623">[[Denver]] sucks. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

==Western Colorado==

Very easy: US. 50 from Salida to Grand Junction (gets a little harder once you hit the Utah    border, cary water)

Very easy: Rt. 135 from Gunnison to Crested Butte

Easy to Moderate: along 24 and 285 north of Salida 

Difficult: 92 and 133 between Carbondale and Delta (Low Traffic)

Easy: 550 Montrose to Durango

'''Note''': When hitchiking in Western Colorado dont get dropped off around Bunea Vista or Canon City, Prisions are located here and you are likely to be stranded for long periods.

[[Category:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>klkbpmsb0l2is6k3662vpqie8mr00op</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1600</id>
      <parentid>1599</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="623">[[Denver]] sucks. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

==Western Colorado==

Very easy: US. 50 from Salida to Grand Junction (gets a little harder once you hit the Utah    border, cary water)

Very easy: Rt. 135 from Gunnison to Crested Butte

Easy to Moderate: along 24 and 285 north of Salida 

Difficult: 92 and 133 between Carbondale and Delta (Low Traffic)

Easy: 550 Montrose to Durango

'''Note''': When hitchiking in Western Colorado dont get dropped off around Bunea Vista or Canon City, Prisions are located here and you are likely to be stranded for long periods.

[[Category:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>klkbpmsb0l2is6k3662vpqie8mr00op</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4554</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T21:25:23Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="584">[[Denver]] sucks. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

==Western Colorado==

Very easy: US. 50 from Salida to Grand Junction (gets a little harder once you hit the Utah    border, cary water)

Very easy: Rt. 135 from Gunnison to Crested Butte

Easy to Moderate: along 24 and 285 north of Salida 

Difficult: 92 and 133 between Carbondale and Delta (Low Traffic)

Easy: 550 Montrose to Durango

'''Note''': When hitchiking in Western Colorado dont get dropped off around Bunea Vista or Canon City, Prisions are located here and you are likely to be stranded for long periods.</text>
      <sha1>6meu7s4a4kqwt0v1g9gki85zu1fe0wu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4555</id>
      <parentid>1600</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:21:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="623">[[Denver]] sucks. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

==Western Colorado==

Very easy: US. 50 from Salida to Grand Junction (gets a little harder once you hit the Utah    border, cary water)

Very easy: Rt. 135 from Gunnison to Crested Butte

Easy to Moderate: along 24 and 285 north of Salida 

Difficult: 92 and 133 between Carbondale and Delta (Low Traffic)

Easy: 550 Montrose to Durango

'''Note''': When hitchiking in Western Colorado dont get dropped off around Bunea Vista or Canon City, Prisions are located here and you are likely to be stranded for long periods.

[[Category:United States of America]]</text>
      <sha1>klkbpmsb0l2is6k3662vpqie8mr00op</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9957</id>
      <parentid>4555</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-12-22T12:19:09Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="670">'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States]].

[[Denver]] sucks. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

==Western Colorado==

Very easy: US. 50 from Salida to Grand Junction (gets a little harder once you hit the [[Utah]]    border, carry water)

Very easy: Rt. 135 from Gunnison to Crested Butte

Easy to Moderate: along 24 and 285 north of Salida 

Difficult: 92 and 133 between Carbondale and Delta (Low Traffic)

Easy: 550 Montrose to Durango

'''Note''': When hitchiking in Western Colorado dont get dropped off around Bunea Vista or Canon City, Prisions are located here and you are likely to be stranded for long periods.

[[Category:United States]]</text>
      <sha1>kakplhpvula3k7qa3rd18dzzhk1de8i</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>10910</id>
      <parentid>9957</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-04-22T22:30:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>67.190.63.41</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="865">'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States]].

[[Denver]] sucks. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

==Western Colorado==

Very easy: US. 50 from Salida to Grand Junction (gets a little harder once you hit the [[Utah]]    border, carry water)

Very easy: Rt. 135 from Gunnison to Crested Butte

Easy to Moderate: along 24 and 285 north of Salida 

Difficult: 92 and 133 between Carbondale and Delta (Low Traffic)

Easy: 550 Montrose to Durango

Very easy: US HGWY 6 over Loveland Pass for back-country skiers (Only in the winter, and only to the top of the mountain). Make sure to find a large pull-off area on a straight stretch of road.

'''Note''': When hitchiking in Western Colorado dont get dropped off around Bunea Vista or Canon City, Prisions are located here and you are likely to be stranded for long periods.

[[Category:United States]]</text>
      <sha1>r29kekm8ipvggj6h5fn30pn9xl3u7jo</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15127</id>
      <parentid>10910</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-25T14:58:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="891">'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States]].

[[Denver]] sucks. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

==Western Colorado==

Very easy: US. 50 from Salida to Grand Junction (gets a little harder once you hit the [[Utah]]    border, carry water)

Very easy: Rt. 135 from Gunnison to Crested Butte

Easy to Moderate: along 24 and 285 north of Salida 

Difficult: 92 and 133 between Carbondale and Delta (Low Traffic)

Easy: 550 Montrose to Durango

Very easy: US HGWY 6 over Loveland Pass for back-country skiers (Only in the winter, and only to the top of the mountain). Make sure to find a large pull-off area on a straight stretch of road.

'''Note''': When hitchiking in Western Colorado dont get dropped off around Bunea Vista or Canon City, Prisions are located here and you are likely to be stranded for long periods.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States]]</text>
      <sha1>41ufzvupq4u2fs0ybcifhx3bzt3i7hl</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24974</id>
      <parentid>15127</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-16T14:43:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>RambleOn</username>
        <id>1588</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="967">'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States]].

[[Denver]] sucks. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

[[Denver]] can be difficult but there are ways out. Check the Denver page. 
==Western Colorado==

Very easy: US. 50 from Salida to Grand Junction (gets a little harder once you hit the [[Utah]]    border, carry water)

Very easy: Rt. 135 from Gunnison to Crested Butte

Easy to Moderate: along 24 and 285 north of Salida 

Difficult: 92 and 133 between Carbondale and Delta (Low Traffic)

Easy: 550 Montrose to Durango

Very easy: US HGWY 6 over Loveland Pass for back-country skiers (Only in the winter, and only to the top of the mountain). Make sure to find a large pull-off area on a straight stretch of road.

'''Note''': When hitchiking in Western Colorado dont get dropped off around Bunea Vista or Canon City, Prisions are located here and you are likely to be stranded for long periods.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States]]</text>
      <sha1>pcqcwi1p91dki3oql7184kudhek0iyy</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24975</id>
      <parentid>24974</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-16T14:45:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>RambleOn</username>
        <id>1588</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1058">'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States]].

[[Denver]] sucks. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

[[Denver]] can be difficult but there are ways out. Check the Denver page. 

Other Major Cities in Colorado include:
[[Colorado Springs]]
[[Boulder]]
[[Fort Collins]]
==Western Colorado==

Very easy: US. 50 from Salida to Grand Junction (gets a little harder once you hit the [[Utah]]    border, carry water)

Very easy: Rt. 135 from Gunnison to Crested Butte

Easy to Moderate: along 24 and 285 north of Salida 

Difficult: 92 and 133 between Carbondale and Delta (Low Traffic)

Easy: 550 Montrose to Durango

Very easy: US HGWY 6 over Loveland Pass for back-country skiers (Only in the winter, and only to the top of the mountain). Make sure to find a large pull-off area on a straight stretch of road.

'''Note''': When hitchiking in Western Colorado dont get dropped off around Bunea Vista or Canon City, Prisions are located here and you are likely to be stranded for long periods.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States]]</text>
      <sha1>6mqj8atg0cfza3mgcef4do5y7dfjvnk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24976</id>
      <parentid>24975</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-16T14:47:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>RambleOn</username>
        <id>1588</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1085">'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States]].

==Colorado's Front Range==
[[Denver]] sucks. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

[[Denver]] can be difficult but there are ways out. Check the Denver page. 

Other Major Cities in Colorado include:
[[Colorado Springs]]
[[Boulder]]
[[Fort Collins]]
==Western Colorado==

Very easy: US. 50 from Salida to Grand Junction (gets a little harder once you hit the [[Utah]]    border, carry water)

Very easy: Rt. 135 from Gunnison to Crested Butte

Easy to Moderate: along 24 and 285 north of Salida 

Difficult: 92 and 133 between Carbondale and Delta (Low Traffic)

Easy: 550 Montrose to Durango

Very easy: US HGWY 6 over Loveland Pass for back-country skiers (Only in the winter, and only to the top of the mountain). Make sure to find a large pull-off area on a straight stretch of road.

'''Note''': When hitchiking in Western Colorado dont get dropped off around Bunea Vista or Canon City, Prisions are located here and you are likely to be stranded for long periods.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States]]</text>
      <sha1>oz1jce9w0ltxigtwyvzah52ozjqz5sq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24978</id>
      <parentid>24976</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-16T14:49:18Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>RambleOn</username>
        <id>1588</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1064">'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States]].

==Colorado's Front Range==
[[Denver]] sucks and while it can be difficult there are ways out. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

Other Major Cities in Colorado include:
[[Colorado Springs]],
[[Boulder]],
and [[Fort Collins]]

==Western Colorado==

Very easy: US. 50 from Salida to Grand Junction (gets a little harder once you hit the [[Utah]]    border, carry water)

Very easy: Rt. 135 from Gunnison to Crested Butte

Easy to Moderate: along 24 and 285 north of Salida 

Difficult: 92 and 133 between Carbondale and Delta (Low Traffic)

Easy: 550 Montrose to Durango

Very easy: US HGWY 6 over Loveland Pass for back-country skiers (Only in the winter, and only to the top of the mountain). Make sure to find a large pull-off area on a straight stretch of road.

'''Note''': When hitchiking in Western Colorado dont get dropped off around Bunea Vista or Canon City, Prisions are located here and you are likely to be stranded for long periods.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States]]</text>
      <sha1>a708oqjeqh2r0ue6ix9jr93w8dgk306</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24979</id>
      <parentid>24978</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-16T14:49:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>RambleOn</username>
        <id>1588</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1071">'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States]].

==Colorado's Front Range==
[[Denver]] sucks and while it can be difficult there are ways out. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

Other Major Cities on the Front Range include:
[[Colorado Springs]],
[[Boulder]],
and [[Fort Collins]]

==Western Colorado==

Very easy: US. 50 from Salida to Grand Junction (gets a little harder once you hit the [[Utah]]    border, carry water)

Very easy: Rt. 135 from Gunnison to Crested Butte

Easy to Moderate: along 24 and 285 north of Salida 

Difficult: 92 and 133 between Carbondale and Delta (Low Traffic)

Easy: 550 Montrose to Durango

Very easy: US HGWY 6 over Loveland Pass for back-country skiers (Only in the winter, and only to the top of the mountain). Make sure to find a large pull-off area on a straight stretch of road.

'''Note''': When hitchiking in Western Colorado dont get dropped off around Bunea Vista or Canon City, Prisions are located here and you are likely to be stranded for long periods.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States]]</text>
      <sha1>eicza4n6xdmqy4upb9ampghdnpef3fx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24982</id>
      <parentid>24979</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-16T15:02:34Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Robino</username>
        <id>4</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1106">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States]].

==Colorado's Front Range==
[[Denver]] sucks and while it can be difficult there are ways out. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

Other Major Cities on the Front Range include:
[[Colorado Springs]],
[[Boulder]],
and [[Fort Collins]]

==Western Colorado==

Very easy: US. 50 from Salida to Grand Junction (gets a little harder once you hit the [[Utah]]    border, carry water)

Very easy: Rt. 135 from Gunnison to Crested Butte

Easy to Moderate: along 24 and 285 north of Salida 

Difficult: 92 and 133 between Carbondale and Delta (Low Traffic)

Easy: 550 Montrose to Durango

Very easy: US HGWY 6 over Loveland Pass for back-country skiers (Only in the winter, and only to the top of the mountain). Make sure to find a large pull-off area on a straight stretch of road.

'''Note''': When hitchiking in Western Colorado dont get dropped off around Bunea Vista or Canon City, Prisions are located here and you are likely to be stranded for long periods.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States]]</text>
      <sha1>e45ag8g22p7ddomgcaz1f8ac5uj9iie</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>24987</id>
      <parentid>24982</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-09-16T15:10:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1128">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States]].

==Colorado's Front Range==
[[Denver]] sucks and while it can be difficult there are ways out. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

Other Major Cities on the Front Range include:
[[Colorado Springs]],
[[Boulder]],
and [[Fort Collins]]

==Western Colorado==

Very easy: US. 50 from Salida to Grand Junction (gets a little harder once you hit the [[Utah]]    border, carry water)

Very easy: Rt. 135 from Gunnison to Crested Butte

Easy to Moderate: along 24 and 285 north of Salida 

Difficult: 92 and 133 between Carbondale and Delta (Low Traffic)

Easy: 550 Montrose to Durango

Very easy: US HGWY 6 over Loveland Pass for back-country skiers (Only in the winter, and only to the top of the mountain). Make sure to find a large pull-off area on a straight stretch of road.

'''Note''': When hitchiking in Western Colorado dont get dropped off around Bunea Vista or Canon City, Prisions are located here and you are likely to be stranded for long periods.


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>qqytiffxb5xbhs2yaxnhkirbj2f7hpa</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>32551</id>
      <parentid>24987</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-02T06:06:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Maplefanta</username>
        <id>111</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1198">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States]].

==Colorado's Front Range==
[[Denver]] sucks and while it can be difficult there are ways out. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

Other Major Cities on the Front Range include:
[[Colorado Springs]],
[[Boulder]],
and [[Fort Collins]]

==Western Colorado==

Very easy: US. 50 from Salida to Grand Junction (gets a little harder once you hit the [[Utah]]    border, carry water)

Very easy: Rt. 135 from Gunnison to Crested Butte

Easy to Moderate: along 24 and 285 north of Salida 

Difficult: 92 and 133 between Carbondale and Delta (Low Traffic)

Easy: 550 Montrose to Durango

Very easy: US HGWY 6 over Loveland Pass for back-country skiers (Only in the winter, and only to the top of the mountain). Make sure to find a large pull-off area on a straight stretch of road.

'''Note''': When hitchiking in Western Colorado dont get dropped off around Bunea Vista or Canon City, Prisions are located here and you are likely to be stranded for long periods.


== Cities ==
* [[Denver]]
* [[Colorado Springs]]
* [[Fort Collins]]


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>064sc1k072cz3crxqklqyolpk7n34e1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>34799</id>
      <parentid>32551</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T17:02:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1202">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States]].

== Colorado's Front Range ==
[[Denver]] sucks and while it can be difficult there are ways out. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

Other Major Cities on the Front Range include:
[[Colorado Springs]],
[[Boulder]],
and [[Fort Collins]]

== Western Colorado ==

Very easy: US. 50 from Salida to Grand Junction (gets a little harder once you hit the [[Utah]]    border, carry water)

Very easy: Rt. 135 from Gunnison to Crested Butte

Easy to Moderate: along 24 and 285 north of Salida 

Difficult: 92 and 133 between Carbondale and Delta (Low Traffic)

Easy: 550 Montrose to Durango

Very easy: US HGWY 6 over Loveland Pass for back-country skiers (Only in the winter, and only to the top of the mountain). Make sure to find a large pull-off area on a straight stretch of road.

'''Note''': When hitchiking in Western Colorado dont get dropped off around Bunea Vista or Canon City, Prisions are located here and you are likely to be stranded for long periods.


== Cities ==
* [[Denver]]
* [[Colorado Springs]]
* [[Fort Collins]]


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>17bxeu9vltuo9vymkwi2jkl3j3rigd0</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>42056</id>
      <parentid>34799</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-05-20T21:31:56Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1207">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States]].

== Colorado's Front Range ==
[[Denver]] sucks and while it can be difficult there are ways out. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

Other Major Cities on the Front Range include:
[[Colorado Springs]],
[[Boulder]],
and [[Fort Collins]]

== Western Colorado ==

Very easy: US. 50 from Salida to Grand Junction (gets a little harder once you hit the [[Utah]]    border, carry water)

Very easy: Rt. 135 from Gunnison to Crested Butte

Easy to Moderate: along 24 and 285 north of Salida 

Difficult: 92 and 133 between Carbondale and Delta (Low Traffic)

Easy: 550 Montrose to Durango

Very easy: US HGWY 6 over Loveland Pass for back-country skiers (Only in the winter, and only to the top of the mountain). Make sure to find a large pull-off area on a straight stretch of road.

'''Note''': When hitchiking in Western Colorado dont get dropped off around Bunea Vista or Canon City.  There are prisons in the area and you are likely to be stranded for long periods.


== Cities ==
* [[Denver]]
* [[Colorado Springs]]
* [[Fort Collins]]


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>6hadj6ymrir14iyatkg98of9vz9wg7z</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>42901</id>
      <parentid>42056</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-07-05T19:27:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>67.176.93.88</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1856">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States]].

== Colorado's Front Range ==
[[Denver]] sucks and while it can be difficult there are ways out. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

It's not hitch-related but the traveler passing through Denver will be wise to note the presence of several Mexican bus companies. More affordable, more comfortable, more reliable, and with noteably nicer co-passengers than the Dirty Dog (greyhound), these companies can take you to Kansas City, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Southern California, and of course, Mexico. If you've got a few bucks and you don't feel like thumbing your way out of suburban sprawl, head over the area between Welton and Champa between 19th and 22nd streets. Autobuses Los Paisanos, Los Limosines, Autobuses Americanos and others can get you to Mexico for 50-60 dollars.

Other Major Cities on the Front Range include:
[[Colorado Springs]],
[[Boulder]],
and [[Fort Collins]]

== Western Colorado ==

Very easy: US. 50 from Salida to Grand Junction (gets a little harder once you hit the [[Utah]]    border, carry water)

Very easy: Rt. 135 from Gunnison to Crested Butte

Easy to Moderate: along 24 and 285 north of Salida 

Difficult: 92 and 133 between Carbondale and Delta (Low Traffic)

Easy: 550 Montrose to Durango

Very easy: US HGWY 6 over Loveland Pass for back-country skiers (Only in the winter, and only to the top of the mountain). Make sure to find a large pull-off area on a straight stretch of road.

'''Note''': When hitchiking in Western Colorado dont get dropped off around Bunea Vista or Canon City.  There are prisons in the area and you are likely to be stranded for long periods.


== Cities ==
* [[Denver]]
* [[Colorado Springs]]
* [[Fort Collins]]


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>psrio1qaox71n45a03cxrsbg9qsik1j</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>42916</id>
      <parentid>42901</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-07-06T08:59:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1854">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States]].

== Colorado's Front Range ==
[[Denver]] sucks and while it can be difficult there are ways out. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

Other Major Cities on the Front Range include:
[[Colorado Springs]],
[[Boulder]],
and [[Fort Collins]]

=== Public transport ===
The traveler passing through Denver will be wise to note the presence of several Mexican bus companies. More affordable, more comfortable, more reliable, and with noteably nicer co-passengers than the Dirty Dog (greyhound), these companies can take you to Kansas City, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Southern California, and of course, Mexico. If you've got a few bucks and you don't feel like thumbing your way out of suburban sprawl, head over the area between Welton and Champa between 19th and 22nd streets. Autobuses Los Paisanos, Los Limosines, Autobuses Americanos and others can get you to Mexico for 50-60 dollars.

== Western Colorado ==

Very easy: US. 50 from Salida to Grand Junction (gets a little harder once you hit the [[Utah]]    border, carry water)

Very easy: Rt. 135 from Gunnison to Crested Butte

Easy to Moderate: along 24 and 285 north of Salida 

Difficult: 92 and 133 between Carbondale and Delta (Low Traffic)

Easy: 550 Montrose to Durango

Very easy: US HGWY 6 over Loveland Pass for back-country skiers (Only in the winter, and only to the top of the mountain). Make sure to find a large pull-off area on a straight stretch of road.

'''Note''': When hitchiking in Western Colorado dont get dropped off around Bunea Vista or Canon City.  There are prisons in the area and you are likely to be stranded for long periods.


== Cities ==
* [[Denver]]
* [[Colorado Springs]]
* [[Fort Collins]]


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>1h7drjaorrjs4pfv8fhr66zd3jeacxp</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>46699</id>
      <parentid>42916</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-11-08T16:09:35Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>174.29.254.187</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2058">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States]].

== Colorado's Front Range ==
[[Denver]] sucks and while it can be difficult there are ways out. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

[[Boulder]] is very easy to hitch into and out of. The easiest place I have ever hitched was Canyon Dr./119 between Boulder and Nederland. Used hitch hiking as a means of commuting in the mountains west of Boulder.
 
Other Major Cities on the Front Range include:
[[Colorado Springs]] 
and [[Fort Collins]]

=== Public transport ===
The traveler passing through Denver will be wise to note the presence of several Mexican bus companies. More affordable, more comfortable, more reliable, and with noteably nicer co-passengers than the Dirty Dog (greyhound), these companies can take you to Kansas City, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Southern California, and of course, Mexico. If you've got a few bucks and you don't feel like thumbing your way out of suburban sprawl, head over the area between Welton and Champa between 19th and 22nd streets. Autobuses Los Paisanos, Los Limosines, Autobuses Americanos and others can get you to Mexico for 50-60 dollars.

== Western Colorado ==

Very easy: US. 50 from Salida to Grand Junction (gets a little harder once you hit the [[Utah]]    border, carry water)

Very easy: Rt. 135 from Gunnison to Crested Butte

Easy to Moderate: along 24 and 285 north of Salida 

Difficult: 92 and 133 between Carbondale and Delta (Low Traffic)

Easy: 550 Montrose to Durango

Very easy: US HGWY 6 over Loveland Pass for back-country skiers (Only in the winter, and only to the top of the mountain). Make sure to find a large pull-off area on a straight stretch of road.

'''Note''': When hitchiking in Western Colorado dont get dropped off around Bunea Vista or Canon City.  There are prisons in the area and you are likely to be stranded for long periods.


== Cities ==
* [[Denver]]
* [[Colorado Springs]]
* [[Fort Collins]]


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>5qgt9i7iea4zw9dch1njjgb9wbc2p8c</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>46702</id>
      <parentid>46699</parentid>
      <timestamp>2010-11-08T17:49:01Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2059">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States]].

== Colorado's Front Range ==
[[Denver]] sucks and while it can be difficult there are ways out. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

[[Boulder]] is very easy to hitch into and out of. The easiest place I have ever hitched was Canyon Dr./119 between Boulder and Nederland. Used hitch hiking as a means of commuting in the mountains west of Boulder.
 
Other Major Cities on the Front Range include:
[[Colorado Springs]] 
and [[Fort Collins]]

=== Public transport ===
The traveler passing through Denver will be wise to note the presence of several Mexican bus companies. More affordable, more comfortable, more reliable, and with noteably nicer co-passengers than the Dirty Dog (greyhound), these companies can take you to Kansas City, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Southern California, and of course, Mexico. If you've got a few bucks and you don't feel like thumbing your way out of suburban sprawl, head over the area between Welton and Champa between 19th and 22nd streets. Autobuses Los Paisanos, Los Limosines, Autobuses Americanos and others can get you to Mexico for 50-60 dollars.

== Western Colorado ==

Very easy: US. 50 from Salida to Grand Junction (gets a little harder once you hit the [[Utah]]    border, carry water)

Very easy: Rt. 135 from Gunnison to Crested Butte

Easy to Moderate: along 24 and 285 north of Salida 

Difficult: 92 and 133 between Carbondale and Delta (Low Traffic)

Easy: 550 Montrose to Durango

Very easy: US HGWY 6 over Loveland Pass for back-country skiers (Only in the winter, and only to the top of the mountain). Make sure to find a large pull-off area on a straight stretch of road.

'''Note''': When hitchiking in Western Colorado don't get dropped off around Buena Vista or Canon City.  There are prisons in the area and you are likely to be stranded for long periods.


== Cities ==
* [[Denver]]
* [[Colorado Springs]]
* [[Fort Collins]]


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>5czc346eou6yiestctxd45zi4tolnto</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>48789</id>
      <parentid>46702</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-01-17T13:03:30Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>78.47.138.23</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2078">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States]].

== Colorado's Front Range ==
[[Denver]] sucks and while it can be difficult there are ways out. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

[[Boulder]] is very easy to hitch into and out of. The easiest place I have ever hitched was Canyon Dr./119 between Boulder and Nederland. Used hitch hiking as a means of commuting in the mountains west of Boulder.
 
Other Major Cities on the Front Range include:
[[Colorado Springs]] 
and [[Fort Collins]]

=== Public transport ===
The traveler passing through Denver will be wise to note the presence of several Mexican bus companies. More affordable, more comfortable, more reliable, and with noteably nicer co-passengers than the Dirty Dog (greyhound), these companies can take you to Kansas City, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Southern California, and of course, Mexico. If you've got a few bucks and you don't feel like thumbing your way out of suburban sprawl, head over the area between Welton and Champa between 19th and 22nd streets. Autobuses Los Paisanos, Los Limosines, Autobuses Americanos and others can get you to Mexico for 50-60 dollars.

== Western Colorado ==

Very easy: US. 50 from Salida to Grand Junction (gets a little harder once you hit the [[Utah]]    border, carry water)

Very easy: Rt. 135 from Gunnison to Crested Butte

Easy to Moderate: along 24 and 285 north of Salida 

Difficult: 92 and 133 between Carbondale and Delta (Low Traffic)

Easy: 550 Montrose to Durango

Very easy: US HGWY 6 over Loveland Pass for back-country skiers (Only in the winter, and only to the top of the mountain). Make sure to find a large pull-off area on a straight stretch of road.

'''Note''': When hitchiking in Western Colorado don't get dropped off around Buena Vista or Canon City.  There are prisons in the area and you are likely to be stranded for long periods.


== Cities ==
* [[Denver]]
* [[Colorado Springs]]
* [[Fort Collins]]


{{Template:States USA}}

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]
[[trash:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>oyjhabgctlsr7f7hyxctnnz7vpexxhk</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>55705</id>
      <parentid>48789</parentid>
      <timestamp>2011-10-08T01:08:43Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2103">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States of America|United States]].

== Colorado's Front Range ==
[[Denver]] sucks and while it can be difficult there are ways out. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

[[Boulder]] is very easy to hitch into and out of. The easiest place I have ever hitched was Canyon Dr./119 between Boulder and Nederland. Used hitch hiking as a means of commuting in the mountains west of Boulder.
 
Other Major Cities on the Front Range include:
[[Colorado Springs]] 
and [[Fort Collins]]

=== Public transport ===
The traveler passing through Denver will be wise to note the presence of several Mexican bus companies. More affordable, more comfortable, more reliable, and with noteably nicer co-passengers than the Dirty Dog (greyhound), these companies can take you to Kansas City, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Southern California, and of course, Mexico. If you've got a few bucks and you don't feel like thumbing your way out of suburban sprawl, head over the area between Welton and Champa between 19th and 22nd streets. Autobuses Los Paisanos, Los Limosines, Autobuses Americanos and others can get you to Mexico for 50-60 dollars.

== Western Colorado ==

Very easy: US. 50 from Salida to Grand Junction (gets a little harder once you hit the [[Utah]]    border, carry water)

Very easy: Rt. 135 from Gunnison to Crested Butte

Easy to Moderate: along 24 and 285 north of Salida 

Difficult: 92 and 133 between Carbondale and Delta (Low Traffic)

Easy: 550 Montrose to Durango

Very easy: US HGWY 6 over Loveland Pass for back-country skiers (Only in the winter, and only to the top of the mountain). Make sure to find a large pull-off area on a straight stretch of road.

'''Note''': When hitchiking in Western Colorado don't get dropped off around Buena Vista or Canon City.  There are prisons in the area and you are likely to be stranded for long periods.


== Cities ==
* [[Denver]]
* [[Colorado Springs]]
* [[Fort Collins]]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:Colorado]]

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>5g9y5kl1lv5t3cuftystnvj6l6172lr</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>59876</id>
      <parentid>55705</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-03-06T00:14:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2771">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States of America|United States]].

== Colorado's Front Range ==
[[Denver]] sucks and while it can be difficult there are ways out. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

[[Boulder]] is very easy to hitch into and out of. The easiest place I have ever hitched was Canyon Dr./119 between Boulder and Nederland. Used hitch hiking as a means of commuting in the mountains west of Boulder.
 
Other Major Cities on the Front Range include:
[[Colorado Springs]] 
and [[Fort Collins]]

=== Public transport ===
The traveler passing through Denver will be wise to note the presence of several Mexican bus companies. More affordable, more comfortable, more reliable, and with noteably nicer co-passengers than the Dirty Dog (greyhound), these companies can take you to Kansas City, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Southern California, and of course, Mexico. If you've got a few bucks and you don't feel like thumbing your way out of suburban sprawl, head over the area between Welton and Champa between 19th and 22nd streets. Autobuses Los Paisanos, Los Limosines, Autobuses Americanos and others can get you to Mexico for 50-60 dollars.

== Western Colorado ==

Very easy: US. 50 from Salida to Grand Junction (gets a little harder once you hit the [[Utah]]    border, carry water)

Very easy: Rt. 135 from Gunnison to Crested Butte

Easy to Moderate: along 24 and 285 north of Salida 

Difficult: 92 and 133 between Carbondale and Delta (Low Traffic)

Easy: 550 Montrose to Durango

Very easy: Durango to Alamosa

Difficult to Moderate: Fort Collins to Loveland to Greeley

Very easy: US HGWY 6 over Loveland Pass for back-country skiers (Only in the winter, and only to the top of the mountain). Make sure to find a large pull-off area on a straight stretch of road.

'''Note''': When hitchiking in Western Colorado don't get dropped off around Buena Vista or Canon City.  There are prisons in the area and you are likely to be stranded for long periods.


== Experiences ==

:''I would not hesitate to claim Colorado as the easiest state in America to hitchhike in and I have been to most of the states. Anywhere east of the front range is incredibly easy. If you are like me you will be wishing people wouldn't pick you up so fast so you could have more time to absorb the scenery. Buena Vista was a great place to hitch through, I got a ride within 10 minutes out of there after camping for the night. The longest I ever waited in Colorado(other than a 4.5 hour wait in Greeley) was probably about 20 minutes.'' - thewindandrain


== Cities ==
* [[Denver]]
* [[Colorado Springs]]
* [[Fort Collins]]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:Colorado]]

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>kgtkb17m52rq6imurfldemfcrd0a41g</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>59877</id>
      <parentid>59876</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-03-06T00:15:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2801">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States of America|United States]].

== Colorado's Front Range ==
[[Denver]] sucks and while it can be difficult there are ways out. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

[[Boulder]] is very easy to hitch into and out of. The easiest place I have ever hitched was Canyon Dr./119 between Boulder and Nederland. Used hitch hiking as a means of commuting in the mountains west of Boulder.
 
Other Major Cities on the Front Range include:
[[Colorado Springs]] 
and [[Fort Collins]]

=== Public transport ===
The traveler passing through Denver will be wise to note the presence of several Mexican bus companies. More affordable, more comfortable, more reliable, and with noteably nicer co-passengers than the Dirty Dog (greyhound), these companies can take you to Kansas City, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Southern California, and of course, Mexico. If you've got a few bucks and you don't feel like thumbing your way out of suburban sprawl, head over the area between Welton and Champa between 19th and 22nd streets. Autobuses Los Paisanos, Los Limosines, Autobuses Americanos and others can get you to Mexico for 50-60 dollars.

== Western Colorado ==

Very easy: US. 50 from Salida to Grand Junction (gets a little harder once you hit the [[Utah]]    border, carry water)

Very easy: Rt. 135 from Gunnison to Crested Butte

Easy to Moderate: along 24 and 285 north of Salida 

Difficult: 92 and 133 between Carbondale and Delta (Low Traffic)

Easy: 550 Montrose to Durango

Very easy: Durango to Alamosa

Difficult to Moderate: Fort Collins to Loveland to Greeley

Very easy: US HGWY 6 over Loveland Pass for back-country skiers (Only in the winter, and only to the top of the mountain). Make sure to find a large pull-off area on a straight stretch of road.

'''Note''': When hitchiking in Western Colorado don't get dropped off around Buena Vista or Canon City.  There are prisons in the area and you are likely to be stranded for long periods.


== Experiences ==

:''I would not hesitate to claim Colorado as the easiest state in America to hitchhike in and I have been to most of the states. Anywhere east of the front range is incredibly easy. If you are like me you will be wishing people wouldn't pick you up so fast so you could have more time to absorb the scenery. Buena Vista was a great place to hitch through, I got a ride within 10 minutes out of there after camping for the night. The longest I ever waited in Colorado (other than a 4.5 hour wait in Greeley and a 1.5 hour wait in Pueblo) was probably about 20 minutes.'' - thewindandrain

== Cities ==
* [[Denver]]
* [[Colorado Springs]]
* [[Fort Collins]]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:Colorado]]

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>hva8kv5se64hwdi1yzlhcvc4qk7tvo1</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>59878</id>
      <parentid>59877</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-03-06T00:17:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2939">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States of America|United States]].

== Colorado's Front Range ==
[[Denver]] sucks and while it can be difficult there are ways out. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

[[Boulder]] is very easy to hitch into and out of. The easiest place I have ever hitched was Canyon Dr./119 between Boulder and Nederland. Used hitch hiking as a means of commuting in the mountains west of Boulder.
 
Other Major Cities on the Front Range include:
[[Colorado Springs]] 
and [[Fort Collins]]

=== Public transport ===
The traveler passing through Denver will be wise to note the presence of several Mexican bus companies. More affordable, more comfortable, more reliable, and with noteably nicer co-passengers than the Dirty Dog (greyhound), these companies can take you to Kansas City, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Southern California, and of course, Mexico. If you've got a few bucks and you don't feel like thumbing your way out of suburban sprawl, head over the area between Welton and Champa between 19th and 22nd streets. Autobuses Los Paisanos, Los Limosines, Autobuses Americanos and others can get you to Mexico for 50-60 dollars.

There is a bus that runs between Fort Collins and Loveland with a policy which allows you to ride free if you claim to be 17 or younger.

== Western Colorado ==

Very easy: US. 50 from Salida to Grand Junction (gets a little harder once you hit the [[Utah]]    border, carry water)

Very easy: Rt. 135 from Gunnison to Crested Butte

Easy to Moderate: along 24 and 285 north of Salida 

Difficult: 92 and 133 between Carbondale and Delta (Low Traffic)

Easy: 550 Montrose to Durango

Very easy: Durango to Alamosa

Difficult to Moderate: Fort Collins to Loveland to Greeley

Very easy: US HGWY 6 over Loveland Pass for back-country skiers (Only in the winter, and only to the top of the mountain). Make sure to find a large pull-off area on a straight stretch of road.

'''Note''': When hitchiking in Western Colorado don't get dropped off around Buena Vista or Canon City.  There are prisons in the area and you are likely to be stranded for long periods.


== Experiences ==

:''I would not hesitate to claim Colorado as the easiest state in America to hitchhike in and I have been to most of the states. Anywhere east of the front range is incredibly easy. If you are like me you will be wishing people wouldn't pick you up so fast so you could have more time to absorb the scenery. Buena Vista was a great place to hitch through, I got a ride within 10 minutes out of there after camping for the night. The longest I ever waited in Colorado (other than a 4.5 hour wait in Greeley and a 1.5 hour wait in Pueblo) was probably about 20 minutes.'' - thewindandrain

== Cities ==
* [[Denver]]
* [[Colorado Springs]]
* [[Fort Collins]]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:Colorado]]

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>7jpdtn5kdt8kpy3j28v6gzjk95eirai</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>59885</id>
      <parentid>59878</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-03-06T12:40:15Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2991">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States of America|United States]].

== Colorado's Front Range ==
[[Denver]] sucks and while it can be difficult there are ways out. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

[[Boulder]] is very easy to hitch into and out of. The easiest place I have ever hitched was Canyon Dr./119 between Boulder and Nederland. Used hitch hiking as a means of commuting in the mountains west of Boulder.
 
Other Major Cities on the Front Range include:
[[Colorado Springs]] 
and [[Fort Collins]]

=== Public transport ===
The traveler passing through Denver will be wise to note the presence of several Mexican bus companies. More affordable, more comfortable, more reliable, and with noteably nicer co-passengers than the Dirty Dog (greyhound), these companies can take you to Kansas City, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Southern California, and of course, Mexico. If you've got a few bucks and you don't feel like thumbing your way out of suburban sprawl, head over the area between Welton and Champa between 19th and 22nd streets. Autobuses Los Paisanos, Los Limosines, Autobuses Americanos and others can get you to Mexico for 50-60 dollars.

There is a bus that runs between Fort Collins and Loveland with a policy which allows you to ride free if you claim to be 17 or younger.

== Western Colorado ==

Very easy: US. 50 from Salida to Grand Junction (gets a little harder once you hit the [[Utah]]    border, carry water)

Very easy: Rt. 135 from Gunnison to Crested Butte

Easy to Moderate: along 24 and 285 north of Salida 

Difficult: 92 and 133 between Carbondale and Delta (Low Traffic)

Easy: 550 Montrose to Durango

Very easy: Durango to Alamosa

Difficult to Moderate: Fort Collins to Loveland to Greeley

Very easy: US HGWY 6 over Loveland Pass for back-country skiers (Only in the winter, and only to the top of the mountain). Make sure to find a large pull-off area on a straight stretch of road.

'''Note''': When hitchiking in Western Colorado don't get dropped off around Buena Vista or Canon City.  There are prisons in the area and you are likely to be stranded for long periods.


== Experiences ==

:''I would not hesitate to claim Colorado as the easiest state in America to hitchhike in and I have been to most of the states. Anywhere east of the front range is incredibly easy. If you are like me you will be wishing people wouldn't pick you up so fast so you could have more time to absorb the scenery. Buena Vista was a great place to hitch through, I got a ride within 10 minutes out of there after camping for the night. The longest I ever waited in Colorado (other than a 4.5 hour wait in Greeley and a 1.5 hour wait in Pueblo) was probably about 20 minutes.'' - [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] 0:17:26, 6 March 2012 (CET)

== Cities ==
* [[Denver]]
* [[Colorado Springs]]
* [[Fort Collins]]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:Colorado]]

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>q671sgm044baa0h6ved565elvfkky1n</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>60505</id>
      <parentid>59885</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-04-10T16:23:42Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2991">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States of America|United States]].

== Colorado's Front Range ==
[[Denver]] sucks and while it can be difficult there are ways out. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

[[Boulder]] is very easy to hitch into and out of. The easiest place I have ever hitched was Canyon Dr./119 between Boulder and Nederland. Used hitch hiking as a means of commuting in the mountains west of Boulder.
 
Other Major Cities on the Front Range include:
[[Colorado Springs]] 
and [[Fort Collins]]

=== Public transport ===
The traveler passing through Denver will be wise to note the presence of several Mexican bus companies. More affordable, more comfortable, more reliable, and with noteably nicer co-passengers than the Dirty Dog (greyhound), these companies can take you to Kansas City, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Southern California, and of course, Mexico. If you've got a few bucks and you don't feel like thumbing your way out of suburban sprawl, head over the area between Welton and Champa between 19th and 22nd streets. Autobuses Los Paisanos, Los Limosines, Autobuses Americanos and others can get you to Mexico for 50-60 dollars.

There is a bus that runs between Fort Collins and Loveland with a policy which allows you to ride free if you claim to be 17 or younger.

== Western Colorado ==

Very easy: US. 50 from Salida to Grand Junction (gets a little harder once you hit the [[Utah]]    border, carry water)

Very easy: Rt. 135 from Gunnison to Crested Butte

Easy to Moderate: along 24 and 285 north of Salida 

Difficult: 92 and 133 between Carbondale and Delta (Low Traffic)

Easy: 550 Montrose to Durango

Very easy: Durango to Alamosa

Difficult to Moderate: Fort Collins to Loveland to Greeley

Very easy: US HGWY 6 over Loveland Pass for back-country skiers (Only in the winter, and only to the top of the mountain). Make sure to find a large pull-off area on a straight stretch of road.

'''Note''': When hitchiking in Western Colorado don't get dropped off around Buena Vista or Canon City.  There are prisons in the area and you are likely to be stranded for long periods.


== Experiences ==

:''I would not hesitate to claim Colorado as the easiest state in America to hitchhike in and I have been to most of the states. Anywhere west of the front range is incredibly easy. If you are like me you will be wishing people wouldn't pick you up so fast so you could have more time to absorb the scenery. Buena Vista was a great place to hitch through, I got a ride within 10 minutes out of there after camping for the night. The longest I ever waited in Colorado (other than a 4.5 hour wait in Greeley and a 1.5 hour wait in Pueblo) was probably about 20 minutes.'' - [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] 0:17:26, 6 March 2012 (CET)

== Cities ==
* [[Denver]]
* [[Colorado Springs]]
* [[Fort Collins]]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:Colorado]]

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>8vq0uy32l54q8axtw97bqtadljggvcu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>61115</id>
      <parentid>60505</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-05-15T23:53:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="2788">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States of America|United States]].

== Public transport ==
The traveler passing through Denver will be wise to note the presence of several Mexican bus companies. More affordable, more comfortable, more reliable, and with noteably nicer co-passengers than the Dirty Dog (greyhound), these companies can take you to Kansas City, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Southern California, and of course, Mexico. If you've got a few bucks and you don't feel like thumbing your way out of suburban sprawl, head over the area between Welton and Champa between 19th and 22nd streets. Autobuses Los Paisanos, Los Limosines, Autobuses Americanos and others can get you to Mexico for 50-60 dollars.

There is a bus that runs between Fort Collins and Loveland with a policy which allows you to ride free if you claim to be 17 or younger.

== Colorado's Front Range ==
[[Denver]] sucks and while it can be difficult there are ways out. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

[[Boulder]] is very easy to hitch into and out of. The easiest place I have ever hitched was Canyon Dr./119 between Boulder and Nederland. Used hitch hiking as a means of commuting in the mountains west of Boulder.
 
Other Major Cities on the Front Range include:
[[Colorado Springs]] 
and [[Fort Collins]]

== Western Colorado ==

Very easy: US. 50 from Salida to Grand Junction (gets a little harder once you hit the [[Utah]]    border, carry water)

Very easy: Rt. 135 from Gunnison to Crested Butte

Easy to Moderate: along 24 and 285 north of Salida 

Difficult: 92 and 133 between Carbondale and Delta (Low Traffic)

Easy: 550 Montrose to Durango

Very easy: Durango to Alamosa

Difficult to Moderate: Fort Collins to Loveland to Greeley

Very easy: US HGWY 6 over Loveland Pass for back-country skiers (Only in the winter, and only to the top of the mountain). Make sure to find a large pull-off area on a straight stretch of road.

'''Note''': Buena Vista and Canon City are prison areas which tend to be more difficult to hitchhike around.

== Experiences ==

:''I would not hesitate to claim Colorado as the easiest state in America to hitchhike in. Anywhere west of the front range is incredibly easy. If you are like me you will wish people would stop picking you up so fast so you could have more time to absorb the scenery. I have been through most highways in Colorado and the longest I ever waited (other than a 4.5 hour wait in Greeley and a 1.5 hour wait in Pueblo) was probably about 20 minutes.'' - [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] 0:17:26, 6 March 2012 (CET)

== Cities ==
* [[Denver]]
* [[Colorado Springs]]
* [[Fort Collins]]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:Colorado]]

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>83nc0rhyf67n7q0knxpu59j8be43w1y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>61142</id>
      <parentid>61115</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-05-16T04:59:38Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4345">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States of America|United States]].

== Public transport ==
The traveler passing through Denver will be wise to note the presence of several Mexican bus companies. More affordable, more comfortable, more reliable, and with noteably nicer co-passengers than the Dirty Dog (greyhound), these companies can take you to Kansas City, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Southern California, and of course, Mexico. If you've got a few bucks and you don't feel like thumbing your way out of suburban sprawl, head over the area between Welton and Champa between 19th and 22nd streets. Autobuses Los Paisanos, Los Limosines, Autobuses Americanos and others can get you to Mexico for 50-60 dollars.

There is a bus that runs between Fort Collins and Loveland with a policy which allows you to ride free if you claim to be 17 or younger.

== Colorado's Front Range ==
[[Denver]] sucks and while it can be difficult there are ways out. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

[[Boulder]] is very easy to hitch into and out of. The easiest place I have ever hitched was Canyon Dr./119 between Boulder and Nederland. Used hitch hiking as a means of commuting in the mountains west of Boulder.
 
Other Major Cities on the Front Range include:
[[Colorado Springs]] 
and [[Fort Collins]]

== Western Colorado ==

Very easy: US. 50 from Salida to Grand Junction (gets a little harder once you hit the [[Utah]]    border, carry water)

Very easy: Rt. 135 from Gunnison to Crested Butte

Easy to Moderate: along 24 and 285 north of Salida 

Difficult: 92 and 133 between Carbondale and Delta (Low Traffic)

Easy: 550 Montrose to Durango

Very easy: Durango to Alamosa

Difficult to Moderate: Fort Collins to Loveland to Greeley

Very easy: US HGWY 6 over Loveland Pass for back-country skiers (Only in the winter, and only to the top of the mountain). Make sure to find a large pull-off area on a straight stretch of road.

'''Note''': Buena Vista and Canon City are prison areas which tend to be more difficult to hitchhike around.

== Law ==
42-4-805. Pedestrians walking or traveling in a wheelchair on highways.
(2) No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of soliciting a ride from the driver of any private vehicle. For the purpose of subsection (2) "roadway" means that portion of the road normally used by moving motor vehicle traffic.
(5) Any town or city may, by ordinance, regulate the use by pedestrians of streets and highways under its jurisdiction to the extent authorized under subsection (6) of this section and sections 42-4-110 and 42-4-111, but no ordinance regulating such use of streets and highways in a manner differing from this section shall be effective until official signs or devices giving notice thereof have been placed as required by section 42-4-111 (2). 
(6) No person shall solicit a ride on any highway included in the interstate system, as defined in section 43-2-101 (2), C.R.S., except at an entrance to or exit from such highway or at places specifically designated by the department of transportation; or, in an emergency affecting a vehicle or its operation, a driver or passenger of a disabled vehicle may solicit a ride on any highway.
(7) Pedestrians shall only be picked up where there is adequate road space for vehicles to pull off and not endanger and impede the flow of traffic.

Basically, hitch all you want in Colorado from off the traveled portion of the road and not on the interstate and you will be fine. There are some municipalities in Colorado that prohibit hitchhiking, but they are required to post official notices.

== Experiences ==

:''I would not hesitate to claim Colorado as the easiest state in America to hitchhike in. Anywhere west of the front range is incredibly easy. If you are like me you will wish people would stop picking you up so fast so you could have more time to absorb the scenery. I have been through most highways in Colorado and the longest I ever waited (other than a 4.5 hour wait in Greeley and a 1.5 hour wait in Pueblo) was probably about 20 minutes.'' - [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] 0:17:26, 6 March 2012 (CET)

== Cities ==
* [[Denver]]
* [[Colorado Springs]]
* [[Fort Collins]]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:Colorado]]

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>0shezfzmo1fcg0g3e3l8ad9z55t4m8y</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>61143</id>
      <parentid>61142</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-05-16T05:00:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4348">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States of America|United States]].

== Public transport ==
The traveler passing through Denver will be wise to note the presence of several Mexican bus companies. More affordable, more comfortable, more reliable, and with noteably nicer co-passengers than the Dirty Dog (greyhound), these companies can take you to Kansas City, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Southern California, and of course, Mexico. If you've got a few bucks and you don't feel like thumbing your way out of suburban sprawl, head over the area between Welton and Champa between 19th and 22nd streets. Autobuses Los Paisanos, Los Limosines, Autobuses Americanos and others can get you to Mexico for 50-60 dollars.

There is a bus that runs between Fort Collins and Loveland with a policy which allows you to ride free if you claim to be 17 or younger.

== Colorado's Front Range ==
[[Denver]] sucks and while it can be difficult there are ways out. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

[[Boulder]] is very easy to hitch into and out of. The easiest place I have ever hitched was Canyon Dr./119 between Boulder and Nederland. Used hitch hiking as a means of commuting in the mountains west of Boulder.
 
Other Major Cities on the Front Range include:
[[Colorado Springs]] 
and [[Fort Collins]]

== Western Colorado ==

Very easy: US. 50 from Salida to Grand Junction (gets a little harder once you hit the [[Utah]]    border, carry water)

Very easy: Rt. 135 from Gunnison to Crested Butte

Easy to Moderate: along 24 and 285 north of Salida 

Difficult: 92 and 133 between Carbondale and Delta (Low Traffic)

Easy: 550 Montrose to Durango

Very easy: Durango to Alamosa

Difficult to Moderate: Fort Collins to Loveland to Greeley

Very easy: US HGWY 6 over Loveland Pass for back-country skiers (Only in the winter, and only to the top of the mountain). Make sure to find a large pull-off area on a straight stretch of road.

'''Note''': Buena Vista and Canon City are prison areas which tend to be more difficult to hitchhike around.

== Law ==
42-4-805. Pedestrians walking or traveling in a wheelchair on highways.

(2) No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of soliciting a ride from the driver of any private vehicle. For the purpose of subsection (2) "roadway" means that portion of the road normally used by moving motor vehicle traffic.

(5) Any town or city may, by ordinance, regulate the use by pedestrians of streets and highways under its jurisdiction to the extent authorized under subsection (6) of this section and sections 42-4-110 and 42-4-111, but no ordinance regulating such use of streets and highways in a manner differing from this section shall be effective until official signs or devices giving notice thereof have been placed as required by section 42-4-111 (2).

(6) No person shall solicit a ride on any highway included in the interstate system, as defined in section 43-2-101 (2), C.R.S., except at an entrance to or exit from such highway or at places specifically designated by the department of transportation; or, in an emergency affecting a vehicle or its operation, a driver or passenger of a disabled vehicle may solicit a ride on any highway.

(7) Pedestrians shall only be picked up where there is adequate road space for vehicles to pull off and not endanger and impede the flow of traffic.

Basically, hitch all you want in Colorado from off the traveled portion of the road and not on the interstate and you will be fine. There are some municipalities in Colorado that prohibit hitchhiking, but they are required to post official notices.

== Experiences ==

:''I would not hesitate to claim Colorado as the easiest state in America to hitchhike in. Anywhere west of the front range is incredibly easy. If you are like me you will wish people would stop picking you up so fast so you could have more time to absorb the scenery. I have been through most highways in Colorado and the longest I ever waited (other than a 4.5 hour wait in Greeley and a 1.5 hour wait in Pueblo) was probably about 20 minutes.'' - [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] 0:17:26, 6 March 2012 (CET)

== Cities ==
* [[Denver]]
* [[Colorado Springs]]
* [[Fort Collins]]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:Colorado]]

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>bxwx7jiok2937bt8typlozk3ojwjw33</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>63903</id>
      <parentid>61143</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-09-22T13:41:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4360">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States of America|United States]].

== Public transport ==
The traveler passing through Denver will be wise to note the presence of several Mexican bus companies. More affordable, more comfortable, more reliable, and with noteably nicer co-passengers than the Dirty Dog (greyhound), these companies can take you to Kansas City, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Southern California, and of course, Mexico. If you've got a few bucks and you don't feel like thumbing your way out of suburban sprawl, head over the area between Welton and Champa between 19th and 22nd streets. Autobuses Los Paisanos, Los Limosines, Autobuses Americanos and others can get you to Mexico for 50-60 dollars.

There is a bus that runs between Fort Collins and Loveland with a policy which allows you to ride free if you claim to be 17 or younger.

== Colorado's Front Range ==
[[Denver]] sucks and while it can be difficult there are ways out. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

[[Boulder]] is very easy to hitch into and out of. The easiest place I have ever hitched was Canyon Dr./119 between Boulder and Nederland. Used hitch hiking as a means of commuting in the mountains west of Boulder.
 
Other Major Cities on the Front Range include:
[[Colorado Springs]] 
and [[Fort Collins]]

== Western Colorado ==

Very easy: US. 50 from Salida to Grand Junction (gets a little harder once you hit the [[Utah]]    border, carry water)

Very easy: Rt. 135 from Gunnison to Crested Butte

Easy to Moderate: along 24 and 285 north of Salida 

Difficult: 92 and 133 between Carbondale and Delta (Low Traffic)

Easy: 550 Montrose to Durango

Very easy: Durango to Alamosa

Difficult to Moderate: Fort Collins to Loveland to Greeley

Very easy: US HGWY 6 over Loveland Pass for back-country skiers (Only in the winter, and only to the top of the mountain). Make sure to find a large pull-off area on a straight stretch of road.

'''Note''': Buena Vista and Canon City are prison areas which tend to be more difficult to hitchhike around.

== Law ==
42-4-805. Pedestrians walking or traveling in a wheelchair on highways.

(2) No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of soliciting a ride from the driver of any private vehicle. For the purpose of subsection (2) "roadway" means that portion of the road normally used by moving motor vehicle traffic.

(5) Any town or city may, by ordinance, regulate the use by pedestrians of streets and highways under its jurisdiction to the extent authorized under subsection (6) of this section and sections 42-4-110 and 42-4-111, but no ordinance regulating such use of streets and highways in a manner differing from this section shall be effective until official signs or devices giving notice thereof have been placed as required by section 42-4-111 (2).

(6) No person shall solicit a ride on any highway included in the interstate system, as defined in section 43-2-101 (2), C.R.S., except at an entrance to or exit from such highway or at places specifically designated by the department of transportation; or, in an emergency affecting a vehicle or its operation, a driver or passenger of a disabled vehicle may solicit a ride on any highway.

(7) Pedestrians shall only be picked up where there is adequate road space for vehicles to pull off and not endanger and impede the flow of traffic.

Basically, hitch all you want in Colorado from off the traveled portion of the road and not on the interstate and you will be fine. There are some municipalities in Colorado that prohibit hitchhiking, but they are required to post official notices.

== Experiences ==

:''I would not hesitate to claim Colorado as the easiest state in America to hitchhike in. Anywhere west of the front range is incredibly easy. If you are like me you will wish people would stop picking you up so fast so you could have more time to absorb the scenery. I have been through most highways in Colorado and the longest I ever waited (other than a 4.5 hour wait in Greeley and a 1.5 hour wait in Pueblo) was probably about 20 minutes.'' - [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] 0:17:26, 6 March 2012 (CET)

== Cities ==
* [[Denver]]
* [[Colorado Springs]]
* [[Fort Collins]]
* [[Limon]]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:Colorado]]

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>5qufezbwh13u2n7wz1xmndnhatzeu0x</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>64860</id>
      <parentid>63903</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-10-03T23:07:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4493">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States of America|United States]].

== Free/Budget Public Transport ==
The traveler passing through Denver will be wise to note the presence of several Mexican bus companies. More affordable, more comfortable, more reliable, and with noteably nicer co-passengers than the Dirty Dog (greyhound), these companies can take you to Kansas City, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Southern California, and of course, Mexico. If you've got a few bucks and you don't feel like thumbing your way out of suburban sprawl, head over the area between Welton and Champa between 19th and 22nd streets. Autobuses Los Paisanos, Los Limosines, Autobuses Americanos and others can get you to Mexico for 50-60 dollars.

There is a bus that runs between [[Fort Collins]] and [[Loveland]] with a policy which allows you to ride free if you claim to be 17 or younger.
There is a free bus that runs between [[Gunnison]] and [[Crested Butte]]. Ask the locals for detailed schedules.

== Colorado's Front Range ==
[[Denver]] sucks and while it can be difficult there are ways out. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

[[Boulder]] is very easy to hitch into and out of. The easiest place I have ever hitched was Canyon Dr./119 between Boulder and Nederland. Used hitch hiking as a means of commuting in the mountains west of Boulder.
 
Other Major Cities on the Front Range include:
[[Colorado Springs]] 
and [[Fort Collins]]

== Western Colorado ==

Very easy: US. 50 from Salida to Grand Junction (gets a little harder once you hit the [[Utah]]    border, carry water)

Very easy: Rt. 135 from Gunnison to Crested Butte

Easy to Moderate: along 24 and 285 north of Salida 

Difficult: 92 and 133 between Carbondale and Delta (Low Traffic)

Easy: 550 Montrose to Durango

Very easy: Durango to Alamosa

Difficult to Moderate: Fort Collins to Loveland to Greeley

Very easy: US HGWY 6 over Loveland Pass for back-country skiers (Only in the winter, and only to the top of the mountain). Make sure to find a large pull-off area on a straight stretch of road.

'''Note''': Buena Vista and Canon City are prison areas which tend to be more difficult to hitchhike around.

== Law ==
42-4-805. Pedestrians walking or traveling in a wheelchair on highways.

(2) No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of soliciting a ride from the driver of any private vehicle. For the purpose of subsection (2) "roadway" means that portion of the road normally used by moving motor vehicle traffic.

(5) Any town or city may, by ordinance, regulate the use by pedestrians of streets and highways under its jurisdiction to the extent authorized under subsection (6) of this section and sections 42-4-110 and 42-4-111, but no ordinance regulating such use of streets and highways in a manner differing from this section shall be effective until official signs or devices giving notice thereof have been placed as required by section 42-4-111 (2).

(6) No person shall solicit a ride on any highway included in the interstate system, as defined in section 43-2-101 (2), C.R.S., except at an entrance to or exit from such highway or at places specifically designated by the department of transportation; or, in an emergency affecting a vehicle or its operation, a driver or passenger of a disabled vehicle may solicit a ride on any highway.

(7) Pedestrians shall only be picked up where there is adequate road space for vehicles to pull off and not endanger and impede the flow of traffic.

Basically, hitch all you want in Colorado from off the traveled portion of the road and not on the interstate and you will be fine. There are some municipalities in Colorado that prohibit hitchhiking, but they are required to post official notices.

== Experiences ==

:''I would not hesitate to claim Colorado as the easiest state in America to hitchhike in. Anywhere west of the front range is incredibly easy. If you are like me you will wish people would stop picking you up so fast so you could have more time to absorb the scenery. I have been through most highways in Colorado and the longest I ever waited (other than a 4.5 hour wait in Greeley and a 1.5 hour wait in Pueblo) was probably about 20 minutes.'' - [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] 0:17:26, 6 March 2012 (CET)

== Cities ==
* [[Denver]]
* [[Colorado Springs]]
* [[Fort Collins]]
* [[Limon]]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:Colorado]]

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>ixpuzglk2dav1xu00rjztvxi3snxnp8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>64861</id>
      <parentid>64860</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-10-03T23:07:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4496">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States of America|United States]].

== Free/Budget Public Transport ==
*The traveler passing through Denver will be wise to note the presence of several Mexican bus companies. More affordable, more comfortable, more reliable, and with noteably nicer co-passengers than the Dirty Dog (greyhound), these companies can take you to Kansas City, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Southern California, and of course, Mexico. If you've got a few bucks and you don't feel like thumbing your way out of suburban sprawl, head over the area between Welton and Champa between 19th and 22nd streets. Autobuses Los Paisanos, Los Limosines, Autobuses Americanos and others can get you to Mexico for 50-60 dollars.

*There is a bus that runs between [[Fort Collins]] and [[Loveland]] with a policy which allows you to ride free if you claim to be 17 or younger.
*There is a free bus that runs between [[Gunnison]] and [[Crested Butte]]. Ask the locals for detailed schedules.

== Colorado's Front Range ==
[[Denver]] sucks and while it can be difficult there are ways out. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

[[Boulder]] is very easy to hitch into and out of. The easiest place I have ever hitched was Canyon Dr./119 between Boulder and Nederland. Used hitch hiking as a means of commuting in the mountains west of Boulder.
 
Other Major Cities on the Front Range include:
[[Colorado Springs]] 
and [[Fort Collins]]

== Western Colorado ==

Very easy: US. 50 from Salida to Grand Junction (gets a little harder once you hit the [[Utah]]    border, carry water)

Very easy: Rt. 135 from Gunnison to Crested Butte

Easy to Moderate: along 24 and 285 north of Salida 

Difficult: 92 and 133 between Carbondale and Delta (Low Traffic)

Easy: 550 Montrose to Durango

Very easy: Durango to Alamosa

Difficult to Moderate: Fort Collins to Loveland to Greeley

Very easy: US HGWY 6 over Loveland Pass for back-country skiers (Only in the winter, and only to the top of the mountain). Make sure to find a large pull-off area on a straight stretch of road.

'''Note''': Buena Vista and Canon City are prison areas which tend to be more difficult to hitchhike around.

== Law ==
42-4-805. Pedestrians walking or traveling in a wheelchair on highways.

(2) No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of soliciting a ride from the driver of any private vehicle. For the purpose of subsection (2) "roadway" means that portion of the road normally used by moving motor vehicle traffic.

(5) Any town or city may, by ordinance, regulate the use by pedestrians of streets and highways under its jurisdiction to the extent authorized under subsection (6) of this section and sections 42-4-110 and 42-4-111, but no ordinance regulating such use of streets and highways in a manner differing from this section shall be effective until official signs or devices giving notice thereof have been placed as required by section 42-4-111 (2).

(6) No person shall solicit a ride on any highway included in the interstate system, as defined in section 43-2-101 (2), C.R.S., except at an entrance to or exit from such highway or at places specifically designated by the department of transportation; or, in an emergency affecting a vehicle or its operation, a driver or passenger of a disabled vehicle may solicit a ride on any highway.

(7) Pedestrians shall only be picked up where there is adequate road space for vehicles to pull off and not endanger and impede the flow of traffic.

Basically, hitch all you want in Colorado from off the traveled portion of the road and not on the interstate and you will be fine. There are some municipalities in Colorado that prohibit hitchhiking, but they are required to post official notices.

== Experiences ==

:''I would not hesitate to claim Colorado as the easiest state in America to hitchhike in. Anywhere west of the front range is incredibly easy. If you are like me you will wish people would stop picking you up so fast so you could have more time to absorb the scenery. I have been through most highways in Colorado and the longest I ever waited (other than a 4.5 hour wait in Greeley and a 1.5 hour wait in Pueblo) was probably about 20 minutes.'' - [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] 0:17:26, 6 March 2012 (CET)

== Cities ==
* [[Denver]]
* [[Colorado Springs]]
* [[Fort Collins]]
* [[Limon]]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:Colorado]]

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>83gg5y99o1ia3ag4y7gj6ncz6596cqf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>64862</id>
      <parentid>64861</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-10-03T23:17:55Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4371">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States of America|United States]].

== Free/Budget Public Transport ==
*The traveler passing through Denver will be wise to note the presence of several Mexican bus companies. More affordable, more comfortable, more reliable, and with noteably nicer co-passengers than the Dirty Dog (greyhound), these companies can take you to Kansas City, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Southern California, and of course, Mexico. If you've got a few bucks and you don't feel like thumbing your way out of suburban sprawl, head over the area between Welton and Champa between 19th and 22nd streets. Autobuses Los Paisanos, Los Limosines, Autobuses Americanos and others can get you to Mexico for 50-60 dollars.

*There is a bus that runs between [[Fort Collins]] and [[Loveland]] with a policy which allows you to ride free if you claim to be 17 or younger.
*There is a free bus that runs between [[Gunnison]] and [[Crested Butte]]. Ask the locals for detailed schedules.

== Colorado's Front Range ==
[[Denver]] sucks and while it can be difficult there are ways out. West of Denver treated me pretty good though.

[[Boulder]] is very easy to hitch into and out of. The easiest place I have ever hitched was Canyon Dr./119 between Boulder and Nederland. Used hitch hiking as a means of commuting in the mountains west of Boulder.
 
Other Major Cities on the Front Range include:
[[Colorado Springs]] 
and [[Fort Collins]]

== Difficult Routes ==
While Colorado is generally an easy state to hitch, doing these routes may prove more difficult than others.

*Difficult: CO133 [[Carbondale (Colorado)| Carbondale]] to [[Hotchkiss]]

*Difficult: CO92 [[Delta (Colorado)|Delta]] to Blue Mesa Reservoir

*Difficult: CO115 [[Colorado Springs]] to [[Penrose (Colorado)|Penrose]]

*Difficult to Moderate: [[Fort Collins]] or [[Loveland]] to [[Greeley]]

*Difficult to Moderate: US287 [[Lamar]] to [[Limon]]

'''Note''': [[Buena Vista (Colorado)|Buena Vista]] and [[Canon City]] are prison areas which tend to be more difficult to hitchhike around.

== Law ==
42-4-805. Pedestrians walking or traveling in a wheelchair on highways.

(2) No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of soliciting a ride from the driver of any private vehicle. For the purpose of subsection (2) "roadway" means that portion of the road normally used by moving motor vehicle traffic.

(5) Any town or city may, by ordinance, regulate the use by pedestrians of streets and highways under its jurisdiction to the extent authorized under subsection (6) of this section and sections 42-4-110 and 42-4-111, but no ordinance regulating such use of streets and highways in a manner differing from this section shall be effective until official signs or devices giving notice thereof have been placed as required by section 42-4-111 (2).

(6) No person shall solicit a ride on any highway included in the interstate system, as defined in section 43-2-101 (2), C.R.S., except at an entrance to or exit from such highway or at places specifically designated by the department of transportation; or, in an emergency affecting a vehicle or its operation, a driver or passenger of a disabled vehicle may solicit a ride on any highway.

(7) Pedestrians shall only be picked up where there is adequate road space for vehicles to pull off and not endanger and impede the flow of traffic.

Basically, hitch all you want in Colorado from off the traveled portion of the road and not on the interstate and you will be fine. There are some municipalities in Colorado that prohibit hitchhiking, but they are required to post official notices.

== Experiences ==

:''I would not hesitate to claim Colorado as the easiest state in America to hitchhike in. Anywhere west of the front range is incredibly easy. If you are like me you will wish people would stop picking you up so fast so you could have more time to absorb the scenery. I have been through most highways in Colorado and the longest I ever waited (other than a 4.5 hour wait in Greeley and a 1.5 hour wait in Pueblo) was probably about 20 minutes.'' - [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] 0:17:26, 6 March 2012 (CET)

== Cities ==
* [[Denver]]
* [[Colorado Springs]]
* [[Fort Collins]]
* [[Limon]]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:Colorado]]

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>lmbrdz5wnxrp6rfqklznupzuacdhx1w</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>64863</id>
      <parentid>64862</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-10-03T23:18:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3920">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States of America|United States]].

== Free/Budget Public Transport ==
*The traveler passing through Denver will be wise to note the presence of several Mexican bus companies. More affordable, more comfortable, more reliable, and with noteably nicer co-passengers than the Dirty Dog (greyhound), these companies can take you to Kansas City, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Southern California, and of course, Mexico. If you've got a few bucks and you don't feel like thumbing your way out of suburban sprawl, head over the area between Welton and Champa between 19th and 22nd streets. Autobuses Los Paisanos, Los Limosines, Autobuses Americanos and others can get you to Mexico for 50-60 dollars.

*There is a bus that runs between [[Fort Collins]] and [[Loveland]] with a policy which allows you to ride free if you claim to be 17 or younger.
*There is a free bus that runs between [[Gunnison]] and [[Crested Butte]]. Ask the locals for detailed schedules.

== Difficult Routes ==
While Colorado is generally an easy state to hitch, doing these routes may prove more difficult than others.

*Difficult: CO133 [[Carbondale (Colorado)| Carbondale]] to [[Hotchkiss]]

*Difficult: CO92 [[Delta (Colorado)|Delta]] to Blue Mesa Reservoir

*Difficult: CO115 [[Colorado Springs]] to [[Penrose (Colorado)|Penrose]]

*Difficult to Moderate: [[Fort Collins]] or [[Loveland]] to [[Greeley]]

*Difficult to Moderate: US287 [[Lamar]] to [[Limon]]

'''Note''': [[Buena Vista (Colorado)|Buena Vista]] and [[Canon City]] are prison areas which tend to be more difficult to hitchhike around.

== Law ==
42-4-805. Pedestrians walking or traveling in a wheelchair on highways.

(2) No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of soliciting a ride from the driver of any private vehicle. For the purpose of subsection (2) "roadway" means that portion of the road normally used by moving motor vehicle traffic.

(5) Any town or city may, by ordinance, regulate the use by pedestrians of streets and highways under its jurisdiction to the extent authorized under subsection (6) of this section and sections 42-4-110 and 42-4-111, but no ordinance regulating such use of streets and highways in a manner differing from this section shall be effective until official signs or devices giving notice thereof have been placed as required by section 42-4-111 (2).

(6) No person shall solicit a ride on any highway included in the interstate system, as defined in section 43-2-101 (2), C.R.S., except at an entrance to or exit from such highway or at places specifically designated by the department of transportation; or, in an emergency affecting a vehicle or its operation, a driver or passenger of a disabled vehicle may solicit a ride on any highway.

(7) Pedestrians shall only be picked up where there is adequate road space for vehicles to pull off and not endanger and impede the flow of traffic.

Basically, hitch all you want in Colorado from off the traveled portion of the road and not on the interstate and you will be fine. There are some municipalities in Colorado that prohibit hitchhiking, but they are required to post official notices.

== Experiences ==

:''I would not hesitate to claim Colorado as the easiest state in America to hitchhike in. Anywhere west of the front range is incredibly easy. If you are like me you will wish people would stop picking you up so fast so you could have more time to absorb the scenery. I have been through most highways in Colorado and the longest I ever waited (other than a 4.5 hour wait in Greeley and a 1.5 hour wait in Pueblo) was probably about 20 minutes.'' - [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] 0:17:26, 6 March 2012 (CET)

== Cities ==
* [[Denver]]
* [[Colorado Springs]]
* [[Fort Collins]]
* [[Limon]]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:Colorado]]

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>0ukr23ie54mn8o7nvtdxi1nu5a1gno8</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>64864</id>
      <parentid>64863</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-10-03T23:18:41Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3924">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States of America|United States]].

== Free/Budget Public Transport ==
*The traveler passing through [[Denver]] will be wise to note the presence of several Mexican bus companies. More affordable, more comfortable, more reliable, and with noteably nicer co-passengers than the Dirty Dog (greyhound), these companies can take you to Kansas City, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Southern California, and of course, Mexico. If you've got a few bucks and you don't feel like thumbing your way out of suburban sprawl, head over the area between Welton and Champa between 19th and 22nd streets. Autobuses Los Paisanos, Los Limosines, Autobuses Americanos and others can get you to Mexico for 50-60 dollars.

*There is a bus that runs between [[Fort Collins]] and [[Loveland]] with a policy which allows you to ride free if you claim to be 17 or younger.
*There is a free bus that runs between [[Gunnison]] and [[Crested Butte]]. Ask the locals for detailed schedules.

== Difficult Routes ==
While Colorado is generally an easy state to hitch, doing these routes may prove more difficult than others.

*Difficult: CO133 [[Carbondale (Colorado)| Carbondale]] to [[Hotchkiss]]

*Difficult: CO92 [[Delta (Colorado)|Delta]] to Blue Mesa Reservoir

*Difficult: CO115 [[Colorado Springs]] to [[Penrose (Colorado)|Penrose]]

*Difficult to Moderate: [[Fort Collins]] or [[Loveland]] to [[Greeley]]

*Difficult to Moderate: US287 [[Lamar]] to [[Limon]]

'''Note''': [[Buena Vista (Colorado)|Buena Vista]] and [[Canon City]] are prison areas which tend to be more difficult to hitchhike around.

== Law ==
42-4-805. Pedestrians walking or traveling in a wheelchair on highways.

(2) No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of soliciting a ride from the driver of any private vehicle. For the purpose of subsection (2) "roadway" means that portion of the road normally used by moving motor vehicle traffic.

(5) Any town or city may, by ordinance, regulate the use by pedestrians of streets and highways under its jurisdiction to the extent authorized under subsection (6) of this section and sections 42-4-110 and 42-4-111, but no ordinance regulating such use of streets and highways in a manner differing from this section shall be effective until official signs or devices giving notice thereof have been placed as required by section 42-4-111 (2).

(6) No person shall solicit a ride on any highway included in the interstate system, as defined in section 43-2-101 (2), C.R.S., except at an entrance to or exit from such highway or at places specifically designated by the department of transportation; or, in an emergency affecting a vehicle or its operation, a driver or passenger of a disabled vehicle may solicit a ride on any highway.

(7) Pedestrians shall only be picked up where there is adequate road space for vehicles to pull off and not endanger and impede the flow of traffic.

Basically, hitch all you want in Colorado from off the traveled portion of the road and not on the interstate and you will be fine. There are some municipalities in Colorado that prohibit hitchhiking, but they are required to post official notices.

== Experiences ==

:''I would not hesitate to claim Colorado as the easiest state in America to hitchhike in. Anywhere west of the front range is incredibly easy. If you are like me you will wish people would stop picking you up so fast so you could have more time to absorb the scenery. I have been through most highways in Colorado and the longest I ever waited (other than a 4.5 hour wait in Greeley and a 1.5 hour wait in Pueblo) was probably about 20 minutes.'' - [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] 0:17:26, 6 March 2012 (CET)

== Cities ==
* [[Denver]]
* [[Colorado Springs]]
* [[Fort Collins]]
* [[Limon]]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:Colorado]]

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>pyss020zki4enxrtmg3ayy9feakmm1u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>64865</id>
      <parentid>64864</parentid>
      <timestamp>2012-10-03T23:20:05Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="3917">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States of America|United States]].

== Free/Budget Public Transport ==
*The traveler passing through [[Denver]] will be wise to note the presence of several Mexican bus companies. More affordable, more comfortable, more reliable, and with noteably nicer co-passengers than the Dirty Dog (greyhound), these companies can take you to Kansas City, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Southern California, and of course, Mexico. If you've got a few bucks and you don't feel like thumbing your way out of suburban sprawl, head over the area between Welton and Champa between 19th and 22nd streets. Autobuses Los Paisanos, Los Limosines, Autobuses Americanos and others can get you to Mexico for 50-60 dollars.

*There is a bus that runs between [[Fort Collins]] and [[Loveland]] with a policy which allows you to ride free if you claim to be 17 or younger.
*There is a free bus that runs between [[Gunnison]] and [[Crested Butte]]. Ask the locals for detailed schedules.

== Difficult Routes ==
While Colorado is generally an easy state to hitch, doing these routes may prove more difficult than others.

*Difficult: CO133 [[Carbondale (Colorado)| Carbondale]] to [[Hotchkiss]]

*Difficult: CO92 [[Delta (Colorado)|Delta]] to Blue Mesa Reservoir

*Difficult: CO115 [[Colorado Springs]] to [[Penrose (Colorado)|Penrose]]

*Difficult to Moderate: [[Fort Collins]] or [[Loveland]] to [[Greeley]]

*Difficult to Moderate: US287 [[Lamar]] to [[Limon]]

'''Note''': [[Buena Vista (Colorado)|Buena Vista]] and [[Canon City]] are prison areas which tend to be more difficult to hitchhike around.

== Law ==
42-4-805. Pedestrians walking or traveling in a wheelchair on highways.

(2) No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of soliciting a ride from the driver of any private vehicle. For the purpose of subsection (2) "roadway" means that portion of the road normally used by moving motor vehicle traffic.

(5) Any town or city may, by ordinance, regulate the use by pedestrians of streets and highways under its jurisdiction to the extent authorized under subsection (6) of this section and sections 42-4-110 and 42-4-111, but no ordinance regulating such use of streets and highways in a manner differing from this section shall be effective until official signs or devices giving notice thereof have been placed as required by section 42-4-111 (2).

(6) No person shall solicit a ride on any highway included in the interstate system, as defined in section 43-2-101 (2), C.R.S., except at an entrance to or exit from such highway or at places specifically designated by the department of transportation; or, in an emergency affecting a vehicle or its operation, a driver or passenger of a disabled vehicle may solicit a ride on any highway.

(7) Pedestrians shall only be picked up where there is adequate road space for vehicles to pull off and not endanger and impede the flow of traffic.

Basically, hitch all you want in Colorado from off the traveled portion of the road and not on the interstate and you will be fine. There are some municipalities in Colorado that prohibit hitchhiking, but they are required to post official notices.

== Experiences ==

:''I would not hesitate to claim Colorado as the easiest state in America to hitchhike in. Anywhere west of the front range is incredibly easy. If you are like me you will wish people would stop picking you up so fast so you could have more time to absorb the scenery. I have been through almost all of the US and State highways in Colorado and a few of the County Roads and wait times have averaged about 15 minutes depending on traffic.'' - [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] 0:17:26, 6 March 2012 (CET)

== Cities ==
* [[Denver]]
* [[Colorado Springs]]
* [[Fort Collins]]
* [[Limon]]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:Colorado]]

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>nxa6clphpghvjepocpqdmook0y1atu2</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68507</id>
      <parentid>64865</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-03-08T02:50:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4344">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States of America|United States]].

== Free/Budget Public Transport ==
*The traveler passing through [[Denver]] will be wise to note the presence of several Mexican bus companies. More affordable, more comfortable, more reliable, and with noteably nicer co-passengers than the Dirty Dog (greyhound), these companies can take you to Kansas City, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Southern California, and of course, Mexico. If you've got a few bucks and you don't feel like thumbing your way out of suburban sprawl, head over the area between Welton and Champa between 19th and 22nd streets. Autobuses Los Paisanos, Los Limosines, Autobuses Americanos and others can get you to Mexico for 50-60 dollars.

*There is a bus that runs between [[Fort Collins]] and [[Loveland]] with a policy which allows you to ride free if you claim to be 17 or younger.
*There is a free bus that runs between [[Gunnison]] and [[Crested Butte]]. Ask the locals for detailed schedules.

== Difficult Routes ==
While Colorado is generally an easy state to hitch, doing these routes may prove more difficult than others.

*Difficult: CO133 [[Carbondale (Colorado)| Carbondale]] to [[Hotchkiss]]

*Difficult: CO92 [[Delta (Colorado)|Delta]] to Blue Mesa Reservoir

*Difficult: CO115 [[Colorado Springs]] to [[Penrose (Colorado)|Penrose]]

*Difficult to Moderate: [[Fort Collins]] or [[Loveland]] to [[Greeley]]

*Difficult to Moderate: US287 [[Lamar]] to [[Limon]]

'''Note''': [[Buena Vista (Colorado)|Buena Vista]] and [[Canon City]] are prison areas which tend to be more difficult to hitchhike around.

== Law ==
42-4-805. Pedestrians walking or traveling in a wheelchair on highways.

(2) No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of soliciting a ride from the driver of any private vehicle. For the purpose of subsection (2) "roadway" means that portion of the road normally used by moving motor vehicle traffic.

(5) Any town or city may, by ordinance, regulate the use by pedestrians of streets and highways under its jurisdiction to the extent authorized under subsection (6) of this section and sections 42-4-110 and 42-4-111, but no ordinance regulating such use of streets and highways in a manner differing from this section shall be effective until official signs or devices giving notice thereof have been placed as required by section 42-4-111 (2).

(6) No person shall solicit a ride on any highway included in the interstate system, as defined in section 43-2-101 (2), C.R.S., except at an entrance to or exit from such highway or at places specifically designated by the department of transportation; or, in an emergency affecting a vehicle or its operation, a driver or passenger of a disabled vehicle may solicit a ride on any highway.

(7) Pedestrians shall only be picked up where there is adequate road space for vehicles to pull off and not endanger and impede the flow of traffic.

Basically, hitch all you want in Colorado from off the traveled portion of the road and not on the interstate and you will be fine. There are some municipalities in Colorado that prohibit hitchhiking, but they are required to post official notices.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Rocky Mountain National Park
Hitchhiking in the park is allowed and restricted to the road shoulder.

== Experiences ==

:''I would not hesitate to claim Colorado as the easiest state in America to hitchhike in. Anywhere west of the front range is incredibly easy. You might start wishing people would stop picking you up so fast so you'll have more time to absorb the scenery. I have hitchhiked almost every US and State highway in Colorado and many of the County Roads and wait times have averaged about 15 minutes depending on traffic.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 03:50, 8 March 2013 (CET)

== Cities ==
* [[Denver]]
* [[Colorado Springs]]
* [[Fort Collins]]
* [[Limon]]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:Colorado]]

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>1wn20nln3y2bpkudyh0dgu43mc22b20</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>68508</id>
      <parentid>68507</parentid>
      <timestamp>2013-03-08T02:50:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4403">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States of America|United States]]. It is generally regarded as welcoming towards hitchhikers.

== Free/Budget Public Transport ==
*The traveler passing through [[Denver]] will be wise to note the presence of several Mexican bus companies. More affordable, more comfortable, more reliable, and with noteably nicer co-passengers than the Dirty Dog (greyhound), these companies can take you to Kansas City, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Southern California, and of course, Mexico. If you've got a few bucks and you don't feel like thumbing your way out of suburban sprawl, head over the area between Welton and Champa between 19th and 22nd streets. Autobuses Los Paisanos, Los Limosines, Autobuses Americanos and others can get you to Mexico for 50-60 dollars.

*There is a bus that runs between [[Fort Collins]] and [[Loveland]] with a policy which allows you to ride free if you claim to be 17 or younger.
*There is a free bus that runs between [[Gunnison]] and [[Crested Butte]]. Ask the locals for detailed schedules.

== Difficult Routes ==
While Colorado is generally an easy state to hitch, doing these routes may prove more difficult than others.

*Difficult: CO133 [[Carbondale (Colorado)| Carbondale]] to [[Hotchkiss]]

*Difficult: CO92 [[Delta (Colorado)|Delta]] to Blue Mesa Reservoir

*Difficult: CO115 [[Colorado Springs]] to [[Penrose (Colorado)|Penrose]]

*Difficult to Moderate: [[Fort Collins]] or [[Loveland]] to [[Greeley]]

*Difficult to Moderate: US287 [[Lamar]] to [[Limon]]

'''Note''': [[Buena Vista (Colorado)|Buena Vista]] and [[Canon City]] are prison areas which tend to be more difficult to hitchhike around.

== Law ==
42-4-805. Pedestrians walking or traveling in a wheelchair on highways.

(2) No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of soliciting a ride from the driver of any private vehicle. For the purpose of subsection (2) "roadway" means that portion of the road normally used by moving motor vehicle traffic.

(5) Any town or city may, by ordinance, regulate the use by pedestrians of streets and highways under its jurisdiction to the extent authorized under subsection (6) of this section and sections 42-4-110 and 42-4-111, but no ordinance regulating such use of streets and highways in a manner differing from this section shall be effective until official signs or devices giving notice thereof have been placed as required by section 42-4-111 (2).

(6) No person shall solicit a ride on any highway included in the interstate system, as defined in section 43-2-101 (2), C.R.S., except at an entrance to or exit from such highway or at places specifically designated by the department of transportation; or, in an emergency affecting a vehicle or its operation, a driver or passenger of a disabled vehicle may solicit a ride on any highway.

(7) Pedestrians shall only be picked up where there is adequate road space for vehicles to pull off and not endanger and impede the flow of traffic.

Basically, hitch all you want in Colorado from off the traveled portion of the road and not on the interstate and you will be fine. There are some municipalities in Colorado that prohibit hitchhiking, but they are required to post official notices.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Rocky Mountain National Park
Hitchhiking in the park is allowed and restricted to the road shoulder.

== Experiences ==

:''I would not hesitate to claim Colorado as the easiest state in America to hitchhike in. Anywhere west of the front range is incredibly easy. You might start wishing people would stop picking you up so fast so you'll have more time to absorb the scenery. I have hitchhiked almost every US and State highway in Colorado and many of the County Roads and wait times have averaged about 15 minutes depending on traffic.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 03:50, 8 March 2013 (CET)

== Cities ==
* [[Denver]]
* [[Colorado Springs]]
* [[Fort Collins]]
* [[Limon]]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:Colorado]]

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>q9moyksju3c9shtlwni0esz5bj01qnb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>74877</id>
      <parentid>68508</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-04-22T01:51:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4633">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States of America|United States]]. It is generally regarded as welcoming towards hitchhikers.

== Free/Budget Public Transport ==
*The traveler passing through [[Denver]] will be wise to note the presence of several Mexican bus companies. More affordable, more comfortable, more reliable, and with noteably nicer co-passengers than the Dirty Dog (greyhound), these companies can take you to Kansas City, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Southern California, and of course, Mexico. If you've got a few bucks and you don't feel like thumbing your way out of suburban sprawl, head over the area between Welton and Champa between 19th and 22nd streets. Autobuses Los Paisanos, Los Limosines, Autobuses Americanos and others can get you to Mexico for 50-60 dollars.

==rFree Transportation===

*There is a bus that runs between [[Fort Collins]] and [[Loveland]] with a policy which allows you to ride free if you claim to be 17 or younger.

*There is a free bus that runs between [[Gunnison]] and [[Crested Butte]]. Ask the locals for detailed schedules.

*SummitStage runs free anywhere in Summit County including Silverthorne, Dillon,  Frisco,  and Breckenridge. 

*Denver has a free bus that runs along 16th street between union station and the capitol.

== Difficult Routes ==
While Colorado is generally an easy state to hitch, doing these routes may prove more difficult than others.

*Difficult: CO133 [[Carbondale (Colorado)| Carbondale]] to [[Hotchkiss]]

*Difficult: CO92 [[Delta (Colorado)|Delta]] to Blue Mesa Reservoir

*Difficult: CO115 [[Colorado Springs]] to [[Penrose (Colorado)|Penrose]]

*Difficult to Moderate: [[Fort Collins]] or [[Loveland]] to [[Greeley]]

*Difficult to Moderate: US287 [[Lamar]] to [[Limon]]

'''Note''': [[Buena Vista (Colorado)|Buena Vista]] and [[Canon City]] are prison areas which tend to be more difficult to hitchhike around.

== Law ==
42-4-805. Pedestrians walking or traveling in a wheelchair on highways.

(2) No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of soliciting a ride from the driver of any private vehicle. For the purpose of subsection (2) "roadway" means that portion of the road normally used by moving motor vehicle traffic.

(5) Any town or city may, by ordinance, regulate the use by pedestrians of streets and highways under its jurisdiction to the extent authorized under subsection (6) of this section and sections 42-4-110 and 42-4-111, but no ordinance regulating such use of streets and highways in a manner differing from this section shall be effective until official signs or devices giving notice thereof have been placed as required by section 42-4-111 (2).

(6) No person shall solicit a ride on any highway included in the interstate system, as defined in section 43-2-101 (2), C.R.S., except at an entrance to or exit from such highway or at places specifically designated by the department of transportation; or, in an emergency affecting a vehicle or its operation, a driver or passenger of a disabled vehicle may solicit a ride on any highway.

(7) Pedestrians shall only be picked up where there is adequate road space for vehicles to pull off and not endanger and impede the flow of traffic.

Basically, hitch all you want in Colorado from off the traveled portion of the road and not on the interstate and you will be fine. There are some municipalities in Colorado that prohibit hitchhiking, but they are required to post official notices.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Rocky Mountain National Park
Hitchhiking in the park is allowed and restricted to the road shoulder.

== Experiences ==

:''I would not hesitate to claim Colorado as the easiest state in America to hitchhike in. Anywhere west of the front range is incredibly easy. You might start wishing people would stop picking you up so fast so you'll have more time to absorb the scenery. I have hitchhiked almost every US and State highway in Colorado and many of the County Roads and wait times have averaged about 15 minutes depending on traffic.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 03:50, 8 March 2013 (CET)

== Cities ==
* [[Denver]]
* [[Colorado Springs]]
* [[Fort Collins]]
* [[Limon]]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:Colorado]]

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>tosl29d0zn0z6nzoyejhmvv2bgfuvb3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>74878</id>
      <parentid>74877</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-04-22T01:52:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4631">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States of America|United States]]. It is generally regarded as welcoming towards hitchhikers.

== Free/Budget Public Transport ==
*The traveler passing through [[Denver]] will be wise to note the presence of several Mexican bus companies. More affordable, more comfortable, more reliable, and with noteably nicer co-passengers than the Dirty Dog (greyhound), these companies can take you to Kansas City, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Southern California, and of course, Mexico. If you've got a few bucks and you don't feel like thumbing your way out of suburban sprawl, head over the area between Welton and Champa between 19th and 22nd streets. Autobuses Los Paisanos, Los Limosines, Autobuses Americanos and others can get you to Mexico for 50-60 dollars.

==Free Transportation==

*There is a bus that runs between [[Fort Collins]] and [[Loveland]] with a policy which allows you to ride free if you claim to be 17 or younger.

*There is a free bus that runs between [[Gunnison]] and [[Crested Butte]]. Ask the locals for detailed schedules.

*SummitStage runs free anywhere in Summit County including Silverthorne, Dillon,  Frisco,  and Breckenridge. 

*Denver has a free bus that runs along 16th street between union station and the capitol.

== Difficult Routes ==
While Colorado is generally an easy state to hitch, doing these routes may prove more difficult than others.

*Difficult: CO133 [[Carbondale (Colorado)| Carbondale]] to [[Hotchkiss]]

*Difficult: CO92 [[Delta (Colorado)|Delta]] to Blue Mesa Reservoir

*Difficult: CO115 [[Colorado Springs]] to [[Penrose (Colorado)|Penrose]]

*Difficult to Moderate: [[Fort Collins]] or [[Loveland]] to [[Greeley]]

*Difficult to Moderate: US287 [[Lamar]] to [[Limon]]

'''Note''': [[Buena Vista (Colorado)|Buena Vista]] and [[Canon City]] are prison areas which tend to be more difficult to hitchhike around.

== Law ==
42-4-805. Pedestrians walking or traveling in a wheelchair on highways.

(2) No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of soliciting a ride from the driver of any private vehicle. For the purpose of subsection (2) "roadway" means that portion of the road normally used by moving motor vehicle traffic.

(5) Any town or city may, by ordinance, regulate the use by pedestrians of streets and highways under its jurisdiction to the extent authorized under subsection (6) of this section and sections 42-4-110 and 42-4-111, but no ordinance regulating such use of streets and highways in a manner differing from this section shall be effective until official signs or devices giving notice thereof have been placed as required by section 42-4-111 (2).

(6) No person shall solicit a ride on any highway included in the interstate system, as defined in section 43-2-101 (2), C.R.S., except at an entrance to or exit from such highway or at places specifically designated by the department of transportation; or, in an emergency affecting a vehicle or its operation, a driver or passenger of a disabled vehicle may solicit a ride on any highway.

(7) Pedestrians shall only be picked up where there is adequate road space for vehicles to pull off and not endanger and impede the flow of traffic.

Basically, hitch all you want in Colorado from off the traveled portion of the road and not on the interstate and you will be fine. There are some municipalities in Colorado that prohibit hitchhiking, but they are required to post official notices.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Rocky Mountain National Park
Hitchhiking in the park is allowed and restricted to the road shoulder.

== Experiences ==

:''I would not hesitate to claim Colorado as the easiest state in America to hitchhike in. Anywhere west of the front range is incredibly easy. You might start wishing people would stop picking you up so fast so you'll have more time to absorb the scenery. I have hitchhiked almost every US and State highway in Colorado and many of the County Roads and wait times have averaged about 15 minutes depending on traffic.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 03:50, 8 March 2013 (CET)

== Cities ==
* [[Denver]]
* [[Colorado Springs]]
* [[Fort Collins]]
* [[Limon]]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:Colorado]]

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>4ffylrt8lktwfd6tazy1hnoyot7qjlu</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>74879</id>
      <parentid>74878</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-04-22T01:53:44Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4496">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States of America|United States]]. It is generally regarded as welcoming towards hitchhikers.

== Free/Budget Public Transport ==
*The traveler passing through [[Denver]] will be wise to note the presence of several Mexican bus companies. More affordable, more comfortable, more reliable, and with noteably nicer co-passengers than the Dirty Dog (greyhound), these companies can take you to Kansas City, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Southern California, and of course, Mexico. If you've got a few bucks and you don't feel like thumbing your way out of suburban sprawl, head over the area between Welton and Champa between 19th and 22nd streets. Autobuses Los Paisanos, Los Limosines, Autobuses Americanos and others can get you to Mexico for 50-60 dollars.

==Free Transportation==

*There is a bus that runs between [[Fort Collins]] and [[Loveland]] with a policy which allows you to ride free if you claim to be 17 or younger.

*There is a free bus that runs between [[Gunnison]] and [[Crested Butte]]. Ask the locals for detailed schedules.

*SummitStage runs free anywhere in Summit County including Silverthorne, Dillon,  Frisco,  and Breckenridge. 

*Denver has a free bus that runs along 16th street between union station and the capitol.


----
== Difficult Routes ==
While Colorado is generally an easy state to hitch, doing these routes may prove more difficult than others.

*Difficult: CO133 [[Carbondale (Colorado)| Carbondale]] to [[Hotchkiss]]

*Difficult: CO92 [[Delta (Colorado)|Delta]] to Blue Mesa Reservoir

*Difficult: CO115 [[Colorado Springs]] to [[Penrose (Colorado)|Penrose]]

*Difficult to Moderate: [[Fort Collins]] or [[Loveland]] to [[Greeley]]

*Difficult to Moderate: US287 [[Lamar]] to [[Limon]]

== Law ==
42-4-805. Pedestrians walking or traveling in a wheelchair on highways.

(2) No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of soliciting a ride from the driver of any private vehicle. For the purpose of subsection (2) "roadway" means that portion of the road normally used by moving motor vehicle traffic.

(5) Any town or city may, by ordinance, regulate the use by pedestrians of streets and highways under its jurisdiction to the extent authorized under subsection (6) of this section and sections 42-4-110 and 42-4-111, but no ordinance regulating such use of streets and highways in a manner differing from this section shall be effective until official signs or devices giving notice thereof have been placed as required by section 42-4-111 (2).

(6) No person shall solicit a ride on any highway included in the interstate system, as defined in section 43-2-101 (2), C.R.S., except at an entrance to or exit from such highway or at places specifically designated by the department of transportation; or, in an emergency affecting a vehicle or its operation, a driver or passenger of a disabled vehicle may solicit a ride on any highway.

(7) Pedestrians shall only be picked up where there is adequate road space for vehicles to pull off and not endanger and impede the flow of traffic.

Basically, hitch all you want in Colorado from off the traveled portion of the road and not on the interstate and you will be fine. There are some municipalities in Colorado that prohibit hitchhiking, but they are required to post official notices.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Rocky Mountain National Park
Hitchhiking in the park is allowed and restricted to the road shoulder.

== Experiences ==

:''I would not hesitate to claim Colorado as the easiest state in America to hitchhike in. Anywhere west of the front range is incredibly easy. You might start wishing people would stop picking you up so fast so you'll have more time to absorb the scenery. I have hitchhiked almost every US and State highway in Colorado and many of the County Roads and wait times have averaged about 15 minutes depending on traffic.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 03:50, 8 March 2013 (CET)

== Cities ==
* [[Denver]]
* [[Colorado Springs]]
* [[Fort Collins]]
* [[Limon]]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:Colorado]]

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>eyx78q4whoxioyanpy6kirrx62fohyz</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>74880</id>
      <parentid>74879</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-04-22T01:59:37Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4550">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States of America|United States]]. It is generally regarded as welcoming towards hitchhikers.

== Free/Budget Public Transport ==
*The traveler passing through [[Denver]] will be wise to note the presence of several Mexican bus companies. More affordable, more comfortable, more reliable, and with noteably nicer co-passengers than the Dirty Dog (greyhound), these companies can take you to Kansas City, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Southern California, and of course, Mexico. If you've got a few bucks and you don't feel like thumbing your way out of suburban sprawl, head over the area between Welton and Champa between 19th and 22nd streets. Autobuses Los Paisanos, Los Limosines, Autobuses Americanos and others can get you to Mexico for 50-60 dollars.

==Free Transportation==

*There is a bus that runs between [[Fort Collins]] and [[Loveland]] with a policy which allows you to ride free if you claim to be 17 or younger.

*There is a free bus that runs between [[Gunnison]] and [[Crested Butte]]. Ask the locals for detailed schedules.

*SummitStage runs free anywhere in Summit County including Silverthorne, Dillon,  Frisco,  and Breckenridge. 

*Denver has a free bus that runs along 16th street between union station and the capitol.

*Steamboat Springs has a free bus running across town
----

== Difficult Routes ==
While Colorado is generally an easy state to hitch, doing these routes may prove more difficult than others.

*Difficult: CO133 [[Carbondale (Colorado)| Carbondale]] to [[Hotchkiss]]

*Difficult: CO92 [[Delta (Colorado)|Delta]] to Blue Mesa Reservoir

*Difficult: CO115 [[Colorado Springs]] to [[Penrose (Colorado)|Penrose]]

*Difficult to Moderate: [[Fort Collins]] or [[Loveland]] to [[Greeley]]

*Difficult to Moderate: US287 [[Lamar]] to [[Limon]]

== Law ==
42-4-805. Pedestrians walking or traveling in a wheelchair on highways.

(2) No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of soliciting a ride from the driver of any private vehicle. For the purpose of subsection (2) "roadway" means that portion of the road normally used by moving motor vehicle traffic.

(5) Any town or city may, by ordinance, regulate the use by pedestrians of streets and highways under its jurisdiction to the extent authorized under subsection (6) of this section and sections 42-4-110 and 42-4-111, but no ordinance regulating such use of streets and highways in a manner differing from this section shall be effective until official signs or devices giving notice thereof have been placed as required by section 42-4-111 (2).

(6) No person shall solicit a ride on any highway included in the interstate system, as defined in section 43-2-101 (2), C.R.S., except at an entrance to or exit from such highway or at places specifically designated by the department of transportation; or, in an emergency affecting a vehicle or its operation, a driver or passenger of a disabled vehicle may solicit a ride on any highway.

(7) Pedestrians shall only be picked up where there is adequate road space for vehicles to pull off and not endanger and impede the flow of traffic.

Basically, hitch all you want in Colorado from off the traveled portion of the road and not on the interstate and you will be fine. There are some municipalities in Colorado that prohibit hitchhiking, but they are required to post official notices.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Rocky Mountain National Park
Hitchhiking in the park is allowed and restricted to the road shoulder.

== Experiences ==

:''I would not hesitate to claim Colorado as the easiest state in America to hitchhike in. Anywhere west of the front range is incredibly easy. You might start wishing people would stop picking you up so fast so you'll have more time to absorb the scenery. I have hitchhiked almost every US and State highway in Colorado and many of the County Roads and wait times have averaged about 15 minutes depending on traffic.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 03:50, 8 March 2013 (CET)

== Cities ==
* [[Denver]]
* [[Colorado Springs]]
* [[Fort Collins]]
* [[Limon]]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:Colorado]]

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>htftzuqlire0gagrrudh9u1fxna4a13</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>74887</id>
      <parentid>74880</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-04-22T16:57:32Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4542">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States of America|United States]]. It is generally regarded as welcoming towards hitchhikers.

== Budget Transportation==
*The traveler passing through [[Denver]] will be wise to note the presence of several Mexican bus companies. More affordable, more comfortable, more reliable, and with noteably nicer co-passengers than the Dirty Dog (greyhound), these companies can take you to Kansas City, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Southern California, and of course, Mexico. If you've got a few bucks and you don't feel like thumbing your way out of suburban sprawl, head over the area between Welton and Champa between 19th and 22nd streets. Autobuses Los Paisanos, Los Limosines, Autobuses Americanos and others can get you to Mexico for 50-60 dollars.

==Free Transportation==

*There is a bus that runs between [[Fort Collins]] and [[Loveland]] with a policy which allows you to ride free if you claim to be 17 or younger.

*There is a free bus that runs between [[Gunnison]] and [[Crested Butte]]. Ask the locals for detailed schedules.

*SummitStage runs free anywhere in Summit County including Silverthorne, Dillon,  Frisco,  and Breckenridge. 

*Denver has a free bus that runs along 16th street between union station and the capitol.

*Steamboat Springs has a free bus running across town
----

== Difficult Routes ==
While Colorado is generally an easy state to hitch, doing these routes may prove more difficult than others.

*Difficult: CO133 [[Carbondale (Colorado)| Carbondale]] to [[Hotchkiss]]

*Difficult: CO92 [[Delta (Colorado)|Delta]] to Blue Mesa Reservoir

*Difficult: CO115 [[Colorado Springs]] to [[Penrose (Colorado)|Penrose]]

*Difficult to Moderate: [[Fort Collins]] or [[Loveland]] to [[Greeley]]

*Difficult to Moderate: US287 [[Lamar]] to [[Limon]]

== Law ==
42-4-805. Pedestrians walking or traveling in a wheelchair on highways.

(2) No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of soliciting a ride from the driver of any private vehicle. For the purpose of subsection (2) "roadway" means that portion of the road normally used by moving motor vehicle traffic.

(5) Any town or city may, by ordinance, regulate the use by pedestrians of streets and highways under its jurisdiction to the extent authorized under subsection (6) of this section and sections 42-4-110 and 42-4-111, but no ordinance regulating such use of streets and highways in a manner differing from this section shall be effective until official signs or devices giving notice thereof have been placed as required by section 42-4-111 (2).

(6) No person shall solicit a ride on any highway included in the interstate system, as defined in section 43-2-101 (2), C.R.S., except at an entrance to or exit from such highway or at places specifically designated by the department of transportation; or, in an emergency affecting a vehicle or its operation, a driver or passenger of a disabled vehicle may solicit a ride on any highway.

(7) Pedestrians shall only be picked up where there is adequate road space for vehicles to pull off and not endanger and impede the flow of traffic.

Basically, hitch all you want in Colorado from off the traveled portion of the road and not on the interstate and you will be fine. There are some municipalities in Colorado that prohibit hitchhiking, but they are required to post official notices.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Rocky Mountain National Park
Hitchhiking in the park is allowed and restricted to the road shoulder.

== Experiences ==

:''I would not hesitate to claim Colorado as the easiest state in America to hitchhike in. Anywhere west of the front range is incredibly easy. You might start wishing people would stop picking you up so fast so you'll have more time to absorb the scenery. I have hitchhiked almost every US and State highway in Colorado and many of the County Roads and wait times have averaged about 15 minutes depending on traffic.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 03:50, 8 March 2013 (CET)

== Cities ==
* [[Denver]]
* [[Colorado Springs]]
* [[Fort Collins]]
* [[Limon]]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:Colorado]]

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>kh9w3laof11kbtkd37ft4yod5blgion</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>74888</id>
      <parentid>74887</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-04-22T16:58:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4552">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States of America|United States]]. It is generally regarded as welcoming towards hitchhikers.

== Budget Transportation==
*The traveler passing through [[Denver]] will be wise to note the presence of several Mexican bus companies. More affordable, more comfortable, more reliable, and with noteably nicer co-passengers than the Dirty Dog (greyhound), these companies can take you to Kansas City, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Southern California, and of course, Mexico. If you've got a few bucks and you don't feel like thumbing your way out of suburban sprawl, head over the area between Welton and Champa between 19th and 22nd streets. Autobuses Los Paisanos, Los Limosines, Autobuses Americanos and others can get you to Mexico for 50-60 dollars.

==Free Transportation==

*There is a bus that runs between [[Fort Collins]] and [[Loveland]] with a policy which allows you to ride free if you claim to be 17 or younger.

*There is a free bus that runs between [[Gunnison]] and [[Crested Butte]]. Ask the locals for detailed schedules.

*SummitStage runs free anywhere in Summit County including Silverthorne, Dillon,  Frisco,  Breckenridge, 
and Keystone.

*Denver has a free bus that runs along 16th street between union station and the capitol.

*Steamboat Springs has a free bus running across town
----

== Difficult Routes ==
While Colorado is generally an easy state to hitch, doing these routes may prove more difficult than others.

*Difficult: CO133 [[Carbondale (Colorado)| Carbondale]] to [[Hotchkiss]]

*Difficult: CO92 [[Delta (Colorado)|Delta]] to Blue Mesa Reservoir

*Difficult: CO115 [[Colorado Springs]] to [[Penrose (Colorado)|Penrose]]

*Difficult to Moderate: [[Fort Collins]] or [[Loveland]] to [[Greeley]]

*Difficult to Moderate: US287 [[Lamar]] to [[Limon]]

== Law ==
42-4-805. Pedestrians walking or traveling in a wheelchair on highways.

(2) No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of soliciting a ride from the driver of any private vehicle. For the purpose of subsection (2) "roadway" means that portion of the road normally used by moving motor vehicle traffic.

(5) Any town or city may, by ordinance, regulate the use by pedestrians of streets and highways under its jurisdiction to the extent authorized under subsection (6) of this section and sections 42-4-110 and 42-4-111, but no ordinance regulating such use of streets and highways in a manner differing from this section shall be effective until official signs or devices giving notice thereof have been placed as required by section 42-4-111 (2).

(6) No person shall solicit a ride on any highway included in the interstate system, as defined in section 43-2-101 (2), C.R.S., except at an entrance to or exit from such highway or at places specifically designated by the department of transportation; or, in an emergency affecting a vehicle or its operation, a driver or passenger of a disabled vehicle may solicit a ride on any highway.

(7) Pedestrians shall only be picked up where there is adequate road space for vehicles to pull off and not endanger and impede the flow of traffic.

Basically, hitch all you want in Colorado from off the traveled portion of the road and not on the interstate and you will be fine. There are some municipalities in Colorado that prohibit hitchhiking, but they are required to post official notices.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Rocky Mountain National Park
Hitchhiking in the park is allowed and restricted to the road shoulder.

== Experiences ==

:''I would not hesitate to claim Colorado as the easiest state in America to hitchhike in. Anywhere west of the front range is incredibly easy. You might start wishing people would stop picking you up so fast so you'll have more time to absorb the scenery. I have hitchhiked almost every US and State highway in Colorado and many of the County Roads and wait times have averaged about 15 minutes depending on traffic.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 03:50, 8 March 2013 (CET)

== Cities ==
* [[Denver]]
* [[Colorado Springs]]
* [[Fort Collins]]
* [[Limon]]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:Colorado]]

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>a9ntcatg3mtacaan9nlim145x9t9wzh</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>74889</id>
      <parentid>74888</parentid>
      <timestamp>2014-04-22T16:59:26Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Thewindandrain</username>
        <id>4678</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4551">{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States of America|United States]]. It is generally regarded as welcoming towards hitchhikers.

== Budget Transportation==
*The traveler passing through [[Denver]] will be wise to note the presence of several Mexican bus companies. More affordable, more comfortable, more reliable, and with noteably nicer co-passengers than the Dirty Dog (greyhound), these companies can take you to Kansas City, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Southern California, and of course, Mexico. If you've got a few bucks and you don't feel like thumbing your way out of suburban sprawl, head over the area between Welton and Champa between 19th and 22nd streets. Autobuses Los Paisanos, Los Limosines, Autobuses Americanos and others can get you to Mexico for 50-60 dollars.

==Free Transportation==

*There is a bus that runs between [[Fort Collins]] and [[Loveland]] with a policy which allows you to ride free if you claim to be 17 or younger.

*There is a free bus that runs between [[Gunnison]] and [[Crested Butte]]. Ask the locals for detailed schedules.

*SummitStage runs free anywhere in Summit County including Silverthorne, Dillon,  Frisco,  Breckenridge, and Keystone.

*Denver has a free bus that runs along 16th street between union station and the capitol.

*Steamboat Springs has a free bus running across town
----

== Difficult Routes ==
While Colorado is generally an easy state to hitch, doing these routes may prove more difficult than others.

*Difficult: CO133 [[Carbondale (Colorado)| Carbondale]] to [[Hotchkiss]]

*Difficult: CO92 [[Delta (Colorado)|Delta]] to Blue Mesa Reservoir

*Difficult: CO115 [[Colorado Springs]] to [[Penrose (Colorado)|Penrose]]

*Difficult to Moderate: [[Fort Collins]] or [[Loveland]] to [[Greeley]]

*Difficult to Moderate: US287 [[Lamar]] to [[Limon]]

== Law ==
42-4-805. Pedestrians walking or traveling in a wheelchair on highways.

(2) No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of soliciting a ride from the driver of any private vehicle. For the purpose of subsection (2) "roadway" means that portion of the road normally used by moving motor vehicle traffic.

(5) Any town or city may, by ordinance, regulate the use by pedestrians of streets and highways under its jurisdiction to the extent authorized under subsection (6) of this section and sections 42-4-110 and 42-4-111, but no ordinance regulating such use of streets and highways in a manner differing from this section shall be effective until official signs or devices giving notice thereof have been placed as required by section 42-4-111 (2).

(6) No person shall solicit a ride on any highway included in the interstate system, as defined in section 43-2-101 (2), C.R.S., except at an entrance to or exit from such highway or at places specifically designated by the department of transportation; or, in an emergency affecting a vehicle or its operation, a driver or passenger of a disabled vehicle may solicit a ride on any highway.

(7) Pedestrians shall only be picked up where there is adequate road space for vehicles to pull off and not endanger and impede the flow of traffic.

Basically, hitch all you want in Colorado from off the traveled portion of the road and not on the interstate and you will be fine. There are some municipalities in Colorado that prohibit hitchhiking, but they are required to post official notices.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Rocky Mountain National Park
Hitchhiking in the park is allowed and restricted to the road shoulder.

== Experiences ==

:''I would not hesitate to claim Colorado as the easiest state in America to hitchhike in. Anywhere west of the front range is incredibly easy. You might start wishing people would stop picking you up so fast so you'll have more time to absorb the scenery. I have hitchhiked almost every US and State highway in Colorado and many of the County Roads and wait times have averaged about 15 minutes depending on traffic.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 03:50, 8 March 2013 (CET)

== Cities ==
* [[Denver]]
* [[Colorado Springs]]
* [[Fort Collins]]
* [[Limon]]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:Colorado]]

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>fbexfsta0omkzcjbzkqrg2otfynzqp7</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>113710</id>
      <parentid>74889</parentid>
      <timestamp>2025-09-29T08:26:12Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>KnyttesBot</username>
        <id>47742</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <comment>Added infobox with coordinates to geographical article</comment>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="4691">{{infobox Location
|country = -
|state = -
|map = &lt;map lat='38.7251776' lng='-105.607716' zoom='9' /&gt;
|pop = -
|plate = -
|motorways = -
}}
{{IsIn|United States of America}}

'''Colorado''' is a state of the [[United States of America|United States]]. It is generally regarded as welcoming towards hitchhikers.

== Budget Transportation==
*The traveler passing through [[Denver]] will be wise to note the presence of several Mexican bus companies. More affordable, more comfortable, more reliable, and with noteably nicer co-passengers than the Dirty Dog (greyhound), these companies can take you to Kansas City, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Southern California, and of course, Mexico. If you've got a few bucks and you don't feel like thumbing your way out of suburban sprawl, head over the area between Welton and Champa between 19th and 22nd streets. Autobuses Los Paisanos, Los Limosines, Autobuses Americanos and others can get you to Mexico for 50-60 dollars.

==Free Transportation==

*There is a bus that runs between [[Fort Collins]] and [[Loveland]] with a policy which allows you to ride free if you claim to be 17 or younger.

*There is a free bus that runs between [[Gunnison]] and [[Crested Butte]]. Ask the locals for detailed schedules.

*SummitStage runs free anywhere in Summit County including Silverthorne, Dillon,  Frisco,  Breckenridge, and Keystone.

*Denver has a free bus that runs along 16th street between union station and the capitol.

*Steamboat Springs has a free bus running across town
----

== Difficult Routes ==
While Colorado is generally an easy state to hitch, doing these routes may prove more difficult than others.

*Difficult: CO133 [[Carbondale (Colorado)| Carbondale]] to [[Hotchkiss]]

*Difficult: CO92 [[Delta (Colorado)|Delta]] to Blue Mesa Reservoir

*Difficult: CO115 [[Colorado Springs]] to [[Penrose (Colorado)|Penrose]]

*Difficult to Moderate: [[Fort Collins]] or [[Loveland]] to [[Greeley]]

*Difficult to Moderate: US287 [[Lamar]] to [[Limon]]

== Law ==
42-4-805. Pedestrians walking or traveling in a wheelchair on highways.

(2) No person shall stand in a roadway for the purpose of soliciting a ride from the driver of any private vehicle. For the purpose of subsection (2) "roadway" means that portion of the road normally used by moving motor vehicle traffic.

(5) Any town or city may, by ordinance, regulate the use by pedestrians of streets and highways under its jurisdiction to the extent authorized under subsection (6) of this section and sections 42-4-110 and 42-4-111, but no ordinance regulating such use of streets and highways in a manner differing from this section shall be effective until official signs or devices giving notice thereof have been placed as required by section 42-4-111 (2).

(6) No person shall solicit a ride on any highway included in the interstate system, as defined in section 43-2-101 (2), C.R.S., except at an entrance to or exit from such highway or at places specifically designated by the department of transportation; or, in an emergency affecting a vehicle or its operation, a driver or passenger of a disabled vehicle may solicit a ride on any highway.

(7) Pedestrians shall only be picked up where there is adequate road space for vehicles to pull off and not endanger and impede the flow of traffic.

Basically, hitch all you want in Colorado from off the traveled portion of the road and not on the interstate and you will be fine. There are some municipalities in Colorado that prohibit hitchhiking, but they are required to post official notices.

=== Federal Districts ===
'''Note''':All land regulated by the National Park service prohibits hitchhiking under the Code of Federal Regulations 
Title 36 section 4.31: Hitchhiking or soliciting transportation is prohibited 
''except in designated areas and under conditions established by the superintendent.''

*Rocky Mountain National Park
Hitchhiking in the park is allowed and restricted to the road shoulder.

== Experiences ==

:''I would not hesitate to claim Colorado as the easiest state in America to hitchhike in. Anywhere west of the front range is incredibly easy. You might start wishing people would stop picking you up so fast so you'll have more time to absorb the scenery. I have hitchhiked almost every US and State highway in Colorado and many of the County Roads and wait times have averaged about 15 minutes depending on traffic.'' [[User:Thewindandrain|Thewindandrain]] ([[User talk:Thewindandrain|talk]]) 03:50, 8 March 2013 (CET)

== Cities ==
* [[Denver]]
* [[Colorado Springs]]
* [[Fort Collins]]
* [[Limon]]


{{Template:States USA}}
[[trash:Colorado]]

[[Category:United States]]
[[Category:Colorado]]</text>
      <sha1>akgurqk32bosbf9ao7xh5akuc5kkc44</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Liftari.org</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1549</id>
    <redirect title="Multimedia" />
    <revision>
      <id>1603</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T21:27:19Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="34">#redirect [[Hitchhiking websites]]</text>
      <sha1>jvcovfl6jd97nndhquslxro33591rfi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1604</id>
      <parentid>1603</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:28Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="34">#redirect [[Hitchhiking websites]]</text>
      <sha1>jvcovfl6jd97nndhquslxro33591rfi</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>15382</id>
      <parentid>1604</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-04T04:26:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="24">#redirect [[Multimedia]]</text>
      <sha1>16qvo4w8l7cbxy2n6l0btb5pat339zq</sha1>
    </revision>
  </page>
  <page>
    <title>Slovakia</title>
    <ns>0</ns>
    <id>1550</id>
    <revision>
      <id>1605</id>
      <parentid>4558</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-08-23T18:04:02Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>0</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="290">'''Slovakia''' seems not to be so easy. It is best to directly ask at gas stations. Some, but not many, speak English or German. Russian is more widely understood, but not necessarily liked.

==Cities==
* [[Bratislava]], the capital
* [[Kosice]]

[[Category:Slovakia|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>7um2hrnm83ao7y7hj0uokvlf8grbbzn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>1606</id>
      <parentid>1605</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T11:35:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="290">'''Slovakia''' seems not to be so easy. It is best to directly ask at gas stations. Some, but not many, speak English or German. Russian is more widely understood, but not necessarily liked.

==Cities==
* [[Bratislava]], the capital
* [[Kosice]]

[[Category:Slovakia|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>7um2hrnm83ao7y7hj0uokvlf8grbbzn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4556</id>
      <timestamp>2005-12-19T21:28:51Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="200">'''Slovakia''' seems not to be so easy. It is best to directly ask at gas stations. Some, but not many, speak English or German. Russian is more widely understood, but not necessarily liked.

{{stub}}</text>
      <sha1>089gv4f8klanel0n2l4sanida2o4bnb</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4557</id>
      <parentid>4556</parentid>
      <timestamp>2005-12-20T14:28:59Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="221">'''Slovakia''' seems not to be so easy. It is best to directly ask at gas stations. Some, but not many, speak English or German. Russian is more widely understood, but not necessarily liked.

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>ethsx67vem9rqgr8uea6hhg3srrnjw3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4558</id>
      <parentid>4557</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-08-23T17:58:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="276">'''Slovakia''' seems not to be so easy. It is best to directly ask at gas stations. Some, but not many, speak English or German. Russian is more widely understood, but not necessarily liked.

==Cities==
* [[Bratislava]], the capital
* [[Kosice]]

{{stub}}

[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>qjafns0fy5qj6wa3rrovplbmm0xej1d</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>4559</id>
      <parentid>1606</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-22T16:21:00Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Admin</username>
        <id>1</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="290">'''Slovakia''' seems not to be so easy. It is best to directly ask at gas stations. Some, but not many, speak English or German. Russian is more widely understood, but not necessarily liked.

==Cities==
* [[Bratislava]], the capital
* [[Kosice]]

[[Category:Slovakia|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>7um2hrnm83ao7y7hj0uokvlf8grbbzn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9257</id>
      <parentid>4559</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-26T18:04:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>85.216.174.28</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="580">'''Slovakia''' seems not to be so easy. It is best to directly ask at gas stations. Some, but not many, speak English or German. Russian is more widely understood, but not necessarily liked.

Young people can speak english and it's not so bad with english in bigger towns. Of course in vilages it can became difficult understand each other. You can find a lot of [http://stopar.sk offers for hitchhikers] on website [http://stopar.sk stopar.sk]. It's available in english as well.

==Cities==
* [[Bratislava]], the capital
* [[Kosice]]

[[Category:Slovakia|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>4aodpo4mot9y4r35cseqvtc62u37dl5</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9268</id>
      <parentid>9257</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-26T23:30:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="594">'''Slovakia''' seems not to be so easy. It is best to directly ask at gas stations. Some, but not many, speak English or German. Russian is more widely understood, but not necessarily liked.

Young people can speak english and it's not so bad with english in bigger towns. Of course in villages it can become difficult to understand each other. You can find a lot of [http://stopar.sk offers for hitchhikers] at [http://www.stopar.sk/index.php?newlang=english stopar.sk] (available in English).

==Cities==
* [[Bratislava]], the capital
* [[Kosice]]

[[Category:Slovakia|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>cpmwcshqvmaya41dbw56puc0nwcbftg</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9281</id>
      <parentid>9268</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-27T21:24:07Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>85.216.174.28</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="647">'''Slovakia''' seems not to be so easy. It is best to directly ask at gas stations. Some, but not many, speak English or German. Russian is more widely understood, but not necessarily liked.

Young people can speak english and it's not so bad with english in bigger towns. Of course in villages it can become difficult to understand each other. Hitchhike in Slovak is [http://stopar.sk autostop].

You can find a lot of [http://stopar.sk offers for hitchhikers] at [http://www.stopar.sk/index.php?newlang=english stopar.sk] (available in English).

==Cities==
* [[Bratislava]], the capital
* [[Kosice]]

[[Category:Slovakia|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>cj5dauj8dazw3hso44bt7fcdxca2r9b</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>9282</id>
      <parentid>9281</parentid>
      <timestamp>2006-11-27T22:36:50Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="633">'''Slovakia''' seems not to be so easy. It is best to directly ask at gas stations. Some, but not many, speak English or German. Russian is more widely understood, but not necessarily liked.

Young people can speak english and it's not so bad with english in bigger towns. Of course in villages it can become difficult to understand each other. Hitchhiking in Slovak means autostop.

You can find a lot of [http://stopar.sk offers for hitchhikers] at [http://www.stopar.sk/index.php?newlang=english stopar.sk] (available in English).

==Cities==
* [[Bratislava]], the capital
* [[Kosice]]

[[Category:Slovakia|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>7xlpgl8hogl2m9if4pfrm6231g4fqqf</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>12128</id>
      <parentid>9282</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-07-05T12:47:13Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="711">'''Slovakia''' seems not to be so easy. People rarely tend to stop, when you are standing at the road with a sign. So it is best to ask directly at gas stations. Some, but not many, speak English or German. Russian is more widely understood, but not necessarily liked.

Young people can speak English and it's not so bad with English in bigger towns. Of course in villages it can become difficult to understand each other. Hitchhiking in Slovak means autostop.

You can find a lot of [http://stopar.sk offers for hitchhikers] at [http://www.stopar.sk/index.php?newlang=english stopar.sk] (available in English).

==Cities==
* [[Bratislava]], the capital
* [[Kosice]]

[[Category:Slovakia|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]</text>
      <sha1>3b645fg2z0hf4bjq7jux75p99mzeo3q</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13706</id>
      <parentid>12128</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-13T09:41:24Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="737">'''Slovakia''' seems not to be so easy. People rarely tend to stop, when you are standing at the road with a sign. So it is best to ask directly at gas stations. Some, but not many, speak English or German. Russian is more widely understood, but not necessarily liked.

Young people can speak English and it's not so bad with English in bigger towns. Of course in villages it can become difficult to understand each other. Hitchhiking in Slovak means autostop.

You can find a lot of [http://stopar.sk offers for hitchhikers] at [http://www.stopar.sk/index.php?newlang=english stopar.sk] (available in English).

==Cities==
* [[Bratislava]], the capital
* [[Kosice]]

[[Category:Slovakia|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]
{{hitchbase_country|172}}</text>
      <sha1>874getuz1gh1cuki0sx5jtzpgawxad9</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>13857</id>
      <parentid>13706</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-09-16T08:26:58Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="754">'''Slovakia''' seems not to be so easy. People rarely tend to stop, when you are standing at the road with a sign. So it is best to ask directly at gas stations. Some, but not many, speak English or German. Russian is more widely understood, but not necessarily liked.

Young people can speak English and it's not so bad with English in bigger towns. Of course in villages it can become difficult to understand each other. Hitchhiking in Slovak means autostop.

You can find a lot of [http://stopar.sk offers for hitchhikers] at [http://www.stopar.sk/index.php?newlang=english stopar.sk] (available in English).

==Cities==
* [[Bratislava]], the capital
* [[Kosice]]

[[Category:Slovakia|*]]
[[Category:Europe]]
{{hitchbase_country|172}}

[[de:Slowakei]]</text>
      <sha1>c18vns1gz64o2dh79quf4f8ct0ftirx</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>14743</id>
      <parentid>13857</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-10-13T19:53:22Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="757">'''Slovakia''' seems not to be so easy. People rarely tend to stop, when you are standing at the road with a sign. So it is best to ask directly at gas stations. Some, but not many, speak English or German. Russian is more widely understood, but not necessarily liked.

Young people can speak English and it's not so bad with English in bigger towns. Of course in villages it can become difficult to understand each other. Hitchhiking in Slovak means autostop.

You can find a lot of [http://stopar.sk offers for hitchhikers] at [http://www.stopar.sk/index.php?newlang=english stopar.sk] (available in English).

== Cities ==
* [[Bratislava]], the capital
* [[Kosice]]


[[Category:Slovakia| ]]
[[Category:Europe]]
{{hitchbase_country|172}}

[[de:Slowakei]]</text>
      <sha1>dkub501m0abe08jcp0xjit4gcws9ynw</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>16124</id>
      <parentid>14743</parentid>
      <timestamp>2007-11-26T15:02:52Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Platschi</username>
        <id>112</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="840">&lt;map lat='48.6667' lng='19.5' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' country='Slovakia'/&gt;
'''Slovakia''' seems not to be so easy. People rarely tend to stop, when you are standing at the road with a sign. So it is best to ask directly at gas stations. Some, but not many, speak English or German. Russian is more widely understood, but not necessarily liked.

Young people can speak English and it's not so bad with English in bigger towns. Of course in villages it can become difficult to understand each other. Hitchhiking in Slovak means autostop.

You can find a lot of [http://stopar.sk offers for hitchhikers] at [http://www.stopar.sk/index.php?newlang=english stopar.sk] (available in English).

== Cities ==
* [[Bratislava]], the capital
* [[Kosice]]


[[Category:Slovakia| ]]
[[Category:Europe]]
{{hitchbase_country|172}}

[[de:Slowakei]]</text>
      <sha1>8ud8lo72ed6cks5lekjwgef77fwthal</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>18379</id>
      <parentid>16124</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-02-15T12:39:29Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="920">&lt;map lat='48.6667' lng='19.5' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' country='Slovakia'/&gt;
'''Slovakia''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitchhiking here seems not to be so easy. People rarely tend to stop, when you are standing at the road with a sign. So it is best to ask directly at gas stations. Some, but not many, speak English or German. Russian is more widely understood, but not necessarily liked.

Young people can speak English and it's not so bad with English in bigger towns. Of course in villages it can become difficult to understand each other. Hitchhiking in Slovak means autostop.

You can find a lot of [http://stopar.sk offers for hitchhikers] at [http://www.stopar.sk/index.php?newlang=english stopar.sk] (available in English).

== Cities ==
* [[Bratislava]], the capital
* [[Kosice]]


[[Category:Slovakia| ]]
{{hitchbase_country|172}}

[[de:Slowakei]]</text>
      <sha1>n6extyzttdemxlih41ek1ln9127syze</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21695</id>
      <parentid>18379</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-19T00:30:25Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Guaka</username>
        <id>2</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="957">&lt;map lat='48.6667' lng='19.5' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' country='Slovakia'/&gt;
'''Slovakia''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitchhiking here seems not to be so easy. People rarely tend to stop, when you are standing at the road with a sign. So it is best to ask directly at gas stations. Some, but not many, speak English or German. Russian is more widely understood, but not necessarily liked.

Young people can speak English and it's not so bad with English in bigger towns. Of course in villages it can become difficult to understand each other. Hitchhiking in Slovak means autostop.

You can find a lot of [http://stopar.sk offers for hitchhikers] at [http://www.stopar.sk/index.php?newlang=english stopar.sk] (available in English).

== Cities ==
[[Image:Hugo.JPG|thumb|200px|right]]
* [[Bratislava]], the capital
* [[Kosice]]


[[Category:Slovakia| ]]
{{hitchbase_country|172}}

[[de:Slowakei]]</text>
      <sha1>3nsm1x0vo07u4j1jiy8ou2rruwzacvs</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21750</id>
      <parentid>21695</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-19T06:08:33Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Budy</username>
        <id>1442</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="980">&lt;map lat='48.6667' lng='19.5' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' country='Slovakia'/&gt;
'''Slovakia''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitchhiking here seems not to be so easy. People rarely tend to stop, when you are standing at the road with a sign. So it is best to ask directly at gas stations. Some, but not many, speak English or German. Russian is more widely understood, but not necessarily liked.

Young people can speak English and it's not so bad with English in bigger towns. Of course in villages it can become difficult to understand each other. Hitchhiking in Slovak means autostop.

You can find a lot of [http://stopar.sk offers for hitchhikers] at [http://www.stopar.sk/index.php?newlang=english stopar.sk] (available in English).

== Cities ==
[[Image:Hugo.JPG|thumb|200px|right]]
* [[Bratislava]], the capital
* [[Banská Bystrica]]
* [[Kosice]]


[[Category:Slovakia| ]]
{{hitchbase_country|172}}

[[de:Slowakei]]</text>
      <sha1>dzc8p5zcejlmxtr51pgsvg12btuzdea</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21751</id>
      <parentid>21750</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-19T06:09:06Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Budy</username>
        <id>1442</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="981">&lt;map lat='48.6667' lng='19.5' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' country='Slovakia'/&gt;
'''Slovakia''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitchhiking here seems not to be so easy. People rarely tend to stop, when you are standing at the road with a sign. So it is best to ask directly at gas stations. Some, but not many, speak English or German. Russian is more widely understood, but not necessarily liked.

Young people can speak English and it's not so bad with English in bigger towns. Of course in villages it can become difficult to understand each other. Hitchhiking in Slovak means autostop.

You can find a lot of [http://stopar.sk offers for hitchhikers] at [http://www.stopar.sk/index.php?newlang=english stopar.sk] (available in English).

== Cities ==
[[Image:Hugo.JPG|thumb|200px|right]]
* [[Bratislava]], the capital
* [[Banská Bystrica]]
* [[Košice]]


[[Category:Slovakia| ]]
{{hitchbase_country|172}}

[[de:Slowakei]]</text>
      <sha1>mv4n31x5wplwymu6ab4ytbclqpy060i</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21752</id>
      <parentid>21751</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-19T06:09:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Budy</username>
        <id>1442</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="980">&lt;map lat='48.6667' lng='19.5' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' country='Slovakia'/&gt;
'''Slovakia''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitchhiking here seems not to be so easy. People rarely tend to stop, when you are standing at the road with a sign. So it is best to ask directly at gas stations. Some, but not many, speak English or German. Russian is more widely understood, but not necessarily liked.

Young people can speak English and it's not so bad with English in bigger towns. Of course in villages it can become difficult to understand each other. Hitchhiking in Slovak means autostop.

You can find a lot of [http://stopar.sk offers for hitchhikers] at [http://www.stopar.sk/index.php?newlang=english stopar.sk] (available in English).

== Cities ==
[[Image:Hugo.JPG|thumb|200px|right]]
* [[Bratislava]], the capital
* [[Banská Bystrica]]
* [[Kosice]]


[[Category:Slovakia| ]]
{{hitchbase_country|172}}

[[de:Slowakei]]</text>
      <sha1>dzc8p5zcejlmxtr51pgsvg12btuzdea</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21766</id>
      <parentid>21752</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-19T09:15:45Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>MrTweek</username>
        <id>3</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1004">&lt;map lat='48.6667' lng='19.5' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' country='Slovakia'/&gt;
'''Slovakia''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitchhiking here seems not to be so easy. People rarely tend to stop, when you are standing at the road with a sign. So it is best to ask directly at gas stations. Some, but not many, speak English or German. Russian is more widely understood, but not necessarily liked.

Young people can speak English and it's not so bad with English in bigger towns. Of course in villages it can become difficult to understand each other. Hitchhiking in Slovak means autostop.

You can find a lot of [http://stopar.sk offers for hitchhikers] at [http://www.stopar.sk/index.php?newlang=english stopar.sk] (available in English).

== Cities ==
[[Image:Hugo.JPG|thumb|200px|right]]
* [[Bratislava]], the capital
* [[Banská Bystrica]]
* [[Kosice]]


[[Category:Slovakia| ]]
{{hitchbase_country|172}}

[[de:Slowakei]]
{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}</text>
      <sha1>lh9076lwn9myiwvt5zp0s0kfdqppoae</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>21934</id>
      <parentid>21766</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-06-21T22:18:36Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1005">&lt;map lat='48.6667' lng='19.5' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' country='Slovakia'/&gt;
'''Slovakia''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitchhiking here seems not to be so easy. People rarely tend to stop, when you are standing at the road with a sign. So it is best to ask directly at gas stations. Some, but not many, speak English or German. Russian is more widely understood, but not necessarily liked.

Young people can speak English and it's not so bad with English in bigger towns. Of course in villages it can become difficult to understand each other. Hitchhiking in Slovak means autostop.

You can find a lot of [http://stopar.sk offers for hitchhikers] at [http://www.stopar.sk/index.php?newlang=english stopar.sk] (available in English).

== Cities ==
[[Image:Hugo.JPG|thumb|200px|right]]
* [[Bratislava]], the capital
* [[Banská Bystrica]]
* [[Kosice]]


[[Category:Slovakia| ]]
{{hitchbase_country|172}}

{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}

[[de:Slowakei]]</text>
      <sha1>0jegva3retaaatcd4sby67i5657bewn</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>25465</id>
      <parentid>21934</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-10-01T11:43:08Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Speckmade</username>
        <id>23</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1005">&lt;map lat='48.6667' lng='19.5' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' country='Slovakia'/&gt;
'''Slovakia''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitchhiking here seems not to be so easy. People rarely tend to stop, when you are standing at the road with a sign. So it is best to ask directly at gas stations. Some, but not many, speak English or German. Russian is more widely understood, but not necessarily liked.

Young people can speak English and it's not so bad with English in bigger towns. Of course in villages it can become difficult to understand each other. Hitchhiking in Slovak means autostop.

You can find a lot of [http://stopar.sk/ offers for hitchhikers] at [http://www.stopar.sk/index.php?newlang=english stopar.sk] (available in English).

== Cities ==
[[Image:Hugo.JPG|thumb|200px|right]]
* [[Bratislava]], the capital
* [[Banská Bystrica]]
* [[Kosice]]


{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
[[Category:Slovakia| ]]
{{hitchbase_country|172}}

[[de:Slowakei]]</text>
      <sha1>o5cvgav2wghd9fkccjay8hnhi53885p</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>27798</id>
      <parentid>25465</parentid>
      <timestamp>2008-11-16T10:13:10Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Prino</username>
        <id>93</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1035">&lt;map lat='48.6667' lng='19.5' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' country='Slovakia'/&gt;
'''Slovakia''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitchhiking here seems not to be so easy. People rarely tend to stop, when you are standing at the road with a sign. So it is best to ask directly at gas stations. Some, but not many, speak English or German. Russian is more widely understood, but not necessarily liked.

Young people can speak English and it's not so bad with English in bigger towns. Of course in villages it can become difficult to understand each other. Hitchhiking in Slovak means autostop.

You can find a lot of [http://stopar.sk/ offers for hitchhikers] at [http://www.stopar.sk/index.php?newlang=english stopar.sk] (available in English).

== Cities ==
[[Image:Hugo.JPG|thumb|200px|right]]
* [[Bratislava]], the capital
* [[Banská Bystrica]]
* [[Kosice]]


{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
[[Category:Slovakia| ]]
{{hitchbase_country|172}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

[[de:Slowakei]]</text>
      <sha1>j3ij0tocmr6q2aha1kvatfsnf056s8a</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>31538</id>
      <parentid>27798</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-03-04T23:16:40Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Sigurdas</username>
        <id>1658</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1054">&lt;map lat='48.6667' lng='19.5' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' country='Slovakia'/&gt;
'''Slovakia''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitchhiking here seems not to be so easy. People rarely tend to stop, when you are standing at the road with a sign. So it is best to ask directly at gas stations. Some, but not many, speak English or German. Russian is more widely understood, but not necessarily liked.

Young people can speak English and it's not so bad with English in bigger towns. Of course in villages it can become difficult to understand each other. Hitchhiking in Slovak means autostop.

You can find a lot of [http://stopar.sk/ offers for hitchhikers] at [http://www.stopar.sk/index.php?newlang=english stopar.sk] (available in English).

== Cities ==
[[Image:Hugo.JPG|thumb|200px|right]]
* [[Bratislava]], the capital
* [[Banská Bystrica]]
* [[Kosice]]


{{hitchbase_country|172}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
[[Category:Slovakia| ]]
[[trash:Slovakia]]
[[de:Slowakei]]</text>
      <sha1>oqglqvj3v2vcb7ya7wqump6mqnxj7c3</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>33710</id>
      <parentid>31538</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-05-28T12:51:17Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>89.156.213.38</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1071">&lt;map lat='48.6667' lng='19.5' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' country='Slovakia'/&gt;
'''Slovakia''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitchhiking here seems not to be so easy. People rarely tend to stop, when you are standing at the road with a sign. So it is best to ask directly at gas stations. Some, but not many, speak English or German. Russian is more widely understood, but not necessarily liked.

Young people can speak English and it's not so bad with English in bigger towns. Of course in villages it can become difficult to understand each other. Hitchhiking in Slovak means autostop.

You can find a lot of [http://stopar.sk/ offers for hitchhikers] at [http://www.stopar.sk/index.php?newlang=english stopar.sk] (available in English).

== Cities ==
[[Image:Hugo.JPG|thumb|200px|right]]
* [[Bratislava]], the capital
* [[Banská Bystrica]]
* [[Kosice]]


{{hitchbase_country|172}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
[[Category:Slovakia| ]]
[[trash:Slovakia]]
[[de:Slowakei]]
[[fr:Slovaquie]]</text>
      <sha1>fdy5pfq9lee0fu6uon6z6rqcelj9222</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35461</id>
      <parentid>33710</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-10T18:53:03Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1072">&lt;map lat='48.6667' lng='19.5' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' country='Slovakia'/&gt;
'''Slovakia''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitchhiking here seems not to be so easy. People rarely tend to stop, when you are standing at the road with a sign. So it is best to ask directly at gas stations. Some, but not many, speak English or German. Russian is more widely understood, but not necessarily liked.

Young people can speak English and it's not so bad with English in bigger towns. Of course in villages it can become difficult to understand each other. Hitchhiking in Slovak means autostop.

You can find a lot of [http://stopar.sk/ offers for hitchhikers] at [http://www.stopar.sk/index.php?newlang=english stopar.sk] (available in English).

== Cities ==
[[File:Hugo.JPG|thumb|200px|right]]
* [[Bratislava]], the capital
* [[Banská Bystrica]]
* [[Kosice]]


{{hitchbase_country|172}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
[[trash:Slovakia]]
[[fr:Slovaquie]]

[[Category:Slovakia| ]]

[[de:Slowakei]]</text>
      <sha1>js6uon0ouphu6kmn7sdc22xp5m8pxwq</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35842</id>
      <parentid>35461</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-16T20:38:49Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Paluch</username>
        <id>1363</id>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1242">{{infobox Country
|country = Slovakia
|map = &lt;map lat='48.6667' lng='19.5' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' country='Slovakia'/&gt;
|language = Slovak
|capital = [[Bratislava]]
|pop = 5 455 000
|currency = Euro (EUR, €)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Slovakia''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitchhiking here seems not to be so easy. People rarely tend to stop, when you are standing at the road with a sign. So it is best to ask directly at gas stations. Some, but not many, speak English or German. Russian is more widely understood, but not necessarily liked.

Young people can speak English and it's not so bad with English in bigger towns. Of course in villages it can become difficult to understand each other. Hitchhiking in Slovak means autostop.

You can find a lot of [http://stopar.sk/ offers for hitchhikers] at [http://www.stopar.sk/index.php?newlang=english stopar.sk] (available in English).
[[File:Hugo.JPG|thumb|200px|left]]
== Cities ==
* [[Bratislava]], the capital
* [[Banská Bystrica]]
* [[Kosice]]


{{hitchbase_country|172}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
[[trash:Slovakia]]
[[Category:Slovakia| ]]

[[de:Slowakei]]
[[fr:Slovaquie]]
[[pl:Słowacja]]</text>
      <sha1>m833m5qhgmm44cek77xaswb7j3fpsav</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>35850</id>
      <parentid>35842</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-07-16T22:55:21Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <username>Lanigiro</username>
        <id>173</id>
      </contributor>
      <minor/>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1243">{{infobox Country
|country = Slovakia
|map = &lt;map lat='48.6667' lng='19.5' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' country='Slovakia'/&gt;
|language = Slovak
|capital = [[Bratislava]]
|pop = 5 455 000
|currency = Euro (EUR, €)
|hitch = {{good}}
}}
'''Slovakia''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitchhiking here seems not to be so easy. People rarely tend to stop, when you are standing at the road with a sign. So it is best to ask directly at gas stations. Some, but not many, speak English or German. Russian is more widely understood, but not necessarily liked.

Young people can speak English and it's not so bad with English in bigger towns. Of course in villages it can become difficult to understand each other. Hitchhiking in Slovak means autostop.

You can find a lot of [http://stopar.sk/ offers for hitchhikers] at [http://www.stopar.sk/index.php?newlang=english stopar.sk] (available in English).
[[File:Hugo.JPG|thumb|200px|left]]
== Cities ==
* [[Bratislava]], the capital
* [[Banská Bystrica]]
* [[Kosice]]


{{hitchbase_country|172}}
{{Template:Europe/countries}}

{{IsIn|Eastern Europe}}
[[trash:Slovakia]]
[[fr:Slovaquie]]

[[Category:Slovakia| ]]

[[de:Slowakei]]
[[pl:Słowacja]]</text>
      <sha1>mliuaaqanqpzhjocmbm97rqzrkf7x8u</sha1>
    </revision>
    <revision>
      <id>36360</id>
      <parentid>35850</parentid>
      <timestamp>2009-08-05T11:51:46Z</timestamp>
      <contributor>
        <ip>78.90.24.229</ip>
      </contributor>
      <model>wikitext</model>
      <format>text/x-wiki</format>
      <text xml:space="preserve" bytes="1565">{{infobox Country
|country = Slovakia
|map = &lt;map lat='48.6667' lng='19.5' zoom='6' view='0' float='right' country='Slovakia'/&gt;
|language = Slovak
|capital = [[Bratislava]]
|pop = 5 455 000
|currency = Euro (EUR, €)
|hitch = {{fucked up}}
}}
'''Slovakia''' is a member state of the [[European Union]] as well as the [[Schengen Agreement]]. Hitchhiking here seems not to be so easy. People rarely tend to stop, when you are standing at the road with a sign. So it is best to ask directly at gas stations. Some, but not many, speak English or German. Russian is more widely understood, but not necessarily liked.

Young people can speak English and it's not so bad with English in bigger towns. Of course in villages it can become difficult to understand each other. Hitchhiking in Slovak means autostop.

Two weeks ago I was in Slovakia. At the gas station I was asking people. After 2 houers cops with were standing there told me that hitchhaking in Slovakia is lillegal(everywhere!!!) and driver can get 100 euro penalty(new low). After 4 houers cops live the station and some Czech took me. He told me thet is true...

You can find a lot of [http://stopar.sk/ offers for hitchhikers] at [http://www.stopar.sk/index.php?newlang=english stopar.sk] (available in English).
[[File:Hugo.JPG|thumb|200px
[file cut: first 33554432 bytes kept]
[document cut: first 32353319 of 33492979 characters kept]
